Discussion: Issue 14: Mission Architect - FAQ
By
8_Ball,
Posted on: 2009-02-26 13:02 in Developers' Corner
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I'm hoping that the "Turn into Warwolf" power is really a "Turn into <insert MOB>" power.
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If it's truly open, it would be awesome. "Quick, Sereni! You're being beaten senseless! Turn into Sailor Lune!" "Right!" (Boss becomes Elite Boss in a leotard and miniskirt.)
Too much freedom. Since where only getting the illusion of "build and create". And in turn not not becoming our own GM's, in our own Missions. Its nice to have customizable missions but, if your going to attempt to give us real freedom, We should have GM power in OUR own missions. Why restrict our own mission power?.
To me this is a very delicate hit or miss. So far I can only see plenty of miss's, especially when I saw that there won't be random drops of any kind. That would never encourage me to do something.
"If you can make a girl laugh, you can make her do anything"
"You're like Giraffe's, the way you look down on me, with your vegetarian scorn."
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Please tell me there is a save button and a holding tank so that we can work on stuff, set it aside, and come back to it later; without having to worry about people using it.
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From the faq, you have effectively unlimited storage for local missions that you're working on. Unpublished arcs start out as simple files on your computer somewhere, so I'd imagine you can create copies of them and do versioning pretty easily.
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I'm a little... disheartened at the '1000+ votes at average 5 stars.'
This sounds very much like 'have fun with 3 arcs forever.' I mean, I think I can make some nice arcs, but getting 1000+ folks to vote 4-5 stars, and hope there aren't griefers or grumps dragging it down?
Sigh.
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I tend to agree with this.
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It sounds ominously high to me as well. I'm hoping that they data-mine it after release, and adjust the requirements accordingly.
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First, divide the requirement by 8 (or 4, or whatever the average team size is) and it's much less daunting. A couple of hundred teams playing through a good mission sounds very feasible IMO, and (hopefully) that's what we'll actually be looking at here. (If ticketing works at all equitably, I can easily see teams that used to run newspapers running MA missions instead -- less running around, potentially a lot more variety. I'd probably prefer it myself over having to manage separate enhancement, salvage, and recipe inventories while I play.)
Second issue, partial approval can be very arbitrary; what does 4 stars mean, 2 stars? I wonder if a simple thumbs up (yes, I enjoyed myself, yes I'd play this again) or thumbs down (no, the mission had problems, I wouldn't play it again without significant changes) wouldn't work better for this sort of system. You'd still represent the aggregate by a number of stars for the rankings, but individual votes would be binary.
Any idea if some sort of in game message boards/comment system is on the radar for public feedback? (Bug reports, typos, praise, whatever.) Feedback is a very valuable source of encouragement for hobby builders. While email may work if you want to send feedback, I don't think you can email someone's global handle (and it's limited to private messages too).
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Too much freedom. Since where only getting the illusion of "build and create". And in turn not not becoming our own GM's, in our own Missions. Its nice to have customizable missions but, if your going to attempt to give us real freedom, We should have GM power in OUR own missions. Why restrict our own mission power?.
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....huh?
We're getting custom missions. Where we can create custom AV/Heroes. And custom villain and hero groups, with custom minions, custom lieutenants, custom bosses, custom dialogue, custom objectives, betrayals by the people who you're rescuing, adjustable names, flavor text, powers and abilities.
What in God's name do you need to feel like you're being given "GM power?" The I-Win command? The ability to have rocks fall and kill all the players in your game? A function that makes you lattes and serves you cheetos every time someone rates your story arc four stars or above?
Seriously. Dude.
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Please tell me there is a save button and a holding tank so that we can work on stuff, set it aside, and come back to it later; without having to worry about people using it.
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From the faq, you have effectively unlimited storage for local missions that you're working on. Unpublished arcs start out as simple files on your computer somewhere, so I'd imagine you can create copies of them and do versioning pretty easily.
