Fallen Heroes, Villain Goals, and Factions My Way
By
ansetsuken,
Posted on: 2004-11-08 17:48 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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then why are they selling speakers in brickstown? listen to some of the freakshow dialogue. they take their role in the paragon black market.
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The Freakshow Goal is Ego, not Money. They're just selling speakers to show that they stole them. Punks.
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Another thing about fallen heroes is that they always get like 10 times as strong the moment they become evil.(ex: Parallax)
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The power increase is illusionary. Once free of the burdening restriction of morality, honor and justice they once had, heroes (now villians) pretty much do whatever they darn well please, however they want to do it.
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Power
A natural. What villain doesn't want to be all-powerful? Linking it with Magic seems bogus though. There are many, many means to achieving personal power (as opposed to personal influence) in a superhero universe.
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I think the reason it seems "bogus" is because Power is much too broad a term to use for a Goal. This Goal needs to have a more specific name instead...
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Chaos
Seems too narrow. As stated above, I think it should be broadened into Destruction.
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They're the same thing.
Well, that's not entirely true. Chaos does not necessarily imply destruction, only change, which is why it is associated with Mutation.
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Ego
Overlaps way way too much with Power. Junk it.
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You're trying to compare the Freakshow to the Banished Pantheon?
Power villians pump themselves to show others how powerful they are. Ego villians pump themselves to show themselves how powerful they are. Similar results, but the root of the Goal is different.
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Then again, robots do not want money more than anyone else.
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See: Domination.
61866 - A Series of Unfortunate Kidnappings - More than a coincidence?
2260 - The Burning of Hearts - A green-eyed monster holds the match.
379248 - The Spider Without Fangs - NEW - Some lessons learned (more or less.)
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then why are they selling speakers in brickstown? listen to some of the freakshow dialogue. they take their role in the paragon black market.
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The Freakshow Goal is Ego, not Money. They're just selling speakers to show that they stole them. Punks.
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The response to this quote made me giggle outloud. I will give you rating if my laziness does not overtake me.
What about the idea of, instead of making Power, Greed, Ego, Money and Domination 'extra Origins' associated with existing Origins, why not make them something else entirely?
Your Enhancements would still function along the lines of Magic, Technology, etc but your Contacts and Missions would reflect your Goals. Your Goal would not have to mesh with your Origin (some players would find that restrictive), but certain kinds of missions would tend toward certain drops (instead of basing the drops on the enemy defeated).
So you could be a Magic/Greed villain, for instance.
Also, the current plan is for all player villains to be granted their powers some time after play begins, when they 'earn' them from a sponsoring criminal organization. Your Origin/Goal might be set by which organization(s?) you choose to work for before you get your powers.
As for Fallen Heroes...maybe that is the mechanic for them as well. You want your hero to fall from grace? Cool! First, you have to submit to this power-stripping process and succeed in some missions as a thug in my organization before we give you new powers, Superman...
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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Power is personal power over the forces of the universe: magic. It adjoins Domination and Chaos (natural and mutation), and opposes Ego and Money the same way magic opposes science and technology. Power villains are Hellions (who steal magic artifacts), the Circle of Thorns, and so on. Power missions will be to seek out artifacts, relics, and spells in museums, or seek to rescue a captured sorcerer to learn his secrets; they oppose Ego and Money by robbing banks, destroying labs, and so on. Power contacts can be evil sorcerers and wizards, alchemists, scribes, and those who keep the Secrets Man Was Not Meant To Know.
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Having JUST discovered this post, and perhaps I missed it above, but IMHO: Power should be adjoined by Domination and Money, and Chaos should oppose. I mean, let's face it, power and money are hand in hand here, and a Ruler must have control/order (usually via domination), not Chaos.
However, the posts are great and well thought out. Superman with pockets ... hehe, sheesh.
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Jeff Kuroi suggested: Destruction: Someone who doesn't wish to rule the world, but rid the entire population. The ultimate evil.
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In my opinion, this is entirely unworkable for several reasons, both on a story level and on a game mechanic level.
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I gotta disagree with you here.
