Heroic :"Ordinary People" arcs 1 & 2 are republished

[cranebump]

The epic tale of intrigue and sacrifice, centered on King's Row, is open for play-throughs and suggestions. Ordinary People features 3 complete story arcs (of 5-4-5 missions respectively). Full text, custom baddie, and allies, new and familiar.  Here are some details:

 

#1: Standard Operating Procedure (Heroic lvls 10-20)
[Arc ID: 24691]

You’ve been having these dreams. They’re about Willie Sullivan, and what happened six months ago. A time when you failed, and she died. You keep seeing her. She speaks of the “storm” in your heart. The one raging. The one that won’t go away...

 

And then, you remember. That day--a “20-alarm chili” Freitag called it. The whole Row lit up. Portal Co did as well. The Hellions. The Skulls. But...not the usual suspects. Working with Freitag, you pursue what appears to be the theft of an invaluable heirloom--the Cullinan diamond of Kawanda. It’s gone, as are nearly all the diamonds in the Row. Including a necklace with a fragment of the meteor that destroyed Galaxy City, inset in a pendant. They call it, “The Constellation.” You’re tasked to get back the goods, and deal with a new threat to the Row. A hybrid of the typical thugs unironically called “The Skullions.” 

These guys are different. They don’t just snatch purses. They engage in “projects.” This one’s called “Equinox,” and you’re about to take it down.

 

 

#2: Hope and Bullets (Heroic lvls 10-20)
[Arc ID: 24554]

The “Skullion” threat turns out to be just the beginning. The “Constellation” is still missing, and now, it seems the diamond thieves are after more than diamonds. Or rather, their overseers are. Call themselves “The Gatling Gang,” cowboys with high tech weaponry. Stymied in his investigation by Powers Division, Joe Freitag looks into it himself, accompanied off the books by a brilliant young cadet, Willie Sullivan. Of course, they stumble right into trouble, which causes Pep Becktrees to give you a call to bail them out. In doing so, however, you get pulled right back in. Seems you’re not the only interested party, either. Arachnos has their eye on the situation. Something called, “Project Orion.”

 

Arachnos. “Skullions.” The Gatlings. And Project Orion. All in a week’s work for you. But for others, the consequences are more tragic.

 

#3: The Last Full Measure (Heroic lvls 15-25)
[Arc ID: 24707]

Your heroic tale rounds out with your friends taken prisoner by Powers Division. You’ve gone to ground, where, the pieces put together now, you learn the terrible secret behind all the strange events that have occurred in the Row. Events that lead you into the heart of Project Orion, then out into deep space to face the threat of “Galaxian!”* It's time to save Paragon City. And to put and end to the storm in your soul.

 

Most missions include Allies, so it's soloable. You might need some insps for the bad guys, depending on build and archetype. Several timed missions of the shorter variety. 

 

Anyway, I'd love some feedback. I've been pretty diligent about editing and playtesting, but, well, you just never know with these things.

 

Thanks in advance,

Crane

 

* (no, it's not a Galactius ripoff)

 

Edited April 10, 2020 by cranebump

[DougGraves]

I went through the first arc.  You may want these to tie together, but they really need to stand alone somewhat as well.  3 long arcs is so very long.

 

The contact as Freitag was fine.  But the intro to the first mission did not work for me.  It needed more framing.  The first map looked awesome.  Seeing the person was fine - but that did not tie into anything else in the arc.  If you just dropped the first mission and did the rest as an arc I would have made it 4 stars.

 

The Skullions idea does not work for me.  They don't dress like either.  Other then the name, there is no connection between your groups and the skulls or hellions.  I would name them something else or have their outfits reflect skull and hellion influence.

 

I did like the villains.  The thieves probably the least.  When I encountered the next group with the mastermind summoning thugs I was sorry I had not been facing them the whole time.  I do like variety, so having multiple versions of the villain groups is nice - but the thieves group was not very interesting as costumes or powers.

 

The timed missions worked fine for me.  It gave a sense of time pressure but I could easily do it in the time allowed.

 

The map variety was good.  I liked the last map and mission the best.

