Venture

I didn't do any of them, explains everything.

Are you ever gonna stop banging on that particular drum? Just curious.

I dunno. In a way it's useful to have a tangible metric for the bottom of the barrel. One of the NYC newspaper movie reviewers used to use Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge as his example of "as bad as it gets".

OTOH I'll probably stop when people stop taking shots at me over it. That will depend on them not attaching "Blight" tags on my next review thread, of course. (Or gems like "troll with good publicity"...I thought it was against forum rules to accuse people of trolling but whatever.)

Creative works are never finished. Only abandoned.

I'll toss one of my early efforts into the hat: "Chains of Blood", #4829.

Arc #41646 "Origin 5th Element - Part I Get Max"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: "just a bunch of stuff that happened", incomplete, gameplay issues

Reviewed on: 10/20/2009
Level Range: 50-54
Architect's Keywords: Challenging, Ideal for Teams, Custom Characters
My Keywords: Challenging, Origin Story
Character used: Venture/Virtue
Difficulty: +2x5+B-AV

Part I, capped level range, extreme warnings, those tags...I don't like it already.

"Drake Steel", founding member of the 5th Element supergroup, offers you a chance to experience the events that went into the origin of the group through an AE simulation. You are to look into the disappearance of his partner, "Max Savage", who vanished while investigating a new gang called Interga^H^Hcrime. You're warned that while Drake pulled this off alone you may want help. As you enter the warehouse a pop-up tells you "the Pulverizer" knows something about Max's disappearance, which you are to learn through percussive interrogation. Intercrime turns out to be a custom faction with a mix of guns and blades and not very inventive costumes. Bosses have Unyielding, so sucks to be you, Controllers. As for the Pulverizer, he turns out to be an AV/EB (Energy Melee/Invulnerability) who was a bit of a pain to deal with thanks to some lucky shots. On defeat he tells you he'll be out of the Zig soon and that Max was "mind swiped" and is now a member of Intercrime. This is confirmed by some files you find on a laptop.

Pulverizer gives up some more info, presumably after extreme rendition, leading you to another warehouse. Drake warns you that Intercrime is bringing in some Rogue Isles supervillains to keep you off their back. On entry, I heard a patrol boasting that this was actually a set-up by the Pulverizer. The first of the villains was Boneyard, a Dark Melee/Dark Armor AV/EB. The second was Bonfire, a Fire Blast/Dark Miasma AV/EB:



His backup showed up after he hit the floor. On capture he gives up Intercrime's plan: their leader, Lustre, plans to use the Mind Swiper to take over the city. This doesn't seem consistent with what you were told about the Mind Swiper device in the first act, but moving on....

Time for the Fight Scene: you have to head to the office HQ of Intercrime, take down Lustre (whom Drake knows nothing about) and likely beat up Max as well.



Max Savage turned out to be a War Mace/Invulnerability AV/EB with BuildUp who instantly hit me for about 2400 points. I took another death fighting a "MilTech Commander", who managed to land a KO Blow for about 1300 points. The Big Bad, Lustre, turned out to be an Illusion Control/Energy Blast AV/EB in a Stripperific getup. She calls two ambush waves as her health declines, and her defeat clue throws off some info that's supposed to lead into the next part, as does the aforementioned MilTech Commander.

The arc has no theme, and doesn't resolve all the plot elements it brings up. Many of the mobs have their difficulty ramped up gratuitously. (I will point out that in a few cases truly obnoxious powers were left out -- nothing used a tier-9 defensive, and the Super Strength mobs did not Rage.) The arc doesn't do anything truly horrible but there's nothing to really commend it for either.

Well, I get negative rep for breathing.

Personally I knew exactly why it was "Croc Pot" and I have a hard time imagining people who wouldn't get the joke. In fact, until I looked just now I had no idea it was a trademark.

Of course, once upon a time, so was "aspirin".

In any case, humor is completely subjective and this argument is pointless. This is why I don't respond when people complain that I didn't think their comedy arcs were funny.

I must correct you on one point: the Romans in "Quest for Magic" are not reskins. They're customs.

I might have more objections but CMPT 371 is starting.

Interested, but I still owe four reviews in my queue (which has cobwebs now), and I was already naughty and put the Guest Author arcs ahead of them....

Once my queue empties I'm only going to review arcs I choose, and this will probably be one of them.

Arc #337436 "The Great Face-Off"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: "ain't half bad, ain't half good neither"

Reviewed on: 10/19/2009
Level Range: 1-40
Architect's Keywords: Solo Friendly, Custom Characters, Comedy
My Keywords: Comedy
Character used: Venture/Virtue
Difficulty: +1x2+B-AV

"Solo Friendly", and has warning tags for extreme AVs and EBs. OK.....

