Lycanus

Suggestions, please provide alternate styles of the basic utility and storage items:

For-Example:

Bio-Organic: - chiton/tendrils....HRGeiger-esque designs...Zerg nests

Teleporters: pillars of wrapped tendrils with energy vortex

Storage Units: cocoons

Enhancement Stations - reaching tentacles?

etc.

********

Plant: - trees, vines growing out of walls/dirt....walls similar to Perez Park Tree walls and leafy ceillings....dirt-floor, root/vine items....

Teleporters - a tree

Storage Units: fruit

*********

Martial Arts - what it says on the tin

Enhancement stations - training equipment, like the punch-pole you always see in Kung fu movies

Teleporter - possibly something like that magical rug Shiwan Khan uses in The Shadow movie (I know that was to help find and hypnotise people, but still pretty nice)

Storage Units: Weapon Racks

**********

others

oops. wrong section

Suggestions, please provide alternate styles of the basic utility and storage items:

For-Example:

Bio-Organic: - chiton/tendrils....HRGeiger-esque designs...Zerg nests

Teleporters: pillars of wrapped tendrils with energy vortex

Storage Units: cocoons

Enhancement Stations - reaching tentacles?

etc.

********

Plant: - trees, vines growing out of walls/dirt....walls similar to Perez Park Tree walls and leafy ceillings....dirt-floor, root/vine items....

Teleporters - a tree

Storage Units: fruit

*********

Martial Arts - what it says on the tin

Enhancement stations - training equipment, like the punch-pole you always see in Kung fu movies

Teleporter - possibly something like that magical rug Shiwan Khan uses in The Shadow movie (I know that was to help find and hypnotise people, but still pretty nice)

Storage Units: Weapon Racks

**********

others

the new issue, I16, is going to reduce rewards for anything found to be a farm mission. Thus allowing people to fill a mission with bosses for the challenge, but negating the reward for much of it to avoid it attracting farmers.

I don't think I'll ever make another Energy Melee Tanker.

Slow Animation times combined with only one real AoE outside of Taunt make for an aggro control nightmare. If I had known it was a scranker set to start, I probably wouldn't have gone for it.

If I combined Energy Melee with Dark, Fire or Ice armors, it might...MIGHT alleviate the horrid aggro control situation afflicted on me by EM due to the large amount of aggro control inside those Armor sets, but with almost anything else it's just FRUSTRATING.

I've been dealing with this problem once a week for 2-3 years now.

...it says something about being "on a distinguished road" anybody know exactly what that means?

I did a test mission so I could set up some shots for my wereshark (in both versions) to take on Captain Mako

here is the vid

Note, my goal was for the video, so I did god-mode it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xe7vg2VTYys

[ QUOTE ]
I don't have a problem with these badges from just a pure "something to do to get a badge" point of view.
But I heavily disfavor the general idea of account-based badges in any way, shape or form.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well, the devs have already released something like 4 or 5 of them.

And in situations like this, it only makes sense.

The character doesn't have multiple characters, the account does.

Likewise if the other badge idea mentioned here is used, the character is not focusing all its time on one character, the account is.

Either focusing on one character, or trying out a whole bunch of different characters is an account-based practice and thus an account-based badge.

[ QUOTE ]

As for Martial Arts, the alternate animations we have right now are mainly punches. The idea was to provide you guys with a way to make the classic, fights with their fists and feet, super-hero that many have been asking for. That includes a new animation for assassin's strike (Assassin's Blow?).

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you going to be changing the MA power names from "Kick" to "Strike" then?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
me, I just want the CC emotes to be able to be worked successfully in a bind so that I don't have to pull that screen up every time I want to use a costume change emote...

[/ QUOTE ]

Why not just use the /cce command? For instance:

/cce 1 ccspin

This will cause you to switch to your costume in slot 2 (if you have one, and slots are numbered from 0) while doing the spin costume change emote. From what I've seen, costume change emotes system names are the same as their names in the dropdown with spaces taken out and CC at the start. Bind that to a key and you're set.

[/ QUOTE ]


ah aha....see, I thought it was /ccspin 1

thanks for that!

me, I just want the CC emotes to be able to be worked successfully in a bind so that I don't have to pull that screen up every time I want to use a costume change emote...

Incidentally, and this is just to get a jibe in at the people that said a certain new element would never come, would it be possible to have a water splash costume change emote now that it's possible to have body-type changes between costume slots?

