Mission Architect knowledge base.

Mission Architect knowledge base.

This was compiled from what I recall of the Mission Architect workshop at Herocon. While I intend this to be a living document, we don't expect more info for a good while. Buckle your seatbelts and keep your eye on the emergency exits. We're going for a RIDE here!


1. Overview. Or what IS the Mission Architect anyway?

The Mission Architect will let us, the players, design missions for other players as well as undertake missions made by other players. Missions from the Architect will be available to heroes AND villains alike on ALL servers. You will finally be able to tell that story about why the Freakshow hate whipped cream, Statesman shall declare "The potato chip aisle is no longer a crime scene." (Yeah that was me), and legions of Blood Widows will sing the praises of Lee Press On Claws! And honestly, who can resist that? I for one, shall welcome our new architect overlords.


2. What the Mission Architect is NOT.

The Mission Architect is not a powerleveling, farming, or badging tool. (Exception for badges directly related to the Mission Architect.) The devs have taken various steps to prevent this feature from being used for those purposes, but I'll discuss those later.


3. Yeah yeah yeah. Where do we go for this thing anyway?

It will all start at Architect Entertainment Stations (AES) placed in multiple zones throughout the game. (1 in a co-op zone was implied, but not guaranteed.) Here you will be able to search for other player made missions to go on with or without a team, or create, save, load, test, publish, or unpublish your own missions. (More on those new terms later.) A quick note about the mission search engine. It will have to sort through content made by ALL players that have published a mission. So it's expected to load slower than the markets load. (Honestly just the search engine alone on the Architect was a big undertaking and we appreciate all of the dev's work that went into it!)


4. So what do I expect from playing one of these missions?

Well to start with, there can actually be up to FIVE missions in a published arc. All Architect missions will be instanced and NOT in an open zone. While you are on an Architect mission it will be similar to being on a Task/Strike Force in regards to other contacts being greyed out. You may well notice that your toon's level has changed while in the mission. Do not be alarmed yet. Your level can shift in either direction and can even vary with each mission in the arc. Why? Because our benevolent Architect overlords whim it so. Ok.. you can be alarmed now.

After the published misson is complete, you can rate it as thumbs up, thumbs down, or inappropriate and why.


5. Weeding out the farmers, a how-to.

Opinions on farming and powerleveling are seldom neutral, and this isn't a forum for that discussion. It IS, however, where you get informed of how the devs are going to discourage the Architect from being overrun with intentionally mindless stuff from folks that do not care about the stories the Architect is intended to encourage. Please keep in mind things can change between now and implementation.

While in an Architect mission players WILL get normal kill xp, inf, prestige, and inspirations. After the arc is complete there may also be a different type of merit (not i13 merit, not Rikti merit) called a skeeball ticket (placeholder name maybe?). Skeeball ticket is all the information we really have. No present idea how they will be used/redeemed.

While in an Architect mission, players will NOT get: end mission bonus, salvage, recipies, or enhancements.

Badges? Only those tied to the Architect folks. Get a change of underwear ready as I give some examples.

Kill x amount of y badges? No.
Healing? Damage taken? Debt? No.
"But what about..." NO. Ain't happening inside the Architect folks.


6. Creating a mish for you and/or others.

The exact order of mission creation isn't known, but at various points you will pick a mission type and goals, enemies and level, possibly a NPC combat ally(s) and/or custom boss, and oh yeah, a premade map and write the thing and save.

Yes I DID say premade map. The devs have promised us over 1,000 maps to choose from at launch, including all unique maps. (They also said no one wants to see Hamidon in the 5-layer room.) They would like to get us a mapmaker at some point, but that point will not be at launch. (It's alot of work for that folks.) Likewise mobs will spawn on the maps at preset points.

The ability to add a custom boss is the feature WE demanded and the reason we are getting the Architect an issue later. It's known that in i13 we get the ability to save and load costumes from our toons to our local computer. We will also be able to download it to a custom boss. Each one will get a primary (attack) and a secondary powerset. It was asked by an audience member if we would be able to scale our custom bosses to Elite Bosses or Archvillain/Hero, but I wasn't clear on the answer given.

No ambushes will be possible with the Architect. Also no cutscenes. (THANK YOU DEVS!!!)

Mission type and goals like glowie clicks or kill-alls are easy enough to understand. Turns out there is a link between enemies and level though, as enemies exist in various ranges and don't always scale out of those ranges well. Call it quality control for a better play experience.

