Venture's Reviews II: The Nightmare Continues
By
Aisynia,
Posted on: 2009-05-16 24:40 in Mission Architect
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For instance, would it actually hurt anything if the /info on a Nemesis soldier said "The weapons used by these troops may look archaic, but that's just an affectation. On the inside, Nemesis technology is nothing but cutting edge superscience" instead of trying to tell us that Nemesis is so CRAZY BRILLIANT that he can do things with steam that are utterly impossible?
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What is the difference between doing things with steam that everyone else thinks is impossible and cutting edge superscience, other than a bit of flavor and cosmetics?
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Well water can be made to do some really crazy stuff, so I don't think its that much of a stretch.
Why are we even arguing over physics in a comic book game? That's like trying to arrange a gravel driveway so all the stones are the same exact size. You can do it, but its much better if you just accept it for what it is and move on.
What is the difference between doing things with steam that everyone else thinks is impossible and cutting edge superscience, other than a bit of flavor and cosmetics?
The former strains disbelief way beyond the breaking point. The latter does not.
The audience only has a limited ability to suspend disbelief. As I've said before, quoting Campbell, they'll swallow one porcupine but not two. Do you really want to use your one and only get-out-of-jail-free card on getting them to accept (e.g.) steam-powered robots that can pass for human beings?
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
Venture,
Thanks for the very well written review. You summarized everything very well and hightlighted the themes and plot points nicely.
And you definitely linked to the two TV Tropes most appropriate to the later versions of Escalation. 
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Picking a nit, it might be spruced up a bit if the mobs had a little more variety. Maybe some of the factions Escalation is dealing with could have representatives around, having just delivered her supplies or maybe just wanting to see howher work is progressing for their own reasons.
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I'm mulling this over.
Could have some Trolls or Family in on the police station attack in Act III. Or Family or Crey making a delivery of supplies in Act IV. Maybe.
My two concerns would be: 1) level restrictions and 2) having all the enemies be Dr. Lashion (in one form or another) or her robots is supposed to build the feeling it's a one-on-one grudge match between Dr. Lashion and the player hero. At least in her mind. I'll consider if there's anything I can do to add variety without taking away from the theme as I see it.
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Escalation Extreme's final defeat is kind of Deus Ex Machina-ish but it's hard to see how else it could be done. Actually I can think of a way to do it but I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.....
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I agree, and I've been concerned about having an abrupt Dues Ex near the end. However, I don't want to lose the build up to the final mission where Detective Becktrees is impressed by the fact that the hero is "going in" without an option to stop the villainess for good. I wanted to provide a chance for players who like that kind of thing to say their hero was on the way to face insumountable odds with grim determination but no clear path to ultimate victory.
I had also hoped that the "lesser clones" in Mission Four would lay the groundwork that Dr. Lashion was getting more and "attached" emotionally to her top-line clones. But more hints of what is to come is probably needed.
I've added two more computer collections optional goals in Misison Four, in her lab. The clues involved, combined with the dialogue of the weaker clones, should give a hint of what's to come. (at least, to somewhat clever players who click optional glowies and read clues)
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In any case, it's a great arc, recommended.
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Thank you, sir, for all your kind words, and the good commentary. And, may I use the above for a "pull quote" if I make a movie poster?
Don't want to clutter up Venture's thread, so I'll end with a link to my thread for the Escalation arc, where I'll do all my further discussion:
Arc #6143, "Escalation"
I'm a published amateur comic book author: www.ericjohnsoncomics.com
******MA Arcs****
Arc 5909: "Amazon-Avatars"
Arc 6143: "Escalation" (Nominee: Architect Awards, Nominee: Player Awards, and Dev's Choice!)
Thank you, sir, for all your kind words, and the good commentary. And, may I use the above for a "pull quote" if I make a movie poster?
Sure, go for it.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
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What is the difference between doing things with steam that everyone else thinks is impossible and cutting edge superscience, other than a bit of flavor and cosmetics?
The former strains disbelief way beyond the breaking point. The latter does not.
The audience only has a limited ability to suspend disbelief. As I've said before, quoting Campbell, they'll swallow one porcupine but not two. Do you really want to use your one and only get-out-of-jail-free card on getting them to accept (e.g.) steam-powered robots that can pass for human beings?
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Well I will gladly swallow a whole truckload full of porcupines. If those porcupines are AWESOME.
Whatevers, ill shut up now. Make with the reviews!
