LordXenite

I did indeed. Then tried Celebrity Kidnapping (1388) on my Plant/Thorn Dominator and had to call it quits in the 3rd mission... I played on Difficulty 4 and forgot how squishy Dominators are when confronted with enemies that can hold better than the Dominator can...

I think I'll have to either lower the difficulty, or switch to another Villain.. perhaps a Mastermind.

All in all, really solid work and I like Celebrity Kidnapping so far despite the silly defeat I had.

I hope you'll have as much fun with my arc as I've had with yours. Though I doubt it.

Teen Phalanx Forever! (67335)

I played a Lv50 PB on Heroic difficulty.

First off, Coyote does a great job of briefing the player about the odds of facing very powerful enemies (EB's on Heroic), but states that caution and sticking with the team will help. Like a good team-member, that's what I did. I went on slowly (the maps luckily were not too large or complex) and made sure I kept the Teen Phalanx close by before starting a fight.

The flow of the story and action was excellent so much so that although I started out with a "been-there, done-that" feeling, by the end of the first mission, the dialogs and compelling "teen-drama" captured my interest and amused me to no end. (I'm easily amused at times...)

Entering the Monitor Duty mission, a staple in most TV shows about Super-groups, had me expecting somewhat of a let-down, just click the Monitor, have it display a very long progress-bar and then the mission would end. So, I took my time to explore the Teen Phalanx Base. Boy oh boy did I ever find goodies! I never knew Cora had such an artistic flare and inserting a self-reference was cleverly done!

After the exploration part was complete, and with a lot of time on the clock, I clicked the Monitor, and settled in to wait for the progress-bar to go down... *WOAH!* was I ever surprised at what happened next!

The plot then shifted past the "we've got trouble" moment and things got real serious when... (that's it, I won't tell you, you'll have to play it yourself).

The good parts: Solid writing, clever use of maps, good character highlighting and a sense of accomplishment that grows from mission to mission.

The bad parts?: Not much, perhaps simply the fact that it's been done before... and maybe that St...Stacy.. that's right, Stacy never made an appearance! I'd have loved to have seen that!

Here's my personal souvenir from this solo-friendly 5-stars arc.

Thanks!

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

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I assumed that the term had its own definition in TVTropes, but searching for it gave me the link I posted and two other links about Aesop and Spoof Aesop. By way of elimination, I figured the Aesop links were not relevant.

If you're right however, wouldn't Venture simply say something like: "No character development", or "No meaning to the story"? Just to keep things short and clear?

On the other hand, if it truly were Random Events Plot, I guess Venture would simply say that and use the TVTropes link...

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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.

Arc ID: 5349
Arc Name: Childhood Horrors
Faction: Council, Arachnos, Custom
Creator Global/Forum Name: @Xenite Blackthread / LordXenite
Length: 3 Missions
Difficulty Level: Easy
Synopsis: Discover how growing up surrounded by Superheroes and Supervillains can affect the mind of a child...
Estimated Time to Play: Anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour.

To be honest, I don't think you're a Police Woman at all. I think you're probably an educator of some sort.

Having read through the post I'm responding to, as well as the post that started it, I would like you to review my story-arc, Childhood Horrors (#5349). I hope you'll enjoy it and request your feedback whatever it may be.

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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.
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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!

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You said 'Christopher Reeve' and that already marked, in my mind, any jokes you were going to make as bad-taste, therefore, for me, not funny.

Clark Kent (in the year 2050 for example...) going into a phone-booth changing into Superman only to have the phone actually *RING!*, now that in my book would be funny, especially if on the other end of the line, there would be an operator claiming that the Phone Booth registered a Legally Binding Use of the Phone Booth according to the Commercial Communication Law Act of 2039 and Superman now has to pay a fee!

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My biggest problem with my PB is that I run out of slots. I wish Squid and Lobster form had atleast 3 inherent slots for each power.

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Don't we all?

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I want to propose a topic for discussion. Is the Mission Architect a good, an evil, or a complete grey area?

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Any tool, technology or idea, is as good, or as bad as the people who discovered, conceived and are using or misusing it.

I recommend using Subversion and a suitable Subversion client program to guarantee that if you made a mistake, you can always compare the current file to its previous version and revert to it if need be. That way, you also don't have to create backup files of anything, Subversion does it for you.

I use Visual SVN as a Subversion server (for Windows) and Tortoise as the Subversion client program because the installation and integration are easy and streamlined.

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[u]Childhood Horrors[u]
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Rating: *****
Likes: Dynamic mission objectives, story references, canon incorporation, plot flow.
Gripes: Mission 2 escort seems unnecessary, mission 3 has a few too many glowies.
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Synopsis: I found a gem! Well, barring the grammar stuff, so maybe a gem with a scratch, but still a gem. The story was compelling, mixed several elements together into a cohesive and evolving plot, was told from a very interesting perspective, and while it ended a bit predictably, it was an excellent work all the same. I especially liked the dynamically changing objectives, the cross-referencing to here and there, and of course just the idea of You Know Who doing You Know What. ...

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You know... for a story-arc with the sole purpose of simply showcasing my custom-enemies, Childhood Horrors has pleasantly surprised me and my friends (both in-game and out).

Glad you loved it and I will eventually revise it. Seeing as the one major change I want to introduce — other than the obvious language and balance issues you've raised — probably requires improvements to the MA/AE system itself, I may have to unpublish and republish the arc if the work I have to do on it proves to be too extensive for the in-game UI tools.

Thanks for an awesome review — feedback-providing as well as flattering — and you're absolutely right, English is not my native tongue.

