Rattler_EU

Hmm, i've soloed tons of EBs with Thugs/Traps - It's really, difficult at times. I need to use everything in my disposal, mines, mortar, even drones, gang war (it's only for a brief meat shield). But one skill owns them all, caltrops > EB's. Dont know if it would work against heroes, since i havent ever tried . I seem to pull aggro very easily off my minions, sometimes it gets locked on me for good - if i show up, the eb is coming to me.

I forgot the name but the radiation blaster was really hard for me, some chick scrapper was really tough too..even with caltrops. I dont think Traps is the good EB powerset secondary, if you wish to survive it.

Here goes,

Thug MM:
Brute = Lord Smash - whats with the rocks?
Enforcers = Rambo & Pants
- Rambo is usually rushing..alot
Thugs = Kamiz, Softie, Grill
- Kamiz the uber elite-boss puller, Softie is faceplanted first & Grill the burner.

Robot MM:
Assault Bot: Megaroid
Protector Bots: Semitype & Prototype (ehm)
Drones: A1,B1,C1 (simple but effective!)

Zombie MM:
Liche : Boogieman
Grave Knights: Mr Pop & Monkey
Zombies: Fodder, Itch & Vapor

Traps is underrated but there are couple of powers that don't deliver as much they could. Triage Beacon (medicine powers are way better), Detonator if you need your minions to stay alive (Trip Mine is better imo) and Seeker Drones because mercs get flashbangs already but everything else is really good .

I use it as an distraction against EB's & normal bosses although, EB's dispatch the gang with 1 blow and some bosses do too but it's a good power, a life saver. If your thugs aggro 3 groups with 5 mobs in each.. mayhem, chaos!.

Went for the Recharge/Damage/Accuracy, maybe it was 3/2/1

I'm slotting it for Damage/Accuracy later on. The ghost has a good single-target Hold power to use and a ranged ability plus self-heal. I think it's very good and has saved me from debt at least once but i use it everytime i can. I havent timed but it seems to last around quite a while, maybe 5 minutes.

Grave Knight vs Zombies spawn different looking ghost but with same abilities, i still need a few levels for Liche.. uh.

edit: Anyway the level of the ghost is same as yours but dont know about lich.

So i came up with a post like this, not trying to make it as a poll but rather to share battle stories, please do. So what's your best or toughest battle you've ever had as an MM?. I can start with a few of my own.

First one: it was against CoT Ruin Mage - Purple. All i can say it was scary - the thrill afterwards was sweet. There were few moments where i had to retreat or get faceplanted & burned all my insps.

Second: Longbow Ballista - this guy is so hard for me and i've had to beat him 3 times, it's a high-risk debt mission everytime. Those nukes make any thug eating dirt in one/two hits. I really dont want to see him again .

Third: Infernal is probably my favourite fight. Intense fight. He can do some nasty things to "Gang War", it would be a miracle if the thugs lived more than 5 seconds.

Four: Getting ambushed after Portal by 5-10 CoT Earth Casters is truly the craziest moment i've ever expirienced. Again very high change getting faceplanted.

Thats it. I hope you enjoyed, but please add some of your own if you want to.

Hmm, how about Mu Mystic (or alike) MM?. Their high energy(is it?) blasts sound so powerful . 3 Ranged, 2 Support with damage/accuracy buffs and then one bigger with really powerfull blasts. If you have faced Arachnos Mu 36+ boss, you know what i mean . "and then came the thundering strike that shaked the very foundations of earth."

Hmm, yeah my arsonist goes with the brute sometimes to melee stuff "look what i can do!" "Did you see that!" /em boast bicep, he's also very stubborn and refuses my orders but hey thugs are like that sometimes. He's a real comedian with those stunts. "So what's that thing flying trough the air?" "Just the arsonist, dont worry about him.".

Then again the brute just wants to throw some rocks, "like i'm going to actually hit that guy, get real, it would ruin my gloves."