 

I liked the large number of patrols - it was interesting.   But they all said the same text which just came out as awkward and weird. 

 

Overall I liked the amount of detail in the missions.  It helps to label the clues by mission M1, M2, etc at the start of the clue name.  Also a lot of the clues felt short - reading them I did not understand where I got them or how they fit in.

 

Overall it felt like you were going for theme over clarity, and a lot of clarity got lost.  Which also meant a lot of the theme got lost.

 

Typos

Mission 2: Empty Safe clue has "should've" mispelled

4th (?) mission briefing: Sportive Tricks has "A lot if" which makes no sense.

5th mission briefing: Grim Visaged: it mentions The Constellation like it should mean something to me - I don't recall it being mentioned

 

[cranebump]

Thanks so much for the constructive feedback. I’ll respond to a few things, just to give a sense of what I was going for.

 

The first mission map is echoed in the very last mission of the 3-arc story. I agree it does not work as welll as a stand-alone. It does work if you play all 3 missions. It was the very last thing I added, after designing all three missions. Creatively, it works, but only if you play all 3. That’s a good and bad thing. I think it probably needs to be woven into the basic story of each arc to work optimally.

 

Patrol dialogue: I’ll fix this. Just got lazy, and didn’t want to place each patrol individually. I’ll have to do this in other arcs, too. 

 

Skullions: you make a good point in that they aren’t a very accurate hybrid. I think some of the dark/flame toons are, but I assume you mean the mercenary looking ones. I think that’s a valid point, though I was also trying to mix powersets to broaden the challenges. As for costumes, I wanted it to appear they’d gotten advanced training. The suspicion that there’s a hand pulling the strings is inherent in that. Of course, if someone doesn’t play through, then I may have wasted the design. Glad you liked the X-Tactics toons. When they drop gang war, it makes for a fun combat. Anyway, I’ll reconsider the hybrid idea, or find some better explanation. 

 

Clues: thanks for the tip. I kept seeing them out of order when I playtested, not realizing that they drop according to the mission goals list. I agree that fewer and more robust clues would be better.

 

The Constellation: that’s a MAJOR error on my part. It’s inherent in all 3 arcs. I’ll have to fix that. I plan to give all the mission text another pass, this time putting it all on a doc where I can see everything. I think this being my first shot at authoring since reboot, I may have gone overboard on text. Loss of clarity is a huge thing. Being clear is much more important than being “fancy.” So, definitely another pass on all that. Now that it’s set for a bit, I can look at it again with clear eyes.

 

Thanks for taking the time to run the mission, and to provide the feedback. Let me know if you continue through. I appreciate it very much.

Edited March 31, 2020 by cranebump

[DougGraves]

I would then start with a basic Hellion or Skull outfit and then add a few pieces of armor or tech.  Shoulderpads, goggles, a helmet, etc.  You could have them add more tech items each arc.

[cranebump]

That’s a good idea. I tried the basic Hellion type outfit with the Masher, and a couple others, but didn’t really consider the rest. That would show some augmentation, while retaining their basic identity. Great suggestion. It refocuses on the idea that the gangs are deadlier not so much because of the tech, but because of coordination and leadership (which allows greater rationalization of the MM characters as Lts and Bosses). Also homogenizes the look, which probably will be visually more appealing. I like it!

 

On adding more tech: the Skullions get supplanted in Arc 2 by the Gatling Gang. So, any gain would be small, I think, because the arcs follow each other closely in time. But, as above indicates, a makeover would probably add some overall coherence to the arc.

 

One thing I did after Arc 1: created the bad guy rosters first, so I coulda pick and choose for patrols and such. Sounds like I need to make another pass at that, as well.

Edited March 31, 2020 by cranebump

[Kyksie]

Standard Operating Procedure

 

1) This arc opens in an interesting way, with the player having a dream about being on a rocky asteroid, and there's a dude named Willie Sullivan who appears hostile, but when you get closer he's friendly, and oh yeah Willie is also a chick. And then you wake up, but can't get her out of your head for months or something. Kinda like all the yiffers yiffing in Pocket D, whose bios tell you how you're enraptured by their ethereal beauty or something.

