Summon Reaper

make it aggressive by default and 2x as fast

Lvl 60, Necro v3.15, minion focus.

It's intended to be a one man army, but it acts more like a one man surgical strike team. It can go toe to toe and rip rares and bosses a new one, but just having it is a dps loss because my other minions (in mass) put up more dps and clear more of the screen at once.

Just having it actively makes my dps go down because the same items and passives that I have used to buff it are the same that generically buff all minions, and a horde of other minions does more damage than this collectively.

As it is now, there is no reason for my build to use it.

Maybe it could be reworked into a golem that works reverse the way carrion golem is (it gains bonus damage from minions around it instead of it giving bonus damage to minions around it.

Or give it a way to competitively clear large numbers weak and spread out mobs. Maybe a kind of ranged projectile with moderate/low hit damage that has corpse explode on death affect?

>2500 hours played in PoE.

Character: NoPantsYesMinions - lvl 91 Guardian in the Expedition. Up to 2.7m dps on Sirus.

League started with the Reaper and still playing it as the main minion skill. The build focuses on "Bleed" damage.

I want to elaborate on a few issues from an endgame perspective (lvl 83+ maps and heists). Those issues are interrelated and are a consequence of each other mostly.

The concept of one powerful minion is good. However, in the current reaper, that concept is not well made.

In almost all aspects I mention below, the reaper lacks severely compared to the Herald of Agony, which is just better overall and also can be described as a single powerful minion. Also, just Zombies have more QoL overall.

Highlighted issues are:

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1. Survivability of the Reaper.

This is a major issue.
A single powerful minion which can't deal with tens of enemies at once (the 2d issue), under their focused attacks, must be resilient.
However, it has the amount of life below that of zombies on the same skill gem level.
So with a maximum of 6 zombies, skill gem Raise Zombie has a 6 times more effective life than a single powerful minion.

The situation of survivability is worsened by the shared cooldown (3rd issue) of the command skill, which is used by its CD each time because it is the only reliable source of the damage from the Reaper (4th issue).

So when the reaper dies (and it dies often), we have to wait before resummon it, so the situation becomes pretty dire.

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2. Clearspeed and AI.

It might look alright early in acts, but in high-end maps with extreme density of monsters, it becomes clear how weak and flawed is this minion in its current state.

Although it has a few auto skills, they severely lack compared to the command skill mechanically and in both AoE and damage.

The reaper severely lacks any kind of 360 degrees AoE. All of its current auto skills lacking mechanically compared to zombies' single slam.

Like this, the command dash skill is not that good because it's not 360 degrees, and can miss many targets as result. If I could at least choose the direction of attack (by dragging the mouse from A to B), it'd solve the problem partially.

About AI I have just one question. Why does the reaper go offscreen after the Convocation when there are enemies around me? It clearly should attack the closest enemy, and not his previous target.

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3. Cooldown.

I won't elaborate on this much because I mentioned a few aspects already.

4 seconds base CD is just too long in the endgame. We don't have so much time.

Reaper can't survive for so long, has very low damage and low AoE outside of command dash skill.

Clear speed issues are forcing us to use the Second Wind support gem and get Cooldown Reduction by any means (helmet enchant, alternative quality gem, influenced belt, etc). We have to sacrifice already weak damage to get a little QoL.

Also, the major issue here is - shared CD with the resummon, as I mentioned before.

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4. Low power ceiling. My favorite.

Reaper can't get extremely powerful benefits from the buffing specters and an Animated Guardian.

Has no options to scale Bleed damage multiplier outside of Amanamu's gaze and helm enchant (we need CD here).

We don't have any spell or melee alternatives to Ensnaring Arrow, so the bow must be used no matter what (for bleed builds). Also, no alternative to Crimson Dance for minions.

We can't get a 100% chance to bleed.

Other reaper skills are just too weak compared to command dash.

Haemophilia is, basically, the best in the slot, bc it has some little impact on lacking clearing potential.

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That's basically it. Personally, for me, the survivability of the reaper is problem number one, followed by a lower power ceiling.

Gave my feedback before and after the nerf (patch 3.15.0f).

1) https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3148505/page/6
2) https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3152428/page/1

TLDR:

+ Only good damage with cooldown nuke (Ultimate)
+ Looks Cool
- Base in-between-cooldown abilites do minuscule damage for that kind of minion
- Can't consistently use Ultimate-ability anymore (second gem setup with second wind) after nerf.
- Less overall damage after nerf: You need to sacrifice (at least) one DMG support for Second Wind to spam Ultimate again.

Neutral:
Reaper "works" if you ridiculously increase the gem level. Then the Ultimate chunks the endgame bosses good. But it's also a counter argument considering other minion setups are more effective with way lower gem level and investment.