Before I begin, I want to point out that I am advocating a general Destruction motivation type, not a type that, if you select it, automatically means that your character wants to personally cut the throat of every living thing in the world. Maybe he will want to, in the same way that a Science hero may have been bitten by a radioactive animal to get his powers. There are other Destruction types - those who want to destroy the government, or who like blowing up cities, or who just want to beat the heck out of the good guys and each other, or those who like to break lots of windows and knock over mailboxes at 3 AM. Basically, Destruction contains your Chaos model but allows for broader range.
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One, if there were someone bent on destroying all life on the planet, this would perforce include all villains, too. Such a character would be a threat to everyone and would draw equal wrath from villains and heroes. Lord Recluse and Statesman would fight side-by-side to beat you to a bloody mush, and they would kill you dead, really properly dead, no barmy crossed fingers, no click to go to the hospital, dead.
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Once again, you're falling back on "The tough NPCs would just stop you." First it was Sister Psyche, now it's Statesman and Recluse. It's true that "normal" villains and heroes would all be opposed to you (once they learned of your goals). But I think we've already covered the facts that A) Heroes will be against your villain characters anyway and B) Villains will fight each other anyway. Statesman wants to stop all burglars, too, but he can't. Other villains will be after you, but they can't kill you any more than you can kill them. World Destruction villains will be playing the same game, just for higher stakes.
As to "dead, dead, dead" - the COH idiom already eschews "real death". It is a fact that nobody dies in this game, regardless of whether or not someone really, really, really wants them to. (Unless it is already written in as part of a story arc.) I could go on about this, but what you're saying boils down to "Destruction villains are too evil to be allowed to exist." I don't see why really, really evil, evil villains can't exist in COV, no matter how sincerely others might want to stop them.
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Two, the game mechanics would be completely out of line with this philosophy. Killing everyone in the game a) violates consensual PVP, b) includes killing stores, trainers, and contacts, and c) introduces the concept of 'killing' to a game that currently doesn't have it. Villains are arrested. Heroes are defeated. Nobody dies.
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Yes and no. I think you are positing that Destruction advocates want new game mechanics instituted. I, for one, don't. Right now, in COH, I have a Broadsword Scrapper whose goal is to kill the Circle of Thorns wherever she finds them, and maybe take a part in exterminating them once and for all by finding the Big Boss and cutting his head off. COH is structured such that this is totally OK, and she is doing a great job. She "defeats" (not "arrests") COT left and right, and due to the (intentional!) vagueness of what defeating mobs really means, I am perfectly satisfied in my imagination that they are dead. So, yes, there is death in COH - but it is implicit. "Defeat" means what the player of a given character wants it to mean - nothing more, nothing less. If I wanted, I could extend her idiom and say that she is bent on killing all criminals (including all COV player villains). No new mechanics would have to be implemented to make this work. Yes, PvP will be consensual, and the game may not cater to my every whim in terms of murdering whoever I want. But it is still valid for me to say that my "hero" is a killer. The fit is blurry, but it works well enough. For villains, it will be the same way. No, they won't be able to blow their contacts or whatever away whenever they feel like it. But this will not break immersion any more than consensual-only PvP is broken for my Scrapper right now. I'm cool with that, and other players are cool with it, and hopefully they will continue to be cool with it in COV.
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Last, any possible less-than-complete way to implement the 'kill everyone' philosophy of Bad Guys would raise the question, "Hey, why can't I kill everyone? Ripoff!" Like it or not, a no-rules character simply can't fit into a videogame of this nature. This is only my opinion, of course; I am not a developer.
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True. Players would have to cope with the existing system. See above.
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Better just stick with a Chaos villain.
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Limited. For no reason.
One other thing - your comments seem to imply that you think that Destruction villains can only be "Mad Slashers" who immediately kill everyone they see. Nothing could be further from the truth. Blowing up the world, through scheming, recruiting, and the building of superweapons, is a STANDBY of supervillain goals. Blowing it up is right up there with taking it over. Such a villain wouldn't TELL all his underlings that that's what he's trying to do, or they wouldn't work for him. But that sure as heck wouldn't stop him from trying.
I plan to make at least on destruction type. A beast that attcks everything in sight. I'd play him mostly in hazzard zones, and it might not work that well, can't group, have to challenge everyone I see to PvP combat, no matter their level, or maybe I'll ignore high level heros like the mobs do now . . .
