Quote:
Originally Posted by PoliceWoman
Mission 1:
Civillians -> Civilians (in entry popup)
Mork needs a better description. Also, the name Mork is pretty heavily associated with an old TV show, you might want to use a different name unless you're ok with reminding people of that.
Defeating Mork and his group finished the mission. There didn't seem to be any clues or anything to do besides fight Mork; this makes the mission feel too much like an ordinary police radio mission. Mork's dialog was also very generic, stuff that any villain could say. I'd suggest adding more objectives, maybe some clues, and giving the boss some more personality in his dialog.
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Mork/Gork were mainly placeholder names that I really didn't have anything better to change them into. Any suggestions on what I can use for names?
As for the mission, I may add a thing or two to it and change some things around, but that mission is mainly just to get the arc kicked off and establish the enemy group--I'll add more chatter to change it up a bit, maybe add a collection to disarm some bombs and stuff.
Also, thanks for the spelling catch. I kept typoing civilians as civillains in a freudian slip, guess I didn;t completely fix it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PoliceWoman
Mission 2:
"It just so happens that there are rumors abound that..." is awkward sounding. I'd suggest rephrasing to either "Rumors abound that..." or "There are rumors that..." (in briefing).
Rather than having the contact tell the player where to go next, it would be a little cooler if the player finds a clue in the first mission (from the boss, or some other objective) that leads them to the next mission.
It seems a bit too much coincidence that not only does the contact know about the Arachnos computer with the location of the secret base, but the Sons of Cid also know and are attacking at exactly the same time, AND the Praetorian guy, Krash, also knows about this computer and is attacking at exactly the same time.
Also "Vergel" in the Michael Krashe clue should probably be "Virgil".
As for it being cooler if the player finds the information in the first mission for where to go in the second... that's kinda what's happening in this mission, a clue in the second mission for where to go in the third.
Gork says "Tch. You win this time, Hero." But actually he has been killed by Arachnos, I never aggro'd him.
Debriefing seems too short (only 1 sentence).
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I'll fix up the dialogue later on tonight, I'll take a look at the briefings/debriefings too.
And, I've gotten an idea for how to explain that partly well, and shore up the contacts status as a Rogue Information Broker (not unlike the Dean guy from the first i17 villain arcs)... he sold the information.
And... Vergel's the characters name. It's shortened from Vergeltung--the German word for Nemesis, which is where I got the name for the character originally (the character wasn't originally made for the MA, and it's where I got the name for the arc from)
Also, to maybe liven it up a bit, I was thinking of replacing the Collection with a Defend Item mission (Triggered after the base commander fight) where you actually do have to defend it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PoliceWoman
Mission 3:
The contact gives me more info that he got from Krash. I think it would be better if Krash told the player this directly (through a clue or something) rather than Krash telling Billy, then Billy telling the player.
"Save the Civillains!" objective should be "Save the Civilians".
I rescued Businesswoman and she started following me. It did not seem to satisfy the "Save the Civillains" objective. Leading her to the door didn't help either. Not really sure what I am supposed to do with her? I ended up ditching her. I think it would be simpler if you just had the hostage leave when rescued.
Saved Businessman and Officer also, same deal, didn't seem to help the objectives.
Found and killed Mork again. He still needs a better description and his dialog is still rather generic.
Saved Female Civillian (should be spelled Civilian). Again, not sure what to do with her.
Beat up Gork, who also needs a better description and dialog.
Saved Feisty Civillian (should be Civilian). Left her behind too.
Rescued Civillian (should be Civilian). He says:
[NPC] Civillian: Your in for it now! Get 'em, Kashira!
"Your" should be "You're".
Rescuing this Civillian triggers "Take down Dr. Cid". But why isn't he an objective to begin with? Is there something that makes Dr Cid appear after all the civilians are rescued? The story needs to explain this better.
I find Cid? ... "have come to Paragon City" should be "has come to Paragon City" (in his description).
I defeat Cid? and he talks about "Master Cid", which makes his description of "Dr. Vergel Cid" not really make sense. Should there be some clue that explains why I think this guy is an impostor? Also maybe there should be a clue involving him, suggesting that Krash might be in trouble since Krash was supposed to go after Cid.
It sounds like ALL the hostages betrayed while I was fighting Master Cid. Fortunately, I had ditched them all. If anyone actually led them around like they asked, though, it would be a pretty ugly trap.
"Son's" should be "Sons" in the debriefing. There's also an extra space after "drat" and before the period. This new development that the Sons of Cid can intercept medical teleporting kinda came out of the blue; needs some foreshadowing, I'd suggest adding some clues hinting at this earlier on.
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Okay, I'll change it to be a mission exit clue for mission 2.
As for the Save the Civilians bit, it's a technical limitation workaround. The Civilians are allies, each a seperate event since you can't have 'Random' in a Custom Enemy Group, because otherwise they'd all be the same. Basically, my choices are to make them all required, resulting in a really odd looking objective screen, make each one required to be finished before the last (meaning you'd have to run back and forth to save all the civilians) or to just have one count and put that one in the back, I went with the latter so that hopefully the players won't notice anything too suspicious and fall for the trap I've got set in that mission, at least on the first attempt. And that's why I made the one civilian required for the bossfight, to make it more likely that the PC will fall into at least a part of the trap. Do you have any suggestions on what I could do?