Enemies and allies can be pretty much anything you can already fight somewhere in the game. At the time of Herocon, even Giant Monsters were available for use in Architect missions. I inferred that Giant Monsters may change before launch however. One member of the panel commented that the day before they had fought against 6 AV Clockwork Kings with another one helping them in an Architect mission!

Writing well is always a challenge, and this won't be any different. You will be able to write breifings, NPC dialog, clues, debriefings, and souveniers. Just the same as the Devs! Please keep in mind that the devs have spellchecking software in their process that isn't in the Architect. So take some time to doublecheck for typos is my advice.

Saving is done to your local computer. Now get THIS, you can save an UNLIMITED (by the game) number of missions! And it gets better! You can edit your saved missions offline as they are in a text file! SWEET!!!

What then? Well you might..


7. Test.

You can load up a saved mission and run it for yourself or your team. This can be useful for laughs or less widespread applications like SG initiations and the like. You can test a mission as often as you like. This is also known as running an unpublished mission.


8. Publish.

This is where you submit your blood, sweat, and tears for the enjoyment of the masses. Or so we all hope. Here's the kicker though, you can only have three (3) published missions per ACCOUNT. Now you can publish and UNpublish at will, so please lower the DOOM meter and restart your heart. Go on, we'll wait.

Also worth noting is the toon that is logged on when you publish the mission is the toon that is getting any Architect badge credit for that mission. I don't know if unpublishing a mission and republishing it on the same toon restarts any badge credit for the mission, but I see it as likely.


9. Dev's choice and Hall of Fame

There ARE 2 ways around the 3 published per account limit. Dev's choice and Hall of Fame. These actually copy your mission onto the game servers and delete it from your published slot, freeing it.

Dev's choice simply means a Dev liked it enough to save it. It's not "official" story, but they liked it!

You get a mission into the Hall of Fame when an unknown number of players rate it thumbs up.

Both of these will be search options in the Architect menu.


10. Show me on the doll where the Architect touched you. Flagging for inappropriate.

The devs are trusting us not to publish missions that violate the TOS and EULA, but when it happens you can let them know via the normal /petition or when you rate the mission at the end. There will be an assortment of options to check so we can help the GMs speed up their review. Players found to be in violation might be banned from the Architect system, or you know, the entire game at the GMs discretion.

Now in reverse, if your ex-smizmar or whatever decides to flag all your missions as inappropriate, the GMs will be alert for that too and the ex can be reprimanded for harrassment at the GM's option.

The lesson here is to play nice and civil and spellcheck often. Oh and souveniers are deletable by the player in case of inappropriateness too.


11. Architect badges.

All that's really known is there will be some. I would suspect that Hall of Fame would grant one, but that's my opinion.


12. Author's notes

Ok, well I hope you enjoyed reading this guide and find it useful. This is my 1st crack at writing a guide and it turns out I'm posting it on the 3rd anniversary of my VG's (The Schulls on Victory) founding. If you are interested in writing missions I might recomend checking out back issues of the City Scoop for Content Watch by Plater. Knowing what has been well recieved can only help your chances of being well recieved as well.


13. Mission suggestion example: The impatient player tutorial.

A better place for mission ideas would be the City Life or Forum Games section, but a fellow herocon/workshop attendee inspired this.

Have you ever been on a Pick Up Group (PUG) where 1 person just won't wait for the rest of the team? Of course you have. Well when it happens you can "suggest" this mission. The only real restriction is the map should have a door inside for best effect. Closer to the mission entrance is better. Here's how it should play out..

Team enters the mission and the impatient one dashes ahead to find a glowie and a door. They click the glowie and get the "CLUE FOUND" prompt. Then they heedlessly open the door and find as many AVs/Heroes/GMs as you want to put in. Maybe they say something about reading the clue like "Clue tax of $2.37! PAY UP!!" before/during an epically short beatdown. Oddly enough the rest of the team goes nowhere near the door.

The clue reads "Wait for the team please."

---

It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

Allow me to add to this my notes from HeroCon as well. I didn't write it as a guide; it is just literally, the notes I jotted down as the panel was talking. Hope it helps!

---

[ QUOTE ]
Mission Architect knowledge base.

This was compiled from what I recall of the Mission Architect workshop at Herocon. While I intend this to be a living document, we don't expect more info for a good while. Buckle your seatbelts and keep your eye on the emergency exits. We're going for a RIDE here!


