Necromacer Summons Window

I think we need a way to place necro summoned pets either on the party window or give us a window of our own so we can see the health of all our summoned minnions to make the use of spells like death nova and monks heals and such easyer to use. When our minnions are in a large group of mobs, and players finding the minion that is low enough on health to make the use of death nova effective before the 30 second timer runs out is 50% at best. Healing them from a distance is next to impossible if you have a large number and are not far enough along in the game to have verata's sacrafice.
What do you all think? It would make the Minnion Master's life so much easyer, and more effective.

I have started this same thread on another forum as suggested by the guildwars support staff. I have linked both threads to each other and emailed support with the links as well.

http://forum.photics.com/viewtopic.php?pid=245#p245
http://www.guild-hall.net/forum/showthread.php?t=17897

If we can get this thread sticky it would be great.

Sounds like a good idea to me.

We need more input on this. I was told by A guildwars GM that if the player community responds well to this idea it may get implemented.

Wow I never even thought of putting death nova on a minion lol! That actually works?

Seems sensible, so yeah I'm for this.

100% I agree with this - otherwise Death Nova is not even worth trying to use. Now, if Death Nova would affect ALL minions within a certain radius, that would be nice too.

I vote FOR!!! My ranger/necromancer only relies on his pet/minions

I'm absolutely for adding this type of feature. The main reason I *don't* use minions in pvp at all really does come down to the current inability to use them for full effect with things such as DN as was pointed out ( and I also like the idea of having an area version of DN that would be minion specific ~ it could have the energy cost upped to 25, and a longer recast timer to balance things out etc ... a possible future elite death magic skill perhaps ? )

The idea of a minion window could be fairly easily implemented I'd think ~ all it would have to be is a toggleable window that acts basically the same as the team window, adding the health bar of each minion as they were summoned. This would go a long way with targeting issues for not only things like DN , but for nec/monk combos who'd like to use minions, but would prefer to keep their monk heals loaded for general team use rather than taking up the extra skill slot with one of the other minion specific heals.

~~ As a side note, I'd still love it were minion's default *idle* position be off to my side, rather than directly benind me. It causes two issues they way they are currently if not engaged in battle ~ A ) With even as few as two minions behind me, I'm effectively blocked from moving in that direction until they decide to get out of the way ... and using the default X key for quick turns seems to confuse them so the'll stand in front of me etc B ) More often than not, once fighting begins, I have one or typically more of my minions become *stuck* behind me ... they'll try and run to attack but can't quite make it around me so just stand there until they die unless I run in circles for a bit. ~~

I agree 100% as well, one of the main reasons I'm turned off of death magic for my mes/nec is that After a battle by the time I scroll over each minion they're already dead. I could just continually spam blood of the master, but then I'm going to be low on health.

100% in favor of this. Rangers get a window for their one friggin' pet, but we have to keep track of 6-10 minions running around, and try to select them amongst the other players and mobs? Might I add that if they're next to a hench or something it will instead select the hench, it makes it really hard for death nova.

Implement this dangit! (please)

Thanks for the support on this everyone. lets keep this thread at the top of the front page. Maybe we should turn it into a pettion that can get sticky status? I think this is an important issue for all Necro's.

I think pets should have advanced monitoring and control, because they are static additions to your party. Minions are not, they are fleeting additions that are not ment to be controled so closely. They are ment to come and go, not be monitored and upkept for long periods of time, which is why thier health steadily decreases and they die reguardless.

Making a window for players to monitor thier minions makes it easier for them to monitor and heal thier minions to retain a large army, this can become an unfair advantage as necromancers can easily swarm thier enemy with high lvl minions to overpower them already. But the real dilema comes from the amount of minions that a necromancer can create/maintain at once, and the amount of window space it can consume. A 6 to 8 man party already fills most of the party window, and if they all have normal pets (because they are circus freaks) then thats 12 to 16 health gauges on a party window, that is already to much to carry in the party window, and then thiers allies. But if you could see undead minions of yours and your teammates, players could easily cover your monitor with health gauges from dozens of minions, even if you only saw the minions you created and thier health gauges were reduced size it could take up considerable space, but putting them in the party window is unacceptable.

