GlaziusF

Aw. I remember when I was wondering about this.

Here's the skinny, LJ: every mission spawns a group of enemies proportionate to the heroes inside it. So when you're fighting Clockwork alone there are three minions, maybe a minion and a lieutenant. When your team of 8 fights Clockwork, there are three bosses, four lieutenants, and six minions, or something like that.

(Difficulty Levels 2 and 4 spawn for one extra hero at even level.)

The XP you get from defeating an enemy is multiplied by some factor based on team size and then split evenly among team members, unless there's like one guy who's higher-level than everybody else, then he gets the lion's share.

So why does anybody team if they get more XP alone? In that team of 8, that's a 1/8 share of three bosses four lieutenants six minions and a gearbox in a pear tree. It's generally a little higher than the 100% share of three minions you'd get on your own.

Welcome to the game. Sorry you got ganged up on and curbstomped, but this stuff happens, especially at lower levels. If you're running with people new to the game, stick to smaller teams with tighter level spreads until you're, like, 10 or so?

Also, unless they're especially built to be lowbie friendly, the bag of tricks that custom mobs get to tap into is death on a stick to very low characters.

(and if you're looking for something to play, "Bricked Electronics" should be manageable, and "Dream Paper" a bit of a stretch.)

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Can you put the Teen Phalanx base on a slightly larger map? Clamor spawned right on top of Bitty Babs, and I mean RIGHT on top.

[/ QUOTE ]

Oh, forgot to address this - but for technical reasons this mission has to use a really small map. In order to get the map to start initially empty, I had to define an encounter for every single spawn point on the map, and set it up so that all those encounters are triggered from clicking glowies. The smaller map also helps the player quickly locate each spawn of Freaks as it arrives, which I think helps the sense of immersion.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why bother leaving it initially empty? Put in some Slag Golems! ("They really don't clean up in here. In fact - did you just see some of that move?") They're the right level range and everything.

PW, there's one more thing I should say, and it's not actually going to help in any way at all, but I'm sure you realize there's no good way to make a junior version of somebody's name. If we ever get user-set variables ("Ness thought about some RABBIT and craved eating it") you're going to work them in here sharpish, am I right?

The character I'm gunning for the mission architect accolade on first is a spine/regen scrapper named Harlequin Cirsium (she's a Bladegrass who joined the Carnival of Light, don't ask) and "Kid Harlequin Cirsium" is just a dang mouthful. They might call her "Kid Thistle", but...

OH! Idea! Glorious idea!

"Kid $origin".

I think the modest spread of names works, and nobody ever uses origin for anything. Cora can still call you $name Jr to be snarky.

One of the ambushes the Clockwork King summons uses "name Jr", but the Clockwork are portrayed as a little loopy so that's probably okay. I like the one going "I love Penelope Yin!".

"Citadel XP" is nice, but can you use "Red Hat Citadel" instead? With obvious jaunty headgear? That may cause operating system wars given the final boss, or you could call him "Solaris Citadel", Mr. S, to avoid that clue in XP's locker implying Valkyrie is a tech genius out of nowhere and dumping all over him. This is just some crazy tech geekery and not a serious suggestion, and also because I think Citadel would look hilarious in a jaunty red fedora.

Definitely captured the "teen superhero drama" feel you were going for. Just a few things I'd change:

1) Put in some amusing "interrupted" text when you try monitor duty. I wondered what it'd say and walked away disappointed.

2) Can you put the Teen Phalanx base on a slightly larger map? Clamor spawned right on top of Bitty Babs, and I mean RIGHT on top.

3) Don't give Manticora Oil Slick Arrow. I hit a bug where Citakid sparked it off but then it started damaging the good guys.

4) Look into a different objective order or something so that you can probably get the team together to fight Mr. V. He spawned right up a blind ramp and I only had a couple allies at the time. Fortunately Cora was in the same room.

5) Make all the defeat boss objectives defeat boss ONLY. Most of the Teen Phalanx can do some kind of crazy knockback and I don't want to hunt for a minion that fell down a little crevice to clear the mission.