1. Overview. Or what IS the Mission Architect anyway?

The Mission Architect will let us, the players, design missions for other players as well as undertake missions made by other players. Missions from the Architect will be available to heroes AND villains alike on ALL servers. You will finally be able to tell that story about why the Freakshow hate whipped cream, Statesman shall declare "The potato chip aisle is no longer a crime scene." (Yeah that was me), and legions of Blood Widows will sing the praises of Lee Press On Claws! And honestly, who can resist that? I for one, shall welcome our new architect overlords.


2. What the Mission Architect is NOT.

The Mission Architect is not a powerleveling, farming, or badging tool. (Exception for badges directly related to the Mission Architect.) The devs have taken various steps to prevent this feature from being used for those purposes, but I'll discuss those later.


3. Yeah yeah yeah. Where do we go for this thing anyway?

It will all start at Architect Entertainment Stations (AES) placed in multiple zones throughout the game. (1 in a co-op zone was implied, but not guaranteed.) Here you will be able to search for other player made missions to go on with or without a team, or create, save, load, test, publish, or unpublish your own missions. (More on those new terms later.) A quick note about the mission search engine. It will have to sort through content made by ALL players that have published a mission. So it's expected to load slower than the markets load. (Honestly just the search engine alone on the Architect was a big undertaking and we appreciate all of the dev's work that went into it!)


4. So what do I expect from playing one of these missions?

Well to start with, there can actually be up to FIVE missions in a published arc. All Architect missions will be instanced and NOT in an open zone. While you are on an Architect mission it will be similar to being on a Task/Strike Force in regards to other contacts being greyed out. You may well notice that your toon's level has changed while in the mission. Do not be alarmed yet. Your level can shift in either direction and can even vary with each mission in the arc. Why? Because our benevolent Architect overlords whim it so. Ok.. you can be alarmed now.

After the published misson is complete, you can rate it as thumbs up, thumbs down, or inappropriate and why.


5. Weeding out the farmers, a how-to.

Opinions on farming and powerleveling are seldom neutral, and this isn't a forum for that discussion. It IS, however, where you get informed of how the devs are going to discourage the Architect from being overrun with intentionally mindless stuff from folks that do not care about the stories the Architect is intended to encourage. Please keep in mind things can change between now and implementation.

While in an Architect mission players WILL get normal kill xp, inf, prestige, and inspirations. After the arc is complete there may also be a different type of merit (not i13 merit, not Rikti merit) called a skeeball ticket (placeholder name maybe?). Skeeball ticket is all the information we really have. No present idea how they will be used/redeemed.

While in an Architect mission, players will NOT get: end mission bonus, salvage, recipies, or enhancements.

Badges? Only those tied to the Architect folks. Get a change of underwear ready as I give some examples.

Kill x amount of y badges? No.
Healing? Damage taken? Debt? No.
"But what about..." NO. Ain't happening inside the Architect folks.


6. Creating a mish for you and/or others.

The exact order of mission creation isn't known, but at various points you will pick a mission type and goals, enemies and level, possibly a NPC combat ally(s) and/or custom boss, and oh yeah, a premade map and write the thing and save.

Yes I DID say premade map. The devs have promised us over 1,000 maps to choose from at launch, including all unique maps. (They also said no one wants to see Hamidon in the 5-layer room.) They would like to get us a mapmaker at some point, but that point will not be at launch. (It's alot of work for that folks.) Likewise mobs will spawn on the maps at preset points.

The ability to add a custom boss is the feature WE demanded and the reason we are getting the Architect an issue later. It's known that in i13 we get the ability to save and load costumes from our toons to our local computer. We will also be able to download it to a custom boss. Each one will get a primary (attack) and a secondary powerset. It was asked by an audience member if we would be able to scale our custom bosses to Elite Bosses or Archvillain/Hero, but I wasn't clear on the answer given.

No ambushes will be possible with the Architect. Also no cutscenes. (THANK YOU DEVS!!!)

Mission type and goals like glowie clicks or kill-alls are easy enough to understand. Turns out there is a link between enemies and level though, as enemies exist in various ranges and don't always scale out of those ranges well. Call it quality control for a better play experience.

Enemies and allies can be pretty much anything you can already fight somewhere in the game. At the time of Herocon, even Giant Monsters were available for use in Architect missions. I inferred that Giant Monsters may change before launch however. One member of the panel commented that the day before they had fought against 6 AV Clockwork Kings with another one helping them in an Architect mission!

