Dante

The franchise was already ruined. Now it's been hacked up, set on fire, locked in a steel chest and buried one hundred miles underground with a rabid cheetah.

Definitely giving it a miss now.

I've long thought that these needed to be made a reality. In a team of 4-8, I still feel like a valuable member of the team, that I'm doing something useful. In a league sized team, I feel superfluous, un-needed, just Hero005435 punching things in faces. I'd love smaller sized Incarnate trials.

But yes, back on topic, they should be different for both sides, not just a rehash of the same trial.

I'd be completely happy with this solution.

I may try and play this while watching it:



Although the last time I tried that was during Sharktopus and I blacked out before the end...

I think you've pinpointed the problem right there. I'm still amazed that the Devs introduced four new moralities with Going Rogue (Vigilante, Rogue, Loyalist and Resistance) and then failed to incorporate their perspectives into future content. That just seems incredibly short sighted.

I'm honestly beginning to wonder if I preferred the content when there were only 15 people working on the title...

I ordered and watched that because I had to as an avid fan but even I struggled. If they ever turned the Dragonlance saga into something, I'd have to be as a TV series instead of a film in my opinion.

The trailer in question though looks like a fan made film. In fact, I've seen fan made films that looked better!

Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. What I'm saying is that there's no story development. What does it mean to be a villain that even Lord Recluse chooses not to touch? How did the Rogue Isles respond to the Praetorian threat? Have they been able to use the chaos to launch an offensive against Paragon? What are they doing now that Statesman is gone? Surely there's a huge opportunity there being missed. Does Von Grun know about the differences between Primal Hamidon and Praetorian Hamidon? Has he sent researchers to find out?

There are things added to villains for sure. There were two new arc recently and even the Valentine mission advanced things a little. But if you can't see the huge disparity between villain story content and the overly heroic content we've been given recently then nothing I am going to say will convince you otherwise. Villains get access to the new zones but the best they get is a slightly darker version of the same story, one that is always about saving the world (although apparently, we're saving it for later, some vague, undisclosed time in the future when we can take it over). As I've already said, some zones don't even bother with that.

Writing for villains is always difficult. Difficult but not impossible. And getting villains to team up with other villains is surely easier than teaming them with their sworn enemies?

Nope, not really. I'm disappointed more than anything else. But the fact remains, for villains, once they reach level 50, their story stops dead. Unless they want to run the LRSF for eternity, there is nothing for them to do other than team up with heroes.

And again, this is not to do with characters who are mindless thugs. Those ones are easy. Wind them up and point them in the direction of Bad Guy of the Month. But for any others, who want to gain money, power, influence over others, there is nothing, nowt, zilch, nada.

All the examples you cite are good reasons to lay aside differences and work together. But when it's been employed over and over and over again, it gets dull and demonstrates lazy writing and development. Give villains something beyond 50 to do other than saving the day once again and I'll be happy. Until then, meh.

Oh and for what it's worth, I'm not keen on co-op content of any variety even if it does make heroes do questionable things. I'd rather see shorter but multiple arcs for different alignments. Most of First and Night Ward were just padding and having different routes through the zone for heroes and villains would have been far more interesting.

Where bad people get exploited by the so called heroes...

Ooh look, looks like they're sliding already.

A fair question. Slaunyeh has already offered a very good explanation too which I would wholeheartedly agree with. However, I shall quote Nalrok from earlier in the thread:

It has been, quite frankly, overused to the point of silliness. Is there seriously any high end content where villains get to be villains? The only one I can think of the LRSF and that got added how many issues ago? It is, to me, just sheer laziness that the Devs are not even acknowledging that some players like to play villains.

No, my villains are not so stupid to ignore high level threats but they've been forced into hero content so much now, there doesn't seem to be any point in playing them. It's tired, overused, lazy, boring. If the Devs start to write for villains again, properly, giving us the chance to actually play villains rather than heroes' shady sidekicks, I'll happily resub and pay up. That is, after all, what I paid for City of Villains for.

See my signature.

I'm a roleplayer. The lore of this game is something I have loved since day one. I have enjoyed immersing myself within the world of the game for over six years now but in recent years I've seen a decline in the writing, lack of content for villains and an obsession with another dimension I care not two pips about. Night Ward was simply the final straw so I've unsubbed. Sure, I've ignored a fair amount of content on the game in order to roleplay within it. But when I'm ignoring whole zones and the Incarnate system, I'm not having fun anymore. So why pay for something I'm not enjoying?

Some people care about the lore even if they're not roleplayers. And if the story is not up to scratch, they have as much right to complain about it as a broken mechanic.

