dragonslay

The Calling of the Cult 64859
Rating 2 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 3.

The Calling of the Cult is a storydriven arc about a group of creatures that have existed for milennia and are now starting to reappear. The arc was frustrating at times and great at other times. The contact dialogue feels like it was written by two different people one a good writer and another not so good. Oddly this is the way the entire arc felt. Some of the custom critters look great and others are just plain bad. The in mish dialogue as well, alternates between great and horrible from moment to moment.

Mission 1 Arachnos are fun to kill. I like the cave.
Mission 2 CoT, boss fun to kill.
Mission 3 Big beautiful cave, Whisperer fun to kill.
Mission 4 EB Snake very cool. Best mish in the arc.
Mission 5 difficult map to navigate. The Shadow Lurker was very cool looking and very tough to kill.

The current version of The Calling of the Cult feels like a rough draft to me. At times I thought I was reading some filler text that the writer was later going to replace with the correct text.

To the author:
Some things I liked. The contact was good. The opening dialogue by the contact was quite good. I was pysched that this was going to be a good arc. In mish one I liked the fact that the guards call for backup when i get near the egg. Mish three was a good map. I liked the vision from the contact going into mish 4. The cultist, the demon crawler and the shadow lurker looked good. Snake EB battle in mish four was great.

Some things I did not like. The contact dialogue gets too verbose near the middle/end. I wanted him to get to the point already. There were a few too many ssss in his dialogue. I got the idea and I heard the ssss in my mind everytime I read his text from the opening statement. At the middle/end you need to remove some of those ssss because they just started to get distracting and I didn't want to read anything he had to say. The in mish dialogue generally quite good, but at times it is quite bad. Arachnos boss in mish one says "I haven't been rattled like that since high school." Yikes that's bad, moreover it was completely out of place when considering all the other dialogue in the arc. The story is crystal clear at times and other times it is very fuzzy, at the end I am supposed to be dead so they can resurrect Xaos or am I supposed to be alive for that? The story is a little muddled. I didn't like the garbled, ancient language the Shadow EB was saying, that was silly to me. Then suddenly he speaks perfect english. Overall I liked the maps a lot however, that last map sucks. I know what you were trying to do thematically, but honestly that map is not fun to navigate at all. Worse still you cannot see those cool costumes until you are standing ontop of the guy. C.C.s enlightened and supplicant need a makeover IMO.

Why not five stars? Muddled storyline. No flow. Contact too longwinded. Bad map choice mish 5. A couple of the C.C.s look bad.

The Revenge of Dr. Marcovici 161797
Rating 5 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 3.

The Revenge of Dr. Marcovici is a great arc. It is very well written. The custom critters look good and are tough. The contact is likeable and his dialogue is excellent. If not for the fact that you never actually meet Dr. Marcovici this should be a devs choice.

Mission 1 rescue guys, find a clue, kill some Freakshow.
Mission 2 Custom critters look good (not great) and are fun to kill. Nice attention to details with the c.c.s, similar clothing style yet all different. Digger has a shovel, lumberjack has an axe, etc.
Mission 3 I loved the tie in to me in the storyline here. 5 bombs, quick simple. why is this mish even here?
Mission 4 Ah that's why. Nice. Very nice. I hate Dr. Marcovici, never even met him and i hate him. How did I know Marcovici wouldn't be here.

The Revenge of Dr. Marcovici deserves five stars because the story is so good I was eager to go back in and look for this [censored] guy. The missions are quick and straightforward, but that's not what makes them great. They are great because they are all quick and straightforward, the flow, tempo, pace whatever you want to call it is maintained perfectly. A rare and wonderful thing. The c.c.s are cool to look at and are tough and fun to kill. Most of all the storyline grabs you from mish one and holds you throughout.

Great job!

The Revenge of Dr. Marcovici ends in a cliffhanger. You must decide between two life choices. I decided to go after the hostages because that's the sort of hero I am. So:

Dr Marcovici H 161800
Rating 4 Stars

The continuation of the arc maintains all the great things from the first part. The story is good. The pace is quick and straightforward and most of all I want to kill this guy already.
I enter each mish eager to finally come face to face with evil.

Mission 1 rescue heroes, Kung fu and Rad-Rad look great.
Mission 2 Rescue hero.
Mission 3 the sewers, nice unexpected surprise. Dr. Marcovici EB tough and I couldn't wait for him to die. He asked me why I killed his brothers? Because they were evil, just like him.

Very good continuation. Not quite as good as the first part.

Why not five stars? This H edition needs some slight twist or surprise in the storyline. Either or both Kung fu and/or Rad-Rad should fight, they look way too good not to see them in action. Mish 1 (or mish 2) needed a boss guarding the hostages.

Good job!

The whole story overall awesome. Everyone should play this.

The Lost Choir: Chapter one Old Testament 123675
Rating 2 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 3.

The Lost Choir chapter one is a long storydriven arc that had me fighting stock CoX enemies and some custom critters. The story is ok. The custom critters look very good for the most part and are fun to kill. The in mish dialogue tends to be a little odd.

Mission 1 five rescuees. Simple fast fun.
Mission 2 Ritki boss is fun to kill. Ritki are always fun to kill.
Mission 3 EB was very cool looking.
Mission 4 c.c.s here not very interesting and have odd dialogue.
Mission 5 One very tough very cool looking EB.

