Taskmaster: Are you up to the Task? ****

Marvel Puzzle Quest MPQ Character Discussion Speculation and Concepts
1

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Photographic Reflexes*(Passive)*: bluetile.png
(0) Taskmasters iconic ability is second to none, making him a dangerous adversary in a fight. Whenever a enemy matches 3 black tiles while Taskmaster is in the front of the party he mimics their movements and performs the same attack right back at them causing equal damage and gains 1 black AP.

Level Upgrades:
Level 2: Triggers if the enemy matches 3 black tiles. Gains 2 Black AP
Level 3: Triggers if the enemy matches 3 or 4 black tiles. Gains 3 Black AP
Level 4: Triggers if the enemy matches 3 or 4 black tiles. Gains 4 Black AP
Level 5: Triggers if the enemy matches 3 or more black tiles. Gains 5 Black AP

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Show Me Your Moves!: yellowtile.png
(10) Taskmaster mimicry skills are so keen at times he can even predict what his opponents are going to do next. When activated Taskmaster makes a yellow 1 turn countdown timer, while this timer is on the board any tile match made by the enemy will bring Taskmaster to the forefront and have the damage dealt by the match nulled, this include critical special tiles. However special abilities that trigger on a enemies critical match still trigger and take effect. Opponents still gain AP for the match.

Level Upgrades:
Level 2: Increase Timer to 2.
Level 3: Increase Timer to 3.
Level 4: Increase Timer to 4.
Level 5: Increase Timer to 5.

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I Can Do Better: blacktile.png
(16) Anything you can do physically he can do better. So long as it doesn’t require super strength or speed Taskmaster can near instantly copy the move and in some cases do it even better if possible. This means after all his previous fights and observation Taskmaster knows a LOT of fighting moves and has contemplated numerous ways of applying them. Taskmaster deals 700 damage and destroys 3 random team-up tiles. Generates no Team AP. This damage ignores protect tiles.

Level Upgrades:
Level 2: deals 1000 damage and destroys 5 random team-up tiles.
Level 3: deals 1500 damage and destroys 7 random team-up tiles.
Level 4: deals 2000 damage and destroys 9 random team-up tiles.
Level 5: deals 3000 damage and destroys all the team-up tiles on the board.

At Max Level:
Level 3: deals 3000 damage and destroys 7 random team-up tiles.
Level 4: deals 5000 damage and destroys 9 random team-up tiles.
Level 5: deals 7000 damage and destroys all the team-up tiles on the board.

2

Wow, nice design. Very simple, yet fits the character well. I was a bit confused about “Photographic Reflexes”, but then read it more closely. I initially thought it was 5 black AP for any match. I think it is balanced. I think a team-up with Iron Fist and/or Doctor Doom would work out pretty well. “Show Me Your Moves” seems like a great way to counter enemy cascades, especially when they have strong Strike tiles. I think it would interact weirdly if Thing or Deadpool jumped in front of the very strong match damage and die, instead of Taskmaster tanking, lol. Black power is also very fair. Overall, I think you did a great job. I think people would run 5/3/5. What do you think?

3

Thanks for the vote of confidence. I was worried about the wording for Photographic Reflexes, I just couldn’t think of a way to explain it better. Yes him teaming up with someone like Doctor Doom would have some nice synergy and he would prove a great foil to people like Iron Fist or Doom who like to create tons of black tiles with their specials.

Show me your moves is definitely my favorite of the three powers from a design perspective seeing how it’s mechanics works in conjunction with Photographic Reflexes in some cases. Yet even on it’s own the ability is a very solid but not overwhelming tank ability similar to Colossus but definitely stronger. I feel I balanced this ability out the best, it’s cost isn’t to pricy and the effect can be immediately felt even though it’s not a passive. I love the idea of this being on and then some enemy matches black, lol null the damage then do the damage they would have done back to them and gain black AP for it. icon_e_wink.gif

I can do better was me simply thinking “okay I need to give him a direct attack power but I don’t know how the do damage scales in this game so let me look at another tier 4 character who I think has a good solid hit move and kind of mimic them.” which is what I did in that I saw things green ability and just rounded down to the nearest 100, then kind of increased the damage by systematically. It was a cop out because originally I didn’t know how to make it special for the AP cost, so I decided to tack on the destroys team up tiles bit, but that didn’t feel like enough so I also tacked on the ignores protect tiles bit as well. I like the concept overall though simple because I didn’t want his blue to lead to quick build up and use of his black so I upped the cost of his black to a unprecedentedly high ability cost to kind of balance it out.