IMO Reaper was okay ,with his abilities+damage, before they "fixed" the second gem setup.
Now Reaper isa mixture of being dead-weight / D.O.A. and basically the opposite of buff spectres on normal/SSF budget and vanity/showcase pets for meme builds when you have too much currency and don't know what to do with it (aka increase gem level to 30-34+).

INTRODUCTION

The look of the Reaper is glorious. The concept of an Ultimate Minion is tantalizing. The aesthetic of a badass, sickle-wielding Grim Reaper tearing apart the battlefield is awesome. The mechanic of a devastating active ability is satisfying when it hits right.

So what happened?

Weak clear. Mediocre bossing. Paper-thin defenses. A long 1-second cast time on the Ultimate that was thankfully lowered to 0.6 seconds (personally, I'd prefer if it were Instant or 0.25 like mine throwing, since there's already another delay from waiting on the Reaper to take action). The Reaper doesn't excel over competing minions in any category, be it clear, bossing, or support, while also hamstringing the inclusion of other minions with a punitive Less Damage and Less Life multipliers on them. The fact that it eats other minions further restricts the minion pool, barring support from an Animated Guardian or Chieftain Spectres. The Reaper comes with many costs and few upsides.

But I love the little maniac. So I brainstormed ways the Reaper could be improved. Not just boring numerical changes, that's too easy. Instead, I wondered how its mechanics could be more in line with its theme and fantasy to overcome its weaknesses; how could it be more interesting to build and support.

The ideas could apply directly to the gem, or be something built around like jewels and gear. The specifics can be left to GGG's discretion. Let's just get to the meat of the ideas!

Here's 12 that I've come up with. Now, a quick caveat, this is à la carte, not a package deal, so please don't think I'd necessarily want all 12 with no other costs!

Without further ado:

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IMPROVEMENT IDEAS

1. Soul Explosion - Reaper applies debuff on hit. When killed, foe releases their spirit as a fast projectile mortar that bombards the furthest target in range not already targeted by another spirit.

2. Shadow of Death - Reaper has 200% increased Stealth. Monsters have a delayed response to the Reaper's presence.
"Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil."

3. Dance with Death - Reaper has 50% dodge, 50% spell dodge, and 50% damage reduction against Bleeding foes.

4. Inevitable - Reaper retaliates on dodge with a phantom scythe. (e.g. Riposte)
"Death is inevitable. The more you fight it, the more it hurts."

5. Solitude - Reaper has 500% more Life and Damage, losing 20% per Non-Reaper Minion you have.

6. The Weak Shall Perish - Reaper targets your weakest minions to consume. Priority from lowest duration to lowest life.

7. Immortal - Reaper performs Ultimate when summoned if Reaper has died recently.

8. Bloodbath - Reaper detonates a Bleed on each target hit by Ultimate, removing all Bleeds and dealing area damage.

9. Fear of Death - Reaper inflicts Terrify on Bleeding targets in a large area when consuming a minion. Terrify causes monsters to Flee away from the source for a short duration, detonating the remaining Bleed damage in an area at the end of its duration.

10. Decrepify - Reaper inflicts Decrepify on hit against Low Life foes. Decrepify increases damage taken by 20% while moving. Reaper has a 10% chance to deal Triple Damage against targets with Decrepify.
"As our health wanes, we become prone to greater injury."

11. Extinction - Reaper gains 5% cooldown reduction for 20 seconds per Kill, up to 300%. (= 60 kills)
"Death comes for us all."

12. Unending Hunger (Jewel) - Applies to both Spectres and the Reaper. Grants these minions a 50% chance to gain Soul Eater for 20 seconds on Kill.

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EXPLANATIONS

1. Soul Explosion is intended to help a single melee minion do the seemingly impossible: competently clear in a way that is consistent with its theme and unique among other melee minions. The spirits aim for distant targets to hasten screen clear, as moving around to targets is the prime mechanical weakness of melee. When the Reaper kills a pack, a blossom of spirits would erupt and smash down upon periphery mobs toward the edges of the screen while the Reaper goes to work on a closer pack.

2. Shadow of Death's stealth effect is similar to Phase Run without the phasing. Its purpose is to help mitigate a severe downside to the Reaper's splendid aggressiveness: triggering offscreen mob aggression. Monsters usually have a wind-up just before they attack. They're normally idle until you can see them on your screen, which gives you the opportunity to spot the attack animation tells and react accordingly, such as dodging. What happens with the Reaper, who is as aggressive as Spider Bots and runs ahead of you, is these mobs get aggro'd way before they're on your screen. This, unfortunately, can result in the player waltzing face-first into an unseen barrage of monster attacks and dying without a chance to react.

