Is '18 chained Boss Fights' EVER justified?

Nope, this isn't a rant about some poor schmuck's badly-designed arc - this is me throwing MY possibly 'badly-designed arc' arc to the wolves lol

My arc has 18 chained boss fights as the objectives in the last mission. the reason for this rather excessive amount of fighting is rooted in the storyline and the narrative required in the final mission.

The text delivered to the Player in the last mission is very long, split up into those 18 clue drops. The clues HAVE to drop in a certain order, or it doesn't work.

In order to minimise the irritation, I used a cargo ship map, so its pretty linear, and spent a long time tweaking the spawn points so that 1-6 spawn in the first room, 7-12 in the middle ones, and the final ones in the last room. Unfortunately, sometimes the crossover bosses swap. My briefings and chat messages are full of hints to help the player avoid as much unneccessary backtracking as possible. The actual bosses themselves are all fairly easy, and there is an actual narrative reason for them being there, and for them spawning one at a time. I also took some care to make them individual with dialogue etc, sto help the player not get bored.

Every other mission is designed to be playable as fast as possible, too. No defeat alls, small maps, clues placed in obvious points, no EBs or difficult powerset combos in the customs, etc. Th whole arc can be played through in two hours, easily.

So far ive got 19 plays, 4 stars, I try to warn players about the flaws in the last mission, and I've had mainly good feedback.

Saying all that, at the end of the day, its still 18 chained boss fights in a single mission lol. 18 boss fights does seem a bit much, even to me.

People have mentioned the 'phew, lotta bosses to wade thru there!' issue, though so far without any Ragequits or anything. Nobody has said 'theres too much story' in the feedback, however. If we could double the character limits for each clue, there'd only be 9 boss fights lol. etc.

I'd also lkike to point out that the original block of text earmarked for mission 5 was three times larger. It's already been self edited to a shadow of its former self (and must improved in the process, actually - I DO like to edit stuff down).

I can't alter anything in the last mission, I'm not looking for editing advice (I might change a few small things in earlier missions to even out one missions level range for example though). But I would be interested in hearing any comments on this sort of thing. Is it an instant 'nope, not doing that'? Is this sort of thing something best left for Challenge Arcs?

Does anyone else have 'aargh, how'm I gonna fit this in?' issues?

Eco.

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

Sounds like a deep sink ticket farm to me. Whats the Arc number?

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"If a system can be exploited, it will be exploited. And if a developer thinks their system cannot be exploited, it'll be exploited like a new actress in her first porn movie." Sanya Weather MMORPG Examiner

Tickets were the last thing on my mind when I made it, believe me. Its not a farm but its ticket total is quite nice as well i think. It's ID is 1688. There's a link in my sig to the feedback thread.

Eco

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

Dude, if you're going to drop that much text on a player, just go ahead and write it up as a story and post it in the Fan Fiction section. And I say that as a writer and a mission creator.

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My characters at Virtueverse
Faces of the City

[ QUOTE ]
Dude, if you're going to drop that much text on a player, just go ahead and write it up as a story and post it in the Fan Fiction section. And I say that as a writer and a mission creator.

[/ QUOTE ]

I too am a writer and a mission creator. I'm also a reader and a mission player. I'd be quite happy to read that much text in the form of mission clue drops, if I felt the writing appealed to me. Luckily for me, there are others who feel the same, and about the Echo, from the feedback I've received so far.

I think the MA is a wonderful addition to the game. it allows such a massive variety of missions and arcs. There really is something for everyone!

Eco.

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

I think the better thing would be to set up your clues such that reading them out of order isn't confusing, and make all the bosses spawn immediately.

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http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt

I think it's a wasted effort. I don't think a lot of people actually read the clues. They expect most of the story to be in dialogue.

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sounds like a farm.....run and hide before the whiners report your mission

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Qr - I am supremely confidentthat if it were ever examined for farm-hood, it would be fine.

As for 'too long', you can't please everyone, all the time. Which is ok too.

Eco

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

Simple answer: Ever justified ?

Yes.

But the justification had better be good. That sounds like a fun one

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@Catwhoorg "Rule of Three - Finale" Arc# 1984
@Mr Falkland Islands"A Nation Goes Rogue" Arc# 2369 "Toasters and Pop Tarts" Arc#116617

Qr - that's the ticket, cat - open minds are what we want LOL.

There IS a justification for it, but wether or bit it's a good enough justification to warrant the implementation is of course going to be debatable after the fact. The proof of the pudding, and all that.

Eco

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

What a horrible, terrible idea to thrust upon people!

Of course I want to try it!

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Dec out.

