Crane's World

[cranebump]

I don't normally spend much time shilling my stories, other than announcing when I have something new (or when I've tweaked or fixed one of my many flubs). But I thought I'd spend a moment here outlining how some of these arcs connect. I also thought I'd provide some info on the one-shots. You never know - someone else might get the AE bug, like our fabulous, famous, @TerroirNoir (aka TN). This also helps me organize everything a bit better, and prompts me to realize what a massive amount of time I've poured into this sh*t. I mean, really, Crane...get a life.:-)

 

Since my main megatale isn't overtly linked by title (or any other indicator), we'll start there. I guess we'll call it the King's Row Epic, since it has its roots there. Sequentially, it runs like this:

1. Ordinary People 1-3 (Standard Operating Procedure, Hope and Bullets, The Last Full Measure)
2. Leviathan 1-5 (Hollow Pursuit, Hollow Ring, Hollow Victory, Origin, Mantle)
3. Mobius 1-5 (Full Circle, Much Madness, The Sign of the Five, Dempsey's Hard 8, Auguries of Fate and Time)
4. Fallout 1-3 (The Unlock, Puzzle Box, Reassembly)

 

The first 3 arcs are the main story, while Fallout is just what it intimates - the aftermath of Mobius. Everything can be played self-contained, but a sequential run-through reveals the tie-in, all the way back to the first arc. You can also see I got better as things went along (well, hopefully I got better - you can judge for yourself). There's a wide variety of customs, some use of the usual suspects, and a significant callback in the finale (one might say, a fixing of an injustice).

 

The other multi-part arcs are self-contained. Here's a list and some brief capsules:

 

The Bleed 1-3 (Insecurity Measures, De Pulvis Rediit [From the Dust Returned], Wave, Landing) This was my attempt at a magic-themed arc, with IP as the backdrop. I was mainly trying to get out of my KR/Noir fixation, so I went with an origin I rarely play, and an underutilized zone (outside of Yin TF, which, these days, is the only reason for the zone to exist [or, um, Cita-hell, too, I suppose]).:-)

 

Noble Mettle 1-2 (The Colossus of Rose, The Hollow Crown) Did I mention my KR/Noir fixation? Welllll...kinda went back to that a bit, mainly basing this in AP, and making use of Kiros Nandelu and his "bodyguard," the Ivory Leopard. It’s about global markets, Communist zealots, and world-changing technology (and parenthood, to an extent).

 

The Cage Series 1-3 (Cage Match, Grudge Match, Match Point) Intended for vigilante characters, I delved into this after doing a wiki dive into Kirk Cage, which led me to the Iron Widow, which led me to Scrapyarder, and so on. It ends up being a meditation on the vigilante ethos.

 

Black Chamber 1-2 (The Lid, The Drum): A lore-related arc wedged in between RWZ arcs where you meet Sefu Tendaji, and then he's dead. Part 2 resurrects Agent X (literally), and runs concurrently with Dark Watcher's The Horror of War. Not a great deal of custom toons, but several custom groups, made by recoloring and mixing/matching. It's a straight up villainous arc, where the bad guy gets entwined in a save the world sorta thing.

 

Solace (3 parts):  Justice Society vibe here, with lore connections to past heroes and vills. Features Skyway Contacts embroiled in corporate intrigue that’s a cover for something bigger.

 

Homage Amalgama (2 parts): A mashup of DC/Marvel/CoH, and my love letter to superheroes in general.

 

Stalking the Detectives/Veilance: I do not have a unifying name for this story, but it starts with kidnappings of safeguard contacts, which morphs into a bigger threat. I flat out stole the resolving plot framework from an Astro City arc, which I won't detail here due to spoilers.

 

A bit on the one-shots:

Of Guns and Asa Ronan: @Darmian instantly pegged the title inspiration the moment I published it (Guns of Navarone). That's really what I started with - a knock off title. It was also my first villain/rogue arc. I used it to experiment with chained bosses, and attempted to create an adversary with powers like Multiple Man. Used a broker as a contact. UPDATE: After watching @Valeyard's run on Twitch, saw that I had forgotten to switch off autospawn on a boss, so "Norris" kept popping up. Hoo boy. Those rookie mistakes. Also had a timer that I at first extended, then eliminated. Also made the escort mission unfailable by making Anatastio untargetable. Kind of a bummer, but just isn't worth the hassle.

