Merc revamp

and a new act 4 merc with something like 3 Bone skills + Corpse Explosion + either Amplify Damage or Lower Resist would also put emilio under a lot of pressure

and a new act 4 merc with something like 3 Bone skills + Corpse Explosion + either Amplify Damage or Lower Resist would also put emilio under a lot of pressure

Or some Warrior from Diablo 1 with that legendary black armor, weapon and shield as a pure tank merc!

btw anybody knows if synergies work past lvl 20? i mean rogues get like lvl 40 Cold Arrow/ Fire Arrow, does it benefit the Freezing Arrow/ Exploding Arrow past lvl 20? or at all, dmg is stated pretty low anyways..

Cool ide indeed, to many build are dependant on Act 2 auras & Infinity / Insight, Andariel's Visage.

I'm using Act 2 Mercenarys on 90% of my characters, For the Summon Warlock, for my Frozen Orb Sorcc, for my Fire Bolt Sorcc & for my Summon Necro, only for my Barbarian I doubled down on more Physical melee dmg and went Act 5 Frenzy Barb Merc,
he does not provide me with any kinda of Aura, unless I swap out his Lawbringer Phase Blade for a Last Wish Phase Blade, but that's strictly for bossing.
would be nice if they had Might aura without a weapon or some other aura or synergys, like Sword Mastery instead of Taunt, I don't think I have ever seen the mercenary Taunt or if that's just passively applied but it feels like a useless skill that could be something better.

oh, i just realized the mercs can't level past 98??

that certainly also needs to be addressed!

Schnorki wrote: 2 months ago

A3...A3 needs help. Bad.

Why not just drop the concept of having a spellcasting merc at all? It was always confusing to my why they got sword and shield when all they do is casting spells.

Even with OP Aura and/or some Sunder source, they will be a rare choice because of retarded AI plus no reliable way of getting life back besides regen and pots.

Some close-combat skillset including magical damage and some cc on top of phys would be a welcome change imo.

spellcasters are bad? look at the sorc, and she also wields threshers, crossbows or axes at times

agree on the ai - but that's an issue for most mercs and minions isn't it?

and if they equipped mercs with more gear and five synergized spells the iron wolfs would certainly be very strong

like Fire Bolt + fire ball + Fire Mastery + Enchant + Warmth with Magefist, Flickering Flame, Arachnid Mesh, Chains of Honor, socketed Hexfire and Spirit.. beats fire zon in power probably

or Nova + Static Field + Telekinesis+ Energy Shield + Lightning Mastery with socketed griffon, Crescent Moon Runeword, Spirit, Skin of the Vipermagi, Arachnid Mesh and Frostburn.. will be very strong and survivable

ganseng wrote: 1 day ago

spellcasters are bad? look at the sorc, and she also wields threshers, crossbows or axes at times

agree on the ai - but that's an issue for most mercs and minions isn't it?

and if they equipped mercs with more gear and five synergized spells the iron wolfs would certainly be very strong

like Fire Bolt + fire ball + Fire Mastery + Enchant + Warmth with Magefist, Flickering Flame, Arachnid Mesh, Chains of Honor, socketed Hexfire and Spirit.. beats fire zon in power probably

or Nova + Static Field + Telekinesis+ Energy Shield + Lightning Mastery with socketed griffon, Crescent Moon Runeword, Spirit, Skin of the Vipermagi, Arachnid Mesh and Frostburn.. will be very strong and survivable

You can basically already do those builds without arach and Magefist and they suck. This is not an itemization issue, it's a poor damage issue.

let's do the math for the fire guy

40 fcr more = 13 fps instead of 15 (with vipermagi), or 15% more dps

Warmth & Fire Mastery synergy = 8x more dmg on Enchant. substantial enough, especially for summoners

Fireball will get approximately same dmg from 20 points in Fire Mastery & 20 points in Fire Bolt as say 30 points in Fire Bolt.. but a few k dmg per Fireball at a decent cast rate is good and beats some existing characters

and Boots can provide extra str to equip Spirit much earlier, or double Phoenix e.g.

so i'd say it does make a difference

and if you further customize by adding a latent sunder charm and some blue charms, it certainly gets interesting

vued wrote: 16 hours ago

ganseng wrote: 1 day ago

spellcasters are bad? look at the sorc, and she also wields threshers, crossbows or axes at times

agree on the ai - but that's an issue for most mercs and minions isn't it?