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What about the idea of, instead of making Power, Greed, Ego, Money and Domination 'extra Origins' associated with existing Origins, why not make them something else entirely?
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So you could be a Magic/Greed villain, for instance.
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Did I not already clarify this? I hope so. Yes, I think the origin of your powers is completely separate from what your missions will be. In fact, I'd throw out origins for Villains entirely; I don't see them as relevant.
I personally can't think of a single game mechanic that has anything to directly do with the origin of a villain's powers. You get Enhancements for your powers, yes, but if you get an Enhancement called 'Crowley's Ring' you're not actually wearing a ring, nor can you lose it or see it. It's just a name. If it's called 'Stolen Prototype Goggles' or 'Upside-down Cake' it doesn't actually change the way you play the game. Money villains should get any origin upgrades that money can buy; Domination villains can get any upgrades that one can coerce or blackmail away from its producer; Chaos villains get any upgrades that can be stolen. But in the end the're just names.
But hey, I'm not the designer of COV. Maybe they'll put in Villain origins. Me, I'm still wracking my brain to think of any reason why this is necessary. There doesn't seem to be any across-the-board comic-book rule of correlation between a villain's powers and what he wants to do with them.
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Jeff Kuroi suggested: Destruction: Someone who doesn't wish to rule the world, but rid the entire population. The ultimate evil.
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In my opinion, this is entirely unworkable for several reasons, both on a story level and on a game mechanic level.
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I gotta disagree with you here.
Before I begin, I want to point out that I am advocating a general Destruction motivation type, not a type that, if you select it, automatically means that your character wants to personally cut the throat of every living thing in the world.
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You're being confusing. My response was to Jeff Kuroi, who was clearly advocating "rid (the world of) the entire population" and "ultimate evil."
You're taking about a person who just generally wants to destroy systems, governments, policies, laws, whatever. That is what my vision is for Chaos, based on the old "Chaotic" model from D&D. You say that your "Destruction" concept includes my "Chaos" concept but I think we are, after all, talking about the same thing, only with different words.
Are you advocating an Ultimate Evil motivation set, or are you advocating a villain who seeks to tear down what has been built by others?
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Once again, you're falling back on "The tough NPCs would just stop you."
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This was in reference to an Ultimate Evil character, not to a "breaking windows and breaking mailboxes at 2am" character. Please tell me if you seriously think that Heroes and Villains wouldn't be united to destroy something out to depopulate the planet. (At best, the Villains would seek to enslave or capture it, but I can't see anybody simply ignoring the end of the world.)
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I could go on about this, but what you're saying boils down to "Destruction villains are too evil to be allowed to exist."
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No, no, no, I'm saying that Ue-B4R, Eater of Worlds is a character concept that is too evil to code. It appears that you and I agree that anybody playing this villain type would have to learn to accept the limitations of any system structure put in place: just as it is impossible in a shared gameworld for any Hero to actually truly eradicate crime, it is impossible for Ue-B4R to actually destroy the world.
However, Heroes can fight crime one villain at a time. What lesser, intermediate goals will Ue-B4R have, short of destroying the world? Destroying a country, well, we don't have any. Destroying a state or county... don't have those either. Destroying a city ... well, there's only one city, and it's shared. Destroying a city block? Damned if I know how you'd permit that in a shared world; take away the buildings and there's no place to do door missions. You're left with destroying people, or destroying things in instanced missions.
So my question to you is how, exactly, would you implement Destruction as a villain goal? Who would be a Destruction contact and how would it be materially different from the Chaos model? What would Destruction missions be like, and how is that different?
I suspect we're talking about exactly the same thing, here, using different words. Chaos is where I put all the villains who strive toward destruction, death, and disorder; you appear to think it's the name which isn't punchy enough. Fine, imagine it as Destruction then: how would it be different?0
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Better just stick with a Chaos villain.
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Limited. For no reason.
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I think this is a semantic argument and I'm not going to pursue it. I believe that wanton destruction with no particular aim or goal is included in Chaos, and I said so when I described Chaos contacts; you seem to think that Chaos is a smaller subset of destruction. Call it whatever you like; the principle remains the same.
