Rayonn
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Posts
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Joined
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Now I have one for you to review. It's still in the tweaking stages, so I'd prefer a scoreless review, but you can post it publicly.
#491402 Everything Falls Apart.
It's intended to be solable. I haven't had too much trouble, though you'll want to keep your ally alive during the boss fight in mission 3.
Thanks in advance. -
My own arc is now up.
#491402 Everything Falls Apart.
It's still a draft, the gameplay probably needs tweaking and there are some odd things I tried with the writing that may not have worked.
It's intended to be soloable. There is an elite boss, but you have an ally. The 'high level villain' that you are warned about is a captive you have to rescue.
I'd like feedback if anyone has the time. -
Of course, I have less to lose by this, being new, but here's a (rather crazy) proposal:
It's fairly clear that in-game rating and number of plays are not a very good measure of the quality of an arc in terms of story and gameplay.
So what if we ignore them, and just write for people who are interested enough in playing well-written arcs that they take the time to read reviews or look at the MA finder channel, instead of picking off the first page.
If we don't care about ratings and number of plays, then there's no reason not to publish and republish an arc (well, the arc number changes, but I tend to search by author or title anyway). That means we are no longer limited by number of slots: once we hit four or more slots, we can started cycling arcs on (say) a weekly basis (maybe keep the most recent arc up permanently, and cycle the other two). Slightly inconvenient for players, but it seems to work fine on Hulu.
This is what I'm going to do, anyway. It seems like if everyone did this, the authors would have more reason to continue writing (instead of just filling up their slots and waiting for them to get played), and the players (well, the ones who want story rather than rewards) would have more new arcs to look forward to.
I dunno. -
Quote:It's possible that I was just annoyed at the Icari for getting lost and blaming it on me (not something to change, it fits their characterization) while I was looking for Typhoon, so I just imagined the chaining as the reason I was having so much trouble (I had read a previous review - probably not a good idea, but I read it before I started this thread).Originally Posted by Mirror_Man
This point kind of surprised me. While I did initially have each member of the Icari chained to each other in the first mission of the arc (thus making the player have to complete each objective in a distinct order), I un-chained all of them some time ago due to the negative feedback I received because of it. I just tested the arc again, and the objectives are still un-chained. Maybe there was a glitch in the AE system?
Maybe just find a way to point out to the player that they are non-combat (for some reason they had HP/END bars, so I thought they were set to 'pacifist'), and that there's no reason not to just collect them all and only backtrack once.Quote:Originally Posted by Mirror_Man
The powerless Icari in the third mission of the arc are actually non-combat escorts, so the Council shouldn't be able to attack them (or vice-versa). Still, the "backtracking" required to rescue all of the Icari has been mentioned by several other reviewers as a point of frustration, though I still haven't decided on a way to fix it. -
Very nice.
I did basically the same thing in Excel when I was analyzing my Kinetic Melee build, but this is much cleaner. -
Quote:For some reason, in the context of people being endowed with god-like powers by semi-sentient entities, I thought at first that you were referring to Jack Harkness.Originally Posted by Mental_Giant
I think Jack would like this interpretation.
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I don't see what you changed.
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If I understand your code correctly, it looks like you're having a power start recharging as soon as it *starts* executing, but I'm pretty sure it starts recharging once it finishes.
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Quote:In the build I've been drawing up for by KM/Inv (brute), the best chain I could find for next-to-no global recharge had Quick Strike doing the plurality of the damage. It was something like 40% of the total.Originally Posted by Werner
I have several toons with an attack chain of this form (based on the numbers I map this pattern to):
12321242
You'll note that attack #2 occurs four times in the chain. I doubt this is typical of the highest DPS chains, but it's typical for some of my mid range chains. -
Quote:This is the algorithm/strategy that I called 'naive' in the above post.Originally Posted by Arcanaville
My near-optimal algorithm is basically this: always use the highest DPA attack that is recharged.
I see your point, though, that it still works if the environment changes, so I guess it's 'naive' not like 'naive set theory' but in the sense of 'best response to unfamiliar conditions'.
And here's the counter example I promised:
Three attacks, call 'em H, J, and K
H: D=50, A=0.5s, R=4s
J: D=20, A=1.5s, R=3s
K: D=10, A=2s, R=3s
where D = damage, A = Arcanatime, and R = recharge time.
Unenhanced, the chain seems to be
H->J->K
with a 0.5s gap before it can be repeated.
DPS = 80/4.5 = 17.77777...
Watch what happens if you enhance the recharge on J, without changing anything else. For the sake of argument, let's enhance it by 100%, even though that's a stupid use of your slots.
Ok, actually that wasn't what I expected. It takes a bit to display cyclic behavior, but ends up on the same chain.
