Arc #1034, "Getting to Know Crey Financial: the Teaser"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: typos
N.B. this arc was bypassed in the queue earlier when a bug made it unavailable. I'm coming back to it now that it actually shows up in the database.
Jacob Smithy, who appears to be a PPD Detective, asks you to respond to a break-in at Crey Financial. It seems that some disgruntled person is threatening the company's executives. Can't imagine why. Smithy does wonder why Crey is calling them instead of using their own security, but they've got to respond. On acceptance he also asks that you keep an eye out for any evidence of Crey wrongdoing...must have six-slotted Debuff Civil Rights.
The mobs are custom office workers with various powers and somewhat humorous /info. Unfortunately there are typos all over the place. You find a computer with files that might be useful, and a JPEG of "Pam at the Holiday Party", If You Know What I Mean. (You also notice that Jeff's been on break 17 minutes too long. Another Clue contains humor about another staffer.) The vigilante you were sent to stop turns out to be a hostage, who runs away when rescued saying he has to stop them from killing again. He drops a wallet ID'ing him as Charles Reiner of Fouders' Falls. The debriefing is just an ad for the full arc.
The arc is short, fairly easy and contains some decent attempts at humor. Unfortunately it is marred by typos.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
Thanks for the review, Venture! If you happen to have a minute or two could you PM me any typos you may remember? I've had 3 people (of the 999+) mention typos, I've gone through it myself many times and had 2 other people go through and look for them and I haven't seen any. I'd love to get those taken care of!
There is one part that says "'comperter' won't shoe up" but that was obviously on purpose. I hope that's not the 'typo's' people have been referring to!
My queue is full for now when it gets down to 5 arcs I will fill up to 10 again
Current Queue:
55098, 8928, 1992 or 2595 (still have not decided), 38226, 46405, 6536, 53131, 17702, 59152, 7595
As always if you don't want me to review say so.
I was asked why my queue is limited to 10 arcs in private. In case anyone else is wondering it is becuase the arcs in a queue are unlikely to be reviewed by others and large queues mean people end up waiting a long time to see a review.
Well according to Ventures queue I have about 3 days to tighten up my arcs. before they get hammered. j/k Venture is exactly the person I want to review them. I can't look at the text anymore without going cross-eyed.
Edited to include: holy crapzilla there are alot of typos. Too tired to fix now...
This was a two-parter so I will review it as one arc.
Also I will be changing my review format. I tried to follow Ventures style as this was his thread but it doesnt fit with the way I write and it gave away too many surprises.
Arc: 3962 and 4804
Temporal Anomalies
and
Inversion Point
Lenght: 4 missions and 4 missions
Foes: Clockwork, Banished Pantheon, Custom
Level Range: 11-20 and 25-30
Contact: Professor Jamie Salladon AKA Usurper Dyne (custom) then Heteodyne (custom) hope I spelled those right as my notes got spilled on.
Rating: 3 stars and 4 stars
TL-DR
Pros: Fun, great story shift, well written (mostly), balanced foes, excellent foe design (mostly), good story flow, has cannon ties
Cons: Some clumsy wording of mission text, too much info about the contacts, very bad map choice in one mission
Overview:
The story starts off wiith a simple rescue of a young girl who wants to be a hero. during this you discover the Clockwork are acting odd.
Then you are asked to find some missing psychics the clockwork kidnapped, but it turns out they are not clockwork but a group called Golem Court. Still everyone still refers to them as Clockwork.
Then things get weird. You contact has code errors in his Intro text but still you do as he asks (?) Which is to rescue someone named Hettie. Hettie turns out to be a hero named Heteodyne, Usurper Dynes alternate dimension dopelganger. She sees the Golem Court as her realities Clockwork and you fight a boss that was there to force her to be the Golem Kings wife.
Then you find out that you are actually in the Mission Architect and that there is a bug that needs fixing so you fight the Golem King who aludes to a partner.
(next arc)
Heteodyne is now your contact and she asks you to enter the Mission Architect to clean up a bit of code. Inside you find the Banished Pantheon who need to be cleaned out and Mynx who helps you do this.
