Arbegla

Oh ok, i get it. Melee pets only underperform when compared to other MM primaries in your opinion. Yep, because they may or may not be able to run at +4/8, and may or may not be able to solo AVs, both tasks not actually meant for ANY AT AT ALL, then they need a buff.

I see now. Your not thinking of the baseline, on SOs, running at 0/1, your thinking of top end.

And i have started playing a Ninja/poison. Thanx for asking about that. My progress is over on this thread, and I'll be updating it as that character gets higher up in levels. I may or may not get to the 4/8 difficulty, but then again, i find that difficulty unnecessary, as its just boring and tedious even on character i have that can run that difficulty.

And the only reason i bought up that you haven't been around as everyone else, is because you seemed to have forgot that the dev's have changed multiple powersets around, and reworked ENTIRE archetypes and inherents. So saying 'it'll never happen' when there is already evidence that the dev's are open to looking at thing is just really bullheaded of you.

ET is only higher at base, with critical, from both placate and hide included, ET actually falls behind pretty quickly due to not having additional damage.

Here's a quick comparison. Your best Energy melee chain is ET->BS->TF->BS, which would require about 216% global recharge to pull off (in order to get TF to recharge in the required 6.336 seconds)

Assuming you do that, the chain will take a total of 9.768 seconds, for a total of 657.75 damage, or about 67.33 DPS. This is assuming base damage.

Now, a decent chain for Kinetic Melee would be CS->SB->BB->QS->SB which would require about 279% global recharge to pull off (in order to get CS to recharge in the required 5.28 seconds)

The above chain would take a total of 8.316 seconds to animation, for a total of 501.37 damage, or about 60.29DPS. This is again assuming base damage.

Its about a 7 DPS lead for energy melee, but with more attacks in the KM chain, in a shorter duration, you'll get more fuel out of BU, and possibly more use out of damage procs.

I'm not sure how to go a step further with those numbers, but i feel they are close enough (7 DPS really isn't much on paper) that with decent slotting of damage enhancements affecting the crit damage of KM more-so then it would affect the crit damage of EM as only bone smasher crits for 100% damage, TF is about 50% extra damage, and ET doesn't crit at all, where Smashing blow, body blow, quick strike all have 100% crit damage, CS doesn't crit at all, but the refresh on BU could factor into higher uptime and allow for more damage over time as well (especially with the recent change that allows forced crits with CS, either via hide, or from placate, to refresh BU as well)

In your opinion. Numbers wise, they actually don't suck at all, and can make robots and thugs look like pea shooters.

Quoted for truth.

-damage is your best friend for melee pets. That and -tohit (or +def). and Layering them allows you to do some pretty wicked things.

while traps offers all those, you have to be in melee for them to really affect the target you want them to affect (as both of those debuffs are in seeker drones, which have a mind of their own) but dark offers it in a toggle, /thermal offers it in a single target attack, as does /poison, and trick arrow has an AoE version of -damage.

I'm not sure where you figure this out from, as Kinetic Melee has better DPA in most of its attacks then energy melee, with about the same, or faster recharge times. For example:

Energy Melee
Barrage -> Recharge 6 seconds, damage 80.75, animation time 1.584s, DPA is 50.98
Crits for 154.15 damage, crit DPA is 97.32

Energy Punch -> Recharge 4seconds, damage 61.17, animation time 1.056s, DPA 57.93
Crits for 116.78 damage, crit DPA is 110.59

Bone Smasher -> recharge 8seconds, damage 100.32, animation time 1.716s, DPA 58.46
Crits for 191.52 damage, crit DPA is 111.61

Energy Transfer -> recharge 20seconds, damage 253.58, animation time 2.904, DPA 87.32
Does not Crit, just doesn't cause the self damage of 166.83

Total Focus -> recharge 20seconds, damage 203.53, animation time 3.432, DPA 59.30
Crits for 259.14 damage, crit DPA is 75.51

Kinetic Melee
Quick Strike -> recharge 3seconds, damage 51.38, animation time 1.056, DPA 48.66
Crits for 98.1 damage, crit DPA is 92.90

Body Blow -> recharge 5seconds, damage 70.96, animation time 1.32, DPA 53.76
Crits for 135.47 damage, crit DPA is 102.63

Smashing Blow -> recharge 7seconds, damage 90.53, animation time 1.452, DPA 62.35
Crits for 172.84 damage, crit DPA is 119.04

Burst -> recharge 15seconds, damage 76.46, animation time 2.904, DPA 26.33
Crits for 145.98 damage, crit DPA is 50.27

Focused Burst -> recharge 8 seconds, damage 100.32, animation time 2.244, DPA 44.71
Crits for 191.52 damage, crit DPA is 85.35

Concentrated Strike -> recharge 20seconds, damage 197.97, animation time 3.036, DPA 65.21
Does not have additional crit damage, but each successful crit (from hide, following a placate, or the 10% base chance outside of hide, which scales with more teammates) refreshes Build Up, allowing higher uptime of the Build Up effect.

