Necromacer Summons Window

Studio Ghibli

Studio Ghibli

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2005

Gaelic Storm

Implement!

squakMix

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2005

/signed

Teufel Eldritch

Teufel Eldritch

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Apr 2005

Shadar Logoth

The Legendary Majestic 12

N/

Good idea. Would be very nice to see it implemented.

Elena

Elena

Desert Nomad

Join Date: May 2005

Belgium

/signed i love my horrors for the moment and being able to use those spells you mention like that on them would make em even more effective

Adamar Kain

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Apr 2005

This is the latest email I sent to GW Support:


Guild Wars Support Team
Customer 06/06/2005 07:11 PM
Here are the links to the 3 threads I have started now. The suggestion for a Necromancer summons window is very popular. What would it take to get this implemented?

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/...ead.php?t=17923
http://forum.photics.com/viewtopic.php?id=44
http://www.guild-hall.net/forum/showthread.php?t=17897

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
There Reply to me:

Subject
Necromancer Summons

Discussion Thread
Response (GM Emergency) 06/06/2005 07:18 PM
Greetings,

Thanks for contacting the Guild Wars Support Team. We do appreciate the enthusiasm in wanting improve the overall quality and enjoyment of the game. I will forward this information to the proper department in hopes that someone with influence can see these suggestions. Continuing to post your suggestions on popular fansites is by far the best way to let the developers know what you would like to see implemented in the game.

Thanks,
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Lets not let this thread die or our chances of getting this implemented die with it. Spread the word about this thread to all your guildmates and friends.
Also the other two threads are kinda weak in responce maybe we can get those threads moving a bit too.

Gangrenous Khan

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: May 2005

Good Call, Adamar. I'm all for it!

Here's one more thread looking for ways to add to the ally window for easy targeting:
http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...334#post155334

Sniper22

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2005

I am a necro.... but I'm against the whole minion window. Yes it is hard to target the right minion, but once you get up to 20+ minions the window will be getting way to big for the screen and you will be looking at the minion window more than whats really going on. A window may be good for 5 minions but the big groups just won't work.

For Necros... they should add a minion that acts like a pet like rangers (no health degen, leveling) because necros must be one of the worst attackers ever. They need some sort of attack to help them and regular minions/horros/fiends never last more that a minute in pvp. Also they should change scar pattern legs to scar patter shorts. I don't like running in my underwear for extra energy.

squakMix

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2005

The window (like party) would probably have a scroll bar so it would'nt have to stretch across the screen...

TrunkMonk

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: May 2005

I completely agree... Minions as well as party members you are 'supposed' to keep alive (as per quest), should be in a window of sorts!

Gangrenous Khan

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: May 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by squakMix
The window (like party) would probably have a scroll bar so it would'nt have to stretch across the screen...
True.
Or perhaps targets could be added to/removed from the window by a hot key. Then it would be up to the player if he wanted to try and micro manage 20 minions or just focus on 3-5 of the 20.

JoDiamonds

JoDiamonds

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Jun 2005

New England

I'm in favor of this, like every user of nearly every feature, but only if it's relatively easy to implement. I believe I would be happy enough to see minions in the party window (at the bottom, of course), especially since that window can be shrunk or enlarged as appropriate.

I encourage other people to say how MUCH they want this feature relative to other things, or generally. All users want all features, but there's only so much time.

I do not want this feature taking major priority over an economy fix or auction help, or over more PvP options and gametypes. I'm personally hoping this isn't a monumental task, so it can be "slipped in" as one of the smaller add ons in a patch.

Thank you, gurus, and ArenaNet.

Sadye X

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by JoDiamonds
I encourage other people to say how MUCH they want this feature relative to other things, or generally. All users want all features, but there's only so much time.
You do bring up a good point, and I'm sure alot of people would agree that in terms of the overall aspects of the game that could or should be improved upon or expanded, it makes most sense to focus on what would be of greatest benefit to the player base in general rather than the desires of a specific profession.

Having said that, yes I agree there's quite a few more important things that I'd hope would be potentially implemented / fixed as the game progresses.