The Lost Choir chapter one has very good looking c.c.s. The c.c.s are fun to kill. However, the arc suffers from terrible flow problems. The first and second mish were very quick, the third mish was very slow because I had to run around a big map looking for the EB that spawns after the objectives are fulfilled, the fourth mish was a little slow as well as there is some searching. Then the last mish was another quick one.
It is a storydriven arc, but I never got into it. I honestly didn't care if I helped these people or not. I never felt like I had any reason to help them. There are a lot of twists and turns, the guy I kill in mish 2 is my ally in mish 3, etc. etc. It never grabbed me.

Why not five stars? No flow. Weak story. In mish dialogue at times poor.

[ QUOTE ]
Thanks for reviewing my arc. I appreciate the honesty and feedback.

I was expecting a 3 star maybe a 4 star at best. It's nice to think with some polishing it might be a 5 star. Although 75% of the 5 star missions in the MA (I have tried) I think aren't even worth 2 stars. But we each have our own tastes.

I've only played a few Task Forces, so I can't comment too much on their length or content, although I would say my arc is far smaller than the ones I have played.

I'm guessing you don't like large maps? Or long missions? (I like the longer missions personally and a variety of enemies... I don't like the speed run type of mission) . . .


[/ QUOTE ]

You are confusing what I would consider to be great and five stars. Five stars does not mean it is the greatest story arc in all of CoX.

The five star rating system is very limiting. It is a little too basic for me. I certainly do NOT want a complicated rating system, however, I feel 1-10 would have been better. I hope the 5 Stars system is never changed, because it has set a strong tone. When I start a review I start with a clean slate and the arc "has the potential to be five stars" attitude.

Five stars as I interprete it (and I believe this is the way Devs choice works as well, because I have run many of them and most are a three or four, only rarely a five) is an above average story, with good and new looking custom critters that work correctly mechanically, in story appropriate maps, that are fun to play and long.

Lets break that down into a simple form to read. An above average story is purely subjective IMO. There is a very popular Devs Choice arc (name eludes me) about the Phantom of the Opera, that is very well rated. I loved that arc. I read about ten percent of those quotes from the play. I just loved the look of those custom critters. Most of the story and in mish dialogue, tldr. When I review I make a point of reading every single thing. A lot of the time, its not worth reading. However, when I review, if the story is interesting and makes me WANT to do the next mish, it could be about pink ponies and it will still retain the "potential for five stars".

Good and new looking custom critters. I am sure there are Devs Choice arcs without c.c.s however atm I cannot think of any. However, I have found that having c.c.s dramatically helps in pursuit of Devs Choice. More importantly they have to work correctly. When the devs make EBs and AVs for PVE they have a different specs than what we give our EBs and AVs. I have knocked down countless EBs in MA with Air Superiority. AS is a great power, but it doesn't tickle EBs in PVE, it certainly does not make them 360 like a childs toy. So have c.c.s that mechanically work the way they are intended is important.

The maps have to fit the storyline. It's basic, if you see a bunch of tech ops in a graveyard there better be some good writing about who kidnapped them and which highway they used to get them there.

Fun to play. Well there cannot be anything more subjective. However, I am very brave and I will say what is fun for me, is fun for the Devs. Challenging enemies, that are not ridiculously difficult to defeat, that rarely send me to the hospital, but that will send me to the hospital quick if I play my powerset poorly.

Finally I'll throw long into Devs Choice, but NOT for me. I only say long because every Devs choice i've seen has been a long or very long arc. I think there is one (total) medium (or less) arc and I ran it and that thing was the longest three MA mishes I've ever done. For my reviews any length has the "potential for five stars", even one mish arcs. Although, honestly, for a one mish arc to get five its going to have to reinvent the wheel.

You believe I dont like longer arcs. You are correct, when I am playing for pleasure, when I'm reviewing, I have no bias for length.

I work in the entertainment industry, on the production side. I consume TV and Film media 40 hours a week as my occupation and then many more hours a week for personal pleasure. I grew up on movies and moviemaking. I watched Roger and Ebert review films for years and read their books as well. What I noticed, even as a teenager, is that they had to review films that they themselves would never have seen for pleasure. They reviewed countless films that were not their "style" of film. However, they gave the film a clean slate when they stepped into the theatre. Film critics never write a review that starts "I hated Batman, because I love musicals." or "I hated Mama Mia, because I love blood and guts." I review MA in the same way.

I do not rate arcs down for having larger maps or longer missions. I rate arcs down for having larger maps without a good reason for it to be so large. I rate arcs down for having longer missions when there is no good reason why I need to do so much.

A Week in the Life of a Villian could have been a stronger arc if it contained only what is necessary and not everything that is nice to have. It is nice to have patrols of several diff enemy groups at a convention, but not necessary. Maybe the carnies are on patrol duty, Freakshow get the day off. It is not necessary to have four wall safes. The wall safes are actually quite deep and one can hold four clues. It is not necessary to have all sixteen quads still alive for the ritual, maybe the cauldron ate eight already. It is not necessary to have all five Mages on the map at once, a couple could have gotten stuck in traffic. It is nice to have thoroughness, but with thoroughness you must be prepared for the downside. Too long, too boring and mostly too frustrating. Players do not like mishes with multiple objectives. Five Mages in the final mish is fine, if the others were quicker, or sixteen rescuees are fine if all the other mishes are quicker, well maybe a dozen, sixteen is sixteen no matter how you cut it. Four wall safes? That's just silly and unnecessary to me, but as you said about 'personal tastes'. You love a movie that the critics hated, sometimes.

