Possession change disappointment

[Melodar]

I must say I was looking forward to seeing this however upon using it I am simply stunned at how pathetic it is. I have master possession and vs a 66^^^ the highest dmge the pet did was 582 on a crit. It doesnt matter what mob you choose all you get is the skin of that mob the dmge you get is the exact same, pathetic. A charmed master pet does double this damage. Both charm and possession are taking up 3 conc slots so you have to choose one or the other so they didnt make a useless spell useful they just gave us a choice of spells to not use. You pick possession or charm and which every you pick the other is rendered useless. The goal of this was supposed to be make possession a useful spell however in this they have failed as we still have a spell that can not be used.

[Rarlin]

<p>Yeah,</p><p>Honestly it it's current state, I'd say just give us back the old Possession.  I'd be happy if it didn't use conc slots (or 2 slots max as sorry as the pet is), but in it's current form, meh.</p>

[Aeralik]

It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.

[Tiko_7801]

<p>So the main advantage of possession would be to have a pet that wont break, but at the cost of dps from the mob. I just dont see where this would be a plus. You cant really use it much on raids due to concentration cost, and solo, well your soloing why not just use teh charm form. If you want to make it to where its worthwhile I would suggest giving it something that would make it stand out from the charm version or drop even 1 concentration slot from it so that it becomes semi viable to use in group situations atleast. That is just my 2 cents I play an illusionist and am pretty much standing by waiting for the result of the class loving to see if im following everyone else and betraying. Atm I dont see coercers getting the full love that would make me or others want to pick up that class. But again just my 2cents.</p>

[ShadowMunkie]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>In your other post you said you wanted to make possession a worthwhile spell. This doesn't cut it, its a nice start but the fact of the matter is possession is better in its Live for than on Test. Sure it only has limited uses but, it doesn't take a concentration slot and its fun to move mobs outta the way. Making it possess the essence of the mob is nice, it fits well. Giving it 3 concentration slots and saying its basically a sub to charm, doesn't cut it. It will never get used, unless someone is scared to die from charm. Even if they are scared to die from charm they will still charm because the mobs do 10x more dps.Suggestion for the spell.Make it 1 concentration slot. Same timer as charm, or a tag where "Must not have charmed mob.".Copies the essence of the mob just like now, make the spells Character LEVEL and the same quality at possess essence. HP: Same as characterPower: Same as characterDistance: 50meterRecast: 1mCast: 10sThis would make the spell unique enough to use inside raids without loosing good buffs.

[toofy]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>Option 1I understand that we can't use both pets at the same time but the possessed mob needs to do more damage than say casting x2 bravado and signet of enlightenment in a group setting or at least dropped it to 1 to 2 conc slots and have it disable charm.Option2Keep it 3 conc slots, up its damage, but lower its hp's so its primarily our safe pet in a group situation/raid that we cannot risk charming.Option3Change possession to use 1 conc slot but it acts as a safety net of some sort when charm fails, such as a fast casting re-charm, or puts the charmed mob into stasis for re-charming or such.Just a few ideas. 

[Grimlux]

<p>Yah. The possessed mob seems just like the charm pet. The only advantage being is that we can use it in raid instances. No matter what, the new possession will be more useful then the old one. Where is the line drawn though for how much we can DPS? Everyone wants a free conc pet, but has anyone actually seen the damage were doing on test? With a possessed pet and coercer's raid buffed, and geared, Coercers' will easily pull 4k+ dps and thats minimum.</p><p>After all that and you still want a pet that does more DPS? Careful what you ask for cause would you rather sacrifice our new spelldamage for a pet? I certainly wouldnt. Some important points about the possessed pet that you seem to be leaving out. </p><ul><li>DPS is same as charmed pet</li><li>More hitpoints then charmed pet</li><li>No chance to break and kill you</li></ul><p>Those are 3 seemingly positive aspects of our new pets. The dps complaint is still relatively new with the nerf to pet damage in RoK.</p>

[Nuhus]

