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The Legacy of Romulus: Paralells official thread

Parallels

Your orders are to take your warbird and claim a new world for the republic. what you find is a world that has developed a society just like the planet Vulcan during the time of the sundering. will you be able to bring peace between the warlord and those who follow Surak? what has happened to this planet's version of the early Romulans? Discover all this and more in this one part mission with two alternate endings!

This mission has a lot of custom map and costume work and a compelling story. Look for a fully published version this month. It will be playable to level 50 fed aligned Romulan players.
A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.

Comments

  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    edited October 2015
    mission is for any level fed aligned Romulans player.
    Post edited by lincolninspace on
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • guljarolguljarol Member Posts: 979 Arc User
    That was fast ;) I expected it in a few weeks LOL​​
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    I've put a lot of hours into this one :)
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • guljarolguljarol Member Posts: 979 Arc User
    I played it tonight, and it was a truly nice mission.

    I took time to explore some maps. They were really great. I liked "my ship", and the planet with its ruins, and the village of the locals was really pretty. I took a lot of selfies. :smiley:;)

    I also liked the "beam out" effect. On two maps it caused me to "fall", because I beamed waaay above the ground, but that's a small price to pay for the effect, if it can't be fixed.

    Capt. Arronax - I see what you did here! :wink:


    Some thing could be improved:

    There were some typos here and there.

    On two maps the objective tab disappears. One was after talking to the people in the Ready Room. I used "V" to find where my objective was. The other one was after talking to the Warlord. Again, I used "V" to find out where to go.

    At the end the objective says "Talk to Romulan /scientist"- I think. I forgot. But I noticed Gen. M'Chev and talked to him. And the mission ended, so no Romulan to talk to. I'm not sure if I broke something by talking to him first, or it's some leftover from a different objective before the Romulan was changed to M'Chev.


    None of the issues were mission breaking, it went fairly smoothly, and it was really interesting to explore that world. :)

    I think my outfit was a good match to that world's aesthetics ;)

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    gkZbqhh.jpg

    And BTW, you broke my heart, because I sooooo wanted to go there and couldn't! ;)
    UDT39Kx.jpg
    ​​
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    Glad enjoyed the mission. I'm curious which of the two endings you found one is surak's fate and the other involves a man named Tellus (no spoilers please). The ending with M'chev... Yeah I'll clean that little mess up. Almost changed it to a Romulan character but decided to keep it at the last second.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • guljarolguljarol Member Posts: 979 Arc User
    Oh, I completely forgot that you mentioned two endings!

    I found Surak's fate.

    Shame my other Rommies are KDF. I'd run it again on one of them to find the other ending :D
    I'll run it again with my Karameth some day soon. Too curious to drop it now LOL​​
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    Parallels

    Your orders are to take your warbird and claim a new world for the republic. what you find is a world that has developed a society just like the planet Vulcan during the time of the sundering. will you be able to bring peace between the warlord and those who follow Surak? what has happened to this planet's version of the early Romulans? Discover all this and more in this one part mission with two alternate endings!

    This mission has a lot of custom map and costume work and a compelling story. Look for a fully published version this month. It will be playable to level 50 fed aligned Romulan players.

    The mission now begins in the beta quadrant at the New Romulus system. Thank you for the support.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • paxfederaticapaxfederatica Member Posts: 1,496 Arc User
    edited September 2015
    I played this last night. Here are my comments:
    • I'd change the Map 1 transition button text (the one that shows up at the New Romulus system at the start) to something more descriptive like Begin: "Parallels".
    • I like how you redressed the Odyssey bridge map to stand in for the New Romulus underground bunker, then transitioned it to represent an actual Odyssey bridge.
    • On the village map where I'm talking to a bunch of citizens, consider putting all those dialog w/ contact objectives in parallel instead of in series, so I don't have to do them in some arbitrary preset order. (To do this, drag each objective in the current sequence next to the first one so that the "Complete All" banner appears above them, and they're all in a horizontal line across the storyboard instead of a vertical sequence down it.)
    • On the map where I'm speaking with the warlord, one of his guards refers to my team as "extraterrestrials". While technically that is accurate, as neither my toon nor any of my BOffs were human, that particular descriptor isn't really appropriate when used in relation to a planet other than Earth (and even less so when used by a people who have, presumably, never even heard of Earth). A more generic term like "off-worlders" would probably work better.
    • Also on that map, after I finish speaking with the warlord, there are no more objectives; I had to run around the map for awhile before I noticed the ship behind me was interactable. Evidently you made the ship the object to transition to the next map. In most cases it's considered best practice to do all map transitions from Whole Map, to avoid confusing the player in this way. In other words, after the player finishes speaking with the warlord, add one more interact objective with the ship, labeled something like "Return to ship"; completing that would progress to the aforementioned Whole Map transition.
    • Likewise, after returning to the planet, the door to the Sanctuary should be tied to an Interact objective at the end of the map's storyboard, and the map transition should be changed to Whole Map.
    • At the end of the mission there was a bit of flashback dialogue involving a young T'nae. I don't see how that ties in with the rest of the story; it came pretty much out of the blue.
    ​​
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    I appreciate the helpful comments. I hope you enjoyed the mission.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    Mission has been revised with new and edited dialogue as well as the addition of a friendly npc on maps to answer any FAQs.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • duncanidaho11duncanidaho11 Member Posts: 7,867 Arc User
    edited October 2015
    Hey, I just gave Parallels a run through and I wanted to drop a few extra comments off!

