Eva Destruction

So you're saying if the writers have two four-mission arcs ready to go, but the map guys only have time to create four maps, it's better to release only one arc with all-new maps than to re-use some of the generic maps and release two arcs?

Yeah, you would think so, but as we've seen there have been a lot of "too strong" enemies being thrown around lately. The philosophy seems to be "make them too strong then balance downwards based on player feedback" rather than "make them weak then strengthen them or reduce their rewards after players farm the crap out of them." Which is fine, because testers are more likely to complain about enemies being too strong. It is less fine if you're say, revamping an old mission with a new boss in an issue that is mostly focused on end-game shinies and players aren't as inclined to thoroughly test your new enemy and provide feedback. It is even less fine if the too-strong enemy is left as is (level 30 Zeus Titan EB anyone? New Siege?)

Who wears short shorts?

She wears short shorts.

She also has that rubber spine thing happening. This enables her to strike the classic fanservice pose:



For when you just can't decide which assets to showcase.

Please do. I haven't done a DE story arc in years due to the "defeat alls" and general crappiness of the presentation.

As anyone who has played a significant amount of AE will tell you, unique maps lose their uniqueness when they start appearing over and over. Creating actual custom maps is probably a lot of work. I'd rather have more actual content, even if it means generic maps have to be used much of the time, than less content on fancy maps.

Again, more work required to make the content = less actual content. We can slap together a custom mob in AE in five minutes. As anyone who has played a lot of AE will tell you, we shouldn't.

Have very limited use without power-GMing. The devs don't seem to mind making sweeping assumptions about our characters, a lot of players don't seem to mind, but those of us who are more invested in actual story than "oh cool, EVIL ME!" do. The only use I can think of for doppelgangers that makes no assumptions about your character is Nemesis automatons, and those aren't right either, since automatons don't have powers. Automatons with powers means Nemesis is cooking up new plots. New Nemesis plots are groan-inducing.

Is often distracting and easy to miss, especially with older characters who don't have "cutscene captions" in their chat tabs.

We have too many cutscenes already.

This I agree with, if used sparingly and strategically. Praetorian Penny talking all in pink is just annoying.

New tech should be used when it enhances the story. Often new tech is being used for its own sake. If talking to an NPC before I beat him up gives me some indication to his motives, or shows how truly despicable a villain is, sure, bring it on. If it's just an infodump, or worse, a showcase for branching dialogue that gives the player the illusion of choice, then skip it and just let me punch him in the face. If in-mission radio transmissions let my objectives evolve mid-mission and allow the writer to condense two missions into one, it's a good use of tech. If it's just there to let a pet NPC talk, I don't care. If a "talk to" computer gives me the option to look up some not-mission critical but interesting backstory info, sure, let me talk to it. If I'm just using it to blow up a bunch of Council robots, making me look up then "enter" a password is annoying. Make it a simple blinky and get on with it.

There are also things on that list that undermine the game experience and frankly look sloppy, and leave a bad impression on new players, should be easy to fix, but aren't fixed. Such as typos and excessive ambushes. How hard is it to edit a line of text? Or remove a few ambushes? We've been told Mission Architect was created as a dev tool, so if they're using anything remotely similar to what we're using it's extremely easy, especially since they have players spotting and reporting this stuff for them.

How hard is this? Seriously. Most of the APP powers are copy/pasted from powers that can already be customized. I. Want. Matching. Fire. Give to Eva. Please. If you can't give to Eva, some explanation as to why would be appreciated.

If you're referring to their tendency to go charging into melee at random, all pets are idiots. At least Mastermind henchmen can be pulled back. Eventually. Not before Ghost Widow heals off that robot though.

And the Magic Pack high collar can be used with regular capes for male characters, but not for female characters.

I've also seen this happen with one of the missions from Dean. It may be a general problem with doubles.

