Active companion for TR

coldbeer

In this moment I have 3 options: Con Artist for rings and 10% debuff, Shadow Demon for damage and deflect bonus and Young Yeti for tanking. Which one is better in the long run to ugrade to legendary? Thanks

sirjimbofrancis

The yeti bonus, apparently, doesn't work. I wouldn't pick that one.

The con artist gives a buff that helps your whole party, and it stacks with other con artist buffs. That makes it a great choice.

The Fire Archon has a better active bonus, and is probably the better choice for personal DPS. I picked this one a while ago and, in retrospect, I wish I had known then what I know now and chosen the con artist.

Unfortunately, for me, upgrading my con artist right now is too darn expensive. If I had it to do all over again, I'd probably go with the con artist, but fire archon is a solid choice, too.

coldbeer

Thank you. I will, some time in the future, buy 2 archons, but for now I want to invest in a long run companion and bondings.

micky1p00

Just small note. While you do get the most out of making the summoned legendary, you don't have to, you will get the 15% transfer if any of the 5 is legendary.

coldbeer

I doubt that I will have enough AD to make all legendary any time soon! Nevertheless, thanks for the info.

micky1p00

coldbeer#1097 said:

I doubt that I will have enough AD to make all legendary any time soon! Nevertheless, thanks for the info.

No, you only need 1. Multiple legendaries add you nothing. And to get the 15% stat transfer that single legendary doesn't have to be the summoned one.

coldbeer

Oh, now I understand.

demonmonger

Shadow demon

coldbeer

Can you please elaborate? Actual experience with this pets in combat will give me a insight, especially because the Shadow Demon need some investment in deflect that can go in other places with Con Artist.

sirjimbofrancis

I think, generally, people like the shadow demon because it is a companion that actually does good damage (when comparing to damage done by other companions). The active bonus is just okay, because it only procs once every 20-30 seconds, but if you are trying to maximize the overall amount of damage you, and the party does, you are better off with a con artist or fire archon. It also has no ring slots.

I got my shadow demon all the way to legendary before I realized that the damage it does is small compared to the buff the con artist can give to the damage of the whole party, or the damage I could do with the right companion with the right active bonus.

I can see how it might be quite useful when soloing content because it will draw agro away from you, but soloing will only take you so far in this game. Eventually, you will have to team up to get things done.

coldbeer

Good to know. I realize that SP habits are no longer useful in a MMO and I am doing as much teamwork that I can. Companions are not really tanky or draw enough heat of you like in SP. I am going to invest my tarmalune bars in something else and upgrade the Con Artist. Thank you all.

kinganuthin

Sellsword. Swordcoast, all companion equipment have the same stats. may as well go with 3 offense slot.


Does con artist strike fast enough to make rising rings work well? If it does, then maybe Con artist.

protagonist

Is death slaad still worth as an active?

blur

No, in trash fights it doesnt activate at all and on bosses damage it does is too low. In the end its 1-2% of total damage. Best i saw was 3% once, tested in FBI. Also i think blue rank is superior to purple rank because it doesnt remove poison stacks. If it would receive a buff to poison it could be usefull but for now avoid it.

sundance777

The one drawback of the con artist is the offense/offense/defense combination on the bonding stones slots. The debuff and ring slots are nice if you have 3 double slotted rings to outfit him with. It also has to be at least blue to obtain the debuff and it actually does an OK job of staying alive, I ran one for a while with my paladin and was happy with it.

On my TR I still have the legendary mercenary, I don't care for the belt slot all that much but it works well and at least I can make a double slotted belts on the cheap. The drawback of a fire archon is the talisman slot, there is not a cost effective double slotted talisman available, at least not on Xbox.

I have a friend that swears by the shadow demon, it's cool, has a good bonus, hits fairly well and is fairly hard to kill as it shadows around.