Writing well is always a challenge, and this won't be any different. You will be able to write breifings, NPC dialog, clues, debriefings, and souveniers. Just the same as the Devs! Please keep in mind that the devs have spellchecking software in their process that isn't in the Architect. So take some time to doublecheck for typos is my advice.

Saving is done to your local computer. Now get THIS, you can save an UNLIMITED (by the game) number of missions! And it gets better! You can edit your saved missions offline as they are in a text file! SWEET!!!

What then? Well you might..


7. Test.

You can load up a saved mission and run it for yourself or your team. This can be useful for laughs or less widespread applications like SG initiations and the like. You can test a mission as often as you like. This is also known as running an unpublished mission.


8. Publish.

This is where you submit your blood, sweat, and tears for the enjoyment of the masses. Or so we all hope. Here's the kicker though, you can only have three (3) published missions per ACCOUNT. Now you can publish and UNpublish at will, so please lower the DOOM meter and restart your heart. Go on, we'll wait.

Also worth noting is the toon that is logged on when you publish the mission is the toon that is getting any Architect badge credit for that mission. I don't know if unpublishing a mission and republishing it on the same toon restarts any badge credit for the mission, but I see it as likely.


9. Dev's choice and Hall of Fame

There ARE 2 ways around the 3 published per account limit. Dev's choice and Hall of Fame. These actually copy your mission onto the game servers and delete it from your published slot, freeing it.

Dev's choice simply means a Dev liked it enough to save it. It's not "official" story, but they liked it!

You get a mission into the Hall of Fame when an unknown number of players rate it thumbs up.

Both of these will be search options in the Architect menu.


10. Show me on the doll where the Architect touched you. Flagging for inappropriate.

The devs are trusting us not to publish missions that violate the TOS and EULA, but when it happens you can let them know via the normal /petition or when you rate the mission at the end. There will be an assortment of options to check so we can help the GMs speed up their review. Players found to be in violation might be banned from the Architect system, or you know, the entire game at the GMs discretion.

Now in reverse, if your ex-smizmar or whatever decides to flag all your missions as inappropriate, the GMs will be alert for that too and the ex can be reprimanded for harrassment at the GM's option.

The lesson here is to play nice and civil and spellcheck often. Oh and souveniers are deletable by the player in case of inappropriateness too.


11. Architect badges.

All that's really known is there will be some. I would suspect that Hall of Fame would grant one, but that's my opinion.


12. Author's notes

Ok, well I hope you enjoyed reading this guide and find it useful. This is my 1st crack at writing a guide and it turns out I'm posting it on the 3rd anniversary of my VG's (The Schulls on Victory) founding. If you are interested in writing missions I might recomend checking out back issues of the City Scoop for Content Watch by Plater. Knowing what has been well recieved can only help your chances of being well recieved as well.


13. Mission suggestion example: The impatient player tutorial.

A better place for mission ideas would be the City Life or Forum Games section, but a fellow herocon/workshop attendee inspired this.

Have you ever been on a Pick Up Group (PUG) where 1 person just won't wait for the rest of the team? Of course you have. Well when it happens you can "suggest" this mission. The only real restriction is the map should have a door inside for best effect. Closer to the mission entrance is better. Here's how it should play out..

Team enters the mission and the impatient one dashes ahead to find a glowie and a door. They click the glowie and get the "CLUE FOUND" prompt. Then they heedlessly open the door and find as many AVs/Heroes/GMs as you want to put in. Maybe they say something about reading the clue like "Clue tax of $2.37! PAY UP!!" before/during an epically short beatdown. Oddly enough the rest of the team goes nowhere near the door.

The clue reads "Wait for the team please."

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
3. Yeah yeah yeah. Where do we go for this thing anyway?

It will all start at Architect Entertainment Stations (AES) placed in multiple zones throughout the game. (1 in a co-op zone was implied, but not guaranteed.) Here you will be able to search for other player made missions to go on with or without a team, or create, save, load, test, publish, or unpublish your own missions. (More on those new terms later.) A quick note about the mission search engine. It will have to sort through content made by ALL players that have published a mission. So it's expected to load slower than the markets load. (Honestly just the search engine alone on the Architect was a big undertaking and we appreciate all of the dev's work that went into it!)


