LaserJesus

Arc #73207: Beyond the Door
Rating: 2 stars
The short of it: Not really much of a plot, bad placing of objectives, overpowered ally

Plot Overview

A Vahzilok Mortificator named Dr. Keh Davyr (should probably be K. Davyr to sound at least a little less made up) wants you to find a person who he claims is a friend, Dr. Westman. Davyr says that Westman has gone missing, and the only person who knows his whereabouts is a woman named Dr. Calvin, who has been kidnapped by monsters. Upon entering the sewer where she is held, you run into a man named Hands McCoy who is apparently working for a Lady Talvik, who is apparently after Dr. Calvin for some reason. Upon seeing you he decides that you must be eliminated, though he runs after deciding that fighting you is not worth his time. The monsters are reanimated corpses, Frankenstein-style, but not Vahzilok's variety. You rescue Dr. Calvin from the monsters, and she tells you where Dr. Westman is hiding.

You go to Dr. Westman's lab, only to find that it is the site of a battle between the monsters and Lady Talvik's followers. The place is littered with the bodies of people slain by the monsters, one of which being Westman. You return to Davyr with the bad news, and he decides that besides his desire to study them, they are too dangerous and must be destroyed. He asks you to go to the lab, find any research notes you can, and blow the building up. Inside, you meet up with Hands McCoy again, who explains that Lady Talvik wants these monsters dead, so he will aid you. You plant the bombs, collect the research and leave.

Davyr explains that he was only using you the whole time (Wait, I was supposed to believe that his goals were somehow noble?) and that the Talvik were apparently some form of Vampire clan. But everything's ok, since the research was incomplete, and Davyr can't create Westman's monsters.

Mechanics

All of the maps are random, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. However, on my second playthrough of the arc, the correct body (the body you need to find is one of quite a few bodies) spawned practically right after the mission door. Considering it's the only objective in the mission, it really should be in the back. Also, in the third mission I had a similar situation with the EB that was required to kill, but since that wasn't the only objective it's less of a problem.

Hands McCoy is just plain too strong, as an enemy and especially as an ally. His willpower is set to hard, making him practically unkillable, and he's an EB. Thankfully in the first mission he wasn't a required objective, and ran as soon as all of his minions are dead. In the last mission, though, he was a required ally to save, and as an EB was just plain overpowered. With his RTTC taunt aura, he was like a pocket brute with constantly full fury. The EB I had to fight in the mission was laughably easy with the help of the ally, even on my level 38 blaster.

The custom enemy groups, however, were fairly well balanced, the only problem being that one of the lieutenants has ninjitsu, and you rarely run into it.

Story

There's not really much of a plot here, and what there is of one only makes sense if your character is retarded. The plot says neutral, but a hero wouldn't willingly hand over people and research notes on zombies to a Vahzilok doctor, and a villain wouldn't do a mission that professes to have altruistic intentions. I realize that he's paying you, but Davyr professes to be doing this out of a noble purpose. It's a catch-22, his 'ulterior motive' is so blatantly obvious as to not really even be ulterior, but by trying to hide his intentions, however poorly, makes it nonsensical for a villain to be doing the story.

The whole vampire clan angle at the end of the arc felt tacked on. Even this is supposed to be some kind of series of arcs, at the end Davyr said essentially "Oh, by the way, there were some vampires there."

Final Thoughts

The ally needs to be much less powerful, I would suggest turning down both of his powersets and making him a boss. It's not like you're fighting an incredibly powerful AV, as the big powerful monster was only an EB, and his sets weren't even turned up that high. The story needs a lot of work, right now it's just a barebones framework for some fights.

As for your minions, I actually didn't state that any were on hard. In fact the only one I have a little bit of an issue with is the electric one, only due to the end drain, mainly the electric fence. It spams incredibly fast and has a 20% chance of -100% end recovery. Perhaps electric melee instead of manipulation?

Are you sure that the forcefield guys don't have hard level energy blast? I remember specifically that they used energy torrent, which i believe is only available on hard difficulty.

The main problem with the robots mastermind bosses is the protector bots. Frankly, the fact that bosses and higher summon up two of them bothers the crap out of me. The stacking of the forcefields and all the seeker drones can really mess someone up. That's really the only issue I had with those. On the AV the bots are fine, considering he's a final boss fight. Like I said, I didn't have a single problem running through

As for the paragon protector elite, it's pretty much the regular Paragon Protector with a cape, and it fights similarly to the burn protector, though it's definitely stronger. (it has inferno.) Like I said, it's only a minor nitpick.

However, in regards to Citadel being built by the 5th Column, I still don't think that's correct. I doubt I have my original Bastion TF souvenir sitting around, but I think you have it a bit backwards. In the Bastion TF, the 5th Column had gotten their hands on Bastion's schematics and were using them to improve their robots. As far as I can remember, Bastion was built by a superhero.

And as far as the story being hard to follow, I really can't place my finger on it. Maybe it's just a bit too convoluted. It's like the further I get in the story, the more details I forget about earlier on in the story. Like for instance, when I was in the last mission, I tried to remember why I had even gone to the portal corp lab in the first place, and I completely drew a blank. Of course now that I've run through it again and wrote it down in a review, I remember. I'm not sure exactly what you could do to fix it, besides making the clues clearer on exactly what is going on, so if someone forgets, they can just look back through their clues.

Arc #70210: Is it Live or is it Memory-X?
Rating: 3 stars
The short of it: Decent plot with a few issues, annoying custom enemies, problems with mission design

Plot Overview

The 5th Column are robbing a bank, and Citadel has asked you to stop them. You arrive on the scene and dispatch the soldiers, who are being led by a Wolfpack Mk II robot. One of the guards drops an encrypted 10 GB flash drive. (Yes, it's that specific) Citadel is unable to fully decrypt it, but from what he was able to extract from it, he is able to discern that the 5th Column are attempting to build a new highly advanced AI system called Memory-X, and the flash drive contains the schematics for it. Your next goal is to go to a Crey computer research lab, where an experimental AI is being developed. The 5th Column are going to strike there next, and it is your mission to destroy the AI before they can steal it, and obtain a copy of some decryption firmware that is being developed at the lab. After fighting through both Crey and 5th Column forces, you manage to find the firmware and destroy the mainframe. Upon decrypting the flash drive fully, Citadel discovers that apparently the 5th Column has already built Memory-X but lost it, and is now trying to build another one to find and correct the problems with the first one.