Split Personality - You have at least 10 existing characters who have been active in the space of a month. (must have been played for at least a solid hour each). Awarded to all characters on account.

Schizophrenic - You have at least 20 existing characters who have been active within the last month. (must have been played for at least a solid hour each). Awarded to all characters on the account.

Alt-aholic - You have at least 30 existing characters that have been active in the last month. (must have been played for a solid hour each) Awarded to all characters on the account.

This does sound like an interesting idea.

Gads, I'll have to reroll Castle Rat as a stalker now....

and my magical gun-toting cat-spirit will finally be able to come out from undercover...

[ QUOTE ]


Souvenir: pretty nicely written souvenir. "Eastern European roots and were unable to reach her before the killer" should maybe be "Eastern European roots, and you were unable to reach her before the killer".

Overall
The story arc does quite a good job of setting a suspenseful mood for most of it (all but the first mission, which seems to be just a lot of fighting). The feeling of pursuing a psycho serial killer was definitely conveyed.

However, the initial riot scene requiring a defeat all on a huge map is a dealbreaker as most players will be unwilling to get through that, and as a result will never reach the more thoughtful, investigative parts of the story. The mob violence of the King's Row riot was also quite at odds with the eerie, suspenseful mood of the rest of the arc, as well.

I also thought the hook that started some of the missions (especially #2 and #3) was pretty thin and early on it felt like I was just having random events happen to me, rather than actually pursuing a proper investigation.

I was rather dismayed that the final mission ends with the killer being captured, but the girl dies. It's very unsatisfying for me to do everything I can, and it still isn't enough. I do recognize that a lot of serial killer movies end this way, so I'll cut some slack for that reason; but it's still a terrible anti-climax in my opinion.

Although I love the moody ambience of the later parts of this arc, with the other problems I felt I could only give this 3 stars. I hope you think that is fair!

[EDIT: Victoria Stnad's virtual death is really bothering me, which maybe means I should increase my rating, as I am trying to generally give higher ratings to things that "move" me. But I do think there are other problems, so I'm sticking to what I put for now, and will simply add the comment that I found the depiction of Victoria Stnad as a character to be quite effective.]
------


[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks, and yes, I'm not entirely satisfied with the riot mission myself and I had an issue with trying to explain a fight at every mission in what was supposed to be primarily an investigation. The following arcs in this story won't have this problem as I have violent distractions built into the future parts of this storyline.

#2 is a bit random...though perhaps I can fix that a bit...I think I might have you trying to canvass for witnesses to the murders in the riot situation.

#3 is an production of the whole "every mission has to have a fight" deal again. I figured one place to go for a bit of information was the police given that heroes and cops tend to work together a lot in this setting. I'll see what I can do to make it a little less random.

Thanks for the #4 comment, I'll go ahead and make the mission text changes necessary.

As for other comments that might make you feel a bit uncertain, I'll respond in PM.

[ QUOTE ]
I'm glad you are okay with the feedback. It is only my own opinions so take them as what you will. I will gladly play it through again if you want. I might understand it more on a second pass. :-)

@Lycanus here is some feedback for The Aegis Affair:

Overall its an arc and the story starts off very well. I think it starts to lose the plot on mission 4 and 5 though which is a shame because it has a good premise. Mission 5 however is horrendous and I almost 2 star'd the arc based soley on that mission but the arc as a whole has some good ideas so I refrained from that.

Mission 1:
*This is a good mission with good dialogue. The Navi bar is much improved and it flows nicely. I still think the custom warrior is slightly off-colour compared to his comrades but that is just me.
*One thing I will add is that the arc could really use a title for each mission "The Aegis Affair" and a subtitle "Part 1: The Museum" etc, I think that would work well and you are missing a trick there.

Mission 2:
*I like this warehouse map, the atmosphere of it is great for the "find clues" mission.
*The navi bar says find 7 clues, but there is only 5 clues to find. You get credit for 2 glowies which don't give you a clue.
*The mission clue at the end which is cumulative and updated is a very nice touch. Good job! It lacks a title for mission 2 though.

Mission 3:
*The navi bar is much better, thanks. Are we to believe they are student nurses? Otherwise I don't understand the relevance of the nurse captive.
*Jane Merith's description could use some punctuation.
*The clues mention "Warrior Twins" However there is about 4 or 5 young warriors and only one actual leader
*The cumulative mission clue mentions hellions erronously I believe.
*I wrote down Terra Black for can't remember why I wrote it now ;-) *edit oh yes, she is from the custom group "Warrior Recruits" which feels odd as she is a civilion of course.
*Ambrosia is mentioned in one of the clues, but I'm not sure where or how I got that clue.