3. Dance with Death is to make the Reaper tankier in a different way from most minions. Stacking the Reaper with a huge life pool doesn't really suite its tall, spindly frame. I liked the idea of an untouchable, intangible Death. However, dodge does nothing against degens, so I added generic damage reduction (like totems and the monster version of Soul Eater) and reduced the dodge from 75% to 50%.

4. Inevitable's retaliation effect is to build something mechanically interesting into the Reaper's tankiness from Dance with Death. Thematically, I liked the concept that fighting against Death only hurts you back. Take a look at all the various cultural stories of vain attempts at seeking immortality, from Gilgamesh to the Fountain of Youth. Since the retaliation works like Riposte, it gives the Reaper a ranged melee attack to help clear, but you'll need to somehow ensure those foes are bleeding to activate Dance with Death, wear Bloodbond, or socket the Quickening Covenant jewel.

5. Solitude is a different way to encourage players to use the Reaper by itself without pigeonholing it. Instead of Less Life and Damage for other minions, Solitude's bonus would scale the Reaper's damage and life instead. Now you have the choice between a singular ultimate minion or incorporating a weakened Reaper into a larger army as bleed support or an assassin-type with its Ultimate. However, this may make Bloodlust Support too much of an obvious choice for the standard minion army. Then again, there are already several Spectre monsters who could do the same (e.g. Kitava's Herald, Knitted Horror).

6. The Weak Shall Perish is to give more control to players on what the Reaper will consume. So long as you keep a supply of perishable Phantasms around, you can avoid losing your Golems, Spectres, and other permanent minions. I imagine the consume ability was conceived precisely to limit the usage of hard-to-replace minions like Spectres, so this suggestion may only be allowable if it comes at another cost, such as an item slot.

7. Immortal offers a limited reprieve from the dangerous hesitation, distraction, and confusion of not realizing amid chaotic combat that your Reaper has died and wondering why the Ultimate that should have killed that Rare didn't happen. Lag? Mana? You're frozen? Stunned? Silenced? Reaper's frozen/stunned? Bad line-of-sight? No, it was just dead. But with Immortal, it can come back with avengence!

8. Bloodbath adds a rhythm to using the Ultimate, where waiting for a Bleed to proc on a boss can lead to more damage. It offers another way to capitalize on Bleeding. Against large packs of mobs, this gives immediate damage when you don't want to wait for Bleed damage to chip away at trash, as well as compounding damage against tight clusters. In the end, I really just wanted to do more interesting things with the Reaper's Bleed.

9. Fear of Death is both thematic and practical. Flee is movement, and Bleed deals more damage to moving foes, so the synergy is simple. With Bleeding mobs scattering outward and then detonating at the end of Terrify, they widen the area of effect and may reach other packs, helping clear. The Reaper would be able to act as support for other Bleed builds. Consuming a minion has a 6 second cooldown, though, so there are stiff limitations as well as build opportunities with cooldown reduction.

10. Decrepify came from the idea of old age, when our Life is coming to an end. Running from Death takes its toll. Knockback and Ensnaring Arrow are two ways to ensure the target is considered moving, which benefits Bleed and activates Decrepify's damage taken debuff, which can help your entire team. Even if the target isn't moving, though, the chance for Triple Damage for the Reaper still applies. The limitation of Low Life to apply Decrepify is thematic, making it similar to the Punishment curse.

11. Extinction is a way to boost clear by double-downing on the Reaper's unique mechanic. This lets you build up a massive cooldown reduction for the Reaper, affecting its Ultimate as well as its other moves, like Dash, Combo, and Consume (Fear of Death). It's similar to Unending Hunger for Spectres by letting your minion go wild while clearing but having little relevance during big boss fights.

12. Unending Hunger including the Reaper would work to improve clear speed, but it's also a less unique solution. I included it because it's one of the simplest ways GGG could give the Reaper a mechanic boost as a standalone minion.


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OTHER DISCUSSIONS

1. [Reddit]
2. [Feedback Forum]


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EDIT

A gem like Detonate Mines called "Command Minions" that orders all minions to use their active skill at target location if they have one would be cool. We would gain back some of the neat possibilities of the second Reaper gem bug, while also benefitting any future minions with active skills. If it could apply to certain monster abilities, for the sake of Spectres, that'd be even better.

Command Minions could apply a 30 second buff to minions. Spectres and other minions with this buff would forego using their longest cooldown skill (by default, if they have one; an override tag would also be necessary for GGG's designers) until ordered to by the use of Command Minion. The override tag would be set on specific monsters/minions by the designers in cases where necessary, such as for the Reaper's Ultimate (since their longest cooldown is the 25sec Consume).

By making the hold contingent on a buff, the player can allow Spectres to return to automated behavior by letting the buff time out, or keep the skills held for demand by using Command Minion semi-regularly.

