Kheldians are not archetypes
By
Aliana Blue,
Posted on: 2004-11-10 09:21 in Archetypes and Powers General Discussion
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Green Latern Corps
Speed Force users
Kryptonians
Gamma powered beings (a la Hulk)
Martians (be they Jonn Jonzz, or white)
Angels
and these are just off the top of my head. I'm sure you can add your own.
The point is, are all Gamma powered characters the same? How about all speed force users? Kryptonians? No they are not. Because a character is not wholly defined by his or her powers. Hell, I'd say not even mostly. The Hulk is AMAZINGLY different from Doc Samson. Parallax and Kyle Raynard are nothing alike. Zoom does things The Flash would never even consider, and vice versa. Making a character that is part of a defined group is TOTALLY part of comics. I am glad we are getting this as an option. Personally, I'm not sure why so many people are surprised. Statesman said a long time ago that the EATs are like Kryptonians. What did you think he meant by that anyway?
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Anyone else read the Justice League A? story line from 2 or so years ago? Some badass dude got a mentalist to remove all memory of the Justice League of America. He then finally cracked through the badasss defences and tried to make everyone remember again but only manage to make them remember Justice League A. Produced all sorts of neat Justice Leagues, some more closely linked then others.
Justice League Arkam
Justice League Alien
Justice League Amazon (one of the more closely connected ones)
Justice League Atlantean (again closely connected characters)
I think that might have been it but it was a really cool idea imo.
What about the bat team. I mean they bleed through each others books, you don't get much more closely knit then that and when you get down to it they are all pretty similar in what their "powers" are and what their mo is but would you say they are all carbon copies? Tim Drake is nothing like Dick Grason (One being the 3rd and 5th/current Robin and the other being the 2nd Robin).
Ouch.
Crap.
Reading this thread just put a kink in my intelligence and lowered it atleast 30 points. Stop living up to the over-critical Comic no-lifer Fanboy Otuku whatever thing that probably lives in a basement --Archetype or Stereotype, or whatever.... or atleast post it in the culture forum.
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I think this paragraph pretty much hits it on the head. I've run superhero RPG for some time now. Usually I get really good backgrounds, were people think of interesting ways their characters became heroes. But every once in a while you get the guy who's only explaination for his character is he's Kryptonian, former S.H.I.E.L.D, or just a mutant (with no other backstory). That to me is what Kheldains are in COH. How did you get your powers? Your a Kheldian. Why are you here? Same reason the other Kheldians are. What are your general goals? Same as the other Peacebringers.
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I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you think no one is creative enough come up with something more indepth than your statement. The only reason why anyone would be forced into doing something like that is if the Kheldians were some sort of hive mind like the Borg. (This is not what I think the case is.) I can actually think up a slightly unique background for a Kheldian.
Q: How did you get your powers?
A: I am Kheldian, however, I'm kind of young by my race's standards so I'm not very experienced yet.
Q: Why are you here?
A: I don't know about the others, but I'm here for the adventure. Actually, I don't think they even know that I followed them here, to be perfectly honest.
Q: What are your general goals?
A: I'm SUPPOSED to be guarding against the Nictus on our home world. But they haven't attacked there in years. The front lines is where the excitement is. And besides, I want to learn more about your the cultures of your people.
I could go on from there, but you get the idea. Just because someone is of a given race doesn't mean they can't have a deeper background. Heck, depending on how the powers work, you could come up with a back story about how your powers are actually similar to the Kheldians without actually being Kheldian. All this really does is offer a jumping off point for you to build your own story into the world.
Its true that the Kheldians are aliens.. but the body they inhabit is not. Remember the Paragon Times thing? They come to earth in energy base, found they could merge with humans, and benefit from each party.
So you could have a Natural Origin character who has joined with a Kheldian. A mutant could have joined with a Kheldian. A technician could create armor and fire power with the help of a smart Kheldian. etc. etc.
Just because the power used is alien doesn't change the fact that the body is human or mutant or whatever. Remember that.
And everyone knows there are those unique, uber powerful heroes/villains out there that just doesn't fit the mold as a tank or scrapper .. so on. *Shrug* Think about it like this:
Lets estimate 200,000 + people play CoH.
Now about.. 500 of those are level 50 (There was some previous post a long time ago, like before Update 2, where someone got statesman to do a better estimate ratio then this. )
Now that'll mean that the majority of heroes are your usual, common base type heroes.. Then there will be that special bred of heroes! Not uncommon, I find it rather cool. Then there will be more and more eAT's added, giving a nice mixture of unique, grand powerful beings.