 

2) Now you're not dreaming, and Detective Frietag gives you a job. Or maybe you're still dreaming, you just woke up from one dream into another. Anyway, some dudes are breaking into an antique store in King's Row, so you head on down to make with the punching. The foes are guys who can't decide whether they're Hellions or Skulls. Maybe they wanted to join the Hellions because they can shoot fire, but then considered the Skulls because they shoot darkness. A tough choice.

 

3) Now we're headed into an office, where the "Skullions" are trying to steal a diamond. We rescue an African prince who needs our assistance in moving a large sum of money out of the country or something. The Skullions are a custom group with about a dozen members, with varied powersets, but no bios. Some of the names are a bit odd, like "Tactics-X" and "Darkfemme". Oh no, they stole the diamond!

 

4) Now we need to go into an office and plant a bug or something. More punching. For some reason we need to manually exit afterwards.

 

5) And finally the diamond is being put on a boat, so we go to the Port Oakes docks for more fistyness.  A truck needs to be smashed, which triggered multiple ambush waves. We also need to "clear the decks"; I punched every mob on the boat, but the mission didn't end until I stood next to a decorative NPC. The story is continued in the next arc.

 

This is a tough arc to rate. The writing is extremely well done, although the opening bit feels like it was written by someone in Pocket D roleplaying as a immortal demon vampire succubus from another dimension whose immeasurable beauty mesmerizes everyone in the room, bending them to her will. And also she has six boobs or something. There are a few spelling errors and missing descriptions, but the big problem here is the difficulty. Every map has wandering patrols who can arrive in the middle of a fight, and almost every objective triggers ambushes. The truck in particular appears to be set to send ambushes at 75%, 50% and 25% health, but it doesn't have many hitpoints, so after a few punches you will be knee deep in mobs. This is simply not a good idea for a map designed for levels 10-20. I tried it with a new lvl 10 MM and got flattened multiple times, then switched to a 50 stalker, and still had to eat a pile of insps.

 

Standard Operating Procedure tells a very good story, but it really needs to be made more accessible to low levels.

 

 

Edited April 3, 2020 by Kyksie

[cranebump]

“Demon vampire succubus...” that was pretty funny.:-) 

 

Thanks for the feedback on the diff. I was running tests with toons at the level cap, plus I had a scrapper. Most of the time it ran pretty easy, though the multiple ambushes were sometimes a challenge. Your experiences with an MM are therefore really valuable. Some commentary:

 

1) There’s supposed to be a segue from the dream of Willie Sullivan to your memory of her death, which begins with mission 2. This makes this arc, plus the 2 that follow, all about how she died, and what you did to redeem the situation. I’m hopIng the fact that it’s a memory didn’t get lost, but maybe it did. I’ll have to read it yet again.

 

3) Prince Nandelu probably needs a bio. He’s from “Kawanda” who supplies vibranium. The diamond, the Cullinan, is his heirloom. When you bash the truck later on, you end up finding the diamond on the truck. This averts a diplomatic dustup by showing the PPD (thanks to you) is actually competent. Of course, if that got lost, I need to fix it.

 

4) I don’t remember why it has a manual exit. I’ll have to look.

 

5) Mission should’ve ended without freeing anyone. I may just need to turn off the “required” switch. There should’ve been a few allies to help with this mish. Originally there were 5, but that seemed excessive. I think I dropped it to 2-3 recently. The allies are also good at spotting bad guys the player might miss. That was the idea anyway, considering that dry dock map.

 

In some ways, I’m glad the mishes are hard because the game outside AE often feels like it has training wheels on it these days. On the other hand, a mass of face planting is just no bueno. Considering the level bandwidth, and the fact that AE is primarily a solo experience, I think nerfing the ambushes, either in number or in diff is likely going to be a “must fix.” 

 

I’m hoping the arcs get better as the story goes on. That said, I’m guessing I might end up having to do some major revisions in the end. As someone who writes a lot, I know it’s the editing that makes things work. So feedback like yours is very helpful.