The New Freaks in Town pt. 1 72852
Rating 2 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 3.

The New Freaks in Town pt.1 is a fast simple arc intended to introduce a new enemy in Paragon. A rival group to take out the Freakshow. The custom enemies look good and are challenging in groups. However, the storyline is not engaging and the missions are lacking excitement.

Mission 1 Custom critters look ok, have interesting powers and I liked the fact that the Freakshow still wanted to kill me even I helped them.
Mission 2 Three glowies, big map, very dull.
Mission 3 Two cool EBs, but they weren't fighting each other.

The New Freaks in Town pt 1 tries to be good by playing it straight and simple, however, the story never gets off the ground and the missions lack excitement, twists, surprises and pretty much anything except good looking c.c.s

Why not five stars? Low on interest, low on story.

nuff said

A Madness of Blades 98770
Rating 4 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM diff 3.

A Madness of Blades is a short fast and fun arc. Overall I enjoyed running it very much. I actually wished it had been longer, a rare and wonderful thing. The story is good. The custom critters look good and are fun to kill. The maps are all appropriate to the storyline.

Mission 1 Boss Blades looks great. He is fun to kill.
Mission 2 Find the Gem, defeat Bloody. Another fun Boss battle.
Mission 3 EB was fun to kill.

Overall A Madness of Blades is a good arc. It can be run at most levels as it is not that tough. There is on tough EB at the end, but you get ally support.

Why not five stars? I never got engrossed in the story completely. Custom critters looked good, but not "WOW".

Good job!

[ QUOTE ]
Interesting.

You want to field this one, Dragonslay?

[/ QUOTE ]

Gladly.
What am I fielding?

A Week in the Life of a Villain 153720
Rating 3 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM diff 3.

A Week in the life of a Villain is an ambitious arc that wants to be a mini-TF, but instead just becomes an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink story. In fact, there probably is a kitchen sink in there. The arc is very long, in every aspect, big maps, numerous objectives per mission and a plethora of stock CoX enemy groups, plus a couple of custom critters as well. The real story behind the contacts' motives is actually a very good story, but by the time it gets going you find yourself wishing you were getting towards the end.

Mission 1 Nemesis, carnies, custom bunnies and many objectives gives you the mini-Tf feel from the start. EBs with Elude suck big time, but I guess thats the point. Oh yea did I mention the Freakshow.
Mission 2 Council wolves are fun to kill, even when there are scores and scores of them. Are we getting close to the end?
Mission 3 Banished Pantheon another fun enemy to kill, Ally makes life faster, but sixteen rescuees?? Sixteen !! That's too many for me sorry, even in a real TF with a large team, I didnt like that. Yes, the talking soup bowl was cute.
Mission 4 now the story gets good. I can understand the contact would hold out on me a little with such a huge bombshell, but honestly if this hadn't been a review I would have never lasted this long and never received this beautiful twist in the story. Malta, lots of Malta, map too big for my taste, worse still you cannot hear those wall glowies on that map with all that ambient hum, i missed the first (of four) and wasted about twenty minutes running around looking for it. My polite response, Not good.
Mission 5 CoT, can't have a TF without them no? Again CoT another fun enemy to kill. Map way too big for a mish five and too many bosses to kill. Akarist EB battle was epic, ally was necessary (that Akarist dude is nasty).

I had a love hate relationship with this arc. I know it is designed for teams, it is not meant to be soloed. It is long and hard, OK, but what makes it so long is the ridiculous number of patrols, unnecessary objectives, and running around looking for stuff. That stuff is not moving the storyline ahead. The true motives and the true nature of the contact is lost in the hours of fighting, which is really sad, because I really liked what the contact turned out to be. This arc has the potential to be a four or even a five star arc, if it is dramatically scalled down in scope. Not the necessary stuff, just all the 'ok we need that, so multiply it by FOUR!'.

Overall great CoX enemies to kill. Decent looking custom critters. Great behind the scenes storyline. Problem is A Week in the Life of a Villain wants to do it ALL.

Why not five stars? Too many objectives. Too many rescues. Too many different enemy groups. Huge maps that take forever to navigate.

Positrons Task Force The Remix 1945
Rating 4 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Ice/Ice Blaster diff 3.

This comedic arc is both fun and fast. The missions are very easy and meant only to entertain your funny bone. A team can run this and get some laughs while the team leader recruits more members to do other arcs.

Mission 1 click the glowie.
Mission 2 get the radioactive materials.
Mission 3 rescue person, kill guys.
Mission 4 retrieve three wands.
Mission 5 destroy the juice.

Overall fun, fast and repeatable. Honestly it really takes only 15 minutes.

Why not five stars? I think you can fit a couple more jokes in there somewhere.

Good job!

Ashes: The Mystery of the Rudatio Corp 135774
Rating 4 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM Tanker diff 3.

