I feel it should come back. Problem is that I think morale is way too low for people to stick with it. Also, I think it's a little petty for people to ask for plays but not play other people's arcs in return. I wonder if that's part of why it died off the last time. You shouldn't need to bribe people to get them to come along and it may backfire if you can't keep up a steady income stream for them.
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This is probably the biggest issue - between things not getting fixed, pages (and HoFs) of farms and the griefing, I'd think trying to get it going might be... rough. |
Originally Posted by Zamuel
I feel it should come back. Problem is that I think morale is way too low for people to stick with it.
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(Plus, though I've wanted to get into a few, I've got... er... arc'ers block, which is irritating on its own.)
I'd be interested, Bubba. Very similar in some ways with what I do with "Mission: AExcellence".
How many people would be interested in trying this out again?
I'd be in on it. I've only one arc, so not much to get plays on, but I do enjoy giving feedback.
Should I offer prizes to those who play/rate multiple arcs?
I'd hate to see people having to be bribed to play. For authors, the prize is having the opportunity to get more plays for your arc. For non-authors (or one-shot authors like me) the prize is finding more arcs to play. Besides, in this game, what can you really offer that is of any consequence?
How should I organize the arcs that want plays?
I'd suggest putting more than one arc out there per week, perhaps three, or perhaps a list of arcs for each month. That way, the author is not sitting out the week, and people like me, who really dislike certain types of arcs, have a choice of what to play without sitting out a week.
If weekly, first week, arcs chosen from among those who join whom you know will continue, at least for awhile, even after their arc gets played. Every arc on the list played by an author gets that author's arc 1 "point" for the random roll among arcs picked for the next week. These points would cumulate until the arc gets picked.
At this point, would a thread like this be asking for griefers?
Any act of putting your arc out there for the attention of others is a risk. I don't see this being any more attractive. You're not asking for random 5-starring of arcs. Just to 5-star the arc if you like it.
At this point, would it be wrong to ask for 5 stars or no rating at all?
I don't think so. Most story writers seem to agree the ratings system is broken. I give an arc 5-stars or nothing because it's not a rating system, it's a way to say "thanks for the entertainment, here's 25 tickets for your trouble".
I don't see a problem with basically saying that the position of the Club is that we don't want to participate in a broken ratings system, but we also are not telling you how to decide if an arc should get 5-stars or not. That's not the same as the club blindly 5-starring an arc just because it belongs to a club member.
@Doctor Gemini
Arc #271637 - Welcome to M.A.G.I. - An alternative first story arc for magic origin heroes. At Hero Registration you heard the jokes about Azuria always losing things. When she loses the entire M.A.G.I. vault, you are chosen to find it.
The ratings system is meaningless and you should treat it as such. I'd avoid any mention of ratings at all and just treat it as a way to trade plays and feedback. I'm boycotting ratings.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
I'd be in. 
I'm out of signature space! Arcs by Tubbius of Justice are HERE: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=218177
I'm in.
As for negativity, I think things like this help fight that. We need some postivity, to show that even with the issues AE faces, stories can and will be written. We will persevere.
I also agree to "five or none" when it comes to ratings, with this caveat: No hard feelings for no rating. It could mean you just don't feel it's a stellar arc, it could mean you don't like the ratings system in general, whatever. As long as you don't help downvote an arc, it's all good.
Global @Twoflower / MA Creator & Pro Indie Game Developer.
Mission Architect Works: DIY Laser Moonbase (Dev Choice!), An Internship in the Fine Art of Revenge (2009 MA Award Winner!) and many more! Plus Brand New Arcs for Issue 21!
I think I'd be in for this. I've been working on a major in-game "project" that is not related to AE, but I have been getting interested in getting back into AE-related stuff and this might be a good way to do it. (And I choose to fully embrace the false hope that MARTy will shut down AE farms for good, which, somehow, helps my interest level a little.)
