Seeking help with MM concept I had...

[biostem]

Basically, I want to try and create a mastermind that that leads his pets into battle from the front.  Because of this, I'd need some status protection and defenses.  I'm planning to take the fighting pool with this build, so I'm not too concerned with the personal attacks from the primary.  I was thinking that forcefield may make a good secondary, and the force bolt could make for a neat "hadoken".  I'm pretty much open to any primary and secondary.  I'd love to hear your input.  Thanks!

[plainguy]

Its clear you are new to masterminds.

 

That is pretty much called a Tankermind Build.

 

You are defense capped and pick up provoke to taunt mobs to attack you while your pets mop up. 

Personally I prefer Traps but you can use Time and Force Field as well.

 

There are tons of those builds on the first page alone.  But just search anyone one of those secondaries and this forum and you will exactly find what you need. 

[biostem]

1 hour ago, plainguy said:

Its clear you are new to masterminds.

I'm quite familiar with MMs, just not "tankerminds".  That aspect of the AT is, admittedly, new to me, which is why I asked for input.  Thanks.

[Erydanus]

Force field is probably really good for defense but it's such a passive set generally that I personally have not played it. If you're already planning to go into Fighting pool significantly I think you could probably be more flexible in your choice of secondary unless you want something that will let you do very high difficulty content (I'm personally fine playing on base or slightly higher difficulty). Anyway wanted to offer up /dark as a possible alternate. You get concealment and significant defense from shadow fall and I had a vampire themed MM who used thugs as his brainwashed minions. It was very easy to be up in the front line with them, and at the time we didn't have dual pistols so it scratched my itch to do a little shooting. ^_^

 

[TheSpiritFox]

Whats up. 

You don't want /ff. You really do not. I know it's popular, thats because it's very set it and forget it. It's also an extremely early blooming secondary that turns to dogshit late game, especially solo. /FF is a toolkit that only has one tool in it. A tool that is among the most widely and commonly available tools out there. Defense! Cool! Half the builds in the world at 50 are softcapped now, teams won't need you and you'll suck solo. 
 

Now, you want to lead from the front. A few bits of info about the MM class. 

- Without provoke from the presence pool, you will not personally hold aggro for long against anything. Your damage comes from your pets and you have no inherent taunt on any attack so your aggro is based around how much damage you do only. 

- Even with provoke, building around planning to personally face tank things with your pets in bodyguard is difficult and will force you to perhaps sacrifice other things you'd want to have for survivability purposes or damage purposes. 

- We are weak to mez. Many of our secondaries offer little to no protection from it. I have a /traps that actually has mez protection with FFgen, and even he worked up to his "held, sleeping, etc" badges pretty quickly cause it doesn't protect me against everything and sleeps get through often. If you want to tank at all as an MM, you have to build a good bit around mez protection. 
- Bodyguard mode. When the MM class first came out, we were getting one shotted left and right. In PVP we were fucking useless, fly by and snipe us once in the middle of our pets and watch us die in one shot. Anything that threw out AOEs was murdering us at the start of fights. So the devs came up with bodyguard mode. If your pets are in defensive stance and under follow you, stay, or goto location orders, and you are in supremacy range (40' from your pets or less) every time you take damage, you take 2 parts, every living pet takes 1 part. 75% damage reduction by bleeding damage onto your pets. This splitting of damage takes place after your personal defense and resistance come into play. Misses you, misses the pets. Hits you, gets reduced by your personal resistance, THEN gets split up among the pets. Suddenly MMs went from the squishiest class in the game to on par with brutes for tanking, just below real tanks. 
 

So, even if you are leading from the front, you want to be in bodyguard or you will die fast. If you're in bodyguard, you want the ability to heal yourself and all your pets at once because you will all be taking damage, and ways to protect yourself and all your pets as well. 

/Time will do it. If you build some mez protection into the build, /time comes with a solid way to throw a bunch of defense at your pets (farsight) as well as a bunch of debuffs for enemies and buffs for you, like chrono shift giving you an extra 50% global recharge on top of hasten and set bonuses. /time has no mez protection at all other than defense, you'll have to really build yourself into tank status personally, if your defense is much lower than your pets it's better for them to tank over you, everyone will take more damage if theyre hitting you vs missing your pets. 