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Its true that the Kheldians are aliens.. but the body they inhabit is not. Remember the Paragon Times thing? They come to earth in energy base, found they could merge with humans, and benefit from each party.
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Is it just me, or does anyone else suspect that this is the "Shapeshifting" that statesman keep alluding to? Basically, I suspect that the Epic character is linked to your lvl50, and you can switch back and forth. wouldn't that be NIFTY (assuming it had barriers in there to keep it from being horribly broken...)?
Not saying that wouldn't be rather awesome. But I sadly doubt it. It'll probably some sort of cool shape shifting skill in one of th epower sets in the arch types. . .Though he did mention that it 'wasn't like we thought it was'.. ..So maaybeee..
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Maybe the dev's are being creative and trying to make archetypes that aren't in comics yet.
Yes this game is based on comics but that doesn't mean that everything has to be from comics
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BINGO! The goal of the Epic Archetypes is NOT to reflect paradigms that already exist, but rather to create a gameplay experience that reflects the City of Heroes mythology.
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Obviously you know what you're referring to much better than I, but I gotta say, if they're so unique why do the Warshade sound like an echo of the Goa'uld?
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Obviously you know what you're referring to much better than I, but I gotta say, if they're so unique why do the Warshade sound like an echo of the Goa'uld?
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because you need to read more scifi?
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These aren't archetypes
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How do you know that Kheldians can't be largely defined by the classifications of "Warshades" and "Peacebringers?"
If you know this, It seems you know much more about Kheldian culture than has been stated on this website. Who's your source? Spill it! Don't make me torture you for the information.
the city of heroes mythology is exceedingly similar to if not parallel'ed to the Palladium Books role-playing game called Scraypers
Over the hills and through the woods.
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Green Lantern Corp
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And how many active Green Lanterns hang out on Earth?
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At what time? I saw more green lanterns during the Crisis episodes than the previous year put together. Remember, the EATs are here because something is about to hit our local fan...
Players' Choice Awards: Best Dual-Origin Level Range Arc!
It's a new era, the era of the Mission Architect. Can you save the Universe from...
The Invasion of the Bikini-clad Samurai Vampiresses from Outer Space? - Arc ID 61013
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Except of course Tanks, all they do is serve a nerd game purpose, they are nothing like the comics, but 4 out of 5 is pretty good!)
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Think again...
The Thing=Tanker
The Hulk=Tanker
She Hulk=Tanker
Wonder Woman=Tanker
Wonder Man=Tanker
and the list goes on, and on, and on...
Their main is the ability to resist damage, then they can hit hard. Sounds tanker to me...sure, in the game you cannot lift a plane with your left hand, but having that would need to have the same on the other side, and it could be impossible for a blaster or a controller to fight the Juggernaut(Tanker) or the Wrecking Crew(Tankers). But, after all, they're part of comic books. This is a game, it must be different. Even in the comic the same character is having different powers depending from the writer. The Hulk has passed from being totally invulnerable to be tough with an unheartly regeneration power(the Pantheon saga). And this just because the writer decided so. They made Spider-man beat Firelord, just because it was his comic book. Firelord, you know? Herald of Galactus, used to soar through the galaxy, resist the heat of a sun, fighting almost equal to the Silver Surfer...beaten by Spider-man? 
They have reduced the extent of what Super Strenght means, just because the game couldn't works with people like Gladiator who can lift a skyscraper. This doesn't means that the tanker is not a good comic book archetype.
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Now we get Warshades, Peacebringers. Ok, so, these are the archetypes for all those dozens of your favorite super powerful comic book heroes who are from another planet and draw power from the number of people around themselves? I mean a facet of the class is that they are aliens? That should be left to origin, not be inherent in an archetype. The description of these things is actually kind of too specific for a class, let alone trying to pass it off as an archetype.
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Nope. They cannot be just the origin. "Alien" could be an origin. Keldhans could not be an origin, too narrow, unless the merging with a Keldhan doesn't result in a random alteration of the human host. And it's not. But you will have to choose between 16 different power sets, this is a very good thing. And, talking about the humans merged with extra-terrestrial entity in the comic book...Spider-man with the alien simbiote, all the Wetworks team, Phoenix(the last version, not the original one. Even if even that was similar to this, being an alien who copied inside itself the mind of the original), Captain Universe...we could even add Spawn to the group. And don't we forget War Machine(a pure human using a living alien armor)
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I was hoping for actual missing comic book archetypes, maybe along the lines of Powerhouse (big guys who can also do damage), Mastermind (Lex, Joker, etc... smart guys the type everyone has to make scrappers or controllers now) and Sentinel (maybe along the lines of Defender but with melee damage).
