Recently, I did a test to confirm my theory that many non-boss monstrology minions and some boss monstrology minions who have access to shadow spells are unable to use them because of something in their coding. I have tested a number of boss monstrology creatures in my monstrodome including Renegade druid and Prince viggor who have access to a number of shadow spells, and from the dozens of times I have battled them, neither of these two enemies have ever used their shadow spells. Many of the bosses and non bosses of the catacombs seem to have this in common (assuming they have access to shadow pips).
Recently, I decided to test a myth rank 16 Chromeclops (Tier 5) (from the Sinbad and The Iron Sultan gauntlet), who when I farmed the three enemies in that dungeon would often cast either blades or globals followed with shadow aoe's or other damage spells, against Zandra the Quietone (rank 12 boss from Khrysalis) to see what spells my Chromeclops would use in that fight. The reason I selected this particular boss was because this boss was myth (meaning that both sides would do low damage to each other), the boss had high hp allowing me to see a high pool of spells, and that boss had no outgoing damage boost which allowed my minion to survive for a long time. I was able to remove the boss's minion from that combat before my minion casted its first spell to ensure that my minion would not get focused down quickly. I then mostly passed to ensure that my Chromeclops would be able to go solo against the boss with no interference (I did cast one Tatzleworm at one point to take the boss's aggro off my minion). In total, my Chromeclops was able to cast 56 spells without me assisting it (outside of providing it with a few tower shields). The following highlights my minions spell usage in this fight:
Globals (Time of Legend and Saga of Heros): 11 Yellow Troll: 11 White rat magician: 6 Mythic fuel: 6 Shatter: 5 Pass: 5 Pierce: 4 Spirit Blade: 3 Myth Blade: 3 Orthrus: 2
Unused spells:
Keeper of the Flame: 0 (I have seen this minion cast this spell prior to doing this test)
Witches House Call (Shadow pip): 0 (never attempted)
Mythic Colossus (Shadow pip): 0 (never attempted)
Snake Charmer (Shadow pip): 0 (never attempted)
What I am trying to figure out is whether or not this is a bug and is something that should be fixed, or if this is an intentional design mechanic. If this is intentional, I would love to know what the justification is for restraining summoned monstrology minions from using spells they should have access to. If this is just a bug, I would hope that there could be some sort of acknowledgement that this issue is being looked into. Hopefully, this post will help make continued improvements to the monstrology hobby in W101.
