The Twinshot Trap

[Leogunner]

3 minutes ago, boggo2300 said:

We do ignore and not play through this terribly written arc, this thread was about the OP forgetting and running it, the rest of us were commiserating, lighten up man

Ah! You found me out! I sometimes intentionally prod people with a shaper than average remark to spark discussion. 

 

I still stand by my response that it's not as bad as people say. The worst arcs, IMO, are the ones I struggle to stay awake reading or log out early because of a spontaneous desire to take a nap. 

[biostem]

TBH, I don't recall ever encountering this arc while the game was live; Perhaps I left before it was added.  I finally played through it about a month ago, and while it was a little interesting, I did wish I could take a "3rd option" at several points during it.  It's just one of those things that would require a significantly advanced AI, (or much better branching options), in order to satisfy everyone...

[boggo2300]

41 minutes ago, Leogunner said:

Ah! You found me out! I sometimes intentionally prod people with a shaper than average remark to spark discussion. 

 

I still stand by my response that it's not as bad as people say. The worst arcs, IMO, are the ones I struggle to stay awake reading or log out early because of a spontaneous desire to take a nap. 

I recently had to do twitshots arc with my SG mates because they hadn't done them, I felt like rage quitting every damn mission, there is nothing in the mission texts for this arc that is unique, funny or entertaining, just annoying, the only fun to be had is making the obvious name change for Dillon to free my inner 12 year old

Edited September 10, 2019 by boggo2300

[Lazarillo]

2 minutes ago, biostem said:

Perhaps I left before it was added.

Not sure when you left, but for reference, the Twinshot and Dr. Graves arcs came out with Freedom/Issue 21.  They were part of the revamped approach to telling the tutorial: expanding it out through several story arcs after a quick basic overview in Galaxy, rather than cramming everything into Breakout/Outbreak.

[boggo2300]

2 minutes ago, biostem said:

TBH, I don't recall ever encountering this arc while the game was live; Perhaps I left before it was added.  I finally played through it about a month ago, and while it was a little interesting, I did wish I could take a "3rd option" at several points during it.  It's just one of those things that would require a significantly advanced AI, (or much better branching options), in order to satisfy everyone...

It really doesn't need that much complication, just better thought out branching it's an arc I specifically avoid, fortunately doing Habashy and it's follow ons, then going to Stockwell in KR lets you avoid the evil that is Twitshots!

[Lazarillo]

7 minutes ago, boggo2300 said:

then going to Stockwell in KR lets you avoid the evil that is Twitshots!

Aren't unresolved cliffhangers the real evil?

[boggo2300]

Just now, Lazarillo said:

Aren't unresolved cliffhangers the real evil?

What unresolved cliffhangers?

[Lazarillo]

3 minutes ago, boggo2300 said:

What unresolved cliffhangers?

The Neo-Skulls arc.  It was never finished.  It "ends" with some unresolved deal with Atta, Morana disappearing (with clear plans to destroy the Zig and break her brothers out of jail), and a mysterious third party hiring an assassin to put BaBs in the hospital (and said assassin succeeding).  This went along with extending the Skulls level range another 10 levels past where the arc that starts with Shauna ends, and was intended to be followed up by the original Dev team in i25 and beyond, but, well, we know what happened to that...

Edited September 10, 2019 by Lazarillo

[boggo2300]

1 minute ago, Lazarillo said:

The Neo-Skulls arc.  It was never finished.  It "ends" with some unresolved deal with Atta, Morana disappearing (with clear plans to destroy the Zig and break her brothers out of jail), and a mysterious third party hiring an assassin to put BaBs in the hospital (and said assassin succeeding).  This went along with extending the Skulls level range another 10 levels past where the arc that starts with Shauna ends, and was intended to be followed up by the original Dev team in i25 and beyond, but, well, we know what happened to that...

Ah right gotcha, nah still better than dealing with the Shining Stars nonsense, I just treat it like it's still happening, and by the time you get through Eagle Eyes I'm ready for some not Skull missions to be honest 🙂

[Lazarillo]

So speaking of choice, I've been re-running an old villain arc for the first time since relaunch, and as I noted in a previous post, since it's in a story arc, there is no "choice" in it, no backing out from it because you're already locked into a story arc, and it's definitely not going to be appropriate for the self-aggrandizing evil types (even if it's just dandy for my morally gray, former-Power-Loyalist Rogue).

 

But I'll be cold and dead before I'm okay with someone calling the Slot Machine's arcs "bad writing".

[MetaVileTerror]

Slot Machine doesn't ever tell you what your character is feeling or what their motivation is; at least not any more than any of the other content already established at that point in the game.  

It also has the saving grace of actually being well-written and internally consistent, as well as touching, funny, and even rewarding in the context of gameplay rewards.  As far as I'm concerned, that marks Slot Machine as particularly good.

