What keeps you away from AE arcs?
By
Acemace,
Posted on: 2010-12-11 19:09 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
I like the idea of AE arcs. I don't actually play them in practice. Why not? Hmmm.
1. The group I normally team with doesn't. If they did, I would.
2. When I did run them, I got tired of the bad ones.
3. Maybe just my imagination, but it feels harder to get a good AE team than a good team for regular content.
4. When I solo lately, I tend to be after purples/shards or trying to complete specific Dev content just for the sake of having done it (getting all those little stars in Ourorboros, badge missions, etc).
The number one reason is because I'm just tagging along with other folks most of the time, and that's not what they're doing. So why aren't they? I think some are gun shy, from having hit bad arcs. Some perceive AE content as harder, or less rewarding. Some particularly enjoy certain arcs in the regular content and want to do them. I could probably push for an AE night now and then, but I'd need to find decent missions first, level appropriate. I used to keep a list of arcs which had won awards and so on, but they didn't always work out. Often they were too hard for our level. Also, story telling is just hard to do with a team, and hardly seems worthwhile.
Maybe I'll start trying to solo some AE missions with my newest alt, if I can find good low level arcs.
Avatar: "Cheeky Jack O Lantern" by dimarie
Quote:
This! And add a function where the creator himself can flagg a arc as 'Farm'. Or make the hidden once still accessable if you know the ID. So you can hold your farm hidden while still able to play it.|
Originally Posted by Clave_Dark_5
Remember how people would whine about all the good names being taken and suggest the devs free up names from inactive accounts and the devs said no? They don't want to risk alienating returning players with that. I'm guessing that same thiking would apply here.
Rather than unpublish, they could mark all - ALL - arcs with a 'do not show in search' and send every author a message that asks them to go to AE, PLEASE make sure the arc is playing 'right', "maybe give it a once-over", and then click a button to make it visible in search again. Combine that with a "works in progress do not show in search" function and I think that's clear the search (which needs its own help too, yes) of a lot of dross, without annoying people previous authors who came back and wondered where the arc they spent HOURS on got to. And yes, switch to a "like"-only system of rating an arc. Showing previous player comments would be nice too. |
One big thing that would help instantly without too much hassle would be to use this 'hidden' tag to instantly hide all content in the AE that is flagged by the system as 'unplayable'. If your arc for whatever reason cannot be played it should not appear in any search!
Proud owner of an arc started out in Beta and grieved down by farmers to 4 stars. Even though it has been reshaped and retouched for months. The amound of work is incredible and a 15 min created farm has a higher rating!
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Quote:
The biggest reason I don't run MA arcs isn't actually any one reason. It's a compound mixture of many things: the only AE teams that seem to run are farms, finding a good arc is difficult (the ratings system is useless--I've run many a "5-star" arc that was nothing but click the glowie or some other idiocy); once you do find a good arc, the same problem develops that has nothing to do with AE and comes back to human nature (even the bestest, most funnest things evah get old); baddy balance is a problem in many arcs (you can always tell when an author runs only scrappers or tanks and what kinds of powersets s/he finds most challenging on that AT--key phrase being "on that AT"); the ticket system is not an incentive to do anything in AE and seems designed to ensure that people have to pick it over regular content or vice versa (it just doesn't seem to mix well with the "regular" reward system: can only use tickets in MA and only to get what is on the menu, mostly other AE stuff, etc. If you do get salvage, you then must run over to ww's to get something you really want or to base/univ to craft what you really want, etc. It's an added step that doesn't pay off in any real way--unless you never leave AE, I guess, or are a market player). If purps dropped, I'd be in there a lot more. Heh.). |
Originally Posted by Bubbawheat
For those of you that do find and play actual story arcs in the AE, thank you. But for the many that either don't, or have stopped. What is the biggest reason that keeps you away from the AE building? Can't find the good arc from all the farms and junk? No chances for purples/Incarnate shards outside of Dev Choice arcs? Not really aware of AE at all?
And a second question, what's something that *would* bring you into the AE building to try out an arc? [tl;dr mini-rant below, feel free to ignore] The MA/AE community feels like a dying breed. Authors find it hard to get plays on new arcs. Five star arcs get downrated to four stars where they pretty much never get played again. It feels like the devs have abandoned it, handing out only 2-3 Dev Choice awards in a year, Hall of Fame is practically impossible to reach, the search engine for finding an arc is terrible, and the ratings system and sorting system just plain doesn't work the way its intended. And the only time the AE gets any real attention is for the exploits. I'm sure everyone knows the term "monkey farm", but how many people know the term "Teen Phalanx Forever"? Even doing something to highlight the best arcs of the year has largely been ignored, when the year before it was a rousing success. Even the third Aeon Challenge, the last dev-supported event only created a single new Dev Choice arc, when the last two challenges created three. And those challenges have been the *only* source for new Dev Choice arcs recently. Where's the incentive? Edit: Those who want to find good arcs to play, sorted by level range and theme: Go Here |
But at the end of the day, it's not any one of those things, so no fix on one would suddenly make me salivate at the thought of running AE content. I think that once the shiny wore off, people who weren't really inclined to the creative process of creating arcs or to the farming process of power leveling or amassing fortunes just sort of drifted back to what they like best. This is bad news for the players who really wanted MA to offer good alternative story lines of course (I have no idea how RP groups use MA, so can't comment, but I imagine they'd have a field day in there). But the waning interest of the majority was bound to happen and happens with all new content (it's getting harder to find teams in Praetoria and to get leagues going for iTrials, too).
I think that's what is best about COH/COV, though, that it can accommodate so many different player interests, passions, and play styles (even if the devs don't always want it to, heh).
[edit: now if I could trade tickets for Hero Merits or A-merits . . . well, sure, that would do the trick. Doing the same hero tips and/or trials, like anything, gets old, so being able to get something yummy from AE would add an alternative for when I'm just burned out on the same tips mishes and trials.]
I always imagine that the experience gained from AE missions are less than normal story arcs, is it at enemies and/or the story XP bonus you get at the end.
Maybe i'm wrong, though.
I've mentioned this on occasion, but one way to deal with custom critter balance would be to implement hybrid critters - ones that functionally use existing mobs, but allow for visual customization of player-created mobs.
Still need to deal with the ratings system, though, as well as the effort of finding good arcs. One way to do that might be to enable "peeking" into the arc - essentially allowing the player to read the text and goals without having to start and play the arc itself - it would allow the player to get an idea of the writing quality at a glance.
Difficulty has kept me out of a lot of arcs. I've been against difficulty increases generally in COH, and the AE foes typically are too difficult or tend to ignore the things brought to the table by characters I like (controllers) and/or throw mezzes around too much. This is independent of my opinion of difficulty sliders (of which I generally approve).
Anyway, not every arc does it, but enough do that I've kinda given up. Mostly.
Lewis
Random AT Generation!
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Just a small update here, but ever since I found this thread and read through it, I've started to play AE arcs more. Although I've not been using them as a separate path to leveling, Policewoman's suggested thread for alternate contact missions was great for finding enjoyable story arcs.
The Incarnate system.
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