dugfromthearth

solo - defender is better. You get a solo damage buff that is nice

team - corr does better damage. The defender loses their solo damage buff, and scourge is more useful. The defender does get some slightly better buffs/debuffs

I will second the archery/kin (or kin/archery)
the only kin I can enjoy and the only archery I can enjoy

If you are starting a new character and want to play in AE, here are some arcs (not mine) to play for levels 11-20. I recommend all arcs listed below. The star rating is my own for dividing them here, I would rate all of them 4 or 5 stars in game.

I do not include any missions with EB's or AV's. I rate missions based on their story and the quality of the missions themselves. The story should be interesting and the missions themselves should be fun.

Feel free to post additional arcs for level 11-20 and I will try to play them and put them in the top post if I like them. I still have more to play through but I figured I would at least start the thread in case people are looking for arcs to play.

5 Star Arcs ---------

Level: 5-15, ID#:124906, Name: The Lazarus Project
Great story. Great details. A lot of clues – many just flavor. Two problems: you fight the same mobs a lot and it is tough (mostly Vahz). But it is really a great arc.

Level: 1-14, ID#:519044, Name: Grunty McFisterson's Two Step Guide to Winning Respect
Villainous arc. Humorous but not silly. Face a variety of foes. Very short missions with a lot of humor. Read the NPC text and clues. Optional objectives add fun flavor.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 543322, Name: Meet the Author
Hilarious, verging on silly. The contact is perfect. The plot is great. Mission details are good. Ending is surprisingly excellent. Some missions are a little long for the detail.

Level: 1-14, ID#: 540613, Name: 001-Bonefire:FREEDOM Style
The first in a remake of older real missions in AE, so it might be familiar. Contact is well done, with personality. Missions are good. Short but with some nice detail. The overall story is okay but each mission just sort of happens so it is a bit confusing.


4 Star Arcs ------------

Level: 1-14, ID#: 1472, Name: Hearts on Fire
Very effective story. Motivation is weak at first, a couple of missions lack details but are short. A large variety of foes. It should be only a 3 star but the story just works.

Level: 8-19, ID#: 2180, Name: Bricked Electronics
Great details in the missions. Diverse maps and enemies. Story is engaging at first but then confusing. Contact has a wall of text, so it may be explained but I missed it. The parts are all great, the sum is less so.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 534435, Name: Hero Space Corps: The abandoned freighter
A good implementation of Alien in a single mission. The mission works well with a series of tasks that rarely require back tracking. Aliens look reasonably good. Four stars because while there is not a lot to the story, it is short and fun while it lasts.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 534498, Name: The Blonde Brawler Gets Her Cape Back
Single mission arc. Lots of details in the mission. Explanation of the story is good and motivating. Dropped to 4 stars because not a satisfying conclusion.

Level: 5-14, ID#: 375018, Name: A Hero in Need...is a Friend Indeed!
Play for the story. Starts out dull, gets much better. Likewise the first missions are just okay but short, gets a lot better. The first part of the arc is 3 stars, the end is 5 stars.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 94504, Name: Daytime Divas
Humorous and pretty silly. Fun and funny plot and characters. Custom villains but not hard. Some missions are a lot of fun, others are basic.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 169260, Name: Eagor to Please
Villainous. Humorous single mission arc. Story has you as the master villain. Fun characters. Custom villains but not hard, plus longbow.

Level: 15-20, ID#: 1874, Name: Dream Paper
Nice story. Missions have good details, lots of optional objectives. The arc is long (5 missions) and the missions tend to be very long - a bit too long for the detail in them.

Level: 5-30, ID#: 255146, Name: An Internship in the fine art of revenge – best villain arc '09
Great plot. Fun contact and story. Missions had some detail but could have used more

Level: 1-14, ID#: 544909, Name: 002(A)-The Clockwork Captive: FREEDOM Style
The second in retelling old arcs but is a stand alone arc. Plot is good and feels nicely heroic. Contact is good. Some details in the missions. Only clockwork enemies so it gets a little dull.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 177370, Name: Relativity Be Damned
Good story. Contact is decent - personality but wall of text. Nice objectives in missions add to the story. Main problem is that it is all Arachnos you fight so it gets repetitive.

Level: 1-34, ID#: 510265, Name: Special Delivery
Villainous. The contact is named Samuel and your first mission is getting snakes off of a ship. If that sounds good, you will like this arc. Good variety in maps. Missions are either short and to the point, or larger maps but you can just do your objectives. Story is fun, mostly because of the contact.


3 Star Arcs --------------

Level: 5-15, ID#: 379160, Name: A Wake For Dead 6
*** short, kind of bland first mission. Silly mission. Interesting story telling, really odd.

Level: 5-14, ID#: 141376, Name: Idol Hands
Basic storyline but nicely done. Contact is bland but not bad. Missions have some nice bits of text, and especially side clues that add flavor and detail. It is tough – several places encountered extra large spawns.

Level: 5-14, ID#: 4727, Name: Future Skulls
Nice story which is dramatic from the start. Short missions so it is a quick play, much more story focused than combat. Would be 4 stars but the end was not satisfying enough.
Level: 5-14, ID#: 70801, Name: Simple Times
Continues Future Skulls and is the same quality.
Level: 5-14, ID#: 255895, Name: Future's End
Continues Simple Times and is the same quality.

Level: 5-14, ID#: 174640, Name: Redemption
Good story, heroic but dark. Good contact and characters. Would be 4 stars but 2nd mission has large map with escort back to entrance.

Level: 5-15, ID#: 374481, Name: Suppression
The Wizard of Oz with Dorothy, a few winged monkeys, a witch, and a wizard. And a collection of random monsterish enemy types. The story was adapted to Paragon City and is pretty good. But the actual missions were so-so.

