Live Feedback: Issue 14: Custom Critter Creation!

Issues with Critters:
EB/AV Dark Melee:
The AI loves to run away and almost never uses its tier 1/2 attack. And against players hovering at ground level, it will run away eventhough the player is well within melee range.

Masterminds:
Something is erratic in thier behavior on patrols, because sometimes they all will summon, and sometimes no summons... but very rarely some summon and some dont. Not sure on the trigger to summon in a Patrol, but its very erratic. (Using Mercs/Pain)

Subjective:
Critter spawn rates. I would like to see a slider or just raw weighting given to custom critters in custom groups over stock critters in custom groups. Stock critters are nice filler material for a group because of arc size limits, but I would like to see a 60/40 or 66/33 wieghting for my custom creations in my group..... ya know since I went through the trouble of creating them.
And sometimes you want to have a rare spawn thats just a real pain.

It has always been sadly hard to make a truly natural hero but it is even harder to make the, even more common, natural minion.
give me the ability to make a melee minion with a ranged attack which is not something as theme specific as web grenade and not something as super powerful as ripping a chunk of cement from the ground.

I would like it if sets of powers from other, already existent foes, were available to tack on to our custom critter models. that way we could make minions who would throw rocks and attack with crowbars instead of having to fire energy blasts from their fists or pull out giant sophisticated rifles.

actually, I was hoping the sets of minion powers would be, mostly, pulled from other minions instead of retrofitted heroic powers, in order to keep the heroes and villains distinctly powerful.
When a minion's energy blast goes off and does almost nothing to the target and then, a moment later, you unleash an identical energy blast that obliterates an entire room, it tends to damage the thematic feel of the game.

It'd be nice if there was a way to add things like 'pistols' or whatnot to mostly melee characters. Having to have two powersets focused on attack is limiting (and hard to justify sometimes), and Dominator Assault sets (which mix range/melee) lacks weapon sets.

Subjective: I would like to be able to use individual Mastermind Minions as mobs in game. One of the RWZ missins has you freeing an Oni and fighting a Lich so I know it is possible.

I know this is a thread for custom critters, but since ther is not an I14 MA Mission Creator thread posted by the devs:

We need more emotes for civilian escorts that are appropriate for a person in distress.

We need to be able to place rescue targets behind destructible doors since there are mobs that thematically "take no prisoners".

Subjective: Allow us to access the ID screen on standard mobs added to custom groups. It would be nice to also allow us to create a new look for them as well (I realize you can't actually edit an npc's existing look).

Subjective: Can't agree more with others - we need to have additional power sets possibly listed under "All" or a new "NPC" category that has a grab bag of various npc/invention powers. A Jab with Pistol, a Shotgun with Crowbar, a Snapshot with Bat, a generic defence ability with some minor resist and/or defence that scales up from standard/minion to extreme/boss well and uses the standard npc mez protection scheme.

I hate having to sacrifice defence to get both a melee and range, and I hate that so many things have a secondary effect that turns out too powerful when put on a minion.

okay... here's my biggest pet peeve with the custom critter creation tools:

THERE IS NO WAY TO SET A BUFF / DEBUFF PATTERN

Specifically speaking, when I place allies into a mission, they always continuously attack any target. The only way I am able to get any kind of buffs out of an ally is by doing this:

set preference attack to melee

take controller power set on easy

take defender buff power set on extreme

By doing this, I managed to get one fortitude and 2 clear minds out of an empath ally. Granted after those buffs wore off I never got any more, and I still haven't gotten buffs from kinetic allies, sonic allies, rad allies, therm rad allies, and so on.

About the only good news to this is that enemy custom critters are just as bad about using buffs / debuffs. Kinda pathetic when I give an Elite Boss opponent rad blast / rad debuff and never get LR'd.

***

So here's my suggestion: add in some finer grained tools for controlling enemy critters with buff powersets.

Add an additional three sub options to fighting preference:

attack: custom critter focus's on using their attack powers

buff: custom critter prioritizes powers that offer buffs

debuff: custom critter prioritizes powers that offer debuffs

If possible, actually put these on a sliding or ranking scale, so that you can you can tell an enemy to focus on debuffs and attacks, but not worry about buffing it's lewys; or conversely, tell an ally to focus on buffs, debuffs, and maybe turn attacking off completely. While the buff / debuff changes won't make any difference on a custom critter with only attacks, it could really help when creating storylines that feature or include players that are known for their buffs and debuffs, not attacks... like Rave Kitty, Zeria Sundae, or Fractured Existence.

