Task Force Mutternacht - Dr. Aeon's Challenge

PoliceWoman has provided a very complimentary 5 Star Review of TF Mutternacht.

Still having problems with selling some of the actions of the arc, but I'm starting to think that's going to be unavoidable. Also of note, PW had a really hard time with the final EB/AV on the lowest setting possible, which is a concern. I'll have to get some more responses back from players to see if that difficulty persists.

In the meantime, I still owe people some plays, but the Winter Event, RL holidays, and some LOLRP in-game has slowed down my MA activity. I haven't forgotten you, folks.

Bubbawheat has posted his review of the arc, which appears to be dealing with some of the same issues as prior reviews.

He does mention the final EB/AV fight as being very difficult, but not as hard as PoliceWoman's laborious trial.

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Updated arc to remove typos and grammar errors. Contemplating a big overhaul of the final fight but that will depend on whether the particular EB/AV is available at the arc's level.

I don't have the MA interface here to check what level she spawns at, but your comments about Indigo's ability to "play the game" in covert ops led me to wonder if it would be possible/preferable to replace Ms. Lib with Agent Indigo herself (with the rationale that she's tying up the last loose end of her conspiracy - the PC themselves). I feel like there's some narrative logic to this, but it would require a very big revision to the final mission.

Looking at Paragon Wiki, she can spawn as a hero at 35-54. Would you think that the arc would be benefitted by the change? I still can't really figure out how to shoehorn another clue to sell the need to confront the final EB/AV as it stands.

While I was playing the arc, I was picturing Indigo disavowing $name at the end of mission 4. Then in mission 5, federal agents would surround $name's hideout, purportedly to arrest the Dystheist, but actually, they'd be happier if the Dystheist was killed while resisting arrest. This would neatly tie up all of Indigo's loose ends and would be an elegant ending, by the conventions of the spy thriller genre.

Of course, you cannot actually kill off the player character in mission architect (in fact, it would be undesirable if you could ), so this probably wouldn't work for an actual AE story arc.

Perhaps Indigo could try to assassinate the player character (under the guise of "arresting the Dystheist"), but when the player character defeats her, she agrees to fake the Dystheist's death instead; or maybe the player turns it around on Indigo somehow and plants evidence that she is the Dystheist, and then Indigo gets arrested at the end. If that happened, I think Indigo would stoically go down under the frame job, maybe even giving a false confession for the sake of saving MJ's reputation.

This would be a pretty big change to the last mission, though; I'd picture it all going down in some seedy warehouse that Indigo finally tracks $name down as hiding at, rather than in Atlas Park. Might be too big a change from your original idea. So, up to you. Use what you like, ignore what you don't.

It's not a bad idea, I'll need to take some time to look at how Mission 5 is constructed now, and determine how/if I can really get that last battle to come off without suspending too much belief.

Hmm. You know, if I could remove another one of the generator spawns and insert Indigo as a sub-boss to Ms. Liberty - allowing the opportunity for Indigo to deliver some clue that Ms. Lib is on the way. Or, I guess at this point I could remove the generator spawns all together.

If GR's AE loosened file sizes come around and allow us the ability to expand to more than 5 mishes, I could definitely work in that last mission vs. Indigo. Definitely food for thought.

Okay, looking at the AE Interface, Indigo is an AV in the 35-41 range and 46-52 range. Which leaves a gap of 41 to 45. I don't know if having a lower mish level will bring the 46-52 version down sufficiently to allow her to spawn for all recommended levels.

I tested replacing Ms. Lib with Indigo. Indigo has /ninja I believe, which mean that she's totally stealthed/invisible when she spawns. This will probably mean that anyone playing the arc blind (i.e. not knowing about Indigo's presence) might have a damned hard time finding her. And if they do "find" Indigo, it will probably be because EB/AV Indigo will have ganked the PC from stealth. Worse still, if the PC themselves have sufficient stealth they might NEVER aggro Indigo, depending on how the surrounding escort group spawns.

This is sort of a JerkMove for design, so I really wouldn't feel good about putting Indigo in unless I could be certain to get around this.

Well, I got a mixed review from the folks at AEntertainment Tonight, which is not unwelcome. Net rating of 4 stars, which is as much as anyone can really ask for. You can go here and download the Jan 24, 2010 show. TF: Mutternacht is discussed around beginning the 36:05 mark and goes for about ten minutes or so.

In response to the comments raised in the arc:

* Heroic Label: Since I submitted this for the Doc Aeon Challenge, I set the labels as FINAL and HEROIC because I believed those two to be required in order to get the arc entered as a qualified submission. It is, as we have seen, not in a final state and really, Neutral would probably fit the arc better. I'll be updating the arc to place it in Neutral alignment status.

* Costume Disclaimer - The first mission (the Malta mission) was a late addition to the arc. Originally you were told very quickly about the Dystheist's costume, which I figured could let people sorta jump out of AE for a moment and make a costume if they wanted to. I can't presently think of an elegant way to tell players to "go make a villain costume" prior to when it comes up in the arc, at least without spoilering that bit of plot progression.

* CANON DEFILEMENT: First off, I'm totally not offended by the commentary. Other reviews, the playtesting on this arc, I've gotten these comments before. I've come to accept that some people will have very strong negative reactions to the way the story plays out. The arc is tagged as non-canon, the players are welcome to ignore it for the purposes of how they feel their PC would act.

