So using Professor X's special mastermind under the new rules. My assumption would be he is making the two hypothetical adjacent characters that share a keyword into the hit targets of the attack because that's how Mastermind works now, but Professor X's player still gets to choose how the damage is distributed for that attack because his power specifically allows you to. Correct? Dissenting opinions thus far?

Now assuming that we're agreeing that my interpretation above is the correct way to play him, how would you handle an attack with additional hit targets besides the two (or one) hit because of Professor X' special? Say Professor X was only 1 of three original targets and after using his special mastermind there are now 4 total hit targets
Do I get to choose all the damage distribution for that attack?
Or does the other player assign the other hit targets damage normally and I assign the remainder between the two hit due to Professor X?
Neither of the above?

COMPLETELY UNOFFICIAL: Mastermind has fundamentally changed so powers like this have to as well. The simplest way to do this for this one is that now he can choose two adjacent characters to become targets rather than one. However, that means he gets no say in damage distribution.

And I disagree with his power allowing him to distribute damage because that's a function of old Mastermind, not a function of the old special power.

I agree with all this, but would add the caveat that the power should specifically say the attacker has to divide damage between the hit targets. Otherwise, we get into the "multi-target close attacks do full damage to each target" situation.

Agreed. I was stuck on the second scenario (where damage would already be divided).

Edit... nevermind.

Well that is disappointing.
So is there any advantage at all to even using that part of his power? If they can just choose to deal all of the damage to one of the two characters of their choice anyway wouldn't you just choose to Mastermind it to 1 of those character so at least you get to choose which one? Is there something I'm overlooking?

Maybe it's splitting hairs, but personally I wouldn't have considered 2013 Mastermind to really be distributing the damage. You either don't use it or you deal all of the damage to one character. It was definitely his special power that let you choose how to divide the damage

Generally, no, not really. I'm sure there are some weird corner case interactions where it might matter, but yeah, essentially it would now just let the opponent choose which character is taking the hit.

It's only kind of splitting hairs. But it goes more to the point of how fundamentally Mastermind has changed, and how this power really is just not at all compatible with the new version.

Chuck's power let's him Mastermind to 2 characters instead of one. Under old MM, that meant he would have to decide where the damage that was being dealt to him would go. But that happened after the opponent got to assign damage as part of the normal attack sequence. So his power never actually affected that.

With new MM, it redirects the attack before the opponent gets to assign damage. Which, again, Chuck's power never actually affected. So, unfortunately, without taking some liberties with the wording and just making as direct a translation as possible, this is how it would work.

That said, this is absolutely an "ask your judge" situation. There's definitely an argument to be made to have it work more the way you were hoping. But it's just not how the things are actually written, and would (technically) require a little more rule-bending than I would be comfortable with.

This is kind of the crux of any rule/wording changes and how they affect old powers... play it as it was intended (using old wording, effectively) or pay how it currently acts with the new rules. For the last 4 years of rules before the newest change, AV002 Iron Man's damage power really hurt him (which has now reverted to how it was before, but will never be used because you can't prob it anymore)


... sometimes the rule changes help, sometimes they hurt, but as an overall practice, most will play it as it currently interacts with the rules because there are some off-shoots that could become more powerful or much weaker with any given change.