Regicide - 252484 (& discussion of related topics)
By
Eva Destruction,
Posted on: 2009-07-22 10:30 in Mission Architect
I haven't played the arc in question, so these comments are purely on the subject of variance in level range.
I started off in I14 with the personal opinion that having the level range bounce around a bit during the story arc was no big deal. However, player feedback has had a Pavlovian punishment/reward effect on me, causing me to adjust my opinion. I now think that having the level range vary a lot is mildly annoying, but not a gigantic flaw. I can understand how this might be especially annoying for someone trying to get exp via story arcs. (I have a lot of level 50s so I'm not nearly as uptight about exp; but some people are.)
As purely empirical data, here are my observations based on how my story arcs gradually evolved.
Arc A started out with 4 missions, level 1-54, 1-54, 1-54, 40-54.
Arc B started out with 3 missions, level 30-38, 1-14, 30-39.
Arc C started out with 4 missions, level 15-20, 20-20, 20-25, 29-30.
As you can see, all my arcs initially started with some variance in level. (Of course, this was back in I14 when you couldn't really adjust it unless you resorted to elaborate trickery.)
On Arc A, a frequent complaint I received was, "I enjoyed the first 3 missions, but my level 18 character couldn't handle the AV in the last mission." Which made perfect sense because a level 18 shouldn't expect to beat a level 40 AV, even if sidekicked up to 40; but the low level range on the previous missions gave the player false expectations about what he could handle. Once I15 came out, I raised the minimum level on all my missions, making them all around 25-54 or 30-54, in order to better set expectations for the player.
On Arc B, I very frequently got complaints about the middle mission, which dropped you to level 14 (to fight Skulls). The idea was that you're just sneaking by some random bums in an office to steal something, and I figured Skulls would work for that. But I got so much hate email about the level drop that I ended up having to yank the Skulls out and replace them with a mix of Tsoo, Freakshow, and custom mobs, in order to fit the 30-40 level range that I gave the arc overall in I15. Now I get occasional complaints of, "What's up with the level 40 street vagrants?" which just goes to show you can't make everyone happy, but these complaints usually are less angry sounding than the people who hate being dropped in level.
On Arc C, I almost never get complaints about the level range changing, even though the level range in that arc changes MORE than in any other arc. As a result, I haven't touched the level range even after I15 came out. I think this is because of two factors: (a) the level range always increases, never decreases -- so it never feels like the story is taking powers away from you, and (b, probably the lesser contributor) there are storyline reasons for the level increase.
tl,dr version:
* Use the low end of your level range as a "You must be at least this tall to ride this ride."
* People hate when mission N+1 is a lower level range than mission N.
* People don't seem to mind when mission N+1 is a higher level range than mission N.
* No matter what you do, someone will hate it.
* Make a good faith effort to reduce the number of people who will hate it. But make sure YOU like it.
@PW - Police Woman (50 AR/dev blaster on Liberty)
TALOS - PW war journal - alternate contact tree using MA story arcs
=VICE= "Give me Liberty, or give me debt!"
I very much appreciate your insights, PoliceWoman. When I made my arc, it never even occurred to me that people might be angry with the changing level ranges because they would earn less XP. I suppose I've played only level 50s for so long that I forgot about XP as a motivating factor. Similarly, after doing the range of Task Forces and Strike Forces innumerable times, I've grown accustomed to fighting at a lower level than that at which the character is capable. This arc's story was conceived with reference to enemy group identities, not levels. Even where I recognized that changing maximum levels might be jarring, I never anticipated the amount of displeasure it seems that some people feel when forced to a lower level.
Naphil, 50 Peacebringer
Captain Darkspirit, 50 Warshade
Operative Acier, 50 Bane Spider
Durante Ragno, 50 Fortunata
et al.
See, now "Teen Phalanx" is one of those cases where a disjointed level range actually makes sense for the story. The only minor nitpick I have is that if it's possible to do so by making a custom group out of standard mobs, the final mission could be made 25-30, so as to fit the pattern a bit better.
Since we're discussing level ranges though, there is also the case of the level 1-54 mission. Sure, it doesn't force anyone to exemp. However those arcs always show up when you search "my level," even though they are usually completely inappropriate for lower levels, from a gameplay perspective, and I fail to see how anything can be appropriate for all levels story-wise.