Except that, rather bizarrely, there's a 1 second gap between J and K. This means that the chain now takes 5s, cutting the DPS down by 10%, and leaving the best attack sitting ready in the tray for 10% of the time, waiting to be used.
I'm pretty sure the non-naive version (which considers waiting for high-DPA powers to recharge instead of using slower ones) would not do this.
EDIT: I think just about everyone posted something while I was figuring that out. it may not even be relevant anymore. -
Quote:I will be away from the internet next week, so no, it doesn't.Originally Posted by BackFire
Does this mean I get to be a follower next time
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Critique of The Icari
Arc #458576
by @Unknown Hero
Level 26 Dual pistols/Rad Corruptor (Heroic) +0/x1, no bosses
Mission 1:
The intro dialogue is good but the purple text is hard to see. Also, 'mayorial' should be 'mayoral'.
I like the descriptions of the Icari. Every one of them hints at interesting questions.
The chaining objectives are rather annoying. I get that you're trying to prevent the navbar from getting too cluttered, but having them spawn in one-by-one means I can't use the map to see where I've already looked.
The word 'emits' in the clue has an extra e in it.
So, very good intro story-wise, but the gameplay could use some tweaking.
Mission 2:
Straightforward gameplay; nice plot-twist at the end.
The only potential weak spot I see here is that most of the plot development occurs in the mission-complete dialogue. I don't think that's worth changing.
Mission 3:
For some reason the double-inverted-commas (<--- affected British-ism) at the end of "Wrightman Heights" ended up at the at the beginning of the next line. You should either shorten that line somehow or add a hard-return somewhere.
I like the story development, but again the gameplay is a little odd. I ended up returning to the exit several times to drop off the Icari. I guess I could have just collected them all and gone back once, but I didn't want the Council killing them. Perhaps you should make them unkillable. (Or use 'Rescue Captive' instead 'Escort', but then there wouldn't be as much time to read their descriptions).
Play-balancing and mission design isn't really something I'm good at. I will say that the story has been good so far.
Mission 4:
That much bold+italic is hard to read.
Ok, at first I was all set to complain about all the running around I had to do looking for clues. But then I realized--the writing is good enough that the hunting around just adds suspense.
If you're doing the 'fake plural' the way I think you are, then you have control over the order in which the player finds the clues, right? If that's the case, Mental Maiden's #2 and #3 are out of order. Also It would be nice if the clues (i.e. the ones in the 'clues' window) were in the order they were found in. How did you do it, anyway?
One last thing: In the text for the 'barrel' clue, you used it's as a possessive. Should be its.
Overall, good plot development. I would see what you can do to shorten this mission as much as possible, though, because some players won't like the lack of XP on such a long mission.
Oh, and in the completion dialogue, Typhoon's accent seems to have disappeared. (After playing Mission 5, I see this wasn't a slip-up, but I'm not still not sure where the accent went)
Mission 5:
Very dark. Very, very dark. This is a good thing.
Perhaps since Mental Maiden fell the farthest you should put her at the end? Also she was the toughest fight, so she'd make a good climax. And then the last dialogue in the mission would be 'Wait why are you sad?" or whatever it was.
Gameplay was straightforward. The bosses were tough, but beatable.
and then at the end:
Sequel!
Hook!
(Is there a sequel?)
Overall: As I stated in the original post, I'm mostly here to critique the story. This one doesn't need much. It might increase the emotional impact if you managed to get the player attached to the Icari in the first mission (at least the more sympathetic ones). Maybe make them somewhat less condescending (especially Sentinel). Patriotic Man should stay condescending, as he is never really all that sympathetic.
Also, you might consider adding a bright spot. Maybe one of the Icari can be redeemed. (Irony points if it's Patriotic Man.) The story is good without this, so I don't know whether it would be an improvement or not. But even Wuthering Heights has a happy ending. If you stretch the definition of 'happy ending' to include 'at least Heathcliff didn't manage to completely destroy everyone's lives'.
Regarding gameplay, you implemented some fairly complex mechanics that were occasionally confusing. Someone with more MA experience than me would give better advice on what to do about that. -
Here are the strategies to beat then. (I'm going to quit calling them algorithms, because it makes me sound like a programmer, which I'm not.)
Naive Best Available DPA (NBAD haha)
1. Calculate the DPA of each power. If a power is still recharging, list it as having 0 DPA.
2. Execute the power with the highest DPA. If no powers are recharged, then wait until one recharges.
3. Repeat 1-2.
Best DPA Available (BAD)
1. Calculate the DPA of each power. If a power will finish recharging in t seconds, then list the DPA as D/(A+t). D is the damage the power does, and A is the activation time (taking Arcanatime into account).
