Title:Future Imperfect
Rating: Five Star
Comments: Many refs, loved it. Can't wait to try the rest! Wonderful story, 2 escorts but they are made up for by the story telling aspect.
I hereby endorse this arc for people who want a MA exper. off the beating path! o.ob
Thank you very much for the comments! I'm very happy you liked the arc, and am looking forward to any comments and feedback for the other two.
Here are "quickies" about the two of yours I played. I'm writing up more complete reviews in word, and I'll post them when I finish them (probably next week).
#1033 Wool Over One's Eyes (5 stars)
Interestingly, although marked as heroic, I actually didn't feel terribly out of place playing it as a villain. Neat use of formatted and colored text throughout, and an interesting story - any story that makes me want to keep accepting the next mission to see where this goes is a good one. Neat twist making the "finale" actually the second to last arc - it was satisfying to get to chase down and defeat the guy who'd been leading me on. A few typos, and several minor (non mission-breaking bugs) - most notable, cases where battle dialog is "mixed up" (e.g. a Council member spouts Freakshow lines, a Freakshow says the Council guy's lines). Got some more specific examples for the longer review.
#2085 (4 stars; didn't write down the title...)
Fun, good arc - had more issues with technical errors (typos, etc.) for this one: I think it needs a little more work to clean up some of the bugs than the previous arc. There were some places where there were "disconnects" between the mission text and what's happening in the mission itself (like you had an idea for the mission, changed your mind or adjusted some of the objectives, but didn't alter the briefings to reflect the changes) - it made parts of the mission confused. Made a more complete list; I'll post it here later. 
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
Arc #1033 Wool Over Ones Eyes (Rated 5 stars)
Okay, as promised, here is some more specific feedback:
In the first mission briefing, the green (and enlarged text) runs into the white, normal-sized text that follows it adding (another?) space to separate them would be good.
Although the first mission is a surprise timed mission, it doesnt really detract from the arc (since, theoretically, the player could just quit out and restart to reset the timer, without ever having played any part of the arc), and I didnt grade down because of it. Still, just for completeness and polish you may want to consider adding some prior warning its a timed mission yes, I agree its absolutely unnecessary, but sometimes we players appreciate unnecessary stuff
There was a typo in the mission two briefing
should be the buildings are marked for destruction. Likewise, after you accept the mission, the send off text has a little part that doesnt make sense: there should beif you find it
perhaps a comma and a space to separate be and if.
Mission 3 was the first time I noticed that there seemed to be a mix-up in which group in a battle was saying the text Id recommend you recheck all of your battles carefully and make sure that youve got each groups text assigned to the proper group (i.e. there were several instances of Group A saying text that sounded like it belonged to Group B, and vice versa.)
In Mission 4 theres an asterisk in the mission briefing text, but no footnote or anything else that I could see that adds into the asterisk. Was it supposed to refer to something that wasnt put into the text?
Also, Bosco should probably say no hard feelings about before.
Okay, and now on to
#2085 (4 stars
and still BOO onto me as I havent looked up the arcs title
I just couldnt give this one five there were too many typos and technical errors this time bad enough to actually make parts of the arc seem confused - but hopefully I can help with that.)
Okay, I think this is in mission one: The mission wants you to defeat Sister Jenna yet in the mission it is Operative Felix (which doesnt seem right for the Knights of Artemis in any case
Operative actually implies Arachnos).
Take a careful look at the mission two briefing there were just plain parts that I didnt follow probably related to several typos or writing errors:
1) Why would I need backup *after* Im done with the mission?
2) Theres a reference to the other Meta what Other Meta? It was almost like there was some foreshadowing of a future mission (or a deleted mission objective) that I shouldnt have been privy to
Gator refers to Felix as a him, although Felix (Jenna?) was actually female.
Also, after finding the correct computer to hack in that mission, I think you meant the text to read You found the information.
Theres also a reference to salvaged gear even though no in-mission glowies had me salvaging gear (at least that I remember)
I assumed you might be referring to normal enhancement drops and salvage (or, if this arc is really intended for your supergroup, perhaps some rule for taking stuff from your groups storage that the typical player isnt privy too), but briefing references like this that have no connection to something that actually happened in the mission can be a little confusing.
And, just FYI, I certainly saw why I might need a team for mission three, but I wasnt so sure why it would have been necessary for mission two
maybe I missed something, but there just didnt seem to be anything that I would have needed a team to get past, even if I had been on a much squishier character.
Other miscellaneous typos Id recommend you do a very careful read-through to catch and correct:
*Watch for the correct use of a versus an.
*Youve got some sentence beginnings that need to be capitalized.
