0.9.12 Information and Incomplete Patch Notes (Updated)

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CanHasPants wrote:

Skeletons haven't been terribly affected in my opinion. We get 50% less from the skill, about 33% less total with passives. They're given 50% more base life, which will make minion life passive / support much greater on them. The net effect is fewer skeletons with vastly improved durability. Total dps from a maxed horde will be reduced overall, but their enhanced longivety makes them more viable as a primary summons, and increases damage from MI, while cutting down on server lag by reducing the number of models on screen.

The problem for me is that I like to use skellies more as an instant meatshield/mob distractor than a true offensive spell. 2 at a time means they will just get swarmed by the larger packs of mobs and will be far less effective at providing me cover. I guess I'll have to learn to love frost wall.

Loving the minion changes, definitely going to be trying a minion master spec out once the patch is released :)

It depends on where the +1 Spectre passive is, but maybe splashing spectres into differing builds will become a good idea since you can get what you need from them.

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CanHasPants wrote:

The problem for me is that I like to use skellies more as an instant meatshield/mob distractor than a true offensive spell. 2 at a time means they will just get swarmed by the larger packs of mobs and will be far less effective at providing me cover. I guess I'll have to learn to love frost wall.

My thoughts exactly, see you on the other side of the frost wall....

I'd just like to add, I also use skeles almost exclusively for meat-shield purposes. They aren't very good at distracting enemies, especially if you spawn them far from you, and they take a while to actually attack anything, but they do physically block spells and projectiles. For that alone, I am disheartened by the skele 'nerf'. I know you guys are just changing stuff around, maybe they'll be much better as minions now, but I feel like we're going to be seeing a lot more frost walls, and after the initial hype from the patch dies down, a lot less summon-mancers as well.

I might even have to use decoy totems instead, and those don't block anywhere near as much as skeles do. I look forward to seeing less minions on the screen when I group with a 'necro', but the fact that they can still be moused over and targetted (this should have a hotkey, like hold ctrl to show minions and make them selectable) will still make them a colossal nuisance in groups.

I didn't know about the reflect damage cap thing, that's actually great, but I get the feeling I'll 1 shot myself on some 8-10 mobs now instead of doing it on 20, meaning focus on AoE skills is going to drop and some builds will have to be revisited.

I don't know what 'arc' is, but man I can't wait for the patch that adds it in, the game is getting a tiny bit stale in terms of choices, especially with the map drop rate for maps over 65. I don't even care about the loot, I just wanna see the cool areas :\

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NastyExile wrote:

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CanHasPants wrote:

The problem for me is that I like to use skellies more as an instant meatshield/mob distractor than a true offensive spell. 2 at a time means they will just get swarmed by the larger packs of mobs and will be far less effective at providing me cover. I guess I'll have to learn to love frost wall.

My thoughts exactly, see you on the other side of the frost wall....

Lol... I just have to go on record and say.. this is a misquote! I didn't write that, it was what was written in reply to what I wrote.

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Leap Slam: Reduced cast speed from 1.9 seconds to 1.2 seconds.

YES!!!

This patch sounds so amazing. Great collection of updates and new stuff.

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Torin wrote:

BTW, limiting skeletons to only 2 per cast is a nice try to weaken Totem+skeleton spam but it just means now we need to attach faster cast rate to the totem as well to get the same benefit. I would be better if you ban skeletons from totem altogether.

I had to read that last line more than a few times to get over the shock of such an absurd statement (in my opinion at least :p). I really see no reason to have a totem gem at all if you are going to be selective about the (totem functional*) gems that it can be linked to.

*Obviously not talking about gems like Phase Run (which crashed the game before the fix) or Blood Rage, etc.

Hmm.. I wonder what the vertict was on the things under consideration? I was really looking forward to not having to gimp myself to run maps as a possiblity.