Mission 4:
*This mission seems very abstract. Why are the warriors raiding Steel Canyon? If they are after Medusae how do they know she is there? Doesn't seem to link very well into the overall story.
*Medusae has a very odd costume I think, I believe it is hinted she is Terra Black but I don't understand the angel wings.
*Again "Twins" are mentioned but there is no reference to them on the mission. There are lots of clones yes, but I wouldn't describe it as "twins."
*Perseus and his custom group all have access to fly. Why? This feels very wrong.

Mission 5:
*Again this mission is a bit abstract and no real reason is given. Suddenly the contact has just figured out everything in a moment of genius and sent you off to fix everything.
*Why a graveyard, again it makes no sense. No where is it mentioned they are working from a graveyard and the contact does not mention one in the mission brief. In fact she doesn't mention anywhere.
*Navi bar is again messy. It asks you to find 5 random objects, but for what reason? The contact asks you to rescue Medusae but does not mention wanting you to find clues. If they were optional, sure. But as mandatory objectives?
*This quite annoyed me, but the mission is full of lieutenants with no minions. It is possible it could have been full of bosses but I'm on heroic so not sure. This is rediculous and the mission one big chore. Did you even play test this? Also, while we mention cloning, it is one giant leap to go from a few clones to an entire army of over 100 clones gathered round a graveyard with no warriors at all anymore.
*I did like the way the clones got progressively harder for each mission in the arc though, as bosses.
*Perseus Incarnate must have been an elite boss which I am not sure is necessary, especially as he is surrounded by bosses/lieutenants. I think you should bump up his physique to, I just feel he should be more gladiator like and stronger, he seemed a little too weak (in appearance)

I rated it 3 stars but I was almost inclined to rate it 2 after my experience of mission 5. I don't see how you could play test it and leave it like that. Remember I am here to review arcs not play test them for you and the over riding feeling I get is that more self-testing should have been done and many of these problems would have been fixed before publishing.

I think the story IS good, especially early on but it just seems to lose focus around mission 4. One thing that is never explained is the contact's involvement. A heroic story involving a villain contact? It just seems odd and no explanation throughout.

I reccomend a whole can of polish for mission 4 and 5 and don't go overboard on the clones. I'm willing to play it again for you when you've made some changes. Sorry if this review is negative, but it wasn't a good experience!

[/ QUOTE ]

Hmm, interesting, previous reviews thought the army of clones at the end was a strong point in the arc's favor.

As for the last two, yeah, the story rushes, I've had this story in mind for a while, and the original arc was about 10/12 missions long and condensing it has left me a bit...

But, I've been told by many that they liked it and it was verging on 5 stars if I just cleaned up a few things.

My guess is that their opinion and yours differ on what makes a five star.

They might have a firmer background in heavy myth, for example...they also didn't like the bits of comedy I originally had in there...said in distracted from the mood, so you didn't get to see the "Jail Bait" comments in reference to Medusa.

The last review encouraged me to add more clues to the beginning of the mission.

As for Med, she's one of my characters...she is supposed to be a descendant of the original Medusa and the current bearer of the power and title.

Explaining the wings: It's a mythos reference. Medusa is supposed to have bronze or brass wings, and if you go to the pre-Greek versions (where she was a Goddess), she was representative transformation as well, so I tend to portray her with varying types of wings dependent on the situation.


As for surprise clues...I've often found that a problem...either I miss the flash "Clues Found" or I'm in a fight while it pops or whatever and when I go back to the clues folder I have stuff I can't remember where it came from.

Unfortunately, not much I could do for that, save try to condense the description enough to add a sentence stating where you got the clue.

Btw, I've already reduced the number of patrols as per earlier requests.

btw, have you finished the Aegis Affair yet?

oh yes, I forgot to note all the references to things like Herbert West, Animator and Doctor Who. The Doctor enemies especially dressed like the Tom Baker doctor.

[ QUOTE ]
I decided to do "The Aegis Affair"

It's in my level range, so seemed like a good choice. :-)

I'm going to try review more by mission, and type it while playing so I can give better feedback.

Mission 1
Starting text is good, it hints to something bigger. Curiously no use of title or subtitle though. You should definity think about including that. Also highlighting a key line of text is nice too I think, but I am a perfectionist!

