Samuel_Tow
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Quote:Look up at the thread title and you'll notice it says "retro SciFi." This isn't "the jetpack," it's a retro sci-fi jet pack. It has to fit within the retro sci-fi style. An F15 is not retro or sci-fi. It's contemporary technology, which is about as far removed from retro sci-fi as it gets without involving magic.Originally Posted by Liberties
Specifically a Sexy Jay Costume Suggestion thread that suggested using the F-15 for inspiration and having Folder wings. (Fold out when in flight fold in when on the ground...).
Frankly, the Think Tank was itself a perfectly serviceable fish bowl helmet, and I would not have batted an eye if they just gave us a version of that with a real head inside.Quote:Originally Posted by Liberties
It seems with the bubble helmet you are taking the easy route using the base of the existing "Brain in a Jar."
You're calling a sci-fi neglegee "androgynous?" Really? Seriously, I don't get that. I guess you could put a man in that, but... Why would you? I suppose if you dig Armstrong's imaginary sister I could maybe see how it would be androgynous, but to me, it's a dress and entirely female-specific.Quote:Originally Posted by Liberties
The armor is ok, but the female outfit is fairly androgynous. It's like you took the argument a few months ago and went in the COMPLETE opposite direction instead of finding a happy medium, but again perhaps this is due to the WIP nature of the reveal. (I do like the female belt with the rocket...
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Quote:I'm not sure normal maps alone can cause such a drastic change in colour as the Celestial Armour set is experiencing. I'm not questioning your expertise, Dink, but I just feel there's more going on. Specifically, I believe that a lot of Celestial Armour pieces are specifically designed to take tint colours to a smaller amount, possibly through transparent colour mask patterns. I know of other items in the game that do the same. the Defence top and bottom are a good example - those have parts that take base colour, parts that take secondary colour and parts that end up a mix of base+secondary colour, I assume because colour mask there is partially transparent.Originally Posted by Dink
I think now that we are using Normal Maps it changes the look ever so slightly, that may have something to do with it as we used to use plain old Bump maps.
Could you please check to see if there isn't something keeping the Celestial pieces from colouring intentionally? Since you restructured how your costumes are stored in your pigg files, it's been a lot harder to find them with the now-aging pigg viewers, so I can't check for myself
I actually have another example of what might be going on. When you have a spare moment, check out the base texture for the Steampunk boiler backpack. Even when given pure white as a colour, the pack comes off brown, because its basic texture is brown. This I've actually seen for a fact, and it's a large reason for why it doesn't colour properly. As I understand the colour-mixing system you used from when BABs explained it, it should be additive, meaning that choosing pure white as the colour should reveal the base texture unaltered, though perhaps bleached somewhat. But selecting pure white for the Steampunk boiler backpack reveals it to be brown. Could you give us some insight into that? -
Quote:So long as you're noting bugs and speaking of Forcefields bubbles, could I please submit a few more that should be right up your alley?Originally Posted by Honey Badger
Stonehead- Keldian CCemote bug is noted.
Forcefields custom-coloured bubbles are misaligned. The original bubbles track body movement and move with the character in animations. Custom bubbles only track character absolute position and don't move with the character in animations, meaning the character often jumps, steps and ducks outside the bubble. This is true for all bubbles, not just Forcefields. It's also true for the Traps Forcefield Generator.
I have pics, too. This is a pic of the proper, original bubble with a sitting Mastermind. Note how the bubble has sunk half-way into the ground and the whole character is covered. By contrast, this is a custom yellow Forcefield Generator. Note how the bubble is still hovering in the air where the character's chest would be normally, and how the Mastermind is largely outside the bubble.
This is the case for all Forcefields bubbles: Deflection Shield, Insulation Shield, Personal Forcefield, Dispersion Bubble and I believe others. This is also the case for the Traps Forcefield Generator, which is essentially using a copy of Dispersion Bubble's graphics. This is actually true for one of the Kheldian shields, as well, the one that has a rotating ring of energy. I've been reporting this for so long and never, ever gotten a response... Please, do something about it, or at least say something about it
Additionally, the Traps Poison Gas Trap is bugged when given custom colours. Again, I have pics: Evidence. What you're seeing is a Poison Gas Trap from Traps using a custom colour Red/Blue. The only thing that actually colours on the custom trap, however, is the bottle and the initial spray, which you can see displaying in a sort of purple in the pic. The actual poison gas cloud is always a sort of blueish white that looks like steam. The poison gas cloud DOES NOT take custom colours, and it really should.
Oh, and before I go - the Original colours for hero Electric Melee -> Chain Induction are bugged. The initial hit from Chain Induction is blue like all the others, but all the secondary jumps use the villain Electric Melee red. I suspect the pseudo-pet the power summons is an exact copy of the villain version using the exact same colours. In a reverse of the above problem, the custom version of Chain Induction is consistent between original attack and jump arcs.
Already have, actuallyQuote:Originally Posted by Honey Badger
Sam Tow- "aura-only body parts" would be character costume stuff. A concept would have to get approved, then an artist would have to fill in the shoulder-hole if there was to be no arm, and then I could work some magic with it. Pitch it on the original All Things Art thread! Thank you for acknowledging it. I'll see about resuggesting it.
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Quote:It's a lot like Darth Vader. When we didn't know the specifics of his backstory or how he became essentially a cyborg, he was a great villain. With James Earl Jones' cool voice and his flattering writing, the man was threatening. Now that we actually know the specifics of his backstory and what he was like as a kid, it's a lot harder to take the man seriously even with the previously impressive presentation.Originally Posted by BrandX
Must be his look and that he hasn't opened his mouth yet. Mind you that goes a long way too. Sooo, you could be right.
In the case of Foreshadow, you're exactly right - much of his fame comes from the fact that he hasn't opened his mouth yet, so he hasn't had a chance to mess up. In fact, in the one story where he shows up, he is... Less than impressive on all counts, and I personally like to pretend that didn't happen. It was so long ago I barely remember it anyway. But Foreshadow is an empty vessel with a pretty face, so he's easy to like while we fill him up with our secret wishes.
In a way, I kind of wish Foreshadow never does speak up. I have the sinking feeling that if he does, he'll be revealed to be an emo jerk who has power greater than that of the Statesman (which he does), yet still somehow manages to screw up because of his mental baggage. I just don't trust our writers to write a likeable hero to save their lives. Villains, maybe, but not heroes. -
Quote:Good point. Those already exist. Yeah, a path aura like those would be very cool.Originally Posted by ThePill
I assume it would trigger like the piston boots do.
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Quote:This is one reason I usually turn off subtitles for talky games. Not only do I end up reading the subtitles faster than the voice actors can deliver them, thus growing impatient, but I also spend my entire time reading subtitles and not watching the actual scene. Which is very silly, because my grasp of the English language is good enough to comprehend from listening, and comprehend much better, as a point of fact, since I read fast and sloppy. Just as an example, for the last seven years, I've been reading the name of the Tuatha de Dannan as "Tautha." See how that swapped the A and the U? I read the word too fast the first time I saw it, and I have never actually "read" it in the intervening years. I just saw the world and recognised it, only my recognition of it was wrong.Originally Posted by Zombie Man
Not to mention that even if the voice acting is in your native language, one can read the text much faster than it is spoken, making listening to throw-away dialogue from side-questers a chore. And because of that, there is not much chance for extensive dialogue, or monologue as the OP would call it (bringing the topic back to CoH). This can put a dent into story telling since everything has to be very, very terse.