 

The Tenuous State of Grace: Created this as an entry for a contest sponsored by another player (I'm such a sh*t - I can't remember their name). If I remember right, this one ties in to Frostfire, taking place after his arrest, and before the events in The Hollows. If I remember right...it's been a LONG time. It's an old arc.

 

Garden of the Will: Mainly fiddling around with powersets and Perez Park as a backdrop. Got a Dev nomination with this one, but, like the above, I don't remember it well. (Update: I ran this one today, and made a few minor tweaks and cleanups).

 

The Book of Bond's: TOTALLY stole the initial plot idea from an Astro City story about El Hombre/Conquistador. Twisted it a little bit, but main impetus was to explore how supers face mortality.

 

The Lost Girls: Why aren't they any women in the Lost? Started there, then wrote this. I still don't care for some of the costumes.:-)

 

Injustice Systems: Premise="one bad day." You know, the theory posited in The Killing Joke? It’s a bit of that. But mainly I was working off a character idea my wife mentioned. You end up pursuing a particularly vicious bad guy, who was "driven" to it  by...well, I won't spoil it. Someone might actually play it someday.:-)

 

Gravity: The result of a wiki dive into gravitational fields. This one's actually linked to the lore, and is something of a follow up to the Sheridan arc in Bricks.

 

Wednesday's Wyverns: Had a hankering to do something involving Manti's brood, so I fused it with Minority Report (sorta).

 

Of 'Dine and Men: A Family/Marcone arc, having to do with a secret they don't want out (again...if I recall correctly).

 

Dark Legacy: After crushing the Legacy Chain with one of my rogue toons, I wondered, What the hell happened to these guys AFTER that a**-whoopin'? Then I wrote this.

 

Shadow and Silver: Wrote this after reading the Lethal Weapon-inspired backstories of the Steel Canyon detectives. Somewhat similar to The Tenuous State of Grace in that it explores the consequences of "justice."

 

The Re-education of Westin Phipps: Everyone wants to kick Phipps's a**. So...here it is. This does not work all that well with a team, btw. The last map is VERY small, and the story just whizzes by, unless you catch the dialogue.

 

Potter's Field: Got interested in Sharkhead's Tarixus, a contact in Potter's Field. Did some reading on Rogue Isles origin, thought about who might be buried there, and why, in particular, Tarixus is there (and why did he cross Henri Dumont, other than the obvious reason?). Also dropped in a homage to TN as a thank you for supporting AE stories (with some help from Darm, who got me the data I needed for that).

 

Magnificence: Inspiration came out of discovery of an explore badge in St. Martial that is keyed to this slum, tucked away there near the Giza. In thinking about it, I (for some reason) decided I wanted to do a take on the Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai).

 

Squalls and the Comet: My stab at getting out of my comfort zone a bit. Higher level arc, with a lighter, much less bittersweet tone that I usually employ.

 

Turf: A return to The Row (do I ever really get away from it?). Mainly an exploration of how people respond to grief.

 

Bounty on a Mutiny: Basic inspiration is a play on the classic film(s). Also an exploration of: What happened after I took Protean's funds following the Leonard arc? Ended up being, How many traitorous double-crosses could I pile into one story?🙂

 

Mr. Rivers: Angel Heart meets Egyptian myth basically (well…those are the inspirations).

 

Thirty Thousand Seconds: For my 50th published arc, I explored the idea of vulnerability. Guiding question is: what if you had a Superman without kryptonite? What does his arch-nemesis then do? The results seem a bit obvious, though I knitted in an idea based on a story my wife told me about a resident at an old folks home who paints beautifully, but, due to her declining faculties, cannot recall her own paintings after they are shown to her. I've been sitting on how to work this in to some sort of story, and did so here (as well as in my superhero novel). 

 

So them's the basics. If I had to make suggestions about what's really worth running in this mess, I'd suggest;

• All of the KR Mega Story. If not, then start with Leviathan, and go from there. You can skip Fallout, if you want. It's just an add-on.
• Noble Mettle is pretty well polished. It's a more recent arc, so it doesn't suffer from my earlier inexperience. Which means any mistakes are now not due to ignorance but rather my own inherent stupidity.:-) It does have some spelling issues in the finale arc, which I can't seem to fix because the arc keeps crashing after I load it to work on it.
• The Bleed has an interesting, tragic tale, with nice coda.
• I personally liked The Cage Series, but that's because it suits my mains and their ethos. Some decent writing in there.