With scans made by Positron, Citadel is able to direct you towards an abandoned lab which may contain clues to Memory-X. When you arrive, you find that the lab is not abandoned, and in fact is crawling with 5th Column forces. You're able to find the data that you came for, and surprisingly, you find Citadel being held captive by robots within the base. Citadel claims that he hasn't sent you on any of your previous missions. As it turns out, the previous Citadel was a fake. Memory-X had kidnapped Citadel and replaced him with a replica version as part of its plan. The real Citadel is able to discern from the data you collected that Memory-X's purpose was to create replicas of all of the world leaders to bring the world under complete 5th Column control. However, the AI has rebelled against its masters and is now working towards its own ends. After scanning for the energy signatures of the battle droids that you encountered in the lab, Citadel pinpoints some of the robots at a new Portal Corp. Facility, and asks you to check it out while he consults with Statesman. He gives you a bio-scanner designed to pick up life-signs so you can find if there are any hostages inside. When inside, you find the President of the United States and Statesman captured by the robots. The robots are preparing to teleport them to a facility where they will be replicated, and upon learning of your intrusion attempt to destroy the mainframe which houses the co-ordinates. You successfully prevent that from happening, and rescue the hostages. However, it turns out (not surprisingly) that Statesman is a replica.

Memory-X's base is located underground on the moon, and Portal Corp. is capable of teleporting you there. Citadel says that he has found a reliable way of determining who is real and who is a replica, and the Freedom Phalanx will sort out the world leaders who have been kidnapped and not with the help of the United Nations while you go to the moon base. On the moon base, you rescue the hostages that Memory-X has held there, including Back Alley Brawler. With his help, you destroy the mainframes that house Memory-X, and the Master Builder droid that he downloaded himself to, ending its threat. Upon your return to Earth, Citadel informs you that the Freedom Phalanx was able to find the world leader replicas and destroy them, and thanks you for saving the world.

Mechanics

The first mission is on a 15 minute timer, and the contact doesn't tell you that until after you accept the mission. Bad move, made even worse by the really short timer. The specific amount of time isn't a big issue, as it's a really small CoV heist map. However, how small the map is an issue, as the final boss runs at low life, and if you don't have knockback resistance, the amount of KB that higher level 5th Column have will ensure that he escapes. The mission is a defeat all, but that's not a huge deal considering how small the map is.

In the next mission, you have Crey and 5th Column facing off, and it looks like the 5th Column are the main enemy with Crey on Rogue. However, it looks like the author made a couple mistakes with the details, because I would often see groups of Crey killing each other. There are too many fake computers in addition to the real one. Finding the right glowie in this mission is a major pain. The map is also the Crey cloning lab, which doesn't make sense considering the story. The lab is supposed to be developing software, not bio-engineering humans.

The third mission takes place on an abandoned tech map, and you have to find 4 computers in a sea of fake ones. It's not as bad as the first mission, but still annoying. Citadel spawns after you find the 4 correct ones, and he spawns as the AV version instead of the Pet version. I would switch him to the pet one. This map is also a defeat all, but here it's much more of a big deal considering that the map is a larger size. After you rescue Citadel, patrols of 5th column spawn, meaning you have to hunt all of them down in the random areas they pop up at. Considering that this mission is an escort, the defeat all can just be taken out. Even if you stealth the glowies you're going to have to fight things as you haul Citadel back anyhow.

The fourth mission uses a portal corp map, not really any problems with the map itself. Really, the only two problems with this mission that I can think of involve the President. First, he's not set to non-combat, but is a person, meaning that he'll run into fights and begin brawling people. He should be set to non-combat. Also, right after killing his captors, the defend object appears. Based on the clue you get when you return him to the door, it sounds like it should spawn after you haul him to the door.

The 5th mission takes place in one of the Rikti Caves, a pretty big one. I didn't really have a problem with the size, as it was the last mission. In my opinion, your last mission has the freedom to be rather large. However, there are far too many non-essential boss spawns, and the bosses themselves are really annoying. Even if you decide to grab Back Alley Brawler (he's non essential to the mission) he doesn't help much as the bosses are all masterminds who summon 5 robots, meaning BABs will inevitably start beating up a protector bot or something.

The custom group has a few problems. The aforementioned bosses are a bit too much. Bots/Devices, with what appears to be hard/standard. My scrapper had no issues with them, really, but my all-human peacebringer was having major problems. First, they'd immobilize him, and plus the protector bots would just wreak total havoc on him with their forcefields, seeker drones, and stuns. A squishier character is going to have major problems with these guys. The LTs just plain have too many powers. One of them is Forcefield/Energy Blast. The energy blast is definitely on hard, as they have energy torrent, but I'm not sure what the Forcefield is on. Regardless, they have force bolt, dispersion bubble, and aid self. On my peacebringer it was just constant knockback, and I couldn't even hold them to stop it due to the dispersion bubble. The other LTs are Axe/Elec Armor, axe is on hard, not sure of the elec armor. I will tell you however that they were annoying as all hell to kill, even on my scrapper. My peacebringer eventually just skipped all of these whenever he could, because since he only uses energy it was like fighting someone with unstoppable running constantly. Lastly, one of the minions uses Electric Blast/Electric Manipulation. The end drain from these minions was incredibly brutal, thanks to the custom critters using the same power effects that players do, and the fast recharge of charged bolts and electric fence. Even with conserve power on, my Peacebringer's end was floored practically the whole time.

Story

The overall plot is a decent one, but it has issues. First off, in the first two missions Citadel says that he was built by the 5th Column and that they will take control of him if he goes with you. I really hope this is foreshadowing the fact that he is the fake Citadel that was created by Memory-X, because Citadel wasn't created by the 5th Column. Another issue is that the plot, while it makes sense, is pretty hard to follow. After playing through it with 2 separate characters, I had to run through part of it a third time when I sat down to write the plot overview and drew a complete blank as to how the transition between the plot of the first three missions went. After playing it again, it made sense, but barely. Things need to be made clearer. Also, a minor nitpick, but the Flame Protector that spawns claims that he has a powersuit, when Flame Protectors have demon faces under their helmets. After they use a certain power their demon heads are visible. If you really do want him to be someone in a power suit, there is a Paragon Protector Elite that uses fire powers that you could use instead.

Final Thoughts

With some improvements, this arc could be turned into a pretty good one. The plot isn't a bad one, just hard to follow at places. The custom enemy group does need work, however.

Well she does mention it, but not until after you accept the mission. And I figured the spawn point was probably out of your control, I frankly haven't even messed around with outdoor maps.

Sorry about the Arc ID foul-up. I don't even know how I managed that one. I looked in my queue and it even says 4384 there as well.

Arc #4384: The Double-Edged Sword
Rating: 5 stars
The short of it: Well written, nice plot twist.

Plot Overview

Mynx has learned about a shady shipment that Crey is bringing in for their Biotech division, and she and you both know that it's most likely sinister. First up, you need to know when and where the shipment is arriving. You hit up a Crey office which is heavily guarded by Crey security and find the shipping manifest on a computer. Obviously, the next step is to get on that boat and to find out exactly what they're bringing in. Most of the cargo is innocuous, except for a kid who's being held against his will. It's uncertain why Crey has this kid, as after you rescue him he explains to you that he just does bird calls. Upon your return, Mynx makes sure the kid is in protective custody, and tells you that it's been discovered that more children are being held at a Crey Biotech facility hidden in Brickstown. You head off to rescue the children and find out exactly what is going on. All of the children turn out to be mutants who exhibited small amounts of power who were kidnapped by Crey and have had their powers artificially magnified. Among the children are a girl who has been transformed into a half human, half cat, a boy who has control over the earth, a girl who has control over fire and pixie wings sprouting from her back, a boy who can communicate and transform into animals, and most importantly, a girl named Josephine Revenoir, who possesses strong psychic powers, but is usually in a state of deep sleep.