So, yeah, I consider level 1-54 missions just as sloppy and inappropriate as arcs with varying level ranges. The only exception to this is humor-based arcs that use a standard group, such as Council or Longbow, that spans the entire range.
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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I suppose I've played only level 50s for so long that I forgot about XP as a motivating factor.
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It's not always the XP issue, very much of the annoyance is the "where the hell did half of my powers just go?" issue that it causes. Especially aggravating if the character was not built to be exemplar friendly at all levels and to be honest, many builds just plain suck below certain levels when critical powers are unavailable.
I've just got to chime in on this because until I read these forums I had no idea that level range consistency was such a hot topic. I can understand the complaints about losing powers or xp but really, if the story merits the range (for whatever reason) then why not just let it go?
Honestly the whole idea of 'level' or a faction having a level is non-immersive and I just ignore it. The concept that "I can't fight that, its 40 levels beneath me!" is seriously laughable. If I'm a hero, I'm going to fight the fights that need winning regardless of who the enemy is.
The player has far more choice about the level range than the author does really. If I'm playing a character 'to get xp' I'll skip an arc that exemps me or come back to it later on a 50. Similarly if I see an arc with Custom Factions and I'm playing a level 8 I'll skip it till I'm at least 18 or 20 because I know it might be too hard. Leave it to the player to make the judgment call on whether or not to play the arc. They have fair warning when selecting the mission and no one is forcing them to play it! (Of course, if a reviewer has an issue with it that is their prerogative, they offer a service and aren't obligated to do anything.)
In short, set the level to what is most logical and if you play an arc with disparate level ranges don't complain because you were the one that chose to play it!
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Honestly the whole idea of 'level' or a faction having a level is non-immersive and I just ignore it. The concept that "I can't fight that, its 40 levels beneath me!" is seriously laughable. If I'm a hero, I'm going to fight the fights that need winning regardless of who the enemy is.
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So you stop and whack every purse-snatching Hellion you see? Level 50s shouldn't be fighting Hellions. If Hellions are showing up in a level 50 arc they should have a very good reason, and they should probably show up as grey-cons. There is a dev arc that does this, it's a Malta mission with level 15 Skulls in it.
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In short, set the level to what is most logical and if you play an arc with disparate level ranges don't complain because you were the one that chose to play it!
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When I can set the search engine to ignore level 1-54 arcs when searching for "my level," I'll stop complaining about them.
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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if the story merits the range (for whatever reason) then why not just let it go?
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I don't have to put up with such nonsense in dev-created arcs (even Oroboros only does it for one short arc) so why is it so excusable in player-created arcs.
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The concept that "I can't fight that, its 40 levels beneath me!" is seriously laughable. If I'm a hero, I'm going to fight the fights that need winning regardless of who the enemy is.
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And if I'm a villain then it probably is beneath me. If I'm a high-level hero then I'm handling the big threats, it's not like there aren't bunch of lower-level heroes around to take care of it in the CoX world.
I only have one problem with this, and it's not SpyderNoir that I have a problem with.
It's you, "honest" Lazarus.
In your thread, you stated the rules by which you would do a review. Here it is:
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Now if you want a critical review, you gotta pay for it. That means playing one of my arcs listed here and leaving feedback for it in that thread. A warning for everyone critical reviews will have spoilers.
Also, you can only submit one arc at a time. You can submit another arc after I post the review for the previous one. I will let you know in-game when I have finished reviewing you arc.
My rating system generally goes like this: I started at 3 stars and add or subtract from there. 3-stars is radio mission quality in my opinion. 4 stars is above average, while 5 stars is not perfect but means I recommend that everyone play it.
Now let's cover the things that I like and dislike in arcs, so you have some idea of whether or not you want to submit yours to me.
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I cut it off before your list of likes and dislikes, because those appear to be "outside" the rules of getting you to post a critical review. The first 2 paragraphs seem to be the extent of the rules you laid out. The rest is telling HOW you rate and then listing things you like and dislike, which frankly is fine. It lets people know ahead of time things you don't like and may be critical of in a review or take off ratings for.
SpyderNoir followed your posted rules and "paid" for a critical review from you. He ran one or more of your arcs and posted his review in that thread. I didn't read the review, just skimmed the thread until I found that he had indeed fulfilled his part of the bargain. And it wasn't a little 2 sentence or even 2 paragraph review.