2. Execute the power with the highest DPA. If that power is still recharging, then first wait until it is ready.
3. Repeat 1-2.
It should be fairly easy to construct a case where NBAD produces a lower DPS attack chain when extra enhancements are added. I don't know if BAD does this or not. -
Actually I thought of something like that as well. I think I even implemented it, but I was using an excel spreadsheet, and I had to make a lot of fiddly changes to get it to work, so I didn't really trust my results.
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Quote:I was planning to take the build as a given and come up with methods for find optimal or near-optimal attack chains for the given build.Originally Posted by Linea_Alba
The optimal chain will unfortunately vary from build to build.
Ok, I know what recursive means (from number theory), so I have an idea of what you're doing, but I don't know enough about programming theory to actually construct the algorithm based on this information. Any chance you could explain it in more detail? I do pick things up fairly easily.Quote:Originally Posted by Linea_Alba
I used a recursive algorithm sorted by dpa. However, it takes too much CPU time to go more than 2 or 3 levels deep as brute force isn't pretty.
I did something like this, except I used a bottom-up approach (taking the recharge as given). I did forget Arcanatime, though.Quote:Originally Posted by _Pine_
First thing I do is check out the DPA of all the set's powers unenhanced. Then pick 3-4 of those powers and start fidling with putting them in different orders to find the best one. Next, i calculate what each power needs in seconds to recharge (usually add together activation times (keep in mind Arcanatime), then divide the base recharge by the needed recharge to get %recharge needed. (the powers themselves can get around 100% recharge mind you).
I'm not really trying to optimize any particular character (which I can do using methods like what Pine suggested) as I am just interested in the problem. It would be awesome if we could come up with a generalized method for constructing attack chains as a tool for players. They wouldn't have to be provably optimal; instead we could just try for other criteria for 'near-optimality' or even just 'good'. (i.e. does not yield a lower DPS if the build improves lol)
When I say 'we' I mean 'me, and anyone who's interested in helping'. I don't have that much background in math or programming, but I do pick math-related things up fairly quickly, but I said that already. -
I'm posting this in the scrapper forum because it seems like scrappers are most likely to be interested in this sort of thing.
Does anyone know if there is a way to prove that a given attack chain is 'optimal' (i.e. maximizes sustained single-target DPS) for a given amount of +recharge? I mean, it should be fairly easy to show that one is better than another, but it would be cool if a given chain could be actually be proved 'the best'.
Also, are there any algorithms for building near-optimal attack chains? My first guess at one (use the highest DPA attack available) turns out to work horribly: sometimes adding +recharge makes the algorithm switch to a different chain with a lower DPS-sustained.
I don't have much experience with higher math (by 'higher' I mean 'higher than calculus'), but I'd be willing to help design some methods like these, if they don't exist already.
Any thoughts? -
The pic is awesome.
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Your mention of Mal risking the lives of his crew got me thinking. It seems like great leaders always make people a danger to themselves. Mal, Ender Wiggin, the Doctor, Hazel-rah...
Rory mentions this to the Doctor in The Vampires of Venice. And Davros accuses him (in Journey's End) of making his companions into weapons. If you watch the season finales, and Torchwood and SJA, you can see that Davros is right.
But he turns them into a very specific kind of weapon: a terrifying weapon, capable of destroying planets and wiping out entire species. He turns them into Little Doctors.
EDIT: Oh and I like the idea of River as a Night Widow. -
Quote:I see your point.Originally Posted by The_Cheeseman
I also don't think that Mal is a "hero" by any stretch of the imagination. Sure, he risked his life to spread the truth of the Alliance experiment, but I don't see this as a particularly heroic act. First of all, he was responsible for leading an entire armada of reavers onto the Alliance, a fate he himself claims is worse than death. Secondly, I personally think his motivation is less about helping people and more about weakening the Alliance via the exposure of their corruption. I mean, who did he actually help through his actions? He got a bunch of people killed, including some of his own crew, and all that he really accomplished was to create a PR issue for the government. I don't consider that particularly heroic.
My interpretation of Mal's actions is that what got him into all the trouble at the beginning of the movie was trying to help River and Simon, and he had several chances to hand them over, which he didn't take. It's quite a change from his initial attitude toward them (in the pilot, especially). If you look at it this way he seems a lot more heroic.
That we can come up with such different interpretations of the characters is part of what makes the show so awesome. -
Quote:That's why I was more impressed that she mezzed it first.Originally Posted by Twisted Toon
It was a Dalek with severe -regen applied to it, as well as a severe -recov and the vahz plague toss in for good measure. minus the flies, of course.
Oh dear, I just thought of a stupid pun relating to that episode and CoH. I won't say it, but it involves a certain centurion. -
I've decided on which character I'm bringing:
Sundassa (level 9 Natural MA/Nin Stalker--Praetorian) comes from an alternate dimension where dinosaurs apparently survived the K/T boundary. He's a new-style dinosauroid rather like those of Nemo Ramjet or Simon Roy. He is seeking someone he calls 'the Maiden Reforged', but has had no luck so far, and won't any time soon. His quest often brings him to Studio 55, and he's lately become curious about Primal Earth.
