Animate Guardian

Not only was it awkward to figure out how to use this ability, I can't use it on crappy blue drops that I wouldn't want to pick up, identify, throw back down and then cast this on.

This thing doesn't do much, dies quickly and is generally a waste of time.

Maybe I'm missing something. Even so, if I can't intuit the value of an ability, then it's not for me.

I really like the idea behind it. Especially coming from a summoner :). However, for the level of maintenance it needs and effort it requires it is not worth the skill slot nor ingame actions. I think the core mechanics are very well thought through, but I suggest some stream lining examples and ideas (NOTE: this is a resume of other people's thoughts in this thread as well as mine):

TLDR




1. Survivability of your Guardian

I've heard many say that either [A] a general buff to survivability is needed or [B] it should be possible to view your Guardian's stats, so you know what stats to buff with specific items. Currently, due to its relative low survivability at low levels and the fact that most players will at first only use white items to construct their Guardian, the time it takes to look around for an item to constantly heal your Guardian is too much effort for most players and also not viable with most playstyles, even for a summoner.

A possible fix may be to add some functionalities to your Guardian's AI. Most importantly, it may be a good idea to have your Guardian return to you when it drops below a certain % of Life. This will [A] cause a trigger for you to realize you have to heal your Guardian instead of looking around all the time and [B] increase the survivability of your Guardian without affecting the functionality of using high-end items to construct your Guardian, as it will be out of combat less and doing more DPS with better items.


2. Damage of your Guardian

DPS of the Guardian is currently low. Increasing flat DPS may be a good idea as this will also increase the difference between using lower or higher end items due to its inherent %increase dmg per level. I think it's also a good idea to allow ranged weapons for your Guardian, because I believe most ranged classes prefer melee Guardians and vice versa, which should balance out the items used and actually increase it's versatility without becoming a staple skill.

Currently, functionality of your Guardian when not using unique items is very limited. This is the same for most classes, but they have additional Passives to back them up, where a Guardian does not. Again, this warrants to use of allowing a way to see your Guardian's stats or even being able to spend his own Passive points to specify its use. However, I understand that this is close to having a 'mercenary' type skill, which is too dominant in PoE's vast skill viability system, so in fact I'm not cheering for it. A possible solution may be somewhere in the middle of this. For example, it would be cool if you could give your Guardian 1 or 2 skill gems. While such a gem sink may result in everyone using the skill, if it is not exaggerated it may be a very welcome change. To make sure the skill does not become too OP, these skills may then be cast by the Guardian only once every couple seconds or so.


3. Using items on the floor to create your Guardian

Some ideas are practically unsound ideas, such as being able to use unidentified items on the ground. This will surely lead to a storm of critique of people losing uniques because they misclicked. Still, the way it is now is the other way around, as you are able to create a Guardian out a 6 linked white on the floor. Ouch. So in my opinion, this mechanic does need some polishing. This biggest problem however currently is that you can not use your Guardian if it's not leveled up and your are, unless you want to go to level 2 Lunaris on Cruel every time it dies. To me that's a broken mechanic. Most players will reach level 10+ without too much effort, but after level 14-15 it becomes much harder and so the skill is often unusable for a long time at first. I propose that the item requirement per level is not a flat +3 ilvl per level, but instead exponentially lower at higher levels.


4. Using items on the floor to maintain your Guardian

Currently, the mechanic of healing your Guardian by using items on the ground and having a Guardian constructed of powerful items is contradictory as the item used to heal will replace your powerful item. Therefore, there should be a control to which item quality is replaced by adding items to your Guardian. I propose that this is limited to the item quality, so only white items replace white items, only blue items replace blue items, etc.


I hope some changes will go through as I do love the general idea behind it :)

I wish this became a Support Gem. We would still be limited to one Guardian per character, but once the Guardian had enough items to use a gem (so a sword for a Guardian linked to an attack requiring swords), he would begin using the skill every once in a while. Higher levels of the Guardian skill would increase the frequency in which the supported skill is used (still limited, of course, by the cooldown).

This would turn Guardians into mobile totems who consume items and still just use common attacks more often than not, but it would at least make them somewhat useful, unlike the current incarnation.

Too much micromanagement with little reward.

Guardian is not tanky enough, nothing like any golem from d2 (and they are not invincible at all). Considering that you cannot rise it anytime, it should be even more survivable than those golems.

Oh, and why I can't use unidentified items just to heal it, for example?

Hi.

I just want to add my observations to this thread about the Animate Guardian.

I have been using my Guardian for a very long time since I got the skill gem. I have leveled up the gem to level 13 as of this post. However, I have given up on the Guardian and do not intend to use him going forward unless there are some changes to the AI.

From what I can gather from reading through this topic is that most are complaining about DPS, lack of information or feedback on the current Guardian stats such as HP or DPS, etc... -- or the fact that it is next to impossible to babysit the Guardian due to his habit of running headlong into mobs and getting swamped and killed rather foolishly.