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Do you really want to use your one and only get-out-of-jail-free card on getting them to accept (e.g.) steam-powered robots that can pass for human beings?
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One last comment and then I'll give this thread back to the reviews: as I understand it the Nemesis automaton faction is something of a joke, with office workers as the butt - the idea being that robots don't have to be passable if all they're impersonating is office workers. IIRC the arc in which they first appear is full of Office Space references ("Where's my TPS report?" etc).
And for a while things were cold,
They were scared down in their holes
The forest that once was green
Was colored black by those killing machines
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Do you really want to use your one and only get-out-of-jail-free card on getting them to accept (e.g.) steam-powered robots that can pass for human beings?
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One last comment and then I'll give this thread back to the reviews: as I understand it the Nemesis automaton faction is something of a joke, with office workers as the butt - the idea being that robots don't have to be passable if all they're impersonating is office workers. IIRC the arc in which they first appear is full of Office Space references ("Where's my TPS report?" etc).
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Is there anywhere in the game that explicitly states the automatons are steam powered? I would think Nemesis would use any technology available... especially considering one of the later arcs in which he's trying to construct an artificial brain - definitely not steam powered - cybernetic.
131430 Starfare: First Contact
178774 Tales of Croatoa: A Rose By Any Other Name ( 2009 MA Best In-Canon Arc ) ( 2009 Player Awards - Best Serious Arc )
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Is there anywhere in the game that explicitly states the automatons are steam powered? I would think Nemesis would use any technology available... especially considering one of the later arcs in which he's trying to construct an artificial brain - definitely not steam powered - cybernetic.
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I understand Nemesis is also building steam-powered dimensional portals so he can conquer other dimensions. 
What this argument reminds me of is an old Flash comic book where the Mirror Master was in prison, and he somehow managed to make a device to teleport himself out using a cannibalized electric shaver and some earwax to polish his leather shoes to a mirror-like sheen. LMAO
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How much logical consistency can we reasonably demand of a game that intentionally incorporates so many disparate "reasons" for super-powered-ness?
Lots. There is no imperative to be logical inconsistent.
For instance, would it actually hurt anything if the /info on a Nemesis soldier said "The weapons used by these troops may look archaic, but that's just an affectation. On the inside, Nemesis technology is nothing but cutting edge superscience" instead of trying to tell us that Nemesis is so CRAZY BRILLIANT that he can do things with steam that are utterly impossible?
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In my view, Nemesis isn't doing impossible things with steam. "Steampunk" tech is merely his obsession. I think his technology is based on the absence of semiconductor technology and advanced battery technolgy. In essence, what Steampunk tech is all about.
If you wanted to inject some "science" into the Steampunk tech of Nemesis, keep in mind the water used is probably "Heavy Water". Which is deuterium or protium, depending on the isotope. So essentially what he has is Fusion-technology without the semi-conductor revolution. Since the water itself is the powersource, you don't need batteries to store that power.
Also it's very strongly implied in the CoH in-game cannon that the Sky Raiders are a front for Nemesis. So Nemesis is capable of making modern, high-tech looking equipment, he just only does so when he doesn't want something traced back to him.
The biggest problem with Nemesis is he's protrayed and All-knowing and all-powerful yet never succeeds in his plans due to the heroes. Even then supposedly all they stopped was a distraction from the real goal. Etc. Etc.
The best way to deal with it would be to take the parts of the canon that work and dump the parts that make no sense. Which according to Venture you can't really do.
"Steady as a mountain, attack like fire, still as a wood, swift as the wind.
In heaven and earth I alone am to be revered."
- Motto on the war banner of Takeda Shingen (1521-1573)
This is a game in which people can perform Eagles Claw.
I think it's honestly implied that alot of Nemesis' technology - particularly his guns - are advanced modern weapons dressed up as steampunk weapons because Nemesis has a Victorian fetish. You could explain just about everything he has this way, and then whatever's left (exploding bayonets and the weather control device) can be left up to Rule of Cool. Seriously. This is a comic book game. What do we expect, Micheal Crichton?
Has been killed by the DoT on Throwing Knives and proud of it.
Arc #174586, "Assault on Aru Prime"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: "just a bunch of stuff that happened", problematic mobs, some plot holes
Reviewed on: 5/24/2009
Level Range: 1-54/1-54/1-54/1-54/41-54
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
The first thing to note is that the arc has a warning on it not to play below level 31. Evidently an object used in one of the missions doesn't scale properly. The next note is that this arc takes place entirely outside of CoX canon; it's a science-fiction adventure casting you as a "Federation Meta-Sapient Ranger".
