there is a group of pve players that are not happy with the update, but from what temperature i can gather, there is a lot of players just waiting to see how this will go.
and to mention something another user (@PhilC posted recently :
this is were i think mwe might be going. to a complete disaster, having thralls “alive”, and the ammount of them “being alive” should be opt in, not forced on players. better than just alienating one group or the other. since this is more “cosmetic” and bring no real benefit to players… it should be optional , and let people decide if they want to use it or not, i might want to have 3 or 4 alive and the rest in their benches, and if they want to use it, let player control how many of those thralls will be “alive” and how many others will be as inventory items.
this solution will work to EVERYONE,., and if it turns into a lag fest or bring issues to client, people can just drop those thralls, and put some inventory items thralls in the benches, until system is more mature.