The Path of Most Resisted - Journey through Legacy content

So with new level pacts disabled and not looking like they'll be re-opened anytime soon I thought to myself how it had been so long since I actually did the 1-20 levelling thing through natural progression as opposed to various methods of skipping past it from PLing myself via Radio/Paper/AE missions to joining others helping PL through RWZ repeatables.

I begin my content run by making my Staff Electric Armour Brute, Star Kat and load her up with my veteran tools of the trade: Return to Battle, Inner Inspiration but foregoing the prestige powers: Sands, NemeStaff, Blackwand.

So after getting past the newer Atlas arcs, level 7 with not too much trouble, I've started going back and levelling my new staffie through some of the legacy content starting with the old punching ground: the Hollows (yeah, thanks Synapse). After using the Find Contact button I was given two choices: Matthew Habashy (Whuuuu?) and good old David Wincott. So one choice really since I finished Atlas and rescued Dana. Teleport activate.

Hello David. What's that? After 7 years the Outcasts are still a problem? Wait, Sammy fell down the cave? Off we go for some old-fashioned hunting. Except: where the PANCAKE are they? Hunt 10 Outcasts and I get Hellions, Trolls, Lost, Skulls. After sweeping enough I find a couple of mobs on the south side of David and finish. Now it's the Trolls turn.... okay, now they decide to hide. Dammit. Found them eventually and now the real fun begins: attack the Outcasts' bases... oh and Meg Mason is waiting for me to talk to later. Two bases later I'm done and on to Flux.

Ah Flux, I remember when you used to be hidden in that corner and no-one could find you but that was the beauty of it: you're an undercover agent. Maybe they can tuck you back in since your waypoint is an arrow-in-an-arrow and you have a giant floating coin above your head. But I know what you hold. Yours is the arc that gave me so much frustration, that punished so many, so easily and after a few missions of beating up your "friends" I soon find his location: Frostfire.

It's at this point I noticed something: that's some bland mission text. After coming off Atlas using colours for the significant bad guys or orangetext for highlighting placenames; only the mission headers really stand out at this point. But mission awaits and I know my Star Kat can't take on Frostfire along so I draft in my Time/beam Mender in to aid her in her battle. Even though Star Kat was doing most of the damage dealing; Mender Sequent's buffs and debuffs were helping take the edge off the 2-man mobs. With just a couple of light insps and Sequent in tow we plough through to Frostfire and he goes down like a sack of hammers. Afterwards: Sequent Ouro-ports out and Flux introduces me to Julius the Troll.

It's a shame Julius. For years I never knew your name. I levelled past you in the days of yore and I was often recruited to teams who were ahead of me. I didn't place value at the time and I missed out on you. But no more. Once I learned there was a story arc behind the entire Hollows I make it a point of trying to get all of you done. So here we go...

... and then we're done. Couple of hunt missions against Trolls in the riverbed and then rescuing some slaves and our time so quickly passes. But I'm only level 11 at this point and you have something for me at 12? Sweeping time! Ooooo, some nearby Circle of Thorns. They'll get me the xp I need and they're no match for my Star Kat. Sure enough they weren't and I was level 12. After levelling up at Foreshadow and calling Julius he introduces me to Talshak.


Talshak; I never realised how important you once were back in the day. The stepping stone to the Cavern of Transcendence trial (I'd like to say that was less gimmicky but 8-player simul-click, ugh!). I never knew your name either but then I found out why. Nothing major to note at first: Trolls and Igneous but then: Atta! The famous Atta cave which dutifully lives up to its reputation as I went from 12-14 in a solo run of clearing it out. One last mission in the Hollows to find Sam who's in the Circle's hand. Not much fight here either but then I get introduced to Karsis (who looks suspiciously like Diviner Maros). My journey through the Hollows ends here as the trial...TF is an 8-man affair. So on to Steel to fill out some xp with Montague Castellanata and get access to the Midnighter's Club. Then I see a familiar name crop up from Monty: Colleen Saramago. I'll play her arc next and hope it gets me to 20 or close enough at least. I finish this leg at level 16.