[ QUOTE ]
Arc #2180, "Bricked Electronics"

[/ QUOTE ]

Not that I expect Venture to play it again, but revisions complete. A rundown:

Mission 1: Mark now gives you a quick and straightforward rundown of how his mutant power works.

Mission 2: Success dialogue is a little more explicit.

Mission 3: The Council base is now like unto a scorpion: head up front, toxins in the back. A patrol mentions Targus's gas and he drops a logbook describing it, instead of a rant on base hygiene.

Mission 4: I think a patch reset the allies in this, they all displayed as being in the front with no listed enemy group guarding them (I guess the game defaulted to Brickers, fortunately). Pared it down to 2 allies, each in a different map zone to minimize the chance of overlap.

Mission 5: Attempted to make the electronic intrusion sound more serious than a single email to the wrong source. Wodesten is now rambling because of the pressure instead of narrowly psychotic, and the success dialogue provides a little more information and sadly 100% fewer Spelunky jokes.

I think it's still not completely obvious why the Goldbrickers are showing up but it should be easier to work out.

After finishing this arc, I have one burning question: is there some reason you can't use "Fuhrer"? Does it trigger some filter? It doesn't seem so. And it bugged me unreasonably.

In the Wolf's Den, there's a possible boss spawn in the back room up on a catwalk that isn't immediately obvious to access. Just a heads up.

I dislike scouring outdoor maps in search of things to do. At least I can make a custom target macro for "general", but then the Soviet generals are nearly invisible until I get close to them. Maybe give their guards some kind of obvious animation? I think the French general was drilling his troops but they didn't stand out much against the cityscape.

It didn't help much that none of your custom groups except the US Army had lieutenants, which meant all the spawns were just varying numbers of minions.

Schadenfreude certainly seems to be living off my sorrow. AR does knockback and "avoid" with the burn patch, meaning she was always sending something away and chasing it down. Especially when a lot of stacked web grenades had me slowed, this hurt. Maybe make her dark blast on a power level that doesn't take Torrent? Wait, no. I think just Hard AR rather than Extreme will work.

Speaking of minions with web grenades, the saddest thing in the world is to get 4 web grenades on you and unwittingly run up a tiny slope into a "pit" with 6-inch high walls. It was like being tied up and bumped to death by puppies, and if I hadn't heard the Oberst behind me I'd be furious right now. Web grenades and broken terrain are not good playmates.

And that brings me to the last thing. That ruined Atlas Park map. If you're going to use it, at least mention the giant robots in the arsenal of things that got dropped on it? But it has no minimap, making it a real pain to know where you've been, and it's chock full of broken terrain that gives allies fits. (Speaking of allies, are the Obersts supposed to spawn with no surrounding captors?)

I'd almost suggest the Atlas Park with the meteor wrecked into it and have Shaddy gloating about how their super-science dropped a freakin' space rock on the place.

[ QUOTE ]

The premise appears to be that you become a lackey for the Comte and Contessa of the fictional evil country of Bravura.

Minor quibble: Comte is French, and a Comte's wife is a Comtesse. Contessa is Italian, and a Contessa's husband is a Conte.


[/ QUOTE ]

Are you going to tell Their Excellencies that they've claimed the wrong titles for themselves? Lloyd's certainly not.

[ QUOTE ]
Strangely, her idea of a tryout is to leave her bodyguards at home and have the player bodyguard her through an assassination attempt. I think this is logically insane; if she isn't sure I'm reliable, she definitely should not count on me in such a life and death situation! Logically, her tryout should be something less important to her, like maybe defeating her current bodyguards in a fair fight, or murdering some minor enemy or expendable henchman.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, a) already you understand the Contessa very well, and b) when you replay this, try to get her killed and see what happens. (also try to ditch her. I am very thorough.)