Mynx gives you the number for her personal training program. In that program you find Mynx's programed version of Crey called Cray and her passive aggressive version of Synapse who runs off quickly. The code that needs cleaning is Some Banished Pantheon masks that are named in a technological way. These Masks are accompanied by strange zombies with cybernetics. Even more curious they are from a group called 'Kolizhav'
Turns out that the Golem Kings ally was his realities version of Dr.Vahzilok called Dr.Kolizhav. he is using the mission architect to enter this reality. Both Dynes have a way to do this but need you to clear the way which means you need to take down a guardian in the mission architect. Usurper Dynes send his wife to help you but a glitch ruins that.
After defeating the guardian you are sent to shut down some techno item in the MA. But it dosnt work as you planned and Dr.Kolizhav shows up. Defeating him sends him and his plans packing. But according to the Dynes he knows we are here and may try again.
Specific Review:
Your two contacts have fully fleshed out stories making me think they are the authors toons. Usurper was a friend of the Clockwork King and even had his cybernetic made by Ol' Brainjar. And Hettie is Usurper's female counterpart. This was handled very well not intrusivly so it didn't bug me until in the second arc they casually mention how they are friends of Mynx.
Mission 1: Map is a not too large not too small cave that fits the mission type well. The hostage is cute in a lil orphan Annie way.
Mission 2: Each goal is a triggered event. I assume this was done to make you find things in specific order which is a neat idea but it results in some backtracking. The Golem Court are balanced well for the levels you are capped at and the costume is decent, nothing great but not bad either. The info on each is interesting. But they are small. I understand that they are little statues but for some reason all the small foes in the MA is getting to me. Mission map felt a little to large for my taste but that may be due to backtracking issues not the actual map. I do like the cannon name dropping you do here.
Mission 3: The mission text had an corrupted file look to it as a clue as to something wrong. It wasn't a hard guess as to why. Even with the corrupted text in Usurpers mission briefing you just go along and do his mission without saying a word about it. Little immersion breaking there. I don't know how one would fix that without changing the direction the Arc takes. The mission entrance pop-up is cute. Another perfect choice for map size and type.
Mission 4: This one is where the rating went down. Using the sharkhead Leviathan (sp?) map has a couple flaws IMO. First its very large and the spawn placement is fairly spread out so I found long long stretches of running to the end without encountering anything. Second its a very well known map which had no conection I could see to the mission you made.
The final fight was largly forgetable due to the Golem King having a fairly bland costume/powers.
Mission 1 (5): Hettie now is your contact and she says the Arc is now a Taskforce. Thats well and good but give us a TF callsign (pout). Anyway the mission is simple enough a defeat all in a moderatly sized map. I liked the hostage and kidnapper animation choices. I wasn't fond of having Mynx helping me. She does vast amounts of damage which made me look pathetic in comparrison. Not a big deal just slightly off putting.
Mission 2 (6): I loved the idea of entering Mynx's personal training simulation as well as her virtual Synapse. Was not a fan of the Cray costumes but liked why she used them instead of standard Crey (not a typo it is Cray and Crey). I really liked the custom BP/Kolizhav guys. Who Kolizhav was is not a suprise at all. Maybe a change in the name? Keep the mystery longer.
Mission 3 (7): I am not sure if it was intended or not but the Boss you need to fight spawned very close to the entrance so the mission was over quickly. I had forgotten that I had an ally in the mission so completly missed that part. Going to go back to check it out.
Mission 4 (8): The better looking graveyard map was perfect, its too bad the effect was ruined by it being daytime when i went in. The very first glowy dropped the clue which told me I had found all the glowies yet something went wrong. It proved to be anticlimatic finding the other glowies to spawn the final foe. Perhaps have it that you need to collect the others first making the last one a triggered event which then triggers the final fight.
Now I gotta say I was actually looking forward to fighting the cannon version of Dr Vahz as a renamed foe. It disapointed me to find he was a custom foe. I understand this was done becuase of level limits but it was still a letdown as I love his costume and powers. The custom Dr Koli (dosnt have the same ring as Dr Vahz) was fairly bland. Not sure how you could spice it up but I really thing it needs it.
The first arcs major flaws which hurt my rating were the forgetable final fight and the map choice in the last mission.