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One other thing - your comments seem to imply that you think that Destruction villains can only be "Mad Slashers" who immediately kill everyone they see. Nothing could be further from the truth. Blowing up the world, through scheming, recruiting, and the building of superweapons, is a STANDBY of supervillain goals.
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And as I said, in an MMO he cannot be permitted to succeed, so what lesser intermediate goals would be playable for such a villain?
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You're being confusing. My response was to Jeff Kuroi, who was clearly advocating "rid (the world of) the entire population" and "ultimate evil."
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Gotcha, gotcha. My bad. I still think that these "ultimate evil"-motivated guys should be allowable - my whole deal is that they should be incorporated into Chaos/Destruction instead of either A) being excluded wholesale or B) having a whole Goal set that is exclusively theirs.
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You're taking about a person who just generally wants to destroy systems, governments, policies, laws, whatever. That is what my vision is for Chaos, based on the old "Chaotic" model from D&D. You say that your "Destruction" concept includes my "Chaos" concept but I think we are, after all, talking about the same thing, only with different words.
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Agreed.
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Are you advocating an Ultimate Evil motivation set, or are you advocating a villain who seeks to tear down what has been built by others?
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I advocate a broad set of motivations that are still tight enough to be lumped together: someone who tears down society fits, someone who just likes to hurt people fits, someone who wants to blow up the Earth fits.
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Please tell me if you seriously think that Heroes and Villains wouldn't be united to destroy something out to depopulate the planet.
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I see your point; you seem to be missing mine. No matter how many enemies a villain has or how earnestly those enemies wish to stop him, some villains will still find a way to survive. That's why they are called "supervillains" instead of "just some nut case".
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No, no, no, I'm saying that Ue-B4R, Eater of Worlds is a character concept that is too evil to code.
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Point taken! Plus, that is a hilarious sentence.
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... Just as it is impossible in a shared gameworld for any Hero to actually truly eradicate crime, it is impossible for Ue-B4R to actually destroy the world.
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Right. But the heroes in COH try - why can't Ue-B4R try as well, even though the player knows he can never succeed?
(Whoops, you address this later.)
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However, Heroes can fight crime one villain at a time. What lesser, intermediate goals will Ue-B4R have, short of destroying the world? ... You're left with destroying people, or destroying things in instanced missions.
So my question to you is how, exactly, would you implement Destruction as a villain goal? Who would be a Destruction contact and how would it be materially different from the Chaos model? What would Destruction missions be like, and how is that different?
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Very good point! I don't really have an answer. I guess really that world-destroyers in your system could be subsumed under the other Goal types depending on approach, e.g. a guy who wanted to kidnap scientists and build a giant laser out of gold that would punch through to the Earth's core would be a Money villain; a guy who wanted to gather an army and kill everyone he could that way, or gain control of all of Earth's nukes and detonate them at once would be a Dominator; and a guy who just wanted to bust heads one at a time would be Chaos.
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I believe that wanton destruction with no particular aim or goal is included in Chaos, and I said so when I described Chaos contacts; you seem to think that Chaos is a smaller subset of destruction.
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The point is that, for some villains, destroying the world IS the "particular goal".
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Chaos is where I put all the villains who strive toward destruction, death, and disorder; you appear to think it's the name which isn't punchy enough.
I suspect we're talking about exactly the same thing, here, using different words.
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We are very close. Not on the same page, as it were, but on the same shelf. So close as makes no nevermind.
On reflection, I think that my main problem with the name "Chaos" was the same problem I had with it in D&D (thanks for bringing that up): it equates destructiveness with disorganization, which is bogus. The giant-laser-building-guy is very organized, since he'd have to be a really sharp cat with a strong machine to even try to get the damn thing put together. I wanted to fit Ming the Merciless (who practically defines Lawful Evil) into your model. He is pretty much a Dominator though, just on a bigger scale than earth-bound villains. Also, I know, I know, he isn't a "real" supervillain; he's a serial villain. But there are enough parallels that he makes a good "example villain".
Sorry for making such a dogfight out of this small point for so long. Guess I was just in the mood to argue today. 