Honestly, voice acting can really make or break a game. I think the greatest example of this is the Soul Reaver series. None of those games are precisely good as games, their plots are convoluted... But god damn it, the voice cast is just so damn awesome that I can't help but fall in love with the product. Michael Bell, Simon Tempelton and Tony Jay are simply so damn awesome that I'd honestly play those games just for their amazing performances. No subtitles for me, no skipping dialogue, no rushing through anything because it's the experience that counts. Honestly, I feel that first and foremost, voice acting can make or break a character before anything else is taken into consideration. A good voice actor can salvage a stupid script, a horrible in-game model, a crappy game and so on. To a large extent, Mark Meer and Jennifer Hale are responsible for much of Mass Effect's smashing success. Yes, the writing is good, but the delivery is better.
Maybe it's just me, but I'm a sucker for a good actor
That's not a bad idea, actually. Essentially, an in-game version of a ParagonWiki story arc writeup, but generated automatically? I like it. I remember running the Quaterfield TF a while back, and being completely unable to follow the "story," so I spent all my downtime on ParagonWiki reading up on what I missed. If I had that actually in-game and if it pulled straight from the game without someone having to write it down specifically (so, unlike souvenirs), then this would be a very useful tool for those of us who want to follow a story even if it's not our own.Quote:Originally Posted by cohRock
Several years ago I proposed a mechanism called "Story Book", for missions, arcs, TFs and AE content. Each member of the team would have one, and all dialog, NPC utterences, disembodied voices, objectives completed, etc., would be available in various tabs. The book would update "live", so a player interested in story could watch the dialog as it occurred. Players not interested would simply keep the Story Book closed. If on a fast-moving team, but are curious later as to what happened, the Story Book could be reviewed. A given Story Book would be persistent and last for some time after each arc were completed. Multiple Books would be available in event player is involved in simultaneous arcs. 48 hours or so after completion, that particular Story Book would go away. If there were a Souvenir for that particular arc or TF, the Story Book would be replaced by its Souvenir.
The game already has a variable for gender. A few, in fact: $heshe, $Heshe, $sirmam and $Sirmam. Those aren't usable in the actual game, but they are usable in the architect such that you can put them in NPC dialogues. Personally, I find that to be a very good idea. I get that some people are adamant about using "they" even when "they" don't have to, but I find that having a game's writing at least seem to accommodate my character is much more immersive. Have you noticed that City of Heroes is one of the very few MMOs out there that actually has people address you by name, and I'm talking about purely text-based MMOs with no real voice acting.Quote:Originally Posted by Anti_Proton
I think my biggest gripe with the dialog is that is isn't personalized enough to each character. It would be nice if they acknowledged not just my name, but my powers, my size, and my gender.
There's actually a variable for origin and AT, as well, but none for powersets. Personally, I'm not a fan of those, just because archetype is an abstract gameplay concept there to facilitate character builds and shouldn't really be treated as a story element and origin is far too broad to be able to infer things about people from a particular one. With that having been said, I REALLY don't believe variables for powersets are a good idea. As said before, people are already taking one powerset and customizing it into something completely different, and I'd personally hate to have contacts make assumptions about what my character can and, more importantly, CAN'T do based on what powersets I picked. -
Quote:Originally Posted by gameboy1234
I haven't read through the whole thread yet, but I needed to put my two cents in on your opening statement.
I WHOLLY disagree that these "talky" missions are somehow bad. I like them a lot, and I'd like to see more of them.I suggest both of you actually read the thread, or at least my original post in its entirety, before commenting, as opposed to commenting on the first sentence. You both have completely the wrong impression of what I'm saying and are bringing up points both I and others already addressed earlier in the thread. To summarise it for you: I'm not against conversations. I'm actually greatly in favour of them, but only if they're done right and constitute actual conversations. If they take the form of monologues, there's no reason for them to be delivered through the conversation interface. That system comes with great drawbacks that are only worth it if you can make use of its strengths, which a "dialogue" that has three text screens, each with a single dialogue option simply does not.Quote:Originally Posted by Ein_Dose
...You know, the dialog options aren't in unintuitive positions. It isn't like you have to 'hunt' for the right option. Just give the choices a read, even independent of the actual text if reading more than three sentences while playing a game causes you to, I dunno, break out in hives or something. -
The guy has quite a sexy butt!
That aside, my first reaction to this set was "ZOMG! A new set of large boots and gloves?!? Thank you!" Great stuff so far, though I honestly don't like the faces used in the examples. Are those the Steampunk ones?
I am looking forward to this set, and quite a bit. Thanks!
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I want to start farther afield and open with the Iron Widow. She's one of the oldest characters I ever met "in person" who actually inspired me both visually and thematically. The Iron Widow, for those unaware, is Scrapyard's widow and leader of the Scrapyarder rogues. I really like how she's presented as a strong individual, both physically and psychologically. When Mako murdered her husband with great brutality in full public view, Scrapyard's Widow overcame her grief and carried on the fight, becoming the emotional unifying core of the Scrapyarders.
And she looks damn cool, too! Sure, her costume is a bit of a mish-mash of sets, but her overall appearance is still pretty good. She looks like a no-nonsense tough lady who keeps her cool even when things are looking bleak. I guess the Iron Widow comes off as "attractive" to me less because she's physically beautiful as depicted, but because she's just a cool character as presented.
Obviously, I can't really skip Ghost Widow and still have any integrity left. Ghost Widow is probably this game's greatest success by far. She has a VERY striking visual design which combines a very clean stylistic design and iconic colour scheme with visual complexity which still keeps her unique and interesting. Visually, Ghost Widow simply sticks in people's minds. She looks mysterious, interesting and not a little threatening. Contrast that against Sister Airlia, whose costume is so busy and such a mish-mash of white and black that she comes off more like a fire pit than a character.
Of course, where Ghost Widow really shines is in her personality, backstory and presentation. Her "evil" is given context so strong it's almost easy to understand. Unlike Silver Mantis or Ice Mistral, Ghost Widow almost seems justified in what she does. Her story is not malicious almost at all. On the contrary, it's more tragic than anything else. And because she is given as much characterisation as she is, Ghost Widow has a chance to appear as a much more rounded, much more believable character with actual motivations, dreams and desires. She's a cool villainess that skirts the line just close enough to make us feel like we can fix her, but just far enough to still be a credible villain. No other character in this game even comes close.
And where would I be if I didn't mention Doc Delilah? I was right there with Penny when she said, though not in those exact words: "She's smart, she's strong, she's... Well, she's enough to give a regular girl a complex." And looking at the good doctor... Yeah, she could Visually, Delilah is just impressive. She's huge and super strong and well capable of taking care of herself... More so in storyline than in actual gameplay, but you can't win 'em all. She really does look the part of a former hero, and with this game's character creator, that's very hard to do for a female character.
Besides, I really like the personality she's been given. Delilah manages to be both a competent, confident, capable character, leading multiple dig sites and essentially conducting significant archaeological work in a war zone, as well as a goofy, zany, devil-may-care "girl" at the same time. It's this duality of character that I really like. I like that she's a competent character, and strong, to boot. But I also like that she's not wholly defined by her competence and has an almost anime wackyness to her at times. She's a nice contrast to the honestly very grim storyline of Faultline. And unlike the jokers in First Ward, Delilah actually works, because she's not a joke, herself. She's just a very lively individual whose personality is not a product of the plot. -
Quote:On the contrary, I believe "personality" has a lot to do with why Foreshadow gets mentioned so much. Consider what's happened to pretty much all the Phalanx members who've shown up in the SSAs: They've been depicted as gigantic ******** or heedlessly incompetent, to the point where some people are actually afraid for the characters whenever any are involved in storyline.Originally Posted by BrandX
Just seeing Foreshadow mentioned makes me think it's just in game model and personality is not an issue.
