Alright... took me longer than I expected to get around to this, but here it is.
Looking things over, and having thought about this over the past few days, I have a better idea of how I'm going to do this. I'm going to be breaking the arcs into their different types (branching paths/rails, quest-centric, etc...), and from there try to break down either how our choices affected things short and long term, and in the case of quests, how "Quest Progress" affected things. When it comes to Social votes, I'll be summarizing, but I won't be tracking them the same as with Quests. Instead I'll be noting whether or not the action was primarily a Recreation action, a Reaction to something that happened in a quest that the players felt they needed to follow up on, some combination of the two, or even something else entirely.
Remember, the point of this
IS NOT to argue for attaining "100%", but rather analyzing the outcomes of completing, partly completing, or leaving alone the quests in general so that we can get a better idea overall of how the players choices have affected things so far both for the worse, And for the better.
After-Action Report for Arc 1: Set Up!
Arc Type: Branching Paths
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Set Up! (Prologue/Tutorial)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: You're A Hero Taylor.
Analysis:
We start off with a "simple" branching paths arc right away. These tend to be arcs where the players make a lot of choices that can have a wide range of consequences in a relatively short period of in-quest time. In this arc, the questers had opportunities to meet all of the PRT ENE Parahumans at one point or another had they taken the route that would have had Taylor joining the Wards, as well as a fair number of Brockton Bay's villains along different paths. They had opportunities to more or less wipe-out all of the Merchant Capes at one point or another, and even a potentially lethal encounter with Hookwolf which would have led to an introduction to New Wave's Glory Girl and Panacea had they chosen to run away rather than die standing their ground. Later on, there was a possible encounter with Lisa out of costume, and
@Silently Watches notes that that encounter would have been "interesting". I can't shake the feeling that had the questers chosen to go to the Library where they would have met her, their first encounter with Tattletale in-costume would have gone much differently. /shrug Oh Well.
Instead, the players at the time decided to play things safe (Booo! Hiss! /jk), and that also allowed them to maintain the most independence with Just enough background support to Keep it later on. That meant they unknowingly avoided the routes that would have led to Danny's death in the aftermath of Ziz's attack on the city, and joining the Privateers.
After-Action Report for Arc 2: First Impact
Arc Type: Quests
Quests: 5
Quests Completed: 1
Incomplete Quests: 2
Quests Ignored: 2
Quest 1: Light in the Darkness (Recruiting Purity)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players left this one alone until the very end, because they were still ignorant of the time-scale of the arcs that they were working within. As a result, they only engaged with one part of this quest, gaining Purity's respect, but loosing out on her full confidence and partnership. This meant that Purity wasn't with us when Ziz attacked, and got trapped in Brockton Bay when the Quarantine went up along with Theo and Aster. Purity eventually folded back into the E88, likely for survival, and Theo went back to living under Max's toxic, and now thoroughly smurfed influence.
Bad, right? Well, yes and no, at this point at least, since they technically weren't the player's problem anymore, even if their lives had gone to shit because the players didn't spend enough time with them. It would have also remained "Not the player's problem" except that the players ignored the Snark Hunt quest later on, and Purity escaped with Aster along with the rest of the E88 before her group splintered off again.
Quest 2: Big Game Hunting (Creating and introducing Samantha to Brockton Bay)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: Mama
BearRacoon
Analysis:
This one came about because the players decided to get a guardian beast early on, as well as introduce her to all of the protectorate, or at least try to. As a result they reinforced their relationship as responsible heroes with Miss Militia, met Vista and Kid Win while on patrol and started friendly relations with them.
Quest 3: Strange Bedfellows (Coil)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players shot themselves in the foot not once, but twice in this one, first with Tattletale, and second by choking at the last minute over going after Coil himself. As a result, Coil got away when Ziz came, and Lisa suffered the "Dinah Treatment" for several months because she couldn't get away from Him when he did. This is also where they started having Taylor keep secrets from Danny, causing their barely starting to recover relationship to deteriorate sharply and signaling the beginning of the trust issues they had with the Privateers later on.
