MasterMinds (and the Hero version of them)

Not really, no.

Indeed.

My demon/thermal MM is a hero. He's a "redeemer" and his demons are fallen souls who he's offered absolution if they return to the mortal world to help him fight against the greater evils facing the world.

Should one fall in combat they have made good on their service for his cause and are crossed over to the heavens. The replacement demons are new souls seeking salvation.

@Oathbound & @Oathbound Too

Have you (2nd person singular) every played an MM? Seem like half the time the henchmen do whatever they want to once the fight starts. Much like what you describe above.


Why would a hero "group" (i.e. a heroic MM) be less disciplined than a villain group? Is there some reason that DumDum or Reb wouldn't take order from Sgt. Fury?

I have no problems with Masterminds as heroes. Neither do the devs as evidenced by the fact that there are several MM heroes currently in play.

Really? I see no reason you can't justify any of the current MM minon sets.

Merc .. You are a small band of Special Forces working for the good of Paragon City and ultimately all mankind. The MM is the Commander and the minons are the team specialists

Ninja .. The MM is the Sensae (Sorry not sure how that's spelled ) and the ninjas are his loyal students helping to rid the city of the criminal element.

Demons .. Someone already said it. INFERNAL. Plenty of ways to explain how a Mage or priest/priestess has managed to control demons to do their bidding in the battle against evil.

Necro .. Sort of the same as demons. Nothing says the heroic MM was the one that created the undead that follow him or her. they simply found a way to control them and use them in the fight against evil.. possibly with the promise that once they have helped do enough good deeds they can finally find etenral peace/rest and stop walking the earth as rotting corpses.

Robots .. Are just too easy. Come on anyone good or bad can create robots to help them

Thugs .. Okay this one may be the biggest stretch but still very doable. The MM and minions grew up on the streets at at some point may have even been part of a gang. Later in life they reformed and now use the abilities they possess and the skills they learned on the streets to battle criminals and clean up the city.

Now for the question of sending men off to die. Okay since no one ever seems to die here (run a pile of newspapers or radios and see how many times you fight the same Council leaders.. kill em? we can't even keep em in jail) who says a fallen minon is dead? When we end up face down in a mission we either have a team mate rez us, rez ourselves, or head off to the hospital using the medical transport. If a minion falls during a battle and you resummon does a completely different minon with a different NAME appear or do you get the same minon back that dropped with all the same powers? Okay since we all know the answer .. The minon was defeated, the medical transport wisked them off to the hospital, and the MM just happens to have a handy teleporter that allows them to tp their troops back into the battle instead of having to wait for them to run, jump or fly back like our team mates do. Again this can be explained in a variety of RP ways that make perfect sense... Magically by casting a teleportaion spell or through the use of Science/technology by clicking a hidden device that teleports them using the same technology we got from the Rikti that transports us to the hospital.

I do like the idea of a heroic version of an MM where the Pets provide some limited damage but do a lot more in the way of buffing/bebuff/hold and the MM is the main damage dealer. Call them Sidekicks, students, comrades in arms or whatever you like. Thing is if we suddenly provide heros with a version of the MM then what do we give Villains to balance it?

Tank (Hero) .. Brute (Villian)
Scrapper (Hero) ... Stalker (Villian) *okay its a stretch but they are both melee*
Controller(Hero) .. Dominator (Villain)
Defender(Hero) .. Corruptor (Villian)
Blaster(Hero) ... ???
??? ... MasterMind(Villain)

And of course each side has two epic types though very different in powers etc. So if we give heroes a Mastermind set we need to come up with a Blaster set for villains so things stay even.

Of course as also mentioned these days all 14 different ATs can eventually be on either side through by switching sides. All but the epics can do the same thing by starting in Praetoria. I have a 50 level Bots/DM Mastermind that started there and until she became a Vigilante had never set foot in the Rogue Isles.

Um. This is exactly how it works now. Have you heard of bodyguard mode?

Well judging by the Kheldian Inherant

Tank - Mastermind
Scrapper - Brute
Controller - Dominator
Defender - Corruptor
Blaster - Stalker

Now I'm not against it, but if you're going to add an AT to one side you have to do the same for the other.

That was my point . The person I quoted was saying that only Mercs, Bots and Ninjas could be Heroic so I was giving Heroic examples of the non-Heroic sets.

OH I know Adeon I just used your quote to emphasis my post. LOL I am NOT disagreeing with you Sorry if I confused anyone LOL

Now DMystic I can see you point on the Blaster .. Stalker both do good damage and both squishy but even the Stalker sets have some defenses and some even the ability to heal themselves.. blasters are ranged damage primary and melee damage secondary with a hold or immob to TRY and help you survive. Mastermind.. TANK? I have done a lot of things with my MM but grabbing the aggro on an entire 8 man team mob or the AV? Not my MMs LOL The lines shade a lot when we start talking tank, Brute and Scrapper. Tanks have the edge in HP but Brutes are a close second and deal more damage.. Like a scrapper. Tanks are a little better at Aggro management but Brutes hold their own in that area and fill in nicely when no tank is a round.

