How To: Minion Mangement

 

Few things in the Necromancer's arsenal are as feared and respected as Minions. These are one of only 2 charmies that can be created "in the field" for a comparativly small price of 50 mana; a bargin considering thier massive potential. They possess a Variety of attacks - ranging from blunt force to peircing - and can even be Necromancer's themselves, which is as good as having a low-level necro help you (almost - thier rather brain damaged in terms of spell usage - more on that later).

Minions will Always be 5 levels below you (so a level 50 will have level 45 minions, a level 55 level 50 minions, ect). Minions can be "normal" minions, or "Necromancer" minions - both have the same "stats" but necromancer's cast spells (much like your own). They can use any spell of thier level, which makes life rather interesting - i've seen them acid blast, flame strike, aura of contamination, and shocking grasp. The spells seem to be either random or in a cycle, and no "logic" goes into it - for example if the mob is immune to fire, it'll still stubbornly flame strike it every so often.

Part I: The Attacks
A Minion has several attacks, which serves well in situations where the "primary" attack isn't sufficent. Minions can (amoung other things): Bite, Crush, Claw, Bash, High Kick, and Punch. Biting does damage, and can disarm an opponent; high kicking causes considerable damage (particuarly when 5 minions do it at once), and crush can destroy some types of equipment.

One interesting (and oft overlooked) ability is that minions are able to disarm, via biting. Disarming a crusader almost ensure's his eventual demise - Crus' are just not made to fight weaponless. So against a player (or a well-armed mob), be sure to disarm.

NEW! Minions now fall down and go into a "resting" or "noncombative state" if they miss a kick or get tripped. Order them to stand, and all is well; but dont spam 200 high kicks, or else you'll be up a creek pretty fast.

 

Part II: The Skills
Minions are versitile little creatures; aside from the usual use as "attack and tank" charmies, they can also serve as rescuing, and lock picking charmies. Rescuing is key against aggro mobs - it really can save your bacon. Breath and magic attacks, however, can still hit you - but if you have all 5 minions in effect, it's less likely a "directed" attack will hit you. Breaths there's not alot to do - use primal if you got it, or enfeeble.

As for lock picking, this can really be a life saver, particuarly if your "missing" the key to something important, or if your in a hurry. Remember - minions require pills to use pass door, so you can save alot of money (and time and mana) by simply having them pick locks whenever possible. This is also a life saver with "treasure chest" type situations.

Interestingly, Minions water breathe, fly, and don't seem to run out of Movement. I've taken them under the sea, in to the clouds, and in similar situations. This alone makes them much more useful - as you dont have to worry about providing hard-to-find water breathe or cast fly on them.

NEW! Minions can also hide and sneak; useful for PK but not much else.

NEW! Minions, when given a wand/stave/scroll (not sure about that one though) can not only USE the scroll, but they tend to use it "automagically" - zapping of thier own discretion. You can also order them to use it. Quite useful.

 

Part III: The Issue of Addressability
After doing some pretty considerable expirements and explorations, I've come to a few conclusions concerning how the minions are "addressed" in the group listing. Here are those conclusions:

1. The group listing is order of creation, but is not necessarily the order that thier in at the moment.
2. The best (simplest) way to discern order is to order them all to report in this fashion: Order 1.minion report, order 2.minion report, ect. This shows you what order thier acutally in instead of the "ideal" order
3. The "general" method for how minion order is figured out by the mud engine is as follows: First in is last in list, last in is first in list. So the last created (or arrived) minion is the "first" (top) of the list, with the first created minion being the "last" (bottom) in the list.
4. At current i'm not sure if minion order changes from room to room; i'm also not 100% sure if the 1.minion always gets the first hit when you issue a "kill" order. There seems to be SOME amount of variation to this; i'm not sure how much or what system it uses. UPDATE! This is dynamic; what's 1.minion one room, is 4. or something else the next.

So, in short, if you need to keep track of minion health (to have the most healthy attack first (or least healthy - be creative)), have them all report first, in order, then use that to set up which one is which. It's complicated, but worth it in the end. (i'd advise setting up a client-side alias for this).

 

Part IV: Advanced Combat Tactics
There are some very interesting ideas and tactics you can put to use in combat, to help you better level (or just kill a difficult target). I'll outline these below.

1. Worst Foot Forward
Kill a leveling mob, and get an idea how much HP he knocks off before he dies. Next figure out how many minions this is - 1 or .5 - whatever. For me, at level 55, a Statue took 3 minions and killed one of them. Why this is important is that the fewer mobs (or people or whatever) in your group at the TIME THE MOB DIES The more Xp you get - almost as though you'd killed it alone. So if your very careful, you can plan out when the minions will die - thereby ensuring that only one (or none) will be left when the mob acutally dies. Play with this idea some.

2. Best Foot Forward
An alternate plan is to "switch out" your minions, so the most healthy is always in front. What makes this possible is that minions can rescue, even each other. So keep an eye on your "Group" listing, and have it rescue whoever is hurting the most. In this way you can prolong your own survival considerably, as well as that of your minions (at least, over all). This is important in "closed loop" situations, in which your not able to get out and regen mana.

3. Let'em Fight Alone
This one's a kind of dirty trick. I've found a few cases where it's really saved my bacon though. Here's what you need for it to work: A room that has "No Exits" - which can mean you need to open a door to get in. If you got that your good to go; just send in the minions, attack, flee yourself, then close the door before the minions can flee. This "locks them in" and makes it so they fight - to the death. All told a quite effective tactic against "big" targets.

This tactic no longer works, due to the "resting if miss a kick or tripped" thing. They end up all resting (though one seems to keep fighting - odd no?)

4. Purification of the Ranks
One of the nice things about minions is that you can make them on site, or at HQ. Sometimes (as in evo) you HAVE to make them on site, but other times you can make them at HQ and "meander" to the target zone. This is handy because it allows you to "purify" the minion ranks into being all of one kind, fairly easily. How do you do this? easy. Make a minion, and if it's the type you want - Keep it. Otherwise, ungroup it and make another. Usually it takes ~20 casts to get 5 necromancers, or ~6 or 7 to get all regular (sometimes just 5). You want necros if you want it DEAD NOW, and you want regulars if you want to get some useable or "delicate" (ie potions or other gear) off of it.

5. How to be Saved from 2 Attackers
It's well known that minions rescue, but it's not well known that minions can't (to my expirance) rescue from 2 oppoents - even with multiple rescues. There is however a way to do this - though it's a bit of a dirty trick. First, flee. Since minions 'slowly' flee away, run back in quickly, and there you should see your minions, loyaly kicking ass still - on both attackers while you are 'rescued' from them both. (note: I'd not use this in evo 64 or some other "unique" areas; it could be fatal).

Closing Words

Remember - you are a Necromancer, one of the most lethal creatures on earth to man and mob; use that to your advantage, and use all your spells to your advantage, as well. Most of all, enjoy yourself, and expirement.