"Shadows of the Past" by @backyardserenade

Title: Shadows of the Past
Author: backyardserenade
Faction: Federation
Level Requirement: 31+
Author Notes: Solo-play. Dialog-heavy. Light combat. Part 1 of 3.
Current Version: 1.07

Description:
An Orb of the Prophets was stolen during a recent True Way raid on the Bajoran capital. Starfleet Command wants you to investigate the whereabouts of a Bajoran ship that apparently engaged the True Way raiders responsible for the theft.

Head to the Toron System in the Beta Ursae Sector Block to search for the S.S. Ratosha.

Further comments:
My first foundry mission. I would love some feedback on map design, story progression, characters and dialogs.

I'm not a native speaker of English. So everyone who points me in the direction of spelling errors gets a free cookie. :)

STO Forum thread: here
STO Wiki site: here

Thanks for your feedback! :kiss:

Played through this today and really enjoyed it.

The dialogue is wrote in a way which makes you feel like you're commanding your ship and crew rather than your bridge officers commanding you (which it's like in most other missions) with a lot of optional dialogue options.

I thought the mission was going to end only for it to kick into a whole different direction. I'm eagerly awaiting part two! You did a great job! :)

I do think you may need to give it a once over to check the dialogue. I noticed three occasions when "you're" or "your" was used when the opposite should have been used. There was also a spelling mistake early on when the
And there may have been a few moments where you had wrote a lot of short sentences. Comma's may have made the dialogue flow better.

Other than that I thought it was great!

Thanks so much for your review and support, Halish. And thanks for the constructive criticism. :)

Response to Halish
I will do another spell check (and have already changed bits and pieces in my current version). Some things just get unnoticed, cause there is so much dialog in the mission. I sometimes mix up "you're" and "your" - especially when I type fast. One of the few things that I hate about the English language ("their" and "they're" is about the same). ;)

I see the problem with short sentences. I always try to make sentences clear and easy, but I might've gone overboard in some instances. Have already changed some dialogs in my internal build to improve their flow.

Update
I'm currently working on the Docking Ring map and have it almost finished. Habitat Ring and Mission Debriefing to go and the mission will be complete. Can't wait to work on part 2!

Reviews so far
Most feedback has been quite positive and I'm really glad. Me is a happy boy! :)

However, one reviewer slammed the mission for political correctness and me forcing my personal views onto others. He's raging about me promoting stuff in a game he pays money for... Mission accomplished, I guess. B)
In all seriousness: I'm a bit saddened by this response. It just happens that one of the male characters talks about his male fiancé; and that the Bajoran Vedek is onboard the Ratosha because she wants to lead their wedding ceremony. That's not even a huge plot point. I'm neither forcing anything upon someone, nor am I actively promoting same-sex marriage - they are just talking about in a sentence or two.

I'm still looking for feedback. If anyone's willing to help out, I'd be more than happy! :kiss:

All I can say is that I look forward to playing it when it's finished! This iteration is a little rough around the edges - but that's what revisions are for! This is gonna be a great mission.

And, seriously, anybody who thinks that paying money means they get to control content should check what's on TV the next time they pay their cable bill. You're paying for access to media, not the media itself! :P

Thanks for your comment, Rodger! :)

Anything in particular you think that was still rough? Would love to get some input.

And I agree regarding the user review. It was just such a weird comment to make. ;)

I would try reading the dialog aloud to yourself and see how it sounds compared to how it seems in your head. I think that'll help you see what I mean by it being a little rough. The actual mechanics are really nice so far. Mini-map markers and suchlike are well done. Just played a mission earlier today where every minimap marker covered the whole map. :| Completely unhelpful, LOL. Yours are great though. :)

Hey, I just played this tonight... I really enjoyed the mission to this point, and I'm excited to play the rest. I found the story compelling; I typically have a hard time immersing myself in the story of many player-made missions, but found myself intrigued in this one. I enjoyed how the story wasn't linear, in that I wasn't able to anticipate how the next portion of the story would unfold, until I experienced it.

There were a few, minor spelling mistakes, but unfortunately, I didn't make note of where they were.

Having published a mission with gay content myself, I've had a few negative reviews on that basis too. I wouldn't worry too much about it, because you're bound to get a few.

Anyway, I had a good time playing this... I need to know what happens... soon! :) Good work!

Cheers,
Dave.