*Be careful with pronouns its very easy to make what a pronoun is referring to overly vague, which can make your mission text confusing.
Okay, one last bug: Catalina 6.7 is actually in the All Custom Characters faction if you want to change that, be sure to Edit Character and re-set her faction in the Character Bio/Description screen.
Whew! I tried to give you significantly more thorough feedback than usual because I really did appreciate you trying out my arc. I hope its helpful!
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
Updates: May 20th
*Fixed some typos.
*Added a patrol to the front of Mission 2. The intent is to make it very clear the Rebels attack heroes on principle, so it's morally okay to beat up on them.
*Although it unfolds behind the scenes in the contact text, the arrest of the pawn shop owner, and his interrogation by the police, now happens over several missions. He now reveals a little more detail about what Earth First wanted with the bomb (it's also revealed in a later arc, but it does leave one less 'loose end' in this arc to be tied up in the sequels).
*Warning text added to mission three, for the optional EB.
*The escorts for missions four and five are now non-combat. This is to keep them from getting killed (plus, the Mission Five escort is a little overpowered - as is, it doesn't make any sense why he'd even need your help to get back to the map entrance). The "damage control" text for mission fail was getting outdated anyway, given previous updates to the arc, and it freed up some space for other tweaks.
On the 'to-do' list for the next editing pass:
*More typo fixes. ('Destroys' instead of 'Destroyes' on a clue in Mission 2)
*Add warning text for the optional EB in mission 4. (Oversight - makes no sense to warn about an EB in 3, but not in 4, even if both are optional)
*Minor text change in one of the Assault Leader's dialog to better reflect his contempt for heroes.
*(If I can figure out what to drop to free up file space) Add a bit of text to the mission three debrief indicating 'someone' will take care of any 5th column you opt to leave behind in the base in mission 3.
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
I'm reposting a PM critique I received from EvaDestruction, along with my responses (with her permission, of course).
There are spoilers in this review (and in my responses, although some of the most egregous ones have been removed), so if you don't want to see them, don't read the review until after you've played the arcs.
(The next two lines were added by me. The rest is Eva's critique.)
Future Imperfect (#10931)
Rating: 3 stars
First off, some general impressions.
The basis of the story was interesting to me, I like those "alternate future" type stories. The "save Citadel" hook was nicely pulled off as well, you managed to find a logical way for a player character to help out an A-list hero. I've seen too many "Freedom Phalanx sidekick" arcs, in this one the player is definitely the star.
For the first arc of a multi-part story, it does stand alone. You avoided the "Fellowship of the Ring" ending, there was a sense that I had accomplished something while still leaving a hook to lead in to the subsequent arcs.
I liked your custom group. Good balance, not hard (can't say if they're too easy or not, I played with a fairly-decently IOd SS/Invul Brute so they should be easy). Nice costumes, kinda reminiscent of Wyvern actually, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, since they have the same "training and technology" powers and a similar grey morality. The one thing I didn't like was their wall-of-text bios that gave out too much information and were spoilerish if you read them in the first mission.
Ok now the biggest thing I didn't like: You tried to cram too much in I thought. You overcomplicated the story, and left too many loose ends.
More specifics:
Mission 1: Yay Freaks. Smashy smashy. Sux2bJOO's dialogue was appropriately amusing. The ambush spawning right on my head actually made sense for once. But an atomic bomb? For an eco-terrorist? Based out of a pawn shop? Maybe something less huge, less environmentally destructive but still fancy enough for the Freaks to take interest. Also, he was arrested awfully fast. Perhaps if the return dialogue mentioned that the evidence was enough to get a warrant, and the next mission briefing had the contact mention he'd been arrested, to give a sense that some time had passed.
Also, unless I missed something, I never did find out how the Freaks got the portal thingy. Some NPC dialogue would fix that.
Mission 2: This is where I ran into a slight problem with the morality of what I am doing. I just bust into a warehouse and start cracking these guys' heads, just because they're there. It doesn't help that I'm beating up two rival groups, both of whom are hostile to me. Then I find the blinky that portrays Primus as an evil dictator (I thought he was the Transformers' god? Not sure if that was intentional) which makes the rebels more sympathetic. Then I get to the boss, ok, fine, they hate me and attack metas on principle. So now it's ok to beat them up. A bit of patrol, battle or optional boss dialogue near the beginning would help establish that sooner though.
Speaking of the boss, his unaware dialogue was a bit too "I am going to loudly shout my evil plan so the hero can overhear." Slightly more ambiguous dialogue would be more believable while still allowing the player to piece together the plan from clues. And he has a typo, he says "I can see why you become such as threat."