This is a very good arc. I had a lot of fun running it. The story is ok, it is well written and feels like a stock CoX arc. The custom critters look very good and are fun to kill. It is five missions long, but the arc goes quickly since the first two mishes are very fast. I was recruited by a gang member to investigate another gangs relationship with a new enemy in town.

Mission 1 kill some gang members, rescue guy. Good map.
Mission 2 rescue doctor.
Mission 3 I am having a hard time believing that map is in Boomtown, it is possible sure, but it just didnt feel right. Lillith fun to kill.
Mission 4 good map for story, nice little twist in the story, Ally more of an aggro magnetic, than helpful.
Mission 5 The Auditor EB was a little disappointing. All the custom critters looked so good until this guy, he is very bland looking. He was fun to kill.

Ashes: the Mystery of the Rudatio Corp is a solid arc. The story is easy to follow. The missions are fast and simple. The custom critters look very good.

Why not five stars? This is arc feels very stock CoX. A couple of the maps seemed out of place. Final EB doesnt look as good as the rest of the CCs. Ally needed to be in mish 5, more than mish 4. Storywise ally must be in mish 4, but fighting wise he is unnecessary in mish 4 and would have been useful in mish 5.

Good job!

Entrusted with the Other Secret 120462
Rating 3 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 3.

Overall this was a well written, somewhat long, story driven arc that lacks the excitement one expects while playing CoX. One of the Ouroboros Menders has enlisted me to fix a time stream. The story is quite interesting and honestly it made my head hurt trying to keep up with all the twists and turns one encounters while changing the past. The ally was cool and helpful. However the enemies are somewhat dull and annoying.

Mission 1 fix the time stream. Clubbor and Time Arrow both looked good, but were a little too verbose for me. What they had to say was sometimes amusing, but other times was just too corny. Then kill Time shift with ally help.
Mission 2 contact is a real smart aleck, I loved her dialogue. In mish enemy dialogue ok, but a little too much of it. Kill Time shift EB. Again.
Mission 3 rescue ally, kill 5th column guys, etc.
Mission 4 go back to map (and time) from mish one and note the changes, click some glowies, kill Time shift again, honestly Im getting sick of seeing the guy.
Mission 5 back to the 5th column map in mish three and hack the computer to restore the time stream to the way we know it.

Entrusted with the Other Secret is a very ambitious arc in that it attempts to explain how the Council won out over the 5th Column in history as we know it. In other time streams the 5th column persisted. The potential for five stars and even devs choice for this arc, is there, however, the uninteresting custom critters and the repeated battle against a bland looking EB keep it quite dull. There are also end drain critters that start to just get annoying. It was nice to see Merc MMs, but their costumes are all just too similiar for my taste.

Why not five stars? Dull custom critters. Annoying end drain. Repeated EB battle not subtly changed to stay fresh.

The Brass Reaver Part 1 16952
Rating 4 Stars

character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 3.

Overall this is a very well written storydriven arc. The EBs are very tough and this is intended for teams. The custom critters look great and they seem to naturally blend in with the stock CoX enemies. Carnies and Nemesis are always fun to fight and the custom enemies compliment them well.

Mission 1 Fake Reaver looked great, one of the best custom critters i have seen to date. He is what i have been fearing from day one a /EM with BU and Energy Transfer. This guy could one shot many of my other characters. This was an epic battle.
Mission 2 fight Fake Reaver again.
Mission 3 Dark Ring mistress dies.
Mission 4 Contact tells me i must enter Reaver's mind, that was a great twist in the storyline. The map compliments the story well. Two allies possibly too much help.
Mission 5 Kill 3 Reaver manager EBs with double ally help.

This is definitely a well written, high action arc. It is a little too long for my taste, probably intended to be a mini-TF; my incentive to continually risk my life wanes.

Why not five stars? I wanted a little more variety in the big boss battle, you do fight the same guy five times. I wanted a few more custom critters. I felt there was too much ally help mish 4 and 5. Final dialogue by contact a little discouraging, even insulting, if that is supposed to "hook" me to play the next part, it backfired.

Good job!

Flatline 94250
Rating 3 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Invul/EM tanker diff 1.
I appologize to the author for the low diff setting, I forgot I was doing a tf earlier, but the LTs were orange anyway, so not too soft.

This is a quick one mish story about what happens when a hero dies and doesn't go straight to the hosp. The in mish dialogue was good and helpful to the story. The map was good also for the story. There are several hostages and destructable objects. Overall it was good.

Mission 1 go in kill the ghosts, save the doctor and hostages, destroy some machines, restore proper-go-to-hospital technology.

This is a three star mish. It is fun and the story is good.

Why not five stars? It really needs another mish. One mish to identify the problem and a second to fix it. I had no emotional attachment to it since its just one mish. Honestly I didnt really care if I finished it or not.

Do Onto Others 120452
Rating 5 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM diff 3.

This is a great arc. The contact is interesting, the dialogue is good. The custom critters looked great and they were fun to kill. The in mish dialogue was very good. The story was simple and straightforward. Even all the little details were good. This arc was introduced to me by a stranger who told me there were three groups out to kill me; the thornies, the electrics and the metallics. I had to go in and stop them before they take me out.

