Over 20 Billion Inf to Commission some Arcs

Over the double experience weekend I played my Ill/Rad with a random team through some of the Vanguard arcs. I had great fun. I have run many similar teams through the Imperious Task Force. They are great fun when I can turn up the difficulty to ensure teammates die regularly.

My problem is that I want to always have some missions to utilize Fallout how I want to use it. Task Forces have been known to have issues with difficulty. I will run out of Vanguard missions. I don't want to use Ouroboros. I don't want to use infinite RWZ missions. Mission Architect is the answer. I'm not creative and I don't want to spend time making cool looking foes and carefully crafted missions, objectives and ambushers. However, I do have an outrageous amount of Inf for someone who will do such things for me.

There are some things I specifically want and do not want in my arc. I'll frequently compare to the Imperious Task Force because it is very close to the ideal. The most important thing is making the arc a helluva lotta fun to Fallout teammates on. I advertise for anyone, any level, any archetype as long as you come to play aggressively. I don't like "I'm a healer so I don't attack" nor "I'm a Tank so I just taunt", nor anything else where you don't have attacks and/or don't use them. Come and at least try to kick some booty. I'm an Ill/Rad with perma PA, hasten, vengeance, Fallout and piles of debuffs so it's kinda cheating. As long as we all listen to the immortal words of Sister Flame and "just mash 1-2-3-4 until they are defeated" we should be just fine.

1) The missions must allow the starholder to be level 50 and play as a level 50. The enemies really need to go up to level 52 and hopefully 54. Minimum levels are irrelevant**Edited**
2) Assume an 8-man team is playing the mission.
2) The enemies must be capable of defeating my teammates with some regularity. Some examples: Rikti and Romans were about perfect. Nemesis a little too frequent at killing teammates. Arachnos and Longbow are probably about right as well.
3) Mezzing must not be a featured aspect of the enemies. A few enemies with Mez are ok. See Romans
4) Linear missions. We go in the front. We go towards the back. Then it's over. No open maps where a team may split up or be unsure where to go. No going to the back, getting a hostage, then going back to the front. See the Imperious TF. The cave missions and the occasional non-perfectly straight is just fine.
5) Bad to the bone encounters. Occasionally have ambushes, surprises, AVs or other interesting and non-standard fights. See the ITF for the right ratio of standard verse special encounters.
6) Nothing failable. I'll do my own failing, no need for the mission to have its own ways I can fail. However, an ever increasing ambush or defend something after the mission has already succeeded can be great fun. "We've got to hold out and give Moderator 8 as much time as possible to finish his sandwhich. Every minute we can give him helps." That's good. "You died and Moderator 8 lost his sandwhich. You fail." That's bad.
7) No missions that cause un-fun amounts of lag nor slow down the server.

**EDIT*These rules aren't really a code as much as they are a guideline. If you feel that you can make a mission that fails that is fun or break some of my other rules and make it fun give it a try. I'll test the mission and tell you if your plan succeeded or if it failed horribly. For a general idea of how I play this video will semi-give the concept. Here's a video of myself and a bunch of friends taking Moderator 8 on a +2 difficulty (Relentless/Invincible) Enemies Buffed, Players Debuffed Imperious Task Force. The video is the entirety of mission 3. Skip to about 5:30 when we start going crazy. That video is about 4 of my friends on Rads. I'd normally be the only guy with Fallout but that video gives a semi-general idea. I'll try to get a recording of myself on my Ill/Rad soon. Link to video. We skip the hill because of lag. We'd love to march right up it and obliterate all those Romans.**EDIT**

I'm not really a creative person and don't have much to add creatively. However, hopefully some of my own and some of my brothers' thoughts can give you inspiration.

We're entering the mission for a fight. We want to kick something's butt. We want to fight some enemies with a "warrior spirit". We want to punch them in the face and want them to punch us right back. Fireball is a PBAoE power in my eyes. I've never thrown Blaze from more further away than arm's length. Some quotes we like that fit the theme: "He fights you not because you wronged him but because you are there." "If God had wanted you to live he would not have created me."
If you go with your own theme and story that's cool too.

Prizes will be:
5 Billion for the MA Arc that most allows me to kick butt, have fun, and blow up my teammates.
3 Billion For second.
2 Billion for third.