This isn't the only mission where you're given a "required" objective that you don't have to do. There's a tip mission where you rescue a negotiator from the 5th column, the objective changes to "lead her out," a lead-out dot appears, then immediately vanishes, you are ambushed, and your objective becomes to defeat the ambush.
As does Traps.

NPC dialogue in Praetoria is worse.

Nothing happens when you click the door to the Smuggler's Ship to go to Striga. You must click it twice. Same with the helicopter.

There is no indication that the Smuggler's Ship is how you get to Striga. The entrance was changed but the contact dialogue sending you to Peebles probably wasn't, since I've heard several people in Talos asking how to get to Striga in the last few months.

Where have you been? They got proper variety with i18.

Of course the Quartzes are still instant-death for any character that relies on defense, and the DE in tip missions have 64% to-hit for some stupid reason that I can only chalk up to "Castle was sick of everybody soft-capping everything and becoming effectively invincible".....not that people who rely on defense tend to go near DE, because, quartzes.
AE text boxes are like this too. Don't even get me started on all the other AE bugs and issues that have been completely ignored.

Now I realize they can't fix anything at once. I realize sometimes bugs are introduced that they can't even find, let alone fix. I do think a complete, regularly updated "Known issues" list would go a long way to letting players know that "we are aware of your concerns and are trying to work on them." At least we can stop complaining about the same things over and over again hoping a dev will read it.

Oh and one more thing: Finish. What. You. Start. Please. The sad thing is, I don't think this ADD approach is necessarily the devs' fault. Players want new shiny, they resub for new shiny, get bored of new shiny, unsub and wait for next new shiny. So they have to keep giving us new shinies.

Yeah, you know what else negatively affects me, along with everyone else I play with? Defeat all enemies in warehouse (Peregrine Island) > Defeat all enemies in warehouse (Skyway City) > Take artifact to Azuria > find blinky in giant warehouse (Faultline) > hunt 40 Carnies in PI. I'd rather have Lingering Radiation not slow as it should (and I do actually have two /Rad Corruptors, so I'm affected by this bug directly) if that runaround could be condensed into two solid missions in a single appropriate zone.

And I would MUCH rather have that runaround condensed into two missions than have it remain as is while the devs spend a month trying to figure out why Lingering Rad isn't working properly, failing, and fixing nothing.

So yeah. Negative impact =/= critical. If a mission is bugged I can abandon and reset or autocomplete it. It will inconvenience me for a few minutes. If the Synapse Task Force is too long and boring it will inconvenience me for hours. If it's so long and boring nobody wants to do it with me it will inconvenience me for more hours. If it's so long and boring I decide it's not worth doing it will inconvenience me forever, since I can't get Task Force Commander without it.

I will say that missions with fancy new mechanics on unique maps are more prone to bugging, and shouldn't be used unless there is time to thoroughly test them.

Somebody PLEASE kill off Nemesis. Make it so Mender Silos is lying. He's just some guy, pretending to be Nemesis because....I don't know, make something up, it'll probably be better than another Nemesis plot. Oh, and all his good fakes explode (because steam powered things sometimes do that) leaving only crappy mindless fakes so we can still get the badge, thus putting an end to all Nemesis plots. This is retroactive, so nothing else will ever be revealed as another Nemesis plot.

Parallel earths are a nice place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there, or have three issues in a row (so far) devoted to them. I would also like it very much if the CoH multiverse's cosmology were straightened out, a chart was drawn up, and anybody who wanted to write anything regarding alternate dimensions, parallel universes, other planes of existence, anything that isn't on this physical earth that we know exists in the real world had to memorize said chart, which clearly spells out what falls into what category, and assume all NPCs had also memorized the chart. Then post the chart on the official website, so players can see it and find all the places you've deviated from the chart. You can even put it up as an in-character presentation from the Dark Watcher or Steven Sheridan or somebody.

It is also revealed that piercing the dimensional barrier was not a Nemesis plot after all.

The signature characters can stand around giving out task forces until the end of time for all I care. Maelstrom can get killed off because I'm sick of fighting him with his Martial Arts secondary that players want but can't have.