Thanks for the review, Voleron. Kind words! :)

I hope to finish and polish the mission within the next two weeks. :)

I'm away from home right now for work, but am looking forward to playing this when I get back, and will definitely provide some feedback when I do :)

Delighted to have another fleetie making Foundry missions - welcome to the club :D

Looking forward to both your replies and opinions! And thanks for your time! :)

Thanks for your review, I appreciate all the effort.

I'm glad you liked it. And thanks for all the little things you pointed out - will make sure those are squished in future builds. :)

I'm also glad you like the Starfleet lieutenant. :D

Mission update:
- the mission is now at version 0.95
- many spelling and dialog fixes
- last maps have been added!
- some few debriefing elements are still missing
- mission is essentially finished, but not all of the mysteries are yet addressed - will change very soon

- still looking for feedback! :blush: :kiss:

The mission is finished now. Technically.

In all likelihood I'm going to add and improve little things in the future - especially counting on feedback, of course.

I wanted to say a big thank you for everyone who gave me feedback so far. A lot of great tips, hints and annoying spelling errors that were fixed! You're amazing guys. :kiss:

promotional image:
A small image with some impressions from the mission. Bigger pictures can be found here.



mission update:
- version 1.101
- several spell fixes
- added additional contacts and optional dialogs to several maps
- improved ambient visuals on "Terok Nor" maps
- made some minor gameplay improvements (e.g. spawn points, enemy mobs)

STO Forum thread: here
STO Wiki site: here

I have recently updated the mission with overhauled maps, gameplay mechanics and some storyline additions. I also fixed some typos and the flow of the story/dialog.

I'm quite proud of the new "Terok Nor Docking Ring" map. It is a bit larger and I tried to make it more three-dimensional. There's also a Control Room and some obstacles added in the player's path.

"Celestial Temple" was overhauled to look more ominous and mysterious. "S.S. Ratosha Bridge" was mostly beautified, with some more consoles and a little Bajoran touch. "S.S. Ratosha Cargo Area" was updated with better gameplay mechanics and a little sidestory about pests in Cargo Bay 06. :)

Overall I tried to improve the mission flow by changing many contacts to triggers (with the nice effect that most dialogs can only be played once, giving some meaning to your dialog choices!).

I would still love to get some detailed feedback. And I'll be very thankful for any input, feedback or opinions about the mission. :kiss:


PROMOTIONAL IMAGES:


PATCH NOTES:

Current version: 1.03.000.beta

General:
- renamed several NPCs
- removed typos and language errors
- streamlined dialog (optional dialog can now be accessed through triggers)
- changed the formatting of some texts (e.g. OOC-font)

Gameplay:
- changed several NPC contacs to triggers
- added some environment triggers ('Scan Crates', 'Receive subspace message', etc.)
- added several access points to the S.S. Ratosha Library Computer for background info
- added optional storyline regarding pests in Cargo Bay 06
- added new objectives to Terok Nor Docking Ring
- made it harder for several NPC contacts to be accidentally killed (hopefully)

Storyline:
- added optional Starfleet subspace message/contact to Terok Nor maps
- added Ferengi contact to final map

Maps:
- redecorated "S.S. Ratosha Bridge"
- changed some assets on "S.S. Ratosha Cargo Area"
- small improvements to "Terok Nor Promenade"
- complete overhaul of "Celestial Temple"
- complete overhaul of "Terok Nor Docking Ring" (new shuttle bay + control room)

Reviews:
- SBUGC List of Great Missions (Thread)
- Evil70th's In-depht Mission Review (Thread)
- BroadcastUGC Episode 40 (StarbaseUGC.com | Thread)

[INDENT]"I would highly recommend this mission to anyone who loves a great story combined with good maps and tough but fun battles." - Evil70th[/INDENT]

[INDENT]
"The maps look cool. The story was well based in what was established on Deep Space Nine." - BroadcastUGC

"It is a really great story that is told well [...] and a character-driven mission as well. I was impressed by last week's maps and I was impressed by this week's maps as well [...] The station was great!" - BroadcastUGC

"Nice time-traveling, [...] taking everything back to the point where all those complicated decisions had to be made. You got to know the characters."
- BroadcastUGC

"That was one of the things that stood out about this mission, that almost every kind of dialog had those two-way choices at the end." - BroadcastUGC [/INDENT]