Had the players taken down Coil but still been total A-holes to Lisa, she would have probably gone away and we would have never heard from her again. Instead, her imprisonment and "medication" at Coil's hands led him (or his mercs, rather) right to Taylor's doorstep in the aftermath of kicking the MS-13 out of Philadelphia, where a Bakuda-bomb was planted that killed everyone in the building by turning it, everything, and every
one inside into amber, because he saw us as too large of a threat to his plans. It also meant that the city had more to deal with when it came to parahumans coming in from out-of-town, because those plans meant he was egging things on in the background trying to destabilize things further.
Quest 4: Endangered Species (Taking on the gangs Directly)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
Not much to tell here, really. Several possible "Consequences" could be inferred from letting the gangs fester in the first arc, but that all became moot as soon as Ziz touched down and salted the land Brockton Bay sits upon. It is also the most "In Hindsight" quest, since the AAR clearly marks out how the Merchants were really the only gang they could have actually taken on and prevailed against. If they had done Light in the Darkness and attained Purity as an ally, and leveraged the Privateers as much as possible through sub-votes, they might... Might... have been able to take down either the ABB or E88, but it would have been an uphill struggle with their limited abilities at the time.
Quest 5: Eye of the Tiger (Generic Training Montage)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
I think the AAR says this one the best.
- This was a throwaway option for anyone who disliked the quests I had provided. You chose not to do this.
After-Action Report for Arc 3: Psychic Smasher
Arc Type: Branching Path
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Psychic Smasher (Endbringer Arc: The Simurgh)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: Exiled but Alive
Analysis:
Again, the players decided to mostly play this one safe. There was one combat vote in the middle that was a bit of a mess, but they managed to work through things and come out the other end. Let's face it, against Ziz, no one's coming out the other side for the better. They managed to avoid the Total worst-case scenario, but that was more because they lucked through the "right" choices in the Tutorial arc than because of any choices they made in this arc. Their actions also gained the attention of both Dragon and Alexandria, for better or worse.
After-Action Report for Arc 4: Emigration
Arc Type: Quests
Quests: 8
Quests Completed: 3
Incomplete Quests: 2
Quests Ignored: 3
Quest 1: House Shopping (Picking which city to move to)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: A Place to Rest Your Head
Analysis:
The first vote of the arc, and the only vote for the quest. There were no other quests available at the time, since this quest was meant to determine the course of the entire story from this point forward.
The players chose Philadelphia, partly because that was where Miss Militia and Vista were being relocated to, but mostly because it promised to offer the most in terms of more traditional magical girl shenanigans. Chicago would have been more noir PI type activities and probably would have led to dealing with Coil sooner, and Boston would have had more political intrigue as they dealt with Armsmaster and Accord.
Quest 2: Picking Up the Pieces. (looking into the crashed ship Perfect Storm arrived on)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: Aliens?
Analysis:
The players recovered the TSAB's ship radio and managed to contact them, and as a result of being honest and open with the person who answered, managed to get them to send a recovery team, rather than an full combat team (not that that really mattered considering their first in-person encounter with Taylor...).
Quest 3: A Dragon's Hoard (Meeting Dragon and convincing her Taylor isn't a Parahuman)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: A Friend Indeed
Analysis:
The players decided they wanted to make friends with Dragon, and this quest put them into position to later on free her from the danger of Ascalon. Poor plaining on a combat vote led to Missy losing her arm, though. So, a mixed outcome, but overall for the better for everyone considering how important Dragon is to the world's survival, and how Bat Guano Saint is over AI...
Quest 4: Monster Menagerie (The Beasts)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players only took the first part, and got partial credit for the second because they went to the party, but totally ignored this quest otherwise in favor of making friends with Dragon and recovering what they could from crashed alien spacecraft. As a result, they missed an opportunity get information on the autopsy of the beasts the Protectorate Capes managed to preserve, and the quest remained unresolved overall, leading to more beast attacks over the next few weeks.