"2 Display Case" - could probably jazz up this navi bar text. Also the ambush was a little tough I thought, but my difficulty wasn't on heroic for this.

I liked the fact they mention Odysseus, good tie in. However theres a lot of patrols so there was a lot of spam when going to the 2nd floor.

Custom Boss: Was his names the wrong way round? He was called Young Warrior from the faction of Perseus. Colour wise he looked a bit out of shade, perhaps make him darker green or something.

Mission 2:

Intro text seems very brief to me, I think you could offer more explanation here but maybe that is just me.

The nav bar could use some work, at the moment it looks like "1 Crate, 1 Book, 2 Desk, 1 Desks, 1 Laptop" Perhaps group it together as "# Clues to find" under plural. In my experience if you put "Clues to find" for every clue as plural, they will group together nicely.

Some of the action bars didn't have text on them. The clues are well written and start is getting quite interesting. I love mythology. I do think perhaps you could have a smaller warehouse with fewer clues however.

Mission 3:

First time I've played on the carnival map, its a great way of introducing the students I think.

The student nurse is called "nurses" I'm sure she should hahve a name or title. Navi bar txt again could use a lot of work.

"goth girls" and "popular girls" you should really capitilize thir names. Also I'm just wondering if you could use a normal civilion female and cycle through till you get the look you want. You chose the WSPDR reporter as your popular girl, but it comes with a dodgy tag. Just a thought.

** Couldn't play anymore, it's bank holiday weekend in the UK and I'm off to my mothers. I hope you don't find my review too critical, its meant to help you is all :-)

[/ QUOTE ]

No problem, this is a direct recopy from an arc I had in test and after I did some changes. there used to be 3 each of all the generic hostages in the third mission, hence the plural names...think I will go in and make them more unique.

This was also my first or second arc written, so sounds like my last remake produced mistakes/things that I should have considered.

As for Young Warrior/Perseus, really, I should change the group name, because it gives some information away.

Hunter of Beasts: It starts with a riot...

suggested levels 5-15

Arc ID: 110465

Again, Peace, I must say that my choice to bring a sniper into the mission was probably ill advised (especially given that I've been player scrapper and tanker a lot) and I am susceptible to the tendency to go from one defeat to another as my brain gets into the wrong frame of mind.

A lot of my deaths and retreats were due to poor flight management and situational awareness. Though I still think it was a bit hard for a 32 squishy throughout.

Det. Crimson Rice.
Background: Daughter of a former mutant supervillain and a master martial artist. People who have read my Ranma/Tenchi Fanfiction "Ryoko Saotome" and its mini-sequel "Ryoko Saotome: Those who forget the past" might recognize Sol-assigned Galaxy Police Officer Akane Saotome (daughter of Ranma and Ryoko, of course)

In any case: imagined response from Crimson to Watson

"Note...badge, there, on my chest....see, 'POLICE DEPARTMENT' you even get to stare at my breasts as you read it. Look, detective's badge. Note: Hero Liason. So get your eyes past the cat-tail and the fact I can float and realize that I...wear....blue!"

************************

Anyway, that'll be enough for that...

First mission was fairly, short and much closer range than Crimson is usually comfortable with. (She's geared for range and sniping.) But convenient, I only wish that there was an office building this short for doing houses.

The second mission...oh...my...goodness.....sniper's nightmare....too few places to go where nobody can reach me until the last room which is one of the fewer inside Sniper's Paradise's.

There is some sort of bug with the Special Agents, soon after the first time they fall on their backside behind one of Rice's bullets, they spend the rest of the fight locked in place.

Third mission luckily had some of my favorite sniper's galleries for warehouses....unfortunately, I lost track of Watson after the first fight (I'd hovered up to look left and right of a bridge) and he died....somewhere...before I could find him...

At this point I should mention that my 32 AR/En died numerous times in this arc and usually I do not have that problem with her.

I would suggest boosting your suggested level up to 35, 38 or even 40. The custom enemies are quite difficult for a solo squishy, though my range/fly-centric being stuck indoors might be part of that.

EXCELLENT story however. I like the custom enemies especially.

Unfortunately, I failed, so not sure on the ending.

As for my arc, given this story arc, you might like "Hunter of Beasts: It begins with a riot..." 110465 (for lvls 5-15) more than some of the other ones:

"The Aegis Affair" 16376 - The warriors are raiding museums, what are they looking for?

"A Rose's Thorns" 113224 - Crey got a hold of the WRONG DNA sample.