Would love mine reviewed pls
Title: Temple of the Four Winds
ID:16769
Suggested Level Range:45+
Description:Save a young woman who is destined to take up the mantle of one of the four winds. Battle preatorians, arachnos and misguided monks to save Summer Gale and ensure she takes up the role of Monsoon. Scirrocco makes a sneaky appearence too (nb arc includes EBs/AVs)
Link to City of Guides entry: http://www.cityofguides.com/ma/view-mission.php?id=101
[ QUOTE ]
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I shall have to change them back.
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While you're at it, you really should add a souvenir called "The Earth" or "Global Domination" or similar.
[/ QUOTE ]
Maybe. I deliberatly didn't do a souvenir because of the non-cannon ending. Any other opinions on the matter?
Can I add The Steel and Gold Affair to the end of the queue? I've tried to buff the storytelling since the Col. did his review. CoG
I really should do something about this signature.
I don't see why not being canon should stop it having a souvenir, as MA souvenirs have their own section away from the canon ones anyway.
A Penny For Your Thoughts #348691 <- Dev's Choice'd by Dr. Aeon!
Submit your MA arc for review & my arcs thread
And if people really object, then they can throw that souvenir away. If you want to stay true to the cannon, you can even mention that it is just a reminder of how things COULD have been if it had been for real.
Okay, I'll add a souvenir.
Really, you people want me to give you the world!
I really should do something about this signature.
Review: Love Spurned (Arc ID 1934, Heroic, 40-44)
by @Gunbunny
Summary: A fun and humorous arc, Love Spurned suffers from a few enemy spawning bugs, an inconsistent level range, an inconsistent plot and some flawed grammar.
Should I play it?: The sweet spot for playing this arc is level 40. Any lower and you may encounter enemy spawning bugs. Any higher and you won't get XP in missions 1 and 2. It is a good arc but needs serious polish.
Rating: Three stars.
I played this arc on Razorslash, a lv35 Katana/Regen Scrapper.
Report: I love the central idea of this arc. Who hasn't seen the Desperate Guy in Pocket D and wondered what would happen if he went after the Carnies or KoA?
Probably lots of people... but I digress...
Our contact is the Desperate Guy, who's worried about his new "girlfriend." Apparently when he walked her home he saw her going to meet some Family at a warehouse, and he's worried about her, so he asks us to go check she's OK.
First map is a warehouse filled with Family. Most were level 35, the same as me, but a few were level 40. Fortunately none of the 40s were Lts or bosses, and Inspiration use was enough to get me through the lv40 spawns.
Eventually we find a hostage: The One True Love, who happens to be a Carnie Ring Mistress. She thanks me for helping her and escapes, asking us to tell the Desperate Guy to stop pursuing her, and apparently stealing some Superadine on the way. The Family boss has some angry words for me about helping a thief.
The Desperate Guy takes her turndown badly, but decides she's just trying to protect him and starts following her around. Just as he mentions that he saw her going into a bank, we get a phone call from a detective about a bank robbery.
Inside the next map, we find the Tsoo. High level Tsoo. In other words, a map where every spawn except the boss is a Blue Ink Man - an excellent opportunity to be debuffed down to the Recharge and Speed floors. Nice if you like that sort of thing. I don't.
One of the nice things about the MA is Custom Factions allow you to add variety to canon factions that lack it. For example, in Total Domination PRAF made a new Crey faction to replace the immensely boring 45-50 Crey faction.
I suggest you do so in this mission. Make a new faction, include the Blue Ink Men in it, but add some custom Ninjas, Sorcerers, Ancestors and so on as well. Your players will thank you for it.
Anyway, after a while we find The One True Love, being guarded by Tsoo, and free her. It seems she came here alone before the Tsoo attacked and was as surprised as anyone else when the Tsoo attacked.
The final mission begins with the Desperate Guy finally getting "lucky" - by the time we go to talk to him, The One True Love has dragged him off somewhere.
At some point in this briefing we think about when we told the One True Love about Desperate Guy being a stalker the first time we met her, even though when I read back he'd not actually done any stalkerish things at that point.
It turns out she's taken him to a lawyer's office. These officers have a few regular Carnie spawns, but it's mostly a custom faction of Family and Tsoo that have been given masks and enslaved by the Carnies - and also been forced into some really garish costumes. The Desperate Guy turns up as a horribly dressed WM boss that defies description. These bad costumes are of course deliberate.
There's a strange clue about blackmail that is very obscure. It took me a while to figure out the "he" who was blackmailing her was the lawyer - at first I thought it was the Guy. This was probably because I hadn't rescued the lawyer by this point.
The One True Love's goal is quite simple - get revenge on everyone who's annoyed her at once. The Family, the Tsoo and the Desperate Guy are all her brainwashed slaves, the blackmailing lawyer is captured and she's set bombs full of "fecal matter" all over his office, and now you're here to be defeated.
She spawns as a standard Ring Mistress, and thus isn't impossible to beat. With her captured and everyone rescued, you return to Pocket D with the Desperate Guy. Just as it looks like he might be entering a state of self-examination and gaining a lick of common sense... a KoA walks through the door.