Admiral Ayala wants your help with the Federation's stalled invasion of the Azeri Alliance. There's a report in of an archaeological find on neutral planet Aru Prime, an artifact that might help disrupt the Azeri's psionic technology. You're to do this under the pretense of negotiating for medical supplies, during which process you are to kill their ambassador, hack into the planetary database to find the dig site, and break into a command bunker for military information as a distraction. The map is an office-to-caves-to-Rikti one with "Aru Civilians", Martial Arts/Regen (I think), and "Aru Security Officers" (Mace/Shield). You have to click two computer glowies and beat up the Ambassador, who has climbed into a suit of powered armor (Martial Arts/DiedTooFast Boss). When you get back, the Admiral tells you they've destroyed the Arusian fleet, but the planet's defense shields were too strong and they managed to get off a distress signal.
It turns out the military information you swiped was the location of the Arusian's central defense installation. While another team checks out the dig site, you're to invade that, knock down the planetary shield, steal any information that looks valuable and plant a neurotoxin bomb to kill as many Arusians as possible after you leave. A Boss, "Major Vezija", spawned frontloaded (Martial Arts/Electrical Blast), and some Aru Security Officer Lietenants entered the mix (Assault Rifle/DiedTooFast). The goals were to take down 5 generators, plant the toxin and find four "shield technologies". There turned out to be a number of the Boss spawns, reminding me yet again that the END drain on my Widow could suck the chrome off a fender through 20 feet of garden hose.... On return, the Admiral orders a planetary bombardment and says they're going to need your help with the dig site.
It turns out the Arusians caught the Federation spy, so they know about the artifact in question. A courier was tranporting it through the capitol but that's in ruins now. You'll have to go in after him, and quickly because the Azeri fleet just showed up and they're busting caps both in orbit and planetside. You beam down to a ruined city map to find two glowies and the Azeri team leader, a Katana/Kinetics Boss, and her cohorts, Robotics/Pain Domination Minions. The result of all this is you discover the artifact is gone, probably taken by an Azeri team. You beam back up to a bad situation.
The command ship's scans confirm the artifact is now aboard the enemy flagship. Even with the new shield modifications online, your fleet has lost a third of its ships with negligible enemy casualties. Despite the fact that Azeri ships are deathtraps for boarding parties, you're going in. The artifact is near the enemy's reactor core, so you're also to plant explosives to destroy the flagship from the inside. The map is an Arachnos lab, with the Big Room...kill me now...in which you find an "Azari MSR" Elite Boss, Electric Assault/Invulnerability, which dropped me when it was nearly dead with an 760-point or so Havoc Punch backed up by a 290 point Charged Brawl. It was surrounded by the Engineers which had to be entirely cleared out first, as they're all healers, and (of course) turned out to be personally guarding the artifact. I wondered at this point why, if it actually does what the Federation thinks it will, it wasn't destroyed by now.... Then I lost conn and had to do it all...over...again.... The rerun went a bit more smoothly, though I had to drain my tray to beat the MSR. On your return to the command ship, the Admiral reveals she's herded the Azeri ships in towards their flagship just in time to have it blow up. That's the good news.
The bad news is that even though you'll win this battle, an Azeri force three times the size of the last one is coming in. If the artifact does what everyone thinks it does and the techs can get it working, you might have a chance...but an Azeri boarding party including several MSRs has taken over the lab section. You have to get in and protect the artifact. At this point the arc takes a major nosedive as the difficulty skyrockets. The first room contained the artifact, two Bosses and (on CL2) about 15 of the healer mobs right up front. If you deal with that, you have to put up with four of the Azeri MSRs, all of which are surrounded by healers. There are battles with your ship's marines but they're going to be over in the Azeri's favor by the time you see them, and all that means is everyone already has their pets out when you attack. There are assorted objectives to deal with other than protecting the artifact (which, somehow, survived despite my biting it on the first sortie) but none of them matter because the map is a kill-all. I died five times trying to get rid of the first EB, which is capable of one-shotting a VEAT. I stopped counting after that but I must have died at least 15-20 times on the last map. In the debriefing the Admiral tells you the artifact works beyond their expectations: it doesn't just disable Azeri technology, it kills them outright. Once the incoming fleet is wiped out by pushing a button, it's on to the Azeri homeworld. You get a medal and a promotion for making genocide possible.