So; not too bad a start. Hollows has aged well since it was cleaned up but I felt that there was a little missing. There's a pretty cool forest in the SE corner and lots of Circle hovering about down there but nothing in the zone actually takes you there anymore.

I was on the fence about the bluside Midnighter's access arc completion changes but it's alright. Most of it takes place in the same zone and the only real bother is finding a workbench which presumes you know where they are but it does give you the locations for the Lost in highlighted orangetext.

Next leg: Colleen Saramago.

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Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.

I did something similar a couple of months ago, with a ma/nin stalker, just to see what it was like. It holds up quite well, truthfully -- although dear Crom, that fight against Frostfire is a pain solo. I'm a roughly 6-year vet, I know all the tricks, I went in with a stack of medium inspirations, but fighting an EB who spams hold, his 4 pets one of which spams hold, a miniboss scaled down to a lieutenant, another lieutenant, and something like 7 minions, all spawned at the entrance to the room? While standing on ice? That took me a couple of tries. That's some pretty tough level 9 content! But worth it: Frostfire's Lair is still one of the best custom maps in the whole game, and Atta's cave is pretty epic in size and decoration.

When I did it, I went to Montague Castanella at level 15, then to Faultline. The Hollows/Faultline revamps do achieve what they were intended to: if you know to take that path, there is one (and only one) pure solo(ish) story arc leveling path that takes you to where the real story arcs begin in the classic content, level 20 in Talos or IP or Striga.

Bonus question for the devs: When we fight against (or with) Frostfire in the tip missions, he no longer has his pets. Why not?

"Look he's the stooge, the one with the giant spinning floating coin over his head, get 'em!"

Most of the problems you ran into is that the Hollows, while a pretty-looking zone, is just garbage for story. As in, there isn't any. There's a setting, but no real plot, which is precisely what you noted. Hunt some dudes, hunt some more dudes, save some slaves, here's a big bad out of nowhere, move along. The Hollows pioneered the "zone arc" idea, which isn't really story arc as such, but just an unrelated collection of standalone missions that hall happen within the same zone and are supposed to give the zone background. I'm glad to see this idea has not survived past Croatoa and the standard these days is STORY arcs with actual story in them.

That said, I can't agree with the "bland text." I HATE colour in text boxes for the same reason I hate the default Windows XP theme - it looks like a kindergarten playground, and it gives me the impression that the development team have low confidence in my attention span and reading comprehension capabilities, so they have to highlight important details in case in case I get easily distracted and skim past them. Whenever possible, I prefer plain text with no colour and formatting tricks that you couldn't use outside of Note Pad, pretty much how I compose my posts here.

I don't really have any experiences of my own worth sharing because I level up on old content pretty much all the time. I prefer Kings' Row to the Hollows and new Atlas and I prefer the Clockwork Captive and BoneFire to Montague's necessary arc. And I've run all of three DFBs or so, I HAAATE having to rely on broadcast for them, but the LFG Queue has never worked for me for anything whatsoever. About the only thing you'll run into that'll frustrate you is being sent to the Hero Corps Field Analyst, then being sent to a Security Chief then being sent to the PvP Zone Liaison, then being sent to speak with Jim Temblor before you're allowed to do anything else, which is a practice that needs to die in a fire.

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Originally Posted by Arcanaville 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.

I do this kinda thing all the time. I usually do Hallows till level ten, then Midnighter's, saving the lost hunt for the Faultline arc which I get as soon as I can. Doc Delilah starts at 20 so when that arc comes around I do that one. Then off to IP or Talos or maybe Crotoa

I usually fill in with various legacy stuff. Maybe some tips so I can unlock hero merits. Signature Story arcs are also nice to fill in holes.

I can't remember who it is, but there is a nice little arc where you get to fight Dr. Vahz. Fun.

I haven't done the whole hollows arc in about 6 months. It was pretty good last time I did it.

try Striga

Oh yeah, Striga! I usually do that before Croatoa. Love Wedding Ring!

