Captain-Electric

Cityoflore.com is a darn cool name.

I get how some people feel wiki'd out. But it's not really "another wiki to keep up with for the same stuff". The resource it's providing wasn't available anywhere else to begin with. Paragon Wiki can't function without breaking the fourth wall into a million little pieces. This is why Paragon Wiki wouldn't function well as a lore resource. Tony seems to acknowledge that in an above post.

Really, an encyclopedic resource like this should have been a job for Paragon Studios, on their official website. And the best "lorepedia" would be one that accumulates in-game as you make new discoveries and achieve certain victories. Sort of like the way you accumulate souvenirs from story-arcs, just in a more cohesive, illustrated format. I don't think we're likely to see these things, but they would be nice (any devs reading this can file it as a suggestion). The last update to the official website's history page is from 2002, SIX years ago, when the Omega Team took the plunge. A lot has happened since then!

Better if they don't say too much about the place of Atlantis in CoH lore anyway. If the devs ever decided to create new content (including zones) themed around Atlantis, they'd have free reign to create supporting material without being tied down to existing lore.

People want it, so maybe it should happen eventually. I don't know. On the other hand, Atlantis has been done to death in other comic book universes. City of Heroes started something different with Oranbega, which is awesome. Imagine an Oranbega-themed expansion on the level of City of Villains or Going Rogue. Or imagine zones on other planets, space-stations or ships. Or zones that take you back to the 1930s. Or zones that are wrapped around other zones and then sprinkled generously on top of a donut. Huh time for bed.

A few tips from a random passer-by (albeit one with super powers and good looks).

Want to know how to make Altitis an irrelevant concern? You can get bogged down treating Altitis, or you can redefine what your roster of heroes and villains means to you. The following tips aren't just ideas that sound nice to me. They're guidelines that evolved throughout my first year in City of Heroes, and following them closely has greatly improved my enjoyment of the game. These aren't role-playing tips, as inviting as they may feel to that group. They're ways to learn to relate to your characters, the same way you form brief connections with characters in books and movies.

(1) THE LIST - None of my heroes and villains are alts; they're all main characters. Sound like pure semantics? Think again! From the beginning, I took a tip from the comics (where else?), and have sought to view my characters on an A-list, B-list, C-list scale. They're all important to me, but a few of them have definitely affected local (or even worldwide) events on a larger scale than the others (see "The Time" below).

(2) THE WELL - In the 1960s, Spider-Man had few fans among Marvel's editorial board. He was almost cut before they realized he had struck a unique chord among their readership, who finally had a hero with average life problems they could all relate with. There are all sorts of ways to create a character, but few heroes and villains are memorable for their power sets alone. So why start there when creating one? Start at the beginning, with their life and the circumstances that led to their origin as a hero or villain. This may involve taking out a notepad or sketchpad, or it may just take a bit of day-dreaming before going straight into the Character Creator. You will not want to delete a persona who feels more substantial to you, who is worth exploring and enriching through in-game experiences. After a while, these won't be "toons", and you won't think of them as your "Fire/Kin" or "Troller". As their personalities take shape, you'll begin to think of them by their names. Give the well of your sub-consciousness some breathing room, here. Like Spider-Man's first audience, you may end up liking a character you may not have expected yourself to make. (And if you created heroes and villains as a child, they're still living in your sub-consciousness. It can be very satisfying to breath life into these within the game.)

(3) TIME - After a year of playing, my highest-level character is level 43 (that's the only time I'll mention that often useless barometer). Out of 15 heroes and villains on my home server, four of them are A-listers. As expected, they get more attention from the fictional world they inhabit. They hob-nob with patron heroes more often, go on more task-forces, have arch-villains after them, and they get their origin stories told through AE and through Virtueverse.com. And naturally, more "real" people know them, because an A-lister might get a straight week or two of play-time; they're simply around more often. B-listers and C-listers will get days or even just hours of play-time between those longer stretches. I decide how much play-time a persona is getting before I revisit them, and then I stick to that decision. The first few times I did this, I misjudged the amount of time I would enjoy playing some characters. But now, it's a natural gut decision born out of experience, no spread sheets or complex formulas required (LOL).