It's true that Foreshadow hasn't had much of a chance to develop his character, but that also means that he hasn't had a chance to annoy us and disappoint us. Foreshadow is, in large part, a mystery. He's a possibility. I honestly don't know much about him, but from looking at his appearance and from what I've heard, he sounds like he could be a very cool character. I have no real information, so my brain fills in the blanks. Because his appearance predisposes me to like him, my brain is also predisposed to assume his personality and story are also likeable. That's pretty much the trick to the "mysterious stranger" that seems to be so popular at least among popular fiction polls.
Plus, he has that really cool promo video where he fights Circle of Thorns while the Statesman spends the entire time immobilised by glowing orange hentai tentacles. That counts for a LOT. -
I skipped Hand Clap on mine because the mitigation it offers shoots you in the foot by knocking enemies away and scattering them. People will argue for it, but if you're looking for something to skip, skip that. Skip that before you skip Taunt.
As for Taunt, I'd keep it. It's a great way to stop runners and works most of the time. It's also a good way to keep enemies off your team-mates and works well as designed. It's also a VERY good way to force ranged enemies to close in on you, as it inflicts a 75% range debuff on anything you taunt.
I can't speak about "must-have" powers since in all my characters in all the years I've been here, I've only ever skipped two powerset powers - Hand Clap and Cloak of Fear. I find everything else to be a must-have if it's in your powerset. -
Quote:If you hadn't scrolled past my example, you'd have noticed I put in "Attack" as an option in all but I believe three text screens. I'd have to check, but I made it a point to put "Attack" everywhere on every text screen just so the player could end the dialogue and start combat at every stop along the way. Crucially, I put "Attack" right at the very start for a player not even interested in dialogues at all to make use of.Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect
Dialog options would be cool.
But how many people would a dialog tree like the one that took me 15 seconds to scroll past piss off if they have to navigate something like that every single time they want to go punch stuff in the face?
This was done deliberately. I know some don't like reading text, and I honestly don't hold that against people. Hell, I wouldn't want to bother reading that after the fifth time through. That's where "Attack" comes in. You can try to solve the problem with diplomacy, or you can simply attack the guy and treat him like a regular boss fight that ends up giving you the clue anyway.
This is part of my larger point of adding dialogues that are actually dialogues instead of one text screen broken up into five parts: You can make legitimate dialogues and just let people skip them. This really isn't a question of tech or even a question of writing, it's just a question of work. With some practice and a better game plan, a dialogue tree like that can be produced in a couple of hours in a word processor, though I imagine it'd take extra time to actually execute into the game, and that's the sort of thing you only really need once or twice in a short-ish story arc. In an arc like the SSAs, you only really need one of those, if that.
It's obvious that City of Heroes is not a game where conversations can decide anything. They're just there for flavour. As such, it puts them in the favourable position of being entirely skippable, and by allowing people the option to skip them as soon as they show up, I see no real downside to actually having them. In a sense, what we have now is WORSE because you still have to progress through the dialogue in order for the story to make sense because dialogues are written as part of the overall narrative. They don't have to be.
Think back to how the game was back at Launch. You were sent to defeat a boss, you fought an NPC and then received a clue. It was assumed you defeated the boss, spoke with him and what he told you was written down in that clue. That's exactly how dialogues can be treated - as a more in-depth depiction of how that conversation took place. Of course, that's only if the player really cares to have one. If the player does not, then it's simple enough to just skip it and treat the thing like a regular boss fight. Dialogues can - and really should - be treated as extra reading to explain omitted narrative that gameplay infers, rather than an integral part equal to actual gameplay.
In a sense, the answer to my own question becomes evident: Monologues as a gameplay element, conversations as supplementary reading. ACTUAL conversations, mind you. -
Personally, I'd go with Foreshadow. I'm not sure why that his. He has a very "stylised" look, he is ever so slightly mysterious, he has a nice build and he was the guy who replaced the Statesman on the cover of City of Hero. That wins my vote, though I'm not sure how much a guy vote counts in terms of "attractive."
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Quote:The problem with these missions is not everyone reacts like you do. Not everyone is motivated by failure to try again and succeed. Personally, when I run into a mission that I fail and it seems like there was nothing I could do, like the Stop 30 Fir Bolg one or the Stop Agent Crimson one and so on, I mission-drop it and continue on my way.Originally Posted by Leo_G
Having those missions you can fail, having failed them but coming back with more experience perhaps with a new character puts emphasis on challenge where instead most of the game involves patience. It's definitely not a bad thing there is emphasis on both or some missions focusing on one vs the other. So long as there's still room for both in the game, how can you go wrong?
If I have to be honest, I don't like to lose. That's why I don't do PvP in any game - because PvP has to be fair to both myself and my enemies, and I like playing with an unfair advantage. The AI is a good sport about letting me win, though, and doesn't mind when I cheat, which is why we're the best of friends. "Challenge" has never been a motivation for me, and the absence of challenge has never been a detriment. I look for games that involve me, not games that challenge me.
I want to go back to Kingdom of Amalur that I mentioned in another thread. In this game, my character specialised in Blacksmithing, and I devoted so much time to it and admittedly used save-scumming to salvage some really good components, that about mid-way through the game I made for myself armour that was SIGNIFICANTLY better than what current content was based around. Also, because I took my sweet time and did all the side quests, killed and rekilled a whole bunch of garbage enemies along the way as I was sent all over creation and so forth, I managed to level my character a good 10-20 levels above most of the overworld I was doing missions in.
The result of the above is that my character was INSANELY overpowered, and a very strong fighter besides, so whenever someone would tell me about this oh so horrible monster that no-one had a hope of killing but they'd pay me if I did, I'd do a half-smirk and go kill the thing with the greatest of ease. I don't believe I ever lost more than a tenth of my hit points, and I considered the enemy who could do this to be particularly hard.
This made me the happiest in a quest chain involving an arena tournament. I knew from the start that the odds would be stacked against me, and everyone kept saying how there was now way I could win, but I knew better. My character was a pure monster at that point. They told me I'd be fighting with just one team-mate against entire teams, and my first question - had I been allowed to ask it - would have been if I could go in alone against the enemy team, instead. Frankly, giving me people who could help out actually made things HARDER as opposed to easier, and harder in a non-entertaining way. At least quest-specific NPCs in that game can't die. They have no health bars. They also deal no damage to enemies, though, so they just get in the way.
My point in all of this is that I LOVE this kind of gameplay. I like easy games. I like having not just the confidence of being strong, but the arrogance of being TOO strong. A game can very much be entertaining even if it does not make me lose just by having interesting gameplay, and Kingdom of Amalur does so with an involving combat system. City of Heroes, by contrast, does this by allowing me to build my own characters and tell my own stories. The less I have to lose and be pissed off, the better off I am. -
Quote:I think you can have your cake and eat it, too in this case, but it might take a lot of work for only a little return. Arcana mentions a particular problem - if you have lots of dialogue, a mission owner on a large team is put in the no-win situation of either skipping all dialogue to keep the team moving or keeping the team waiting to read the dialogue. That is indeed a problem, but I ask you this: Is it worse to have the option to stop and read lots of dialogue as well as the option to skip it than to not have any dialogue at all and essentially be forced to "skip" dialogue because it's not there to begin with?Originally Posted by Zwillinger
There are many players out there who love involved, interesting and compelling dialog. There's also many players out there who have never read a bit of mission/quest text in any MMORPG they've ever played. There's certainly a fine line we have to walk; do we provide more dialog/story and please a passionate and devoted segment of our Community or do we risk a inducing story fatigue within another, equally important segment of our player base?
My point is pretty much what you said, as well - by giving people the option to "space bar" through the talky bits and not feel like they've lost much of the actual immediate plot, you can put in dialogue, background information and additional reading in the actual game, yet not actually require people to read through them. Some might feel that they're missing out by not being able to read the story, but I've always been of the opinion that a story is best experienced either alone or with people who are interested in it, as opposed to with a random rush-rush PuG.