/Traps will do it well. I'll put it this way. You lead from the front different with /traps. Like, I have super speed with the stealth IO in it that makes super speed basically be stealth. I run right up into groups, start dropping traps, and by the time enemies fight off my mezzes on them and start attacking, my bots are already opening up on them. I go in first, but I seldom get aggro. If I do, though, /traps ffgen give me both defense and mez protection and since I am not trying to personally tank, I give no fucks if I get mezzed for a minute, so far I have not run into the enemy group yet that can kill more than one of my bots before I drop mez. Usually I'm just sleeping while my bots murder everything around me. 

/Dark will do it well. /Dark stacks so much -tohit so fast that if you debuff well it's basically like adding defense to yourself. You can pull groups with darkest night, your AOE debuff toggle, and everything will immediately come after you. It has a really solid AOE heal with the caveat of having to hit an enemy with it to successfully  heal. Comes with mez of your own to throw at enemies so that maybe they'll be the helpless ones not you. 

/thermal and sonic I would think would do decently well. Resist sets over defense, so you'll get hit more, but take a good bit less damage. I haven't tried either set yet, so I can't give you any more details on how to use them for your concept. 

/nature you want to avoid. Not because it's weak, it might be the overall strongest healing set in the game. But /nature is NOT a lead from the front set lol. It's main heal is a cone in front of you not a PBAOE, your place as /nature is behind whoever is fighting =p 

 

I'd say the same about /pain. Healing sets are not going to be lead from the front. 

/Trick arrow could be, but you'll be weak defensively and have to build around that. 

For primaries, I would say bots or demons. Why? Ninjas and mercenaries are weak, playable, but weak. I can't make myself enjoy anemic sets, especially ninjas I hate resummoning as much as I had to trying to use those. I also kinda think ninjas are the ugliest set. Just so...plain. Thugs are a great set, but leadership doesn't apply to you. Demons give you a resist shield and bots give you a defense shield, if you wanna lead from the front I would pick one of those two so that your pets help your survivability directly. 

 

Demons/thermal, demons/dark, bots/dark, bots/traps, either and time,  any of these combinations would be able to do what you want if you built them for it, pretty sure. Though my top two picks personally would be bots/traps or bots/dark to lead from the front like you want to. 

 

[Shazbotacus]

2 hours ago, TheSpiritFox said:

Defense! Cool! Half the builds in the world at 50 are softcapped now, teams won't need you and you'll suck solo. 

 

This is what I was dubious about with IO sets back on live when they were announced. Why buff defense in endgame when everyone stacks it to a threshold with sets? Everyone takes Fighting but nobody does it for the merits of its powers but to stack set bonuses as high as possible, and things end up having to be balanced around that rather than how well the power itself works. sigh Sorry, this sort of “back in my day” rant has little place in the topic at hand.

 

Back to it, I might recommend something like Bots or Necro paired with Dark or Traps. Protector Bots will put at least one shield on you (7.5% defence) to stack with your Force Field Generator (10%), some mez protection, and provide CC from Poison Trap and alpha strike fodder with Seeker Drones. Dark also provides mitigation basically everyone against what you hit with it thanks to plentiful -To Hit and CC. Necro also has the Lich and his amazing CC and mitigation courtesy of his own Dark Miasma powers, and the whole lot of them have self healing to deal with the damage they receive from being your bodyguard.

 

I wonder if Demons/Sonic would make a... resistance-based Tankermind? Possibly with the resistance bubble and resistance from Ember Demon. But probably not as well as other options.

Edited October 24, 2019 by Shazbotacus

[Sura]

20 hours ago, biostem said:

Basically, I want to try and create a mastermind that that leads his pets into battle from the front.  Because of this, I'd need some status protection and defenses.  I'm planning to take the fighting pool with this build, so I'm not too concerned with the personal attacks from the primary.  I was thinking that forcefield may make a good secondary, and the force bolt could make for a neat "hadoken".  I'm pretty much open to any primary and secondary.  I'd love to hear your input.  Thanks!

