Journey's End 1.4.4: Balance Feedback and Discussion Thread

[qwerty3.14]

Looking at the light levels of these light pets there really doesn't seem to be too big of a diffrence between them, I'd probably just use whichever fits my characters aesthetics the best.

 

[Full Metal Kirby]

-Betsy’s Wrath damage buff? Yeah, uh. If we’re nerfing the damage of Ichor to 15 (a good change, btw), then Betsy’s Wrath just gets that much better in comparison. Not to mention its massive damage buff by almost *double*. Combined with the debuff, it essentially has a hit damage of 130 now, AND has a powerful synergy with any other weapon. I think it did need a buff due to the difficulty of OOA, but holy.

From a rough bit of testing in endgame gear, assuming all shots hit:
Betsy's Wrath: ~2.5k DPS average
Razorpine: ~3k DPS average
Nebula Blaze: ~2.3k DPS average

Given that Betsy's Wrath is heavily affected by gravity making it fairly hard to hit all/any shots, and the latter is a homing pillar weapon that basically never misses, I'd say it's in a pretty good place now for how difficult OOA is in higher difficulties.

If anything was needing to be changed with it, it's probably still too weak, because unless you're basically point blank or firing at ideal angles, you're rarely going to be hitting with all three shots that get fired, making the practical DPS more around 1.8k-2k, if not less.

That said, I think it's in an okay place now. The fact it can be more than just a "debuff and switch to a better weapon" tool now is a very good thing.

 

[Leinfors]

I will say that my Betsy's Wrath numbers were based on number testing against similar tier equipment, and took into account its unique aiming and trajectory (as well as its AoE/group damage effects). It wasn't just an arbitrary ballpark, though like several OOA weapons, I did go with a 2x damage multiplier to start with (because my conclusion was that it was an acceptable value).

 

[whoneedsnamestbh]

From a rough bit of testing in endgame gear, assuming all shots hit:
Betsy's Wrath: ~2.5k DPS average
Razorpine: ~3k DPS average
Nebula Blaze: ~2.3k DPS average

Given that Betsy's Wrath is heavily affected by gravity making it fairly hard to hit all/any shots, and the latter is a homing pillar weapon that basically never misses, I'd say it's in a pretty good place now for how difficult OOA is in higher difficulties.

If anything was needing to be changed with it, it's probably still too weak, because unless you're basically point blank or firing at ideal angles, you're rarely going to be hitting with all three shots that get fired, making the practical DPS more around 1.8k-2k, if not less.

That said, I think it's in an okay place now. The fact it can be more than just a "debuff and switch to a better weapon" tool now is a very good thing.

I will say that my Betsy's Wrath numbers were based on number testing against similar tier equipment, and took into account its unique aiming and trajectory (as well as its AoE/group damage effects). It wasn't just an arbitrary ballpark, though like several OOA weapons, I did go with a 2x damage multiplier to start with (because my conclusion was that it was an acceptable value).

That’s reasonable. The fact that it has the massive debuff and therefore such a massive synergy with literally anything else should bring it down a bit in my opinion, like Golden Shower, but I guess it makes sense why its damage was buffed that heavily.

 

[qwerty3.14]

From a rough bit of testing in endgame gear, assuming all shots hit:
Betsy's Wrath: ~2.5k DPS average
Razorpine: ~3k DPS average
Nebula Blaze: ~2.3k DPS average

Given that Betsy's Wrath is heavily affected by gravity making it fairly hard to hit all/any shots, and the latter is a homing pillar weapon that basically never misses, I'd say it's in a pretty good place now for how difficult OOA is in higher difficulties.

If anything was needing to be changed with it, it's probably still too weak, because unless you're basically point blank or firing at ideal angles, you're rarely going to be hitting with all three shots that get fired, making the practical DPS more around 1.8k-2k, if not less.

That said, I think it's in an okay place now. The fact it can be more than just a "debuff and switch to a better weapon" tool now is a very good thing.

Bety's wraith has to big advantages those other two weapons have.

It lowers defense- what this weapon is known for this is the only weapon that can lower defense this well, it practicly outclasses the kaelidiscope thanks to its range and debuff duration. Even if the damage of this weapon was dropped to 1 it would still see some use.