Mission 3: Um, when did Vandal rejoin the 5th? Unneccessary complication #1. Ok, beating up Nazis is fun, but using Council would have worked just as well, with a change to one of the clues. Also, the presence of an AV should really be in the description. I know he's not required, but there's a chance he could spawn in the way of a required objective. Which would suck if you were on Invincible. Again, a bit of a morality quibble: no, it shouldn't be a defeat all, but at least something from the contact that suggests someone will deal with the nazis would be nice.
Minor quibbles: The nav bar reads "x defeat patrols" when it would sound better as "x patrols to defeat" and Wedge (heh, Biggs and Wedge) calls me a hero, which should probably be in quotes considering his stance on metas.
Mission 4: Overcomplication #2. What do the vahz have to do with anything? Was there something I missed with the optional patrols? The massive level drop is, frankly, always annoying, I won't fault your explanation for it because at least it's canon. But I didn't get what this mission had to do with anything. I did get one of the optional objectives, it didn't explain much. The vahz are working on a super virus...so? Aren't they always? Does it relate to Primus's origin somehow? Possibly I missed something because I failed when the escort bit it. (At which point the return to contact text told me that just before he died the boss said Citadel wasn't Primus....he did?)
Ok, the one thing it does do is get more into the time-travel aspect, since it starts me doing it. Otherwise...I suck and I have no powers and I'm fighting vahz. And I'm never told why.
Minor quibble: The guards around the escort were attacking the other rebels.
Mission 5: No real problems here, fairly straightforward. For once, a use of this map that actually fits the story. It would have made slightly more sense I think for Citadel to be still recovering from the virus and set to non-combat, since it's a bit of a stretch that an AV needs my help fighting past minions.
Unanswered questions: Do the Freaks have the bomb? Why do the rebels refer to Citadel as Bastion? Are they from an alternate dimension, or a possible future of our dimension? (The ending suggests it's ours, but some earlier hints suggest otherwise) What does the vahz virus have to do with it? How did the Freaks get the portal thingy in the first place? The things that were explained were done well, your clues and dialogue were well-written, and again, the "to be continued..." was established through the finishing dialogue, as well as the final boss's dialogue, which again nicely establishes the grey morality of the group...makes me think that if they stopped blaming metas for all their problems they could be useful allies.
Phew, that was long.
(My responses follow. And I do want to add here as well that I very much appreciate the critique and feedback.)
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
(A few things that are severe spoilers - I flat out answered several questions that are answered by the later arcs - and other things that would be out of context here.)
Eva,
Thank you very much for the feedback!
Okay, to respond to some of your observations:
For the first arc of a multi-part story, it does stand alone. You avoided the "Fellowship of the Ring" ending, there was a sense that I had accomplished something while still leaving a hook to lead in to the subsequent arcs.
Oddly, I seem to be getting a lot more credit than I deserve for making the arc 'stand alone.' My intent was to give each arc some sense of closure, in case the player just ends up hating the story and doesn't want to play the sequel. But your chief complaint - there's too much story and too many loose ends - is a direct result of what the arc is: a 14 mission story arc, divided into 3 parts. The story's only a third done, so only about a third of the "threads" are really 'wrapped up' at this point (if that). So your critique is dead on: there *is* too much story for five missions. It's still an open question though as to whether or not I really needed nine more to finish telling it, but I haven't gotten any feedback on that one way or the other.
Heh, the huge miscalculation on my part is that anyone wanted to play an epic, fourteen mission story! Trust me, you're not alone in wanting to treat the first arc as stand-alone (something, that as you pointed out, it does do, but rather poorly). Just look at the plays on the other two - taking into account the fact one rating is my wife, and the other is the drive by 0-star who never even played the arc, there are five times as many plays on the first arc, versus the other two.
The one thing I didn't like was their wall-of-text bios that gave out too much information and were spoilerish if you read them in the first mission.
Definately a matter of personal taste. I've gotten more people who like the bios versus those who didn't, but at the moment my collective feedback is exteremly lopsided in favor of keeping them (and, like all authors, I can be very stubborn about some things, and, to be honest, I just like the long bios). A agree with your point that the bios reveal too much info too quickly, though. Trust me, though, if file sizes could have been 135 KB, I wouldn't have hesitated to make a "clone" copy of the Temporal Rebel group with their group ID and descriptions obscured for the first two missions. That was the original plan, actually, until open beta and the realization that file size was severely limited.
But an atomic bomb? For an eco-terrorist? Based out of a pawn shop? Maybe something less huge, less environmentally destructive but still fancy enough for the Freaks to take interest.
It's largely addressed by mission three of arc two, although there's a little bit more that you can piece together from the clues in arc three if you *really* want all of the i's dotted and t's crossed. But it does have to be "that huge" (although why isn't supposed to be obvious until later).