I very recently started a Necro/Sonic mastermind, and so far it's working pretty well, and I'm spending a lot of time sitting in the middle of melee.  I'm not DOING a lot, just the Sonic bubbles, Sonic Siphon, and some of the temp attacks, but at 31 (with some financial backing) I've already maxed resists on the T1 and T2 pets for Smash, Psi, Cold, and Energy (I think, I can't remember exactly).  So I send in the pets and follow them in to make sure they're getting the benefits of Sonic's dispersion field.  

 

I put Disruption Field on one of the Grave Knights when soloing, and on a meleer when grouping.  Love that power.  Stacked with Siphon some bad guy's at -40% resist.  

 

I'm thinking about getting in to the Stealth pool for Stealth at least, and maybe Invis.  If I sit there invisible will my Dispersion bubble still be buffing the pets?  I'll maybe have to find out.

 

Eventually I'll get Liquify, and maybe go for Bonfire, to give me some good ground targeted use-knockdown-as-mitigation options.  I wish the fire epic PP had some kind of armor in it.  I'm also figuring on what will probably be at least one significant respec as I've not done much with Masterminds, Necro, or Sonic, so I'm kind of making it up as I go along.  I also admit to being a little bit RP bound (this character's a banshee) so I may not make optimal choices.  🙂

 

Still, it might be something that would work for what you're looking for.  I'm happy to answer any questions as best I can.

[Shoulung]

I have a new 50 demons/thermal and while the pets are pretty tough, I’m not, even with tough/weave/maneuvers/scorpion shield. I’ve got a dark/rad that does pretty well in melee range, thanks to its pbaoe hold toggle, that pretty much locks up minions. I think time also provides that as well. I do think that rad solos better against AVs than time, because AVs like to run and rad debuffs are a toggle. They both have a pbaoe hold though, and time probably outperforms in general content. Sonic has more defense than thermal but no heal, which would be a good reason to pair with necro, for the single target heal.

[plainguy]

This is what I am running now.

 

Setup

• Triage Beacon in front of me
• Pets behind Triage Beacon in stay position
• Caltrops toss at front of Triage Beacon at tip near the triangle glow.
• Trip Mine between Caltrops and Triage Beacon.
• Acid Mortar to side or behind Triage Beacon.
• Summon FFG behind me at all times, otherwise it will pick up aggro.

 

Caltrops

Trip Mine

Me 

Triage Beacon & Acid Mortar

Pets 

 

 

1. Then I Provoke mobs to attack, while spamming pets to stay. I use the Period key on the numkey pad as my all pets stay. I use the numkey pad binds posted on the forums.
2. I Then use the pets all command to attack mobs one by one. I try to do bosses first. 
3. I try to keep the pets in that position. But it always does not work. So I have to sometimes put them on passive fast send them back and then put them on aggressive again or bodyguard mode. 
4. Once the mobs move in and get hit by trip mine I then put down poison trap and another trip mine. 
5. Then I mix it up as I see how the fight is going. Some times dropping a Trip mine can be difficult when a simple light hit will break the placement. I am hoping the Device changes get moved to Traps as that will make it much better set.
6. Pets need to stay near triage beacon. 
7. I try to make sure I put a second one as soon as it pops up.
8. Some times I am just provoking as placing trip mines is difficult and several attempts kill my endurance.

 

Hero Plan by Mids' Reborn : Hero Designer 2.6.0.7
https://github.com/ImaginaryDevelopment/imaginary-hero-designer

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 50 Magic Mastermind
Primary Power Set: Robotics
Secondary Power Set: Traps
Power Pool: Fighting
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Presence
Ancillary Pool: Soul Mastery

