Strategy:Spider Mastermind

0.9.9.7

The Spider Mastermind is perhaps one of the single scariest monsters you'll ever face if you battle her head-on without a fast move speed/invurnability.

The Spider Mastermind marks the end of Hell, however, like the Cybie, not necessarily the end of the entire game. The Hell Keep is beyond the Dis. However, you have to do some special stuff to access the last floor.

The strategy to completely destroy the Mastermind is to nuke her. To do so you must be invurnable and somehow set off a nuke. Popular choices are using a thermonuclear bomb, or overcharging some weapon (nuclear plasma rifle, nuclear BFG). Sometimes, if you're really lucky, you can alt-fire the Trigun and use that as an insta-nuke.

In order to become invurnable, you may get lucky and find an invurnability globe right before entering Dis. However, there IS a surer way of finding invurnability.

If you enter The Lava Pits or Mt. Erebus, you will be faced with the boss, the Lava Elemental. When he dies, he drops the Lava Element. This consumable pack gives you 10 turns of invurnability.

To successfully use this strategy:

• IF USING THERMONUCLEAR BOMB/OVERCHARGING WEAPON (NOT TRIGUN)
  • Use the thermonuclear bomb/overcharge the weapon upon entering Dis.
  • Press the "wait" key until the messages tell you that the bomb will explode in 1 second.
  • Right at that point, use the Lava Element.
  • TADAAA!!!

• IF USING TRIGUN METHOD
  • Use the Lava Element upon entering Dis.
  • Then alt-fire the Trigun to insta-nuke.
  • TADAAA!!!

Realize that the Lava Element was specifically engineered to last ONLY ten turns to balance this strategy out. Paired with the fact that homing phase devices don't work on this level, you can't nuke the MM and then home-phase to the stairs and then use the Trigun to insta-nuke JC.

There. Now that you know how to defeat the MasterMind, go and exploit it to all Hell! (no pun intended)

If you can dish out large damage in a single hit, you can also exploit the staggering mechanic. If Spidey takes 20 or more damage (after armor reduction), she cannot attack as her next action. These effects stack - if you manage to score multiple 20+ damage hits on her between two consecutive action of hers, the duration stacks. The duration also stacks if the single hit is really huge - one attack lost for every full 20 damage of the hit.

Now, how to exploit this:

• If you use huge-damage weapons, you will probably be able to force Spidey to flinch and stagger. But note that such weapons usually have long firing and reloading times, during which Spidey can easily recuperate. Bottom line - if you force Spidey to flinch, attack immediately again, but mind your firing speed.
• Melee builds need to close the distance before they can even land a hit (be sure to stock up on armor), but once you're in range, you should have an easy time, especially if Berserk procs. Be wary, however - while Spidey is staggering, she moves randomly, and that includes movement out of melee range, which you need to close again, and this may cost you valuable time.
• The best and most reliable case occurs if you are a Sharpshooter with Son of a Gun 5, and you happen to find a Grammaton Cleric Beretta or a P3-modded combat pistol. In this case, you always score 21 damage after armor reduction, and you can fire more than six times faster than Spidey can. Once you hit Spidey for the first time, she's already dead with no chance to retaliate, even if you may have to reload once on higher difficulties.