<cite>Praetorate@Nektulos wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>Yah. The possessed mob seems just like the charm pet. The only advantage being is that we can use it in raid instances. No matter what, the new possession will be more useful then the old one. Where is the line drawn though for how much we can DPS? Everyone wants a free conc pet, but has anyone actually seen the damage were doing on test? With a possessed pet and coercer's raid buffed, and geared, Coercers' will easily pull 4k+ dps and thats minimum.</p><p>After all that and you still want a pet that does more DPS? Careful what you ask for cause would you rather sacrifice our new spelldamage for a pet? I certainly wouldnt. Some important points about the possessed pet that you seem to be leaving out. </p><ul><li>DPS is same as charmed pet</li><li>More hitpoints then charmed pet</li><li>No chance to break and kill you</li></ul><p>Those are 3 seemingly positive aspects of our new pets. The dps complaint is still relatively new with the nerf to pet damage in RoK.</p></blockquote>I agree. If the main source of DPS is ourselves and not the pets, it's a pet with some advantages. I think charm itself needs to keep an advantage over the possessed essence pet, otherwise it will become the new charm. It's nice to have a mostly permanent pet when you want it.  imo we should be the main source of DPS, otherwise we're not doing much in groups and raids without the pet. I'd rather have it as an just an option not as a NECESSITY to DPS. Otherwise our only option would be a pet if we wanted to do any DPS.

[KamidariTuibumbi]

I do kind of think too much weight is being put on the possession change.  While I agree that it won't be useful in a lot of situations, neither is the Illy pet, and that's their only option as far as pets go.  Given that we still have charm as an option, and that this is a spell we don't get until 65 (and never get an upgrade for), it really shouldn't become one of the primary spells that we are using 100% of the time.That being said, I wouldn't mind if it were maybe 2 conc, and not castable if you have a charmed pet already. <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />  I do like the "flavor" it provides being able to run around with the essence of a mob that you've stolen, so it'd be nice to be able to use it a little more often than I forsee using it now.  It's also nice that you can still choose a pet based on your needs - nuker, healer, tank, etc.Given the dps boost we're getting through the other spell changes, it's not like we really need the dps from this pet.

[Cawti]

Actually, I see where you are trying to go with this, Aeralik, but the way it is right now, it can't really function as a tank.It doesn't produce enough aggro to hold anything off of me, even if I cast very little on the mobs myself.  It has a fair chunk of HP, but could probably use a little more, if you are trying to give us a tank pet with this.  And if you don't want to give it dps, I think it needs some taunts.  Even with demeanor up, just a spell or 2 would have it break right off.

[Wrapye]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>Except the summoner fighter pets taunt, so mobs stay on them.  This pet doesn't taunt, and doesn't generate enough dps to keep a mob on them.Personally I'm not asking for a no concentration slot version of the spell.  I want a completely different spell, something that isn't essentially an illusionist spell.  The class is called <b>coerce</b>r.  We make mobs (or our allies) do things that they would not normally do, not make illusory copies of them.  Both Possess Essence and Puppetmaster are illusionist spells, not coercer spells.  Is it really too much to ask to have spells that conform to the class concept?

[ximo]

I originally expected possess essence to be a dumbfire pet as we already have a 3 conc slot charm, albeit dependent on another mob being available.  Still, I think I will find a use for it at times which has to be an improvement.My instant thoughts are the changes are bit knee jerk-ish, and serve to higlight just how desperately two classes have been squeezed out of the one enchanter class, and certainly as welcome as the dps increase is, the changes to reactives just don't seem appropriate to nature of the class, putting spells on enemies that cause them damage when they attack is what made the coercer feel like a suitably evil enchanter.

[Rijacki]

<cite>Praetorate@Nektulos wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>Yah. The possessed mob seems just like the charm pet. The only advantage being is that we can use it in raid instances. No matter what, the new possession will be more useful then the old one. Where is the line drawn though for how much we can DPS? Everyone wants a free conc pet, but has anyone actually seen the damage were doing on test? With a possessed pet and coercer's raid buffed, and geared, Coercers' will easily pull 4k+ dps and thats minimum.</p><p>After all that and you still want a pet that does more DPS? Careful what you ask for cause would you rather sacrifice our new spelldamage for a pet? I certainly wouldnt. Some important points about the possessed pet that you seem to be leaving out. </p><ul><li>DPS is same as charmed pet</li><li>More hitpoints then charmed pet</li><li>No chance to break and kill you</li></ul><p>Those are 3 seemingly positive aspects of our new pets. The dps complaint is still relatively new with the nerf to pet damage in RoK.</p></blockquote>Did you Possess a melee or a mage? There is a HUGE difference.  I possessed a mage last night and damage with the possessed was less than 1/3 that of the exact same one charmed. Even with possess at Adept III and charm at Master I, that difference is, in a word, ludicrous.From what others said, possessing a melee vs charming the same one provided close to the same amount of damage.  From your comments in other threads and on Test last night, I am presuming you only charmed a melee.  Try a mage to compare. I'll be trying a melee tonight to get some comparisons, too.  I'll post my parse info.