Yeah 5 3 5 is definitely what I think the majority would run with, or depending on who he’s team up with like if he’s team up with Doom and tier 3 cyclops, I could see 5 5 3, as a means to just double up on black ap generating.

Thanks again love the positive feedback.

4

Kind of boring. Black is just Magneto’s Red but better. His passive is kind of interesting, he has to be in front which makes it unreliable but free AP on an enemy match is pretty neat.

His Yellow power, which I first thought was just Colossus but better, I guess it only nullifies match damage; I assume strikes are factored in but the enemy using a power on their turn is not? That’s different enough from Colossus to be interesting, not bad in the meta where 5* match damage is as much of a worry as their powers. 10 might be too high a price to pay for that but maybe it’d be nice sometimes.

Nice theme. Not super excited by the spec but there’s nothing I would change or tweak about it. I’d like to see Taskmaster in the game; I specced him a while back in the age of new 3-stars, maybe it’d be fun to revisit.

5

I have some suggestions. All 3 abilities seem to focus on one aspect of Taskmaster. There is some difference between his ability to predict and his ability to perform, but overall I think you are missing some of Taskmaster’s other abilities. He is a trainer of goon/thugs for one, so there could be several different ways you could go with that ability (having an effect on strike/cd tiles etc.). He is a merc too, so your blue might tie in better with that aspect (making sure he gets paid - stealing black).

Definitely a character worth working on…

6

Thanks for the ideas, maybe if D3 actually looks at this and considers it, they’ll take all of our suggestions and cobble something together.

7

I wouldn’t count on it. icon_razz.gif

8

One more stone for the cobbling then… In his first appearance (early Avengers) it is made clear that versatility is one of his advantages. He has several iconic weapons as part of his gear (cap shield, hawkeye bow), so it might be cool if he had a power similar to Green Goblin purple, where he can choose a color for a variety of effects. It should be cheaper than Nick Fury avengers assemble, because he doesn’t have to wait for anyone to arrive though.

Here are some effects I think the power should have for 8 AP:
Blue - AP return and 1 turn stun similar to Cap or alternately DD billyclub
Red - lesser ninja swords as deadpool
Green - lesser enemy team damage with bonus if he has special tiles on the board as Beast
Black - lesser enemy team damage with retaliation as Black Panther
Purple - special tile removal as Bullseye
Yellow - lesser twin pistols as Hood

9

That’s a cool idea. You might to want design his other two powers to be less complicated to compensate for the added depth, but it would fit the character.

I think since the power requires selecting a tile, you should make the effects dependent on it (besides just using it as a color picker). Additionally it’d make sense if the powers were generally recognizable as similar/identical to other character effects, but no matter what you do it should feel like one power, with options, instead of a total grab bag.

Here’s how I would do it:

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Versatile Combatant 8 redtile.png
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Taskmaster does (Totally awesome power description goes here!). Select a basic tile. The chosen tile’s color will determine the effect:

  • Red : Deal moderate damage and convert the chosen tile into a 2-turn Countdown tile that returns 6 Red AP.
    Blue : Stun the target for 1/2 turns and convert the chosen tile into a 2-turn Countdown tile that stuns the target for 1 turns.
    Yellow : Deal high damage.
    Green : Deal moderate damage and create 2/3 Red Strike tiles.
    Purple : Converts the chosen tile into a Critical tile.
    Black : Converts the chosen tile into a strong Attack tile.

Moderate damage values should be pretty tame. High damage can be a bit better, but not so much that it’s always the best option.