It has become apparent the AI has some serious flaws.

-an AV (standard OR custom) stands there, picking its nose for 5 minutes waiting for a long-recharge power to recharge. Encounter becomes trivial.
-a custom mob uses NO debuffs whatsoever
-a custom mob spams a certain power whenever it becomes available
-an ally on defensive will aggro the entire map if one person has tactics on

Even if the AI were simplified to:
-every second, pick a random power out of BOTH powersets to use
Then it wouldn't fight so idiotically.

Please let us pick individual powers for custom mobs.
Balance it any way you feel like, but please give us choice.

There appear to be some issues with Mastermind allies. The ally summons his pets quickly enough, but for the most part they just trail along following the MM, and don't attack. After watching their behaviour, it occurred to me that the pets are probably being summoned in defensive mode, which means that unless the MM themselves draws aggro (not common, if you're playing a solo tank like I was), then the pets are basically useless.

Objective Feedback:
<ul type="square"> [*]Custom bosses in the MA are too easy to defeat (compared to outside of MA). They also appear to have no damage resistance, and no mez/status effect resistance.[*]Custom bosses should NOT be able to be set to standard (pushovers). They should at least be set to a minimum DEFAULT of HARD (at least for ONE of their power sets).[*]Custom MELEE foe type powersets are unbalanced. i.e. being able to make a custom melee foe that is broad sword/martial arts is unbalanced, as it has NO defense/damage resistance. You end up with a foe that is INCREDIBLY easy to defeat.[*]The following Archetypes and power sets are missing from the custom critter creator:
Corrupters: poison, traps.
Stalkers: HIDE ability.
Peace bringers
Warshades
Villain Epics Archetypes (crab/bane spiders, and, widows).[*]Mayhem and Safeguard maps are missing.[*]Spawn points on several maps are incorrect. When setting a boss to appear at the "BACK" of a map, I have encountered many at the FRONT of the map instead. Spawn points need to be reviewed on all maps.[/list]

Subjective Feedback:
<ul type="square"> [*]I feel players are exploiting the MA, by being able to set up custom bosses that have no defensive set, and with a standard setting, this makes bosses a complete pushover. The bosses inside the MA are ending up much easier to defeat compared to a lieutenant outside of the MA. [*]Under "NEW CUSTOM GROUP", the existing critter level ranges view is complicated. For example - when viewing the 5th column, minions, you end up with a long list, sorted by name. It would be incredibly handy if there was an option to SORT this list by level range instead.[*]Triggers. I would love to have a trigger, whereby if you move into a certain area of the map, it triggers an ambush. For example, think of mayhem missions, where a longbow ambush happens as you move over a part of the map, another trigger makes the PPD spawn when you stand in front of the vault, etc.[*]The limitation to being able to pick powers for my custom enemies is frustrating. I would like to be able to pick the individual powers from each set.[*]I would also like the ability to pick from other powersets that aren't available to heroes or villains. For example, I would love to be able to pick powers that the arachnoids have, powers from zombie hoard invasions, powers from rularuu, etc, to make a fascinating critter with the delight of not knowing what to expect. It would add a lot of diversity.[*]I would like the ability to make my own maps. Currently, I know the layout of EVERY map in game. So does most veteran players. This makes things VERY boring.
No suspense, no anticipation, no surprise.
I would love the ability to pick a map tile set (eg office), then plonk rooms onto the map, and decorate them. What I have in mind is similar to the supergroup base editor. PLEASE I really hope this is added some day.[/list]

[ QUOTE ]
Custom bosses in the MA are too easy to defeat (compared to outside of MA). They also appear to have no damage resistance, and no mez/status effect resistance.

[/ QUOTE ]Your experience (custom bosses being pushovers) is contrary to the majority of my own, and that of may reports I've seen on the forums. You are correct that they have no damage resistance unless you give them resistance powers... but then again, neither do canon bosses. It's just that in the case of most standard critters, they have an auto power called Resistance which gives them certain resistances thematic to them. Custom bosses have standard boss mez protection (mag 3), just like all standard bosses; and it's much easier to find a custom boss with additional mez protection above and beyond that than it is to find a standard boss with more than mag 3 protection.

