The ranged/melee problem with ninjas is infamous especially when locked in a cell, the higher level they go less it seems to matter though, however my ninjas have gotten my char killed in situations where they really should have done better. All in all though ninjas do well, if you want trouble try zombies *rolls eyes*
The end is just a new beginning, Goodbye all my coh friends and even the enemies, its been a blast I will miss you all. Thank you Paragon team, you gave me a home from home I will always appriciate it.
There is *kind of* a way around this. It's not ideal and I have to say your idea of a toggle works much better. But as you're dark (I have a dark/zombs MM myself) using Shadow Fall you can get just past the enemy as you launch your first attack, while the pets are in defensive mode. Then when they attack you, the pets should have followed you until they're right next to the enemy anyway. So they'll attack back at about the right time to use melee instead of ranged.
So, in short... make sure you get in there first before things get crowded, and start off with a debuff like Darkest Night to make sure you don't take too much of an alpha strike.
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"Hard pressed on my right. My centre is yielding. Impossible to manoeuvre. Situation excellent. I am attacking." - General Ferdinand Foch
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There is *kind of* a way around this. It's not ideal and I have to say your idea of a toggle works much better. But as you're dark (I have a dark/zombs MM myself) using Shadow Fall you can get just past the enemy as you launch your first attack, while the pets are in defensive mode. Then when they attack you, the pets should have followed you until they're right next to the enemy anyway. So they'll attack back at about the right time to use melee instead of ranged.
So, in short... make sure you get in there first before things get crowded, and start off with a debuff like Darkest Night to make sure you don't take too much of an alpha strike.
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Thats the way i actually do it if im solo, it does indeed get your pets into melee without having to drop BG mode. Sadly this solution assumes 3 things:
1. Your groupmates play along and let you take a lead position.
2. The enemies dont have strong AEs that will go off before my DN and kill half my minions(hello scrapyarders).
3. You are the only MM in the team.
Especially point two is bad imho, with me taking the alpha it usually spells death for my already weakened genin if there is AE. Also remember im talking about teams, so we are talking about several Boss/Lts per spawn which can easily be several lvl above my minions. If i try this tactic it usually means i have to resummon atleast my genin every fight.
Shadow Fall *ought* to stop the mob attacking first on all but the most perceptive of foes (so, EBs and AVs). Just make sure your ninja are relatively close when you charge and set off DN, so they're still in its radius.
If that's not working, you could use Fear instead, though you'd have to slot it for accuracy and order the ninja to attack as you set off DN if you did...
But yeah, points 1 and 3... you got me there. Sadly if you have a selfish team like that then having ranged minions is the least of your worries. 
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"Hard pressed on my right. My centre is yielding. Impossible to manoeuvre. Situation excellent. I am attacking." - General Ferdinand Foch
i also use button X for "/petcom_all goto aggressive" that's help too :P (Z is for BG mode)
I'm also Ninjas/Dark, and I love it... despite some of its flaws...
This is what I do, and it works nicely for me, although still not as good as if you were able to toggle all the pets to melee only... That would be awesome!
I use some binds I found on the US forums: HERE
I then press 2 on the numpad to control my Jounin only, and send them into melee only..
I have a hotkey that makes only the Jounin and Oni attack. It's bound to 1 (not numpad) and it's "petcom_pow o attack"
That way, the Genin stay in BG mode and the Jounin and Oni attack. I find Jounin and Oni do a large percentage of the overall damage anyway after level 32
I never bother training the genin, due to the their squishy nature. I only train when I need that extra boost. So that way, they're mostly just for keeping me alive. But of course, as they're defensive, they will attack most of the time anyway.
So in conclusion you have:
- Only two ninjas trying to get into melee range.. No more struggling for space
- Oni staying at range and using holds and stuff
- Three Genin as very disposable bodyguards and a little extra damage
Like I said, it's still not 100% damage efficient but it's a very rounded set up.
