Bob From Accounting Episode 1 & 2

littlesarbonn

This is more of a fun adventure, involving missions given by Bob From Accounting, where the missions start to indicate there might be more about Bob than we realize. It's my first foundry mission, so it probably needs a lot of work, but I'm not proud. I'll keep revamping this thing until people actually like it.

The second part of the mission is in the review area of the Foundry (the first one is in the regular Foundry area having received over 5 reviews). The second adventure involves Bob sending you on a mission to recover something extremely delicate, but equally important. It also involves my first attempt at creating a map that is more than just a generic one. Hope you all like it.

littlesarbonn

Have updated this mission so it's fixed pretty well. Would love feedback on this and reviews so I can release it into the main foundry lists.

littlesarbonn

One thing I'll say is that it is EXTREMELY difficult to get people to review a foundry mission. My fleet is great friends of me, and then when I ask for a review, they all sort of disappear (still there, but won't say a word and then suddenly start talking about whatever they were talking about before).

Starting to think that creating foundry missions is not worth the effort if no one ever wants to play them.

markhawkman

It's best if the first task in a Foundry mission has the name of the location to start the mission.

Why does Bob have white eyes?

Kroger was hilarious. It'd be a bit funnier if there was several response choices.

"More Gorn Raiders" needs a dialog telling you where to go

"We found where he was taken" such bad techno babble...

Martian surface... the locations of the mobs seems... arbitrary and dumb.

"Talk to Gorn Captain Male 02"..... Also his dialog is weird...

Why does Candy look like Kes?

Go to next map? Enter cave

Overall, the mission left me wondering what was going on. Kinda like the story was missing actually.

littlesarbonn

markhawkman wrote: »

It's best if the first task in a Foundry mission has the name of the location to start the mission.

Why does Bob have white eyes?

Kroger was hilarious. It'd be a bit funnier if there was several response choices.

"More Gorn Raiders" needs a dialog telling you where to go

"We found where he was taken" such bad techno babble...

Martian surface... the locations of the mobs seems... arbitrary and dumb.

"Talk to Gorn Captain Male 02"..... Also his dialog is weird...

Why does Candy look like Kes?

Go to next map? Enter cave

Overall, the mission left me wondering what was going on. Kinda like the story was missing actually.

Thank you for the comments. All good information I will use to make the mission better.

Actually, not sure why Bob has white eyes. Guess I never looked that close when I designed him.

I didn't know you could make multiple response choices. That's a great idea.

littlesarbonn

This may sound like a complaint, but it's not really meant to be taken that way. But I never realized how hard it is to get people to try out a foundry mission. I'm in a huge fleet, and I've been able to get a token few to try it out. On the boards, you can hear a pin drop from the people interested in trying out a new foundry mission.

I kind of thought that players would be anxious to play anything new, but I guess the foundry isn't perceived that way. Kind of sorry I put all of those hours into this project now.

duncanidaho11

It's definitely hard work trying to get a mission going from the forums alone. A lot of what's discovered is semi-viral with missions graduating out of the top 3 getting a lot of plays while in the "new" tab, then drifting off to semi-obscurity unless they're tied to a series, prove incredibly popular on merit, or located a planet with an official Cryptic mission (where players frequently go.)

It's getting those ~6 plays that's key, and hopefully avoiding the seemingly random bug that prevents some missions from qualifying for rewards (and thereby appearing in the sector block, affecting its long-term profile until Cryptic sorts that bug out, which we have brought to their attention.) People to reach out to for help with promotion are the Foundry Roundtable (dedicated podcast) and Legion of Myth (streaming group, player side perspective), both of which do mission liveplays. Easiest way to get a hold of either, just ping me (I'll push the message on) or contact either LoM or Roundtab through their twitch, youtube, or twitter outlets.

Also, you can post your mission at http://www.foundrymissions.com/ for additional presence (people do search through that and you can provide screenshots, tags, and a full description.) It also lets you provide easy links to your missions (such as for a forum signature.)

For getting fleets involved, you might try running a contest to help motivate people. Easiest way to moderate that, just have folks PM you in game when they complete your mission. Then, you compile a list of names and draw one at random to receive a designated prize (ex. assign numbers, roll a physical or electronic dice.) For that, lock box keys are pretty good incentives.

And lastly: participate in challenges (there's one coming up soon. ) Those are heavily promoted and players are encouraged to play all entries. It's a good way of getting your name out there as a new Foundry author and if you make a winning mission there's a chance your mission will earn itself a spotlight. It's a good creative exercise, regardless, and you learn both from your own building process and seeing what others made in the same time how to approach a story concept and build a compelling mission.