However, then you decided to change the rules after he'd already "paid" for a critical review.
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Already I'm looking at that level spread and don't want to bother playing it. I'm not saying who it was here but it's going to the back of the list until the level issues are sorted out.
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You don't want to bother playing it? After you've already been "paid" to do so? How "honest" is that Lazarus? You made the initial offer to review the arcs and stated the "payment". After the "payment" was made you now want to include your likes and dislikes as criteria for playing it in the first place and make that part of the rules?
Not very honest.
At least now I've found another reviewer to scratch off my list who lets their own bias color the reviews, or whether they'll even run the arc to review it.
I haven't run Regicide yet, but I think I'll give it a go since the "reviewers" want to dismiss arcs so readily.
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
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So you stop and whack every purse-snatching Hellion you see? Level 50s shouldn't be fighting Hellions. If Hellions are showing up in a level 50 arc they should have a very good reason, and they should probably show up as grey-cons. There is a dev arc that does this, it's a Malta mission with level 15 Skulls in it.
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If I'm playing a story arc that compels me to in order to advance the story then "yes". If I see Tsoo playing tug-of-war with a giant green crystal then "no" because they are just going to respawn anyway (ie. there isn't a motivation to). And ya, it would be cool if we could add grey mobs like that to simulate that effect.
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When I can set the search engine to ignore level 1-54 arcs when searching for "my level," I'll stop complaining about them.
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I agree about that, there's a lot of ways I'd like to see the searching improved (what I meant was set the level of your arcs logically and don't complain to an author personally about it).
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I don't have to put up with such nonsense in dev-created arcs (even Oroboros only does it for one short arc) so why is it so excusable in player-created arcs.
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That's because the Devs can make whatever they want for their stories (like ladies in dresses with big blunderbuss guns that come from another dimension and are level 50) and we mere players have to content ourselves with using the MA to tell stories. If we want certain content, we have to use it as-is, we can't adjust the level of it--like the Devs did when they added high level Banished Pantheon for Portal Corp missions. There's a group that you only saw in the 20-30 range, but when they added the level 40-50 content they decided to use Banished Pantheon. If a player wanted to do the same thing in MA with say, Warriors, they couldn't, they'd just have to use them as 20-30.
My point still is, why not just ignore arcs with level ranges you don't like? Or, if the arc is interesting, why not ignore the level?
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So you stop and whack every purse-snatching Hellion you see?
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True story: I used to do this when I was a newbie. My friends would be like, "What's taking you so long to get to the mission?" and I'd say, "I'm fighting these Hellions along the way, they're trying to take this lady's purse!"
And they'd be, like, "You know you don't get exp from those"...
I eventually outgrew this habit, but kinda miss that age of innocence sometimes too. 
@PW - Police Woman (50 AR/dev blaster on Liberty)
TALOS - PW war journal - alternate contact tree using MA story arcs
=VICE= "Give me Liberty, or give me debt!"
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
So you stop and whack every purse-snatching Hellion you see? Level 50s shouldn't be fighting Hellions. If Hellions are showing up in a level 50 arc they should have a very good reason, and they should probably show up as grey-cons. There is a dev arc that does this, it's a Malta mission with level 15 Skulls in it.
[/ QUOTE ]
If I'm playing a story arc that compels me to in order to advance the story then "yes". If I see Tsoo playing tug-of-war with a giant green crystal then "no" because they are just going to respawn anyway (ie. there isn't a motivation to). And ya, it would be cool if we could add grey mobs like that to simulate that effect.
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You can, as of i15.
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If we want certain content, we have to use it as-is, we can't adjust the level of it--like the Devs did when they added high level Banished Pantheon for Portal Corp missions. There's a group that you only saw in the 20-30 range, but when they added the level 40-50 content they decided to use Banished Pantheon. If a player wanted to do the same thing in MA with say, Warriors, they couldn't, they'd just have to use them as 20-30.
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You have the option of making custom critters. Warriors are pretty easy to do in the critter creator. Of course, you'd have to have a reason for having level 50 Warriors. They are a mid-level gang.
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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I cut it off before your list of likes and dislikes, because those appear to be "outside" the rules of getting you to post a critical review.
