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This thread is barely 24 hrs old and is already 34 pages long......you'd think this would send a message to the devs. 
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What message? That's there's a small group of players who get hysterical over incomplete information and post multiple times?
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Rampant speculation can be fun!
Also, it's only 19 pages for me.
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Yay, at least someone else doubles up the threads like I do. I cant stand how short the default is..
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Of course we might accept their patronage to our own ends, but when the mood or conditions are right, betraying the fools would be in our villain's interests. That's just the RP justification for why I think we need an out.
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Actually, it seems to me that joining a patron gives you powers that your villain gains on his own, and not really tied to the patron in any way other than theme. Say I join Scirocco, and he teaches me the secrets of the Mu. I am now free to use those powers as I see fit, and he can't take them away. I can even use them against him, if I feel like. And when the day comes and I do, will the other patrons want me to join them? Hell no! Because they'd be afraid the same would happen to them!
RP-wise, villains are about the power, and if they have to work for someone to achieve that power, they'll do it. It's what villains do from 1-40, for god's sake.
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That aside, like Venture said earlier, designing in a permanent choice like this is just a bad decision. It's going to cause no end of grief.
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As Posi said, hard numbers will be given before any choice is made. (What the dev's consider numbers vs. our numbers notwithstanding) The real grief that this is likely going to cause is purely aesthetic - XX power doesn't look cool like XXX power, and so on.
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Dawnslayer on Virtue.
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Oh and in beta you USED to be able to change AT's through the Terra Volta trial. So the tech is in place to change patron powers. Just like the tech is available to do name changes, etc.
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Actually that was the original, on-paper, plan for Terra Volta. The Strategy Guide went off the on-paper plan and said that is the end result of the trial. Thus there is no "tech in place" for this. The Terra Volta trial was not in the COH beta, it was issue 2, I believe, that it made its debut. Changing ATs has never been in the game, it was never programmed.
Hopefully that clears that up.
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That was the first thing I thought. I remember when the respec was introduced and I wasn't in beta, so someone's facts were kinda... totally wrong. 
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Not being able to respec out of your Patron is understandable from the way I see it.
Oh wait! I just realized something, people are looking at the powers instead of the Patron.
Wow, how anti-RP can you get?
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I don't really care about the powers too much, what I'm concerned about with the information available at this point in time is that with each villain I get to level 40, I'll be able to see 25% or so of the special content.
Because from what's been posted by the devs it sounds like once you "lock in" to a patron, the other partons won't give you their arcs.
I understand that the devs don't want all the content to be available to any one hero or villain, but give me a break - are we expected to have 4 level 50 villains before we get to see all of the high level content?
One of the main reasons I play is for the story and to me this smacks of a marketing droid's "brilliant" idea on how to keep people playing longer as opposed to a good design decision.
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This thread is barely 24 hrs old and is already 34 pages long......you'd think this would send a message to the devs.
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What message? That's there's a small group of players who get hysterical over incomplete information and post multiple times?
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Sigh. The information isn't incomplete. You guys and the "wait till test mantra" is getting old. It's doesn't matter what the powers do, all that matter is that they're permanent. Positron said they are so there is no "incomplete" information.
But that never matters does it?
The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
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I understand that the devs don't want all the content to be available to any one hero or villain, but give me a break - are we expected to have 4 level 50 villains before we get to see all of the high level content?
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Team with others doing different arcs.
I don't believe that the powers are permanent. The power set is permanent. Isn't that the case?
Oh yes EvilGeko, because your opinion is so not valid. We're always right. 
Jeez, all we are saying is to get a better opinion is to wait until it is on Test because we dont know full details. Is that an evil thing to say?
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The problem is, this patron thing has found a way to get on the bad side of all sorts of players.
1. Content enthusiasts don't like it because they want their characters to complete as much content as possible, and this means there is a significant fraction they can't do so with.
2. Roleplayers and people who build characters by concept or are jealous of backgrounds don't like it because it forces their characters into a certain (subordinate!) mold.
3. Min/maxers and pvpers don't like it because it means they might end up with a subpar set, because the opportunity to test all entire sets is so arduous compared to the heroes ability to respec apps.
Against that, I've seen very few arguments in favor of the ideas. Some people want to be different from heroes, and some want decisions to have lasting consequences. Most defenses are more or less "Wait and see, it might not be that bad."
Me? I'm dismayed by the possible implications of both #s 2 and 3, and I'm wholeheartedly in favor of independent epic sets. I firmly believe that those who aren't willing to lock themselves into a patron and are willing to miss out on the patron content should be able to gain some form of APPS, just as the heroes did. I really LIKED the way hero pools were handled.
If patron pools can't take the competition, I would think it an indication that they were a bad idea in the first place.
Amazingly enough, I will not fly off the handle or scream about the "permanentness" of the Patron Power Pools (PPPs). That is of minimal concern to me, as I am disinclined to change powers around on a whim, am not the least bit worried about "maximum effectiveness" or powergaming, and certainly couldn't possibly give less of a [censored] about PvP.