One of the most uncommon combinations is a N/Mo or a Mo/N, firstly, if someone wanted to keep the minions alive for such a long time, it would take so much concentration on all of them that they would be useless to their entire party, and at later levels the minions don't last more than a few seconds anyway, so the only thing to do IS blow them up. We're not trying to raise armies, they die in 2 seconds later anyway, we're just trying to make it easier to select them so we can blow them to smithies.

Also why is it that a ranger should have an addition that can reach lvl 20 and attack sometimes as strong as a normal player, whereas a necros pets that are doomed to death shouldn't get even the benefit to blow up easier. That doesn't sound very reasonable or fair.

Also, it would just as a whole be very very difficult to keep so many minions alive, you can't create a ridiculous amount of "bone horrors" because the bodies would disappear by the time you got to all of them, I'd say you could maybe get 5-6 at a time, and they cost the least amount of energy. To try and raise 6 bone horrors 15 energy each in a very short amount of time while healing all of them would cost a lot of energy, and would take the majority of your concentration. And I'm pretty sure the rest of your party would want you healing them, not your minions, since later on the minions aren't worth crap as fighters anyway. And it's worth noting that things like bone minions, which come 2 from one body, takes 25 energy, even more, and you wouldn't be able to make an insane amount while keeping your energy and healing them again, and they're only about lvl 12 if you have them maxed. And those die almost instantly later on in the game where you'd actually have all the skills to heal them efficiently enough.

So yeah, gigantic armies just wouldn't work, unless you have a few monks all healing them, but only the master would get the window anyway so it wouldn't work.

If people want armies that badly they can make them anyway, because you don't create such a mass army IN BATTLE, you do it after a battle with all the corpses. We want the window so that we can select them IN BATTLE for other purposes.

Well i got a N/Mo build and i experimented with alot of stuff. I could write all day now but no thanks.
Later in the game, your undead are meatshields only. My horrors are lvl 16 (i could make em 18 with a superior rune but thats not worth -75 health ^^). Before and after ascencion you meet lvl 20+ enemys and no single horror can own any of those enemys.

But back to topic, i'm totally ++++++ for a undead window.

Actually, it is very easy to keep an army alive with certain healing spells, vigorous spirit gives an unit health for every time they attack, for 5 energy, and heal area can maintain a large group for 10 energy then theres blood well which a necromancer can cast. A necromancer gets energy from deaths so they usually have energy ready if something dies for them to raise it as a minion, add in a few healing spells and you have at least 10 minions at once. And no they don't just drop over and die, Minion barracading is a popular tactic you can create many minions very quickly, furthermore, there are 3 minion spells, one of which summons 2 minions from one corpse, use at least 2 and you have dozens of minions under 1 necromancer in minutes, they don't even have to be the one sustaining them a teammate can do the sustaining for them. Minion armies are already a powerful tactic in PvE and can be powerful in PvP if your team can manage get some kills. The list goes on, want what you like, but in no way should minion health gauge be shown on the party menu, it will lead to necro hate, most players don't even pay attention to others pets, the same people have no desire to see how your minions are doing.

The original post stated either in the praty window or in a window only the necro can see. The main purpose is to make spells like death nova easyer to use. Keeping a large army alive is way to difficult a task. You mentioned well of blood, it doesnt last long enought to keep your minnions alive nor is it powerfull enought even with healing spells to maintain a large army that will scatter after multiple targets with out your direction (which we can not even give them in the first place) while they are fighting and taking way more damge from the mobs than they deal out. Yes multiple minnons on one mob can do considerable damage but more often than not they scatter not all gang up on one mob. As for soulreaping keeping us up in energy, well its not that effective a skill. I frequently find myself low on energy or out of energy struggling to get off one more vampiric gaze. We dont have control over our minnions we cant keep them grouped up to easly heal them and thats not the main intent of this request its simply to much work even for those that really want to do it.

