Minions in Sacred 2

[Mystic 0]

Either between her or the inquisitor for me these days. Both sets of their Combat Arts are "fresh" and I want a toon who's mechanisms are novel. Did you guys also check out the inquisitor's very cool Combat Arts?

 

They look and sound awfully complicated...new toys ^^

 

 

 

gogo

 

 

Hello everyone, I'm looking quite forward to Sacred 2 and am glad I can get info here, at Sacred Wiki, and at the main Sacred 2 forum.

 

When it comes to Inquisitors, Soul Reaver almost sounds like a gamebreaker. Let's see, not only do I get to raise undead minions, but they become more powerful as the army grows? Yeesh, as if Minion Masters weren't typically powerful enough in these types of games. Then, to make the ability totally ridicuolous, the minion timer resets every time a new one is raised?!

 

About the only problem such an army will probably face is flying monsters, if the minions can't hit them. Beyond that, unless there's a hidden drawback, Mininon Master Inquisitors are just going to rapidly annihilate everything in huge chunks of areas.

Edited October 1, 2008 by Mystic

[gogoblender 3,071]

Mystic, I hope you don't mind, but your comment was so interesting, that I thought it would merit it's own topic here, as what you brought up was something that I'd actually wanted to write about as well, but never got to till now. First off, welcome to DarkMatters! And we're looking forward to your visits, and what you'll be doing with Sacred 2. This is a release, that a good number of use from this site have been awaiting for a while now, and to think we're actually having the game released already in different parts of the world already is thrilling.

 

It's funny, one of the things I noticed about Sacred 2 is the different kinds of thinking involved in the Combat Arts this time around. If we examine the Combat Arts found in the original SAcred, most of them (at least the ones players liked to use) were all direct damage, with little subtlety. Of course this was fun, and for it's time, noone really expected anything else. The Vampire, of course, was a minion user, but the Seraphim's Peace was always somehow lacking.

 

Enter Sacred 2. We can see that there are at least three characters that offer Minions or followers... Inquisitor, Shadow Warrior, Dryad... I like to think that Sacred 2's take on Combat arts is a more mature, grown up vision of game mechanics, and the use of Minions with at least fifty percent of the character classes has added a lot of depth.

 

I do agree, that in a good number of other games that have offered minions, yes, it was easy to have an almost over-powered character. The Minion Master in Guild Wars, for example, was constantly re-balanced, as players found more and more ways to exploit the potential of having so many monsters attacking enemies.

 

There have always been drawbacks, however, to the use of minions. Bosses, for examples, or a group of high level elite monsters that are ranged far from where corpses or bodies can be found. Intrinsic to the nature of minion control is the use of bodies, and with this comes the time limit that all the animated bodies/minions have.

 

If you have to travel far to a group of monsters that are all relatively powerful, your minions may not even make the trip, and after one is perhaps taken out by the minions... what does the player do next?

 

And against bosses, who perhaps would not have underlings that we could convert or kill easily...the minion master would be at a loss for being able to provide support once his minions were killed off, and would therefore be forced to use secondary attacks.

 

I've of course been very happy to see so many minion opportunities shown so far by the class Combat Arts, and am looking forward to see how they will all work into builds as we discover more.

 

 

What games have you played minions with btw, was it GW?

 

 

gogo

[Mystic 0]

Gogoblender, you bring up a number of interesting points, such as the use of minions by the Dryad and Shadow Warrior as well. The reason I commented specifically on the Inquisitor's ability is sheer numbers, as the Dryad is limited to one minion (though if that minion can be a dragon like the Vampiress could do in S1...WOW). And the SW, while able to control more, will still be under a low limit. But the Inquisitor's Soul Reaver seems like it's designed to have a much higher cap, and thus able to generate the army sizes capable of flattening most monster groups.

 

Your counter points are definetly worth thinking about, especially as regards to bosses I believe.

 

As far as distance goes, I lean towards that not being too much of a problem. From the comments I've read from the main board, I'm guessing that Sacred 2 will have a fairly steady supply of enemies. So an Inquisitor Minion Master build will typically be constantly plowing into them to keep the army maintained, and I think they'll probably be able to enter into most boss fights with a full up army. However, your point about elite monsters may prove quite accurate, as strong area attacks could decimate the entire army.

 

The general main point I believe you were making, though, that Inquisitor Minion Masters will still encounter difficulties and struggle at times, should be accurate. Ascaron seems like a good developer overall, and I'm sure they've given some monsters abilities which will counter the build.

 

I did play Guild Wars for a while, and two of my characters were minion based builds. And while that didn't insure victory, they were frequently brutal on missions and freestyle maps with ease.

[Llama8 8]

Soul Reaver doesn't actually raise minions, it boosts attack & defence based on the number of monsters killed (by absorbing their souls). But since the bonus is fairly short lived, you have to keep killing.

 

It's kinda like the Daemon's Call of Death from Underworld, except it's a buff & it boosts attack/defence, not damage...

[Mystic 0]

Soul Reaver doesn't actually raise minions, it boosts attack & defence based on the number of monsters killed (by absorbing their souls). But since the bonus is fairly short lived, you have to keep killing.

 

It's kinda like the Daemon's Call of Death from Underworld, except it's a buff & it boosts attack/defence, not damage...

 

Ah, okay. I misinterpreted the description of Soul Reaver on the Sacred Wiki.

[gogoblender 3,071]

Hey Mystic!

 

Maybe this CA for the Inqusitor is the killer mm one:

 

Inexorable Subjugation

 

A channeled beam hits and petrifies the opponent. Additionally, the beam inflicts magic damage. If the opponent dies while Subjugation is active, the unfortunate soul will transform into a spectral companion of the Inquisitor.

 

It sounds good. Now let's see if we can get Schot or Llama to see if they can get it up to speed and give us feedback ^^

 

 

gogo

[Llama8 8]

Better ask Jonny for that Gogo, he's the Inquisitor expert.

[gogoblender 3,071]

Good idea. I'll pm him and see if he's got time to make a video of this CA^^

 

 

gogo