Wait a minute.. (WD Breakthrough)

[Telzen]

Way to over simplify. Sacrificing and resummoning mongrels is very mana inefficient. So people aren't going to be doing that. And you wouldn't have to sacrifice all of your mongrels, so you could still have some out as distractions/meat shields and sacrifice 1 or 2 to help take down enemies.

[LaZeR]

Intersting. I didn't think about Mana. Probably because I'm still stuck in D2..

[lunarleif]

Sacrifice is useless

Its resistance is useless. Though the thing is that sacrifice makes the mongrel useful longer since eventually enemies will be one shotting them, so you blow them up in their face to get some use out of them. Also, the sacrifice may convey enchantments you enchanted upon them.

[Kraszu]

Its resistance is useless. Though the thing is that sacrifice makes the mongrel useful longer since eventually enemies will be one shotting them, so you blow them up in their face to get some use out of them. Also, the sacrifice may convey enchantments you enchanted upon them.

Not necessery becouse of passives that will make them stronger.

It can offer some interesting gameplay, your mana is limited so you have to think before you sacrifice, the lower health summons will be much better to sacrfice so you could have some interesting gameplay.

Sacrifice could also take few seconds to work, you will have some flag(sacrifice icon) you could see on the flag when it will work, it could be of red on black, the red color would fast drop down in the directory of your minion when it gets completely black it blows )or whatever else sacrifice does, diferent sacrifice diferent flag, so you could also have leech sacrifice for example). So you would have to plan little more, and it would look great.

As for limited number of active skill, why not give couple summoners as one skill, you could have ability to summon 3 diferent kinds of mongrel's with one skill, and with passives you will then improve what you want.

[sreda]

I've been thinking about Blizzard statement that Mongrel is one of the many pets in the WD disposel. However, he is the ONLY pet we've seen so far. And comparing number of active spells to the Wiz and the Barb- There aren't a lot of room to increase it. Especially if Blizzard don't want the minions to his main damage but more of a distraction.

Anyway, that made me think- Maybe all of his skills are considered summons aswell? I mean, Plauge of Toads- The WD SUMMONS toads to jump and explodes on enemie. Spider Statue- The WD SUMMONS Spiders to attack his enemies.
Why this is interesting you ask? Well:

1. It bring up a new aspect of summoning- Summoning a minion, but not for long. For example he can have a skills called Ancestral Rage where he SUMMONS a tribal warrior to fight, but vanishes over time.

2. If these skills are considered Summons they can be buffed as minions. One exmaple- Sacrifice. You can blow up not only your Mongrel, but also your Spiders and Toads. This can make Sacrifice the main skill of the WD and be a whole lotta fun.

What do you think? I think it's an amazing way to give summoning the difference from D2 Necro Summoning, which is what Blizzard is after, as they said repeatedly

The witch doctor is not filling in the shoes of the necromancer. So the witch doctor can not be LIKE the necromancer since Jay Wilson himself said they MAY plan on bringing back the necromancer in future expansions of the Diablo III franchise.

Think of the witch doctor like WoW's warlock, a hybrid of summons (demonology), spirit (destruction), plague (affliction).

I for one am going to be playing the Witch Doctor avidly, until my eyes bleed.

[Kraszu]

The witch doctor is not filling in the shoes of the necromancer. So the witch doctor can not be LIKE the necromancer since Jay Wilson himself said they MAY plan on bringing back the necromancer in future expansions of the Diablo III franchise.

Necromancer didn't summon minors to sacrifice them after they fight for a while, only resurrected monsters had died after time periods, others were alive till killed. It would play very differently. Sacrifice could be add to improve necromancer instead of WD trough, but we don't even know if it will even be in D3.

[sreda]

I've been thinking about Blizzard statement that Mongrel is one of the many pets in the WD disposel. However, he is the ONLY pet we've seen so far. And comparing number of active spells to the Wiz and the Barb- There aren't a lot of room to increase it. Especially if Blizzard don't want the minions to his main damage but more of a distraction.

Anyway, that made me think- Maybe all of his skills are considered summons aswell? I mean, Plauge of Toads- The WD SUMMONS toads to jump and explodes on enemie. Spider Statue- The WD SUMMONS Spiders to attack his enemies.
Why this is interesting you ask? Well:

1. It bring up a new aspect of summoning- Summoning a minion, but not for long. For example he can have a skills called Ancestral Rage where he SUMMONS a tribal warrior to fight, but vanishes over time.

2. If these skills are considered Summons they can be buffed as minions. One exmaple- Sacrifice. You can blow up not only your Mongrel, but also your Spiders and Toads. This can make Sacrifice the main skill of the WD and be a whole lotta fun.

What do you think? I think it's an amazing way to give summoning the difference from D2 Necro Summoning, which is what Blizzard is after, as they said repeatedly

An interesting thought, however I think I heard Blizzard saying they don't want any of the classes to be one-skill-wonders. So spamming sacrifice I don't think is a viable option, though it could be definitely done in conjunction with other spells. I'de imagine the Voodoo witchdoctor as a Warlock in WoW. Fearing/Kiting/DoTing their opponents, keeping them at distance while minions do their bidding.

So far the skill trees seem to suggest it so that's what I'm expecting.