Judgement_Dave

Quick everyone - we can all buy the pack before they take it down again at about 21:59 RLT.




Rapthorn Local Time that is...

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If a map has 2 front, 2 middle, and 2 back spawn points I can use, then on attempting to use a third, I should get an error telling me so, and it shouldn't allow me to publish or test that mission.

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TBH I would have thought a warning allowing you to test/publish but alerting you to the fact that it may not act exactly as intended would be better.

I suspect that the current system can be used to create useful effects (but after 5 min trying to simply explain why I think that, I'm giving up - let's just say that I think it may allow semi-randomised placement of objectives if the way it seems to work is taken into consideration).

A warning would avoid invalidating any published arcs that have managed to use the system as is to achieve there desired effects.


BTW - does it make any difference just setting the AV to BACK, the ALLY to FRONT and leaving your other ambushes/objectives as ANY?

My 386 blew several years back.. though my 8088 laptop still works. I'd need to whip up a quick browser though...

Digs around for 10 year old copies of Lynx and netscape navigator... Mua ha ha ha!

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Hahahaha! You inexperienced veteran! You double posted!

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It wans't me - a wizard did it

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That too?

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No - I think that was a warlock

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That can't be correct - warlocks can spell.

Thank you for escalating - but it looks like todays patch has not fixed the issue.

Handyman (arc 1076) was available before the downtime at 14:00 BST. It was still available when the servers came back up.

At c.15:20 BST, Ashuroa (who posted above re: problems with accessing arcs from Zukunft) contacted me to say that he'd tried to access the arc from Zukunft and could I check that it was still available.

It was not. It was wrongly reporting to be invalid again.

BTW - Ashuroa tells me that they've tested from other servers and it looks like Defiant is OK but both Zukunft and Vigilance cause the issue.

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I take it the death card kills you but when you're rezzed or something then the effect takes place or not at all?

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Erm, why would Death in the Tarot kill you? It means Transformation/Change.

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Yes - transfomation from being alive to being not alive

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Yes, but only if you get your meaning of things from really bad movies.

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And the Wheatley novels that inspired several really bad Hammer movies.

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Not a guide, but could we include:

MA: Help Snippets, Tips and Tricks

I'd hate for it to be eventually lost to obscurity.

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I was just coming here to post that myself!

BTW - I didn't know your latest tip about multiple objectives grouping if the descriptions are the same... thinking you couldn't group multiple objectives was bugging me! Thanks.

Had to answer a few problems about this one recently.. so I guess I'll add it to the list:

Republishing Arcs

You can edit published arcs and republish them to preserve the arc id and any ratings that it has.

To do this:

1 - Access the published story from the 'My Published Stories' screen
2 - Select the 'EDIT' button and make your changes.
3 - Most of the 'Save' buttons in the MA editor will have changed from 'Save' to 'Republish' (e.g. 'Save and Exit' -> 'Republish and Exit') so select the appropriate one and republish.

After several seconds you should see a message in your chat tabs (think it's using the 'Architect Entertainment' channel) saying 'arcname' has been updated.

If you do it this way (My Published Stories -> EDIT -> republish) then the ID and ratings remain intact. If you unpublish, edit and then publish again your arc will be assigned a new arc id and will not keep any of it's previous ratings.

Also note that the 'Browse and Play' screen shows you 'UNPUBLISH', 'PLAY' and 'COMPLAINTS' (where applicable) for your published arcs, but the 'EDIT' button is only available on the 'My published Stories' screen.

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How many maps are there in total?


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Early statements/interviews suggested that there's about 1000 maps we have access to.

Though I think it tends to be the unique and unlockable maps that have most issues. The ones that are part of standard (more generic) map sets tend to be better marked so that they could already be used for a wide variety of dev-created missions which didn't need to specify a single map.

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...which would have pushed back issue 14 to 2010.

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I'll be happy waiting 'til as late as 8:30 pm if it gets sorted out!

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**Those vampires and werewolves aren't exactly Italian

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Italian Vampires? Maybe not.

Italian Werewolves? Not sure... I've seen some pretty darn hirsute waiters in pizzerias...

