Summon Pass

[kathy1234]

If summon monsters get buffed up as OP suggested, no one will buy gold seal hirelings anymore.

[Captain_Wizbang]

, they need to be kept on par.

On par w/ another mmo?

Please, no more my little kitty stuff.

[Enderoc]

Hold up, someone had a good idea....allow lower level summons to generate more summoned creatures when cast by a higher level caster. Makes sense to me.

[vystal]

Well if they were to overhaul summons I think this is not a bad road map. On the other hand, I personally have no interest in using up development time to improve summoned creatures. I will take content, level cap increases, new races/classes etc all long before I would have any real interest in seeing my summoned creatures improved.

[bsquishwizzy]

Hold up, someone had a good idea....allow lower level summons to generate more summoned creatures when cast by a higher level caster. Makes sense to me.

You think you've got problems with lag now? All of those summons will create increased traffic, and will generate lag. So no, it's a bad idea.

I can almost GUARANTEE you, it'll never happen.

[kathy1234]

You think you've got problems with lag now? All of those summons will create increased traffic, and will generate lag. So no, it's a bad idea.

I can almost GUARANTEE you, it'll never happen.

It wont generate as much traffic as you thought, maybe from 0.4kb to 1kb per second. It was big traffic 10 years ago when DDO was launched, but it shouldn't be any problem now. Or we won't get hireling or companion or pet....etc.

All lags comes from server lag not traffic lag. Yes, ALL lags.

[jsm123]

You think you've got problems with lag now? All of those summons will create increased traffic, and will generate lag. So no, it's a bad idea.

I can almost GUARANTEE you, it'll never happen.

As kathy1234 is saying. We are getting into very high traffic capacity with up to 1gbs services such as Google Fiber. One thing to add however is that it isn't just server side that could cause lag but also client side. With every online service, there is a small amount of latency from the server to the client and vice versa. If you have an ill-equipped machine, then the client will not be able to keep up with the data transfer from and to the server (same goes for the server). Most, if not all, game servers use algorithms which sort of anticipate where you will be, what you will do, etc in that moment of latency. If the client sends back data that does not match up with what the server has, then another piece of code must be executed in order to force either the client or the server to regain synchronicity. This is why when sometimes you swear you were jumping to the ledge in front of you, suddenly you end up either back where you were or a bit off where you were going. So these small number of summon instances mean nothing to traffic. Also, there are party size limits so there is a finite number of summons at any moment. The biggest problem may arise from raid parties like how a raid full of Pale Masters can really weigh down a client and/or server (though this is from particle effects from spells, various enhancements, and equipment which take up more memory than the mesh of a character).

I very much like this idea nibel. +1

And the idea of lower level summon spells gaining a larger quantity of instances as your caster level increases is an awesome idea and one that I've been hoping to be implemented in this game for months now.

[jsm123]

If summon monsters get buffed up as OP suggested, no one will buy gold seal hirelings anymore.

Who uses gold seal hirelings?

[Tlorrd]

I like some of the suggestions of the OP ... here is how I'd modify it ...

1. Summons CR is based on your Conjuration DC (this will make it scalable into epics (EE especially). Since monster CRs are into the 60s+ (if not more). Also those who are conjuration specialist can really work this. Druids get this as a capstone, clerics as past life feats, and obviously the spell itself is conjuration based.

2. You can use heighten feat to increase the CR just like a regular spell thus if you like a certain summons from a level you can boost it to 9th level (or 6th in some cases, can't remember if Bard/Warlock have summons).

3. Use the hireling bar to control your summons. That coding is already in place and easy to transpose to a summoned monster/animal

4. T5 Magister Grand Summoner adds Champion Buff to your summons! It is T5 thus you have to be in Magister to use this wonderful enhancement and it cannot be twisted.

I think these few simple changes can really add to the summons variant of the game.

[illuminar]

All too complicated for a marginally used ability.

We just need a simple solution, both for players and developers. My idea of what that looks like...

Effectively give summons unlimited HP. They stay as long as their timers allows.

When they run out of xp they are stunned for n seconds. Augment summoning and enhancements reduce the stun time, possibly eliminating it. Summons continue to be mostly undirected distractions for mobs.

Pets and hirelings remain untouched, they work enough to be useful, not so good that they can carry anyone, which in my opinion is the perfect spot for them.