Black Chamber [Two Arcs]

[cranebump]

 

Background:

• L40-50.
• Piggy backs on RWZ arcs (is wedged between Gaussian and Dark Watcher).
• Ran on low and high end. My little L40 Regen scrapper (a Long Rider toon) had some issues. My L50 incarnate tank breezed, even at higher settings. I don't have anything in the 45 range I can use to run this (atm).

 

The usual design notes (spoilers!)

Spoiler

• Inspired by a clue in the RWZ mish, in which a note addressed to "Martha" is found. I could not discover who the hell this was, so I decided to write a story around it.
• The obvious answer for who she is is Alito's wife. But I didn't feel the note made sense from him, so I needed someone else. I decided that former LB agent Arthur Bell's experience in the Kelly Uqqua arc would make him paranoid about alien infiltration, so he left LB for Vanguard. Once he's there, the love triangle is in place, and I have my inciting incident--Bell, who was already distraught over losing his child, discovers Project Imminere.
• Since the child, Alan, is the focal point, and is infused with power, I figured there's no way he could ever lead a normal life. So I decided, before I even started the second arc, that he'd be hidden back in time, and eventually become the Well of Furies (so, yeah, I said f*** the lore there, because I thought my idea was more interesting).
• Dropped a subplot involving Vonderlehr's former team members (whom he thinks are dead), and settled on a cameo for one of them.
• K. Alito is listed as a VG Sorcerer. I didn't think that'd be much of a challenge, so I made him kind of a power tank, with drone support.
• Misadventure cameo was to give me a reason to introduce the drones that Alito has later. I chose her for expediency's sake (and because she fit the level range).
• Project Imminere=recolored troops from mixed factions. Imminere STT was originally going to be recolored Crey, but my range of options seemed limited, so I created customs instead.
• Story titles: The Lid=related to whistleblowers (i.e., "blew the lid off of ________"). The Drum: Arc title is named after paper who pursued the awful Tuskegee experiments. Titles are Kurasaw films, only because I wanted to end with Yojimbo (translation: "Bodyguard").
• Reference to Ray Bradbury, with "terrible conflagration up at the place" (short story).
• Robert Woodward and Carlos Quemarpiedra=a nod to Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein (the latter's name meaning "burn stone," which I directly translated, the contracted into a single word).
• Zotz: I have absolutely no idea where this came from. Just threw the name in, and thought "grizzled techie." Made the character female because you don't usually hear women referred to as "grizzled."
• Since Tendaji refers to "sapper weapons" in Lid finale, I made sure there would be some by creating a group of nothing but sappers. This was no fun during testing.:-)
• Figuring out the contact for the second arc was tough. Couldn't use Tendaji, since he's assumed to be on Gaussian missions, which are essential to the ending (that conspiracy obscuring this one, and Sefu dying during it). Brought in Agent X, but recalled he was ganked in Tarixus arc. So I figured, "Well, what if he survived, but now he's soulless, and still working for LB?" Worked out pretty well, since I now had a person who'd have means to transport Alan and Martha back in time, since X (now Omicron) was planning revenge anyway. After that, just a matter of revealing his general discontent with "not making a difference," which eh rectifies by saving the kid (and creating the Well of Furies, though he doesn't know that).
• Finale boss fight: gawwwwwdamn but Alito is tough. My 40 had tons of problems. After stocking up on SUPER insps, I jousted witrh the bastard for what seemed like ages. Finally, on the last pass:

Fitting...

 

Edited November 18, 2023 by cranebump

[cranebump]

After watching Molly run both arcs this morning, caught a couple of typos. And had one of THOSE kind -- you know...where you have to redo the entire window because of formatting all the text. And you have to do it to insert 1 m***********g letter?

 

Yeah...that one...:-)

Edited November 22, 2023 by cranebump