Mission 1 custom critters Thornies look good and are tough to kill. Meso thorny EB was very tough but he died eventually.
Mission 2 custom critters Electrics at the bank looked great and were fun to kill. EB fun to kill and no slouch, however, it should be noted she had no knockback resist and my bruiser tossed her all around the room like a ragdoll, she didnt look so EBish. I learn the contact is deceiving me in some way.
Mission 3 custom critters Metallics look great and are fun to kill. The heavy metal references are great and add to the feel of the critters. These guys are tough as well. Metal Mania EB dies. More enemies arrive to take me out.

This arc deserves five stars because because the action is fast and exciting and the mishes flow quickly one to another. The custom critters are great to fight, look very good and are tough but not ridiculous. This arc would get very hard on higher diff settings, but the contact tells you which inspirations you need to bring with you, which was very cool. The story is interesting, although not that deep, it kept me wanting to go back to see what was up next. The maps are small and appropriate to the story. Rock references were a nice extra touch, the electric EB is named "Ride the Lightning".

Great job!

The Environmentalist Encounter 47796
Rating 2 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM diff 3.

This was not a very good arc in the broad sense. The arc has some fun moments, however, overall I thought the storyline was pretty thin, not well written and honestly just dull. The contact was good, but there wasn't a lot going on with the story to make me want to go in. I am told there are some goodie good environmentalist I need to kill. I know something else is going on behind the scenes with the contact, but honestly I dont care. The custom critters were not that special to look at and were ok to fight. Mr. Freezie looked good, but the others were bland.

Mission 1 kill Rose EB (her info was funny).
Mission 2 Kill Piedra EB.
Mission 3 in the CoT tree map, remove bomb and Kill Helada EB. Ally was great fun, but honestly not necessary, she wasn't that tough.

Why not five stars? The storyline is thin and the custom critters are dull. The maps are mostly caves and I felt atleast one should have been outside with trees, since there are tree archers and other such critters. I knew the contact was up to something, but I didn't have any incentive to find out what.

nuff said

Light of the Sun 89545
Rating 4 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Ice/Ice Blaster diff 3.

This is a great arc with some minor problems that really will be fun for teams to play. In mish dialogue was good. The custom critters are great. They are tough (but not ridiculous) and are a lot of fun to kill. CSS Roughneck looked great, the MMs were great fun to fight and the occasional Empathy made me have to think in battle. There is a very tough EB at the end, but with a strong disclaimer, it is all good. The missions are quick and flow well.

Mission 1 Freakshow die easily Boss was cool.
Mission 2 Good map, quick simple, I like it.
Mission 3 introduces custom critters, which are the highlight of this arc. Yellow text from contact dialogue going in good, I know this map, but many people have never seen it. Boss warns me of ambush before dying (thanks). Best mish in the arc.
Mission 4 MMs are fun to kill. Crey and custom critters side by side make tough opponents, I'm on my toes not to die.
Mission 5 EB pawned me first time. She is not a fan of ice patch tough. She ran at half damage; not sure if this is bad AI or intentional, if it was intentional I didnt like that.

Overall good stuff.

Why not five stars? Storyline is ok, not great. Contact dialogue needs a major rewrite IMO, there was no sense of urgency on behalf of the contact. 'Oh Snowcone, if youre not busy, if you dont mind, maybe you can sort of' no no no 'Holy crap Snowcone I need you to destroy that mainframe now before more PPs are made and destroy the Earth !!' Also there are a lot of small grammatical/spelling errors, even enough to bother my thick skin; "happened" "consciousness" are misspelt, also "your job would be" should say 'your job is to' and "From the looks of it, the Freakshow already moved in. Maybe they found anything Crey left behind." should say 'From the looks of it the Freakshow have already moved in. Maybe they have found something the Crey left behind.' and there are others.

Good job!

The Devs Must Die 113956
Rating 4 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Ice/Ice Blaster diff 3.

This arc is very funny. The very first line of dialogue from the contact made me laugh out loud, a rare and wonderful thing. This arc is a comedic tease on our beloved Devs, I get nervous with many comedic arcs, because as the arc gets longer the jokes usually go downhill fast, the Devs Must Die does not fall into this trap. The clues in the third and fourth mish are just as funny as the jokes in the beginning. Contact dialogue was funny and short. Enemies were fun to kill. In mish dialogue was funny.

Mission 1 before going in contact Nemesis says 'tell you what it is" 'is' should be "was". Inside, good map for this story. Boss was a pain in the [censored] to kill, I believe that was Unstoppable (??) and he was untouchable for many minutes. Fortunately he was so slow he could only attack rarely.
Mission 2 Arachnos are fun to kill, rescue guy, quick simple mish.
Mission 3 clues very funny.
Mission 4 Big EB to kill. Not big as in tough, big as in big, holy cow that guy is bigger than Infernal. Again funny.

This is a very good arc because the enemies are fun to kill. I laughed a lot. The missions were fast and exciting and flowed one to another quite well.

Why not five stars? Custom critters were somewhat dull. Obviously they are hobos and meant to look ugly, but they weren't ugly really, just kind of dull looking. The custom critters were less fun to fight than the Crey and Arachnos, that's not good.

Great job!

The Once and Future King Sac 99394
Rating 4 Stars

Character: lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM diff 3.

