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Mind Games mission feedback *spoilers*
ascaladar
Member Posts: 186 Arc User
*Spoilers*
I love that mission, you start at being captured by the Tal Shiar and being indoctrinated, fighting the indoctrination was fun while at the same time futile and then in phase two I suddenly get the chance to cause chaos and escape, which after the first half of the mission really felt to easy.
Now I wonder myself did my character really escape or was being let go with a loyal to the Tal-Shiar sleeper personality hidden inside him/her, quite a lot more chances of romulan treachery in future missions.
Still I think it is my new favorite mission in STO.
I love that mission, you start at being captured by the Tal Shiar and being indoctrinated, fighting the indoctrination was fun while at the same time futile and then in phase two I suddenly get the chance to cause chaos and escape, which after the first half of the mission really felt to easy.
Now I wonder myself did my character really escape or was being let go with a loyal to the Tal-Shiar sleeper personality hidden inside him/her, quite a lot more chances of romulan treachery in future missions.
Still I think it is my new favorite mission in STO.
Post edited by ascaladar on
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Comments
Why do you think the mission is bad or even infuriating?
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Sounds like the makings of a good Foundry mission to me
And this a good thing. The fact that people feel strongly about this demonstrates that it was an effective method to underline how evil the Tal Shiar are. If there's a single thing that the Romulan campaign gets right where the Fed and KDF campaigns fall flat on their face, it's the issue of emotional attachment. The Romulan story gives us identifiable people in bad situations that we can feel empathize with.
I'd speculated back when the FE came out that Hakeev wasn't a liberated drone, but an "artificial" one, and that his missing eye was a result of a failure in the process (a liberated drone without an eye would probably be left with their implant, but a failure could have left him unable to be fitted with one). I think this scene lends some credibility to my theory.
It also sets apart why what the Tal Shiar is doing with Borg tech is bad yet half of Starfleet is running around with borg tech sticking out of their ship at odd angles.
Though, It may be the current Tal-Shiar is doing what it does due to Hakeev's leadership. In TNG and DS9 It seemed like your standard, partially dubious intelligence organization.
I hadn't heard/thought of that before. It makes a lot of sense. Yeah, it struck me odd that in the Undine arc, you admonish the Romulans for using Borg Tech, but then 6 months later, cryptic added the Borg set...
It is in line with how the Klingons acted on the shows though. I think Cryptic did a decent enough job making it feel like a Klingon storyline while giving the payer enough leeway for charater self-interpruetation. LoR all but writes your character for you by contrast, which is not soemthing I am terribly thrilled about. it's all but impossible to roleplay anything resembling a 'traditional' Romulan-all the dialogue chocies are so very strongly ...opinionated.
I always choose the option to let them go with the borg technology, it seemed so hypocrytical to go picking on the Romulans, who have been stomped on so completely ever since Nemesis (and to a lesser degree, DS9) for doing something that the Federation has been doing since Voyager. the new storyline seems to be continuing the double standard angle though. I seem to remember on the borg cube level the Romulans research being phrased specifically as 'reckless' and basically wrong solely fr the reason that the Rommes were doing it...
For me, Mind Games was a good attempt, but fell far short of the revulsion I felt during Divide et Impera. "Revulsion?!" you might ask (go on, I dare ya). Yes, my stomach was churning with disgust through it, though perhaps not quite for the reason Cryptic intended. Yes, I thought it sounded fishy from the start, but I had two admirals telling me to Just Do It, and so (with reservations) I started in.
(BTW, consider this a Divide et Impera spoiler warning. If you haven't played it yet, DON'T read past here.)
Now, when I did this the first time, I don't know if the AI was programmed differently then, or I was just too inefficient at fighting to cope with it, but Romulan medics healed and rezzed their allies. A LOT. To the point where, if a group had two medics, it was almost impossible to win a fight without vaporizing the Romulans one at a time so they couldn't be rezzed, and I wasn't really set up to do that in a reliable fashion. I finally hit upon a tactic that worked, though. If there was one medic, it was easy enough to assign all my BOffs to take him down with my assistance. If there was two, I'd sic all my BOffs on one, and then I'd go up and repeatedly club the other, knocking him down over and over so he couldn't heal or rez the first medic; once the first medic was down, I'd bring over the BOffs to finish stomping this one, and then finally take on the rest of the group.
The problem in Divide et Impera, of course, was that, for some reason, there were a lot of medics and scientists around. And as the story progressed, and our reason for attacking the station grew more and more suspect, I had a harder and harder time doing it...standing over a doctors clubbing them repeatedly when all they wanted was to get up to heal, to save their colleagues, their friends, and I kept swinging, and swinging, and swinging while they lay there helpless....
dammit. >_<
By the end of the mission, knowing that I had, in cold blood, just massacred a station full of doctors, I was ready to throw up. I've never been affected by a mission like that before, and sadly, Mind Games couldn't match up. Nice try, but...
(Now, of course, I'm much better at wholesale slaughter on ground maps, so I can get an alt through DeI with minimal conscience pangs, but it still kinda haunts me).
That was a great story. Horrifying. Thought provoking. Amusing (am I a terrible person?). It had everything!
I guess in a way the Borgification during "Mind Games" could be worse, in that all you as the player do is push some buttons and things happen. Whereas your story relates a more hands-on approach. Your direct actions had direct consequences. It's said that to kill with a knife is much harder than to kill with a gun for exactly this reason. The Borgification is indirect, things happen by your will and agency but not by your hand.
But I wonder how far it's really wise to take this mission. I mean, sure it could be written to be truly awful... But aren't we here to play games and have fun? STO isn't exactly a hardcore title. I think our target here is "disturbing" rather than "psychologically scarring".