However, I must voice my concern - not a rant, just a concern - about the following statement:
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You are not forced to do any of the Patron content.
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I have seen no evidence, and certainly no statements, about the possibility of ANOTHER "Patron", which is of the non-Arachnos variety. Some of my characters will pick an Arachnos patron, true, but others (in fact, most) are not interested in serving under them at all.
My basic question is, will there be an alternative to Arachnos? Even "Generic" would be acceptable, although sadly bland and boring. Or, as what I quoted above (maybe) implies, will we simply have to go without any extra powers? That latter case is the worst possible scenario. It frightens me.
Looks, here's the breakdown of how it looks from here:
- Scenario 1, and the best possible, is that we will have access to the four PPPs, an additional non-Arachnos-affiliated Patron, AND some generic pools similar to those in CoH.
- Scenario 2, we have the four PPPs, and one Generic Ancillary Power Pool per AT (as in CoH).
- Scenario 3, and the worst possible yet looks to be the likeliest, is that there will be the PPPs, and if you don't like any of them, [censored] you and you can choose from your standard powers like you have for the other 40 levels. Neener neener, conform to our ways or be sentenced to grind away those last 10 levels with NOTHING special to look forward to.
- Scenario 4 is Scenario 3 above, but an alternative set of pools is added later.
I suppose you can see what I think of Scenario 3. I hope it doesn't come to pass, but the cynic in me says it will, considering that NO evidence of any alternative has even been hinted at (that I've seen). I would love, DEARLY love, to be wrong.
Btw, don't be a [censored], this isn't a threat-to-quit post. I am merely saying that if Scenario 3 comes to pass, I will be deeply disappointed in the devs. Scenario 4 I can live with, as the actual characters in question are nowhere near 40...my main is probably going with Ghost Widow. However, offering NO alternatives but to serve Arachnos? I would consider that a slap to the face, and not the slightest bit what I expected from the devs or this game.
Like I've said, I hope that my concerns are unfounded.
You may continue with the usual back and forth. 
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I see so many post saying "Why not just make it like the heroes EPP's."
So what your saying is,you want the villians to be IDENTICAL to heroes.I say no to that,that's exactly why they are villians,and not heroes.
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I'm sorry but that doesn't make any sense. Of course, heroes and villains are different, but in other ways they are the same. In the comics superpowers are delineated by whether you're evil or good. There are people with Super Strenght on both side, Flight on both sides, etc.
This is not a place where it's necessary or desirable to have a difference between heroes and villains.
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All i'm saying is that I like the PP idea.I know the trolls and fanboys will yell at me for saying that but I really couldn't care less what they think or anyone else for that matter.If you wanna try the PP,use the Test Server.If you don't want to try them,choose other powers or just don't play,Simple as that.
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I'm neither a Troll nor a Fanboy, but I'll call you an idiot.
Have you even read the posts here? You CAN'T TEST THEM OUT ON THE TEST SERVER!!
The only way to do this is level to 50 WITHOUT a Patrol pool, then copying to test and going through each arc.
Hell, we don't even know if we lose out of Patron pools at all if we don't pick one at 41.
Isn't it a little early to be reacting with this kind of vehemence?
We don't know anything about the actual powersets yet. We don't know how many powers the sets contain or if patrons offer more than one set each.
On top of that, people got by originally without being able to respec at all. Not being able to switch APP sets will hardly be crippling even if they start up a major patch-o-rama.
Just relax and see what actually comes down the pike. It's not worth stressing over, and it's sure not worth stressing over yet.
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I see so many post saying "Why not just make it like the heroes EPP's."
So what your saying is,you want the villians to be IDENTICAL to heroes.I say no to that,that's exactly why they are villians,and not heroes.
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I'm sorry but that doesn't make any sense. Of course, heroes and villains are different, but in other ways they are the same. In the comics superpowers are delineated by whether you're evil or good. There are people with Super Strenght on both side, Flight on both sides, etc.
This is not a place where it's necessary or desirable to have a difference between heroes and villains.
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All i'm saying is that I like the PP idea.I know the trolls and fanboys will yell at me for saying that but I really couldn't care less what they think or anyone else for that matter.If you wanna try the PP,use the Test Server.If you don't want to try them,choose other powers or just don't play,Simple as that.
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I'm neither a Troll nor a Fanboy, but I'll call you an idiot.
Have you even read the posts here? You CAN'T TEST THEM OUT ON THE TEST SERVER!!
The only way to do this is level to 50 WITHOUT a Patrol pool, then copying to test and going through each arc.
Hell, we don't even know if we lose out of Patron pools at all if we don't pick one at 41.
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Test server is test for a reason.What you do there has NO EFFECT on your character,and if you don't want to level to 50 to test the PP's out then don't because no ones forcing you too.I'm not going to argue with anyone on these boards because it's pointless so i'm stopping this before it starts.