Though he's something of a loner (around mammals, anyway) and quite focussed on his quest, he considers himself honor-bound to protect the weak however he can. It wouldn't take much to get him involved in saving the world from total destruction, though he might not always cooperate with others who have similar aims. -
Well, we found *something*. Then Cleos left.
So, as I said earlier, I'll be away from the internet next week. Our current story-arc is wrapping up, and Ska-Core will be in charge for the next one, which will focus on Nanodrive.
I think y'all are still meeting at 8 central/9 eastern next Tuesday, but I don't know where.
The finale to Cleos' story (what he did over my spring break) will be available in an AE arc that I have in the works. It's slightly AU in that the PPD knows more about Offworld and the Council than we've implied. The player is a hero who happens to run into Cleos while investigating the Council.
We can discuss what actually happened in the 'canon version'.
Did anyone get what Archons Sartori and Quarantotto were a reference to? -
Quote:Even more awesome what she does in The Big Bang. How much terrorize protection does a dalek have anyway.Originally Posted by _Zep_
the single target confuse using a kiss is awesome.
To go back to Joss: Did the heroic tip missions for Rogues remind anyone else of all the trouble Spike used to get into? -
Quote:We did. I think the consensus was that the story was so-so (seems like it kind of dragged) and the custom bosses bordered on being too difficult. Of course, me being scatterbrained as a first-time leader probably didn't help.Originally Posted by Bubbawheat
And I left, but I think the rest of the group ran this mission:
#259452 "A Discordant Note" by @Sentinel of Freedom
4 Mish, Heroic -
Ok, I originally posted this on the same thread as the first question I asked, which apparently wasn't the right place because I haven't gotten any replies yet.
I've prepared a draft of a build (difficult to do in Excel - I can't run Mid's on my Mac).
This is mostly to decide which set bonuses and procs/uniques I want--I can choose which enhancements I want from each set as I go.
With the set bonuses I focused on regeneration and defense against S/L and E/NE.
I exemp a lot with this character when reviewing AE arcs, so I'm planning to use relatively low-level enhancements so that I don't lose too much. Hence the lack of purples.
Any feedback? If someone could look over this I'd really appreciate it.
Aemilia Lacera
Science Brute
Kinetic Melee/Invulnerability/Energy Mastery
Pools: Fighting, Speed
Kinetic Melee:
Quick Strike (6 slots): 3 Pulverising Fisticuffs + 3 Pounding Slugfest
Body Blow (4 slots): 4 Kinetic Combat
Smashing Blow (6 slots): 3 Pulverising Fisticuffs + 3 Pounding Slugfest
Power Siphon: (3 slots): 2 Rectified Reticle + 1 Recharge
Taunt (4 slots): 4 Perfect Zinger
Burst (6 slots): 2 Sciroccos Dervish + 4 Eradication
Focused Burst (3 slots): 3 Devastation
Concentrated Strike (6 slots): 4 Kinetic Combat + 1 Recharge + 1 EndRedux
Invulnerability:
Resist Physical Damage (2 slots): Steadfast Protection (Resist/Defense global) + 1 Resist
Temporary Invulnerability (4 slots): 4 Reactive Armor
Dull Pain (6 slots): 2 Numinas Convalescence + 3 Panacea (including unique proc) + 1 Recharge
Unyielding (4 slots): 4 Reactive Armor
Resist Energies (2 slots): 2 Resist
Resist Elements (2 slots): 2 Resist
Invincibility (6 slots): 3 Luck of the Gambler (including global) + 2 Shield Wall + Perfect Zinger (Damage proc)
Tough Hide (2 slots): 2 Luck of the Gambler (including global)
Unstoppable (4 slots): Either 3 Reactive Armor + 1 recharge or 4 Reactive Armor (not sure yet)
Energy Mastery:
Superior Conditioning (2 slots): 2 EndMod (or a set)
Physical Perfection (4 slots): 2 Numinas Convalescence + 2 EndMod (or a set)
Fighting:
Boxing (1 slot): 1 Accuracy (dont plan to use it)
Tough (3 slots): 3 Reactive Armor
Weave (3 slots): 3 Luck of the Gambler (including global)
Speed:
Hasten (2 slots): 2 Recharge
Superspeed (1 slot): 1 Run Speed
Fitness:
Swift (1 slot): 1 Run Speed
Hurdle (1 slot): 1 Jump
Health (5 slots): 2 Numinas Convalescence (including unique) + 2 Miracle (including unique) + Regenerative Tissue Unique
Stamina (2 slots): 2 EndMod (or a set)