cranebump

Polo!

As an unusual option: Nemesis. Basically the narration is a rant about the stupid pretenders, red and blue side. And we know Nem actually does have his grubby paws in EVERYTHING.

This. I'd do it like Kurt Busiek did in Astro City's Local Heroes (specifically the story of Pete Donacek, the doorman).

Greets again, all. I'm going back to my older Ordinary People series, tweaking/fixing/slightly altering them to put into play lessons learned from all my abysmal failures (also known as, How Crane goes through life in general). I think a couple of stalwarts have done them. I know our buddy @Zhym has justifiably demurred because the older stories contain just about everything that would annoy any player - namely timers, defeat alls, and niggling text errors. The story, however, is pretty strong. And since OP1-3 feeds into Leviathan which feeds into Mobius, I think it's worth it to bring it up to speed where it's at least a passable intro into what I think is a decent megatale, with a nice wrapup. So, I'll post status updates on that project, as I complete them. For those who've run them before, and care to note the details, I'll post here, as spoilers. Hoping to get all 3 arcs nipped and tucked by mid-July. Also working on the follow-up story, which takes us in a different, but hopefully still interesting direction. In any case, if you are interested in checking out the "new "old stuff, drop me a line. I'm always looking to improve. Have to, if I want to come close to keeping up with the masters.:-) As of now, OP1: Standard Operating Procedure is refitted and ready. At least, I hope it is...:-) Moving on to OP2: Hope and Bullets. This was a bit easier. 3's next. If I recall correctly, lots of color-code and such to clean up.

You're absolutely right. We can just do without towels this week!

And then joust with them.:-)

In a pinch, am I allowed to throw him at the stuff?

This seems a bit involved. And I am folding the wash. Do we have an entry-level version?

Haven't really been excited about Storm or Seismic to be frank, and it's likely due to some of the animations. Don't care for big, swirly clouds, I guess, or the massive boulder thing that pops up on one of the seismic attacks. I suppose those are silly reasons to not get into something, but...well, there it is.

I wanted to make Engineria the next head of the Wards, but she’s got too many responsibilities already.:-)

Hehehehe. I had the idea, but @Darmian did the legwork getting the data. I’ll have to fix the typo though. AFAIK she has the same powers.

I’m not sure what universe the op is living in, but groups that hesitate a lot? When does THIS happen? I’ve seen many more examples of the opposite. Typical taskforces feel like a stampede of rabbits heading for Farmer Jones’s cabbage patch.

FYI: I have removed all timers from Ordinary People 1, and am currently running through it to fine-tune it.

Maybe clue should be "Tunnels?"

I can’t say it was the whole team, since the tank often vacated before we gathered, after the first map mob anyway. Then you’d have some race off to follow because, well, they’re the tank, right? It all started with them. It was just a sloppy job, honestly. You’re dead on about the second point, though. For sure.

I think so, but it’s very open. And I like the hole in the floor on the current map serving as how the robbers got in. FYI: My bank idea is based on USAA, an insurance company that serves the military. So I guess it has a more select clientele.

It does, but Bank maps have a very small number of objectives and glowies. So I had to go with a Savings & Loan, and use offices.

Know what? I just thought of something:

Alright, I went back and fiddled with M4 so it's not a Defeat All. It's basically a Boss Subdual/Collect Objective. All it took was a minor edit to Contact's verbiage to justify the change. M2 stays as is, though. It IS a small map, after all.

So, I checked the settings. Mission 2 Defeat all is a small map. I'm leaving it as is. Mish #4 is Medium. I think the rationale was to capture everyone so they wouldn't report to the higher ups. Anyhoo, I'll check on that one. I think that's a big warehouse. I don't feel like M2 is asking that much, though.