All in all, Kinetic Melee seems to out perform Energy Melee in just about every way, and with the lower recharge times and higher DPA Kinetic Melee should pull ahead for single target damage. Especially when you factor the higher uptime of Build Up, due to CS crits.

Granted, Energy Transfer is pretty nice burst, but i feel the increased up time of Build up, and the AoE and ranged powers in Kinetic Melee allow it to pull ahead in other aspects as well.

While traps is nice, its a jack of all traps set, that requires a lot of recharge to be very effective. Without large amounts of +recharge, its not much better then any of the other hybrid powersets (thermal, pain, dark, cold) and its really not as good as the main debuff powersets (poison, rad, sonic, trick arrow, storm) on pure numbers.

Once you can perma double stack acid mortar though, it starts to really shine, but without that, its just as good as the other hybrid sets, and can match the pure debuff sets. But the pure buff sets (ff, empathy, kinetics) still out perform it when it comes to solid numbers.
Defense cap helps out any build, so saying MMs benefit from it more is not entirely accurate. Plus, MMs actually benefit from layers mitigation more-so then just going for 1 form of mitigation. Due to bodyguard mode, which i know you are aware of, MMs benefit from AoE buffs a lot more then singular (as in just benefiting the MM) buffs. Things like AoE +regen (available in /traps, and /pain) have exponential benefits. AoE +defense benefits the MM much more then being self soft capped, as soft capped pets can get 95% mitigation (before any other benefits from the MM) allowing them to basically ignore AoE affects, and +resistance on the MM allows 'splash' damage from bodyguard mode to affect the pets for even less.

In short, the softcap isn't some magical thing just only benefits MMs, and going for pure softcap on a MM build is actually one of the worst forms of mitigation, as your pets will suffer from stray hits, thus lowering your effective resistance 'pool' that bodyguard mode provides.
You really have to redefine melee based MMs. Especially when each powerset (aside from robots and mercs) have a melee based pet in them. Demons has the Hellfire Gargoyle (complete with damage aura) Thugs has the bruiser (which has built in fury) Ninja T1 and T2 pets at all melee, as well as Zombies T1 and T2 pets. The oni has a mix of ranged and melee attacks, and the lich is pure ranged.

Plus the entire tanker mind play style works best when the mastermind is in melee range, as the taunt equation factors range into it, and melee powers cause more threat then ranged powers (as well as the location between the enemy and the player, which is why a higher damaging blaster will never pull aggro off a low damaging tanker, due to the tanker being in melee range, and the blaster usually attacking from a far)

And if the mastermind is in melee range, then the pets are also in melee range, even if you have 'range' pets, like thugs, mercs, or robots.

Masterminds have been out since issue 6 which came out in 2005. There have been a number of AI changes since then, and most of which have benefited the mastermind all around. Some still cause bugs, but for the most part the pets are far more responsive then they were at release, and the powers of said pets have been rebalanced a few things over since then.

Invulnerability comes to mind which was changed quite a bit back in issue 13, there were also similar changes to regeneration and many other armor sets. Also there were massive changes to weapon sets and animation times that allowed basically all the melee sets to attack faster.

You also can't forget the dominator changes that affected an ENTIRE AT, and the blaster changes that reworked the inherent for blasters.

While it isn't very common for the Dev team to rework powersets, or ATs, its not unheard of, and saying it'll never happen could just lead to you being proved wrong.
I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this, but what i quoted and linked above pretty much proves this statement false, as the Dev's have changed things around that have been stated by the player base to not working correctly, or could use a change for the better.
While this is true, all of the ATs have to meet a middle ground when used with SOs. Thats how the powersets are balanced around each other. For example, while the robot pets have +def, and 2 'support' pets, it cuts into their damage, and the bulk of their heavy lifting is in the form of the assault bot's fire patch missiles. Meaning pre level 32, robot MMs have very limited AoE, and 2 of their 6 pets have to balance between attacking and playing support.

Thugs on the other hand have the bulk of their damage in the Arsonist's fire patches, the bruiser has a hard time building fury up, but their 'support' is all passive, meaning they don't take a DPS lose to have really nice support. Lack of heal is the downside here.

Mercs are mostly range, with the Commando even having a LRM rocket. Their 'support' is in the form of control (spec Ops) and healing/mez protection (medic) Now, AI issues and long recharge timers cause the mercs to 'under perform' when compared to other primaries, but it still has a lot of tricks up its sleeve, with the stealth ability of the spec ops (added after release mind you) and the fact they have stealth automatically now.

Demons are a mixed group of range/melee with +resistance and 1 'support' pet. Its heavier melee focus in the hellfire gargoyle, and dominator like Demon prince means its damage is lower, but it has enough hard and soft control to tackle just about anything. Its also mainly 'exotic' damage so its less resisted.

Zombies, while mostly melee as already been mentioned, can stack an absurd amount of -tohit (from the lich and other dark attacks) all the pets have a self heal, and the skeleton knights can stack pretty high amounts of -def, from their sword attacks. This allows the zombies to be pretty durable both in melee and range, without the aid of any of the masterminds secondary helping out. Its a pretty well rounded set in its own right.

