Bubbawheat

This is interesting, many have happened, eventually. Picking and choosing from the first few pages:

Another Epic AT or two available to Everyone
Customizable Attack animations
Sonics, Arrows
More badges
Flashback system
specific costume enhancements that you could only get at certain levels, 20, 30, 40, 50 etc.....certain elements or even color effects
"-A customize mission generator and database. You could use the information terminals that already exist. Not only would they allow you to make missions but would also store those missions so others could use them as well. The only thing you would not be able to choose is the enemies you would fight. You would not be able to out level these terminals. Not being able to choose the enemies would add a little mystery to the mission. This would in time, keep you so busy with missions that you would never run out. I mean how many really use these terminals anyway, I rarely see anyone by these terminals. "
Pistol scrappers (ed: geez, even back then?!)
A train connection at SC that connects the two train lines, a train stop at Founder's Falls.
Ability to buy temporary powers, maybe an ability you can use ten times, and then return to shop for recharge.
Swimming under water.
Mission Difficutly Slider
Trenchcoats,Leather JAckets,Jeans
Different Animations for Powers,Different looking Claws/Swords/guns etc.
server caracter transfers (ed: I'm pretty sure that translates to server character transfers)

Hey, you can say Idiot again!

Avatea 10
BackAlleyBrawler 12
Blue Steel 10
Castle 11
david_nakayama 11
EMpulse 10
Ghost Falcon 10
Ghost Widow 10
Hero 1 10
Horatio 10
JLove 10
lordofboardys 8
Manticore 9
Moon_Witch 10
Mynx 10
Niviene 10
pohsyb 11
Positron 6 -
Red Skeleton 8
Sunstorm 9
Synapse 10
The Dark Watcher 10
TheOcho 13
The Television 10 +
War Witch 12

Ooh, it's time to come back to the forum games for a while again.

BackAlleyBrawler 12
Blue Steel 10
Castle 11
david_nakayama 11
EMpulse 10
Ghost Falcon 10
Ghost Widow 10
Hero 1 10
Horatio 10
JLove 10
lordofboardys 8
Manticore 9
Moon_Witch 10
Mynx 10
Niviene 10
pohsyb 11
Positron 8
Red Skeleton 8
Sunstorm 9 -
Synapse 10
The Dark Watcher 10
TheOcho 12
The Television 9 +
War Witch 12

what's the hate with the Television already? (S)he hasn't even had a visible post yet.

From @Wrong Number's In Poor Taste MA Arc.

Arc Name: A Temporal Disaster: Part One
Author: @Stordarth
Arc ID#: 97135
Morality: Heroic
Level Range: 1-54: custom/council
Description: A routine jaunt for Portal Corps turns out to be a far more complex and dangerous task than anyone could have imagined... *The clues are essential for understanding the story*
Played at: lvl 24-25
How I Found it: searched for "Temporal" at my level. This arc was last on the list with 0 plays.

My contact today is a scientist working for Portal Corp who tells me about his colleague who went off portal hopping on his own and seems to have gotten himself in over his head. I suppose that a time travelling robot like myself would be happy to oblige his request for assistance. Especially as he seems to not want to risk any other members of Portal Corp in this operation. I am about to go into dictionary mode when I see that the minions are all temporal entities in this dimension and they're not happy at all that I am here. I suppose they don't tend to like any visitors. Anyway, I find the trapped scientist and rescue him, although it seems as though he can handle himself quite nicely with an army of robotic minions and a force field device.


Up close and personal with a temporal demon.

After that simple rescue, I find out that an unrelated event with the Coucil has happened, and they could use my assistance to recover some stolen technology. The probability of this event actually being unrelated is 4.28 billion to one, and as I follow the tracking system to their base, my thoughts are confirmed as these temporal beings have begun attacking the Council as well in order to destroy the stolen technology. And I am also tasked by my nav computer to save Archon Visor (why is it that *this* is the name I remember from this arc?)... for some reason. He runs off when rescued, not even thanking me, but also curious as to why these demons just up and attacked his base. According to him for seemingly no reason at all.


Is there a reason why he's just calmly standing there?

After retrieving the technology, it appears as if my contact's colleague has once again gone portal hopping on his own, requesting for no backup whatsoever. This of course means that my contact wants to send me in as back up. And once again, there are lots of temporal demons... in fact, this is very similar in mechanics to the first mission. And for some reason, I have to defeat all of them. Whew, I'm in for a long day. Oh, and I only have an hour to do it... for some reason. I wonder why I'm doing this again? 37 minutes and 12 seconds later the graveyard is clear. And why were they in a graveyard?