Worse comes to worse, the story is just an attempt to do something creative. If all it can do is to elicit a strong reaction in the audience and make them think a bit about their assumptions, their beliefs, and how they approach the themes that CoX engages - there's nothing more I could ask from an audience or player. =D

I'm glad to hear my review was taken well. I must admit, it was quite a bit harsher than my usual review. As I was limited by the No Spoilers tag in the submission, if you would like a more detailed (and less angry) explanation of my rant, feel free to drop me a PM.

Meanwhile, I would like to make sure that readers in your thread know that this episode will only be available until February 5th.

Necrobumping my thread on this for a few notes:

1. In speaking with some other players, I found out that the Destructible Generator detail was removed (again). I checked to see if my TF:M was somehow grandfathered to exclude this and lamentably it was not. So, the final mish now makes even less sense than it did before.

2. The Final mish may suffer from the Buffbot nerf (there are 3 allies available) - but I do recall receiving XP for mobs and stuff, so something it better than nothing. Mission 1 also has one allies and Mission 2 has two, but I am thinking that should be a negligible hit to XP for the most part.

3. No other changes appear to have been made due to the various patches and everything appeared to spawn as necessary. Still considering dropping some of the clickies in the first (Malta) mish.


Still, these concerns might be enough for me to redesign the final mission entirely. The updates/patches to AE do open up the following possibilities:

1. New Atlas Park map (Fashion Show), which would get rid of the need to explain why there's a giant F'in meteor in Atlas. I think I could hack up a rationale that there's an award ceremony for Ms. Lib

2. With the new custom critter XP weighting, I think I could mock up a custom of Indigo that gave reasonable XP while losing her Hide power (making it easier for people to find her). That is, if I wanted to include her as the final boss (as above). However, I don't know what the spawn points are on the map, so I don't know what kind of wiggle room I have to adapt the original mission parameters.

I really do need to update the arc at this point and would like to make the ending a little more satisfying for players, so this is a decent opportunity to do that. I'll probably need some test players willing to comment on it.

Well, I'll look into this, we'll see what options are available once I can get into the editor.

UPDATE 07/15/2010

Revised the final mission, changing the map, final battle, and the ending somewhat.

- Mission 5 map changed to Atlas Park Fashion Show: Under the guise of Ms. Liberty hosting a ceremony for new heroes.
- Mission Start clue changed to reflect the new map and a rationale for being there.
- Mission Start Popup changed to update the revised objectives (destroy TV Trucks), and made it more clear that there are allies you can get.
- Mission Objectives revised: destructible Generators were removed, exploding Trucks put in.
- Changed Mr. Inquiry's text around since he's no longer trying to get access to Sister Psy, but rather trying to get to Ms. Liberty directly now.
- Final Boss changed Agent Indigo - Kat/Ninja AV (will scale to EB). Used the mock-up I mentioned above. Less annoying now that the self-heal is gone. Caltrops are still annoying and she has wicked defense, but you can whittle her down. Silent Blade's mirror of her powerset also rather helps (caltrops vs. caltrops)
- Ms. Liberty is now a "friendly" hostage, to whom you speak after defeating Indigo.
- There is now a Mission Complete clue detailing the conversation with Ms. Lib.
- Mission Complete Pop-up & Debriefing changed to reflect the new conclusion. Mostly the same though.

Thoughts:
1. Riffing on Policewoman's comment above, I felt like Indigo's betrayal of the player is sort of borne out by the kind of cloak-and-dagger work she does normally. After all: two can keep a secret, if one of them is dead. Unfortunately, I could not slip that line into her text. She's also less trouble than Ms. Liberty can be in either Pet form or EB form.

2. I softened the despair of the ending due to several complaints I received that the story was taking power out of the player's hands, forcing them to go along with the conspiracy. I'm sort of on the fence on how to handle this. I rationalized that after taking all the abuse and demoralization from performing the villainous acts (and then being betrayed by your contact), it might make sense for the PC to take matters into their own hands and confront Ms. Liberty directly with the evidence. I feel it sorta loses some impact of the original narrative, but it does make things a bit more heroic in the end - while leaving some of the ambiguity intact. Did you do the right thing by giving it to Ms. Lib? Will she succumb to the corrupting influence of the film?

I feel the new ending is acceptable, although I feel less satisfied with it, and it puts some responsibility on the person most at risk with the film. This isn't supposed to be a wild divergence from canon, so I certainly don't want people to think Ms. Liberty is somehow innately corrupt and that the PC has given her the only evidence to expose her family. That's just not borne out in the story. Besides of which, it does add another level to the theme of "doing evil for a greater good" (shaking Ms. Lib's resolve = bad; inspiring Ms. Lib to investigate = good). As such, the new ending has the potential for building a sequel MA Arc off of it. We'll see where we go with that.

3. I didn't change the Arc Souvenir to reference the new ending, which I sorta felt like it should have (and I have room to do so if I wanted to) - but I really like how it is written at present, and shoehorning in something about Ms. Liberty's new quest just detracted from it. There's still a little mood whiplash going on, but not as bad as it could be.

4. Kinda wish I could have saved a bit more of Ms. Liberty's battle patter, but eh. You win some, you lose some.


FINAL THOUGHT: Need some folks to run this for the new mission. Alternatively, would people prefer that I put up a separate arc with ONLY the final mission to compare. I've already lost the text for the original ending, so I could not easily go back and reset it if the players think they like the original version more - but I could mock up something reasonable.