Mr_Right

Interesting. If this is a Troll Post, I would rate it a 7/10. It's very well cobbled together.

If the poster is serious, however, and posted this sincerely, then I can only say that they are the reasons Trolls can exist so successfully.

Hate to say it, but this most certainly isn't the first time this has been discussed. In fact, every thought presented in this thread has been done repeatedly. Indeed, every idea in the thread has already been imagined, usually as a form of independent creation (where two separate people both create the same work, or works that are substantially similar, on their own and independent of each other).

And really, you apparently didn't read any of the replies to your previous posts that were negative, at least not all the way through. The various posts listed reasons why the idea was no better, and actually worse, then the current status quo. Someone who even "Boo'd" your original idea went on to say how the revised idea would be good, including WHY it would be you're probably not even reading this far anyway better then the current Inherent power for Defenders.

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It took me a while to figure out who was really talking—the Clockwork or the Corps. Once I figured that out, it was all good.

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I must admit I'm confused on this point. The Hero Corps gets blue text and the Clockwork get's the standard white. The first time the Corps' talks to you in the contact text, there's an explanation of the ear piece, and whenever the Clockwork talk, they had a constant *Bzzt* sprinkled in the speech. I'm not really sure how to make it any clearer, but if you have any suggestions, I'm willing to listen. I also tried to have at least two conversations with the Hero Corps' contact each mission (via ear piece, colored blue), once before and once after.

The difficulty of the NPCs I can't really comment on, as they are all standard NPCs you face in game (with exception to the last mission's six bosses) in that level range, as such they should be no harder then what any player could face just by running standard contact missions. (also, all mission's were set to "Flat", so any spawn anomalies you faced are standard for all missions not set to ramp up, or front load)

I'll check mission three's text, as I must have missed something when changing from a Council Base to an Office. I'll also investigate the name of Mission Two's boss in the Nav bar, as you're right, that could be better. I must have glossed over it. I'll even check back and make sure the Hero Corps' contact gets enough talking time.

Thanks for the feedback and review! You've helped me make the Arc a better play

Well, I built my WS as a very form heavy build. Which meant that there were only two powers I HAD to pick, but many powers I needed to slot (all in the forms). Everything else I picked assuming I would spend as little time as a Human as possible, which meant no Auto Powers, no Toggles, and as many Click Powers (including Mez powers and attacks) as possible.

I have no build to display, but I can say that I did my best to pick up as many "low Enhancement Slot required" powers as I could. Things like the Medicine Pool (clicks AND low enhancement requirement!) and extra Travel Powers (Superspeed, Hasten, Combat Jumping, Super Jumping) and plenty from the Primary and Secondary sets (Holds, Stuns, Mires, Cloaks, Eclipse, etc).

I built Human form to be more Utility (stealthing, healing, buffing, Mezzing, etc) while the forms tended to the combat needs.

*shrugs*

The same thing that happens if two people review the same arc over a matter of hours or days.

You reviewed an arc, someone will likely review yours for you.

Wow, you have perfect timing. I was just lamenting to myself over my feelings on how my Arc's story feels a bit... light. If you have any advice on how I can draw people into the story, make it more involved with the player, I would LOVE to hear it.

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Arc Name: The Clockwork Crusade
Arc ID: 126073
Faction: Arachnos, Vahzilok, Council, Clockwork
Creator Global/Forum Name: @YanYan
Difficulty Level: Easy to Moderate, designed to be solo able by any AT
Mission Levels: 1-20
Synopsis: Hero Corps has asked you for some unique help. Seems the Clockwork are making some strange attacks against other villains. They've asked you to 'assist' them under cover.
Estimated Time to Play: 30 Minutes to an Hour.


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*laughs so hard her boyfriend comes over to read over her shoulder*

You win the internets.

-Rachel-

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Steelclaw always wins these. The funny is strong with that one.

I'd like to get a review, or a play, for my Arc: The Clockwork Crusade. It is absolutely easy for a Hero player to RP their way into the situation, at least as far as I'm concerned. I fear the missions are a little bland though, so any feedback on how to improve that would be more then welcome.