Overall this is a very good arc. The story is interesting and well written. The custom critters looked great. Custom critters were tough and fun to kill and had a large variety of powers. This arc had me helping out a stranger, by going into the past, to make sure a boy king did in fact, become king.

Mission 1 Custom critters look very good. Rescue hostage, I knew it was important to do so. Good mish.
Mission 2 Resue teenager, find test tubes with blood. Another good mish.
Mission 3 Killing this EB was great fun, with ally help, another good mish.
Mission 4 enemies still fun to kill, but the storyline is getting a little tired. Destroying the cloning machines on that map was a lot of fun, but I am wishing that this was the last mish at this point.
Mission 5 I have been looking forward to killing Ursekrz since mish one, before his name even came up, but this arc just feels long. Not long in a good way, long as in long. This map is way too big for a fifth mish with one objective.

Overall this is a very good arc and I had fun running it.

Why not five stars? This arc gets long in the tooth around mish four. It is a great concept and well written, but without any twists or turns in the story, it starts to feel like the same mish four times. The fifth map was too big for my taste.
SPOILERS STOP READING !!!!!!!!!!!!!! At the very end when the contact tells me Ursekrz did all that because he 'could not live up to the standards . . .' that was a big let down. I thought he was doing it because he was an evil brother, or a mentor who had been forgotten, but reading that that was the reason made me feel like I had just wasted the last hour and a half of my life.

To Slay Sleeping Dragons 111486
Rating 5 Stars

I ran this arc with a lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM on diff 3.

This is a great arc. Everything meshes well and it flows quickly from one mish to another. Contact dialogue is simple and straightforward. Custom critters look good and are fun to kill. Mission objectives are simple and easy to find. The story is interesting and engaging. This arc had me helping out a stranger inorder to remove a dragon from the body of a humanoid.

Mission 1 kill some custom critters, click a glowie, kill EB.
Mission 2 kill some custom critters, kill two EBs. Azure Song says $name at one point.
Mission 3 kill dragon EB.

This arc works. I know what's up, objectives are clear and simple. Custom critters look good. Neithlium and Azure Dragon looked great. Contact was well written. The pace was fast and exciting.

Great job!

Is it Live or is it Memory X 70210
Rating 3 Stars

I ran this arc with a lvl 50 Ice/Ice Blaster on diff 3.

Overall this is a fun arc that had me downloading data into computers for various reasons and killing the enemies surrounding them. The first three missions are fast and well done, however, there are issues with the fourth mission and the last mish gets tough. Overall a very good concept. Contact dialogue and mish objectives were simple and straightforward. Custom critters looked ok, but were fun to kill.

Mission 1 is a quick simple defeat all on a small map, nice.
Mission 2 had 5th Column and Crey tanks fighting over my mish objective. Nice mish, it gave me the sense that what I was trying to do was very important, im getting wrapped into the story slowly.
Mission 3 rescue Hero and defeat all 5th Column. The story gets better.
Mission 4 Beautiful map, a little bigger than i prefer, but nice mish overall, until the end (more below on this). Too many patrols for my taste.
Mission 5 is a good map to finish an arc with, but there were too many objectives for me. It seems like there were three key objectives that made sense and then two of those were just multiplied by four (five?) to make the mish longer, i didnt like that. There is one group in there that gives bad commands ($name, $class, etc) which was odd, because throughout the arc before this they were good. Too many patrols for my taste. Ally is great. This mission is just the right difficulty, if I am very sharp I can get past the MM, but if I slack off even slightly, I go to the hosp. Before i found the ally, those MMs sent me to the hosp a couple of times, but when i ran into them all keyed up I could take them out just before dying. Once the ally is found life gets much easier.

Overall this arc was fun but the mechanical issues within mish 4 spoiled it for me. In this mish I had to rescue two hostages, after the hostages are led to the exit door another spawn and a destructable object appear to be defeated for mish complete. I rescued a Hero and the president and led them to the door (which was very far away from where I found them), then that objective disappears from the nav bar, then they both run to the door to exit. Then the president discovers the hero is an fake and attacks him. If they were going to fight they should have fought when i first found them, NOT after i led them out three floors past many patrols. They fight. I know the hero is fake and not president because only hero is targetable. However, I dont have to kill the fake hero to get mish complete, so I just ran away from him, he didnt chase me, even though he attacked me after he pawned the president, that was bad. Then the destructable object and last spawn appeared all the way in the back of the mish three floors up, where i just came from, to get mish complete. Then I exit the mish, it says 'good job for saving the president', he's dead !!!

Why not five stars? Custom critters looked ok but were all identical, I know they are robots, but they could have had slight variations between the different models. Mish 4 has serious problems. Too many patrols. Too many useless objectives.

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Mission 3 EB: This used to actually be a chain instead of a group. . . . The problem is, it forced people to run back and forth all over the map looking for the EBs.

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Personally I would have preferred that. Of'course you have to do what you feel is best for the masses, not me, but if it had been one EB and three Bosses all in separate rooms I would have found that mish great, because it is a great map.

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ok, I made one change, if anyone is looking at playing my arc.