Overall, your plan is super cool. I get hung up on details easily. Forgive me.
perhaps rather than chaos or destruction, Insanity may be a better descriptor.
the concept seems to be villainy beyond reason. Harm for harm's own sake. Evil that strives toward no tangible motive. That is all covered under the blanket of insanity. It can be chaotic in nature, like creating mayhem and destruction for it's own sake. Or it can be very ordered and calculated, such as a cold nihilistic agenda to bring an end to existence.
no matter how you flavor the character, villains who's motives you'd consider describing as "Chaos" or "Destruction" are simply insane.
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Gotcha, gotcha. My bad. I still think that these "ultimate evil"-motivated guys should be allowable - my whole deal is that they should be incorporated into Chaos/Destruction instead of either A) being excluded wholesale or B) having a whole Goal set that is exclusively theirs.
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No argument here, on the principle; I already said why I feel Destroying the World has no intermediate, achieveable goals.
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Please tell me if you seriously think that Heroes and Villains wouldn't be united to destroy something out to depopulate the planet.
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I see your point; you seem to be missing mine. No matter how many enemies a villain has or how earnestly those enemies wish to stop him, some villains will still find a way to survive. That's why they are called "supervillains" instead of "just some nut case".
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Hey, give me time to reveal my idea that all good supervillains should get a Last-Minute Deadman Switch Escap-O Teleporter. The bad guy always gets away, according to the comics.
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Very good point! I don't really have an answer. I guess really that world-destroyers in your system could be subsumed under the other Goal types depending on approach, e.g. a guy who wanted to kidnap scientists and build a giant laser out of gold that would punch through to the Earth's core would be a Money villain; a guy who wanted to gather an army and kill everyone he could that way, or gain control of all of Earth's nukes and detonate them at once would be a Dominator; and a guy who just wanted to bust heads one at a time would be Chaos.
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That model works for me.
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The giant-laser-building-guy is very organized, since he'd have to be a really sharp cat with a strong machine to even try to get the damn thing put together.
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Why does this make me think of the Gary Larson laundry room with a cat innocently following signs to the washing machine door, signs which read 'CAT FUD, CAT FUD?' And the dog behind the dryer thinking "Oh please oh please oh please..."
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I wanted to fit Ming the Merciless (who practically defines Lawful Evil) into your model. He is pretty much a Dominator though, just on a bigger scale than earth-bound villains. Also, I know, I know, he isn't a "real" supervillain; he's a serial villain. But there are enough parallels that he makes a good "example villain".
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Hey, the best way to test if this five-point system works is to try to categorize existing villains into the system. That's why I went with emotional motivations rather than monetary ones or specific origins.
The evil vizier from Aladdin is not a supervillain, either, but he would clearly be a Power villain: he wants power at his fingertips. Conceptually it is important that Power is bounded on one side by Domination and the other side by Chaos, for Power is a neutral thing by itself. Darth Vader would be a Domination villain, out to remake the universe into his own model, but the Emperor would also be Power. Any others to toss in?
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Sorry for making such a dogfight out of this small point for so long. Guess I was just in the mood to argue today. Overall, your plan is super cool. I get hung up on details easily. Forgive me.
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Forgiven. Ideas for games have to be tested. I'm still not completely sold on Ego and Power as names, and the concepts need some sanding and polishing, but I've yet to see any suggestions that rise to the same level of raw motivational forces.
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perhaps rather than chaos or destruction, Insanity may be a better descriptor.
the concept seems to be villainy beyond reason. Harm for harm's own sake. ... no matter how you flavor the character, villains who's motives you'd consider describing as "Chaos" or "Destruction" are simply insane.
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I toyed with a motivation of Madness early on, and discarded it for a few reasons.
For one, there could well be villains who wish to transform everybody in the world into one of his sexy harem girls (a Domination goal: the remaking of society in your design). Anybody who wants that many wives is also clearly insane 
, but in a structured, makes-sense-to-him kind of way. A villain might wish to own all the money in the world, clearly an insane and unsupportable goal (if you have all the currency in the world, it becomes worthless, and people find other ways to exchange goods). Money villains can also be insane. I was therefore hesitant to lump all Insane villains into one particular kind of mission, that is, in the words of StrongMad, "breakin' stufffff!"