Except I kind of think that idea could be simplifed and unified further by making every option create CDs. Benefits: it can be even cheaper because it’s slightly less reliable, all 6 options can balance better by scaling the base damage. Downside, it makes the power more like Green Goblin’s… but only a little. So here’s that version, for the sake of discussion:

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Versatile Combatant 7 redtile.png
AP
Taskmaster can quickly adapt to any fight and create an advantage for himself. Deals moderate damage and converts a selected basic tile into a 2-turn Countdown tile.
The chosen tile’s color will determine the effect:

  • Yellow : Converts to a powerful Strike tile when activated.
    Red : Returns 6 Red AP when activated.
    Blue : Immediately stuns the target enemy for 2 turns, and 1 additional turn when the Countdown activates.
    Purple : Steals 2 AP of each color when activated.
    Green : Destroys 6 random tiles when activated.
    Black : Deal high damage and stun the target for 1 turn when activated.

At max level, it should probably target any tile, or maybe non-Countdown tiles, at the very least Protect, Strike, and I’d say Invisibility tiles too to make it awesome.

Anyways I’m rambling. For now, I like my second one better, but it could also be fun to retool the first idea where all 6 effects happen immediately. So Red: Better damage; Blue: Stun; Green: Destroy an ‘x’ of tiles; Yellow: Strike tile; Black; Steal strongest AP; Purple: Critical (unless that’s too strong, instead it could convert the tile and 2 adjacent tiles to green).

I’ll definitely be posting my own updated 4* build later on. It’s a great idea.

10

Here we go! This build is reminiscent of my bygone 3-star build that can be found here: https://forums.505go.com/discussion/29258 with some updates inspired by the ideas above and an upgrade to the 4-star tier. This Taskmaster is a good leader, and an incredibly versatile board changer. Thinking about all of the possibilities for his Black power should be a lot of fun. npxo


4 Star Rarity (Legendary)
At Max Level: HP: 14890 Tile Damage: 73/11/11/82/10/64/3.5x

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Photographic Reflexes - 5 purpletile.png
AP / Passive
Taskmaster counters his opponents by perfectly mimicking their fighting style. Converts up to 2 random enemy Strike or Protect tiles to basic Black tiles.
(Passive) Whenever an enemy creates a Strike tile, create a matching friendly Protect tile of Strength 40.
Level Upgrades

  • Level 2: Converts up to 3 tiles.
    Level 3: Protect tile Strength increases to 80.
    Level 4: Protect tile Strength increases to 110.
    Level 5: Converts up to 4 tiles. Protect tile Strength increases to 160.
![yellowflag.png|34x17](upload://sC9bDFbA0kcHW4WrBuO8qbHYjvp.png) **Cunning Leadership (Passive)** (Passive) Taskmaster's flawless tactical insights come from studying his allies as well as his opponents. Whenever he or an ally fires a power, creates 1 Red Strike and 1 Blue Protect tile of Strength 42. *Level Upgrades*
  • Level 2: Strength increases to 50.
    Level 3: Strength increases to 60.
    Level 4: Strength increases to 72.
    Level 5: Strength increases to 100.
 ![blackflag.png|34x17](upload://76xP2nthMpXhsiYATLFilpznLhN.png) **Versatile Technique 11 ![blacktile.png|17x17](upload://po5owqa0ouOXJkCqO2dqoIetqPk.png) AP** Taskmaster can quickly adapt to any situation to gain an advantage. Select a basic tile and deal 1410 damage. The chosen tile's color will determine an additional effect. Yellow: Convert all basic Yellow tiles to Protect tiles of Strength 38. Red: Destroy the targeted row (Does not generate AP.) Blue: The selected tile becomes an Invisibility tile. Purple: The selected tile becomes a Critical tile. Green: Destroy the targeted column (Does not generate AP.) Black: Destroy all Black tiles. (Does not generate AP.) *Level Upgrades*
  • Level 2: Deal 1800 damage. Yellow Protect Strength increases to 46.
    Level 3: Deal 2250 damage. Yellow Protect Strength increases to 55.
    Level 4: Deal 3000 damage. Yellow Protect Strength increases to 66.
    Level 5: Deal 4770 damage. Yellow Protect Strength increases to 79.

