Are you content with companion gearing?

SpacemanSpiff1 · August 2023

i think higher quality drops should be more frequent. other than that, the gear is fine. they're meat shields, not tuned player builds.

also, crafted sets would mean more stats and server calculations.

KlauthWarthog · August 2023

I am mostly content with the design decisions made for companion gear.
1. I do not think companions should use the same gear as players. Player gearing is very complicated and leads to extreme gaps in performance. Companions should not get that complicated to use (and they are already far more complex to use properly than people seem to realize);
2. I think companion gear should be upgradeable, with specific tempers distinct from those used for player gear. Add something like "Companion Armor Temper" to world boss' drops or daily rapport quest rewards, and require something like 5 of those to upgrade to blue, 30 to upgrade to purple (the numbers and sources are illustrative, do not obsess over them);
3. Companion gear traits are not balanced on their usefulness at all. Quickened beats soothing any time of the day.

Regarding companions as a whole, there is a thing that should be addressed - they need to either move out of stupid, or be made resistant to it.

FantasticFreddie · August 2023

I would love for a "companion gear station" that would allow crafting, upgrading, and deconstructing, even if the mats were all unique and I wouldn't be able to use my existing stash this would be a welcome QOL improvement.

Gray_howling_parrot · August 2023

1. I definitely think while player gearing seems “complicated” to some players that it could add SO much more depth to companions and for players that don’t necessarily seek out group content as much. Companions currently are more often than not a hindrance in anything difficult - either standing in the red and dying constantly or dodge rolling out of bounds while having aggro and resetting the fight.

There’s a lot that needs to be updated with companions and I think the biggest thing is enhancing their AI to be more responsive to environmental damage and also being required to stay within a certain distance of enemy mobs that they’re targeting or that we ourselves are targeting.

Player gear on a companion may add more calculations to the server - sure, but the areas that you use them in primarily (solo content, dungeons, etc) are already population capped and filled with other players whose APM is much higher than a companion’s would ever be, so I think that argument is negligible.

I still think, like many other RPGs (can’t speak for things like SWTOR), where you can place gear you pick up on your companion s(BG3 for example), that this would add so much more depth and fun to companions. Companions are not complicated to use even remotely. You look up the best traits and best skills to use and that’s it.. they’re pretty dry and the only thing that makes them worthwhile is potential to help solo small group content and their cool personal storylines!

2. At the very least, as many have said, we need to be able to deconstruct and create companion gear, collect upgrade materials, etc. This could even be added to where they technically research their own companion traits and a new companion gear station could be created where when creating gear, you actually are creating it as the companion. The RNG associated with companion gear is atrocious, which is weird because it’s not making that big of a difference in their performance regardless.

ZOS has said before that they will be updating the companion system. It has potential to be AMAZING. Currently it’s just meh.

rothan117 · August 2023

The companion gearing system is awful

The gear should be upgradable via crafting. The present cost of purple companion gear makes it silly to even equip it, better off selling it given that it is such a minor stat improvement.

Destai · August 2023

Gearing woes is one of the biggest reasons I don't use them. They don't have their own inventory and I can't craft them gear.

Erickson9610 · August 2023

If Companions could use player gear, I'd put them in Telvanni Efficiency every time — I would find better utility in using a different 5 piece set on my player character while letting the Companion wear armor that buffs themselves.

On that note, I would like to see more set bonuses in the future that buff Companions in some way. Telvanni Efficiency's Companion cooldown reduction is a huge game changer, because it's just not worth trying to build Companions with gear traits other than Quickened without utilizing that set.

The_Boggart · August 2023

Just want the 'mark as junk' option to be enabled

rpa · August 2023

Well, as long as majority of players don't Quickened, it's just a matter of short shopping session to find very affordable set of blues with a bargain purple or several.
Companion in Quickened + Telvanni Efficiency may not be at all optimal but really makes companion spam their abilities.

evan302 · August 2023

1. No. The present system relies too heavily on RNG. I'd be much happier if they could use normal gear or if I could craft their gear or change the traits.