Ninjas seem to be the red-headed stepchild of the group, but with a focus on solid single target damage, there are very few things that can survive a ninja's onslaught for very long, assuming the ninjas can stay alive. With their defensive nature it takes some getting used to in keeping them alive, but once you manage it, there is no other primary that can come close to the single target damage a well played ninja MM can dish out. The lack of support pet is a down side, but the Oni's ability to play 'dominator' allows the MM to have some form of control over the chaotic nature of ninjas, and with the ability for ninja's to placate themselves, and smoke flash from the primary taking ninja's completely out of harms way, their burst damage is hard to match.

Each primary has strengths and weaknesses in their own right, but they all perform pretty well for normal playing (i/e on SOs, running at 0x1) While some primaries scale with IOs better then others, this game is not balanced around them, so taking them into consideration when trying to compare the different powersets together just doesn't work out.
I've already addressed this above, and as the mastermind themselves can decide if their ranged pets go into melee or if their melee pets go range due to different commands, its really just a matter of play style. If you can adjust your play style to match what your pets do, instead of trying to adjust your pets to match the play style you want then you will have far greater success at playing MMs in general.


All in all there may be issues that need to be addressed on MMs, and the dev's are aware of them. Its just a matter of time and manpower before they get fixed, and as the AI issue is with all pets (look at animate stone, or jack frost for good example of screwy AI) it may take a while for that to be fixed. Either you adjust to deal with it, or you don't play MMs.

But they are still HIS powers. that would be like saying a MM can't solo AVs because he uses his primary (which is mostly pets)

Between the pet aura, Maneuvers, and grant invis, my ninja's should be around 25% defense (counting what they already have) which isn't too bad. I managed to get some more recharge in the build, and fireball should compliment the Oni and allow me to actually have some AOE damage.

While i know this already, and you know this already, the general consensus is that both ninja/ and /poison under perform. merc/ also under perform. The problem being, is while the better MM players know that ninja. and merc/ only under perform when compared to other MM primaries, like robots/, thugs/, or demons/ and not as under perform when compared to other ATs.

That is kinda the point of this thread, to prove that the 'under performing' sets really aren't as bad as some people want to say they are.

I'm just going to quote exactly what you put, so you can try to explain it. Because your right, i wasn't there, i can only go off of what YOU said, and assume from there. Which by the way, your obviously not reading everything i put due to the fact that you say I can't comment on things because i run a bot/traps, (even though i have many other MMs as well, demon/thermal being another main i play)

First off, you mean this trial? Even if its not, all the thorn tree trials are the same, so it really doesn't matter.

Anyways, after you cleared out the CoT, and i'm going assume the Thorn Tree Vines, you told you pets to attack the Thorn Tree, which is an Arch-villain.

You say right there, that before they could get into melee range of the AV (the Thorn Tree) they were dead. Well, you do know that AV has pretty nasty ranged attacks right? As its a stationary AV, as in it doesn't move? So sending in your zombies, which have mostly melee attacks, to attack an AV with mostly ranged attack just isn't a good idea to begin with. And then your going to complain that you pets die before you can even upgrade them again, when its entirely your fault due to your pets just doing what you told them to do.

Now, you don't mention what secondary you have, but you do mention a heal, so that limits you to /poison, /pain, /thermal, or /dark. Of those 3, only /poison, /thermal, and /pain have single target heals, so i'm going to assume your using one of those 3 secondaries.

All 3 of those have debuffs you could be using (/poison has weaken, and envenom, /thermal has heat ex and melt armor, though you may not be high enough level for them, and /pain has anguishing cry, but again you may not be high enough level, as you don't specify that)

And both /thermal and /pain have pretty nice buffs that can keep your pets alive longer (/thermal has +res shields, and /pain has an AoE +res, and pain bringer which is a very large +regen/+recovery power) but you don't mention what secondary you have, so i can only assume.

I bolded the most important part of that quote. Be sure you pay attention.

So you admit that it was stupid to resummon your pets within range of the AV, but your preaching for a MM buff, how are the Dev's supposed to buff your own stupidity? You make it sound like you die, but you don't mention being rez'ed, so i'm again going to assume you actually didn't die, just that you came close, as the AV has plenty of AoE attacks, and it hurts.

Now, as your pets have a higher thread modifier then the corruptor, that would explain why the corruptor was getting thrashed, cuz your pets weren't there to pull aggro.

So, you mention a brute now. You are aware that brutes have a poke-voke inherent that allow them to taunt the target they are attacking so that the target only attacks the brute. That's not counting any possible taunt auras the brute may have, or even the fact that the brute could have access to 'Taunt' which will allow him to better control the AV and prevent you, your pets, and the corruptor from taking any large amounts of damage. (obviously AoEs could still affect you, but those are usually lower damage, and easily healed through)

Now, to answer your question, if the players own stupidity causes them to perform at a sub-par level, how is that the Dev's problem? Maybe you really shouldn't play MMs, as your preaching they need a buff, but then admitting that your playing them incorrectly.

I'm reading and responding to everything you right, i don't put words in your mouth, and take everything you say at face value, and just debate it back to you.