Not entirely sure what I'd do about the whole Ouroboros thing. I don't consider "nuke from orbit" to be an option (usually. I make exceptions for things such as the Dr Q and Synapse TFs, and that morality mission with Malta in Striga), especially for something that is such a huge QoL improvement. We don't even know that they're really from the future. We don't even know that we're actually time-traveling. It could be a giant AE building for all we know, since nothing we do in the past alters the present (yeah yeah, if it altered the present we'd be altered too so we wouldn't know the present had been altered but then we wouldn't have to go back so...that's why time travel never turns out well.) So since we have no reason to trust them, and their leader is a big liar pretending to be another person who can't be trusted, we can't go trusting our newfound potentially infinite power to them, now can we?

It does make sense that the Freaks redside would be dumber, since Arachnos isn't big on education. The general dumbing-down of the group also makes sense; they may have started as disillusioned yuppies, but their schtick would attract quite a few people who understand maybe two words out of "The fetishization of material goods is sickening," but DUDE! YOU HAVE A METAL ARM! I WANT ONE!! The Sid Viciouses, as it were. But it would be nice to see some smarter freaks sometimes, and I don't mean just guys like "Teh L34rn3r3r." Evil isn't always dumb, even the smashy smashy kind.


I also think we need a few clear reminders that they are hurting people. As in, body bags. Or at least some terrified hostages we can save.

Future?

One? You didn't beat up Hequat, an actual physical, albeit weakened, god? Oh wait, that's right, you don't play villains. And we haven't actually SEEN him any more than we've seen Mot or Lughebu. We've only seen manifestations of his power, just like with Mot and Lughebu. God-like powers don't have to come from a source, they can come from being an actual, you know, god. Which exist in this game, and predate the supposed "Origin of Power."

We do know that Aeon is involved with them somehow.

That would again tie in to the Nictus, Path of the Dark, and Romulus doing the nasty in the pasty. Which admittedly I am overly obsessed with due to watching Futurama while making a "nictus" outfit for my /Shield Scrapper.

See above.

If we ever manage to find time to fight each other with all the co-op content we've been doing.

The level 30-40 range has always been a little dry.... Please, can we have another Freakshow arc where they are portrayed as dangerous, violent nihilists rather than leet-speaking comic relief? Remember when their stupid names and the funny things they said only served to underscore their casual attitude toward killing people?

Viridian and Shadow Spider, probably. Those are some pretty cheesy names.

If you're referring to the "down with the street" mission that gives you the Nemesis Staff, that's a level 30+ mission. It's one of the "introduction to Nemesis" missions. There's one Sky Raider mission with a single Nemesis Lieutenant in it, that might be in the late 20s though.

In an alternate dimension they exist. Now if BP were to become more powerful in our dimension, that would work for a story arc that deals with them. But I'd imagine that sort of arc would be more suitable to heroes than the villain arc you were talking about.

Well maybe they evacuated a few, but the ones who got out suddenly started biting everybody and turning them into flesh-eating zombies....wait a minute, our zombies don't work that way. Never mind then. Carry on.

We already have One Mole point in the Shard, and aren't Naylor's missions set in an instance called Mole Point Bravo? Build more Mole Points. Problem solved.

I see a new PSA campaign:

Scene opens: A bunch of heroes and villains are partying at Pocket D. Close-up on the bartender pouring shots from a bottle labeled "Well of the Furies." Quick montage shots of the heroes and villains becoming more and more inebriated, and showing off their fancy new powers. Cut to Poison Mastermind hunched over the toilet. Cut to Fire Blaster standing in the scorched ruins of a nice residential suburb.

Cut to Brute standing in front of a falafel place with a "closed" sign in the window. Brute: "I'm so hungry I could EAT THIS WHOLE DIMENSION!" Brute grows really big, hits footstomp, and breaks the world. Fade to Black.

Voiceover: Know your limit. Please drink responsibly.