The concept of supplementary reading is something I and others have been suggesting for some time, and it goes beyond just dialogues. It involves putting in additional descriptions and explanations in missions that aren't required to beat the mission, but provide more context and story for those who go out of their way to look for them. Say you have a mission which requires you to beat up a Skull boss and confiscate his drugs. Simple enough. You only really need two objectives - a boss defeat and a glowie click. What if, however, you add in a bunch of other glowies that have, for instance, that same boss' ledgers and personal notes that give us some background on who this man is and why he turned to crime? People who don't care don't have to hunt for these extra glowies, but I would.
Dialogue goes in a very similar way. To shepherd players from one fight to the next seamlessly, you can always add a dialogue option to skip the dialogue. Instead of trying to talk down a boss, you can immediately attack him and cave his skull in. Instead of prying an enemy for information, you can clobber him and search his person for clues. That sort of thing. Conversations don't even have to result in different outcomes, just so long as they're actual conversations. And if that's seen as too much text, then simply give people the option to skip it. Those like me who really do care about what's being said will find a way do run these missions such that this story can be experienced.
About the only problem is that this genuinely does take a lot of work. The example I gave took me the better part of four hours. Granted, I'm sure I could shave a couple of hours off that if I make a few more of these and come up with a more consistent system as opposed to the chaotic approach I started with, but it's still a lot of work if you're worried most people would just skip it.
But please, whatever you do, please try to make our writers save their dialogues for instances where dialogues are actually useful, and use clues or basic text boxes, instead. The core game is very solid, so if they'll be distracting from it, it really should be worth the distraction. -
Quote:You're still left with no easily-viewable permanent record, however. I do have a tab for NPC chat and cutscene captions, but these are often hard to follow. The source isn't always clear if there's a source at all, they get mixed in with all the other random chatter that's so common to newer missions, and worst of all, they're wiped if you log out... Well, I guess unless you record chat logs, but since those record ALL channels, it's practically impossible to use them.Originally Posted by Mazey
This is true and definitely a problem.
They've taken some steps to solve this in the newer SSAs though. When there's a dialogue part in mission, the character you're talking to talks both with the dialogue menu and with a summery in the standard speech bubble fashion. This allows team-mates to follow the jist of the story and allows you to read back the summery in the speech logs.
It's certainly not perfect, and I definitely agree with what you're saying, but the devs have at least recognised the problem to some extent.
What confounds me is clues really are the perfect delivery mechanism for what people said or for what you did or found. Sure, they suffer from size limitations, in the Architect at least, but they can be very much permanent until at least the end of the story that they're relevant to. What this means is you can run an entire mission and never once read a line of dialogue, log out for the night, then come back the next morning and still be able to catch up on everything that transpired in that mission. By shifting the act of reading to some indeterminate time in the future, clues eliminate the cost of large bodies of text. I suppose clues that summarise a long dialogue would be the next step, in addition to having dialogue narrated.
That's really not the primary aim of the thread, though. Originally, I wanted to examine why it is that "talky" missions in City of Heroes bug me so much whereas "talky" missions in BioWare ripoff RPGs actually come off as some of the best parts of the game. Why, for instance, was it so satisfying to defeat that politician in Human Revolution through nothing more than browbeating him into submission and exposing him for the hypocrite he is. Granted, Human Revolution has a whole system dedicated to this, but really... All of that comes down to a series of four or five three-way choices, each of which has one correct choice and two wrong ones, and it keeps score, plus a quick summary on the person's character off to the side. The City of Heroes dialogue system is capable of replicating that, even if it might be a bit cumbersome to pull off.
Basically, the answer to the original question - that being "Conversations or monologues?" - seems to be that conversations are only good if you commit to them, and actually outright bad if you half-*** them. It transpires that the reason they bug me so much in City of Heroes is they simply take up time that I could have spent punching things and both actually playing the game and being rewarded for it. Conversations take time, effort and energy, and they're simply boring to go through. As boring as plain text, but with the added problem of having to read them then and there, especially on a team. They have many drawbacks but aren't done well enough to have many perks.
Inversely, in BioWare-ripoff games, conversations are often simple, but their structure is such they feel like a gameplay element. The player actually has to do something in those conversations, and that makes it gameplay. When I have to listen to a person's manner of speaking and try to deduce his character, from which then to realise what I should say to elicit which response, this inspires me to be involved. Even if the outcome does not matter, so long as there's a game to it, I'm interested. And City of Heroes conversation simply have no game to them. They are only and ever infodumps. They very rarely offer decisions of any kind and those decisions elicit very little response from the conversation participants.
I'll give you an idle example. In another game, I found a hermit blacksmith on a cliff. The local keep needed him, but he refused to help. Though speaking with him, I realised he held a friendship with the keep's previous blacksmith and was unaware of his death. When given the choice of how to ask him to come back, I could either simply tell him, or I could use his friend's death and last wish to appeal to his higher ideals and remind him of how much he is needed. This didn't really take more than about two conversation screens, strictly speaking. Three if you count the option I didn't pick.
It transpires that if you allow players to ask NPCs as few as three questions about various topics, this is usually enough to build a decent picture of who this NPC is and how one should speak with him, provided the questions and their answers are well written. Giving the player this option up-front and then tying the personality they depict into the conversation seems like a fairly easy way to make conversations a bit more substantial without actually making them more demanding.
At the end of the day, though, conversation tress need to be treated with respect. They need to be done right if they are to be done at all. They don't all have to be as complex (or as redundant) as my example, but they have to be, in fact, conversations, otherwise... Why bother? Why bother break up the action with something if that something's not going to be worth the interruption? -
Not for a name, no. $10's worth more than my time in levelling up the same character from scratch. For new powersets and ATs, though, yes I will. Once I swap powersets or class, what I make is a brand new character that deserves to be played anew altogether. Since I never repeat the exact same AT/powersets combo (with one notable exception), every new one is genuinely new.
As to why not transfer the old character to another server or rename said character and start over that way? Because it costs money and accomplishes nothing. If I'm rerolling a character, it's because I'm making a better version. Once I have a better version, the worse version is obsolete and unnecessary, clogging up slots and costing me money to retain.
As to why not use the old character but change the name, costume and concept and reuse the levels? Because each character is its own thing, and each character needs to serve its time and play its levels. There's no fun in making a new character at the level cap with nothing left to do. If I create a new character who hasn't existed before, then that new character will have to make its own progress. -
I think my intent here has gone misunderstood. I'm not really saying that adding complex, involving dialogues is necessarily a good thing for the overall future of the game. Far from it, in fact, as my aforementioned aversion to "talky missions" should attest. I am, however, going off the assertion that we HAVE these missions in the game already, they're just not very good at it. Let me explain.
Newer City of Heroes content loves to throw dialogues at us left and right. Where before we'd get a clue recording what a person has said to us, we are now given a linear dialogue vector where the same person says the same thing, but in more words and split across more screens and, crucially, without this being recorded anywhere. When you reach a dialogue, you HAVE to read it on the spot, or you don't get to read it at all, because once it's gone, you can't bring it back.
As long as we're going to pay the price of dialogue by having missions which are essentially nothing but that, we should at least go all the way and we should at least make that dialogue worthy of being called that. And if we don't feel that dialogues of actual complexity are worth making, then that's fine, too. Can we, then, stop using them but for extraordinary circumstances like the beginning or end of an arc or some special objective? I ask a simple question: Why should my interaction with a person take the form of a three-screen dialogue with no options in it when my interaction with that same person can take the form of a three-paragraph clue?
