Looking for a coauthor of a mission or small base

[temnix]

I have made costumes for a Carnival of Shadows revamp: I call it the New Carnival. There are about 70 between different variations, minions, leutenants and bosses in various lines. A few command beasts and birds. Some men are in as well. I want to reenvision this faction as a modern, globe-trotting and exciting circus, run as a sort of decentralized franchise after Vanessa DeVore's demise. Their apparent mission is to recruit talented women and develop their gifts to a superlative degree, but nobody knows if they have a further agenda. The most basic level of their troops are Groupies, fan followers, entrance-level masks are given to Harlequins, but then everyone is expected to specialize along one of the four lines.

 

This is the outline, and I'm going to post a presentation of all of them when I can get good screenshots together in one place. Let's imagine that Homecoming could become inspired and adopt those concepts. But it would be good to include a link to, preferably, a short mission to fight these enemies or a small base where they would stand around, as mannequins at least. I would have to learn either Architect mission making or base construction from scratch, if I were to go it alone, though. Here I'm inviting anyone who is a good hand with either toolset to join me and share the glory.

 

[Major_Decoy]

Rather than a Carnival of Shadows, that looks like a Rodeo Obscura.

[temnix]

9 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

Rather than a Carnival of Shadows, that looks like a Rodeo Obscura.

 

And you are used to bow-tied high heels like something out of a Carlo Gozzi? I said a modern circus and an exciting one.

[srmalloy]

6 hours ago, temnix said:

I said a modern circus and an exciting one.

не мой цирк, не мои обезьяны.   😁

[temnix]

Attention, everyone! I have other models and screenshots I am willing to show to those who are interested in an original makeover of the Carnival. The rest of you, who are not offering to help, are welcome to stop spamming in my thread.

[Forager]

Is the spam in the thread with us right now?

[High_Beam]

Look, I am certain your intent is good.  Thumbs up.

 

But that look that you posted is not good.  And to alter the actually fun and pleasing look of the Carnival with that or anything like that would be . . . well . . . terrible.  The devs botched the revamp of the Warriors; made them (The Warriors) now look like fools, and we have to live with that.  Lets not delude ourselves, sometimes truth has to be told and it isn't always pleasant.  You want to revamp the Carnivals design, then add more aesthetically pleasing additions that complement what we have, bring in more European style, which is what you see more often than not in "more exciting and modern circuses" such as Cirque de Soleil or Cirque Eloize.  Also:

 

Spoiler

Vanessa DeVore isn't dead in Earth Prime, only Praetoria.  Harvey Maylor's penultimate Carnival Arc (Upon a Psychic Plane) has her clearly stated as being in jail at the end.  So she is still running things.

 

2 hours ago, temnix said:

The rest of you, who are not offering to help, are welcome to stop spamming in my thread.

As for this.  By starting the thread you opened it for public discourse whereas you could have just as easily posted a simple line asking for ideas and such from like-minded individuals interested in altering the Carnival and have them PM you.  Thus allowing you to formulate a more robust and detailed presentation.  You chose to post here, thus opened the commentary to both complement or critique.

 

So you haven't received any compliments, that doesn't invalidate the critique.  Maybe compliments will come.  Awesome!  But even if they don't, critique can be helpful it drives us to do better.

Edited May 26 by High_Beam
Clarified Who Looked Like Fools

[temnix]

@High_BeamAt least you are not talking like a fool yourself, in this place one has to be grateful even for this kind of feedback that is mistaken on several points. I did make a public thread, but its intention was to invite cooperation, not solicit opinions on the designs. Posting one costume was a way to show that this would not be a mild facelift for the faux-Baroque, fuchsia-abusing faction but something different - and much broader and deeper than I can summarize here. It's an invitation to creative people. Doing all this by PMs as if we are spies would be an unnatural chore. So here is the thread, those who are interested get their opening. The DeVore storyline can be tweaked easily, the game does this back and forth all the time. And in my opinion the revamp of the Warriors at Homecoming's hands is respectable. They don't have any apparent connection to the Greek idea, but they didn't have before. Only Odysseus with his crest looks a little like a scrapyard Bismark. But they are good and entertaining.

 

Now, to the meat of the business: this is only one costume of many. It happens to be one of the Handlers, from the Masques of Empathy who specialize in the taming of beasts. Hence the looped rope they all carry. Minions summon a wolf, but the Handlers are their Leutenants and call forth two mountain lions. They are also accompanied from the beginning by a hawk circling overhead, being a stealth-detecting unit and in the fight swooping in for one attack before flying away. Since this is a circus, all performers want a spectacular appearance, hence the horns. Other Handlers are different, and the bosses of that line, Dominatrixes, are another breed entirely - they command people instead of beasts. But there are more familiar elements in other designs and leftovers of the "jester" trope, patterns, caps. I could have posted a Harlequin here, yet I wanted to make it obvious that this is a revamp and not a slight alteration.