This was heading for four stars until I hit the last map. It would have gotten two but I gave it the benefit of the doubt since my Widow was only 34. Huge piles of healers backing up Bosses and Elite Bosses are more than a bit much. The writing is decent, but it's not clear why the Azeri didn't destroy the artifact when they had the chance, or made an all out effort to take out your ship after you steal it. When their ships are herded together and can't get out except by ramming...well, if I thought the enemy command ship was carrying something that could utterly disable all my technology, ramming is exactly what I'd do. They also take their sweet time about destroying it when their boarding party reaches the labs. Some players may balk at the Federation's tactics but it is a villainous arc. Just bring a build that can solo the Nimitz and you'll be fine.
Edit: typo
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
I just ran this arc because I saw you in VU complaining so much about multiple deaths and had to see the problem myself. I loved the dialogue and plot, it was classic space opera with an evil universe twist. It reminded me of the mirror universe federation from the different Star Trek series.
The only problem I had with it was the final mission having so many EBs and being a kill all. Still I'm guessing it was the fact you were only 34 that got you killed so many times. I went through on my 46 fire/dark scrapper and only died twice, both times in the final mission when two of the EBs were in the same room. I'm guessing the difficulty setting made a big difference too. I went in on rugged and virtually never saw any healing taking place, just a whole lot of robot summoning.
Oh, and also for me the artifact spawned in the final room of the end level. So it might be set for spawn at any location rather than back, or else that's one of the maps where the spawn locations are bugged.
I gave it a 4.
Don't count your weasels before they pop dink!
Sorry you had trouble with the last mission Venture, that really sucks. I've not really had an issue with it personally, not much of one.
It IS a kill all, but it should be noted that it's a pretty small map too It had to be a kill all, plot wise, as the Azeri strike team was obviously wtfpwning the Marines, they need MSR help (you). The Marines are all non-robotic malta. Think I should add the bots in there to help even the odds a bit?
There are three EBs, and 3 floors. They are set to spawn front, middle, and back. They really shouldn't spawn together. I'll mess around with the objectives and see if I can get things to spawn more reliably in there. The EBs are Elec Assault/Invuln (everything here is standard/standard), they are the enemy MSR, the best of the best, they're intended to be tough, but no, not overwhelmingly so. I may change their secondary to something like a second attack set to dial down the difficulty and make them squishier in light of this.
I will say, that map is supposed to seem like the last stand, but I've mostly gotten very positive feedback on it. I've been told it feels "epic" and even "feels like star wars!" with all the red lasers and energy swords and lightning flying around 
I'm really sorry your experience wasn't better.
Not gonna quibble over MOST of the plot issues you pointed out because if something isn't explained well (even if I know the answer), then it probably SHOULD be. Things like "why don't the Azeri just destroy it?", and "Why DON'T they ram them?" I know the answers, and can tell you if you want.. problem is, I'm hitting the text limits on pretty much all my text fields, so some information was not gonna make it in. It's a bit of a side effect of stream of consciousness writing (my method), and I would normally be able to go back and fill in the plot holes, but with the text limits, it's nearly impossible. This arc is 99.79% as it is :|
One thing I will point out, is that in the last mission, you said there were several side objectives who "somehow" survived the first sortie, that being the scientists. I felt I made it pretty obvious that the Azeri are the good guys and wouldn't kill the scientists, as they are civilians (or at least unarmed). The dialogue between the Azeri and the scientists is generally geared towards the Azeri condemning their actions and wanting to rehabilitate them into responsible citizens of the galaxy
Again, sorry you had such a tough time on that last mission.
I'm only ladylike when compared to my sister.
This arc did feel like an epic space battle. Like Venture said, some things just happened. But that's more than acceptable in space opera, in fact you can pretty much expect it. Not everything has to be Law and Order.
I didn't have any problem figuring out why the Azeri didn't kill the scientists or destroy the artifact. The entire plot and the dialogue from the NPCs made it very clear that they were a peaceful race and primarily interested in scientific research.
Are you sure there are only 3 of the EBs in the last mission? I could have sworn there were 4 or 5 of them. And the two EBs that spawned together when I ran it were both in the first room, the same room where Venture said the artifact spawned for him. I'm guessing that particular map has bugged spawn points.
I myself didn't see any points where you could have cut out any dialogue in order to insert more explanations. The NPC chat is what gives you the whole motivations of the Azeri, and the contact dialogue gives whole flow of a storyline rather than just a series of missions.