Your hero makes their excuses and leaves.
This was a fun and mostly-playable arc, with some funny humour, but it has too many problems to give it a firm recommendation. Spelling and Grammar errors are frequent, there are bugs with enemy spawning that the creator needs to find creative ways to work around, and there's plot inconsistencies that give the arc an unfinished and unpolished feeling.
Overall, 3 stars.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
Thanks for the review leese.
You made one error in your review. The arc = 35-40 not 40-44. Some missions are 30-40 though.
I understand, that you got the level 40 family spawn bug as well. That is highly irritating, it happened to others now and then. Nothing I can do about that I fear, except hoping that the developers fix that weird spawning bug. It is apparently a known issue. As you will have noticed, I did put a warning in the arc telling about this bug.
About the Tsoo, faction. A nasty bunch to fight yes. I could see if I got room enough to make them into a semi faction.
About the grammar. Despite word, despite proofreading, despite people telling me about the odd errors they encounter. It is still bad enough to be mentioned in a review? Autsch.
About the story. I had planned to make it a five parter. But the story lost momentum and the joke became to spun out to be funny over the long time. So instead, I finished it off in the grand finale, tying up the knots as neatly as possible. It is a compromise and I still stand with my decision to make it. I prefer to have my story a bit flawed then to make it unfunny by adding too much.
Edit: I just checked my arc and to my surprise the last mission had jumped from 30-40 to 40-44! No idea when that happened. Probably when I was looking for a typo somebody reported this morning. It is remedied right now. Just my luck that a reviewer happened to pass by.
[ QUOTE ]
word
[/ QUOTE ]Just a friendly tip to all Architects out there, Word is less talented at fishing out errors than a 7th-grader. Don't trust it.
removing my arc 101282 from rotation for now.
Found a severe problem with one of the EB fights. He calls a one mob ambush (and it was only one mob when I tested it) but when I played with a group the ambush was 10 of the same mob... impossible to beat.
I'll edit it and re-submit once its fixed.
Well Col_Blitzkrieger is due to review my L46-50 arc at some point, so perhaps you could give me feedback on my L1-15 arc - it would be much appreciated. Details as follows:
Arc Title: The Renegade Rebellion
Arc ID: 117690
Level Range: L1-15
City of Guides link: Clicky
Description: "Members of Paragon's gangs are going renegade. Large numbers of them have gathered in Skyway and started a riot, blocking the freeway. Your mysterious contact asks you to disperse the riot and investigate if the renegades have any stated aims and/or a leader."
It is story-focused, doesn't conflict with any in-game canon, shouldn't have any spelling or grammar errors, should be a nice challenge for a low level character, and you may even find some of the text humorous 
You may want to do this with a brand new character - I designed the arc so that, if not much is ghosted, at the end of the five missions you should be at least L5 and probably L6-7, thus skipping all the tired old L1-5 content that many of us have played dozens of times, and leaving time to get the raptor flight pack from the first mayhem/safeguard mission before you outlevel those missions at L10+.
Enjoy!
Review: Strife in Turmoil (Arc ID: 65180, Heroic, 25-54)
By @Imoba Strife
Summary: An origin arc that mostly avoids the usual pitfalls of Author Insertion, Strife in Turmoil has a inspired and balanced enemy group and an engaging story, but loses a lot of points on presentation.
Should I play it?: Give it a shot. Balance was fine for a squishy blaster, and IMO you'll probably like it. However this arc does ask you to take some actions that are a little morally dubious.
Rating: 4 stars
I played this arc on Tenacious as Jacintha, my lv42 Archery/Elec/Elec blaster.
Report: I'm trying to slim down the report section, so here's a different format.
Our contact is Imoba Strife, a hero and apparently the author's own character. Since The Sleeping Star is all about my own characters, I'm not in any position to get judgemental here.
Imoba's brother Jacen has apparently gone back in time, and undone the event that caused the two of them to gain eternal youth. Imoba is stuck in a magic circle he can't leave, so he needs to ask you to head back in time and stop Jacen's plan.
Overall the author manages the Author Insertion well, apart from a few problems...
<ul type="square">[*]The author assumes we know who Imoba and Jacen are. When I began I had the notion that both Imoba and Jacen were heroes, or at least Jacen was an anti-hero. When I encountered Notorious Inc, I did not realise Jacen was a MM and they were his Thugs/ until the end of the mission, and the author waits until the end of the arc to clarify Imoba and Jacen's relationship and outright state that Jacen is a villain.
