Can someone from Anet pls answer - Heroes question

I've read a post or two from players saying that one hero will do a better job at a role than another.

For example, if Olias and Master of Whispers are spec'd exactly the same, same runes, same wpn, same skills...that Olias will perform "much better" than Master of Whispers as a Minion Master.

I tend to think this is a misperception...but is there some truth to it? Is there some inherent coding that makes Olias use Death Magic skills for example, more effectively or more powerfully?

Same question applies to the other hero duplicates (eles, rangers, monks, etc.)

Thanks in advance

As far as I know the heroes use the same general scripting for ai none of them are specifically scripted for their profession.

I think that Baden is right. I don't find it realistic that they had coded different heroes to perform better with different builds...

By the way, you can't really expect someone from Anet to actually answer your question here... this is basically a fan-forum, and only thing it has to do with Anet is the game. No Anet people are running this site, as far as I know.

I do notice that the N Heroes do get a lot of aggro in PvE. Don't know if this is intentionally or just me. Idc though, don't like Minion Masters anyway.

My W uses MoW as his MM and I've never noticed that he's any less effective than the Oliases my other toons use.

As for drawing the agro Njaiguni mentions, I'd venture 2 possible explanations:

> a lot of people insist on using Sup Death runes/no Vigor runes on their MM heroes, both to get that 10th minion and the notion that less overall health means less health to sac if using Blood of the Master; due to the enemy AI that targets least health/armor, this has the effect of hanging a big "shoot me" sign around his neck;

> I've noticed that a lot of this agro effect (necs or others) depends on who's heroes they are, as the heroes follow their owners if not flagged; watch how often the healers come under attack when they belong to a W compared to when they belong to a R wielding a longbow (in which case they may often not be close enough to the W to keep him healed).

Yes, Anet employees NEVER ever post on this site. [/sarcasm]

I'm not sure about the scripting differences, but the henchies definitely have different scripts, so it's possible that the heroes are different.

I use nothing but minors on my heroes, but as I said, I loathe MM's anyway. I play a Mesmer myself, have 2 Monks and another Mesmer as heroes. I don't use melee in PvE, cus their AI is shaite, and me switching targets alot makes them run around doing nothing. And, by the time they build up the adrenaline for their spike, the foes are dead. Also, they easily tend to aggro other groups.

I run a dual MM alot with me as a SS and one healer. (I use the Aura of the Liche build Zinger posted in heros sections I think). Anyways I find that Olias raises minions faster 90% of the time, and reaches 10 minions while MoW is still around 5-6. I also noticed MoW can't use Golem very well. He casts golem almost evertime it reacharges if I use him solo with that elite. (Olias isn't much better with it but can get to max Minions faster)

I dont know if this is just coincedence or waht but that is what I see.

Also Zhed is a aggro nightmare. Sousuke tends to be less agressive. so maybe there is something to this.

There are like 5 a.net emplyees or so who scan through fan forums. Only Galie would ever be allowed to respond to a post, and she only responds to more pressing issues then this. There are a lot of finer points a.net isn't going to explain to use (like exactly how the formula to determine the shift in the AB line works in relation to AB wins).

Yeah my necro heroes attract a lot of enemy attention. It's annoying, because they'll always end up on 60%DP way before any other hero/hench.

Heres an answer that might be helpful -- Awhile back there was a spike build using necro heroes to spike with discord. Now, the reason that this build worked so well (presumably) was because all of the heroes utilized the same AI for choosing the time to strike, resulting in a perfectly coordinated attack.

Also, just from experience, Master of Whispers is a FINE MM, Just as good as Olias.

That's strange - my MMs are more often than not among the last ones in the party to fall, if not the last one (to the point of being able to res me quickly enough for me to retreat before they go down themselves or to be able to flag him far enough away to escape agro so I can bring him back to res).

Might be the build I use - Dark Pact, 6 minion skills including Vamp Horror and res. So they are receiving reduced dmg/being healed, not sac'ing H using BoM and not wasting energy casting things like Death Nova (I know, some people swear how effective that is); they simply churn out minions.

The one exception to this is my R's Olias, whom I've experimented with by giving a bit of points in Curses and equipped with Barbs; this guy might go down a bit more often than the others as he's running up to cast Barbs and catching something's attention.

I've pinged this build in PUGs and had people ask "why all the minions" or tell me to drop some minion skills and replace with x or y.

This is my experience also - they all act the same with the same skill bar. Zenmai couldn't be a critical barrager (let alone as good at it as she is) if she didn't have the ranger's AI.

The community is pretty much split and this could easily go into hundreds of posts of argument. So far, I go through and test what people tell me to do to "prove" that they are different and I simply do not see it - yea one run had Tahlkora do one thing and Dunkoro do another, but then doing multiple runs have them swap around amongst a few actions anyway. That is, Tahlkora didn't do the same thing each time either and, once the full set of their actions is mapped, they are both the same. That's not conclusive and, in fact, it tends to more support "same AI".

Humans are really good at finding patterns, so good in fact they tend to find them where they do not really exist (normally they take too small a sample or filter out things that do not fit). So I wouldn't say it is impossible - there are few enough hench and heroes that they could very well have differences even if some are minor. However I also wouldn't put it past many to see things that do not exist simply because their believe in a pattern is so strong.

In the end, do what gives you confidence in your game - especially given that they are only as good as you are this makes more of a difference. If you are constantly worried that Tahlkora is a horrid WoH healer then you aren't focusing on what is going on and the whole teams performance will degrade more than any amount of AI difference anyone thinks they have seen.

In fact, things like that are also large contributors to "I know Tahlkora is a prot monk - see we never do any good when she is specced as a healer" - yea, imagine that, when you are totally focused on her skill bar things go bad In the end if the "all are the same" people are correct then it doesn't matter, if the "they are different" people are correct then it makes a difference - so in the end you will never go wrong with the "they are different" crowd other than you miss out on some team builds, but then in PvE it doesn't matter that much.