I agree that the rating system is meaningless, but that doesn't stop me from smiling when I get a 5-star rating, and feel a tad blue when I get one that's lower than that (but I get over it quickly). I think making it author specific would be, IMO, the best option: whatever the author wishes is put in a note next to their arc listing (e.g. "no rates on this one, just feedback" or "5 stars or no rating" or "please rate normally", etc.) But I'm totally okay with a "global" agreement too.
M.A. Arcs
Intended for high level play: The Primus Trilogy (Arc #s 10931, 283821, 283825), "Freakshow U" (Arc #189073), Purification (Arc #352381, Dev's Choice!
)Intended for low level play: "Learning the Ropes" (Arc #100304), "Cracking Skulls" (Arc #115935), "The Lazarus Project" (Arc #124906)
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This is just my personal opinion, and I know many people disagree, but I feel that limiting people to only rating arcs 5 stars would effectively make this group a 5-star cartel that artificially inflates ratings.|
Originally Posted by Bubbawheat
At this point, would it be wrong to ask for 5 stars or no rating at all?
|
It's my belief that the rating system should be used as intended: to rate the quality of an arc based on a 1 to 5 scale. I realize that other players are trying to game the system by only rating 1 stars or 5 stars, but I don't feel this should impact the way I personally rate the quality of arcs.
@PW - Police Woman (50 AR/dev blaster on Liberty)
TALOS - PW war journal - alternate contact tree using MA story arcs
=VICE= "Give me Liberty, or give me debt!"
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I believe it would be a wonderful thing to create though I don't see it taking off for a few more months or longer. Why?|
Originally Posted by Bubbawheat
I'd like to start this up again, but would first like to get some discussion on the best way to go about it.
The Goal The goal is to get more plays, rates, and feedback on newer and/or lesser played arcs. I know there's tons of us out there that want plays and rates on our arcs. But in order to get plays/rates, you should be willing to give plays/rates. How to Achieve The real question is how to achieve this goal. In the previous incarnation, I would choose someone's arc each week and offer everyone to play/comment/rate it. Unfortunately depending on the arc it would only get 2-5 plays out of a group of 15 or so players. The Questions How many people would be interested in trying this out again? Should I offer prizes to those who play/rate multiple arcs? How should I organize the arcs that want plays? At this point, would a thread like this be asking for griefers? At this point, would it be wrong to ask for 5 stars or no rating at all? |
Well, with Issue 21, the devs created an anti exploit program called MARTy which I think will nerf AE farming BAD. MARTy will see that farmers can get 9,999 AE tickets in 5 minutes and allow players to go from level 1 to 50 in about 30 minutes. See MARTy will not tolerate that and will pull out it's nerf bat and auto nerf by not allowing them to get as many rewards once they get to a certain level in a certain time forcing it to take much longer to level up and will also not allow the missions to award as many tickets once they get a certain amount in a certain time.
This might allow the Devs to plug in some mechanics AE desperately needs. Like Ally's not leeching as much tickets and XP. I hate putting in Allies in my missions to help because players don't get any tickets or XP because it's killing everything in sight and not letting players get any rewards or I am stuck using only Force Field with no attack powers. LAME!
Another needed mechanic is more XP per mob kill. Players are better off spawning Mayhem missions and doing tip missions to get more rewards. Why waste time on an AE mission right now unless it's a farm you can do? These are issues the Devs are looking at I think. So in the end. I believe a club like this will be more successful in the future.
MARTy could be like ED's was when it came out with City of Villians. It will really screw up the game at first. But then in a few months or a little longer, the game will get WAY better. So I won't make the mistake I made when I quit the game because of ED's.
