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Epoch: Existence
mildago
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
This is my first mission that I have created in the STO foundry and I was looking for some criticisms and suggestions to help with the piece itself as well as the current piece I'm working on. The details are below. Currently this is just part one of the Existence series within the Epoch collection. The three part story arc (Existence, Threshold, and Interface) may eventually be combined into one but we will see with the later parts. I also want to know if it currently deserves the effort to continue the story as already I feel like it pales to Epoch: ...for a Single Yesterday, which is currently being built. Maybe I'm wrong and it's just the mastery over the Foundry that is making the newer feel better or the leaning of being more far more character oriented.
Mission Name: Epoch: Existence
Author: mildago
Minimum Level: Any
Allegiance: Federation (not Romulan friendly)
Project ID: ST-HOTY8VSFQ
Estimated Mission Length: 30-45 Minutes
Two weeks ago the U.S.S. Wayfarer was authorized by the Cardassian Union to chart and analyze a relatively younger black hole in the Zenas Expanse. Commanded by Captain Alexei Panshin they were allowed a relatively light and small research vessel, per request of the Cardassians, to spend three weeks exploring the Signora Rosaura Singularity.
Three days ago Starfleet lost contact with the U.S.S. Wayfarer, however after 32 hours of silence a distress signal was received for 2 minutes and 13 seconds requesting assistance. The message was jumbled by subspace interference from the singularity and after a day of clearing up the message Captain Panshin was cut off after saying the name "Geppetto". Inquires were made but no matches, besides fictional characters, could be found in the Starfleet database.
Go to the Toron System to begin this mission.
Note: Away mission dialogue requires one of each of the bridge officer types.
Mission Name: Epoch: Existence
Author: mildago
Minimum Level: Any
Allegiance: Federation (not Romulan friendly)
Project ID: ST-HOTY8VSFQ
Estimated Mission Length: 30-45 Minutes
Two weeks ago the U.S.S. Wayfarer was authorized by the Cardassian Union to chart and analyze a relatively younger black hole in the Zenas Expanse. Commanded by Captain Alexei Panshin they were allowed a relatively light and small research vessel, per request of the Cardassians, to spend three weeks exploring the Signora Rosaura Singularity.
Three days ago Starfleet lost contact with the U.S.S. Wayfarer, however after 32 hours of silence a distress signal was received for 2 minutes and 13 seconds requesting assistance. The message was jumbled by subspace interference from the singularity and after a day of clearing up the message Captain Panshin was cut off after saying the name "Geppetto". Inquires were made but no matches, besides fictional characters, could be found in the Starfleet database.
Go to the Toron System to begin this mission.
Note: Away mission dialogue requires one of each of the bridge officer types.
Post edited by baddmoonrizin on
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Comments
I've added your mission in my ever growing list of missions to preview. It might take a while before I will get to your mission, hope you don't mind.
I call it, the Stoutes paradox.
(WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS)
Right off the bat let me point out that your dialog says report to DS9, but your quest text says the Toron system. One would think you could streamline this a bit. Either have the mission start on DS9, or have the dialog simply be from DS9 and order you to the Toron system. It would make it less confusing.
The dialog with the Admiral was fine, if short. She didn't give many details, but any extra info could've been sent in a data burst from DS9. Maybe a comment that she's sending the details in a message?
The dialog announcing the decloaking ship was... too light? There was no concern in the officer's voice. Just... "however, once we scanned a ship decloaked." There is no meat to that statement... it's just a statement. Most officers would show a bit more concern about a ship suddenly decloaking.
The enemy appeared human... After the first fight my officers should be able to tell me something about who the enemy was. What type of ship, or weapons were they using? Even if all they say is; "We weren't able to get any detailed scans of the enemy ship, sir." It's still something, and gives life to your story.
When we follow the warp trail of the fleeing enemy you say it disperses as it goes through the gas giant. This really needs to be corrected. Normal travel at warp won't allow a ship to pass through a solid object. The ship would be crushed by the gas giant or... well any number of technobabble things that would destroy the ship. Fact is... if they could travel through a solid object we need a reason for it, even if the officers just state "We don't know how they managed it, but..." Also, you could just say the proximity to the gas giant is TRIBBLE with our sensors... blah, blah... we need to go around it. That would work too.
Same with the closing statement from the Wayfarer... "We hid in the gas giant..." is not something current technology in Starfleet would allow. Maybe... in the rings of the gas giant, or perhaps even the atmosphere of the gas giant... but not simply "in the gas giant".
Also... why would the bad buys just give up and leave, but still threaten to destroy the ship? Better yet, why would I agree to let them? My ship is undamaged, despite them attacking us with several of their ships... it would seem they are little threat to me, and I have no reason to simply abandon a Starfleet ship that could, somewhat easily, be salvaged. Though you did give me the option of choosing not to abandon the ship, it's presented in a way that my character thought it was a good option.
