Weapons & Equip Support Minion Ideas

[Aceplante]

The amount of ways you can support or help your teammates in vanilla terraria can be counted on one hand. I already created a list of Healer/Support class Items, but I've been toying with the idea of Support Minions for a while and finally decided to post it. Feedback or other ideas/concepts would be much appreciated:

-Mini Dispenser: A small flying metal cylinder that creates thin beams of yellow energy that attach to nearby players with a range of 4-5 tiles? (similar to my medigun mentioned in the other post). Flies over to prioritize healing teammates with the lowest health first, then moves to the next lowest player that does not have a Mini Dispenser healing them already. Multiple summons would target different players each. Each Mini Dispenser heals the same amount per second regardless of how many players are near it, with no limit on how many players can be healed at once. However, summoning multiple Mini Dispensers would NOT allow their healing to stack; though multiple Mini Dispensers may be targeting you, you only gain the same rate of healing as you would with one. Due to this multi healing and advance targeting mechanic, post mech/cyborg seems fair. Or perhaps from my Martian NPC.

-Holy Pixie: I have seen suggestions for a pixie summon, so rather than yet another damage summon, perhaps this could be a healing summon instead? Distinguished by a halo, it also targets your lowest health teammate, flies over, and pulses every second or so. The range of this would be about the same as the mini dispenser.

-Cursed Shield: Floats behind players and boosts defense slightly. Obtained from the dungeon?

-Banner Goblin: A goblin that has no attacks of his own and follows his summoner around waving a rally banner. Why would you want this you ask? Because his presence boosts the DPS of all other minions by... 25%? This is one that would only really benefit the summoner class.

-A sentry that, when placed, either periodically heals (30 every 1.5 seconds?) or boosts regeneration of nearby players instead of attacking.

-A sentry that, when placed, boosts mana regeneration of nearby players instead of attacking.

-A rally banner "sentry" that boosts the melee speed of nearby players

-Tiny Builder: increases building speed by 25% and maybe range by a tile? Credit to @Depressed 0wl

Thats it for now, may add more when I think of them.

To clarify, I am aware using these means you have to sacrifice DPS. That is the point. You are playing healer, not summoner. If you're going to use a summon slot for one that heals instead of dealing damage, it is not fair to then complain about... having less damage. And to the people saying it would be "counteractive to the summoner"/"better for other classes", other classes can already use minions anyways (one by default, 2 with the buff station, 3 or more with accessories), so I think the option to have a support minion instead of one that deals damage is a reasonable sidegrade.

That being said, and so as not to make this too OP, the base healing of these items would be fairly low, on par with other regen items such as the band of regen(?) but scaling based on game stage. Also, this healing would be boosted by specific healer class armor sets and accessories (also outlined in my post: Healer/Support class Items), meaning you can only gain this increased healing if you sacrifice other stats/accessory slots.

 

[J Bame]

To clarify, I am aware this would be "counteractive to the summoner"/"better for other classes" because using these means you have to sacrifice DPS. First of all, other classes can already use minions anyways (one by default, 2 with the buff station, 3 or more with accessories). I think the option to have a support minion instead of one that deals damage is a reasonable sidegrade. Second, this allows players to have more support/healer options. What if a player wants to support/heal instead of DPS

you are aware of the problems but basically shrugged them off and barely dealt with them

let's look at the mini dispenser: In a server with 4 players, the summoner needs to summon 4 to keep everyone healed. The regen per dispenser would have to be small: If we consider Pygmy Necklace (+1 minion) and Charm of Myths (effectively +1.83 hp/s) to be about as good as each other, each dispenser can't be more than 2 hp/s. Dedicated summoner builds will have 6, 7 or more summon slots. Spending 4 slots on dispensers kills the summoner's DPS for a comparatively small amount of regeneration per player.