Bahamut do you have any idea how fast lvl 16-18 animated undead die after ascension? It's almost a one or two hit thing in some occassions, the only way to really get a great amount is still to use bone MINIONS, the skill you spoke of that raises 2 from one body. Those however, are about lvl 12, and those DEFINATELY die, faster than the other 2 forms, later on. I suppose if you worked at it, and had enough skill slots to have all your healing spells, the two summon skills you'd want, and some other skills (because an army of insanely fast-dieing minions doesn't do squat to speak of, just a waste of energy), then I suppose you might be able to keep a team of about 8 going, MAYBE, for a long time. Actually try it sometime, you won't be able to have insane mass armies of undead following you around at full health all the time, sometimes by the time you get to your next mob set they'll be halfway down on health already, especially if they're the bone minions you speak of, which means you'd have to be healing them while the rest of your team would be heading forward, and since you'd be keeping them ALIVE soul-reaping isn't worth an insane amount unless you intend to drop enemies at an insane rate.

The window will not allow necros to create insane armies of undead, it's too complicated and simply will not work.

Also, did you realize that there are already necromancer skills that can FULLY HEAL THE UNDEAD. You don't even need to SELECT them to do that. If what you say works, people can ALREADY create large armies using the veratas skills. And do you see necros with 15-20 undead walking around? Hell no, because it takes too much, the animated undead die too quickly, and it isn't worth it as a whole.

Go take a look at the veratas skills, I think you'll find that those in themselves can keep undead going for a while if they really wanted to, but people don't use them, even though they don't require a menu to use.

Go try playing a death primary necromancer and let us know just how easy it is to keep a huge army of minions alive---it doesn't happen mate.

I am a primary death minion necro. I DO have 15-20 undead or MORE walking around if we're in an active part of a mission. I DO use the Veratas Skills, because they help me maintain my minions. I've had parties where the warriors just start to sit around because my meat shields do all of the tanking for them.

I do it for show, to show people that primary Necro's aren't useless.

For anyone who knows what the skills they have equipped do, having a large army of minions is EASY to accomplish.

I signed up specifically for this thread and to cast my vote for the undead window or some variant of it.

It is far too difficult to find the minion about to die and use death nova on it. If it were easier, death would be a viable spec as your minions would effectively all be useful walking bombs since you could target the right minion at the appropriate time. I started a mo/me because i felt my necro was underappreciated after 3 days lfg at thunder headkeep. Nobody sees curses in action and they rarely see the wells of power (if they even care) and if you want damage you think elementalist (unfortunately). The party window for healing is an essential tool for my monk. If i had to look for characters health individually to heal I would be far less effective a healer. As it is, the health bars are quickly accessible and I can react accordingly. This is not the case with my bone fiends/minions/horrors

I know the necromancer is a great support class because i know what skills i'm using and what effect they have. However, if you try to tell a group they took low damage because you just landed an enfeebling blood on all the melee mobs they won't have a clue what you're talking about unless they're necros themselves (sometimes not even then!) by the way, it effectively halves the enemies physical damage output. People can SEE your undead horde swarming the enemy and they can see the death nova explosions followed by putrid explosions or more minions! God the possibilities for dps for a well played death necro are horrifying! Please give us this window Anet

I do see the arguement you're presenting here, though it's not quite what's being asked for, nor for the reason's you're stating.

In no way are people asking for minions to be an addition to the normal party window, but rather a seperate window that would only appear on the necro's screen ( which could possibley be toggled off in the *customize* menu ). All it would do in terms of functionality is to show a health bar for each minion summoned, and give the necros a very very much needed ability to target specific minions in a reliable manner for whatever reason may be viable.

Necro's in effect have zero control over the minion's actions once they're summoned if already in the midst of battle. However, what we *do* have control over is the ability to either A ) Heal the very few minions we're able to summon ~ and it should be noted the necro heals are also at a fairly large health / energy cost to the necro unless they're a monk secondary ... or B ) Make those lvl 14-16 minions cause a viable amount of damage in PvP by using Death Nova. Necro's don't load DN to make their fellow teammates into bombs, but rather their minions.

