Random complaint about complaints
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2010-07-05 23:00 in Archetypes and Powers General Discussion
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*pokes the sore spot* Yeah, when I first fired up a VEAT, I was expecting a storyline from 1-50 about your rise through the ranks. Of course, my disappointment was great when I found out that there's like 2 missions per contact and that the first ones, anyways, are just there to give you an excuse to do the exact same missions as the non-VEATs, even though it makes absolutely no sense...|
Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha
And don't get me started on VEATs. Please. Just don't. It hurts >_>
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A nice, duty-focused storyline would have been great, as would a fix that would have Arachnos foes on the street not be aggroed, unless attacked, by you or any of your party members within a certain radius (ie, the rest of the party is in the VEAT's custody, for whatever reason; anyone outside of the radius is fair game, and anyone within the same radius as the party member who attacks also becomes fair game) for when you bypass the storyline and team with other players (inside missions aggro would work as normal).
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I never said misunderstood hero. My two examples were Lex Luthor or Doctor Doom, pretty much the two most iconic supervillains I can think of. I can't picture Lex Luthor beating up a bunch of guys just to keep an exterminator in business, ruining people's lives just sorta because, or most importantly, doing a mindlessly evil organization's bidding without question for months and months just for a shot at a little power within it.|
Originally Posted by Madam_Enigma
I fail to see the problem though. If your character is suppose to be a misunderstood hero why is it so hard to believe they wouldn't avoid doing things that hurt innocents?
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Those first two examples are both near the height of your power (40+), but even if you stripped away all their resources, that stuff's below them. They're supervillains, not mindless thugs who will murder indiscriminately for anybody who will sign a paycheck. Which is pretty much what CoV has you play if you follow the main plot. You're not Lex Luthor, you're not Doctor Doom, you're not Magneto, you're not allowed having any moral compunctions or disliking Arachnos unless you read every single contact ahead of time to vet them. You're a thug who just fights whatever random people point you at. And you're only presumably getting paid for it, since very few villain contacts even hint that.
I mean, give me some incentive, at least. Heck, look at Psymon Omega's first arc. "Hey, <character name>, go get this stuff to make me more powerful and beat up my rival for me." He outright orders you to do this stuff. There's no hint of him paying you or sharing the spoils or even asking nicely. It's just some jerk you have no reason to care about saying, "Hey, you. Go get me stuff." And this is how the arcs where you do have to do horrible things are, too. It'd at least make a little sense for many villains to do horrible things in exchange for big rewards, but arcs of "Well, you firebombed some houses, because this one guy told you to!" make your character out as a two-dimensional idiot who just wants to hurt people for fun, not a supervillain in their own right, possibly with their own plans and preferences.
Having Vengeance and Fallout slotted for recharge means never having to say you're sorry.
Actually... Lex Luthor got his start as an underling for another of Superman's mad scientist enemies. So yes, he would play possum and learn everything he can from a villain before deposing them. Victor Von Doom might as well, but he would begin his plans to depose the organization early on. Plans which would come to fruition when the time is right.
As for Psymon Omega, it is possible he just orders you because he can. What if storyline wise, he mentally dominates someone and just orders them around? That would make sense too.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
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Yeah, I almost added a caveat at the end that some of this stuff would be more acceptable at the low levels, when you are getting a start to your career. But still, random people have no business using established villains as lackeys.
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Originally Posted by Madam_Enigma
Actually... Lex Luthor got his start as an underling for another of Superman's mad scientist enemies. So yes, he would play possum and learn everything he can from a villain before deposing them. Victor Von Doom might as well, but he would begin his plans to depose the organization early on. Plans which would come to fruition when the time is right.
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Having Vengeance and Fallout slotted for recharge means never having to say you're sorry.
What about the Dark Reign storyline in Marvel? It was all about a major supervillain gaining a ton of power, and nearly every villain serving him willingly or unwillingly.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
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If you care about the roleplaying aspect of it enough to avoid missions, but not so much to be willing to rewrite the discussion for yourself, then that is the price you are choosing to pay.|
Originally Posted by Kelenar
The point is, you're having to avoid huge chunks of content and plan out your contacts ahead of time, just to play a concept that the entire game should have had in mind when it was built. It's like if half of heroside missions explicitly involved murdering villains, thus precluding you from playing a hero based on Batman or Superman.