But you know what else you can do in a multiplayer server? non-summoners can just summon 1 dispenser for themselves, barely lose any DPS (1 uninvested minion wont do much anyways), get the same amount of regen, and the Summoner keeps all his DPS.

even if the effect scales with summon damage gear we have a similar problem. The truth is that again, while the 3 minion slots non summoners get are useful, they really dont add that much DPS. If instead of a small increase in damage output you could get something more useful like regeneration or more DPS to your main weapon you will basically always go for it instead. Meanwhile a dedicated summoner won't summon more than 1 or 2 because then the DPS cost starts getting too high to consider a passive buff.

It'd be extremely hard to find a balance where the support minion isn't just a free passive buff for non-summoners at the cost of barely any DPS, isn't too much of a sacrifice to DPS to be worth it as a dedicated summoner, and doesn't make the summoner an OP buffer machine in multiplayer

-Banner Goblin: A goblin that has no attacks of his own and follows his summoner around waving a rally banner. Why would you want this you ask? Because his presence boosts the DPS of all other minions by... 25%? This is one that would only really benefit the summoner class.

this kind of thing would change summoner gameplay a lot but in a really really bad way.

Summoning a minion gives more DPS. Summoning a minion that boosts the damage of other minions is more DPS. So which one is better? Whichever one gives you more total DPS. How do you figure that out? Trial and error or a ton of digging and calculating minion DPS.

The result is that for every summoner build ever, you will have to calculate exactly how much DPS your minions have to see if summoning one of these is optimal or not. This doesn't add any "depth" because gameplay is the exact same, you just made it a lot more difficult to figure out a good loadout

Also this is insanely overpowered if it affects another player's minions. To put it simply two players will just summon one of these and get 50% more damage each. With 4 players you double the summoner damage of each of them, and so on.

-A sentry that, when placed, either periodically heals (30 every 1.5 seconds?) or boosts regeneration of nearby players instead of attacking.

-A sentry that, when placed, boosts mana regeneration of nearby players instead of attacking.

-A rally banner "sentry" that boosts the melee speed of nearby players(?)

The problem is even worse with sentries

Sentries dont move so they have very limited range, meaning their damage contribution in boss fights is always pretty negligible unless you change your entire build and playstyle to accomodate them. Therefore most of the time you just skip sentries against bosses for being more trouble than worth.

But if you make a sentry that's one passive buff, the only condition is to be near one of them (Make the buff stack and everyone will just pack them all in one place and facetank everything). Staying near one of your 2-3 sentries is far easier than leading the boss into 2-3 sentries' range, so everyone will use this against every boss. And because nothing locks it to the summoner class, all players in a server will spam these everywhere and get a lot of free buffs without any change to their loadout or playstyle.

The result? Everyone gets a lot of passive buffs and barely lose any dps



the big TLDR is that support minions are a very dangerous idea that will need a lot of careful planning and testing to work properly

 

[Big Sammich]

J Bame is right. I do genuinely think that support minions can work, and I'd like to see them in the game, but balancing them properly would be really, really hard. Not to mention that making them just as good for non-Summoners as they are for Summoners makes them extremely unbalanced in multiplayer, to an unsalvagable level.

 

[Aceplante]

J Bame is right. I do genuinely think that support minions can work, and I'd like to see them in the game, but balancing them properly would be really, really hard. Not to mention that making them just as good for non-Summoners as they are for Summoners makes them extremely unbalanced in multiplayer, to an unsalvagable level.

Then decreased healing to self so they're better as a multiplayers support option?

