I found mission building to be pretty easy, if still a time-suck (choose a map, no not that one, maybe this one, no, no, no, no, OK this one. Now go check to see if they foes spawn like you were planning no...). But I liked to make use of all the chances for talking NPCs and the current AE, just like on the old days live by the time it shut down, is still broken for that.