After the successful rescue of the children, Mynx says that she's concerned about Josephine. Josephine seemed distant, and hasn't been seen since shortly after her rescue. Mynx asks you to check to see if she's alright. Upon entering the building where Josephine should be, you see that the place is crawling with Carnies. After finding no sign of Josephine and interrogating the leader, you discover that the Carnies are searching for her because Josephine has become a limitless source of psychic power. On your return, Mynx tells you that there is a crisis situation. Josephine's powers are to drain people of their psychic energy to power her telepathic abilities, and that she's currently mind controlling an army of Carnies and wreaking havoc on the city, draining everyone of their psychic energy. Other heroes are already on the scene, but they're going to need your help. The scene is total chaos. Positron and Sister Psyche are there on the scene, willing to help you defeat Josephine and her army. After you subdue the mentally unstable Josephine, an army of Longbow arrive to help secure the area.

Mynx explains that Crey's files on the children have been found, and that Josephine barely had any telekinetic power before the experiments turned her into a living weapon. Josephine's powers are only active when she is awake, so until a cure is found for her, she'll have to remain completely sedated for the rest of her life.

Mechanics

All of the indoor maps are random, but seem to be all small size. This isn't a problem, however, as none of them have any kind of conditional spawns or try to do anything fancy with the placement of spawns. The first two maps follow the same general formula, quite a few unnecessary glowies, and one objective that is different that is the real one, in the first mission it's a computer, and in the second mission it's a rescue captive. The third mission takes place in a lab, with 3 rescue captives and 2 allies, who are both LTs, one stone melee/earth control, one who I think is fire blast/fire melee, though she could be fiery assault/something. The fourth mission is very straightforward, defeat a boss, which is a Master Illusionist.

The fifth mission is the outdoor carnie festival that takes place in the middle of the city. The first time I went through, Josephine spawned in the circus area, though the second time in she spawned right in the front. I don't know if her spawn is set to any, or if it's set to back and it's just the MA being retarded, but if this can be fixed it should. There are two optional allies to take, Positron and Sister Psyche, both the special boss pet versions. The whole map is pretty chaotic, with carnies fighting each other, and it helps to add to the feel of the mission. Josephine herself is an AV class enemy, with what appears to be standard or hard mind control and extreme psionic assault. This could be a problem for squishier characters, but anyone with status protection shouldn't have trouble if they rescue Sister Psyche and Positron. One big problem with the mission though, it's not stated before you take the mission that you only have an hour to do it. That should be fixed.

Story

I have absolutely nothing negative to say about this story. Mynx doesn't seem out of character, and the Carnival of Shadows was a nice twist. The ending tugged at my heart a little bit as well. I wouldn't change a damn thing as far as the story is concerned.

Final Thoughts

A couple things need some tweaking, but they're easy to fix and besides the unannounced time mission really minor complaints. I definitely recommend giving this one a play.

[ QUOTE ]
I don't know where you got the idea that your character was willingly ending the lives of the Paragon Police. I stated that part of their rationale for hurting the PPD was the medical teleporters saving them anyway.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, the medical teleporters would save them, but like theHedoren said, it's a case of being the last option that practically anyone would think of taking.

As for Azuria, I'm well aware of the reputation she has. My comments stem mainly from the fact that I did two arcs in a row where Azuria is the contact.

Arc #2622: A Tangle in Time
Rating: 1 star
The short of it: Plot issues, claims to be heroic when it's not, custom bosses potentially too powerful

Plot Overview

Azuria tells you that she needs your help to stop the plans of the Circle of Thorns, who apparently are going to wreak havoc on the time stream. The police are already on site, what Azuria needs you to do is to take an amulet and place it on a pedestal to prevent the spell from being cast. You arrive on the scene and the police mostly have it under control, thanks to Officer Riley, a mutant with plant powers, and Sergeant Hanson, a master of baton fighting. You place the amulet on the altar and defeat Moboseia, the leader of the sect of Circle of Thorns. After you exit the cave and return to Azuria, it becomes apparent that you're in a time loop. Azuria hands you another amulet and tells you to go and place it on the altar. When you tell her that you already did it, Azuria calls you crazy, despite the fact that time travel happens on a daily basis and interdimensional invaders are constantly trying to destroy the city. Upon returning you ask Riley and Hanson about it, and they call you crazy as well. When you interrogate Moboseia he explains that he is the only one who can reverse the effect, and he'll only do it for you if you kill all the police who are invading his home. Well, sounds like a perfectly good idea to me! I mean, why should your 35+ hero bother with forcing him to help me through violence or to even try and discover an alternate method of solving this? Ouroboros, Portal Corporation, or the Midnight Club all obviously have better things to do. Mass murdering the police is obviously the best solution.

So, one crazy killfest later (oh but it's okay, they have medical teleporters) Moboseia undoes the spell. Azuria obviously yells at you for it, saying that you're going to spend a decade in the Zig, (They really need to do something about sentencing in Paragon, apparently) but suddenly now believes you when you show her that you have 3 amulets. She says that you need to get Moboseia to redo the spell by beating the crap out of him, and then destroy the pedestal, which is what I should have done from the start. Now you travel to an Oranbegan ruin, inside of which you find a man dressed in rags who babbles insanely about how you've failed 213 times. (Really? He's just a death mage. I've killed hundreds of them, maybe even thousands. I lost count after the first twenty) You beat down Moboseia, who has some obligatory villain dialogue about how you'll be sorry, after which you go back to Azuria, who is now asking you to place the amulet on the altar again. You cut her off saying that you're just going to smash the thing, to which she freaks out, saying that you can't destroy it because it's an artifact in pristine condition and is incredibly valuable and belongs in the MAGI vault. At this point I begin contemplating killing her. I mean, time's just going to reset itself. No one would ever know. In any case, you go inside to destroy the pedestal. Moboseia confronts you at the entrance, and is promptly defeated. Further inside are Riley and Hanson, both wearing rags and with long beards and hair. Apparently if they kill me, Moboseia will undo their time loops, but they haven't been able to do it yet after the apparent hundreds of times they've fought me. So let me get this straight. I've fought them countless times, won every time, but apparently each of those times I don't destroy the pedestal? Riiiiiight. In any case, apparently the multiple times I have fought them have made them stronger. Doesn't really matter, because you still defeat them and destroy the altar. Upon your return with the two police officers, Azuria realizes that destroying the altar was the best option, and that her love for shiny objects got in the way of doing what was right. With everything wrapped up and a-ok, your hero probably descends into alcohol and depression over the fact that he/she willingly murdered a few dozen police, and nobody will ever know.