PATCH NOTES:

Current version: 1.03.009

General:
- streamlined dialogs
- fixed some spelling mistakes
- fixed some errors encountered during above-mentioned reviews

Gameplay:
- added some more optional dialogs/interacts to explore

New Review:
- November/December 2012 edition of the Stonewall Times (PDF file)

[INDENT]
"Backyardserenade delivers a phenomenally written, Bajoran-centric story that has its roots in the Deep Space Nine universe. The intricately developed storyline easily rivals those being published by some of the best Foundry authors known to the community, despite this being the author's first published mission. This story would find itself at home in the DS9 TV series." - Stonewall Times[/INDENT]

The article also includes an in-depth interview about the mission and its creation process!


PATCH NOTES:

Current version: 1.03.011

General:
- fixed some typos
- changed some odd-looking animations

Gameplay:
- added a little combat to the later parts of the mission
- fixed a potentially game-breaking bug where an NPC contact could get accidentally destroyed, hindering mission progress

I took a bit of time to remaster some elements of "Shadows of the Past". The final third of the mission (the Terok Nor levels) are now more streamlined and allow for a better mission flow. The "Terok Nor Habitat Ring" map was completely overhauled and now looks much cooler and more functional - and now includes elements of the "Bajoran Temple" map, so I could remove one map transfer entirely.

I'm actually considering submitting the mission to Cryptic for Spotlighting. Curious to see if they'll notice it.

As always, I'd be delighted to get feedback on the mission. Especially if you're able to compare the current version with previous incarnations. :)

And now I need to go work on the sequel again!

PATCH NOTES:

Current version: 2.00.001

General:
- streamlined story progression and dialogs
- changed button texts to make them more unified and better explain what they mean
- removed some typos


Gameplay:
- changed several NPC contacs to triggers
- added some new environment triggers ('Examine the Shrine', 'Scan Crates')
- made it harder for the S.S. Ratosha to be accidentally destroyed
- unified the spelling of "sir" (lowercase letters)

Storyline:
- clarified some story elements on the Terok Nor maps
- added some background information to Laira Mika
- made several dialogs more concise for smoother mission flow
- added some additional steps to the "Seeds of Dissent" segment and removed "Daybreak"
- added optional encounter with Cardassian prisoners and some flavor texts

Maps:
- redesigned some elements of "Terok Nor Docking Ring"
- overhauled "Terok Nor Habitat Ring" (new assets, design, flow)
- removed "Bajoran Temple" and incorporated it in the previous map
- small improvements to "Terok Nor Promenade"

Hi there!

Today I played your mission "Shadows of the Past" and I only can say: "Wow! Amazing!!!"

A well written, exciting story. I really immerged into the mission and had a real Star Trek - well, in this case DS9 - feeling.

Pro:
- As I mentioned before: a good story
- Well designed locations
- Many ways/options for answering questions or how to proceed
- You could explore the area and talk to npc´s who hadn´t a big exclamation mark hovering over their heads^^
- Well, ok, it was MUCH text. But you told this in the mission description, so nothing to complain about^^

Contra:
- Your "ETA" in the mission description is 30+ min. Well, that´s a little bit understated. If I play a foundry I read all the text, I want to explore and not run through the maps for fast dil. 70 minutes would be more realistic.

Hmmm.... that´s it so far. Don´t ask me about spelling or grammar - English also isn´t my first language.

I´m looking forward to the sequel and hope that my criticism / statement was constructive.

Greetings, @chemistryset (K.E.)

Some three years in and I'm still updating the mission from time to time, as it's very dear to my heart.

In a recent update I changed the costumes for many characters, since more appropriate outfits are now available. All Bajoran Militia officers wear Bajoran uniforms now, while some of the Resistance fighters wear worn clothing. Faces have been updated to make the best of many of the new options. And of course I'm using standard Federation uniforms where it seems fit. Some other assets have also been updated.

I'm even working on the sequel, Terrors of the Past. But it's a slow progress and my life has changed quite a bit, since the release of Shadows. But I'm getting there and I'll hope that the community will like the idea I have for the continuation.

By the way, I'm very honored that the mission appears in the top list for the Toron System Foundry doors. This has brought in many new players over the last month and I'm excited to see their feedback. It's somewhat surreal that almost 500 people have played (=rated) the mission and most of them thoroughly enjoyed it.