pblue

Thanks, I will experiment with Entangling Aura. I was kind of losing interest as just spending all my effort healing zombie wasn't doing it for me, but this might shake things up a bit.

Thanks, that is exactly the sort of insight I was look for.

I am having trouble getting my head round how to play Nature. I can see the heals, the buffs and debuffs, but it all seems somhow disorganised and I having a hard time arranging this it into a coherent strategy or smooth, standard "support chain", if that makes sense. So really looking for insights into: Which are the key, bread and butter powers to be used in every encounter? Which are the powers only worth using for Boss fights? Which are powers the skippable? Does Rebirth have any use when playing solo? Where do Blooms fit in this? Do they really matter? For reference, I've currently paired Nature with Necro, this is mostly a casual, solo character so I not looking for strategies that require huge investment. Many thanks in advance.

Mercs/Traps fits thematically and Traps is one of the better matches for Mercs. Radiation worked pretty well for me on Bots, but that is becaused bot bring their own defence to the table. Red Skull has used robots before (his Sleeper robots) so that could work too.

Whichever has the coolest animation.

See this thread for a good overview of Incarnate options, and not just for Dark Miasma.

Traps, probably, especially if solo. Ranged henchmen benefit the most from the static nature of traps, the FFG plugs their weak defences and the debuffs help with damage. I found, to me surprise, Mercs/Force Field very enjoyable. You an your men are well protected, Repulsion Field keeps everyone away and because you aren't using much Endurance for anything else, you take the primary attacks and just join in the dakakakakakaka! Yeah, OK, its neither efficient or subtle, but it's oddly satisfying.

If an IO has "Damage/Endurance" style bonus, that generally goes to the pet not the Mastermind If an IO has a set bonus (for instance 4 IOs of a set give +2.5% Def) that generally goes to the Mastermind, not the pet (except for things like the Defence/Resitance Auras).

You don't need to sell me on Merc primary attack. It makes playing Mercs fun, that's all I need to know. One of my most played characters is Mercs/FF. I am not be taking on Giant Monsters but for, as you call it easy solo play, I find it very enjoyable. It's never just about the numbers.

What I meant is that I doubt your robot pets will need help with Endurance from your Empathy powers, especially as the IO sets you've used to slot your bots already are boosting the bot's own Endurance. (along with their Damage and Accuracy) as in: Mark of Supremacy - Damage/Endurance Mark of Supremacy - Accuracy/Endurance Mark of Supremacy - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance These powers may still have a place in teams - I've never played Empathy so I don't know - but in your original post you mention solo play. So if you are looking for something to sacrifice to fit in Weave, that might be an option.

I like Defence on my characters. So having got the Fighting Pool all the way up to Tough, I'd be really, really tempted to get Weave as well. I'd also really want to add two slots to Tough for +3% Def Uniques. Also, if I were to slot Thunderstrike, I'd try hard to push for the full 6 set for the extra +2.5% Ranged Def. Group Fly sounds like fun on Robots for a solo character. Mostly because you get the jet thruster animation, but also I suspect on some maps it might be a great way to frustrate melee mobs. I've never played Empathy so I don't know what is good and what you could potentially drop. You Pet sets already have +Endurance, so maybe the ally Endurance recovery powers from Empathy might not be that useful?

1. You don't need Repair when you have other healing powers. 2. Arcane Bolt is OK, but I'd only choose it if I were already thinking about Sorcery for the travel and mez protections powers or theme. Bot's primary attacks may be a little less efficient but they offer a bit of crowd control which is very helpful solo. Arcane Bolt casting also feels very slow which I find a bit annoying. 3. Kind of like #2 but I admit I've haven't used Enflame much. 4. You may struggle trying to fit full sets on Bots. The Pet Def and Res Aura uniques are very important and you will may want the Sudden Accelleration KB->KD on the Assualt Bot. I'm not really the best person to ask about slotting as I tend to build on the cheap (mostly simple IO with a few tactical Uniques), but you can look at the Bot slotting on this thread and see if anything suits your playstyle and budget.

Necro/Storm was quite possibly my most fun mastermind. I may have mentioned this before but the whole knock target down so zombies can pile on to feed is as cruel as it is satisfying. But the OP has already got one of those. The real surprise, in terms of sheer enjoyment, was my Merc/FF mastermind. You wouldn't think pairing two of the worst performing powers would end well, would you? But somehow, without even noticing I got to Vet level 66 all the way solo. I have a Thug/Cold and a Mercs/Traps mastermind. Either offers everything my Merc/FF does and more, so I should know better. Go figure. The thing about Merc/FF is that all about constant, sustained, ranged fire. You line up your troops and keep shooting until everyihing is dead (which may take a while...). I took all three primary attacks, added a few proc so I join my troopers mowing down everything in our path. If something get's too close, Repuslion Field push it back. It's so simple. I guess I kind of simple too.

