You forgot to mention the Fusionette Task Force!
I'm only ladylike when compared to my sister.
Before I go setting this up as a real event, though, I thought I'd see what the MA story community thinks of the idea.
MA arcs that do not properly scale to group size and difficulty level are not "task forces"; they are simply broken.
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"
He's not talking about arcs that don't scale properly to group size and difficulty (i.e. require a team to complete) - he's talking about arcs that require a team to fully appreciate (i.e. get the most out of them). 
I definetely like this idea, having written my arcs to give teams things soloers don't see when playing them (and having designated one of them a TF 
), changing the experience for the team for each person added. I play on Infinity, Protector, and Virtue, so I'd be happy to join in on these servers.
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
What day/time on Liberty. I'd be happy to join in. I got a TF arc I made in my sig BTW. It has a lot of EBs/AVs in it, only 4 of which are custom.
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Before I go setting this up as a real event, though, I thought I'd see what the MA story community thinks of the idea.
MA arcs that do not properly scale to group size and difficulty level are not "task forces"; they are simply broken.
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I feel the opposite. I wish I could make a MA arc that did not scale at all and required 6+ people to start.
If someone creates an arc that can be well handled by a 6 man team on Unyielding but is extremely difficult for a soloist on heroic, that is not necessarily bad design, as long as the intent is clearly spelled out. Not all MA content needs to be workable for all team sizes, IMO.
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.
He's not talking about arcs that don't scale properly to group size and difficulty (i.e. require a team to complete) - he's talking about arcs that require a team to fully appreciate (i.e. get the most out of them).
There is no difference between the two.
I definetely like this idea, having written my arcs to give teams things soloers don't see when playing them (and having designated one of them a TF ), changing the experience for the team for each person added.
There is nothing of any real consequence that can be added to an MA project that will only be seen by teams and not soloists. You could include a Boss in a custom faction and then not place any spawns of that Boss, thus preventing anyone from seeing one unless they bring in a team of sufficient size as to spawn Bosses at regular points. I had one of these in one of my arcs but removed it. That's about it.
There are mobs available that don't scale down properly for some inane reason (the DE monsters, which do scale properly in canon missions), and you could do things with time limits that might make it mathematically impossible or nearly so for a soloist to complete a mission. Neither of these really meets the condition specified. You could put in (e.g.) a DE Monster and then link the spawn of another objective to its defeat, but really, what would be accomplished by this?
I feel the opposite. I wish I could make a MA arc that did not scale at all and required 6+ people to start.
If the devs chose to include that feature I would not object to it. I'd even welcome it. Until such time as they do, though, it is part of the specification for all MA projects that they are accessible to groups of all sizes, including size 1, and should scale reasonably to both group size and difficulty setting. Attempting to subvert that is simply bad design, whether or not the intent to do is printed on the label.
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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If the devs chose to include that feature I would not object to it. I'd even welcome it. Until such time as they do, though, it is part of the specification for all MA projects that they are accessible to groups of all sizes, including size 1, and should scale reasonably to both group size and difficulty setting. Attempting to subvert that is simply bad design, whether or not the intent to do is printed on the label.
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Let me just make sure I'm understanding this. Are you basicly saying that no one should EVER use an AV in their story arc, not even the standard ones? Because a lot of AVs aren't solo friendly for a lot of ATs, even if they're scaled down..
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If the devs chose to include that feature I would not object to it. I'd even welcome it. Until such time as they do, though, it is part of the specification for all MA projects that they are accessible to groups of all sizes, including size 1, and should scale reasonably to both group size and difficulty setting. Attempting to subvert that is simply bad design, whether or not the intent to do is printed on the label.
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I know what your position is, but I do not really understand why you occupy it.
While you are much more likely to appeal to a larger group of people if you design with level 29 Emp/Elec soloists and 8 man mixed teams in mind, I see nothing wrong with designing a story arc with the intention of requiring a MSTF type team. Ignoring the audience of people who might want that latter content does not seem to be a design requirement for a good MA arc.
Just because anyone may walk up and attempt your arc does not mean you must make it so that anyone can complete it.
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.
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it is part of the specification for all MA projects that they are accessible to groups of all sizes
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That is indeed true.
On the other hand, it's not part of the specification for all AE projects that they should be completable by anyone on any group size using any AT at any level.