[Maroger]

<p>I have never really understood why our charmed pets take 3 COnC. The Necro pet, who is far more powerful than anything we can charm, takes 1 Conc.</p><p>Maybe back in the beginning of the design for this game Coercer where expected to be as powerful as Enchanters in Eqlive where you can really charm great pets and they retain their pre charm stats.</p><p>But COercers pets have been nerfed so badly that they are little better than the "shiny bob" we had as permanent pet in EQlive. </p><p>The whole Developer mentality about Coercer charm still prevails I see - our pets are nerfed, they can't be as powerful as their pre-charm incarnation, they cost us 3 Concentration and they are very near worthless. </p><p>If we have to pay 3 Concentration then make the Pet worthwhile - remove the nerfs or make it just 1 COncentration to make up for the total weakness of the charmed pet as the result of nerfs since the start of the game. </p>

[RingleToo]

<p>Aeralik, what do you see as the purpose and advantages of "Possession" over the charm spell? Because it doesn't seem like there's a whole lot of difference. Is it just that it can't be broken? Certainly, we can't have both at the same time. But why provide an alternate to charm that isn't as desirable? There should be sufficient reason why coercers would want to use Possession instead of charm. Otherwise, why have it at all?</p>

[Nuhus]

Heres the advantages I see,1) Possessed essence scales to your level, no matter what zone2) More consistant HP3) Pet is permanent until you leave the zone4) can use a pet without screwing up ring events5) can possess essence a pet in a heroic area without the risk of a 3 up beating on you6) more useful than the old possession7) Takes the abilities from the possessed essence mob (variety)8 ) can use to pet pull even if your resources are limited (doesn't take a mob from the zone)disadvantages1) 3 conc slots2) Not necessarily as much damage as a charmed pet

[Jesdyr]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>that is the problem .. there is no reason to use it if we have something better at the same cost. Solo we dont worry about charm breaking because we can handle it. In a group we use our buffs. To make this new version useful it needs to be able to be used in a group while still being able to buff the group. Aside from lowing Conc cost on possess essence how about removing Conc on Signet of Intuition line and/or Power of Mind line? This would free 1 or 2 conc which would at least let us buff the 1 person.

[daray]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>If you want to keep the pet similar to that of the illusionist class, does this mean that the mythical coercer epic will remove the concentration cost of possession?If the answer to that is "no", then that "consistency" doesn't really exist, since coercers won't be able to sacrifice the concentration slots on raids, where illusionists with mythicals don't need to.

[Jesdyr]

<cite>daray wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>If you want to keep the pet similar to that of the illusionist class, does this mean that the mythical coercer epic will remove the concentration cost of possession?If the answer to that is "no", then that "consistency" doesn't really exist, since coercers won't be able to sacrifice the concentration slots on raids, where illusionists with mythicals don't need to.</blockquote>Using that in this conversation is really stupid .. Mythicals version of the epic are something many of us will likely never obtain. And by the time you get them .. why do you need this again ?

[Alfgand]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote><p>Aeralik, your points make sense and the reasoning is sound.</p><p>However, the concentration cost seems to be too high for use in raids and some groups. For soloing Charm is the only way to go.</p><p>Could you make Possession <u>not be castable</u> when a Coercer has a Charmed pet, make it show as interrupted or something. You know just flip some 1's and 0's around a bit til it works. </p><p>I also agree it cannot be better than the Illusionist Personae as far as costs. I don't know much about my fellow chanters but don't they have a AA's line that reduces the cost? We don't have such a thing. How about reducing the cost for both to 1 or 2 conc slots? </p><p>Anyhow, I have had only 30 min of test time but it appears that you have done a good job on fixing us. Now if it gets to live without a bunch of meddling.......<img src="http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/images/smilies/385970365b8ed7503b4294502a458efa.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" width="15" height="15" /></p><p>Thanks !</p>

[Rarlin]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote>

[Rarlin]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote><p>Thanks for the reply,</p><p>I understand now what you're trying to achieve with this.</p>

[Jesdyr]

<cite>Rarlin wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite></cite>I understand now what you're trying to achieve with this.</blockquote>LOL ... remove the bugs and exploits that possession caused <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> That is the only plus I see.

