Golden Girl

It's still Heros vs Villains

Our guide to all things Incarnate, Prometheus, has started to talk about the Battalion and the Coming Storm as the next cosmic threat we're going to face after Tyrant and the loyalists have been finished with.
Each time we get a new Trial, he always give us a bit more info about the current situation with the Well, as well as hints about the future, and more info on the Well in general - and now that we've got to the Underground Trial, he's said for the first time that the Coming Storm is the Battalion.
Plus, we're also running our of loyalists to fight - we've defeated over half the Praetorian Guard now, of the major loyalist archvillains, there's only really Tyrant, Dominatrix and Mother Mayhem left, and I'd expect Dominatrix to be part of any Trial involving Tyrant.
Second Measure has said that they're working on the next 2 Incarnate Trials now, so that could mean ones again Mother Mayhem and Tyrant - although the Underground Trial and the general direction of the Praetorian war storyline does kinda suggest we might have to confront the Praetorian Hamidon at some point as well, to prove our superiority over Tyrant and to keep Praetoria safe.

They've already said that all players earn them.

That's only for the first 30 days, or the first 15 bucks spent - whichever happens first

But doesn't trading comes after one month of play? Like isn't that unlocked with the second reward token everyone gets after playing for one month?
Any new player who doesn't pay for the game has to wait 30 days before they can trade, join SGs or use Tells and e-mails - that seems like a reasonable delay for someone not contributing anything to development and running costs.
Plus, during those 30 days, it's quite possible that a free player could buy 1,200 Paragon Points for various things in the Market, so they'd get their 2nd reward token early.

It's because Tyrant is more like the kind of "glamorous" supervillain some players seem to like - Recluse is very much the over the top and openly evil kind of supervillain, and Arachnos reflects that with its comicbook evil style and methods, and everything about them and the nation they rule is just so totally obvious in its evil.
But Tyrant and his emprie have a different style, even though they're just as evil as Recluse and Arachnos - there are giant war robots, armies of clone soldiers, jack-booted security thugs, enslaved thought police and so on, but the way they're presented is much more "realistic" and way less flamboyant than Recluse and Arachnos.
For example, compare the Wolf Spiders with the PPD, or the Bane/Crab Spiders with the IDF, or the Mu with the Seers, or the Tarantulas with the Warworks - Tyrant's dictatorship is closer to the more practical style of Empire in Star Wars rather than the impractical moustache-twirling comicbook style of Recluse and Arachnos.
Arachnos and the loyalists offer players 2 unique styles of evil to serve, so it's natural that there'll be people who rpefer one over the other.

The newer red side content is trying to move players away from havign to serve Recluse

And that's where his lies start - none of the repression is needed at all - that's why Tyrant is the bad guy we're all fighting

An evil dictatorship is still an evil dictatorship

What about taking down the entire dictatorship to leave Praetoria open to a new ruler?

When the devs designed CoV, players complained that they were forced to serve a crazed dictator and his evil organization - they took that feedback onboard when designing GR and the Paretorian storyline, and now players are complaining about being forced to not serve a crazed dictator and his evil organization

Once the Praetorian storyline is completed, the Trials will shift their focus to the Battalion and the Coming Storm.

The way the devs now work, theyr'e able to plan out things a lot further in advance, which is why they've been able to give us this multi-Issue Paretorian arc -and Second Measure recently mentioned that they even have some planning done for Issue 29 - so that's looking 8 issues/2 years ahead, even before COH:Freedom has gone live.

As far back as October 2009? It was only announced in May 2009

Or as they work on several Issues at once, Going Rogue/I18 was being designed at the same time as I19 and I20, and they were trying to give a taste of just how powerful and dangerous the Praetorians were.

Well, they're getting there - First Ward fills the 20-29 gap, and the Praetorian part of the Incarnate storyline seems to be getting closer to some kind of final showdown - so a 30-39 zone and a 40-50 zone would round things off quite nicely.

The general complaint is that all the paths in the 1-20 content lead to the same place - the first starting storyline of the Incarnate content is all about fighting Tyrant and the loyalists, with the help of the Resistance - the option of playing a loyalist stormtrooper who supports the dictatorship and fights the Resistance doesn't exist, even though it does exists in the 1-20 content.
Some players feel it's unfair to have the game basically force them to change sides - Hero players are never forced to become Villains, and Villain players are never forced to become Heroes, but loyalists are forced to turn against Tyrant and the dictatorship they've been serving.
Just think of it as being like 1-20 content on the Rikti homewolrd, where you're not allowed to take part in their invasion at level 50, and have to be friendly to Primal Earth