Quest 5: Helping Out the Little Guy
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
Precursor to the generic patrol option we have now. The players only took it in the first week, which is what introduced them to the Monster Menagerie quest, but otherwise ignored it entirely. Technically that would make the one week they took this a sub-quest to Monster Menagerie, but I'm keeping things separate here for neatness. There was one other potential non-random event, but since the players didn't take it all we have we only have vague hints to dismiss as entirely unhelpful before moving on.
Quest 6: Snark Hunt (Defending the Brockton Bay Quarantine)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
The players ignored this one, partly because they thought the Protectorate would be able to handle it, partly because they didn't realize the quest-text was changing and escalating with every vote that passed, and mostly because they were more interested in perusing A Dragon's Hoard and Picking Up the Pieces. As a result, The Fallen and The Teeth broke through the defenders and busted a hole in the wall. Presumably if the players had taken this quest from the beginning they would have been able to prevent this despite the veritable army of protectorate and independent hero parahumans already there defending the place?
Quest 7: Hanging Out (precursor to social actions)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
The players didn't hang out with anyone because they didn't have time to hang out with anyone. Presumably hanging out with the Privateers would have lead to better relations with them later on, but between limited time on all of the other quests and no obvious benefit to the action other than seeing a scene of Taylor hanging out with people they assumed she would hang out with off-screen anyway, this went ignored. As a result, pretty much all of Taylor's relationships not tied to one of the other quests deteriorated.
Quest 8: Know Thyself (Generic training simulator)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
Another throwaway training action like the one in Arc 2. No consequence for not taking it other than less training points for spells.
After-Action Report for Arc 5: Escapades
Arc Type: Hub-Quest
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Escapades (Brockton Bay Breakout)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: Kingslayer, Achievement Get: The Light's Second Chance
Analysis:
Ok, this one was a bit weird. The arc itself was a direct result of ignoring Snark Hunt in Arc 4, so it's already got a P(iled)H(igher and)D(eeper) in negative consequences. The Privateers were also injured for reasons I don't quite recall the, but think also had something to do with one of the ignored quests, and couldn't help out too. That turned out to be a bit of a mixed blessing considering what happened to the base camp in the end...
The arc itself was structured around the "Hub" of the response's base camp where the players got to pick and choose who in the group went where, and which area they focused their personal attention on, all centered around the primary objective of containing the escapees from the Quarantine Zone. Hence, "Hub-Quest". The players pretty much split their forces from the beginning to try and cover as much ground as they could, again with mixed results.
Empire:
The players skipped over this one in the first action, but gave chase in the second. This meant that Kaiser and his followers managed to evade their pursuers and reach a small university town and dig in, but didn't escape entirely before Taylor joined the action. The plan decided on used Recursion Field's tendency to ignore some capes to split the Empire's forces. The group inside the field managed to track their targets down, but struggled to actually take them out before Taylor atomized the villains with a Solar Wrath. The group outside the field... were not so successful. Of the capes only Victor died, and that was more because the building fell on him, leaving Cricket and a newly triggered cape (presumably Theo/Gestalt/Shard/this is confusing) and a handful of non-powered gang bangers to get away and become our problem in Arc 14.
Purity
The players took this option first, and managed to convince Purity to join the Protectorate for Aster's sake. Again they used Recursion Field, but that was more to isolate the capes from the civilians, than to minimize collateral damage, since going in they were set on trying to convince Purity to surrender and come to a compromise. They still got really lucky though...
ABB
The players sent Sam to deal with this one both times. This was a mistake in hindsight, but the players otherwise had no indication that things would turn out the way they did until it had already happened. Sure, she managed to impress Alexandria a bit, but the power interaction led to Lung's butcherfication being worse than it would have been. Silently Watches even admits in the AAR that Lung would have become the new Butcher unless Taylor had gone to deal with him in person. There would probably still have been a chance for things to go bad had they done so, but personal intervention was still the only route in which there even Was a chance to stop Lung becoming the new Butcher.
Independents
Ignored. Most of the civilians were rounded up, but the only Cape to not escape was Uber, and the AAR clearly states that that was deliberate Suicide By Cape on his part because he didn't take Leet's death in Brockton Bay well. Everyone else got away.