I have been equipping my guardian with gear that I usually keep specifically in mind for summoning a new Guardian by keeping that gear in my stash for the time that I know will come when the Guardian will die. That means that I rarely have used gear laying on the ground to "heal" him because it is often next to impossible to keep track of the equipment the Guardian currently has. Yes, I have tried to keep a pen and paper manifest of his equipped gear. That lasts all of about one play round until I get tired of writing down this information so I just stopped doing that all together and went with my current method of storing gear and just summoning a new Guardian with the new set of gear that I have been saving up. This is not an ideal situation. It would be best if GGG will make a sub panel that shows the equipment and stats of the Guardian. This would be a step forward to ending micromanaging the Guardian.

I would suggest that the Guardian has his AI changed to mimic the defensive posturing of regular summoned Zombies. As of now the Guardian is just really foolish and over aggressive. He charges into battle against impossible odds like a fool -- especially in closed environments like dungeons or interior spaces. Worse, it is impossible to keep track of his location because sometimes he loses path finding and gets on the other side of walls or other barriers and out of your sight if he gets too far away. This is not even mentioning the fact that he will probably die, alone.....

Would it be so difficult to actually make him a "Guardian"??? Just have him hang around you like a zombie. Problem solved. As of now I have to run away like a yellow belly coward a significant distance before he "resets" and warps back to my position. This is IF he makes it...... Perhaps there could be a button for "call minions" that would rally them to your position. This could be for all minions not just the Guardian but I am looking squarely at him because I never have a problem with my zombies getting too far away from me.

I would also suggest that the Guardian is not included in the Minion Instability keystone. That is really the final nail in the coffin to using him. Yes, I must admit that I have been equipping my Guardian for a long time before I got the Minion Instability keystone with really nice stuff that just did not fit into my current build. Yes, even powerful rare stuff. To be honest I have kept my Guardian alive before I hit level 50/51+ for extended periods of days even weeks. I have never kept a record of it but i kept my last guardian alive through both Act 1/2 of Cruel. He had some awesome gear!! I am a bit sad about it because I have lost out a lot on currency due to this. It does seem a bit unfair to have to kiss some of this stuff good bye when he croaked this last time when I went to the Slums of all places and he got WAY far ahead of me and the rest of the group and died like a fool.. That was the last straw for me. It just is not worth it anymore. Yes, I have the appropriate flasks for minions but the Minion Instability is just not meant to be used with a Guardian. It just too much to hear that mega expensive explosion as he dies.

I just don't have a place for him anymore with my current build and I don't see this changing unless the AI is changed and he is no longer affected by Minion Instability.

P.S: I don't think he was lacking DPS. I never looked for him to deal incredible amounts of damage. I just was happy that he was drawing aggro and acting like a tank. However, zombies are better for tanks and they attract aggro just by their numbers. Plus the Minion Instability is mainly for my totem summoned Skeletons. If he was not on the Minion Instability thing then there would still be a place for him, broken AI or not. It just feels better to have a companion running around with you.

Flewdyr

Btw, one more thing is Guardian appearance. An invisible man is just meh, I'd prefer something more solid and massive.

I posted a suggestion thread RE: Animate guardian
http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/732725

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DarkTl wrote:

Btw, one more thing is Guardian appearance. An invisible man is just meh, I'd prefer something more solid and massive.

I agree with this. On top of him dying often, it's not noticeable enough, especially with other minions around.

Guardian can deal MILLIONS of dps currently. Thanks to Moose65 for tips.

Recipe:

1) AG + Cast on Death + Conc. effect

2) Good shield and spellblock if needed. Necro Aegis is warmly welcome (Rathpith/Saffels Frame on you and perandus on AG for ex.)

3) Lightbane Raiment

How it works:

Desecrated ground procs on block in 50% cases and deals 5% of MAX hp to all enemies in it. Since cast on death and conc.eff GENERAL damage boosts apply to the whole entity of AG, they also apply to desecrated ground (DG). DG is general, dot, area and chaos but not minion damage, so none of minion damage passives apply and there is no way except for redbeak/carcass jack on AG/leer cast on you/bino's kitcher knife to boost general damage (redbeak needs lowlife, nah not worth it, other ways dont give that much). You cant play this trick on youself since there is no way to apply support gems to you, not specific skillgems. Though generic and chaos/dot modifiers might work, but not worth it again.

Sum:

5% * (1+3.04) * (1+0.69) = 34% of maxlife per second as chaos damage. Bosses die like pigs, no matter how much absolute hp they have. And vulnerability+shock stacks are your friends.

With bino's knife + carcass jack + leer on you = 53%
with redbeak and lowlife proc on AG -> 77%
with all that on top of 3 shock stacks -> 146% of monster maxlife per second. Vulnerabilty can push that even more, tough with curses doing shit effect on bosses, expect a ceiling of 150% of maxlife per sec.

1) I won't be surprised if they will nerf it asap, since you write about it here :)
2) AG should survive long enough in order to do those millions of dps, at least not to die instantly when you exit the portal near the boss. And that's a problem.