Well, I suppose I should make it more clear that that's not the real Cid (The original plan was to make Krash run in as the backup ally ambush and point that out specifically, only the ambush event kept making 2-3 of him show up, so I ditched that for the current plan) I tried to make it so that Cid himself would point it out, but I don't think it was clear enough anymore. I'll see what I can do to fix it.
As for the trap, yeah, they're all supposed to turn on you. It's supposed to be really nasty, something on the level of that fight in Praetoria on the mission Hunt Down Shen (My favorite praetorian mission) where they keep sending more and more Syndicate after you. One of the civilians (the required one, in fact) is a Thugs/ MM with the pistol attacks and Gang War. Though I may have to tone them down a little.
I'll see if I can throw in some foreshadowing, too, maybe make the Base Commander in Mission 2 mention the mediporter's malfunctioning, and maybe make Billy mention something odd, too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PoliceWoman
Mission 4:
The contact says he won't send any more people in because the Cids keep conscripting them...but he's sending me in, so this doesn't quite make sense.
OK, this mission has plenty of clues about Operation Turncoat and The Conscription Process, which are nice; I think you may want to spread these out among your missions, though, rather than have such a huge info dump in the last mission only.
Now that we've discovered that most of the Sons of Cid are serving them against their will, isn't it kind of mean and unheroic to blow them all up with explosives anyway?
Vergel Cid looks awfully normal for an android. Maybe he should have more robot parts in his costume. The number and size of the ambushes he generated seemed a bit much.
If Dr Cid hates the Resistance so much, wouldn't it make more sense for him to stay in Praetoria? After all, there's less opportunity for killing Resistance in Primal Earth.
The final debriefing feels rather underwhelming ... I'd suggest rewriting it to make the ending seem more cool.
Decent souvenir. Though it ends abruptly with "burned down around h" ... I think you are missing part of a word there.
Regarding the Sons of Cid villain group itself, they seemed pretty bland to me, nothing really making them stand out compared to other villain groups. I think they could use some further development. Though the addition of the conscripted Arachnos and Longbow was neat. Based on the story I almost wonder if mostly re-using other mobs would make some sense, rather than having mostly custom mobs.
The plot thread about hijacking mediporter technology was never really followed up on; shouldn't we find this device and break it or otherwise prevent Cid from doing this again?
What was Billy's tie-in to this story, anyway? How does he know so much about Praetorians?
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I suppose I should make that clearer too, it's that he doesn't want to send any more cannon fodder in. Longbow ran in as backup for you last time, with the end result of Cid conscripting alot of Longbow. (It's also because I originally wanted an ally to be avilable right at the beginning of the mission, and the two portal corp maps explicitly had no place for allies in the beginning, so they almost always turned up midway though the map, which would make people think they may be another trap--which they wouldn't be this time, so I ultimately dropped it)
I wanted to spread them out, but not before the trap/twist in mission 3--I was thinking of adding another mission, before this one, and your complaint about the medi-porter plot thread petering out, and the idea of treating the conscripts gave me an idea for another one, and I'll spread it out between the final two missions.
The text limit on the souvenir is annoying. I'll see if I can edit it fit and still be pretty good.
As for the re-use other enemies bit, I could try adding in the Freakshow or some other villain group to the first couple of missions, too. They're compatible with the cybernetic Freaks.
As for Vergel's look, I didn't want to make him look too robot-y, the Clockwork King has the whole Brain in a Jar pretty much down, and I didn't want to step on it's toes. I'll see if I can change it up a little, though.
The Sons of Cid itself as a group... well, they're pretty much supposed to be almost a fanatical cult in blind allegiance to Cid with intellect but no will of their own. To be honest, I've described Cid before as a Sci-Fi version of a Lich, he takes bodies, conscripts them into robotic 'zombies,' uses electrical abilities so advanced it may as well be magic (he took Shocking Grasp to the next level!... and a few levels more), and has 'died' once before. I'm just not sure how to make that transfer over to the group, though.
As for why Dr. Cid is here, again, I should make it clearer, and maybe re-using mobs would help with that, but, Cid's here on a recruitment drive, pretty much. Officially he's here for the whole Operation Turncoat, get some Arachnos/Longbow, conscript them and use them as spies in the Resistance. Unofficially, he's here to build an army large enough he can take down the Resistance by himself, the Praetors would frown on him getting that much power, though.
Personally, I view this arc as the middle story in a Trilogy, the first one detailing the origins of the villain, this one detailing him undergoing a general 'rise to power' (even if he's ultimately driven back to Praetoria--he'll still have a number of powerful troops recruited from Primal Earth) and finally culminating in a complete showdown of arc finishing up the villain's storyline. This is the only one I can do at the moment, though, due to the lack of Praetorian assets in AE.
Billy's tie-in to the story is pretty much like the aforementioned Dean contact for the i17 villain clone lab arc, an information broker, though a Rogue one and not a villain. A little tenuous, yes, but someone who actually can know the things he needs to know to help the PC out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PoliceWoman
Anyway, after some thought, I decided not to rate this story - I think it would be nicer if your first rating were a good one. I hope this feedback helps, though!
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Thanks, it did.
Edit: Okay, now I've added a few more groups to make The Sons of Cid go through four stages, Mission 1 is Custom + Freakshow, Mission 2 is Custom + Freakshow + Family, Mission 3 is Custom + Freakshow + Family + Arachnos, and finally Mission 4-5 is Custom + Civilian Custom + Freakshow + Family + Arachnos + Longbow. It definitely grows.
