cranebump

Not that I recall. The breakout tutorial on redside is sorta like that. You can also rob a bank during redside mayhem mishes, allow yourself to be defeated, then you spawn in a jail cell in the police station, from which you have to fight your way out. There are also certain missions against the Circle of Thorns where defeat lands you in one of their prison cells. Outside that, I can’t think of anything where the scenario is escape. Summer Blockbuster has some complex missions where each player acts out their part separately to advance a team goal. Other than that…no idea. The Marchand arc has you freeing your team from prison, then fighting bosses.

Well…maybe we can do it…I dunno…dirtier?

Also: thanks for the Mobius run.* Caught it after the fact when I did my usual check in with your channel. I actually have this coming Monday off and thought about hopping on when you do your AE runs. I'll have to (a) check the times and (b) decide if my old fartness can handle the early wakeup. I'd also need to swing a toon over to Everlast, but that's not a biggy. Thanks again, man. Hope you get a chance to get to the finale. *Didn't realize how tough the Shadows/Chalikar were with those settings and numbers, since I write for soloists (I knew the wandering mercs were a bear, since I always ran into their overlapping patrols on the second floor, where you can't really see how many of them there are when you enter through the choke point). Will say that, when you pulled the team back and started herding them, I got a big kick out of it. I was like, Oh man...Molly's goin' old school. And down they went.:-)

KR Devil (aka Juan Jiminez? [never been confirmed!]).:-) It's not optimal, but AR/TA. Got a lot better with the changes to Full Auto, but it's really about flexibility from the Arrow set. And I just like spraying lead.:-)

Heh, heh. I see what you did there, Private.:-)

Superspeed coupled with super jump is pretty awesome. For me, though, it’s about what fits conceptually. The toon I play most is a ground bound scrapper. I haven’t picked up any movement pools at all. Did get the free jump pack and purchased flight pack once he had some cash. Also ended up earning an extra flight pack in the KR Bank mish. He’s part of an SG with a base, too, so I use the TPs there, and Ouro (which I got by zoning into the PvP zone via Atlas, behind Rick Davies in City Hall). That said, nothing feels quite so super as flight.

Any publicity is good publicity. Bourne out here, as the initial review spurred additional plays, and different perspectives.

Red side is excellent, overall. It does hew toward I'm going to be the power on the throne here, eventually, though. That whole "Destined Ones" thing. Driving up numbers there as far as teaming goes requires someone really dedicated to running the content, to include drumming up Strike Force teams. I'd include bank mishes in there, because you can just trash everything on the map, which is its own special, special thing.:-)

I’m just going to provide the immediate steps. Number one: play hero side first. Number two: play the hero side tutorial called outbreak before entering the game through Atlas Park. Once you get to Atlas Park, play through the story arcs presented to you beginning with Matt Habashy. When you open up the contact named Twinshot, Play through her ARC as well. This will get you familiar with the basic stuff as you are learning the game. I would honestly avoid running on a large team until you've played the game solo for a while at the lower levels. However, running as a duo or trio, with a couple of friendly veterans might not be bad since they would answer questions for you on the fly. Try to take it in bite sized chunks. Most of all, though, have fun! If you end up on Torchbearer, feel free to look me up. My global is the same as my forum name. In the meantime, have a great run and welcome!

You know...Torch is still searching for an identity. Unofficial bad guys & (misunderstood) douche bag server, anyone?:-)

I'll chime in as an advocate for actually playing the content (starting with Blue), if you've never played CoH before. Actually go straight up old school, to include slow travel, so you can see the city and learn how to get around. Start with an AT/concept you like and go from there. When you run into issues, ask questions. Don't put any pressure on yourself to get straight to 50. You might not bother getting character #1 more than 10-20 levels (I think I rerolled a half dozen times before settling on one that I stubbornly ran to 50). And, by all means, explore some of our player-made content.:-) (I'd do this after running the regular content, though -- the city comes first!). One day, after you've learned the ropes and then some, return the favor by helping out someone just entering the city. Because that's what being a hero is all about.

I’m with you on fun and intent. And I think a clean, slick piece allows me a greater opportunity for that, since I’m not having to too often stop and mentally autocorrect spelling. I understand that we want to shepherd new authors by being supportive and nice (which is the tone I try to adopt when I review). At the same time, I don’t think it’s a personal attack to say someone’s got spelling errors in their story. We’re critiquing the piece, not the person.* *Until [and unless] they give reasons why they won’t bother to fix anything. Then we know where the issue lies.