The second arc only lost marks because of the casual Mynx friendship remark...it had a very 'I am so cool I sit at the cool table' feel to it that really hurt my opinion of the contacts. I know that wasn't your intent (at least I hope it wasn't) but it really rubbed me the wrong way.
As a minor note, you make a big deal out of your mission being cannon or rather CANNON yet all that really is cannon are the refrences you make to past cannon events. And your contacts actually break cannon.
As always if you change things let me know and I will replay and re-rate.
I have completed arc # 45503 but too tired to review it now...will do it tomorrow.
QR
Well, anyone who wants to review my arcs:
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Author: @FemFury
Level Range: 40+ (with a brief lower level in first mission)
Subject: A mystic artifact threatens to return ancient goddesses to the world.
5909 - Amazon-Avatars
Notes: This is the one I most hope for hearing feedback on. Very story oriented. I typed a lot of text for this one, and I'd love to have more people read it.
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Author: @FemFury
Level Range: 1 to 50
Subject: An encounter with a minor discounted supervillainess brings greater danger than expected.
6143 - Escalation
Notes: My goal with this arc was to create a memorable opponent.
First mission has some running around, every other map is a small, quick one.
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I'm a published amateur comic book author: www.ericjohnsoncomics.com
******MA Arcs****
Arc 5909: "Amazon-Avatars"
Arc 6143: "Escalation" (Nominee: Architect Awards, Nominee: Player Awards, and Dev's Choice!)
Well Venture, I took most of your advice and did an overhaul of a decent chunk of my Arc, mostly in the writing areas since the other parts didn't need so much changing. I also switched it up and made it much more magical themed, although only time will tell if I honestly like it better this way (just being honest :P).
Since your swamped I won't ask for any kind of official review, but if you ever get bored and want to see how your advice has changed an Arc, feel free to take a peek sometime and let me know. The Arc is now #60484
Guess i'm feeling masochistic...
All by @Wulfie
The Voice of Freedom: Arc ID: 33681
Hillbilly Cannibal Mayhem! Arc ID: 2669
(QR) Because I'm feeling masochistic too (or perhaps cocky)
The Tartarus Project
Arc: #1499
Levels: 41-50 (Malta, Knives. Customs only for EBs and AV in final mission and to get specific group mixes.)
Subject: Stopping a minor Malta raid leads to a much larger threat. (Don't want to get too spoilery)
Theme/Feel: Semi-old-school Malta arc that takes advantage of some of the newer innovations in gameplay.
Warning: Author Avatar present in first mission as ally.
I'll toss one onto the barbie here:
Arc ID: 40062
Name: The World's Worst PUG
Difficulty: Two AVs, but on Heroic, it's easily done with two people. Maybe even solo.
Level range: 40-50
Time: About 1 hour. Maybe less.
C'mon. You know you need the XP, and who's gonna know you joined this awful pick-up group anyway?
[This "arc" (it's really just one mission) is both "meta" and "comedy". If you're looking for serious arcs only, move on.]
40062: The World's Worst PUG
84008: Jenkins's Guide to Super-Villainy
230187: The Hero of Kings Row
No H8 - 08.04.10
@Circuit Boy - Moderator - Pride global chat channel
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Arc #6999, "Seekers of the Grail"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: weak plot, Contact deals in bad faith, overpowered mobs
Your Contact is Lancelot...I don't know if he's that Lancelot because he says that secrecy is vital and his brethren are not ready, etc. His costume is a bit on the garish side, a mixture of gold and bright blues and reds, though I realise that's a pretty subjective thing. He wants you to investigate some new group calling itself the "Seekers".
Entering a warehouse, I first ran into an "Arthur's Sword" Minion (BS/Shield) and "Merlyn's Adept" LT (Necro/Dark). Next was an "Arthur's Guard" LT (Mace/Shield) who popped BuildUp and promptly whacked me for 1036 points. He did spawn as a +2 but this still seems a bit much for an LT. I quickly ran into an "Arthur's Arrow" Minion with Archery...no idea what the second set might be. Finding the target computer triggers a new objective, "defeat the boss". The Boss is "Arthur's Wrath", a Mind Control/Empath. The bio says the Wrath agents are rumored to be telepathically linked to "Arthur". Lancelot gets angry when you tell him the goons use Arthur's name.