Notes:
He’s not a monster on his own, but he’s pretty well rounded. Obviously he’s a big special tile user and benefits from turnover. Purple might generate black, if there are enemy specials to use it on, but otherwise he’s low on acceleration. He’s got cheap special removal, which also feeds his Cunning Leadership. If Yellow is too much like ProfX’s Psychic Convergence, I dunno, but it’d be fun to roll both of them together.

Each of the options for Versatile Technique are pretty strong, situationally. Cut down bad enemy specials, block a bunch of damage, or go invisible? Or maybe there’s a purple tile sitting where it will make a double 5-match.

Counterplay - He’s not tough on defense but I like the unpredictability of black. Every so often he’s going to blow up a precious tile, get a huge AP cascade, or just turn invisible as he hides in the shadows, pulling strings. Iceman and Venom beat the tinykitty out of him, but he’s strong against Strike users–especially the passive Strikers at 3-star land–as his Protects will cut into or even surpass them. Reflexes are especially great protection with Back in Black Spidey since the enemy Strikes are weakened anyway.

11

If I am reading that right, a red strike tile for example would be converted to a basic black tile? That would add a completely new and interesting tactic to the game, so I am very much in support of that.

Taskmaster would definitely destroy his own strike tile for an advantage, so even if it meant a little added AP cost it fits his character to be able to target the tiles (vs random).

You already have him creating protect tiles with his yellow, so what do you think about swapping those abilities? By that I mean change his yellow to “Photographic Reflexes” and his purple to “Cunning Leadership”. Then remove the passive from the purple and add in more special tile targeting.

For example:
Target 1 Strike or Protect tile
Level 2: Target 2 Strike or Protect tiles
Level 3: Target 2 Strike, Protect or Attack tiles
Level 4: Target 3 Strike, Protect or Attack tiles
Level 5: Target any 3 tiles

Yellow would obviously have to change to “whenever an enemy fires a power” instead of when an ally fires a power, but that would keep the reflex flavor you initially created. Purple would then become Taskmaster manipulating special tiles, sacrificing his less promising goons and frustrating enemy plans. Moreover, the whole time he will be cunningly building up to unleash his black (Versatile Technique).

Versatile Technique looks great and very much in character. My only suggestion would be to reconsider the sub-blue (invisibility). One idea might be a “stealth” tile. Unlike the more powerful invisibility, a stealth tile would be a CD (instead of constant) but work exactly the same otherwise.

Kudos on what you have done so far, it is fun watching Taskmaster come to life in the MPQ universe!

12

I like your suggestions. The invisibility should be thought of as thematic ‘off to the side, pulling strings’ as opposed to real invisibility, but it could be a long CD with the help text “While this tile is on the board, Taskmaster is Invisible”. I definitely don’t think blue should be the obvious choice in any situation, but I worry that temporary invisibility wouldn’t be worth 11 AP (when you could create cascades for more AP and damage instead). But maybe people would use it in those situations where the enemy just filled their AP bars with a lucky cascade. Maybe the damage it does (and targetable nature) is too good. Perhaps it could be something completely different; Destroy a 3x3 centered on the targeted tile is unrepresented.

Swapping his abilities and getting rid of the reflect passive could be ok. I like his defensive reflexes, but if yellow is his only passive and creates tiles “when the enemy fires a power” the base numbers could be much higher, which would make it especially very strong against goons who fire a lot of cheap CD powers. Putting more emphasis on his tile destruction/conversion would make him stronger as an accelerator, especially if he can use his own tiles to fuel it, and making it targeted is probably in danger of becoming OP. But it also might make him a blast to play. And then the power wouldn’t be a dead weight if your enemy doesn’t make specials (but you might need them to fire one first to make your own.)

Thanks for the feedback.

13

I see what you are saying… more of Professor X type of invisibility… still find it hard to give that ability to Taskmaster icon_e_smile.gif

The purple does teeter on being OP, but consider that GSBW can turn 6 basic tiles to green for 11AP. Keeping the AP at 5 AP made sense when it was the reflex power, but if the reflex became the passive yellow, I thought it would make room to work with the AP cost of the purple a bit. Being able to target any tile could probably be reworked too (maybe just add basic tiles to the list and keep it like lvl 4 otherwise)?