I'll be concluding the contest July 31st. I'm the sole judge. I can judge on whatever criteria I want and give the money to whoever I feel like giving it to. I can change the rules whenever and however I want. I'm making this **** up as I go. To be eligible for the big prize at the end I must have a copy of the AE arc file. I don't plan on posting it myself. I don't plan on changing it. But if something happens, if your arc goes away, if your arc gets bugged, and I lose my Fallout Fix I'd cry. I must have a way to fix it. I'll write how you did all the work in the description of the arc if I have to change/fix/update it. I don't care about the credit. I just need to have my fix.

I'm willing to give feedback on your arcs as the contest goes along. Post your arc here and tell me to give them a try and I'll do my best to try them. I'll tell you what I liked and what I didn't like. I can't promise I'll get to them all. At the end of every month I'm going to give 1 Billion Inf to whichever arc I've tested that currently best embodies what I'm looking for. I don't need the file for the 1 Billion thing.

I'll also give 10 billion on top of any other prizes to an arc that is in the top 3, or wins a monthly bonus, if that arc is "Dev Choiced." One 10 billion only. I might extend it further than the top 3 and if somehow more than 1 gets picked I'll try to get more money to throw at ya. Personally, I don't care about the tickets, the drops, nor the merits in Task Forces. However, telling people they can find purples while they team with me and that standard drops are on is probably nicer than just tickets.

I've got enough Inf right now to cover all the prizes. Most of it is on Freedom/Villainside at the moment. I'm sure we can find people to change it to blueside and change it's server. So you **should** be able to get your full amount of prize on any server on any side. Every arc that wins any prize whatsoever will get 5 stars from me. I plan on running the winning arcs many times with many different people. Everyone I team with will be instructed to 5 star the arc as well. I hope these shiny gold stars further motivate you to do your very best.

**EDIT*I don't care if you PM me in game, send me a PM on the boards, write it up in this thread or whatever. In order to be eligible for the monthly prize you have to either post it here publicly or let me know explicitly that I can tell people your arc # and provide public feedback. You can be sneaky if you like. If you want to hold out on your arc # until the last minute you can do so. If you want me to give private feedback you can do so. But if I don't make the feedback and arc # public it's not eligible for the end of month 1 billion. I'm willing to provide private, sneaky feedback but I'll be testing it with random people who may or may not be competitors.

Feel free to work together. Feel free to steal ideas. Feel free to cheat. I don't care. I just want an arc that is awesome.

Updating the scoreboard. Scores likely to change somewhat as I get a better idea of how to compare Arcs:
There are lots of arcs that are submitted and available for the March 1 Billion. Let me update the list of arcs entered:

95 Cyborg Misunderstandings Lead to Bombs #389407
90 7662: The Nemesis Task Force #364346
80 Psychophage #283197
75 7662 - The Labors of Rustam: The Cold and the Dark #54293[
70 A Warrior's Journey - The Flower Knight Task Force #260284
60 The Ghastly Secret of Dreams #38686

Eligible for March 1 billion but not tested:
7662 - The Labors of Rustam II: Rustam and Sohrab #59243
7662 - The Labors of Rustam III: The Longest Day #78130
Robots (Test for Smurphy’s Challenge) #390036
7662 - Cathan's Revolt #122478
The Lost Time Task Force #392221
The Stroke of Midnight #391853
#215669
Vernon's Big Break #390611
The Peregrine Falcon #352527

Eligible for April 1 billion but not tested:
The Television Strike Force: Part One #392091
The Television Strike Force: Part Two #392092
The End of Saturday Morning #391934
Spread My Legions! #398397
Shift #400487
#394086
Lockdown #250142

Eligible for May 1 billion but not tested:
Sweet Dark Embrace #93711

Needs Revision:
Breathless Nights #38769
Clubbing Nightmare #4234
Mantisman Task Force #15819
Imperial Task Force 2 aka Romulus Rematch #385400
Test Mission for Pacing of Smurphy’s Challenge #388594
Rescue Numina from the Circle of Hands #388422
Pentarchy of Punishment #388164
The Many Faces of Hydro's Villains TF
Episode I: The Next Big Thing #219429
Episode II: Minister Of Pain #224793
Episode III: Made in Paragon #228570
The Many Faces of Hydro's Heroes TF
Episode I: A Dire Threat #41066
Episode II: Tumultuous Times #72829
Episode III: Alpha and Omega #210970

http://tinyurl.com/ycqh6mn (link to thread)

My Arcs
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Mission Architect Handyman

I agree that if someone didn't know you they'd think you were just blowing smoke. A lot of players would be surprised that someone could accumulate that level of in-game wealth. But a bit of searching of your post history in the Market forum should allay fears there, I'd think.