[ QUOTE ]
Lloyd Fredrickson says "when the inevitable happens" in reference to an assassination attempt on the Contessa; how does he know someone'll take a shot at her? This is either a logic flaw or catapults him to #1 suspect for who is behind the assassination attempt.

[/ QUOTE ]

Because Lloyd has experienced enough of the Rogue Isles to know that everyone is trying to kill everyone else all the time. He says as much.

[ QUOTE ]
The goal in the Nav tool is "Extract the Contessa"; this seems to imply she's already in a danger situation even before I enter the mission. I think maybe "Guard Contessa" or "Escort Contessa" would be more appropriate, then have "Extract Contessa" as a subgoal when the time comes to escort her out.

Okay, I'm in the mission now ... hmm, there is no sign of the motorcade that my contact told me to follow. Instead my objective is "Search warehouses for the Contessa." I think maybe the mission briefing needs to be adjusted to match the actual mission.

[/ QUOTE ]

Tweaked a bit.

[ QUOTE ]
There's a lot of Wyvern here but I'm not sure why. Is the Contessa wanted by Wyvern for some reason? Needs some explanation.

Okay, I found Contessa Bravura and her description actually says "you wonder why Wyvern's after her".... so I guess it is meant to be a mystery. In that case maybe change the first line of your popup bubble as you enter the mission to include something like "You wonder why Wyvern is here?" instead of "Ahh, Wyvern" (which sounds like you expected it).

[/ QUOTE ]

See previous tweak.

[ QUOTE ]
I like Contessa's dialog with her captors, very dignified.

As Contessa exits, she says "It seems we shall get on as houses on fire!" This is kind of a weird thing to say. I assume this is intentional because she's not supposed to be a native English speaker?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes. The actual proverb is "get on like a house on fire" which means "to be fast friends".

[ QUOTE ]
I've now completed the mission but have no idea what just happened; I guess my motivation is that I'm a hired thug though who doesn't have need to know. But I actually would've liked to have some clue what's going on.

As we exit the Contessa takes a separate car and abandons my "protection"? Logic problem; Wyvern just jumped her, it does not make sense that she would ditch her security detail.

[/ QUOTE ]

Latter fixed. As for the former... what just happened is what just happened. Hopefully the new intro text clears that up a little.

[ QUOTE ]
Debriefing: "Under the auspices of diplomatic immunity, I cannot enlist any denizen of the Rogue Isles in our national service" -- this seems an odd thing to say considering he just hired me to do a job.

"I do miss my homeland. And occasionally I read its wonderful paper -- out loud, to practice my English." This doesn't make sense; he's clearly not an English speaker, so his homeland's newspaper would not be in English.

[/ QUOTE ]

The latter is fixed. The former... well, technically, you "volunteered", and will continue to do so, for reasons that will become clearer.

[ QUOTE ]
Briefing: OK, upon seeing this I now understand what he was trying to say in the debriefing of mission 1. You're not actually going to Bravura, you're going to get "orders" by overhearing him pretend to read a significant newspaper article. An interesting idea, I just found it hard to get it from the mission 1 debriefing.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, he's not pretending. When you control a tiny nation with an iron fist you can tap a pinky on the press quite easily.

[ QUOTE ]
Entering the mission, I like how you have some objectives marked required and others optional in the nav tool, that's an interesting technique. I guess it makes sense that a villain can choose to blow off helping out the farmers and stuff.

Where is this scene supposed to be? I know it is a Croatoa map, but maybe you should say something like "You find yourself in the Bravuran countryside" in the pop up as you enter the mission, as sort of an "establishing shot".

[/ QUOTE ]

Done.

[ QUOTE ]
Found Mazapegul, I thought it was rather odd that he's a Red Cap; Red Caps usually have nonsense names, while Mazapegul seems more appropriate for a ghost, CoT demon or BP spirit.

[/ QUOTE ]

Mazapegul's description also thinks it's rather odd that he's a Red Cap. As does Mazapegul himself.