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My alternate solution is to pay other players to start missions for you so they are your employees and servants. That works well too. And it's fun.
"Hmm, I guess I'm not as omniscient as I thought" -Gavin Runeblade.
I can be found, outside of paragon city here.
Thank you everyone at Paragon and on Virtue. When the lights go out in November, you'll find me on Razor Bunny.
My problem with a lot of the writing in the game, is that it's simply not very interesting. "Rar! I am evil! Watch me kick this kitten!" Lord Recluse is actually a good example of this. He's stupidly, continuously, mindlessly "evil," in the same way as most Saturday morning cartoon villains. Some of his henchmen get way more interesting stories. Sirocco is cursed, and would really like to *not* be evil. Failing that, he'd like to be sure he's at least acting of his own free will. Ghost Widow feels she is trapped as an echo of her own former life. Hardcase is a mercenary, and believes anyone about to be torn apart for making a deal with demons probably deserves it. Random civilians do not. Marshal Brass has a mandate to preserve order, and realizes that randomly executing everyone who walks by isn't a good way to bring stability to a city.
An interesting villain is not just someone who runs around setting fire to people to prove how evil he is. That's a psychopath, and while some psychos can be interesting, most are not. (And in actual comics, the ones who are not deeper than that generally exist only to give the more bad-*** heroes someone they can kill with a clear conscience.) Interesting villains are ones that have a reason for what they're doing, and/or their own moral code.
Batman: the Animated Series was pretty good at taking silly, throw away bad guys and making them credible, by making them *relatable.* Mr. Freeze became a dark reflection of Batman - an example of what can happen when obsession and the need for revenge overwhelm a person's humanity, and a glimpse at what Batman could easily become with just a little push in the wrong direction. As opposed to a goofy dingbat that froze people because that was his gimmick. And when the audience sees *why* Mr Freeze is willing to destroy half the city to kill one man, almost anyone can understand why he feels that way.
An easy villain is one that the hero can throw into a fusion reactor without feeling bad. A *good* villain is one that can cause the hero to question everything they believe in. One that puts the hero, and the audience, in the uncomfortable position of having to consider, even for a moment, that the villain may have a point. Darkseid is an easy villain. Heath Ledger's Joker is a *good* one. His basic motivation would seem to be "he's crazy." But it's more than that. He wants to prove that everyone is wrong. People aren't good and honest and kind. They aren't better than he is. Not random people, not Harvey Dent, not even Batman. Push them hard enough, and you can make anyone crazy. You can make anyone a killer. And he almost wins.
*Edit* And the problem is, most of the writing in CoV casts you as an easy villain. You get bossed around by loonies like Dr. Creed and Psymon Omega. You work as a random thug for most of the rest. You aren't even allowed to oppose Lord Recluse because he's an obvious cretin and lunatic, you're only allowed when it's clear that his plan would kill you and destroy the world. Which would be an incovenience because that's where you keep all your stuff.
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The devs can only do so much with storyline writing. We the players have to come up with the actual motivations for our characters. Just looking on the surface, it might appear your just some random thug (with super powers). So delve deeper into your character's psychology. WHY is your character willing to do all this? Perhaps it's for the money. Perhaps your collecting favors owed. Perhaps you just want to see the world burn. Perhaps your just making sure no one else destroyes the world before you can conquer it. Or maybe your secretly undermining them all.|
Originally Posted by ShadowsBetween
*Edit* And the problem is, most of the writing in CoV casts you as an easy villain. You get bossed around by loonies like Dr. Creed and Psymon Omega. You work as a random thug for most of the rest. You aren't even allowed to oppose Lord Recluse because he's an obvious cretin and lunatic, you're only allowed when it's clear that his plan would kill you and destroy the world. Which would be an incovenience because that's where you keep all your stuff.
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As for why we put up with Lord Recluse... One newspaper mission does a great job of explaining it. Someone killed an abitor and made it look like you. So why are you going after the real killer?
