Judgement_Dave

Like the new look, however:

- Sort by Last commented is returning no missions.

Glad you mentioned that Col - else I wouldn't have bothered popping ingame to check...

It looks like this patch removed Prisoner mobs that had been allowed to exist in custom mobs before this patch have been removed, but the Prisoner group (containing just the 'random' mobs) has been returned to the MA editor.

Why didn't this get mentioned in the patch notes?

Only a few days ago the removal of the Prisoner group was deemed important enough that it made the patch notes, so why wasn't the return of the group given similar treatment?

It really does no favours to put things back or solve problems and then not tell anyone that they've been addressed...

Why not up the arcsize to 200k or more to allow those whose published arcs have been adversely affected by devs removing assets to have the space to create custom groups to fill in the gap.

This space could be offered without fear of overloading the servers, as the only people using it would be story tellers and not farmers/exploiters (as generally a farm should be possible in a very small arc).

Given that exploits are so bad that emergency-asset-removal is needed I can only imagine that most arcs feature exploits and so would remain unaffected by this increase.

Just an idea. And one that wouldn't annoy anyone trying to use the MA system as it was intended to be used.

Thanks in advance, devs, for considering this humble suggestion from an EU player.

So that's what the patch today did.

Stopped my published arc that was happily using Prisoner Lts/bosses for a single mission in the Zig from working anymore.

Well done devs.

I had good reviews on that story so far, for the story... Was pretty pleased after putting well over 20 hrs into developing it. But because some numbskull idiot thought of some minor exploit with them you decided the only way to deal with the issue was to remove them... and then, in todays patch, stop any existing arcs that were using them.

Is this some sort of ploy to stop any PCC arcs showing a bit more inventiveness than the stories that you come up with? Remove anything that they may use whilst telling a half-decent story?

And the claims of trying to change removed assets and get them back in the MA soon really do ring on deaf ears... Has anything made it back in since I14 hit live? Do the devs even care about this, given that it's bound to be low priority below fixing crashing errors and removing anything that anyone could ever use to farm...

You know what - remove one mob or map or object or whatever and the farmers don't give a damn - they move on to the next easiest target.

Remove that target and the farmers don't give a damn - they just move on to the next easiest target.

Remove that and guess what?? The farmers don't give a damn - they just move on to the next easiest target.

You see where this is going yet?


You neuter a great resource for the general playing population just because you cannot think of a better way to deal with the problem than using the developers A-bomb and nuking the assets out of existence.

Doesn't this mean your game is being dictated/ruined by those doing the exploits... heck - maybe the devs are being out-thought by kids who can't add 1+1 and get the right answer, but know a free meal when they see one... And the devs can't react without the nuke.

I'd be quite ashamed of that.

Still - what does it matter? The devs will never know I'm pee'd off given that I'm situated on the wrong side of the pond for them to give a rat's...



Anyone know where you sign up for CO beta?

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Why, it's easy to test, all we need is to get 4 people, one with unused MA slot. They set up a "guinea pig" arc, and rate it certain way, say, 5,4,4 should be 5 stars if it's rounding up and 4 if it's down or nearest int. if it's 4 then we remove the arc, republiish it and rate it 5,5,4 it would be 4 stars if rounding down and 5 if nearest.


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Should be no need to republish - get one account to rerate so they switch between 4 and 5.

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Only speaking for myself here, but I tend to list them by last commented (descending for reading, Ascending for playing), so I can leave feedback for the ones at the back of the 'queue' so to speak.

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I, also, tend to use that (or arc id, lowest first) when picking arcs to play/review/comment for the same sort of reason.

Of course, if we both do it by reverse last commented we could end up leapfrogging through the list...

Oh - I also tend to look for soloable and giving preference to non-extreme, non-AV...

EDIT: BTW - arc #1064 hasn't got a comment but is out of order on that list. I left a comment but it was too big and unfairly only showed about half the review so I asked for it to be deleted! I've got it written & waiting until CoG accepts longer reviews, but I'm sure GrinningSpade would be happy if anyone else wants to file a comment!

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Two more ratings and it went down to four stars. I may be wrong but I am figuring, from the mathematics involved, that the two people who rated it next either gave one star and two stars, or both gave it one star.

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Five votes of five, two votes of three, gives an average vote of (5 * 5 + 2 * 3 ) / 7 ~= 4.43, which rounds down to a rating of four stars.

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Hmmm. Perhaps I have misunderstood the system. I was under the impression that all ratings were rounded up. I will happily stand corrected, however.

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As far as I am aware we have never been told anything about how the ratings are aggregated except for the Ex Libris post stating that to make it into the HoF arcs needed a rating of an average of 5 rounded up after at least 1000 votes.

Some people at the time showed that they misunderstood what 'rounding up' is and some people still post about needing 4.5 or rounding to the nearest integer.

But, AFAIK, (presumably mean) average rounded up is all we have ever been told by rednames.

BTW - the devs have never clarified which average they mean. I guess that they probably mean the mean average as:
- it tends to be what most people refer to when saying 'average';
- mode and median really wouldn't seem to make much sense in this use!