[ QUOTE ]
Suddenly I have 3 warding steles to smash. Mazapegul gave me a clue to smack something, but it's not clear what it is or why I should smack it. Maybe you could have him (in the clue or in dialog) offer to bribe the player with some sapphires or something to do it, and explain a little more about the 3 steles. You might also have the dialog say something like "Boy do I have an offer for you!" or "Can you help out with something before I start making you gems?"

[/ QUOTE ]

Made it a little clearer as to the interest you have in breaking these things. (also check their description)

[ QUOTE ]
I didn't really want to drag Mazapegul all over the place, fighting every encounter on the map while looking for steles, so I flew to one I could see in the distance. Incidentally you named it "Legacy Chain Warding" but the nav tool says "warding stele"; I suggest you make the names consistent.

Unfortunately, the warding I found had spawned in the side of a hill and although I could target it, I could not actually hit it ("out of range").

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, this is an oddity. You may have noticed playing these mission arcs that occasionally you whiff on an object that should be in your to-hit arc, or smack it when it's looked out of range. The actual hit location for the destructible object is some distance removed from the object model - it only really stands out when there's some vertical distance.

You can actually hit and damage the object with ranged attacks, or by activating an attack power and moving to a different location on the hill. Mazzy is unfortunately no help here as he follows the object's model and winds up out of range of the hit spot.

[ QUOTE ]
This is probably a bug outside your control, but you may want to change to a flatter map or change the destroyable objects into glowies or something else to avoid this problem.

[/ QUOTE ]

In Croatoa there are four types of maps: 1) sloped maps, 2) Perez Park In Yellow, 3) urban areas, 4) maps that don't support hostages. And none of them allow glowies.

I've switched the mission to a sloped map with a smaller portion of the map up on the slope, at least I think so.

[ QUOTE ]
Here's my attempt at a heroic story arc, to give you all something else to check out, if you're interested:

[/ QUOTE ]

I'll give it a look, PW. If you want to review a different arc than the one I presented, run a search on my global, I think it's unique enough to only spit back my missions.

[ QUOTE ]
Arc #2180, "Bricked Electronics"
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: "just a bunch of stuff that happened"

Marc Freeman wants you to check out the store he bought an old cell phone at because there's some suspicious data left on it. (He kind of talks down to the player at this point, which is not a good idea...yes, some characters have a room-temperature IQ and thing the TV remote has imps in it that change the channels, but some are geniuses who invented their own nanotech-based symbiotic AIs.) Level cap for this one is 20 (19 for me). The shop is being robbed by Goldbrickers when you get there, and the owner is not in...the schedule you find shows he wasn't supposed to be in today. You do get his contact information.

[/ QUOTE ]

Probably need to repurpose that bit then. The idea is that he starts to geek out about "digital" being "analog" with a threshhold applied and how he can pick this stuff out because he can actually interpret the analog part of things, but you didn't show up to hear him rant about his mutant power.

[ QUOTE ]
The Boss summons at least one ambush wave to support him, and adds a "3 gas cylinders to destroy" objective with no explanation. (His defeat clue just laments all the trash falling into his base and hopes the Zig is cleaner.) Addition of this objective effectively turns the mission into a defeat-all and makes you run the map twice. Not appreciated. In the debriefing Freeman calls JJ and asks why she sent you into a Council base without warning. Her answer was "why didn't he just turn his cloaking device on?" Freeman notes he has to talk to her about what kinds of tech the average person has. (Venture actually has a stealth IO...in the other build. Wouldn't have helped, of course.)

[/ QUOTE ]

Ah, need to tweak the mission popup text then. It's implied a bit too obliquely that you're "questioning" the Archon because you think JJ set you up to get jumped by the Council. She didn't actually think a Council base was worth mentioning because, again, cloaking device.

But the Archon's inactive speech mentions the nerve gas, and so does the order he barks when he gets down to half health. I think I may have had a patrol talking about it as well? If not I probably ought to. Wondering how you missed the first two, though.

I could probably put the Archon in the middle and stick the nerve gas in the back, but then there's the chance people could run into the Archon before the patrol that talks about the gas. Eh, guess I'll just have to take it then.