 

Granted, I remember /someone/ in the OOC/RP channel complaining about it for some reason . . . can't quite recall . . . 

[Lazarillo]

1 minute ago, MetaVileTerror said:

Slot Machine doesn't ever tell you what your character is feeling or what their motivation is; at least not any more than any of the other content already established at that point in the game.  

It also has the saving grace of actually being well-written and internally consistent, as well as touching, funny, and even rewarding in the context of gameplay rewards.  As far as I'm concerned, that marks Slot Machine as particularly good.

For what it's worth, I agree with pretty much all of that.  My point is more that "lack of choice" does not necessarily translate to "bad writing".  I could be remembering wrong, but I don't recall Twinshot or Graves ever telling you what your motivation was either.  Does that put them on the same level?  Eh, not really.  I just don't think it's cool to trash them on the "don't tell me what I want to do!" factor when every arc is doing that to some degree or another.

[boggo2300]

2 minutes ago, Lazarillo said:

I just don't think it's cool to trash them on the "don't tell me what I want to do!" factor when every arc is doing that to some degree or another.

Honestly they don't need to be trashed for that, there are enough sins in that content they can justifiably be blamed for without resorting to that!

[Lazarillo]

2 minutes ago, boggo2300 said:

Honestly they don't need to be trashed for that, there are enough sins in that content they can justifiably be blamed for without resorting to that!

You better stop that, man.  We start finding too much common ground, discussion in this topic'll die off really quick.

Edited September 10, 2019 by Lazarillo

[MetaVileTerror]

Except Dr. Graves arc really does go beyond simply telling the player "you did the mission."

There's a big gap between the author stating that your character accepts the payment from the Slot Machine using language which doesn't assume the emotional state or motivation of your character, and the author of Dr. Graves arc explicitly using language which demonstrates the player-character as being dumb, emotionally-stunted, and completely ignorant of the rules which govern the Etoile Isles.  Add to that, the Graves arc is internally inconsistent on some of that as well, with your character's dialogue flip-flopping on just how ignorant they are between a few of the mission.  And I see no signs of it having been intentional insinuation of something cunning or secret; the writing is flat tropes.

 

This is the same problem I have with Fallout 4, especially after Fallout New Vegas demonstrated to Bethesda what Fallout 3 did wrong.  With Emil Pagliarulo doubling-down on his hole-laden plot, I would have been willing to forgive . . . but they also made a voiced protagonist.  I call "Fallout 4 the best Mass Effect game" for that reason.  I am starting to feel like I'm robbing the word of its meaning, but agency really is that important for writing in the context of a setting where the player is meant to have the authority to define their character.

[boggo2300]

1 minute ago, Lazarillo said:

You better stop that, man.  We start finding too much common ground, discussion in this topic'll die off really quick.

It kinda surprises me how bad some of the writing became, as there were actual published genre authors playing City some quite prominent and skilled, I would love to.see an arc by Mercedes Lackey or Jim Butcher, I think, and I haven't asked either of them, maybe I should, that part of the appeal of City to them was the blank slate of a lot of the mission text, that allowed you to create your own characters reactions and story

[Lazarillo]

2 minutes ago, MetaVileTerror said:

the author of Dr. Graves arc explicitly using language which demonstrates the player-character as being dumb, emotionally-stunted, and completely ignorant of the rules which govern the Etoile Isles.  Add to that, the Graves arc is internally inconsistent on some of that as well, with your character's dialogue flip-flopping on just how ignorant they are between a few of the mission.

I've actually been meaning to replay the Graves arc at some point (I never played it on the legacy servers, played it only once on Homecoming, and since I didn't know the ending at first, I wanted to see how it holds up when you know the "twist" ...if it's internally consistent as we talked about with Slot Machine, so to speak), but haven't yet so it's not as fresh in my mind, but I do remember for sure that the arc establishes at the very beginning that part of the "competition" involves mandating you act ignorant, in order to keep Arachnos' eyes off the participants.  So flip-flopping does kind of make sense, in a vacuum (like I said, I don't recall the points you're referring to in a specific nature, so that may or may not be what you're getting at).

[Eva Destruction]

9 minutes ago, boggo2300 said:

It kinda surprises me how bad some of the writing became, as there were actual published genre authors playing City some quite prominent and skilled, I would love to.see an arc by Mercedes Lackey or Jim Butcher, I think, and I haven't asked either of them, maybe I should, that part of the appeal of City to them was the blank slate of a lot of the mission text, that allowed you to create your own characters reactions and story

Mercedes Lackey did write a "guest author" AE arc.  It wasn't that good.  Someone told her this on the test server, and she responded with something along the lines of "that's fair.  Writing arcs is hard, it's different from writing a novel."