Also, he was arrested awfully fast. Perhaps if the return dialogue mentioned that the evidence was enough to get a warrant, and the next mission briefing had the contact mention he'd been arrested, to give a sense that some time had passed.
Hmm ... interesting point. I need to see if I can make this work in the dialog the way you suggest. But you're right, the pawn shop owner doesn't play any other role in the story, so how quickly he gets arrested doesn't affect the rest of the story: making it seem like it takes longer for all of that to 'go down' off stage seems better than his 'instant arrest...'
Also, unless I missed something, I never did find out how the Freaks got the portal thingy. Some NPC dialogue would fix that.
You won't until the end of the trilogy. It's a loose end with an answer, but one that you have to piece together from the clues that span the whole thing. Your criticism might still apply though - I don't know for sure if it's clear why the Freaks know what they know by the end of the trilogy. I think it is, but you never know until somebody else plays through.
This is where I ran into a slight problem with the morality of what I am doing. I just bust into a warehouse and start cracking these guys' heads, just because they're there.
Good point. Originally, the fact they up and attacked you, no questions asked, in the first mission was supposed to indicate that they were hostile to you. But you're right ... their motivation in the first mission is to get the Enforcer's portal spawner - that *doesn't* really establish they hate metas on principle. I'll see if I can clear enough space to add a patrol with some "meta-bashing" dialog at the beginning of mission two...
Then I find the blinky that portrays Primus as an evil dictator (I thought he was the Transformers' god? Not sure if that was intentional)
Now that you mention it, he is. I hadn't thought of that ... no, it's not intentional. Here's where the name came from: in the earliest stages of writing, internally I just referred to the character as 'The Emperor' - but it'd be way to easy to think that was a deliberate Star Wars reference (and calling him "King", "Ruler", "The Leader", "The Potentate", or several other things I brainstormed, just seemed lame). In the original AD&D cosmology, the Primus is the ruler of the Modrons, a mechanical race from the clockwork plane of Nirvana. It's also the leader of ComStar in the BattleTech universe. I liked it as a name for a powerful leader, so that's what I decided to call the character. The Transformers reference never came to mind, but you're right - Primus was their god.
Speaking of the boss, his unaware dialogue was a bit too "I am going to loudly shout my evil plan so the hero can overhear." Slightly more ambiguous dialogue would be more believable while still allowing the player to piece together the plan from clues. And he has a typo, he says "I can see why you become such as threat."
That's gotta be the most amusing way I've seen that put. Actually got a laugh from me. Oddly, that makes me want to keep it that way ... but you're right. Maybe a minor tone down would work well... And thanks for pointing out the typo - I get to quash a few with each new set of feedback.
Um, when did Vandal rejoin the 5th? Unneccessary complication #1. Ok, beating up Nazis is fun, but using Council would have worked just as well, with a change to one of the clues. Also, the presence of an AV should really be in the description. I know he's not required, but there's a chance he could spawn in the way of a required objective. Which would suck if you were on Invincible. Again, a bit of a morality quibble: no, it shouldn't be a defeat all, but at least something from the contact that suggests someone will deal with the nazis would be nice.
In the Fall of the 5th Column arc, three of the 5th AVs stay loyal to the end: Requiem, Vandal, and Maestro. Requiem charges the 5th Column loyal to go underground and work under the scenes to subvert the Council. It's possible to imply that all three AVs are not particularly loyal to the Council, and have been working behind the scenes on schemes that will eventually return the 5th Column to power. That's what Vandal is doing there: I've always seen him as more loyal to Requiem than the Center.
So why the 5th, and not the Council? Two reasons actually: one, I needed the first example of your character actually foiling a major plot (that comes into play later in the story). Second (Minor spoiler alert: in the future, when the Rebels are searching the ruins for clues as to who the Primus originally was (and the reason their records are so incomplete is another loose end that is tied up by the end of the trilogy), *this* is the 5th Column base they stumbled across. The base isn't functional in the future, but they do find hard copy files on an andoid hero of the Freedom Phalanx named Bastion (the 5th Column fell before Bastion got his upgrade), and a reference to the fact this base had a computer virus designed to shut Bastion down - which is why they start off going around calling him Bastion, and how they know the base's physical location even here in the past.