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So here you're deciding for yourself what applies and which doesn't, because right in that part you quoted: Now let's cover the things that I like and dislike in arcs, so you have some idea of whether or not you want to submit yours to me.
It's pretty bleeding obvious that one should read that part and not submit an arc containing things that the reviewer does not want to put up with. Those things were listed so that you don't have to waste your time.
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You don't want to bother playing it? After you've already been "paid" to do so? How "honest" is that Lazarus? You made the initial offer to review the arcs and stated the "payment". After the "payment" was made you now want to include your likes and dislikes as criteria for playing it in the first place and make that part of the rules?
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That criteria was included in the first place, the submitter ignored it.
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At least now I've found another reviewer to scratch off my list who lets their own bias color the reviews,
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Good luck finding an unbiased human being. Maybe robots will start doing reviews sometime in the future.
Oh, and nice job totally missing the tongue-in-cheek joke in my thread's title.
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If we want certain content, we have to use it as-is, we can't adjust the level of it--like the Devs did when they added high level Banished Pantheon for Portal Corp missions. There's a group that you only saw in the 20-30 range, but when they added the level 40-50 content they decided to use Banished Pantheon. If a player wanted to do the same thing in MA with say, Warriors, they couldn't, they'd just have to use them as 20-30.
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You have the option of making custom critters. Warriors are pretty easy to do in the critter creator. Of course, you'd have to have a reason for having level 50 Warriors. They are a mid-level gang.
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Right, a reason like the Devs had for taking the Banished Pantheon (once a mid-level gang) to level 50. The reasons are out there, but the willingness to accept it when it comes seems sadly lacking. And sure, its easy to make fake Warriors, but that's not true of many factions and so MA authors just have to make due and hope MA players will understand.
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You don't want to bother playing it? After you've already been "paid" to do so? How "honest" is that Lazarus? You made the initial offer to review the arcs and stated the "payment". After the "payment" was made you now want to include your likes and dislikes as criteria for playing it in the first place and make that part of the rules?
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That criteria was included in the first place, the submitter ignored it.
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If the criteria were intended to be construed such that the inclusion of one of the "dislikes" would change or void the "review-for-review" transaction, I'm afraid that was not clear to me. Quite frankly, I read the list of dislikes and knew that you wouldn't like the level jumping, but I decided to take my chances anyway; it didn't occur to me that you might decide to delay playing the arc simply based on one of these dislikes.
Also, in the interest of improving my arc, I have converted the level 1-15 mission into a level 40-54 mission. This was possible because, as a few people have suggested, I didn't really need to use the group I was using and I could find an acceptable substitute. As that is not the case for the level 20 missions, they remain level 20.
Naphil, 50 Peacebringer
Captain Darkspirit, 50 Warshade
Operative Acier, 50 Bane Spider
Durante Ragno, 50 Fortunata
et al.
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I cut it off before your list of likes and dislikes, because those appear to be "outside" the rules of getting you to post a critical review.
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So here you're deciding for yourself what applies and which doesn't, because right in that part you quoted: Now let's cover the things that I like and dislike in arcs, so you have some idea of whether or not you want to submit yours to me.
It's pretty bleeding obvious that one should read that part and not submit an arc containing things that the reviewer does not want to put up with. Those things were listed so that you don't have to waste your time.
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No. I read it as "whether or not you want to submit yours" not as "these are against the rules so don't bother submitting them."
Whether or not implies a choice that the author should make. Sure, it implies that you may be more critical of that part of the arc or you may lower your rating for the arc based on those things, but it doesn't read as if they are against the rules.
Had you intended them to be against the rules of things you'd review, why bother to put a "whether or not" phrase in there. If they are against the rules then simply state "don't waste my time if your arc includes these because I won't review it.
SpyderNoir apparently read the likes and dislikes and made the choice, based on the "whether or not" statement to "pay" for a critical review by reviewing one of your arcs.
I still stand by what I said, and no amount of clever word play on your part will counteract what you originally posted in that thread.
Good day!
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
Laz - you might want to clarify that part of your criteria-somepeople might see the 'here's my dislikes so yiu can decide wethrr you want to submit your arc to me' to mean 'you risk getting abad review' rather than 'you risk me not running your arc'. I admit, thats what i thought too.