Second, Insanity is great for a character backstory, but it doesn't really rise to the level of a pure motivating force, because there are many different kinds of insanity. A bunch of characters who are insane (in different ways) will likely not agree on hierarchies, give missions, or cooperate with one another, because what is madness to one villain is cool reason to another.
If you simply think that Chaos and/or Destruction should simply be renamed to Insanity, I think that would mislead people into thinking all insane villains must take that Motivation.
I think I answered this in the previous post, MooMah, but here goes.
I believe that Power (the quest for raw power) has to be bounded by Chaos and Domination. Power is a neutral thing and what one does with it shouldn't be handed down from on high.
Also, there are only 5 points to this star; logically, Chaos cannot oppose Money and Domination and Power. Clearly, Chaos opposes Domination.
For the other I chose Chaos to oppose Money because things of value (vintage sports cars, currency, objets d'art, 'Revenge of the Jedi' t-shirts) only have a value relative to other things which can be bought and sold. Gold is valuable because we say it is, ditto diamonds (because the supply is controlled by a cartel); they have few practical uses compared to, say, wheat or beef or the skills of a carpenter.
What would you have Chaos directly oppose? What would you have it allied with?
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perhaps rather than chaos or destruction, Insanity may be a better descriptor.
the concept seems to be villainy beyond reason. Harm for harm's own sake. ... no matter how you flavor the character, villains who's motives you'd consider describing as "Chaos" or "Destruction" are simply insane.
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I toyed with a motivation of Madness early on, and discarded it for a few reasons.
For one, there could well be villains who wish to transform everybody in the world into one of his sexy harem girls (a Domination goal: the remaking of society in your design). Anybody who wants that many wives is also clearly insane , but in a structured, makes-sense-to-him kind of way. A villain might wish to own all the money in the world, clearly an insane and unsupportable goal (if you have all the currency in the world, it becomes worthless, and people find other ways to exchange goods). Money villains can also be insane. I was therefore hesitant to lump all Insane villains into one particular kind of mission, that is, in the words of StrongMad, "breakin' stufffff!"
Second, Insanity is great for a character backstory, but it doesn't really rise to the level of a pure motivating force, because there are many different kinds of insanity. A bunch of characters who are insane (in different ways) will likely not agree on hierarchies, give missions, or cooperate with one another, because what is madness to one villain is cool reason to another.
If you simply think that Chaos and/or Destruction should simply be renamed to Insanity, I think that would mislead people into thinking all insane villains must take that Motivation.
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you're making up archetypes essentially. (in the jungian sense rather than the game term) and while one archetype is dominant in your personality, other motives are very likely to show up from time to time. the motivation is a generalization of their behavior and generalizations aren't hard and fast. you're describing what their core motivation is, not their sole motivation. You make an example that money villains can be insane, but i don't think that invalidates insanity as a motive apart from greed. money villains can also lust for power. Power villains can have dreams of domination, Dominators can often be ruled by their egos. People aren't just one thing, you're merely generalizing what their main motive is. Your chaos classification is villainy without reason. that's insanity. as far as there being very different kind of insanities, that's just character flavor. some of your contacts may be madmen, some deluded, some detatched and nihilistic. all of these NPCs would have one thing in common. destruction for it's own sake, be it destroying the universe, human lives or even just the status quo. You commit evil for no reason other than it's ends.
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Your chaos classification is villainy without reason. that's insanity.
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No, my Chaos classification includes villainy without reason. It also includes things such as eco-terrorism and ultra-libertarianism, as I said. Those certainly aren't without their reasons. It would also include such "villains" as Robin Hood, someone who broke laws and thumbed his nose at the establishment because he thought, in his mind, he was doing a greater good.
I agree that Insanity doesn't work in this system (though I think I suggested it earlier).
Really, the model is about motivational goals, not motivational mediums. Domination villains want to take over. Chaos villains want to destroy. Money villains want to get rich. Power villains want to make themselves personally strong. Insane villains would want to ... what? They might want to do any of these things. Being insane doesn't automatically make you Chaotic. Ego (while I think it is the weakest suggested Goal category) clearly caters well to the insane. Chaos is a good bet too, but it's different. And clearly you can have an insane guy trying to take over the world.