I've got them: 3/2/1 - Damage, Accuracy, Defense Debuff .In my team they are the damage dealers and if they get defeated it sure shows. I play on Ruthless story arcs too and the fodder moments i've had happen usually against some really tough elite bosses, like Longbow Ballista (total nightmare! He one shotted the Brute). Normal bosses dont seem to be very dangerous unless they come in some nasty 2 boss team. Hey and i'd really advice you to slot the little guys too give them a change to shine

I have seen it too but slightly reversed, i have to wait them if i go superspeeding trough the lifts usually but not in normal usage but now the funny part, if i really have to be going now or else (like closing an CoT portal and BANG here comes the cavalry worst case scenario: 2 bosses, 1 lt, 8 minions).. they dont want to leave. "Well i'm going, do what you want." Most of the time, they stay and fight to the end which is quick.

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yeah, he's an fire based corruptor at least i like to think that and it's awesome.

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I just have to quote myself here, just reached 32 myself, and well well. the new goodies he gets are mind blowing literally, without giving spoiling anything just wait until you get the second upgrade!.

ooh. hmm that's strange. I've never had that myself yet

yeah, he's an fire based corruptor at least i like to think that and it's awesome. I also think that Thugs deal slightly more AoE damage than robots do combine that with Acid Mortar, Empty Clips, Poison Trap, Caltrops - brutes first attack ... ahhh, all those numbers

ps. Or maybe Arsonist with Corruptor Scourge bonus. All good though

Thugs are very strong MM team. I got Bruiser yesterday and he's a mean machine, as his first task he was tanking Leo McKnight (typing) longbow elite boss (red) with Gang War, it took awhile but there were no losses at all except for the Posse.

I had mercenaries but only for low levels so i dont know much. Cons for the thugs might be the low levels and then maybe early 20s, i felt weak - had to recall them many times in missions but that might be because of my secondary set and Aid Other isn't as good heal as Poison has (lack of healing thereof). Anyway if you take thugs, stick with them they get amazing

Yeah i agree with you Canine. Even though the healing isn't huge, it can ease the workload on yourself, because it heals the small injuries - while your healing the big ones. When i'm missioning, i've never been so busy with healing as i'm now

Hey

I'm not sure if this post has any deeper meaning or purpose but i just feel that the current gameplay is alot faster (more furious) than before or maybe it's just me. Any other there?. What i mean is when things go bad, they go worse _really_ fast . I used to play with my Robot MM i dont think i had such situations.

I've been faceplanted before i could even think about escaping or in mid-jump only to hit the floor with my face like in the mayhem mission. I usually end up being hit by any boss for 2x more hp then i got :|. The game feels whole a lot more dangerous in my opinion.

Besides the above, does anyone have any tips for Mayhem missions?. I'm not doing so good there suddenly, when the hero comes .. well .. face meet carpet ;p. Feel free to add your expiriences vs past gameplay if nothing else, would like to hear.

Lets get 'em!

I went for Traps (with some medicine powers) - its great fun & good change of gamestyle from my Poison MM although i have to admit, i've had some nasty faceplants here and there, thugs get owned on regular basis but it still rocks

The only 'problem' i had in my career, 1 to 32 (i'll be back but corruptor alt now), i felt that the missions were too easy & short with Ruthless. Some of them were over in minutes, maybe if the mission engine would know that MM is starting the mission and spicing it up alot.

Sure you could lower xp/inf for MMs in general but why would you like to punish someone who likes to play MM . Just up the mission difficulty as the MM gains levels, give us the insane challanges on newspaper/storyline missions, we can take it. What i mean is, the mission engine should count unsummoned minions as players and adjust mob count. "Lich", "Commando", "Assault Bot" counts as 5 players alone etc.

It did say "Mastermind is a very difficult class to play." in the description, so far i dont think its true.