I really enjoyed the ground exploration. The long dark tunnels were a neat backdrop to scanning and trying to figure out what was going on. Aside from some spelling and grammatical errors this was very well done.
The rest of the mission went well, and ended on a cliff-hanger, which I enjoy. I really find on-going stories interesting. I would suggest going back over some of your grammar and spelling.
Overall I found your missing fun. It has just enough combat, but not too much. Exploration and an attempt at diplomacy. Rescues, and scientific discovery. Despite my complaints above I think your mission was well worth the time it took to run it, and I look foreword to your next one. Well done!
So on to the suggestions and questions:
For some reason it wouldn't let me select DS9 for the mission entry point and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why. However I am currently looking into a way around this by having the player actually beam off of DS9. But its in the works.
I don't know the balance for how much is too much when it comes to mission fluff and exposition by characters giving the mission. Currently in "...for a Single Yesterday" I have the character choose whether or not to have more of the background information be discussed and to give more context, however for the story itself it depends on the player's desire for level of world building they need to believe in the characters.
I can see that. Especially with the current war with the Klingons, a single decloaking ships aren't extremely terrifying but it is worrisome. Particularly when the the ship decloaking is not a klingon ship.
Yeah, I was really thinking about adding more dialogue with the boffs to really help set the tone of mystery and exploration. Its the difference between withholding information (which is bad) and cleverly hiding the information (which is good).
I need to reword that part. I was trying to have the warp trail be "lost" as it passes near the atmosphere of the Gas Giant because of some technobabble dealing with high gravity and atmospheric turbulence. I'll reword and rewrite that entire map. It has a lot of logical flaws within it. Especially when I don't say they hid in the atmosphere not in the actual gas giant, since people tend to do that a lot in trek.
I'll have to rework that conversation.
Did using multiple boffs bounce off one another work? I was really worried that people who play like me (tactical officer and slight min-maxer) wouldn't have a balanced party with all three types in their away team or just not want to bring them. It was one of my more risky attempts. But I think its essential to have the player interact with their crew/away team. It makes good story telling.
Without spoilers was "the reveals" the first or second one predictable, were they not effective. You could send me a message with your response if you don't want to give too much away on here since you did have your warning at the top of your review. I plan a rewrite sometime soonish if homework or work doesn't take precedence, it also be slightly second to "...for a Single Yesterday" since that story is far more developed than this one, or what I believe.
EDIT: I also changed the starting location.
I've finished my review of Epoch: Existence! Hope you'd like it!
I call it, the Stoutes paradox.
Federation Mission - Epoch: Existence
Author: mildago
Allegiance: Federation
Project ID: ST-HOTY8VSFQ
Report Start
Summary: This is a good mission, especially for your first work in the Foundry. The battles are tough but fun. The story dialogue is intriguing and well written. I would definitely recommend this mission to all players who like a good story mission with several tough battles. I would not recommend it on Elite as it was tough enough on Normal.
As I have mentioned many times before the response button "Continue" is the default response when a button is left blank for dialogue. I noted "Continue" was used for several response button to dialogue throughout most maps for this mission. There are places in dialogue where "Continue" works but most of the time it just does not work. This is particularly true when the "Player" is receiving reports from a BOFF. It can sometimes be difficult finding the appropriate response, but I believe it helps make the player feel like they are part of the story rather than just reading dialog.
One last thing I mentioned triggered dialogue on a few of the maps below. What I am referring to is the dialogue that when a player reaches a point on the map there is dialogue that normally appears on the players screen. You appeared to be using it to indicate certain things about the area the player had arrived at. It seemed to be coming from one of the BOFFs. As I mention below this type of dialogue will appear only on the screen and can be easily missed by the player. That is why I suggested replacing it with popup dialogue that the player can easily read.
Below are some things I noted while playing the mission that I wanted to let you know about. Everything in this write up should be seen as suggestions on ways I felt you could improve certain elements of the mission. They are yours to do with as you see fit.
Mission Description: This description is very well written and detailed. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this description.
Grant Mission Dialogue: The grant dialogue is well written. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this dialogue.
Mission Task: Consider adding the start location for the initial contact or custom map so the player can locate where to start easier. I noted no spelling errors with this initial task.
Mission Entry Prompt: Referring back to the mission task locating the entry point for your mission was very difficult. I had to run around the main deck of DS9 and came across the entry point completely by accident. Consider changing the mission task to define the exact location on DS9 of this entry point. Or consider changing the start location to another place. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this prompt.
MAPS:
Deep Space Nine: This is a good but simple map design with well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue". From this point forward I will note the maps it is used on and explain it in the summary.
-The entry for this map should be moved to entry point to DS9 on the sector map.
-The initial Hail Deep Space Nine button says "Interact" which is the default setting of the button when not filled in by the author. Consider changing it to "Open hailing frequencies" or something along those lines.