As of your test, the EB in the third mission, The 1st Living Creature (Living Spirit), was surrounded by the enemy group "living creatures" which was composed of three other bosses archetypes (Living fire, Living Thunder, and Living Creation) The difficulty was set to "hard" and I switched the enemy group's difficulty to "easy." So now it SHOULD spawn a smaller group of luits surrounding him instead of a larger group of bosses. I have a feeling this will take care of the issue, but I'm going to test it when I get back from work this afternoon.

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That sounds like an ideal fix.

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Honestly the types of arcs I would go back and run again are not only five stars. I am more inclined to go back and run short four star arcs than most five star arcs that are considerably longer.

It seems lke you are saying that short arcs can't be considered 5 stars or you like replaying arcs you enjoy less than others first?

Correct. That is what I am saying. When I run arcs for myself (this would included going back and rerunning arcs i've reviewed) I choose arcs that I like to play. That means 4 or 5 star arcs with subject matter i am interested in. Horror, Comedy, Scifi are my favorite storylines, 3 mishes long is ideal, stories about Rock music, I like fighting CoT, Nemesis, Carnies, i like stories that make me feel evil (for my villians), etc. When I review an arc, I start off with a completely different mindset. When I start an arc for review I wipe the slate clean. I erase all my personal preferences and I assume the arc im about to run will be five stars. So I can run a Council mish that's five mishes and about a new canon gadget and it still can be five stars, but I would never rerun it because I dont care about those things.

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Adding in more rock references would be great, but that alone would not change the rating.


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As I said I have been adding additional references and even used your welcome to the jungle idea I liked it so much.

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Improving the custom critters would definitely make the arc better.

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You are the first person to say this. Examples?

Explore a little, maybe a little more variety in the color of the costumes. Does the disco queen have a king? Is there a disco club bouncer? They were a little bland for my taste, NOT bad, but not WOW either.

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Adding in a little dialogue, as to how Dr Disco plans on making sure Rock can never exist at all, would help.

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It must be a generational thing, but a type of music being dead does not mean "never exist at all". Is Disco dead? yes. Does it still exist and get airplay on some stations and in some clubs? Yes. Also, the Deity of Rock says Rock will fade away, not die. Never does it say anywhere "never exist at all". That is a bad assumption you made.


No, that is exactly what I am saying. Dr Disco is building some type of machine that will sonically disrupt any music with a hard backbeat. Rock will never exist at all. That will make me want to kill him more.
I did add a clue when you rescue Carter that hints at Fever's backup plan. When you get a chance, please check out what I added. Maybe that will bump it up for you.

WN

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The Unborn Conspiracy: The Council of Thorns 5381
Rating 2 Stars

I ran this arc with a lvl 50 Thugs/Poi MM on diff 3.

Overall I did not find this arc fun to play. The first two missions are fine, but the third mission gets very tough and the storyline becomes so confusing and complex I actually gave up trying to understand what was happening. Contact dialogue starts off good, but then becomes a jumble of stuff that almost sounds like three different stories. There are some spelling and grammatical mistakes, lead in to mish 2; cooperate is misspelt, disagrees is misspelt and "As you" is typed twice. Custom critters looked great and were fun to kill, but they get forgotten in this disaster.

Mission 1 get the energy blocking device, kill boss. Nice and fun.
Mission 2 rescue Shadowwalker, kill Mendior. Nice and fun. At this point everything makes sense and I even know why the CoT and the council are cooperating.
Mission 3 i read the contact dialogue going in twice, im still not sure what she said. Great beautiful map. EB at end overpowered. Extreme bosses passing out SB to other bosses and an EB is not a fun challenge, its a death trap.
Mission 4 another overpowered EB and some Mulch (which were cool), until each of them alone kills you in a second.

This is a good arc for a large team that doesnt read contact dialogue, who like pounding on tough AVs, on a low diff.

nuff said.

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Hmm...

Thanks for the review. I do have some questions though.

#1: "Mission 3 i read the contact dialogue going in twice, im still not sure what she said. Great beautiful map. EB at end overpowered. Extreme bosses passing out SB to other bosses and an EB is not a fun challenge, its a death trap."

Here's the contact dialogue going in to mission 3.

" We've examined the photograph you gave us, but we have some serious concerns. This "Grimmoricum" that the Mage spoke of...it doesn't seem to exist in ANY records. We contacted SERAPH to see if they had any record of it, but none of our resources have turned up anything about what it is or why this Mage would believe it to be so powerful.

We do have an...idea, however, and SERAPH has agreed to help us. Of course, they're as concerned as we are. They've arranged for a guide to meet you. This is where it gets...difficult...$target. The guide will be meeting you in the spiritual plane. This won't be the Underworld, but it won't be heaven, either. It will be the space between. This contact, Gary Owens, exists there, save for moments when he comes to the aid of a Super Group in this world named the Inner Sanctum. He has agreed to help you scour the spiritual plane and see if they have knowledge of this Grimmoricum.

I must warn you, this will be dangerous. ."

My question is, can you help me figure out where you got confused? Since it's a story-driven arc, and so far all of the feedback I'm getting in tells is that people love the storyline, I want to clear any parts that may be confusing up.

The basic concept she's saying is that since neither VAULT nor SERAPH can find any records of anything called the "grimmoricum" they're sending you to the spiritual plane to find answers there. Obviously since the CoT are involved the Grimmoricum would be magic in nature, so the spiritual plane's inhabitants will likely have knowledge of it. If you can show me where you got tripped up I can clarify it for others.

