idea to have epic archetypes cross faction but lore friendly

[jkwak]

there are a lot of people who for what ever reason create a charcter with epic archetype and then go to Null the Gull to have them on the other side

so why not allow it from the start

for Kheldians we could just dub the Wartshade as Nictus and have them be a Nictus who for what ever reason there might be works with Arachnos instead of 5th Column or Council, maybe they agree with there overall goal but not the methods, maybe they have there own little Agenda and think Arachnos is suiting them more

Peace Bringers could either be dubbed as Nictus to or they are still Peace Bringers but want to use more extreme methods in there fight against Nictus, thinking defeating the Nictus is more important than couple civilians getting in to the crossfire

 

for Widows and Arachnos Soldiers its even more easy they can just be former Arachnos members who joined thinking they are on the right side but who got desilusioned when they found out what Arachnos is really about

 

give it a couple of missions to establish that lore and done,

similiar it can also work for Praetoria since Primal earth factions meddled with the affairs with Praetoria having a Primal Earth spy in the Resistance or Powerdevision might make sense to

[Rudra]

Lore friendly (possibly kinda):

 

Blue Soldiers and Widows of Arachnos:

Longbow found and raided an Arachnos training facility. Starting character is a convert using retained armor and weapons.

Character is from a copycat group hoping to use Arachnos' methods against them.

Character is from an alternate dimension where Arachnos are the good guys and the character accidentally found his/her way to Primal Earth with no means of return. (The only starting level SoA I saw followed this, except the character was an orc using native armor and weapons that simply looked like Arachnos gear.)

Character is a mercenary or rogue Arachnos fighting for Paragon City.

 

Red Peacebringers and Warshades:

The kheldian race is not a monolithic race any more than other race. Evil kheldians found their way to the Rogue Isles to start their lives merged with a human (or other Primal) on their quest for power.

The vigilante kheldian has decided the best way to fight the evil of Arachnos is from within the Rogue Isles.

Arachnos captured a kheldian that they released into the Rogue Isles to see how pliable the character is if indirectly controlled/manipulated.

The merge went poorly and the psychotic Primal has mentally dominated the poor kheldian now trapped in his/her body.

 

Gold: Not seeing any real justification for an epic AT to start in Praetoria. No real point in it anyway since the game guides your Praetorian into becoming a villain or hero at 20. (Though you can ignore the mission and just keep playing through First Ward and Night Ward.)

 

I do not recommend allowing the epics to start on whatever side the player wants because they were designed as hero/villain epics. I also don't really care if they do. Like you said, players are already doing so. This post is just to present possibilities without the mental gymnastics or renaming of the OP. ... though there is still quite a bit of mental gymnastics involved, it just feels less torturous this way.

Edited March 7, 2022 by Rudra
Edited to add "t" to "not". ...and "any more"....

[Glacier Peak]

Yes to all of the above. At least they unlocked side switching so I can swap alignment right after, but then I'll lose out on the classic Epic story arcs until I switch back. 

[jkwak]

well warshades are allready nictus who changed sides and are bound to take down other Nictus, so why not play a Nictus who didnt change sides and is just not keen to 5th Column or Council fashism
the main goal of Peace Bringers is also to take down the Nictus, that the majority of them decidet to help Humanity in other things dosnt mean all of them agree, i can easy see some Peace Bringers think they have a better chance to do there job ignoring everything else and destroy the whole planet if needet
 

and low ranking Arachnos getting desilusioned because they fell for propaganda and have reality catching up with them makes sense to me to

[MTeague]

well, one thing with epic archtypes, is "epic" doesn't just mean "powerful", like an epic-rated WoW drop or something.

In this context "epic" archtype meant there is an entire plotline and story specific to the archtype.

 

Or at least, that was how the oldschool live devs saw it. Strictly speaking, HC devs are under zero obligation to care about that.  But if it did matter to them, they'd probably want to create mirror missions of same appromiate difficult and number for your redside kheldians, and for your blueside SoA. I do think it would add a lot more flavor to it than just "okay you can start cross faction now".... but it would mean quite a bit of writing.

 

 

[Rudra]

10 minutes ago, jkwak said:

well warshades are allready nictus who changed sides and are bound to take down other Nictus, so why not play a Nictus who didnt change sides and is just not keen to 5th Column or Council fashism

Because of the problem of needing to duplicate the AT so it can be named Nictus instead of Warshade.

[MTeague]

5 hours ago, jkwak said:

for Widows and Arachnos Soldiers its even more easy they can just be former Arachnos members who joined thinking they are on the right side but who got desilusioned when they found out what Arachnos is really about

 

Honestly, I don't think the idea that someone might have once thought Arachnos was the good guys can pass the laugh test.

 

I do think it's very plausible to have people join not because they like Arachnos even one small bit, but were conscripted in a press gang.

Or just a random citizen who was sick of being extorted / preyed upon in the rogue isles, and decided it's better to be the hammer than the nail.

Either such one might jump ship at the first opportunity. Sent on a mission, and stowed away on a freighter to Paragon instead, never looking back. 

[jkwak]

Arachnos Propaganda is strong though, and the normal guy from the isles dosnt know much about all the crimes they do, sure they see all the Arachnos soldiers and Widows abuse there power but i can see some people think "those are just a couple bad eggs, they just showed on TV how great Arachnos is"

[Rudra]

No... that's where Westin Phipps comes in. He is the friendly face Arachnos puts forth to get the people's trust, and he does so by ensuring no one knows he actually works for Arachnos. The people going to Arachnos for help are only going to them because there is literally no one else for them to turn to. In the places where Arachnos maintains a public presence as the law, such as St. Martial, the people view Arachnos as The Law and Enforcers of Order, but definitely NOT as nice guys out there to help you. There is no "Protect and Serve" with Arachnos in the eyes of the public. It is "Obey and Live. Report those that don't obey, and we can make life a little better for you." So the people go to Arachnos knowing Arachnos will do something because the ones that hurt the people, if it was not Arachnos, will be hunted by Arachnos for disrupting their Order. There is no one that thinks Arachnos is the good guys in the Isles. Just the necessary evil.