"It's not that your afraid of the Abitors. You'd just rather they not interfere with your plans right now... by going back in time and killing your parents before you were born"
Seems like a pretty good reason to me.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
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Or perhaps it's simply that, short of doing nothing but paper missions or AE missions I wrote myself, it's almost impossible to avoid this sort of thing without knowing all the missions in advance. Because *most* of them are written that way. There are quite a few contacts that my main villain would simply kill outright for the good of all concerned if this was a freeform RPG with an actual game master. My villain is the type that is mostly self-centered, rather than baby eating evil, so killing the psychos like that one in Cap or that obvious Rikti spy would be doing everyone a favor. Mechanically though, that character also ended up doing both sets of missions, because I had no idea what they were at the start, and there's no good way to opt out other than refusing to finish the story arc. And realistically, I as a player shouldn't have to go look up everything in some guide somewhere just to get missions that "fit" my character.|
Originally Posted by Madam_Enigma
So delve deeper into your character's psychology. WHY is your character willing to do all this? Perhaps it's for the money. Perhaps your collecting favors owed. Perhaps you just want to see the world burn.
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Going Rogue might fix some of this - they'll either have to provide some way to permanently abort story arcs, or they'll have to put a big stamp on the front saying "Warning, EVIL POINTS included."
*Edit* And the reason given for "fearing" the Arbiters is a joke. If it was that easy, then why don't they just vanish you the moment you balk at being Recluses' loyal little stooge? Instead of, you know, letting you get away and jump around in time and rip his face off. (Or in the alternate future you're trying to avoid, killing every living thing, including them.)
*Edited Edit* Heck, why don't they earn themselves some real brownie points and go back to just before States and Recluse found the well, and make sure Statesman has an accident? Like falling down a flight of bullets and landing on a grenade.
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The problem there is... a "good" villain is going to be a foil to a hero. The Joker wouldn't be near as interesting without Batman. This will hold true to just about any villain you can name off the top of your head... Excepting a few anti-heroes, they all play off 'their' hero/es to make them memorable.|
Originally Posted by ShadowsBetween
An easy villain is one that the hero can throw into a fusion reactor without feeling bad. A *good* villain is one that can cause the hero to question everything they believe in.
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You can't do that in an MMO. Even if I make a Hero and Villain that are supposed to be connected in that way, they can never really meet or fight. We can't play off of any of the signature heroes... they simply don't show up often enough to do so, even if only in your mind. This is simply the truth about CoV - You can never play a truly memorable villain as you can never have a heroic rival.
Does that excuse the bad writing? No. They could have easily worded the contacts dialogue better, to make motivations clearer and/or make it seem like you characters are the driving force, not the contact.
-This Space Intentionally Left Blank.-
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And here we have the core of my issues with villainside writing. Yes, they basically had to stick with a contact system. And there do have to be some constraints on the content, so if your villain's concept is 'he just wants to freeze the world, so anything other than that doesn't interest him,' then you're probably not going to work out too well.|
Originally Posted by OneWhoBinds
Does that excuse the bad writing? No. They could have easily worded the contacts dialogue better, to make motivations clearer and/or make it seem like you characters are the driving force, not the contact.
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If they'd just reworked things to include some vague hints that helping X contact will further your plans, and a lot less 'You! Fetch me these psychic rocks!' or 'You crack your knuckles. Boy, you sure love hurting people,' I'd feel less marginalized on a lot of my villains. It would still make it hard to play a villain with some actual principles, so it'd be nice to add the ability to just up and abandon a contact or something, but that would solve some of the annoying, easily avoidable aspects. And then we just need to take a giant hammer to Arachnos...
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Originally Posted by GavinRuneblade
If you care about the roleplaying aspect of it enough to avoid missions, but not so much to be willing to rewrite the discussion for yourself, then that is the price you are choosing to pay.
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That's really the core of my whole problem here. Everything I've complained about could have largely been avoided, but they didn't put in the effort. Have the contacts work for me, not vice-versa, or at least hint that I'm getting something out of it. Let me easily abandon contacts or arcs that don't work with my concept, or better yet, give me some indication ahead of time so that I never run into them in the first place (whoever introduced my principled megalomaniac to Westin Phipps has issues.) Let me play a villain in my own right instead of defaulting to Arachnos Flunkie #3659. All of these are within the engine's grasp, and they didn't do them. And that is what infuriates me.
Having Vengeance and Fallout slotted for recharge means never having to say you're sorry.