It’s quite a story, LR. Clever framing device to allow you to use a wide variety of bad guys and customs. I still remember the Drac boss fight from #1. That was epic!

I haven’t played this arc, but I did review a different arc by the same author. There are some similar issues with spelling and such in the one I ran, as well as the missing glowie text, both in the search bar and sometimes missing clues altogether—not once, but on multiple occasions. I think the author was trying to place objects as window dressing. There’s a way to set them where they remain inert, but they obviously don’t know how to do that just yet. That said, the aspects were noticeable enough to be distracting in both arcs, representing an error trend in the author’s work (an easily fixed one at that). When someone posts an advert here about their AE arc, I assume they want actionable feedback (if there is anything to address). Perhaps this wasn’t the case here. That said, a bit of work on cleaning up small things can only help both arcs. My issue is the making excuses not to, because editing and revising is a basic composition skill that simply takes time and effort. If someone’s spending time to run something I write, I should respect them enough to put in the effort to make it clean, at the very least.

I have to stick with my original "gold" statement because, despite people receiving reviews, they don't receive multiples from different people,. Getting several reviews/perspectives is usually better than just 1. Of course, we might be getting “reviews" from players via the rating system, but they only drop a few words (and not always useful). As far as how people review, I would say that, while I appreciate the compliment, we should remember that "better" is subjective. What I do is different from Kyksie. I'm mainly looking to provide usable feedback. Kyksie's looking to entertain. Or rather, he was, back when he was more invested in reviewing. The snarky tone is part of the schtick. If you can find any of his older, lengthier reviews, you'll see it. You might not like it, but it'll provide context for his shorter, off-the-cuff review we're talking about here. Lastly, "feel honored," again, is just a saying, meaning, in this case, "welcome to the club." I've had some of my flubs aired for everyone to see. That's part and parcel of putting your work on public display. It means someone might peruse it. And maybe they'll talk about it with others. That's the deal. I can either be thin-skinned about it, or parse my way through the uncomfortable part, and try to find a useful nugget. It's been said that any publicity is better than no publicity. Don't know if that's 100% true, but one could say that any mention is better than silence. Whether one agrees with the tone or not. In any case, it's not my job to tell someone how to review my piece, or what to look for in it. If anything, a review shows me what others look for. If I pay attention, I'll know more about how to address a wider audience. It behooves me not to turn it into an argument, since, as already mentioned, a review is subjective. I don't have to agree with it. Doesn't mean it's not worth me listening to it.

So, um, just to be clear, @huang3721, "feel honored" relates to those of us who have been reviewed (and occasionally skewered by Kyks). It was more of a"welcome to the club" thing. That said, anytime you get anyone taking the time to actually give you feedback, that's typically gold, because it happens so infrequently.

At one point today, all shards had 2 yellow dots on the login. After I got on, I was doing my usual slow play solo on Torch and there were teams forming consistently (I’m not on much on Sundays, though, so I’m not sure this is unusual?). That said I played for stretches over the entire weekend, and Torch did seem busier. If the idea was to shift population, it seems to have worked.

If you run without optimizing -- say, sticking to, at best IO's -- increase your settings, and avoid the incarnate system altogether, it ought to be naturally challenging enough. Or more challenging, at least. Perhaps consider avoiding all the XP buffs. Use only DOs, SOs or IOs (for a bigger challenge, only craft IOs based on what drops). Don't grab your usual secondary pools (Fighting, for ex). Of course, you may not find that fun, but it’s technically not handicapping.

Suggest opening your map, then detaching it, and moving to one side, so you can see contacts, stores, and trainers (like Ms Lib):-)

Echoing playthrough of Twinshot after you Run Habashy. You could also do the Outbreak tutorial prior to entering Atlas.

I can't manage it. Which is why I recently did a mass deletion/consolidation. This includes a couple who'd reached 40+. I just knew I wouldn't "finish" them.

Hard to answer because, if I loved it, I'd likely use it. But I'm guessing it's due to the types of characters I play. I think all the magical stuff, including the witch's peak, and things like jester hats and such are cool, but I'm always running tech/natural origin, and most of the time semi-serious. The mime-turned-vigilante just won't work for me (although...if I ran as a villain, all bets are off).:-) I'll go with wings as something I'm impressed with, but don't use much. I think I have exactly one toon with them, and he's a sort of armored paladin-type, and one of my very few magic origin characters. I'm always wishing I could fold them away, though, when not in use.