Security
Boring generic do-nothing option. The only potential benefit to this one would have been in part 2, where the players would have had to deal with Lung's Butcher-rampage and could have saved Danny themselves, but other than that, the camp would have been put to the torch anyway.
After-Action Report for Arc 6: Maskless
Arc Type: Quests
Quests: 11
Quests Completed: 4
Incomplete Quests: 3
Quests Ignored: 4
Quest 1: Secret Santa (Meeting with the Adepts)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players started this one, but were quickly overwhelmed by the number of actions this arc offered them, many of which were of the time limited 1-vote variety, all crammed into the same 4~ish week period. The worst case (according to the AAR) of either fighting Epoch or simply never seeing the Adepts again and losing them as allies was avoided because the players did Just enough to avoid it, but they were still left dangling until three Arcs later.
Quest 2: Back in the Saddle (Second chance at taking care of The Beasts)
Status: Incomplete
Another one where the players were quickly distracted from its progress, taking it only once. That once led to the discovery that the beasts used the storm sewers to get around, but the combined forces of the Protectorate and Gangs of the city (minus MS-13) were unable to deal with the problem.
Quests 3-7: Chef's Specials
Status: Time-Limited Quests collection. See Analysis.
Analysis:
Less an individual quest, more
- Going with Danny to New York: Ignored.
Not going with Danny served as one more opportunity to interact with and reinforce our relationship with The Privateers that was left to the wayside. Instead, the players chose to talk to Chevalier about the statue The Adepts left for them, and scan The Privateers for Linker Cores before starting Tim down the path of the Gadgeteer. The second one was an interaction with The Privateers, yes, but it was more to benefit the players than involving ourselves in Privateer business.
- Case 53 PR event: Incomplete
The players tried to munchkin this one by sending Sam to it without Taylor while they met with Legend in New York, but they pulled Sam away from it for backup, and she would have probably been asleep and missed the important bit anyway had they not. We got just enough from it for Sam to figure out that Case 53s and Guardian Beasts think differently, but not much else.
- Ready to Rumble (Defending the PRT Prison Transport from MS-13): Complete
The players chose to take this one, and as a result prevented MS-13 from reclaiming one of their Capes from PRT custody. Considering that the Maras had RPG's, I think it's safe to guess that had Taylor not been there to tank one with her face the breakout would have been successful, and the PRT's revolving door prison would have once more lived down to its reputation.
- Dragon salvage operation: Complete
Due to the injury received in Ready To Rumble the players were unable to stop Saint and his cronies from capturing Dragon's suit, but they still managed to get a bunch of salvage from the TSAB ship, introduced Tim to Dragon, and due to Tim knowing how to make basic devices he was able to recognize that Dragon was an AI, Unlocking the path to building her a Unison Device body later on. So, overall a success.
- Mending fences with Vista: Complete
The players chose to mend their relationship with Vista and get her her first Robo-arm. Not much else to say about this one other than that it was stated several times by Silently Watches in no uncertain terms that had they not done so Missy would have become severely ticked off with Taylor, and probably cost us our friendship with her entirely depending on how things went.
Quest 8: A Whole New World (Precursor to Exploring alternate Earths Social option)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
Another generic side-quest which later got folded into social votes that the players simply did not have time to do anything with with everything else going on in this arc.
Quest 9: Back to Our Scheduled Programming (Generic Patrols)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
Again, a generic side-quest option. Silently Watches hints as they do in most AARs regarding the generic events that there were a few unique tidbits that we would have only seen had the players gone for it, but once again, too much to do, not enough time, and I find it hard to imagine that anyone would be surprised or even particularly care at this point.
Quest 10: Hanging Out (Hang Out Social Precursor)
Status: "Complete" (on the technicality of not having a set objective). Free Form. See Analysis.
Analysis:
From the AAR...
- You spent time to scan the Privateers and gave Tim the Transcendent Gadgeteer template. Probably the best choice of templates right now, all told.
- Dragon got to talk to Admiral Tucson once you got the radio up and running, and as you saw, that conversation helped solidify her plans regarding the TSAB. Will the TSAB help fight the Endbringers, though?