Hello again, and no he's not held, he's floating.

Finally, it's time to go speak with someone at Atlas park, as these temporal beings seem to be after anyone who is attempting time travel and erasing them from existence in order to prevent the manipulation of the time stream by those other than themselves. And who do we know that is very fluent in time stream manipulation? Oroborous, and instead of going to Oroborous itself, which I don't officially have access to yet, I'm going to meet one of their members at Atlas Park. But why Atlas? Oh why of course, because Atlas conveniently has a habit of being destroyed in alternate timelines. And why yes, I am now in an alternate timeline in a destroyed version of Atlas Park. And there is a mender which I have never heard of before here for me to rescue, as well as several Temporal bosses, including Temporal Prime. Hopefully he doesn't transform on me.


Mender steampunk. No that's not his name, but that's what I call him now.

And you know what I find out after all is said and done? The scientist I rescued all those times while he was off portal hopping, is the one behind everything. He's even masterminded my involvement for shifting the focus of the creature's attacks away from him while he gallivanted off through space and time. But of course there is no retribution other than the to be continued sign hanging at the end of my contact's speech.

Two point five stars: Ok.

(The minions looked pretty good, although they all looked too similar to each other. There was some use of auras, but they were too subtle to notice much difference, and they are all a dull grey color without any color outside of the subtle auras around a few of their eyes. The objectives in each mission could use some variations, there were a lot of defeating the temporal bosses, especially in the last mission, and they all used the same animation. The timer and defeat all in the third mission were completely unnecessary and unexpected, there was no story reason for either of them. And to top it all off, there was no conclusion to the arc. The bad guy got away scott free, unless you decide to play the next arc. Having a two parter is ok, but there needs to be conclusion at the end of this arc. This is a first play, so there's plenty of room for improvement if the architect ever decides to come back to this arc. I suppose this is one disappointing thing about reviewing arcs that aren't submitted to me: many of these arcs are just abandoned arcs. Both by the architects that will never come back and make improvements, and by the players that will never really see them unless they get stumbled upon through the search function as I have done. Even showcasing them in this thread hasn't gotten any of the lowered played arcs any extra plays. Oh well, at least I enjoy writing these and taking screens, and at least some people are enjoying reading about my adventures. Hopefully I will eventually get to 50 playing all these arcs without having to tread through the ones I know will be just awful, which I already found one and quit after the first spawn of three mastermind minions in the first mission of a five mission with defeat alls on every one. Man, this just turned into one long rant, oops. Anyway, next up is CrystalBlue's arc which I'll try not to forget about again, then onto Oroborous - officially!)

I believe I also mentioned that I had updated my arc Ctrl + Alt + Reset! 137561 and I also have updated Matchstick Women #3369 wouldn't mind seeing these get tossed into the mix in lieu of a random arc. They rated 4s previously, but I see that as room for improvement.

I haven't played it yet, as I mentioned at the beginning, I decided to play this one first to see how it held up on its own merits. The first one is on my invisible queue in my head of arcs that I plan on running at some point in time. And as I enjoy writing reviews, I will write one when I play it.

In other words, I haven't played it yet, but I plan to sometime soon.

As many of the architects are on different servers, a better possible solution is to use a global channel, like MA Arc Finder, which already has many notable architects available for discussions. A supergroup is much more suited to those who want to play arcs together. And there are several of those already.

and you knocked the old searching dev digest off the sticky list.

"There can be only one!!!!"

Nice! It would be even better if you either:

A) Sorted the ratings by numerical value (easy)

B) Sorted the ratings by date given (difficult)

I use a recolored longbow in my arc, and I *still* didn't make the connection. I love how versatile the longbow costumes are when you recolor them - removing the star pattern.

One other thing I was thinking about earlier today is the description of the final battle through the holo-recorder. I don't think it's necessary. The clues are really enough that you don't have to "see" what really happened, it works just as well to leave it at that. The only other thing I might suggest is to at least trim it down considerably, possibly just have it be a sound record without full video catching every important moment, just having a few notable sound bites to sell it without spelling it out completely.

