Criminal Mind

"A forest of thorns shall be your tomb."

**Criminal Mind** is a Dark, Gold Cerebella variant.

**BRIAR STRAITS**

## Tips and Tricks

### Role & Strategy

* Criminal Mind is a fighter with a Signature Ability that can be triggered both offensively and defensively by either fighter. Unlike most other defensive variants that revolves around damage reduction, Criminal Mind's defensive capabilities is tied onto her offensive traits through damage reflection via THORNS and damage infliction via BLEED.

* Criminal Mind has the exact same stat distribution as Harlequin which boasts the highest ATK stat of all Gold-tier Cerebella. Thus, she has the offensive prowess to deal 10% of damage from a single hit using a wide range of Cerebella's one-hit moves such as MERRY GO-RILLA, BATTLE BUTT, DIAMOND DROP, and DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER.
	+ DEATH MARK further complements her offensive output by increasing the damage taken by opponents from CRITICAL HITS and while BLOCKING by 50%.

* Defensively, Criminal Mind primarily relies on her THORNS and inflicting BLEED on the opponent. Her abilities largely activates depending on how her opponent plays, thus making her a potentially dangerous defender without the proper counters.

* **Marquee Ability**: Either Marquee Abilities will work with Criminal Mind. UPPER HAND is generally the superior Marquee Ability as it allows any Cerebella to act as a meter control variant to prevent opponents from using blockbusters to punish. Meanwhile, RING LEADER will trap opponents and prevent them from escaping via TAG OUTS while also disabling their special moves which may be useful in some niche situations.

* **Stat Investment**: Key stats on Criminal Mind depends on how you want to use her. HP, Defense and Resistance makes her a very durable defender while ATK and Piercing allows her to deal more damage offensively. In either case, Meter Gain is a very good stat to invest to quickly recharge blockbusters and deal massive damage.

### Playing Against

* One way to counter Criminal Mind is to simply use multi-hit characters that deals small amounts of damage per hit such as Squigly, Big Band, and Ms. Fortune. Generally, avoid using characters with massive burst damage capabilities such as Cerebella, Parasoul, and Painwheel.

* Playing smart is crucial when facing against Criminal Mind as you have to be cautious with the amount of damage you inflict while also being wary of THROW-based attacks that bypasses blocking such as MERRY GO-RILLA which can deal 10% of damage from a single hit.

* Criminal Mind's ability to gain BUFFS and inflict DEBUFFS makes her quite difficult to counter with a single fighter. However, there are a few fighters that stand out to be strong counters due to their immunity to BLEED, access to REGEN and ability to remove BUFFS such as Silent Kill with the ICU Marquee Ability and Bloodbath with CHAOS BANISH.

### Rift Battles

* Criminal Mind can be a very good defender to reduce the amount of healthpoints the opponent gets in their score through her BLEED and THORNS. As a DARK element fighter, Darknut is a catalyst that synergizes well with Criminal Mind, providing her ARMOR stacks that increases her defense with the chance of inflicting BLEED when hit.

### Trivia

* This variant is a reference to Maleficent from the Walt Disney film, *Sleeping Beauty* which is based on the classic fairy tale of the same name, with the caption referencing a direct quote from the film.