Everyone can start it, not everyone can complete it. Sounds fine to me, and I wish the devs would apply that model to all TFs/trials.
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He's not talking about arcs that don't scale properly to group size and difficulty (i.e. require a team to complete) - he's talking about arcs that require a team to fully appreciate (i.e. get the most out of them).
There is no difference between the two
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I completely disagree. There's a huge difference between "Impossible for anyone to solo" and "More fun to play on a team." Like someone else said, using an AV at all more or less makes it an arc that a team gets more out of. If you're solo, it's an EB instead, meaning that unless your AV is incredibly powerful, then it could theoretically be soloed.
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There is no difference between the two.
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I completely disagree. There's a huge difference between "Impossible for anyone to solo" and "More fun to play on a team."
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Right there. Granted, fun is subjective, and some people feel that soloing is more fun than teaming in this game. Considering this is an MMO, this is something I just don't understand, though. 
Ergo, for me, there's a huge difference between the two.
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There is nothing of any real consequence that can be added to an MA project that will only be seen by teams and not soloists. You could include a Boss in a custom faction and then not place any spawns of that Boss, thus preventing anyone from seeing one unless they bring in a team of sufficient size as to spawn Bosses at regular points. I had one of these in one of my arcs but removed it. That's about it.
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Nope, there's more. A good deal more. 
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
Let me just make sure I'm understanding this. Are you basicly saying that no one should EVER use an AV in their story arc, not even the standard ones? Because a lot of AVs aren't solo friendly for a lot of ATs, even if they're scaled down.
Any competent build should be capable of handling an EB in the general case, at least above, say, level 20. (AVs at level 10 are Killer GMing.) There are likely to be corner cases where certain builds may have trouble with specific AVs, even downgraded, but that's not the Architect's responsibility. At five years into the game the relative power of the various ATs as soloists is received wisdom.
Excessive or gratuitious use of AVs is another matter. Excessive use would be something like that "Praetorian Civil War" arc that throws 14 AVs at you in the last mission, or maps I've seen that spawn nothing but AVs. Gratuitious use would be casting mobs as AVs simply to prevent them from spawning as Bosses at low difficulty if cast as EBs, which I've seen done in two recently-reviewed arcs.
Just because anyone may walk up and attempt your arc does not mean you must make it so that anyone can complete it.
As a matter of fact, it does. More properly, if you are offering your arc to groups of size X then you are implicitly stating that competent groups of size X have a reasonable chance at success. That does not mean that a group of (e.g.) Empathy Defenders with one attack each is going to be able to clear it, as that is clearly not the general case. For our purposes X can vary from 1 to 8, so there is an imperative to accomodate that entire range.
Designing with the intent to kill teams (including teams of size 1) legally able to access the arc is Killer GMing. Writing "this is a Killer GM arc" on the label does not make it not killer GMing. If and when we get the ability to gate access by team size then you can start throwing battleships at people. If soloists game the system to hop over the fence whatever happens to them is their problem. But as long as a solo player can start your arc normally you have an onus to respect the game's scaling mechanisms and give him a reasonable opportunity to win.
I completely disagree. There's a huge difference between "Impossible for anyone to solo" and "More fun to play on a team."
Nothing in the game is more fun to play on a team, except in the degenerate case of unsoloable content like Hami or mothership raids, or maybe one or two others. (I remember people were trying to solo the ITF, don't know if any succeeded.)
Teams are broken. I know it, you know, my cat knows it, small potted ferns know it. Castle even admitted it. Unless your definition of "fun" is "mercilessly destroy anything in your path", which is pathological, the primary effect of teaming is to trivialize content. Fixing this requires making changes the devs aren't willing to make. It's not something you can overcome with the tools in the Architect. Even those maps with nothing but AVs can be steamrollered by a decent team.
Nope, there's more. A good deal more.
No, there isn't. Put up or shut up.
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"
Wow, aggressive much? You know, I could just as easily demand the same of you, especially seeing how you're touting your personal opinions as infallible truths here. Can you prove to me that "nothing in the game is more fun to play on a team, except in the degenerate case of unsoloable content"? No. Because that is your opinion, not a fact.
