You can set up a Battle in the missions and use bosses of two different groups. Just set both factions to "enemy."
Arc# 92382 -- "The S.P.I.D.E.R. and the Tyrant" -- Ninjas! Robots! Praetorians! It's totally epic! Play it now!
Arc # 316340 -- "Husk" -- Azuria loses something, a young woman harbors a dark secret, and the fate of the world is in your hands.
Voo,
I'm pretty much agreeing with you. Defeat Alls tend to be lame. I thought about putting one in on my arc, but decided against it.
Also, any hostages on big maps I use the "Captive: Energy Barrier" (or whatever it's called) animation so it really stands out at a distance. There's also a magical equivalent.
And since I hate glowy hunts, I've used those sparingly. (And will continue to use them sparingly.)
Arc# 92382 -- "The S.P.I.D.E.R. and the Tyrant" -- Ninjas! Robots! Praetorians! It's totally epic! Play it now!
Arc # 316340 -- "Husk" -- Azuria loses something, a young woman harbors a dark secret, and the fate of the world is in your hands.
If you set a custom group with one boss in it, multiple copies of him will spawn in. Trust me, I tried it countless times solo and there were always two, and if you were in a group, there would only be more than that (this could be fine if you don't want the bosses to be a unique opponent/character, but that's what I needed). This happened with an ambush, battle, hostage, etc. I couldn't get two unique bosses (they are characters in a storyline, if you play my arc, you'll know who I was trying to get fighting/ambushing) to spawn in together, or to have one ambush alone after beating the other boss.
The alternative I had to go with was one boss spawning the other boss as a boss spawn. So he came in as unique and surrounded by Warriors, which worked okay for the arc. Still not quite what I wanted, but okay for now until the devs give us some more options.
As for the other discussion, it seems odd to me to be flat out against an objective type when you don't have a context to dislike it in, but whatever. *shrugs* To each their own, obviously, but it is an odd criteria set.
Guide: Tanking, Wall of Fire Style (Updated for I19!), and the Four Rules of Tanking
Story Arc: Belated Justice, #88003
Synopsis: Explore the fine line between justice and vengeance as you help a hero of Talos Island bring his friend's murderer to justice.
Grey Pilgrim: Fire/Fire Tanker (50), Victory
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Arc 6788: Bad Bad Bad Bad Boys
Rating: 3/5
Notes: annoying map, way too many objectives, super gay.
Overall: Other than the overly gay themes it wasn't too bad. Decent use of multiple objectives for a mission, but the map was annoying. Clearly not aimed at my demographic, but otherwise reasonable.
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I was going for "uber gay" not "super gay," so I may need to tweak it. 
I've been focusing on the "serious" stories so I haven't done anything with the feedback on this one, but I may set it up so that the second and third objectives pop in a fixed area, if possible, and let the player know in mission text so they know where to go.
Amusingly, this mission has gotten more plays than the ones I've spent hours putting together. Of course. But everybody deserves a little eye candy. I'll probably end up doing an even gayer sequel to it eventually.
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From what I've seen, a favorite farmer tactic is to make groups that have nothing but bosses. I'm not sure why (better ticket rewards over time maybe?). I haven't really investigated the farming stuff too much, just what I hit when I was trying for the early bird badge.
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Simply put, more tickets per mob. Remember me commenting about how I had a virtual arc (which I refuse to publish because of the no story/defeat all thing) with nothing but AVs that would always spawn as EBs? Well, it was giving no tickets after a quarter way into the map in a full team before the team tickets were changed, but with most of them on extreme/extreme, I went back to solo it and probably averaged over 25 virtual tickets a mob.... Only a couple didn't drop tickets. In fact, I found a published mission last night which had about half a dozen ambushes from EB only groups, obviously to boost the ticket count.