[ QUOTE ]
I was going to criticize the plot here for implying that there was enough time following the Rikti War for unclaimed property laws to kick in, but a quick trip to Google determined that the state assumes control of unclaimed bank accounts after 3 years in most case in Rhode Island (and NJ, as it happens...I thought it took much longer. Wonder if this has changed lately. Enough digression.)

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, even if it was something like 10 years, the arc posits that in the wake of the Rikti War the city froze all seizures of unclaimed property, even the ones where there were just a few months left on the timer, because people had more important things to do than check up on their bank accounts.

[ QUOTE ]
Or soon enough, as it turns out. Act V's briefing tells you the heist is going down: a bank is scheduled to bring out abandoned safe deposit boxes for transfer to the state, and the Goldbrickers have used a virus to send off an email cancelling the extra security. (This is tossing the Idiot Ball at minor characters, as no security outfit worth working with would fail to show up just because of an email.)

[/ QUOTE ]

I'll see if I have some space to talk about it rerouting communications, too, so that the Goldbrickers answer the phone/have access to the passphrase/whatever. Or maybe say that it didn't work forever, but it passed the smell test long enough for them to get into the bank and start working. The idea is that in your average crazy-pressure situation such as follows from being a private security firm in Paragon City a spoofed apologetic email ("sorry, half the staff have been kidnapped by ninjas") isn't going to raise as many red flags as a Troll planting some rebar in the building's power box.

[ QUOTE ]
The ending is somewhat anticlimactic as you don't really get told what the plan was...it's inferred that the Goldbrickers needed to retrieve the money in that account because the increased attention being paid to unclaimed accounts revealed it, but that could stand to be made more explicit.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'll have Wodesten ranting about the pressure of the op, then, in addition to Freeman spelling that out at the end.

I figured you'd have worked out whose money that is and why the Goldbrickers want it so badly, though, unless you're just pretending not to for review purposes.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Uh, no. That's in fact the opposite of my point.

You might get lucky and have your arc be above 4.5 at 1000 votes. (expected value 3 variance 2, 300 samples, not outside the realm of possibility.) Or there might be a Markov Chain model where someone can get a temporarily higher sane:insane ratio than 70:30. But in the end it regresses to the mean, which is 4.4 and out of the Hall of Fame.

[/ QUOTE ]

Which is where it should be, if it's true value was 4.4, the problem with flucation around that value is a different issue and leads to volatility yes.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well, this is the problem. The playerbase will always be 30% insane. There's no way to change that. If you arc gets absolutely 100% 5-star ratings from the 70% of the playerbase that is sane, your arc will regress to 4.4. There is no way to sustain a higher rating.

Hey Lazarus, if you slide me the briefing text for 1567 I'll retense it so it operates the right way. PM or mail the .storyarc to the address in my profile.

Well, I've got three, pick one, though if you played any of 'em in beta the top one is the new one.

[ QUOTE ]

For 10-20 heroes:
Arc: Bricked Electronics
Arc ID: 2180
Author: @GlaziusF
Number of Missions: 5
Description: Mark Freeman finds a ghost in a machine. Follow it through the trash heaps of Skyway City to stop a grievous heist.

For 10-20 heroes:
Arc: Dream Paper
Arc ID: 1874
Author: @GlaziusF
Number of Missions: 5
Description: The Lost are breaking into the cheapest apartments in the city. Finding out why will lead you up a scanty trail of evidence to a disquieting conclusion.

For 20-30 villains:
Arc: The Bravuran Jobs
Arc ID: 5073
Author: @GlaziusF
Number of Missions: 5
Description: The tiny sovereignty of Bravura arose in the wake of the Rikti War. It claims an ancient ruling dynasty, but it's an open secret that its holdings are products of military conquest. Sounds like your kind of place. And even better, they're looking for freelancers.


[/ QUOTE ]

So here's your quid. Played "McGuffin Delivery Service". ****.