and if they equipped mercs with more gear and five synergized spells the iron wolfs would certainly be very strong

like Fire Bolt + fire ball + Fire Mastery + Enchant + Warmth with Magefist, Flickering Flame, Arachnid Mesh, Chains of Honor, socketed Hexfire and Spirit.. beats fire zon in power probably

or Nova + Static Field + Telekinesis+ Energy Shield + Lightning Mastery with socketed griffon, Crescent Moon Runeword, Spirit, Skin of the Vipermagi, Arachnid Mesh and Frostburn.. will be very strong and survivable

You can basically already do those builds without arach and Magefist and they suck. This is not an itemization issue, it's a poor damage issue.

ganseng wrote: 16 hours ago

let's do the math for the fire guy

40 fcr more = 13 fps instead of 15 (with vipermagi), or 15% more dps

Warmth & Fire Mastery synergy = 8x more dmg on Enchant. substantial enough, especially for summoners

Fireball will get approximately same dmg from 20 points in Fire Mastery & 20 points in Fire Bolt as say 30 points in Fire Bolt.. but a few k dmg per Fireball at a decent cast rate is good and beats some existing characters

and Boots can provide extra str to equip Spirit much earlier, or double Phoenix e.g.

so i'd say it does make a difference

and if you further customize by adding a latent sunder charm and some blue charms, it certainly gets interesting

vued wrote: 16 hours ago

ganseng wrote: 1 day ago

spellcasters are bad? look at the sorc, and she also wields threshers, crossbows or axes at times

agree on the ai - but that's an issue for most mercs and minions isn't it?

and if they equipped mercs with more gear and five synergized spells the iron wolfs would certainly be very strong

like Fire Bolt + fire ball + Fire Mastery + Enchant + Warmth with Magefist, Flickering Flame, Arachnid Mesh, Chains of Honor, socketed Hexfire and Spirit.. beats fire zon in power probably

or Nova + Static Field + Telekinesis+ Energy Shield + Lightning Mastery with socketed griffon, Crescent Moon Runeword, Spirit, Skin of the Vipermagi, Arachnid Mesh and Frostburn.. will be very strong and survivable

You can basically already do those builds without arach and Magefist and they suck. This is not an itemization issue, it's a poor damage issue.

Skills from items don't add to synergies, only hard points count.

Obviously, more fcr means faster attack means more damage.
But at the same time, Emilio would get more IAS means faster attack means more damage.

In the end, same problem: Emilio beats the iron wolf. Not much maths needed to figure this out.

I know only hard points add to synergies. Yet currently the mercs go far beyond 20 hard points on their skills, and that adds to their synergies (as far as I can tell). That's why I compare lvl 30 firebolt effect vs lvl 20 firebolt + lvl 20 Fire Mastery

But regardless, skill / gear would make a3 more viable for three reasons

1) we compare vs monsters and not vs other mercs. if a3 can do more vs monsters, he is more viable
2) casters scale more with skills than physical characters
3) casters, a3 included, have aoe effects, while physical characters, a2 and a5 included, are limited to single target dmg and utility

vued wrote: 8 hours ago

ganseng wrote: 16 hours ago

let's do the math for the fire guy

40 fcr more = 13 fps instead of 15 (with vipermagi), or 15% more dps

Warmth & Fire Mastery synergy = 8x more dmg on Enchant. substantial enough, especially for summoners

Fireball will get approximately same dmg from 20 points in Fire Mastery & 20 points in Fire Bolt as say 30 points in Fire Bolt.. but a few k dmg per Fireball at a decent cast rate is good and beats some existing characters

and Boots can provide extra str to equip Spirit much earlier, or double Phoenix e.g.

so i'd say it does make a difference

and if you further customize by adding a latent sunder charm and some blue charms, it certainly gets interesting

vued wrote: 16 hours ago

You can basically already do those builds without arach and Magefist and they suck. This is not an itemization issue, it's a poor damage issue.

Skills from items don't add to synergies, only hard points count.

Obviously, more fcr means faster attack means more damage.
But at the same time, Emilio would get more IAS means faster attack means more damage.

In the end, same problem: Emilio beats the iron wolf. Not much maths needed to figure this out.

wait a new a4 with curses is just an idea so far

kerph wrote: 7 hours ago

I think a4 should probably be utility-focused rather than damage-focused. Some damage would be nice but i don't ever find myself gearing my merc for damage. That's my job! (except for my uber necro merc)

Like i think a niche build where your a4 does all the damage would be cool but i don't think it would help with the actual issue of him going unused for most players

If he had Lower Resist though ... Or Revive...