Tech Guy, head of the Great Face's IT department, needs your help breaking the Great Face out of jail, mainly because his last check bounced. You're to slip in during a prison riot to fetch him. The Great Face's uncle is a lawyer and he'll be there to help you...eh? It turns out the Face is being held without bail due to over 300 unpaid parking tickets. His uncle turned out to have Super Strength (and maybe Assault Rifle, not sure). His rescue triggers the spawn of the Great Face, whom you have to escort out. When you get to the chopper Face says his uncle had already gotten him off on a technicality so you didn't have to break him out after all.

However, in order to pay Tech Guy and the rest of the goons, the Great Face needs to rob a bank, and you're asked to help. This is a 30 minute timed mission with no warning at all. You have to free the Face (Mind Control/Dark Miasma AV/EB) then steal the money, which triggers the spawn of Geoff from the Marketeers (one of Captain Dynamic's writers) as a hostage and more PPD goons, including a Boss you have to defeat. This mission is a bit discordant as half the speaking characters act as if the Great Face is a joke and half act as if he's a dangerous supervillain.

Thanks to the influx of cash, Tech Guy is able to move forward with the Great Face's master plan: uploading a virus onto the computer networks of Paragon City that will prevent anyone from blocking his IMs. Yeah. You're sent to a tech lab map to destroy some firewall computers, upload the virus, and then fight Captain Dynamic (Martial Arts/Regeneration Elite Boss). Joel, the other Marketeer writer, is in as a hostage as well. Dynamic has Instant Healing so the first ninety seconds of your fight don't count. The Great Face starts his campaign of evil IMing, the end.

This arc is just kind of there. It ain't half bad...ain't half good, neither. I didn't think it was particularly funny. In particular the appearances by Geoff and Joel were totally gratuitous.

Arc #337438, "Mission: Awesome"
tl;dr: 1 star. Offenses: legion

Reviewed on: 10/18/2009
Level Range: 1-40
Architect's Keywords: Custom Characters, Non-Canon Story, Comedy
My Keywords: Challenging, Sci-Fi, Comedy
Character used: Venture/Virtue
Difficulty: +2x5+B-AV

Murray, leader of the Marketeers (4th best marketing department in Paragon), wants you to find Captain Dynamic. The Captain went to rescue a kitten in a box but is hours overdue and Murray would really owe you for helping him out, in a non-monetary way of course. The office with the kitten is overrun with diminutive robots:




These turn out to be the minions of Captain Dynamic's arch-enemy The Great Face. The box contained not a kitten but a note from Face, intended to delay Captain Dynamic long enough for the robots to capture him. The bots are actually pretty nasty, loaded with -Defense, +tohit buffs and END drains. Enough of them have Web Grenade to debuff my Recharge to -28%...and I start at 72.5% and I've got Quickness. As for the -Defense, I have just under 80% resistance to -Defense when EXed to 38, and I still saw my Base Defense get knocked down by -45% or so at times....

Murray tells you that the Captain must be in the hands of The Great Face's lackey, Tech Guy and his evil IT Department. And you've only got 30 minutes to rescue him for a conference call about a photo shoot (inadequate warning for the timed mission). The Captain turns out to be in the sewers under the IT Department's office. He claims to be pretending to be captured and is irate when you rescue him. Sadly, you can't feed him to the gnomes.

Unfortunately, the call doesn't happen because the Great Face and Tech Guy have taken over the phone company and installed a Call Waiting Disruptor, so Murray couldn't switch over from his call to the Tie of the Month Club. The lack of call waiting will cause chaos throughout the city (according to Murray, anyway) so you and the Captain have to race over to the phone company and take out the disruptor. Murray warns you Tech Guy might be there to defend it personally. Thanks to overlapping spawns this was less fun than watching paint dry. Tech Guy had some kind of Ice powers; I can't be more specific because I'd finally had enough and had used Elude while destroying the CWD, which triggered his spawn.

Sadly, saving the city's phone system wasn't nearly as impressive as Murray had hoped, so the Marketeers still need a way to make Captain Dynamic look good. Taking out the Great Face should do that, and they know where he is now. You're going along, I guess to keep the Captain from hurting himself or getting lost on the way. Just to complicate things, actors the Marketeers hired to portray the Captain's fans (seeing as how he doesn't actually have any) have been captured so you'll have to rescue them. For some reason the Great Face's hideout is on fire, as the mission uses the Hellions burning office map. The Marketeers' writers are inexplicably amongst the hostages as well, and you have to find one of their laptops to trigger the spawn of the Great Face, a Mind Control/Dark Armor Elite Boss (opens with fear). Murray is happy with the publicity, and you get a pat on the back.