Mechanics

The maps are small, and the arc is a quick one. Even the Oranbega map is pleasantly straightforward and short. The only thing I have to say is that the two custom police officers in the last mission are likely too powerful for an arc that is being sold as a solo-oriented arc. Riley has extreme plant control, and Hanson has extreme mace, meaning he has build up. Mace is also pretty powerful in the hands of NPCs in the first place. My level 50 scrapper had no problem with Riley, though he is SR, meaning that pretty much everything that plant control uses is rendered useless by my defensive powers. Thankfully, Hanson used build up as I was approaching him, and thanks to stealth and the stealth IO in CJ, he didn't notice me right away, even with his enhanced perception from being SR himself. However, other characters are likely to have much more problems than mine did.

Story

Where do I begin? I guess a good place was my character murdering the police. I'm not even talking "rough them up a bit", I'm saying that it was expressly stated in the arc that I was dealing lethal blows to them, and the only reason why they did not die is because of the medical teleporter. That's a couple dozen counts of attempted murder right there, which is easily consecutive life sentences or a death penalty. My hero, and I assume most peoples, would never even think of that as a viable option, especially when so many others exist. Even though Azuria's apparently too retarded to even check out my time loop story, a hero of at least 35+ easily has an extensive enough network of contacts and people who owe them favors to get themselves looked at, both by scientists who know a thing or two about time travel and by magicians who could check out your character to see if any enchantments or curses had been placed on them. Working with a known criminal to murder police is not even close to the top of the list for options to be taken to fix the problem.

I touched on this in the last review as well, Azuria's not stupid. Sure, MAGI has a bad rap for keeping artifacts secure, but that has nothing to do with Azuria. The MAGI vault is in Galaxy City. If anyone's letting criminals into the vault on a regular basis, it's Gregor Richardson. Judging by his attitude, I wouldn't be surprised if he was on the take. Azuria is one of the best mystics in the world according to the Lost Cure arc, so it should take her no time flat to check to see if you've been cursed to be in a time loop. Upon finding out, she would know (since she does later in the arc) that destroying the altar is the best option at this point.

There's also a huge problem with the time loops and the notion that I've done things about 200 times. First, I have no memory of it, and it just plain doesn't make sense. I know time travel gets kind of confusing, but the only thing that confused me is the fact that apparently I had fought the two police multiple times, and this time is the only one where I actually destroyed the altar and broke the spell.

Final Thoughts

A story about a time loop isn't a bad thing, it's just that this one has too many plot holes and huge idiot moments.

If I were to suggest anything about the first mission, is not to remove it, but instead leave it as is and change some later missions to get the Circle more involved in the story. Why did the Circle have the lens? What are their plans for it? Maybe they're trying just as hard to get the lens back as you are to find it and stop it.

The Council mission seemed out of place to me because I can't see why Tophat is necessary. However, with the Arachnos mission, like I said it would be more Lord Recluse's MO to try and take the thing for himself if it ended up on his island. Instead of having Arachnos be your ally, make Arachnos soldiers be rogue in the mission. Have some battles between Arachnos and the Nachtkreiger, a patrol with some dialogue about finding the lens, and maybe drop in a non-essential Arachnos Commander or something.

Arc #91897: The Oblivion Lens
Rating: 2 stars
The short of it: Custom faction with annoying powers, plot issues

Plot Overview

Azuria tells you that a recent raid by the Legacy Chain on a Circle of Thorns stronghold went badly, and that they need to be rescued. Upon entering, apparently only one Legacy Chain member, Arcanist Sullivan, survived. After you rescue him from his captors, you both continue on to defeat the head mage, who is carrying a dark lens of an unknown purpose. Upon your return to Azuria, she says that MAGI will take a look at it. A few days later (apparently) she talks to you again, saying that everyone at MAGI collectively shrugged in regards to the lens. The only thing they could find were references to it in a tome by an ancient German sorceror, which explained that it was something called the Oblivion Lens, and it opens portals to an alternate dimension called the Nachtwelt. Since nobody at MAGI (including Azuria, who's supposedly one of the most skilled sorcerors in the world) could figure anything about it, they charter a boat to send it to Europe so a scholar there can look at it, instead of saving time and money by flying the scholar to Paragon City. Big surprise, the boat is now dead in the water and not responding to radio transmissions. You are teleported (wait, what? Why didn't they just teleport the scholar there and save a ton of time?) to the ship to find that it is overrun by shadow monsters who look like the pictures from the tome. (though I don't really ever recall being shown the tome) After killing the creatures, you can't find the lens.

After you return to Azuria with the bad news, she tells you that the creatures are called Nachtkrieger. She says that she may know some people in the Midnight Club who might know something that can help. Unfortunately, she was wrong. The midnight club, though they have mastered time travel, can't figure out anything about this mysterious lens. Apparently the only person in the world who can figure it out is a man who calls himself Tophat. Tophat is a wizard for hire who has apparently worked for every villain group on the planet. He was too greedy with the Council, however, and they are now going to break his kneecaps. The Legacy Chain wants to pay you back for helping with the Circle of Thorns, so they come along with you. When you're teleported into the base, the teleport screws up and the Legacy Chain are scattered across the base. You find them battling the Council, and eventually rescue Tophat and bring him out with you. Tophat is able to divine the location of the lens, which has somehow ended up in the Rogue Isles. Lord Recluse won't let heroes into the isles, but apparently is willing to let you in to retrieve the lens. You do, and Arachnos soldiers clean up the remaining Nachtkreiger.

Tophat has also provided MAGI with the rituals required to deactivate the lens, and they perform it at an FBSA stronghold. Nobody thought to guard the mystics, however, as the lens summons more Nachtkreiger which begin slaughtering them. Azuria tells you that only the altar needs to survive for the ritual to finish, and you head off to stop the Nachtkreiger once and for all. The leader of the monsters, named Nachtkreiger Herr is there, and after battling him and protecting the altar, the lens is deactivated and the threat of Nachtkreiger invasion has passed.

Mechanics

I ran through this mission with my level 50 Kat/SR Scrapper and my level 38 AR/EM Blaster. The SR scrapper had absolutely zero problems dealing with any of the enemies. My blaster however, did not fare so well. The main problem with the custom faction is the fact that both minions and LTs have dark miasma. Actually, even if it was just the minions I'd still have a problem. Dark Pit is like caltrops from hell, and when you have 2 or more on you, and don't have some sort of slow resistance or good defense, that -res will tear you apart. I would take out the dark miasma minions for sure, and while I'm not sure what you have for a boss, maybe the dark miasma would be best saved for a boss instead of LTs to make sure that ridiculous stacking only happens on large teams, which would be better equipped to handle it. Aside from that, the map for the 5th Column mission seems a bit big for what it does.

