City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

It's all about me, me, me!

Adeon Hawkwood

By Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2010-10-18 06:27 in CoH and CoV General Discussions

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by The Hound View Post
Strangely enough, neither Marchand nor Scott will give you any prompts for undercover missions unless you're introduced to both contacts, like Mr. G and Interrogator Kang in Imperial City for Loyalists.
Not true.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by BenRGamer View Post
Picking a third option, wouldn't work. Not due to engine limitations, but it simply wouldn't work in the story.

You can't 'refuse to take sides' in an all-encompassing civil war without making everybody mad at you because you look like a sympathizer for the other side.

For example, in the Cleopatra/Washington scenario, you can't not pick a moderate choice, Washington would report you if you didn't kill him and you'd get hunted down as a Resistance spy regardless. And Cleopatra would likely send Marauder after you if you and Washington if you didn't kill her.

It's all or nothing in these stories, there is simple, obvious answer. It's supposed to be a hard choice.
That's nonsense. There's always a third option. For instance, why can't I kill BOTH Washington and Cleopatra and claim I came in after they'd killed each other? I get to stay a Loyalist because, eh, who'll know? And at the same time, I get to stick it to the man for forcing me to make a hard choice, because I'm just a dick like that.

Or how about this? I walk and let them fight each other. Then Cleopatra survives and turns out to not be a jerk. She recognises I helped her by not helping Washington and cuts me in on the deal. Everybody wins. Or I knock them both out, tie them up and appeal to their senses. Who knows, maybe I can turn Washington over to the resistance, or otherwise turn Cleo around to the Loyalist cause. How come Commander Shepard could always do that sort of thing, but I never get the chance to?

And even all that said, there IS a third side: The Syndicate. Cole's men have been trying to hunt them down for how long now and they've done a little damage to the organisation. Why bother with the Loyalists or the Resistance when the Syndicate have proven that they can take care of themselves, and both Tub Chi and Wu Yin offer to take care of me, too. Well, of course, deus ex machina says they have to work for the Resistance because the Syndicate don't exist as a faction, but if they did, this wouldn't be necessary. At all. The Syndicate wouldn't need to be working with the Resistance as a plot device to make their morality choices work if they actually had their own faction.

That this "can't" work is provably wrong and shortsighted, to boot. Once again - this works just fine with the Power arcs, as I've never been asked to make any hard choices so far. All of them were pretty straightforward. Furthermore, it very much "can" because it's a question of writing and storytelling. There are ways to talk around these limitations, provided Going Rogue's agenda doesn't get in the way.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
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.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
The Cleo vs Washington choice seems a pretty deliberate way for the devs to show just how brutal Praetorian society is compared to the real world on Primal Earth - like while you're playing around at that level blue side, David Wincott is asking you to help arrest a few Outcasts - but in Praetoria, the game's inviting you to decide who you'd prefer to murder.
And in the Rogue Isles, I'm delivering people to the Vahzilok, destroying a young heroine's life, helping a mad scientist experiment on people and helping a hateful, spiteful, bitter jerk enact his pointless vendetta. Cleopatra vs. Washington is small fires compared to that. Only difference is it pretends to present a choice, only it doesn't, really. Not even as much choice as capturing Miss Francine, or not, as the case may be.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
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.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
There are ways to talk around these limitations, provided Going Rogue's agenda doesn't get in the way.
It would make it much harder to create content - that's why they force the two factions in Praetoria to go to Primal Earth at 20, because that means they can create things like the Apex and Tin Man TFs that everyone can join in on.
A simple set-up of players vs Tyrant means they can give content that's open to everyone - just like players vs Rikti, for example.

@Golden Girl

City of Heroes comics and artwork

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
And in the Rogue Isles, I'm delivering people to the Vahzilok, destroying a young heroine's life, helping a mad scientist experiment on people and helping a hateful, spiteful, bitter jerk enact his pointless vendetta. Cleopatra vs. Washington is small fires compared to that. Only difference is it pretends to present a choice, only it doesn't, really. Not even as much choice as capturing Miss Francine, or not, as the case may be.
But does all that evil stuff happen at such a low level red side?