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Arc Name: The Clockwork Crusade
Arc ID: 126073
Faction: Arachnos, Vahzilok, Council, Clockwork
Creator Global/Forum Name: @YanYan
Difficulty Level: Easy to Moderate, designed to be solo able by any AT
Mission Levels: 1-20
Synopsis: Hero Corps has asked you for some unique help. Seems the Clockwork are making some strange attacks against other villains. They've asked you to 'assist' them under cover.
Estimated Time to Play: 30 Minutes to an Hour.


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Freaks, Geeks and Men in Black (#161629)

Played using Parallel Protector: Level 36 Claws / SR scrapper, with mostly SOs and IOs.

Mission One Text: Right off the bat, I like the contact. The whole mission's text was good, and I gotta say, I liked it.

Mission One Play: Kinda small. Not bad, but I like a little meat in my missions, even to the point of a Defeat All, so I can accept I'm a bit different in tastes.


Mission Two Text: Might be a typo in Crushifier's clue, "possible deliability" instead of "plausable deniability"?

Mission Two Play: Good mission, I liked the use of ambushes and such. Perhaps add a clue to the body bags in this one as right now they're ignorable completely. Again, the mission felt small, can't really fight it too much though, it wasn't half bad. Better then the first one.


Mission Three Text: Again, good text, love the contact's personality, and no typos at all.

Mission Three Play: Alright! This mission is big enough to sedate my thirst after the first two tiny ones. But a lot happens in here. Lots of clues, text to read, and dialog that can be missed if I didn't scroll back to check it. Again, the body bag was a bit clueless, left me wanting details. But then I opened my Clue tab and realised I had a ton of clues already. I can't imagine you being able to fit in another one. The mission ends kind of suddenly, which leaves a weird feeling. I'm not a big fan of the custom Freak's power selection. AR? Regen I like, but the offence felt off. Maybe a form of SS would do it. Liked his costume though.


Mission Four Text: Absolutely love the text, STILL. No typoes and very little to fault. The story's engaging, especially with the dialog and clues.

Mission Four Play: I like Target242's text and info, very nicely done on him. The mission was big enough to be engaging, without too big to feel like it won't end. Nice map pick.


Mission Five Text: Once more, the text and personality was good all over. Loved the intro text, as well as the pop ups. PPD Patrol's text (send everyone) needs punctuation. Might want to mention the Contact's buddies who didn't survive in the end (unless that counts as everyone winning, or you're just glossing over it)

Mission Five Play: The stacked goals is a nice touch, but the map is a bit big for something like this. Decent map pick though, and over all the mission was good.


Overall: From start to finish, this was a very heavy story based arc. It was engaging, and built up to a nice climactic ending. The whole thing ran well, and from start to finish I found myself interested in what was happening, and how it would end. Of course, I had issues with following the story, as occasionally the boss' dialog would be long, and flash by too fast as I beat him up. Might have been my difficulty was too low, so can't fault you for that. But still, the dialog was sometimes too wordy. The Souvenir could stand to be longer, in my opinion. You have a lot of room to work with in there, and in the standard game, you tend to get a nice recap of what you did and how it went, usually read from a third person perspective about yourself. I would keep the style you picked to tell the Souvenir, but elaborate it to cover the whole story.

Score: This one was easy to rate. There were never any "really bad" missions, or "blatently obvious typos", and any negatives could easily have been just my personal tastes. So in the end, I happily rate this arc a...

Five out of Five.


Edit to Add:

I've held off a bit, and did a little editing to my Arc, in an attempt to make it more engaging. I can't promise that I have, but if anyone has not played it yet (and with as few ratings as it has, there must be a few of you still out there, right?) I would love to get some feedback on it. And heck, even if you have played and rated it, try it out again and maybe it's worse then before, eh?

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Arc Name: The Clockwork Crusade
Arc ID: 126073
Faction: Arachnos, Vahzilok, Council, Clockwork
Creator Global/Forum Name: @YanYan
Difficulty Level: Easy to Moderate, designed to be solo able by any AT
Mission Levels: 1-20
Synopsis: Hero Corps has asked you for some unique help. Seems the Clockwork are making some strange attacks against other villains. They've asked you to 'assist' them under cover.
Estimated Time to Play: 30 Minutes to an Hour.