It has splash damage- in crowd control settings this weapon leaves the other two in the dust, usually crowd control weapons have worse overall dps to make up for it.

This is somewhat of a minor advantage but it's more accurate than the razorpine- the razorpine is a bit less accurate than the betsy's wraith even when attack a target at mid range the razorpine's dps drops to a much more comparable to betsy's wraith. at long range there is just no competition, although bet's accuracy struggle's a bit razorpine just becomes sprinkles. Obviously both weapons are less acurrate than the blaze.

 

[Masked Koopa]

Since balancing is actively being looked at for now, I want to just say that I think a lot of the summons need to be retuned.

Basically there are far too many summons who's main limiting factor is that they suck at actually targeting things. The blade staff, terraprisma and sanguine staff are all examples of how to do summons correctly, and I think the same treatment needs to be given to the other summons.

1. First up - All hardmode melee minions need to be able to latch onto enemies in some form like the spiders and/or be made fast enough to follow every boss. All of them. The fact of the matter is that while there are events with slow or ground based minions, the majority of the "meat" of this game is flying boss enemies that move at high speeds, and the best way to deal with those is through fast movement through the air. Summoner especially NEEDS to play this way, because their defense stats are the lowest in the game, and as a result the melee minions just end up constantly chasing the boss around. It doesn't even have to be the same as the spiders - the way the blade staff and terraprisma attack enemies is also effective. There's a reason that the Xeno staff is considered the best summon - it has that reliability that the other summons lack. If any minions become overpowered as a result of this, I don't think anyone would mind if they received a nerf to their damage either. The common consensus is that reliability trumps raw damage output when it comes to minions.
2. Second of all - The "return range" needs to be increased if an enemy is tagged, or just increased in general for non-ranged minions. While it may seem overpowered to be able to have minions attacking a target off screen, the fact of the matter is that this is already exactly what the other classes are able to do with guns, throwing knives, any ranged magic spell, etc. If the player is able to move fast enough to keep a boss off screen, then they shouldn't be punished for playing summoner in a situation where no other class is.
3. Third of all - Minions need to phase through blocks when trying to follow the player. It's fine to not allow minions to attack through walls, but it's not fine that a multitude of minions are completely neutered by trying to use them in a cave. It doesn't add anything, it just makes dealing with enemies while caving a pain. Deadly spheres and Optic staff come to mind especially.

Finally there's the case of turret minions - these need a buff. With the addition of the dungeon defenders armour sets, it's pretty clear that a turret based summoner is meant to be a reasonably viable playstyle for summoner.

The first problem is that the other three DD turrets all play second fiddle to the ballista, with it providing good crowd control as well as the best direct damage. While I can't speak for how to adequately buff the explosive staff (which might be good now) or lighting aura, I can 100% say that the flameburst towers are underpowered. Which brings me to the second point - the turrets are just bad at dealing with bosses. I think the best way to fix this would be to make the flameburst turrets no longer have their limited FOV, and to instead make the bonus effect of the armour to give the turret's fireballs homing, as well as considerable range. The ballista could also be given a projectile speed increase to make it better at dealing with bosses (but somewhat less so than the flameburst), but be given a pierce of only 1 or 2 extra to make the other two staves the king of crowd control.

The second problem is that the Moon lord turrets are just... bad. The other moon lord weapons are all super insane weapons capable of decimating powerful enemies, but the lunar portal and crystal just don't match up with the DD turrets at all. I understand that the main reason behind this is because all classes can use at least 1, and making them powerful would therefore be a boost to all classes rather than just summoner.

• One way of fixing this would be to lower the damage of the weapons to a significant degree and give them very high rates of fire, so that summoner boosting equipment and whipes result in a substantial boosts in power, while other classes will find that the armour of enemies is reducing the turret damage to 1. This could be bypassed through the use of betsy's wrath or ichor, but that would still be fine since that's the user supporting their minions as a summoner would.
• They could also just be directly boosted by the stardust armour in some form, or be able to be powered up similar to the stardust dragon, with multiple summons resulting in significantly increasing returns in power.
• Alternatively just accept that all classes will be able to give themselves a small boost with a moon lord sentry. Summoner can already use guns or yoyos or whatever they want as ranged damage, I really don't think it's a problem, especially not now that things like the zenith are allowed to exist.