[daray]

<cite>Jesdyr@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite></cite>Using that in this conversation is really stupid .. Mythicals version of the epic are something many of us will likely never obtain. And by the time you get them .. why do you need this again ? </blockquote>Actually, I am making a direct comparison to the illusionist pet and its use of concentration slots, so yes, it is relevant if Aeralik is after consistency between the 2 class pets as he states. This assumes that the classes will stay largely balanced in other areas - a coercer not being able to use a pet in raids (where illusionists with mythicals can use pets at no concentration) can be compensated for in other areas if need be though.However, the arguement that possession should cost less than 3 concentration without a mythical is silly. Illusionists without mythicals still have to sacrifice 3 concentration slots to maintain a pet, so you won't achieve consistency between the pets of the 2 classes by making it cost less than 3 concentration slots under all circumstances.

[Rarlin]

<p>Well...</p><p>Actually I was hoping for 20k solo DPS AND a pet that breathed insta-death on anything it looked at.  Don't know what the big deal is... <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p><p>Seriously though, I guess we can't expect some really awesome pet that doesn't carry the same risk of a Charmed pet.  But it DEFINATELY has it's uses when you consider how we can use it to finally have a "decent" pet in lower level zones.  Maybe I'm just still in my honeymoon stage of being looked at, but honestly... with all the changes that we're looking at with this LU, I'm very happy.</p>

[Melodar]

<span class="postbody"><span style="color: #ffff33;">It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.</span>Ok then explain to us how our class being the one who controls the minds of others can't control two at once yet Necromancers can summon AND take over a pet at the same time?Upping OUR DPS is one issue the pet is another issue altogether. The essence simply isn't a quality pet in terms of it's DPS in relation to our recently nerfed Charmed pet. (Yeah it only affected RoK mobs but high end RoK is all we got) A caster only doing 1/3 to 1/2 of the charmed pet and a melee only doing 1/2 dmge AND be totally incapable of keeping the mob off of me isn't exactly what we need. The DPS from the charmed pet helps with the aggro but simply casting twice can cause the mob to rush the coercer. This needs to be fixed for this spell to be remotely usefull. Taking the mobs spells is great and all but doesn't do much for us when the mob is beating our squishy heads in.</span>

[Graywindnz]

<p>Here's an idea:</p><p>Make it a no concentration spell that steals the Soul of the target and then uses its health and power to replenish the group until it dies.. (it cant be healed)</p>

[RingleToo]

<cite>Nuhus wrote:</cite><blockquote>Heres the advantages I see,1) Possessed essence scales to your level, no matter what zone2) More consistant HP3) Pet is permanent until you leave the zone4) can use a pet without screwing up ring events5) can possess essence a pet in a heroic area without the risk of a 3 up beating on you6) more useful than the old possession7) Takes the abilities from the possessed essence mob (variety)8 ) can use to pet pull even if your resources are limited (doesn't take a mob from the zone)disadvantages1) 3 conc slots2) Not necessarily as much damage as a charmed pet</blockquote><p>Nice break down of the advantages. Now I wonder what the advantages of a charmed pet are lol I realize I asked the wrong question. The question I guess I meant to ask is why have both a Possession and a Charm spell? If the situation is such that folks will always use only one of them, then what's the point?</p><p>The issue isn't just that Possession needs to be made as useful as Charm. The issue is that Possession needs to be useful in a different way. Such that sometimes there would be reasons to use Possession and other times one would want to use Charm. If DPS is the biggest reason for not using Possession, then up the DPS and do away with Charm. Or make Charm unbreakable and do away with Possession. But why have both?</p>

[Nuhus]

<cite>RingleToo wrote:</cite><cite></cite><blockquote><p>Nice break down of the advantages. Now I wonder what the advantages of a charmed pet are lol I realize I asked the wrong question. The question I guess I meant to ask is why have both a Possession and a Charm spell? If the situation is such that folks will always use only one of them, then what's the point?</p><p>The issue isn't just that Possession needs to be made as useful as Charm. The issue is that Possession needs to be useful in a different way. Such that sometimes there would be reasons to use Possession and other times one would want to use Charm. If DPS is the biggest reason for not using Possession, then up the DPS and do away with Charm. Or make Charm unbreakable and do away with Possession. But why have both?</p></blockquote>Well, I think charm itself could be upped in effectiveness in general. I see it more as an alternative to charm. Now, charm does have some advantages too. Since it does affect the mobs in the world and you can effective turn a ^^^ into a solo and get it killed by something to get it out of the way. The low duration and possible breaks I think warrant more performance than we see now as far as charm goes. I don't know if removing charm would be an effective solution as people are probably somewhat attached to it this late in the game. I think it's a fairly good solution as it wasn't really that useful a spell to begin with. But I can definitely see the argument there. When I started playing charm was a pretty pathetic spell with a 30 second duration. That was it. I was never really a big fan of charm because we did get nerfed in DPS around the time that happened. We were somewhat more reliant on a pet to solo after that. I don't really think there is a perfect solution to the issues with charm mainly because it does affect mobs in the world. (I don't think the game mechanics always mesh well with it)I think as an option it helps alleviate some of the gaps with game mechanics charm has.