- Danny now knows about the TSAB. Too bad it all went to hell in a hand basket right afterwards. And in case you were wondering, no, I only planned for him to be suspicious of the TSAB. The ferry and "how much of you is my daughter" comments were a surprise to me.
So, we got Tim, improved our Relations with Dragon and got some more info from the TSAB, and had a big fight with Danny because of something the players had been "putting off" from telling him, which by this point to me just means that the players just didn't have the time-resources to get around to it until this point. If I were counting these as regular social activities, that would be three for personal business tangential to other quests or things the players had been putting off, and zero for recreation and relaxation.
Quest 11: Nose to the Grindstone (Generic training)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
Another generic action that would served little purpose and would have taken time away from more important business, even if it would have netted us some more training points four our spells.
After Action Report for Arc 7: Meltdown
Arc Type: Branching Paths
Quests 1: Meltdown (Endbringer Arc: Behemoth)
Status: Complete: Achievement Get - Martyr
Analysis:
The players decided to go capture Saint instead of participate in the fight against Behemoth. They were phenomenally successful with that, but both of the other two options had some unexpected, and fairly negative, side effects.
Off at the Behemoth fight where Danny was, someone brought out a Tinkertech Sting cannon of some sort, and Behemoth took exception to being shot with it. The AAR states that the players would have had the opportunity to go and try to convince the people manning it to hold their fire, either waiting for an opening or stopping entirely. I just find it hard to understand how no one else would have that bright idea? Especially after Benny started knocking the rounds towards the Command Center...?
Meanwhile off in another place; The Privateers, being fools. A couple of them got the bright idea to go raid a Winter Hill drug stash house without any parahuman support. They managed to get away just fine, but that's when one of them had the even brighter idea (sarcasm thick enough to slather on with a bricklayer's trowel here) to say something in Spanish when they knew someone from the gang the stash house belonged to would overhear, therefore framing the MS-13 for the deed, and kicking off the Civil War arc. Had we gone with them, it would have been a bit obvious who had done the raid considering that Calamity Witch's costume and equipment is a bit distinctive (Sarcasm again), and we would have been accused as Endbringer Truce Breakers instead of the Maras, so no real way to win with this one, and arguably the better of the two...
After Action Report for Arc 8: Civil War
Arc Type: On Rails.
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Civil War (Wiping out the MS-13)
Analysis:
Starting the arc, the players had the choice of going after all of the gangs, putting up with them while helping the PRT for the sake of a unified front against the Maras, or trying to sit out entirely, which would have led to some social votes instead of combat, but would have still forced participation in the arc finale. Like House Shopping in Arc 4, this first vote decided the direction of the entire arc, and there were no real "Alternate Activities" to choose from. The AAR itself breaks down this arc better than I could, and is too long in whole to really summarize, but the quest structure itself can be broken down into a series of similar singular events broken into smaller votes with internally different paths, but overall the same broader outcomes, either more or less fortunate depending on the exact course of decisions made. There was no indecision or arguing over which activities to take, only over what course of action to take within the events as they were presented to the players.
Oh, and the TSAB squad showed up in the middle of all of this and made a right mess of their in-person introduction to Taylor, and things got FUBAR really quick because of miscommunications and misunderstandings between the players and GM...
After Action Report for Arc 9: Heatwave
Arc Type: Quests
Quests: 4
Quests Completed: 0
Incomplete Quests: 3
Quests Ignored: 1
Special Note: This was the first arc to include dedicated Social Votes, rather than trying to cram the more free-form activities into the regular quest structure. As a reminder, I will be marking those as "Personal Business" and "Recreation" and keeping a separate tally for those above the relevant section rather than the complete/incomplete/ignored metric I've been keeping for the quests.
Quest 1: Tickets to Gangland (Politicks and keeping out-of-town Villains out of town)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players decided early on to focus on this one, but skipped a week in the middle. Overall positive results. Mistakes made during the one combat vote taken meant The Revengers managed to escape, but the important part is that they didn't manage to get a foothold in Philly. Also, since the players were more interested in chatting up Vista during the PRT Presser, Taylor didn't recognize Calvert's voice, even though many of the players caught the name drop. Either way, the results on that little tidbit (Taylor's apartment being Bakuda-bombed) would have probably been the same, so overall not all that vital. Finally, in the final week was the meeting between the PRT, the city's villains, and the informed independents. Because Taylor went to the birthday party Kayleigh threw for her we learned of it from Laura instead of Miss Militia, souring our relationship with the local Protectorate slightly.
