I agree a generals with a partner is very deadly.

I do not wish to see every Demigod utilizing Idol Minions. I think that would be a mistake. Blur class lines, sure, but with later Demigods.

Give everyone those Idols and thats one less thing distinguishing one entity from another.

Sure, Generals with an Assassin partner can be deadly.  But not nearly as deadly as an Assassin with an Assassin partner,

It's not that clearcut.  A good Sedna or a good QoT + Assassin combo will demolish.  Will they beat a good Rook and TB?  Probably not on Prison, but the larger maps make solo survivability more important long-term.  Personally - playing on a UB/TB team I've been beaten by Sedna/QoT on Prison

The problem for me right now is not that Sedna and QoT are ineffective.  The are very effective playing as Assassins.  If, as Frogboy hints, we are only paying lip service to General/minion builds as a concept until it's politically safe to abandon the idea then let me know, otherwise I'm gonna keep pushing for effective minion builds\

I don't liek the idea of drastically buffing general survivability and nerfing their dmaage, and skill damage.

Then they're useless without minions, assuming minions get buffed aswell.

They need to be viable to be played with or without minion.  I think the biggest problem is that minion buffing items are not worth it after you've paid for idols themselves, and there needs to be some general-specific items.

If your good basicly any combo with an assasin and generals owns. For example Oak and Rook, Oak can slow down dg for Rook to kill and also can allow Rook to take alot of damage than heal him by killing stuff or sheild him. Rook and Qot makes a beastly seige team able to quickly get into your enemy's base and get his/her flags. You say generals are weak yet, I can beat other people with Oak and Erebus( dodn't really like Qot and Sedna). I mean with their minions along they can become an awessome team. If u go Oak healing it takes alot to take him out because everytime he kills a guy he not only heals himself but his minis and grunts about him. Allowing his minis to slaughter and man do all of Oak's spirits togther slaughter.

i'm doing the same thing, Ke5strel, and running into the same problems.  I keep trying, but at the end of the day it always seems I'm better of building them as a straight assasin, or going with an assassin instead.  Additional gold for generals might go a LONG way to mitigating that. 

Frogboy, if additional General gold or other stopgap measure can be worked into the game shortly I think it would be pretty important.  I don't think the General concept is completely bunk in the short term, but they definitely need a boost economically.  Allowing them to utilize minions without gimping your team's citadel or your Demigod's own performance will make them far more effective.

Additional gold will simply make them play as an assassin better.

Additional gold isn't going to make people buy the idols, they'll spend it on items to make them better as an assassin, which will make them better assassins then assassins.

They COULD give idols for free(minotaurs at lvl 1, archers at 2, priests at 3, level 2 minotaurs at 4, level 2 archers at 5, etc..).  That'll make them used, but that won't make them good.  You'll just have people playing as assassins still, and happen to have the idols since they're free.

I think the best solution is better minion buffing and minion synergy items.

The best solution is obvious - give auras only to genegals, and make it powerful auras ( ie. non-ridiculus ).

Specific ideas for auras are also obvious :

Increase HP / damage ( increase more damage than HP, since minions under aura should be dangerous but still killable, though not by a single Fire Nova )

Increase archery range

Healing

Movement and/or attack speed ( remember the dreaded Undead double aura of Death Knight / Dread Lord ? )

Increased damage vs Structures

Etc.

Free / mana-per-sec ( and even more powerful ) auras

Enhancements AoE spells with specifics as above.

Right but you should get those auras from items.. I suggested stuff like that.

It's a faster, better balanced, and more elegant solution just to remove the General/Assassin distinction as soon as politically viable, as Frogboy mentioned.  Tinkering with Minion items and Morale and Idols and Ability Summons may make things better for Generals, but it preserves the design that hasn't proven to be all that effective yet.

Generals are always going to have to buy Assassin items if only to survive the game and not feed.  It's simpler just to make them Assassins with pets and get rid of all this Idol/Minion Stat nonsense.

Noting, fire nova and other moves that knock small grunts into the air will kill the grunts when and if they actually hit the ground again. Heaven's Wrath or w/e the 1000 favor point item has the same type of effect, and does so as well. Unimportant? maybe, but thought i'd mention it.

I don't quite understand your hatred for minionstats..

And I don't see anything wrong with the design of minions and minion idols, just the balance and general items.

I agree that Generals are not as powerful as assasins in their current state, but that is something that can be easily fixed with a few tweaks.  There are already plenty of brilliant suggestions that people have posted on this forum to fix the problem, and these should be looked into.  Scrapping the generals/assasin roletypes would be a HORRIBLE and LAZY fix though.  While this game is similar to DOTA, it's not the same game... and the generals/assasin hero types helps distinguish it and make it a more interesting.  While some players might not want to deal with the whole RTS-style unit controls, there are many that would, and that option should be provided to them.  By having generals and assasins you provide everyone the type of game THEY want to play.  If you're into a fast-paced dungeon crawler style game like Diablo, choose an assasin; if you prefer strategy and unit-based tactics choose a general.

Frogboy, I cannot stress how big a mistake it would be to scrap this class distinction you have established in Demigod.  It really is a brilliant concept and makes it stand out from other games.  I think the game would lack longevity and uniqueness if it didn't contain this feature.  It may be a bit more work, but it's a much better idea to fix Generals to play how they were intended than to scrap them completely.

I continue to have a great deal of *controllable* fun with Minion Idols and their Generals... . No problems here but perhaps for some pathfinding glitches.

I`ve also hammered the computer quite early by purchasing level IV Minions instead of the usual Assassin-style personal items. They work well.

I disagree in that Generals don't seem useless and squishy to me.  They do, however, generally seem rather bland.  They're generally hard to kill enemies with okay stats and a lot of passive / support abilities.  Their minions are nothing but creeps with better stats and a facelift. 

Erebus, I think, is the exception.  He does seem pretty interesting to me, probably the most unique out of any of the Demigods, actually. 

I look at Oak, QoT, and Sedna, however, and just see pesky, persistent opponents that are about as fun to play as they are to play against, which is to say: not really fun and not really annoying, just "eh."

I think you're probably right that a team of Generals versus a team of Assassins will tend to lose, and I think that's because Generals have been cast in a support role.  That makes sense, given that they're supposed to be support their minions.  I think the problem may be, however, that their minions are really just support too.