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Powerhouse=Tankers
as said before, you cannot put in a game a level of strenght like that of the Hulk.
Mastermind=not applicable
To play your game, could you kindly name me just one SUPERHERO taken by the comics who could enter this archetype? No way...because this is a VILLAIN archetype, not a hero one. Professor X=no. His a controller. Oracle(Barbara Gordon)=no. She's just a contact. Ezekiel=no. His a scrapper. And a contact. Maybe in the CoV a similar kind of action could be used, but I doubt it. The game is mainly based on fighting. A thing like that could be for the archvillain, not for the players. Or, if you like(I hope not), a different game, like the Evil Genius one they are selling now, a 007-like version of Dungeon Keeper...
Sentinel=a mix between tanker and blaster and controller. Just like a lot of comic heroes, they could not fit in an AT from CoH. Thor? A mix. Captain America? a scrapper with a shield(in the future, a pure scrapper 
). Iron man? a mix. Superman? A mega mix.
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Nope, Warshades. Peacebringers.
"You know like those comic book staples, uhm... You know the ones, there's that guy."
"Which one do you mean? There's SO many that have the integral traits of coming from an alien planet and drawing power from the people in their proximity. I just don't know where to begin."
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just said before, the mixing human/extra-human exist in comics. And, like other said, it doesn't necessary needs to be a stolen copyright to be interesting. I prefer to be able to create e hero from a not too used idea in the comic than being able to create a mutant. And if they came out with an idea totally invented never seen in the comics, even better.
Where is written that a hero must be necessary be stick to the old rules? I can imagine when you discovered that they merged a biker with a demon in the '70 giving the original Ghost Rider...what are they, crazy? Quick, transform him in a mutant!! 
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And before someone yells out Manhunter or Superman or something... yes they are aliens. We don't need an archetype for superpowerful aliens, we have a science origin. In the above examples I gave Manhunter could be a Science Powerhouse. There's not, and probably never will be (hopefully) an archetype that you can fit Clark in.
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And you still don't remember that Kheldans are just the FIRST AT coming out. It's been said various times that there will be a lot of others in the future, from winged ones(in work) till the Statesman AT(planned after CoV). There will be various, not just this 2.
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I suppose this wouldn't have been such a big issue if Cryptic hadn't sworn up and down, left and right, that this game would never, ever have the pigeon holed classes of other games. Well, then again they said they wouldn't have dance emotes and dance clubs either so... Lame. 
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never read something about it, and I'm in from beta, my low numbr of post and recent enter date is just because they forced me to move from the account I created during beta(as "spagliani") to the actual one. I've read the forum all the time, even to post news on the italian CoH forum, on www.mmorpgitalia.it and I've never read about never put the dance emotes in the game...nor about other statements about "pidgeon holed classes". But since I'm from Italy and my knowledge of english is not perfect, I don't know what you're meaning with this term. What do you mean?
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All that being said, we don't know much about these things so I can't give up hope yet. Cryptic has surprised me in the past, maybe they will here too. I sure hope so!
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It's the only part of the post I totally agree...they've made a very good job till now, I'll wait to see what this AT are for sure before complaining about them, if any...
My point wasnt that there arent any heroes who share common origins (Fantastic Four are some that havent been mentioned yet). My point was that DC doesnt have a Kryptonian standing on every street corner in Metropolis waiting for a crime to stop. If every DCV super team had a Green Lantern on it, people would think theyre being unimaginative.
I dont dispute that each player can give his/her Kheldian different personas and backgrounds. Some might have been scientists, soldiers, or teachers back home. The same would hold true if you chose an elf/mage in another game. Each one would have different goals and motivations. You are still an elf and a mage though. With the same racial powers as every other elf and access to the same spells as every other mage.
Imagine if Cryptic had used that idea from the very beginning. All tanker might be given 16 super strength-like powers and 16 powers appropriate for invulnerability. Even a step further, they would all be rescued Crey prisoners who had been subject to experiment 593. Sure each person is free to decide who he or she was before the experiment, and how he or she feels about it after. Now expand that design to all archetypes; to me that is the difference between the archetype system we currently have and the class system EATs are part of. Its kind of funny when you think about to, many fantasy MMORPGs are trying to break away from the class system with skills trees, traits, alternate advancement, and other bits if individuality. COH is adding class/race combos to an otherwise (almost) freeform builder.