On the other hand, if it's a Council base, the whole thing boils down to "the Council just happens to be working on a computer virus to shut down Citadel, which is really convienient because the Rebels need a computer virus to shut down Citadel." Still, for the record, I do find the feedback very useful - I do have tentative plans to re-write this arc extensively as a true stand alone arc once the rest of the trilogy is taken off the mission servers, and in a true stand-alone re-write, there's no need for this mission to use the 5th Column, since many of the story elements related to that would never be revealed. In that context, the Council works better (incidentally, the fact the Rebels start off referring to Citadel as Bastion, or even that they're records of the past are very, very sketchy, are also unnecessary in a stand-alone version, and they'll almost certainly be calling him Citadel right form the start).
You're absolutely right about the AV warning, though. I actually had a player quit out of the arc because they didn't realize Vandal was optional. It seems an explicit warning he's there, and a straight-out statement that he's optional, is needed.
"x defeat patrols" when it would sound better as "x patrols to defeat" and Wedge (heh, Biggs and Wedge) calls me a hero, which should probably be in quotes considering his stance on metas.
I agree completely. I've had others make that comment too, and I just keep forgetting to make the change. That's my mistake completely. Incidentally, everyone seems to think Biggs and Wedge are a Star Wars reference ... ultimately, they are, but I'm curious, did you catch on to the real source of all of the Assault Leader's names? 
Mission 4: Overcomplication #2. What do the vahz have to do with anything? Was there something I missed with the optional patrols? The massive level drop is, frankly, always annoying, I won't fault your explanation for it because at least it's canon. But I didn't get what this mission had to do with anything. I did get one of the optional objectives, it didn't explain much. The vahz are working on a super virus...so? Aren't they always? Does it relate to Primus's origin somehow? Possibly I missed something because I failed when the escort bit it. (At which point the return to contact text told me that just before he died the boss said Citadel wasn't Primus....he did?)
The short answer (since you're probably getting really tired of reading my comments anyway) - yes, the Vahz are vital to the plot. Yes, the virus is very instrumental in Primus' rise to power. Up to this point the only clue to this effect you've been given was the fact that one of the reasons Citadel is a "suspect" is that he would have been immune to "the virus" (that proved so devastating to other Metas). But it's not totally clear yet - it isn't supposed to be. This story is developed more in the next two arcs.
But again, there's no reason for this bit of "foreshadowing" if the arc is stand alone, and your feedback makes this very clear. I haven't decided yet exactly how to recast the mission in a stand-alone version: I'm considering a full-scale rebel assault on a Freedom Corps base where Citadel is, with the Enforcers fighting to defend him. But we'll see.
The fact that stupid boss can die at all just needs to be taken out of the arc. I'm very sorry he got killed, but I'm glad he did - it certainly contributed to your lack of fun in the arc, but it served a good purpose: your feedback pointed out that the mission text that tries to do "damage control" should the boss die is out of date - it was from before the last mission got a big overhaul, and just plain reveals too much too fast. I'm going to make the boss a non-combatant. It'll even free up some space for other tweaks (like, hopefully, that mission two patrol 
).
Minor quibble: The guards around the escort were attacking the other rebels.
Argh! It's not the first time I've seen this "rampant hostility" bug show up. I'm not sure I know exactly how to fix this one...
Mission 5: No real problems here, fairly straightforward. For once, a use of this map that actually fits the story. It would have made slightly more sense I think for Citadel to be still recovering from the virus and set to non-combat, since it's a bit of a stretch that an AV needs my help fighting past minions.
Excellent point. I'm not fond of him helping you out either, so why it didn't occur to me to just make him non-combat is beyond me. Chalk that up to a designer "brain-fart" moment. There really is no reason for him to be a combatant. I'll change this.
Unanswered questions: Do the Freaks have the bomb? Why do the rebels refer to Citadel as Bastion? Are they from an alternate dimension, or a possible future of our dimension? (The ending suggests it's ours, but some earlier hints suggest otherwise) What does the vahz virus have to do with it? How did the Freaks get the portal thingy in the first place?
(In my PM response I answered these directly - but they are answered in the next two arcs of the trilogy.)
EvaDestruction PM'ed me a response, but technically I haven't gotten permission to post it here, so I won't (at least unless or until she says it's okay to do so).
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
Go ahead, might as well move it here since the spoilers have already been spoiled.
Edit: I reviewed this as a stand-alone arc, knowing that parts 2 and 3 were slated for removal. To people planning on playing the whole trilogy, a lot of the criticisms may not be relevant.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
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#2085 (4 stars
and still BOO onto me as I havent looked up the arcs title
I just couldnt give this one five there were too many typos and technical errors this time bad enough to actually make parts of the arc seem confused - but hopefully I can help with that.)
Okay, I think this is in mission one: The mission wants you to defeat Sister Jenna yet in the mission it is Operative Felix (which doesnt seem right for the Knights of Artemis in any case
Operative actually implies Arachnos).