(QR)

Farming is a means to an end, and as such, can be neither good, nor bad. The question is, once that 'end' is reached, then what?

MMO's are essentially a business. In general, Software Development teams are populated with people who like to get paid for creating things. Software Development teams would rather have the things they create be put to good use by the intended users.

So... if Farming, as a means to an end, eventually leads to people getting bored or frustrated with the game sooner than the Software Development team deems reasonable, then the Software Development team will see Farming as bad, because it's bad for their business. It truly is that simple, and requires no more clarifications!

I think that's a question for the Market Forum actually, because right now I think most Authors are spending their tickets unlocking every MA/AE related unlockable content they can, I know I am...

I'm using Snakes (1-52) and they're just fine. It's probably something to do with the mission settings like GlaziusF said, or perhaps in conjunction with overlapping levels of other enemies within the same mission...

Arc ID: 5349
Arc Name: Childhood Horrors
Faction(s): Council, Arachnos, Custom
Creator Global/Forum Name: @Xenite Blackthread / LordXenite
Difficulty Level: Easy.
Synopsis: Discover how growing up surrounded by Superheroes and Supervillains can affect the mind of a child...
Estimated Time to Play: Anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour.
Recommended Team: Solo-friendly on Heroic

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I'd be interested in seeing your rating history if this was possible LOL

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Which is exactly why there's no "FAILURE -- now go delete your character and try again!" in most MMO's

Having said that, I do love the idea of branching missions inside an Arc, not because I want people to fail and feel stupid, but because I then can present people with choices!

Consider that Villain canon mission where you either catch a Spy Master or let him get away... if I'm not mistaken, letting him get away means the mission "failed", but you actually got to have your OWN agenda regarding what was going on in that mission. One of my characters actually stood there, her hands in her pockets, her Robot minions idle, and watched the Spy Master run for his life... and it felt... great!

In my own story-arc, I want for example to give the player a choice between rescuing Ms. Liberty, or actually forcing her to become Evil... but with the current MA/AE implementation of course that's out of the question because there's no branching and the goal system is as linear as the mission-flow system.

Hopefully, things will change...

I think the Devs are datamining everything we do in AE and how people fight AE-customized mobs so they can then tweak the AI scripts of the in-game regular mobs to make the game more challenging... imagine MindControl/DarkMiasma Minions surrounding Dr. Aeon when you come to fight him... Mu-Ha-Ha-Ha! *cough!*

Just a couple of questions here... what's the opposite (if there is such a thing) of a Mary Su? Would that be a character that is not a stand-in for the author and is repeatedly ridiculed by the arc?

If there is such a character-type, what is its name?

Also, please review my Arc #5349, Childhood Horrors. I'd like to know what you think.

Good to know! Thanks!!

A quick update, I just unlocked the "Costume_Vanguard_Token" and the Talsorian Blades seem to be good now, I guess I must've bought the wrong token earlier.

We're dreaming of bringing more sophistication into the game... some people may love it, others may want our heads on a stick for it.

No can do, yet... maybe in the future but, with the way this game plays, I doubt it.

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Seriously devs you guys need to put this video into some kind of commercial on tv during the time of one of the super hero tv shows or movies. This would get you all the customers you could ever want.

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I actually saw all 3 videos of Captain Dynamic being displayed non-stop in a local EB Games store last night.

I had a similar problem. My arc isn't difficult to solo as far as I'm concerned and I solo'ed it myself just fine with my TriForm PB/WS characters. However, I neglected to acknowledge that since I was playing a TriForm Kheldian, between all my forms, I had self-teleport, flight, self-heals, self-buffs, some crowd control, some DPS and some survivability. So basically, I was a mini-team soloing my own story, of course I wouldn't think it was difficult.

I then take along my wife and a friend, and we travel through my Arc. First and 2nd missions were very easy... as expected. We then came to the 3rd mission, where my custom-made Vampire Bunnies live... and then, after the initial laughter (they look pretty funny) and the initial shock (their Minions has MindControl/DarkMiasma powers) dies down, we're left with a mission that effectively, only my Kheldians could handle!

So, after a few recommendations from my wife (basically it was like CHANGE THEM or else), I toned down my Vampire Bunnies so they would use a much more docile power-set combination. However, it seems like my "work" was not yet done.

You see, for the last Boss in my last mission, I have the player fighting a 'Hero-class' enemy. Without giving up too much of the story/setting, you're there to set someone straight... and the fight kinda went south for some people on some characters when they tried to solo my arc.

I checked the editor and could not see any way to tone-down the difficulty of the End-Boss, so instead, I did the only fair thing I could do, which was to put a secret-Ally in the mission! It is now up to the player whether they want to work towards getting that secret-Ally to come and help them against the End-Boss, or not.

The story itself also flows naturally, I believe, so that if you beat the End-Boss before you meet the secret-Ally, things still seem reasonably logical. So I'm happy with the results. All this by the way, was on the Test Servers, and the Arc made the transfer to the Liver Server quite intact.

It remains to be seen yet, how people will rate it. So far, I've gotten 5-stars from one anonymous voter who did not comment on my arc. I have an idea who he might be, but that's besides the point.

The point is... yes, balancing content is a DIFFICULT job, but I think that if a TriForm Kheldian can reasonably solo an Arc, it can be declared solo-friendly. If a Kheldian will repeatedly have problems with it then it requires re-balancing (if and only if it is meant to be solo-friendly in the first place), but also, keep in mind that sometimes, to balance your work, you don't necessarily need to tweak things down, sometimes you can build on that and add some secret-weapon-type thing like a secret ally.