[/ QUOTE ]

the only thing i don't like there is i would have to go on hide just like i do in base building so i don't get telled too death.




[ QUOTE ]
9. Dev's choice and Hall of Fame

There ARE 2 ways around the 3 published per account limit. Dev's choice and Hall of Fame. These actually copy your mission onto the game servers and delete it from your published slot, freeing it.

Dev's choice simply means a Dev liked it enough to save it. It's not "official" story, but they liked it!

You get a mission into the Hall of Fame when an unknown number of players rate it thumbs up.

Both of these will be search options in the Architect menu.

[/ QUOTE ]

well both them are nice rewards but i have not heard much more about what may be mission creator rewards owell i guess they will tell us in time. (yea i kind of hopped that my work could be canon owell)


great write up keep up the good work

---

sincerly yours:
Bzald of TopTen

Got new info today from the Joystiq interview of Positron.

"Oh, you will also be able to choose what Contact hands out your story arc, or create your own Contact in the same manner as you would create a character or a boss."

Since all missions in the Architect are instanced, my guess would be that your "contact" will have you call them as opposed to actually encountering them in a zone. However that's just supposition on my part right now.

---

It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

[ QUOTE ]
Got new info today from the Joystiq interview of Positron.

"Oh, you will also be able to choose what Contact hands out your story arc, or create your own Contact in the same manner as you would create a character or a boss."

Since all missions in the Architect are instanced, my guess would be that your "contact" will have you call them as opposed to actually encountering them in a zone. However that's just supposition on my part right now.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or we might get a wonderful use of the Mission Computer in our bases.

---

[ QUOTE ]
Got new info today from the Joystiq interview of Positron.

"Oh, you will also be able to choose what Contact hands out your story arc, or create your own Contact in the same manner as you would create a character or a boss."

Since all missions in the Architect are instanced, my guess would be that your "contact" will have you call them as opposed to actually encountering them in a zone. However that's just supposition on my part right now.

[/ QUOTE ]

All RIGHT! Positron is gonna be handing out a new story arc!

Now if I could just get a clarification on whether the "three published" limit means three story arcs (ie, up to 15 missions if each arc has 5), or if it's three MISSIONS (in which case, if my story arc really has 5 missions, I can't publish a full arc).

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

---

I would hope its 3 arcs, and even that 'feels' painfully limiting at this stage. But then again I am used to the prolific player content development in Neverwinter Nights, so I will wait and see.

I am very eager to get my hands on these tools and see just what we are capable of. Hopefully we can get started on testing soon, now that i13 is on its way to live.

Thanks for keeping things updated here.

---

If your can't earn merits from MA story arcs....well, I'll just say that would be a shame.

---

So, lets see:

1. Custom allies
2. Custom Bosses
3. Custom Contacts (placement of?)
4. Custom factions?
5. Large map selection
6. Custom maps unlockable function?
7. Detailed map placement of NPCs/objects?
8. Access to different mission types (kill all, escort, timed, etc)
9. Ability to combine mission types?
10. Ability to flashback to MA mishes already below your level?
11. Ability to reward temp powers?
12. Availability of contacts and mishes in PvP and Co-op zones?
13. Number of usable factions per map/map section?
14. Use of factions at below/above their normal level range?
15. Use of factions not normally available to red/blue sides?
16. Use of NPCs only found in TFs/STFs?

---

Apparently, I play "City of Shakespeare"
*Arc #95278-Gathering the Four Winds -3 step arc; challenging - 5 Ratings/3 Stars (still working out the kinks)
*Arc #177826-Lights, Camera, Scream! - 3 step arc, camp horror; try out in 1st person POV - 35 Ratings/4 Stars

General questions, I realize not necessarily answered yet (or answered but I'm at work, and no can search-fu), but this seems like an appropriately titled post for these, so maybe they'll get answered here as time goes on.

Mission boss/AVs.
1) What I got from above: We can save costume files and apply to our "Big Bad". We can select prim / sec sets for them. Q: Will this be tied to existing ATs (ie A "MM" villain is a summoning / buff-debuff. Or, can things be mixed up, as current AVs display powers from multiple ATs?

NPCs.
1) Any word on if these are just Joe Shmoe (rescue X office workers) with dialogue option? Or can they be of the powered? (such as free Fusionette and then watch her get herself killed)

2) Can saved costume files be applied to NPCs? Can I save my hero/villain roster's costumes and have players have to rescue them all as a mission goal?