In terms of what I'd consider, when looking at the necro profession specifically though, the main thing I'd like to see implemented is most definitely the minion window concept ~ it's a very basic idea yet would make one of the major build types of the class much more functional, closing at least some of the major gaps between how a necro functions in PvE vs PvP. Then for all of those necros who've worked their way to tombs level pvp via the pve environment using minions, it could carry over a bit easier, as well as help with what can be another major issue not mentioned thus far, which is attribute refund points ~ An example being ... I head out on an exploring run and want to use a minion build as it's the most viable for the area, then 20 minutes later my guild wants to head to the Tombs for the evening. I respec to a pvp build since minions aren't nearly as functional there, yet fall a few points short so have a less-than optimal pvp build going in as a resault.

Sniper22

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2005

A target closest/next minion key could also be added. I use malign intervation and then i have veratas gaze to get the minion, but its so difficult to click on the minion where there are so many people around it.

Adamar Kain

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Apr 2005

I agree This is not the most important Fix to be added to the game. But I dont think a new window would be to time consumming to add. But i dont have to code it. I could be way off. But if its not to difficult I think it should be very near the top of the list maybe for the next chapter.

Exadon

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: May 2005

Netherlands, Amsterdam

W/R

Little to late with posting but I cannot agree more

MrDoomMaster

MrDoomMaster

Academy Page

Join Date: Apr 2005

W/Mo

I agree with this idea. I'm a necromancer myself, and I find that AOE is very difficult to come by with a necromancer.

The only reason I use Death Magic is because it contains the only AOE that is worth a dime. Curses focuses mainly on one foe, and doesn't really do any damage. Blood magic is really good for nothing but healing and stealing life. If you want to make a big difference in a party of 8, even in the Ring of Fire, you will use LVL 18 Bone Horrors. In a party of 8, horrors being killed instantly after creation is not very likely.

By having this window, you would be able to maybe keep up with 1-3 horrors or minions and cast nova on them immediately. This would prove useful when foes move aaway from corpses and you are unable to use corpse explosion

Again, I totally would love a window specifically for undead minions, horrors, or bone fiends.

Turbo Wombat

Turbo Wombat

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Nov 2005

Centeral Texas

Heros of Titans Realm

Me/

A minions window might make things a little too cluttered even if I am running a MM. Though, I can't tell you how many times I've cursed the fact that a "Select Next/Prev Undead Ally" button bind didn't exist.

/signed

Two April Mornings

Two April Mornings

No Luck No Time No Money

Join Date: Nov 2005

Amherst College, MA

Scars Meadows [SMS]

Me/

wow - old thread revived
/signed/agree
awesome idea that has yet to be implemented

Titan Chrae

Titan Chrae

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jul 2005

Frozen Lake

Illustrious Chromatic Enigmas (ICE)

Mo/

I agree that another menu is needed but it should NOT be specific to necromancers. I have suggested here http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...ht=allies+menu that a allies/minions menu be added.

This would not only help necromancers, but would help all members monitor the status of any ally that is not an official part of the party but is a tag along NPC.

Quests/Missions where you have to escort/save or otherwise join with NPC are numerous and NPCs are treated like minions as far as monitoring and targeting goes.

Owen

Academy Page

Join Date: Jul 2005

Mo/Me

/sign

Urias Skult

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Dec 2005

Australia

Im not trying to be a jerk but I would prefer to not implement this idea.

1. It is not uncommon for a skilled MM to be controlling 20+ minions. Imagine the screen space that would clutter having their health bars up.

2. Part of being a good MM is being able to effectively keep track of your minions health, when to heal and when to use them as bombs. I never had trouble managing 12+ minions. Sure its a lot of clicking but as a Necro you are well away from the melee so the minions are usually grouped tightly enough, far enough away that this isnt a major problem to do. I have seen competant MM's in SF farming parties controlling 30 or so minions.

3. I dont like how this will 'dumb-down' the role of a MM. Everyone will be using them, and before you know it you will have additional Monks in parties solely to watch over and heal minions, as they now have easily clickable health bars for everyone to see. This would be avoided if only the MM could see the minions, I suppose. I would be annoyed having 'mastered' this build if it was suddenly made this easy.