In a very real sense, the no-win situation of gameplay vs. story already exists, and has always existed. Team-mates don't see mission debriefings, and it's usually difficulty to read briefings, as well, at least when the team rushes for action. However, with dialogues, the problem is far more pronounced, because dialogues leave no written record anywhere. If you don't read them during the actual dialogue, you can't read them at all. Clues, at least, stay behind even after the fact, even after the mission and often persist across an entire arc, especially in the Mission Architect. Why, then, do we use dialogue "trees" instead of clues if NOT to make use of their full potential?
My question here can be asked in both directions. If we're going to have missions that consist primarily of conversations, then why don't we make those conversations into a gameplay element? If we're not going to make conversations into a gameplay element, why have them at all when they come with so many downsides? My suggestion is just a way to make dialogues more interesting, but if that doesn't work, then I'm fine with not having them almost ever, too.
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Somewhat sideways of the subject is the "putting words in my mouth" issue, and it's one I heartily agree with. I HATE the way arcs like Graves and Twinshot put words in my characters' mouths that really, REALLY don't fit them. I don't really blame the writers - the breadth of character concepts here is such that it's impossible to fit everybody. That's not problem without a solution, however, and that solution is to just... Well, not put words in our mouths. Explain what it is that we are communicating, keep it vague enough to have to be interpreted but not so vague as to be unintelligible, and you're set.
You'll note that most of the conversation options I listed in the example dialogue consist of a single word with no punctuation. That's on purpose, and it's the solution as I see it. When, for instance, speaking with Bubba and needing to ask where you can find Vinnie, simply putting in the dialogue option of "Vinnie" should be enough. It's abstract enough to reinterpret that question in whatever way suits your character, and indeed abstract enough to re-interpret exactly what it is your character asked, but it's still specific enough that it tells you which direction it will steer the conversation in. It tells you - the player - that in some way, you will ask something to do with Vinnie. What you will ask and how you will ask it is yours to infer from both the context of the mission and the context of your own character.
I find this approach to be much more liberating and, to be honest, A LOT easier to write. I took the better part of four hours to write the example dialogue just because I'm VERY new to this, but I can tell you for a fact that boiling all responses down to a single word saved me a LOT of time. I never had to worry about what's appropriate to ask, how to word it and which character types I was catering to and which I was alienating. At the end of the day, I knew what the meaning of the question was so I could play off that, but I didn't have to worry about the delivery of the question, and that is quite literally a lot less work.
What I'm getting at is generic one-word conversation options are much easier to write for an actual staff writer and much easier to work with for a player. I personally see no downside to using them. -
Quote:I suggested this before, and I still agree with it. My direct request is for the Seismic aura to be able to produce cracks in the ground only when landing from a jump. Not when running, not when standing in place. Only when landing from a jump.Originally Posted by Redlynne
Flight Only ... Jumping (in air) Only ... Jumping (on landing) Only ... Running Only ... 2 out of 4 combos ... 3 out of 4 combos ... and the existing 4 out of 4 combos.
Imagine a Rainbow Path Aura that only causes FX when Jumping ... producing nice parabolic arcs (like they should be) but which doesn't produce FX with other movement modes. Imagine an Autumn Path Aura that only causes FX when standing/running on the "ground" ... and so on.
Bonus points if it happens only after a jump higher than an inch, but that's not as important
-
Let me set up the scenario for you. We're following a story arc where a mobster by the name of Vinnie has dabbled into Black Magic for some reason that isn't important. He has possessed another mobster, a woman by the name of Helga, whom the player has previously had a chance to kill, arrest or set free to work with her on stopping Vinnie. This conversation is with a third mobster by the name of Bubba, from whom we need to get the information on where exactly Vinnie is.
Yes, I'm aware that the full sum of the conversation is very long, but you're not supposed to read through the whole thing. You're supposed to pick a path and stick with it, and each path is really only five or six screens long. The rest is just for options. I haven't really defined what each outcome means, so feel free to infer. If I messed up the numbering somewhere or forgot to add screen directions to options, please let me know.
---
Screen 1: Opening
A hero? Well, that explains what Tony was yappin about on the radio. Why are you raidn my legitimate warehouse? All this stress aint good on my delicate heart. If get any palpitations, my lawyers gonna eat you for breakfast.
Option 1: Bubba (move to screen 2)
Option 2: Warehouse (move to screen 3)
Option 3: Family (move to screen 4)
Option 4: Mission (move to screen 5)
Option 5: Attack
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Screen 2: Bubba
Me? Yeah, about me! You got any idea who I am, hero? Im Bubba Striker and I own the biggest damn shippin company in town. You bustin into my warehouse was a big mistake, cause see, I got all them friends in high places. You lay a finger on me and youre goin down!
Option 1: Return (move to screen 1)
---
Screen 3: Warehouse
What about it? Its mine and youre tresspassin. I got hundreds of em all over the city. Striker Shippings been in my family for 60 years... Well, its been in the Family, anyway. We got money and connections comin outta our ears, hero. So lemme give you a bit of advice, all friendly-like: Turn around an go home. You dont wanna mess with us.
Option1: Return (move to screen 1)
---
Screen 4: Family
Hah, as if Id be dumb enough to confess. You wearin a wire, hero? Dont matter none, cause I dont know what youre talkin about. But lemme tell ya somethin, hero: The Family aint guys you wanna mess with, cause when you do, you gonna get fitted for a pair of cement shoes and sleep with the fishes before you know it. S all rumour and what they say, course. I dont know nothin bout no Family. Im a legitimate businessman here.
Option 1: Return (move to screen 1)
---
Screen 5: Mission
Vinnies involved in black magic? Ugh, idiot! I mean... I dont know nothin bout no Vivnnie Anzio! Now get outta my warehouse unless you got a warrant, cause Im gonna have to defend myself, see.
Option 1: Warrant (move to screen 6)
Option 2: Helga (move to screen 19)
Option 3: Vinnie (move to screen 35)
Option 4: Attack
---
Screen 6: Warrant
Wait, so you do have a warrant? Huh, figured heroes these days just busted into places on their own head. Well, that puts us in quite a predicament, doesnt it? See, I dont wanna go to jail and you dont wanna get dead, so how bout we make a little deal: You turn around and walk and me... Well, I disappear. You tell the cops whatever you want, I dont care, and I me... Well, I aint never seen you, I dont know you, I dont care about you. That sound good?
Option 1: Vinnie (move to screen 7)
Option 2: Helga
Option 3: Attack
---
Screen 7: Warrant/Vinnie
Yeah, OK, I know im. Vinnie Anzio, an... Associate of mine. But I aint no rat and, more importantly, I aint no wimp! I aint tryin to weasel my way outta this, hero. Im givin you a chance to not get your face punched in. Your call whether you wanna take it or not. Fine by me either way.
Option 1: Leniency (move to screen 8)
Option 2: Threaten (move to screen 9)
Option 3: Black Magic (move to screen 10)
Option 4: Attack
---
Screen 8: Warrant/Vinnie/Leniency
A deal with the prosecution? You think Im stupid? I rat on the Family, theyll find me, dont matter where I am. Your idiot police cant protect me, cause the heavies my guys havell tear them to shreads. Sides, like I said, I aint no snitch. Were all family. They take care of me, I take care of them, and if any one of us sinks, we keep our yaps shut. No deal, hero, and no deal means you die!
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 9: Warrant/Vinnie/Threaten
So, what? Youre goona beat me up? Kill me? OK, I got an idea. Say that again, so I can laugh appropriately! Ha ha ha! I eat heroes like you for breakfast, punk! You think I got to where I am cause of my fancy oratory skills? No, I got here cause all the losers what wanted my pace are dead. Where do you get off threatening me! I can kill you with one arm tied behind my back, and I dont need no capos to help me, neither!