I've found myself rating more five star arcs in the past two weeks than I did in the first two months of player arcs. I know there are several reasons for this, at least where myself is concerned.

1. In the realm of so many reviewers leaving good feedback on what people like seeing, architects are getting better at putting things in that we want and keeping things out that we don't want. And use all that feedback to rewrite, and improve their arcs to something much better than the first drafts when this all started.

2. Architects have gotten used to all of the tools available, and know many more ways to use them smartly and effectively.

3. As a player, I've learned to weed through the arcs better, play arcs from architects I've liked in the past, or play arcs that have already gotten good reviews from other sources.

How do you feel like your experience has changed from when the Mission Architect was first introduced?

I believe I remember seeing somewhere that you would like some feedback on part 2 as to how well it stands on its own not having played part 1. I'll start off by saying that it stands alone just fine.

Played as a level 44 fire/fire brute on challenge level 4. This arc is a war story following the SOLUS Foundation and their battles with the Rikti during the 2002 Rikti war. I'm generally not a huge fan of war movies in general, but I really liked this one. Also one fault I tend to have on occasion is to alt+tab to the internet while I play if my short attention span gets the best of me. This happened very few times during this arc, and typically only between missions.

The first mission has you in an abandoned pawn shop where you are getting information from a Vanguard traitor and planting false information to the Rikti in order to draw some Rikti away from your next operation. This is honestly my biggest gripe in this whole arc. The Vanguard traitor is Force Fields, and has the cage power where I just sit there and watch them hit me for no damage as I wait for the cage to wear off. I would suggest removing this power, I'm also not a big fan of all that knockback, but I can live with that if I have to.

Next up is an outdoor map in the carnie tent section of the city filled with more Rikti than you can shake a stick at. I had a lot of fun with full amounts of fury attacking Rikti after Rikti. Most of the battles were over and done with before I got to see them, as usual, and the Rikti were often the ultimate victors. I'm also taking out Rikti alteration pods, referred to as jammers here. I believe there is a more interesting and visible object you could use for this, check out the first mission in MrCaptainMan's the Audition part 1 to see what I mean.

Next up, I'm tasked with clearing out the lower floors of a MASH unit hospital, rescuing anyone still around and taking out as much Rikti as possible. It is the infamous hospital map, which I do enjoy myself, but some feel is overused. I think it works for this arc myself. In the hospital, I find a few members of SOLUS, who don't stick around, only thank me and move on to another part of the battle. There are also two non-heroes: A nurse, and a Vanguard Soldier, who I must escort to the entrance. They seem to be non-combat, so I just dragged them along with me until the end. The escort text for the Vanguard Soldier said "Find the Vanguard Ranger" after rescuing him but before dropping him off, which threw me off a little bit at the end.

Next, I have to clear out the upper levels of the hospital, which is now on fire, and by my contact text, it appears that my contact is having his own troubles inside as well. I enjoy this map, and use it myself in one of my arc. There is always a spawn right near the entrance, and in this one, it's a raging battle in full effect. Excellent choice to not only help curb what is usually an entrance ambush, but also a chance to see a battle from the start, where most AE battles are over and done with before you ever get to them. Another thing I like the most is how auras look in the distance, including the Rikti Heavy that I have to take out.



I also find a few other SOLUS members here who also run off to continue their own fights with the Rikti.

The final mission is after the hospital tower has collapsed in flames and this section of the city is ruined. The ruined Atlas Park to be more specific. And this mission is where I'm to find the Rikti AV, who is downgraded to an EB for me. It's a tough fight, with one or two ambushes coming in for me, but I manage to take him down without having to hosp. I've already cleared most of the map and don't see any of the heroes I'm supposed to save according to the nav bar. I hear a glowie in the distance, and my fears are soon confirmed, along with some very well written and touching clues for each fallen hero. They all give a very nice sense of personality to heroes that you don't get to interact with very much. There is also an end of mission clue (I believe) that details their last battle, recorded in your contact's holo-recorder.

This isn't saying much when I say that this is the best war themed arc I've played in the Mission Architect, but I can't imagine another one being much better than this. You have a real sense of war in several of the missions, from the raging battle in front of your face in mission 4, to the touching after-effects in mission 5. I will definately run part one whenever I get the chance.

Kinda, but not really. Although I am taking this time to try out a free trial of Final Fantasy XI.... Let's just say that's not going to well so far.