My new personal favorite budget companion right now is the lillend. Three offense slots, three rings slots, is purple already and cheap cheap, like 30-50K on xbox which is way less than the AD to upgrade a blue or a green. It is slow to hit, but with the way the bonding stones work right now it hits fast enough to keep my companions gift up. It also does some healing which is not terrible and seems to stay alive a lot longer in battle than most of my other companions.

sirjimbofrancis

Shadow demon had damage nerfed recently, FYI.

coldbeer

From what i remember Lillend doesn”t proc some insignia. Con Artist is squishy, I have mine at level 30 and I gived up Shadow Demon, because of the nerf sirjimbofrancis mentioned and Yeti since the tanks of the group believe he is stealing aggro.

blur

Yeti's active bonus doesnt work as well, only animation is there.

sundance777

coldbeer#1097 said:

From what i remember Lillend doesn”t proc some insignia. Con Artist is squishy, I have mine at level 30 and I gived up Shadow Demon, because of the nerf sirjimbofrancis mentioned and Yeti since the tanks of the group believe he is stealing aggro.

Oh maybe it is not triggering Protector's Camaraderie, that should be easy enough to test, but I could see that being an issue, as the attack speed is very slow for Lillend, and half the time it is healing and not attacking so it might not load up 4 stacks before the first stack times out.

ravenskya

My Shadow Demon did get nerfed but he still does good damage and attacks a lot. So I'm still using him at the moment. I am looking for something that has ring slots though. I tried the Lillend and I was half way through a fight before bonding popped, I was really disappointed in the Lillend.

blur

Sellsword and Con Artist are top options for summoned now. Sellsword has 3 offense slots but gear slots make him harder to gear up now unless u already have those avenger parts. Con Artis has 2 offense slots but 3 ring slots make him easy to gear up.
Their active bonuses are lame but they reduce targets defense by 10% and those reductions stack.

araxelven

After trying a bunch of different setups in Preview, I recently took the plunge on live and swapped my Shadow Demon for a Sellsword. The transition is pretty natural for me because I already have all the avenger gear for her equipment slots. I've kept her at blue for now while I'm trying her out.

In acutal use she's okay, I guess. She procs Protector's friendship/camaraderie as fast or maybe even faster than the Demon. She's a bit squishy and doesn't draw as much aggro as him, but that may be because I haven't made her epic and legendary yet. Or it may be because she doesn't do as much damage. I've yet to do a bigger dungeon with her, and it's hard to see the difference in real life with her debuff but you have to trust that it's there. I'd hoped to find something a bit flashier but with the ring change my other options aren't that atttractive, so I'll probably spend my tokens to get her up to legendary in a few days.

As for my other pets after some thought I'll be swapping my fire archon for a siege master. I just makes more sense nowadays to get that damage bonus for the entire fight and not just the last few seconds where everybody else does major damage.

coldbeer

araxelven said:

After trying a bunch of different setups in Preview, I recently took the plunge on live and swapped my Shadow Demon for a Sellsword. The transition is pretty natural for me because I already have all the avenger gear for her equipment slots. I've kept her at blue for now while I'm trying her out.

In acutal use she's okay, I guess. She procs Protector's friendship/camaraderie as fast or maybe even faster than the Demon. She's a bit squishy and doesn't draw as much aggro as him, but that may be because I haven't made her epic and legendary yet. Or it may be because she doesn't do as much damage. I've yet to do a bigger dungeon with her, and it's hard to see the difference in real life with her debuff but you have to trust that it's there. I'd hoped to find something a bit flashier but with the ring change my other options aren't that atttractive, so I'll probably spend my tokens to get her up to legendary in a few days.

As for my other pets after some thought I'll be swapping my fire archon for a siege master. I just makes more sense nowadays to get that damage bonus for the entire fight and not just the last few seconds where everybody else does major damage.

Not always you have the luxury to play with a high iL team and bosses, like Orcus and Lostmauth, have a lot of health, making fire archon still a must have companion. Right now, I like my Con Artist, but I am interested also in the Ambush Drake, a prohibitive companion at 6 mil AD, for his 20% debuff to defense for 3 seconds.