Take a careful look at the mission two briefing there were just plain parts that I didnt follow probably related to several typos or writing errors:
1) Why would I need backup *after* Im done with the mission?
2) Theres a reference to the other Meta what Other Meta? It was almost like there was some foreshadowing of a future mission (or a deleted mission objective) that I shouldnt have been privy to
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1). Backup in the sense that you need someone to come mop up the thugs :3
2). I had an optional AV in there, but he didn't go over so well with the masses so i took him out. That is one of the final remains of his presence
[ QUOTE ]
Gator refers to Felix as a him, although Felix (Jenna?) was actually female.
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I missed that and a few others. It really confused alot of folks ^^. i took the knives out due to the play test wiht 6 people I had that literally killed us and me in tank mode. Normally I can take knives but that combined on the fact that their caltrops must despawn prior to the system flagging them as defeated proved too much on Risk over Investment and I took them out I didn't wanta throw sappers in twice so I made a custom malta wing
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Also, after finding the correct computer to hack in that mission, I think you meant the text to read You found the information.
Theres also a reference to salvaged gear even though no in-mission glowies had me salvaging gear (at least that I remember)
I assumed you might be referring to normal enhancement drops and salvage (or, if this arc is really intended for your supergroup, perhaps some rule for taking stuff from your groups storage that the typical player isnt privy too), but briefing references like this that have no connection to something that actually happened in the mission can be a little confusing.
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Remains of the beta version typed out on a word pad at work. I hadn't heard a thing about the editor, but I knew I needed to get started on it. I was unaware at the time we'd be using ski ball tickets :P Will hunt and remove the refs.
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And, just FYI, I certainly saw why I might need a team for mission three, but I wasnt so sure why it would have been necessary for mission two
maybe I missed something, but there just didnt seem to be anything that I would have needed a team to get past, even if I had been on a much squishier character.
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I dulled a lot of the content down, I kept getting angry tells from defenders who couldn't solo my av. In an attempt to reach the widest audience possible, I made some sacrifices. Also, Venture said my AV was too hard. I dumbed everything down as best as I could. I left the warnings in there in case someone still had an issue.
[ QUOTE ]
Other miscellaneous typos Id recommend you do a very careful read-through to catch and correct:
*Watch for the correct use of a versus an.
*Youve got some sentence beginnings that need to be capitalized.
*Be careful with pronouns its very easy to make what a pronoun is referring to overly vague, which can make your mission text confusing.
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I will be running it through spell check again when I get a day or two off. Right now it's fixing the major issues. I tend to get tunnel vision and not see any errors since I know what it's supposed to say :P
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Okay, one last bug: Catalina 6.7 is actually in the All Custom Characters faction if you want to change that, be sure to Edit Character and re-set her faction in the Character Bio/Description screen.
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Fixed. Thanks!
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Whew! I tried to give you significantly more thorough feedback than usual because I really did appreciate you trying out my arc. I hope its helpful!
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Absolutely, thanks a ton!
Note: I've added a few of my own responses to this - strikes me as more economical than replying to my own repost...
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Definately a matter of personal taste. I've gotten more people who like the bios versus those who didn't, but at the moment my collective feedback is exteremly lopsided in favor of keeping them (and, like all authors, I can be very stubborn about some things, and, to be honest, I just like the long bios).
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I notice a lot of people do this, so I guess it is a matter of personal taste.
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It's largely addressed by mission three of arc two, although there's a little bit more that you can piece together from the clues in arc three if you *really* want all of the i's dotted and t's crossed. But it does have to be "that huge" (although why isn't supposed to be obvious until later).
[/ QUOTE ]
Ok, so it does have to be that huge. Still leaves the question of why an environmental extremist would use an atomic bomb. Could you be any more environmentally unfriendly?
Sneak in a response from me: for anyone else reading this, there is an answer to Eva's question, and I PM'ed it to her, but I don't want to post it here. However, her point was extremely valid. Originally, the answer was revealed in the second arc, but, especially if eventually this arc will be stand alone, it has to be revealed in this arc too. One of today's edits does that.
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Good point. Originally, the fact they up and attacked you, no questions asked, in the first mission was supposed to indicate that they were hostile to you. But you're right ... their motivation in the first mission is to get the Enforcer's portal spawner - that *doesn't* really establish they hate metas on principle. I'll see if I can clear enough space to add a patrol with some "meta-bashing" dialog at the beginning of mission two...
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The attack in the first mission could have been a misunderstanding. They literally appeared right on top of me and started attacking. The boss dialogue in the second mission does establish that you do, in fact, need to beat these guys up to continue.