If you ever needed more damage, you can always maneuver the rest with the numpad binds!
Hope this helped
I am not familiar with the Ninja pets but I am however with the zombies who also is melee based. And I agree, a good tactic is simply put them on defensive, run into a mob then put them on agressive then put those heals up. That works perfectly for me.
At some spots, i know it can be hard to get them in melee (caves, for example) or if they are simply too stupid to get it. In that case I say just let them do their range, after all it's better than having them just standing around doing nothing.
ever heard of a "go to in aggressive mode" bind ? lol
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ever heard of a "go to in aggressive mode" bind ? lol
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Yup, tried with my nins, failed.
They run to the rough location you pin pointed then proceed to throw stars from 1ft away.
I've had my Jounin do it too quite a bit, they'll go to a range where their sword could touch the enemy, but instead they use their wrist bow.
I seriously hate nin's.
Hi all, this is my first post here so bare with me. I just startet playing this game 3 weeks ago, and so far it has been a blast. Its a great game, and a even better community and so far i have enjoyed every class and activity i tried.
Apart from the ninja MM. I love the concept, i love the abilities and i can even deal with the squishy nature of what are essentially close range pets(though i dont understand why MM pets are exactly the opposite from the ATs, where close range equals tough).
But what i cant deal with is the bug, namely the one where melee pets stay in ranged mode(and to a much much lesser extend the one where ranged pets go into melee).
Just to give you the right idea, i do use numpad controls and excessivly use goto commands to get the pets into melee. And it works, if your alone. But today was the first time i teamed with more than 2 people on this toon, and it was a total nightmare. These are the issues i had:
1. Using goto to get your pets into melee doesnt work reliably if the way is blocked by players, or if there simply isnt enough room for all the melee pets. Worst is, usually half of them get to the goto place and start kicking, but then you screw it all up trying to get the other half also into melee range(or the enemy is simply dead before you get all of your pets in "scrapperlock" where they will usually keep meleeing).
2. I die, alot. Why? Because i cant use BG mode. I get killed by stray AEs and cones while trying to place my minions(or heal them, im /dark) so they actually attack. I also have to be pretty close to the fight so that i can position the goto circle close enough to the enemies(its visually hard from too far out as you usually cant see the ground with all the people).
3. With 5+ players, one of them a fellow mastermind, it gets damn hard to spot the "lazy" minions who think they are some sort of legolas. Also i admit i dont have a attack and goto command for each single minion, only for each tier, so i usually disrupt the other two genin that are actually doing what they should.
Sorry about the rant but i just had to vent some anger. I know you already know all of this, and even i knew about this as new as i am. I just didnt expect it to be so aggrevating.
But i also HAVE to bring up something which would fix 90% of my(and maybe other peoples) issues. The whole problem is that the pets are stupid AND try to make complex decisions like wether to use their longrange attacks or not(which is situational, and they lack situational awareness).
I would kindly ask the devs to consider implementing a command into the macro system which strips the targetet pet(if owned by the mastermind) of its close/range powers, with an simple on/off toggle.
Examples:
/petcom attacks ranged 0
Deactivates(removes) all ranged powers from a targetet minion
/petcom_all attacks ranged 1$$petcom_all attacks melee 0
Would restore all ranged attacks to all pets, while disabling all their melee attacks.
If we had such a control we could focus more on playing the game, and less on babysitting our minions, while still retaining the usefulness of mixed range/melee attacks. Also the people who are fine with the way melee pets behave can keep playing just as they do now.
P.S. I know the devs are probably looking for a more sophisticated fix, and i do understand that its obviously not as easy, but this would fix most of the issues melee pets have in groups i believe. Also there already is a system in place to add new abilities to pets, so it hopefully wouldnt be as hard simply making a ability that simply strips/adds powers without end/time use or gfx changes(ofc only adds powers previously unlocked by the two pet upgrades).