 

Thanks for taking the time to write a comprehensive review. Much appreciated.

Edited April 3, 2020 by cranebump

[cranebump]

EDITS to Arc #1:

 

(1) Clarified some of the text, so that the role of the Cullinan and the Constellation are clear.

(2) Added info on foes.

(3) Simplified the enemy group. Now using "Skullion Initiates." 

(4) Reduced some patrols. Cleaned up patrol dialogue.

(5) No longer have to exit map manually on mish 4.

(6) Removed "Defeat All" from Mish 5. Added Boss spawns, and increased support from Allies (especially during Truck encounter).

(7) Did some clue reduction, and added Clue numbers in the form of mish-clue (i.e., clue 1 from mish one should be marked "M1-1").

(8) Tweaked a few power selections on bad guys.

(9) Name change "Darkfemme" to "Darkflame." I didn't think you could use the same name, but you can. I had wanted a female version  of the Darkflame toon originally (which was the reason for the original name).

(10) Changed lvl bandwidth to 15-20 for every mission.

(11) Highlighted mission objectives within the intro text.

 

No changes to basic Skullion Initiate costumes. They're supposed to be slightly more powerful versions of the original groups. The orange skull on the T-shirts represents the blending of the two. 

 

Enemies who don't look like Skullions are either mercenaries, or Skullions given advanced weaponry and training. 

 

Remember: this is the opening arc to a longer story. Seeds are planted here that return later on. A bit ambitious for a first real attempt at this. Hoping it will all eventually work.

 

Edited April 3, 2020 by cranebump

[cranebump]

(12) Mission #3:Tweaked patrol numbers and ambush spawn. Plan to buff the guards a bit (maybe).

(13) Mission #4:  Removed all patrols.

(14) Mish #4: Replace Accept text: "Stop the thieves!" with "What do you need me to do?"

(15): Mish #5: Change "Accept" to "I'm the hell ready."

(16) Mish #5: No longer Defeat All; editing Skullion Boat crew to eliminate Hats"

(17) PPD arrives between Truck ambushes.

[cranebump]

Did a ton of work on Arcs 1 & 2 today.  The placement of bosses/patrols can be dicey. I have limited the patrol numbers, and went with more consistent mixes of bad guys (Skullion Initiates, A Lab Crew, Skullion Elites, and The Gatling Gang). Sometimes I ran right through, other times, it was damned hard. I changed the label to Challenging, because it's likely to be that way, as currently constituted.

 

Added more verbiage about Willie Sullivan throughout, to knit the 2 arcs together.

 

I'll be working on #3 next time. Need a brain break.

[Kyksie]

I tried the second arc today, and it went pretty much the same. The second mission contained a boss even though I had bosses set to off, who summoned multiple ambush waves, overwhelming my lvl 20 MM. The writing that I saw was top-notch, and I'm sure the rest of it is great too, but most low level characters will never see it.

[cranebump]

Yeah, that lab mission...I fiddled with that one a lot. Had to do some old fashioned pulling. Change s the arachnids ally to a better version, and he got eaten. Have to revisit the custom enemies and check ambushes again. Thought I’d removed them.

[cranebump]

I did nerf Steve Gatling, but he was still tough.

[cranebump]

I think the best fix for the lab mish is 0 ambushes, which would make sense, since it’s a raid by the hero. The remaining missions are much simpler. Probably needs a set to “empty” (which I thought  had done) to prevent that logjam on the bridge in the middle. Operative Desosse spawns there every time, as does one of the filing cabinets, so you get two groups piled on each other. So, delete a file cabinet would help, and check ambush settings, because I thought I had fixed that.

Edited April 4, 2020 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Changes to arc 2:

 

Mission #1:

*Can exit immediately when Oz is killed, or stay to fight ambush (ambush is used to introduce Skullion Elites enemy group)

*Ambushes: either reduced in number (sometimes to 0 or lowered in settings, or option to run before they get there by exiting.

*Many powersets re-selected for enemies.