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32 Robotics / Poison
11 Fire / Rad Corruptor

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I know that Poisons has a single heal but how do you find keeping your guys alive without a big heal ? I probably only resummon ninja about one genin per mission if that though. Is it a case of simply calling forth more minions to replace lost ones as a non healing Mastermind ?

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I dont have much problems healing all 6 with the single-heal "Alkaloid", sometimes i lose a minion here but i get it back in action fast. I'd say, sometimes they get defeated for the cause , so i just choose my assault bot and keep him going and protector bots too of course.

edit: After i've read about this, Ninja MM sounds interesting.

erm, i dont think you can separately get seeker drones, you only get them via "upgrade robot" skill (32). Or i have missed something. Seeker drones itself; i dont know what they do besides lower accuracy BUT i have also seen mobs move slower (didnt use noxius breath). I bet they do more than that, maybe they buff ToHit changes too. Update: Was talking about the drones that Protector Bot launches, maybe they are different.

ot: their proton grenade disorients more frequently than player skill, or so it seems.

Poison Trap; since at/after 32 your minions (robots) turn into AoE machine i'm not sure how much use you would get for that skill, but maybe you can find some uses for it. Maybe i'm going to get it, i dont know. Pretty vague answer yes :P

edit: doh seeker drones from traps! omg..my bad.

Heh, usually.. if i see one robot going to melee it's almost sure that another will join soon, hmm, this behaviour also happens with some ranged foes.

Offtopic:

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After the level 32, you enter in another world (star wars for the sound ), after being mainly a single target team, they became an AOE team that can clean quickly a group of mobs with the right sequence of powers.

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True!. Had one spot with loads of council (yellow), spent a few moments to make a trap of my own. Bots on all sides, used protectors to pull them to that "sweet spot".. and.. they were like "omg". They went down quick. Once i didn't see much because of explosions going off everywhere :P.

Another small thing, that they bubble up the seeker drones thus wasting endurance, actually they can run out of it in prolonged battles.

Neurotoxic Breath: Weaken: Envenom and the Alkaloid.
I think these are the most used skills from poison, until you get the ranged hold.

Neurotoxic Breath does more than slows them down, it affects the attack speed too.
Currently i have only two slotted this, but there is time to add more.
I've had bosses just stand there for around 3 seconds doing nothing.
Acc/Slow

Weaken;
this attacks every action the target can do and makes them less effective, or makes them miss more.
4 Slotted currently: 2 acc / 2 To Hit Debuff

Envenom: targets the defense, more damage/hits from you.
4 Slotted currently: 1 acc / 3 defense (still hits almost everytime).

Alkaloid: 6 slotted: 3 end , 3 heal. for me, that works.

I dont know about undead so, maybe someone fill that side, but with poison keep the debuffs on the hard targets and use heals when needed. Yes your going to be busy sometimes . I would start with malicious and see how it goes, then when you really feel like it jump to ruthless.

In my opionion, some ruthless missions are simple while others make you sweat. So i couldn't say that they are "easy", just had an tough fight against Archon Galaxy and friends (multiple minions). I escaped certain defeat with 5 hp left, think about it . But thats the hole point, i do them because of the added challenge.

6 henchmen & setupping them shouldn't take all your end, not even close, if it takes alot of end something is wrong. I can manage at 80% endurance, but you have to group the setup / summon process (use SOs on equip skill). Like: starting with battle drones / equip, summon protector bots / equip them while they bubble, assault bot. Now just wait for bubbles

Sure if you summon all the henchmen at once and start equipping fast it takes every drop of your endurance.

Anyway, playing a mastermind has it's moments including the bad ones. When i started my character 10 first levels were fun, next after protector bot i felt unstobbable and even more fun, at 18 i think things were at "cool" for so long. But at 26 things jumped at the "awesome" level again ;P.
And after i reach my goal.. maybe smily faces say it the best

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Current: 31 Robotics/Poison
Goal: 32 Swarm Missiles . mmmm.