The only thing you might want to do is in the arc description itself note that the final mission contains multiple EBs.
Don't count your weasels before they pop dink!
I will strongly consider that (adding in the description), just afraid of description limits.
Only 3, but bosses WILL spawn. The Azeri are a group of minions and bosses, but the EBs ARE in the group. I have never had extra EBs spawn... but I will separate them into their own group to ensure that they don't.
Thanks for the heads up.
Oh and the group Is designed like that intentionally.. squishy, squishy minions with pets as support units that you need to take out in order to properly fight their superiors.
I'm only ladylike when compared to my sister.
I will say, that map is supposed to seem like the last stand, but I've mostly gotten very positive feedback on it. I've been told it feels "epic" and even "feels like star wars!" with all the red lasers and energy swords and lightning flying around
How many of these people were playing Scrappers?
I'm sure if you take a Scrapper or Brute in it's a blast (though the Thunder Strike on the EBs can probably oneshot a SR or the like). Anything the slightest bit squishy is going to be problematic.
There are three EBs, and 3 floors. They are set to spawn front, middle, and back.
There are four EBs. Really.
I saw they were set to standard. Unfortunately the latest round of almost totally unrequested changes to custom critters shoved some very wacky ideas of what powers should go with which difficulty levels down our throats. Hopefully the changes said to be coming with i15 will fix this.
One thing I will point out, is that in the last mission, you said there were several side objectives who "somehow" survived the first sortie, that being the scientists.
No, I said somehow the ARTIFACT survived MY first sortie, despite my hitting the pavement sometime after the second Boss shivved me in the back.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
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I will say, that map is supposed to seem like the last stand, but I've mostly gotten very positive feedback on it. I've been told it feels "epic" and even "feels like star wars!" with all the red lasers and energy swords and lightning flying around
How many of these people were playing Scrappers?
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No idea. I use my Blaster and my SOA (Huntsman) on highest diff. I never test with melees, it skews the results too heavily.
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I'm sure if you take a Scrapper or Brute in it's a blast (though the Thunder Strike on the EBs can probably oneshot a SR or the like). Anything the slightest bit squishy is going to be problematic.
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I do fine on my blaster and my huntsman I haven't used a lower level character (I really don't have any) but I know a couple level 12s that did this fine together. Even at 50 though, they are pretty damned squishy. The only issue they had is that (unbeknownst to me at the time) the generators in mission 2 will not scale down below level 35. They had to have a 50 come in and smash them. With I15, I'm putting a level bump/restriction here. The warning will have to do for now.
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There are three EBs, and 3 floors. They are set to spawn front, middle, and back.
There are four EBs. Really.
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Shouldn't be. I will double check. To be clear, EBs have elec assault, bosses have katana, minions are bots/pain.
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I saw they were set to standard. Unfortunately the latest round of almost totally unrequested changes to custom critters shoved some very wacky ideas of what powers should go with which difficulty levels down our throats. Hopefully the changes said to be coming with i15 will fix this.
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Conceded.
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One thing I will point out, is that in the last mission, you said there were several side objectives who "somehow" survived the first sortie, that being the scientists.
No, I said somehow the ARTIFACT survived MY first sortie, despite my hitting the pavement sometime after the second Boss shivved me in the back.
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I've noticed a trend in AE missions... mobs who are supposed to attack and destroy objects? Suck at it.
I'm only ladylike when compared to my sister.
Arc #113956, "The Devs must die!"
tl;dr: 2 stars. Offenses: not funny, possibly reportable
Reviewed on: 5/24/2009
Level Range: 30-54/1-54/30-54/1-54
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Your Contact on this one is not just Nemesis, but Angry Nemesis. Evidently he's been to Burger King lately. After ODing on Angry Whoppers, though, he tried to take over the city with an army of robotic hobos. His idea that no one notices homeless people so they could strike without warning. And it would have worked, too, if it wasn't for those meddling kids^H^H^H^Hprogrammers. It seems the people he had programming the robots, known as "The Devs" decided they wanted to rule the world and programmed the bots accordingly. You're asked to stop them. The first target is the Crey facility where the bots were being made. Nemesis already told them to destroy the prototypes but thinks the Countess is likely to try to hold onto a few for herself. For some bizarre reason this facility is a cargo ship. You have to find one glowie and take out one Hobobot, a Super Strength/Invulnerability Boss that dropped me twice thanks to KO Blow. (Typo in fight spam: "inherant") The glowie is a list of the programmers' names, but they're all aliases like "Steaksman" and "Applecore". Um, yeah.
