I’ve attempted to run the new Monoliths with a level 76 Beastmaster that focused on pet DoT damage: Wolves, Raptor, Spriggan, Serpent Stirke (to summon the serpent), and Entangling Roots. The initial idea was to have the Spriggan’s Aura + Entangling Roots to heal pets; however, when testing it against the harder maps, the pets get overwhelmed with no way to provide consistent healing. Even with over 100% Minion Healing effectiveness, 200% pet Health Regen, and the Spriggan’s Aura specced for maximum healing + additional benefits for minions, I feel the pets melt just as quickly as if I didn’t provide any defensive benefits for them. It also doesn’t help that the Spriggan AI likes to position itself just outside the other minions so that the healing aura misses everyone.
I’ve seen that there are pet cooldown reductions, but I bet it won’t nearly be enough to counter the incoming damage. In my eyes, pet defenses are limited to Leech + Dodge + Glancing Blow, but pet Dodge is too much RNG to counter what could be large damage spikes. I wish there was a way for the Spriggan to serve as a defensive healer for pets, like having the aura grant the protections that are listed on Spriggan’s skill tree; otherwise, we can see what Healing Wind’s tree ends up being like when it gets its skill tree, but if the Spriggan’s Aura is anything to go by, it’s unlikely to do anything worthwhile.
It’s honestly strange that my level 60 Beastmaster with one Raptor defeated the Abomination with little problems, but the level 76 Beastmaster with 5 pets struggled so badly. With so much AoE damage that’s part and parcel of these boss battles, there needs to be a way to build around protecting the minions.
*8/11 Edit: I respecced the level 76 Beastmaster to a typical leech build; without any gear providing additional pet offenses (heck, I should have just done it with the same gear to show how useless Spriggan’s Aura and such is), the leech build easily did what the Minion healing build could not. That raises a serious question:
- Considering that gear only has 4 affixes and you have to commit to yourself having 100% Glancing Blow, 40-50% Protections and what-not, how many pet restoration (minion healing effectiveness, health regen, and so on) affixes do you imagine a minion healing build to have?
- If minion regen is so useless compared to minion leech, why bother making the affixes in the first place and bloating the loot pool with worthless items that have no place on any build?
- If you don’t want minion regen to be useless, do you think the Spriggan’s Aura is or can be useful for healing minions? I’ve specced the Spriggan all towards improving the healing aura, and nothing it did could outpace what taking a few simple minion leech nodes did.