Imoba and Jacen need to be better explained to the player, preferably earlier than they currently are.[*]Imoba is well done though. Since he's stuck in his magic circle, he never directly aids the player in battle and thus never steals any thunder from the player - his fate is entirely in your hands. And he's a pretty likeable guy.[/list]
MISSION 1
<ul type="square">[*]Jacen's thugs have kidnapped Imoba and Jacen's past selves so that they will miss the event that gave them eternal youth, and you have to go rescue them.[*]Enemy group is a custom group called "Notorious Inc." It took me a while to realise it, but this is actually a nice recreation of the Thugs MM primary. The Punks have been split up into Punk Slicers (DB/WP) and Punk Fighters (MA/WP) and while they're a little bit more difficult to kill than normal minions, WP is not set so high that they have mez protection. I also encountered Enforcers (Thugs/Dev) but no Arsonists. Maybe they're a boss. A fun group to fight, with a decent challenge level, and as the icing on the cake all of these critters had two different costumes which is a touch I always appreciate.[*]Two hostages, guess who. One of them gives you a cute clue, and there is some nice dialogue.[*]A boss, Jacen's bruiser, Axel. Drops a funny clue when defeated. (this was the point that I realised Jacen was a MM)[/list]
MISSION 2
<ul type="square">[*]With his past self rescued, Imoba starts to fill us in on his back-story. Apparently he and Jacen were captured by the 5th Column and experimented on - the result was their eternal youth. The next step is ensuring that Jacen and Imoba are actually captured by the 5th.[*]Since Jacen has stopped the patrol that caught them in the past, we have to actually go beat up Jacen and Imoba and raise the alarm in a 5th base. A little bit of slightly more dubious work, but for the greater good and with Imoba's permission. I quite enjoyed the twisted nature of this mission.[*]Generic spawns were 5th Column, but apparently a custom faction that only consisted of soldiers. I think I remember reading about this before, and it is appropriate that Darkwolfs, Vampires and Robots aren't showing up in the 1940s.[*]Jacen and Imoba spawn as bosses, and put up a decent fight.[*]Raising the alarm is a simple matter of clicking a glowie. My one problem with this mission was that when I did, the ambush spawned right on top of me, but at this point the mission was over and I could click Exit.[/list]
MISSION 3
<ul type="square">[*]With Imoba and Jacen captured, now we need to ensure they are experimented on, but Future Jacen has sent his thugs to stop the experiment. We need to protect the 5th Column scientists and their equipment![*]Another morally dubious mission, but it's presented well as The Right Thing To Do.[*]Fairly straightforward.[/list]
MISSION 4
<ul type="square">[*]With Jacen's plans thwarted, all that remains is to catch him, so that he can't go around again for another try.[*]Map is another warehouse full of Notorious Inc. It's a bit on the large size, really - a large map for only one objective. There are a few patrols IIRC.[*]There is a very strange encounter halfway through. While fighting in one room, a 5th Column boss called "IGNORE ME" came rushing past me, running for the exit. I ignored his request and defeated him, but it didn't seem to have any affect on anything. I later encountered a spawn of Punks using the Unconscious emote, who I assume were his guards, but it didn't seem to have any relevance to anything.[*]Final boss was Jacen, a Thugs/Dev Elite Boss. A tough fight, as in addition to spawning with an Enforcer LT who could summon, and summoning his own pets, he called in an ambush too! Something of a pain but purple insps and AOE work wonders. It turns out Jacen is just sick of having eternal youth, and wants to change the past so that he has a normal life. Understandable really.[/list]
In the debriefing, Imoba talks about how he pities his brother, and finally gives us the back-story over how one brother became a hero and the other a villain. TBH, I'd have loved to see some kind of reconciliation between the brothers in the end - Jacen says that the things he's done mean he'll never be accepted by anyone outside the RI, but I'm not so certain that's true. At the very least, his brother still seems to like him.
The souvenir is cute and funny.
The story of this arc drew me in, in spite of its small flaws, and I enjoyed it greatly, but it has to be said that you definitely need to do a very thorough spelling and grammar check. There are a lot of typos that Word could have easily caught - grammar was better than spelling but could still be improved. The careless mistakes, such as the exposition, text errors and Mr IGNORE ME detract from what could be a 5-star arc, and almost made this a 3-star. But after some deliberation, I decided I liked the central story and the overall playability enough to give this arc 4 stars.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
Good review Leese. Also:
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While fighting in one room, a 5th Column boss called "IGNORE ME" came rushing past me, running for the exit.
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I''m going to take a wild stab, and say that the author was using the boss as a lvl lock?
A Penny For Your Thoughts #348691 <- Dev's Choice'd by Dr. Aeon!
Submit your MA arc for review & my arcs thread
Damn, Mr "Ignore me" isn't actually meant to been seen. He was a device to make the lvl scale 25-54, and he's meant to spawn at the entrance after you've already completed the mission (he actually apears in the first mission for the same reason) the fact you found him anoys me no end, I'll have to fix that.
You're right about the 5th actually being a custom group, I really did not want any robot/warwolves/vampires in my arc, so I made a custom group for this purpose.
As for reconsiliation between my 2 chief characters, I couldn't agree more, but I was lumbered with a limit of text I could use, and had to cut back on the story some.
As for Jacen saying he won't be accepted outside RI, that is just his humble, and incredibly biased, opinion. Remember he's from the 40's who then spent 6 decades in prison, and the only place he's known since then has been the Isles.
