The perils of 'official' content

If you can't find an interesting, fun MA story to run in a couple of minutes, you're doing it wrong.

Even with the less than stellar search tools available in MA, it isn't that tough to find a solid arc to run. It could be a lot simpler and more intuitive, yeah, but it isn't impossibly hard either.

The Tsoo don't really need help on that, they already have over a dozen different bosses with different looks and powers. The problem is that they don't spread them over enough of the level range and some bosses don't spawn as often as others.

Well, ok, I was just giving an example
Crey Scientists are another type that could be made into generic individual bosses by giving them bare heads.

Don't think that CoX is unique in running you all around Hel's half acre; I was playing in the beta of another of NCSoft's MMOs and got a mission that had me (without travel powers):

a) run to a contact that required me to idle for several minutes for a transport to take me to an otherwise-inaccessible part of the zone where the contact was, run to the contact,
b) Get directed to a second contact, running back to where I again had to wait for the transport to take me back to the main part of the zone, run to the contact,
c) Get directed to a third contact in another zone, requiring me to run to the zone gate, switch zones, run to the contact,
d) Get directed to a fourth contact, who is conveniently imprisoned up in an area that is +5 or better to you when you can get the mission, fight and sneak my way to the contact, get given an object,
e) Get directed back to the third contact, fight and sneak my way out of the area,
f) Get directed back to the second contact, run back to the zone gate, switch zones, run to the contact,
g) Get directed back to the first contact, again running to where I had to wait for the transport to take me to where he was, run to the contact,
h) Get sent to a fifth contact, who is near the second contact, run back to the transport and wait for it, ride it back to the main part of the zone, and run to the contact, where I have some local interaction to complete the task.

All of which awarded no XP except for incidental defeats until I completed the whole sequence, and earned me less in XP than several other missions that didn't take me out of zone at all, and had me running around less. It gave me a whole new perspective on the 'Go there, come back, go there again, come back, ..." missions in CoX.

I agree with this entire comment, but especially the quoted part.

The Tsoo need an archvillain, but that's all they need.

We never do get to fight Tub Ci, do we?

Edit - I really hope that was the right name.

Never ever.

Or even the Petrovic Brothers (Skulls).

This. And if you're still having trouble, there's whole threads of reviews available.

Originally Posted by eltonio This is over the top mental slavery.

Don't forget about Architect Chat and any server-channels for MA (like VirtuePublishing on Virtue, for example).

Originally Posted by eltonio This is over the top mental slavery.

Yup, I drift between MA content and regular content on most of my characters. I have one I am doing almost exclusively through MA, but mainly because he's kinda particular about the kind of missions I'd like to have him do, so MA lets me zero in on those.

But I've gone from the MA building to a regular contact and back again more than once.

Originally Posted by eltonio This is over the top mental slavery.

Same with me, but I generally team AE missions and solo regular arcs.

I make no such distinction: I'll team for anything that's not a farm (if I feel like teaming... otherwise I'll solo whatever catches my fancy)

Originally Posted by eltonio This is over the top mental slavery.

Nope, no one ever gets to fight Tub Ci. But villains can get him as an ally.

Actually, you do get to fight the Petrovic brothers but they just don't stand out from the rest of the Bone Daddies. They're Marrowsnap and Marrowdrinker.

Call it what you will. I play these arcs and find myself not enjoying them for a variety of reasons. Some of the reasons I've listed, some of the reasons are difficult to describe, but it all comes down to my personal tastes clashing with what's there for me to do. If that makes me excessively snobbish, then so be it.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

If you're not going to like them, that's one thing (although I think you're underrating things considerably), but when you start throwing in jabs about fanfiction, yeah, it's excessive snobbery.

Hey Sam! Play my stuff. I tried to go for a "some dev's slumming to write this" feeling and I'd be interested in how well it worked.

(if you've played my stuff please to drop feedback in relevant threads?)

Yup, if memory serves, one of them is even in a mission at the beginning of an arc, so the player just bowls past him without even noticing he had a name, much less what that name was.

Back in one of those giganto threads on the old forums I made the point that MA was just the latest incarnation of The Cancer That Is Killing The Game.

Here's hoping you have more luck getting the point across than I did. =)

Probably the same kind of people who think their custom group is actually appropriate for levels 1-54.

My first thought after completing those arcs (the heroside ones anyway, the villain one was just lame): This would be cool if I was 50. In the low 20s? Not cool.

Darrin Wade's arc, as well as the level-locking of the villainside Origin of Power arc to a range where the CoT are always 95% ghosts if you rely on S/L damage, the Midnighter arc's first mission being practically all bosses and unavailable until a level where half those bosses will be Succubi (Fury? What's Fury?), and the complete lack of anything remotely resembling a real arc from Mercedes Sheldon where heroes get three arcs (excessive difficulty notwithstanding) is just fuel for the "devs hate villains" fire.

Actually they should really take cues from some player-created arcs when creating future content. It might give them some ideas on how to write villain content that doesn't rely on the player character being someone's stooge, or inspire "which contact do you most want to beat up?" forum threads.

I found one by @Gadgetdon the other day. It was one of 3 arcs. I had stumbled into the middle one and it was lowbie solo friendly, fun and was very much like the Praetorian portal missions.