You are next sent to a ship (...) being used as a mobile command post by "Bors", one of Arthur's top men. You are warned that he's a powerhouse, and there is even a "WARNING: this mission contains an Elite Boss" at the end of the briefing. (Nit: would be better presented in-character and/or with color so it stands out.) What you are not told until after you accept is that it's a timed mission...30 minutes to reach and defeat an EB at the back of a ship map. I hit stealth and flew past it all, of course. I spotted one Boss spawn, another Wrath, and then another Wrath...right next to Bors. I hit a Luck and Elusive Mind and went in swinging. I managed to drop the Wrath without agroing Bors, then took on him and his (largeish) spawn. Bors is an Axe wielder, and I'm not sure what his second set is. In any case, he didn't have any -KB and was easy pickings. In any case putting the Boss spawn potentially so close is likely to be problematic for many. Afterwards Lancelot tells you that you've confirmed his greatest fears and he must leave to seek his brethren, but has something for you to do first.
That something is to go to another Seeker base to try to find out what happened to the previous hero he asked to help him. Nice time to find out the job's already killed someone, maybe.... The hero "Krieg" (Boss, /info says he's "weakened by captivity") turned out to be alive and triggered a new objective to "Find Merlyn's Tome". He's an escort so I took him to the entrance, but he didn't leave. He wouldn't fight after that so I never found out what his powers were. He did appear to be running a Willpower toggle. The map was an office-to-caves number; the first spawn point in the caves had a large Boss spawn overlapped with a second spawn, the lot becoming much more "fun" after the Wrath cast Regen Aura on everyone.... The new objective was a a "Merlyn's Altar" with a large spawn around it. Evidently the objective was to protect the altar, because defeating the initial spawn around it cleared the mission. (There were a few mobs left from an ambush.) The Clues assume that you take Krieg to the altar and then escape...since the altar is a required objective it would be better to drop the escort portion of Krieg's objective.
The tome not only tells you where Merlyn is but also tells how the entity behind this is something Merlyn summoned but couldn't control, so he submitted to it, and that he convinced it to use the Arthurian myths as a mask. When you get back, Lancelot confesses that he doesn't have an army coming to back you up and you're the city's last hope. In the briefing for the next mission he says he is that Lancelot, that this "entity" is something the Knights of the Round Table fought, and that the "Merlyn" working with "Arthur" is not that Merlyn. He's sent Krieg ahead to Merlyn's location. At this point you are working for someone who has consistently lied to you and left another hero out to dry.... In the accepted text he goes on to say Merlin put all the Knights into suspended animation, set to awake when the "entity" returned, but they don't have the power to compete with superhumans now.
The first target at the base is "Galahad", a Dual Blades/Super Reflexes. He's surrounded by another huge spawn, which included one of the Adept Necro/Darks and one of the Guards, the ones who hit for 1K+. I got caught in a fear off the Necro and faceplanted (it didn't help that I couldn't see the Adept cast a Tar Patch, causing instant interrupts on Aid Self). Defeating Galahad triggered the Defeat Merlyn objective (and gave me a Clue with a misspelled title -- "Galasad". At least I hope that's a typo and not a very bad pun.) Krieg was available as an Ally but I bypassed him. I ran into another four Arthur's Wrath spawns, the first of which was a +2. I popped Elusive Mind and took it out, then stealthed the other three because they weren't listed as objectives. Merlyn himself was a Fire Blast/Force Field; he opened with Inferno, as is usual these days...and missed. On his defeat (which the Clue says is a death, hope you don't have a code versus killing...), Merlyn admits there is no grail (which I thought we'd already established) and with Merlyn gone the Seekers will be weakened as he was partly responsible for enthralling the goons.
The last mission is an assignment to take out "Arthur", whom is said to be an AV. Krieg has gone ahead again. It's an Oranbega map, a large one.... I took down a frontloaded Wrath, and bypassed three more. Krieg spawned on the upper level of one of the big rooms, I left him there. I got dirtnapped later on by a 1252 hit from an LT in the Big Bad's room. "Arthur" turned out to be a Broadsword/Shield AV (EB) who dropped me in the first heat when Practiced Bralwer's autocast interrupted my Aid Self just before I took a 1200 point Head Splitter. (N.B. -- the Big Bad hits about as hard as the Lieutenants.) I took him down in the rematch. His defeat Clue says the armor was empty (typo: "faught") and you can't help but feel he's not gone forever.