Personally, Id rather play Spiderman than shield agent 626. Im not trying to argue against EATs, obviously Cryptic has put a lot of work into them, and so theyre coming whether we like it or not. I just feel they canned heroes and really havent an interest. I could be wrong, and they might be widely unpopular, so like an ice tanker, seeing another one is a rare novelty.
Well, OK, we know Kheldians and Warshades are both part of the same species/whatever, right?
So in reality, you can look at this as the alien AT, with Kheldian and Warshade powersets.
You have less options to pick from, but these two are ATs of the same genre, just like a BS and a DM are both Scrappers.
[Quote]Imagine if Cryptic had used that idea from the very beginning. All tanker might be given 16 super strength-like powers and 16 powers appropriate for invulnerability.
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I believe what Statesman has said was that both EATs would have 16 power SETS (8 primary, 8 secondary I would assume), not just 16 predetermined powers, and I would assume they would have access to all the power pools as well, which goes against the analogy of your "elf mage." Though if you could find the direct quote where he says that the EATs would be given 16 powers rather than 16 powersets, I'll concide the point.
How about a counter analogy. Let's equate both EATs to a branch of the military. Not everyone in a given branch has all the same abilities. Some people are technitians, some are in charge of communications, some are the experts in using heavy ordinance. It comes down to what each person is good at. Now assume that the two EATs are branches of the Kheldians' military. It would stand to reason that each member of that "branch" might have different specializations. In game terms, these specializations would be the power set combinations. The devs know that they need to offer veriety to the players so they aren't going to limit you to only one powerset.
As a side note: When the skills system comes out, all characters, including Kheldians, will be able to destiguish themselves that much more.
Here's my concern. (Note that it's a concern and not an issue. A concern is what you fear may happen. So don't jump down my throat.)
I'm concerned that the game is moving further away from a comic book background and into a more traditional MMORPG character based system. Although I'm enjoying the game, I still think they have a way to go to capture the feel of a comic book. Purposely making this game "unique" will not help them to reach that lofty goal.
Again, this is only a concern. They may be able to pull it off. But I think Cryptic should realize that myself at least will watch very carefully where this goes.
BTW, as a side note, I've been a bit perturbed by how people who voice any negative opinions on Issue #3 have been summarily beaten down by fervent fans. Cryptic needs to hear both the positive and negative, as long as it's done in a constructive manner.
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Think about it, in comics heroes are typically somewhat unique. There aren't a bunch of others with the same orgin & powers running around. Even if the hero's entire race has the same powers as him, he's usually the only one hanging around (or one of a very small number). This is done for a very good reason. Superman, Hawkgirl and Martian Manhunter are all good examples. Each of them would somehow be lessened if a whole bunch of Kryptonians, Thanagarians, or Martians showed up and all became heroes. That's pretty much why I have no intention of playing one.
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Hate to break it to you but that is exactly what has been done in comics. Superman is the best example, there are well over a dozen Kryptonians/(Kryptonian look alikes like Powergirl) running about (including 3 supergirls and counting at the moment) and a whole city of them in storage, all with the same powers whom they pull out whenever they want for a story. Superman's origin and powers were copied so much that that was one of the reasons they restarted Superman from scratch and then fell into the same lack of creativity. Just as DC destroyed all the alternate Earth's and what is happening next month? The villians from Earth 3 are coming visiting again.
The same goes for Hawkman who is basically just a cop from another planet full of people like him.
What you forget is that one server in CoH has more heros than the entire DC and Marvel Universes put together. I sincerly doubt the RPG you run has that many people in it. With that many people duplication of powers and origins can't be avoided. The fact is that for a MORP CoH has the most individuality of characters of any MORP to date.
To my eye from day one CoH most resembles The City in the first episode of the Tick cartoon with so many heros running around they are swinging into each other from buildings.
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You can't please everyone, so lets concentrate on me.
The only quote I've seen on the number of powers
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Both Archetypes have brand NEW power sets.
In fact, there's 16 Primary Powers and 16 Secondary Powers.
Yep. Not 9. 16.
And there's Shapeshifting. Of a sort....
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I dont think he has said if they get more than one primary and secondary for the peacebringers or warshades or if they can mix and match between them but he 16 definitely refers to the number of powers within each set.