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I'm planning on doing a Guide to Subversion for this. Unfortunately, there's not much to do until I actually get my mitts on the beta, since it'll work much better with examples using the actual files and such.
Patience 
Players' Choice Awards: Best Dual-Origin Level Range Arc!
It's a new era, the era of the Mission Architect. Can you save the Universe from...
The Invasion of the Bikini-clad Samurai Vampiresses from Outer Space? - Arc ID 61013
Another question: can we have "Enemy teleport on defeat," similar to Professor Echo's escapes?
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Another question: can we have "Enemy teleport on defeat," similar to Professor Echo's escapes?
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I hope so, I see when can make bosses try to flee, but IDK about the teleport out trigger.
What happens to arcs if the player who created them goes inactive?
Can trial accounts use the MA? ( Better not... )
--Arkham : The Blackened Hatter
Virtue: The Iron Judge - lvl 50 Inv/War Mace Tanker.
And his amazing friends: Warman, Dr. Mindfire, Ms Mallet, Papa Cap, Ibis, Ragman, Queen Steam, Rudraksha, Teflon Girl, Kodiakman.
Can we build opposing/battling factions into a mission, as is seen in some Co* missions? Such as Thorns minions and Bantheon minions fighting it out, while both are hostile to the player?
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I'd be inclined to wonder if the MA missions are available cross-server and cross US/UK.
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The first part of your question (cross-server) is answered in the OP. (The answer is yes, btw.)
Not sure if the "arc server" will be shared between the US and UK like the market server is, though.
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They mentioned it using a global server. So there is a chance.
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
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Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
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What happens to arcs if the player who created them goes inactive?
Can trial accounts use the MA? ( Better not... )
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Probably the same thing that happens to the rest of their stuff.... nothing.
Better not...
Sorry if this has been asked/answered already.
Will we be able to set up "Keyed" doors/elevators? In other words, you have to complete a set mission goal to get the key that opens the door to the next level of the map?
"Null is as much an argument "for removing the cottage rule" as the moon being round is for buying tennis shoes." -Memphis Bill
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It won't be so bad if it is a running cumulative total, like you can unpublish without resetting your tally, and republish later.
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What concerns me most isn't that I can't keep my arcs available to others at all times due to swapping. It's the idea that I could find an arc that I really like, but which the general populace isn't quite so enamored of (say, a 3- or 4-star arc), and later end up having it unpublished because its creator has no alternative if they want to put up other arcs.
I understand that the "Hall of Fame" should have a very high bar. But it seems like this is going to punish both the authors and the players of arcs that are good, but not quite popular enough to meet that threshhold. And that's a shame.
From what I can see we do get the ability to place spawns, trigger some events, and chain objectives (victory conditions). We'll have the ability to create new NPCs and foe groups. All of that sounds great. 
However, we lack the ability to assign transitions. That's the ability to take a building's door, sewer grate, or van door and make it connect between a zone and a map or between two maps. So all MA content will involve consulting a hologram then entering a door at AE, doing the mish, then exiting back to AE.
That's unhappy news for me, because I wanted to use transitions creatively to enhance storytelling, but ... the devs say they have difficulty with transitions in their own Excel-based mission generator, so evidently this is beyond their reach at present. Hopefully the ability to assign transitions will be one of the first things added to MA. (And, devs, if zone-to-map transitions are too difficult at first, please consider enabling map-to-map transitions, and map-on-exit button, which should be considerably easier.)
The next biggest concern I see as a designer is that I'll be able to create new content much faster than my existing content will ring up stars. So I'll have to pull down published content to get my new content up, and that will prevent my previously published content from going anywhere.
So, as someone who expects to put up a lot of content, maybe there should be some sort of facility for adding published mission slots beyond the initial 3 ...? Perhaps buying them with the architect tickets, or even buying them with actual cash thru the PlayNC store (like character slots).
My third concern is that if I ever did make an arc that ascended to the MA heavens it could never be part of the real world of CoH/CoV. It will always be limited to AE, at least till the situation regarding zone-to-map transitions is addressed. 