@Golden Girl

City of Heroes comics and artwork

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
The Cleo vs Washington choice seems a pretty deliberate way for the devs to show just how brutal Praetorian society is compared to the real world on Primal Earth - like while you're playing around at that level blue side, David Wincott is asking you to help arrest a few Outcasts - but in Praetoria, the game's inviting you to decide who you'd prefer to murder.

Well its kind of hard to argue against that point without huge spoilers of the whole arc and what the future arcs reveal








But your wrong

@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by EU_Damz View Post
But your wrong
1. You wanted you're.
2. It's Golden Girl. She's always wrong.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by EU_Damz View Post
Well its kind of hard to argue against that point without huge spoilers of the whole arc and what the future arcs reveal
I'm not sure you got my point

@Golden Girl

City of Heroes comics and artwork

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
That's nonsense. There's always a third option. For instance, why can't I kill BOTH Washington and Cleopatra and claim I came in after they'd killed each other? I get to stay a Loyalist because, eh, who'll know? And at the same time, I get to stick it to the man for forcing me to make a hard choice, because I'm just a dick like that.

Or how about this? I walk and let them fight each other. Then Cleopatra survives and turns out to not be a jerk. She recognises I helped her by not helping Washington and cuts me in on the deal. Everybody wins. Or I knock them both out, tie them up and appeal to their senses. Who knows, maybe I can turn Washington over to the resistance, or otherwise turn Cleo around to the Loyalist cause. How come Commander Shepard could always do that sort of thing, but I never get the chance to?

And even all that said, there IS a third side: The Syndicate. Cole's men have been trying to hunt them down for how long now and they've done a little damage to the organisation. Why bother with the Loyalists or the Resistance when the Syndicate have proven that they can take care of themselves, and both Tub Chi and Wu Yin offer to take care of me, too. Well, of course, deus ex machina says they have to work for the Resistance because the Syndicate don't exist as a faction, but if they did, this wouldn't be necessary. At all. The Syndicate wouldn't need to be working with the Resistance as a plot device to make their morality choices work if they actually had their own faction.

That this "can't" work is provably wrong and shortsighted, to boot. Once again - this works just fine with the Power arcs, as I've never been asked to make any hard choices so far. All of them were pretty straightforward. Furthermore, it very much "can" because it's a question of writing and storytelling. There are ways to talk around these limitations, provided Going Rogue's agenda doesn't get in the way.
I'm not saying that there can't be a third faction (that's likely what the Praetorian Epic Archetype is going to be) what I'm saying is that it would hurt the story as a whole if there was a less extreme (and thus less morally ambiguous) choice in the alignment missions.

It would turn it into what GG was saying it is now. A storyline with an obvious hero path, and make the story as a whole more black and white.

You can't have a test of faith when there's an easy out, that's simply refusing to deal with the hard choices.

 

Posted

Like I was saying earlier, the best way to improve the storyline of Praetoria wouldn't be to make one of the choices less extreme, but to expand on exactly why a choice this extreme has to happen and why a more moderate option simply isn't feasible or available.

 

Posted

I personally think that the "Moral choices" in Praetoria are currently in the wrong arcs. So far I've not reached one where "Join the other side" seems acceptable at that very juncture. I was particularly annoyed with the Crusaders, who did horrible things, but I wasn't allowed to leave until the moral choice for the reasons of "Why should the Resistance get the glory for my work?" rather than "These people are freaking insane." about two mission arcs ago.

 

Posted

It's assumed that you're essentially a bad person when you choose to do Crusader and Power arcs while it's assumed you're a good person when you choose to do the Warden and Responsibility arcs and the choices you get in Morality missions reflect that. The good guy morality missions are usually presented as two ways you are trying to help people that both have undesirable consequences whereas in the bad guy arcs it's more about what direction you want to develop your power and influence in.