Angry Nemesis next asks you to take the coded list to his expert cryptographer, Arbiter Something, hidden in the ranks of Arachnos. This will expose him and probably result in his death but Nemesis doesn't care. Yes, this arc says "Neutral" on the label.... The Arbiter, whose actual name is "Sumting", was already being held hostage, seems his Nemesis decoder ring gave him away despite his claim that he just enjoyed Nemesis' TV show. After rescuing him, he took off for the door and said that list is not encoded, these are the forum names of the programmers. The exit clue says Sumter gave you a hastily-scribbled address Nemesis immediately sends you off to smite the Devs....
...but, when I got there, a voice over the intercom said the Devs were long gone and I'd have to deal with their Hobobots of Dooooooooom. The bots come in a variety of types, there's one hostage to rescue (which, though being a required objective, involves "rescuing" an enemy bot from your allies) and a few glowies, most of which contain insulting comments about the game's developers that I won't repeat. The "hostage" slips you a note from the Devs challenging Nemesis to meet them in Dimension Z.
Nemesis sends you instead, explaining that Dimension Z is not another dimension but a casino in Bloody Bay. You have to defeat-all in a small bar map, including the "DevBot Destroyer Beta Test Version", an Electric Assault/Shield Elite Boss. There's really nothing to write about there. When you finish, Nemesis thanks you and says you can rest comfortably knowing that when the city is taken over it will be by a benevolent genius and not crazy programmers.
The arc is really not funny and makes some insulting comments that might be considered reportable for content.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
Sorry I haven't gotten back to you about the review for quite some time, I've been hosting friends from downstate for over a week. Thank you for pointing out the issues with the sonic debuffs when playing solo at higher difficulties using melee characters; most of the AT's I've soloed this arc with were squishies who were just simply glad there weren't massive mezzes being tossed about, and were quite used to basically being gasoline-soaked rags when it comes to being in melee range with bosses, so I tended to use ranged tactics. Thanks for the data point!
Changes to arc 1153, Chocolatier Wars! , as of May 24, 2009:
Gremlin Wranglers are now Electrical Melee/Regeneration, regen replacing sonic resonance.
Midas-Touched were Super Strength standard/Sonic Resonance Extreme, they are now Sonic resonance Hard.
Sonic Blade were Katana/sonic resonance, they are now Katana/Regeneration.
Tech Coordinators were Robotics/sonic resonance, they are now Robotics/Electricity Manipulation.
I've changed the custom group of Crey Chocolatiers to spawn my custom mobs, or random crey, instead of including all the different possible spawns for lower levels, the sheer number of other possible crey mobs from say, 30-39, were causing very few of my custom chocolatiers to spawn in the missions.
I'm going to keep the somewhat low difficulty of the end Elite Boss, I'd had complaints when I'd first written my arc that he was too hard when I'd originally had him at Hard level Dark Melee/Standard Dark Armor, but no one had seemed to mind the Midas-Touched being Super Strength Hard/ Sonic Resonance Extreme until Lazarus set me straight, and I'd toned him down to Super Strength Standard. Thank you for letting me know he needed to be tweaked downward further.
Okay, going to play through the changes with a few of my characters, thank you again for reviewing my arc!
Arc #132673, "The Galaxy Girl Maneuver"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: "just a bunch of stuff that happened", Timey Wimey Ball, no closure, muddled morality
Reviewed on: 5/25/2009
Level Range: 5-15
Character used: Amy Sunflower/Virtue
Mender Lazarus needs your help. The last time you worked with him, which is three years from now, you stopped a villain named the Silver Scarab from robbing a bank decades ago. One of his henchmen was Lou Pardelli, the man who would go on to mug Kelly Graham, causing her to become Galaxy Girl. That won't happen if Lou goes to jail, so Lazarus wants you to rescue him from the cops. This is not a good start for a Heroic arc.... You have to return to the bank and rescue Lou (ally escort) from the police and bank security. On his way out he insists he had nothing to do with the robbery and shows you a note telling him to be there at that time so he'd "learn something of interest". Lazarus concludes that someone intended to frame him using your own flashback, and runs off to consult Nem^H^H^HSilos.
