How I Wish Summoning Builds Worked

That would be functionally similar to what I'm describing although we would not have to remove the specialized nodes if we don't want. In fact I wouldn't mind if things were as you described with undead minion passives in the intelligence area, animal minion passives in dexterity and animated minion passives in strength.

I like this idea at its core, I disagree with your proposed solutions though. Don't reserve mana for your summons or drain it. Instead have summons work on a point system like warhammer. say you have 5 "summoner points." and zombies take up like 1.5, skeletons take up 1 and spectres take up 3, just an example. And your current summoner passives will add to the pool of points you can draw from. That way you can specialize in a specific type of summon if you so desire and more unique items could target specific types of summons, and more summon skills can be added to the game and use the same system.

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Spyfire wrote:

I like this idea at its core, I disagree with your proposed solutions though. Don't reserve mana for your summons or drain it. Instead have summons work on a point system like warhammer. say you have 5 "summoner points." and zombies take up like 1.5, skeletons take up 1 and spectres take up 3, just an example. And your current summoner passives will add to the pool of points you can draw from. That way you can specialize in a specific type of summon if you so desire and more unique items could target specific types of summons, and more summon skills can be added to the game and use the same system.

That's exactly what I suggested (on page 2) - with a twist.
Summons could be made more powerful but weaken the summoner.
To do that, each of those "points" you "occupy" with a summon, weakens you.

I like the idea of being able to prioritise some kinds of minion over others, but I think what a completely fungible cost would mean in practice is that almost all summoners would specialise completely in just one type of minion (projectile Spectre specialists would probably also use some throwaway Skeletons as meatshields, but they wouldn't specialise in Skeletons in any serious way). The reason is that you can have one summoning skill linked with 5 supports, tailored to that particular kind of minion, and then the rest of your sockets are free for other things such as auras or curses.

As a compromise option, how about a minion cost (whether it's reserve, or drain, or whatever) that ramps up the more minions of the same type you have? That would give some incentive to have a diverse army, while also making sure that builds with huge amounts of mana or whatever don't get too out of hand. You could even keep the current cap system as a soft cap, where minions under the cap are cheap to maintain, but minions over the cap are much more expensive. This would avoid having to redesign existing items that give bonuses to minion caps.

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Incompetent wrote:

I like the idea of being able to prioritise some kinds of minion over others, but I think what a completely fungible cost would mean in practice is that almost all summoners would specialise completely in just one type of minion (projectile Spectre specialists would probably also use some throwaway Skeletons as meatshields, but they wouldn't specialise in Skeletons in any serious way). The reason is that you can have one summoning skill linked with 5 supports, tailored to that particular kind of minion, and then the rest of your sockets are free for other things such as auras or curses.

So I'm glad you brought that up. I have no problem with specialization because it's how existing skills function already. For example, bow characters specialize in one or two bow skills instead of generalizing in as many as possible. Further, the existing summoning system allows for practically no specialization.

Now, I wouldn't mind if all builds had an incentive to specialize or generalize and both were equally attractive. Specialization in summoners can be encouraged through specialized passive nodes, uniques and the limit of skill slots - while generalization can be encouraged through general passive nodes, uniques and diversification in the strengths and weaknesses of each summon type. For example, zombies could have high life but low resistance while skeletons have lower life but higher resistance. The key in balancing specialization and generalization is in creating encounters that strongly favor different skills.

Ramping cost for same-type minions is against specialization, and completely defeats the point of your own suggestion, Incompetent xD

For your suggestion to make sense, perhaps a Keystone that causes Minion to lower the cost of the skill that creates them, while increasing the cost of other minion skills.

So summoning Skeleton once, reduces the cost of further Skeletons, but increases the cost of Spectres and Zombies.
If you keep summoning Skeletons, the difference keeps increasing.

