Ouroboros, Praetoria Contacts, Flashback, and Positron's comment during Coffee Talk

During Coffee Talk Positron was asked about Praetorian missions getting put into Ouroboros, his response was that it would be extremely hard due to dying contacts and that might require a new tech for Ouroboros. It seems there is a simpler solution to this.

Why not just make all the Ouroboros Praetorian Contacts telephone only contacts?

Ever done a Calvin Scott TF flashback? The contact does not exist in the game world he is only an NPC you call via the telephone. Basically, by doing the above you don't even tie the flashback to the original contact in the physical game world. It is simply an NPC "posing" as the contact.

This would also open up the Praetorian arcs to all non-Praetorians and allow them to do the arcs and receive the badges for side switching.

Thoughts on this?

If it is easy for that to be the fix i hope they do it, i missed a few badges for my 2 Praetorian Chars.

I don't think the issue was entirely about visiting the contacts. Didn't he also say something about how the phasing technology makes it hard to do? I also don't see how they'd manage to achieve side-switching in a flashback format.

Don't get me wrong though, I'd love to see a Praetorian flashback system of some kind eventually. I just don't think it'd be as easy as making them call-only.

I think that's assuming the problem with contacts dying/phasing out is they can't be contacted after they die/phase out.

I mean it could be, but that would be pretty silly if they just hadn't thought of that solution >>

The problem may not be with the contacts themselves though. We've just been told -something- breaks because of the phasing. We don't actually know what it is that's breaking or -why- (and they probably don't either). Replacing the contact may not do anything.

They'd also probably have to add new technology to remember your "true" (hero/villain) alignment so that your resistance/praetorian one doesn't interfere, and make sure to cover every possible hole with which someone could exploit the game or accidentally trap themselves with.

Sounds like a good idea. Assuming, as your saying Ult, it is just a matter of doing it that way. And with teh example of Calvin. Unless..that does in fact, work in a different way?
Regardless of the coding involved..it would be a good thing. Except for...no one would have ANY reason to start a toon in prea..as opposed to the reasons we have now. Like..umm...its shiny!

What about the interaction with Marchand/Scott? That's coded into several contacts too. Dunno how that's going to interact with the Taskforce setup.

A better example than Calvin Scott would have been Positron. If you go to the "real" Positron during a flashback of the Old Posi TF, he gives the "Looks like you have more important matters to attend to" line, because he is a different contact from the phone-only version.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DarkSideLeague No, but it allows your contact to show up in the final ''real'' mission and has additional, different objectives throughout the arc (if you choose Maros you'll have to fight an additional AV/EB, for example).

Also, the new Incarnate story arc(s) in Issue 24 are supposed to remember what you did in Praetoria, and in some cases change based on that. Praetoria should only be added to Ouroboros if ALL the choices are available, particularly ones that alter the outcomes of the newer arcs.

I think Ultimus is on the right path with this one. Rather than going to the ACTUAL contacts, with Ouroboros you'd be making use of "parallel" contacts who are just cell phone contacts who give you the same rewards as the "regular" contacts, but who don't engage the Phasing system (see: Ouroboros and Time Travel) nor do they engage the Loyalist/Resistance choices (in a meaningful/permanent way) at the end of the arc. Set things up so that you can run the Flashbacks as *either* a Loyalist or a Resistance member (using a UI choice when accepting the Flashback).

It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...

Badge hunting immaterial? Them's fighting words!

Also, I suspect that along with the lasting impact issues (Cleo and Sheffield, anyone?) that the alignment is the true stumbling block Since Resistance/Loyalist appears to be coded as Hero/Villain+another flag and is a bit more fluid, that might be trouble. After all, apparently Ouro is in two versions already for alignment reasons and apparently kind of hacked oddly behind the scenes even to manage that. And we know there's other oddities under the hood, like tracking your true loyalties goldside based on the initial decision. While I'd love to be able to flash back to them, I can understand why the coding is approached with trepidation suitable to juggling jars of nitroglycerin and hedgehogs at once.