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In the Fall of the 5th Column arc, three of the 5th AVs stay loyal to the end: Requiem, Vandal, and Maestro. Requiem charges the 5th Column loyal to go underground and work under the scenes to subvert the Council. It's possible to imply that all three AVs are not particularly loyal to the Council, and have been working behind the scenes on schemes that will eventually return the 5th Column to power. That's what Vandal is doing there: I've always seen him as more loyal to Requiem than the Center.
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The dialogue doesn't say this though, that Vandal is secretly loyal to the 5th. The way it's worded, he's just back with the 5th and working to take down the Council with no explanation, even though he's been established as a Council villain. (Note that I started playing after the Council takeover of the 5th...but then so did a lot of other people. I did beat up Vandal to convince him to join the Council though, so some indication that he's loyal to the 5th but shhh, it's a secret would be nice.)
Me again: Excellent point. I'll see if I can squeeze something like that in.
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On the other hand, if it's a Council base, the whole thing boils down to "the Council just happens to be working on a computer virus to shut down Citadel, which is really convienient because the Rebels need a computer virus to shut down Citadel."
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It's been a while, but isn't Citadel's task force based around the fact that Vandal's using the same tech as was used to build Citadel? There is definitely a Vandal-Citadel connection. As soon as I saw Vandal was involved it removed the "how convenient!" element.
Me again: Hmmm ... originally, when and if I made the edit to made this arc stand alone, I was going to remove Vandal (since I erroneously didn't see a reason for him to be there any more) - but you just pointed out a reason for his involvement that I hadn't thought of. Nice - I appreciate it.
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Incidentally, everyone seems to think Biggs and Wedge are a Star Wars reference ... ultimately, they are, but I'm curious, did you catch on to the real source of all of the Assault Leader's names?
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(I'm surpressing Eva's answer here. But, for the record, she got it right.)
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I haven't decided yet exactly how to recast the mission in a stand-alone version: I'm considering a full-scale rebel assault on a Freedom Corps base where Citadel is, with the Enforcers fighting to defend him. But we'll see.
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The time-travel aspect does make sense, since the last mission has you traveling in time also, which you normally don't do without Ouroboros being involved somehow. There's also the aspect of going back to when Citadel was Bastion. I do think being dropped to such a low level, and fighting Vahz, probably discourages a lot of random people from trying the arc.
Me: It does seem to bother some more than others. I've gotten feedback ranging from "Cool! Vahzilok!" to "Oh dear God, why do I have to fight the *bleepity bleep* Vahz!!!!"
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The first rule of tyranny is control all the information. Primus has done just that - the Rebels have very limited knowledge of the past, just bits and pieces they've managed to piece together from their attemps to scavange in the wreckage of Paragon City.
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I thought it might be something like that. If you know they're from a possible future of ours, it's the logical explanation. However, Tina does hint in the beginning that they are from another dimension, and it's never clearly stated that nope, it's ours. Maybe having her flat out confirm that in one of the briefings would eliminate all confusion.
Me: I see your point. I'll see if I can find a place to squeeze it into her text.
Oh and Primus is a good name, nothing wrong with it. Looks like there are bunch of obscure nerd references attached to it, which is a plus in my book, I like catching these little references in people's arcs.
Me: Again, thank you very much for the critique. I do appreciate the consideration about PM'ing me the review since it does contain spoilers, and the permission to post your PMs here in the thread. And with regard to your statement as to reviewing the arc as though it were stand alone (since it won't be long before it effectively is), I do appreciate you did it that way. A significant majority of your critiques make the arc (IMO) even better as part of a trilogy. They'll be invaluable to help me 'tweak' it once it is stand along -- and honestly they do make me worry that I might not be able to actually make it stand alone very effectively. I'll do my best, but it may only be a matter of time before I yank 'Future' as well.
Thanks again for all of the valuable input, Eva, I really appreciate it!
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
[ QUOTE ]
Me: It does seem to bother some more than others. I've gotten feedback ranging from "Cool! Vahzilok!" to "Oh dear God, why do I have to fight the *bleepity bleep* Vahz!!!!"
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For me it's more like "gah, mah powerz! They is gone!" For the record, I do not avoid MA arcs that contain Vahz, when I am playing a character who actually is below level 20.
I think it's worth at least making the effort to rework as a stand-alone. Even if just for the fact that you actually do have to save a member of the Freedom Phalanx, as opposed to a "Oooh, Statesman needs me to save him!" mission where Statesman one-shots everything and is way tougher than you are.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
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For me it's more like "gah, mah powerz! They is gone!" For the record, I do not avoid MA arcs that contain Vahz, when I am playing a character who actually is below level 20.
