Mastermind (Tiberium Wars)

Mastermind is the Scrin commando unit in Tiberium Wars and Kane's Wrath.

Background
"Mastermind" was the GDI designation for what appeared to be the commando unit of the Scrin. Reports of Masterminds on the battlefield were scarce, partly because of the low survival rates against these elite units. They could sometimes be found at the heart of concentrated attack forces, and seemed to be capable of teleporting Scrin forces from place to place. Masterminds could even take direct control of human vehicles, buildings, and infantry. How they achieve this is not yet well-understood.

Mastermind units were considered expensive, which was most likely the reason why each Scrin Foreman was only allowed to deploy one of them at a time.

Reaper-17 did not use Masterminds, while Traveler-59 used a more advanced variant of the Mastermind known as the Prodigy.

History
As the momentum behind the Scrin's diversionary attacks on major population centers began to fade, the Mothership AI accompanying Scrin Foreman 371 realized that the use of brute force was no longer sufficient and authorized the deployment of Mastermind units, the AI then instructed the Foreman to infiltrate behind enemy lines and disrupt the military operations of the humans using the Masterminds' teleportation and manipulation abilities.

The first known use of the Mastermind was at Munich, where two Scrin scout ships carrying vital data on Threshold construction were shot down by GDI forces, causing them to crash in the city. In order to recover the data nodes, Foreman 371 guided a Mastermind and two Devourer tanks through the city's outer defenses, turning the GDI defenders against one another using the Mastermind. The Mastermind then planted a manipulator device on a GDI barracks and mind controlled an engineer into shutting down the city's defenses. This allowed Scrin reinforcements to arrive and destroy GDI's Munich base, taking over the entire city.

GDI forces encountered another Mastermind in Rome, where a Mastermind teleported Scrin units across the chasm to attack the GDI base. The Mastermind proved to be a dangerous opponent, as it used a nearby stasis chamber to protect itself and hid behind a chasm defended by several plasma missile batteries, making it difficult to approach. Unlike the standard Mastermind, this particular one was not equipped with manipulator device, but instead armed with a long range plasma beam deadly against infantry and effective against aircraft.

Game unit
The Mastermind is not equipped with any offensive weapons, but has two very useful abilities, its manipulator device ability can take control of most enemy units and structures. Mind controlled units will fight for you, while mind controlled structures, in addition to performing its original functions such as unit production, can be sold just like owned structures, allowing the Mastermind to destroy enemy structures like its GDI and Nod counterparts, with the added benefit of gaining some credits and spawning a squad of infantry under your command.

However, it should be noted that the manipulator device ability has a very long cooldown time, so the Mastermind will be left vulnerable after mind controlling a unit or structure, so it is important to pick the target carefully. Also, commando units, epic units, and base defenses are immune to this power, so care should be taken to avoid them. The Mastermind is one of the few Scrin infantry that can enter structures, which can be used to avoid enemy fire.

The Mastermind also has the ability to teleport friendly units from anywhere on the battlefield to a location within 250 distance units of itself. This can be used to move units quickly around the battlefield, bypass natural barriers and enemy defenses, or to protect the Mastermind from enemy units. When garrisoned into an Eradicator hexapod, the hexapod gains the ability of short range teleportation.

Changelog

 * Tiberium Wars patch 1.01: Teleport Units ability maximum range reduced.
 * Tiberium Wars patch 1.05:
 * cost/build time increased by 66% to $2500/25 sec
 * manipulator device recharge time increased to 30 seconds.
 * Teleport Units ability now begins its cooldown period after units are teleported, rather than when units are first selected for teleporting.
 * can no longer be crushed by enemy vehicles
 * resistance to cannon-type damage increased by 45%
 * added an EVA announcement for when an enemy Scrin Mastermind enters the player's line of sight.
 * fixed an error that caused players to lose credits when selling Refineries or Extractors under the control of a Mastermind.
 * Kane's Wrath patch 1.02:
 * Mastermind/Prodigy teleport recharge increased to 20s, no longer works on EMP'd/phased units
 * Cultist, Prodigy, and Mastermind mind controls (all types) no longer work on epic units or commandosa

a - due to a coding oversight, the Prodigy's area-of-effect mind control still works on epic units

Trivia

 * The Tiberium Wars manual mentions that the Mastermind requires Tiberium to use the "Teleport Units" ability, either from a Tiberium field or an enemy silo. However, this is not the case in the game.
 * Functionally, these units work in a fashion somewhat similar to that of Yuri Prime in Yuri's Revenge.
 * The concept art mentioned that the unit was armed with a disintegrator. Therefore, it is possible that the Mastermind seen in the Rome mission was how the Mastermind was originally supposed to be before it was changed to a mind control unit.