Speaking of which, the stardust armour should ideally either give an increased turret cap as well, or have some sort of toggle similar to stealth mode on vortex armour to swap between boosted sentry counts or boosted minion counts. I understand that terraprisma is meant to be the ultimate summoner weapon, but these are from the final boss in the entire game, they should have power levels that actually represent that rather than just being mediocre dps boosts. Right now the "ultimate" summoner armour barely makes a difference.


Finally, some thoughts on individual cases:

• Sharknados need to have homing projectiles. This summon is the highest tier summon that can be obtained before the lunar events (minus terraprisma of course, but that's an "extra" if anything), and the projectile speed increase just doesn't cut it. I think that this minion is awesome, but it's total lack of reliability means that it is just accepted as an inferior version of the xeno staff, and these small buffs won't suddenly change that. While it is entirely possible that this will result in the minion becoming overpowered, reliability is always king when it comes to minions, so even a pretty substantial damage nerf would still make this a buff overall.
• Xeno staff didn't need the nerf. Not much to say here, the only point in time where I think an argument could have been made is before 1.4's dynamic minion damage, but overall they're just... not overpowered. Better than ravens and sharknado? Absolutely, but that's because the latter two are really, really unreliable while the Xeno staff isn't. While I don't think the nerf has had a substantial impact on its usefulness, I don't think it was justified either.
• Same as above, I don't think the sanguine staff needed a nerf. Dreadnautilus is honestly more difficult to deal with than a lot of other bosses, in large part because of the unreliability of actually summoning one, as well as the very difficult to avoid projectile spam attacks. It just wasn't overwhelmingly powerful for the tier of power it occupied. Although once again, I doubt the nerf will impact it too harshly.
• Give spooky armour slightly more defense than tiki armour, and make it require chlorophyte. It's pretty clear at this point that spooky armour is meant to occupy the same spot as Shroomite, Beetle and Spectral armours, so it may as well require chlorophyte like the other three. It's clearly not trying to be a sidegrade anymore, and giving it less defense is just silly.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and scutlix mount deserves a speed buff. It's VERY hard to get due to the rarity of scutlix gunners, and it just doesn't make sense for it to be the same speed as a UFO. I think making it capable of 62 mph would be fair - same as rudolph but without the flight time, and still making the funny tree mount a viable choice. Just felt like this belonged here since the eye lasers are summon damage

 

[qwerty3.14]

1. First up - All hardmode melee minions need to be able to latch onto enemies in some form like the spiders and/or be made fast enough to follow every boss. All of them. The fact of the matter is that while there are events with slow or ground based minions, the majority of the "meat" of this game is flying boss enemies that move at high speeds, and the best way to deal with those is through fast movement through the air. Summoner especially NEEDS to play this way, because their defense stats are the lowest in the game, and as a result the melee minions just end up constantly chasing the boss around. It doesn't even have to be the same as the spiders - the way the blade staff and terraprisma attack enemies is also effective. There's a reason that the Xeno staff is considered the best summon - it has that reliability that the other summons lack. If any minions become overpowered as a result of this, I don't think anyone would mind if they received a nerf to their damage either. The common consensus is that reliability trumps raw damage output when it comes to minions.
2. Second of all - The "return range" needs to be increased if an enemy is tagged, or just increased in general for non-ranged minions. While it may seem overpowered to be able to have minions attacking a target off screen, the fact of the matter is that this is already exactly what the other classes are able to do with guns, throwing knives, any ranged magic spell, etc. If the player is able to move fast enough to keep a boss off screen, then they shouldn't be punished for playing summoner in a situation where no other class is.

1. I don't think all minions need to be able to keep up with fast flying bosses as long as the have some other niche to make up for it. Although currently the only minions that struggle with flying bosses but are still strong enough to be useful outside of of boss fights are the vamp frog and the spider. For example I think the desert tiger should get a BIG damage buff so that it gets maul to few targets its able to reliably deal with.
2. I never really had issues with minions range, just that when they do wander too far the slow ones are disabled for a long time, I think just increasing the return speed of these minions would be more appropriate. Minions are already able to reach the edge of the screen and I think that's far enough since you generally want to keep threats on screen so that you can actually see what they're doing.