And now, kittens.
I stopped Mindgames in the middle. I won't be doing it at all on Holodeck.
I like to think that every toon is a spin off of me, and I take what they do personally.
Firing phasers - I'd do that. Putting a Borg implant on someone kicking and screaming - never.
Playing a mission where you literally have no choice but to do what you would not - no.
Maybe I'm the only one who would say this. But I think I'm not.
Luckily, there is the "Skip" option.
All the sabotage methods were extremely funny. First there was the fake borg drone. Then there was the fire...after disabling the automatic fire suppression system and hiding the extinguisher. Next was the gas. And probably the funniest was repairing the Borg walker and then watching everyone chase it around while freaking out.
Hakeev's Puppet - you do everything they say
Defiant - you resist doing everything they say (yes, you're still forced to do it)
Needless to say, watching that ship collapse into the singularity felt really good. :cool: I just wish Tovan had given me a minute to watch it burn before reporting.
"Critics who say that the optimistic utopia Star Trek depicted is now outmoded forget the cultural context that gave birth to it: Star Trek was not a manifestation of optimism when optimism was easy. Star Trek declared a hope for a future that nobody stuck in the present could believe in. For all our struggles today, we haven’t outgrown the need for stories like Star Trek. We need tales of optimism, of heroes, of courage and goodness now as much as we’ve ever needed them."
-Thomas Marrone
Divide et Impera was just a bad mission. Why? Because you are supposed to be in full command of you mental faculties and yet, you are unable to do anything. You are not brainwashed. You are just acting like a complete moron. You already know about Undine shapechangers from the incident at P'jem, the Romulans claim that they are doctors and then you find that the station is producing something to unmask Undine. At that point EVERY SINGLE CAPTAIN FROM THE SERIES would have stuck a phaser into Zelles nose and beamed back to perform a few very invasive medical scans. Heck, there were whole episodes written about captains who turned on admirals who broke the law. But no, not you. You are just a stupid moron who can't see the truth if it is shot in his face. How you graduated from Starfleet Academy is a miracle. You are probably a Pakled exchange officer who stole a red uniform to make him go.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
That walker was the one saving grace to the entire mission.. I sincerely want one as a pet..
I understand that some people say its too dark, but it is there to show how evil Sela and Hakeev have become.
Its that "They killed your family/friends, now they force you to commit atrocity" . It makes you revile and hate them properly, even more.
Yes. Killing your friend, killing harmless pets, and forcefully implanting a fully conscious person with borg parts is a big list of atrocities.
Tovan speaking to you...it is a bit odd. Sela could be talking to you trough an implanted speaker in your ear, but Tovan? Did he put something in my other ear ? :eek:
Also, Divide et Imperat was odd. My character would have no problem slaughtering medics, but she would not be so dumb as to not see the whole "Undine thing" from while ahead.
No one is speaking to you (Sela has better stuff to do), it's in your mind. Kind of like the psychic attack on Bashir where the station crew represents aspects of him.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
Both Nero and Hakeev had their ships retrofitted with Borg technology, hence their unusual appearances. Hakeev's, the I.R.W. Khnial, was a D'deridex class warbird in the tutorial.
"Critics who say that the optimistic utopia Star Trek depicted is now outmoded forget the cultural context that gave birth to it: Star Trek was not a manifestation of optimism when optimism was easy. Star Trek declared a hope for a future that nobody stuck in the present could believe in. For all our struggles today, we haven’t outgrown the need for stories like Star Trek. We need tales of optimism, of heroes, of courage and goodness now as much as we’ve ever needed them."
-Thomas Marrone
I thought it was a voice generated by an implant or something.
The mission really affected my character. I'm had him buy a shuttle and abandon the cause to live as a drunk on Nimbus III for now, scarred from the events of the Tal Shiar infiltration.
My character Tsin'xing
While I get that the point of the mission is that your character is being brainwashed, there's no actual brainwashing involved (that we can see). I pick up the disruptor and shoot one of my officers... why? Because it's the only button--the only way to progress. Why can't I shoot the Tal Shiar overseer? Or myself? From plot we're given, there's no actual reason why my character would do what the Tal Shiar want.
Same with the instances: what's really stopping me from smashing them on the table? Why would I detonate the thaleron weapon in the terrarium? In all cases, why do anything at all? Because there's only one button.
In all these cases, the character would realistically have other choices, but as a player I don't. The only reason the character and the player press the buttons is because they're the only buttons left, and it ultimately left me unsatisfied.
I can see two ways this might be corrected.
1. Don't trust your eyes!
Tovan had the right idea. Make the player's choices unreliable. Do the buttons really do what they say they do? This piece here--is is a harmless piece of scrap or a thaleron trigger? Am I dismantling the weapon or putting it together? Am I beaming the epohhs away or detonating the bomb? Let the Tal shiar lie to the player, let them trick him/her into doing what they want. Let the player struggle, try to figure out what they can actually do to resist. He have been tortured and operated on by the Tal Shiar, so the whole situation is already of dubious reality. Play it for all it's worth.
2. The Lesser of Two Evils
Have the Tal Shiar make the player choose between what they want you to do and something terrible. "The bomb has been activated. Here's a console with two buttons--one will beam it into a room full of captured children, the other into a terrarium with epohhs. The clock is ticking, subcommander."
Either way, the idea is avoid making the player press the bad button just because there's no other button. Let them really fight, or else make them press the bad button because the alternative is worse.
Ehm, what do you think Hakeev is doing to you in the cutscene after the interrogation? Taking out your tonsils? For further enlightenment check your new "Deprogrammed" trait under "Passives".
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.