3) If I can apply costumes to NPCs, can they be powered NPCs? Can an NPC emp/dark def wearing my emps' costume act similarly to the Katie temp power for the duration of the mish he is written into? Not to be abusable of course, I'd expect them to con 1 lvl below mish baddies, and perhaps only have 3 or 4 powers max from their sets. Maybe with a cap on the number of "helping" NPCs that can be out at a given time? Although if I recall correctly, there are some mishs in game where you can acquire a small army of fighting NPCs.

Anyway, just some thoughts / questions. To all who contributed their personal notes above, thx for the effort.

---

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Got new info today from the Joystiq interview of Positron.

"Oh, you will also be able to choose what Contact hands out your story arc, or create your own Contact in the same manner as you would create a character or a boss."

Since all missions in the Architect are instanced, my guess would be that your "contact" will have you call them as opposed to actually encountering them in a zone. However that's just supposition on my part right now.

[/ QUOTE ]

All RIGHT! Positron is gonna be handing out a new story arc!

Now if I could just get a clarification on whether the "three published" limit means three story arcs (ie, up to 15 missions if each arc has 5), or if it's three MISSIONS (in which case, if my story arc really has 5 missions, I can't publish a full arc).

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

[/ QUOTE ]

You can have up to five missions in an arc.

You can publish up to three arcs.

---

Excellent, thank you M_B!

Mwahahahaha...

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

---

[ QUOTE ]
So, lets see:

1. Custom allies
2. Custom Bosses
3. Custom Contacts (placement of?)
4. Custom factions?
5. Large map selection
6. Custom maps unlockable function?
7. Detailed map placement of NPCs/objects?
8. Access to different mission types (kill all, escort, timed, etc)
9. Ability to combine mission types?
10. Ability to flashback to MA mishes already below your level?
11. Ability to reward temp powers?
12. Availability of contacts and mishes in PvP and Co-op zones?
13. Number of usable factions per map/map section?
14. Use of factions at below/above their normal level range?
15. Use of factions not normally available to red/blue sides?
16. Use of NPCs only found in TFs/STFs?

[/ QUOTE ]

Just gonna comment on what's known off this list real quick.

1, 2, and 3, yes.

4, no custom factions I'm afraid. Seems that some powers and their animations are unique to a particular faction. The Fir Bolg were cited as an example. Seems their power animations had to be done specifically to look good with their elongated skeletons. Thus trying to paste their powers onto a bunch of 5 year olds would look unacceptably odd.

5 yes.

6 Custom maps are a stretch goal that will take a LOT of dev hours. They would LIKE to do it, but no ETA.

7 No, not at this time.

8 yes, but no ambushes or other "triggerable" events.

9 could you give more detail on this question?

10 Ah I need to expound upon the mish scaling. As I understood it, level won't keep you from trying an Architect mish, instead YOUR level will scale while in the mish. We've seen this before in PvP zones and baseraids (Where all are boosted to lvl 50). Additionally, each mish in a published arc can scale you to a different level.

11 unknown at this time.

12 anywhere there is an Architect Entertainment System. Placements not yet known.

13 no limit mentioned. Overall game limits still apply of course.

14 no. This was quoted as a reason YOUR toons will scale instead.

15 and 16 yes.

---

It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

Yes thanks M_B!)

---

It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

[ QUOTE ]
If your can't earn merits from MA story arcs....well, I'll just say that would be a shame.

[/ QUOTE ]So far as it's known, no i13 merits will be awarded through the Architect. However there will be "skee ball tickets" awarded. How these might be redeemed is presently unknown.

---

It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

[ QUOTE ]
General questions, I realize not necessarily answered yet (or answered but I'm at work, and no can search-fu), but this seems like an appropriately titled post for these, so maybe they'll get answered here as time goes on.

Mission boss/AVs.
1) What I got from above: We can save costume files and apply to our "Big Bad". We can select prim / sec sets for them. Q: Will this be tied to existing ATs (ie A "MM" villain is a summoning / buff-debuff. Or, can things be mixed up, as current AVs display powers from multiple ATs?

[/ QUOTE ]Other than the primary having attacks, it's really not known just yet.

[ QUOTE ]
NPCs.
1) Any word on if these are just Joe Shmoe (rescue X office workers) with dialogue option? Or can they be of the powered? (such as free Fusionette and then watch her get herself killed)

[/ QUOTE ]It can be ANY signature character, up to and including GMs at the time of the workshop. Hostages can also fight you as you "rescue" them

[ QUOTE ]
2) Can saved costume files be applied to NPCs? Can I save my hero/villain roster's costumes and have players have to rescue them all as a mission goal?

