Stonedrake

Option 1. You were the one that cracked open that there is something more. Gives a hero a more "active" role. To many dev stories are #2.

flat and staggerd as dugfromthearth says.

for ramped up you can indeed start with greens and end with yellows.

I do believe there is a backloaded option but haven't tested that one yet.

My vote - I'd say villainous.
The operating presumption is the law and it's minions are the white hats. While heros may oft stray outside the law to do the necessary thing, 'busting them out' instead of gathering evidence in their favor would be more villainous.

Now, you mention 'Chaotic', which me think the nuetral setting is best. Let the player decide if they have been doing good or evil.

But yes, ethical twists can be a great deal of fun, done right.

I haven't done many, and the ones I have done are generally lacking in those locations.

I expect an "average" 3-star mission to be equal to your average IP Family mission. Similar costumes, power sets, minimal story, defeat all/boss at end... Not a high level of expectation there.

However the "Family" missions do have a bit of background, the goal stated, and info on the mobs. Thats part of my minimal 3-star expectation.

The inf I want with custom foes, as I will likely not have seen/heard of them before and I would like the Info to give me some hint what they might do. Or some reason they are there. Heck you could make minions named after gradiations in the visual spectrum and set a poem if you read them in order and that would be novel and interesting, if useless. 8p

I've only got the three stories going, but all have text if you feel like reading it.
But those include info o

This is very annoying.
I made a mission intended for a low level troller or defender.
I repeatedly tested with a fresh L1 TA/A entangling arrow and snap shot. I also tried a 33 Dark/Emp, a 50 tank, took friends in it. It was soloable by all 1-50, but not a complete cakewalk.

It has ...or HAD...a LT filling the Boss slot. Now I need to check if thats still valid, and see what happens with the new ranged attacks. I'm guessing they will tear up little miss Bowpeep. Grrr

Was just running Carnie/Malta missions yesterday.

Carnies are ok, I've always liked COT, it's the maps that can be a little much.

Frankly, both Knives and Malta fall in the "very annoying" category for me, but only for specific mobs. The former for the caltrop throwers, the latter for the sappers.

For some reason I tend to encounter knives in blueside caves with low ceilings, so both range and melee suffer.

The caltrops slow greaty, but are so very rarely fatal, which renders them just severly annoying.

Sappers play havok with my end, and have potential to be fatal, but so rarely are, so it all just feels like a cheap trick. They make me slow down and check each group for the @#$ sapper so I can formulate an approach. Once I've found the sapper it's no problem....usually. Which makes sappers simply annoying, not overly threatening (unless there are 3+).

Large numbers of either, particularly persistant, are simply not worth the effort for me beyond a single mission. Using a custom group for the base mob and the stock group for patrol or ambushes is fine.

That's my 2 cents

A number of these sets sound like they be more suited for a 4-5 power pool in addition to the current APPs. The "laser rifle" of the OP might be a bit gimped if it's ST only for a full set, but if you only need 4 variations it could be easier.

I made an arc with custom critters for low level as well.
I think the issue is that even at the lowest settings, custom critters have 2 attacks, and if you take no armor you're taking another attack set. So they get more.

My intent was to provide something for the solo lower level defender/controller who might have a limited number of attacks to be able to do. I tested it with a Level 1 TA/Archer defender. Snap shot had the lowest per attack damage, no defenses or heals.

Turned out a bit rougher than desired, but I could get through. If I rush, I can get killed, at least at Lvl 1. Tried it on my L34 Emp/Dark, and its a breeze.

I wanted the allies to be right in front, but they wind up a bit inside anyhow even on 'front'. I had trouble finding a map set that worked right and let you get to the allies easy enough.

Also wanted an Lt as the boss encounter, wound up having to split him into a second group type to keep the all-minion spawns.

Selecting 'standard' 'hard' 'extreme' various which armor powers are active. Not all the armor sets have mez protection at the same level.