Well I have tryed it, and I think it worked. I felt the end justified the means.
I wouldn't usually fall over myself for the chance to fight 18 bosses in a row, but in this particular case, I was so griped by the story that I was diapointed when it was over.

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Judging by the rave reviews in'all, I'll have to try this as soon as I can, which will be later tonight, so don't get into trouble for being a farmer before then.

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you don't have to make 18 boss fights. it could be 18 minion or lt fights.

That I don't have a problem with - you'd have to fight 18 spawns anyway. But I don't reliably read clues - and I don't like the story to advance in the clues. I only accept advancing the story in clues when you search an object.

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[ QUOTE ]
you don't have to make 18 boss fights. it could be 18 minion or lt fights.

That I don't have a problem with - you'd have to fight 18 spawns anyway. But I don't reliably read clues - and I don't like the story to advance in the clues. I only accept advancing the story in clues when you search an object.

[/ QUOTE ]

Do you have a reason for accepting object clues but not other types?

Not being confrontational, I'm curious is all.

Eco

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

/waves jedi hand
"You will not change The Echo"
/jedi

Seriously, leave it alone. Your arc is still in my top 3 favorites I've played so far. My son actually turned off his PS3 and came to listen to me reading the clues out loud.

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I liked it.

Good story, and it felt right to fight through the bosses, you set it up well.

My only minor quibble was your contact's final assumption that my character would feel bad about what went down.

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Thanks for the thumbs up!

And for not spoiling too !

As for your quibble, I might have looked at it from a too heroic viewpoint. I'll have a look and see if that remark I think you're referring to (in the final debrief) could be softened.

Eco

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

[ QUOTE ]
Dude, if you're going to drop that much text on a player, just go ahead and write it up as a story and post it in the Fan Fiction section. And I say that as a writer and a mission creator.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's what I told him when I decided to not review his arc. Obviously it's not for everyone.

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[ QUOTE ]
The text delivered to the Player in the last mission is very long, split up into those 18 clue drops. The clues HAVE to drop in a certain order, or it doesn't work.

[/ QUOTE ]

In general, I absolutely despise multiple chained spawns, but you obviously understand how truly awful they are and have done everything humanly possible to alleviate their sheer wretchedness. Backtracking is a truly horrid waste of a player's time. However, I'm not really sure why the clues have to drop in a certain order.

In my experience, once you have collected all the clues, they are displayed in the order that you defined them, not in the order that you collected them. (See my Jabberwocky arc, which has the poem's stanzas as clues. The poem clues have always displayed in the right order at the end of the mission for me.) Are you not seeing the clues appear in the order you define them?

Do you really need to have clue 1 to defeat boss 2? I can see why you could need your clues to display in the right order, but it should do that automatically.

It sounds like you've already got the boss placement down, so if you spawn them all at the beginning of the mission the players would pretty much get the clues in the order you want them to. If you number them it'll be especially obvious what's going on.

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[ QUOTE ]
Nope, this isn't a rant about some poor schmuck's badly-designed arc - this is me throwing MY possibly 'badly-designed arc' arc to the wolves lol

My arc has 18 chained boss fights as the objectives in the last mission. the reason for this rather excessive amount of fighting is rooted in the storyline and the narrative required in the final mission.

The text delivered to the Player in the last mission is very long, split up into those 18 clue drops. The clues HAVE to drop in a certain order, or it doesn't work.

In order to minimise the irritation, I used a cargo ship map, so its pretty linear, and spent a long time tweaking the spawn points so that 1-6 spawn in the first room, 7-12 in the middle ones, and the final ones in the last room. Unfortunately, sometimes the crossover bosses swap. My briefings and chat messages are full of hints to help the player avoid as much unneccessary backtracking as possible. The actual bosses themselves are all fairly easy, and there is an actual narrative reason for them being there, and for them spawning one at a time. I also took some care to make them individual with dialogue etc, sto help the player not get bored.

Every other mission is designed to be playable as fast as possible, too. No defeat alls, small maps, clues placed in obvious points, no EBs or difficult powerset combos in the customs, etc. Th whole arc can be played through in two hours, easily.

So far ive got 19 plays, 4 stars, I try to warn players about the flaws in the last mission, and I've had mainly good feedback.

Saying all that, at the end of the day, its still 18 chained boss fights in a single mission lol. 18 boss fights does seem a bit much, even to me.

People have mentioned the 'phew, lotta bosses to wade thru there!' issue, though so far without any Ragequits or anything. Nobody has said 'theres too much story' in the feedback, however. If we could double the character limits for each clue, there'd only be 9 boss fights lol. etc.