 

Of the one shots, I'd suggest:

• Potter's Field: More recent, so generally less wonkiness with such things as objectives and placement. Pretty decent story.
• Gravity: Got a Dev's Choice for that one, even though it can have spawn issues in the last mish. 
• Of Guns and Asa Ronan: If feedback is any indication, the finale fight can be tough.  In any case, it has the most plays of my one shots, a good villain, and some interesting mechanics.
• Anything from Magnificence on, since it should be cleaner and tighter, thanks to experience. I actually enjoyed running the Squalls arc as a player. Not sure why, exactly. I guess because it's just a simple romp.
• I think Thirty Thousand Seconds is a pretty cool (albeit sad) story. 

 

Still working on the superhero novel. It's slowed down monumentally due to the new position, which keeps me busy as hell (and ends up with me drained of energy by the end of the day). But--it WILL get done. Goal is by end of next July. In the meantime, thanks to everyone who supports Story-Focused AE, including the various authors, both new, and crusty.:-)

 

Cheers,

Crane

Edited September 11 by cranebump

[cranebump]

I figured since I can't recall some of these arcs, might as well do a run through an clean up. 

 

Starting with Garden of the Will

Spoiler

Replay Observations:

• The arc takes place after Pos2. Doc Vahz is taken down, and there's a power vacuum. Which reminds me why I wrote this: who took over after he was gone?
• Found typos, cleaned up flawed multiple mission objective statement.
• The end boss is a good one.
• Know how you sometimes get lucky with spawns. My perp is right next to the following objective (crate back there behind them):-)

• Decided to redo Agent Morrell. Her look is not really skull-like.
• Just noticed 2 of the mishes are L14-20, while others are 15-20. Decided to make them all 14-20, since I don't know what effect going up would have.
• Bit of a cleanup on exit text of M4. Type on grandeur.

That looks like everything. It was fairly solid before. Now it's just dressed up a bit.

 

[Darmian]

After you did this post I pondered a similar one, and then decided not to!  I have a lot less arcs than you, and a full 9 of them ( 45 missions) + a prequel are the same story.  So...anyway. And I'm lazy.

[Ankylosaur]

Party Time! Excellent!

 

Love the world building! 

[cranebump]

With Magnificence out, and the recent Twitch run of Asa Ronan, I plan on tweaking some older arcs. On the backburner, I want to do something involving pets at the forefront (fire imps, for example). I'm not sure what's already there among the stock enemy groups, not exactly sure what the story angle is. With Potter's Field and Magnificence being vigilante/rogue ethos, I plan on returning blue side for this one. Haven't decided which zone to feature, or whether I want to do any callbacks from my stockpile of NPCs. If anyone has any recs about what they'd like to see (or whom they might like to see more of), let me know. I start back to work later this week, so this won't be something that comes out really quickly, unless I get lucky and get on some sort of a roll.

 

Tagential: I'm about finished with my first edit of a manuscript I've been working on for over a year. I'll need to make corrections, as well as do some additional chapters to flesh out the overall metastory. It's basically a series of linked superhero stories, set in an alt-history, brought about by the actions of the narrator, who, through some strange alchemy of alien energy, his own abilities, and some weird, cosmic interaction between all that and a mothership explosion, becomes omniscient, and able to experience (and sometimes interact) with various events in the new timeline. So, he's sorta like my version of The Sandman. Basically a writer's trick that allows me to tell disparate stories, linked together by the inciting event. I find I do better when I do that, rather than trying to tell a single, novel-length tale (more directly, it allows my lazy, distracted ass not to have to stick to one thing). I'm hoping to have a finished, self-published version by next summer. I DO use the names of a couple of my CoH toons here and there, but it isn't a big vanity project (in that manner, at least). I just know that I like superhero stories, in the vein of a Kurt Busiek. So, I guess you'd call it Astro City meets Sandman. Of course, what's f***ed up about all this is that it took me like 45 years to figure out that I should just write what I like to write. Assuming I finish the damned thing, I have CoH and AE to thank for it, as well as the encouragement of people who've played and commented on my arcs (not to mention the master storytellers here, whose stuff I have played, envied, and, on some cases tried to emulate (i.e., steal from).:-) Anything that comes out of all this is a testament to you folks, this game, and the community that continues to inspire my long-held love of superheroes to this day. 