After getting reprimanded by Silos, Lazarus re-examines the timline around Galaxy Girl and discovers another "hot spot": someone is trying to prevent Dauntless, her kid sidekick, from reaching her in time to save her from an attack by Protean -- a battle that costs Dauntless his life. You have to rescue Dauntless from his captors so he can go die on schedule. The ethical implications are not lost in the narrative. You are sent to a warehouse full of Pumicites. Just what my Controller needed, a map full of mobs that can't be rooted.... You are to free Dauntless, optionally two smugglers (all simple rescues) and defeat the "Central Processor", which was an Igneous named Core Dump. His defeat triggers an ambush, but you have to defeat his whole encounter to clear the objective, which made things "interesting". Fortunately I managed to take down the last of his guards then click out while the ambush was beating on me (error: defeat text says "Return to Mender Silos"). On return, Lazarus notes how displeased you are over the last mission and tells you the next one is a strike against the perpetrator.
The Enemy has been using an abandoned superhero base in Eastgate, but accidentally attracted the attention of Longbow. You're to use Longbow's raid as a distraction. Unfortunately because Longbow are a bunch of trigger-happy idiots they're going to treat you as an enemy. Um, yeah. The place is filled with Pumicites and Longbow, occasionally fighting each other, and three copies of The Hood, described only as "a mysterious masked figure attempting to erase Galaxy Girl from history". These are numbered IV, III and II. There are a total of five Clues to find, four of which make it sound as if the real goal of the Hood is to erase Ms. Liberty. The last is from Mystery Letter Writing Guy who once again mocks you for having no freaking idea what you're really doing.
Lazarus comes to the same conclusion. And the Enemy has had enough of the indirect approach and has jumped back to the night Kelly Graham was mugged. You have to flashback and save her yourself. The map is the narrow city map, and yes, more Pumicites. Egads. Goals are to protect Kelly and defeat The Hood, with optional goals to rescue "Rosie" and Lou Pardelli. Fortunately I was able to fly over the map and cherry-pick the objectives, taking out the Hood and Galaxy Girl's keepers with Seeds of Win. This time the Hood is routed to an Ouroboros temporal prison when he tries to jump out. Lazarus is somewhat put off by the way things went but the timeline appears to be in order so it's all good. You don't get to find out who the Hood is or why exactly he wanted Ms. Liberty erased.
The arc suffers from the usual Timey Wimey Ball problems and has no closure. Twice in a four-mission Heroic arc you're sent up against law enforcement. You're left with no idea who you were up against, what was going on or even (as usual for Ouroboros) whether or not you're working for the right people. This means it's impossible to criticize the plot; it also means that's because there isn't one.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
Current queue status is listed below. When requesting a review, please include morality and level range.
Hero: 161066, 81378, 170506, 163274, 57352, 149323, 137705, 171149, 161797, 79354, 75386, 59147, 15988, 1036, 55715, 37636, 17006, 174368, 60280, 178774, 100306, 181244, 91644, 167493, 149765, 118009, 191775
Villain: 162898, 77533, 161865, 32801, 97774, 153720
Neutral: 84420, 170547, 123675, 175675, 156389, 143017, 177826, 67356, 1296
Hero 13-20: 131780, 135563, 24926
Villain 13-20: 103878, 114284
Neutral 13-20: 137561
Rerun: 128109, 181165, 106553
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
Arc #103878, "Gamble for Oakes"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: badly disjointed level range, excessive ambush, bordeline Idiot Plot, no closure
Reviewed on: 5/25/2009
Level Range: 1-54/5-14/1-14/6-12/1-54
Character used: Amarantia/Virtue
You get a phone call from someone named Gil, who claims to be the leader of the local Hellions. He says one of two Skulls who recently defected, both of whom are his childhood friends, was just kidnapped by the Council. He wants your help in getting the hostage back. Sure, I don't mind working for a voice on the phone claiming to be someone I've never met.... The hostage, Cage, turned out to be a simple rescue. There's also a weapons rack that's already been looted ("but by whom?" it asks) and a computer with a file on "Operation Fuschia: Zwei" describing how the Council sent a Cor Leonis codenamed Fuschia (?) into the Family as a sleeper agent, from where she (??) convinced them to assign her to work undercover in the Skulls (???). She's now reporting that the Skulls are about to begin a big plan. Cage, the hostage, speaks on the phone for the debriefing, thanking you for rescuing him and claiming the Council was going to brainwash him or use him in their experiments. In the mission, his approach text says "I just wanted to join you guys, I swear." Yep.