#2:
Mission 3 EB: The EB in this mission is actually supposed to be the toughest in the arc. Its bio and the clues tell you you're actually fighting the living creatures from the book of Revelation (the 4 beings that surround the throne of God.) The warning in red going into the mission saying how dangerous it will be is supposed to clue you in that you may want to take allies. On a team, I've only died fighting this mob once, having run the mission with three different teams (two of which were only 3 man teams.) Should I change the text from "I warn you this will be dangerous" to "I suggest you bring friends?" Would that help?

This is meant to be run like a task force which is what the TF at the end of the title is meant to suggest. It does say " Suggested level: 40-50, Suggest TF style team play. Story driven. Roughly 1 hour." in the description, but maybe I should make the title clearer?

Any feedback on ways to improve it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again for reviewing it and helping me refine it.

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Hey. As for the contact dialogue, I get it now, after reading it four times. I guess reading the first couple times it just sounded like a jumble of text that didnt actually say much. I would say shorten and simplify it. It is the last paragraph that made my head hurt:

We do have an...idea, however, and SERAPH has agreed to help us. Of course, they're as concerned as we are. They've arranged for a guide to meet you. This is where it gets...difficult...$target. The guide will be meeting you in the spiritual plane. This won't be the Underworld, but it won't be heaven, either. It will be the space between. This contact, Gary Owens, exists there, save for moments when he comes to the aid of a Super Group in this world named the Inner Sanctum. He has agreed to help you scour the spiritual plane and see if they have knowledge of this Grimmoricum.

I certainly do NOT want to tell you how to write your arc. However, consider:

We do have an...idea, however, we've arranged for a guide to meet you. The guide will be meeting you in the spiritual plane, a sort of purgatory. This contact is Gary Owens, he exists there, save for moments when he comes to the aid of a Super Group in this world named the Inner Sanctum. He has agreed to help you scour for knowledge of this Grimmoricum.

It loses some of the personality of the contact, but remember this is a game, not a book. When we write story driven arcs, dialogue cannot be too long, because players will not read it and just click Accept. If you actually want players to read everything, you need to choose, lot of story less personality, or more personality less story.


Regarding the difficulty of mission 3. I understood clearly what the living creatures were before going in, I read the big red letters telling me I would die. I have rated arcs in the past five stars, even though I could not complete/kill the big boss. However, there is a difference between what can be reasonable and what is not reasonable. Do all the living creatures have to be present at that moment? They couldn't be spread out in a way that small teams could pull some away from the others? Or separated in different rooms? It can certainly be done by teams, there are much harder things to overcome, taking out the towers and killing Recluse in the STF is accomplished by teams everyday, but many question if the payoff is worth the work. I felt the same about this mish.

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Death to Disco 84420
Rating 4 Stars

I ran this arc with a lvl 50 Ice/Ice Blaster on diff 3.

Overall this is a solid arc. It is fast and fun to play. Someone has changed the past by kidnapping President Carter and now Disco has never died. I had to fix history, kill the bad guy and make sure disco dies and rock survives, a great idea for a MA arc. Custom critters looked ok, but were fun to kill.

Mission 1 kill a thousand Crey Voltiac Tanks and a boss, rescue Pres Carter. Carter found his own way out (Thanks!).
Mission 2 Kill Dr Disco, click some glowies. Dr Disco threw a safe at me! A safe! A huge solid steel safe! Almost as tall as I am, anyway, he died.

This is one of those fast simple arcs that is so fun sometimes you want to go right back and run it again. It feels good to know you helped rock survive. Give a quick reread to contact dialogue I think "sauer" is called "fever" (or i misunderstood).

Why not five stars? Custom critters were ok, not great. Should disco queen really have better D than Kung Fu fighter ? Contact needs more rock references; "$name its time to 'Fight Fire with Fire'", "$name you've got to go back and save Carter, I'm 'Goin off the rails on a crazy train' here with all this disco", and Dr Disco "$name 'Welcome to the jungle baby, you're gonna die".

Great job!

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Thanks for reviewing my arc! It's great that you enjoyed it so much. To address your points.

Disco Queen is a sonic based Lt. and Kung Foo Fightin is an MA based minion. The power sets are what they are and I did not want to have Diva and Disco Queen as both minions. I also wanted range attacks available to both minion and Lt. groups.

I am in the process of every day or two adding another rock reference. I just don't feel changing such a well received arc too much at once is a smart idea. These are just minor tweaks.

It does kind of annoy me that you only gave me 4 stars when you said "This is one of those fast simple arcs that is so fun sometimes you want to go right back and run it again". Having run easily 200+ arcs I can honestly say that I can count on one hand the number I might go back and play again. If those are not 5 stars, I don't know what is. It does not mean they are beyond improvement, but massaging dialogue is certainly a minor change.

WN

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Honestly the types of arcs I would go back and run again are not only five stars. I am more inclined to go back and run short four star arcs than most five star arcs that are considerably longer.

Adding in more rock references would be great, but that alone would not change the rating. Improving the custom critters would definitely make the arc better. Adding in a little dialogue, as to how Dr Disco plans on making sure Rock can never exist at all, would help. Summarily, adding rock references and improving critters and darkening Dr Disco, that's easily a five star.