/EDIT: I would have liked to have the arsonist as a mob in Notorious Inc, But did not include him for 2 reasons. 1. It would have made my arc too big to publish, and 2. I did not want him to have "Super Powers", If I could have had him throw molotovs and explosives he'd be in there like a shot (I'd make room somehow, maybe remove the generic bruisers that currently function as the group's bosses)
P.S. I'll look over my text again to see If i can spot the errors you mentioned, but If' you'd feel obliged to point any out to me I would be incredibly grateful, as I've had nobody proof read it for me
/edit 2 Also the reson for the medium sized map on the last mission is for the ambushes, A small map would not allow them, also looking at Mr "Ignore Me" somehow the condition for his spawn was set to none, I don't know how this happened as It was not like that when I published it, bug maybe? anyway, he's fixed now (I hope).
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As for reconsiliation between my 2 chief characters, I couldn't agree more, but I was lumbered with a limit of text I could use, and had to cut back on the story some.
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A good reason to move the exposition about Jacen's prison time into an earlier part of the arc. You'd then have more space in the final debriefing for reconciliation.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
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Damn, Mr "Ignore me" isn't actually meant to been seen. He was a device to make the lvl scale 25-54, and he's meant to spawn at the entrance after you've already completed the mission (he actually apears in the first mission for the same reason) the fact you found him anoys me no end, I'll have to fix that.
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It may not be worth rushing to fix it - I15 is meant to allow arcs to be fixed by level, as I undertsand it, to avoid the need for level lockdown mobs. SO if that does get a shift on you may be able to get rid of Mr "Ignore me" in a couple of weeks time... so maybe not worth stressing about too much at the moment.
By my mohawk shall ye know me!
my toons
Funny: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! #3662 * The foul-mouthed Handyman! #1076 * City of Norms #132944
Serious: To Save A Single World (#83744) * Marketing Opportunity (#83747)
I've asked Col. to do mine, but it won't hurt to have another person take a look at it. :3
Title: Supa Rumble in the Park
Arc ID: 60092
Level range: 35+
Description: The Trolls have returned! What is their master plan, if any at all? (sorry, paraphrasing a bit, don't have CoH open)
Link: http://www.cityofguides.com/ma/view-mission.php?id=39
Fingers crossed the cross-examination won't be too harsh!
Ideon's Paragonwiki page
Member of Paragon/Rogue Knights
Arc: 60092 - Supa Rumble in the Park
"Keep living the dream, and never let any jerk tell you what to do."
-- High-Roller
Title: The Final Guest
ID: 129750
Suggested Level Range: 1-54
Description: The player is contacted by a demoness known as 'Spectral Sylph', she offers a good rate of pay and her eternal thanks to you if you can help her track down the mother she never knew. With her upcoming wedding all she wants is to meet her mother and hopefully have her attend the big day.
Are you willing to help her follow the clues you find together and track down her estranged relative?
Link to City of Guides entry: http://www.cityofguides.com/ma/view-mission.php?id=134
With Ramon's arc offline for now, the next spot goes to Judgement Dave. I've been meaning to play his arcs for a while, but something else always seems to come up, so I'm looking forward to this.
My standard disclaimer applies - this is just my opinion, based on my playthrough. It's not law, and other people's opinions may vary but be equally valid.
Review: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-oh! (Arc ID 3662, Heroic)
By @Judgement Dave
Summary: A purely comedic arc, Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh is a well written and funny arc, that sadly suffers from a very squishy-unfriendly custom faction in the final mission.
Should I play it?: If you have an armour set and mez protection, or want a challenge on a squishy, you should. However the arc does completely shatter the 4th Wall, so if you don't like meta-humour you may want to stay away.
I like meta-humour. Overall, 4 stars.
I played this arc on tenacious, as Jacintha, my lv42 Archery/Elec/Elec blaster. BTW, this is the character I mainly want to level ATM, so unless you give me some indication that the arc won't be squishy friendly, I'll be soloing your arcs on a blaster.
Report: The contact is Statesman, AKA "Some dude called Marcus," who informs us that some so-called-heroes have bought their way to power, cheating the system. He wants them caught, and their supplier brought to justice.
MISSION 1
<ul type="square">[*]First mission is level 13-19, in some Troll-filled Tunnels.[*]A simple mission. Not much to do here except fight through to the end and defeat a Troll boss. A few patrols complicate some encounters, but not too much.[*]The troll boss is well written, as he gloats over the noobs he defeated despite them being high level. Man, these guys must suck.[/list]
MISSION 2
<ul type="square">[*]Marcus has tracked down the cheaters - apparently they're trying to do the Hess TF, but are hopelessly stuck on the second mission.[*]Goals are simple - complete the cheater's mission goals - destroy 3 generators, save Dr Faber - and capture them too.[*]For me, this was the best mission in the arc. The "level 50 heroes" con as Lt Allies, and while good to have around are never important for finishing the mission after the initial rescue. They all have some funny lines and bios, and are appropriately useless. (you would not believe how quickly the fire blaster died)[*]In addition, I loved Dr Faber's response when informed these morons were the ones sent to save her.[*]As you meet up with the cheaters, you find notes that point you toward a man named "Old Macdonald," who has a farm in Croatoa.[/list]
MISSION 3
<ul type="square">[*]With the location of Old Macdonald's Farm discovered, "Marcus" send us along to close it down, with Positron as ally backup.[*]Map is the Croatoa farms map. Faction is a custom faction, consisting of Macdonald's Chickens, Sheep and Cows. It's a nicely designed faction, at least visually, but I found them frustrating to fight. The mobs which I remember included...[*]The chickens have Minion and LT versions, with Martial Arts and Flight, which means hover is useless. (bearing in mind one of the designed purposes of hover was to stay out of melee range) They do a lot of damage, and with 2 in a spawn they can perma-stun you.[*]The sheep have TA/A, and WILL immobilise you, which really doesn't help.[*]The cows are empaths, who will CM everyone around them, rendering my mezzes useless.
