Mercenaries need to go core!

Title. I was one of those who were sceptical at first, especially after the initial trailer. After having played a fair amount however, I completely changed my mind - mercenaries are awesome and I wish for them to stay.

They're both amazing for solo and group play alike and vastly contributed to shaking up the meta. They are build enabling, gave birth to a new archetype (solo aurabot + mercenary is very viable!) and even give value to items that find no real use otherwise. There is something very satisfying about finding a high level merc that has great skills and supports, immediately thinking about gear choices or complementary builds. I don't really have anything negative to say about them either, other than wishing for a few more slots as just three of them feels very limiting at times.

Overall I'm very pleased with how the mechanic turned out and they'd be an very welcomed addition to the core game going forward - or something to expand / improve upon every major patch.


Just make it happen, GGG :)

Instead of typing the same message out, I'll repeat what I said elsewhere:

"

No.

You don't want this added to core. Giving everyone an Animate Guardian for almost free is going to result in significant power spikes for all players. Whenever something like this happens, GGG nerfs the entire game by boosting all monster HP and damage. I've seen this happen 3 times, and each time it has, barely-viable builds are no longer viable, and the things that made builds powerful are now a necessity.

Mercs won't become an option in this scenario. They will become not only a requirement for any build, but only a specific group of mercs will become the only choice.

Trust me on this, you don't want them to go core.

"

Pizzarugi#6258 wrote:

Instead of typing the same message out, I'll repeat what I said elsewhere:

"

No.

You don't want this added to core. Giving everyone an Animate Guardian for almost free is going to result in significant power spikes for all players. Whenever something like this happens, GGG nerfs the entire game by boosting all monster HP and damage. I've seen this happen 3 times, and each time it has, barely-viable builds are no longer viable, and the things that made builds powerful are now a necessity.

Mercs won't become an option in this scenario. They will become not only a requirement for any build, but only a specific group of mercs will become the only choice.

Trust me on this, you don't want them to go core.

I still want them core. They're amongst the best things that happened to this game in a very long time.

I agree with Ulsarek and I get what u're saying Pizzarugi.

I think however, that GGG has an opportunity here to strike the right balance, because they have a way to scale content whenever u're using a Merc vs. not. They also can limit mercs obviously, make certain items not work or have their effect be reduced by some %.
Even their Auras and skills can get a less modifier pretty easily, so mercs can be pretty much a debuff at first, but scale ur build very well later on once u've set it up correctly.

As Ulsarek said it opens up alot of new build opportunities and item usages. I'd like for GGG to build them into the base game somehow and I still think it's a beta test for PoE2 aswell, so I doubt they will go away completely.

"

Sadaukar#2191 wrote:

I agree with Ulsarek and I get what u're saying Pizzarugi.

I think however, that GGG has an opportunity here to strike the right balance, because they have a way to scale content whenever u're using a Merc vs. not. They also can limit mercs obviously, make certain items not work or have their effect be reduced by some %.
Even their Auras and skills can get a less modifier pretty easily, so mercs can be pretty much a debuff at first, but scale ur build very well later on once u've set it up correctly.

As Ulsarek said it opens up alot of new build opportunities and item usages. I'd like for GGG to build them into the base game somehow and I still think it's a beta test for PoE2 aswell, so I doubt they will go away completely.

I think that's a good compromise. If they were to go core, they wouldn't be as accessible as they're right now anyway. Some are already hard to fish for, factor in a possible atlas tree investment + upfront cost on the map device and it'll already be slightly harder. There's a lot GGG could do on top, like adjusting aura levels / scaling in the very high end but overall I see so many good opportunities, it's really hard to pass.

I'm also thinking we're testing a variant for PoE 2 right now so fingers crossed. Time will tell.

If they do go core they need to be a currency sink other them items. Like if they are rare we are going to need a way to alter their skills so that its not completely RNG on if they are useable or not.

As far as them going core there are a lot of cool things they can do with them and integreation with other mechanics.


Let us hire mercs as mappers, delvers, heist runners, ect. I'd love to gear up a bunch of characters.

As far as balance goes, just make it so dori prototype only affects the wearer and the wearers minions. Adjust any other outliners as needed.

Nah, we don't need any more sub-par league mechanics going core.

"

shardklaw#0080 wrote:

Nah, we don't need any more sub-par league mechanics going core.

Mercs are a core part of many arpgs, they can improve any issues you have with it before adding it core?


What mechanics went\are core that are subpar currently?

I don't hate the general concept of mercs in core, but they would have to be so significantly different from their current incarnation that I wound honestly prefer if they didn't.

Here's what changes they need, at an absolute bare minimum, to go into core:

1 - They can't use player equipment. There's just no way around balancing this one; you could give them a 100% less damage modifier and they're still insanely overpowered as an aura/buff/MF mule.

2 - TAKE OFF WHATEVER MAGICAL SOURCE OF LESS DAMAGE TAKEN THEY HAVE FOR GODS' SAKE. This is something I genuinely can't believe didn't happen hours into the league; high level mercs just can't die, to anything. They can tank Maven memory game slams and searing exarch nukes and who knows what else, even when their stats indicate that they definitely shouldn't be able to survive. They've got some magical plot armor defense going on which seems to scale with level, and it needs to go away.

3 - There needs to be some kind of opportunity cost for using a mercenary. I don't care what it is, there are so many different options here, but it needs to exist. Right now, you would never not take a mercenary into a map with you. You would never consider not using one on any build. That sucks: it's boring and it's bad game design.

1) Then what they have specific gear like heist characters do? I think what makes them interesting is that they CAN use player equipment, outside of the chest the rest is relatively mild in comparison. As far as being powerful aura\mf, isn't that a good thing to give solo players a way to get a fraction of what party players can get?

2) So basically make them something you always leave in town for bosses? I'm ok with this in general, but then it defeats the purpose of gearing one up if they are useless in deadly situations. They absolutely can die in a lot of situations, risk maps, reflect, ect. In regular t16 maps or against some boss encounters yes they don't die.

3) There is a cost, you increase unique monster hp by 50% for something in many cases that doesn't do the damage to negate it. Aside from dori proto chances are they just enhance a build to the point where people find it interesting.



Historically speaking you always take a merc with you into content in other ARPGs unless you know they will die or aren't geared up to survive.