{IceFire}

{IceFire}

Forge Runner

Join Date: Oct 2005

W/

sounds good, but when you have alot, the window would get huge.

T1Cybernetic

T1Cybernetic

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Sep 2005

Wakefield, West Yorkshire, Uk, Nr Earth

Alternate Evil Gamers [aeg]

N/

Quote:
Originally Posted by {IceFire}
sounds good, but when you have alot, the window would get huge.
I agree were gonna have to be quicker on the draw with some spells
but im prepared like many other people to give this my full attention!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Freakychakra
You get my vote on this one, sounds like a good idea
Also agree to the fullest, great idea, i cant really
understand why nobody thought of this previously.

/Signed

Mentalmdc

Mentalmdc

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Aug 2005

Vile Of Faith [NOVA]

Mo/Me

/signed

Skuld

Skuld

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Sep 2005

Thousend Tigers Apund Ur Head [Ttgr]

A/

Yes please, I see one minion at 25% health all to often, heal all of them and then realise the rest are at 100% and that one was caught out of Verata's Sacrifice lol

Wrath Of Dragons

Wrath Of Dragons

Burninate Stuff

Join Date: Aug 2005

New Mexico

E/Mo

great idea

Nevin

Nevin

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Jul 2005

Yeah we need this, and a veriety of more healing spells.. How about an indivual heal for minions?.. Something that gives (at 16 death magic) 122 hp + 10 regain which could be stacked with VS, this would be for a single minion only though.

Or how about nerfing the degen of minions all together *wink*wink*

Tuoba Hturt Eht

Tuoba Hturt Eht

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jul 2005

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Deimos Tel Arin [CCTV]

W/

/signed for this fabulous suggestion

Anything that makes Guild Wars a better game gets a thumbs up from me.

Iggit

Iggit

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Dec 2005

Saviours of Tyria

N/R

Great idea! Though, there could be a problem with the window, with too many life-bars being shown! However, Iggy Snowscar, has a simple solution: the life bars of the first 5 summoned minions are shown. When Minion one dies, Minion number 2 becomes one, 3 becomes 2, and so on.

Underneath the five minion life-bars, a 6th is made. This bar shows the average health of all summoned minions. Explanation:
You have summoned 10 Minions. The health of these Minions is add together, which is then devided by 10(the number of minions alive).

This way you can easily view the stats of your minions, and use multiple-minion healing skills better. However, the 6th bar should not be treated like an ‘individual’ minion, so you wont be able to use any healing skills on the 6th bar, the 6th bar is intended to have more control over your minions.
I would really like to have such a bar, as this will make using minions a lot less hectic, and will also offer new strategic improvements!

Oh, and, ofcourse:
/signed!

Nevin

Nevin

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Jul 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sadye X
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
I find PvP minion masters completely effective.. I've had up to 10 minions by the end of a match in a Random Arena. I'd upload the picture, but its too big.

Anyways for PvE though, a monitor would be great, just it'd take up a lot of room.

Str0b0

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Feb 2006

North Carolina

N/Me

Minions used to list like pets at one point and I never really understood why they stopped doing that. It was much easier to manage your summons. I th ink they should go a diablo route with certain minions lasting a set amount of time and others living until they are killed. Still a window with the life bars would be hella useful.

erkun

erkun

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Mar 2007

D/A

I saw a new thread asking for exactly the same thing but since this one's got more replies, i'll post here, even though it's an old one.

There are lesser minions to control now after some updates that affected MM's. An additional ten rows for minions in the party window wouldn't actually hurt. So, yes, I'm all for this suggestion.

Let there be space for the undead in the party window.

Exterminate all

Exterminate all

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Feb 2007

In a house

Not Behind My Back [Back]

W/

/Signed

This seems like a good idea, my mm needs to know the health/ext from his minions... to know when they are dieing great idea!

Series

Banned

Join Date: Aug 2006

/signed! Make it something like the ranger's pet window!