Are Minion Masters worth it?

There is so much discussion on MM's throughout this board and its all so conflicting. Some people say this, others say that, and there are some serious questions I have about MM's that I think are worth getting concrete answers, not just for me, but for the general building public. So please if anyone could shed light on these that would be great, and discussion is always encouraged.

#1. Should a minion master be purely necro, or is it more effective to use a /secondary? Such as /rit or /mo.

#2. People say its preference for Jagged Bones or AoTL but they seem like two totally different skills to me. AoTL is about keeping a wall of minions alive, no? Minions that have a high level and thus higher hp. JB's main effect is triggered by the death of minions and creates a synergy with bombing. AoTL is 15e and can really hurt your energy after dp, whereas JB is only 5e and so its easy to maintain anywhere under most circumstances.

#3. If my MM dies, all the minions turn hostile and often its worse than multiple heroes dying on my team(timewise) and sometimes leads to wipes. Is a MM worth that risk?

#4. MM seem to have anti synergy with the major protters, we bring in this meta. ST defensive rits, and EMo prot. Shelter and union and displacement all get destroyed by minions soaking up that damage, and the EMo kills himself with infuse or wastes prots like Prot Spirit on a minion people often want to die.

#5. Is running multiple MM's worth it? When one dies you can cover with veritas gaze, no? If you're going /secondary, it can provide extra defense to help with the lacking because of #4.

#6. MM's seem to be slow at the start of each area, no corpses, since nothing is dead, and speaking of slow, they physically are always behind from casting Death Nova nonstop. So often they arent with the party by the next aggro. FB can help to alleviate this, but it requires a decent spec into an attribute on TWO heroes, AND they don't use it well, as they will use it in battle when we aren't moving. I often micro it when I use it, but simply put, I find myself choosing other skills because of how much it needs in attributes to be useful. Are there any other counters to this?

#7. Explosive Growth is a skill that has great synergy with minions, and is semi-often used as a hero build. But Explosive Growth is a spawning power skill, which means you need to be a Rit to spec into it, and thus, you lose you're energy management of Soul Reaping. If you are to build an explosive growth rit, how do you keep them from running out of energy? Boon of Creation doesn't seem to cut it, and a bar is stacked by skills that you(need), such as EG itself, Minion Elite, Animate Minions, Boon of Creation, Spirits Gift, Death Nova/BoTM, Putrid bile, and anything else you see fit.

These questions are all I could think of for now but each of them is pretty standard and yet I believe hold water for debate and discussion. Feel free to disprove that and make the answers Solid fact 1. A pure necro can work, but personally I recommend to bring utility on 3-4 slots from a secondary profession like monk/paragon/rit. With minions dying all over the place the MM will get loads of energy thanks to soul reaping, so why not put that massive energy flow to good use ( with great but expensive prots for example. where a monk can only use them once in a while, the MM can afford to spam them on recharge).

2. It really is a preference. Jagged bones makes it harder for AoE to wipe your army since a new minion rises from the death of the old one, and aotl can put you from 0 minions into a full army of 10-12 instantly. Both are equally good, and both perform fine for both walling and bombing.

3. an MM brings so much defense, utility and damage ( with death nova) the risk is laughable. When the MM dies, pretty much everyone else has died before him. So yes, benefits outweigh the small risks by FAR.

4. MM does conflict with an ST protter, using both at the same time can be done, but it will mean that its possible that you have no shelter up at the moment you need it most. As far as ER protters go, I never noticed them wasting prots or fuses on minions.

5. Multiple MM's is usually not worth it, unless you are splitting or in a zone where enemies come in a bazillion swarms. but 90% of the time: do not bring more then one.

6. MM's will always lag behind, but their utility makes up for this.
If you want record times, do not bring an MM. If you prefer stability over speed, bring an MM and enjoy doing 90% of GW on HM while watching TV.

7. MM on Rit can be done, but its better on a pure necro. Boon of creation should suffice, if not bring something like signet of creation.

ST rits tend to work quite well with minions actually. Keep in mind, level 20+ minions have player-level armor and health. This means they aren't really "wasting" Shelter, it's an extra first line of defense against minions getting lost. Doing elite areas, Shelter up is the difference between a bad AoE enemy instantly killing most of your minions and your minions being healed to full with the next BotM. Yes, Shelter will only protect against 1 spell in this case. That 2nd spell (if it comes) is still a hell of a lot better off killing the minions than hitting your real party. I totally agree. I really don't get all the hate about ST/MM anti-synergy. I run them both all the time and unless you are just constantly getting gibbed by massive AoE, the rit seems to have no problem maintaining that copy of Shelter (personally I only run Shelter and Dissonance). What you really lose out on is the fact that because your minions aren't dying like crazy, you aren't getting a lot of Death Nova explosions, so that might be a valid criticism.

I totally agree. I really don't get all the hate about ST/MM anti-synergy. I run them both all the time and unless you are just constantly getting gibbed by massive AoE, the rit seems to have no problem maintaining that copy of Shelter (personally I only run Shelter and Dissonance). What you really lose out on is the fact that because your minions aren't dying like crazy, you aren't getting a lot of Death Nova explosions, so that might be a valid criticism. There is a difference between a minion master where you really want to keep your minions alive and a minion bomber where you want your minions to act as bombs. Sacrificing with BoTM and Shelter to keep your minions alive runs counter to the intention of letting your minions explode on your enemies and causing damage.

Don't get me wrong, a minion master can still cause damage without death nova, it is just a different way of playing. For example, if I am using fiends which cost 25e each to animate obviously I am not going to intentionally use them as bombs and fiends have good damage on their own so it makes sense to use BoTM to maintain these expensive minions. It is just a different play style and both are viable. People are confused when both are called MMs but with different skill bar design and philosophies.

i believe in mm's for one pure reason, it confuses the AI of the enemy. i also believe its better to use a staff since they "throw further than wands" thus getting minions out front. and of course there are long bows to start fights. Just to dispel a potential myth at once, staves and wands have the EXACT same range!