As for Voodoo, I completely agree. I try to avoid the defeat all maps, even if there is a story line purpose to it, partly because it just takes that much extra time where I could be testing out any other arc. I WILL say that defeat alls don't have to be annoyingly time consuming. I've used them, but I usually make sure to add allies, including maybe patrols as allies or battles, etc.... Patrols seem to make them go the quickest (for a published example, see my arc "SPLICE" mission 3, though that mission does have a boss/EB at the end).
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From what I've seen, a favorite farmer tactic is to make groups that have nothing but bosses. I'm not sure why (better ticket rewards over time maybe?). I haven't really investigated the farming stuff too much, just what I hit when I was trying for the early bird badge.
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Simply put, more tickets per mob. Remember me commenting about how I had a virtual arc (which I refuse to publish because of the no story/defeat all thing) with nothing but AVs that would always spawn as EBs? Well, it was giving no tickets after a quarter way into the map in a full team before the team tickets were changed, but with most of them on extreme/extreme, I went back to solo it and probably averaged over 25 virtual tickets a mob.... Only a couple didn't drop tickets. In fact, I found a published mission last night which had about half a dozen ambushes from EB only groups, obviously to boost the ticket count.
As for Voodoo, I completely agree. I try to avoid the defeat all maps, even if there is a story line purpose to it, partly because it just takes that much extra time where I could be testing out any other arc. I WILL say that defeat alls don't have to be annoyingly time consuming. I've used them, but I usually make sure to add allies, including maybe patrols as allies or battles, etc.... Patrols seem to make them go the quickest (for a published example, see my arc "SPLICE" mission 3, though that mission does have a boss/EB at the end).
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Jack there is another thing that could cause the EB only ambushes.
The ambushes won't allow just a single to come. If you have an ambush group and only want and EB to ambush it will come out with an entire spawn of EBs. I had this issue in my arc when we first played it. The last boss fight got insane. I had to go make new special mobs that were LTs instead to get the difficulty about where I wanted it.
<sigh> Viv says its no longer "all me".
http://wendy-mags.mybrute.com/
I tend to 5-star the good stories I play, because I know almost everyone will give it a lower score, and even a single 4 can drop a story from the first 5 pages to the 15th or so. At that point it doesn't even matter.
Things I like:
Cool Custom Critters,
Clues and Dialog (especially if I'm not the leader),
Comedy (Comics are comical).
99.99% complete is a plus,
and CoH/V lore compliant,
Things I dislike:
Multiple AVs in a mission (EBs are okay),
Standard enemies being the map default,
and the Ruladek map (you should be ashamed).
I tend to prefer shorter arcs since I can't invest much time lately.
I like @BentSpear's Zombie one, and Topple the Pyramid.
The first has a prodigal array of custom zombies to fight, and the second one I find hilarious and enjoyable.
Another of my favorites has been @Violet Diamond's arc Lights, Camera, Action! was really good, and just a few minor tweaks would have made it perfect. Sometimes I feel that the better an arc is, the more it is critiqued since everyone can sense how close it is to being something really special. Then again, terrible arcs usually have a lot to be said about as well, so...
I'll try to post other great ones that I find.
If you're into humor I'd definitely recommend Heraclea's Monstrous Regiment of Lesbian Hellions arc (#27178). Humor arcs can be hit or miss, but this one had me loling quite a few times. Great custom critters and great use of existing ones.
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From what I've seen, a favorite farmer tactic is to make groups that have nothing but bosses. I'm not sure why (better ticket rewards over time maybe?). I haven't really investigated the farming stuff too much, just what I hit when I was trying for the early bird badge.
[/ QUOTE ]
Simply put, more tickets per mob. Remember me commenting about how I had a virtual arc (which I refuse to publish because of the no story/defeat all thing) with nothing but AVs that would always spawn as EBs? Well, it was giving no tickets after a quarter way into the map in a full team before the team tickets were changed, but with most of them on extreme/extreme, I went back to solo it and probably averaged over 25 virtual tickets a mob.... Only a couple didn't drop tickets. In fact, I found a published mission last night which had about half a dozen ambushes from EB only groups, obviously to boost the ticket count.