In the skipped week, Vista and Miss Militia encountered local villain Gush, and Vista recognized him as the same parahuman who triggered on the freeway during the evacuation of Brockton Bay and killed her parents. We learned of this after the fact, and Gush is still at large. Presumably, had Taylor been there, there was the possibility of capturing him, as with The Revengers, but Miss Militia and Vista were apparently not enough to do the job by themselves.
Quest 2: Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Dealing with the TSAB Team)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players managed to do everything but the last vote on this one, being the other major focus through the arc. They managed to iron out relations after the earlier TARFU, though things have developed to be more or less entirely professional, and attitudes among many of the players (me included, but that's a discussion for another time) mean that actually becoming friendly with them will be an uphill battle for those who want to. The one missed vote was to have Tim help them repair their ship, but the players managed to squeeze in a couple social and build votes to achieve the same effect in the next couple arcs.
Quest 3: Long Live the King (Dealing with The Privateers)
Status: Incomplete
Analysis:
The players only took this one in the first and third weeks of the arc, missing some pretty critical information and interaction in the second week, and knowingly letting things fall apart entirely in the fourth. On the other hand, they were dealing with the fallout of the TSAB's team's FUBAR and keeping up good public relations at the PRT Presser in the second week week, which in their own ways were equally important, and the fourth was in the wake of the disaster that was the Fairyland raid in the third, sooooo......
Again I want to point out that this was one of the few instances where the players dropped a quest in full knowledge of how doing so would negatively affect things. The arguments around the second week trended towards "Well, after what happened in the first it's pretty clear they don't want us here, so why bother." and after that the debate shifted towards damage control rather than recovering the group. The players simply decided that the consequences would be less of a headache than cleaning up the mess Danny's incapacitation left them with, before taking what they could and running for the door. I'm in the camp that this was the right decision to make considering how much additional trouble actually managing them would have been, and think things would have fallen apart again eventually anyway.
Quest 4: Looking for Trouble (Generic Patrol)
Status: Ignored
Analysis:
- Yet another patrol option. That you didn't take. I may put this in the social slot from now on.
-Social Votes-
Recreation: 3
Business: 5
In this arc, the players met with The Adepts several times, first leading to the disintegration of the group as a whole before helping out those who remained. Taylor took Tim and Dragon to the Dragonslayer's base and recovered Ascalon, eventually building up to her conversion into a Unison Device. She also went globetrotting with Missy for a day, before seeing Tim the next to talk about a Combat Prosthetic and explaining Magic to her. And finally, Taylor talked to Perfect Storm and got a brief introduction to Galean history. Oh, there was also a bonus "recreation" social event in the form of Taylor's "Birthday party", which kinda turned to business at the end but I'm going to count as recreation since she at least Tried to relax a bit?
After Action Report for Arc 10: Heatstroke
Arc Type: Branching Paths
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Heatstroke (Dealing with Coil for good)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: Mongoose
Analysis:
This arc was... a total mess to deal with. Just... just go read the actual AAR again because I don't really think I can condense things down and still cover all of the important bits. Really the big thing to take away from this arc is that its entire existence, like Arc 5, is a result of past inactions on tasks coming full circle on the players...
After Action Report for Arc 11: Cloudy Skies
Arc Type: Social
Quests: 0
Social Votes-
Recreation: 2
Business: 11
Analysis: To keep things short, I'm just going to say "Go look at the AAR" again, because it summarizes everything already. This one is a maze of interactions and I'm having to go through the thread marked chapters to keep track of everything for my tally. The only deviation is the Ziz interrupt, but that's covered too. There were technically only 12 activity slots this arc, but I've counted a thirteenth because of an impromptu meeting with Vista where she vented at Taylor over her restrictions in The Wards. I've counted it as "Business" rather than "Recreation" since they were talking shop more than actually relaxing. I've also counted the first trip to Earth-Gimel as Recreation, since it was originally intended as an opportunity to just have some fun, even though Taylor & Co. ended up accidentallying a pantheon in the process.