 

[Aceplante]

you are aware of the problems but basically shrugged them off and barely dealt with them

I view support minions as a reasonable sidegrade, so what I'm saying is I dont think there is a problem at all.

let's look at the mini dispenser: In a server with 4 players, the summoner needs to summon 4 to keep everyone healed. The regen per dispenser would have to be small: If we consider Pygmy Necklace (+1 minion) and Charm of Myths (effectively +1.83 hp/s) to be about as good as each other, each dispenser can't be more than 2 hp/s. Dedicated summoner builds will have 6, 7 or more summon slots. Spending 4 slots on dispensers kills the summoner's DPS for a comparatively small amount of regeneration per player.

okay? and? Again, these are intended to be used as support minions to help other players. I'm aware that it would be at the cost of your own DPS. But some players would want that and be okay with (oh no, how tragic) "losing dps" in exchange for being able to heal instead. You can't expect to do both for free (healing but also maintaining full dps). However, I was thinking about how I would handle summoning multiple. One of my ideas was that you would summon one dispenser that gains increased range and HpS per summon rather than multiple smaller ones, but ultimately decided a bunch of smaller ones that track players would be better. As for it being negligible... read on:

But you know what else you can do in a multiplayer server? non-summoners can just summon 1 dispenser for themselves, barely lose any DPS (1 uninvested minion wont do much anyways), get the same amount of regen, and the Summoner keeps all his DPS.

I admit I didn't think of that when I was originally making this post, but even now, I dont really see a problem with that. Players can already get a few summons for free anyways, so this would simply provide an alternative option.

even if the effect scales with summon damage gear we have a similar problem. The truth is that again, while the 3 minion slots non summoners get are useful, they really dont add that much DPS. If instead of a small increase in damage output you could get something more useful like regeneration or more DPS to your main weapon you will basically always go for it instead. Meanwhile a dedicated summoner won't summon more than 1 or 2 because then the DPS cost starts getting too high to consider a passive buff.

In response to the "dps cost" comment, read above. Thats the point if you wish to play healer instead of summoner. Again, you cant possible expect to have support summons while maintaining full dps. However, I do agree that the base healing should be low, and would only be boosted by various support class accessories and armor sets as I mentioned in my other post. That way, it would be powerful if used by a dedicated healer, yet not too OP as a passive for other classes.

It'd be extremely hard to find a balance where the support minion isn't just a free passive buff for non-summoners at the cost of barely any DPS, isn't too much of a sacrifice to DPS to be worth it as a dedicated summoner, and doesn't make the summoner an OP buffer machine in multiplayer

Just as the "DPS you're sacrificing would be barely anything", the "passive buff" would also be fairly minor unless you also use tons of support class accessories and an armor set. So for other classes, this would only really be helpful as a small passive buff to healing outside of combat.

Summoning a minion gives more DPS. Summoning a minion that boosts the damage of other minions is more DPS. So which one is better? Whichever one gives you more total DPS. How do you figure that out? Trial and error or a ton of digging and calculating minion DPS.

The result is that for every summoner build ever, you will have to calculate exactly how much DPS your minions have to see if summoning one of these is optimal or not. This doesn't add any "depth" because gameplay is the exact same, you just made it a lot more difficult to figure out a good loadout

uh, I cant imagine that most players are going to do calculus every time just to find out how to min-max your DPS. I just picked a random percentage, and the number can certainly be adjusted to whatever would be balanced, but this ultimately boils down to if you like him then sure why not, but if you dont then you dont have to. Also, I think the idea of minions that are only beneficial to the summoner class would be good.

Also this is insanely overpowered if it affects another player's minions. To put it simply two players will just summon one of these and get 50% more damage each. With 4 players you double the summoner damage of each of them, and so on.

I was kind of going back and forth on this, which is why I intentionally left it vague. On one hand it would be easier to balance if it didn't affect other players, but then is only beneficial to yourself soo...

The problem is even worse with sentries

Sentries dont move so they have very limited range, meaning their damage contribution in boss fights is always pretty negligible unless you change your entire build and playstyle to accomodate them. Therefore most of the time you just skip sentries against bosses for being more trouble than worth.

But if you make a sentry that's one passive buff, the only condition is to be near one of them (Make the buff stack and everyone will just pack them all in one place and facetank everything). Staying near one of your 2-3 sentries is far easier than leading the boss into 2-3 sentries' range, so everyone will use this against every boss. And because nothing locks it to the summoner class, all players in a server will spam these everywhere and get a lot of free buffs without any change to their loadout or playstyle.

