I Sing The Praises of First Ward
First: I love First Ward.
Second: I'm glad a played through it with a Praetorian, because I was invested in reaching the resolution. If had been playing a Primal character, I would had run screaming back, Primal about halfway end and start (at least in my head) lobbying for Praetoria to be magically sealed off from Primal Earth. If that can't be done: nuke it to ashes.
Hell, I know a couple of my characters would be looking to join Malta.
Third: It was an emotionally draining experience. I think I am going to hold off repeating it until I roll a new Praetorian so I can take him from Praetoria, to First Ward and then Primal because I don't think Praetoria city and its secrets would send him away screaming, but First Ward, and particularly the fate of the Forlorn, will. That alone was enough to make me queasy.
Third: It was an emotionally draining experience. I think I am going to hold off repeating it until I roll a new Praetorian so I can take him from Praetoria, to First Ward and then Primal because I don't think Praetoria city and its secrets would send him away screaming, but First Ward, and particularly the fate of the Forlorn, will. That alone was enough to make me queasy.
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I've often said that drama in games needs to be handled carefully, because unlike in real life, in a game people have the option to just stop playing, or as I did, just click through the mission objectives. The point of drama should be to keep people engaged, not to make us feel like we have to distance ourselves from events. Real life drama can't alienate people because people HAVE to deal with it. But when fictional drama gets too heavy, I flip the channel.
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.
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To be clear, I was playing a hero and I like to stay "in character" with his decisions. (This is another reason I don't like to team. It sometimes pisses people off that I don't always do the "smart" thing.) There is no way in hell my guy would have ever enslaved Katie for any reason. Even if it meant stopping the furies would be harder, even if she was treating him like crap. And I didn't like having no option. Not one little bit. First enslaving her and then not going back for her was deeply disturbing. I appreciate you were doubtless *trying* to provoke an emotional response. Well, you got one. And not one I enjoyed.
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My characters at Virtueverse
Faces of the City
It occurs to me that a lot of the newer concept is written to be played BY THE PLAYER much more so than by the actual character. It's hard to explain exactly why, but this is the sort of thing you see in choose your own adventure games that you're only really supposed to play once, and even more so ones that have a specific good and evil karma system like Mass Effect. It's really not intended to be at all accommodating to any specific character who isn't being written to fit events on the fly. And as content written for games intended to only be played once, I'm only really going to play the First Ward once.
Here's the thing: Even if I had a charter who fit events perfectly, the story is still so heavy and so dark and so devoid of a satisfying resolution that I don't WANT to play though that content again. Hell, if I knew what I were in for, I probably wouldn't have played through it even once. What's there is great, I must admit. The writing is top notch, the mysteries are very interesting, the characters are well-written, ignoring the complete derailment of established ones and the mood and atmosphere are expertly delivered. The problem is that this all comes together to form a story which honestly upset me on an emotional level, and since I don't play games to push myself out of my own comfort zone, I have no interest in being upset like that again. Maybe if there were a reasonable resolution or if the arc weren't so heavy-handed with the depressing plot points things may be different, but as it is, it's just way too heavy to run twice. And it's a shame, really - First Ward is a great arc, but it suffers for its own greatness by side-lining character concept and trading replayability for moody darkness. |
Because your priorities and what you want out of storytelling in gaming is so completely opposite mine.
Heck, i didn't even find First Ward that depressing. It's not Narutaru or anything.
Seconded. This part of the zone arc had a bad case of "But Thou Must". We're not even allowed to try anything else. |
"Men strunt �r strunt och snus �r snus
om ock i gyllne dosor.
Och rosor i ett sprucket krus
�r st�ndigt alltid rosor."
Still working my way through First Ward arcs... but they're very awesome. I think they do a great job of making you feel like what you're doing actually changes things. Plus, they're just interesting and fun, with interesting enemies.
![](http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc232/minty89/coh%20photos/banner3.jpg)
my lil RWZ Challenge vid
Working my Praetorian Mastermind through First Ward, originally a loyalist up until the final Responsibility moral choice. Man, the final choices in every arc *really* make you want to switch sides XD Was kind of disappointing since you're working for a particular goal following any specific path and then the final choice turns all that on its ear. But I digress.