Very disappointed by the recent "bug fix" that removed the secondary gem link and cast potential. It really hurt my ability to enjoy the game for a couple days. I still don't like that it was patched away without much thought to the people playing it whatever. i sent an email and tried to message GGG staff about it. (not that it was going to go anywhere) I just wanted it changed back.

I can say I enjoy the animations and overall feel of the Reaper aesthetic.

Beyond that, it is not great.I've tried Reaper on both a deadeye and now a scion and tried to heavily invest into it as my main damage skill. Functionally it is very disappointing as it has terrible for clear and average for bossing in end game. I was able to see the "potential" of my build when i was with an aura bot player who buffed my minions with auras. It was very sad. it took a whole min (or longer) to kill a t16 boss.

Random big brain ideas:

- be able to equip the Reaper much like a companion in some other games would be interesting. you can just select items off the ground like with Animate Guardian (somehow) or create a new UI for pets/minions.

- make the trigger attack instant.

- make a second link work with the reaper again.

- make game fun again.

I'm still playing reaper right now see where it goes. my enjoyment of poe is at an all time low. i have zero faith that GGG knows that they are doing. I did enjoy my time in poe but i know GGG doesn't care about that. Just patch the game so you remove the ability to have fun. Thanks.

I already made a post for Summon Reaper in the "General Gem Discussion" post here: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/22679/page/62#p24227853

Just want to make clear that I hope they clean up the bugs with Dancing Duo + Reaper consumption. The better players in this thread already have great suggestions to make it a worthwhile skill - and have experience to boot.

I do want to reiterate having some way of taming or learning Reaper's prioritization when it comes to consuming minions, a way to be "careful" on how Chris describes in his video.

*Opens a new box of Vanilla Wafers and prepares hot milk*

I would simply allow the reaper to ONLY consume non-permanent minions like skellies, phantasms and raging spirits. I understand the reduced minion damage IF it was additive (I am not sure if it is additive or multiplicative).

I love the reaper I just cannot sacrifice spetres, animate guardian etc. Because the minion isn't good enough by far to justify it.

Alternatively make the reaper a replacement for spectres and allow up to 4 reapers. Should make for a fun minion build.

I want to give a modest contribution too, if you'll allow me...

I normally play physical skelletons as a Witch only through the Acts and I thought I should give this new gem a try. I just finished Act 5 Kitava with this skill (also killed the firs Lab Izaro on Act 3 with it) on a 4 link, with Summon Phantasms, Meat Shield and Multistrike. The only other minion I have is the Holy Relic, since I'm using Shield Charge on a defensive build, and it is linked with Feeding Frenzy and Maim.

The Reaper really feels weak, compared to other minions (I've tried going full damage supports too like Melee Physical, Impale, Cruelty, etc, with Pride on also and casting Vulnerability).

I like monik390 and Hercanic views on the gem, but I personally think you (the developers) should choose a deeper focus on either its characteristics for the skill, that being DoT versus a powerful spell like minion. I guess that would also help solve the low power ceiling problem.

I like the mechanic of consuming your minions, since it forces me to actually try a different minion build, but I personally dislike the spell like ability with a cooldown builtin (and since this minion doesn't die easily on acts, this is not because of sharing the same cooldown to respawn), so I would be happier if the DoT is raised as the sole focus of this minion.

Specifically, going on with the Death DoT theme, what would be fun in my view was giving the minion this traits:
a) Invulnerable (it's Death, after all)
b) Damage should not scale with skill gem level like other minions (since we summon The Reaper, it should be meaningful that it's always powerful, it should scale off of something related to us, like gaining a buff the more corpses we consume and the buff gets better with levels, because that means the bond between us is getting stronger)
c) It should be a single target focused minion (unless its a plague, how death can caputre multiple targets)
d) If it has DoT, it should be applied like a death aura (either chaos or some sort of physical damage over time, but not bleeding with a chance)

In my opinion, what would work as trait c is this: the minion gives a debuff to one target (say, for 8 seconds), and this target is the one that suffers from the powerful physical DoT, much like the Impale debuff, but for DoT and we command what the target is. Besides that, when the debuffed enemy dies, a death aura pool is left at its position which damages other enemies who are not debuffed.
This way you can mark the boss (much like Predator) and after the cooldown (maybe a fixed 4 seconds) you can mark another lesser enemy who dies before the boss and helps killing other lesser enemies while also helping damaging the boss.
Then we could have Cast Speed scale how often the Reaper consumes our minions and that would scale the DoT

Aside from that, I guess you have lots of options (including other posters ideas):
1) It could either be weakened by life (allies near it), or strengthened by death (like corpses on the floor or kill count)
2) It could have some gimmick with low life (Petrified Blood)

I really don't mind having a slow pace to my gameplay, but in my view (considering only what I play) I feel that right now the skill doesn't have space alongside other minions gems.