    To start with, great map transitions and effects work. There was only one objective that was a little troublesome (plant bomb, blow the ruble) but the rest was (on my scale) top notch. The plot, well it deals with a thing in the Star Trek universe that I choose to ignore exists but to your credit it made me consider it seriously and finish the mission with far fewer reservations (which to reiterate are with the canon, not how you used it) than when the plot twist was revealed.

    The scenery also was well used but I did notice in places (ex. meeting with the...
    warlord
    ...) where a few things were misaligned. The look was spot-on but you could still go back and polish up some of the fine details.

    I think my only major criticism of the content is how the background lore was presented. I've had to think about this a lot recently for my missions and I don't think that a single info-NPC is necessarily the best way to do it. I'd chop him up into 2 or 3 and spread them out on several different maps and structure their questions based on the immediate social context. Make it feel like I'm talking to a person, not just accessing a data terminal.

    But, overall a well done example of how you can have non-combat mission that still manages an exciting climax. :)
    Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
    Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
    Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    Glad you enjoyed it. The blow rubble objective had to be done outside of the main story chain because it is used to reveal one of two alternate endings.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • duncanidaho11duncanidaho11 Member Posts: 7,867 Arc User
    Glad you enjoyed it. The blow rubble objective had to be done outside of the main story chain because it is used to reveal one of two alternate endings.

    The only issue I had is that I blindly tried it first out of sequence then had to back up a few mental steps to figure out what was going on. There was nothing technically wrong with it, and I'm not sure of how best to tweak it to make it less idiot/me proof, but it's the only time in the mission where something didn't trigger flawlessly. :)
    Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
    Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
    Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
  • rickysmith1rickysmith1 Member Posts: 610 Arc User
    I enjoyed it, but the combat seemed out-of balance. An easy fix however.

    My Part 4 of my Beneath the Raptors Wings will involve going back to ancient Vulcan in a Romulan City, perhaps you could assist me with your perspective when I get around to it. :)
    STAR TREK CONTINUES
    Episode One - A Single Moment Episode Two - Infancy Episode Three - Unto the Breach
    Episode Four - Head Of A Needle Episode Five: The Duality of Men Episode Six - Redemption Earned
    Episode Seven - Shattered Universe Episode Eight - The Gepetto Condition Episode Nine - One Room, Two Officers
    Episode Ten - Beyond The Farthest Star Episode Eleven - It's OK, It Won't Hurt Episode Twelve - A Protracted Officer
    Episode Thirteen - Somewhen Episode Fourteen - The Boy Who Lived Episode Fifthteen - Empathy
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    I enjoyed it, but the combat seemed out-of balance. An easy fix however.

    My Part 4 of my Beneath the Raptors Wings will involve going back to ancient Vulcan in a Romulan City, perhaps you could assist me with your perspective when I get around to it. :)

    It's a non combat mission....
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    This mission is now out of the review stage and can be found by a simple search.

    ST-HCCVWZIUU
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    Parallels has been republished with added maps and objectives! Give it a play and try both alternate endings.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
  • evil70thevil70th Member Posts: 1,017 Arc User
    Hi Brian, I am calling on you again to help me with my second published mission:

    ST-HCCVWZIUU

    Parallels [Rom]
    Level 50+
    Fed (designed as a Romulan mission)
    Door is the building in the south of staging area on new Romulus.

    Federation Mission - Parallels
    Author: Lincolninspace
    Allegiance: Federation (Romulan)
    Project ID: ST-HCCVWZIUU


    Report Start


    Summary: This mission has a lot of potential to become a great mission. The basic story is a great concept but the execution of that story needs a little work. The map designs, including the use of maps within maps, is really well done. The battles are simple and do not appear to really add anything to the story. You can keep the optional ones but you may want to increase the challenge level of the required one. The story dialogue is well done overall. Despite these issues I would still recommend this mission to other players. Once the author makes the changes needed in this mission it will be even more fun to play.