If you then also start raising Zombies, Zombies become slightly cheaper, while SKeletons more expensive, and Spectres are super expensive at that point because they get penalty from both Zombies and Skeletons.
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So, the way I see it, the issues with specializations in regards summons comes down to a few points. Each summon type needs to offer something different, there needs to be a benefit to specialization, there needs to be some kind of resource management, and there needs to be something else for the caster to do once all the summons are up besides throw the occasional curse.

The first thing that needs to be determined is how specialization will be determined. I think Nurvus has the right idea by using a resource mechanic, since it can be used across all kinds of summons. I like the "less caster damage per summon" mechanic, as well as using a "reserve" per summon (where each summon type can have a different reserve amount). This way you can eliminate the hard cap on the number of different summons one can have, since it is now limited via reserves.

It has also been mentioned that the +1 Notables should be removed from the passive tree, which I agree with. I would replace them with minion specific notables, Zombies Taunt enemies on attack, Skeletons gain x% critical strike chance, etc. Other Notables could reduce the reserve amount, and the unique items that are already out there can just be changed to grant a "free" summon of that type.

The last thing would be to give the Summoner a few more tricks up their sleeve, such as an attack that marks a target as the primary target for their summons, not dissimilar to Diablo 2's Attract curse. Something like this could help against certain foes that you really want your minions to focus on, like Dischargers, Alchemists, Evangelists, etc.

Adding more summon types could allow for more variety as well. Bringing in some Wolves that bleed, a Bear that stuns, or some Elementals that focus on elemental damage and status effects. Each of these could use different reserve amounts, or could use different resources altogether. For example, Elementals could work like Guardians and require a spell gem as their resource (hmm, I like this idea, might have to make a thread on it).

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The last thing would be to give the Summoner a few more tricks up their sleeve, such as an attack that marks a target as the primary target for their summons, not dissimilar to Diablo 2's Attract curse. Something like this could help against certain foes that you really want your minions to focus on, like Dischargers, Alchemists, Evangelists, etc.

Good idea. We need minion control tools. As for everything else I generally agree. Minions using a common resource, whether stacks, mana or something else, seems like a home run.

Elementals or golems seem like a fun minion idea, you should definitely make a post about it.

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Quxudica wrote:

I think a big hindrance in PoE for Summoner is just that this game limits you to to few active abilities. A real summoning class to me is one that has many many different tools in an expansive kit for tailoring just the right army for the situation. Ranging from summon types, to support spells and curses. Really very few if any game has approached this.


I will admit though, from an RP perspective - even if it didn't really change anything mechanically, it would be nice if you could specialize in one type of summon. Be it army of ghosts, army of skeletons/zombies/demons or what have you. It would be a neat bit of flair to make your character a bit more distinct.

at the moment u can specialize on every of the 3 minions in POE.
Every 1 has the ability to to clear maps.

Zombies for example in bringer of rain. or with alot of meelee supp gems. or with the new mace
very few summoner like this because u are so much squishy , every point u spend in minions u are lacking in ur exile (char)

Skelis
go with multi strike , added chaos dmg , faster cast - and queens decree . max out ur seklis
there you go 20 seklis with multistrike and added chaos
some ppl say u can clear maps as fast as normal buids,

raise spectre
this is the only minion which has ranged attacks , and thats the reason alot summoner use this .

believe me summoner are hell squishy , they suffer from every point they put in the minions . and u can spzialize in every minion of ur choice (expect weapon and guardian YET )

and its not true that every summoner is the same. since everbody use another spectre or diff zombies or different support gems.



the minion control tools - in most cases is arc but u can use any other attack /spell EXPECT channel spells. the minions are as long inactive as long as u are .
cast arc and they run directly to the enemy you have in target.


so which summoner u are lies in ur hands completly - which minion gem gets the 4 linked 5 linked 6 linked. or the +2 minion bonus .

aaaannnd i didnt start with all the uniques which has "added support gem of lvl x to the skill" OR with necro aegis check the unique shields and their bonuses

there is alot ways to play a summoner

bump