Feedback and Suggestions (Path of Exile 1) - Guardian Minions Link ... impossible play / fix with QoL upgrade suggestions - Forum

with the 3.22 league we got:
- Harmony of Purpose rework => link focus
- sentinel of radiance => perfect target to be linked
- frigid bond support => damage from a link skill

these 3 in addition to the link mastery for minions gave me the impression that linking to your own minions should be a viable play style and guardian should be the most proficient in it.

unfortunately with some tests it turns out that the frustration is unbearable to even try it in a build or even test simply with guardian's default minions and a link skill. you will die needlessly and very frequently no matter how you approach it. i'll give a run down a bit later and start with suggestions instead.

Disclaimer: these suggestions are general QoL and whilst i did my best i'm no expert in balancing nor do i know how the game is coded. this is just what i think is easiest to implement (again with no knowledge). 3 suggestions are presented of which any combination of, would make the play style viable (mechanically not damage wise).

1-Summon Sentinel of Radiance Skill

Spoiler

-suggestion:
make this skill a togglable buff cost mana to cast and maintain. toggle on to summon / toggle off to despawn it / auto off when minion dies
- reasons:
this is general Qol upgrade should keep the damage reduction up as long as you can sustain the drain (should be similar to casting off CD). that remove the need to resummon you tankiest minion that's giving you the much needed damage reduction.
also remove the risk of dying due to resummonning the linked minion

2-Link Skills can target Damageable Minions

Spoiler

-suggestion:
make it unable to target minions with duration tag => Link Skills can target Damageable Permanent Minions
- reasons:
you cant even namelock your minions and Guardian has a 5sec duration minions, you will link to them accidentally no matter how careful you are. this has been suggested before

3-Link Skills QoL

Spoiler

- note:
i fail to understand the balancing of link skills and their duration, the only probable reason seems to be to kill players by overcommitting. if that's the case this suggestion has no weight and should be ignored.
-suggestion:
Link skill lose the duration and get a common sub ability => cancel links (can't come up with names i know). this sub ability should work similar to detonate mines as it breaks (cancels) all active links
- reasons:
this is a major QoL upgrade not only for our Guardian target play style but for all link players. should allow to link the correct target out of combat and keep the link as long as you can sustain it or target dies.
the cancel possibility just before a linked target dies is a feat in itself and should be allowed to players who can pull it off

as stated any combination of these would enable us to play a Guardian minion link comfortably:

1-2: Sentinel of Radiance is a permanent and can be targeted with link skill without accidentally linking to an elemental relic.

1-3: link to your minion/s at the start of the map / encounter ... run around. this still have the huge risk of linking to a soon to expire minion but should still make the play style viable since the link should stay up until you yourself break it or you die.

2-3: best and more generic allowing all builds the benefits of links. the guardian will need a permanent minion to link to which is no big deal just that you can't use your innate tank for that purpose.

all 3: is a god sent = all the benefits should even allow a guardian to be a full on aura bot while still doing damage without much investment in minions just using the default minion with link skills.

needless deaths and clunky play style
deaths

Spoiler

limited to ones involving guardian default minions and links:
the few tests i did were all frustrating with no exceptions due to these reasons:
- link to a duration minion (worst is elemental relic) if you run out of enemies or boss runs away you die
- link to sentinel of radiance only and it expires
- link to sentinel of radiance only after resummoning it and resummoning a linked one

clunkiness:

Spoiler

-to minimize the needless deaths my go to was trying to summon sentinel away from fights link to it, run back to the boss, convocate it back into the fight then run around the boss so it stays in the link all this for around 11s of link duration.
-endedup linking mid fight and dying when fight ends or boss phases
- this is much worst if we factor in the fact that most minion builds will have some sort of fodder minions and will insta die cause of wrong link target

Last bumped on Nov 23, 2023, 10:17:28 AM

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