Now, as I'd mentioned, once your minion(s) engage a target, you're pretty much stuck with it's course of action, as it's unalterable at that point by the necro master. So say you're in PvP and are trying to be a useful member of your team as a Death Necro / minion master type build. If you've spent much time in tombs etc, you'll know that on a given map it takes a decent amount of time to even build up about half-dozen minions.

Is it more viable for the necro to have to spend all their time running around in circles watching their *uncontrollable* minion's health bars to either heal or DN them ... or more viable to be able to use the other 6 skills on your bar to be more useful overall to your team ?

Or a more important question I suppose .. how would a viable targeting method for minions in any way add imbalance to the class ?

Sure in PvE a necro can summon a fair sized army .... but a W/ Mo can basically solo most missions / explorable areas sans henchie-squad ....

Otoh ~ A PvP necro using minions is faced with :

A) The start of any map renders your minion summoning abilities uselss until there's corpses present.

B) Soul reaping can *in theory* assist you in getting more minions .. but kill rates in PvP are slow enough that the only source for quick energy via soul reaping is to simply let your minions die ( hence no *army* ) or to make them into bombs via DN ( hence no *army* )

C) The damage output of a single minion is basically laughable against a level 20 player. Our *one* way to make them a viable damage source is indeed to use DN.

D) Death Nova is only minimally effective without a means of monitering a specific minion's health. They can and will die before you can actually target them and get the spell cast more often than not.

F) Unless you're standing next to the single corpse that the minion will be summoned from, you're usually forced to watch your mini-map to see where the wee little green triangle shows up, then rather than being useful member of your team, you'll be running to find where that minion ran off to so you can target it ...

And the list could go on, but I'll leave it at that for now, and just say again ~ The addition of a minion window on the necro's screen would only serve a singular, yet much needed purpose for any nec who chooses to use minions. This would in no way add an imbalance to the class, only make this aspect of the class function better. ( there is a very , very good reason why the majority of necros you see in PvP are either Blood or Curse afterall )

If you feel there *would* be an issue, I'd ask you to make a lvl 20 necro, and enter Tombs and give it a few runs and see just how (not)easy it is to raise an unstoppable army

*pledging his support* YES! I love this idea! It'll make my necro so much easier to manage, so I can focus an my strats more! While their at it, add a way to check DMG, health numbers, conditions, and add this functionality to ranger pets as well. ^^

~Firax

In response to Ludic's post.

I wast primarily referring to how insanely difficult it would be after lvl 20. Because once you complete ascension and move past the southern shiverpeaks, trust me, you won't have 20 minions walking around when several of them drop by a single meteor from one opponent, even with full health. Or when they get hit by a normal attack twice, and still die.

I remember through Kryta and Ascalon I had many, many minions walking around.

When you get later on in the game, you'll realize that all they're good for is exploding.

Regardless if minions play a smaller role in one person's gameplay than another's, it is still a great idea that would provide useful for those who enjoy using undead pets. Play how you like and allow others the same privilege.

Good idea Adamar, let's hope something like this gets implemented.

I will also add my support to this idea. It's so obvious that I'm surprised it's not in the game already.

Thanks for all your support in this. I hope that the Devs take notice of this thread and give us something thats simmilar to this idea if not the window I suggested. The Necro community can really use this or something like it.

Mountain Man I agree its so obvious this is needed im surprised the game went through Alpha and Beta and noone thought to suggest this.

I disagree that the minions should be put on the party window, because they are meant to be disposable, not truly a part of the party, as shown in their life degeneration rather than a set timer not related to their life.

However, for convenience and game play issues, I think they should be put under the Allies slot in the party window next to the Ranger's pet.

Solution: use death nova + taste of death... kills the minion, which in turn deals the damage...