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Dave, I played your Ei-Ai-Ei-Ai-Oh Arc last night.

Very amusing.

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Why, thank you!

Glad that you enjoyed it.


BTW - If you've joined City of Guides you can leave comments on it (and Handyman) there.

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I always find it a bit of a shame to be honest if a religions strong anuff it should be able to take a bit of creative interpretation but you can bet that we wont see Jesus appear alongside hercules and Thor in the avengers any time soon.

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Usually the religions are strong enough - but the followers vary wildly.

Just look at religious violence/extremism... Whichever religion you care to look at, any violence carried out by purported followers has often been from a splinter-view that varies from the main. Most people, whatever religion they follow, are pretty moderate and can get along with others who are not enlightened enough to follow the true faith.

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As for fighting Malta and then suddenly getting depowered because the next group is Trolls, well, I'll forgive them as it's one of the limitations of MA, but I will still find it jarring.

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But that may become problematic if you're nearing the size limits - since you'd need something like 4 mobs ( 2/1/1 minion/lt/boss) as an absolute minimum to 'extend' the existing group. You'd probably want more like 3/2/1, 2/2/1 or better to create a decent group of all custom mobs.

It's why it'd be good for the devs to add some non-standard-level groups the quick and dirty way - take the same skin/animations and reset the applicable level range and power modifiers.

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And that kids, is why you should always make sure that the MA autosave is in the 'on' position.

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Not had that on since it seemed to be linked to crashes in beta...

Is autosave actually stable enough to leave switched on now?

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are the guys making these missions breaking any rules ?

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There's a bit in the I14 patch notes stating that NCsoft reserves the right to ban any missions that contain any exploits that provide unintended statistical advantages.

I'm not certain what the definitions of 'exploits' and 'unintended statistical advantages' are. Heck it doesn't even state who the 'statistical advantages' are 'unintended' by...

It could be argued that a farmer making a farm of easy to kill mobs that they can plough through maximising xp/INF gain has gained a statistically advantageous rate of reward gains... but that was always the farmers intention and we don't know NC's intentions regarding this.

If NC didn't reserve the right to ban on a whim it'd almost be worth finding out exactly what the terms mean...

From memory:
Did you go to the published arc in normal search/browse, or did you go to it in the 'My Published Arcs' tab?

IIRC you don't get an edit button for your arcs if you look in th enormal search/browse window.

I guess it's only me who sees it as odd that the buffs granted by Mystic Fortune are based on the Major Arcana of the Tarot when IIRC many Christian religious groups don't take much to the Tarot...

Just find it a bit odd that any theme/names/explanation could have been used and they pick one that some people may get upset about (and also one that may play into the 'videogamers are satanic spawn' camp of public misconceptions).

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It's totally messed up my Return of Disco arc as the AV keeps spawning in front of all the other bosses on the final mission, when she's clearly set at BACK, and the others are either FRONT or MIDDLE.

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Back in beta, I got the impression that the front/middle/back designation is used merely as a preference.

If there aren't enough spawn points in the requested area, but there are still spare spawn points in another area, then the spawns will be placed in the available area rather than not placed at all.

I also assume that spawns with a preference are placed before those without, but we don't know the spawning order for the ones showing preference.

Example: if you have:
1 AV showing BACK
5 EBs showing MIDDLE
But the map only has 2 FRONT/3 MIDDLE/1 BACK

My guess is that the AV will always make it to the back if there's an available spawn point at the back when its spawn point gets set - but to guarantee being at the back it needs to be placed 1st.

If the 5 EBs preferring the middle are placed 1st, then 3 take the middle 3 spawn points and then the remaining 2 EBs take any of the 3 remaining points (as MIDDLE isn't available). It's possible that one of the EBs takes the only spawn point in the back and so the AV later gets placed in the FRONT.

Note that I've not tested this - it's only what my irrational human mind felt was happening...

But if that is what's happening, then you may do better placing the AV as BACK and leaving the EBs as ANY - as I'd hope that spawns set to ANY are placed after any spawns requiring specific positioning. Hopefully this would force the AV to pick it's spawn point ahead of the EBs whilst there's still a spawnpoint at the BACK to grab!


