ShawnVW

Arc Name: Cloudy with a Chance of Zombies
Arc ID: 352369

Level Range: 14-33
Morality: Heroic.
Length: Medium (4 missions, one is very brief)
Difficulty: ?
Soloable: Yes
Group Playability: Yes
Enemies: Police, Banished Pantheon offshoot, Prison Guards, Midnight Squad

Summary:
"My name is Monsieur Blanc, and I need your help. Evil men with the power of the storms are about to make war on the city! Only a true hero can do what is required.

"Stop them? No, I'm afraid we have to help them."

Any feedback is welcome, as long as it's fast! The contest deadline is today!

Someone -- I believe it was Heraclea -- on the "Clever Tricks when Making Missions" thread had this great idea: say you want a "contact" in the mission: an NPC that your player walks up to, and then who tells the player some useful information, and leaves.

You can use a Captive, Ally, or friendly Boss for this, but it only makes sense if there are no enemies guarding him. For that you can set the Enemy Difficulty to "Single", and none will appear. When you're finished talking to this guy, I want to trigger the next objective.

But there is a problem: If the NPC has no guards, then he's considered "Completed" as soon as he spawns. He won't be "rescued", which means he'll still be standing there until you meet him, but the next objective will have spawned before you do talk to him.

I need these events to happen in the right order. How do I keep the second objective from being triggered before the player is really done with the NPC?

Thanks. I changed the Escort objectives to Release Captives, which basically performed the same function.

On the map Unique Maps -> Outdoor Maps -> City Map 01, I have four Escorts that are set to "Follow". But when I get to the exit, they won't leave, they just keep following me. Any idea why?

I want to use a Banished Pantheon shaman as an AV. I can't make a custom mob because I don't think most of the costume pieces are available to us. I can't use the existing shamans in "Fight a Boss", becuse they're lieutennants and they need to be Boss level or higher to begin with.

Any ideas?

Let's say that there are four Escort or Captive objectives. One of the NPCs is the leader, and refuses to go until the others are all safe. How can I make it so that one Escort/Captive cannot be rescued until the three others are?

Here's a similar issue: a Escort/Captive is a hostage who won't be brought into public (that is, the objective won't be triggered) until the heroes finish three other clickies/destructibles/defendables. They can do them in any order, but all three must be done. Any ideas how I would do that?

Which of the Destructible Objects is the biggest or tallest? I know that the saluting Hero Statue, if placed outdoors or under a high-enough ceiling, is about twice the height of a typical character. Is there anything bigger or more imposing?

From the first time I heard of Mission Architect, I thought a really cool plot idea would be for the player to be completely outclassed by the mobs (say they're all lieutannants and bosses). Their goal is not to try to beat them all, but to free a captive Hero (that is, a friendly AV) who merrily mops up the bad guys because HE outclasses THEM.

Although I like watching NPCs beat each other up, I realize that MA players may not like this as much. For one, the big AV will kill-steal a lot of their rewards away. Also, if releasing the AV triggers "Mission Completed", then the rest of the fighting is optional and kind of anticlimatic. On the other hand, if the final goal is to mop up the villains, that requires this to be a "Defeat All", and a lot of players don't like those.

Is there a way to keep my premise and still make it fun to play?

What if the end goal is a clickie or destructible object, and the AV only fights defensively? Then you use him to protect you from the millions of mobs, or just give him defensive/crowd-control powers. No kill stealing, and no defeat-all. Is that good?

This thread has been extremely useful, but it's time for someone to update the original post. For instance, you can now reorder objectives by dragging and dropping them up and down, and I believe there's a way to manually set the overall mission levels.

I know about the Unique maps Graveyard 01 and 02. However, the regular game maps also have cemetaries, like the ones in Striga and Dark Astoria. Are there any maps in MA which have these cemetaries in them?

Also, are there any indoor maps that would make good tombs?

The player's character is undercover with a bunch of Arachnos, and they're about to go rob a bank. That means that the security guards are Enemy, and Arachnos are Ally. But what if the PC's job is to betray the Arachnos guys? That means that the Allies have to become Enemies and vice versa. Is there any way to simulate that?

Here's a modified version: the PC clicks a glowing phone and call in the police. Maybe the security guards are still Enemies, but the police have to be Allies to the PC and the guards, and Enemies to Arachnos. Is that possible?

(I'm halfway to a workaround. Calling in the police can also call in a new patrol of Ally guards and Enemy Arachnos, and you can just pretend that they were told of the situation before they got there. This still doesn't solve the problem of the original guards who are still shooting you.)

I'm writing a mission that revolves around the giant statue of Talos in Talos Island. Ideally, I'd like that statue to be a map, but I doubt that's even possible.

Are there any MA maps set in Talos Island in which the statue is at least visible in the near distance? Failing that, is there any way to display a miniature statue or picture of Talos somewhere, so that the characters can at least see the subject of all the drama?

[QUOTE ]
Or you can make them as custom mobs.
[/ QUOTE ]
And give them the Mastermind powerset "Necromancy" so they can summon others.

There’s a hilarious mish called “The Pickup-Group from Heck” or something. One of the allies, when rescued, says “Phone’s ringing. AFK.” Then the character just stands there, ignoring all of the fighting, for some period of time, and then starts following you. Its’ as if there was an emote called “Stand still for 90 seconds”. Anyone know how he accomplished this?

I wonder how this affects what I was trying to do -- which is basically the opposite of the OP's issue.

I want my NPC to NOT summon her minions when she's rescued, but to wait until she betrays the user. (The user is supposed to be surprised that this isn't just a little old lady). I didn't want to spend a whole afternoon testing, like the OP, but the Mastermind may or may not summon when rescued, and it may have to do with the number of friendly NPCs and whether she's set to Aggressive or Passive. Any suggestions?

Plan B is, instead of using the Mastermind powers, make an Ambush that triggers when she betrays the user. Is that possible?

Can we see the original costumes, and learn the powers of, some of the heroes we only know as statues, like Dauntless, Casseopeia, M-1, Wayland, and that really tall guy in the middle of Steel Canyon, whatever his name is?

I'm working on an MA arc about old heroes. How can I find out the powers of the heroes commerated by giant statues, such as M-1, Wayland, and Dauntless? I know Galaxy Girl was a Kinetic/something.

Also, who is that big guy saluting in the middle of Steel Canyon?

If I could find pictures of these guys in costume, that would be cool too.

I want to play a Brute in my new static group. I want to play like a Tanker. I want to run ahead of everyone and grab aggro.

What're the best powersets for something like this?

My friend lives about 2 miles from me. We both use AT&T U-Verse (cable) with a 2WIRE wireless router.

I'm using two laptops at my house, and both give me these two problems. He logged in to my account on his own computer (which is more powerful than either of mine) at his house, and had no problem.

I just tried my laptop on his network, and as I expected, it worked fine. The problem is with my network.

Any ideas?