My final concern, as others have expressed, is the ratings system and the likelihood it will become part of the metagame. It seems to me the big SGs will dominate MA by getting their members to vote for SG-created content. It will become a popularity contest, basically, and not really a means of measuring the value of player-created content.
Having said all of that, I must say that this is for me the most exciting addition to the game, period.
(qr)
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...further up the cue.
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Tech support IRL, CLR/DRU/MED/WHM/PRI/DEF. Hmm, I sense a pattern...
S 80% E 80% A 40% K 0%
A few of my alts
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When I read the article at lunch this after noon, I called my wife and told her "I think my head just exploded!"
The MA is an exciting addition to CoH.
However, one line in the description cut into my enthusiasm greatly, unless I'm misinterpreting:
"At the high level we allow you to create your own stories and share them with others in the game."
What does "At the high level" mean? I've been in CoH for 30 months, but I have severe altitis. My highest level character is 32. Is the MA level-gated? If I can't get in and start creating content at release, it will be a *major* disappointment. This is the update I've been looking forward to the most.
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In the Massively audio, they said you can use MA from level 1. You can do the tutorial at that level. At level 5 you will be directed to it if you have not gone yet.
I take the saying "At the high level", to not mean level in game but like an executive or bird's eye view. A summary if you will.
--Rad
/whereami:
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My final concern, as others have expressed, is the ratings system and the likelihood it will become part of the metagame. It seems to me the big SGs will dominate MA by getting their members to vote for SG-created content. It will become a popularity contest, basically, and not really a means of measuring the value of player-created content.
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Well, as long as it's rated fairly, I don't see that being a problem. Of course, it probably won't be - the temptation would be too great for a large guild to farm their own arcs. And getting a leg up in the ratings by having fifty or so motivated people grind your arc to completion might be seen as kind of a bonus to joining a large guild.
Might we in future see a 'Mission Writers Guild' SG whose sole purpose is to play through and critique each others' missions to combat this? Who knows.
@Mindshadow
Touch my awesome button.....
Oh my god, I'm still laughing.
Okay, probably not the right place to post, but ... again, still laughing.
I'm excited about this! I'm already drawing up ideas for some missions to create with my villain main, Poison Bloom. Missions to share her evilness with both villains, and heroes who might wish to thwart some of her plans in Paragon.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
Ok, dumb question (forgive me if this has been asked before):
Are all the mission arcs that are "published" going to be available to the entire community or will you be able to create mission arcs that are more isolated (for SG events, RP stories, etc)?
I've been plotting out a Praetorian version of my character ever since I read about MA, back last year. Is there a way to make the main villain of my mission arc an exact copy (costume/archetype/powerset) of anyone else's toon that decides to do my arc?
My DeviantArt Gallery
I understand we can't edit existing villain groups powers. But can we at least alter their appearance, or colors?
IE: I want a black and red PPD Hardsuit. And I'd like a big pink warwolf for my GF.
"Where does he get those wonderful toys?" - The Joker
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Ok, dumb question (forgive me if this has been asked before):
Are all the mission arcs that are "published" going to be available to the entire community or will you be able to create mission arcs that are more isolated (for SG events, RP stories, etc)?
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It might be cool to have a fourth slot that's "Supergroup-Only." Still gives tickets and XP, but it has no way to rate it or get ratings from tickets, and only members of your Supergroup (or Supergroups in Alliance with yours) can see it. For the whole "running a full campaign" thing that might be too idiosyncratic for the regular.
But then, it sounds like you can unpublish one of your regular 3 arcs, publish your SG-only arc, let the group leader select the mission and launch it, unpublish your arc and republish your regular one, and your supergroup will be able to play the arc through with rewards even though it's unpublished. Which is likely how I'll do "regular tuesday group RP" stuff.
OK.... so can you have multiple factions in a mission.
I.E. a war started between the Malta and the Pretorians or something. With some of say Battle Maiden's group and some of Dominatrixes group, and the Malta