If you're down to 1 or 2 leftover bad guys, sure. But if you're the tank, and you're the only tank, and you're on a TF with us squishy-ass blasters, it really IS your job to control aggro until the threat damage is mitigated. All that hopping in and running off that some folks do results in what I saw yesterday, while running in a Yin. Our tank did that thing where they gather a mob, stick around a short bit, then just run away, leaving behind not 1 or 2 stragglers, but significant numbers of foes (some of which chased the tank, thus scattering the leftover mob across our path). This constantly caused the team to split, thereby making it take more time to clear the mobs. If our tank had stayed even a little bit longer, we could've focused fire on them. Instead, they turned us all into free safeties. It should come as no surprise that we had a rolling wipe in the finale, because you couldn't depend on Mr. Combat ADD to contain anything. Just to be clear, I usually just ignore this shit, because people running in groups while acting like soloists isn't unusual these days. But this was just poor play. Poor, clueless, selfish play. (By the way, I did a lot of that retreating when 6 of our tribe went down--kept backing up and firing at the freak mob...backing up and firing...damnit, they're still coming! I- [fwump]...gdit...)

Yeah, I thought about that. But the contagion aspect of it made me feel these were justifiable choices. (At least they’re not combined with timers:-) it’s just two missions right? If I remember right, one of them is a medium size map, and the other is large. The large one has a couple of corners in the big central warehouse location. I did not think the first clear all was too difficult. Speaking of timers: at some point this summer, I’m going to take a look at ordinary people again and take the timers Completely out. That series is the introduction that culminates in Mobius. I really want to take another pass at it now that I have a better idea of what I am doing than I did when I created it

Well, for what it’s worth, the next couple will likely be July projects.

At one time, I did this with Acrobattle (Staff/Ninj). His Goldside counterpart was Louis Johnson, a member of the resistance (Blaster: DP/and I forget the secondary). Acro is a former Spec Ops who kept some of the experimental tech (staff, "micromesh armor," etc.). He mainly just wants to run is Bakery in KR (called Sweet Eats), but all the crime, man. Louis didn't have much of a BG at all, but figured he was just a harsher, more violent version of Acro.

Arc 1 Design Notes: We return to KR once again (can't stray from my gal for too long).:-) Low level (15-20). Tested with an SS/Invul L26 Tank, outfitted with basic Enhances (mainly DOs-he's a Long Rider toon). A bit dicey with some of the finale bosses (considering his powersets, you can probably guess what his vulnerabilities are). Didn't die, though! (most of this is easy) Namesake toon exemplared down and cruised through it. Mish titles: various leadership and business books. There is no logical reason for this This is planned as a 3-parter. I'll need more slots for that, though. If you've run my previous stuff, you'll recognize some old faces. Have not run on higher settings yet. Will try it with a hardy toon, just to check it out. If you run on such settings, or on a team, I am (as always) interested in critter synergy. Arc 2 Design Notes: Level increase to 25-30 (representing a time gap in the story) Mostly a straight up solo arc, and by that I mean, very few allies (and the ones there are optional). Callbacks, but mainly as part of the narrative. I may have overdone it on a certain set of bad guys (synergistically...maybe...I was running with a L26 tank with no IOs or sets). Every major NPC should have a story, for those who like reading them. I think I finally caught all the typos. I'm not holding my breath. I'm not sure why the mish title is half orange up there. Maybe it's just tipsy. Mish titles: Hamlet. All from the same speech. Though I can't say they necessarily match the missions. Arc 3 Design Notes This one is VERY rough. Feels like all the mishes need a bit of a punch-up. Custom critters from earlier arcs are much tougher than what's here, so I may need to look at that. Used some maps I've never used. I'm iffy on them, at present, but should make interesting runs for any teams. Experimenting with narrative focus, making this a story that is basically being recounted after it happened, while you're playing through it. I think I confused myself a few times with tenses and stuff, but I've rationalized this as due to the nature and state of mind of the person telling it. I DID have a major glitch in M1, where a glowie spawned in an area I could not reach. Only did that once in the test runs, though. Hope it's an outlier. Mish titles are Self-Improvement type books, like the first arc. Minor level bump to piggy-back on Fallout 2. Couldn't justify a major bump, since time passage between 2 and 3 is minimal. Did a lot of reading on epigenetics, which is this theory that lived experience can pass into DNA, and then get "written" into offspring (i.e., the parent passes emotional responses to the child, who might experience them without really knowing where they come from). This functions as a sort of explanation of where all supers come from, as revealed on the last page of text. Only 5 clues. That's weird. For me, anyway. This puts the lid on Mobius and the Wards, as far as I'm concerned. Unless I come up with something that makes sense.:-) Thanks (again) in advance, Crane