Level: 5-15, ID#: 474611, Name: Cole in Your Stocking
Praetorian. Story is interesting, very Praetorian. Mission details are limited. It is about the same as running a low level arc in Praetoria.

Level: 4-54, ID#: 21391, Name: Enter the Father Hat Gang
An amusing, short one mission arc with funny characters and dialog. Not much of a plot and it just kind of ends. Apparently a parody of Azumanga Daioh (an anime show).

Level: 15-20, ID#: 45500, Name: Bringing Down the Overpass
Okay story. Not a lot of in mission details. About the same as a standard mission arc.

Level: 1-54, ID#: 440149, Name: The Trouble With Transformations
Villainous. Interesting story. Good variety of enemies and maps. The missions have some details but not a lot. Very few clues given.

Level: 1-14, ID#: 410165, Name: No More Fires For This Marshall
Simple story, funny. Missions are fairly short, good but few details

Level: 1-54, ID#: 42083, Name: Arab Spring Democracy
One mission. Not much of a story but enough. Little in mission details. But it is short and the custom enemies are interesting.

Level: 5-12, ID#: 374002, Name: Two Tickets to Westerly
Good contact, interesting story idea. Missions have a few details. Standard maps.

Level: 1-14, ID#: 189439, Name: The Fireside Poet
Pretty good contact. Story is interesting. Gruesome and grim. Standard maps, missions are standard spawns with one objective, very few details.

Reverse the standard villain plot so it is actually good. Make her the lackey of the player. She gets a cut of some amazing robbery that the player pulls off. The player is the mastermind, she is the up and coming villain.

One thing to do with existing villain groups is to subdivide them into your own custom groups.

Make a group of Arachnos Mu, and Arachnos Spiders, etc.

That lets you set up spawns of specific types with appropriate dialog. It is really weird having an arachnos spider make comments about grabbing a cup of coffee off duty.

beam rifle is for noob mecha

everyone knows that to win you have to form Blazing Sword!

cool tip
and the video was well done
I would happily watch more like that

Faultline is 15

but there are also 2 new arcs in Steel that open at 15. The contacts will appear in your find contact.

I like controllers but they are slow to solo. So I dabble in doms and corrs as well.

I've known that dark has a lot of control. I have recently paired it with sonic and discovered I have basically a controller with a lot of damage as well.

Cone fear up every fight
Cone sleep up every fight
single target hold
AoE disorient up about every other fight

plus -res in the attacks and -res in tar patch

this is my new favorite combo.

there are sets that can single handedly keep a team alive, but controllers

ice slick can be made perma, combined with arctic air you can almost totally lock down a spawn

mass hypnosis makes them not only stop attacking you but attack each other

static field from electricity can put them all to sleep perma. An elec/psi or elec/elec can drain a whole spawn and keep them from acting - an elec/elec blaster can do it even

there are plenty of permable powers that can single handedly keep a team alive. Of course the foes can be immune to them, not be bunched up, the hero casting them can be mezzed and unable to renew them.

what is possible and what is practical can vary greatly

Having played Cracking Skulls and The Lazarus Project - Coulomb you should be making arcs for this game. You just get it. The stories fit the world but are interesting and dramatic. The details are great.

I will definitely try out your other arcs.

I do invention tutorial at 22 - gets me a lvl 25 accuracy IO.

the problem is regarding them as poses

Take a still frame of Bruce Lee fighting, then call it a pose and it will be ridiculous
People moving adopt endless ridiculous poses - because they are not poses, they are part of moving.

The official marvel drawing style (at least back in the day) was to draw the most extreme part of the action so that you got the sense of action.

A person punching should not look like a person standing around.

I haven't done the whole hollows arc in about 6 months. It was pretty good last time I did it.

try Striga

it is a powerset, not an AT

while I agree that invasions are over done - there isn't much else for an epic storyline

you aren't going to get 24 heroes together to stop a bank robbery

I think the only search is missing only a couple of things:
broken missions - you just shouldn't see them
EB's, AV's, custom characters - you should be able to filter out missions with them

It would be nice to see what individuals liked - but I suspect that would lead to stalking and griefing.

For those looking for decent arcs you can search for SFMA - stands for Story Focused Mission Arc. That narrows it down a lot.

I have been going through lvl 1-10 arcs for story arcs. I am skipping any with EB's or AV's. I have a list on MA board, divided into my rating of 5, 4, or 3 stars (I don't include any that I rate below that). Plus a mini-review.

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=287853

1. Old badges are changed to match new badge
"That's lame, we should keep our old badges"

2. Old badges are different from new badges
"That's lame, now I can't get all of the badges on my character, there shouldn't be any badges that new characters can't get"

I've been on a team that tried it before but failed miserably. We could not get past the portal mission.

Today I was on a team that made it all of the way through. It truly is epic. Every mission is a great mission. The boss fights are interesting and different.

The new posi's are pretty good. But if TF's were all of the quality of Sutter, that would be amazing.

yeah, I've fixed it and added arcs as I have played them.

Almost ready to move to 10-20 missions. If nothing else to get past skulls and hellions

I think from the responses that AE could be revitalized with 2 changes

1. Wipe all existing arcs. This may require notifying players to save their old arcs. Or it could just be a wipe. Players who have their arcs saved could republish them. This would remove the backlog of old, broken arcs.

2. Have a setting for missions for type of mission, at least dividing between farming and story. I am thinking: story, experience, challenge, roleplaying. With roleplaying being personal/SG arcs that they do not intend for outside play. You can only set the arc to be one of these.