Lancelot thanks you, tells you that we still don't know who or what the entity was, and that its enslaved goons will slowly return to their normal lives.
The arc does invoke the Arthurian legends, but I'm not sure if that's a good idea. There are probably dozens of bios on each server that involve those stories leading to some potential backlash from fervent RPers, not helped by the fact that it plays loose and fast with them. The Contact deals with the player in bad faith; the arc doesn't really throw the Idiot Ball but it would take a big leap of faith for someone to keep working with Lancelot by act IV. An additional issue is that we never really see the Seekers doing anything bad. We don't bust up a robbery by them, recover stolen goods from them, rescue hostages intended for mind control, etc. We never find out who "Merlyn" really was or what "Arthur" really was. It's pretty clear from the dialog that the Seekers are bad guys, but without that it's as if you've been handed a gun and told to walk into the next room and shoot the first person you see. The arc is Boss-heavy at points but I wouldn't mark down for that; I'm just noting it for the benefit of squishier builds. The Arthur's Guard LTs, however, are way over the top.
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I don't know how, but you played an older version of the arc. Most of those problems have been addressed already. I don't know how re-publishing works, I guess its not instant. Oh well.
Also, I'm telling the story *I* want to tell. It would be impossible to try and make sure everything was compatible with all the different possibilities of PC back stories.
DELETED DUE TO OVERPROMOTION
"City of Heroes. April 27, 2004 - August 31, 2012. Obliterated not with a weapon of mass destruction, not by an all-powerful supervillain... but by a cold-hearted and cowardly corporate suck-up."
I kind of assumed the point of having several people making review threads was to get more arcs reviewed, not to have a few arcs get 2-3 reviews each.
Character index
Hey... who says everyone in Los Angeles reads the New York Times? 
"City of Heroes. April 27, 2004 - August 31, 2012. Obliterated not with a weapon of mass destruction, not by an all-powerful supervillain... but by a cold-hearted and cowardly corporate suck-up."
>_>
The TV Never lies...
*runs away*
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Hey... who says everyone in Los Angeles reads the New York Times?
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Yes, getting a lot of plays on your arc requires mentioning it in as many threads as possible, but think of the bigger picture. If every reviewer has to put every arc in their queue, there might as well only be one.
(I swear there was a name for this, where the community in general benefits most from a resource if everyone uses it sparingly, but there's a net gain for each individual when they take up more of the resource, so everyone ends up taking up as much as they can and nobody wins. No idea what the name was, though.)
Character index
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(I swear there was a name for this, where the community in general benefits most from a resource if everyone uses it sparingly, but there's a net gain for each individual when they take up more of the resource, so everyone ends up taking up as much as they can and nobody wins. No idea what the name was, though.)
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Tragedy of the commons. I think.
EDIT: I should add that I'm reserving judgement on whether it is applicable here, but I wanted to answer the question.
Current main:
Schrodinger's Gun, Dual Pistols/Mental Blaster, Virtue
Avatar: Becky Miyamoto from Pani Poni Dash. Roulette roulette~
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(I swear there was a name for this, where the community in general benefits most from a resource if everyone uses it sparingly, but there's a net gain for each individual when they take up more of the resource, so everyone ends up taking up as much as they can and nobody wins. No idea what the name was, though.)
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Tragedy of the commons. I think.
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Ah, thanks, that was it. (Google is sadly unhelpful where all you have to go on is "that thing with the cows and the shared pasture".)
Character index
Would love some feedback on my arc (its in the sig), I realise its not perfect but hey, everyone starts somewhere :-)
Its a short story and thus shouldn't take too long to play. Probably takes longer to read all the clues.
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(I swear there was a name for this, where the community in general benefits most from a resource if everyone uses it sparingly, but there's a net gain for each individual when they take up more of the resource, so everyone ends up taking up as much as they can and nobody wins. No idea what the name was, though.)