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Let me try explaining it again. We can't change how the story arcs are scripted. That is already set in virtual stone. What we can do is roleplay. It is an MMORPG after all. Your character is doing all these jobs for everyone else. YOU create the reason your character is willing to do everyone else's dirty work. And it's not just "because that's the way the contact is scripted" either. Why does Poison Bloom do so? Because she is a mercenary who sells her services. Why does Father Bone do so? Because it amuses him to watch the petty squables that take place. He's a depowered demon, so takes his fun where he can. |
Originally Posted by ShadowsBetween
Or perhaps it's simply that, short of doing nothing but paper missions or AE missions I wrote myself, it's almost impossible to avoid this sort of thing without knowing all the missions in advance. Because *most* of them are written that way. There are quite a few contacts that my main villain would simply kill outright for the good of all concerned if this was a freeform RPG with an actual game master. My villain is the type that is mostly self-centered, rather than baby eating evil, so killing the psychos like that one in Cap or that obvious Rikti spy would be doing everyone a favor. Mechanically though, that character also ended up doing both sets of missions, because I had no idea what they were at the start, and there's no good way to opt out other than refusing to finish the story arc. And realistically, I as a player shouldn't have to go look up everything in some guide somewhere just to get missions that "fit" my character.
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So, what is the Role Play reason behind your character? The developers can't decide that for you, only you can create this.
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| Going Rogue might fix some of this - they'll either have to provide some way to permanently abort story arcs, or they'll have to put a big stamp on the front saying "Warning, EVIL POINTS included." |
A hint, my misunderstood hero took the mission and then let her broadcast. He is a hero, even if the world brands him a villain.
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| *Edit* And the reason given for "fearing" the Arbiters is a joke. If it was that easy, then why don't they just vanish you the moment you balk at being Recluses' loyal little stooge? Instead of, you know, letting you get away and jump around in time and rip his face off. (Or in the alternate future you're trying to avoid, killing every living thing, including them.) |
Time travel is tricky stuff. You go back in time due to Event Y to change it in your favor. But your doing so requires event Y to not go in your favor. If it went in your favor, you had no cause to go back to change it. Such a time paradox would either negate it's self, or could possibly do damage to the time stream. It's why Recluse isn't monkeying with the future of Earth Prime. Rather he's trying to dominate the future of a paralel earth which he hopes will force events in Earth Prime to lean towards that eventual victory.
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| *Edited Edit* Heck, why don't they earn themselves some real brownie points and go back to just before States and Recluse found the well, and make sure Statesman has an accident? Like falling down a flight of bullets and landing on a grenade. |
If you were Lord Recluse, would you permit anyone to mess with traveling into the past, knowing that it could jeopardize your very existence?
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
I don't know about you Kelenar, but I frequently felt that missions hero side drop the ball for motivation. I want my hero to be the center of the stage. I want to be the one tracking down clues and finding leads. Instead it's always "Hey, you. Go do this because I say so. It's for a good cause."
When digging up the dirt on Countess Crey I want to be the one who comes up with the plan. I want to be the one who figures out what's going on with the Carnies. Instead it's always "Hey, I know what's happening, so you need to go do this task for me."
Doesn't that ruin the idea that your character is a skilled detective for example? Superman doesn't deal with other people telling him where to go to fight the badguys (unless you mean the justice league). Comish Gordan doesn't tell Batman what to do, he asks for help. The police in Central City don't order Flash to go stop the badguys. Rather, he goes to the police to see what they have on the person IF he can't figure it out himself. Very rarely do guys like Spiderman get ordered around. Rather they do the digging on their own.
But in CoH we are the flunkies of every single concerned citizen. They don't just give us tips. They do everything but beat the snot out of the criminals for us. And the writing of the missions always assumes you bring them in alive. Not all 'heroes' will capture the criminals. Some go for the kill. Do you think Punisher arrests his enemies? No, but CoH doesn't give you the option. So you have to overlook or flat out ignore every mention of arresting the bad guys.
See, the same argument can be said for heroes.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
QR to OP;
I object more to being treated like a lackey, servant or minion throughout nearly all, if not indeed ALL, of my villanous career.
The I17 missions were the FIRST time I got treated like the guy someone ELSE wanted to work FOR. That, to me, was win.
Heroes getting treated like that? Ok, I can swallow that. The contacts are asking you to do something you signed up to do; become a Hero and save people. That works.
Villain side? I would have shot nearly half the contacts by now, for daring to talk to me like they do. On a good number of characters.
And don't get me started on VEATs. Please. Just don't. It hurts >_>