TonyV

Hey all, please don't do anything drastic with your characters. Don't delete them, don't nuke all of your stuff, don't do anything that is irreversible.

I'm saying this because of two reasons. First, as has been hinted in rumor threads elsewhere and even if it weren't a rumor it would still be possible, another studio may very well pick up this game. If so, it's entirely possible that the servers won't go dark on November 30. If that happens and the game keeps chugging along, you'll be kicking yourself for doing something permanent that carries forward after November.

Second, at the Titan Network, we are working on tools to export your character data in a form that, even if the servers go down November 30 but we're able to revive the game in some form, will be usable to recreate your character on alternate servers if need be. If you go deleting them or deleting all of your stuff, you'll lose the opportunity to do that and, if the servers are recreated at some point, you'll have to start from scratch instead of having your characters documented in a format that we can use to re-import them unscathed.

We'll be talking more about this as we make progress on our toolset--we're not keeping it a secret, but we're still in the process of working on it at a furious pace--but in the meantime, like I said, just please don't do anything permanently bad to your stuff.

For newer players, "Twixt" was David Myers, a professor at Loyola who decided to conduct a "study" about what would happen if he started griefing people in PvP zones. The result, shockingly, was that people got mad. He then parlayed this idiocy into an article in the New Orleans Times-Picayune, where his reporter friend made him out to be some kind of uber-player with mad skillz who did what he did in the name of science instead of what he really was--someone who was exploiting being able to teleport people into drones using a well-known exploit. It basically was a hack piece that made games look like crazed thugs and completely misrepresented our community. And then he followed up with another article that was a little bit better, but still didn't discredit anything that David Myers was doing.

As you can imagine, it caused an uproar. It got the attention of Mercedes Lackey, who wrote some letters complaining over Myers's testing methodology (specifically, how he used subjects without their knowledge or consent). I personally wrote a letter to the Times-Picayune complaining that it was a gross misrepresentation of our community and trying to explain a little better the context in which some of the comments were made and why what Myers was doing was perceived as such a bad thing. I also pointed out that the reporter didn't do the basic due diligence of getting any other side of the story, even though many in the community would have been happy to provide information and insight into the matter. I offered my contact information and asked them to contact me, but of course, they never did.

Anyway, it caused quite the big stir back in the day. The reporter still works for the Times-Picayune, and I don't know whatever happened to David Myers. I think they both were grossly negligent and misrepresentative in their respective fields, and it wouldn't have bothered me one iota if both had been fired. Probably didn't happen though, and with the crew at Paragon Studios who have such amazing talent being fired, that seems a shame that these guys get to keep their jobs.

IF this rumor is true, I really hope it's not SOE. If it is, I swear, I'll throw up a little in my mouth. Sony has screwed me so many times over the years that I've permanently sworn them off. IF SOE acquired the game, I think it would be a short-term reprieve at best, as I honestly think they are incapable of managing a game like City of Heroes or a studio like Paragon Studios without screwing it up--and screwing us players over in the process.

IF it is SOE, I honestly can't help but think that they would be buying the IP rights and/or assets for the sole purpose of ensuring that no one else gets it, so that they can be 100% sure that City of Heroes is permanently dead and can NEVER be competition for any of their other MMORPGs.

I'm begging everyone here, please be careful what you wish for. We do not want this game in the hands of Sony. It pains me to say this, but I hope that NCsoft would just shutter the thing before selling to Sony, because if they shutter the thing, it doesn't preclude someone else getting it and opening it back up later.

IF there is meat behind this rumor and there are other interested parties, I really hope that a smaller publisher/studio acquires the rights. I want a company that isn't a behemoth in the industry. Such a company wouldn't look at the income that Paragon Studios generates as small potatoes. Such a company would treat it with the value and worth that it deserves.

To make an analogy, if you make $800 per month in income and someone gives you a $100 bill, that can actually be life-changing. At the very least, you will appreciate the hell out of it and remember that gift forever. If you make $8,000 per month in income and someone gives you a $100 bill, you'd probably say, "Yeah, thanks..." and forget about it in a few days. I want Paragon Studios and City of Heroes in the hands of a company that really appreciates it for what it's worth, someone who doesn't shut it down because it's not making enough money.

Cross-posted at the Titan Network forums

First of all, I am not soliciting you to do anything that you would feel uncomfortable with or that you cannot do due to contractual obligations, severance package agreements, etc. I don't know what you can and can't say or do, so if anything below makes you say, "I can't do that!", please understand that it's in the spirit of not being aware of any limitations you're under, not in the spirit of milking information out of you that you're not supposed to be giving out. I promise that if I don't hear from you, or even if I do and you cannot or will not participate or tell me something, there are no hard feelings. Having been under contracts, non-disclosure agreements, severance agreements, I understand and the last thing I want you doing is putting your financial well-being at stake.