-Consider changing "However 12 hours ago received a distress call from Captain Alexei Panshin" to read "Twelve hours ago we received a distress call from Captain Alexei Panshin".
-Consider changing "From what we could discern from, the message that the U.S.S. Wayfarer had been attacked or suffered from some sort of cataclysmic failure" to read "From what we wer able to discern from the message, the ship had either suffered an attack or had a cataclysmic systems failure".
-Consider changing the following sentence into two separate sentences at the comma; "From what we could tell they seem to be in working order, we have deduced there would be no way they would be able to send a signal out of the interference from the black hole".
ZEA-213: This is a good map design with a couple of fun battles and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue".
-The use of triggered dialogue that only displays on the screen, for example "Sir we?re picking up a derelict Federation ship", is not recommended. It can easily be missed by a player depending on where they display onscreen dialogue. In my case it is across the top of the screen.
-Consider changing "[Rank], A ship is decloaking" to read "[Rank], a ship is decloaking".
-Consider changing "However, it appears they are hailing us" to read "They are hailing us".
Nearby System: This is a good map design with tough but fun battles and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-Consider changing "Perhaps if we go around the gas giant we mightbe able to pick it up again" to read "Perhaps if we go around the gas giant we might pick it up again".
-Consider changing the response button "Can anyone tell me who we're up against" to read "Any idea who we are up against".
-Consider changing
-Consider changing "There weapons are firing damage like I've never seen before, its similar to the Cardassian disruptor however its shifting beyond phaser and disruptor damage" to read "There weapons are producing damage like I've never seen before. It's similar to the Cardassian disruptor however it's shifting beyond phaser and disruptor range".
-Consider changing "against a superior opponet" to read "against a superior opponent".
-Consider changing the response button "Lets find the Wayfarer" to read "Let's find the Wayfarer".
-Consider changing "I ahve no intention of leaving my ship" to read "I have no intention of leaving my ship".
Mysterious M Class Planet: This is a good map design with well written story dialogue. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this dialogue or any issues with the map.
Planet Surface: This is a good map design with well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue".
-Consider using "Captain" vice "Sir".
-Consider changing the map transfer button "Continue" to read "Let's go".
Underground Tunnels: This is a good map design with well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue".
-Consider adding popup dialogue that comes up following each scan to provide information on each item scanned.
-Consider changing "Perhpas the interference is masking the other DNA" to read "Perhaps the interference is masking the other DNA".
-Consider changing the response button "Lets keep going" to read "Let's keep going".
-The use of triggered dialogue that only displays on the screen, for example "This seems to be some sort of engine or generator room" is not recommended.
-Consider changing "I'm picking up Human, Klingon, Cardassian, Gorn" to read "I'm picking up Human, Klingon, Cardassian, and Gorn".
-The map transfer dialogue button "Go to Next Map" is the default entry for the button. Consider changing it to read "Let's go".
Unknown Facility: This is a good map design with tough but fun battles and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue".
-The respawn points you added will not work as I believe you intended them to. The very fist respawn point is closest to the entry and exit point for the map. That respawn point is most likely the one you will need more than the others you created. The other points generated deeper into the map actually override the first one you created. Consider removing the other respawn points deeper in the map.
-The use of triggered dialogue that only displays on the screen, for example "Sir this is Klingon Technology, how long have they been doing this" is not recommended.
-Consider changing "This is federation crates and technology" to read "These crates and consoles are apparently Federation".
-Consider adding popup dialogue that comes up following each console the player investigates to provide information on each item scanned.
-Consider changing "He's unconcious" to read "He's unconscious".
-The sentence starting with "Without the proper sequence it would kill him" does not read correctly and needs to be rewritten.
-The sentence starting with "[Rank], as much as I would like" does not read correctly and needs to be rewritten.
-The "Investigate holographic display" task interaction button says "Interact" which is the default for interaction devices if the author does not make a change. Consider changing it to read "Activate console".
Geppetto's M Class Planet: This is a good map design with several tough but fun battles and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue".
-The sentence starting with "[Rank], it looks like the technology" is a run on sentence and needs to be rewritten.
Geppetto's Space Lab: This is a good map design with several tough but fun battles and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
-The use of the response button "Continue".
-Consider changing "However, i hate to be the one to break this to you" to read "However, I hate to be the one to break this to you"
-Consider moving the Imposter's ship closer to the "Defeat Geppetto Imposter" task location.
Report to Deep Space Nine: This is a good map design with well written story dialogue that wraps up the mission. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this dialogue or any issues with the map.
End Report
Thanks again for authoring and for giving me the chance to review your work. You did a great job developing this mission and I look forward to playing/reviewing more of your work in the future.
Brian
This critique report also filed 10/27/2013 on forum posting for: In depth mission reports upon request.