[/ QUOTE ] As I understand it, yes.

[ QUOTE ]
3) If I can apply costumes to NPCs, can they be powered NPCs?

[/ QUOTE ] Positron confirmed yes.

---

It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
9. Ability to combine mission types?


[/ QUOTE ]

9 could you give more detail on this question?



[/ QUOTE ]

I think what is meant here is the ability to combine objectives in your mission.

For example "Find the clue, kill the boss, escort out the prisoner, oh, and you have 12 minutes."

---

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
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9. Ability to combine mission types?


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9 could you give more detail on this question?



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I think what is meant here is the ability to combine objectives in your mission.

For example "Find the clue, kill the boss, escort out the prisoner, oh, and you have 12 minutes."

[/ QUOTE ]Thanks! While I don't see why not, it isn't "known" at this time.

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It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

While putting together missions for creativity's sake is a noble and good cause, it would seem to me that there would be some wisdom in linking together missions and villains, such that it would be an alternative way for villains to gain some sort of XP or what not by creating missions. In other words, villains could create a mission and each time a hero works through it, if the hero defeats it, the hero gets something, but if the hero is defeated, the villain gets something. This would be strikingly different IMHO than just "is my mission good"?

Heck, it might be good end-game content for level 50 characters. You could make it such that no XP is traded, but influence or something is. If you got a sustainable population of 50s doing it, it would provide that background layer of "the big guns" stopping crimes.

just some late night stream-of-consciousness going on in my head

John (CC)

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Cerulean Caver - L50 (+2) Energy/Energy blaster (been there since Day 1)
Darkest Echo - L29 Dark/Empathy controller
Ceiling Burner - L38 Fire/Fire tank
Doctor Boo - L50 Robotics/Poison MM
Evil Pixie - L45 SS/Invul Brute

Will we be able to make hero working with villain missions, like in Rikti War Zone?

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Rikti Invasion Music Video
Borg King MySpace
Help support my photography!!
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My Characters:
Lady Sheenah on Liberty
Sukothai on Liberty
The Gymnist on Liberty

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Yes I DID say premade map. The devs have promised us over 1,000 maps to choose from at launch, including all unique maps.

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I wonder if we will get access to the Terra Volta reactor map, with a reactor that can explode if the team fails to protect it? Even if there's only the initial spawn of bad guys, a more challenging reactor mission could easily be devised.

Will there be hidden keys to unlock doors?

Will we be able to mine a mission with proximity bombs, or just clues and glowies?

And I wonder if it will be possible to make a map re-spawn at regular intervals? Probably not, sadly.

I'm a little bummed that there won't be "triggers" in the missions, e.g., cross an invisible threshold and spawn a bunch of bad guys or start a countdown. I assume that the "no ambushes" rule actually means "no triggers".

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Goldbrick 50 inv/ss tank
Other 50s: Power Beam, Rocky Mantle, STORMIE Agent, Matchless, Major Will, Knightmayor, Femstone, Space Maureen, Crimebuster Ako, Dr. Twilight, Doc Champion, American Gold Eagle

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Will we be able to make hero working with villain missions, like in Rikti War Zone?

[/ QUOTE ]All published arcs in the Architect will be available to any hero or villain on any server.

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It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

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ex-smizmar

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Nice reference!!! You get major points for that one.

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4. Custom factions?


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4, no custom factions I'm afraid. Seems that some powers and their animations are unique to a particular faction. The Fir Bolg were cited as an example. Seems their power animations had to be done specifically to look good with their elongated skeletons. Thus trying to paste their powers onto a bunch of 5 year olds would look unacceptably odd.


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So I can only rename enemies, I cannot give Tsoo Nemesis guns?
(Apologize for the redundancy, but I'm just in a slight state of shock. But on the other hand, perhaps I might be able to circumvent these issues...)

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Click here to find all the All Things Art Threads!

Will there be a tutorial to help us when we do our first one?

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Rikti Invasion Music Video
Borg King MySpace
Help support my photography!!
My RedBubble Page
My Deviant Page
My Zazzle Page


My Characters:
Lady Sheenah on Liberty
Sukothai on Liberty
The Gymnist on Liberty