 

The writing became bad because Dr Aeon was a bad writer who was more interested in gimmicks than interesting and consistent worldbuilding, and thought he was more clever than he actually was.

[boggo2300]

9 minutes ago, Eva Destruction said:

Mercedes Lackey did write a "guest author" AE arc.  It wasn't that good.  Someone told her this on the test server, and she responded with something along the lines of "that's fair.  Writing arcs is hard, it's different from writing a novel."

 

The writing became bad because Dr Aeon was a bad writer who was more interested in gimmicks than interesting and consistent worldbuilding, and thought he was more clever than he actually was.

I quite enjoyed her AE story but yeah it needed polishing, but I imagine with practice would have become easier for her

 

Can't argue about Dr Aeon, there is nothing in those arcs that doesn't make me cringe,

[Lazarillo]

12 minutes ago, boggo2300 said:

Can't argue about Dr Aeon, there is nothing in those arcs that doesn't make me cringe,

I don't know that I'd go that far.  I'm not sure what he did and didn't write specifically, but there's plenty of stuff I liked that came after he was hired, including:

-Everything about Dean MacArthur

-Pretty much all the Praetorian starter arcs

-Some of the Tips (these vary pretty widely though, I admit)

-Dark Astoria (which has kind of a lame ending, but pretty good up 'til then)

-The aforementioned Skulls arcs, which were good, just suffer greatly for being incomplete

-The ideas he had for Kallisti and the Battalion arcs in the Lore AMAs sounded pretty good too, though admittedly here, there's a gap between concept and execution.

 

And yes, that all said, there were also some real story stinkers in the game's last couple of years, too.  I don't know which of those he did or didn't write, specifically, either, though.

Edited September 11, 2019 by Lazarillo

[boggo2300]

14 minutes ago, Lazarillo said:

I don't know that I'd go that far.  I'm not sure what he did and didn't write specifically, but there's plenty of stuff I liked that came after he was hired, including:

-Everything about Dean MacArthur

-Pretty much all the Praetorian starter arcs

-Some of the Tips (these vary pretty widely though, I admit)

-Dark Astoria (which has kind of a lame ending, but pretty good up 'til then)

-The aforementioned Skulls arcs, which were good, just suffer greatly for being incomplete

-The ideas he had for Kallisti and the Battalion arcs in the Lore AMAs sounded pretty good too, though admittedly here, there's a gap between concept and execution.

 

And yes, that all said, there were also some real story stinkers in the game's last couple of years, too.  I don't know which of those he did or didn't write, specifically, either, though.

The writing even in the Skull arc isn't great, but at least it's not annoying or railroadiy pretty much everything added after i21 has very bad writing in my opinion, it's just that some of it is still in passive voice so you can interpret it to suit your character

[Eva Destruction]

1 hour ago, MetaVileTerror said:

Slot Machine doesn't ever tell you what your character is feeling or what their motivation is; at least not any more than any of the other content already established at that point in the game.  

It also has the saving grace of actually being well-written and internally consistent, as well as touching, funny, and even rewarding in the context of gameplay rewards.  As far as I'm concerned, that marks Slot Machine as particularly good.

 

Granted, I remember /someone/ in the OOC/RP channel complaining about it for some reason . . . can't quite recall . . . 

It would be cool if CoV had "paths," kind of like Praetoria has Warden and Crusader or Power and Responsibility.  You'd know what kind of missions the contacts offer before you accepted them as a contact, so if your villain was a mustache-twirler they could choose contacts like Peter Themari but if they were "just misunderstood" they'd be happier with content like Slot Machine.

 

[MetaVileTerror]

I mean . . . I've been toying with the idea of proposing some rewrites of Red-Side content to A)  Give a brief warming of the content in an arc as part of the "Ask About This Contact" text, and B)  Each mission offering a pip on the appropriate Morality Alignment tracker.

[Herotu]

13 hours ago, MetaVileTerror said:

agency really is that important for writing in the context of a setting where the player is meant to have the authority to define their character.

I think the mission "engine" doesn't really give the devs much choice. Look at the architect.. have players been given loads of choice in the architect? Are we so smart that we've overcome the lack of choice inherent in the engine? 

Perhaps the best thing they could do (could they?) is give us a choice of contact, and taking one contact, locks off one (or more) others. That would provide us with choice, I guess.

Remember that in doing so you get this "redundant content" issue which would be expensive in dev terms if this game wasn't so much about rolling a zillion alts.

Edited September 11, 2019 by Herotu

[MetaVileTerror]

This isn't about the limitations of the engine; but entirely about the specific use of language in the Dr. Graves arc.  Yes, there are issues with finding ways to grant players the power to make meaningful decisions about their characters when the mission architecture is built the way it is.  I won't call out "bad writing" when there's something in the gameplay limiting choice.  I call out "bad writing" because the /writing/ takes away agency.