Plot was great. Second mission especially, with the use of ally bosses in a way I hadn't seen before to create atmosphere.

This suffers from two things. First is Mission 3, fighting Circle of Thorns at their most annoying, with Earth Thorns and Nerva Spectral Lords debuffing defense, accuracy, and attack speed, in the most annoying terrain to fight them. And it doesn't help that some of the glowies ended up right in the middle of a field of crystals. Not impossible to click but dang if I wasn't hairline positioning that.

Second is some overall problems with grammar. A lot of times you build a run-on sentence by using a comma to join what should be separate ideas. The navbar tag for the boss fight in the first mission is an example of this. "You heard a noise. Leave no witnesses." Two ideas, savvy?

More importantly, the contact is you writing a Doogie Howser-type journal looking back at the past. Writing the past is tricky, especially when you write about events that would have been happening in the future of the past. You use, I kid you not, the pluperfect and pluperfect progressive tenses, formed as (have + past participle) and (have + be + present participle) to describe events happening in the past or for a length of time in the past. And then there's the pluperfect subjunctive (will + have + be + present participle) to describe actions happening in the future of the past.

You just kinda throw present and future around in this journal you're writing, and it makes it difficult to distinguish your villain's modern-day commentary on the actions from his description of past events.

[ QUOTE ]
Very cool, I have a need for grouping hostages too. After setting up a grouping like that is there any way to restrict another objective to only show once all of the people are rescued?

[/ QUOTE ]
Unfortunately, no. Multiple objectives can chain from one completion, but not vice-versa.

[ QUOTE ]
Is being in two groups WAI? I thought it was a bug (and an annoying one).

[/ QUOTE ]

I think when used as a specific objective critters will always display their original group.

But everything has to be associated with SOME group. Keeping filesize down by using a placeholder group for your rank-and-file mission spawns and culling as necessary is a better alternative than deleting or reassigning custom critters.

To better manage custom characters, create a source group for them and then pull them into another custom group to put into your missions. You can drop them from the custom group without having to delete them from the source group.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

The flawed assumption being made is that the relative score will instead diverge from normality after reaching a certain point into approaching normality.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, guy? What do you think "random" means? It means there's no way you can predict what's going to happen. Working assumption is that 30% give random ratings and don't know about 0 stars so they rate a 3 average. This means your arc's at 4.4 if the remaining 70% all rate it 5. If you can get a temporary influx of "sane" people (through word of mouth or whatever) then your arc can crest above 4.5 but after that influx fades the randoms will drag it back down. Or you just get a small stretch of good random luck and you go above 4.5, but then as more people play you hit a bad stretch and drop back down.

I mean, you could make the argument that a hall of fame arc needs constant promotion if it wants to stay hall of fame. I don't think it's a good argument but you could make it. I will continue to say that the steady state of a "perfect" arc is going to be 4.4 or slightly south.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am making no argument, I am making an observation and comment on a flawed assumption.

Restated in terms of statistics, the flawed assumption being that as the sample size increase, the margin of error also increases.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, no. That's in fact the opposite of my point.

You might get lucky and have your arc be above 4.5 at 1000 votes. (expected value 3 variance 2, 300 samples, not outside the realm of possibility.) Or there might be a Markov Chain model where someone can get a temporarily higher sane:insane ratio than 70:30. But in the end it regresses to the mean, which is 4.4 and out of the Hall of Fame.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
HOF missions losing their status is ridiculous.

The bar is high enough that getting over it represents a major achievement and a guarantee of a certain level of quality- where's the logic in 'losing' them at some future date?

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

[/ QUOTE ]Any arc that deserves HoF will keep it regardless of what happens. If HoF can be lost to bad ratings, HoF arcs that achieve that rank through means other than deserving the status will drop off the list.

However, regardless of what happens to the arc, the author should keep the extra slot.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, no, see above about people making random votes.

They can make your arc fluctuate above 4.5 and back down and there's nothing you can do about it.

This includes the people who will rate an HOF arc 1 on principle.