No seriously, the only thing stupider than tying Rularuu to the Well would be to reveal him as yet another alternate Statesman. It wouldn't surprise me at all if GG thought this was a good idea.

A friend of mine has a Stalker named Censored Bleep.

Hamidon was a scientist who turned himself into a giant amoeba. The DE story arcs explain their origins quite well.

They do, unfortunately most of it is on the official website and not in-game.

Read their bios. That's pretty much it. They appear again in one of the Grandville arcs, Tavish Bell's I believe, which deals with the negative consequences of mixing the dark arts with mad science. There's also one in the Faathim the Kind TF, he is a Malta scientist who has been possessed. Apparently nobody in Malta noticed when his eyes started glowing green....maybe it's those green-tinted goggles they wear?

You're sure he would be? I'm sure he is. Ernesto Hess is an Arachnos mole, this is now explicitly stated in Burkholder's dialogue. Giant robots. I want. GIVE TO EVA!

The 5th would be pretty stupid to launch a full-out assault on the Council's best-defended stronghold, unless of course they had help from within. Burkholder switches sides pretty easily in Mender Lazarus's arc. Perhaps he could be persuaded to switch back just as easily. And bring his giant robot with him of course. Those two "colossi" in the ITF look very familiar....

Vampire Freaks, more likely. Warwolves aren't created on Striga, vamps are.
Malta is too high level for Striga. Let's keep lower level content lower level. There's enough to go on there without bringing high-level groups into it.

Unfortunately level 30-34 BP don't exist. What they need to do is make a level 20-30 villain SF on Striga, and then add another 30-35 SF somewhere else. More SFs for villains!

Yes. Let those poony heroes go off and save the world. While they're busy with that, I'm gonna go take their stuff.

1: Because it's part of the Rogue Isles so there are Arachnos everywhere.
2: Because it's a slum, and Recluse is shipping in droves of small time crooks, bullies, practitioners of the dark arts, and mad scientists. Your average civilian doesn't want to be robbed, beaten up, sacrificed to the forces of darkness and have their remains used in an unholy perversion of science, so they try to leave.
3: Because having two training/selling locations is more convenient for players who don't have a travel power yet.

I think the better question is why aren't there treatment plants on the other islands. Infrastructure like that is only shown when it's going to be used. If nothing ever happens at the St. Martial treatment plant, there's no need to clutter up the zone with it.

1: Money. Arachnos finds the Family useful.
2: The same people who live in the nicer parts of Cap au Diable. Some people manage to do very well for themselves in a country run by a power-mad super villain. Most of them are corrupt. Also, people with a gambling problem, which I'm sure the Family loan sharks encourage.
3: Why are the Council and Sky Raiders allowed to establish bases on Sharkhead? Why do the Freakshow get that entire slag heap and its surroundings to themselves? Why do the Tsoo have so much territory? Arachnos can't be everywhere, that's why they have you do so much of their dirty work. If it doesn't threaten them directly, they leave it alone.

That's the nice thing about villain zones; if an enemy group appears in the streets, chances are missions within the zone will feature them. If you're fighting Wailers you'll be going to St. Martial. If you're fighting Coralax you'll be going to Sharkhead. But heroside, if you're fighting Banished Pantheon you'll be going to....Independence Port???

Usually you only absolutely need to do one or two missions from a contact before starting their arc, if you're willing to abuse the heck out of the "Abandon mission" feature. Most of these contacts offer the same mission first every time (Janet gives you the one with the debuff, Maria gives you Infernal's portal, Indigo gives you the "check out the shady types Crey are dealing with" mission which introduces you to Malta, etc) but after that it's pretty much random.

You can get new contacts no matter how many arcs you have open, you just can't do their arc if you have more than two open already. Zone arcs such as the ones from Levantera and Tremblor don't count toward that limit, and you can have as many open as you want.
Yes. Upon completing a safeguard you should get to choose from all available contacts for your level range. Heroes are at the point now where they have way too much content available, they shouldn't have to go through hours of content they don't want just to access content they do want.