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Tragedy of the commons. I think.
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Ah, thanks, that was it. (Google is sadly unhelpful where all you have to go on is "that thing with the cows and the shared pasture".)
[/ QUOTE ]I heartily agree. I don't mean to sound like I'm all special and stuff, but when someone wants me to review an arc with 30+ plays I wonder how interested they are in what I actually have to say.
Part of why I keep an eye on this thread to avoid doubling up overmuch with what venture's touching on. Unless I seriously disagree with him - he thought Hero's Halo was decent, I thought it was utter drivel - I'm not going to bother making an issue of what I think when he's providing guidance and useful information to people for both finding arcs to play, and finding arcs to avoid. So yeah, posting a review request in my thread, and then in his, it becomes low priority for me.
Oh, and I don't have a queue. I have a pile.
OK ok. Point taken.
I was hoping for unique opinions on a brand new "server shutdown warning as I was publishing" arc, but... seeing as it's being taken as shameless promotion instead, I'll remove mine from both queues.
"City of Heroes. April 27, 2004 - August 31, 2012. Obliterated not with a weapon of mass destruction, not by an all-powerful supervillain... but by a cold-hearted and cowardly corporate suck-up."
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Honestly folks...this is an MMO. How high a standard do we want here? Most people aren't going to be putting weeks tweaking their arcs. If the story is good, the mobs acceptable in challenge and the whole is engaging it should be noted by both players and Devs.
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Why should an average mission the author didn't spend a tremendous amount of time on be rewarded with 5 stars?
The bar for a Hall of Fame should be higher than "the author spelled all the words correctly, and the enemies weren't terrible".
To me a pretty good story is a three star story- I don't grade on a curve because I'm worried about hurting someone's feelings.
With regards to Green Dwarf's story, the plot synopsis reminds me strongly of a low level mission in WoW where dwarven brewers send you around the zone collecting this and that for their special stout, and an enemy you can't defeat without ranged attacks is terrible design, period.
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This! Exactly!
I don't like giving a 1 or 2 to people, but when I enter a story, see it's filled with the same repetitious custom mob, has no text (in one story, the player literally just hit random keys to get the field filled in), and was obviously slapped together in 15 minutes, it's going to get a very low rating from me. It may be the most wonderful farming mission ever created, but it doesn't make it a good mission. It could be an incredible story, .but if it's unplayable by the average character because it's geared for the author's purpled-out Warshade, it'll get a lower score from me.
But if you take the time to write a coherent plausible story that plays smoothly, is of an appropriate challenge for whatever difficulty level you're playing at, and has good entertainment value, then I'll rate it higher than 3 stars.
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
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Arc: 3962 and 4804
Temporal Anomalies
and
Inversion Point
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Thank you for taking the time to play these, Hell_O_Ween.
I'm going to keep my commentary here (somewhat) brief, as I'm sure most people don't really care about my point-by-point reaction. But I'll address a few of your comments, simply because they may clarify things for those who decide to play or not play based on it.
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Contact: Professor Jamie Salladon AKA Usurper Dyne (custom) then Heteodyne (custom)
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Heterodyne, otherwise correct.
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Your two contacts have fully fleshed out stories making me think they are the authors toons.
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Correct. This arc is, in essence, an answer to the hypothetical question "if your character was a signature character, what would their Task Force be about?"
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Mission 2: Each goal is a triggered event. I assume this was done to make you find things in specific order which is a neat idea but it results in some backtracking.
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Apart from ensuring the sequence of the hostages, it's mostly a holdover from earlier versions of the mission. I'll look into revising it.
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But they are small. I understand that they are little statues but for some reason all the small foes in the MA is getting to me.
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I think there's a bug with the creator where it doesn't always save the scales correctly, so some of what you're seeing may be unintentional. But in my case it was deliberate (for the servitors). Yes, they are statues, but more to the point, they are parallel Clockwork, and most of the Clockwork are pretty small.
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Even with the corrupted text in Usurpers mission briefing you just go along and do his mission without saying a word about it
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Good point. My thinking was that the player's character would obviously have realized that something was wrong (probably before this mission), but that the system wouldn't be giving them any real way to figure out the cause, short of continuing the simulation in order to see what it does next. I was also wary of putting words in the player's mouth (though I suppose I already did that with some of the Accept Mission strings)
I have an idea on how to handle this more explicitly, without requiring branching text or whatnot, but I don't know whether there's space left to pull it off, so I'll have to do some testing and adjusting this evening.