The Praetorian zones are purchasable content - unless someone is on the VIP server, then Praetoria will be the only starting area where there won't be masses and masses of freebies, which might suit some of the more sensitive types

He might have to be dealt with later on if he does something crazy

For example, Vanessa DeVore has been revealed as the guiding force behind the Resistance, and Calvin Scott is just their military commander - but now that Vanessa is dead, and the influence she had over Calvin might be lost, and rather than looking at the bigger picture, he might decide to try and get Aurora back by launching an attack on Mother Mayhem's asylum, with the justification that it has to be done at once because without Vanessa to shield the Resistance from the Seers, the entire movement is in danger - plus, there's also the possibility that Penelope Yin, who also happens to be in the aylum, might be lined up as replacement for her mother as the protector of the Resistance from the loyalist thought police.
So we'd naturally help with the assault on the Asylum, but run into problems with Calvin if it became clear that the only way to defeat Mother Mayhem was to kill her, meaning that Aurora would also be lost forever - and the Resistance commandos that had helped us attack the asylum would probably side with their leader, rather that the visitors from Primal Earth.
And what better place would there be for Calvin's obsession to tip over into madness in the very place where it all began, and faced again with the monster who stole his wife? The final fight would see us versus Mother Mayhem and her Seers, plus Calvin Scott and his Resisatnce commandos, with Penelope Yin and possibly Katie Douglas helping us - it'd be insanity in the asylum

When we defeated them, Mother Mayhem and Calvin could both be fatally wounded, but Praetor Tilman's consciousness would have been destroyed with some kind of mental overload in a last desperate attempt to stop us, so that would allow Calvin and Aurora to share a moment before they both died.
Penelope Yin could then lead the Resistance, which would now have a hgue army of libertaed Seers to help them, and the last major hurdle between us and Tyrant would be gone - we'd have turned back his invasion, and fought our way through his evil empire, defeating his Praetorian Guard one after the other, leaving only Praetor Duncan and her boyfriend in their tower in Nova Praetoria for the final showdown

It's sensible game design - First Ward is 20-29, so it's over halfway to 50, which means that the content needs to be moving towards the Incarnate content, where everyone is fighting Tyrant and the loyalists.
The 1-20 GR content already pushes every Praetorian avatar into a position of resistance to Tyrant and his dictatorship - so it's natural that the First Ward storyline would fit with that situation, and have the contacts be Resistance or Resistance allies.
The higher the level of the content, the closer it has to be the Incarnate storyline, where we're helping the Resistance smash Tyrant and his loyalist forces.

Only when they start helping the Resistance take down Tyrant

Correct

The zones are also designed from a new player's point of view - they start in the shadow of Tyrant's Tower, surrounded by the gleaming buildings of Nova Praetoria, and work their way away from there as they learn the truth behind the lies of the dictatorship, with their progress through the zones and away from Tyrant being shown in the increasing amount of dirt and decay, leading to the slums and abandoned buildings of Neutropolis.
The zones were designed as visual clues and cues for the progress of the 1-20 stories.

The BAF, Lambda, Keyes and Underground Trials were all designed at the same time, during the work on GR

We arrest Recluse and his henchpeople on the STF, but for some reason the red side zones remain totally unchanged

Or if you prefer a Praetorian version of the same thing, we defeat Neuron and Bobcat on the Tin Mage TF, but when we go to Neutropolis, Neuron is still there under his tower, and Bobcat is still in Studio 55.
We defeat Battle Maiden on the Apex TF, but when we go to Neutropolis, she's still standign on her trainer platform.
We tear up the BAF, but when we go to Nova Praetoria, it's still holding prisoners, and Nightstar is still on her training platform in Imperial City.
We smash Lambda Sector, crippling a large part of Tyrant's military power, but when we go to Neutropolis, it's still totally untouched, and Marauder is hanging out in Nova Praetoria.
We take control of the Keyes' Island reactors, but when we go to Neutropolis, they're still in the hands of the loyalists, and Anti-matter is still hanging around beside them.
We see Vanessa DeVore die on the Underground Trial, but when we go to First Ward, she's hanging out by the Chapel of Enduring Light.

So far, we've defeated over half the Praetorian Gaurd, and massively degraded Tyrant's loyalist forces and his ability to wage war across the dimensions - but there's not a single sign of that anywhere in the Praetorian zones.

Using those zones as a way of guessing what happens next in the Incarnate storyline isn't really a very good idea

Then it was lucky for them that they'd already designed the Pretorian zones to include raid locations like the BAF, Lambda Sector and the Keyes' Island reactors, just in case they decided to add raids at the last minute.
And if we didn't already know it was a last minute decsion, it might almost look like they'd been planning the raid locations from when they first started designing the Praetorian zones.