And yet by ignoring their players who enjoy playing villains, they are effectively pushing players away from the game. Those players either have to play heroes all the time or quit. I can only speak for myself but I know that a lot of my decision to drop my sub was due to villains not being catered for any more. I like playing my heroes too but I'm fed up of paying for zones that only half of my characters can use.

Last time I saw anything official, the split between heroes and villains was 60/40. If Paragon wish to ignore that 40% then more fool them quite frankly.

What he said.

And people wonder why I cringe whenever the Devs try to do anything lore based. Lazy, lazy, lazy lazy. It's pretty much how I regard their attitude to lore, story telling or anything to do with the history of the game world.

It honestly made me very sad when I realised I care a lot more about the game lore than the writers do. But these days, I can't even sum up the effort to feel disappointed.

"None of you seem to understand. I'm not locked in here with you. You're locked in here with *ME*!"




Okay, wrong movie but you get the point.

I had a big smile by the end of the trailer. That's normally a good sign that I'll go see it.

I couldn't have said it better myself. I have no problem with the concept of villains having to grudgingly team up with heroes every once in a while but it has been so overused, I'm sick of it. The Devs can write stories for villains, the arcs already mentioned and even some of the early SSA1 episodes were great for allowing villains to be villains for a change. Yes, we're still running around doing things for our contacts but for once, it was for our gain and not because some NPC told us to go and beat up (insert name here) for the 'greater good'.

We've had three new zones since Going Rogue (ok, two new, one revamp) and every one of them has failed to cater to villains. Night Ward doesn't even try to be accessible to villains, it just assumes you're there to do good. There's not even an offer of money or power if we decide to help out. And that was what finally made me throw in the towel and stop my account from auto-renewing. If the writers want to ignore the alignment of 40% of my characters when developing new zones, I can't be bothered to pay for them anymore.

I should have mentioned that this tends to be when facing Council and teaming with gun wielding characters! Sorry, Sonic is still awesome though.

I couldn't have said it better myself. I used to love playing my Sonic Blaster and watching shell casings and all other kinds of debris flying about. It felt epic and powerful. Without them, it's a lot less fun.

It's a small thing but it really does add to the epic feeling of a battle.

I agree with you 100%. Alas, I tend to think I'm in a minority about it these days.

You're not alone. I've played both a Dark/Dark and a Mind/Dark up to the late 30s and I know which one I prefer by miles.

I found Dark Control a big disappointment. A lot of its controls are 'soft' and the whole set feels lacking in power. Maybe I'm spoiled by Earth or Mind but there's nothing in the set that solidly locks down a spawn and feels powerful. Its stuns and fears are strong but I found Shadow Field to be sorely lacking in its ability to pin a mob down. Fearsome Stare is still great as a linchpin of the set but outside of that, there were too many times when mobs would slip out of my control and start wailing on me. Haunt is too easily ignored by mobs and Possess, although easily the coolest looking power in the set is only single target. If you're looking for a set that controls a mob and keeps them controlled, Dark is not it. It looks pretty but it just didn't feel powerful to me. And I love my Dark sets.

The less said about the dog the better. However, it's a noisy, mediocre pet at best and theme breaking for a lot of concepts. I still consider it plain lazy of the Devs to just jam a dog in there and try to pretend it's anything else by sticking a murky aura on it. However, even ignoring the dog, the set just isn't remarkable enough to be worth enduring. My D3 Defender locks mobs down better than my Dark/Dark any day of the week.

Dark Assault though is just plain awesome on a stick. Ignore the old graphics and consider that you have two strong melee attacks, a great PBAoE, a self heal and a damage and effect buffing power in one and it's a great set. It does solid damage at distance and close up so it mixes nicely with all Control sets and has so many lovely toys to play with I feel spoilt for choice half the time. Its AoE is a little lacking (Nightfall is quite a narrow cone) but for single target, it's strong set.

To be honest, I don't feel the two sets mesh that well together. Although stacking the -ToHit is good, I've found that Mind Control goes with Dark Assault a lot better, pinning mobs down then taking them out. Dark Control would probably go nicely with Assault sets that offer a little more mitigation, such as Stone, Energy or Psionic.

Of course, your mileage may vary and clearly opinion is divided it seems. Try them out and see how you feel about them.

I think that was the one that made me adore Coulson. Such a great little short. And while we're on the subject of all things Coulson, I am pleased to have bought this t-shirt recently. Fans of Bruce Campbell may recognise the style.

I'm not a person who follows actors as such but Mr Lee is definitely the exception. I'll pretty much watch anything he's in because he's always 24 carat gold wherever he appears. I even endured The Wicker Tree just to see him reprise his role as Lord Summerisle for five minutes.

If you get the chance, read his autobiography, it's by far the funniest and most enthralling bio I've ever read. I loved his last album and I reckon this one will be just as awesome.

Sorry, couldn't resist! Totally agree with you though.