I really really love the atmosphere of First Ward. It manages to capture perfectly what it is, a forsaken, destroyed city full of survivors scraping by, nasty things around every corner and, of course, the friggen Seed looming over everything. It's incredibly unsettling hearing the thing groaning overhead, more so to see it drifting by while I'm scurrying around trying to avoid its notice as I do my missions.
The factions and critters are varied and interesting, I like the style for the Carnivals and the Awakened and the Apparitions are a neat visual treat (oh and the Awakened Subjugators are *freaky*!)
I'm liking the story so far. I haven't completed the zone yet, just got the 2nd mission from the blind shamen.
I will have to echo a few comments from previous posters. The story is really well written, but it does feel like I'm being railroaded into avenues that only fit a particular character style. Obviously it can't cater to *everyone*, but since this is a continuation of the Praetorian setting that offered a *lot* of choice with 4 separate storylines you can play 2 ways (being able to 'spy'), it is kind of a stark contrast. It feels kind of like if you were suddenly forced to just do the Crusader storyline regardless of what other branches you were pursuing.
I definitely would have liked to see Alignment matter more. I agree with another poster earlier on that it was kind of surprising that the villain side contact is a member of the Carnival of War and immediately I'm set up to help out the Carnival of Light. I am still working my way through the story but so far after completing so much with the Compound the Carnival folk, War and Light alike, are just kind of relegated to the sideline after the initial friction. Honestly I don't know how often I plan to run this arc if it really just doesn't change regardless of what alignment you're playing as, be it Prime or Praetorian. I mean I guess we could just use the generi-contacts that offer repeatable missions to certain alignments to just screw around, but as was pointed out, there's no way to find them without looking it up on the wiki or just stumbling across them. So far I've managed to find the Generic (Vickers, I think), the Villain (Mr.... Coulard? Probably misspelling. Dude in the zoot suit outside the hospital) and... either the Hero or Loyalist, since my resistance mastermind and rogue blaster couldn't talk to her.
As I said, it does feel kind of odd coming out of normal Praetoria where alignment was pretty important and then just being put on this single track that didn't care about any of it, while continuing the plotlines established by the very thing it ignores.
I wouldn't mind additional arcs being added to the zone, or at least some parts that branch. Like Villains working for the Carnival of War, Loyalists helping with the D.U.S.T., etc.
It did also seem like the Carnival of Light came out of nowhere. I like their flavor and concept, but after running through normal Praetoria where we see so many different aspects of the resistance and loyalists to have an entire group that's pretty radically different (aside from Vanessa showing up as the 1st Res Trainer) show up suddenly. D.U.S.T feel like a logical extension of the PPD and T.E.S.T, whereas the carnivals are just entirely new (Not that that's really so bad given the different nature of First Ward).
Still, it's a pretty cool zone and if this is the quality we can expect from future content then I really am looking forward to it.
It did also seem like the Carnival of Light came out of nowhere. I like their flavor and concept, but after running through normal Praetoria where we see so many different aspects of the resistance and loyalists to have an entire group that's pretty radically different (aside from Vanessa showing up as the 1st Res Trainer) show up suddenly. D.U.S.T feel like a logical extension of the PPD and T.E.S.T, whereas the carnivals are just entirely new (Not that that's really so bad given the different nature of First Ward).
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But this doesn't answer the actual question as it pertains to First Ward and Praetorian Earth in general. Why are the Carnival of Light a carnival? On Primal Earth, the answer is actually simply - the Carnival of Shadows are a carnival because Primal Vanessa DeVore feeds on people's emotions, so it's natural for her organise events where people come to be entertained, thrilled and frightened. It also makes sense for the Carnival of Light to be a Carnival because this makes it easy for them to hide their activities, with people who've had their souls stolen simply believed to have been deeply affected, and where the women can wear masks all the time and the walking corpses don't stick out as much. The Carnival of Shadows being a travelling circus is just an extension of who and what they are and the convenience such a venue offers to villains of this type.
But why are the Carnival of LIGHT a carnival, aside from just for the sake of parity? They never act like a carnival, never act like entertainers. Especially in the First Ward, what purpose is there for a carnival to begin with? Oh, sure, most of the Carnies either act crazy or dress like jesters, but again - why? Why do they act crazy and goofy? Why do they act like circus performers... Really weird circus performers, since their gold and white clothes just stand out too much, and the misshapen masks with wings on the side are a bit much. I just can't follow the train of thought that saw former Midnight Club or Legacy Chain mytstics suddenly decide to dress up like clowns. Even Vanessa's own acolytes don't make sense to look like carnies, nor, as a point of fact, does Vanessa herself make sense to be in that ridiculous getup.