There's more wrong with this than there is right with it. Nintendo Hard mobs are not appropriate for a comedy arc. The floor and ceiling don't make any sense to me -- these mobs are way too hard for anyone below SO level at least, and there are no canon factions at all so why cap it at 40? The plot can't seem to decide if it's something that's supposed to be happening in Paragon City or if the whole thing is a simulation. There's a certain style needed to pull off breaking the fourth wall and this arc doesn't have it. The comedy just didn't work for me, in part because the inept fiddling with the fourth wall deprived the comedy of context. Give this one a pass.

Yes, I typed them during combat. SR perk.

Arc #337434, "Quest For Magic"
tl;dr: 2 stars. Offenses: throws the Idiot Ball HARD, borderline Idiot Plot, telegraphed Contact name

Reviewed on: 10/17/2009
Level Range: 46-50
Architect's Keywords: None
My Keywords: Challenging, Magic
Character used: Venture/Virtue
Difficulty: +2x5+B-AV

Irena Faust (-2.5 stars for telegraphed Contact name) wants your help in obtaining magical power. What Could Possibly Go Wrong? After catching the Idiot Ball your first task is to retrieve a book for her. According to her anyone who masters this "Book of Lost Marvels" will become a champion of good, but it's currently in the hands of a "Dr. Mordrin Marrow" who is attempting to corrupt its powers. He's being aided by the Pride, a mercenary cat-themed supergroup:



...so Venture was used to dealing with large numbers of catpeople. Statesman put in a cameo, front-loaded as a hostage, but he took off on rescue to "take care of the east wing". He did mention he was there as a favor to one "Irena Carey", a woman he had saved some time ago. Dr. Marrow turned out to be a Electric Blast/Energy Blast Boss, meaning two Aim powers so I finally had to push the You Lose button (Elude). Along with the book, you find evidence that Marrow was looking for two other artifacts as well. Irena lets slip that Statesman had saved her and starts thinking of what codename to use. She's also interested in those other artifacts, of course.

After having a chance to read up a bit on the Book of Lost Marvels, Irena determines she needs a source of magical energy to really take advantage of its spells. Fortunately Marrow located one for her, the "Casket of Ancient Days", which is also in villainous hands (according to her at least). She emphasizes that getting the Casket away from the bad guys is worth doing on its own, which is true. It's just the part about giving it to her any rational being should have a problem with. The Casket is the hands of "The Black Legion", a Roman-esque outfit reportedly led by a vampire.



These are not reskinned Cimerorans, so they don't have some of their annoying features, but they do have two LT models with Aim and/or BuildUp. Your objectives are to defeat the Tribune (there were several thanks to my difficulty setting, couldn't tell which was the Tribune) and the "Vampire Caesar". He turns out to be "Marcus Londinius" (bio says "Gius Markus", pretty sure that's supposed to be "Gaius Marcus"), one of Julius Caesar's engineers who got turned way back when. He was an Elite Boss with two Bosses in agro range, so I just said "screw it" and hit Elude to start. He does the turns-to-dust thing on defeat, threatening to return and hunt you down (And Your Little Dog Too, no doubt). His defeat triggers the spawn of the Casket, which required backtracking to find for no clear reason. Irena is happy that you've brought her semi-phenomenal nearly-cosmic power, and why not.

Just one problem. The Book is full of offensive spells. She doesn't want to get shot full of holes her first time out, so off you go to find the other artifact Marrow was interested in, the Cloak of Protection (no plus specified). This is in the hands of the Snakes...presumably this mission takes place in the Rogue Isles but that's never said and isn't all that important anyway. You have to take out the lead Snake, "Karatos the Mighty", and find the chest with the Cloak, very straightforward. On your return, Irena pulls her Sudden But Inevitable Betrayal, but while gloating gets possessed by her old master, Dr. Marrow. (S)he vanishes in a puff of plot.

You quickly run off to Azuria hoping she can divine Marrow's location. She finds him/her gloating over a defeated Statesman, who is being dragged away by the goons so Marrow can steal the power of Zeus from him. You rush off to the rescue (with a bring-friends warning). You arrive at an office-to-caves-to-sewers map loaded with Hydra, which Marrow has taken over with his/her new powers. You do get two allies for this, "Raptor Septavia" of the Black Legion and Ratas Hurr of the Pride, but they are both LTs meaning neither one lasted nearly as long as, say, a pork chop in a piranha tank. There's a named Hydra Boss to take down, then the new improved Dr. Marrow (now with 100% less Y chromosome), an Earth Control/Fiery Assault (I think) Elite Boss. Defeating him/her triggers Statesman as a rescue (which spawned Rocks Fall Everyone Dies style for me; fortunately Elude was still up). The artifacts are shattered, Irene is depowered and Marrow forced back into his body in prison. Irene admits she was corrupted by power but claims when she gets out of the Zig she's going to show she's a changed person and really wants to help people. Riiiiiiight.