Fortunately nobody has mez protection aside from CM. It was still a very annoying group to fight. I'd suggest removing flight from the Chickens - the real birds aren't exactly known for their ability to soar through the air, and the changes coming in the next patch will give them ranged attacks.[*]There are also a few spawns of Fire/Kin farmers, which spawn only as Lts. Since they're controllers, they were definitely best left alone by me, as a group of 4 fire trollers WILL perma-hold.[*]Positron spawns as a Boss-level Hero I think - he was pwned by a group of farmyard animals he aggroed. He does deliver a plot point, almost referring to the farmers as "rival farmers" before correcting himself to say "evil."[*]Old Macdonald is a Rad/Rad EB, and a toughie. While manageable by himself, he once again proves what I'm calling "Leese's Maxim."
"It's not the EB that kills you, it's the ambushes."
Yeah, he calls three ambushes, a tactic that I generally find to be overkill most of the time. But, in the end, he was beatable.[*]Overall, this mission represented a significant and aggravating difficulty spike for me. My philosophy is thus - I don't mind if arcs are hard or easy, but they should be consistently so.[/list]
Upon returning to Marcus, we get the twist ending - he and Positron run their own farms, and we've just shut down their main competitors. It turns out to be an amusing end to a comedic arc.
A few more notes...
<ul type="square">[*]Level range is inconsistent - mission 1 is 13-19, mission 2 is 29-35, mission 3 is 40-54. This doesn't bother me too much, but it may concern you.[*]Spelling and grammar were generally excellent. The only way I could mark you down for this would be on your tendency to only use two dots in an ellipsis, and that's so minor I barely see the point.[/list]
Overall I really enjoyed this arc until the third mission, which quickly became an exercise in frustration - not as bad as some others I've played, but bad enough that when the EB died I immediately hit Exit, glad it was over. But putting aside the annoyed feelings the last mission gave me, I think this is a definite 4 stars.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
Cheers for the review Leese. Glad you mostly enjoyed it.
In light of your review I have slightly changed a few things in mission 3 and republished.
[*] I've added this line to the end of the description "Last mission contains an EB, though you also get an ally!"
[*] The fire/kin farmers in mission 3 have regained a lt and minion that they used to have. These were taken out when the arc suddenly shot to over 100% when I14 went live - and it wasn't just &nbsp; shenanigans causing it... But then sometime later it suddenly changed to reporting the size as c.75% so I can now put them back in.
[*] Hens/Roosters have lost flight (see later).
[*] Lost an ambush and lowered difficulty of remaining (see later).
[ QUOTE ]
Should I play it?: If you have an armour set and mez protection, or want a challenge on a squishy, you should.
I played this arc on tenacious, as Jacintha, my lv42 Archery/Elec/Elec blaster. BTW, this is the character I mainly want to level ATM, so unless you give me some indication that the arc won't be squishy friendly, I'll be soloing your arcs on a blaster.
[/ QUOTE ]
You'll see later on that I've addressed some points that you raise about the final mission, but I think this is a point that we may differ in expectations/design philosophies.
I try to design for Challenge Level 1 (heroic/villainous) - and I try to make sure my arcs are reasonable to solo at that level by most characters.
By 'reasonable to solo' I mean that of course you may have a struggle depending on AT/sets and team/solo build - but it ought to be possible even if you need to chew a few insps and have 1 (or maybe even 2 deaths)... After all, an arc should always have some small risk of defeat.
Anything that takes many deaths, needs constant boosts from 4 or 5 insps or feels like banging a head against a brick wall is too hard...
To check that, this arc was tested/played by me solo on the following:
- 50 NRG/NRG blaster
- 50 ill/emp troller
- c.27 earth/rad troller
- c.25 dark/dark scrapper
- 50 DM scrapper
- c.35 kin defender
There may have been more (and some of these had multiple runs through the whole arc) but none of these felt too hard, although some did feel the pain. Also, IIRC, none of my test squishies have any real armours/mez protection past using lucks and breakfrees (though a few also have the leadership pool which helps a little for defence).
Which makes me wonder if it's because I've missed a big issue with the sets you used or if a big part of the issue was using challenge level 2 (Tenacious) which will effectively give you 2-man spawns (more LTs iirc) and puts the EB back up to EB, rather than boss as it would be at CL:1.
I suspect that playing at CL:2 solo had a fair bit to do with it - but as the official position has always been that CL:1 is the normal difficulty that's what I try to balance for.
[ QUOTE ]
[*]The chickens have Minion and LT versions, with Martial Arts and Flight, which means hover is useless. (bearing in mind one of the designed purposes of hover was to stay out of melee range) They do a lot of damage, and with 2 in a spawn they can perma-stun you.