[/ QUOTE ]
Jack there is another thing that could cause the EB only ambushes.
The ambushes won't allow just a single to come. If you have an ambush group and only want and EB to ambush it will come out with an entire spawn of EBs. I had this issue in my arc when we first played it. The last boss fight got insane. I had to go make new special mobs that were LTs instead to get the difficulty about where I wanted it.
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Well, in this case, the ambushes, mission, etc... didn't exactly have a story and were clearly being used to create more things to get tickets from.
And yes, you can set a single elite boss to "ambush" you by using the defeat boss function and selecting the appropriate surrounding enemies group, but it rarely really works correctly because you have to hope there's another spawn point nearby (best on smaller maps, as well). If you use the ambush function, you can only choose a villain group, so you're not choosing a specific enemy to fight, unless that enemy will spawn within a villain group spawn.
With the help of seven VERY patient folks, I stress tested "V'kta A'cha Vox'm" at level 5 with a full team of eight.
And promptly watched my custom group team wipe us over and over.
Based on that, I've toned down the bugs a bit as it was simply too much to give them access to some of the more... well, super kill you powers they had.
And with that, I've made all the tweaks I'm planning, so I offer up arc 36984 for your perusal / criticism / enjoyment in whichever order you choose.
I also wanted to take this opportunity to say that "What the VuDu?" is an example of a well written / well balanced arc that is also fun to play. I have pointed it out to a few who have run my arc and asked me for recommendations for "not too long, but not too easy" arcs.
-Escher
"I swear you could fling a man hole cover across the street and hit more notes than 90% of those idiots on American Idol" -Desmodos
"Every time you post I feel like I been hit with a fist full of smart! Thanks." - Volken re: Sucker Punch
Arc #36984 V'kta A'cha Vox'm
Arc 28712 "Television Land"
Rating: 4/5
Notes: Nice map selection, The EB ally at the end is a bit overpowered, but then so is the final boss. Power Sink on an EB/AV is gross. Last mission is timed, but the timer is set pretty high.
Overall: This arc has a pretty well designed custom group, but the storyline is sparse and it suffers a bit from a "Lets go to this map, ok, now lets go to this map." feel.
Arc 34399 "What are we doing tonight Iggy?"
Rating: 3/5
Notes: The second mission is called "Steal the Council Technology", but you're fighting the 5th column.
The only clue you get as to why this might be is:
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Eagledon had a plan to subvert villian evilness by subverting them the Villians to his Security Reformation Center. Thanks to your work this device is permantely[sic] out of commission
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At this point the only thing you have done is busted a guy out of jail.
If one boss fight is good, 6 is better right? On a side note, I have never understood why so many Kheldians went into the PPD. Is there some sort of racism in Paragon City that prevents them from getting non-government jobs?
The Martian faction has a naming scheme where every mob is "Martial X", which is strange for a faction that mostly relies on energy blasts and Pain Domination (on the bosses).
The Final AV's dialog only makes sense if you're playing as the guy you rescued on the first mission. Perhaps he was supposed to be an ally on this map?
Overall: This arc needs a good once over with an editor. While there was some story poking through, there were a lot of unanswered questions at the end. If cleaned up, I think this could easily be a 4 or maybe even 5 star arc.
Arc 36984: "V'Kta A'Cha Vox'm"
Rating: 4/5
Notes: Why can't Onus rescue his own friend? "Safe zone in Orenbenga" seems like a contradiction in terms to me but oh well. Targeting drone on the ally means his aggro range is approximately 8 maps wide. You can forget any idea you might have had about engaging a single spawn at a time. Glue arrow lasts for an eternity when an Lt fires it. Is it really necessary to set the AV on extreme so it gets Unstoppable? Is this elite boss ally set on extreme? He has build up and most of his sheilds. Why am I even fighting? My Ally is one-shotting everything.