Ran this as a level 37 Storm/Dark Defender on Heroic (The bolding of Storm will help you figure out the screenshot below).

This is a short and fun 3 mission arc that is, as the title proclaims, in poor taste. I don't think anything crosses the line as far as PG-13 goes, but I'm sure my lines are different from other's lines. The first mission sets things up with a very small map with the boss just bursting to get whacked right near the entrance.

The second mission is a similar setup as the first mission, though with a different direction of poor taste. I had to drop an air freshener in my Steamy Mist to help with the smell, though I'm not quite sure it worked the way that I had hoped. See below:



Anyway, I blew him away and as much of the smell as I could send with him. I knew I should have taken Tornado, I need much stronger winds than just Gale to get rid of all of it.

And the final mission is an amalgam of Bosses from here and there, all returning to the first mission's direction of poor taste humor, though none of them were very hard enough to last long enough for my character's tastes. Our contact, Miss Manners was there as well to help teach those naughty bosses a thing or two. The map choice was great with all of the small rooms to help give each boss their own section.

All in all, I had a lot of fun with it, and there was nothing too hard for my solo defender to take out. Play it today!

I played the same arc as well and enjoyed it quite a bit even though I didn't understand most of the language. I liked all of the custom models quite a bit, they were all unique and distinctive. The custom mob you added to <La Famille> seemed a little out of place, though you can rename standard characters now. I don't play on the french server obviously, so I don't know if the mob names are translated into French at all, but if they aren't, then you can do that yourself. I enjoyed recognizing little words and phrases here and there. The betrayal from Billy at the end was a bit of a surprise, especially because of the current bug where all allies follow you no matter what, so I took him to the entrance right away and continued on, not being surprised that he continued to follow me. I didn't realize he was hostile until we came to the next group of mobs and while I was tabbing through them, I ended up targeting Billy. I think Airhead covered most of what I might mention as well, so I'll just leave this short and say I really liked it. c'est tres bon!

I will continue to be a review [censored] by submitting:

Matchstick Women #3369
@Bubbawheat
3 missions
Notes - Lots of fire customs and a couple re-colors, one EB just a notch above standard difficulty, with no defensive powersets.

I'll check up on In Poor Taste shortly, haven't played that one yet.

Sounds like fun. I've forgotten most of my four years of high school French class, but I will definately play one of these and give my feedback here - I don't think the feedback /tells work across the pond, unless they've fixed that. And I hope you will forgive what I'm sure will be my awful butchering of the bits and pieces of French language I will try adding in my review.

Bon... uh... luck!

Oooh, nice posters. I'd love to get one of:

Matchstick Women
#3369
Description: Emily Metzer is a crazed woman who has amassed a cult following of women arsonists. Follow the flames to find her and stop the madness!

Poster: I want to feature the Matchstick Women custom group, but not Emily - I'd like to keep her appearance a surprise for the arc. The thing that I always love seeing is how the auras look in the distance on the third map, it would be great if you could capture that.

Ok, I've got an inking of an idea for a new story arc, or even possibly arcs, that are for a set of Hero Patrons. But my question is, what would be the best choices for Hero Patrons, also, what AT and possibly even APP would best equate with them. This idea is still an inkling, and I may end up dropping it, but I'd like to throw the idea out there and anyone else can take the ball and run with it if it sounds interesting to them as well. Any suggestions on where to look for extra lore to try and keep as close to canon as possible would help as well, outside of Paragonwiki of course.

Back Alley Brawler: One of the most popular Devs due to his frequent and entertaining posts on the forums. Definately a tanker at heart.

Castle: Popular due to his posting on the forums, unpopular at the same time due to being the powers guy and scapegoat for nerfs, though quite lacking on in-game lore.

Infernal: props for being cool looking, and has some interesting backstory.

Mrs. Liberty: Gets made fun of for standing around and doing nothing a lot, but seems to me to be the most prominent female Signature Hero.

Blue Steel: Also has the popularity factor, though I don't want it to turn into a Chuck Norris joke-fest.

Other possibilities: Swan, Valkyrie, Mynx, Numina, Sister Psyche, are other female possibilities. Manticore, Citadel, Woodsman, Positron, Synapse are other possibilities as well. I'm sure I'm forgetting some others and I don't feel like searching for them at the moment, so I'll just leave it to others to fill me in. I'm lazy like that.

Random sidenote: I like seeing more non-review, non-arc ad posts on this forum.