Finally, some thoughts on individual cases:

• Sharknados need to have homing projectiles. This summon is the highest tier summon that can be obtained before the lunar events (minus terraprisma of course, but that's an "extra" if anything), and the projectile speed increase just doesn't cut it. I think that this minion is awesome, but it's total lack of reliability means that it is just accepted as an inferior version of the xeno staff, and these small buffs won't suddenly change that. While it is entirely possible that this will result in the minion becoming overpowered, reliability is always king when it comes to minions, so even a pretty substantial damage nerf would still make this a buff overall.

I haven't tried the buffed sharknados yet, however I would rather sharknados keep something to distiguish it from xeno, I'd like to see the sharknado be a slower, less acurrate but more damaging alternative to the ufo. Basicly I'd like to see it be a 'bomber' minion while the xeno staff is a 'fighter' minion.

Xeno staff didn't need the nerf. Not much to say here, the only point in time where I think an argument could have been made is before 1.4's dynamic minion damage, but overall they're just... not overpowered. Better than ravens and sharknado? Absolutely, but that's because the latter two are really, really unreliable while the Xeno staff isn't. While I don't think the nerf has had a substantial impact on its usefulness, I don't think it was justified either.

Xeno staff was a tad bit to strong, it's arguably better than the stardust cell staff and that's supposed to be in a higher tier... obivously it's not comparable to the stardust dragon but honestly no weapon that isn't 'super endgame' comes close to the stardust dragon.

I think ravens are actually a fairly reliable minion, not to the level of the sanguine or xeno but far from unusable.

Give spooky armour slightly more defense than tiki armour, and make it require chlorophyte. It's pretty clear at this point that spooky armour is meant to occupy the same spot as Shroomite, Beetle and Spectral armours, so it may as well require chlorophyte like the other three. It's clearly not trying to be a sidegrade anymore, and giving it less defense is just silly.

Adding chlorophyte to the recipe feels kind of unnessary, it's already a bit annoying how much spooky wood it takes to craft it. As for the defense... it doesn't really matter. Especially in higher diffculties a few extra points of defense doesn't really help much.

 

[TrouserSnivy]

I don't really have a great suggestion for anything around this since I'm not familiar enough with the numbers in this game to provide anything meaningful. But I was wanting to ask what exactly the team's goal for balancing is. Or specifically why mixed sets were target-nerfed and the solar armor was buffed.
Is the goal for only one set per chapter of the game to be truly good?
Were mixed sets seen as an unintentional and abusive way to use the armor sets that were intended to be used specifically with turret summons?
Was there any consideration for reworking the point of the Tavernkeep sets to be around making mixed sets instead of around using turrets?
Just wondering what the mindset and intent around this sort of thing is, not suggesting that I know how they should be.

If this has already been addressed elsewhere, sorry for repeating it.

 

[qwerty3.14]

I don't really have a great suggestion for anything around this since I'm not familiar enough with the numbers in this game to provide anything meaningful. But I was wanting to ask what exactly the team's goal for balancing is. Or specifically why mixed sets were target-nerfed and the solar armor was buffed.
Is the goal for only one set per chapter of the game to be truly good?
Were mixed sets seen as an unintentional and abusive way to use the armor sets that were intended to be used specifically with turret summons?
Was there any consideration for reworking the point of the Tavernkeep sets to be around making mixed sets instead of around using turrets?
Just wondering what the mindset and intent around this sort of thing is, not suggesting that I know how they should be.

If this has already been addressed elsewhere, sorry for repeating it.

Solar armor used to be quite underwhelming, it used to have less offensive bonuses than beetle shell set and worse defensive effect than beetle shell, wich is a bit underwhelming for an endgame armor. A lot of player would literally just use nebula armor for their melee builds because its set bonus trumped solar armor's stats.

Mixed armor sets are still viable and incredibly strong, you just need to rethink some combos.

