ArrowRose

Thanks so much for your review and for taking the time to play my arc.

I was at 99% space usage, so I could not add a lot, but I was able to add some info on MAL to the mission 5 send off dialog.

I played: Small Fears

This was an extremely well-written arc that made great use of maps and chained objectives.

What I liked best: The quality of the writing and the great choices of childhood fears.

This was a great arc that was so full of details.

What I liked best: An amazing story with so many clues. It made me want to keep on playing to discover the truth and solve the mystery.

I loved this arc! It was very well written, told and nice story and had some humor.

What I liked best: This is hard to pick, but I would have to say it's entertainment value. It let me have fun while uncovering a story. It made me want to keep playing to find out more!

I played Glory Days and I really enjoyed it. It has a great story which is full of details and is so much fun to play! I posted some additional comments on your thread.

What I liked best: The last mission debrief and the souvenir. The whole arc was great but that really stood out to me.

Thank you so much for such a nice review, but way more importantly, thank you for all the time and effort you put into running my arc and providing me with comments and suggestions to make it better.

I appreciate your help and your encouragement so much.

Thanks

I changed this so the first mission takes place 9 years ago and the second seven.

I too hate caves, any caves, but I really wanted the treasure chest in a cave for the mood of the arc. I spent a lot of time selecting maps for the arc. I tested every office map and every cave map as well so that I could be sure that the player did not have to back track. I chose this map because, I loved the look of it and way more importantly, I could guarantee that you find the child before you find the treasure.

I am so glad you liked them. I spent a lot of time creating them and then later balancing the powers based on input from other reviews.

Your pun made me smile


The reason I have Statesman is his relationship to Liberty and his importance in COH lore. I made him trapped in a glowing trap so he is easier to find. Also he tells you that the swords are near the ruins of City Hall. Oddly they always are. Before I knew that I too went nuts looking for them. I am very bad at finding glowies.

Yes but also your destiny to help her.

I changed it to 3 allies and lost the mist on my stormy. Someone suggested that was part of the reason the allies got lost. It seemed to help.

I am glad that you mostly enjoyed it. Thanks so much for your review and especially for the comment that it was worth more than 3 stars. That meant a lot to me

Thanks so much for your review of my arc.

Based on your input, I did the following:

I removed Statesman from the last mission.

I added some text to the MA overview indicating that the arc difficulty scales based on your setting and that at level one it is soloable.

I tried to add a bit more detail at the end but I am almost completly out of space.

I changed the mob in the 4th mission a bit based on some specific suggestions from another review, but I was unable to make them custom due to lack of space.

I am so glad that you enjoyed my arc! Thanks for playing it and for such a nice review.

Thanks so much. That worked perfectly for me

That would be a good idea. It is unfair for people to present arcs for you to review based on false expections. When you state specifc criteria and rules you should follow them.

If you want to just go with your gut on reviews that's fine so long as you make no pretense that you are doing otherwise.

Thanks again for your detailed review. I have made a lot of changes based on your input and I have a very specific question regarding the following comment that you made.

I agree with your comment. I also had his minions get mixed up with the others. I tried to have no surrounding enemy group and could not find a way to do this. Perhaps you need to do this when you add the boss? As I now sit at 99.95 space, I am reluctant to attempt removing and re-adding him.

So my question is, what would you think of having him surrounded by a different group, say Family? This would solve the issue you mentioned and bring the arc full circle?

Let me know your thoughts on this.

Thanks

That was obvious, but sadly not much help. The arc knows what it wants to be, but apparently that is not something that you care for. Luckily for me, not everyone feels the same way that you do.

The arc is intended as a light-hearted origin story. Does it have comedy? Yes, many find parts of it funny. Is it serious? Yes, at times. It has some serious messages. Is it horrific? NO! The villains are evil. Villains are supposed to be evil, but no one besides you has found anything horrific about them (OK maybe too much fear ).

I don't agree with you that an arc or a book or a movie needs to be all one thing. Most of my favorite movies are action or sci-fi with a little comedy and or romance mixed in.

Thanks for the rest of your input in your latest post. Much of that was helpful.

The reason for this, was in fact that it was for more than the obvious reason. Ms. Liberty is Little Liberty's aunt. The reason that she doesn't come out and tell you, is that the idea behind the arc is for you the player to discover what is going on as you play.