[/ QUOTE ]
Oh ok then... they don't fly anymore. (Or at least shouldn't - I republished with hens not flying).
[ QUOTE ]
[*]The sheep have TA/A, and WILL immobilise you.
[/ QUOTE ]
Hey - you know I'm a sucker for a poor pun - so Ram Beau had to be done... that meant archery skills that can drop helicopters. Though I did jiggle the difficulty as previously they immob'd you and pretty-much-perma-blinded you as well. That really wasn't fun being unable to see any mobs!
[ QUOTE ]
[*]The cows are empaths, who will CM everyone around them, rendering my mezzes useless.
[/ QUOTE ]
Which is why on some characters I tried to mezz/defeat them before the other mobs! Though mob priority changes according to AT/sets/characters...
[ QUOTE ]
[*]There are also a few spawns of Fire/Kin farmers, which spawn only as Lts. Since they're controllers, they were definitely best left alone by me, as a group of 4 fire trollers WILL perma-hold.
[/ QUOTE ]
Non-required battles - so they can be happily ignored/treated as 'flavour'. And once again, there were only so many as you were on CL:2 solo.
[ QUOTE ]
[*]Positron spawns as a Boss-level Hero I think - he was pwned by a group of farmyard animals he aggroed.
[/ QUOTE ]
The whole reason I placed the ally in the final mission was to provide soloer support for Old McDonald. Depending upon build you may not need his help - but I considered that damage-light characters could do with a little help.
In all runs that I did I managed to keep Posi alive whether by healing him or just keeping a close eye on him and quickly attacking anything that he aggroed. Losing Posi would have made Old McDonald harder, especially on CL:2.
[ QUOTE ]
[*]Old Macdonald is a Rad/Rad EB, and a toughie. While manageable by himself, he once again proves what I'm calling "Leese's Maxim."
"It's not the EB that kills you, it's the ambushes."
Yeah, he calls three ambushes, a tactic that I generally find to be overkill most of the time. But, in the end, he was beatable.
[/ QUOTE ]
Possibly one of the biggest flaws IMO - why hadn't I relised before and why has no-one else pointed this out...
Worse still - I had 3 ambushes set as medium/medium/hard. No wonder I and at least one other player have suceeded before with a simultaneous faceplant with the Old McDonald...
I have downgraded this slightly to 2 ambushes: at 75% and 25% health, and both at easy. Should be more manageable.
I'll also rerun the arc/mission 3 with some other squishies to re-evaluate in light of your comments.
[ QUOTE ][*]Overall, this mission represented a significant and aggravating difficulty spike for me. My philosophy is thus - I don't mind if arcs are hard or easy, but they should be consistently so.
[/ QUOTE ]
Rather than a flat difficulty, some variation is probably better - usually with the difficulty ramping up towards the end bigbads.
Of course you want it to feel like it ramped up rather than suddenly leapt up. I appreciate that, at least for your test, it felt more like the latter!
[ QUOTE ][*]Level range is inconsistent - mission 1 is 13-19, mission 2 is 29-35, mission 3 is 40-54. This doesn't bother me too much, but it may concern you.
[/ QUOTE ]
Inconsistent, although intentionally so for reasons you may have guessed:
Mission 1: Benchmark to show how poor the so-called heroes are that, even though they're lvl50s, they can't even beat a simple troll boss!
Mission 2: Well if I'm going to include a Hess-alike I had to include it at about the same level range as Hess (though I made sure I didn't try to find too similar a map - I'd hate to spoil anyone's 1st time Hess through spoilers...)
Mission 3: It's the farm... Farms tend (AFAIK) to be run at the high end of the level range.
[ QUOTE ][*]Spelling and grammar were generally excellent. The only way I could mark you down for this would be on your tendency to only use two dots in an ellipsis, and that's so minor I barely see the point.
[/ QUOTE ]
Actually if I was making that error then you do see the point, and the second point - but the third is sadly absent.........
To make up, I gave you some extra ones there - and here..... 
[ QUOTE ]
Overall I really enjoyed this arc until the third mission, which quickly became an exercise in frustration - not as bad as some others I've played, but bad enough that when the EB died I immediately hit Exit, glad it was over. But putting aside the annoyed feelings the last mission gave me, I think this is a definite 4 stars.
[/ QUOTE ]
Hopefully my changes, though minor, may avoid this from now on!
Thanks again for the review/feedback.
By my mohawk shall ye know me!
my toons
Funny: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! #3662 * The foul-mouthed Handyman! #1076 * City of Norms #132944
Serious: To Save A Single World (#83744) * Marketing Opportunity (#83747)
I see what you mean about CL2. For the record, this blaster usually solos on CL4 in the canon game. It's a dilemma trying to decide what difficulty to run on - I think that, despite the pain, I'd rather encounter true bosses and EBs rather than downscaling, which is why I haven't been running on heroic.
If anyone has any opinions on whather this is fair to architects or not, I'd like to hear them.