(4) THE STORY - Planning the time I spend with a character may seem OCD, but in this case, it's actually just another tip I took from the comics. The average comic book runs around 20 or 30-something pages. Comic writers have a certain amount of space and time to work with, to push their characters stories forward. And most comic book heroes don't even have their own comic books. There are a lot of supporting members of comic-book super-groups who don't say much or make many decisions compared to more famous heroes, even though they may do a lot to keep their teammates alive. I have several C-listers in this category. In comics, B-listers often get their own series, while A-listers get wide-ranging story arcs and get to affect crossover events. Planning gives me a goal, and a time frame during which to push my own characters stories forward, no matter how small (i.e. PUGs) or large (i.e. TFs, major arcs, SG or AE events) that story may be. And it ensures I'm more focused on characters who deserve more focus.

EDIT - Thought I'd mention, after creating several characters, I now only allow myself to create a new one every 1 - 3 months. This is because the characters I already have should never be "finished". When I write bios for my characters, I archive their screenshots and later update them (every month or so, or whenever I feel like they've had enough new experiences to warrant it). Advancing my characters stories might include costume changes, or even spin-off characters (these can be VERY fun to create, because they start off with some history already set up for them).

Finally (a more advanced tip here), I don't keep all of my characters separated by a vacuum of space and time; I have intermingled some of their stories when writing or updating bios, and created a duo among my own roster of characters (working on a concept for a super-team). One of my B-listers is side-kicked to one of my A-listers, and two of my villains are the arch-enemies of two of my heroes. None of this is terribly silly. With AE, it's possible to fight alongside (or against) your own characters, so anything's doable now.

THE GUIDELINES ABOVE are the most natural way to handle "Altitis" that I've found. I've discovered for myself that Altitis isn't the problem. After all, most comic-book universes exist in a permanent state of Altitis, with all the personalities and story-lines they expect their readers (and writers) to keep up with. Your roster of heroes and villains can either be a flat list of video game toons, or it can be the jumping-off point to your corner of a substantial fictional universe. Unfortunately, there isn't a universe that we know of where time management isn't an issue.

One unavoidable factor is right under our noses: Cultural demographics. Since the 1930s and moreso since World War II, the United States in particular has had a fierce and long-standing love affair with super-heroes. Some of its oldest still fondly remember Captain-America punching you-know-who in the face. People have especially turned to them for entertainment (and comfort) during times of war and economic upheaval, when the U.S. has historically seen comic-book sales and related film-sales skyrocket. When Captain-America was assassinated several years back, the event made for bold, front-page headlines across the nation's newspapers. Serious business, know what I mean?

Really, with little to no European advertising coming down the pipe from NCSoft, the responsibility for community building necessarily falls on the community itself. Your paying customer base is dwindling, so what can you do? Well, always remember, like Spider-Man (didn't) say: With Great Problem comes Great Responsibility! Download the fan site kit and start building more interest in your game. Don't ask what NCSoft can do for you, because it's too late in the game for that strategy. Instead, do something for your publisher. Bring them numbers, and they will bring your funding.

Last but not least-- For those European players who are thinking of moving to the Freedom server, I'd also like to add that the Virtue server (NA's "Officially Unofficial Role-playing Server") often goes toe-to-toe with Freedom's concurrent population count, has more comic-book geeks, super-groups for role-players, and events for role-players than you could shake a, well, role-player at, and even has its own community-run website (Virtueverse.com).

Ahem. On a lighter note. From one of those players who spends so much time heroing (it's a word now) around that we rarely pop into the forums (we exist).

THANK YOU FOR THIS. And not just for Dual Pistols.

April will mark my ninth month subscribing. That may not seem like much to many of you, but I have made friends and developed heroes that are uniquely my creations, and they mean more to me than any character in any of the MMORPGs I've played over the past decade. Through City of Heroes I've had a hand in producing personalities and stories and histories and allies and enemies that make for very substantial fiction, and it's well worth the money for the subscription and various item packs I've bought. I also bought the series of comics from my local comic book store and have enjoyed those.

Now. Where's my Natural Defender's damn grappling hook gun, fellas? GET TO WORK ON THAT.

Operating System: Windows XP

Browser: Firefox 3.0.13, Firefox 3.5.2

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Bug Description: Cannot log in at all with Firefox 3.0.13 (the latest edition of the non-upgraded FF3).

This is not insignificant, as FF3.0 is still receiving updates from Mozilla, which of course means it is still considered a supported browser.

I can log in now that I've upgraded to FF3.5. If you're reading this, having problems, and you're using FF3.0, try upgrading. It is quick and painless, and your browser and accompanying features (like bookmarks and history) will work much, much faster.