Of course, all this may be wrong and some maps still seem to have wacky or incorrect area definitions.

Note to self - test this when revising Notes on Groups and Spawns.

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It's a mess and it needs fixing. IMO, the MA shouldn't have gone out live with this still broken. We've been telling them it was broken since closed beta...

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Easter and Marketing made an irresistable argument for going live.

Now I'm inevitable! Cool!

Am I as inevitable as death in Texas though?

My poor memory again - I thought there was a big gap in the middle of the range.

Still - my error only detracts from the final (BTW) note - and that was more thrown in to appease my poor humour.

From memory:
Access the published story from the 'My Published Stories' and select 'EDIT' and then most of the 'Save' buttons turn from 'Save' to 'Republish' (e.g. 'Save and Exit' -> 'Republish and Exit').

If you do it this way (My Published Stories -> EDIT -> republish) then the ID and ratings remain intact.

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Though one thing I do recommend is that your level range should try and be consistent. As in you're fighting at full strength, then suddenly fighting as a lvl 10 for no reason and then lvl 30, etc.

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So... Is the level switching acceptable when given a story reason?

If so:
- Presumably you're fine with it being used to simulate the old bigbad-has-stolen-my-powers story.
- Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! does it purposefully for a different reason (as mentioned above) - is that fine?
- Would world/dimension hopping that 'affects' your powers be a good enough explanation?
- Does 'a wizard did it' work?
- Could it work as a mid-arc flashback (you recall when...)

Just asking as I'd guess that many (not all) people who are bothered by level switches probably wouldn't mind as much if there is a reason given for the change... So I'm wondering: how much reason is needed?

If someone needs a lowlevel mob for concept in mission 3 of their mainly-Malta arc isn't it acceptable just to have the lowlevel mission just for story?
If it needs an explanation, does it need a good one?
Isn't a dodgy-explanation better than nothing as the author tried?
Is a bad explanation worse than no explanation?

Just wondering...


BTW - for some reason I kept thinking of a Raiders of the Lost Arc arc writing the above... I suspect that one group may cause level-swapping issues... Snakes. Why does it always have to be snakes?

The thing that irritates me (as a mission creator) is having to have slight level shifts even when using tricks to lockdown level ranges because the standard mobs have some odd level ranges...

In an arc that I'm still developing (though I started it not long after Open Beta started) my 1st 3 missions are:
Mission 1: 29-35 (locked down using Rogue Robots Group)
Mission 2: 30-38 (locked down using Prisoners Group)
Mission 3: 29-35 (again using Rogue Robots Group)

These groups provided the closest picks (IMO) to achieving similar mission ranges using mobs that won't seem out of place and allow some small variation (the main groups used in these missions have different sets of mobs at the extremes of the ranges shown).

But the small difference in ranges irritates me...

It would have been good if the spawns had some standardisation applied to ranges (though I could understand that that could cause issues to the normal game).

Or maybe if new non-standard 'standard groups' that were slotted into set ranges were provided... There's no real reason why lvl25-29 or 39-40 prisoners couldn't be made and added by the devs. I'd hope that for slight tweaks like this it would only need a replication of existing mobs, possibly tweaking combat stats if required to adjust for the change of range.

Even creating these as the only mobs in new standard groups would allow them to be used in MA custom groups to tweak the mission range as required.

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What I do not like is when I keep switching all the time between one level and the other. Try to keep your arcs in the same level range please.

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Is the level switching acceptable when given a story reason?

Try Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! (arc #: 3662) - Not only should it hopefully raise a smile or laugh, but it has 3 missions each at different level ranges... and there's good reason storywise for the 3 missions to be at different levels:

mission 1: Is low level 13-19 as I wanted to capture how poorly the custom mob 'PL-heroes' play by having them fail against a basic, low-level group.

mission 2: Is mid level, 29-35. This is due to the level of an ingame activity (it attempts to capture the essence of mission 2 of Hess TF, and so I set it at a similar level. Note that I purposefully didn't try to match the Hess TF too closely so that I don't spoil an excellent TF!)

mission 3: Is high level as pretty much all PL farms will be high level !

Since you hate level switching I wonder how you'd find this arc...