Overall: This arc was cruising for a 5 until mission 4. Setting an AV/EB up to extreme is not something to be done lightly. Then on mission 5 your allies could easily solo the entire mission. Some of the regular mobs were using powers that should be more carefully considered like Glue Arrow, but that wasn't a dealbreaker for the solo scrapper. The storyline was good.
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I also wanted to take this opportunity to say that "What the VuDu?" is an example of a well written / well balanced arc that is also fun to play. I have pointed it out to a few who have run my arc and asked me for recommendations for "not too long, but not too easy" arcs.
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Aww thanks bug man. Not sure when you ran it, but I made some tweaks over the weekend to make it more solo-friendly if you aren't a debuffer, but should still offer a challenge. Wish there was a tad bit more customization for power selection for mobs based on solo/team sizes. 
[edit] Hmm I say that then see patch notes for Test:
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Extensively revamped the Custom Critters powers Rank and Difficulty settings. Power selection for custom critters should be better standardized, more flexible and provide finer control over the difficulty of custom critters.
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Will have to see if it allows what I was thinking.[/edit]
[rant]
I'm 50/50 on my procedure in getting the Editor to actually save and update published missions for any charcter edits (text/costume/power changes) and other mission changes correctly. *rolls eyes* FYI, even if the editor *shows* the changes you made and supposedly updated (via the MA channel saying so) your already-published misison.....doesn't mean the changes are actually reflected... yet. I've had similar changes take anywhere from 5 min to 24 hours before the changes actually showed up in-game. FUN STUFF!
I've already forgotten about most of you
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From what I've seen, a favorite farmer tactic is to make groups that have nothing but bosses. I'm not sure why (better ticket rewards over time maybe?). I haven't really investigated the farming stuff too much, just what I hit when I was trying for the early bird badge.
[/ QUOTE ]
Simply put, more tickets per mob. Remember me commenting about how I had a virtual arc (which I refuse to publish because of the no story/defeat all thing) with nothing but AVs that would always spawn as EBs? Well, it was giving no tickets after a quarter way into the map in a full team before the team tickets were changed, but with most of them on extreme/extreme, I went back to solo it and probably averaged over 25 virtual tickets a mob.... Only a couple didn't drop tickets. In fact, I found a published mission last night which had about half a dozen ambushes from EB only groups, obviously to boost the ticket count.
[/ QUOTE ]
Jack there is another thing that could cause the EB only ambushes.
The ambushes won't allow just a single to come. If you have an ambush group and only want and EB to ambush it will come out with an entire spawn of EBs. I had this issue in my arc when we first played it. The last boss fight got insane. I had to go make new special mobs that were LTs instead to get the difficulty about where I wanted it.
[/ QUOTE ]
Well, in this case, the ambushes, mission, etc... didn't exactly have a story and were clearly being used to create more things to get tickets from.
And yes, you can set a single elite boss to "ambush" you by using the defeat boss function and selecting the appropriate surrounding enemies group, but it rarely really works correctly because you have to hope there's another spawn point nearby (best on smaller maps, as well). If you use the ambush function, you can only choose a villain group, so you're not choosing a specific enemy to fight, unless that enemy will spawn within a villain group spawn.
[/ QUOTE ]
I've done that in my arc, but as you said, it doesn't always work correctly. Typically it doesn't.
<sigh> Viv says its no longer "all me".
http://wendy-mags.mybrute.com/
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Arc 36984: "V'Kta A'Cha Vox'm"
Rating: 4/5
Notes: Why can't Onus rescue his own friend? "Safe zone in Orenbenga" seems like a contradiction in terms to me but oh well. Targeting drone on the ally means his aggro range is approximately 8 maps wide. You can forget any idea you might have had about engaging a single spawn at a time. Glue arrow lasts for an eternity when an Lt fires it. Is it really necessary to set the AV on extreme so it gets Unstoppable? Is this elite boss ally set on extreme? He has build up and most of his sheilds. Why am I even fighting? My Ally is one-shotting everything.