Story

The problem with missions where "A simple thing becomes something huge" is that you have to ask yourself if you really need the simple thing in the first place. Here, the Circle of Thorns mission seems completely extraneous. It's never described why the Circle even has the Lens in the first place, or what their plans were with it. In fact, the Circle never even shows up again after the first mission. The arc would be pretty much exactly the same if the first mission was the tanker mission. The 5th Column arc also seems pretty unnecessary, if you consider the multiple plotholes. I'm sorry, but I cannot be expected to believe that the entirety of MAGI and the Midnight Club can't figure out anything about this lens, but some random guy who learned his powers from Arachnos' Mu troopers could. Like I mentioned earlier, Azuria's said to be one of the most highly skilled mystics in the world, and the Midnight Club has mastered time travel. And if they did need to bring in an expert from Germany, they could use their fancy teleportation instead of shipping the dangerous artifact on a boat. And finally, Arachnos would never let a hero come in and grab such a powerful artifact. He'd take it for himself and try to get Scirocco and Ghost Widow to figure out how it works. Not saying that he'd succeed, but he'd at least try. And how did the lens end up in the Rogue Isles anyhow? Too many dangling plot points and not enough explanation.

As a side note, $name is used too much in some of the contact dialogue. Towards the end of the arc I felt like Azuria had tourette's syndrome and her tick was to say my name.

Final Thoughts

The premise isn't terrible, just poorly executed. With some rewrites to fix the plotholes and cut out the fluff, it could turn into something good. However, right now it feels like nothing in the arc had any real purpose at all. The Dark Miasma critters need to be fixed, but otherwise the custom group isn't bad.

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ok LJ, I made things generally easier. Herr Zerstoerung is not going to one shot people anymore and should go down more smoothly. Der Kommandant is no longer /rad, he's devices, though honestly that guy seems to be a cinch no matter what I do to him. Heh.

Fixed statue name just because, and Stahlfaust no longer has ET or TF unfortunately. He does however retain buildup, since his hardest hitter is now bonesmasher. His elec armor is unchanged, since he will currently NOT pop PS for whatever reason and would be too easy on a lower difficulty. Elec armor EBs are not hard, it was really his ET that made him too strong. I also made a change in the powerset of the last boss, which you did not reach.

Most importantly, you no longer fight 5th Column. You're up against the Wehrmacht. I had to make sacrifices in the US Military to get in the file space, but it should be fairly balanced and I do like that idea a lot more.

All in all, I decided that balancing the arc around my IO'd ss/invuln was not a good idea. Hopefully it's not too easy, but if you feel like finishing it you should have a smoother ride :]

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I will give it another attempt when I get the chance.

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I have a question about the reviews, from Venture, or other... this may be answered somewhere in the thread, that I missed, but, how does one avoid the sin of "just a bunch of stuff that happened?" Does that basically mean that the events don't seem connected to each other? Does that mean what initiated them was uninteresting? I'd like to avoid this because it SEEMS bad but I don't know how it's defined.


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As so often happens on these boards, Arcanaville had a great answer a few pages back in this post.

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On the CoX boards, we don't have Simpsons did it, we have Arcanaville didn't.

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...how does one avoid the sin of "just a bunch of stuff that happened?" Does that basically mean that the events don't seem connected to each other? Does that mean what initiated them was uninteresting? I'd like to avoid this because it SEEMS bad but I don't know how it's defined....

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I think they mean Random Events Plot.

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That's actually not what that means. What it means is that the story isn't much more than foiling a villain's plans, or the opposite for villains. I also wouldn't call it a sin, it's just that if you're judging a plot, one with character development and meaning is stronger than one without it.

Maybe Venture should explain it in his signature or something, this question gets asked so much.

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Just an aside to this, Laser- in some cases, that would either shut out entire powersets, or utterly cripple the bosses, since they have it even on hard difficulty, and most 'normal' bosses are, frankly, jokes (and this is speaking as a squishy, mind).

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Oh, I'm aware. I think it was a mistake on the part of the developers to give NPCs build up at all. Considering that bosses and higher can easily out damage players if they're given strong enough powers, giving them build up, aim, and rage is just plain wrong.

And as for bosses being jokes, yeah? So? If the intent is to make the enemy strong, the enemy should be made as an EB or an AV, not given horrifically strong powers.

Arc #77928 Heroes at War - 1944
Rating: 1 star
Pros: German enemies actually speak German
Cons: Huge outdoor maps with hard to find objectives, ridiculously powerful custom enemies, minor plot issues

Plot Overview

Alright, I have to be up front about this. I didn't finish the arc. Not for a lack of trying, however. I'll get to that later. However, I can't do a full synopsis like I usually do. The plot however has your hero travel back in time to help out in key battles of World War II, where the German forces have superpowered soldiers of their own.

Mechanics

The custom bosses are quite simply too hard. I'm not even talking AVs bumped down to elite bosses, I mean regular bosses that are one-shotting my level 50 SR scrapper who's fully slotted with hamidon enhancers with a 60 something percent chance to hit.

Every mission that I played (I got to mission 3 before I couldn't go any further) took place on an outdoor map. The first one was the coastal map with the ridiculously huge island in the corner. Not too far in, I see the boss I have to kill, Herr Zerstoerung. I run in to attack, and he instantly uses rage and hits me with knockout blow, killing me practically instantly. I die a total of 3 times against Herr Zerstoerung before I finally kill him, which took me far too long due to the fact that his invulnerability was also on extreme difficulty. I'm fairly certain it took about as long as it used to take me to solo an archvillain back around Issue 2. Keep in mind that he is Boss rank. After all that work, now I just have to find and rescue an American Sergeant. After a bit of searching through the huge map, I find him tucked in a corner.

The second mission takes place in the burning forest map filled with battles between 5th Column and American soldiers, where my only objective is Rally at the statue. I assumed that it was a defend object detail, and I was correct. 5th column soldiers are standing around a hero statue named Rally at the statue. I dispatch them and the ambush, and my objective is now Defeat Derr Kommandant, who spawned nowhere near the statue. After searching through the confusing and smoky map, I find Derr Kommandant, an elite boss. Just from looking at him I can tell he's extreme radiation, since he has choking cloud on. Reading his description also tells me that he's a mercs mastermind, that I correctly guessed was also on extreme. He wasn't as bad as Herr Zerstoerung, mainly because he doesn't have anything like KO Blow to use on me, and because this time I used every purple and orange in my insp tray before running in. He spawns an ambush of 5th Column when he gets to 75% health, and judging from my NPC dialogue tab he apparently spawns an allied ambush at 50% health of American soldiers, though by the time I killed Derr Kommandant they still hadn't shown. They probably aggroed on 5th Column soldiers before reaching me.

The third mission takes place on the absurdly mammoth destroyed city map of Psychic Clockwork King fame. My three objectives are to defeat two bosses, and rescue one captive. The first one I run into is a boss named Stahlfist, who is beating down some American soldiers and smack talking them in German as he kills them. Well, I head in to fight him. I learn quickly that he's Energy Melee, guess what difficulty. Energy Transfer difficulty. He didn't even have build up active, he must have used it on the American soldiers. Regardless, he energy transfers me, with no damage buffs on him, for over 1900 damage. He's also electric armor, so even if I somehow could manage to survive such an assault, since once he uses buildup I'm toast even through my high defense even if that last one was a lucky shot, it would take me forever to kill him once he uses his tier 9 power, all through which I'm going to have built up energy transfers and total focuses being used on me. So I quit there to prevent myself unnecessary stress.