 

That said, if what you desire is more of the same that has been around for so long, then we have nothing to talk about. The Carnival, as it exists, is a boring and pointless enterprise that could not sell a ticket. All they do, apparently, is hypnotize people to spook them and steal their souls. Try putting that on a flyer. I more or less like the Strongmen and they get to remain, with some upgrades to the textures, but theirs is a circus without numbers, without charm, without art and without clowns. I have clowns, acrobats, aerialists, beast tamers, jugglers, illusionists and others with such unique personas and powers that they don't fit in any niche - they make their own. That is what a real high circus, like the aforementioned Cirque du Soleil, strives for.

[UltraAlt]

18 hours ago, temnix said:

The rest of you, who are not offering to help, are welcome to stop spamming in my thread.

 

I'm sorry. That comment is not welcome.

You are going to have to face the fact that you are posting in a forum where everyone can react to your posts.

If you don't like what they are posting, you always have the option to put other people on ignore. That is the only power you have here.

 

I agree with the others that your post of what you to believe to be a Neo-Carnival of Shadows is not appealing to me whatsoever.

It does not look Carnival of Shadows related to me. It doesn't have a circus feel to it.

[Forager]

2 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

 

I'm sorry. That comment is not welcome.

You are going to have to face the fact that you are posting in a forum where everyone can react to your posts.

If you don't like what they are posting, you always have the option to put other people on ignore. That is the only power you have here.

 

Umm...

 

[temnix]

@UltraAltI am entitled to consideration of my intent. You and the others are behaving like street bums who feel free to crash any party, even one that is obviously not theirs, and shout drunken expletives inside.

 

There are more than 70 different variations of creatures. The Carnival is a complex affair. It welcomes many professions, talents and races. It is not as simple as some people in masks and fool's caps standing around to serve an evil mistress. I can't even make the masks from the commonly available parts, Homecoming would have to fashion them themselves - small articles and not obscuring the eyes. The New Carnival does not suppress individuality, it demands it. Right now in my designs there are only placeholders for where masks would go. I understand this is an unfamiliar direction and broadening and may feel confusing and alienating. But this is a noble circus as it should be - vivacious, hard and embracing, and if there are shadows, they lie deeper down. For what reason and purpose, if any, does the Carnival insist on its relentless exuberance?

 

Here is the complete line-up of Harlequins. I have only made four versions of each same-tier creature, though there should be more - in any faction and especially in the Carnival so that encounters with it remain surprising for a long long time. At least six, I would say.

 

      

Edited Thursday at 09:36 AM by temnix

[Forager]

One of my favorite forum phenomena: two posters telling eachother that they can't say what someone else can and can't say what someone else can and can't say...

 

They just keep using different words, trying to find the last one. This is fun!

[UltraAlt]

17 hours ago, temnix said:

@UltraAltI am entitled to consideration of my intent.

 

Who said you weren't?

You are being overly argumentative.

 

On 5/26/2025 at 2:30 PM, temnix said:

The rest of you, who are not offering to help, are welcome to stop spamming in my thread.

 

On 5/27/2025 at 9:11 AM, UltraAlt said:

I'm sorry. That comment is not welcome.

You are going to have to face the fact that you are posting in a forum where everyone can react to your posts.

If you don't like what they are posting, you always have the option to put other people on ignore. That is the only power you have here.

 

On 5/27/2025 at 7:49 AM, temnix said:

I did make a public thread, but its intention was to invite cooperation, not solicit opinions on the designs.

 

Too bad. 

Just as much as you have the right to post things in the forums, other people have the right to post things as well.

 

On 5/27/2025 at 9:11 AM, UltraAlt said:

I agree with the others that your post of what you to believe to be a Neo-Carnival of Shadows is not appealing to me whatsoever.

It does not look Carnival of Shadows related to me. It doesn't have a circus feel to it.

 

You do not have the right to be abusive to other people on the forums:

 

17 hours ago, temnix said:

You and the others are behaving like street bums who feel free to crash any party, even one that is obviously not theirs, and shout drunken expletives inside.

 

I think you are attacking other that disagree with you simply because they disagree with you.

You have openly insulted me and others on the forums. You need to curb this kind of abuse.

You are the one in the wrong and not those that are posting in this thread that they disagree with you based on your one initial post.

 

@GM Crumpet I may be wrong in this, but I do not feel that the disrespectful behavior from @temnix should be tolerated.

 

@temnix If you post on the forums, you don't own the thread that you started.

Everyone else on the forums has I right to post to any thread.

If you can't deal with that fact, I suggest that you stop posting in the forums.