I had a very smooth, easy solo experience with Sonic. Sonic provides a lot of control along with damage. The sleep power Siren Call, often skipped for group orientated builds, becomes very effective when you are on your own. Full disclosure, I wasn't playing a max difficulty, but then this was very cheap build with only a few tactical uniques and standard IOs. But your best bet is just read through the sticky thread and choose whatever sounds fun to you.

Go to Pocket D, look for one of the parked trunks inside the club . On top there is a bird NPC, a gull called Null. It allows you to change alignment just like that. Or you could do that whole 10 Tips followed by a Morality Mission.

Leadership to tripple dip on Maneuvres and Tactics? Medicine because you have no other heal? Invisibility because Invisiblity and Force Field goes back to the days of the Fantastic Four? Speed for Haste and Superspeed (which in turn gives you stealth+the right IO - see FF mention above) or Whirlwind because it's nuts. In a way it's a shame you already picked your Epic. because Leviathan's Knockout Blow is pretty strong and with Cross Punch it can make pretty good melee character, for a Mastermind.

Is it worth putting the -Res proc in a fast recharing attack like Burst? I can never gauge the trade off between the high probability of a proc firing off on a slow recharger power vs the increased opportunities of triggering the proc on rapid power - sort like the difference between having just one dice throw with good odds vs many dice throws, each with poor odds.

I had a Ninja/FF Mastermind set up with attacks from Fighting and Leviathan. I figured, my guys are melee, why not join them? On paper the attacks looked OK but in practice, even solo, by the time I got my character close enough to land a punch, one the ninjas had already killed my target. I tried ordering the ninjas to focus on one target while I handled the spare, but that just felt as my pets were letting my have a pity kill. Eventually I respeced. Still, the potential is there. I might try it on my Necro/Sonic at some point.

My Sonic Sentinel absolutely feels like a Controller. I went a different route in that, as a solo player I leveraged Siren's Call (with Mass Hypnosis as a back up) for hard control and the disorient powers for the rest. It was very smooth, very safe. I paired Sonic with Super Reflexes but with hindsight I kind of regret going for a more adventureous secondary. Fair warning though, I never really tested this character against truly hard content.

I played a lot of masterminds but I am still unclear why in some instances caltrops are little more than an annoyance while in some cases caltrops cause total chaos in my pets. I don't if this is true, but I think my Resistance-based pets have it worst than Defence based ones. The very worst outcome I saw was with my Necro/Sonic character though. A few caltrops and my zombies wnet nuts. up running wild in random directions, even different rooms. I had not taken the Leadership powers on that character yet. @Decaying Rose explained the reason to me:

Have a look at these two sticky thread to get a great overview of all the different Mastermind Primaries and detailed account to two of the most powerful Secondaries (Time and Dark). The guide for Dark even gives you guidelines for enhancing the powers when you are on a budget ("Basic Slotting"), the principle of which will apply to other powersets. Personally, for a first timer, I'd look at Robots or Necro. They are well balanced, well behaved pets. Robots are nice in that they help protect you with their forcefields, whereas zombies help you control the battle (particularly handy if you solo). Thugs and Demon might be stronger but I find they require a little micro-management. Ninja, you may find, are a little fragile. But in the end all the pets are pretty awesome, there is just a little bit of a learning curve. In terms of secondaries, other than that two mentioned above, you may also what to consider Cold. It's pretty simple, works well even with a small budget and it has tools to deal with hard targets. It lacks healing but both Robots and Zombies (eventually) can heal themselves a bit and you can always fall back of the Aid pool power.

If you really don't want to do the Market thing, note that you can get the Steadfast Protection +3% Enhancement for only 20 Merits, which you get just doing missions without even noticing. Also, while it might be too late, Super Reflexes is really a very, very effective secondary for someone who is on a budget.

It's a quality of life thing for me, especially as I solo mostly. I like that I can get a (subjectively) smooth play experience with a pretty cheap, casual build.

Title says it all. I solo a lot and I am enjoying the pseudo-controller (with awesome defences) play style of my Sonic/SR Sentinel. Just wondering if the second Mag 3 Sleep might affect higher ranked mobs or is just redundant?

Some suggestions here: