Can we do something about Patron Pets?

I really want to like them but they are just so not likable. Besides role-playing reason, patron pets just don't seem to add much. If you are not a Corr/Defender/Troller (Crab is ok) with buffs for them, they don't survive long enough and what's worst is that they have 900s recharge with 240s duration. Is the Duration really that necessary?


I was trying out my Widow Widow Sister build with my Blood Widow build (follow up) and Blood Widow patron. I took double Maneuver, double Assault and Mind Link. I set it to +3 (since I am level shift) at only x3. Oh my, she still dies so quick. I would jump in first to try take alpha but strangely Blood Widow either has some sort of taunt that draws so much aggro to her or I smell really bad that mobs just leave me. It was really strange.

I don't think level shift applies to Patron Pet right? Because I think she was lvl 50 fighting +3 or +4.


I really hope we can improve patron pets.


1. If you want to put 900s recharge with 240s duration, can you at least allow us to Pass Inspirations to them? I know we can't Direct them but I wanted to pass Greens to my sister Widow so much when she was dying. Is passing inspirations to Patron Pet going to be overpowered?


2. Can level shift apply to Patron Pets? I don't think it does but I could be wrong on this.


3. Can we reduce 900s down to 600s recharge?



I really just want to pass inspirations to my blood widow so she can survive better.

Level shift applies to all pets. Even silly and inconsequential. Yes, your power drone pet with 10 HP is level shifted because it's one of the most powerful beings in the universe.

The pets are permable with enough recharge (takes a lot though). But in general they aren't meant to be huge bonuses and be around all the time doing tons of stuff. They're just perks like any other power. If you want them to be more durable you could try adding any of the 4 pet uniques that ups DEF and RES.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

Both of the characters that bothered taking them have them permanent or within 10 seconds of permanent. I've always felt like the reason they have such a long recharge is because they were meant to be situational. Having trouble with an EB or AV? Give yourself a little extra damage with the patron pet. whether that's accurate or not is another story.

1: I can get behind the passing inspirations thing. I wouldn't really bother with it, but I can see why someone would want to, especially solo.

2: I just checked, the level shift does apply

3: I'm good either way on this one. Like I said earlier, I feel like the recharge time is as long because they meant for the pets to be situational, but bringing the recharge time down to 600 wouldn't hurt either.

IMO "something should be done" about Voltiac Sentinel and Gun Drone first. Having to recast a pet every minute or two is just a pointless time waster.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

The problem with Patron Pets is that at one slot they aren't worth the power pick and at six slots they aren't up enough to justify that many slots (Assault would probably provide more damage over time than a single-slotted Patron Pet).

A couple of exceptions: the Spiderlings for Stalkers and the Blaster for Bane Spiders both tend to work out very well, in my experience. If you're soloing x4 or greater spawn sizes, the Coralax Guardian tends to die more or less immediately, which is very unfortunate as the Gurardian is one of the more interesting pets from an aesthetics/powers perspective.

Of course, given Villains can access all the APPs now, the Patron Pools are more or less roleplay, for the most part. The balancing pass helped, but the APPs on the whole, are still better.

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Originally Posted by Bright If you have room for it in your build, picking up Aid Other so you can heal them up between fights helps a lot. That plus Grant Invis made a world of difference for my main stalker's Adept side-kick.

Having to spend two power-picks just to make the Patron Pet viable kind of says it all. I really must play test this approach though, because it does sound fun, if highly suboptimal.

WARNING: I bold names.

My Dominator's Toxic Tarantula is so close to perma that the downtime is almost unnoticeable and rarely dies while soloing at x8 unless I let it run off into another spawn... but I also recently figured out that it and my Animated Stone combined only contribute a really small amount of my DPS. Maybe 15% of it in AV fights if I err really generously in their favor. On the other hand, having two pets around to soak up the aggro from uncontrolled enemies actually improves my survivability a good bit. If one of those Energy Melee Longbow Wardens dodges a hold or two in a row, they can level me in one hit... unless they decide to punch my pets instead, giving me enough time to mezz them.

Toxic Tarantula's merits: Sometimes it gets punched instead of me, looks cool, takes a relatively cheap set that gives +6.25% recharge, probably contributes some damage occasionally.

Toxic Tarantula's drawbacks: It isn't Sleet, and the slots I gave it could have theoretically been put in a different power.

I had Black Scorpion's pet, IIRC, on both my fire / kin corruptor and stone / EA brute; respecced out of the powers ASAP. I simply couldn't keep the pets upright long enough for them to do anything meaningul. I got better value for my power picks and slots elsewhere. I remember when Posi said that the PPPs were superior to APPs to compensate for the choice being permanent ... and then facepalming while I watched my pets get ganked on heroic missions.

The Mu Guardian on my dom, however, was different. My fire / fire dom had more than enough recharge to make the pet perma, and the ability to one-shot mez every single spawn she met meant the pet could do its thing in perfect peace. What I liked, mostly, was the Guardian's ability to heal the Imps -- it saved me time by not having to deal with recasting them. And the Guardian contributed OK damage.

But ...

Meh.

I don't think they're good enough to justify their recharge and prerequisites, and they seem to be more or less valuable depending on AT and power set choices.

Pets tend to be most valuable to toons with (de)buffs and controls.

I run an Arachnos Blaster on my huntsman's build.

He has 21% defense aura and both the 5% pet aura uniques giving the two disruptors and the blaster 31% ranged defense. They are also up perma (though like 2 seconds downtime on the blaster).


Works quite nice.

my 2 cents on this:

voltaic sentinal - i agree with the stacking of them, but an alt option i would accept is to make it a permanent pet that doesnt have a summon duration and to balance that you could make it targetable by the baddies

gun drone - the horrid end cost and interruptability have always made this power a real let down everytime i try to play a devices toon, i think it should definitly be made similar to how FFG is, but give it a higher end cost and higher rech time, but it should not be interruptable

patron pets - definitly need rech reduced, they are in no way that strong and they are extremely easy to kill, so if it or you dies 2 sec after you summon it, then it has to go through that massive recharge essentially being pointless, i think all pets should be at minimum permanent, so 5 min duration, 5-7 min rech (past 5 min it would be perma through 3 rech reduct SOs), just because a pet has a 5 min rech, does not mean it will LIVE for the full 5 min

Blasters could still cast it for the damage buff