No it's easy. Do safeguard, get contact. Do a few missions for that contact, get new contact. Repeat until you have all contacts. This is how it's supposed to work. Unfortunately it doesn't actually work that way.

A thought: perhaps Tina is acting wonky due to her model having been replaced? The Ouroboros rock doesn't teleport you to her, or to Maria, it just says "The crystal doesn't know where to send you." See, their disguises are so good they even fool the Ouro rock. Your average contact doesn't stand a chance. I'm not sure what excuse the "detectives" have though.

Only with the "better writers" caveat. Because I swear, if Rularuu's origin is tied to the Well of the Furies I'm never reading another scrap of mission text outside AE ever again. And the only reason I want more Malta is for someone to fix what the last few issues broke.

But then I'd have to play a Kheldian Requiem travels back in time to ancient Rome and becomes his own grandfather or something after the Kheldian storyline anyway, so he's obviously trying to take over the world again, and the Nictus are somehow involved, as Romulus is so fond of telling us.

It's also #12 in the Evil Overlord List.

Which would tie beautifully into any further Malta stories.

I also second the want for more Dark Astoria. Why are there level 50 Banished Pantheon in other dimensions? Maybe we can go there and find out. Then we'll have to make sure the same thing doesn't happen here.

Rularuu is a "coming storm" and the writers are messing with us. It's been heavily implied if not stated outright that the Coming Storm is a combination of things, and Ruladak is just one of the AVs in the future Ouroboros.

Except that Crey hides behind legalities, and exposing them requires you to break the law. Manticore is rich enough to convince the law to look the other way, while Synapse is not.

It's not interesting enough for all new content to include it. The way it's been written it's a self-contained storyline, with nearly everything neatly wrapped up by the time we move on to Primal Earth. The only things left to do are to get rid of Tyrant and get rid of their Hamidon, which would provide content for two issues at most, unless they get more creative than they seem to be able to of late. But due to the devs' love affair with the place, they're stretching it out with incidental stuff like the BAF. Stopping a prison break is a story for a morality mission, or one mission of a larger Task Force, it doesn't merit a Task Force/Trial in and of itself.

And there are too many ambushes, but that's everywhere now.

I don't want a "bug fix" issue because there are always new bugs. You can't get rid of them all. I want a content fix issue. You can fix pet AI only to have it break again six months later, but a revamped Synapse Task Force will remain shorter, less tedious and more engaging than the current "clocks, clocks and more clocks" slogfest until the servers go down.

These unique mechanics also happen to be more prone to not working as intended. Does the "Future self" Villain Morality mission work properly yet? We are on the third iteration of the "Unstable Trigger" hero alignment mission, because the writer insists the player have a conversation with Maelstrom....and this third iteration can become uncompletable. Not failable, uncompletable. And what about that rogue > hero mission where you have to get a bunch of Shadow Shard artifacts away from Nemesis, which has a "talk to" destructible object right near the door, surrounded by enemies that can aggro and destroy it while you're loading, and triggers two ambushes, one of which includes a Rad/Rad boss...dead while zoning because a new mechanic is available and just had to be used even though a simple blinky grab would have served. Do the devs even test these missions on x8, or do they just run through them on base difficulty to make sure everything spawns where it's supposed to?

Oh and another thing about the writing: Quantity =/= quality. If your underlying premise is poor, it doesn't matter how much exposition you give your in-mission contact (too much, IMO....the new missions completely lack the sense that there's more to the story for us to discover in obscure one-off missions or as an aside in an unrelated arc twenty levels down the line. We're still speculating about the Shadow Shard, Malta, and the Circle of Thorns. Nobody speculates about the Ghouls, because it's all laid out for you by the end.) or how many paragraphs long your badge text is. The content becomes entirely forgettable. I can't remember half of what I did in Praetoria, even though I read all the mission text. I do remember there were lots of plot holes and spelling errors.