FredrikSvanberg

Meh.

It's not technically called a story-arc. It's really just a bunch of stuff that happens, and which somewhat explains the politics of Mercy in a roundabout and simplified way. My plan was to make an arc which reflects this arc and shows what's really going on behind the scenes.

I'd be interested to know how it could be made much better. I mean, I've only done what the devs do in Kalinda's starting missions. They're all unconnected without clues or any kind of story to tie them together. In fact what I've got here is already more of a narrative than the introductory arcs in CoV, since I'm building on those same missions.

They could really have been in pretty much any order. I added connections between missions 1 and 4, and mission 3 and 5, which meant that they suddenly had to come in that order. Mission 2 is sort of filler right now but I wanted it in there because it's not a lowbie villain arc without Snakes.

I use mostly standard mobs so it should be just as difficult as official missions at that level. I try to include lots of optional allies so the VEATs can use their team-buffing powers if they want to.

Thanks a bunch. Glad you liked it.

The brown caves (villain-style) work just as well but aren't tear-my-eyes-out ugly.

They aren't mutually exclusive you know.

But there is no such inferiority. A well made arc is just as rewarding as a normal arc (minus Merits and end of mission xp, of course, which are somewhat compensated for by Tickets and ease of play - no travel time, etc). It's just sad that people compare the normal rewards rate with the rate they could get using the exploits found in the early MA and decide that now MA arcs are worthless. And then they spread rumors to that effect which makes new players avoid the MA too. It's ridiculous.

If the devs found a way to reward MA players in a way which wasn't too good but perhaps just different from the normal rewards, we might see an influx of more players. I'm thinking about stuff like what we get from the Mayhem and Safeguard missions - everyone's done them a hundred times but we still play them because they give us temporary powers we can't get anywhere else.

Maybe if we could buy special enhancements or recipes only available in the MA store we might see more players basking in that green glow. Or maybe we need something else to make people actually play and rate arcs instead of just farming for more tickets. I don't know.

I define break as getting hundreds of plays on my arcs. *shrug* It wasn't quite as low as 40 total (that was a guesstimate if I unpublished my most played arc, and I hadn't logged on to check my numbers) but I have 7 arcs published with about 200 plays total. One arc has 94 plays and has been up since day one. Another arc has about 45 plays. A third has 20-25.

And even if the farmers have left for greener pastures (not entirely true - I'm still farming in the AE, for fun and profit) they were unlikely to play my arcs anyway so I don't think that matters as much as other things.

For example: rumours about bad or no rewards in the MA; rumours about being banned if you by some accident happen to find an arc with good (i.e. normal) rewards in the MA (I've heard this one, I couldn't believe it either); old abandoned farms and tests and other debris still cluttering up the MA search engine; an unfair ratings system which hides well established 4-star arcs with hundreds of plays behind recently published 5-star arcs with 1 or 2 plays. Etc.

I think that the best we can hope for to correct some of these problems is a spring cleaning of the MA database, and (less likely) a new ratings system. If I thought it would help I would pester Dr. Aeon for something to be done about it but I don't think he's got that kind of clout. I'd be happy to be proven wrong.