And since Statesman compared them to krytonians, it would be like having one in a DC RPG. You would all have the same powers as Supes. Some may neglect developing certain powers like their eye beams and through pools, some may be the boxers, doctors, or leaders of their people, but they all have flight, speed, tough skin, heat vision, and strength as there racial powers. The high-elf/mages of COH.
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My point was that DC doesnt have a Kryptonian standing on every street corner in Metropolis waiting for a crime to stop. If every DCV super team had a Green Lantern on it, people would think theyre being unimaginative.
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Actually, in my opinion, some of the most imaginative stories in DC occured when you had several people with common powers and backgrounds. There are loads of great GL corp stories full of characters with the same background and origin, yet good authors flesh out the characters and make them distinct and interesting.
Take Legion of Superheroes, at times they had three or four Kryptonians around (well some were Daxamites but close enough.) Now, there were certainly unimaginative authors that wrote as if Mon-El was just Superboy in a red shirt and Kara was just Clark in a skirt. But there were also great stories, where differences in personality and subtle differences in backgrounds made the characters seems alive and unique.
The same will be true with the Kheldians. Unimaginative players will be Kheldian12324 who is here, like all Kheldians to fight bad guys and get experience. But clever players will be Blargo, the quiet yet passionate Kheldian artist caught up in a war he wants no part of but agrees must be won.
It comes down to the players and how much effort they want to put into the character. Some people prefer to play without worrying about characterization or background, Kheldians will be great for them. Some people like being creative and coming up with a complex background, Kheldians will be good for them as well, they just present different challanges.
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I was pretty excited when they announced a couple of epic Archetypes for the game.
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I wasn't - have to get to level 50 first? Yeah right.
OK, so I stand corrected, but that still keeps them from being limited. We are talking about a total of 32 powers for each EAT, and those are just the ones that are specific to them. Statesman didn't say they wouldn't have access to Power Pools so that ads the 4 powers from each of those. So there would be a bit more variety than I think you were assuming (which I could be wrong about), just not as much as the other ATs. The point is that this doesn't seem like it is that much of a step back just yet.
As an aside: Statesman did say new power sets for both EATs (first line of the quote), but not how many between the two of them, so there is still the potential for there to be more than one Primary and one Secondary for each of them.
In any event, we will have to wait and see.
(Yet another aside: I am liking our debate about this, so if I'm being at all abrasive in my disagreeing with you, I appologize.)
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Being true to comics is good but being a good game is the most important thing.
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Dittos.
1) Is it fun?
2) Is it consistent with the world of comics?
... 3) Is it in exactly the same format that we've become used to?
Who really cares about 3?
Actually, I have thought about this a little more.
No, Kheldians are not really comic archetypes (small a). But they will be (Epic) Archetypes (big A) in COH, because they will be player characters that have powers, and the power sets that your character has are delineated by their Archetype. By definition, any discrete and exclusive set of character options is an Archetype in this game. So much for semantics.
Story-wise, here is a hypothetical comic situation (and I'm not a good DC geek, so some of my facts might be wrong; please bear with me): imagine that Krypton never went kaboom, and that Superman was fired into space because his parents wanted to spare him being tortured to death by Kryptonian fascists or some such thing. Of course Supe doesn't remember any of this; he was just a baby. The message crystal or whatever got lost in transit. All he knows is that he is from space and landed on Earth in some kind of alien escape pod. Still comic booky? A more lame story, but yes. OK. Now imagine that somebody from Krypton sends a message to Supes 30 years later. Krypton's sun has turned yellow or something and there's a big civil war going on at home, with everybody all superpowered and stuff and vying for domination. Maybe some evil guy wants to unite Krypton into a huge super army to take over the universe. So, the basic story line is that Superman, with his long experience using these powers, has to return home to tip the balance and make sure that Krypton natives use their new abilities for good, and whip the forces of evil. He decides to bring along a bunch of his friends, because even though they suck compared to him, they can still probably help. A big long limited series runs this story line, which all takes place on and around Krypton. You with me so far? OK, I know the concept isn't the greatest; I just thought it up as an example. The point is that it is still in keeping with the overall genre of superhero comics. Right? Right.
Now, in this series there are obviously going to be a bunch of new Kryptonian characters introduced. They may be great, or they may suck, but they are obviously going to be necessary for the story. If a GM wrote this storyline in a pen-and-paper RPG, some of the players would probably want to run Kryptonians while others would stick with their Earthling characters, brought along by Supe.