The long and the short of it is that there are a lot of Foundry missions out there and while you might not see too much posted here, there is a regular output in game. Anything you make has to compete for attention against that, older missions, and regular STO business. So, a bit of self promotion is necessary to get the ball rolling. And what that means is providing as much of a hook as possible (screenshots are great) and connect with those in the community who can give you critical feedback and help spread the word about your mission.

Hope this helps, and I've added Bob to our (Roundtable's) list of missions to liveplay. If you want us to wait for revisions on ep 1, let me know.

littlesarbonn

duncanidaho11 wrote: »

It's definitely hard work trying to get a mission going from the forums alone. A lot of what's discovered is semi-viral with missions graduating out of the top 3 getting a lot of plays while in the "new" tab, then drifting off to semi-obscurity unless they're tied to a series, prove incredibly popular on merit, or located a planet with an official Cryptic mission (where players frequently go.)

It's getting those ~6 plays that's key, and hopefully avoiding the seemingly random bug that prevents some missions from qualifying for rewards (and thereby appearing in the sector block, affecting its long-term profile until Cryptic sorts that bug out, which we have brought to their attention.) People to reach out to for help with promotion are the Foundry Roundtable (dedicated podcast) and Legion of Myth (streaming group, player side perspective), both of which do mission liveplays. Easiest way to get a hold of either, just ping me (I'll push the message on) or contact either LoM or Roundtab through their twitch, youtube, or twitter outlets.

Also, you can post your mission at http://www.foundrymissions.com/ for additional presence (people do search through that and you can provide screenshots, tags, and a full description.) It also lets you provide easy links to your missions (such as for a forum signature.)

For getting fleets involved, you might try running a contest to help motivate people. Easiest way to moderate that, just have folks PM you in game when they complete your mission. Then, you compile a list of names and draw one at random to receive a designated prize (ex. assign numbers, roll a physical or electronic dice.) For that, lock box keys are pretty good incentives.

And lastly: participate in challenges (there's one coming up soon. ) Those are heavily promoted and players are encouraged to play all entries. It's a good way of getting your name out there as a new Foundry author and if you make a winning mission there's a chance your mission will earn itself a spotlight. It's a good creative exercise, regardless, and you learn both from your own building process and seeing what others made in the same time how to approach a story concept and build a compelling mission.



The long and the short of it is that there are a lot of Foundry missions out there and while you might not see too much posted here, there is a regular output in game. Anything you make has to compete for attention against that, older missions, and regular STO business. So, a bit of self promotion is necessary to get the ball rolling. And what that means is providing as much of a hook as possible (screenshots are great) and connect with those in the community who can give you critical feedback and help spread the word about your mission.

Hope this helps, and I've added Bob to our (Roundtable's) list of missions to liveplay. If you want us to wait for revisions on ep 1, let me know.

Thanks for that. I was in the middle of doing my third mission (a Klingon one this time) when I was trying to get anyone in my fleet (there were about 30 online) to review either of my previous two missions and got nothing but dead air silence. Kind of gave up right then and there cause it just didn't seem worth it.

I'll try some of your ideas later. Right now, I'm still a bit frustrated with the whole thing so probably going to take some time out of the game for now.

where2r1

Well...the title sounds pretty funny.

littlesarbonn

where2r1 wrote: »

Well...the title sounds pretty funny.

It's a serious mission (or series of missions) with humor throughout.

duncanidaho11

Hey! Roundtable gave part 1 a play. Here's a simple link to the twitch video (we start off with some discussion then head into our adventure with bob.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/296127003

We had fun and provided some technical commentary and writing ideas (mainly how one could go further with certain comedy bits, you have some nice setups here.)

Summary would be: keep pushing with learning the Foundry and be sure that you're playing through your missions with an eye to flow, presentation, and how the player might break things if they go through a set of encounters out of sequence. Definitely try to pick up how to use triggers, if you haven't already done so in your latest missions, rotate objects as needed (your consoles had no back side, could have easily hidden that by moving up against walls), and try to have some fun with the costume creator (I noticed that bob had the default NPC mash-up. )

minababe

littlesarbonn wrote: »

This may sound like a complaint, but it's not really meant to be taken that way. But I never realized how hard it is to get people to try out a foundry mission.

It helps to exchange reviews with other players in the forums also looking for people to play their missions. Just be very honest and detailed in your review (don't just post fluff). If the player senses you really took the time to play his mission and carefully note all the good and bad points, he will most likely do the same for you.