 

[Masked Koopa]

1. I don't think all minions need to be able to keep up with fast flying bosses as long as the have some other niche to make up for it. Although currently the only minions that struggle with flying bosses but are still strong enough to be useful outside of of boss fights are the vamp frog and the spider. For example I think the desert tiger should get a BIG damage buff so that it gets maul to few targets its able to reliably deal with.

I would agree, but ultimately there just are not enough minions to properly facilitate this kind of progression. The other classes generally have at least 5 different equally (ish) viable weapons to use at every stage of the game, but summoner is generally a linear matter. The only reason certain summons get used over their later counterparts is because the later counterparts just don't do much of value.

2. I never really had issues with minions range, just that when they do wander too far the slow ones are disabled for a long time, I think just increasing the return speed of these minions would be more appropriate. Minions are already able to reach the edge of the screen and I think that's far enough since you generally want to keep threats on screen so that you can actually see what they're doing.

It's moreso an issue in multiplayer I would assume, which I where I spend most of my time. Another player drawing boss aggro can often mean the boss repeatedly going off screen. Either way it would be nice if tagging would at least extend the range by a little.

I haven't tried the buffed sharknados yet, however I would rather sharknados keep something to distiguish it from xeno, I'd like to see the sharknado be a slower, less acurrate but more damaging alternative to the ufo. Basicly I'd like to see it be a 'bomber' minion while the xeno staff is a 'fighter' minion.

The problem with this is that there's no reason for this alternative to exist. It's not for gameplay, because you're not the one firing at enemies, and your control over your minion's aim is practially none. And it's not for the majority of enemies either, as there are no notable matchups for the sharknadoes to deal with. Frost Moon and Pumpkin Moon both have a flying, fast boss as their most powerful enemy, same with Martians. If sharknado were a pre hardmode weapon I wouldn't even bring this up, but everything sharknados are going to go up against is something better dealt with via the xeno staff. They don't even fit the "bomber" role because their crowd capabilities are minimal.

Xeno staff was a tad bit to strong, it's arguably better than the stardust cell staff and that's supposed to be in a higher tier... obivously it's not comparable to the stardust dragon but honestly no weapon that isn't 'super endgame' comes close to the stardust dragon.

The only way you can rank Xeno as OP is on a relative scale. When it comes to actual performance vs enemies, the staff is entirely reasonable and has no easier a time than similar weapons. I'd say xenopopper is much more powerful than xeno staff, it's just that summoner's other options are all awkward and mediocre in comparison.

I think ravens are actually a fairly reliable minion, not to the level of the sanguine or xeno but far from unusable.

Ultimately they're just not reliable enough. Their slow speed and constant backtracking to the player just hampers them far too much, and there's really no reason for them to be as awkward as they are. IMO minions should be reliable above all else.

Adding chlorophyte to the recipe feels kind of unnessary, it's already a bit annoying how much spooky wood it takes to craft it. As for the defense... it doesn't really matter. Especially in higher diffculties a few extra points of defense doesn't really help much.

The main reason would be so as to give summoner an incentive to even mine chlorophyte in the first place. And if anything this would be a good way to excuse lowering the spooky wood cost at the same time. While the defense doesn't make a huge difference, I still think it would be a good way to better bring summoner in line with other classes.

 

[Ilmarinen]

that isn't why it go nerfed it was literally capable of trivializing most bosses making master mode considerably easier than expert in many fights.

A better solution I think would have been to keep it as it was and just make it a post golem drop.

Edit: OK I just tried the Black Spot with my 1.4 character and I have to say you guys REALLY overdid the nerf. It's not just slow in comparison to how it was before it's actually painfully slow even if someone was to experience it for the first time.
I saw somewhere above you said that you liked where it is in the drop progression, in that case why not just make it to where you can't use your weapon while mounted on the Black Spot and restored it to it's previous speed. It would be better to have a mount that could be used to traverse the world quickly but not useful on bosses rather than having a mount that's not useful for either purpose.
Maybe have fun with it and make it fire cannonballs when you use left click instead of swing/fire your weapon. That functionality already exists with the DCU, just swap out the laser drill for cannon fire. Probably it would have to be reduced in power from regular cannonballs since boss cheesing was your main concern. Maybe make the cannon fire inaccurate too. It wouldn't matter, just make it fun. Because the Black Spot isn't fun anymore.

