Samuel_Tow

I disagree. Having a consistent storyline that evolves and makes sense is far superior to unrelated episodic tales that are never spoken of again once they are over. This has been my gripe with television shows for years now, and I do not want to bring that in this game.

Furthermore, creating brand new maps and enemy factions for one single TF sounds like a colossal waste of resources, and to be honest, I don't see how "going into space" has anything more to do with super heroes than going back in time. Considering half of Marvel's heroes are either Norse gods or Greek holdovers, I don't see the point.

And I would caution you against bringing up underwater combat. This will not happen, for the simple reason that there are far too many things we do in this game that make no sense in water. And, no this doesn't get a "miracle excuse." To quote the Spoony One: "It's be like me inventing a sport where people light themselves on fire and play tennis in a cube made of bees in outer space. I don't care how good an athlete you are, it ain't happening!"

I have to wonder - can't the Mission Teleporter take you there?

You make a very good argument there, Cipher. Morality missions of all kinds feel more meta-game than they feel like an integral part of the storyline. They're a vessel for switching sides, so they deliberately put you in a position where switching sides is possible. They have practical consequences, which forces morality to take a back seat to pragmatism.

You know which moral choice was the hardest for me? Whether to knock out Paolo Marino and force him to be with his family or whether to respect his wish to be an idiot and stay with the PPD despite hating them. This had no practical consequences, so I never had to consider what I stood to gain or what I stood to lose. I only had to consider what was right and what was wrong to do. To top it all off, it had moral consequences, because afterward, the Syndicate Suit I was fighting taunted me about my decision, and about how the Resistance are hypocrites because we would force people to be free against their will. That bothered me, because it only then sunk in how questionable my morality was.

I honestly prefer these kinds of non-meaningful morality choices where I don't have to worry about politics and metagame.

You know, what... I just figured it out, at least in part. How is it that choices are always so hard and ambiguous on BOTH sides of the fence? Well, as I see it, because they are intentionally crossed. Resistance moral choices are designed such that they favour the Loyalists more while Loyalist moral choices are slated such that they favour the Resistance. Let me explain:

The final moral choice in the Resistance comes courtesy of Calvin Scott - do we blow up people's only source of fresh water to "free their minds" and let them "choke on dead air and foul water," as Muro would put it, or do we wait and find an alternate solution? If I want to stay with the resistance, then I have to kill people by taking away their drinking water. In this case, the Loyalist option sounds a lot more appealing.

The final moral choice with the Loyalists comes courtesy of Interrogator Kang - do I reveal the Emperor's plan to slaughter Primal Earth to the people, thus instigating open revolt, or do I keep it quiet and deal with it myself? If I want to stay with the Loyalists, I need to hide this horror from the people, and for what? To avoid upsetting the peace? To spite the Resistance? In this case, the Resistance option sounds a lot more appealing.

Clever, writers, very clever! To paint the moral ambiguity of Praetoria and make us less likely to entrench ourselves on just one side, you made each side's moral choices biassed towards the OTHER side, such that every time we feel like we are where we belong, the moral choice suggests the opposite. It's not how I would have handled it, as I'd probably have played it straight all the way, but that kind of underhandedness really does work. What do you know!

You know, I was just going to come here and rant about Praetor Tillman and what the hell she was doing in the Responsibility arcs when she's clearly evil and clearly coocoo for cocopuffs. I just about did, but I kept telling myself "Dude! Chill! See this arc through to the end, and maybe it won't be so bad. Remember - you're still sore from the last time your head exploded!" And sure enough, right at the very end, what I would have otherwise described as one of the most vile arcs I've done in the game in quite some time turned right round right round and still let me come out of it clean.

To go on with the spoilers, Tillman's entire arc revolves around finding and capturing Vanessa DeVore. Well, that and Tillman being guano crazy. It was very clear to me that what I was doing had very little to do with my responsibility to Praetoria and much more to do with blindly following the orders of an obvious complete monster. I mean, seriously. This is Kelly Uqua levels of obvious. I'm not sure if this would be appropriate for the Power tree, either. It's not about responsibility, it's not about power... To be honest, it's the same brand of railroading servitude that turns most people off Arachnos. Mother says jump, I ask how high. No, thank you.

