Coercing Coercion

[Xelphiem]

Let's talk about the favorite skill of pet lovers all across the MUD, COERCION. More specifically, let's talk about why it doesn't work in comparison to other skills, and ideas on how to fix that.

Rank 1 Commanding Presence
This skill is fantastic at what it does. Make pets better. However, that simply just doesn't do much for the individual or for the group. In fact, pets often detract from people using 2h weapons or anything similar. It grants hp and more damage to pets. Even with coercion at rank 25, this doesn't make pets compete with the damage of an individual character, it only makes pets a better shield that has a slight damage bonus. Since there is no intention of making pets compete with players for damage, not only should it improve your pet stats, but it should improve your own when you have pets like riding does for mounts. Grant a slight hp and damage bonus for having pets that is dependent on your coercion skill, as well as improving the pets.

Rank 3 Propagate
I guess this is useful? Most people can figure out where shops and quests are without this ability, but sure. Maybe if there was a way to remember shops and return to them this would be better, but really it just kinda does nothing.

Rank 5 Commerce
This skill finally buffs the individual, but not in a combat sense. Many people consider this to be an essential addition to their builds as gold is such an inhibiting factor. In fact, it's cheaper to respect into 5 points of coercion and buy gear like that, then respect out again than to just buy the gear... Maybe gear prices should be changed and this ability gone away with if it's that valuable?

Rank 8 Spell Bond
This is completely written over by the rank 20 skill. Acrobatics' initiative is rewritten, but the rank 20 ability isn't massively better like acrobatics' rank 20 ability is. This just grants pets a few personal spells. Once again, this doesn't buff the individual at all, and pets don't benefit from the increase in things all that much. Maybe this ability stays the same, or maybe it should be the rank 20 ability seeing as the rank 20 ability also applies negative status effects to your pets if you have them too?

Rank 9 Leadership
Sweet, one more pet that doesn't deal that much damage and only prolongs the livelihood of all my other pets. Nice addition? Good skill, but needs something else as well. If commanding presence or another ability got better the more pets you had and so improved the individual based on keeping pets, this would be great, but right now it doesn't do all that much besides add another pool of hp to whittle down.

Rank 10 False King
False king really benefits your pets and kinda your group. Why does it not benefit you as the bestower? That would be great. That would actually help a lot.

Rank 13 Loyal Sacrifice
Isn't this counterintuitive? I can sacrifice one of my pets that's about to die when I could just set them to ranged and set a different pet to guard and keep my pet alive? Or heal my pet since I've got spell bond? If you're that low on hp that you're willing to sacrifice a pet to die, you're not saving yourself, you're just prolonging your own demise. This doesn't help someone, it just makes them die a little bit slower. This needs a huge rework, or just needs to be replaced.

Rank 17 Imperious Splendor
Wow, this is a long time to wait for another skill, hope it's good. Oh, it's not. It helps pets and group members by an indeterminate amount and then once again leaves you high and dry. Can this maybe also grant you extra damage? Maybe critical surge? % bonus increases would be nice to the individual as well as everyone else.

Rank 20 Servant Link
This rewrites spell bond and saves some casting time! Sweet. That's all it does. Can this be the final skill that grants you bonuses the more pets you have? Bonuses to the individual and the pet and the group? Pretty please? It fits with the name. This would be super sweet.

As a final comment, I realize that since you are buffing other individuals and pets, that the self buffs can't be as strong as something that only buffs the self. However, that doesn't mean the self shouldn't be buffed at all. Others are being buffed at the expense of the individual, meaning that at higher levels especially, this skill will be replaced and will become pointless for people as they need something that will contribute to damage more than a little bit of hp in between attacks. In addition, this detracts from valuable other abilities and makes people want to take coercion up to 5 just to get commerce. The number of people in the top 10 of rank with commerce is much more than it should be... nearly all 10 whether they've got pets or not. That's a sign, a sign for change.

Please add your comments and experiences with Coercion below. This is by no means the opinion of everyone else, and I'd love to hear the opinions of the developers as well. We pet users need a way to stay viable in later levels! Help us!

[Cahl]

I 100% completely disagree with this.

Right now, pets/coercion is such a huge blessing to have. You can literally completely avoid damage (physical damage) right now with their use, and the coercion skills all play a role in making that happen.

To put it night and day:

if you have 0 coercion, whether you're enclave, or a lich, or just a random guy dabbling, your pets will not last long (wall of ice aside). Coercion makes them last long. From what I can tell, their damage is based more on player level than coercion, but from what I remember, Greg does not want people being able to just sit AFK with their pets killing stuff, that's probably why they don't do as much damage as a player.

I've been using coercion for a bit now, and I can honestly say, if you're a lich, or enclave character, you're truly missing out on living a very carefree life with pets right now. I can literally just sit back and blast things without taking any damage, it's pretty insane to be honest.

-------------------

As an edit, i'll also respond/talk about the skills specifically too:

Rank 1 Commanding Presence
This is the bread and butter of the whole build. It makes your pets stronger with each point

Rank 3 Propagate
I agree, I don't use this at all. Just a flavor skill really

Rank 5 Commerce
This is a very powerful skill because gold is so valuable in the game. I agree that it's messed up that people respec to get it just because it's cheaper, however I hate saying that because the only solution I can think of is making respecs cost more, which I don't want

Rank 8 Spell Bond
You're right, this ability gets removed by rank 20 skill, but what if someone doesn't want to go 20? I'm actually going to switch to a Coercion 10 build here soon and it's kind of nice to still be able to buff my minions.

Rank 9 Leadership
One more pet is literally a pillar of any pet build. You get a third more pets, and that's another pet to divvy the damage of the group.

Rank 10 False King
False king makes your pets true tanks, very strong from what I can tell

Rank 13 Loyal Sacrifice
Just like the mysticism skill to sacrifice for mana, this skill is an "oh crap" button in case of emergencies. It's an instant heal when you know yo'ure going to die and need to bail.

Rank 17 Imperious Splendor
I agree that it sucks to not know how much of a difference the damage makes, but I imagine it's nice if you're relying on your pets to do the damage.

Rank 20 Servant Link
Pretty cool end ability and can be -very- powerful with certain spells. If you went a full buff build, this could make your pets pretty gnarly. Not to mention this works with food items, though that may be a bug.

[Dsiban]

Long time coercion 20 user here. My biggest complaint is pet passive hp regen. I think it was over-nerfed. Perhaps pets could rest or meditate with the player and reduce the downtime of waiting for pets to heal to that of a resting player (campfire tie in?).

Ability-wise :
Propagate : Have it show only incomplete quest.
Loyal Sacrifice : Never use this. When I'm dying my pets are already dead. Though this could be great for someone with charm or summon elemental.

I'm pretty satisfied with the state of coercion. When I try to melee without pets I realize just how rough poorly armored melee fairs against mobs. It's brutal. I'd like to see that issue solved, in which case pets can take a backseat or build complementary role to powerful player characters.

[Cahl]

I absolutely love the idea change you had with propogate. showing only what quests are not complete in the area would be -amazing-, super awesome quality of life change too.