[Wrapye]

You know, if you look at the two coercer spells that Aeralik has created, Puppetmaster and the revision of Possession, they are both pet spells.We are not a pet class, not in the sense that the summoners are.  We are a control class.  Give us control spells.  Even our 'pet' spell, Charm, is a control spell.Now, I've heard that Aeralik has been quoted as saying that he doesn't like control spells.  That kind of makes things difficult for a class that essentially is all about control spells.  Leave the making copies of mobs to illusionists where it belongs.  Give coercers their control spells.  It might not be a category of spells that the developer of the class abilities likes, but that's really not his choice - that was made when the game was designed, and he should work within that framework.

[Grimlux]

I really think Possession is fine the way it is, however it is much like a personae. Would it be hard to allow us to use the abilities our pets gain? (Think WoW pets) I dont want to compare the 2 games but in WoW, you can control what abilities your pets do. Why cant we use the abilities our possessed pet inherits. If he gets a crappy 500pt fire ball (relatively speaking), I think I should have a seperate hotbar that pops up when I make a personae with a Fireball button on it that I can use anytime I want. I can put my pet on auto if i want to if I didnt want to think about it.

[Nuhus]

Puppetmaster was originally a control spell.

[Wrapye]

<cite>Nuhus wrote:</cite><blockquote>Puppetmaster was originally a control spell.</blockquote>And it was even worse, conceptually, than the revamp of Possession.  I would have been hard pressed to have been in a position to be able to cast the original version of Puppetmaster.  It required having a pet while in a group, which I've only done as a way to prevent a wipe.Okay, so maybe he has even an even harder time thinking up of control spells.  Hmmm...  Maybe he could solicit suggestions from trusted sources.  It is one of the things a person can do when confronted with an area that they have little expertise with.

[QQ-Fatman]

illusionists' pet doesnt do any better dps than the new possession pet and also costs 3 concentration (unless you have mythical version epic.) It only nukes for 400ish and the new stun / stifle spells the pet uses only hit for 300. It only has 1/2 the hp of the new possession pet too.

[cxp1]

<p>I was one of the most vocal critics on these forums.. I am very happy with the changes.  Only disappointment is Possess Essence, but we shouldn't expect perfection.</p><p>I don't think dps is sufficient to justify the three concentration slots.  Unless we could get it reduced to one conc. slot on our mythical.  Also, you could put it in the same line as charm to avoid coercers using both instead on conc slots.</p><p> Vixn</p><p>80 Coercer Befallen</p>

[Sir Longsword]

After playing my coercer on test, I'm happy with the overall changes of the class if it goes live in it's current form.  The increased dps makes up for the lack of dps of the essence.  I'm looking at the essence as a potential group pet that is safer to use then the charmed one. 

[Outerspace]

I'd just like to know though, what the actual point of Possession is when you can charm a <b>significantly</b> more useful and powerful pet (i.e. any mob in the game) for the same concentration cost?

[Sir Longsword]

<cite>Outerspace wrote:</cite><blockquote>I'd just like to know though, what the actual point of Possession is when you can charm a <b>significantly</b> more useful and powerful pet (i.e. any mob in the game) for the same concentration cost?</blockquote>I think the difference between the two is charm is more dangerous with more dps, the essence is safe with less dps.   You can't charm any mob in the game though, there are many that can't be charmed. 