But to satisfy your...ahem...'request', just take the very basic example of the boss with support (heal/buff/debuff) critters. By tailoring of the spawn difficulty and the powers associated with the support critters, it's easy to make a boss fight in which the boss has little to no support for solo players, but has enough for larger teams to make the boss very difficult to take down, and requiring the team to take out the support critters before they can defeat the boss.
I'm guessing from what you've posted up to now that for you, this would not be fun. For me though, it is, allowing me to get more fun out of playing this game with a team than without.
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
QR
It looks as if there's mild interest for this sort of thing, but it looks as if it's best organized elsewhere.
Those who are interested, just PM me.
"Bombarding the CoH/V fora with verbosity since January, 2006"
Djinniman, level 50 inv/fire tanker, on Victory
-and 40 others on various servers
A CoH Comic: Kid Eros in "One Light"
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Nothing in the game is more fun to play on a team, except in the degenerate case of unsoloable content like Hami or mothership raids, or maybe one or two others. (I remember people were trying to solo the ITF, don't know if any succeeded.)
Teams are broken. I know it, you know, my cat knows it, small potted ferns know it. Castle even admitted it. Unless your definition of "fun" is "mercilessly destroy anything in your path", which is pathological, the primary effect of teaming is to trivialize content. Fixing this requires making changes the devs aren't willing to make. It's not something you can overcome with the tools in the Architect. Even those maps with nothing but AVs can be steamrollered by a decent team.
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Well, yeah, if you have a full team of 8. I personally like to roll in smaller groups.
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More properly, if you are offering your arc to groups of size X then you are implicitly stating that competent groups of size X have a reasonable chance at success.
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If and when we get the ability to gate access by team size then you can start throwing battleships at people.
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This is where I disagree with you. While it would be nice for the devs to add that functionality, there is zero reason I should feel constrained to wait because people choose to ignore a recommendation. If one designs an arc with a recommendation that a team of 6 is needed to beat it, if soloists ignore that text and hop over the fence whatever happens to them is their problem.
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Nothing in the game is more fun to play on a team, except in the degenerate case of unsoloable content like Hami or mothership raids, or maybe one or two others. (I remember people were trying to solo the ITF, don't know if any succeeded.)
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Nothing in the game is more fun... than making a subjective statement into absolute truth for all.
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Unless your definition of "fun" is "mercilessly destroy anything in your path", which is pathological, the primary effect of teaming is to trivialize content. Fixing this requires making changes the devs aren't willing to make. It's not something you can overcome with the tools in the Architect.
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True, to an extent. However, maps full of AVs are not my idea of challenging a team. Oh, AVs are one good way of providing challenge. But a long series of them gets old, although making them varied helps quite a bit (the AVs in the STF are a good example). A variety of different types of tasks can also provide good mental exercise for a team, even if many of the individual tasks are somewhat easy for the team. Provide enough variety and even good soloists could be severely hampered, as they will probably run into something that hits a weakness (something a teammate or two could handle well or cover for you).
Another challenge for a team is overcoming Killer GMing. While that isn't a good way to run an RPG, it is common in video games. Many video games require you to learn through defeat and repeated effort. The trick is creating encounters that are fun to fail a few times until you learn how to succeed (and after that, trying other things and failing some more while learning other ways to succeed).
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.
The fact that I stuck the term "Task Force" in my MA title got me to thinking about task force-like arcs: arcs that feature lots of powerful enemies and require a team to appreciate fully, yet still tell a full, coherent, well-written story. Well-known arcs that fall into this category include "Tomorrow Belongs to Me," "David and Goliath," and the recently-promoted Zombie Apocalypse TF.
It can be difficult to find fairly large teams to do these kinds of team-focused arcs, yet those I've seen are among the best work the MA has produced so far. In order to enable more people to see them, I'm floating the possibility of putting a series of teams together on various servers in order to team up and do some of these arcs. I imagine this could be run as any other player event, taking perhaps a few hours some evening.
Before I go setting this up as a real event, though, I thought I'd see what the MA story community thinks of the idea. I'd be willing to lead a team on Liberty. Any other takers? Be sure to give your server and any other information you consider relevant. If we go ahead with this, we'll also need to figure out how to select the arcs.
Thanks for considering.
"Bombarding the CoH/V fora with verbosity since January, 2006"
Djinniman, level 50 inv/fire tanker, on Victory
-and 40 others on various servers
A CoH Comic: Kid Eros in "One Light"