Items Single-Target DPS Minions

VDragunov

Terrarian
Suggestions for a more proper title are very, very welcome.

So what are ST-DPS minions? Well, if you're like me, you're probably thinking straight up on the stardust dragon, which, I mean, I can't blame: That thing's a beast against bosses, but no so much against groups... Wouldn't it be neat to have more of those across the game? Specially pre-hardmode, where the summoner kinda suffers from crippling lack of power (as far as mobile goes; not sure of PC class balance) against bosses.

Also, if not specified, then recasting the staff simply makes the summoned minion deal more damage, a la stardust dragon.

First Tier: From the get-go.
This one could be found in chest/crates on the world, or by fishing

Giant Eagle/Pelican: summons giant eagles/pelicans that deal non-piercing damage by contact. The giant eagle could be found rarely on normal wooden chests and with a higher chance, on golden ones, while the pelican could be a special drop from fishing in the ocean biome.

Though functionally identical, the giant eagle is meant to deal just as much damage as the hornet staff, but with a higher dps provided by the contact damage of the summons, while the pelican staff is meant to be useful through early hardmode; both of them are meant to be weaker, faster variants of the raven staff.

Second Tier: Crimson/Corruption.
This tier could be either obtained from shadow orbs or crafted like most weapons of the biome.

Corruption variant: Purified Eater.

A shorter variant of the worm enemy you find in the corruption, doesn't attack through blocks and grows longer as you recast the summon (so... a watered down SD; I'll get more creative with the next ones, keep reading...!)

Crimson Variant: Brood Crawler

A larger variant of the blood crawler, while it does damage by contact, it's actual focus is spitting small broodlings that deal non-piercing damage to it's targets, each re-cast of the summon adds up to it's rate of fire, as well as the damage dealt by the shot broodlings.

Tier Three: Pre-Hardmode.
Crafted with hellstone bars, for the sake of theming.

Fallen Champion: An armored figure clad in black, re-casting the spell doesn't make more warriors, but it does return the one you summoned closer to it's former glory. It attacks by flying towards the enemies and (presumably) punching them really hard.
Suggested Tooltip: Freed from it's hellish prison, the champion fights for you!

Tier Four: Pre-mech bosses.
Another set of biome variants, woo!

Frozen Devourer: An upgrade of the Purified Eater, although it's raw damage isn't that great, it provides better control of those stronger enemies by inflicting both the frostburn and cursed inferno debuffs.
Suggested Tooltip: The cooler Purified Eater.

Hive Breeder: An upgrade of the Brood Crawler which actually uses beewax (along with souls of night and ichor), making the resulting summon a bee-spider abomination (we already have a wasp gun, so let's add more nightmare fuel items...!), now capable of flight, the Hive Breeder shoots broodlings which inflict the ichor and poison debuffs upon contact, and just like it's predecessor, recasting the staff increases its rate of fire.
Suggested Tooltip: Be strong, [player name], be strong for [dryad name].

Restored Champion: The hallow variant of the fallen champion, out of the three, it's meant to be the one with the greatest raw damage, as it doesn't inflict debuffs, and can now shoot terra-blade-like projectiles. re-casting makes it hit harder, faster, and make it's projectiles pierce more targets.
Suggested Tooltip: Whole once more, the champion fights for you!

---- This one should be post-golem, since it should only be unlocked after defeating Duke Fishron, but hey, if you're up for the challenge...! ----

Merfolk Warrior Staff: Summons a fishy armor-clad figure, that spams shoots blue homing projectiles that travel faster inside liquids, each minion summoned slightly increases the rate of fire of those that already were summoned (so two would have a 1.2x firing speed, 3 would have 1x3 firing speed and so on).
Sorry if I made the reference too obvious.

As for how you'd actually get the staff, here's some ideas:
  1. Fishing: It's fitting for something that's unlocked upon defeating Duke Fishron to be unlocked by fishing, also, it'd give fishing a bit more of a purpose outside of farming potions (which by the point you're fighting duke fishron, you'd usually be overstocked with anyway)
  2. Crates: again, it fits the fishing/marine theme of the staff, so unlocking it this way is actually intuitive, it'd also give you a reason to use the surplus crates you'd have if you just used them to upgrade your year all the way to adamantium/titanium without mining.
  3. Crafting: Using chlorophyte and materials from the solar eclipse (well, the solar tablet, at least) seems fitting as well; this is a merfolk warrior, after all, and solar eclipses seem to call up for their kind.
Tier Five: Pre-Golem.
Because given the right arena, ST minions with ichor/chilled would probably just bully plantera... and the golem too, but for this one I had an idea...!

Albino Lihzard Staff: Summons a wingless, flying white lihzard that charges towards your targets, they shoot pink projectiles that pierce through blocks towards far away targets.
Suggested tooltip: Bet they wish they killed them like the rest...

Tier Six: Post-Moon Lord
While the stardust dragon already does the job really nicely against the moon lord, it'd be neat to have some post-moon lord minions, such as...

Black Sapling: Summons a black, flying blob full of red eyes (so a drippler, but creepier) which charges at enemies with xeno-staff like speeds, it deals non-piercing damage, and re-casting makes it larger overall.
Suggested tooltip: Splat. Splat. Splat. Splat. Splat.

Seraphic Champion: The final tier of the --- champion staff, crafted with luminite bar and fragments of each pillar, the champion fires with a vortex-beater like weapon towards faraway targets, and seemingly hits the close ones with a daybreak.
Suggested Tooltip: restored beyond it's zenith, the champion fights for you!