I apologize in advance, but I want to to disclose my post issue 21 plans anyways even though it's not the topic of this post. I plan to consolidate down to 2 active characters plus an ALT that was once uber, but got destroyed once EDs came out. I can't bring myself to delete her for sentimental reasons so I decided to keep her and look for ways to improve her. But I am doing this to save cost and time because I reason that I would want to 2-4 toons with all tier 4 incarnate powers rather than focus on getting 48 level 20-30s. I also want to focus on AE more by making my own story arcs and playing other peoples story arcs to level up while also doing tip missions and mayhem missions. So a club like this would suit me fine in the future because I have another outlet to look for more AE missions for me to play!
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You can believe anything you want and use it as it was intended, but that won't change the fact that it's not working as intended. That said, it's your right to rate as you see fit, though the net effect of which can be seen by looking at the first few pages of player rated arcs. The people who write farms do a much better job of promoting the arcs they enjoy. Is that "gaming the system" or just rewarding/promoting what they want to see more of in MA? |
Originally Posted by PoliceWoman
It's my belief that the rating system should be used as intended: to rate the quality of an arc based on a 1 to 5 scale.
|
WN
Check out one of my most recent arcs:
457506 - A Very Special Episode - An abandoned TV, a missing kid's TV show host and more
416951 - The Ms. Manners Task Force - More wacky villains, Wannabes. things in poor taste
or one of my other arcs including two 2010 Player's Choice Winners and an2009 Official AE Awards Nominee for Best Original Story
As it stands now, any person with access to a couple of accounts can, at will, destroy an arcs rating pushing it down hundreds if not thousands of pages where it will rarely if ever get played. As long as this is acceptable to do, I see little point in investing the 60-80 hours of work I've put into my most successful arcs into new ones just to have this happen to them. People with DC's or HoF at least have a realistic way for their arcs to be found by players, so should one of my arcs achieve either of these or should the rating system be overhauled as it desperately needs, I would consider getting back into MA authoring. As it stands now MA just depresses me. I played this game for enjoyment and the thing I enjoyed most and actively championed was MA which for me personally has been ruined.
WN
Check out one of my most recent arcs:
457506 - A Very Special Episode - An abandoned TV, a missing kid's TV show host and more
416951 - The Ms. Manners Task Force - More wacky villains, Wannabes. things in poor taste
or one of my other arcs including two 2010 Player's Choice Winners and an2009 Official AE Awards Nominee for Best Original Story
That's a shame, Wrong Number. If you're not interested in an Arc Club, that's fine. Thanks for considering it.
Moving on...
MARTy doesn't even enter into this discussion. We aren't making farms and he won't affect us at all. It'd be NICE if the Designated Helper changes thanks to MARTy watchdogging, but that's tangential to the point of the thread-- getting a club of authors together to try out each other's stories, yes?
As for ratings, we could RECOMMEND "five or none" for the reasons we've all cited, but I guess there's no way to enforce that. But whatever, you know? Let's just get in there and write and play for the love of story itself.
Looking forward to exchanging some ArcIDs!
Global @Twoflower / MA Creator & Pro Indie Game Developer.
Mission Architect Works: DIY Laser Moonbase (Dev Choice!), An Internship in the Fine Art of Revenge (2009 MA Award Winner!) and many more! Plus Brand New Arcs for Issue 21!
Cool cool. I'll start a new thread up pretty soon with more details.
I'd like to start this up again, but would first like to get some discussion on the best way to go about it.
The Goal
The goal is to get more plays, rates, and feedback on newer and/or lesser played arcs. I know there's tons of us out there that want plays and rates on our arcs. But in order to get plays/rates, you should be willing to give plays/rates.
How to Achieve
The real question is how to achieve this goal. In the previous incarnation, I would choose someone's arc each week and offer everyone to play/comment/rate it. Unfortunately depending on the arc it would only get 2-5 plays out of a group of 15 or so players.
The Questions
How many people would be interested in trying this out again?
Should I offer prizes to those who play/rate multiple arcs?
How should I organize the arcs that want plays?
At this point, would a thread like this be asking for griefers?
At this point, would it be wrong to ask for 5 stars or no rating at all?