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 10: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic
That idiot. I told him not to mess with that stuff. Ive seen black magic before, I know what it does to people. I tried to stop Vinnie from meeting with that shaman, but the guy has rocks for brains... And it aint just him, neither. Seems like a lotta guys been goin off the deep end these days. If it aint death magic its dyne or Freakshow stuff or who knows what. Whats this Family coming to?
Option 1: Arrest (move to screen 11)
Option 2: Deal (move to screen 12)
Option 3: Helga (move to screen 13)
---
Screen 11: Wrrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Arrest
Say what? No! Just cause I think my associates are idiots dont mean I wanna go to jail! Hell, what am I even sayin? Deals over, hero. First you die, then Im gonna find that idiot Vinnie and make him dead, too. Eat lead!
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 12: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Deal
You got a better deal, then? So, what, I rat on Vinnie and you let me go? You know, I aint no rat, but that idiot Ill rat out, cause he aint Family no more. Black magics evil, hero. I know I aint exactly a good guy here, but that stuffs just wrong. See, my brother, he got taken by the Pantheon a couple a years back. We got im out, but... We were too late. I dont ever wanna see that again, and if Vinnies dealing with that stuff, then to hell with the guy. Ill tell you what you need to know, then Im outta here. Outta the whole damn business. Ive seen enough death, and it only gets worse.
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 13: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Helga
Helga Reinhardt? Oh, no! What did you do?
[from previous mission] Option 1: Dead (move to screen 14)
[from previous mission] Option 2: Arrested (move to screen 15)
[from previous mission] Option 3: She sent me (move to Screen 18)
---
Screen 14: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Helga/Dead
Shes what? But she was... How could you!?! Youre dead, hero! Hear me? DEAD!
Option 1: Attack.
---
Screen 15: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Helga/Arrested
What do you mean possessed by black magic? Vinnie! Oh, that little punk! Wait till I get my hands on him! I mean, OK, hes a crook, fine. We all are. But to get Helga in trouble like that? Hes dead! And you, hero, you get outta my way! You wanna know about Vinnie, Ill tell you where to find his body when Im done. Now get outta my way!
Option 1: Comply
Option 2: Refuse
---
Screen 16: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Helga/Arrested/Comply
Smart move. Ill deal with Vinnie, you just keep outta the way and you can have whats left.
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 17: Warrant/Vinnie/Black Magic/Helga/Arrested/Refuse
I said move! You know what? Fine. You put Helga in jail, you get to die, too. Fine by me!
Option 1: Attack
---
What do you mean possessed by black magic? And what do you mean she sent you here? Is she OK? I... I gotta see her! Look, arrest me, punch me, I dont care, but I gotta see Helga! I gotta make sure shes OK! God damn Vinnie! You wanna have a shot at him? You got it. After that... AFTER THAT! Yeah, Ill rat on the little punk! You find the guy, you kill im! I dont care bout no laws on this one! Helga didnt deserve none of this. I got er into this whole mess... Guess I gotta do what I can to get er out, eh?
---
Screen 19: Helga
Yeah, Helga Reinhard, shes a friend of mine. What about her?
[from previous mission] Option 1: Dead (move to screen 14)
[from previous mission] Option 2: Arrested (move to screen 20)
[from previous mission] Option 3: She sent me (move to screen 26)
---
Screen 20: Helga/Arrested
Shes been arrested? What the hell for! Helga never hurt nobody! And if youre gonna try to tell me she ratted me out, forget it! Helga wouldnt do that! I run a legitimate business here, and so does she. Now I suggest you get outta my warehouse. I gotta call my lawyer and sort this whole mess out.
Option 1: Helga info (move to screen 21)
Option 2: Helga testified (move to screen 22)
Option 3: Vinnie(move to screen 23)
---
Screen 21: Helga/Arrested/Helga info
Helga Reinhardt. Shes runs Reinhard Imports, and shes a good woman. Whatever you think she did, she didnt do it. Helgas one of the good ones, and in this business... Err, in the import and shipping business... Thats saying a lot!
Option 1: Return (move to screen 20)
---
Screen 22: Helga/Arrested/Helga testified
OK, now youre just fishin! Ive know Helga for 20 years, and she aint never gonna incriminate me in any illicit-like activity. Im a legit businessman, and sos she. Either youre twistin er words, or youre a damn dirty liar. Or both. Either way, I aint buyin it.
Option 1: Return (move to screen 20)
---
Screen 23: Helga/Arrested/Vinnie
What do you mean possessed by black magic? Vinnie did what?!? But shes OK, right? Thats a relief. Yeah, I dont know nothin bout no Vinnie, but you keep on lookin. Now if youll excuse me, I got some... Family business to attend to, then I gotta get Helga out of that unfortunate misunderstanding. Now get outta my warehouse if you know whats good for you.
Option 1: Comply (move to screen 24)
Option 2: Refuse (move to screen 25)
---
Screen 24: Helga/Arrested/Vinnie/Comply
Smart move. Ill remember that. I just hope nothing bad happens to this Vinnie character any time soon. Thatd be a shame, wouldnt it?
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 25: Helga/Arrested/Vinnie/Refuse
Bad choice, hero. Looks like Im gonna hafta defend myself, what with you trespassin on my property and all that. Too bad for you!
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 26: Helga/She sent me
Yeah, and Im the Queen of Englad. Which Im not, in case it aint obvious. What do you think I am, stupid? I know Helga, and she dont work with no heroes!
Option 1: Lie (move to screen 27)
Option 2: Vinnie (move to screen 28)
Option 3: Bubbas brother (move to screen 29)
Option 4: Attack
---
Screen 27: Helga/She sent me/Lie
Nice try, hero, but I dont buy that for a dollar. You think Im stupid? I grew up on the streets of Kings Row. If I bought lies like that, Id have been dead in a ditch 30 years ago. Like I said Helga dont work with no heroes, and thats a fact.
Option 1: Return (move to screen 26)
---
Screen 28: Helga/She sent me/Vinnie
Helga hurt by black magic? OK, that is just low. You heroes are the worst. Quit tellin lies bout my friends! And I keep tellin you! I dont know no Vinne! Sheesh! Youre worse than the cops!
Option 1: Return (move to screen 26)
---
Screen 29: Helga/She sent me/Brother
Howd you know about Miles? I never told nobody! Except... I told Helga, but she wouldnt... She told you about this? I dont believe it, but... OK, hero, if Helga trust you, then I trust you... Well, enough to hear what you got, anyway.
Option 1: Arrest (go to screen 30)
Option 2: Vinnies whereabouts (go to screen 31)
Option 3: Vinnies secret
---
Screen 30: Helga/She sent me/Brother/Arrest
Figures! You heroes are all the same. Nothins too low for. You use my bother and my best friend against me. Shoulda seen that comin. Fine, if thats how you wanna play it, then lets dance. Youre trespassin on my property. And youre gonna die for it.
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 30: Helga/She sent me/Brother/Vinnies whereabouts
Like I said, I dont know no Vinnie. Figures youd use my Helga and my brother to get me to incriminate myself, though. You wearin a wire, hero? Dont matter none. Im done talkin, and youre gonna die for traspassin on my property. Its all legit, see.
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 32: Helga/She sent me/Brother/Vinnies secret
He what? That son of a... Oh, no, so Helga really is hurt? Is she OK? Oh, thank god! Yeah, OK, I admit, I know the guy. Vinnie Anzio, small time hustler, works for one of the local loan sharks. Beats people up and collects loans, nothing major. But black magic? I mean, I knew the punk was up to no good, but this? And to hurt Helga? Hes gotta pay! Look, Ill make you a deal you got nothin on me, and I actually do know where Vinnie hangs out. Pretty sure hes still there. So how bout I tell you where to go and you go there n leave me alone?