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<ul type="square">
[*]Your SG starts a new Villain SG on the same server, but you didn't find out until someone mentioned it in casual conversation in SG chat.
[/list]

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Mandu do you know if players on the same AE team can enter the same mission from different AE buildings/zones?

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I'm no Mandu, but I know that once you set an AE mission, it's locked into that zone's "Data Stream". So if the Leader sets the mission in Atlas, the team has to go to the Atlas AE building to run the missions. Same for any other zones with an AE building where the team is running AE missions.

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Theres a Diff of working for it. And price gouging. And the Markets right now are price gouging.

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And ya' know what? You're more than welcome to join in. Get some of your own salvage, wait until it's low in price, and then buy it up, and sell it when the price is high.

But that would be too easy, wouldn't it?

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That's how I afforded three sets of Purples for my Warshade over the course of three months. It was quite interesting. Though I've been distracted by the MA since then.

It worked for me, it can work for you! And remember, I'm not just the spokesman of the 'Get off your bum and do it yourself' Club, I'm a member!

So... why don't you get a Heavy and send it after the Hero? Or it's Heavy to distract it while you fight the Hero?

Which is why she said:

"Your RESISTANCE shortens the duration!"

So when you have a high resistance to Holds (through Mezz Protection), "Your RESISTANCE shortens the duration!"

This way, that ~11 second hold is reduced, because "Your RESISTANCE shortens the duration!"

So if you have a 65% resistance to Holds, and are hit by an 11 second hold, "Your RESISTANCE shortens the duration!" to 3.85 seconds.

This is because "Your RESISTANCE shortens the duration!"

Con to your idea:

Players on servers who don't get the boosts get punished for playing their characters.

Players on servers who don't get the boosts must now pay money if they wish to play their characters on servers who do get boosts.

Markets are cross Server (all servers have access to the same market) so players who get more Influence / Infamy for playing on a low population server can out-bid people who are not. This can cause market prices to rise, as people are willing to spend more of what they have because they get more of it, or are more desperate to spend what they have to get something to "keep up with the Jones'".

[u]Con[u]
Merging Servers gives the signal to the rest of the MMO world and players that this game is dieing.

Server mergings are held as a last resort when the subscription costs of the players on a single server is under the cost it takes to maintain that server. It is, literally, like cutting off your leg to escape a bear trap. Yes, you may survive longer, but how long now that you're bleeding subscriptions?

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I'm pms'y. I gotta have something to work out this angry biological issue on.

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RAWR! Angry Biological Issue SMASH!

Due to an accident on my part, and the forced unpublishing of my Arc thanks to certain Rikti not being appropriate any longer (Rikti Magus, which is a shame because I liked him), my Arc: Romio and J'Let is no longer in existence.

And so I took some time to mourn the loss, then promptly made:

Arc Name: The Clockwork Crusade
Arc ID: 126073
Faction: Arachnos, Vahzilok, Council, Clockwork
Creator Global/Forum Name: @YanYan
Difficulty Level: Easy to Moderate, designed to be solo able by any AT
Mission Levels: 1-20
Synopsis: Hero Corps has asked you for some unique help. Seems the Clockwork are making some strange attacks against other villains. They've asked you to 'assist' them under cover.
Estimated Time to Play: 30 Minutes to an Hour.


This Arc actually has a few things that many people hate. The Defeat Alls, both of them, are purposefully on small maps, both one floor (I think, the office one might be on two), so they're not hard to navigate. I hope the story makes up for it though.

Maybe, but the contact could talk to YOU.

"I know you can't hear me, $name, but..."

This is NOT the "Live: Announce You Latest Creation!"

This is actually, the Mission Arc Critiquing Thread. In this thread, it is customary to post a review of an Arc before submitting your own Arc for review. I know this rule is not hard to follow, but people are just dropping them off like children at a daycare.

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I like your suggested idea, Geko. It covers a nice area for ratings.

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Geko's suggestion.

