Recommend a new MM

[TheMoncrief]

49 minutes ago, kelika2 said:

And out of my 14 or so masterminds, all have the personal attacks while still getting pets to or around softcap def.

But, unless you are doing "pure emp" things like taking tactics, veng, victory rush and other filler stuff like fighting pool before level 20 or thinking you need EVERYTHING in medicine.. then we just plain flat out build differently and at the risk of starting this thread on fire, stop thinking like a pure emp.  half the stuff you bought you probably dont even need.

 

Fight without Tactics on for example, your tier1s are more accurate than people make it out to be, and there is just only so much you can bounce back from the -5 zone.

 

But I am going to go back to whipping, shooting, throwing bees, dark balls and my boxing/kick/cross punch focused ninja/sonic named Street Ninja

Please don't compare a Mastermind who chooses to play to the AT's strengths to a "pure emp" who thinks being a dedicated healer is actually useful in CoX and likely ignores the really great powers in Empathy like Clear Mind and Fortitude because they aren't heals. I have nothing against personal attacks in your Mastermind builds - or even in my own Mastermind builds sometimes - but you don't need to be bringing them to the forums.

 

Not everybody enjoys playing the same way as you. Nor should they. They are not wrong. Neither are you. The case that one way of playing or the other is better in some objective sense can probably be made, but it doesn't need to be. Both ways work fine.

 

I have edited this several times to avoid saying anything truly offensive. I don't object to your arguments supporting the use of Mastermind primary and pool attacks - merely to your dismissive attitude toward those who don't agree with you.

[Neiska]

I would like to take a brief moment to highlight this thread, as I think its actually a good thing and part of why I love masterminds so much.

 

Yes they are a pet class, and I usually love pet classes and tankers in games. But Masterminds are an entirely different beast altogether than a mere "pet class."

 

Here, you really can build them in so many different ways, even within the same powerset picks. Which to me, is sort of the secret niche of masterminds.

 

You make your mastermind in so many ways. You can have quasi CC, or a super durable tankermind. You can decide to buff defense, or resistance, or a bit of both. You can buff everyones endurance, damage, even give everyone status immunity. And yes, you can heal as well, and most healing sets also offer additional things than just healing itself. You can also focus on some super potent debuffs that are god tier later on. Or you can take personal attacks if that is what you like.

 

Honestly, I don't think any other AT can be built in so many different ways. A scrapper is always gonna melee. A tanker is always gonna be sturdy. A blaster is always going to blast. A Controller is always going to be CC orientated. But masterminds? They really are in a league of their own if you want to crunch numbers. The only thing I think they can lag behind is DPS, but even then they can put up a good showing for what else they offer in addition to the decent DPS. I mean, you can even farm with them if you wanted to. Only Warshades and Peacebringers with their different forms can offer so many options, but Masterminds have advantage of being customizable.

 

Moreover, your secondary can greatly affect how your mastermind will "play", or their "style". A traps MM feels very very different from say, a Dark MM.

 

Some people like personal attacks, for flavor, feel, personal taste, or whatever reason. Others dont. One of the great things about CoH in general is there really is no "wrong" way to make a character. If you want to focus on fun/flavor/theme, then do that. If you want to focus on minmaxing you can do that too! Personally I strive for a balance of both. Something that is strong, but also makes sense thematically and rp wise.

 

But one caveat to this is that with such a varied, customizable and varied AT, not everyone is going to agree on what is superior or best, because not everyone has the same goals or objectives. And I would say that is expected, normal in fact.  It is a complicated AT, but to me thats a large part of their attraction. Not everyone wants to push the same 4 or 5 buttons, no matter how good those 5 buttons may be. I perfer options, or being able to fulfill different roles and do different things all within the same AT. On my main MM I can farm, I can heal, I can buff resistance, damage, tohit, defense, status protection, and give everyone endless endurance which everyone is always happy to have. I can even AFK farm on her if I want to. Plus she has goodies like teleport, fold space and group fly for those oddball situations.

 

But thats just how I view Masterminds. Personally I think they offer so much in one neat little package. It can be over whelming for some, but I think once most get a feel for it, it can be quite an interesting, active, and potent AT, particularly if you don't focus on just DPS numbers.

 

My two cents for what its worth!

 

TLDR - Masterminds are awesome because they can be made in so many different ways, and can do so many different things. Which I think is their "real" feature, their pets is a huge bonus.

Edited May 26, 2021 by Neiska

[kelika2]

4 hours ago, TheMoncrief said:

Please don't compare a Mastermind who chooses to play to the AT's strengths to a "pure emp"

it works and hits home.  thats why i do it.

My experience with mastermind secondaries allow lots of free space for personal attacks.  Miasma, thermal, ff, sonic, traps.  Once your pets are nice and properly protected you have so much free time it staggering after your first or second mastermind.

With Miasma just drop a Darkest Night or Fearsome Stare and you just got a lot of time to do other things.

FF and Sonic are fire and forget, no reason to not take personal attacks

While Thermal is more active, still lots of time to attack along side my forgedx4 pets

Traps has so little to do after Acid goes out

 

When you get your pets def to near softcap, or their resists fairly high you are kinda sitting around with your thumb up your butt.  Thats why I started building my masterminds for personal attacks

[Crysis]

On 5/25/2021 at 5:29 PM, TheMoncrief said:

Power picks and enhancement slots are in strictly limited supply. Masterminds have such a low damage scale that spending them on direct attacks is easy to consider a waste of resources, unless you are playing a primary where the attacks have more utility than just doing damage.