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I loved the idea of entering Mynx's personal training simulation
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That mission was a lot of fun to write.
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Mission 3 (7): I am not sure if it was intended or not but the Boss you need to fight spawned very close to the entrance so the mission was over quickly.
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No ... the spawn placement settings have no effect on most outdoor maps, so the location is entirely out of my control.
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The very first glowy dropped the clue [...] Perhaps have it that you need to collect the others first making the last one a triggered event which then triggers the final fight.
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I'll have to do something about it, as that behavior is definitely not intended. It's either a bug, or I've been misunderstanidn how collections work all this time.
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The second arc only lost marks because of the casual Mynx friendship remark...it had a very 'I am so cool I sit at the cool table' feel to it that really hurt my opinion of the contacts. I know that wasn't your intent (at least I hope it wasn't) but it really rubbed me the wrong way.
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No, it wasn't. (As a level 50 character he technically does "sit at the cool table" now, according to the game itself, but this isn't about him and the player has no reason to know or care about his accomplishments, so that's not what I was going for. I only hint that he's "up there" by having him form the task force on his own initiative.)
The Mynx friendship thing is pretty much just me poking fun at my own characters for my own amusement (players would have had no way of getting the joke unless they were around at the time it happened).
See, back in the dim and misty of 2004, when UD was in the Skyway level range, I hadn't found any roleplayers to hang with, and I was bored of repetitive soloing. To amuse myself, I started having UD "chat up" Mynx (badly) in Local whenever I went by there (he's a geek ... she's a catgirl ... it seemed an obvious thing to do at the time). Being an NPC, she obviously never responded to him beyond her function as a trainer, which I interpreted as "keeping things entirely professional".
So, UD is deluding himself (and by extension, so is Heterodyne) ... or to be charitable, they are "misremembering things". There was never any significant in-character relationship between UD and Mynx.
The allusion was also a (very terse) explanation for why I chose to add that particular character to the story. But if it is giving the impression I'm trying to make UD seem cooler-than-thou, I'll take it out.
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As a minor note, you make a big deal out of your mission being cannon or rather CANNON yet all that really is cannon are the refrences you make to past cannon events. And your contacts actually break cannon.
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That particular tag wasn't my idea ... it came from a thread here in the forums, where it was suggested for arcs that "make an effort to work into the story of the game" (or something along those lines). Whatever the exact wording, it was broad enough that to my mind, it included arcs that attempt to expand upon canon, as long as they don't outright contradict it. If it's misleading, out it goes.
I don't think I contradicted anything that is explicitly factual in canon, though I am well aware that I elaborated on some canonical *deductions* about the nature of the Clockwork, which isn't quite the same thing. In Mind of a King (the text of which I just reread on the wiki), you learn how the clockwork are powered, and Synapse makes a reference to this in his TF, but that only addresses how they move, not the nature of the personalities (or lack thereof) that they display. In this arc, I didn't say that the working theory was incorrect, only that it was incomplete.
(I believe that there is some indication in the clockwork boss descriptions that they have robotic brains, but that IS contradicted by Mind of a King, so I ignore it as an explanation.)
(The idea that the Clockwork can go rogue is based on the prevalence of clockwork hero characters ... they were a common sight at one time not long after release. This is just me making a nod to those other players ... not anyone in particular, though.)
Well if this is the place to advertise your arc, and hopefully get feedback to improve it.
Arc ID: 41625
Name: Getting to Know Oneself
Difficulty: Not too hard, an EB in one mission, AV in last (timed)
4 missions
Level range: any
Players are needed to help investigate a strange force that links some heroes to other people. (readers of Moorcock will get the idea)
FireBrandi - Champions lvl 50 Fire/Fire/Fire Blaster - Tier 4 Alpha
Kim Paler - lvl 50 Crab Spider - Tier 3 Alpha
My DA page
I would like to toss in Brass Reaver part 1 and 2 (16952 & 59456) for review.