And NO, for the last time, you should not be forced to play an entire arc to be able to rate it.

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I was posting from my iPod, leave my grammar alone! And which part of Geko's suggestion mentioned having to play the entire arc before rating? Or was that supposed to be an unrelated point you wished to address to the thread as a whole?

I like your suggested idea, Geko. It covers a nice area for ratings.

Thank you for the review, I'll get right on the typos and questionable dialog:

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Mission 1: uh oh....a defeat all. There is just never a good reason for a defeat all mission. Luckily, it's mitigated by using an arachnos base with no real hiding places. Enjoyed it. The one Con on that mission is the clue at the end. I wouldn't put words in the character's mouth, but phrase the clue more generically.

For example. "Working with criminals, like the Clockwork, isn't normally your style." I would change that to read something more like "may not be your style".

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I hear that people don't like defeat alls a lot, but to me, there are good reasons, and I feel this is one. However, I may consider adjusting the missions, either in size or plot.


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Mission 2: I like having clickies in a mission that are not required objectives. However, if you're going to have more than one I would give them separate clues. Otherwise it just seems like why bother clicking any after the first.

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I'll look into that. I might lower the number of them to one... should be easy enough to rewrite a little text for it. Thanks


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Mission 3: ack! Defeat all!! In an office map! Nooooooooo!
More non-required, clue giving clickies. Good idea but, IMO, needs better execution. Same advice as in Mission 1, though. I think there were 4 or 5 of them in this mission and again, after the 1st, there was no point.

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Yes yes, Defeat Alls are the devil! Thanks Ma'ma, you really s-s-saved me this time!
Again, I might adjust the text and remove some of them. And yes, the size of the mission might change. I try to keep my maps small-ish as is, but I can drop the size a bit more.


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Mission 4: Good job on the custom bosses. I thought they fit in with the clockwork well. I did not get the mission intro dialogue, though. I thought the contact was breaking down or being assaulted, but, didn't see why that would be from the mission.

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Well, the mission text was supposed to give a sense of "dialog" between your character and the Clockwork. Upon entering the mission, the contact is supposed to scamper off someplace, leaving you alone. I'll see if I can make that clearer. (if that wasn't your problem, drop me a PM and we can work out what you had an issue with, and how I can better get the point across)

Thanks again for all the feedback, I'll keep hammering down those pesky typos. Seems every time I smash two, one pops up. I'm making headway, but I'll be damned if it isn't the slowest headway ever!

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Might as well post mine, nobody will play it but if anyone does I would like to know so I know to do more stories

Legacy of a Dragon Chapter 1: A Demon's Maid
Arc ID: 138053
Morality: Neutral
Length: Long

This is ment to be played with a group however on challenge difficulty 1 it can be soloable with some cleverness

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As usual, I wrote this as I played, so if I sound like I'm contradicting myself, that's because things changed in the mission:

Character: Level 30 Claws / SR Scrapper. Mostly basic IOs and a SOs. Solo, on difficulty 2.

Mission One Text: "A group of Knight", need to plural Knights, and add a space between "Contained" and "with", same paragraph. Need a comma after "very weak compaired to her captors". "Go to the caves in the far east of this place" should be a sentence, and I believe "east" should be capitalized. Mission pop up needs to be broken up into two sentences. Check all the minions for misspellings. The return text also feels a little light.

Mission One Play: Good map choise, as far as ease of play goes. And the enemies are fairly engaging and just difficult enough, at least as minions. The clue could be a bit... better. It doesn't have to go into details, but you could elaborate on it, add in what she says, or at least a comment that links the clue to what you did to earn it.

Mission One Overview: Over all a standard "search and rescue". I'll reserve commenting on how the text feels thin in case you're holding back to prevent giving away suprises in future missions. But still, the text feels a bit light.

Mission One Score: 2

Mission Two Text: "I am too weak to fight them" sentence could stand to be split up as it feels wordy. "They are traveling my a cargo boat", "They are traveling by a cargo boat"?