Money, Ego, Power, Domination : Insane | food, paint, ink, cloth : red
Im really sorry if someone brought this up, Id also like to state that I dont know how this could be implemented or if it world/could work.......what about the Force of Nature? Something a being like Galactus, I wouldnt really classify Galactus as Evil. He needs planets to live, or something like the Beyonder that wanted to learn about our reality etc. Just wanted to throw that out there if it wasnt already..
Sorry if it was mentioned. 
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Zombra said, I agree that Insanity doesn't work in this system (though I think I suggested it earlier).
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Thank you for understanding what I've been trying to do here.
If any further clarification is needed, Oniongum, Insanity is a why. Greed is a why. Other things such as sadism, revenge, and so on are whys. For all practical purposes, there is no game effect to why so I stuck with something more concrete: who do you get missions from, who do you fight, what are your missions.
Villains might want to blow up the statue of Atlas for a hundred reasons. One is a disgruntled sculptor who came in second for the civic beautification bid. One hates Atlas for killing his grandfather, who was part of the German invading force into Paragon. One thinks the aluminum structure is an attenuating repeater for the Orbiting Mind Control Lasers under the control of the Gnomes of Zurich via the Boy Sprouts. It is still essentially the same mission.
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Ego (while I think it is the weakest suggested Goal category) clearly caters well to the insane. Chaos is a good bet too, but it's different. And clearly you can have an insane guy trying to take over the world.
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I agree that Ego is a weak category for villains, which is a shame, because I can think of several Ego-class villains in literature. (I'm not as much a comic afficionado as some here.)
The Wicked Witch from Snow White ("mirror, mirror, on the wall") and Salmissra from the Belgariad are both Ego villains, both of whom are obsessed with their own beauty. Any supervillain who ever wanted to dedicate a forty-story statue to himself in the heart of the capital city, or use a giant laser to sign his name on the moon, is an Ego villain. Megalomania is a great villain schtick, but I need to find the right way to encapsulate it so it has good, playable missions and logical contacts.
Wait. No, I don't. This is just blue-skying an idea, isn't it? Well, maybe among us we can come up with some ideas anyway. It's gonna be a long while until City of Villains comes out.
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Im really sorry if someone brought this up, Id also like to state that I dont know how this could be implemented or if it world/could work.......what about the Force of Nature? Something a being like Galactus, I wouldnt really classify Galactus as Evil. He needs planets to live, or something like the Beyonder that wanted to learn about our reality etc. Just wanted to throw that out there if it wasnt already..
Sorry if it was mentioned.
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It has kinda been mentioned, in part.
Someone asked about Ultimate Evil, or a character whose idea is to depopulate the planet of every living thing. The idea of a force so powerful that it would obliterate life on Earth is unplayable, because PVP is consensual; one must either throw out consensual PVP (which the devs already stated will be in COV) or throw out that character's range of power. And a blow-up-the-world villain, in a shared universe, cannot be allowed to succeed without angering thousands of paying customers ("okay, the world ended, so we're wiping the server and everybody starts over at level 1 with no influence"). The problem is that there are no intermediate playable goals: we have no other cities, states, counties or provinces, or even other countries. The city is the world for all practical purposes. The blow-up-the-world type is all-or-nothing where the All part has been taken away.
Regarding a character like the Beyonder, a nigh-all-powerful observer who isn't necessarily evil, what could your missions possibly be? If you had the power of the Beyonder, no mission would be a challenge; would that be a fun game for you?
I admit it would be fun to play an impish godling such as Q (from Star Trek) if I had the ability to create unique, bizarre missions, such as the Nottingham visit in Q-Pid, and dump players into them, but that's only because I have a broad streak of Dungeon Master in me. That would certainly keep me entertained, and I think it isn't entirely impossible that an MMO may eventually permit this sort of in-game GMing by players. I don't think it's here yet.
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or use a giant laser to sign his name on the moon
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A Chairface reference! Excellent!
I've thought about the classifications more and more and I think they could work. The beauty of language is that you can find a way to fit almost anything into an existing framework if you try hard enough. I just don't know why we have to stick with five.