Story

I really like the fact that the enemies actually speak German. I can only read a little bit of German, so I'm not sure if the NPC dialogue is syntactically correct, but the fact that they're not speaking English was nice. However, while I realize the 5th Column are awesome, I really wish people would stop using them in WWII arcs that take place in Europe. I know I'm being nitpicky here, but the 5th Column's name comes from the fact that they were insurgents on American soil who performed a sneak attack on Paragon City during the war. The 5th Column never fought in any battles in Europe during World War II. Also, the presence of warwolves, vampyr, and robots in World War II makes me go absolutely nuts. If you are going to use the 5th Column, make a custom group with only the soldiers in it, and call their faction Wehrmacht or something.

Final Thoughts

I really wish I could have gone through and played the entire thing, but the custom bosses are just far too difficult. They need to have their powers turned down so none of them have build up, and extreme difficulty should be saved for very rare cases.

Arc #84420: Death to Disco!
Rating: 3 stars
Pros: Fun premise, amusing dialogue, well balanced custom group.
Cons: Doesn't go far enough with the premise, first map too long for the small amount of objectives.

Plot Overview

The Go- I mean, Deity of Rock has called upon you to repair the time stream and save Rock and Roll music from death at the hands of an insane scientist named Dr. Disco Fever. Dr. Disco Fever has hired another mad scientist named Dr. Sauer from Crey to go back in time with him to 1977 to brainwash President Jimmy Carter into liking disco. This will lead to the national anthem being set to a disco beat, and disco becoming the main style of music everyone listens to, leaving rock music to fade into obscurity. Sauer has kidnapped Jimmy Carter and brought him to an abandoned laboratory to enact Dr. Disco Fever's plan. Going through the mists of rock you find yourself in the lab, and tear through Sauer's Crey goons and rescue the President. Sauer himself thinks the plan is absolutely ridiculous, and is only in it for the money.

The Go- I mean, Deity of Rock congratulates you, but Dr. Disco Fever is still at large. Now you must go to the Disco Demolition, an event where rock fans destroy large amounts of disco 8 tracks, cassettes, and records, where the evil doctor plans to make his final stand and destroy rock music forever in order to retain his status as the king of the dance floor, instead of becoming a low wage janitor at the Crey Corporation. He is on the scene with an army of disco fans who have been given the same super-serum that he stole from Crey to receive his own powers. You lead the rock fans to victory, destroying the crates of disco music and defeating Dr. Disco Fever and his evil scheme.

Mechanics

The first mission takes place in an abandoned lab map. 3 floors, though none of the floors are too big. Unfortunately, what's small for a floor of a lab map is still pretty frickin' big. There are two objectives, rescue Jimmy Carter and defeat Sauer, who both spawned in the last room all three times I played it. (I played it 3 times because I went to bed after the first two times and then ran through it again real quick to refresh everything in my mind.) The map while not massive-huge by any means, still feels big and empty with only two objectives that spawn in the last room. The map could stand to be smaller or have some more objectives in it to liven the place up a bit. The enemies on the map are Crey, with the only custom enemy being Sauer, who is a boss that uses energy blast/electric blast, which I believe are both on standard, though energy blast may have been on hard. Not a hard fight for either of the characters I ran through with (Level 50 Kat/SR scrapper and a level 31 Crab Spider who needs enhancements bad) though the end drain did make me wheeze a bit on my spider. Not a huge deal though, popped a couple blues and solved that problem.

The second mission is an outdoor forest map, specifically the one that's always used for the Shadowhunter missions. It features two custom groups, one of Disco fans, and one of rock fans who are your allies. All of the enemies seem to be on standard difficulty for all attack sets. The minions of the disco group are Disco DJ, an AR/Dev, Disco Granny, a TA/Archery, Diva, a Sonic/Sonic, and Kung Fu Fightin, an MA/SR. Lieutenants are Disco Prince who is Katana/SR? I think? I actually can't remember. Disco Queens are Ice Blast/Elec Blast. If there are custom bosses for the faction, I didn't see any. Some of the enemies have fly, which can be a problem on outdoor maps, but since it's not a defeat all it's not that big of a problem. On the map there are 5 crates of disco music of assorted types to destroy. After you destroy all of the crates of one of the types, not really sure which, but it doesn't really matter, Dr. Disco Fever spawns. Dr. Disco Fever is a boss with Gravity/Elec Armor, with Gravity set to hard. Not sure how high the elec armor is set, but probably either standard or hard. As both the characters I did this with had status protection, he didn't put up much of a fight. On the map are also battles between rock fans and disco fans. The rock fan group seems to only have one custom NPC in it, a Battle Axe/Inv minion, however the rock fans always got the upper hand on the disco fans. I think I saw one of them die once in my 3 times through the mission.

If I have anything at all to say about the second mission, it's mainly the same problem with the first mission, there's not really much happening here. Sure, there's a couple battles, but they end about as quickly as they start and the rock fans just end up standing there, and the place just doesn't feel as chaotic as it should. I'd up the ante by adding a couple patrols of both rock fans and disco fans, maybe another battle or two if you have the room in the mission for it.

Story

I'm not going to lie, I'm a fan of silly humor, so the concept of the arc had me excited. Helping the Deity (haha word filter, you silly [censored]) of Rock stop disco from taking over the world? Count me in! However, the promise of silliness only really holds up with the Kung Fu Fightin minion who sports a martial arts gi and an afro, Dr. Disco Fever who looks like he jumped straight out of a 70s dance club, and Dr. Sauer whose dialogue is great. ("You can't possibly care about this nutty plan!") The Deity of Rock is kind of disappointing in appearance, simply being a big, muscular man in a leather jacket and pants with big sunglasses. I personally would have gone for a more Glam Rock or Hair Metal look instead of a Heavy Metal look for comedic value. In addition, I think the rock fans should have a couple other minions. Considering the timeframe is the late 70s, punk rock fans and glam rock fans would make great additions to the current heavy metal fan minions that you already have. Give them thematically appropriate costumes and powersets.

In general, while I see the potential for this arc to be really funny, it's currently not actualizing that potential. The arc needs more energy, and more dialogue in the missions. Throw in a couple patrols to say some funny lines in the missions, especially the first one. The return dialogue that the Deity of Rock gives could use some more pep to it as well, as it currently is, he more or less just says "Good job" when you come back. Definitely some room for some jokes there.

Final Thoughts

With some work, this could be a really funny arc that's short and to the point. As it stands right now, it's a solid arc that got a few chuckles out of me, Sauer's dialogue in particular was good.

Yeah, I feel like the way things are saved could use a lot of tightening up, but I'm not the one programming them, so whatever. I'll get some of my characters made into custom characters later and post it in there in case anyone wants to grab a couple and use them.