Credit would also go to J. Bame 666 for helping with the suggestion.
 
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Super original and cool concepts, Summoner needs better weapons right now, especially against bosses. I particularly love how you avoided making them the classic minion that is a smaller version of another enemy, and the classic "I shoot slow projectiles" guys that are inaccurate and terrible for bosses. I would play summoner a lot more with these minions.

But as always, I have nitpicks:
  • Every single one of these Single target minions has Stardust Dragon mechanics. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but some of these (the Eagle, Albino Lizard, Merfolk Warrior) would probably fit better as multiple minions.
  • Frozen Devourer, with its Chilled/Frozen. Messing with enemy AIs like this is bound to be troublesome; there is a reason Confused is resisted by so many things. Stuff like this is either broken because it makes things way too easy to deal with, or terrible/barely relevant because it would be limited to Fighter AIs which are super simple to kill anyways. This is most likely better as just a strong Ice Worm that inflicts Cursed Inferno.
  • Hive Breeder being affected by Hive Pack. Seems kinda pointless? I mean, I would need some numbers for the bigger guys spawned, because it's really hard to justify using a Hive Pack at this point since even in Pre Hardmode it's outclassed by the Shark Tooth Necklace. If more stuff that uses Hive Pack gets added (and that item gets buffed) it could be another story.
  • Fishron Drops are based on his own attacks, the Merfolk Warrior Staff is out of place as a Duke Drop. Maybe add some new Ocean miniboss that drops it? Don't know.

And that's pretty much it. I really love these ideas, especially the Fallen Champion line.

P.S: The Single Target minion is supposed to be the Stardust Cell, the Dragon just happens to be better at that too.
 
Multiple minions have a tendency to aim for multiple targets, at least as far as I've noticed (either that or maybe I went overboard with menacing accesories), so having a single overbuffed minion seems like the easiest way to achieve high minion ST dps, but…

  • If the giant eagles were multiple minions, they could be a weaker, faster version of the raven staff, since they don't deal piercing damage, it'd be able to stack into some pretty nasty numbers, at least in prehardmode standards. As for the other two, the albino lizhard is a subtle DBZ(A) reference, hence why it's a single, strong minion, same with the merfolk warrior, it's meant to reference a boss from Undertale, so having it be multiple minions would be weird.
  • How about stacking cursed inferno and frostburn? That way it'd still fit the "double-biome" theme I gave to the tier.
  • Well I didn't know it was that bad. How about replacing the hive pack interactions with a venom debuff? Same reasoning as above.
  • How about making the merfolk warrior staff a drop from fishing in the ocean (or iron/gold crates) that is only available after defeating Fishron? That way it is at the very least locked by having to go through the goal of beating such a hard boss at least once… and it'd still fit the marine theme.
 
  • If the giant eagles were multiple minions, they could be a weaker, faster version of the raven staff, since they don't deal piercing damage, it'd be able to stack into some pretty nasty numbers, at least in prehardmode standards. As for the other two, the albino lizhard is a subtle DBZ(A) reference, hence why it's a single, strong minion, same with the merfolk warrior, it's meant to reference a boss from Undertale, so having it be multiple minions would be weird.

If the Eagle ends up becoming too insane in pHM that's a problem with the weapon's balance, not with the fact that you can summon many of them. As for the other two, unless they are literally the thing you are referencing then there really isn't a problem with having many of them.

  • How about stacking cursed inferno and frostburn? That way it'd still fit the "double-biome" theme I gave to the tier.
  • Well I didn't know it was that bad. How about replacing the hive pack interactions with a venom debuff? Same reasoning as above.

I mean, this is basically a visual thing since DoT is a very small increase to DPS to the point where not having it doesn't change a lot.

  • How about making the merfolk warrior staff a drop from fishing in the ocean (or iron/gold crates) that is only available after defeating Fishron? That way it is at the very least locked by having to go through the goal of beating such a hard boss at least once.

On one hand, there is no reason to still care about fishing at this point in the game. On the other hand, there really is no reason to fish at this point in the game so this is a good addition.
 
If the Eagle ends up becoming too insane in pHM that's a problem with the weapon's balance, not with the fact that you can summon many of them. As for the other two, unless they are literally the thing you are referencing then there really isn't a problem with having many of them.

Actually, the reason the raven staff can reach big numbers in and out of itself is a combination of the amount of accessories you have by that point in the game and the method of usage (since they don't deal piercing damage, throwing a bunch of them in a small, confined space makes the numbers rack up quickly if there's too many mobs in there; as seen with pumpkin moon farms). That's why I pointed that out.

Also since it's a weapon you can access at literally any point in the game, it'd probably have just a bit more damage than the hornet/imp staffs if actually added, unless it is locked behind fishing (as all other tools that can be acquired by this mean can last all the way up to early hardmode, for some reason)… changing eagles for pelicans would (sort of) keep the water theme, in that scenario, maybe!

As for the other point… fair enough.

I mean, this is basically a visual thing since DoT is a very small increase to DPS to the point where not having it doesn't change a lot.

Visuals are just as important as mechanics, IMO, so having this tier of staffs keep a dual-biome theme (snow-corruption, jungle-crimson & hallow-underworld) is neat, even if the way they're combined is basically aesthetic; the frostburn/poison add to the impression of it, even if they only provide a very small change to the actual DPS of the weapons.

I'll edit the starter post with the changes we discussed once I get on my laptop; thanks for the feedback 'u'/
 
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