Okay, let's see how it goes:

One thing I’ve learned from experience when it comes to hearing criticism of my writing: if I’m having to “explain” my logic to the reader, they’re not the problem. I am. Failure to fulfill basic expectations of clarity and entertainment is my job, not theirs. I can even fail on the second part, which is sometimes inevitable, since what entertains is often subjective. But I have no excuse for not being clear, and adhering to a very basic level of professionalism, if I’m sharing my work in the public sphere. Since you are sharing it, you can expect criticism. How you react to it will dictate whether you learn anything from the experience. Lesson one is to try not to be defensive about what people say. If your immediate urge is to make excuses (I.e. “explain” your mistakes, rather than admitting you may have made them), you’ll learn absolutely nothing, because you’ve justified what you’ve done [to yourself], and therefore see no flaws or avenues for growth. I know this, because I’ve done it before, and gotten nowhere. When you get feedback, consider it. Whether you initially agree with it or not. This is a skill that goes far outside of just trying to write a silly superhero story. Sometimes, people are just trying to help us. It’s our job to know when this is happening, and to know how to use it. On that: (1) Interact text: You should put verbiage in every search bar because it’s an expectation derived from the actual game missions, which you are trying to emulate. Players expect it, so they notice it when it’s missing. They shouldn’t be thinking about why it’s not there. You’ll have to show me, by the way, the “some people” who don’t care for interact text. I’m betting it’s not many, and that none of them script. (2j Basic grammar, spelling, punctuation: You want this to be tight as possible, so that you aren’t perceived as lazy (or worse, illiterate/stupid). Chalking off a failure to edit because you don’t get paid to write is a cop out that only harms your efforts. If a player is noticing the errors in my writing more than the story details, it’s a hindrance, plain and simple. Is it time consuming to, you know, edit the thing? Hell yes, it is. Its a pain in the ass, and the worst part of writing. It’s also the difference between doing a half-assed versus a stellar job. You can have the best idea in the world. Execute it with lazy writing, riddled with noticeable errors? You’ll hear about it, maybe even as the first thing. This isn’t just in AE scripting. It applies to all written communication, outside informal texting (well…for some of us…I personally maintain a modicum of proper execution. Habit, I guess). (3) Annoying your players: if you get a comment concerning something a player didn’t like, you might chalk it off as a single instance, depending on who it is, and the nature of the complaint. If you hear the same thing from multiple sources, however, take it to heart. I’ve had critiques from single sources that I initially didn’t agree with, but later realized they were right (using timers, for example). As for latter, multiple instances, here’s one case in point: both Kyks and myself pointed out your blank interact bars, in two different arcs. It’s pervasive. We noticed. Your explanation for leaving them blank feels like an excuse to not go back and fix them. It’s lazy. I’d also suggest taking Kyksie’s advice about the running bosses being almost impossible to defeat, and change that, as well. Regardless of your intent, you’re actively diminishing a player’s enjoyment. Multiple times. He may have a point about that (especially when I think about how many “boss running away” missions there are in the actual game, and how I can’t recall really liking any of them). You just don’t want arbitrary player frustration, if you can help it. They’re your audience. You owe them a good time. Be honored, by the way, that Kyksie reviewed your stuff. It’s been a good while, and you were chosen to break the silence. You even got a compliment. Kyks won’t give you that unless you actually earn it. Other than that, I strongly suggest doing some clean up of easily fixable errors. Yeah, you’re not getting paid for your work (and frankly, intimating that we should only care about quality when one gets paid for it doesn’t reflect well—it sounds like an excuse I’d hear from one of the many HS students I’ve taught over the decades). But that’s immaterial. Because you do get “paid” by eliciting a basic level of respect from your audience by giving them a good effort. As with any paycheck, if you don’t put the time in, you won’t get jack.

I shoehorned Tendaji into Dark Chamber. Lore wise, it takes place between his first appearance and his death. Mollymauk commented that he was dead while running both parts, indicating he’d seen others use him even though he was gone. I knew he was, too, which drove how I used him in the story. That said, Tendaji’s career could exist outside the RWZ arcs. Just indicate the time by adjusting his contact verbiage (“Sefu Tendaji is an up and comer in the Longbow ranks…” Then make him something lower than a ballista to indicate his previous status). or, if you’re Darm, use a clone.:-)