My main concern with City of Villains is not what origins or archetypes I can play - my concern is all story/content related. You can often tell a better story with a villain - they are much more interesting characters. A good villain makes a story many times better. I would prefer to have more origins and archetypes for villains in order to give players more room to spread out. I don't see why we have to artificially constrain it to 5 groups in order to mirror the heroes. There is no reason we can't split it up to account for differences within each concept.
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or use a giant laser to sign his name on the moon
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A Chairface reference! Excellent!
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Silly person. Reliable sources indicate that it was none other than Charo who was behind that (fortunately thwarted) scheme.
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A Chairface reference! Excellent!
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Was not the Ottercreekite reference enough?
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My main concern with City of Villains is not what origins or archetypes I can play - my concern is all story/content related. ... I would prefer to have more origins and archetypes for villains in order to give players more room to spread out. ... There is no reason we can't split it up to account for differences within each concept.
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No, there is no reason why we couldn't, at least on this message board bull session. If we wanted to create something likely to be implemented we have to acknowledge some practical realities such a how long each additional sub-faction would take to code, to populate with contacts, to write missions for, to balance, or whatever.
Another limitation the design team faces is that they will never create enough distinct factions to satisfy all tastes or all imaginations; and that "telling a story" is really outside the grasp of any pre-fabricated set of missions unless it is the devs telling a story to us.
I might be able to think of some tools that would assist players to become more... diverse in their choices. What do you think of this?
First, you subdivide each of the five major Goals into splinter groups. (I would say into five each, for the symmetry, but I haven't really tried it yet.) Name the splinter groups and give them distinct flavors. Money splinters could be art collectors, real estate barons, money hoarders, etc; Chaos could be anti-government, anti-industry, anti-banking, or just plain destructive. Populate each splinter group with splinter-specific missions and contacts.
Next, permit players to select which of those contacts they will deal with. Track the missions they take (and complete). The character will have a running tally of the number of objectives completed for each splinter group: banks burgled, businesses blown up, governments graffit'd, whatever.
Players who stick with a particular flavor of Chaos (or Money or whatever) could be rewarded for their dedication to a specialty, with a badge, perhaps with an accolade at the higher levels. Imagine a badge like Anarchist or Mogul or Connoisseur or Dictator! Accolades, of course, would have to be unique to each group but not unbalancing. The Crey Ice Pistol with the mega-long recharge springs to mind.
You might even reward players who show a generalist attitude toward all kinds of Chaos, someone who is pretty much anti-anything across the board.
The missions the player chooses for himself should be far more important to a character's personal tally than the missions he goes on with friends, otherwise each character could be eligible for 25 separate accolades (5 goals x 5 splinter groups) if he constantly teams up and tries to farm these bonuses; or perhaps he should be limited to one or two; or perhaps a Money villain can never achieve any Chaos or Power accolade and only nibble at the smaller adjoining Ego and Domination badges.
This wouldn't allow you to tell a story with your character, or to invent your own missions and objectives, but it might be a good tool to show other players what choices you have made for yourself in the past.
I would not make these badges available to street hunting, if they are to be meaningful and distinctive. Any 50th level monkey can sit in a place like Perez Park and shoot a hundred Bone Daddies or Gears or Embalmeds.
That's my off-the-cuff response to giving players some more story control. What do you think?
That would definitely be good in tailoring higher level content down the road for a villain - they get more specialized and the missions begin to reflect them.
I think it needs to be mentioned that there is a difference between being evil and being a villain.
There are plenty of "evil" heroes (Paragon City is apparently defended by the population of the ninth circle of Hell, judgicng by many of the players I've seen) such as Ghost Rider, Etrigan the Demon, or even early Wolverine. And many villains, such as Magneto or Doctor Doom or Dr. Vahzilok have goals which are ultimately noble.
To be a villain, you have to have A Plot That Must Be Stopped. Some unattainable goal that spells doom (or at least a massive bummer) to the world (or at least the city) such as controlling all of the crime, being able to flout laws without consequence, or killing everybody to make the world a safer place.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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Just as a point, Anarchy is not Chaos.
Common misconception, though.
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Just as evil and misguided tho