Next, Gil invites you over for pizza. No, not really, he really wants your help on another big job. It seems the other one of his childhood friends who defected, Fujin, was also grabbed by the Council but she (first mention of gender, I'm pretty sure) managed to grab some weapons and escape. Gil wants you hit a Family warehouse and plant the Council weapons to frame them for it. The entry pop-up says "Time to throw the Idiot Ball and hope the Family catches'...OK.... This is a defeat-all on a medium-sized map with four glowies. Gil is on site as a free-willed ally hostage (i.e. he doesn't follow you when released). He has no info and his garb makes him look more like a Prisoner than a Hellion. "Consigliere Zwei" was in the last room, a hostile custom mob. I have no idea what her powers were since she was confused and held in short order. She very tersely expresses her consternation at your interference. In the debriefing Gil says Fujin took a beating "which is weird" (you'd think he'd notice the conspicuous giant thorns and stuff) and is gleeful at the prospect of the Family and the Council going for each others' throats.
There's no indication of that actually going down in the next act, though, as Cage has been grabbed by the Skulls now. Gil and Fujin are going to get him back and he wants your help. This is a three-hostage rescue on a large warehouse map, effectively making it a kill-all, and when you rescue the third he triggers the spawn of two more boss objectives. Just in case you weren't ready to reach though the monitor and throttle the Architect, downing the first of those resulted in a tidal wave of Skulls that easily dispatched all three of us. I zoned back in and cleaned up the mess. On exit, you get a call from Cage explaining that he and Fujin joining leaving the Skulls for the Hellions was supposed to be a trick. The plan was to be for Cage to join with the Council and that was to provoke the Hellions into a war to get him back...they thought the Hellions were going to take on the Council?!?!?!?!?! In any case it didn't work because the Council knew about the plan somehow. I can't imagine how.
Cage calls again to tell you he's taken over the local Skulls and arranged an uneasy truce with Gil -- uneasy because the rank-and-file don't like the idea, that is. They're making a big move now and want your help. The Family is tied up with the Council, so they aim to send the Mooks packing by taking out a bunch of their leaders, including Emil Marcone (bring a team warning, and that's the wrong leader -- the Mook's leader is Guido Verandi). The office turns out to have Council and Family in it. For a Mook HQ, it didn't have any actual Mooks in it. There were one or two tense spots dealing with Emil but he went down on the first fall. So did two Council Archons, both complaining about things not going according to plan. In the debriefing Gil thinks this means the Skulls and Hellions now own Port Oakes. I can just hear him saying "extended warranty? How can I lose!"
The last mission, entitled "The Big Bloody Reset Button", opens with Arbiter Unger on the phone, informing you that allowing the Skulls and Hellions to control the area is not in Recluse's best interests, and it is up to you to fix it by killing Gil, Cage and whoever the hell Fujin/Zwei/Fuschia/Mata Hari/Lee Harvey Oswald/Nemesis is. You're warned that they'll try to run and that cannot be allowed. Entry popup: "For some people, failure is the only option".... The ending faction for this is "Skullions", which was cute. As I was on CL1 and playing a Dominator none of the targets had any real chance. In the debriefing Unger mocks you for having killed all your friends and co-workers, then congratulates you on having dealt with everyone who would have tried to control Oakes and being wise enough to obey Arachnos when necessary.
The arc doesn't really throw the Idiot Ball (except at Gil, who runs for the end zone with it), but you have to be a pretty dim bulb not to realize that "Fu" is playing everyone for saps. There are two problems with this. One is that you have no real incentive to play along, unless it's being assumed that your character has about fifty fewer IQ points than you do, in which case this is an Idiot Plot. The other is that it's pretty clear, from the fact that she never speaks in sentences containing more than one word, that Fu is chipped or mind controlled or a Nemesis Automaton or something along those lines, and there's never any indication as to who she is really working for or what she really is. The gameplay is decent except for the Ambush From Hell, but you're going to be left scratching your head at the end.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
Thank you for your review.
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For instance, would it actually hurt anything if the /info on a Nemesis soldier said "The weapons used by these troops may look archaic, but that's just an affectation. On the inside, Nemesis technology is nothing but cutting edge superscience" instead of trying to tell us that Nemesis is so CRAZY BRILLIANT that he can do things with steam that are utterly impossible?
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What is the difference between doing things with steam that everyone else thinks is impossible and cutting edge superscience, other than a bit of flavor and cosmetics?
Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.