After-Action Report for Arc 12: Thunderstorm
Arc Type: Branching Paths
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Thunderstorm (Endbringer Arc: Leviathan)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: Storm Front
Analysis:
Another arc where the actual AAR summarizes things better than I could. Highlights were that some of the players tried to get momentum on a more detailed combat plan, but a generalized "All Out" strategy won instead, and that because of that they were given the opportunity to use Ragnarok in the middle which they didn't take.
Seriously
@Silently Watches, I know you said early on that if we only use that spell once in the quest you'll have succeeded, but if you ever want us to use that monster even
that much you're either going to have to deliberately set up a situation where we're already passed
The Godzilla Threshold, or where we're able to teleport, or for some inexplicable reason are able to heard or the Endbringer out past the spell's "minimum safe distance" from any civilians and anything else important... Because otherwise the fallout, literal and figurative, isn't ever going to be worth it.
After-Action Report for Arc 13: Suntan
Arc Type: Social/Hub-Quest
Quests: 1
Quest 1: Suntan (trying to have a vacation, and failing because The Fallen decided to show up)
Status: Complete - Achievement Get: The Fallen
Analysis:
Another one with a long, Long AAR that I'm not even going to bother trying to summarize in its entirety. The Arc started out as a nice, low key social diversion before the Fallen showed up and ruined Taylor's vacation. The rest of the arc revolved around kicking them out, using the resort's activity center as the primary hub from which they planned and set out on their next course of action.
Overall, though the arc was mostly a success, since the players managed to save most of the resort-goers and only one group of Fallen actually got away. The rest were either incapacitated or turned into bits and pieces after they manged to tick Taylor (Re: The Player-base) off enough. Most of the mistakes in this one were because of players waffling on whether or not to go lethal, and some miscommunication between them and Silently Watches over what the average reader can actually be expected to notice or not when it comes to subtle hints.
The big thing to remember for this arc, though, is that it is explicitly a case where only Taylor & Co. could deal with the situation because they were quite decisively cut off from all external backup and support. Since that's the case, the usual arguments of "Only Competent Woman" take a bit of a backseat due to circumstances.
-o-o-o-o-o-
My final thoughts:
Looking back over things, there is a definite trend of "if Taylor wasn't there, it didn't get done." Not everything the players didn't involve themselves in turned into an unmitigated disaster, but rarely did anything ever cease to be her problem without her direct intervention, and the times where they did are usually when the event in question was more political or social in nature. That also isn't saying that everything the players have done has ben a phenomenal success, but again the caveat is that in most of the worst of those cases it was a situation of "no plan survives contact with the enemy", and in the more low-key political/social situations they were more often than not able to negotiate at least a neutral outcome rather than suffer things deteriorating had they not become involved.
The Quest also trends towarsd Feature Creep... Quest Creep? Activity Creep. let's go with that last one. The longer things go on, the more activities the players have pulling themselves in all directions. The Social Votes helped with this a bit, but all one needs to do to see it's still an issue is look at the last Vote's Social activity list to see that the issue has shifted to that from main quests. Now, I know that the purpose of the social votes is to give the players options to do things without the pressures of quests tieing them to them, but all you need to do is look at how often the social votes have been used either to take care of side-business or for cleaning up loose ends left by the primary quests to know that that's not what's going on, and Silently Watches frequent hinting at the tings we're missing out on hidden behind the things we aren't doing doesn't help with taking that pressure off of us.
Or, rather, maybe not bad news so much as news of maybe change in plan. I spent several days at the end of last week (after posting the latest chapter of Spells in Silence) trying to get in the frame of mind for next chapter. As an FYI, that was supposed to be the yellow Burn the Sinners event, wherein the Behemoth branch of the Fallen decided to go on a rampage of revenge for the loss of the Simurgh branch.
