Stalwart is now a bad guy?

[d4verman]

Noob question here. I was doing a "tip" mission about drugs or some such and I ran into Stalwart. He's supposed to be a "good guy" though I've usually only fought him on the villain side. He said something about needing this (the drugs, I guess) I was just curious...did he go bad? It's not like this should be spoilers but it really made me wonder. I don't know how "spoilers" work here as the game isn't "live"...but that being said I don't mind them, I just want to know. 

[Greycat]

"Good guy with problems" or "good guy making some bad decisions."

 

If I remember the mission correctly, it was basically "I'm getting old and can't keep up, I thought this would help me keep an edge."

[Eva Destruction]

You're not the only one who changes alignment in tip missions.  Some of the "generic" heroes and villains do too.

[d4verman]

7 hours ago, Eva Destruction said:

You're not the only one who changes alignment in tip missions.  Some of the "generic" heroes and villains do too.

It sounds interesting. I hope its not just a one off thing that never comes up again. 

[MTeague]

Some characters you see from several angles as you do each type of tip mission. Hero, Vigilante, Villain, Rogue.  And there's some really good writing in the Vigilante-to-Villain, or Rogue-to-Hero tip missions.  Offhand, I don't know how many of them feature Stalwart, but there's a few at least.  I'm more familiar with Flambeaux, Blast Furnace, Polar Shift, Hollow Point, etc.

 

I really recommend doing the tip missions though. 40 merits for 11 mission (10 tip missions plus 1 alignment mission) is on par with some TF's, and they're a LOT better written than radio missions.

 

I do have some characters where their concept means they're ALWAYS a hero, or ALWAYS a villain, but other characters of mine are more fluid and it makes sense for me to do the tip missions on those characters.

Edited August 9, 2020 by MTeague

[Twisted Toon]

2 hours ago, MTeague said:

Some characters you see from several angles as you do each type of tip mission. Hero, Vigilante, Villain, Rogue.  And there's some really good writing in the Vigilante-to-Villain, or Rogue-to-Hero tip missions.  Offhand, I don't know how many of them feature Stalwart, but there's a few at least.  I'm more familiar with Flambeaux, Blast Furnace, Polar Shift, Hollow Point, etc.

 

I really recommend doing the tip missions though. 40 merits for 11 mission (10 tip missions plus 1 alignment mission) is on par with some TF's, and they're a LOT better written than radio missions.

 

I do have some characters where their concept means they're ALWAYS a hero, or ALWAYS a villain, but other characters of mine are more fluid and it makes sense for me to do the tip missions on those characters.

No reason you can't do Tip missions for the "always Heroes" and just confirm the hero-ness of the Hero.

Same goes for the villains, I guess, too.

[Ironblade]

Stalwart isn't bad, just..... desperate.

[cohRock]

1 hour ago, Ironblade said:

Stalwart isn't bad, just..... desperate.

"He's not bad.  He's just drawn that way."  -- apologies to Jessica Rabbit 😸

[JasonZZ]

I actually feel kind of bad for the guy. You see him later and at higher levels, still as a hero, but it's obvious he's lost his edge and that he just can't keep up anymore. He still tries, and in some of the missions he was there holding the villains off until you show up, but still.

[RikOz]

Yeah, it's just the fact he's getting older and his powers are fading, but he doesn't want to hang it up / retire. I'm guessing he's in his 50s like me, and I can understand it. I'm only a cook, and even at that the hours on my feet are starting to get to me.

[Jacktar]

2 hours ago, RikOz said:

Yeah, it's just the fact he's getting older and his powers are fading, but he doesn't want to hang it up / retire. I'm guessing he's in his 50s like me, and I can understand it. I'm only a cook, and even at that the hours on my feet are starting to get to me.

Nooooo...you are not “only a cook”, you are “a cook”, you stand and serve, you are a hero!

Thank you.

[Silverado]

Stalwart goes bad, Frostfire goes good, Flamebeaux goes bad, Blast Furnace goes vigilante, and there is some assassin chick with a katana who goes rogue.

[mechahamham]

Drugs don't make people evil. Addictive drugs make people desperate. Desperate people make extreme decisions.

 

Good and evil come from the choices we make. Fallible creatures that we are, if the only tool available to us looks a lot like a hammer, then problems all start seeming nail-shaped.

[FoulVileTerror]

"Flamebeaux goes bad"

Implying she was good to begin with?

[JasonZZ]

Well, she was technically part of "team good" to begin with, even if she didn't belong at all.

[mechahamham]

I really like how Flambeaux is fleshed out:

Spoiler

She's given a great deal of 'comedy' dialogue, but as the player goes through the Shining Stars' arcs, they find a FP-compiled dossier on members of the Shining Stars. Flambeaux's states in no uncertain terms that she displays signs of narcissistic personality disorder.

 

This is a personality disorder that I'm very familiar with. I have a couple close relatives who show symptoms. Every word out of Flambeaux's mouth makes me go 'Yup.'

 

Flambeaux, in her own mind, can do no wrong. Things she does are right and good because *she* does them. If someone around her has a problem with the way she acts or the things she does, obviously, they are in the wrong and are possibly evil individuals who are plotting against her.

 

A lot of people hear 'Narcissistic' and think that it revolves around Flambeaux thinking she's attractive. While that is certainly there, the main component of NPD is an obsession with self and the inability to perceive anything negative about themselves. People who have NPD tend to try to warp reality around their obsession by working to convince others that they are indeed the center of the universe. This is not terribly effective on the average person-- We all see Flambeaux as pretty deluded. For people who are close to or care about someone with NPD, that reality warping becomes a bit more difficult to avoid. (It's especially effective on their children since the parent is already pretty close to center of a child's world. This often necessitates therapy, counseling, and other kinds of support for people who grew up in that situation.)