 

So, thanks for that, and thanks in advance to any future contributions/feedback I receive. You're a great group. Now...back to hunting down and fixing those typos (aka "hte neverendng task").:-)

 

Crane

Edited July 24, 2023 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Tweaks of Of Guns and Asa Ronan:

Spoiler

• Detailed above, but removed timer, and made the escort mission unfailable by making target non-combat.
• Change title presentation to ARC TITLE/Mish title, to make consistent with newer work.
• Made a boss "No autospawn," as it was popping up all over the place as a named entity in generic mobs.
• Worked with clues to make consistent with my established (yellow on dialogue; simpler numbering).
• Typos, naturally.
• Final test still pending.

 

[Darmian]

On 7/24/2023 at 3:36 PM, cranebump said:

With Magnificence out, and the recent Twitch run of Asa Ronan, I plan on tweaking some older arcs. On the backburner, I want to do something involving pets at the forefront (fire imps, for example). I'm not sure what's already there among the stock enemy groups, not exactly sure what the story angle is. With Potter's Field and Magnificence being vigilante/rogue ethos, I plan on returning blue side for this one. Haven't decided which zone to feature, or whether I want to do any callbacks from my stockpile of NPCs. If anyone has any recs about what they'd like to see (or whom they might like to see more of), let me know. I start back to work later this week, so this won't be something that comes out really quickly, unless I get lucky and get on some sort of a roll.

 

Tagential: I'm about finished with my first edit of a manuscript I've been working on for over a year. I'll need to make corrections, as well as do some additional chapters to flesh out the overall metastory. It's basically a series of linked superhero stories, set in an alt-history, brought about by the actions of the narrator, who, through some strange alchemy of alien energy, his own abilities, and some weird, cosmic interaction between all that and a mothership explosion, becomes omniscient, and able to experience (and sometimes interact) with various events in the new timeline. So, he's sorta like my version of The Sandman. Basically a writer's trick that allows me to tell disparate stories, linked together by the inciting event. I find I do better when I do that, rather than trying to tell a single, novel-length tale (more directly, it allows my lazy, distracted ass not to have to stick to one thing). I'm hoping to have a finished, self-published version by next summer. I DO use the names of a couple of my CoH toons here and there, but it isn't a big vanity project (in that manner, at least). I just know that I like superhero stories, in the vein of a Kurt Busiek. So, I guess you'd call it Astro City meets Sandman. Of course, what's f***ed up about all this is that it took me like 45 years to figure out that I should just write what I like to write. Assuming I finish the damned thing, I have CoH and AE to thank for it, as well as the encouragement of people who've played and commented on my arcs (not to mention the master storytellers here, whose stuff I have played, envied, and, on some cases tried to emulate (i.e., steal from).:-) Anything that comes out of all this is a testament to you folks, this game, and the community that continues to inspire my long-held love of superheroes to this day. 

 

So, thanks for that, and thanks in advance to any future contributions/feedback I receive. You're a great group. Now...back to hunting down and fixing those typos (aka "hte neverendng task").:-)

 

Crane

There's a few on here that provide stellar AEs for me to trundle through and you're one of them. Keep on keeping on!

[cranebump]

Latest release: Squalls and the Comet. Details are posted in another thread. No immediate ideas on the horizon, but I was thinking of going back to Asa Ronan in some manner, due to the cryptic hints that he survived the final encounter. Basic question would be: What has Ronan learned that makes him more dangerous now than he was previously? I also thought about generating some random elements, then creating a story from them. Honestly, I'd rather do that as part of a collective task, where several different designers take the same elements, the create their own stories. Then we run them all to see how they came out. I could get back to Joshua Jones, or maybe use Devil Bat as the reviewing character, then review the entries myself (which means I'd have to exclude myself from creating an arc.

 

Or better yet, a collective narrative: we gather a team of writers to develop an experience over a certain level range. The missions piggy-back off one another, or or tied together in some way. Anyhoo, just spitballing. It's not like I don't have enough writing irons in the fire, what with the wife asking me to write a Christmas play about the Magi (so, page to stage in around 4 months). Yeah...I'm sooo superman when it comes to that (or maybe not).:-/

[cranebump]

With the latest entry done (Turf), casting about for a new idea. Considering a random story elements generator. And the Asa Ronan follow is still lingering in the mind.