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Battle Drones -- BldMnd-Acc/Dmg(A), BldMnd-Dmg/EndRdx(15), BldMnd-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(15), ExpRnf-+Res(Pets)(19), CaltoArm-+Def(Pets)(19), SprMarofS-EndRdx/+Resist/+Regen(25)
Level 1: Web Grenade -- EnfOpr-Acc/Rchg(A), EnfOpr-Acc/EndRdx(3), EnfOpr-EndRdx/Immob(3), EnfOpr-Immob/Rng(5), EnfOpr-Acc/Immob(5), EnfOpr-Acc/Immob/Rchg(7)
Level 2: Caltrops -- Rgn-Knock%(A), Rgn-Dmg/Rchg(9)
Level 4: Triage Beacon -- Pnc-Heal/EndRedux/Rchg(A), NmnCnv-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(7), Pnc-Heal/Rchg(9), NmnCnv-Heal/Rchg(11), Pnc-Heal/+End(25), NmnCnv-Heal(27)
Level 6: Boxing -- Acc-I(A)
Level 8: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 10: Acid Mortar -- ShlBrk-DefDeb(A), ShlBrk-Acc/DefDeb(11), ShlBrk-Acc/Rchg(13), ShlBrk-DefDeb/EndRdx/Rchg(13), ShlBrk-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(46), ShlBrk-%Dam(46)
Level 12: Maneuvers -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), LucoftheG-Def(27), LucoftheG-Def/EndRdx(33)
Level 14: Tough -- StdPrt-ResDam/Def+(A), GldArm-3defTpProc(45)
Level 16: Force Field Generator -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), LucoftheG-Def(17), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg(17)
Level 18: Tactics -- GssSynFr--ToHit(A), GssSynFr--ToHit/Rchg(40), GssSynFr--ToHit/Rchg/EndRdx(42), GssSynFr--Rchg/EndRdx(42), GssSynFr--ToHit/EndRdx(42), GssSynFr--Build%(43)
Level 20: Poison Trap -- BslGaz-Acc/Hold(A), BslGaz-Acc/Rchg(21), BslGaz-Rchg/Hold(21), BslGaz-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(23), Lck-%Hold(23)
Level 22: Weave -- LucoftheG-Def(A), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(48)
Level 24: Provoke -- MckBrt-Taunt(A), MckBrt-Taunt/Rchg(43), MckBrt-Taunt/Rchg/Rng(43), MckBrt-Acc/Rchg(45), MckBrt-Taunt/Rng(48), PrfZng-Dam%(48)
Level 26: Equip Robot -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 28: Seeker Drones -- Stp-Acc/Rchg(A), Stp-EndRdx/Stun(29), Stp-Acc/EndRdx(29), Stp-Stun/Rng(31), Stp-Acc/Stun/Rchg(31), Stp-KB%(31)
Level 30: Protector Bots -- BldMnd-Acc/Dmg(A), BldMnd-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(37), BldMnd-Dmg/EndRdx(39), SvrRgh-PetResDam(39), EdcoftheM-PetDef(39), SvrRgh-Acc/Dmg(40)
Level 32: Assault Bot -- SlbAll-Build%(A), SlbAll-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(33), SprCmmoft-Rchg/PetAoEDef(33), SprCmmoft-Acc/Dmg(34), SprCmmoft-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(34), SprCmmoft-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(34)
Level 35: Trip Mine -- OvrFrc-Acc/Dmg(A), OvrFrc-End/Rech(36), OvrFrc-Acc/Dmg/End(36), OvrFrc-Dmg/End/Rech(36), OvrFrc-Acc/Dmg/End/Rech(37), Obl-%Dam(37)
Level 38: Upgrade Robot -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 41: Dark Embrace -- Ags-Psi/Status(A)
Level 44: Oppressive Gloom -- RopADop-Acc/Rchg(A), RopADop-EndRdx/Stun(50)
Level 47: Super Speed -- Clr-Stlth(A)
Level 49: Soul Storm -- Dvs-Acc/Dmg(A), Dvs-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(50), Dvs-Dmg/Rchg(50)
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Supremacy 
Level 2: Swift -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Health -- NmnCnv-Regen/Rcvry+(A), NmnCnv-Heal(45)
Level 2: Stamina -- PrfShf-End%(A), PrfShf-EndMod(40), PrfShf-EndMod/Rchg(46)
Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A)
Level 50: Musculature Radial Paragon 
Level 1: Battle Drone 
Level 32: Assault Bot 
Level 30: Protector Bot 
Level 4: Ninja Run 
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