 

 

Edited Friday at 02:53 AM by UltraAlt

[UltraAlt]

11 hours ago, Forager said:

One of my favorite forum phenomena: two posters telling eachother that they can't say what someone else can and can't say what someone else can and can't say...

 

They just keep using different words, trying to find the last one. This is fun!

 

Seems to me that you are prompting this kind of behavior:

 

17 hours ago, temnix said:

I am entitled to consideration of my intent. You and the others are behaving like street bums who feel free to crash any party, even one that is obviously not theirs, and shout drunken expletives inside.

 

[Major_Decoy]

17 hours ago, temnix said:

Here is the complete line-up of Harlequins. I have only made four versions of each same-tier creature, though there should be more - in any faction and especially in the Carnival so that encounters with it remain surprising for a long long time. At least six, I would say.

 

I would say you're kind of approaching costume design from the wrong direction, at least in the way you're presenting things in this thread. You should first take a character, ask what their role is in the carnival, and then design a costume to help them in the role. If you're moving fast, ribbons and streamers help emphasize motion. If you're moving slowly, tight clothes help show muscle and lack of motion while baggier clothes help obscure motion. So if you're showing your talent, you want tight clothes. If you want it to be easier, lose clothes.

 

If you've envisioned the Harlequins as a troupe of demons who ride horses, then I would give them all spurs (because demons aren't going to worry about cruelty to horses) and keep in mind horseback riding while designing the costumes. Capes and scarves will exaggerate the speed of the horses, tight costumes will make the rider seem like they're stiller on the horse (while baggy clothes will bounce with every step, making the rider look less skilled)

 

If you've envisioned the Harlequins as slapstick, give them checkered costumes. A little bulk is nice for padding on prat falls and to make hits seem more realistic.

 

You need to have a goal of what the costume to trying to accomplish before you make it.

[GM Crumpet]

If you can't say anything constructive then don't say anything at all. Please be kind and if it's not your cup of tea then shrug and move on.

[temnix]

Let's not spam in the thread MORE with new appeals not to spam and be respectful and whatnot. That will just lead a moderator to shut it down.

 

@Major_Decoy That is one way to approach the design, though conscious decisions are always inferior to intuitive ones. And I don't know where you got the horses theme from. It's not the King Harla's harlequins who work in this circus, obviously. And horses don't exist in this game world. I could not possibly intimate the existence of horses off-screen, even if I gave everyone spurs. You were on a wild ride there, I think. :D

 

There is an idea here, however, a simple one: the New Carnival is the old Carnival who changed their intent, public image and organization. (By the way, Vanessa DeVore is out of the picture on Prime Earth as well. Desdemona wears her mask, there with the survivors of Praetoria. Everyone gets Provost Marchand as a Contact around level 30 and can see that for himself, so this is the official storyline. But I don't really care.) And probably the magic at work as well. Inducting people by force and shutting their entire faces in identical masks so as to keep them enslaved was a dead end and no kind of art at all.

 

The new movers and shakers in the Carnival, whoever they may be, advertise the outfit as a circus that lets dreams come true. They welcome all kinds of creativity and while there is some carryover and legacy of diamond patterns and caps, nothing is really forced on the members except to progress in the trade. Recruited from Groupies, Harlequins may be the least original workers in the circus, being fresh blood. They are given light half-masks that inspire them and assist in the basic stage fencing, juggling, simple acrobatics and light clowning, but they have no powers as such. (The rapiers, as you might have noticed, don't glow, and they should use something more mundane for missile attacks, like playing cards. Bleeding DoT. Cards exist as an object in the game, too, so it is possible.)

 

Before long Harlequins are expected to specialize in one of the four lines, representing four aspects of femininity. These are the Masques of Empathy, Agility, Mastery and Mystery. Those who fail to show talent for too long come to bad ends, usually suicide by drowning. At some point they develop an irresistable urge to see their reflection in the water and throw themselves in. The advanced masks lead their wearers to heights of art and originality, but away from humanity as you know it. A few talentless Harlequins that show outstanding administrative abilities get promoted to Ringmistresses, but each Masque line has its own Bosses. There are also Barkers, the male members of the Carnival that take on ticket sales, check admission, serve as butts of jokes between main circus acts and eventually, at Leutenant and Boss levels, advertise and promote the Carnival at large. All Barkers are sniper units that detect stealth and taunt with sonic attacks out of their barrel chests.

 

 

 

[Octogoat]

Well this is a thread.

[Forager]

12 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

Too bad. 

Just as much as you have the right to post things in the forums, other people have the right to post things as well.

 

12 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

@GM Crumpet I may be wrong in this, but I do not feel that the disrespectful behavior from @temnix should be tolerated.

 

Lol

[Maelwys]

13 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

If you want it to be easier, lose clothes.