Option 1: Comply (move to screen 33)
Option 2: Refuse (move to screen 34)
---
Screen 33: Helga/She sent me/Brother/Vinnies secret/Comply
Pleasure doin business with ya. Here, I got the address to Vinnies hideout, its a ratty old warehouse at the docks. One of my old ones, actually. Go there and kick the guy in the teeth for me, will ya? And if youll excuse me, I need to go get Helga out of trouble. I owe her that much.
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 34: Helga/She sent me/Brother/Vinnies secret/Refuse
Stupid! Fine, you wanna be a boy scout, go right ahead. Good luck finding Vinnies address when youre dead!
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 35: Vinnie
Like I said. I dont know no Vinnie and I dont know nothin bout no black magic. Are we done here? Cause Im a busy man. I gotta run a business here. Cant just go goofin off like you heroes can, cause the city aint gonna pay my bills.
Option 1: Threaten (move to screen 36)
Option 2: Trick (move to screen 37)
Option 3: Attack
---
Screen 36: Vinnie/Threaten
Ooh, Im so scared. Im quakin in my boots. Do you see me quakin in my boots? No? Thats cause I dont give a damn about your threats. Think youre the first bully to come bargin into my warehouse and want somethin? Ive taken down tougher guys than you, hero. You dont scare me. Sides, aint that illegal-like?
Option 1: Return (move to screen 35)
---
Screen 37: Vinnie/Trick
Look, for the last time, I dont know Vinnie Anzio! I mean... Ugh... OK, fine, so Ive heard the name before. What of it? I heard of that Requiem guy, too, but that dont mean I got anythin to with im. Alls I know bout Vinnie is he works for some guy givin out loans with... High interests, and thats just rumour from the guys workin the docks. So what about im?
Option 1: Whereabouts (move to screen 37)
Option 2: Black Magic (move to screen 38)
Option 3: Helga (move to screen 41)
Option 4: Attack
---
Screen 37: Vinnie/Trick/Whereabouts
Like I said, I dont know the guy, I just know the name. Try the docks. S all I know.
Option 1: Return (move to screen 36)
---
Screen 38: Black Magic
Ugh... Nightmare stuff, that. Ive seen what it does to people. So youre sayin Vinnies mixed up with that? Idiot. OK, so I know the guy. So sue me. I knew he was up to no good. He was always a small-time punk lookin to hit it big time. Guess thats was his way, eh? Figures hed try somethin stupid like that. Look, if youre looking to stop his black magic, maybe I can help you out. I know for a fact where you can find Vinnie, and Im willin to part with that info if you clear outta my warehouse soon as you know. Deal?
Option 1: Comply (move to screen 39)
Option 2: Refuse (move to screen 40)
---
Screen 39: Vinnie/Trick/Whereabouts/Comply
Guys got a warehouse at the docks, one of my old ones. I let im rent it for a while, but he trashed the place, so I moved my business. Shoulda capped the punk back then, but I was movin outta the docks anyway. Heres the address. Pleasure doin business with you.
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 40: Vinnie/Trick/Whereabouts/Refuse
Figures. You heroes are all the same. You smash peoples stuff, you barge into peoples property and demand everything happen your way. Yeah, good luck with that. You dont wanna deal like civilised people, then fine. Youre tresspassin and Ive got a right to defend myself. Eat lead!
Option 1: Attack
---
Screen 41: Vinnie/Trick/Helga
Yeah, Helga Reinhard. Shes a friend of mine. What about her?
[from previous mission] Option 1: Dead (move to screen 14)
[from previous mission] Option 2: Arrested (move to screen 42)
[from previous mission] Option 3: She sent me (move to screen 45)
---
Screen 42: Vinnie/Trick/Helga/Arrested
What do you mean possessed by black magic? Vinnie! I should have known that punk was up to no good! How could he do that to Helga? She never hurt nobody! Listen, hero, somethin just came up. Family business. I suggest you get outta my warehouse. Now.
Option 1: Comply (move to screen 43)
Option 2: Refuse (move to screen 44)
---
Screen 43: Vinnie/Trick/Helga/Arrested/Comply
Smart move. You just remember to keep your nose outta my business.
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 44: Vinnie/Trick/Helga/Arrested/Refuse
Fine! Dont matter to me any. You dont know when to leave well enough alone, then you can die, too. And when Im finished with you, Ill make Vinnie wish he was never born!
Screen 45: Vinnie/Trick/Helga/She sent me
What do you mean possessed by black magic? And she sent you? Huh... She was always a smart lady, Helga. Listen, you want Vinnie, you got im, but I want in! If he hurt Helga, I want in. Ill get one of the boys to show you where he hangs out. You meet me there, gimme an hour to get some muscle together and Ill meet you there. You wanna arrest me or whatever, we can talk about that when were done.
Option 1: Leave
---
Screen 41: Vinnie/Trick/Helga
Hey, you keep Helga out of this. Oh, no! What did you do to her!
[from previous mission] Option 1: Dead (move to screen 14)
[from previous mission] Option 2: Arrested (move to screen 15)
[from previous mission] Option 3: She sent me (move to screen 45) -
It seems like ever since Freedom, I haven't had a single good word to say about most new content, but the one thing which keeps repeating is my hate for overly talky, no-action missions like Dr. Graves or Twinshot or a lot of the new stuff. However, I'm not sure that dialogues themselves are the problem. I've been messing with Kingdom of Amalur recently, and despite that game having a VERY rudimentary conversation system, I never really found myself put off by actual conversations, even though they take up such a large part of my time.
This got me to sit down and wonder exactly WHY it is that "talky" missions bother me so much. I wondered why it was that I considered punching enemies in the face proper gameplay and conversations not, despite games like Alpha Protocol, Mass Effect and Human Revolution having succeeded to such an extent almost entirely on the strength of their talking (because combat in all three is pretty garbage). And I realised something:
Conversations in City of Heroes are not gameplay. They're not even conversations, they're simply long briefings punctuated by by mouse clicks. Conversations in this game are just monologues, and it makes me wonder why that is when the very motivation behind the system which makes dialogues possible is to provide a complex system of options. That, really, is at the root of the problem - when we speak with NPCs, we aren't actually DOING anything. We're just reading text and clicking the "proceed to next text screen." option.
Of course, one can argue that City of Heroes isn't really the right game for that sort of thing, that we can't make meaningful choices and so on. But you know what? Based on what I've seen the game system actually do, I believe it's much stronger than we give it credit for. For starters, dialogue windows seem perfectly capable of swapping between a long tree of dialogue screens, even looping on themselves, such as the infodump by Prometheus. We know badges can influence what dialogue options we get, such a villain who's run the Clone Lab arc and swapped to hero-side will get a different response to Jenni Adair speculating about Protean, or how Praetorian can get an option to admit they're Praetorian to Roy Cooling. We know previous mission can have an effect on subsequent dialogues, such as deciding whether or not to kill the DUST leader for the Last Word Heatman.
To me, it seems like dialogues are less limited by technology and more limited by the effort they take to write and set up. In fact, the whole reason I made this thread is because when I woke up this morning, I was inspired to try and write a complex dialogue of my own as a suggestion and an example. I want to put this in a subsequent post, however, because what I came up with ended up very long.
Generally, though, what I mean to say with this whole things is that I'm not against dialogues themselves. In fact, I actually rather enjoy a "boss dialogue" that's as involving as an actual boss fight. I realise we don't have actual player skills to do with dialogues and I realise skipping a boss fight or even talking time to skip a boss fight may be seen as a poor return of rewards, but my point is that it can be just as entertaining, and it can actually make the dialogue seem like it has a reason to exist for more than just one screen with a binary choice on it. -
Quote:Exactly, and I'd be at the forefront. If I had my way, I'd expunge failable missions from the game entirely. I fail enough in real life. I pay good money to play games where reality is of no consequence and I can have all my positive reinforcement irrespective of whether I deserve it. We should not be failing more. We should be failing less.Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
Yes, but the majority will cry too much about it so it won't happen.