    After researching the subject I found an article on Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planetary Development. There are some episodes in most of the Star Trek series that support the idea of a parallel Earth, so a reference to a parallel Vulcan would not be far off. However, your reference in the dialogue to "Germany won World War II" is apparently a reference to an ENT episode from the end of season 3 and into season 4. If so, that would be an incorrect analysis as that was caused by temporal interference. The only other one I am aware of is the TOS episode "Patterns of Force" that had a TRIBBLE similarity. This was due to intervention in the societal development by a cultural observer, named John Gill. Therefore it was not a form of parallel development. I would suggest going to the above link and pulling another reference for this purpose. Otherwise it is a good plot twist.

    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 is a good detailed description. I noted one item to consider changing:
    -Consider changing "and what happened to" to read "What happened to".

    Grant Mission Dialogue: This is good grant dialogue. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this dialogue.

    Mission Task: This is a good initial mission task. I noted no spelling errors with this task.

    Mission Entry Prompt: This is a good use of the entry prompt. I noted no spelling or grammatical errors with this dialogue.

    MAPS:
    Astrometrics Lab: This is a good map with well written story dialogue. I liked the use of the map within the map from Astrometrics to the ship. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -This is more of an observation rather than a problem. The use of a single map for both portions is very well done, but the name of the map should probably be something more neutral.
    -The Lieutenant T'vhar dialogue, consider changing "mostly unninhabbitable, but a small ban along" to read "mostly uninhabitable, but a small band along".
    -Consider changing "We dont know much" to read "We don't know much".
    -Consider changing the response button "I willl notify" to read "I will notify".
    -The Anthropologist dialogue; consider changing the response button "as valuable to the Republc" to read "as valuable to the Republic".
    -The General M'Chev dialogue; consider changing "Q'pla I have made" to read Qapla'. I have made".
    -The Admiral T'nae dialogue; consider changing "[OOC]However I want to take advantage of the aadvanced scanning technology on you vessels., so we[/OOC]" to read "[OOC]However, I want to take advantage of the advanced scanning technology on your vessels, we[/OOC]".
    -Consider changing the response button "If there is nothing more to addm I will return to my ship" to read "If there is nothing more Admiral, I will return to my ship".
    -Consider changing the response button "Q'pla" to read "Qapla'".

    Close orbit: This is a nice map design with well written story dialogue. I noted several items to consider changing:
    -Consider changing the ships need to approach the other ships in order to communicate with them. It was tedious and unnecessary.
    -The I.K.S Lukura dialogue, consider changing the dialogue label "I.K.S Lukura" to read "I.K.S. Lukura".
    -Consider changing "Q'pla [Rank] [LastName]" to read "Qapla' [Rank] [LastName]".
    -The U.S.S. LINNAEUS dialogue, consider changing "Jolan Tru, [ShipName] a detailed" to read "Jolan Tru, [ShipName]. A detailed".
    -The post Scan the surface of the planet task dialogue, consider changing the response button "Next" to read "Report".
    -In that same dialogue you start off with it labeled "Scientists" and then "Bridge", which seemed odd. Consider standardizing the name for those dialogue windows.
    -If you plan to use the "I.K.S Lukura" label consider changing the dialogue label to read "I.K.S. Lukura".
    -The General M'Chev dialogue, consider changing "You count on our full support" to read "You can count on our full support".
    -Consider changing the response button "The Republic is new. we have yet to decide what protocol we should follow" to read "The Republic is new and we have not yet decided how to deal with these situations".
    -Consider changing the response button "I conccur" to read "I concur".
    -Consider changing the response button "We shall take a small party to explor" to read "We shall take a small party to explore".
    -The entire dialogue that starts with "[LastName], this planet may not" needs to be rewritten. The "but" you used before a period is incorrect. Due to that the rest of the dialogue does not read correctly. Consider rewriting the entire dialogue for this window.
    -The Admiral T'nae dialogue, consider changing "You wont like what you find down there anyways [[Rank]" to read "You will not like what you find here [Rank]".
    -You have dialogue from a Klingon labeled "Bridge Officer" but it appears to be coming from the I.K.S. Lukura. Consider changing the label to read "I.K.S. Lukura".
    -Consider changing "Q'pla greenblood" to read "Qapla' green blood".
    -Consider changing the response button "Please send me the coordintes" to read "Please send me the coordinates".