In my arc as originally written, missions 1 and 2 took place in the present day. At the beginning of mission 3, Ms. Liberty told you that 7 years had passed. Two separate reviewers had a BIG problem with time passing between missions in an arc. I found this odd because I have read many books where years pass between chapters. So, my question is would it make the arc better if mission 1 and 2 were present day and 7 years passed between mission 2 and 3?



Hmm.. Shouldn't villains be horrifying? I won't change the look of the villains, as that is what most people liked best about the arc. In fact don't all real life monsters look human? And yes you are right, that is scary.

Thanks for this input. I wondered why she did this as I have her set to fight defensively.

A joke....

I have no control over this. Liberty was placed at middle. The treasure I placed at the end. I agree it is stupid. A bug maybe?

I agree, thank you for your original input.

I did this because, if you are not the team leader, you can't see what is going on in the 2nd brief screen and the debrief screen.

I am not sure what you mean here, so I will explain. There are all sorts of treasures in the world, and "gold and sliver" isn't at least in my view, true treasure. To me, true treasure is always found in people and what they have to give. The idea here, was in fact a mock on greed, and yes sadly I have encountered some very greedy COH players.
My intent was not to offend you, or imply that you the player are greedy. It was in fact a mock on greed, and if I recall, I stated that you are a hero and for you thanks is enough.

The intent of this arc is for you to uncover what is going on as you play. The idea is that you uncover exactly who Little Liberty is as you help her find her destiny. If Ms. Liberty told you all of this, it would defeat the point of the arc. I truly wish I had more space, because then in the wrap up of the arc, I could explain way more. I will see what I can do, but I am currently sitting at 99.8 space usage.

I have looked at this but will look at it again. I get XP. The point of the arc is definately not XP, otherwise I would write a farm. The idea was to make a magical garden. I don't know why you got no XP though. Odd...

This I won't change as this is what everyone else liked best. I am glad you noticed the similarty. All use anarchy chest symbol, all have the same cape symbol. This is part of the theme. Each has a unique bio with powers and costume to match.

It does. Perhaps, you did not defeat the surrounding group?

I am not sure which mission you are referring to here. In mission 3 there are no longer any allies. I will check all the other missions (1, 4 and 5).

Can I control the order? I had him give a clue about the location of the swords because they always seem to be in the same place and lots of people had trouble finding them.

They were chosen to be random and also for visual effect. PW suggested, keeping more to a futuristic theme. I will look into this.

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Again thanks to your input and I agree Yay!

He had one, it keeps getting lost .

I am not quite sure what you said in the above quote. Clearly you don't like something about the interaction with Ms. Liberty I take it?

I have played many arcs where the contact gives extremely long boring speeches which I hate. In fact, they have bored me so much, I could barely read them. Still, I looked past that to the obvious effort that was put in the arcs, I have rated them 4 stars.

Given that I don't want Ms. Liberty to spell out everything. Given that I want you, the player to figure things out, is there anything specific that would make her or the framing less annoying?

On a positive note, I am glad the gameplay was less frustrating. That is definately in part due to suggestions from you.

Thanks

Thanks so much for taking the time to review my arc.
I am maxed on on space (99.8%) but I will address as many issues as I can. Hopefully I can at least fix the typos.

I have some comments/questions.

The idea here was mystery mixed with mild humor. Ms. Liberty didn't spell out the why because the why was meant for the player to discover as he or she played the arc. She is in fact Little Liberty's aunt. Her sister is Liberty Rose's mother. My intent was to provide a clue in the first mission with the family tree and fully reveal this in mission 4.

I originally had a question about this for you. When I wrote the arc, mission 1 and mission 2 both took place in the present. At the beginning of mission 3, Ms. Liberty informed you that seven years had passed since you last spoke. For some reason, two reviewers had a huge problem with this. They had NEVER seen time pass between missions in an arc. I found it odd that villains with ice and fire powers was fine, but time passing was not. I have read many books where time passes between chapters. Anyway, my question here for you is would the arc be better with the first 2 missions in the present and seven years passing between mission 2 and 3?

Since posting this question, another reviewer agreed that jumping years between arcs was unacceptable to him. So I tried to explain, as much as space allowed, why you were being asked to do this and why it is urgent.

Well the answer here is two-fold. She needs to go back to AP and more importantly the main point of this arc is how you, a powerful hero, help Little Liberty find her destiny and thus save the world.