My only suggestion to you is to make sure your deadline extends beyond i17 going live. They've announced improvements to Mission Architect, although we have no details yet. It'd be good for the arc(s) you're commissioning to be able to take advantage of the latest/greatest.

Try it anyways. I think he's given enough details for most competant arc writes to give it a shot. ITF actually isn't my favorite TF but I think I have a good idea of what he might like.

My Arcs
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Mission Architect Handyman

I have to admit I gave it some thought after I posted that. I don't have a really strong enough grasp on the AE system for designing 'tough challenges', I usually stick to the kiddy-pool end of that pool because when I tel a story I want people to see it, rather than grousing about how the boss beat them senseless.

However, one goofball story idea I have knocking about waiting for the chance to get made might fit this, so I'm going to have to see if perhaps I can make that fit these parameters... fewer plays but a billion inf? Sounds good!

So... Smurphy, are you looking for a mish with standard dev-made foes or are customs ok (do customs play out at levels 51+ anyways?)? I also take it you're looking more for melee foes rather than ranged, right?

I don't particular care whether the enemies are custom or dev-made nor whether the enemies are mostly ranged nor mostly melee.

The right balance of difficulty and a general "warrior spirit" of the enemies is what I'm looking for. The right balance of difficulty is hard enough to put up a fight and kill one or two teammates of mine with some regularity yet easy enough that we can all run at them, push our attacks, and defeat them. Of course I'll be on an Ill/Rad with infinite unkillable phantoms, massive debuffs, nuclear weapons and the most powerful team-buff in the game --> Vengeance. As I stated in the original post Rikti and the Romans are just about perfect. Family are too easy. Nemesis are too hard. Exploding Warhulks kill a few too many teammates with too much regularity.

"Warrior Spirit" is an intangible quality I can't properly put into words. Three-foot tall pink bunnies don't got it. Enemies that run away don't got it. Enemies that don't attack don't got it. Enemies with annoying powers like self-intangible, teleport, aoe mez etc. don't got it. A Rikti Soldier boss who pulls out an 8-foot alien axe and wacks a teammate for 1200 -- he got it.

lol this is EPIC and RESPECT to you This needs to be somebody's signature, first Dev to apply should get it.

Well, my most played arc does have bunnies in it. :P Bunnygirls, but somehow I don't think that makes too much of a diff here.

"Warrior spirit" isn't a language I speak fluently, sad to say, partly because I can't resist making light of most situations as I write. The closest I came was probably in my WickerWork Khan arc but even that has it's light moments and setting. Heck, thinking about it, that one might still fly under that flag. You could take a look at it maybe, but it's only 3 missions long; I gather you want a real five mish epic. But anyways, my one idea I mentioned up above is seriously goofball (no bunnies though) in nature, so that's probably a no-go.

Still, I'll look through my list of ideas on the backburner and see what I might dredge up. I have to admit I'm starting to see this as something of a challenge...

That's sort of my thinking here as well. I'm more of a satirist and a fanserver; but I do have one challenge oriented mission that does feature warriors of a sort. I may have a look at reworking that one to fit the competition. It's a single mission story; if that isn't what's wanted let me know.

Now that sounds interesting. I have a mish that is just sitting .
I made it to challenge my IO'ed out fire/fire blaster and any team that is with him but it sits at 98.99% and don't have room to finish the text and clues.
Thankfully I read there upping the arc limit to 200k and I will be able to finish it then. I ran out of memory on the 3rd mish.
What are your thoughts on allies? ,I might need to remove some.
I do know solo on two of the mishes there a must have.

I need to revisit it and enter it into this contest.