 

RIGHT NOW: Working on the logjam in the middle of Arc2-2. Starting by dropping one of the destructible objects. Kicking Steve Gatling's a** (hopefully). Using a lower-level toon this time.

[cranebump]

Tested Arc #2. Results and changes:

 

Played Arc 2: Hope & Bullets using a lvl 15 War Mace/Shield tank

Mish #1: Played through multiple times. Kept mostly as is, but am considering dropping OZ, and spawning the last ambush on getting database. There’s no reason Oz is there (or shouldn’t be as a spawn). Considering giving Willie pistols, so player has a minor ally, but overall the mish is doable as is. You can’t bumrush everything on the map, however, depending on archetype. Had to play strategically, to include a retreat, with a taunt to drag away a Darkflame from another group. I’d say a stalker would breeze this mish.

 

Edits:
*Added dialogue to Oz to make his appearance a reaction to the player’s incursion.
*Gave Willie Pistols, and made her an Ally.

 

 

Mish #2: Levelled to 16 between mishes. Played a couple times, then made the following changes:

Playthrough: it's too damned hard, due to cluttered map.

 

Edits:

*Made Gatling and Sanders plain ol’ bosses
*Set map to “empty”
*Removed one of the destructible objects

Result: I still get a boss spawn in front, either Gatling or Sanders. Sanders is the tougher of the two. He spawned yello (LT), but summoned ambush, and it got dicey. Had to retreat to pull leftover minions. The Soothers and Pacifiers make things tough with bubbles and heals.  Gatling would’ve been easier, but when I corner-taunted, I pulled the second patrol. Glowies ALL spawned in the same room, which was great. Operative Dessose appeared in the same area, but was not logjammed, so I recovered him, and used him to take down Gatling/final room. The first time it’s worked out that way. Overall: mish is doable. The ambush is still difficult. You can’t just charge in, if patrols are active. Map is set to empty outside that, so player has to be selective. I’d bring Insps along.

 

Mish #3: The way this mish goes depends on the wandering patrol. I aggroed them, and they pulled Noira. So I ran back to entrance. Surviving patrol followed, but Noira turned back around. I took them out, then went back down, took her out. Noira is not a mission objective, and will run at 25% or less health. She’s not tough alone, but, with tight quarters down below (Univ library map), you might need a pull if you’re playing a melee toon, like I was. Boss was low damage/whiffed some, but has good defense, so I concentrated on minions first. Had to use a green insp, just to be safe. Spawn points of objects is perfect. Boss spawn ended up being below, instead of at door, but it worked out.

 

Edits:

None

 

Mish #4: This one’s pretty easy, if you take the allies along. Glogre moves so slow that I ended up walking most of the map until it was 95% cleared. Sullivan is hard to find, so I replaced the collection object. Spent a lot of time looking for her, but found her with over 10 mins to spare. Dunno why. When Steve G spawned, had a yellow nav that led me to him (yay!). But the nav for Larry was WAAAY off. Steve is easy, particularly with allies. For Larry, I needed both Glogre and Acrobattle. I didn’t find Whip until later. Had wiped out his guards, but he was behind a wall. If you use all 3, the entire mission should be a breeze. None are required, however. Whip and Acrobattle can keep up with faster movers, but Glogre cannot. No nav for Sullivan, which sucks. I didn’t clear the whole map, though, so that may be why. Of note: there are several PPD spawns that roam around and kill stuff, which is sorta nice, I guess. They won’t follow, but they’re there.

 

Adjustments after playthrough:
*Set all Ally guard groups to “Empty.”

Changed Sullivan collection object.
Get rid of “The Whole Gang” enemy group, which was the original group for the mish.
Gave Overseer a different guard group to presage what’s in Arc #3.
Changed Glogre to “aggressive” so he’d be more active.

On the whole: it’s more balanced, and all doable by a lvl 15. My toon has multiple slots that weren’t even enhanced. The one’s I had enhanced were all at 15. The Mutant Hacker is an interesting baddie. Then they die, they rez, with a stun effect. There aren’t many, but it’s quite the surprise. Even effects the boss allies.

On the whole, the arc should now be playable enough for players to enjoy the story (hopefully).