So with that having been said...

As you know, I would really like to chase down the possibility of keeping City of Heroes alive as far as I possibly can. I'm hoping you will be on board with me, because this is your baby. I really feel that you deserve better than this, and I suspect that at lot of you feel the same way. The game was well into its era of jamming on all cylinders, and the stuff you had coming down the pipeline was going to push it into overdrive with a shot of NO2. We don't want a corporate strategic realignment to kill this game, and I'm sincerely hopeful and optimistic that NCsoft will understand that there is no good business reason to let something of value collect dust, and there would be a lot of goodwill generated by allowing the fans to continue playing and the community to continue growing. Hopefully they are also proud of their extraordinary accomplishments with City of Heroes and will understand that even if they cannot be involved with City of Heroes's continued development due to adjusting long-term goals, continued success of the game would reflect well on them as a company.

At the Titan Network, we could really use your advice and expertise. Not just technically, but regarding any aspects you think would help us in our efforts. I know that you've been hit with a lot recently and I certainly don't expect you to prioritize helping us over doing whatever it takes to provide financial security for yourself and your family, but if you have any spare cycles to give, I would love to pick your brain with the explicit understanding that "I cannot talk about that" will be respected.

Please write down my contact information:
E-mail: tonyv@cohtitan.com
Skype: tonyv.paragonwiki
Facebook (Though if you want communication to remain undisclosed, you might want to use an alternative means of contacting me since friends lists are rather public on Facebook.)
Gtalk/Google+: tonyv@cohtitan.com
Phone: Contact me using one of the above means and I'll tell you; I don't want it published.

And, of course, the Titan Network forums.

Again, to moderators and NCsoft, this is not an attempt to solicit information that is prohibited from being divulged. To former Paragon employees, your privacy will be respected. If there is any confusion over what I can or can't share with the public or the rest of the Titan crew in our efforts, I will make every effort to make sure your wishes and well-being are respected.

Some of the things we need help on are topics such as the corporate culture at NCsoft, approaches we can take when contacting them and what you think would and wouldn't be effective in what we are trying to achieve, technical information regarding the back-end platform that City of Heroes runs on, technical information regarding the software and tools used to develop City of Heroes, contact information you'd be willing to share (or vice versa, contacts you'd be willing to give our names to in hopes that they would contact us), and so on. Also, if our efforts are successful and we are able to either acquire rights to City of Heroes via crowd funding or work with another studio to ensure that the game continues to exist, I'd like to gauge your level of interest in continuing to work on the game. If any of you have ideas or help to offer us, or need help in any personal efforts to keep the game alive, please know that you will have a dedicated team of Titans unquestionably at your beck and call to help you in any way we can.

But again, I don't want you to think that I only want to talk to you to milk information out of you. Even if you can't share anything at all, I'd like to keep in touch with you folks, if for no other reason than to pass news and information about new projects you're involved in to the community (which will continue regardless of the ultimate fate of City of Heroes). You all have built up quite a following, and this news and information would be of great interest and might very well benefit you in spreading the word about projects you are involved in, which would undoubtedly capture City of Heroes players and fans who admire your work.

Thanks again for all of your hard work, and I really do hope to hear from you. I've enjoyed meeting every one of you every opportunity I got, and no matter what happens, I have the utmost faith that you are going to land on your feet and make the best of this situation.

If you're not a former Paragon Studio employee but you know one or more personally who isn't familiar with me, the Titan Network, or our reputation, I'd appreciate any efforts you can commit to facilitate getting us in touch with one another.

Hey all, when you contact me, please be sure to give me your Titan Network forums name also. I need to add you to the coordinators list.

To be clear, although we're laser-focusing on an effort right now to save Paragon City, we will continue to be around long after. Anyone who wants to is welcome to migrate to our forums. As we get closer to D-Day (which as an interesting historical trivia side note, I found out recently, stands for "Day" Day), we will probably create forums as they exist here so that, for example, server communities can stay together, artists can post their creations, etc. Don't know that the build forums would be much use, but we already have them created from character planner work over the years, so...

Anyway, yes, we are more than willing to serve as the new City of Heroes community forums.

Hey all, related to our Save Paragon City! campaign, I'd like to get a few volunteers to be coordinators of activities I have in mind. These will be people who we're going to designate responsible for certain tasks, such as looking for CoH-related artwork pertaining to a theme, going through posts looking for certain things, etc. The intention is that we'll give the coordinator a task, they go off and do the research, reach out to the community, gather the data, and report back with what they've got while continuing to look for more.