 

[scientistB]

Just finished a 12 hour session on a new run (don't judge).
I'm still pre-boss but I have to say, I'm so satisfied with Summoner's early start. It was a bit of a struggle, but once I got the new Flinx gear, I immediately felt the reward of my efforts; on that note, the Flinx minions are absolute carries if you get them early enough. Their unique pattern of attack makes them reliable in more situations than I expected. Thank you for that, this is what we needed; consistency, both in reliable minion AI, and an early craftable summon. On top of that, heading into the snow biome helped me get the Bestiary completion for that immediate Leather Whip, which is easier to get now. This is good pacing.

What I'm worried about however, is the Blade Staff. While I don't mind its relocation as it eliminates some of the RNG required to get it... it's now gated behind a boss in which it excels at fighting. In past experience, Spider minions have proven to not be too consistent when fighting Queen Slime, especially when it's time to fly. And the Optic Staff straight-up won't attack at all in the second phase. When I discovered the Blade Staff, I had found my answer; a consistent minion that greatly combats this very mobile fight.
So what's the best strategy now?
This leaves me with the Sanguine Staff, the only other pre-boss summon in Hardmode (I'm going to ignore the Pirate Staff in this case because lol). With the increased drop rate, the Sanguine Staff looks quite tempting and possible to get with the right Spider setup.
The problem is, sure, the Sanguine Bats will destroy Queen Slime and get me what I need... but they also destroy everything else up to the Empress of Light and Duke. Completely nullifying my need for the Blade Staff in the process, and everything else up to the Xeno Staff.

Anyway, what I'm saying is, I'm a bit worried about how my playthrough will turn out when I get to early Hardmode. Maybe there's some new strategies I can do, such as making use of flasks on whips, that can help me perform a more consistent Queen Slime fight on a Summoner run.

 

[MageKing17]

To start with, I'm largely a fan of just about every change I've seen in this update; the Nightglow buff is especially noticeable, and I greatly appreciate Life Drain no longer draining mana when not actually hitting anything. The 20 extra mana from Celestial Cuffs is the cherry on top. Also, it's no longer in my loadout, but for Nostalgia's sake, I thank you for giving the Shadowbeam Staff some power back; I always thought it was a little overnerfed in 1.3.

There's just one change that confuses me a little:

Kaleidoscope (Buff)
- Damage increased from 165 to 180

I'm not sure why the best whip in the game needed to be buffed to the point where the Morning Star now has even less of a niche than it did before.

 

[qwerty3.14]

Hornet Staff (Buff)
- Damage increased from 9 to 11

Ok... I appreciate the buff but this is no where near enough... let me put it this way...

1.4.1 added a new minion the flinx, it has a base damage of 8 and attacks about 2x per second meaning it does around 16dps (it can attack even faster if in the right circumstance). The hornet does 11 damage, however it only attacks once per second on average, this means it does 11dps...

Ok so why is the flinx a gold/platinum tier minion doing more damage than the hornet staff a queen bee drop? And it's not just the flinx that makes the hornet look bad, you can also go blood moon fishing to get a minion that not only attacks faster than the hornet but also does more damage than it.
Oh and before someone says flinx is locked to the ground...

Gyazo Screen Video

gyazo.com

now... sure I guess there could be a few situations where the hornet staff might be better, but if you compare the other bee weapons to thier gold/platinum weapons, they are objectively better in every way, not debatable sidegrades!

Let me put it this way, say you craft a gold bow you load it with frostburn arrows and go off to kill queen bee, after defeating queen bee you're rewarded with this...

This is what it feels like 'upgrading' from the flinx staff to the hornet staff...


My suggestion is too double the hornet's attack speed, its damage ouput would still be well below hardmode minions but high enough that it may be considered an upgrade to pre boss minions.

 

[Leinfors]

There's just one change that confuses me a little:

I'm not sure why the best whip in the game needed to be buffed to the point where the Morning Star now has even less of a niche than it did before.

Morning Star is a Hardmode Dungeon weapon, which puts it as a pre-Golem weapon.