There's nothing really horrible about the gameplay, except maybe too many mobs with +tohit but that's not going to be a factor to many builds. The story, however, needs to be taken out and shot (bury it first). I gave it an extra star for having moderately-interesting custom mobs and not being as bad as "Blight" (but not by much).

The game is not "easy enough." It never was, it never will be.

The game is too easy, always has been and evidently always will be. I regard 4XP as the death knell for balance in this game. My main is fighting at +2x5 and could probably go higher, which is insane; spawns that size should kill any soloist, no saving throw.

In any case, Bosses showing up at team size 2 is not new. It started at least an issue ago, maybe longer. It's not a product of 4XP.

Arc #337435, "OMG it's the LOLBAT!"
tl;dr: 5 stars. Nits: "just a bunch of stuff that happened" (but comedic), possible bugs in act III, odd choice of level range

Reviewed on: 10/16/2009
Level Range: 35-40
Architect's Keywords: Non-Canon Story, Comedy, Kid Friendly
My Keywords: Custom Characters, Non-Canon Story, Comedy
Character used: Venture/Virtue
Difficulty: +2x5+B-AV

The LOLBAT, meme-powered hero of an unnamed nearby city, has come to Paragon to warn you of an imminent attack...you think. Something about rats "in ur vaults stealin ur monies". When you arrive at the designated bank, the leader of the "Algonquin Hate Table", one Monsieur Ronguer (Thugs/DiedTooFast Boss, typo in defeat clue: "Monsier") is robbing the place with his "Ratters" (recolored Redcaps). He vanishes when defeated, but during the fight drops a list of orders to "Croc Pot".

On your return, LOLBAT is approached by a woman wearing an "I CAN HAZ CHEESEBURGERS" T-shirt asking for help, which coincides neatly with the orders to Croc Pot, directing him to the Paragon Burger offices. Translating from the lolcat, LOLBAT says Croc Pot wants everyone to eat healthy and you have to stop him since "ur manz can't survive on broccoli alonz." The "Culinary Institute of Evil" is on the site in force with four hostages. The Chefs all use a similar minimalist but effective costume design, with a mix of bladed weapons and Fiery Assault for the Bosses (which also have Shield Defense, which I thought was a bit off...Willpower maybe). The four hostages include a customer, a model (with the Most Common Superpower), an employee and a chef, all with fairly cute bios. Croc Pot (War Mace/Invulnerability Boss) drops a recipe for Mind-Control Custard on defeat. LOLBAT is surrounded by cheering burger lovers on your return.

Later, LOLBAT asks you to stop The Scrabbler from taking over the Paragon City Press. You get a Clue on acceptance which describes some of The Scrabbler's tactics. Following these instructions makes the mission pretty easy. Unfortunately, it's a decoy: The Scrabbler is a fake and the whole thing was a set-up to distract you while the Algonquin Hate Table kidnapped LOLBAT. You rush back but too late: he's gone and there's a taped message from Ronguer taunting you. (N.B. a few players have commented that the spawn triggers in this act haven't worked for them. It worked fine for me on the first try, YMMV.)

The Table's real plan is to force-feed LOLBAT the Mind-Control Custard then unleash him on the city, causing his meme-ridden speech to infect the entire population. Now that's evil. You track Ronguer to his lair to stop them, which you realize will probably mean fighting LOLBAT himself now. All the Table's members are present (Croc Pot bribed his guards with tasty and nutritious cuisine), though you'll have to draw out Scrabbler again (the same instructions apply). This is a straightforward set of fights (except for triggering Scrabbler but that's not hard) on the flooded office map. You do have to fight LOLBAT (Martial Arts/DiedTooFast Boss), and there's a bit of a twist at the end I won't spoil.

This was really a four-star effort, I thought, but some of the humor, low-key though it was, pushed it up to five for me. There's no theme, and though strictly speaking as a comedy it doesn't really need one, I do think it would be improved if the dichotomy between LOLBAT and his intellectual foes was played up into one. I did feel kind of sorry for Croc Pot, but then I liked his one appearance in PvP too, waging his one-reptile war against high-glycemic carbs and saturated fats.... The one other nit I'd pick is the level range. I can see flooring the arc at 35 as some of the customs can be nasty, but I don't see any reason why the ceiling is set to 40. The only stock mobs used are the recolored Redcaps and they should go all the way to the top. Still, it's a solid arc and well worth a play.

I've just starting reviewing these, starting with "OMG it's the LOLBAT!" I'll post the reviews to my thread as I finish them.

Throwing in a few more under the wire, I hope:

Best Serious Arc: "Karmic Exchange", #47550

Best Use of Mechanics: "The Beating Heart of Astoria", #170547

Best SO-Level: "The Horrible Mr. Caractacus", #10271

Best TO-Level: "Soul Train: Origins", #9590