Some of this will be part of a larger goal, such as to put together a cohesive story of how City of Heroes has affected people's lives. Some of it will be to rally our own troops and get the blood pumping to get people to want to do more. Some of it will be to send off to media and other personalities to try to drum up outside support. Some of it will be putting some gray matter to it and composing lists of data.

These people need to be at least moderately well-spoken (no "i need ur pics plz send to me @ xena-warrior-princess@gmail" kind of communication...) and have some time on their hands and patience to really exercise your search-fu, dig in and find stuff we can use.

If you're interested, drop me an e-mail at tonyv@cohtitan.com and I'll add you to a list of potential coordinators to assign a task to. In the meantime, I'll be putting together my own list.

I honestly don't see myself getting involved in another MMORPG anytime soon. City of Heroes has been an unbelievable experience and I don't regret one minute I've spent playing it or working on our web sites, but I really don't want to get sucked into another game like I have this one. I'm still convinced that we're going to be able to rescue Paragon City, and we'll be pushing out Titan 2.0 in a new era of heroes, but if everything falls through and the unthinkable happens I will probably stick to single player games or games like Portal 2 that don't require massive time investments. Or honestly, what I'll probably do is buy a ton of games on gog.com that I missed or didn't have time for and scale my online activities way back.

Okay everyone, the next Call to Action is posted. Let's get this thing kicked off. Please read the post linked above and show NCsoft how large, committed, and doggonit, downright nice we are! Remember the goal here: to show them the human side of the game, to help them understand why it is so important to be open to keeping Paragon City alive, whether it means changing their mind or, if they just plain can't, letting it go to someone who can.

Good morning, heroes! Just woke up after a few restless hours of sleep. I really needed them, too--I thought of several good ideas while I was drifting in and out. I like to joke with friends sometimes that Morpheus is my muse, but this time, I really did get some inspiration from my dreams that I'll be sharing with you all.

I'm going to be posting some of these ideas today as Calls to Action in our Save Paragon City! forum over at the Titan Network. (Bookmark that link! We don't know how much longer we have here!) Hopefully some of the projects you'll find fun; I really think all of them will be worthwhile towards the goal of keeping the lights on in Paragon City.

Thanks, Z! We will indeed continue to operate and serve the City of Heroes community after NCsoft shuts their servers down. We will continue to post news and updates about our efforts to keep the game alive (see signature) and to keep the community together.

Moderation-wise, we shoot to maintain a feel similar to the forums here. We do actively moderate posts for content such as personal attacks, vulgar or offensive content, etc. Everyone is more than welcome to continue congregating in our neck of the Internet.

WE ARE HEROES. THIS IS WHAT WE DO.

Remember those words.

I know you all are discouraged, I know that you all feel like you've been punched in the gut. Some of you reading this probably just found out that you're out of a job that you loved and are wondering what tomorrow will bring. Everyone is experiencing the prospect of something we are passionate about being relegated forever to only existing as memories. I hear you. I feel you. For a day now, I've reminisced and shed tears, and it hurts like hell. Now it's time to clench your teeth, roll up your sleeves, and get to work.

We are heroes, damn it, and I don't just mean the kind that pushes pixels through a virtual landscape oohing and ahhing at flashy colors. Starting right now, we are going to pull together all of our teams and form a league the gaming world will not soon forget. We will beat this trial. We will save the day. By God, they will chant our names. Incarnates? Give me a break. We are Titans, all of us. We've shed blood, we've cried tears, we've never stopped and we're not about to quit now. We've been saving Paragon City for eight and a half years. It's time to do it one more time.

I have created a new forum at the Titan Network site. The posts in this forum will be dedicated to the purpose of saving Paragon City. I'm absolutely convinced that we, the City of Heroes community, are smart enough and motivated enough to not let our passion die. Not like this. Not without every ounce of effort we can muster, and then some, to keep up the fight. I'll be posting news and information in this new forum, and more importantly, what you, the City of Heroes community, can do to help our efforts. My #1 goal at the end of the day is to keep the lights on in Paragon City, and all topics and discussions here will be focused on that effort. Be forewarned that posts created to antagonize NCsoft or any other company or person we will need to help us will be removed.

Please bookmark this forum and check back there frequently, as I'll also be posting stickies at the top that are "Calls to Action," things that we need you to do or expertise we need in order to progress in our efforts. That's right, you. This is a community effort, and we need you to step up. You, member of the City of Heroes community, you are our heart. You are our soul. You are our geniuses. You are our front line warriors.