This is the situation with Kheldians in COH. There is actually a storyline going on in the game that introduces a significant new population element to the game world, and these Epic ATs allow the players to participate directly in that storyline (as opposed to: "Aliens are around! Well, they're all NPCs, but you can fight the bad ones.") Sure, it may be a egg > chicken situation where the storyline was written specifically around the idea of putting new ATs into the game, but what's wrong with that?
Now, if the story sucks, and the new ATs are boring, then we'll have something to get legitimately annoyed about.
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Here's my concern. (Note that it's a concern and not an issue. A concern is what you fear may happen. So don't jump down my throat.)
I'm concerned that the game is moving further away from a comic book background and into a more traditional MMORPG character based system. Although I'm enjoying the game, I still think they have a way to go to capture the feel of a comic book. Purposely making this game "unique" will not help them to reach that lofty goal.
Again, this is only a concern. They may be able to pull it off. But I think Cryptic should realize that myself at least will watch very carefully where this goes.
BTW, as a side note, I've been a bit perturbed by how people who voice any negative opinions on Issue #3 have been summarily beaten down by fervent fans. Cryptic needs to hear both the positive and negative, as long as it's done in a constructive manner.
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Exactly. This is what I'm talking about and is preciesly Statesman's own concern with Tanks.
I don't want to go grab quotes from everyone's posts but I'll address some stuff folks said in their replies to my thread. (Which I appreciate by the way.)
To the person who thought they were proving me wrong by listing Tanks in comics. Yes you're right, there ARE tanks in comics, and the heroes you listed are infact of that archtype. My concern with Tanks, which Statesman agrees with by his own admission on more than one occasion, is that characters in this game of the Tank archtype do not feel like Tanks from comics. This isn't really debatable here by the way, the person who designed the game is taking steps to remedy this, they obviously see the problem.
Second, I'm not quite sure how my post somehow paints me a mimic player. I'm one of the people reporting all you Spyderm4ns, Poonishers and -Wolv3rines-. Every single one of my heroes has a well thought out origin and back story reflected in their appearance and power choices. Yes I gave examples of heroes in the same archetypes as Paragon but this was to illustrate that no such hero exists for "Kheldians."
The quoted post above very succinctly states the issue. Statesman is changing the Tank archetype to more reflect the flavor of comics at the same time Cryptic is introducing an "Archetype" that has nothing whatsoever to do with them. This is a discrepency in design.
To the people who say it doesn't matter, we disagree. OF COURSE it matters, the setting and theme of these massive online nerd games is one of the most important ways it can differentiate itself from the herds of others. This precise, simple idea is what led Statesman to say that Tanks were in need of help, because while they did their assigned task in nerd games, this wasn't enough because they didn't (don't) mimic comics.
If Kehldians, why not an "archetpye" of Elves? How about Dwarves? "Elves are heroes from an alternate dimension called the Land of Yor and can choose from the Archetypes of Thief and Mage." Your arguments that Kheldian's are a legitimate addition can be used to justify aboslutely anything. I find generic arguments tenuous.
Now of course I'm not insinuating that I think we'll all be raiding dragon's, searching for "The Wrath"s, drinking potions and working on our cooking skills. I don't think there's going to be a hobbit archetype. But like the poster quoted, I do beleive this is a departure from stated goals, design and theme. They are a race, not an origin, and they are some typical nerd game hybrid class, not superhero archetypes.
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Think about it, in comics heroes are typically somewhat unique. There aren't a bunch of others with the same orgin & powers running around.
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Green Lantern Corp
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OOOOHHHH!!!!!!
Seriously though, that is a surprisingly good point for something so succint. It is well known that Statesman is a fan of DC comics. Lets see what "Groupings" of characters we can find with same/similar powers (not just from DC).
Green Latern Corps
Speed Force users
Kryptonians
Gamma powered beings (a la Hulk)
Martians (be they Jonn Jonzz, or white)
Angels
and these are just off the top of my head. I'm sure you can add your own.
The point is, are all Gamma powered characters the same? How about all speed force users? Kryptonians? No they are not. Because a character is not wholly defined by his or her powers. Hell, I'd say not even mostly. The Hulk is AMAZINGLY different from Doc Samson. Parallax and Kyle Raynard are nothing alike. Zoom does things The Flash would never even consider, and vice versa. Making a character that is part of a defined group is TOTALLY part of comics. I am glad we are getting this as an option. Personally, I'm not sure why so many people are surprised. Statesman said a long time ago that the EATs are like Kryptonians. What did you think he meant by that anyway?