If your character is outraged by what the Crusaders are doing, the simple option is to stop doing their story arcs and either go back to the Wardens or chat up the first contact of a Responsibility chain. Remember, you can do the Responsibility story-arcs regardless of your alignment.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by BenRGamer View Post
Like I was saying earlier, the best way to improve the storyline of Praetoria wouldn't be to make one of the choices less extreme, but to expand on exactly why a choice this extreme has to happen and why a more moderate option simply isn't feasible or available.
But they already seem to do that - like the Cleo vs Washington one is pretty clear-cut - if both of them live, then one of them is going to cause a lot of problems - so one of them has to be killed.

@Golden Girl

City of Heroes comics and artwork

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Steampunkette View Post
Actually, It's mostly me being upset that there are no other choices.

I realize it's a limitation of the medium, but it should be possible to choose something between "Terrible Horror" and "Horrible Horror" as a third option. A more "Moderate" choice where you can choose to disable the plant, maybe spike the batch of mind-control drug with a chemical bonder which inhibits it's abilities and also increases the resistance against that chemical for all who consume it...

Or killing neither Cleopatra or Washington, but arresting her even at the cost of subduing him to take her before the courts for her crimes, regardless of the risks.

Or the option to sabotage the Seer network and -still- arrest Yin for his various crimes against the people of Praetoria.

A number of "Moderate" Morality choices would make Praetoria a more pleasant place to play, I think. There are no true "Heroes" in Praetoria. The Responsible Loyalists commit just as many infractions as the Wardens, they just affect a different number of people with their actions.

-Rachel-

I got the feeling that part of the lesson your heroic characters are supposed to learn in Praetoria is that neither side in this fight is entirely in the right. You find that if you want to take up the truly just cause, you have to strike out on your own.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
But they already seem to do that - like the Cleo vs Washington one is pretty clear-cut - if both of them live, then one of them is going to cause a lot of problems - so one of them has to be killed.
I mean in the later ones, mainly, like the Morality Choice with the Enriche Bottling Plant.

Where Steampunkette was saying why not just expose it, or sabotage that one part without blowing it all up. The game should make it clear why that's not feasible.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Eiko-chan View Post
1. You wanted you're.
2. It's Golden Girl. She's always wrong.

1. No
2. No
3.

@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

 

Posted

But anyway, back on the topic of the Power Arc, it has almost all of my favorite missions in Praetoria.

The various 1 on 1 matches in Reese's arc, the Hunt Down Shen mission, the you vs 100 Destroyers mission, my two favorite Morality missions (The Reese one and the one where you can talk to Emperor Cole)

The only other mission that I can think of off the top of my head that I would consider a favorite is the Hunt Down Vanessa DeVore bossfight.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Golden Girl View Post
But they already seem to do that - like the Cleo vs Washington one is pretty clear-cut - if both of them live, then one of them is going to cause a lot of problems - so one of them has to be killed.

So if your a hero what option would you chose? If you keep both alive they will cause a LOT of problems and in your words, one has to die [xp!!!!!!]

Side note: I was kind of hoping to Maelstrom to smash through the window during the cutscene and take them both out as a form of introduction to you

@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

 

Posted

Quote:
The only other mission that I can think of off the top of my head that I would consider a favorite is the Hunt Down Vanessa DeVore bossfight.
Action wise, the defend TPN mission is the best. But for storywise i agree on the ones you said

@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

 

Posted

Oh, I meant actionwise. That bossfight was pretty fun.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by BenRGamer View Post
Oh, I meant actionwise. That bossfight was pretty fun.
Devore HAX!!! I want that power on one of my characters: "Here, fight a whole lot of me while I hide in the corner!"

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Divus View Post
Devore HAX!!! I want that power on one of my characters: "Here, fight a whole lot of me while I hide in the corner!"

Its what the illusion power [Decoys] should have been!

@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Leo_G View Post
Lol yeah, you need an editor, Sam. To help trim your posts a bit
(I'm an editor and I don't see much to trim there. Yes it's long-ish for a forum post but not meandering or loaded with unnecessary info. Works for me as-is.)