14

All right. I don’t want it to target basic tiles, because that should cost more, and plain acceleration/crit fishing is less restrictive and fun. But making it targetable (and usable on friendly tiles) really rewards you for looking at the board and makes specials interesting for that reason. So here’s a new iteration based on your feedback.

At Max Level: HP: 14890 Tile Damage: 73/11/11/82/10/64/3.5x

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Ruthless Strategist - 6 purpletile.png
AP
Taskmaster puts his plans into motion by any means necessary. Converts up to 2 chosen Strike tiles to basic Black tiles.
Level Upgrades

  • Level 2: Convert Strike or Protect tiles.
    Level 3: Converts up to 3 tiles.
    Level 4: Convert Strike, Protect or Attack tiles.
    Level 5: Converts up to 4 tiles.
![yellowflag.png|34x17](upload://sC9bDFbA0kcHW4WrBuO8qbHYjvp.png) **Photographic Reflexes (Passive)** (Passive) Taskmaster counters his opponents by perfectly mimicking their fighting style. Whenever an enemy fires a power, creates 1 Red Strike tile of Strength 126. If there are fewer friendly Protect tiles than friendly Strike tiles, creates 1 Blue Protect tile of Strength 126 instead. *Level Upgrades*
  • Level 2: Strength increases to 150.
    Level 3: Strength increases to 180.
    Level 4: Strength increases to 216.
    Level 5: Strength increases to 300.
 ![blackflag.png|34x17](upload://76xP2nthMpXhsiYATLFilpznLhN.png) **Versatile Technique 11 ![blacktile.png|17x17](upload://po5owqa0ouOXJkCqO2dqoIetqPk.png) AP** Taskmaster can quickly adapt to any situation to gain an advantage. Select a basic tile and deal 1410 damage. The chosen tile's color will determine an additional effect.
  • Yellow: Convert all basic Yellow tiles to Protect tiles of Strength 38.
    Red: Destroy the targeted row (Does not generate AP.)
    Blue: Destroy the targeted column (Does not generate AP.)
    Purple: The selected tile becomes a Critical tile.
    Green: Convert all basic Green tiles to Attack tiles of Strength 38.
    Black: Destroy all Black tiles. (Does not generate AP.)

Level Upgrades

  • Level 2: Deal 1800 damage. Special tile Strength increases to 46.
    Level 3: Deal 2250 damage. Special tile Strength increases to 55.
    Level 4: Deal 3000 damage. Special tile Strength increases to 66.
    Level 5: Deal 4770 damage. Special tile Strength increases to 79.

This Taskmaster would be insanely good against PvE mooks (beats the tinykitty out of ninjas and symbiotes), but less so as they scale up in difficulty. He’s a bit easier to beat on defense for various reasons, but will at least neutralize enemy specials for cheap and create unexpected board situations, which promises fun counterplay. The more specials you get on the board, the more powerful Master Strategist becomes. I don’t think any of the options for Versatile Technique is necessarily the best, and would often depend on the situation (e.g. there’s a well-placed Purple tile). The revised Reflexes creates Strike/Protect tiles in balance which clever players could manipulate (e.g. by creating Yellow Protects with VT).

15

Awesome! I really like how his purple is not completely dependent on the enemy because of his yellow or black and also that all 3 powers work in concert.

I really like the descriptions for each power, so this is minor, but could the purple be changed to “Ruthless Strategist”?

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16

Sounds good!

I really like how this spec turned out. Way to collaborate!

17

You alluded to it earlier and I can see that his purple will be weak in the AI’s hands. If the devs ever decided to add this character to the game, then the AI should be restricted from targeting friendly tiles with purple. That simple restriction would make him play decently in the AI’s hands.

His yellow is just like the comics, because the longer he watches his opponents the more dangerous he becomes. Though not explicitly personified, all three of his powers represent his training of thugs by his heavy use and control of special tiles. Overall, I think we came up with a pretty decent Original Taskmaster (when he was all villain).