2. I'm fairly happy with them, but I don't see why they can't carry their own gear, or alternatively give them 5-10 bag slots as a reward for getting them fully levelled with max rapport or even tie it to a new achievement.

Calastir · August 2023

A resounding "no" from me.

I've been playing daily for over 2 years now, and still have some companions only decked in blue gear.

Tandor · August 2023

I'm fine with companions' gear, but I'd like them to be able to stand on pressure plates in normal dungeons.

Necrotech_Master · August 2023

the 3 major things for me from companions gear would be:

able to mark it as junk for quick selling (it currently cannot be marked as junk for whatever reason)
future content i would like to see would be actual set gear bonuses on companion gear, to give them a little more flavor than basic plain gear
ability to do some crafting of companion gear, such as using tempers to increase quality

gamergirldk · August 2023

Lets craft companion gear, same type and stats as we have,but let us be able to craft it. Make some quests we have to do to unlock it.

Ragnarok0130 · August 2023

I'd prefer to be able to craft and improve companion gear at work benches with our already existing blacksmith, woodworking, jewelry, and clothier skill lines. Not only would this ease to metric tonne of RNG nonsense that ZoS loves to have their game revolve around but it would give players added incentive to rank up those skill lines and commit skill points to them.

Ragnarok0130 · August 2023

SpacemanSpiff1 wrote: »

i think higher quality drops should be more frequent. other than that, the gear is fine. they're meat shields, not tuned player builds.

also, crafted sets would mean more stats and server calculations.

Not if you would just be able to craft companion gear as a separate tree under the current crafting system with normal gear not being usable by companions and vice versa. I am sure however that the servers could handle companions in normal overland, dungeon, and trial gear with set bonuses since it has no issues handling real players in set bonus gear during events, free weekends and peak hours. The server performance woes seem to stem from too many effects going off at once in once place such as in large cyrodill battles or trial bosses with over the top visual effects such as the reef guardian.

Hapexamendios · August 2023

No, I think they should be craftable. We can make armor for other players, why not companions?

bmnoble · August 2023

As it is with the current system, now that I have a few purple gear sets for them, it just gets taken off one companion and put on the new one to wear while they level, then goes to whichever ones I happen to like, there is zero incentive in my opinion to have them all geared up.

I would like to be able to just make their gear, or at the very least be able to upgrade their gear, the bulk of the green and blue companion gear ends up being vendor trash, the purple is still hit and miss depending on the trait.

With the gear being trait based there is not much incentive to try out other set ups, people pick the traits they like and then have no reason to seek out more gear, if they had some actual set bonuses people might have an actual reason to seek out specific companion gear or at least renew interest in it.

cyberjanet · August 2023

People actually have purple sets for their companions??? Wow. I have no incentive to gear my companions, unlike Guild Wars original where it was up to you to make them fabulous.

jle30303 · August 2023

I would like two things:

(1) To be able to upgrade companion gear. White (from shops or starting gear) to green, green to blue, blue to purple.

(2) To be able to change trait on companion gear.

Perhaps, for the latter, it should be required to have "bound" at least one piece of companion gear in the relevant trait - for instance - no changing a Jack to Aggressive unless you have Bound an Aggressive Jack previously (a green one will do).

Calastir · August 2023

cyberjanet wrote: »

People actually have purple sets for their companions???

One even wears a gold legendary quality ring; the Companion's Ascendant Ring (Quickened-Reduces ability cooldowns by 3%) which was in the Heroes of High Isle Reward Bundle within the in-game Crown Store for all those who owned the High Isle Chapter before October 21, 2022.

spartaxoxo · August 2023

I'm okay with them having their own gear, but we should be able to improve and transmute it so that getting the correct weight and traits isn't so awful imo.