 

 

[cranebump]

Here’s the playthrough with lvl 16 Shield/WM tank

 

Mish #1:

Narrative mish. Willie is a bit hard to see, but torch helps.

 

Edits:

None

 

Mish #2:

First time up, the two front patrols both got me. Rezzed in mish. Went with corner pulls of patrols when I could not bypass. Ambush spawn after Cyrus caused me to retreat to upper floor and wait around corner. Took out last of Skullion crew there, then hard to return to finish off Cyrus’s guards for mish complete.

 

Edits:

*Make to where defeat Cyrus is boss only. This should allow a hasty retreat under duress. 

*Revisited ambush group to ensure it was doable. Changed to Cyrus at ¼ to Cyrus completed, as to allow some lag time, and a delay for player to leave, or attempt to defeat the ambush.

 

Mish #3:

Guards conned at 15, so they were actually useful. Still had to do some fancy stepping to drag opponents with me a couple times. Had both guards on ambush, and that saved me pretty much. For the last boss, she got off Gang War before I downed her, so I spent about a minute hacking the Posse down. 

 

Edits:

*Revisited Ambush setting, but, as it spawns after you get 2nd guard, it is beatable. Had 3 mins left, even after playing “Hack a thug” for 45 seconds.

 

Mish #4:

Taunt-pulled, but got too many perps. Retreated to exit, took a beating and rezzed. Stupid Darkflame pet was still around, and they all came again, so exited normally, rested, then went back in. They were STILL at door, so exited again, bought insps. Popped 9 of then, before damaging boss enough for her to flee, but by then the minions killed me. So, first issue is a logjam at front of map, due to spawns. Went back in, she’s STILL there, with her Umbra beast out. I free Kendricks and he helps me take her down. Once past the door, the mish is pretty easy. Ambush is 4 Initiates. I’ve learned to target Pacifiers and Perforators first. I collect the glowies and exit, leaving many spawns behind.

 

Edits:

*Left as is. Just because I faceplanted and had to run doesn’t mean it’s not doable.

 

Mish #5:

I start at the top, free an Ally, find 2 crates, and the truck. I level up in the middle of the ambush battle. PPD swarms in, but, by then I’d taken everything out. Now I have a swarm of cops with me. They end up hunting perps, and I lose most of them. Easily take down the two bosses with about 4 mins to spare. And this with normal speed, no sprint toggle.

 

Edits: 

None. 

 

The arc is doable at lvl 15-17, with a tank, at least. It would require some doing with something like an MM. My tank had low damage output, so it was a slog. High dmg output might melt some groups before they engage. I am hoping the player analyzes the opposition to determine priority targets. Not everything should be a plow through (like a lot of TF/mishes are). Since it’s AE, I assume players are looking for something different here. I think the changes I’ve done make it dicey, at times, but manageable. There are so many variables, though. Some toons might just cruise through. In that case, I am hoping story works.

 

Next up: visiting Arc 3. I suspect there’ll be some issues (there always are).:-)

Edited April 4, 2020 by cranebump

[DougGraves]

I played the first one with a lvl 34 tanker.  I'll dig up something in the level range that is not a tanker and try it again.

[cranebump]

Thanks, appreciate it.

 

i unpublished Arc 3 after play through. Need major fixes on last two missions.

Edited April 5, 2020 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Playthrough of Arc #2 with a lvl 16 Corrupter,Archery/Poison/Experimentation. Breezy, esp, since I can heal allies. Faceplanted vs. Operative Demare, but Demare is not a mission objective. Will likely change destruction of last object to a long-click glowie instead. Demare is tough, even with allies, so may not need reinforcements for him (even though the spawn mob is easy). 

 

Arc #3 with same toon plays easy through mishes 1-3. Still have to work on Mish 4 and final boss battle before republishing. On the whole, looks like it will be moderate enough for toons 15-20. So far...

[cranebump]

Standardized the Skullion costumes more

Balanced encounters

Ran multiple tests with on level toons, including a squishy corruptor

 

Still on the fence about certain maps, but at some point, you have to leave things be.