[ QUOTE ]
Hey - you know I'm a sucker for a poor pun - so Ram Beau had to be done... that meant archery skills that can drop helicopters. Though I did jiggle the difficulty as previously they immob'd you and pretty-much-perma-blinded you as well. That really wasn't fun being unable to see any mobs!
[/ QUOTE ]
Now that I think about it, I vaguely remember being blinded a few times... but I'm not sure TBH. I may be thinking of a different arc. You may want to check anyway that Ram Beaus are on the right difficulty.
Re: level ranges, yeah, it was clear why you had the breaks, but uneven lavel ranges seem to be a big problem for some people. It didn't affect my mark.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
I'd like to throw mine back into the review cycle:
ARCID: 143449
NAME: AE Combat Evaluator
description: a straightforward PvP simulation program. what could possibly go wrong ?
details:
5 maps.
no AV , no EB. solo-able. custom mobs. all maps ghostable.
levels: 20 +
also I have a short mission to present:
ARCID: 143311
NAME: Deep Deep Down
desc: a mine collapse, resuce the miners single map.
level: 5-14
Ramon_Daark only just missed being reviewed before JD because his arc was down at the time. Now that it's back up, I've gone back to it.
Review: AE Combat Evaluator (Arc ID: 143449, Heroic, 20-50)
By Ramon_Daark
Summary: An arc with original concepts and fun missions that suffers due to an extremely muddled plot, possibly-unbalanced custom group and lacklustre presentation.
Should I play it?: I think so. It's a fun arc with some good writing, and is fun to play. It just needs a lot of polish and a restructure of the story.
I said that the custom group was "possibly unbalanced." This refers to the fact that a lot of them seem to have mez protection. When the next patch hits and Mez protection is only available on Extreme this may change.
Rating: Three stars.
Summary: The contact is the "AE System Avatar," who is appropriately just the basic Contact Hologram. Apparently we've started a PvP training program to test our skills, and as we calibrate the system the Avatar will devise PvP training programs to suit our level of ability.
Except it's not going to work like that...
MISSION 1
<ul type="square">[*]We quickly get the impression that not all is well with the entry text - "Lost connection to mapserver"[*]It's a city map full of freaks, and we have one goal - find the Simulator Interface AI. This turns out to be a contact hologram lookalike. A new chained objective appears once we have him - defeat a Freak called BSOD.[*]BSOD is a EM/inv Boss, with some funny lines. He seems to have a grudge against someone called "Hexx." On defeat, he promises to track the player down in the real world and kill them.[*]On return to the Hologram, he gives a worrying stream of error messages, non sequiturs and HAL references and then reboots.[/list]
MISSION 2
<ul type="square">[*]After rebooting, the Hologram informs us that our acceptance of the Terms and Conditions in the previous briefing allow him to press-gang us into helping him fix this mess.
... except I never agreed to any terms and conditions. I just agreed to waive my right to sue if this went wrong. Maybe consider putting some reference to the EULA or something in the first briefing?[*]The system has traced some suspicious activity to a specific location within the system, and wants to send us in to do some "debugging."[*]This mission is another Freakshow mission, in an abandoned office, and it's timed at 60 minutes. You didn't mention that before I accepted the mission BTW. There are only two objectives - destructible objects, so it's fairly simple.[*]The second destructible object has some odd dialogue...
[ QUOTE ]
[NPC] Virtual Console: decryption eta 25 minutes
[NPC] Virtual Console: Decryption complete. Pass key for protected memory space ready.
[/ QUOTE ]
These two lines occurred within ten seconds of each other. Must be a Windows-style progress bar.[*]Knocking out these two objects completely closes off the Freakshow's access to the system. We won't see them again for the rest of the arc, and we'll never discover what BSOD's problem with Hexx was.[*]In the debriefing, the Hologram has tracked down who Hexx was - one of the main designers of the MA system, who was fired and is now deceased following a zombie outbreak in Steel.[/list]
MISSION 3
<ul type="square">[*]It runs out the Freakshow were trying to force access to a protected area of memory that the system didn't know about. The Hologram sends you to check it out.[*]Inside, there are... the Circle of Thorns? Quite unexpected. They're guarding a number of Power Conduits, and complaining about how unnatural they find this "technology" stuff. The conduits seemed to be taking energy from the virtual world and converting it to mystical energy![*]Destroying each conduit gives the message "You have destroyed all of the Conduits"[*]Overall a simple mission.[*]On returning to be hologram, he starts tracing where the magical energy was being sent to...[/list]
MISSION 4
<ul type="square">[*]I'll be honest, I'm not entirely sure what the first part of the next briefing means, but it seems to boil down to - this looks like Hexx, but it can't be, there's another piece of protected memory, go have a look in it and try to find Hexx.[*]Another timed mission, at 90mins, but this one gives you appropriate warning.[*]This mission contains a custom group - Circle mages combined with BlackICE enemies that represent the virus protection in this memory. They're nicely designed, but at least half of them have mez protection.[*]Worth noting - BlackICE is the name of an existing PC security program, but I guess they're not going to worry about you using the name.[*]To begin with, the main objective is finding the right glowie Node out of about seven. As a nice touch, if you click the seven nodes you're not meant to, you get an ambush as the virus checker realises there have been a lot of suspicious logins recently.[*]Once the node is found, a Boss spawns - Redvik, a Circle Mage who took a tumble off a KR rooftop and is currently in the Zig's hospital wing, "undergoing rehabilitation through Interactive Holographic Imagery as well as physiotherapy for four artificial limbs."