[Rarlin]

<cite>Outerspace wrote:</cite><blockquote>I'd just like to know though, what the actual point of Possession is when you can charm a <b>significantly</b> more useful and powerful pet (i.e. any mob in the game) for the same concentration cost?</blockquote><p>There is no point of Possessing in your current tier.  But that's why you would still use Charm for T8, but when clearning a low-level area for old quest updates I'd end up using the new version of Possession.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not skipping through the streets about this change (to be honest, I used the old version more than most did in groups just to have fun... and it was fun!), but it does actually have it's uses.</p><p>The way I'm looking at it, I remember the screaming about Charm sucking because we didn't have any pets in lower zones.  Now we do.  If you never used the old version of Possession, then you've gotten a new toy, if you did actually use it in it's old form, you lost a minor fun spell and got a new spell for lower zones.</p><p>Lastly, I'd just like to know how I'm supposed to drop heroic mobs on node ninjas who are ticking me off?  Comon' Devs! <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>

[Wrapye]

<cite>Rarlin wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite></cite><p>Lastly, I'd just like to know how I'm supposed to drop heroic mobs on node ninjas who are ticking me off?  Comon' Devs! <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY<img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />" /></p></blockquote>Become a tinkerer <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[Outerspace]

Good point Rarlin, had not thought about that

[VengeanceX]

<cite>Aeralik wrote:</cite><blockquote>It needs to have concentration since its a controllable pet and I can't let you have both pets up.  The pet is pretty powerful in its own right.  It's largely based of the summoner fighter pets but instead of having a limited spell book it picks up the spells of that class much like charm would.  The choice is yours to use it or not but it needs to remain consistent with charm and the illusionist pets in cost.</blockquote><p>Now my Coercer is not a high enough level to use Possess Essence yet but I wanted to make a few comments.</p><p>I think I see where you are going with the changes.  Possess Essence seems to be intended to be a dire charm ability that copies a mob rather than removes it from the content (thereby causing less content related problems).  That being said, a dire charm is simply a charm that creates a permanent pet that is somewhat weaker than a normal charm.  If I take that to be the intention then the spell is headed in the right direction.  The spell must use three concentration slots to remain balanced with Illusionists (mythical epic effects aside, which is a separate issue that should not affect the balancing of the base spell).  The only thing that really needs to be addressed is the strength of the pet.  I would say that summoner strength pets would be a good starting point but would obviously need to be balanced with the other ability changes and further testing.</p><p>The problem with the risk/reward ratio of charm still remains though.  Personally, I would like to have the concentration cost of charm itself removed or reduced.  The purpose of this would be to allow me to use it as a crowd control tool in groups.  It already cannot be used on epics and most named mobs which makes it useless in raids.</p><p>I have also read <a href="http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/preList.m?topic_id=416592&post_id=4649254" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">this</a> informative post about necromancer pets and charm as well as discussed it a little bit with some necromancer friends.  Their pet uses one concentration point and they use another concentration point for a pet buff for a total of two concentration points.  I think this fits just fine with Possess Essence; after all, we are not a true pet class and should not be as efficient as one.  What intrigues me more is their ability to have a summoned pet and a charm pet at the same time.  I do not want them to be nerfed at all, they can only do that with undead mobs after all, but this is definitely the kind of flavour a Coercer should have.  This would have to be balanced of course and I suspect the cost of such a thing (along with my suggested concentration cost removal) would be a reduced duration on charm.  I am not certain how big of a deal this would be.  I know many Coercers sacrifice duration on charm if they have a lower level copy that is Master quality, and this doesn't seem to bother them because the reward if worth it.</p><p>What do you all think?</p>

[ShadowMunkie]

Aeralik, you said that you wanted to make Possession into a spell that could be useful on raids. Here are the flaws in the spell as it currently sits on test.1. Too many Concentration slots. Why use a pet that does a mere 1000 DPS(at most) whenever we can use our dehate buff on 3 people and get possibly 2-3k from each person? We are sacrificing our own DPS to improve the raid, but over all so are illusionist with their Tandem spell.2. Epics can't be possessed/charmed so its virtually useless in RAIDS, wasn't that the main reason you wanted to change possession?3. It would die to often from too many mobs in raids due to AE's.4. No point in re-summoning it in raids since in that 10seconds it takes to re-summon it you could have done roughfully 15-20k damage alone.5. Even by mere chance its AE immune it does so little damage that once again its not worth using in raids/groups.Top 5 reason why no one will ever use this in RAIDS with 1, 4 and 5 reasons why not to use it in groups.Couple suggestions. Go in an entirely different perspective with the spell. Don't make it do damage at all. We don't another pet that does damage, I myself would like more utility.1. Make the pet give sometype of buffs. Double Attack/Crit vs Ranged, Melee, Spells. (RAID WIDE)2. Make it Debuff, thats mainly what are class is designed around in raids, is debuffs. Every 12seconds reduces damage dealt by mob by 25% for 3seconds.3. Make it heal the raid while its present. AE raid wide heal for 500points of damage every 3seconds.These are just 3 suggestion that would make it useful in raids.