My usual play (Blue, now) is:

• Finish new Atlas Arcs
• Head to kings for Radio/Safeguard (Usually gets me to 8 and I lock XP)
• Do at least one mission from each 1st tier contact.
• Turn XP back on and head to Hollows and run Wincott & Flux (Gets me to 10-12 group depending).
• Run 2nd Tier Contacts (all at least once, then Storyarcs)(A lot of abandon missions are made) with Invention tutorial at 12 (usually) and locking XP at 14 until I start Midnighters at 14 with another lock at 15.
• Finish Midnighters and run Temblor and maybe Yin Arc in Fault before running 3rd Tier Contatcs.

@Travlr (Main) / @Tymers Realm (Test)

I do invention tutorial at 22 - gets me a lvl 25 accuracy IO.

I honestly don't mind the 'lack of story' in the hollows, in general. I mean for being a basic 'starting out' zone I don't think you really need any kind of intricate plot or deep meaningful reason to go beat up gang members that are causing trouble and take down their boss. My first non-praetorian character ran the Hollows arc and I think it's just perfect in terms of the flavor it needs to be. You're a low level super hero helping out the cops. That's all it really -needs- to be. I don't need Frostfire to be some developed rising kingpin that's got some evil agenda like recruiting school kids and mutating them or whatever or getting help to perform some arcane ritual to empower him and his lieutenants. The guy is just a jerk, the outcasts are jerks, and they need their clocks cleaned so the local police have one less issue on their plates to deal with.

I guess it's just me, but I prefer lowbie stuff to be simple like that. As has been said the seeding for a lot of the larger plots in the game start building up once you hit Faultline and Talos etc.

I don't think it tells you about the city rep, but it definitely tells you via the trainer when you hit 20 to go see the Icon in Steel Canyon.

Thinking about it; I did recently purchase the global unlock for capes and auras so if the City Rep doesn't show up at 30 for me, I'll know why. For now: Striga part 1. Yes, part 1.

So I head to Talos and on to the Smuggler's Ship, nicely marked with an inverted colour S icon these days and also a linked transit so I could jump to Independence Port that way as well. Enter Striga Isle.

The old design philosophy peers through as Stephanie Peebles isn't auto-dropped into my contact list. I forgo using the Find Contact function as I know where she hangs out. Hello Mrs. Peebles. I pick her first mission and the lack of the blue title text is very apparent. No idea of progress in the arc. She gives me a Hunt 10 Council mission which is apt as I passed several mobs on the way to her, littering the streets. A nice conservative number too. Quickly on to the next mission: Rescue Dr. Francois. I really lucked out here. Although the map was one of the largest ship maps there is; he ended up being placed just inside the door (like an old 50s cinema serial or a humourous sketch show "How will we ever find... oh there he is"). Possibly his quickest rescue to date

Next mission: Family vs. Council DEFEAT ALL. Urgh, wasn't looking forward to this but my Staffie Brute ploughs through them with ease and done in no time. On to the next mission: ANOTHER DEFEAT ALL! But wait; Zenith Mech Men have apparently been activated and are clearing a warehouse. Sure enough on entering the mobs consist of nothing but Mech Men except for the boss who is the only Council man on the map. Nice use of NPC-specific groupings to add flavour to the mission directive.

Next up is a Family mission: bust Tommy One Eye and his crew. This is where I learn that the Family is supplying Paragon's superadine which is turning people into Trolls. A lore connection, one level of NPCs connecting with others, just like with the new DA arcs, by referencing past lore events. It's also just a boss-kill as when Tommy and his close allies go down the mission ends. I stick around to clear out the remainder.

Another DEFEAT ALL (are we there yet?), another ship of mobs to beat but this time to find some marine research specimen that was appropriated by the Council. Given the hints; it could be a Coralax, perhaps an old hint for CoV given it's described as man-sized with claws capable of ripping a boat to shreds. Some optional NPCs to rescue but they let themselves out thankfully. Next I get to talk to Long Jack who tells me I might want to bring a few friends along in plaintext. It leads-in to the next mission: Defeat Heracles and his men, another E-B fight. No orangetext with this one either but I know what I'm in for since this is the Wedding Band mission. The fight is fairly short, went through almost my entire tray of insps but Heracles fell. After returning to Peebles she gives me the original version of the Wedding Ring temp power prompting the joke in one of my global channels "She's got a lot of husbands"

Before she introduces me to Long Jack I check out the store and she only sells Natural-Magic DOs. They're in a better range of 20-25 but now limited by origin. No matter to me since I'm slotting out with common IOs and utilising Form of the Body (the end-reduction one) to keep my endurance in check. And on to Jack I go.