Very true and it is not a coincidence. The note you receive at the end of mission 1 explains that all members of the Liberty League take a hero title with Liberty. The agent you are finding is not a Longbow Agent but "Agent Liberty" from the Liberty League. However, point taken and I will be more specific about which Liberty is your objective.


This is by intent. I want it to be a mystery for you to unravel.

Perhaps. I intended that they be a surpise and you find out about them in the note at the end.

MAL is for Master Al. I do see that it is a bit confusing and should be clarified and also two Als make it even worse, so I changed Big Al's name.

You are correct, Big Al is in the dark and Ms. Liberty could tell you all but the idea of the arc is for you to uncover it as you play.

This was an attempt to be funny. Sadly many players of COH are in fact very greedy. Demanding PLs and random influence whenever they see a level 50 at WW. I read on this very board that people don't like origin stories because they want it to be "all about THEM". I am in complete agreement that a true hero would be motivated only by a desire to save the girl.

I reworded some of the treasure related dialog.

Both the costume and the swords are magical and required for her to fulful her destiny. How I wish I could buy more space!!! I did what I could to make this all more clear.

Yes a theme. You are pursuing Liberty in more ways than one. The whole arc is themed. Even the mission titles and intro text is red, white and blue.

Again this is part of the mystery.

She is not yet a hero. Perhaps I should make her dress more civilian like. She was a captive and I found it odd that she just stood there instead of leaving the mission. Perhaps this is a bug?

I really like the look of the magic case in the garden, but I definately agree with the rest of the above. I tried to make it more like a journal entry, but found I only had 300 characters. I changed it a bit to provide more info.

It was revealed this way because it is Miss Liberty's journal. The importance to the story was that Little Liberty was Miss Liberty's granddaughter.
I have tried to fix this about 50 times. No matter what I set this to he appears cowering. Perhaps I need to bug report this. I have tried talking, thank you and various other emotes. I HATE that he appears cowering.

Others have had this problem. So Statesman now tells you they are near the ruins of City Hall and oddly they always are.

I chose a coffin because it is a symbol of death and the future is dark.

Yes you are correct. I did what I could to provide more info. I have all of .2 space .

Because he is her great grandfather.

Info on her is in her bio. Point taken, I got rid of Liberty Elite and made her group Liberty League. At one point, before I realized I had no space, I had intended to make some Liberty League members but never did, and so the more special members were Liberty Elite.

I am sure that every author who put months of work into creating an arc in his or her heart believes that it deserves 5 stars. So naturally, I hoped, but did not expect that you would rate it 5 stars. I spent close to 3 months creating and revising it. It is themed and full of detail, but not of the type you were asking for.

I could have written an arc where the contact explained everything up front, but that is not what I set out to do. My intention was to have you the player uncover what was going on as you played. I wanted you to be the focus of the arc as you figured out what was going on and at the same time helped a hero fulfill her destiny.

Honestly, I think that 4 stars would be fair.

That being said, I respect your opinion and value your input. Your arcs are among the best I have played. I have already made changes based on your suggestions which I hope makes the arc better.

Thanks again for the time and effort that you put into this review.

I completely understand why you didn't give a 5 star on detail. Your point on the Boss bio was very valid, and based on your input, I moved detail on him from a clue to his bio. It's just on a scale of 1-5 I don't get a 2, as he did have a bio.

As an aside, I just played Venture's top arc from the rotten COH thread. One of his main bosses had an extremely short bio, shorter than many of his minions and personally I would have given him a 5 on detail.

At any rate your input was very valuable, in that most people probably missed the detail I had in the mission begin clue, so it is much better to have it in the bio.

I was maxed out on space and each time I reloaded customs it seemed to take me over the top and this is why the detail on him was not where it really belonged. I think I now sit at 99.8 space usage.


Before you replay, you should know the intent of the arc is lighthearted fun, so I don't really want the player to take it too seriously. Since you played it, I added a warning that the arc may contain some humor to the summary displayed before you play.

Also a word on the allies. I made them all fight defensively so that don't go "Lady Jane" and cause random aggro. However, Liberty Rose and Statesman are still "overpowered". If either was defeated, it would ruin the spirit of the arc.

I realize that many want to feel important and don't care for overpowered allies. Is there any wording that I could put in the mission overview to briefly convey allies are there only if you need them? I am not the most amazing player and on setting one I can solo my arc without them, though some ATs I play, give me more trouble than others.

If you replay and give me additional feedback, I would love it.

Thanks