Overall: This arc was cruising for a 5 until mission 4. Setting an AV/EB up to extreme is not something to be done lightly. Then on mission 5 your allies could easily solo the entire mission. Some of the regular mobs were using powers that should be more carefully considered like Glue Arrow, but that wasn't a dealbreaker for the solo scrapper. The storyline was good.
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First, thanks for the honest feedback. Onus can't rescue his own friend because he's been warned that Crey is collecting Vox'm DNA and he doesn't want to risk giving them more samples. I need to make this clearer from the start - as it is, the player isn't given this reason till later in the arc so it doesn't make sense. I will be toning down the allies and taking Unstoppable off of the EB. I wasn't aware of just how sucky it is to fight Onus till I tried it with ... well Onus. I'll tone down the allies as well. Agent five is the right level for mission four as you are fighting two EBs at least (though I really wish there was a way to scale the ally ability). Having Onus be on extreme in the last mission is probably overkill. Having the Princess be extreme was a mistake on my part. 
Part of the reason I had set the allies up so high was to be able to check the behavior of them and the rest of the AI while not having to worry about being killed by my own creations - in other words they were set up so "I" could solo the map. Will revise as soon as I can get home to do it. This is exactly the kind of feedback I needed, thanks again. 
-Esch
"I swear you could fling a man hole cover across the street and hit more notes than 90% of those idiots on American Idol" -Desmodos
"Every time you post I feel like I been hit with a fist full of smart! Thanks." - Volken re: Sucker Punch
Arc #36984 V'kta A'cha Vox'm
Arc 1672 "Turf Wars"
Rating: 3/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*]I'm not a big fan of rescuing enemy groups from one another, but this one isn't too egregious so I'll let it pass.[*]Don't Skulls and Hellions already take Supradyne? I thought they just didn't turn into Dyneheads like the Trolls because they're wimps and can't get very much normally.[*]Why are Nemesis troops helping a Skull EB? And a Hellion EB?[*]Lieutenants are much stronger.... On the Overpowered Hellions[*]Is there any point in making the last mission timed?[*]Why is there an Arachnos flyer in AP for a Nemesis invasion?[/list]
Overall:
While there weren't any glaring problems with this arc it left a lot of questions unanswered. Why did Nemesis suddenly take interest in Atlas Park? Why did he let the Skulls and Hellions take all of the Dyne? Certainly even a small number of his troops could have wiped out the Skull and Hellion thieves, so he must have given it to them on purpose, but this is never explained. It's also not explained why such a low level threat like Superdyne can suddenly turn any old thug into a threat to Nemesis, when the Trolls take the stuff by the bucketful and are barely a threat to Skyraiders, much less Nemesis.
Arc 28850 "A Fistful of Deaths"
Rating: 1/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*]Two EB helpers? Set on at least hard? Probably extreme? There had better be one hell of a fight at the end.[*]Make that 3 EBs and 3 Bosses, all set on at least hard, probably extreme.[*]My allies just defeated Lord Recluse in the time it took me to read the glowie clue.[/list]
Overall:
There's really no point to the story, and you're given such an enormous array over grossly overpowered allies. Any one of them could have soloed most of the mission, although the three that were just bosses might have had trouble with Recluse.
Arc 18816: "A Badger's Plea"
Rating:2/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*]"A Minion is no match for a Hero..."[*]Nice commentary in the clues[/list]
Overall: Cute, but kinda pointless. I'd talk about it more, but there really wasn't much to it. The only notable thing was the meta commentary in the clues tab.
Arc 18861 "Save the Victory Forum Superstar!"
Rating: 2/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*]Lieutenants are much stronger than Minions...[*]What do pirates and ninjas have to do with one another? the world will never know.[*]Regen on an EB, on Hard? Ugh. I'm going to be staring at this naked catgirl for a long time waiting for Instant Healing to wear off. Thank goodness she doesn't have MoG.[*]The hostage ran off without so much as a thank you[/list]
Overall: There's not much to this mission. The custom group only has one kind of minion and one kind of LT, there is no story to speak of, and no dialog. There isn't even a real contact for it (the hologram guy just stays as a hologram). It needs fleshing out badly.