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One of my arcs was rated five stars after seven ratings, most of which I knew to be actual five star ratings because the ratings were from people I knew and who tested it for me, people who I trust greatly.

Two more ratings and it went down to four stars. I may be wrong but I am figuring, from the mathematics involved, that the two people who rated it next either gave one star and two stars, or both gave it one star.


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Once more the maths:

From what we've been told the HoF criteria use the mean average rating rounded up, so I am assuming that all in-browser ratings are mean average rounded up.

To have a 5-star rating in the browser after 7 ratings means that you need a mean average above 4, so you need a total of greater than of equal to 29, as 29=(4*7)+1 so 29/7 > 4.

But let's factor in that you said most of the initial 7 ratings were 5s, and assume that they actually were (and your friends weren't being kind and telling white lies and that they didn't rate an initial 5 to avoid hurting your feelings before going back and rerating it lower). Most of 7 is 4.. so lets assume 4 ratings of 5, that's 20 in total, leaving a total of 9 stars to get between the remaining 3 of 7... That's very possible, especially if your friends know you and either share similar tastes and know similar references (possibly more important if humour or references to other ingame characters are used).

To have a 4-star rating in the browser after 9 ratings you need to have a total between 28 and 36 inclusive, i.e. between 28=(3*9)+1 and 36=4*9.

So if you were only at a total of 29 (for your 5 stars after 7 ratings) then the 8th and 9th ratings could be as high as a 3 and a 4 and you would still drop to a 4-star mean average rounded up.

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Thoughtlessness or simple one-star griefing?

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To maintain a mean average rounded up of 5 stars after 9 ratings you would need a total of at least 37 stars - i.e. (9*4)+1.

If the 8th and 9th votes had been 1-star (or lower) griefing then you would have had to have at least 35 points from the previous 7 votes. Possible... but it means that every single rating before the 8th gave full marks.

And if your arc is truly that good, then I still have faith that it will bear out in the long term.

BTW - they might take time, but I'd hope that sooner or later the devs do start spotting any true, recurring grief-voters and then their votes can probably be removed from the system. You'll notice that the system keeps track of past ratings that you've given to arcs.


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Anyway, without some kind of feedback it is a little dispiriting for people who are putting a lot of effort into creating arcs they think people will enjoy and that will add, in some small way, to the game's content.

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True - but possibly nothing that can be done until the comments between EU and US are resolved. If the arc was picked at random, or because of it's position in a search, then I'd think that it's most likely that the player was on the US servers. I think this purely because they outnumber EU players so much that anyone randomly stumbling across an arc is more likely to be on the US servers.

And if that is the case they may even have left you comments but you never received them.


BTW - On the subject of ratings:
* A 2-star is described as 'Mediocre' on the arc info screen.
* A 3-star rating is 'Good'.
* A 4-star is 'Excellent'.
I've no idea what a 5-star is (I've placed some 5 -star votes, but for some reason it's not shown me them on the browser window).

If you treat a 2-star as mediocre/average and not as poor just because it's below the mean of the numbers 1 to 5 (and below the mean of the numbers 0 to 5) then 2 star ratings become somewhat more understandable. I wouldn't be surprised if these dev-provided descriptions become more common as people start noticing them more...

Or don your ruff and do your bestest ingame impersonation of the Bard - given it's both his birthday and deathday anniversaries.

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You can not possibly sit and tell me that if you have an invention-orientated build, you did not farm. It's incredibly difficult in doing so, which hence provides the point of farming, to buy it.

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You can do an invention-orientated build easily without farming.

You maybe can't do one that relies upon purples and the higher priced non-purples, but you didn't state that they were needed.

And without farming, if you've been playing a 50 for long enough against spawns that drop lvl50+ rewards then you will get the odd purple or high priced recipe/salvage that is:
* of use to the character it dropped for;
* of use to another character you have;
or
* can be sold to buy things that are of use.

It's not hard and it doesn't require farming.

I know - but that's why I'd suggest persuading people asking for reviews to list them at CoG...

It'd be useful for reviews to be posted in both CoG and here, but at least CoG easily gathers the comments/reviews of several people into a single, easily searchable database.

And, of course, the more people who use CoG the more useful it will become to all users.

Any idea just how unwieldy a thread-only approach will become when we have tens or hundreds of reviewed arcs? It still has it's place, but IMO a searchable database of reviews/comments is far more user-friendly.

MA v2 could do with a couple of extra clue-timing options.

In a similar manner I needed to give a clue when you exited the mission - not neccesarily when you complete it. But mission completion clue is the best fit I could find...

IMO It could do with allowing clues on:
* Mission Acceptance
* Mission Entry
* Mission Exit (when Complete)
* Mission Return to Contact

It's 'kinda' good that another review thread has started, but these threads are a pain in the backside to monitor and search.

I've just gone straight to trying to play through the arcs on City of Guides, leaving comments/reviews there and sending PMs (here or ingame) to the authors about typos/grammar (which I try to discount from affecting ratings unless it's really atrocious or the arc would be 5-star without linguistic errors)!

