Here's the objectives in English at least:
Normal
- Collect 1000 loot
- Steal the painting
- Return to the sewers
Hard
- Collect 1,500 loot
- Steal the painting
- Find the snake ring
- Don't kill anyone
- Return to the sewers
Expert
- Collect 2,000 loot (200 in gems)
- Steal the painting
- Find the snake ring
- Don't kill anyone
- Return to the sewers
The detective aspect is unique, but it doesn't add much. I was actually on the fence on calling it "predictable" because even though I really believe there's a part of it that feels that way, it doesn't really describe the mission as a whole. It's mostly the level design being very straightforward that gave me the idea to name it that.
Honestly, it's more a criticism of the detective element. Even without that element, this mission would still be very solid, if a little straightforward in...
"The Violent End of Duncan Malveine contains some novel elements: a randomized objective/clues, a collecting aspect, and guards that can switch between bow/sword at will. Of these three, the last one was probably the one that I liked the most, even though it's the most understated aspect of the mission. Why is that?"
Probably because either - people K.O. everything there is, or they ghost. In neither case, people will even make acquaintance with the guards' weapons.
BTW, I think you're ...
Well if weed is your 1st association ;-o I always interpreted it as just smoking to kill time (cool enough as is). Mechanists are there apparently on notice to collect bodies for their certain project...etc.
PS You made it sound as if the story wouldn't fit into some timeline but it wouldn't matter anyway because it would be all nonsensical - it is not. It is relatively difficult to parse the story from all the relevant readables that need to be combined with observations from environmenta...