HedgeHugger · August 2023

Sarannah wrote: »

Jaustink wrote: »

Sarannah wrote: »

Jaustink wrote: »

This is a 2 part question for those of us that utilize companions:

1. Are you content with the companion gearing system? Would you rather continue using companion equipment or be able to place gear that we can use as players on them?
2. If you could change one thing about companions in general, what would it be? How would you make them better?

1: Yes I am content with companion gearing. And I would NOT want normal player gear to be used on companions. The only thing about companion gear I would change is allowing us to upgrade the companion gear's quality, as we have 0 control over what we find with which trait and with what quality.

2: Companions are awesome, but the one change I would make would be: Do not allow companions to get aggro at all, unless they specifically have a taunt skill equipped.

PS: I absolutely love companions!

Interesting! Do you have a reason why you DON'T want player gear as an option on companions?

Many reasons actually:
-ZOS would have to balance companions for every player set.
-ZOS would have to keep companions in minds when creating future player sets.
-Companion gear is a nice extra possible good drop when using them.
-Companions skills would become too complicated if they could use all possible player sets.
-Companions could become bugged too easily with certain player sets, and this many player sets in existence.
-Companions would be affected by balance changes if they could use player sets.
-Companions could become too flashy with certain player sets.
-As someone mentioned above me: It could create lag due to all the possible extra server calculations.
-Companions are not players, we should not dress them like us(set wise).
-Companion gear is an extra branch in the economy(even though I do not trade companiongear myself), a more fleshed out economy is always better.

But a companion wearing a gearset would be no different from another player, in theory, surely?

BXR_Lonestar · August 2023

Companions need gear sets that actually make them useful. I would certainly think it should be sufficient to just use player gear on them, but I'm open to a solution that is somewhere between what we have now and using player gear. At this point, the gear just comes with basic traits, and thus, the companions are pretty basic. They're great for normal content, but you will never feel confident running vet DLC dungeons 3 man with a companion and feel that this is an adequate substitute for a player.

Perhaps gear can even be rated so that companions with certain gear ratings can fill spots in the dungeon que because nothing sucks worse than waiting an hour in que for a random normal that I know I could otherwise clear by myself if only it would put me in there....

Remathilis · August 2023

We now have six companions. I've leveled half of them to 20 (a slow process) and most are still wearing mismatched green gear with random traits because grinding purple gear in the right trait is a nightmare x6 characters.

karthrag_inak · August 2023

Any existing craftable sets should be able to be crafted for companions as well. Make companion traits seperately researchable and only known to the level of the gear that is used for the research (so you can make a purple aggressive pauldron only if you have researched a purple aggressive pauldron before).

RaddlemanNumber7 · August 2023

1. Player Character equipment, or similar sets that can be crafted for Companions would be so much better.
2. Put polymorphs on Companions with the polymorph's sounds replacing the Companion sounds. A tanky Boneman as a Companion for my nercros would be a dream come true.

disintegr8 · August 2023

Haenk wrote: »

As a "master crafter" I can not understand, why I should not be able to create even white companion gear. That makes no sense.
At least allow us to upgrade gear.

Master Crafters should be able to at least upgrade gear, making it bound. Allowing us to make gear would be better but only if it's bound (too much impact on the marketplace otherwise).

boony · August 2023

It would be nice if their gear stacked and in combat they are able to activate synergies.

merpins · August 2023

This isn't a gearing system. This is a gearing grind. There is no real system in place aside from buying from players or getting random drops. I'd like an actual system in place, where you can craft companion gear and companion sets; give us companion versions of the crafted sets that aren't nearly as strong, and companion monster helms that do the same stuff but with a huge power decrease.

The only time I use companions is when I duo dungeons with my wife. There is no build to be had, aside from having our companions use healing staves and having them heal us slightly. It helps very slightly, but it did make it possible to duo a couple harder dungeons where we needed just a little push. Being able to gear and build companions properly would make them actually useful, and not just tiny nudges as they currently are. They don't need to be good, just slightly more useful.