[/ QUOTE ]

The flawed assumption being made is that the relative score will instead diverge from normality after reaching a certain point into approaching normality.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, guy? What do you think "random" means? It means there's no way you can predict what's going to happen. Working assumption is that 30% give random ratings and don't know about 0 stars so they rate a 3 average. This means your arc's at 4.4 if the remaining 70% all rate it 5. If you can get a temporary influx of "sane" people (through word of mouth or whatever) then your arc can crest above 4.5 but after that influx fades the randoms will drag it back down. Or you just get a small stretch of good random luck and you go above 4.5, but then as more people play you hit a bad stretch and drop back down.

I mean, you could make the argument that a hall of fame arc needs constant promotion if it wants to stay hall of fame. I don't think it's a good argument but you could make it. I will continue to say that the steady state of a "perfect" arc is going to be 4.4 or slightly south.

Arc Name: Dream Paper
Arc ID: 1874
Faction/Level Range: Lost, Tsoo, Trolls (heroic alignment) -- 10-20 stuff.
Creator Global/Forum Name: @GlaziusF/GlaziusF
Synopsis: The Lost are breaking into the cheapest apartments in the city. Finding out why will lead you up a scanty trail of evidence to a disquieting conclusion.

Arc Name: Bricked Electronics
Arc ID: 2180
Faction/Level Range: Goldbrickers, Council, Custom Group (heroic alignment) -- 1-20 stuff, probably best for 6+
Creator Global/Forum Name: @GlaziusF/GlaziusF
Synopsis: Mark Freeman finds a ghost in a machine. Trailing it will lead you through the scrap heaps of Skyway City to stop a grievous heist.

Arc Name: The Bravuran Jobs
Arc ID: 5073
Faction/Level Range: Wyvern, Legacy Chain, Carnival of Shadows, Custom Group (villainous alignment) -- 20-30 stuff, though it'll kick you higher for the Carnie mission you could handle villain carnies at 20.
Creator Global/Forum Name: @GlaziusF/GlaziusF
Synopsis: The tiny sovereignty of Bravura arose in the wake of the Rikti War. It claims an ancient ruling dynasty, but it's an open secret its holdings are products of military conquest. Sounds like your kind of place. And even better, they're looking for freelancers.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
HOF missions losing their status is ridiculous.

The bar is high enough that getting over it represents a major achievement and a guarantee of a certain level of quality- where's the logic in 'losing' them at some future date?

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

[/ QUOTE ]Any arc that deserves HoF will keep it regardless of what happens. If HoF can be lost to bad ratings, HoF arcs that achieve that rank through means other than deserving the status will drop off the list.

However, regardless of what happens to the arc, the author should keep the extra slot.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, no, see above about people making random votes.

They can make your arc fluctuate above 4.5 and back down and there's nothing you can do about it.

This includes the people who will rate an HOF arc 1 on principle.

...for Lieutenants and Bosses, and possibly AVs. In Mission Architect mode. On Hard difficulty (but not Extreme)

Most other offense sets (blasts and manipulations) don't get this power, but do get a bigger variety of attacks. Broad Sword, Martial Arts, and Energy Melee all get Build Up or a Build Up alike when going from Standard to Hard for lieutenants and bosses, alone among the many offense powersets.

I think this is an oversight in constructing powers, and should be tweaked so we can add a few more attack powers from these sets without introducing the necessity of whoever gets them opening with a devastating combo.

[ QUOTE ]
Arc 5073 - The Bravuran Jobs
Rating: ****
I finished the first mission and found myself with only one clue... figuring the other mentioned clues would show up in the other missions, I moved on. Hope that's not a mistake.


[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure what you mean about other mentioned clues. The "got clue" noise makes the same sound as the "got badge" noise, which is a bit odd, but not exactly something I can prevent.

