F%#& CoH: Mistress of Mayhem Trial

 

 Minds ofMayhem Trial (ur MoM trial)

5^th iTrial released.  Well co-released with the TPN trial.  Semantics.  I’m going by memory on a trial I have only done twice and the wiki hasn’t been updated yet.  I may be missing a phase.  

 Oh like anyone cares.

Trial starts in a staging room with Desdamona.  You can stock up on inspirations (temporary buffs for you non CoX players) here.  It is recommended you buy some rezzes and mez protections here.  There is no hospital, and if you allow Des to rez you 15 seconds gets run off the clock.

Phase 1:  Beat up Malaise.  When Mal gets to 50% health he summons several giant monsters or AV’s from other game content for the party to kill.  You have to beat them up too, and after a while Mal pops back in for you to finish.  All the while a big pink patch periodically appears to give Psychic damage over time.  It’s not an instant kill, but it is really, really quick.   If you are in the center or in the midst of a long animation, it will be hard to escape.  There’s a time limit, and I can see some particularly inept groups screwing this up.

Phase 2: Beat up Penelope Mayhem.  PM can only be damaged after some boss level monsters are defeated near her.  The most successful tactic is to have most of the group wait by the first door while tanks drag the AV and the “vulnerability” type monsters near her.  Also timed, and probably won’t be failed.

Phase 3:  Beat up Mother Mayhem to free Aurora Borealis.   Simultaneously you must defeat MM while keeping AB alive.  AB is being attacked by Lieutenant level monsters.  Not an imminent threat, but a big enough one that a sub-group needs to split off and deal with this.  Tankers and players with targeted heals.   In the main battle pink death patches are back, as well as some devastating AoE attacks that give a  warning (if tagged suffer in silence, get the hell away from the main group).  Still timed, and uncoordinated groups will have trouble.  After this an annoying cut scene plays.  Thankfully shorter than a lot of the other iTrial cut scenes.

Phase 4:  Final Showdown.  Beat up Mother Malaise and Shalice Tilman.     There’s story behind why Mother Mayhem now turns into Mother Malaise, but even I, who play CoH regularly could give a crap.  This battle is kind of a combination for Phase 1 and 2.  The following procedure needs to be repeated 3 times.

Beat Malaise down to 50% health.

When Malaise gets to 50% health he ports out and a couple more mobs from CoH greatest hits arrive, this time at boss level.  You need to drag them over to where Shalice Tilman has spawned and defeat them.  

After defeating them ST becomes vulnerable to holds, which the team needs to do because at 50% health ST heads to the center of the map and if she reaches there, Mal respawns at full health and that resets the round.  

Too many ‘round resets’ will result in a trial failure, and it looks pretty easy to do.

The Review:

Right now, I think this is my favorite iTrial.  It’s very challenging, unlike UGT, Lambda or BAF.  But it doesn’t gank the player just for the sake of ganking, like in Keyes or TPN.  Inexperienced or dense players will die a lot from the psychic death patches and AoE attacks, but they are fairly avoidable if you pay attention.