[Clave Dark 5]

Ignore the random generators, you'll have to click them a LOT to find one or two, and they'll be more of the "sure, I could do that, I suppose" variety rather than the "I really want to do that" type.  Instead, take some idea you liked that you saw done elsewhere, but done wrong in your opinion, then do it right, or at least with your own flavors.

[cranebump]

5 hours ago, Clave Dark 5 said:

Ignore the random generators, you'll have to click them a LOT to find one or two, and they'll be more of the "sure, I could do that, I suppose" variety rather than the "I really want to do that" type.  Instead, take some idea you liked that you saw done elsewhere, but done wrong in your opinion, then do it right, or at least with your own flavors.

Oof. Things I thought were done wrong. Hmmmm...See, now I have so much to consider.:-)

Edited September 20, 2023 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Finished 1st part of 2-Arc story. Am delaying release until both are done. Here's the capsule:

 

[SFMA] Villainous you is recruited by Longbow straightarrow Sefu Tendaji in promise of a someday favor. But a murder in the stormy present quickly obscures your future prospects, by placing you at the focal point of a massive conspiracy disguised as a civil defense plan.

 

Fancy that. Me doing a conspiracy arc.:-)

[cranebump]

Bumping just cuz.

[TerroirNoir2]

13 hours ago, cranebump said:

Bumping just cuz.

Just cuz.

[cranebump]

Thanks, cuz.:-)

[cranebump]

Not sure when I’ll get to it, but do have an idea. Just need to mull it a bit more.

[cranebump]

Likely going to wait till next page drops before doing anything new. In the meantime, I'm going to scan all my published arcs for internal consistency. Been watching Molly's runs on Twitch, and it sure looks like there are more published arcs under my name out there than I have on my actual "published" list (including one with the "Mobius" keyword that shouldn't have it). It screwed up @LordRassilon's run through the Mobius story today, which should have gone into Modius 4: Dempsey's Hard 8. Now I'm wondering how may other of the old Mobius stories are floating around there, among the new, much better, final version. 

 

Gah! I swear, shit like this...

Edited January 29 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Current project: a “branching arc,” where you choose which direction to take after the initial.  This oughta be interesting.

 

or torture…

[Lockely]

4 hours ago, cranebump said:

Current project: a “branching arc,” where you choose which direction to take after the initial.  This oughta be interesting.

 

or torture…

 

I would be incredibly interested in hearing how you manage to pull this off, mechanics wise! AE has always seemed relatively linear to me, so maybe my brain can't wrap around how you'd break the objectives to your will to make that happen.

[cranebump]

I can’t. I have to make 2 additional arcs and let the player choose the next to play. Hence “branching.” 🙂 (I should have said series of arcs).

 

That said, @Kyksie managed to simulate a “choose A or B” outcome in the arc I reviewed under Crane’s Short Reviews. Worth a look!

Edited February 14 by cranebump

[cranebump]

Okay, scratch the branching: I just got 5 new slots. I'd be using three of them to plot 10 mishes (4 in the initial arc; 3 in each of the branches). I'd rather tell additional stories, at this point.

[cranebump]

Newest arc is done. At least until people run it and show me everywhere I screwed up.:-)

[cranebump]

Got a jump on the follow-up to Stalking the Detectives. I will say the story is taking a strange turn, mainly due to:

Spoiler

me failing to consider WHY the kidnappers kept Detective Rogers. 

 

[cranebump]

Did an update of the big list to include Thirty Thousand Seconds. 

 

Also got some feedback on a recent team run of Leviathan by @SeraphimKensai. That BEWARE: CUSTOM POWERS warning is, evidently, da truth.:-)  

[SeraphimKensai]

2 hours ago, cranebump said:

Did an update of the big list to include Thirty Thousand Seconds. 

 

Also got some feedback on a recent team run of Leviathan by @SeraphimKensai. That BEWARE: CUSTOM POWERS warning is, evidently, da truth.:-)  

 

It was pretty fun, even when facing three groups at once that had bosses either running hurricane and dropping freezing rain/snowstorm or running lightning field and sapping endurance while complimented by minions that shot out swarms of bees and lieutenants stacking trip mines all over.