Now prior to them actually showing stalkers some love there is no way I'd even mention STALKER and SCRAPPER in the same sentance but now they can do a lot more than just be a one hit wonder. I have a couple and they can hold their own in a fight. Now as survivable as a scrapper but they will take on solo sized mobs with no problem these days.. OLD days my tactics included AS one minion and run for the front door or elevator. Then go back and do it again after everyone calmed back down LOL

Sensei would be the proper spelling (italicizing isn't for smarmy emphasis, it's because stylistically, foreign words are supposed to be italicized, unless they've been adopted into the language (which sensei has not).

Actually, this one is also fairly easy to figure out, though for inspiration I went somewhere aside from comics. Kim Kaphwan from the Fatal Fury and King of Fighters series recruits street roughs into his dojo by challenging them to a fight with that as the stakes, then reforms them into fighters on the side of justice. There have been similar concepts of "street gangs redeeming themselves" in comics, I believe, but since I play Kaphwan in KoF, he's the first one to spring to mind.

Originally Posted by Back Alley Brawler Did you just use "casual gamer" and "purpled-out warshade" in the same sentence?

Yes, Yes I have. I'm well aware of the Tankermind, and utilize this practice on my own MMs (when I play them, I frankly find them kid of boring). I even take the Presence pool for the taunt on some of them.

My comment was intended to refute that whole "send your minions to die" line people tow about hero MMs.

@Oathbound & @Oathbound Too

Interresting. Why don't Zombies work for being heroes?

No, I'm sure some people wouldn't like Uncle Bob being lifted the grave to fight crime, but if it comes down to stop the killer or let the killer murder someone because they didnt want to raise the dead, option 2 sounds better.

Just saying, all the MM primaries can be made to work for heroes if one just tries, even a little.

Not against new MM primaries though. However, I don't think using NPC groups is a good idea.

I guess my point is that no mastermind "sends his minions in to die." Well, I'm sure there are some who do, but they aren't any good.

Anyone who says that masterminds are inherently villainous must therefor believe the same for every single one of their country's military and police organizers. Generals "send their minions in to die." So do police captains. Was Patton on the beach in Normandy? Does the police captain show up for the drug bust that might turn into a fire fight? The fact that masterminds are even present for all the fighting puts them a step towards heroic compared to these examples.

The truth is that all of these examples "send their minions in to not die." Everyone knows that some people will die, but the objective is always to win with the least amount of casualties. You don't have to be a tankermind to do that; you just need to be strategic. There's that old saying from Patton that (paraphrased) "You don't win by dying for your country, you make some other idiot die for his."

Who said anything about people? My mastermind sends in her robot army! Robots can be repaired much more easily than people can.

I have another hero MM as well, mostly made because someone said it's impossible to make a plausible heroic Necromancy MM. Mine is an Anglo-Saxon knight (and his most trusted retainers) who swore a sacred oath to defend and serve his lord's bloodline "until the end of time." If he'd worded it as "until death," they might not all be revenants now. So yeah, it can be done, it's just tricky and you have to use loopholes in order for them not to be Darker And Edgier.

Agreed. Don't ever start giving us NPC minion .. Look at LORE for the reason why. No one was happy when it started and the only choices were Praetroian NPC. Now on Beta they have more than a dozen new types to chose from and everyone is STILL not satisfied. I think its best to avoid using any of the hero or villain NPC groups as minions.. no matter how many we get some one's favorite group will be left out and they will be here screaming for it to be added.

Now if anyone would like a new idea, or maybe not so new, how about this..

We have the Animal pack now so how about a Beastmaster set

3 Wolves as the lowest level set

2 Tigers as you enforcers

1 Bear as your Brute

Don't want to deal with the animation to have them run on all 4's.. fine. You already have X number of heroes roaming around on 2 legs with Canine and Tiger heads so do the same with the beasts.

MM weapons could go a few ways... Whip attacks like DS would work and give the MM a sort of Circus animal trainer feel. A Rifle would make the MM look more like a big game hunter. Bow and arrow could give the MM a tribal/jungle feel or along those same lines since its something I know people have asked for how about a whole new weapon....
three spear attacks!

Now head over to the costume designer. We already have top hats and tuxes so if you went the circus trainer route we CAn easily make them look the part. Plenty of things we can use for that big game hunter look but get to work and get us some loin clothes, ect if you go the jungle route.. something like the Shaman of the Banished Pantheon wear would work and for heaven sake make it in male AND FEMALE versions. That means coming up with a cloth or animal skin style top since a LOIN cloth doesn't come up to one's neck LOL

THAT works better. yeah I can see an MM as a Troller type and Dominators do have the same attack chain as Blasters. I agree with you on the Assault AT red or blue side. I love my MMs but there are times where it seems more like I am the pets support system than the one running things. They are the ones doing the majority of the damage while I buff/debuff/heal/hold/immob and occasionally toss in a few weak attacks.

In game Henchman ignore commands all the time, all the time

Somehow Zombies and Demons seem less than heroic. . . More evilly flavored, at least to me. But yes, a case could be made most any kind of pet. It seemed to me that a heroic "Commander" or "Leader" should have at least a few pet options that are purely heroic and the Masterminds should have a few that are purely villainous. Just my own observation though. Several posters have pointed out that any MM can crossover to the blue side, but the whole point of this is to be able to CREATE them as heroes from the start.

As for using the NPC groups, I have long wanted to see MORE player integration with the various NPC factions. EATs drawn from the NPC groups for example.

A villain Mastermind with Arachnos pets would rock, as would a heroic Commander with Longbow pets!