The Primal Earth Vanessa and her entourage make sense to BE a carnival because that actually is what they masquerade as. The Praetorian Vanessa and her Carnival, however, don't act like a carnival, so why do they dress partially like one and why are they called this? The story simply assumes that this should be obvious, and it really isn't.
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.
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But this doesn't answer the actual question as it pertains to First Ward and Praetorian Earth in general. Why are the Carnival of Light a carnival? On Primal Earth, the answer is actually simply - the Carnival of Shadows are a carnival because Primal Vanessa DeVore feeds on people's emotions, so it's natural for her organise events where people come to be entertained, thrilled and frightened. It also makes sense for the Carnival of Light to be a Carnival because this makes it easy for them to hide their activities, with people who've had their souls stolen simply believed to have been deeply affected, and where the women can wear masks all the time and the walking corpses don't stick out as much. The Carnival of Shadows being a travelling circus is just an extension of who and what they are and the convenience such a venue offers to villains of this type.
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Global name: @k26dp
We don't the the history of the CoL, or how they draw their power. Seems likely that the CoL started out the way it did for similar reasons as the CoS, that they are powered by emotions, though it seems likely that they "feed" in a more benign way than the CoS.
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See, the thing with the Primal Earth Carnival of Light is that they look and act like circus freaks. They wear actual stage clothes, they hold shows in circus tents and they always seem like they're just out for a spot of fun even when they're engaged in mortal kombat. There are a select few Carnival characters that sometimes do this, but for the most part the Carnival is as dark and angsty as the rest of Praetoria, and it just seems odd for it to BE a carnival to begin with. Maybe if we got more backstory then THAT would help, but the thing is... That kind of sort of should have been what the First Ward opens with, not something to leave for well after the end in another expansion.
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.
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Short answer: It's still the mask of Giovani Scaldi. And her parties were often considered "carnivals" do to their scale and... uhh... festive-ness.
Though it does make one wonder about the nature of Giovani Scaldi herself in Praetoria, since she was kind of evil in our world.
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My initial guesses would be that since Praetoria is very 'magic light', magicians and the like are more prone to being odd balls and misfits, at least for the lower levels. The higher echelons, it's likely symbolic or actually serves a purpose for the kind of magic they use, like it's a kind of defense against the nastiness around First Ward. Dunno, again just guesses but there are lots of things that would work.
But yeah, a little background would've been nice. We get an explanation for what the DUST are for and what they do, but we're not given an introduction by the Carnival even though they're the ones that initially bring us to First Ward.
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.
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Ok, I just got done with the arc, stopped Serene and all that.
Now that I've been through it, I don't really see why everyone is thinking how outright evil it was to plug Katie back into the network. She did revile it, yes, but it was the only way to save her from being taken by the Talons, which I think is a far far worse fate given their psychotic nature. The only other option would have been taking her out of First Ward entirely, but by then she'd have become part of the Talons and... well, you probably would have had to *kill* her to stop her, so I and my character were pretty okay doing the short term 'She'll kill me for this' bit to her than letting her become something she'd hate worse and probably have to be put down.
I think the mission's only fault is just missing one line of dialogue from Vanessa saying "Plug her in, it's the only way to prevent the Talons from taking her" or something. I didn't see it as that unreasonable, and checking her unconscious body beforehand tells you *why* you're doing it, though I could see why to some it would suddenly seem like you're just knocking her in and plugging her back in for no real reason.
And I have to agree it does seem to just kind of stop abruptly, you manage to stop Serene specifically but it doesn't really feel like you've stopped the troubles plaguing First Ward, at least the ones Serene was directly involved in. There definitely feels like there could, and should, be more to do, though I did like how long and involved the arc story was and it wraps up certain character's arcs certainly but by the end I don't really feel like I made any considerable impact, like some other arcs do.
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I will say one thing, though - First Ward is a lot more "hectic" than legacy contain, with always two separate streams of text to read and an objective which spawn one or two different streams of ambushes. And I don't like a hectic game.