Villainous lowbie arc [41018] LF feedback

[cranebump]

 

Notes:

• This one is completely self-contained (though it references a former arc, due to inclusion of a character whose origin relates to it) [lets me shill Ordinary People] 🙂
• First try at a villain story.
• Temp powers (esp. KB, stun grenades) may be helpful, if toon isn't typically proc'ed up and exemplaring down.
• Tested with an exemplared L38 Staff/SR brute with limited procs, and 90-something% SO's. Didn't have any major issues.

 

Thanks in advance,

Crane

Edited June 11, 2021 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Second test of tests:

• Ran with L24 (exemplared, non-optimized) Elec/Elec Tanker, whose only multitarget is Sands at L15
• Lost the escort in M2, which messes with the narrative. Since Escort text said, "Tougher than he looks," I increased his defenses. Main issue was I didn't clear the route before grabbing him, and didn't properly engage baddies. One of 'em strayed and "BAM!" down went my mish obj.
• Reworked spawn points on M3 to mitigate running back and forth.
• LAST MISH: Ambush is a BEAR. Am running again with another toon to confirm whether I need to make that easier. Player can exit if they just bring down the boss, and he is spawning as an LT every time, so the jury is out on this.
• Text looks good so far. [UPDATE: Found mistake. NAME placeholder should be formatted to place in character name; fixing after test run]

Edited June 11, 2021 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Completed mish with L38 Exem Dom (Grav/Shuriken). faceplanted a few times (not paying attention to health bar like I should've). Made use of a pull on final boss, and popped domination just as he was weakening, so I melted his ambush mobs. This is a weak toon, so consider this a very doable arc. Still had some back-n-forth on mishes 3 and 5, mainly due to randomness of spawns. Considering eliminating "Save Vito, Jr." from last mish, and just have it a boss takedown, intimating that he has the wife and son hostage, and must be dealt with.

[DougGraves]

I ran this with a lvl 19 rad/dark tanker at +0/x1.  I had no trouble with the difficulty.  I played it without solo bosses.

 

I liked the arc.  The missions were uneven with a variety of villain groups, so each felt fairly different.  Each felt like its own story and not just another excuse to beat up enemies.

 

A lot of text in the opening mission intro, but it spelled out clearly what was going on.  And then the amount text varied, so it felt right.

 

The 3rd mission was great, very different feel to it.

 

I would have liked more details in some of the missions.  There were a lot of standard spawns of foes to grind through.  A few bosses that talked or other things to break it up would have been nice.

 

I would have also liked more variety of villains in the missions.  Through in some regular paragon police, or mooks, or whatever.  While between missions there was diversity, within a mission it tended to just be the same fight over and over again.

[cranebump]

Thanks for the feedback. @DougGraves.  You bring up some useful points. I'll address this one:

 

Enemy Diversity: I think diversifying the Stingers with more minion types would be easy enough and justifiable, given the nature of the team. As far as Ronan's dupes go, I'm a bit more limited, premise-wise. The Dupes are based on the idea that they're essentially him, without his inherent super power. So, they can fight hand to hand, use guns, melee weapons, etc., but nothing else. Other than rooting through powersets to find weapons/attacks that fit that cosmetically, there isn't much I can do about them. There is a bit of room to add a couple more basic types, though. I didn't touch certain powersets because it didn't feel like they made sense, given that a Dupe must either punch you, or pick up available weapons and attack.

 

My takeways:

*take a look at the Cop faction. There's room for critter expansion there.

*see about dropping in more Fam/enemy battles. It would make sense to have those in Capston mish. I was just worried about it cutting into #/enemy spawns.

 

Thanks again!