All of the types of missions mentioned - timed, NPC escorts, objective defences, the GOD DAMN Stop 30 Fir Bolg mission, all of those are pretty much the sum total of content I despise. -
Quote:I teach several courses at the university here, and most of my students are 18 and 19 years old. While I don't exactly count them as adults on account of their being ridiculously irresponsible about their future and still being supported by their parents, very few of them act like children, and the ones that do act like that to impress their class-mates. And then fail their tests because they spent most of their time monkeying around instead of listening to what I'm saying.Originally Posted by KnightofKhonsu
I gather you do not have any 17 to 19 year old kids, specifically a daughter. It is a known parental fact that most, not all, but most teenagers lose their minds after turning 13 and do not regain their faculties until on or after their 21st birthday. While that is a joke, it does hold a certain amount of serious to it.
No, I don't have kids, you're right about that, but I deal with young men and women on a daily basis. I've never seen one that acted like Penny. Yes, some are bubbly and fool around and such, but none of them share those same mannerisms. -
Quote:How people interact with content in practical, empirical terms is completely irrelevant. The actual Incarnate content is just fine. Perhaps not to my liking, exactly, but that's really not the point. It's not about content, it's about the system behind it, the system which dictates which content you can run at which point after how much effort and, moreover, what subtle psychological cues you're fed to condition you to want to keep going.Originally Posted by BellaStrega
I am fairly suspicious of your argument because you're making how people view and interact with the content in practical, empirical terms irrelevant in favor of theory about what endgame content is supposed to be as you describe it here. As long as people who participate in it and the ways they do so aren't a factor, it's not hard to use theory to propose all kinds of things about it, but all of this is irrelevant if the people involved only matter insofar as they can be made to fit what you're saying.
It would be pointless of me to criticise specific raids for specific reasons, or even to criticise raids in general. I don't like them, but I don't like a great many things and that doesn't stop me from progressing through the rest of the game. I don't like Task Forces but no-one cares. I can progress through other means. I don't like large teams, but no-one cares. I can progress by myself. I don't like complex stat systems, but no-one cares. I can progress with a less optimised build. What content I like is not relevant, because content is not at fault here.
In a sense, that's precisely what I'm saying - because of how the end game system is designed, raids bear the brunt of player complaints, and it starts to seem like even having raids is an affront to some. That's not at all the case. Raids are merely an expression of the deeper problem, and the deeper problem is that the system thus far only manifesting through those raids is designed first and foremost to impede people.
You can argue this angle from a player's perspective, yes. But from a development perspective, you do indeed need to be impeded forever, because if you're not, you'll get to the end. And then what? It's unreasonable to assume that this system can be extended into infinity. Yes, they've said they could work on adding more slots beyond Omega, but all this does is spread out the Incarnate "level range" even farther while not providing much substance to the journey. The benefit of having a game with an end is that you have a static range in which to add content. By constantly moving the goal posts, you end up with a game so "wide" that it's functionally unmanageable.Quote:Originally Posted by BellaStrega
Except endgame raiding is all about progress, so you can handle the next tier of raids. Yes, that's something of a treadmill, but it also means people aren't expected to simply run the same raids over and over and over again forever, but to run a particular raid until the next raid is released and they're able to handle it.
Let me give you an example with my character roster. Back in the day when I had, say, 6-8 characters, they all levelled up fairly fast. If I wasn't playing one, there was a very small number of others I could be playing. Today, I have right around 50 characters. What this means is that some of them have not been touched in years. Samuel Tow himself has not done anything meaningful since I10, Xandra hasn't been played since before Energy Transfer got its slower attack animation.
It's not feasible to have an "infinite" game, thus your end game has to be either slow or hard or repetitive or, very often, all three. And all of those are ways to keep players away from the end, lest they peer over the edge of the world and realise the Earth is flat, then leave. What content you fill this doorstop with isn't the issue. It could be the game's best content by far, but it's the system of stops and time sinks that serves to ruin it.
And if you have any illusions that Dark Astoria will be any different because it's not raid content, you're in for a rude surprise. Not only is Dark Astoria the very same time sink, it's actually considerably worse for fear of it stealing population from raids. Again, that's not an unreasonable fear, but it serves to diminish the impact on the content it impacts.
"Altitis" is a condition involving creating characters and not really playing them. This is the very antithesis of replayability. Not only are you not experiencing much of the game, you're actually hurting your own replayability by overfocusing on the beginning content until you can quote it in your sleep. I know a thing or two about that.Quote:Originally Posted by BellaStrega
This is super bizarre. I raid and I have as much altitis as anyone else.
But how many of those characters are you actually planning to get a decent way into the Incarnate system? Two? Ten? Twenty? At what point does it become evident that the time sink is simply too great?
In a sense, though, having the Incarnate system be this huge, obvious time sink actually DOES encourage altitis to a great extent. I've found myself making new characters more often since I19 than I did ever before, to a large extent because every time I think about how long it would take me to get anything done on my 50s, I think "Screw it. I can play something else."
It's easy to talk about the game's replayability if you don't include the Incarnate system in it. Not so easy when you do.
That's because we ARE arguing over the concept of an end game. There's nothing wrong with the content itself. Like them or dislike them, raids are more or less exactly what they should be - huge team clusterhugs that come down to organisation, communication and preparation. There really isn't anything more one could ask of them. Not only that, but I'm sure everyone who made them did their bests to make the best of an inherently boring, grindy, repetitive basic system - the actual endgame.Quote:Originally Posted by BellaStrega
I feel like we're arguing over an idea of what an endgame represents, rather than the reality of what endgames are, at least in many American MMOs. Nothing you've argued here really resembles anything I've done in the trials I've done here. When I log into CoH, sometimes I do trials. Sometimes I do tip missions. Sometimes I run SSA missions. Sometimes I hang out in Ouro and chat with global friends. Sometimes I log into a sub-50 character and get them through about 2-5 levels. None of these things is particularly more difficult, time-consuming, etc. than any of the others.
See, "endgame" is not the same as raids. Endgame is a concept, a combination of systems designed to give people reasons, at least theoretical ones, to keep playing the game even when the game can't really offer much in the form of new content. Raids are just what MMOs use more often than not, but other games use timed challenges, survival modes, trinket collection, hidden objectives... Resident Evil 2 required you to complete the game four times in a row under 2 hours each without using a single healing item and without saving a single time to unlock "Hank," a 10-minute no-dialogue challenge course with a masked SWAT guy. All of that's "endgame," because it's stuff the game gives you to do after you've officially beaten it, and the requirements for those are always ridiculous, because their point is to keep you playing.
I'm honestly not sure if raids really can exist without being tied to an end-game system. They require degrees of participation that aren't easy to achieve, and the people who really, truly love them aren't as many as they seem. It's a lot like the Abandoned Sewers Trial - plenty of people will say they like the Trial, but when's the last time you saw one forming? Because I haven't in five, maybe six years. The last one I did, I did because I tossed the idea to Zamuel and he put a team together through Search. And that's a Trial that takes only 8 people.
Honestly, if I thought we could scrounge up enough participation for raiding without having it be tied to the Incarnate system, then I'd be all in favour of non-Incarnate raids. I'm just not sure the team requirements would be realistic without the strong incentive that's Incarnate progression.
And again, because it needs to be said multiple times - there is nothing wrong with raids in this game. It's what they're used for that I have a problem with. -
Quote:Speaking of which, Jim Temblor calls Penny a "kid" and I think more than once. How old is HE? Because in Faultline, he looks like he's 19 or 20 himself.Originally Posted by Chyll
She hung out with Fusionette............. 'nuff said.......