Arc 1334 "The Great Chicken Caper of '09
Rating: 4/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*]Apparently this is the extra spicy crispy variety[*]It would be awesome of General Tso's personal mobs were Broccoli Guys[*]Note to self: If I ever run across evil mutant chicken feed, don't eat it[*]Oversight: The "Crazy Mutant Chicken" is missing a description[*]It must be some pretty serious mutation to allow the chickens to fly around so much like this[*]The boss "run when I'm low on health" setting was foiled by the large group of mobs he summoned and that came as an ambush. He was mired in his own minions.[/list]
Overall: I liked this arc. The dialog was excellent, the concept was great, the execution lost a point though because I was kind of lost as to how the whole story tied together. Something about nemesis stealing the recipe and then some chicken masterminds taking over the world and what? Still a very worthwhile arc for anybody to run.
Arc 27178: "The Monstrous Regiment of Lesbian Hellions"
Rating: 5/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*] The next mission in the list "Anactoria's Descent Into the Underworld" has been pulled, so I skipped ahead to this one.[*]I actually googled for firemullet, I was disappointed that they aren't apparently a real band[*]Statesman is a coward and a wimp?[*]The description is missing on the "Lesbian Hellion"[*]I like the use of $archetype, but the attempt to change my character's backstory in the arc is just odd. [*]...That's an awfully fancy name for a vibrator[*]The end-of-mission popup might have worked better as a clue[*]I have a strong suspicion that Doc Delilah wasn't tough to turn[/list]Overall: This is a solid arc, but it is rated PG-13. I really appreciate how the author did a good job making the mobs look like lesbian stereotypes, but maybe that's just the part of me that's not PC. Do not run this arc if you are politically correct, it will just offend. However, unless you are particularly sensitive this will not be a problem, it's all in good humor.
I am skipping the Chromatic Rangers arc to avoid conflict of interest.
Arc 136118: "Enter the Yagyu Kage clan"
Rating: 2/5
Notes:<ul type="square">[*]This arc caps out at 40, at least on the first mission.[*]"I still need your help the Yagyu Kage clan in Paragon City."[*]"Circle of Throns"[*]What, where did this test come from? Did I miss something?[*]I'm glad I have high defense or this web grenade spam would get old in a hurry.[*]Nice lampshade on the fact that you can't get much variety in MA mobs[*]I'm having trouble understanding why I want to be ambushed on the fourth mission.[*]Energy Drain on an EB?[*]I've heard a rumor that there may be map sizes other than "Huge"...[*]Sorry, but I'm just rushing this one. I try to fight through most MA missions to make sure I don't miss anything, but I'm tired of fighting the same three mobs[*]When in doubt, add Nemesis. Seems to be a theme tonight.[*]Woo, 500 badges! Getting "Heroic" for this arc pushed me over.[/list]Overall: Needs a once over with the spell checker, badly. Then an editor needs to read through it and clean up the grammar. This arc felt a little padded. Using huge maps for every mission really made it take a long time to fight through. I would turn a few of the EBs down from Extreme as well, especially if they're all going to come with huge ambushes. Even on a large team, it's going to hurt when the AV starts the fight off with Aim+Inferno, or Build Up and Total Focus. I was saved by the one-shot code several times.
A pair of bosses should be possible, although probably not as an ambush. You can create a boss kill objective and then create a custom group that just has exactly 1 mob: the single other boss. then set that custom group as the escort for your first boss and set the spawn size to small.
Teams may still get multiple copies of the second boss, but them's the breaks with the MA system.
You can have the boss objective spawn after completing a different objective, and with careful map choice, you might be able to get him to spawn in the same room (this will take trial and error as the spawn at front/middle/back flags only work sometimes, so you'll have to play around with maps until you find one that works), but you won't be able to make them auto-aggro on the players.