[ QUOTE ]
Custom bosses should NOT be able to be set to standard (pushovers). They should at least be set to a minimum DEFAULT of HARD (at least for ONE of their power sets).

[/ QUOTE ]Why shouldn't we be able to make bosses that aren't gankmasters? Because custom critters use player scalars and critter modifiers, they have the potential to become much more deadly than any standard critter, and a boss with an armor set on extreme takes quite a while to drop; it's like fighting an EB in the standard game.

For every person who makes a paper tiger boss to use for a farm mission, there's another person making a weak boss simply because they aren't trying to kill their players, or because they're trying to make a lowbie-friendly arc.

[ QUOTE ]
Stalkers: HIDE ability.

[/ QUOTE ]There are no Stalker powers, despite what the interface wuld have you believe. There are no Corruptor, Defender, Blaster, controller, etc. powers, either. There are Mission Maker Attack powersets, and there are Mission Maker Secondary powersets. The Dark Armor you can select for a custom critter under the listing of Tanker is the exact same powerset as the one listed for Scrappers, Brutes, and Stalkers. Because it isn't Tanker.Dark Armor versus Stalker.Dark Armor, it's Mission Maker Secondary.Dark Armor.

[ QUOTE ]
I feel players are exploiting the MA, by being able to set up custom bosses that have no defensive set, and with a standard setting, this makes bosses a complete pushover. The bosses inside the MA are ending up much easier to defeat compared to a lieutenant outside of the MA.
...
The limitation to being able to pick powers for my custom enemies is frustrating. I would like to be able to pick the individual powers from each set.

[/ QUOTE ]So you don't like people being allowed to leave an armor set off their critters and believe it to be an exploit (it's not), but you want to be able to cherry-pick your custom critters' powers? You can't realistically have both.

[ QUOTE ]
I would like the ability to make my own maps. Currently, I know the layout of EVERY map in game. So does most veteran players. This makes things VERY boring.
No suspense, no anticipation, no surprise.
I would love the ability to pick a map tile set (eg office), then plonk rooms onto the map, and decorate them. What I have in mind is similar to the supergroup base editor. PLEASE I really hope this is added some day.

[/ QUOTE ]I'm certain that this, along with about a million other things, is on their list of things-that-would-have-been-awesome-to-add-but-couldn't-be-due-to-time-constraints-and-can-hopefully-be-worked-on-for-MA-v2.0

Subjective:

- It'd be great to be able to mark a custom critter as unique(*) without having them be an EB/AV. EBs/AVs tend to be too powerful for lowbie arcs, and some (coughNinjitsucough) are just too powerful for solo-friendly missions. Currently, the only way of doing so appears to be to make a second group, but then you run into problems with the two groups having different names.
- There doesn't seem to be a way to set a custom group's display name from the GUI. You can change it in the .cvg file (in my case, to give 2 different groups the same name), but the GUI overwrites it back to the value that was entered in the critter's group drop-down.
- More replacement text options for dialogue would be nice. In my case, I'd like master/mistress (sir/ma'am doesn't have quite the same tone).
- The payphone can't be used as a contact? That seems like one of the more obvious choices.

EDIT: (*) By unique, I mean that they won't show up in normal spawns, only as placeable objectives.

Subjective- doing a 1-54 lvl mission on lower lvls solo or with limited help is problematic.

Heroes seem underpowered against custom critters designed I am sure for lvl 50's to fight against.

Also, the defender powers rad and dark seem ultra powerful against lvl 20 heroes on rugged with DO's.

Soloing against range powersets with melee heroes very hard in IMHO.

In general, if the mission creator picks reasonable power lvls for his custom creatures they
still are too challanging to solo or for lower lvl groups.

Also in a related problem, hard to judge mission difficulty without some scale on missions.

rmthornton:
You could name one group 'Blargle' and the other group 'Blargle '.

Yes, the perceptive player will notice that &lt;Blargle&gt; and &lt;Blargle &gt; are different, but it'll work for now.

Though I agree it'd be nice to handle it like character names (which can be identical).

Aside: it'd be nice to be able to set default 'standing around' animations for specific custom enemies, and also default flypose.