Start by getting the word out. Let other players know. Friends, supergroups, former players, former developers, whoever might be able to help. Post it on your fan site. Make it your supergroup message. Broadcast it on your Internet radio station. Link it in your YouTube videos. Share it on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and every other mountaintop you can shout it from.

Now go be great. Don't despair for tomorrow, look it in the eye and say hello. Or when necessary, wrestle it to the ground, put your knee on its neck and make it cry uncle, because we are heroes. This is what we do.

Houtex, your avatar is killing me. Every time I see it, I want to reach out and comfort the little guy. "Aw, come on, little Houtex avatar dude, it will be okay. Don't despair yet, we still might be able to save it!"

Those are possibilities, but to be clear, my #1 goal right now is to keep the lights on. After we meet that goal, we can focus on improvements and/or alternatives. If the lights go off, though, especially for any significant length of time, we're going to lose opportunity and committed players. My goal is first and foremost to keep what we have intact. Other options are on the table, but only if we reach an impasse with regards to keeping the lights as they currently exist on.

Hey all,

So I've figured out the first thing I need in our effort to save City of Heroes: someone who is fluent in Korean, particularly a native speaker who is good at business writing and who is familiar with the South Korean business culture so that we can avoid any social gaffes or misunderstanding in dealing with NCsoft. I'm fluent in business communications in English, but totally out of my league in Asian languages. While I strongly suspect that the higher-ups at NCsoft are fluent in English, out of respect and to really get their attention, I would rather communicate in their native language.

To be clear, I don't need anything translated immediately, but when I do, I don't want to have to wait around for days to get help. Also, I'd like to have at least two or three people to 1) make sure that one person isn't screwing around and trolling me in a language I don't understand because they think it would be funny for me to send a formal letter cussing out higher-ups at NCsoft, and 2) just to have someone to proofread and edit anything before it gets sent.

If you fit this description or know someone who would be willing to help with translation duties, please contact me using any of the following methods:

E-mail: tonyv@cohtitan.com
Skype: tonyv.paragonwiki
PM: here or at the Titan forums

I don't mean this to be as snarky as it's undoubtedly going to sound, I promise. But how about we not boycott anyone based on rumors? Some of us are diligently trying to save the game, and I really think that calls to boycott companies are not going to make any positive difference, and can only alienate us with companies whose cooperation we might need to keep City of Heroes up and running.

That rocks!

Cross-posted on the Titan Network forum

Hey all, I've noticed that a lot of people are putting together disparate efforts to save Paragon City, myself included. We need to work together as a team. In that spirit, I'm starting a thread to list what's being done and by whom. If you want to save Paragon City, please direct your energies to an existing effort if possible instead of kicking off another thing to divide everyone's attention even further. For example, please don't create a new Facebook page, as several are already created and one page with 10,000 supporters is much better than 100 pages with 100 supporters each. If you know of something that's not listed here, please let me know and I'll edit the post to add it.

For the sake of maintaining a high signal-to-noise ratio, please try not to derail this thread. It is intended as a reference, not a discussion of the merits or lack thereof of the efforts. Also, please bear in mind the topic: to SAVE Paragon City. There are a lot of threads and efforts going on to remember City of Heroes and perhaps to commemorate the end of City of Heroes if that comes to pass, but these links are sites and efforts specifically dedicated to making sure that doesn't happen.

• We are heroes. This is what we do.: A rallying cry from the Titan Network, as well as a new forum dedicated to efforts to save Paragon City.
• Titan Network's crowd funding appeal: The purpose is to explore the possibility of using crowd funding to acquire or license the IP, code base, and client distribution rights to City of Heroes. Sponsored by the Titan Network.
• Keep NCsoft from shutting down City of Heroes petition: An effort to convey to NCsoft the importance of keeping City of Heroes active.
• VALVe email campaign: An effort to encourage Valve to acquire City of Heroes. Valve has an extensive distribution infrastructure and City of Heroes might make a good addition to their portfolio.
• NCsoft write-in campaign: Let NCsoft know how much City of Heroes means to you and how important it is for the game to continue on. Remember, the idea is to save City of Heroes, so please do not use it as an opportunity to vent. This will hurt us MUCH more than help us.
• Save our City of Heroes: A Facebook site dedicated to saving City of Heroes.
• City of Heroes Can Not Leave: Another Facebook page dedicated to trying to save City of Heroes.
• Open source the code for City of Heroes: A petition to request for NCsoft to release the code base for City of Heroes as open source.