Minion Damage

Does anyone know if a totem is technically considered a "minion"?

It very technically is still a minion, but does not benefit from minion stats purely because it uses yours instead. So instead of minion damage get damage. Minion stats would only increase the damage/health of minions that the totem summons.

It very technically is still a minion, but does not benefit from minion stats purely because it uses yours instead. So instead of minion damage it just gets damage. Minion stats would only increase the damage/health of minions that the totem summons.

I think customizing your minions is important, but I really don't like the Minion Life, Minion Damage, and Minion Speed support gems. They are simply too narrow in function. We need to open things up a bit.

In terms of this support gem, I think you should remove the Minion Damage support gem and instead allow the following gems to work with Summon Skeletons, Raise Zombie, and Raise Spectre:
* Melee Physical Damage
* Added Fire/Cold/Lightning/Chaos Damage
* Additional Accuracy
* Faster Attacks
* Life Gain on Hit (minions get life, not caster)
* Life Leech (minions get life, not caster)
* Increased Duration (Summon Skeletons)
* Increased Critical Strikes/Damage

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

I think customizing your minions is important, but I really don't like the Minion Life, Minion Damage, and Minion Speed support gems. They are simply too narrow in function. We need to open things up a bit.

In terms of this support gem, I think you should remove the Minion Damage support gem and instead allow the following gems to work with Summon Skeletons, Raise Zombie, and Raise Spectre:
* Melee Physical Damage
* Added Fire/Cold/Lightning/Chaos Damage
* Additional Accuracy
* Faster Attacks
* Life Gain on Hit (minions get life, not caster)
* Life Leech (minions get life, not caster)
* Increased Duration (Summon Skeletons)
* Increased Critical Strikes/Damage

Some of these already work, like Faster attacks or added damage. Don't know about LoH or Lifeleech or even duration though. The thing however is by removing it, it'd arguably be a lot worse. Minion damage currently both increase the damage they do while attacking but also the damage they do by exploding with Minion Instability. For skeletons, this is a large part of their actual damage(for zombies too especially early game or depending on how you build your summoner).

Fixing the few that don't work could be useful but removing a unique feature gem doesn't "open things up a bit". I agree with your ideas on the Minion speed gem which is fairly terrible, but both Health and Damage have unique synergy with Minion Instability so removing them actually removes options.

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PyrosEien wrote:

The thing however is by removing [Minion Damage], it'd arguably be a lot worse. Minion damage currently both increase the damage they do while attacking but also the damage they do by exploding with Minion Instability. For skeletons, this is a large part of their actual damage(for zombies too especially early game or depending on how you build your summoner).

Point taken. However, a gem that only effects 3 skills is just too narrow; I'm never going to feel okay with something like Minion Damage existing.

Maybe a better suggestion would be to rename Minion Damage as Spell Damage, and have it apply to all spells while continuing to work with Minion spells the same way. It seems a little unfair that there's stuff like Melee Physical Damage but nothing like that for spellcasters.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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PyrosEien wrote:

The thing however is by removing [Minion Damage], it'd arguably be a lot worse. Minion damage currently both increase the damage they do while attacking but also the damage they do by exploding with Minion Instability. For skeletons, this is a large part of their actual damage(for zombies too especially early game or depending on how you build your summoner).

Point taken. However, a gem that only effects 3 skills is just too narrow; I'm never going to feel okay with something like Minion Damage existing.

Maybe a better suggestion would be to rename Minion Damage as Spell Damage, and have it apply to all spells while continuing to work with Minion spells the same way. It seems a little unfair that there's stuff like Melee Physical Damage but nothing like that for spellcasters.

Or maybe they'll just add more minions that aren't skeletons/zombies/spectres which will benefit from the gem.

And there's already penetration gems which work as increases in dmg%.

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PyrosEien wrote:

Or maybe they'll just add more minions that aren't skeletons/zombies/spectres which will benefit from the gem.

And there's already penetration gems which work as increases in dmg%.

Good point on the penetration gems. Spell Damage support is probably a bad idea.

Regarding Unstable Minions, having a keystone exist only to support a single keystone seems way too niche. Maybe the keystone should be removed and made an active skill -- a spell where all your minions blow up to deal damage. There are lots of ways to have the gem improve with levels, but I think creating a health threshold (only minions below a certain %life explode) is best, then have that threshold shift down as the gem levels; if the skill did a % damage of their current life, this would also allow levels in the gem to increase damage. As an active skill, it could be modified by supports such as Increased Area of Effect and/or Concentrated Effect. Where the Unstable Minions passive is, you could put a new keystone to help summoners out.