<ul type="square">[*] Ability to individually select (or deselect) a critter's power from use. We could use this to make, essentially, new power sets. Like the Robotics Mastermind powerset could be use to make a laser rifle set. Disable the pet powers and viola!
[*] Would like to see more 'group emblems/logos. We already have PPD, Vindicators, Arachnos and so forth. Would like to see more emblems such as Ouroboros, Architect Entertainment and so forth.
[*] More Mission Architect specific power sets would be welcome. ( Also there appear to be some missing such as "Traps" ). Mostly would just like to see the existing NPC villain powersets find their way into the creator.
[*] More general costuming options such as faces, hair styles. The usual stuff we whine about all the time.
[*] Ability to specify intended level range for custom critters/groups.
[*] Would like the ability to specify 'default' NPC dialog.
[*] Would like more options to specify 'how' an NPC fights. We have this to a degree within the larger MA editor itself for Allies (Aggressive, Defensive, Pacifist) but would like to see this expanded to include other spawns.
[/list]

1 is gonna happen in I15, confirmed.

3 is an AI problem the devs are working on

5 is something I really want too.

Objective: I created a boss NPC and couldn't save him because he had an "invalid costume." I haven't tried to replicate this, but it may have been a conflict between his large exposed brain and a head aura I gave him.

Subjective: I'm really enjoying the flexibility of the custom critter system, not only with regard to the powers, but also the costume pieces. I just wish custom mobs didn't take up so much memory in a mish file.

ok since noone seems to want to look at this, I'll state it and it alone.

any clue about the lack of epic AT's blue and redside.

I've been waiting since before I17 went on test to make an arc for my PB

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Subjective: Custom Critter power bundles by difficulty need to be reworked.

Powers that blind characters ie. Flash arrow, Smoke grenade, and Smoke (or is it Cinders) are available at too low a setting.

This either makes Custom Critters too powerful (with the Bundle that includes Blind) or too weak (without the other powers that are bundled in with the Blinds)

[/ QUOTE ]Subjective Feedback: On one hand it really makes it hard to create challenges meant for basic teaming because we dont have enough control over the powers a critter gets. We end up making them too tough for the control ATs because if we give them any defensive secondary they get so much mez protection. If we dont then its essentially us creating paper dolls which are easily slaughtered. This in turn is like the same wussified content we have had these past 5 years. So somethings going to have to be done with critter mez protection to be fair to all ATs.

What I been hating with all of this is all the thread on farming. Its totally getting out of hand. The devs need to make a public formal statement on what farming is or isnt in the mission architech so we can finally put this arguement to rest. I dont want the MA so stripped down that it no longer a challenge for tankers/scrappers/brutes/stalkers/masterminds all because of the farming tattle tales.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree strongly that the custom critters are WAY too hard at the standard setting. I have seen team wipe after team wipe and usually they disband because someone gets fed up and leaves and then they can't even hope to complete. I have found that if I have more than one kind of anything, all I get is complaints that it's too hard. And even with one set of anything I constantly get low ratings and feedback that it's too hard for too little xp. And that's with everything set to standard, and not giving the scrappers a defensive set at all, because that caused such a huge cascade of complaining.

The whole thing is extremely badly balanced for soloing with anything but a tank too, and getting worse. People are so excited about the possibility that someone is cheating (A concept I find fundamentally impossible since the point is to have fun whatever that means to you) that they are making it impossible to solo any AE stuff with my blasters or trollers or other such.

And now having threatened everyone the way Posi did, I can't even find teams for them. You guys went WAY too far with making it hard.

A lot of us don't have that many hours to play in and really do it for the people (Who appear to be fleeing like rats from a sinking ship now) not because we want anything to be hard.

Why is it so impossible to just let people have an easy setting? If it makes them pay for the game, which imp and rikti farms were doing, then why take that away and cause everyone to abandon ship like they have now?

The business sense behind all this is just missing as far as I can tell. Gear a setting to people who only have a couple hours maybe once a week to play. Let them still make progress rather than taking years to get to 50. People don't have to play on the easy setting if they don't want to. More power to them if they like it hard. But many of us don't. We want to vent stress and feel powerful, not struggle and die and only have a chance if on a team of 8 we can't find.