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Point taken. That does make you, so far, the only one whose complaint about that particular mission actually focuses on the loss of powers - other folks comments have actually seemed more focused on the fact its the Vahzilok in the mission, for ill or for worse. Well, at least so far.
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I think it's worth at least making the effort to rework as a stand-alone. Even if just for the fact that you actually do have to save a member of the Freedom Phalanx, as opposed to a "Oooh, Statesman needs me to save him!" mission where Statesman one-shots everything and is way tougher than you are.
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Oh I certainly will. My priority for pulling an arc is based on popularity and ratings more than anything - when I need another slot, either the least active or lowest rated arc is the one that gets pulled. I doubt I'll pull 'Future' until it hits those criteria, but I have no doubt it'll get pulled some day. Only way to make an arc permanent is to get it voted into HoF (or Dev's Choice, but I'm not holding my breath), and none of these arcs are headed there. Frankly, how long it stays up is directly related to how good of a job I do making it stand-alone, since ultimately, it's everyone else's votes/interest that makes the deciding call.
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
Latest round of edits:
*Added warning text for the optional EB in mission 4. (Oversight - makes no sense to warn about an EB in 3, but not in 4, even if both are optional)
*Minor text change in one of the Assault Leader's dialog to better reflect his contempt for heroes.
*Added a bit of text to the mission three sendoff indicating 'someone' will take care of any 5th column you opt to leave behind in the base in mission 3.
*Added at least a minor hint to Vandals dialog - trying to make it more clear he's still officially affiliated with the Council, but secretly working with the 5th Column.
*Expanded the Contact's 'analysis' in the mission two briefing to make it clear the Rebels are from the future, not an alternate dimension.
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
Pardon my little unrelated side note, but I am wondering about the reference of 'Primus' being somehow related to 'Transformers' that I saw mentioned, somewhere. I'm not sure if you were referring to the toys/movie, or, if there is some kind of in-game content referenced. (I've only played CoH for a year, so I have very limited knowledge of game lore) If it is a reference to the toy, I don't recall that name at all. All I thought of was 'Optimus Prime' being the leader of the Transformers. (The only reason that I even know that is because my son did part of a colab flash video on Newgrounds, and his part of it was Optimus Prime vs Solid Snake) So, it's not quite the same thing, therefore no problem using that name at all if that's the case. 
/sidetrack
No AV/EBs Deal with The Devil's Pawn-207266 Slash DeMento and the Stolen Weapons-100045 Meet the Demon Spawn-151099 Feedback
Primus was never mentioned in G1. He's mentioned in some of the comics, there is also a "Covenant of Primus" in Beast Wars. But as Coulomb2 pointed out the name has been used for leader figures in various other nerdy things, and it's fairly generic, plus the Transformers movie never mentions him and I don't think the current comics run does either, so I'm pretty sure any trademark they might have had has expired.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
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Primus was never mentioned in G1. He's mentioned in some of the comics, there is also a "Covenant of Primus" in Beast Wars. But as Coulomb2 pointed out the name has been used for leader figures in various other nerdy things, and it's fairly generic, plus the Transformers movie never mentions him and I don't think the current comics run does either, so I'm pretty sure any trademark they might have had has expired.
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Ahh...Ok. Thanks.
I had never heard the name before. I have heard a lot of references to Optimus Prime, so I wasn't sure if that was what he was thinking of or not. Chalk it up to the confusion of an 'uninformed' older person. 
lol
No AV/EBs Deal with The Devil's Pawn-207266 Slash DeMento and the Stolen Weapons-100045 Meet the Demon Spawn-151099 Feedback
Updates:
"The Will of the Primus" (#25966)
and
"The Rise of the Primus" (#71636)
are no longer available (actually, Will of the Primus still is, but only until I finish an arc to replace it, so I'm effectively not advertisting it any more and pretending like it isn't available)
A new arc is available: Freakshow U (#189073) - a short (one mission), very fun, and humorous look at the Freakshow's answer to Francine Primm's "School for the Freakshow." Have fun!
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
I'm going to jump on the bandwagon and directly post my arcs up here in the hope that they'll get some attention and feedback.
The arcs are a trilogy, and intended for high level play (most missions will have you at at least level 40). The first arc is closest to being a "stand alone" arc, and they're very story driven. Pay careful attention to the mission briefings and listed mission objectives: most of the biggest combat challenges in the arc are completely optional.
Here are the arcs:
"Future Imperfect" #10931
"The Will of the Primus" #25966
"The Rise of the Primus" #71636
(Of course, they're listed in my signerature as well).
You can post feedback to this thread, or PM me - and frankly if you just want to play them, and have no interest in giving feedback, I'd appreciate that too.
Thanks!
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)