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i went with option c
reached the ticket cap on my 43 fire/psi dom and got all five ticket cap badges, visited the ticket vendor, clicked on two gold rolls
and surprisingly i got a LoTG +global recharge... i was very happy for the rest of the day

though the first roll i got was crap

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Grrr, the best thing I got was a +chance for lethal damage, forget the set name, but it's a PBAoE set. Still looking for that LoTG.

Alright, the queue so far looks like this:

84420
77928
91789
2622
4384
70210
73207
26420
106017

I'll blast through some of these tomorrow.

Sorry to double post here, I just wanted to say that even though I will be giving feedback on what I think you could do to make your arc better, I probably won't review it again if you make changes to it. The reason why I won't, is because I would start to feel like I'm writing people's arcs for them, and that's not my intention at all.

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Now, say, having a giant carrot doing dance moves with a boom box in the middle of a deadly battle between the Council and 5th Column? That's definitely unexpected, but it's more silly or absurd than actually funny, because there's no particular context for it.

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Let em guess, you actually saw that in an MA story huh?

That is a good point. Much silly passes these days for funny - sometimes it even succeeds but more often than not, it doesn't. It's like funny's "slow" cousin or 12 year old bother. Then again, when it hits you in the right mood or something, it can work, so I'm not about to tell anyone DON'T DO SILLY! (which is good because I'd be a hypocrite for doing so, see my arc listed in my sig, which does have some funny as well, I hope)

Best part of the MA is we chimps all get to try our hand at whatever we want; the law of averages says that Shakespeare is within our grasp.

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Protip: Shakespeare wrote his plays for the unwashed masses of England who didn't know [censored] about literature. And yet, he's considered one of the greatest writers of all time.

Arc #17702, Every Rose...
Rating: 3 stars
Pros: (Mostly) well suited to low levels, interesting premise from a metagame perspective.
Cons: Ill-suited/unexplained enemy groups, plot issues, problems with level cap.

Plot Summary

You're fresh off the boat (so to speak, it's an Arachnos Flyer but whatever, it's a turn of phrase) and a woman named Polyantha Hawthorne offers you to join the Circle of Thorns. Obviously they'll need you to do something for them before handing you your robe, so to prove your worth they send you to retrieve a magical tomb from a police warehouse. Once that's done, they are willing to begin your initiation.

The initiation involves the casting of a spell of your choice which requires a fragment of magical coral, which you steal from the holds of a cargo ship which is protected by private security guards. Once this is done, the spell can be cast. The spell requires multiple CoT mages to be performing a ritual at once. Polyantha explains that only the mage leading the ritual is important, however, and that the other mages are simply there to increase the power. The ritual is to be performed at a specific location, the outside of a crypt it seems. However, Vahzilok show up on the scene and you have to prevent them from disrupting the ceremony by rescuing Polyantha from the franken-zombies. She explains that the spell was a success, though it will not take effect for a long time.

Now the Circle needs only one more thing from you before you are inducted into their ranks proper. You must kidnap 3 people who have an Atlantean bloodline for the Circle to use for their dark schemes. When you arrive, you face both Rogue Island Police and Legacy Chain members who are trying to prevent you from kidnapping the citizens, one of which is being interrogated by members of the Family. After you bring them back to your would-be masters, they invite you in to Oranbega(?) to be inducted into their ranks. Polyantha explains that you won't become a Circle Mage as you don't carry Oranbegan blood(?) and instead you will be the Circle's covert agent in the isles, serving their interests clandestinely. When you arrive, however, the Legacy Chain has infiltrated the underground city. You must collect your ceremonial thorn and robe and rescue the ritual leaders from their captors so they can conduct the final initiation ritual.

Mechanics

Even though the description says that the mission is designed for levels 2-5, I ran through it first with my level 50 Kat/SR Scrapper, and second with my level 6 Fire/Rad Corrupter. The Corruptor was the closest level character I had to the arc, and I didn't feel like making a new character just to review it.

Upon entering the first mission as my level 50 running on challenge 4, I'm greeted by a map completely filled with level 51-52 custom bosses from a group called CopShop, who were Assault Rifle/Willpower, both set to standard. At first my jaw dropped, but then I remembered that I'm supposed to be low level at this point. The bosses themselves weren't a problem at all for my level 50, but a character not built for the kind of soloing scrappers are would have a much bigger problem. The level 6 corrupter was greeted by level 4 RIP and... Crey Security Guards? If I hadn't run through mission 2 on my scrapper already, I would have been dumbfounded. I had gotten that out of my system when I went through mission 2 on my scrapper. This is where the "mostly" part of suited to low levels comes in. These Crey Security Guards, as it turns out, are in the regular security guard group. They have a little over 1/3 the HP of a normal minion, but have the furthest perception radius I have ever seen on any enemy. I'm serious, we're talking see you from halfway across the map here. I don't know where these guys came from, but I would take them out. Because when they see you, everyone they spawn with sees you. Meaning that your level 2-5 character is suddenly going to have a whole room fighting them. In addition, I don't really see a need for the custom boss. Both private security guards and RIP have bosses that could be used in the case of a big team running the mission, and with the custom boss in there it throws the level cap way off. I would just plain take that out, and the "Crey" guards, and just leave the custom group just RIP capped at whatever low level you want it to cap out at. As far as objectives in this mission go, there are non-essential destructible crates, and one essential clickable crate which spawns a small ambush of Tuatha. The crate drops two near identical clues in your clue tab, I'm assuming one from the crate and one from mission complete, one should be edited out. I'm a little concerned about the tuatha on bigger teams. Tuatha minions aren't really much of a problem, but their LTs and Bosses I can see being a big problem for low level characters.

On the second mission, it's more or less the first mission except on a tanker. The custom group is called MySecurity, and is Private Security Guards and the "Crey" guards. No problems with the level cap, though thanks to the wide open nature of the tanker map, if you get unlucky and have some of the "Crey" guys spawn up front, you'll be greeted by an immediate assault by security guards, even if you have full invisibility on. My scrapper (fighting at level 19) did not get lucky, and ate tanker floor shortly after entering. The second time around I ate practically all of my inspirations fighting the horde of enemies. My Corruptor fared better, mainly I think because instead of fighting level 20s he was fighting level 6s, which were equipped with pistols instead of assault rifles. Same as the last mission, non-required destructible crates and a required collect object, and the collect object spawns an ambush of Coralax on you. However, I don't think the Coralax ambush was very necessary, as there is a Coralax patrol mission that talks about needing to find the coral. The glowie also drops two clues, one saying that you have found some coral, another saying that now that you have the coral, you can get the spell cast, and it makes a mention of the weird coral creatures. The first clue can be taken out, it's pretty much extraneous.

The third mission is an outdoor map with Vahzilok, but the required rescue is practically right in front of your face when you enter. Both times through I finished this mission in about a minute.

