Okay, I played through this arc with a level 32 Vigil PB. (I thought it was fitting)
I'm not more up to date because I decided to review the topmost arc in the original post, which apparently hasn't been updated, and as a result I didn't realize I was reviewing the wrong arc until I was finished doing so. Whoops! So enjoy your review.
Arc ID: 477906
Arc Title: One Night Bridge
Factions: Council, Crey, Cult of Stars, Awakened Division
Morality: Vigilante
Length: 5 Missions
Level Range: 30-54
Description: The Peacebringer Tracer Brightstar is looking for Vigilantes to help her bring a rogue Warshade to justice. [SFMA][SLMA]
Brightstar is an ugly mother when bathed in the AE green light. The goggles and crayon red hair do not work for her at all. She looks goofy.
Mission 1 Intro Text:
Right off the bat, good use of coloured text, and "the last past that was hit is" should be "the last place that was hit was".
Mission 1:
A bunch of slow and painful death patients being kidnapped? Oh boy, this is going to be a fun arc.
"You think that will stop me." That is a comment. Also, why a boss-level ally in a mission with no EB or AV?
There should be more connection to what's going on beyond a dark, complicated map fighting Council.
It should be the Council, not The Council.
Mission 2 Intro Text:
"What, that is great." This is excellent acting! I had no idea you could made someone sound like dull surprise through writing. Seriously, the contact needs to feel a bit livelier.
Mission 2:
Another boss-level ally. At least these missions are easy. Children of the Star has a pretty spiffy outfit. Feels alienish. Going to suggest this is Voidfire.
I am very confused why the Child Warshade suddenly betrayed me upon rescuing a scientist when I had yet to find the nurse, and what the suspicious techs were.
"Who knows what those Council extremists would have done to me." Statement again?
So far all I've got is "Voidfire attacked Council base after they robbed a hospital for terminally ill patients and is stealing them and turning them into minions." Grim!
Mission 3 Intro text:
Whoa, what? There was no evidence in either mission Voidfire had leaked information to the Council or was stealing portal tech. This is such a twist and also an info dump. They would be better missions if evidence was placed within them of this information before we were told it, like Council talking about the mysterious tip they got, or complaining about missing tech in their base. FORESHADOWING! helps set up the plot and makes the arc feel consistent with itself.
Mission 3:
Lots of things to do. Kind of overwhelming. Cometfall working for Voidfire all along doesn't make much sense if the contact had known Cometfall for years- Voidfire is a child, isn't she? Voidfire has been planning this for how long? Mysterious and interesting.
So to recap, Voidfire has been planning to build a portal to another world, and is stealing tech from other people by leaking tips about places for them to raid, then following them back to their secret bases and taking their stuff. That's pretty vigilante.
Mission 4 intro text:
Whoa, so Voidfire and Brightstar's hosts are mother and daughter. And now Brightstar has to kill her host's daughter to prevent Voidfire from destroying the world with a portal. That's some gravitas. It still comes out of nowhere and has no build up, but it's actually somewhat compelling if it was done properly. AS it is I have no reason whatsoever to care. Brightstar sure wants Voidfire dead if she's overriding a mother's love.
Mission 4:
Time for some mildly vigilante action.
All the patients were joined with willing warshades in order to become liuetenants? Makes sense.
"Cult of the Stars" would have more visual consistency if everyone was wearing the mask, not just some people.
Audio Diary 4 is "Now we a chance to live with my healthy son" ... It makes no sense.
So, the Warshades were reviving the terminally ill in exchange for host bodies. Somewhat against the patient's will in some cases, but seems a fair deal- Stargate did it a few times with the Goa'uld.
The diaries make it clear they've had a working portal for some time- at the very least, a couple of days- and they've visited 35 different worlds, some of them pretty dark. However, in Mission 3 you were getting a stabilizer to PREVENT them from having a portal. I'm a bit confused- are we trying to stop them or are we already too late? Mission 3 suggests stopping them from getting a portal, Mission 4 suggests they're just about finished with one. Maybe the portals are too unstable for transport.
Mission 5:
This mission suggests that I actually get a choice to stop or help Voidfire. I'm interested in seeing how that plays out.
Brightstar is still the epitome of dull surprise.
Oh, I see, mandatory ally, and if she dies that counts as helping Voidfire.
Cult of the Stars spanks the PPD on this map on the outside, but got torn apart inside.
You know what, I like Voidfire. She has a good goal: She wants to start over, a new life, free from her past. We never find out what she did, so I can't judge that. She's recruiting other likeminded warshades, and they're taking hosts by reviving the terminally ill and giving them second chances at lives. Yeah, it's a bit iffy ethically since some of them were comatose, but all for the best. (Vigilante!) She's planned this for at least a while, got defectors and peacebringers within Crey working with her, and now she's on the cusp of succeeding - taking a group of defectors from evil and decadence, and saving those who would suffer from death, to start a new life on another world. The "danger" Brightstar mentions again and again is never shown.
Brightstar is dull and tortures people for information in order to break a promise to her own host. Brightstar is the one doing things against her host's will, here. I think I'm going to see if I can "Have Brightstar Fall In Combat".
How I Tried to kill Brightstar
This is actually somewhat difficult since Brightstar is a boss-level ally and I'm flying solo on +0/x1. She's also got a health+. I'm not sure it'll even be possible to get her killed.
She two-shots lts and misses minions alot. It's looking impossible to get her killed. She heals herself for half of her health. And then when I get to the first portal device, the ability to get her killed is removed. In the end, I didn't need to do a thing. PPD Patrols found and destroyed one of the devices, and Brightstar slaughtered every minion on the map who came near. In the end, it came down to Voidfire versus Brightstar with me spectating.
Voidfire won. But I could no longer get credit for "defeating" Brightstar and helping Voidfire. So I was forced to kill Voidfire to end the map. In short, soloing this map on normal means it is impossible to choose to help Voidfire.
Conclusion
In the end I think there was a pretty good concept to this story: Peacebringer versus Warshade, where the Peacebringer is the "lawful evil" one versus the "chaotic good" Warshade.
The drama of the mother and daughter wasn't really played enough. Brightfire refused to go any further after I reached the portal devices- and that was it. She was still in perfect range to attack and attempt to kill everything. There was no dialogue outside of Mission 3 and that event in Mission 5 that touched upon Brightstar and Voidfire's relationship.
In addition, the first two maps feel very clunky in terms of development. If additional materials were put in to make them feel more fleshed out, and developments moved there or something, it would help the story immensely. The usage of a PPD ally in mission 1 is very much not needed.
I felt like Voidfire was way more the likable character than Brightstar was. She was proactive and attempting to do something good with very little negative consequences outside of the danger of opening a portal, which is never elaborated upon or explained, and in fact it feels like Voidfire was removing even the chance of something going wrong with the stabilizer and scouting.
In short, Brightstar is a boob and this arc makes me feel like I'm doing work for a madwoman who just wants revenge at all costs, but in the end can't do it, so there's no climax to it. If the contact info was changed to give more of a feel of the clash between Brightstar loving and also hating beyond hate Voidfire, that would be more interesting and also somewhat villainous if you kept working for her, I guess.
Still Concluding
In the end, I gave it a 5/5 for a good, interesting concept. I'd like to see this retooled into something with more life and character- Voidfire is a great character but the rest of the story falls flat, and the missions (besides 5) are somewhat ho-hum. It could make an incredible revenge/character drama arc, and if it did so it would make up for the gameplay.
Please learn how to foreshadow properly and make your arcs feel consistent. However, at the very least, your arc did feel like it had a purpose to it.
That's all I've got to say.