Next year let’s collaborate on Modern Taskmaster! icon_twisted.gif

18

I felt like it was time to spec Taskmaster again. Mostly just want to give him cool, thematic and also interesting powers. This version would be brutal against a host of newer better characters; Dr. Strange, Black Bolt, Carol, basically anyone whose passives deal direct damage are going to rack up a ton of high-strength Attack tiles. (Black Panther Yellow? Haha!) Anyone who relies on a lot of countdowns expiring (Star-Lord, Carol, Coulson–or just mooks) are going to face a lot of lower-strength Attack tiles.

I love the Passive strength increase effect of Photographic Reflexes; it’d work like Punisher’s blue, but scale up throughout the match as your opponent collects AP, and if they get a lucky cascade, could even double or triple your special tile damage. Eat it, Ultron Drones.

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Photographic Reflexes
Taskmaster is an incredible hand-to-hand combatant, able to mimic and adapt to the attacks of other combatants.
(Passive) At the start of the battle, create 1 Attack, Protect, and Strike tile of Strength 60.
(Passive) Friendly Attack, Protect and Strike tile Strength is increased by 1% per enemy AP.npxo

Level 2-5: Tile Strength increases to 330 (660 max). Friendly tile Strength increased by 2-5% per enemy AP.

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Henchman Training Program 11 yellowtile.png
AP
Taskmaster orders his pool of hired mercenaries into battle to test their skills. Turns all basic Black tiles into Attack tiles of Strength 70, then stuns Taskmaster for 3 turns.
(Passive) When an enemy Countdown tile expires, create a random Attack, Protect, or Strike tile of Strength 70.

Level 2-5: Tile Strength increases to 220 (440 max)

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Adaptive Fighting 7 purpletile.png
AP
Taskmaster retaliates with an expertly crafted counterattack. Create 1 Attack, Protect, and Strike tile of Strength 110.
(Passive) If an enemy Passive ability deals damage to Taskmaster, create a random Attack, Protect or Strike tile with Strength equal to 10% of the damage taken.

Level 2-5: Tile Strength increases to 220 (440 max). Passive tile Strength increases to 20-50% of the damage taken.

19

That purple power, yo!

So simple, so good.

Give this guy top-tier HP and he’ll be a sweet add on.

20

I still really like this build. Taskmaster is the perfect guy to “counter” passive damagers like Okoye. I think he could use a couple adjustments. Black isn’t so bonkers (counts only tile-specific colors instead of all colors), yellow is reworked to be more thematic, and purple tweaked to provide a benefit without having to tank the hit and not be a percentage.

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Photographic Reflexes
Taskmaster is an incredible hand-to-hand combatant, able to mimic and adapt to the attacks of other combatants.
(Passive) At the start of the battle, create 1 Attack, Protect, and Strike tile of Strength 120.
(Passive) Friendly Attack, Protect and Strike tile Strength is increased by 5% per enemy AP in that tile’s color.

Level 2-5: Tile Strength increases to 660. Friendly tile Strength increased by 6-12% per enemy AP in that color.

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Leadership Position 11 yellowtile.png
AP
When things get dicey, Taskmaster steps aside to let his pool of hired mercenaries do the work. Turns all basic Black tiles into Attack tiles of Strength 140, then stuns Taskmaster for 3 turns.
(Passive) When Taskmaster takes more than 2866 damage, drains up to 8 friendly Yellow AP, providing a burst of 110 Health per AP spent; then immediately fire this power at no cost.

Level 2-5: Tile Strength increases to 440; healing increases to 492 per AP.

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Adaptive Fighting 7 purpletile.png
AP
Taskmaster retaliates with an expertly crafted counterattack. Create 1 Attack, Protect, and Strike tile of Strength 220.
(Passive) If an enemy Passive ability deals damage to Taskmaster or an ally, create a random Attack, Protect or Strike tile of Strength 220; then increase the Strength of all friendly Attack and Protect tiles by 75.

Level 5: Creates tiles of Strength 440, boosts all tiles by 310.