    Wastelands: The map design is good with simple optional battles and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -Some of the NPC’s do not seem to appear on the map when the player is supposed to be encountering them.
    -The story here does seem to feel right. It appears to be a problem with the way the story flows. Specifically, it seems as if the player is obsessed with trying to colonize this planet, which does not make sense, with or without the prime directive.
    -The Scout dialogue, consider changing "Sudoc has deads for cycles" to read "Sudoc has been dead for cycles".
    -The Anthropologist dialogue, consider changing the response button "Yes, but did'nt that get disproven" to read "Yes, but didn't that get disproven".
    -Consider changing the response button, " 'Let's hope we can" to read "Let's hope we can".

    City of ShiKahr: This is a good map with well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -The parallel planetary supposition needs a little refinement. I will discuss it in more detail in the summary above.
    -The "Speak with citizens" task is way too much running around on a small map. It became rapidly tedious and boring. Consider consolidating some of the dialogue into fewer encounters with citizens. You can still have the citizens on the map as optional dialogue but they all do not need to be part of the task list.
    -The Surak dialogue, consider changing "We want you to to [MissionInfo]speak to our rival[/MissionInfo]" to read "We want you to [MissionInfo]speak to our rival[/MissionInfo]".
    -Consider changing "We want you to negotiate a peacy treaty" to read "We want you to negotiate a peace treaty".

    Fortress of the warlord: This is a good map design with a simple but fun battle and well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -The initial spawn point appears to be a couple of meters off the ground. When the player initially spawns they drop a few meters.
    -The Warlord dialogue, the dialogue starting with "[OOC]It We come from[/OOC]" is a run on sentence and has several errors. Consider rewriting the entire dialogue.

    Ship interior: This map design needs some work. It appears the spawn point is in the wrong place. See the note below. The story dialogue is well written. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -When we first spawn we appear to be behind a wall facing the wrong way. I can see shuttles and the Veteran Commander and speak to her but cannot approach her. Check the spawn point.
    -Consider changing the task "Speak to Vetran Commander" to read "Speak to Veteran Commander".
    -The Veteran Commander dialogue, consider changing "Commander" title to read "Veteran Commander".
    -Consider changing "Vetran Commander" title to read "Veteran Commander".
    -The map transfer dialogue, consider changing "some primitive sattelites" to read "some primitive satellites".

    Low Orbit: This map is good but appears to have been rushed. There are elements that can be added and there is default dialogue as indicated below. The story dialogue is well written. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -Consider adding the floating radiation animation to the vicinity of each satellite.
    -The map transfer dialogue needs to be filled in. It has the default entries "Go to Next Map".

    Bay of Seleya: This is a good map with well written story dialogue. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -Consider moving the initial spawn point closer to the initial mission task. It seems to be an unnecessary distance from the task.
    -The Warlord dialogue, consider changing the response button that starts with "That is where you are wrong". The sentence cuts off after "follow" which probably means you maxed out the number of characters that can be in a response button.
    -The scan location button for the task "Scan temple sanctuary" is set to the default "Interact". Consider changing it to read "Scan sanctuary".
    -The Away team dialogue response button cuts off after "Surak is one of". It is unlikely that this is a problem caused by too much dialogue. Most likely it is simply you forgot to type "them".

    Sanctuary: This is a good map design with an excellent consolidation to the ship map. The story dialogue is well written. I noted a couple of items to consider changing:
    -The location button where the player is to set the explosives is set to the default entry "Interact". Consider changing it to read "Set explosives".
    -Create a new task to "Detonate explosives" so the player can move away from the blast before detonating it.
    -The Subterranean refugee dialogue, add a space in between "Ah I see" and "My name is Tellus".
    -Again I like the use of a single map for both portions this mission and it is very well done, but the name of the map should probably be something more neutral.
    -The General M’chev dialogue. Your first window title is "KDF General" and the rest are "General M’chev". Consider standardizing them for this dialogue.


    End Report


    Thanks again for authoring and for giving me the chance to review your work. You did good developing the concept of the story. It will be even better when you update the mission. I look forward to playing/reviewing more of your work in the future.
    Brian

    This critique report also filed 12/28/2015 on forum posting for: In depth mission reports upon request.
  • lincolninspacelincolninspace Member Posts: 1,843 Arc User
    Thanks so much. I will make the necessary edits to my mission. And I will make a point of getting a dil tip sent your way. Happy holidays.
    A TIME TO SEARCH: ENTER MY FOUNDRY MISSION at the RISA SYSTEM
    Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
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