Long Jack starts off on a bit of a downer as I get two hunts in a row; defeat 20 Family and then 10 Council but the Council one leads-in to a rescue missions for 'unwilling recruits'. Bit of luck here again as both ambushes holding keys literally walk into my path and are quickly wasted allowing me free access to the rest of the warehouse. Rescued without too much trouble. Then comes the next one: Another hunt mission: Defeat 20 Sky Raiders in the Maw.

The where? At this point I haven't really explored much of Striga so The Maw is still blacked out and there's no directional marker to indicate where. After a bit of an explore I see the Sky Raiders around a checkpoint to the east. Sure enough; beating them starts counting for the mission. Now deeper into enemy territory the mission door for the next one comes up nice and close; DEFEAT ALL in a warehouse. So uneventful I actually forgot to write who I was fighting. On checking: the Council were going to raise the bridge. Bit pointless given Striga is an ISLAND but apparently those in the Morass would suffer so a cleaning I will go. After that; clear out the Bog of Pantheon and Council.

Again: where? I haven't explored much of Striga and it seems accepted that I should know this already. Not even a passing mention. I'm also forgoing usage of Reveal for zone maps to see how well I get sent to places. So I explore some more and find Pantheon... all two levels higher and above. Chomping down some purples and all my AoEs manage to take the minions and then the lieutenants in short order. Council though seem to come in groups of +2 lts and bosses or have at least two +3 bosses inside each mob. After a couple of trips to the hospital and stalking round the various mobs looking for easy game; I still have to take down some +2s. I get lucky with insp drops and use Inner Inspiration to bulk up out in the field. Job is eventually done and on to the next.

Long Jack then gives me a mission which is kinda sprung on me; capture the guy who tortured him. A standard bossroom fight that's over quite quickly and apparently gives him peace now. This could've been an arc in itself, searching out clues and eventually finding the toturer but it's all done in one mission.

Anyway; last mission from Jack: Maestro (slight snigger from me as it's the name of a classic British car). Jack decides that in order to fight him I might want to 'bring a crackerjack team' along which is the most interesting way I've heard it said for an E-B lead-up. Oh yeah, he's an E-B of course. I'm loaded with insps and get to him in the old lab map type and.... wow, he's pretty.

No really, he's the most colourful E-B I've seen, like a Destro from GIJoe in style, and it's a real shame because I kick his donkey in about 30 seconds flat. I stand over his body and watch it fade out. It's all over.

Back to Long Jack and he introduces me to Tobias and after traversing the hordes of Warwolves and Pantheon to get to him: "Sorry, your princess is in another castle". No, not really but he has level-blocked me and won't speak to me until I reach level 25 which leaves me a long way to go since I only hit 22 from the two arcs so far. Obviously a relic of the old design philosophy where it was expected to team through the zone, curse my solo-ability

Anyway I spent the next couple of days making use of the tips that had dropped in my tips tab to start the shift to Vigilante in preparation for my character's concept and hit 23 getting close to 24 as I start: Andrea Mitchell. I remember her arc being one of the first grey-cons I ever cleared out and it's even more relevant today: the Wheel of Destruction.


So far; the quality of the Striga story is sound but the mechanics are basic. The headings are uncoloured and so far the first two contacts only have one 'spare' mission each which could easily be incorporated into the actual arcs they give. The reference to the fish specimen seems to hint at the appearance of Coralax which if the arcs were updated; they could make use of this reference given they show up in the Hollows now. It was also surprising to re-learn that Sky Raiders are Rikti War veterans turned mercenaries which makes their porter tech and FFGs seems less out of place. Also has development potential given their recent activities with Malta in Talos. It's also not something that's common knowledge and has potential extension to anything Vanguard-related. Striga has held up pretty well overall.

And Maestro really is very pretty for an evil guy

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.