 

(Edit Again: Hells, the people in St. Martial that turn to Arachnos for help really only do it because the only other authority there is the Family. And the mob is even less likely to do anything helpful than Arachnos.)

Edited March 7, 2022 by Rudra
Edited to capitalze the "t" in "The Law".

[Greycat]

As far as Kheldians, the lore's already there.

 

Warshades (Nictus) - are obviously *already* working with the Council and have an entire plan or set of plans we work to disrupt through the Kheld arcs blueside.

 

Peacebringers - we *already* have arcs with "Rogue Peacebringers" (again, in the Kheld arcs) that work with the Nictus, or at least against Sunstorm's treaty with Shadowstar.

 

The issue's basically just a lot of writing.

 

Redside... eh. For three of the four VEATs, it's "I didn't buy the propaganda." For Banes, there's a bit of lore conflict between the "they get jacked into a psychic network" and the "One good spider" blueside alignment mission where we explicitly save a Bane and bring them back to Paragon, but that's on the original devs - it at least gives a foundation for them (any, really) to be blueside.

 

Though I'd hope, for them, they had some mechanism - either ambushes or a slightly higher taunt vs. other Arachnos or something - to deal with the fact you *left Arachnos.* It's one of the things that annoyed me with them redside - other than "I have a few meh arcs and a special costume," you were treated like any other player, no extra hostility (or support) from other Arachnos members.

[Zepp]

Peacebringers are already kinda evil in their attitudes towards Warshades...

[Rudra]

7 hours ago, Greycat said:

As far as Kheldians, the lore's already there.

 

Warshades (Nictus) - are obviously *already* working with the Council and have an entire plan or set of plans we work to disrupt through the Kheld arcs blueside.

 

Peacebringers - we *already* have arcs with "Rogue Peacebringers" (again, in the Kheld arcs) that work with the Nictus, or at least against Sunstorm's treaty with Shadowstar.

 

The issue's basically just a lot of writing.

 

Redside... eh. For three of the four VEATs, it's "I didn't buy the propaganda." For Banes, there's a bit of lore conflict between the "they get jacked into a psychic network" and the "One good spider" blueside alignment mission where we explicitly save a Bane and bring them back to Paragon, but that's on the original devs - it at least gives a foundation for them (any, really) to be blueside.

 

Though I'd hope, for them, they had some mechanism - either ambushes or a slightly higher taunt vs. other Arachnos or something - to deal with the fact you *left Arachnos.* It's one of the things that annoyed me with them redside - other than "I have a few meh arcs and a special costume," you were treated like any other player, no extra hostility (or support) from other Arachnos members.

There are actually several references scattered in tip missions starting at level 20 that at least references Bane Spiders breaking free of the network even before the One Good Spider mission. Hells, the mission where you fight Blast Furnace and lots of Arachnos to stop a missile launch is because Arachnos wanted you to annihilate a neighborhood to kill a group of Bane Spiders that broke free of the network.

 

The Bane Spider network is the collective minds of the Bane Spiders keeping each other in line. Humans are not drones though and all it takes is a single mind to question and that doubt starts to fester in the rest of the linked minds even as they repress the disorderly mind. And if the will is strong enough, that repression further fuels the individual's need to break free. It is human nature to fight against a system that represses you, and the Bane Spider network is all about repression.

 

And yeah, it would be nice if hostile Arachnos treated your SoA or WoA as traitorous scum instead of just another Destined. I think that would require some fairly extensive coding though.

 

Edit: I realize you most likely know how the Bane Spider network works. Apologies for the unneeded lesson. I did need the lesson to set up my argument though.

Edited March 7, 2022 by Rudra

[MTeague]

On 3/7/2022 at 1:35 PM, Rudra said:

And yeah, it would be nice if hostile Arachnos treated your SoA or WoA as traitorous scum instead of just another Destined. I think that would require some fairly extensive coding though.

 

Personally, I would never consider using any power that summons arachnobots or widows to my aid, if I was a SoA/Widow gone blue. (EDIT or any other archtype for that matter) I wouldn't feel right enforcing that limitation on other players... maybe they have a way to make it work in their own headcanon, or maybe they literally give zero F's about making it make sense and just want the powers they picked to work. 

 

But for myself, I would never use any clearly-arachnos-related summon power unless I was red-aligned.

Coralax from Mako's pool would still be fine though, because coralax's don't give a flying yeet about Recluse. 

Edited March 11, 2022 by MTeague

[Rudra]

In the case of the bots, I figure the character reprogrammed them. In the case of the Tarantulas and others, they could just be rogue Arachnos that help you for their own purposes, have been mind controlled by you, have decided to help you to spite Lord Recluse and his lieutenants, the patrons, or for any number of other reasons. In the case of the Coralax, they hate everyone, so justify that however you like. 'You' in this sense being a generality rather than you, @MTeague, the writer of the preceding post specifically. It's kind of like justifying having an MVAS when you're running around robbing banks, blowing up buildings, trying to enslave/destroy the world, what have you. If you try hard enough, you can justify anything.

 

Edit: Or justifying having a Shivan Destroyer as an ally, one of the Freedom Phalanx (temp power) when you're a red sider, having a pair of Wailer Queens (only obtainable once and only for magic origin characters), still having the Arachnos mini blaster when you go blue side or the Longbow mech when you go red side, etc.

Edited March 12, 2022 by Rudra