Mission Two Play: I'm sent to find a Knight General, but I find a Necromancer? I'd try and name the Necro as "Knight General" as a boss name. Not a big fan of the cargo ship, but I'm grateful it's not a defeat all. Still, cargo ship doesn't feel right for the mission, to be honest.

Mission Two Overview: I question the use of the cargo ship, and the mission felt slow. Not much plot reveled, and while I get why I did this mission, I don't feel much attachment to it.

Mission Two Score: 3

Mission Three Text: Several typos in the opening text, might want to read through it to double check. "Kill Paladin Cross"? I'm not going to argue it, but maybe change it to "Defeat"? Instead of "I better find this Paladin Cross fast", make it "You better find..." as opening text is usually read as if someone is telling you this, from a third person, not first. The clue "Letter from Bolog": "dimention's" should be "dimension's". Also, "quick wit"? Quick wit defeated the Master's kind? Extra return in "This slumber lasted". Too many typos to properly list in that clue.

Mission Three Play: The Master's avatars might need to be boosted a bit, as they fall pretty fast. Maybe give them some support characters? Also, they're under the classification of "Knights", shouldn't they be called something else? Like "Avatars"? I see the need for friends. The EB is one shotting me (hitting me so I'm down to one HP) as a Scrapper. Took quite a few tries (and MANY insps) to take him down. It might not be above question to add a few rescuable allies in the form of Avatars.

Mission Three Overview: Over all the mission was very basic. Go in, beat up the boss, leave. I'm not advocating the need for it to be a Defeat All. Far from it. However, it might be nice for some side goals to shed light on the background / story. Even reading all the clues and text and dialog, I feel like I'm missing a lot of background.

Mission Three Score: 2

Mission Four Text: So wait, they can get me in, but not any others of the army "waiting outside the doors"? Cloning lab? I don't mind turns in the plot, but dayum, I think I got whiplash. In my [censored]. Mission acceptence text has a typo, "wont" is missing an apostrophe.

Mission Four Play: Arachnos Lab? The map doesn't fit the theme. I'd almost think the Superadine Lab map the Skulls use in a low level Hero mission would be better. :P So many questions unanswered. The mission feels very unfinished.

Mission Four Overview: Falinia, a Necromancer, okay. An EB who decimates entire spawns alone? Might be a bit much, in my opinion. But, I'll admit this one felt much more involved. Rescue the hostage, click a glowie, then the main enemy spawns and you finish that off, along with some battles along the way. Very nicely done there.

Mission Four Score: 3


Story Arc Overview: I must say, I leave the arc feeling very.. "meh". I never learned enough a bout the contact, his attraction to the Falinia person, the mysterious "Master", or even really the Knights. There was a small blurb in the clues, and the souvenir gives a weird summery. In fact, I'd really use the space provided for the Souvenir and give a summery of events, THEN go into the "find out next time, same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel!" speech about what I do and don't know. And spend more time talking about what I do know, not what I don't know. What I don't know about the Arc could probably fill a book. Or two. So I get that these questions will be answered next time but... I was given a conclusion of sorts in this story, and it was very unfulfilling. It only felt like a place to stop, not even a cliff hanger proper, or the end of an episode. Very "Meh..."

Story Arc Score: Normally I round up, but this time, I can't bring myself to really give a three. I already feel like I'm rounding up on the individual missions. I'm afraid I'll have to give this arc a fairly bland...

Two out of Five.


Edit: Jeez, and once more I forget. I could stand to have a review or so done again. Since the edits, I have gotten positive feedback, but no hard critiquing. I need someone heartless and thorough.

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Arc Name: The Clockwork Crusade
Arc ID: 126073
Faction: Arachnos, Vahzilok, Council, Clockwork
Creator Global/Forum Name: @YanYan
Difficulty Level: Easy to Moderate, designed to be solo able by any AT
Mission Levels: 1-20
Synopsis: Hero Corps has asked you for some unique help. Seems the Clockwork are making some strange attacks against other villains. They've asked you to 'assist' them under cover.
Estimated Time to Play: 30 Minutes to an Hour.


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I think people are missing the point of posting a critic of a mission arc, THEN posting an arc to be reviewed. Not just jump in and dump an arc.