Kaleidoscope is an Empress drop, putting it soundly at at least a tier above Golem-level drops.

The two are not of the same tier and buffing Kaleidoscope has little impact on Morning Star's "tier" territory. By the time you get it, Morning Star should be well past its time.

 

[MrD108]

I have two balance ideas:

1. Wizard Hat is a drop from a rare enemy, but has suffered a serious nerf. It would be a good idea to give it a new bonus when worn with the Flinx Fur Coat as it is similar to Crystal Robes.

2. Crystal Assassin Armor got a boost to three classes in addition to the summoner.
I know it's hard because the new minion slot would be too overwhelming, so I have two ideas:

a) let the armor give minions a critical attack chance

b) have it have an extra set bonus that increases the power of summoner accessories. Eg. Pygmy Necklace = +2 Minion Capacity, Hercules Beetle / Papyrus Scarab = + 30% minion damege (but not +2 minion capacity)

 

[qwerty3.14]

2. Crystal Assassin Armor got a boost to three classes in addition to the summoner.
I know it's hard because the new minion slot would be too overwhelming, so I have two ideas:

a) let the armor give minions a critical attack chance

b) have it have an extra set bonus that increases the power of summoner accessories. Eg. Pygmy Necklace = +2 Minion Capacity, Hercules Beetle / Papyrus Scarab = + 30% minion damege (but not +2 minion capacity)

Crystal assassin already seems good, thanks to that dash it effectievly frees up an accessory slot, which if you want to you can fill with a summon accesory

 

[MageKing17]

Morning Star is a Hardmode Dungeon weapon, which puts it as a pre-Golem weapon.

Kaleidoscope is an Empress drop, putting it soundly at at least a tier above Golem-level drops.

The two are not of the same tier and buffing Kaleidoscope has little impact on Morning Star's "tier" territory. By the time you get it, Morning Star should be well past its time.

I never said (nor, I think, implied) that Morning Star was in a comparable tier to Kaleidoscope (while Empress is theoretically available pre-Golem, I can't imagine anyone actually beats her that early); however, it used to at least have a niche use in the endgame because it had the highest single-hit damage of any whip, plus the knockback. Kaleidoscope was still undeniably the best whip overall, and I'm just confused why it needed buffed when the general whip changes/fixes already gave it a considerable buff. My mental comparison, I guess, would be with the Sniper Rifle—also available from post-Plantera Dungeon, and has the highest single-shot damage in its category, even though nobody considers it the best in the game, but that very fact gives it a niche use even for an endgame character (although the zoom ability without without taking up an accessory slot also has something to do with that).

 

[SsIras]

Morning Star is a Hardmode Dungeon weapon, which puts it as a pre-Golem weapon.

Kaleidoscope is an Empress drop, putting it soundly at at least a tier above Golem-level drops.

The two are not of the same tier and buffing Kaleidoscope has little impact on Morning Star's "tier" territory. By the time you get it, Morning Star should be well past its time.

I would say Morning Star is still not very good though, it's a DPS whip that is worse than many side class weapons you could be playing as summoner at that point. But I'm okay with it staying that way.

The thing with summoner though, is that the ability to cross class does make it a lot harder to balance, this might be the reason things like Rainbow Crystal Staff and Lunar Portal didn't get a buff, because it can be used to boost your DPS without cost, but this makes getting individual summoner weapons underwhelming and may force some players to repeat an event multiple times to get gear to go along with it. Summoning weapons that are not consistent are bad on their own, but can significantly improve DPS when combining with other weapons, that's what whips are supposed to fix, and a whip that relies in doing raw damage may not be good enough even with summon boosts.

Also, I support the idea of Stardust armor giving sentries, even if it's not likely to change now

 

[Harrybo778]

To be completely honest, I was a little sad when they romoved the broken hero swords from the crafting of the true night edge and true excalibur. It just felt so right for the requirement of broken hero swords and the method to obtain them, and throughout all the times I've used the broken hero sword crafting recipes with the true swords, I began to love going through the solar eclipse and crafting the true swords. I remember the first time getting the true nights edge on my first ever world, on the last slot on the xbox 360, and it felt so rewarding.