I really liked this character. He's well written, has an interesting concept, a sympathetic problem, a believable motivation and I think he could... nay MUST be expanded upon. I'd say that personally, I found him to be the star of the arc.[/list]
MISSION 5
<ul type="square">[*]Accessing that node in the last mission let us know where Hexx's "code" is. I'm still not clear whether this Hexx is an AI or the man/zombie himself, or if he's actually done anything bad, but we need to go knock him out.[*]Before we go, the Hologram says that after this mission he will be reset again.[*]This mission was very short and rather anti-climactic. The only objective, Hexx conned as a Boss, and was pretty easy to defeat.[/list]
Upon returning to the Hologram, it only welcomed us to AE and directed us to the terminals to pick a mission, having reset itself already. I found it quite a touching and melancholic way to end the arc - I hadn't realised how much I liked it until that point.
A few more notes...
<ul type="square">[*]Spelling and grammar were quite flawed - typos and grammar errors were frequent. You have some interesting writing buried under them though.[*]If I had to pick one flaw that drags this arc down, it would be a lack of focus in the villains. Who is the main villain? BSOD? Redvik? Hexx? What, in fact, was the evil plan I foiled? I'm not entirely clear on that. Is Hexx alive or dead, why was BSOD angry with him, and why was he apparently working with Redvik? In the end this arc raises more questions than it answers, and I believe it's because you have too many villains. The time you have to actually develop them or better explain their plots is split three ways, and with the limitation of 5 missions that's time you don't have to waste.[/list]
So overall, even though I enjoyed playing this, it ranked a three.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
One note: I'm going to close my list to new applications at the moment. I'll keep working down the current list until the end and probably take a short break after that. Reviewing MA arcs is nice, but it does kinda take time away from the TFs etc I also want to run.
"The Hamidon is a what what of what?" - Brian the mission guy.
thanks for the review much appreciated.
I'm thinking I might actually take your suggestion and expand the bosses individualy and spread the story over three shorter arcs instead of squishing it into the one.
some comments:
Mission 1:
BSOD: personally I like him and I wanted to bring him back in the future, this served more as an introduction than anything else (I'd like to give him a show of his own).
Mission 2:
didnt realise I hadnt given warning about the 60 minute limit. I'll correct that one.
Probably didnt get the point across (its a fine line between spoon feeding and hinting!) but the freakshow are looking for Hexx and using the second console to decrypt his security passwords to access the protected storage.
point taken, and I'll re-write to make it clearer. Possibly something spreadign the arc out would help with.
Mission 3:
Meant to be an easy one to be honest. didnt see that message about the objectives being destroyed.. didnt do that in the last incarnation so no idea why its doing it now (i didnt change that mission).
On returning, the AE system tracks the energy source (where it is coming from) , will make that clearer too.
Mission 4:
Need to edit it to make it clearer again (sorry!). In essence the protected area was set up by Hexx for the circle, which is why the code is familiar to AE but still not actually hexx's work.
I'll remove mez protection from the mobs. They dont need it in hindsight and it would ruin solo-ability for fenders/controllers. Its all about the balance.
Redvik: a literally last minute addition but the more I've thought about it the more I like him and I agree, I have to expand on him in the future (again an argument for a seperate arc).
Mission 5:
again 
clearer briefing required. In essence it doesnt matter if Hexx has done anything wrong or not, AE wants him gone.
As for the length, I was afraid of making too large a map and stretching the players patience.
Cant tell whether you like the fact that the contact was reset or not. Was a melancholic ending good or bad? It is supposed to show AE's uncaring business side. you fulfill your contractual duties. thats it. your job is done as required by the agreement and by the agreement you dont get anything extra. Not hugely heroic, i know, but I also want it to be "realistic" for villains to accept as well.
Overall:
thanks, I'll have a hunt for typos and grammar issues. personally I hate writing on a keyboard, I prefer pen and paper but its the system we have to work with.
3 bosses. I'll up Hexx to EB status. if I spread thigns out then I can flesh out each boss a bit more. I personally found Hexx more interesting than BSOD but with the limitations of MA I found it hard to get his backstory across. Redvik, as i said, a last minute addition but his character has opened up a lot more ideas for the overall arc.
I'll leave this one up for now and make the changes and I'll give you a shout when I have my BSOD feature up and running. (but it will mean mixing real world with the simulation which is not really what i wanted to do).
anyway, thank you very much for the review. Its very much appreciated.
PS. BlackICE in this context was taken from Neuromancer by William Gibson that I read a long long time ago and really stuck with me over the years... must give it a read again.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuromancer (glossary section) this was the direction I was hoping for with the neon-effect samurai
Thanks, I wouldn't ask about it either if not for the spawn bug
(actually there used to be a short sublot involving her, but it was cut because of the bug I didn't know how to fix back then. All that was left of the subplot is this cameo and I didn't want to cut her entirely.)