However - and this is what blew my mind - right at the very end of the arc, Vanessa, defeated and surrendering, makes a compassionate plea with me to let her leave. And unlike Beholder and the other psychics who were utterly pathetic, and not a little hateful, Vanessa manages to do hers with dignity, honour and, most of all, respect. And as I read through it, it killed me that I would have to bring her into "Mother's" care. Only... It turns out I didn't have to. "So, what, I should let you go?" says my line in the dialogue, and I'm thinking it's just creative writing, but no! Vanessa says "Yeah, you should." And I say "Yeah, I should. Go." And I go O.o

You know what the best part of it all was? This was NOT a morality mission, and it didn't change my alignment. I didn't have to abandon the Loyalists, I didn't have to join the resistance, I didn't have to flip the game on its head. For the first time in... Well, the ENTIRE Praetorian storyline, I was finally given a choice that I felt like I made on my own. I wasn't facing the pressure from my alignment, I wasn't facing the consequences of doing the "wrong" thing. It was just a choice, for me to make.

They say "character is what you are in the dark," and this could not have been more true here. It's interesting how much more... Personal a difficult choice can become when neither option has consequences. It is in those times that we are free to choose based on what we feel and what we believe, rather than based on what "must" be done. These are the kinds of choices I want to have more of.

Ironically, the entire alignment system and the morality missions which come with it are, in my opinion, their own greatest enemy. We can never have a grey-and-grey morality as long as there is an omniscient narrator always judging our actions after the fact, anyway. As long as we are hamstrung by consequences, our choices will always be difficult, but they will never be as satisfying. In my opinion, questions of morality need to be asked in a vacuum, determining people's personality and beliefs, rather than their ability to prioritise.

In a sense, I'm going to dread the ACTUAL moral choices in the future, the ones that matter, because those are simply never as much fun to go through. In the meantime, I will console myself with revelling in those other moral choices where it is not pragmatism, but rather ACTUAL MORALITY that decides.

While I want to join the festivities of glee and joy, I want to go in another direction. I enjoy content and combat in this game a lot, but for me the driving force behind my enthusiasm has always been characters. If I can make a good character with a nice costume, appropriate powers and a cool name, that can last me through a lot of content, be it new or old, good or bad.

Praetoria, the new costumes, the new powersets and the act of AT proliferation gave me the excuse to create four brand new characters, each with his or her own unique storyline and each with is or her own cool costume. What I did was the following:

I was finally able to make the Axe/Shield hero who is not a Tanker a reality via the medium of Brute. That's one new character.

I was finally able to put into practice a recent concept that I just didn't have convincing powersets to use for, via the medium of Kinetic Melee. That's two.

I came up with a brand new character inspired in whole by the Clockwork costume pieces combined with an old secondary helmet I've used for another character. That's three.

I made a brand new character based on a random joke by someone in a global channel somewhere and put that into practice via the medium of Clockwork and Alpha costume pieces. That's four.

And even now I'm entertaining the thought of bringing in a very old character I never actually made into the game, just because I can. And if I do, I'll have to make at least two or three more with him, being that he's a leader.

I agree that this is a problem, and it doesn't need to be one.

At this point in time, I dare say it's time we dropped the pretence of "correct" stores altogether. Have all stores buy all enhancements at their "high" prices and be done with it. That's what they do with Inventions, anyway. Save us all a trip and spare us all from being ripped off for stupid reasons.

Yeah, City of Villains could really benefit from a trace through its story arcs to pit pro-Arachnos and anti-Arachnos decisions in more places. I'm not sure if I'd want to specifically tie that to the Villain and Rogue metres, as those are more abstract than "Are you with Lord Recluse or not?" but I'd definitely look to add a "spite Arachnos anyway" option wherever plausible.

As far as how to do Moral Choices, here's what I had in mind with the missions I mentioned before:

With Amanda Vines, instead of having her offer you money the mission before, have her do it at the end of the last mission. Have the mission objective be "destroy the generators" with the last one being in the basement of the building. However, before you can take the stairs down, Amanda meets you and offers you money if you just walk away. If you accept, mission ends, you get full credit and you get Amanda's souvenir. If you decline, she disappears, you take the stairs down, break the generator, mission ends with full credit and you get Brass' souvenir.

With Miss Francine, instead of just having another hostage to "kidnap," have the player speak with her. She makes a case, makes a passionate plea, then you get a choice. If you choose to take her in, she becomes an escort and you have to fight through waves of Freakshow to escape. If you choose to let her go, she disappears and you're beset by waves of Arachnos soldiers looking for her. Maybe even have her be escortable either way, only in one case you turn her in and in another case you set her free.