Eco
MArcs:
The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
[The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."
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Qr - and OP, on the subject of your arc, someone else said it better thn i could:
"One should always listen to criticism, but one also needs to know when to stick to their guns. If we authors addressed every little thing that someone found annoying, and different people have different annoyances, we'd all just be writing farm arcs or some crap."
Eco
MArcs:
The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
[The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."
|
Argh! I was just getting ready to put that quote in here.
I guess I AM slowing down in my old age.
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
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You don't want to bother playing it? After you've already been "paid" to do so? How "honest" is that Lazarus? You made the initial offer to review the arcs and stated the "payment". After the "payment" was made you now want to include your likes and dislikes as criteria for playing it in the first place and make that part of the rules?
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That criteria was included in the first place, the submitter ignored it.
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If the criteria were intended to be construed such that the inclusion of one of the "dislikes" would change or void the "review-for-review" transaction, I'm afraid that was not clear to me. Quite frankly, I read the list of dislikes and knew that you wouldn't like the level jumping, but I decided to take my chances anyway; it didn't occur to me that you might decide to delay playing the arc simply based on one of these dislikes.
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I was trying to do people a favor by giving them a chance to correct the level range issue before I do the review and knock of points for such an easily avoidable flaw. Nowhere did I say that I had thrown the arc off the queue, I had simply given a warning about something that already had been pointed out. Your arc was not even the first to get that warning and I was getting tired of doing it on a per-arc basis and decided to make an announcement. Last time I did such a thing was when the Devs changed what Standard/Hard/Extreme meant, I made an announcement and delayed all reviews for a week so that people could fix whatever may have been broken before I got to their arc and ended up giving them a bad review.
MrCaptainMan, you're the last person who should be addressing me on "clarification".
I'm through with this nonsense.
Sure, why not. People have already pointed out how you are changing the meaning of the wording of your original post. Now you are changing the meaning of what you posted here.
And your comment of " it's going to the back of the list until the level issues are sorted out" means that it will stay at the back of the list, thus you wouldn't be running it and reviewing it as you stated you would if people ran your arc and reviewed it in your thread.
Good job.
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
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MrCaptainMan, you're the last person who should be addressing me on "clarification".
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i dont know what this is meant to refer to. Do i have a reputation for being unclear?
Eco
MArcs:
The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
[The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."
|
The information for this arc follows below, but the primary purpose for this thread is to continue a discussion begun in "Honest Lazarus's Discount Reviews!" in a more appropriate place.
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If you can't be bothered to explain yourself then I can't be bothered to play your mission to see what you did. It is virtually certain that it is either the case that what you want to do can be done without munging level ranges or your story is "just a bunch of stuff that happened".
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Sure, I can be bothered to explain myself. What would you like to see explained? If it's "why does your arc have level ranges that jump around?" I can PM you the precise details. I won't provide them here because they reveal aspects of the arc's story that are intended to be revealed gradually and even after all of this, it's possible that somebody may wish to play it.
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That's not an answer. Life is short, we don't have time to play every arc. I've already got almost thirty requests pending for reviews. If you want me to take the time to play your mission you have to give me a reason to want to play it. So far you're giving people reasons not to want to play it.
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Life is short. You're right. And gaming time is even shorter. I am not familiar with your reviews or how you decide which arcs to review, but I know that Lazarus offers reviews as part of a quid pro quo exchange: you review one of his, he'll review one of yours. His time is valuable just like yours or mine, but I have paid him for his time according to the rules that he himself set out. I had hoped that his review would be favorable and that other players would choose to play it based on that review. Yes, I now realize that jumping level ranges are something that particularly annoy this reviewer and I might have done things differently knowing what I know now.
Arc ID: 252484
Arc Title: Regicide
Author: @Spyder Noir
Morality: Hero
Number of Missions: 5
Description: A mysterious Clockwork presence has emerged. The PPD discovers its nature and sends you out to meet this new threat. But does your contact, Detective Guerrero, really have it figured out? You'll have to examine the clues yourself to decide exactly what's going on. Intended player level: 40-50.
Warning: maximum level changes throughout arc
Naphil, 50 Peacebringer
Captain Darkspirit, 50 Warshade
Operative Acier, 50 Bane Spider
Durante Ragno, 50 Fortunata
et al.