I'd also lkike to point out that the original block of text earmarked for mission 5 was three times larger. It's already been self edited to a shadow of its former self (and must improved in the process, actually - I DO like to edit stuff down).

I can't alter anything in the last mission, I'm not looking for editing advice (I might change a few small things in earlier missions to even out one missions level range for example though). But I would be interested in hearing any comments on this sort of thing. Is it an instant 'nope, not doing that'? Is this sort of thing something best left for Challenge Arcs?

Does anyone else have 'aargh, how'm I gonna fit this in?' issues?

Eco.

[/ QUOTE ]

This isn't quite a wall of text, though it is a very vain post. If you think there are problems with that many glowies and boss fights then you should change it. It sounds like some forumites are fawning over your arc though, so... "Good job"?

If you need to discuss your arc ask for feedback from friends or hook up with a PuG and do some PR. Because, from where I stand, you're just trying to garner attention by talking about yourself on the boards.

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[ QUOTE ]

In general, I absolutely despise multiple chained spawns, but you obviously understand how truly awful they are and have done everything humanly possible to alleviate their sheer wretchedness. Backtracking is a truly horrid waste of a player's time. However, I'm not really sure why the clues have to drop in a certain order.

In my experience, once you have collected all the clues, they are displayed in the order that you defined them, not in the order that you collected them. (See my Jabberwocky arc, which has the poem's stanzas as clues. The poem clues have always displayed in the right order at the end of the mission for me.) Are you not seeing the clues appear in the order you define them?

Do you really need to have clue 1 to defeat boss 2? I can see why you could need your clues to display in the right order, but it should do that automatically.

It sounds like you've already got the boss placement down, so if you spawn them all at the beginning of the mission the players would pretty much get the clues in the order you want them to. If you number them it'll be especially obvious what's going on.

[/ QUOTE ]

Your Jabberwocky arc sounds interesting, I'll check it out.

Myclues do display in the correct order once they're all dropped, but the crucial thing is that this is the only way Ican guarantee that the player wont read them out of order. Players have different ways of approaching clues. I myself read them as they drop, as standard. Some players might however read them all at the end. numbering the clues would help some, but probably what would happen if the player defeated boss 3 first is open the clue and see 'Blah blah 3, the wossname did sth with the doohickey and then...'. Finding clue 2 and clue 1 later doesn't prevent the Player from knowing later bits of the story out of order.

If i started telling you a joke by telling you the punchline, it would eventually make sense, but the experience might not be as good as telling it the normal way.

I hope I'm not coming across as a knob here, i'm not trying to belittle your advice. It's hard to explain without spoiling, but the story delivered in mission 5 is something of a reveal, so the WHEN of the reveal is important.

My simple answer i guess is that its not so much the need to display them in the right order, as ensure that the player reads them in the right order. To this end there's IN CAPS hammerblow shouty 'CHECK CLUES' all over the place lol.

Talen's right - its obviously not for everybody. No arc can be for everybody. You possibly get bad ratings from folk who hate poetry. I'm going to get slated by people who put more stock in length than in quality (for a given value of 'quality', lol, of course I freely admit that The Echo's quality might be debatable).

Eco.

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

[ QUOTE ]

This isn't quite a wall of text, though it is a very vain post. If you think there are problems with that many glowies and boss fights then you should change it. It sounds like some forumites are fawning over your arc though, so... "Good job"?

If you need to discuss your arc ask for feedback from friends or hook up with a PuG and do some PR. Because, from where I stand, you're just trying to garner attention by talking about yourself on the boards.

[/ QUOTE ]

I apologise if it comes over as vain. I personally don't have any problems with the way mission 5 works (considering the 'limitations' of the system as is re character count for clues), so I won't be changing its mechanics in any major way.

I did hope this would prove to be more of a discussion on Long/Very Long arcs and especially story-heavy (as opposed to story focused) arcs. I can't be the only one who's maxed out the 100k limit while only having a few custom critters (my arc has 4 different types, but 3 of those come in 2 forms where just the head is different). I wonder if anyone has hit the limit without using any customs.

RE: 'fawining' I don't see anything particularly wrong in receiving or giving praise if something is enjoyable. Those posts were fairly brief.

As for the PR thing, if this thread garners attention to my arc, I'm certainly not going to complain, but i'm not forcing anyone to play it, or even to take part in the thread.

Eco.

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

[ QUOTE ]
If i started telling you a joke by telling you the punchline, it would eventually make sense, but the experience might not be as good as telling it the normal way.

[/ QUOTE ]

Maybe it's just me, but I tend not to read the clues I get in a mission until it is already over. I don't have time really to stop and read every time I get one, especially when playing a Brute or a Dominator.

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