With the Council Spy, use the mechanic where you beat someone enough and then he talks. Instead of the Spymaster making the offer for money, have the Spy himself make the offer. You beat him to about half health, he turns blue and wants to speak with you. Then he makes you an offer - let him go, at which point he disappears and you're beset by Arachnos soldiers because you're an intruder, or fight him some more, at which point you're beset by Council soldiers looking to extract him.

Oh, and before I forget, the end of Kelly Uqua's arc. Instead of it being a simple fight against a Ballista where success or failure determines the outcome, have it act like the Spymaster mission I described. You fight the Ballista, he's almost dead and at 10-20% health he goes down and you can speak with him. He tries to tell you that Kelly is a Rikti spy and gives you a choice between... Actually I don't know. Getting paid off and staying true to Uqua? I don't know. But he offers you a choice where you can either slap him around the remaining 10-20%, or you can let him finish the upload.

None of that has to affect a meter or give points. Just like the Clone mission where you can save a clone or not, then rob a bank or not, it doesn't have to have mechanical consequences. It's enough that it feels like a choice.

"Morality missions" as a general thing already exist, and I can name at least a few off the top of my head:

Destroy Amanda Vines' generators to prevent the truth from getting out, or let the people know and take her money.

Recapture Miss Francine and hand her off to Arachnos or let her go and punch Westin in the face.

Stop the Council Spy and earn "brownie points with the Spiders," or let him go to spite Mr. Mary Sue.

Yes, all of those are villainous, but all of those exist and make use of the horribly assy "let the mission fail" mechanic which isn't really a question of choice but a question of kludge. I would love to see these missions redone with actual moral choices, rather than play-pretend ones.

HOWEVER, and this is a big thing, I would like to see morality missions which DO NOT SWAP YOUR ALIGNMENT. I really enjoy the morality missions in Going Rogue, but the one thing that spoils them for me is that the choices are weighted. Not only do I have to consider which alignment would look to be "better" to my character, but I must also consider which faction I want to keep him as, which oftentimes makes my choices for me. Let me make Morality choices as they come without instantly swapping my alignment. If need be, add those up to my hero or villain alignment points.

In fact... You know what I'd have liked to see in Praetoria? The same Resistance/Loyalist metres as we get for Hero, Vigilante, Rogue and Villain, where we don't back-and-forth instantly, but are allowed to make choices in favour of one or the other and swap sides only when we make too many of them.

The distinction between Wardens and Crusaders is actually what the moral choice is, when I stop to think about it. Saving Cleo is an act of compassion, showing that I believe some Resistance members may be OK and trying to show them that some Loyalists aren't all that bad, in return. Unfortunately, this is accomplished by becoming a member of the resistance. Killing Cleo, by comparison, is an act of conviction, demonstrating that I do not believe anyone in the Resistance is worth saving and that Loyalists and Resistance can never work together. The hardline approach, as it were.

And you have a point - I'm mixing in a bit too much of my own beliefs here. As a player, and especially one who has been through the Warden arcs, I'm sympathetic to the Resistance, so I'm much more inclined to like them and make compromises for them. My character, however, would have no reason to feel that way. She just saw the resistance try to blow up a hospital practically out of spite, and now she's faced with a Resistance mole that's saying "Trust me!" This turns into a very classic animated movie scenario where a character who is truly sympathetic is exposed to be a traitor and is no longer trusted. Hell, that's basically half the plot to Avatar, only Jake Sully didn't get murdered in cold blood... Well, just about, anyway.

I'll probably have to give the greater struggle of freedom vs. safety more thought before I delve any deeper into this, because I suspect that's where the key to the answer lies. It's easy to sympathise with the Resistance's desire to free people's minds no matter the cost, but having run through the Wardens' arc all the way through and seen how much actual practical damage this does to the innocents they try to protect... Let's just say there's food for thought here.

To drop a few more spoilers, things I've done for the Resistance include disabling the Seer network almost entirely by freeing the Seers and destroying people's only source of drinking water because it was being spiked with "docility" chemicals. In both cases, this does SIGNIFICANT harm to people for the sake of freeing their minds, and one has to wonder if simply tearing the world down and plunging people into a dark age really is the superior decision. After all, Cole didn't build this police state for no reason. He built it because desperate times called for desperate measures. There IS something to lose by discarding it.

But then, that's just a sign that the writers did a good job. I don't have an easy answer, and that's quite impressive, coming from someone as introspective as me.

All I'm going to say on the subject is: I told you so. You know who you are.