Suggestion for Death Magic Minion Traits (make all current traits baseline)

I was really happy to see more skills getting a big makeover through the choice of traits.Like the Feast on corruption changes or now the Harbinger Shroud changes.I really hope they will bring these huge functional makeovers to the minion traits.

Currently our minion traits are all passive in function.

• Flesh of the master (passive toughness and passive minion HP)
• Necromantic Corruption (passive minion DPS and passive condi management)
• Death Nova (passive on-down and on-kill effects)

Passive Passive Passive.No!All these passive boosts should be made BASELINE already in the current meta where minions are so weak.A Necro loses out so much just by choosing a Minion that even if you made all the current passive traits baseline, he would still be far from OP.

Traits can be a lot more fun when it drastically changes the functions of minion skills.Rework suggestion:

Adept level: Flesh of the master -> Minion Skill Mastery

• Reduce cooldown of all minion skills by 50%
• Rigor mortis from 50 secs to 25 secs
• Haunt from 20 secs to 10 secs
• Charge from 40 secs to 20 secs

Master level: Necromantic Corruption -> Haunted

• Shadow Fiend's Haunt skill is now performed by the Necromancer
• So when you use the Haunt skill, instead of the Shadow Fiend teleporting, it is the Necromancer that teleports
• All the Haunt effects are performed by the Necromancer too: like 1200 range teleport, gain 10% LF, apply blindness/chill/weakness to foe, does damage
• Cooldowns remains the same at 20 secs (or 10 secs if the above CD reduction trait is chosen)

Grandmaster level: Death Nova -> Golem Possessed

• Elite Golem's activation skill 'Charge' is now performed by the Necromancer
• So when you use the Golem skill Charge, instead of the Golem charging, it is the Necromancer that charges.
• All the charge effects are performed by the Necromancer too: like gain 3 stab, dash 1200 range, knockdown & launch foes, ignore cripple/chill, remove immob, does damage
• Cooldowns remain the same at 40 secs (or 20 secs if the above CD reduction trait is chosen)

A possible 10 seconds 1200 range teleport + a 20 seconds 1200 range dash...and with all those effects...I would definitely become a minion master in this case...Drools...wakes up from dream...

A reality where minions are meta in any mode except pve is not a reality I want to live in.

I'm okay with what my minion are right now. A diversion that can fight for me and allow me to participate in combat, while also allowing me to live to fight another time, if need be.

you can do whatever you want with minions but as long as they're AI-based they'll be bad

I don't want to have a core traitline that is useless unless you use minions - it kills build diversity.

Your suggestions would transfer Death Magic to something like a minion based elite spec traitline.

Spite: Power damage \ no matter what utilities are used \ alternatively to power damage also debuffing optionsCurses: Condi damage \ no matter what utilities are used \ alternatively to condi damage also debuffing optionsBlood Magic: sustain via healing, leeching, protection, condi cleansing \ fits into power and condi buildsSoul Reaping: shroud (class mechanic) improvements and options for sustain or additional condi or power damageDeath Magic: currently no real identity \ mostly sustain, but weaker than BM and SR options \ already way to much focus on minions

I would even remove the minion traits in DM with one exception: minions deal 10% more damage and have 20% reduced cooldowns (the typical utility buff trait).

Then give the traitline a real identity to be an alternative to the other traitlines for different playstyles. DM traits could boost leeching and condi effects for necromancers or copy conditions applied to the necromancer to surrounding foes. Or it could add conditions to weaponskills, e.g. your dagger auto attacks apply chill or weakness.

The idea about giving the necromancer the minion skills is interesting and changing the functionality of skills via traits seems to be something ANet likes. Nevertheless I don't want to run around with that ugly golem just to be able to use a gap closer. "Rise!" is already an ugly damage mitigation skill with these litte rats surrounding me. I don't want to have an even bigger meat circus around me to be competitive in mobility.

Make DM focus on sustain/condi removal/toughness? IDK the minion part is always clunky since well you have to give up a utility slot for a minion, which is a massive sacrifice...

Maybe 1 day if we get an elite spec with a big boy minion that we can summon like a shade (so no need for utility space), and then have skills build around that.