To eA-Zaku.
I agree the pets should not be in the party window. When I made the suggestion it was for the allies section of the party window. But I Would much rather see the minnions in a seperate window only the master sees. No reason for them to be on the party window as your right they are not part of the party just walking bombs for there masters.

To Syuveil.

Yes useing death nova and taste of death works but it requires two slots. While its true that taste of death is a usefull spell and a fine addition to any minniom masters skill bar. It should not be a must have to make death nova work. As it is it takes two skills already you have to summon a minnion to blow it up, three slots is a bit much for one explosion. Keep in mind not every Necro can afford three slots for one spell. A seperate window for the Necro to monitor their pets hurts noone and it does not unbalance the class at all. It would just be a usefull tool that should have always been there.

That would be awesome, there are so many unneeded undead deaths because of no window... it's so sad... It's like wasting energy on a pet, who will die almost immediately

If you want to have a pet that wont die and if it does you can res him be a ranger... But still the minions should have their own health window...

At early levels the window would be usefull to help keep minions alive. However after ascension trying to keep the minions alive is a waste of health and energy if you want more that 6-8 minnions and even that is tough and not worth the trouble. The window really helps out the use of death nova, and what ever new spells and skills that may be added in the futre that require targeting your minnions which is almost imposible to do now and still be a usefull member of the party.

I've actually used this combo before when messing around with various all death / curse builds ~ In theory it keeps your damage output going via Death Nova, and you can still make use of curses like Enfeebling Blood that require a health sacrifice, only gaining the health back via Taste of Death rather than using something like Life Siphon etc. from the blood magic line ( in pvp I try and at least counter any of my sacrifice spells with life stealing spells ~ helps my team overall by being one less person the monks have to keep spamming heals on )

This combo is even good for being able to somewhat *time* when / where you want that particular minion to explode ....

But it leads directly back to the central issue of the thread, the suggested ability to be able to target our minions via a seperate window. As useful as combos like this one could potentially be, their usefulness is somewhat negated by the fact that targeting specific minions at present is difficult at best. As I'd said before, more often than not your minion will already be dead by the time you can get them targeted and DN cast on them, in which case you may as well have just used Putrid Explosion to begin with to save yourself the energy and trouble ~~ but then that still leaves Minion Necros out in the cold

Good input from everyone Lets keep the discussion going.

Agreed. As it is now, death necros are very difficult to play because there's no effective way to manage all your minions. Of course, this may lead to further abuse of the army of minions "exploit", but the possibility of easier exploitation shouldn't stop the majority of players from having fun with large numbers of minions in PvE

I think this is a good idea. I'm not as far along with my necro as the rest of you guys, it seems, but I've noticed that it'd be really hard to PvP with my undead minions, simply because of all the management required at high speed. But yeah, cast my vote in for agreeing

A seperate window is needed. Having them in the party/allies window could get quite messy. When you're running a minioner build and have over a dozen of the things running around you're going to have a HUGE party bar. never mind other players would likely not want to see them

I support the idea of a seperate window for the minion master to monitor the summons health. I think adding the bars to the party or allies box would seriously annoy everyone else in party but another screen that only the necro can see i think would be most useful

I agree that it would be better to have a seperate window for the minnions. Althugh the party window is adjustable so it would not be too hard to just make large enought to show the party members and not the pets and minnions. But A seperate window is easyer for all involved.

Although exploding does help when there are a mob of enemies, I can get 20 minions "later on" in the game. If you noticed in my screenshot, I'm a level 20. I'm at Hell's Precipice. I can get a army of minions, or fiends, or whatever if needed. Sometimes they die due to too many enemies or the things you mentioned earlier, but I can usually quickly recreate it because of the large mobs. Hell, I just was in Snake Dance earlier with a decent army of fiends. It all depends on the situation as to what tactic I choose to use.

Is that what you meant? Actually, I think that's brilliant. The Necromancer gets his/her own window and the rest of us aren't bothered.

But I don't know how much work it would take to implement this. If it's a whole lot, I wouldn't bet on it. If it's relatively simple, I say, "Why the hell not?"

You get my vote on this one, sounds like a good idea