 

Most Masterminds have plenty of things to use power picks and enhancement slots on that contribute considerably more to their arsenal than their direct attacks. At least until they need to mule a good set, but by then you're usually done or nearly done leveling, and depending on the secondary they still may not find a chance to use them. Some secondaries are very busy, others are very endurance hungry. Either can interfere with your chances to actually use those attacks even if you take them to hold a nice set.

 

There’s lots of ways to build and play MM’s.  If I’m playing almost anything /Storm, it’s a DPS machine, as one example.  But others play /Storm purely for the mass chaos/fun that they enjoy.  That’s the nice thing about the AT, the variability.  I know some MM’s who NEVER leave bodyguard mode and play entirely defensively.  It’s obvious because you’ll be teaming with them and look over your shoulder and all the pets will be just be standing there, arms at their side, while the MM throws out a few attacks or debuffs or whatever.  Now I personally wouldn’t say THAT style of play is “playing the AT well” but hey, its viable if the team will let you get away with it.

 

But without trying to oversimplify things....

 

-Your secondary has debuffs.  Debuffs are there to lower defenses, resistances, reduce to-hit or otherwise make your opponents easier to kill.  

-Your secondary has heals/recovery effects or shielding of some kind.  Those serve to make you and your pets sturdier (or other teammates) or to otherwise allow you to sustain longer periods of incoming damage so you can whittle down your opponents safely.

-Your secondary offers a powers amplifier of some kind.  Better shields/heals, better DPS, less END or whatever.  Or in the case of Storm, more DPS output thanks to damage-dealing pseudo-pets.

 

The point of your secondaries all boils down to either improving your damage, improving your survival versus incoming damage or amplifying some native power effect.

 

So for me, taking my primaries, which delivers at least SOME DPS (admittedly low levels) is in DIRECT harmony with the goal of this game.  Kill the spawn before it kills you.  If you are spamming your secondaries to better survive/sustain inbound damage, but you aren’t dishing out DPS to eliminate the threat faster, then they effectively are two methods of accomplishing the same goal.  So use BOTH to get it done faster!

 

I’ve read enough of the MM Pylon tests to believe that taking and slotting at least some of my primary attacks matters in overall DPS output.  And this game entirely REVOLVES around a DPS formula.  So honestly, there’s very little argument to be had that putting out as MUCH DPS as you possibly can, regardless of solo or grouped, is the objective of this game.  

 

And lets be real...not like our buffs/debuffs are any better than our damage relatively speaking when compared to other AT’s.  

[Mopery]

I have to recommend trying Thugs/Kin.

 

There's nothing quite like popping Gang War + Burn Out + Gang War + SB + FS, perhaps with a Transfusion and Barrier in there to make sure the lil punks survive. Life becomes a sea of drugged up fast moving homies steamrolling everything in their path.

 

Thematically, you're a Drug Lord, giving your minions all the "good stuff" and not caring about whether they live or die, there are always more willing to take their place.

Edited May 27, 2021 by Mopery

[TheMoncrief]

On 5/26/2021 at 12:51 AM, kelika2 said:

it works and hits home.  thats why i do it.

And that is exactly why you shouldn't do it. There are very few "wrong" ways to play City of Heroes. The pure empath concept is famous because it is one of them. It is a build and play philosophy that absolutely requires a team to support, and provides extremely minimal support to that team in response, because it is based on the unfounded belief that providing healing (and only healing) to your teammates is essential in all circumstances, when it is usually not even helpful.

 

A Mastermind with no personal attacks is usually perfectly self sufficient and contributes well to a team. It is an entirely functional build for any content where a Mastermind is going to be useful. No team will fail to defeat its targets and clear its missions because the Mastermind was not contributing personal damage - in order to come even close to that mark, it has to be playing so close to the edge of viability that failure is an expected outcome whether the Mastermind is attacking or not.

 

Playing a Mastermind without attacks is not a wrong way to play. And leveling personal insults against people who prefer to play that way is not a good way to make your point.

 

Regardless, I'm out. If you think you are engaging in constructive debate and have "won," go for it. You asked why people consider the MM primary attacks pointless, I explained, you insulted me and everybody who has ever reached a similar conclusion, I asked you to tone it down, you doubled down. There is nowhere this conversation has left to go.

[Samsupra]

I agree that MMs can be build is many different ways.

 

As for personal attacks: I find many carry over the old, pre-IO set/proc builds where personal attacks were largely underwhelming. That isn't the case now, depending on build. Some secondary power pools are very hands off and leave plenty of time for cycling in personal attacks. Those attacks can carry procs that increase the damage of both your own and your pet's. It's a viable option for certain builds.

 

Further more, not all MM sets are created equally when it comes to placing pet and proc sets. Personal attacks can help offset this if you choose a limited MM option. Your secondary can also offers slotting options to help offset primary limitations. Questions like who is tanking more, your pets, you or bouncing aggro are important too (like ninja where t2 pets naturally placate along with Oni if you Smoke Flash him often).

 

Now, I'm still learning all of this but once you start going over your IO set options, you begin too see the benefits of personal attacks in certain builds that leave you struggling for set bonus slotting options.

Edited May 28, 2021 by Samsupra