Minions are not fun (so far) / Hardcore

Currently playing a witch (level 11) on hardcore.

Whats a minion build look like so far?
A lot of contagion and essence drain casting... because there isnt actually anything to do in terms of minion gameplay.

Minions are being recast automatically, and they neither deal any damage nor do they have any kind of survivability... so you are just stuck casting contagion and essence drain (or any other random different spell).

I dont know what minion gameplay looks like on higher levels, but right now it feels very bad and quite boring.

In boss fights you are basically running around 90% of the time dodging and not doing anything, waiting for minions to be recast, so you can get a few more real spells off.

So far i dont know what the intended gameplay purpose for minions is, whether it is just meant as a support "meat shield" for later levels (as they die instantly right now even to white mobs), or to actually clear maps, which they also cannot do right now as they deal literally no damage before dying to white mobs.

This is just early game feedback right now, might change later on.

I'm also currently level 11 as a Merc with Minions. I use Snipers + Flame Wall. Sniper with +2 additional projectile (also work with their active ability) and the support gem that make them stay 4s when they die. I think the later is a must for any DpS oriented Minions for boss as like you said they die everytime they get hit by anything. Also, their regular attacks don't do much to boss (maybe later when you can have more of them but with only 2 Snipers currently it's really underwhelming). So, I really think their damage really come from their active abilities.

The Sniper's Ability (Gaz Arrow) is nice but you NEED to detonate it to actually do damage with it. I choose Flame Wall because of his 100% ignite chance that make the Gaz explode when an Ignited ennemy enter the Area dealing a good chunk of damage. It also add a bit of Fire Damages to their regular attacks if their projectiles traverse it.

So my experience is quite different from you: It's quite an active gameplay as I need to setup FlameW and GazA. This combo one shoot most of regular mob and 2-shoot most of the rare one. And Boss fight, yes you will run a lot but I also use a Shield to "tank" (with Raise Shield) the Boss making Snipers safer for a few seconds.

And it should be even more effective with a Witch because my passive skill tree point are quite worthless as I need to make all the way to the top. So I just have a bunch of attribut points right now. :x