The fourth mission is an office map where you have 3 escorts, two surrounded by Legacy Chain, one surrounded by family. I can't really remember who is the main enemy to face on the map, as most of the spawn locations were used up by patrols of Legacy Chain and RIP, which are enemies to each other. Each patrol also had a set of dialogue, meaning that as you go through the mission you're assaulted with text boxes. If you want to have dialogue with your patrols but keep the number, I would suggest making one seperate patrol detail for each group that says the dialogue, put those in the front, and make the rest of the patrols with no dialogue. After you rescue the 3 hostages, there is an ambush of Legacy Chain, but like the other missions, the mission is already complete so there's no real reason to stick around to fight them, except for the experience and tickets.

The fifth mission takes place inside an Oranbega map, where Legacy Chain are your enemies. Your objectives are simple, one glowie, 3 captives, and 1 ally. There are ally patrols of CoT walking the halls, which gives a nice feel of being inside of the CoT's base which is being invaded. However, again all of the CoT patrols spout the same dialogue. I would bring it down to one patrol in the front saying the dialogue. The spawn placement of Polyantha both times was in the water in the back room, in a place that's not really easily visible. I would suggest trying to make her spawn in the middle, though this placement could be because of map limitations. If that's the case, I wouldn't change the map, because it's a nice, small, non-complicated Oranbega map that works well with the spawn locations besides Polyantha.

Story

I'll start with the plot itself. I like the premise, the idea of having a third person to start with instead of Kalinda and Burke, but I don't know. The Circle of Thorns? They don't seem to me to be the type that would hire outside help. They're also uncharacteristically helpful in this arc. Considering the fact that the CoT's idea of recruitment is to kidnap people and force a thorn in their chest or trick kids who are big into the occult to do it, this just seems odd to me.

The intro dialogue for mission 2 seems to put words in the mouth of the player too much for my tase. Instead of having Polyantha say that it'll take months to get a coral fragment and the player (presumably) telling her that it's too long to wait and suggesting that they go get one, why not just have Polyantha say that she knows of a cargo ship that's carrying some in it's hold? There's also the deal with her asking what spell you want. This isn't putting words in the mouth of the player, it's the opposite, but the way it played out left a bad taste in my mouth. I realize that any promise of favors or power from a contact in the game is meaningless, and even less meaningful in MA missions, but this seemed even less meaningful than that. Like I was being promised something, but I didn't know what it was, and I knew that I'd never get it. Instead of having her ask what kind of spell the player wants, getting no answer, and saying "Oh yeah we can totally do that" (I mean, what if the spell was a spell that exploded Statesman's head or something? Nitpick, I know, but still) why not just have the CoT cast a spell of good fortune on the player instead? That way it can be tangible (story-wise) to the player as an actual (but fictional) thing, that doesn't assume anything on the part of the player or his character.

Mission 3 seemed completely extraneous to me, like it could have been described in the return dialogue of mission 2 that she performs the ritual and grants you the spell. I would either do that, or make this mission have more meat on the bones. Make multiple objectives of mages that need to be rescued. Also, Vahzilok? Seems completely out of touch for the theme of the story. Security guards and police are all fine, those are vanilla enough to go with any story, but cyborg zombies jolted me right out of the magic theme. Why not make them Legacy Chain? Legacy Chain is already in your arc, and they're the heroic counterpart to the magical villain groups. They could have arrived on the scene to stop whatever evils they thought the CoT were cooking up.

In mission 4, when I was reading Zhang Qi's (one of the hostages) bio, her bio said that she had no idea that her soul would be replaced by that of an ancient wizard. Now, personally, I wouldn't put that in there. The in game reveal that the CoT are actually millennia old ghosts who are hijacking the bodies of people doesn't happen until your 30s. Before that all you know is that they like to kidnap people with Mu blood, and people who delve deep in the occult and join the CoT go mad and seem like they become different people. I'm also confused by the presence of the family here. That wasn't explained at all in the dialogue or any clues. I also am having a hard time wrapping my head around why the RIP and the Legacy Chain are fighting each other, unless... the RIP are there to arrest my kidnapping targets?

Finally, a couple things about CoT lore. Oranbega is only in Paragon City, the underground cities you go to in the Rogue Isles, I believe, are the ruins of the Mu civilization. At least I'm fairly certain, I'm a bit rusty on my CoV lore. In any case, it's not Oranbega. Also, it doesn't say anywhere that someone has to be of Oranbegan descent in order to become a CoT mage. In fact, there are no people of Oranbegan descent, as because of the pact they made with Ermeeth to destroy the Mu continent, they all became ghosts, so Polyantha saying that you can't become a true member because you don't share their bloodline doesn't make any sense. As far as I know, anyone and their mother can become a CoT mage if a spirit thorn gets stabbed into their chest.

Final Thoughts

All in all, it's not a bad mission. Aside from the "Crey" guards that see for miles, low level characters shouldn't have any problem going through it. The plot is weak, but the weak plot didn't detract from my enjoyment. If you fix the problems with the level cap and take out the hawk-eye guards, tone up the writing, I can see this being a 4 star.

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That's a different aspect, true, but falling down a hole in the first place is itself unexpected. (Someone walking around and intentionally jumping into holes would simply be peculiar, and neither tragic nor comic.)

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Unless another element was added to make it humorous that the person was jumping down the holes.

But I think you see where I'm going with this.

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Bear in mind that an essential part of humor is usually the incongruity of something unexpected happening in a situation where you wouldn't expect it.

For instance (to use a superhero example), Clark Kent entering a phone booth and changing into Superman isn't funny. But Christopher Reeve looking for a phone booth and finding only a modern-style "boothless" phone? Funny!

It's funny because we know the whole "standard" Superman/phone booth trope, and seeing it not "work" for Superman is unexpected.

Now, say, having a giant carrot doing dance moves with a boom box in the middle of a deadly battle between the Council and 5th Column? That's definitely unexpected, but it's more silly or absurd than actually funny, because there's no particular context for it.

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Well, not all humor relies on unexpected situations. There's the joke at somebody elses expense. The whole "If I fall down a hole, it's tragedy, but if you fall down a whole, it's comedy" angle.

I've decided that I'm going to start reviewing people's arcs, and I'm going to do it in this thread instead of starting another one. (We've got like what, 7? 8 review threads?) I'm not going to look back through the thread and try to figure out who's been reviewed yet, who's on people's queues, and all that. If you'd like me to review an arc, post it or PM it to me or what have you.

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Sreufuuopls and eiuuoacloqs plieoorshages fulerenqty bcmoee dtambioslcoebud and uinrscbalende wehn desraraingd tulshy.

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Crap, I can figure out everything but plieoorshages.

Superfluous and eloquacious ??? frequently become discombobulated and undiscernable when disarrainged thusly.

And no, I didn't use one of those word jumble engines. If I did, I would know what that other word was.

Back on topic, I'd really love it if god was taken off of the list. Lord of the underworld just doesn't have the right feel to it. I also agree that the words that are on there for trademark issues should be reserved for names of people. Far far too many of trademarked names are just normal words.