I guess shouting up that persuading authors to register their arcs on CoG and leaving copies of reviews there would be out of order?

I don't know if you've played any of my arcs, and would like to offer the following:

arc name: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh!
arc id: 3662
Suggested Level Range: 30+ (though I have done it solo on mid-20s scrappers and controllers)
author: @Judgement Dave

Someone's PL'ing and farming phat loot - but rather than whine about it you're determined to find out who and put a stop to it! WARNING: Contains non-canon mickey taking that some players may find immersion breaking. aka EIEIO.

My 4th-wall breaking look at how Paragon heroes (and Rogue Isles scoundrels) deal with PL/RMT farmers is hopefully funnier - I know of at least one player who claimed it really did make them laugh.. so hopefullly you'll enjoy it too!

I tried to pack humour into the dialogue, clues, critter descriptions, mission intros etc... so if you're after the humour be sure to check the text!


You can comment on this arc at City of Guides.



Shout up if you've played this already and I'll offer another one (probably one of my linked-but-standalone serious arcs).

I bet that the official 5th anniversary celebration will be keeping the servers up for 24 hrs without an unexpected middle-of-the-European-day downtime.

Or should that be saved for a real biggy, like the 10th anniversary??

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I bring bad news... It seems the problem is not as resolved as we would like it to be after all.

When I try to start an arc from Zukunft now and it doesn't start it does not get marked as invalid anymore or disappear from search. BUT when I now try to start it from Union it doesn't start from there anymore either.

So basically they have just removed the invalid flag but trying to start it from Zukunft or Vigilance still seems to break it. Which means the only way to find out if it is still valid (startable) now is to regularily try starting it yourself and republishing if it doesn't work anymore.

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At least we know that the dev team will have told the servers to send an email to them and log their actions when anything is happening that would have previously set the 'invalid' marker...

Shame that I only just spotted this after downtime starts - so if my arcs are broken when I return I won't know if they were broken before the downtime/patch or by the downtime/patch.

I asked in announcements (about the 21st April downtime):
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BTW - any idea how long it'll be until, to combat farming/exploits:
* the only group left in MA is rularuu?
* the only map is the smallest cave?
* the only objective is kill all?


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It is this. The removed assets being due to return in the year 2525 if mankind is still alive.

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Its the icon for the 36 months veteran pet :-)

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It's a bit forward calling me 'pet' - We hardly know each other!

I've still not claimed the 36 month pet yet - since I'm not particularly good at deciding which piece of eye candy to pick! Think the icon looks the same as the portable workbench accolade though - did they reuse the tray icon?

Just a second... isn't the 3rd icon on power tray #3 the portable workbench accolade? Those 8 hrs included the time to gather and craft all those many, many CIOs?

And what were you just about to type what when CoH crashed... I can't quite make out that word on the screeny..

By all means stick closely to the canon, but don't obsess too much on it. If you're the sort that worries about sticking to it and you don't know some minutiae then it's highly unlikely that anyone else playing your arc will know either! SO anything you do that feels in keeping with canon should be fine.

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However it would appear that Kirk Cage bought the Island

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The biggest problem won't be 'tripping up' over some tiny bit of canon known only to 3 people, but is more likely to be upsetting trekkies who may feel that 'Christopher Cage' or 'Pike Cage' are more correct. Oh - and, obviously, the Cage guards should really be in uniforms coloured disposable-red.

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Nope, not just be a display thing. In your CoH game files is a text file called PlayerCreatedSouvenirClues it's being overwritten completely by new souvenirs every so often (is for me at least).

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My file has three entries in it, all identical
All looks a bit broken to me...

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That depends...

If you do an arc again then you do get another copy of the souvenir - that is WAI.

You also get a copy every time you complete an unpublished arc (i.e. test it). So there were points whilst testing when I'd have 4 or 5 copies of the souvenir for the arc I was testing.

It's also the case that MA souvenirs are installation based - multiple characters and multiple accounts using the same installation of CoX will all share the same PlayerCreatedSouvenirClues.txt file. So testing/playing a single arc on multiple characters should also result in duplicate souvenirs.

Again I just lost about 5 souvenirs - and the one that I picked up (and seemed to make the others vanish) was repeated twice.

My bets most definately on dodgy client handling when appending the new souvenir.

Certainly not just patrols that I've noticed not substituting (and without rogue patrols in th emission).

Is it not just a problem with text that doesn't have the substitution variables in the popup menu? If so I'd guess that th evariables are unsupported on those fields - Even if the odd one does work.

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And Sparta... erm, Romans were so hot right about then. You gotta be on trend girlfriend (note to self. Stop watching Gok Wan with fiancee).

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So you're going to start watching Gok Wan in private and not tell the fiancee?!

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1) there was an ambush when you click a glowie. If there weren't any, that's another misspawn. (sorry, forgot to mention it in the OP)


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Actually there was an ambush - it was so early in th emission I clicked the glowy that I forgot about it!

It was certainly spawned well away from where the problem, invisible hostage was.