[ QUOTE ]

Now we hit mish 3, and I'm getting thrown astride the 2-level bump. I'm trying to work out why, if there's a custom enemy group that the level range goes so oddly in this arc - 20-30, 20-30, 30-54? But we'll see. There are ways to limit a level range (like hiding a single Legacy Chain Kaolin, for example, somewhere on the map). The enemy group introduced looks pretty neat, has a distinct theme in names and powers, and overall, remind me a lot of Crey. It serves you well to know who does what, but at the same time, you don't get the feeling they're all handcrafted snowflakes designed to look unique. In fact, the designer has hidden their faces in many cases, which reduces the jarring effect of an army of identical twins. While I was warned about such things going in, I actually found one of the mobs a bit too rough, and saw the tell-tale sign that it'd be even rougher for a dom or controller - he was toting a damn shield. Being a dirty [censored], I came back and mugged him with inspirations running. This just served to play into the theme further. But then, I died again at the next time one turned up. Then again. Then again.

Now, I'm up late right now and I feel like hell warmed over, but come on.


[/ QUOTE ]

This is a problem with difficulty settings for Broad Sword - I can either give him the same two attacks that a minion gets, or five attacks plus build-up. Fortunately, Shield Defense doesn't actually get the status-protection power until it's set to Extreme, so you can still knock that Mr. Problem back or hold him still.

I think I'll have to tone him down while the devs put in a reasonable intermediary between minion and Mack truck. I think in other weapon/offense sets the short-term damage boost only comes out in "extreme" difficulty, and I'd rather not give him a mace or axe because then he'd be chaining stuns/knockbacks.

(I know that it's Build Up that's giving you grief because the other type of lieutenant with a lot of melee attacks to chain doesn't have a shield, or a buildup-alike)

[ QUOTE ]
The fourth mish has one thing I've become fond of - an enemy spawning based on something else happening. The problem is, the hint for where to find the newly-spawned badguy is totally unhelpful because it seems to be wrong.

[/ QUOTE ]

The lobby is the first floor of a hotel, isn't it?

Oh, wait, I used a random map for that. Were you on one of the ones that starts you off at floor 5 and goes down? Hmm. Well, either I'll bite the bullet and use a specific map or genericize the hint but I have no idea how to make it both generic and still helpful.

[ QUOTE ]
In the end, what did I think? Well, great dialogue, and a story that covers a range of interesting enemy groups and only really gets weird when you have to deal with the level range issue.

[/ QUOTE ]

I actually had a broader level range on test, but there were some issues with using 1-54 versions of certain enemy groups. Perhaps they've ironed those out, I'll have to see. Unfortunately I can't manage to fit the Legacy Chain and Carnies in the same arc without at least a little level strain, but the lower-tier Carnies they made for CoV are IMO suitable for fightin' at 20, if not before.

K, here ya go.

Author: GlaziusF
Level Range: (suggested) 20-30, villainside
Subject: The tiny sovereignty of Bravura arose in the wake of the Rikti War. It claims an ancient ruling dynasty, but it's an open secret that its holdings are products of military conquest. And even better, they're looking for freelancers.
5073 - The Bravuran Jobs

Author: GlaziusF
Level Range: 1-20, heroside
Subject: Mark Freeman finds a ghost in a machine. Following it will lead you through the scrap heaps of Skyway City to stop a grievous heist.
2180 - Bricked Electronics

Author: GlaziusF
Level Range: 11-20, heroside
Subject: The Lost are breaking into the cheapest apartments in the city. Finding out why will lead you up a scanty trail of evidence to a disquieting conclusion
1874 - Dream Paper

[ QUOTE ]
Also, there was no payphone contact =(

[/ QUOTE ]

That's what I said!

You can get a bronze roll for 75 tickets, which on a decent-sized mission where you clear everything out means you get about 3 of them and enough left over to fill your salvage tray with random commons.

Regular recipes can be bought at the rate of about 1 per mission but really you're better off taking some bronze rolls or common salvage to the market.

Outdoor maps are problematic with spawn points to begin with. Sometimes several of them overlap and you can only see one spawn by defeating another and going off elsewhere for a bit.