 

The more time Flambeaux spends with her teammates, the less likely they are to call her on her bullshit and the more likely they are to start thinking, 'yeah, I'm dirt. Flambeaux is beauty and light. She says it all the time, so it must be true.' Those who are paying close attention will realize this is happening and distance themselves from her, possibly calling her out in the process. Even if they do, however, she would almost certainly turn on them, treating them as if they are an evil attacker.

 

[CursedSorcerer]

I kinda wish it was possible to choose NOT to fight him. Not because I find him hard to beat, but because I don't want to see him as a true villain.

[MTeague]

5 hours ago, CursedSorcerer said:

I kinda wish it was possible to choose NOT to fight him. Not because I find him hard to beat, but because I don't want to see him as a true villain.

For some situations like that, where the mission (tip mission or otherwise) forces a fight vs enemies my character would NOT want to fight

• I will not throw the first punch
• I'll soak 4-5 attacks before attacking, for the "C'mon man, this doesn't have to happen!" / "I don't want to fight you!" factor.
• When I do attack, it is with punches or kicks ONLY.  No firearms. No blades. No fire/lightning/cold/darkness, etc.  If the only qualifying attack i I have is Brawl?  Then that's what I used.
  • An exception:  My Mind Controller is permitted to use Holds/Sleeps, because I can rationalize that as doing even less permanent harm than a punch or kick.
  • For those characters who may find thesmelves in such situations, I manage to work in some kind of non-lethal attack in their build.
  • My Claws/SR scrapper, on the Vigilante-to-Villain mission to set half of Salmanca on fire, used just "Kick".  Only "Kick".  To defeat upwards of 45 Psi Cops, and Overdrive, and Miss Thystle. Because my beef wasn't really with them. It was with Desdemona. 

Of course, other characters of mine see the world in far more "us vs them" terms, and have no compunction using lethal force against.... anyone

And still other characters of mine just don't take the missions that would put them in those kinds of scenarios.

[Ironblade]

On 8/22/2020 at 5:42 PM, CursedSorcerer said:

I kinda wish it was possible to choose NOT to fight him. Not because I find him hard to beat, but because I don't want to see him as a true villain.

Just because you have to fight someone doesn't make them a villain.

A person can get drunk and violent and you have to deal with them.  It doesn't make them a villain.

[CursedSorcerer]

6 hours ago, Ironblade said:

Just because you have to fight someone doesn't make them a villain.

A person can get drunk and violent and you have to deal with them.  It doesn't make them a villain.

True, but it does make me feel like I'm beating up a villain.

[d4verman]

On 8/23/2020 at 7:29 PM, Ironblade said:

Just because you have to fight someone doesn't make them a villain.

A person can get drunk and violent and you have to deal with them.  It doesn't make them a villain.

It would be cool if there is a follow up mission where you help him get off the drugs in the end. (For all I know, there could be, there's a lot of things I have forgotten or did not experience before the CoX was canned. For instance is Overdrive a woman? I always though she was a dude. It only occurred to me that she was female because of some offhand NPC dialogue.)

[Chris24601]

On 8/22/2020 at 10:54 PM, MTeague said:

For some situations like that, where the mission (tip mission or otherwise) forces a fight vs enemies my character would NOT want to fight

• I will not throw the first punch
• I'll soak 4-5 attacks before attacking, for the "C'mon man, this doesn't have to happen!" / "I don't want to fight you!" factor.
• When I do attack, it is with punches or kicks ONLY.  No firearms. No blades. No fire/lightning/cold/darkness, etc.  If the only qualifying attack i I have is Brawl?  Then that's what I used.

Water Blast is FANTASTIC for going full bore while still feeling like you're being non-lethal and just trying to get them to "cool off" in situations like this.

 

Yeah, high pressure water can actually do a LOT of damage in real life, but given that you're basically water-bending it feels like something you can really control the power level of and the fact that all of its knock attacks are all relatively low mag down or up (vs. back) it feels like you're self-regulating the flow so you're just doing enough to knock them down rather than hitting them with a blast of water solid enough to send them flying through the air.

[Black Zot]

Speaking of wonky alignments, Doc Quantum is treated as a hero by bank missions, but his behavior in tip missions makes it clear he's much closer to the other end of the spectrum.

[MTeague]

1 hour ago, Black Zot said:

Speaking of wonky alignments, Doc Quantum is treated as a hero by bank missions, but his behavior in tip missions makes it clear he's much closer to the other end of the spectrum.

The level range factors into it.  

At LOW level, Doc Quantum basically was a hero.  I think you only see him defending banks at fairly low level Mayhems.

As you level, he becomes more and more evil, more and more twisted to figure what people will do for what reasons, never mind who he hurts along the way.

 

Similarly, Frostfire, at low missions, is basically a superpowered thug. 

And in tip missions in the 20's, that stays true.

In the 30's, the tip missions have him kind of conflicted

in the 40's the tip missions have him reformed as a Hero.

 

Some of the NPC's in tip missions change like that over time. Not all of them. I think Hollow Point / Savage Siren are always Vigilantes. Echidna and Pyris, I think are always Villains.  But some shift as you level, to simulate them changing over time (since they weren't really planning on people powerlevelling to 50 in a day or two...)

Edited August 26, 2020 by MTeague

[Bossk_Hogg]

1 hour ago, Black Zot said:

Speaking of wonky alignments, Doc Quantum is treated as a hero by bank missions, but his behavior in tip missions makes it clear he's much closer to the other end of the spectrum.

If you do Vigilante tip/alignment missions you see his progression and can nudge his fall. I really liked that aspect!