The result? Everyone gets a lot of passive buffs and barely lose any dps

I cant imagine any of these would be too op, so again, using these instead of DPS seems fine to me, even for other classes.

the big TLDR is that support minions are a very dangerous idea that will need a lot of careful planning and testing to work properly

Sure, I'll agree to that.

Soo TLDR: these affects would be minor and only boosted with healing specific armor sets and accessories so as not to be too OP when inevitably used by other classes (which I think is fine). Also edited the last part of the original post, plus added a new item

 

[Seagull of Rage]

-Holy Pixie: I have seen suggestions for a pixie summon, so rather than yet another damage summon, perhaps this could be a healing summon instead? Distinguished by a halo, it also targets your lowest health teammate, flies over, and pulses every second or so. The range of this would be about the same.

What would the pulse do? Besides that it fits thematically and makes logical sense.

-Banner Goblin: A goblin that has no attacks of his own and follows his summoner around waving a rally banner. Why would you want this you ask? Because his presence boosts the DPS of all other minions by... 25%? This is one that would only really benefit the summoner class.

The only way I could see this not being OP is if you could only summon one, and you did not benefit from you allies minions. Even then, its quite a significant increase.

To clarify, I am aware using these means you have to sacrifice DPS. That is the point. You are playing healer, not summoner. If you're going to use a summon slot for one that heals instead of dealing damage, it is not fair to then complain about... having less damage. And to the people saying it would be "counteractive to the summoner"/"better for other classes", other classes can already use minions anyways (one by default, 2 with the buff station, 3 or more with accessories), so I think the option to have a support minion instead of one that deals damage is a reasonable sidegrade.

This is completely ignoring the entire issue. One minion isn't a significant increase as a summoners power comes from having many of them. A boost to health regen is essentialy saving a accesory slot, and is really good, and doesn't cost anything.

 

[Aceplante]

What would the pulse do? Besides that it fits thematically and makes logical sense.

Just heal I guess? Perhaps it could also have the unique bonus of clearing debuffs (or reducing them by 20% each pulse so as not to be OP).

The only way I could see this not being OP is if you could only summon one, and you did not benefit from you allies minions. Even then, its quite a significant increase.

I dont mind either way. If this is really a balance concern then sure it can only affect its summoner and no one else. I see no problem with summoning multiple becuase keep in mind each of these take up a minion slot. So if I had 7 minion slots for example, I could summon 4 to allow my last three minions to do 100% more, or double, damage. And considering that takes 4 minion slots to do, seems balanced to me.

This is completely ignoring the entire issue. One minion isn't a significant increase as a summoners power comes from having many of them. A boost to health regen is essentialy saving a accesory slot, and is really good, and doesn't cost anything.

It costs a minion slot, which is one they couldn't use for something else. And as mentioned, to make them still useful but way better for a dedicated healer, these support minions would be boosted by healing armor sets/accessories.

 

[Big Sammich]

I dont mind either way. If this is really a balance concern then sure it can only affect its summoner and no one else. I see no problem with summoning multiple becuase keep in mind each of these take up a minion slot. So if I had 7 minion slots for example, I could summon 4 to allow my last three minions to do 100% more, or double, damage. And considering that takes 4 minion slots to do, seems balanced to me.

If you had 7 minions, and sacrificed four of them to double the damage of the remaining three, that would just be giving up damage. Those three minions would do the damage of six minions, but slower. If you just summoned all seven of your minions normally you'd have more damage.

 

[Seagull of Rage]

If you had 7 minions, and sacrificed four of them to double the damage of the remaining three, that would just be giving up damage. Those three minions would do the damage of six minions, but slower. If you just summoned all seven of your minions normally you'd have more damage.

Technically invincibility frames exist, so not as efficient l. Good point though.