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Isn't it a little early to be reacting with this kind of vehemence?
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...And the reward for being the 427th poster in the thread to point this out IS...!
I kid. What I said has been repeated ad infinitum too. That's mostly what we do here, is rephrase and regurgitate.
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I understand that the devs don't want all the content to be available to any one hero or villain, but give me a break - are we expected to have 4 level 50 villains before we get to see all of the high level content?
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Team with others doing different arcs.
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All you can get while teaming is the mission breifing - you can't see the post mission debrief. IIRC you also can't see / read the clues that show up during the missions.
I like to take my time in order to read the stories, read the clues, read the debrief... IMHO teaming with another to see the arc is not even close to doing it yourself.
If you're doing it with SGmates, you could have them take screenshots of the debriefings and clues and put them on Photobucket for you.
Ok, I am not saying such a story doesnt exist, but something is kinda bothering me.
People are still complaining about how it ruins their RP concept to have to pick a patron and stuff, but for the life of me I cannot come up with a villian so evil, that backstabbing someone for more power would fit.
Im sure some exists, so could someone just give me a few examples of something this doesnt work for?
wait, i got one, like, super strict code of honor or some such. anyway, just an idea to a few others would be nice, since Im kinda curious, and Im pretty sure quite a few story arcs earlier in the game also involve backstabbing, so its nothing new...
[edit] Also, for the content people, teamw ith someone else doing the arc, and then afterwards, I gaurentee there will be atleast one fan site with all the clues and post missions and such, I think there are already a few that already have all this for CoH and alot of it for CoV
"Evil backstabber" doesn't cut it all the time. For a villain to even THINK about stealing or being taught powers by another would be an admittance of his own weakness. He's not good enough to handle the job by himself, so he needs someone else to lighten the load.
The problem I have here is that you HAVE to rely on someone else's power in order to reach the level that heroes are capable of through their own efforts. It's insuling, it isn't an aspect of villains any more than it is an aspect of heroes, and it cheapens the game experience.
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Im sure some exists, so could someone just give me a few examples of something this doesnt work for?
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Well, my main is probably going with Ghost Widow, but that's because she actually respects her. Buttered Cat is not evil, but she's considered such because she's a Controller who does damage, and that's strictly against the Hero code. She's a lighthearted almost-jokey character and has a patently absurd backstory.
However, I have other characters who are also (for RP-ish reasons) not interested in Arachnos, but by and large don't have anything against them, either.
- My Corruptor is an ex Crey employee, who was abandoned by them after one of her wetworks assignments got botched all to hell. She has ZERO use for any authority at all now, and only contempt for Arachnos. She certainly isn't interested in any skullduggery against them...that would involve caring about them, and she doesn't. She's aggressively freelance. I have two MMs with the same (lack of) agenda.
- I have another Corruptor who is neither evil nor good, but perfectly neutral. She joins no factions and takes no sides. She is in the Rogue Isles only because the Law was scared of her power and put her in jail. Think X-Men on an individual scale. She is grateful to be out, but her perfect neutrality forbids her from joining Arachnos.
- I have one MM who IS planning to take over Arachnos first, then the world. Bokor is a powerful Vodoun sorceress and is eager to take her rightful place as ruler. Conceivably, she could use, and then dispense with, a Signature Villain. Ideally she'd operate totally on her own though....
I can come up with reasons for basically anything.
point taken, but you can backstab someone to gain power, even if they are weaker then you.
Faster than making the tech yourself, just taking it for a quick base design, then modding the crap out of it, a magic lesser than yours but of a different kind with different uses, ect..
Hell, if you REALLY hated arachnos, wanted to see the content, and felt they were weaker then you, it could be a sabatoge mission. While you are stronger they still have quite the set up, and could eventualy become a threat, so you "joined up" but really did some nasty sabatoge, and just got a few ideas for powers and stuff while doing it.
Heck, pick the patron with powers that fit your concept/current theme, run their arc ignoring the ingame flavor infavor of a earning their trust/sabatoge/whatever (even if you are uber, they are still a potential threat), and then as you take the powers they are just what you developed, completely on your own, as you were doing your sabatoge.
Sure it requires some bending, but really, if you had that strict of a RP atmosphere that you couldn't bend things substatially (like always leveling from them, always doing missions you were told about and never ones you designed, all the other people saying ooc stuff), you never would have played to 40 anyway.
I dont know, maybe its just one of those things I am never going to understand since my only actual contact with an RPer in this game was someone who didn't tell me they were rping, and I thought they were just talkative/had a few attacks with a bind or something. Then they leveled, I said Gratz, and proceded to get a 10 minute lecture on how that ruined RPing, and then they booted me from the team lol.
[edit] See, and i can understand your freelance character having no particular interest, but as a scientist, wouldn't she atleast have some interest in stealing their tech. Just ignore what ever Rien says and pretend hes hiring you out to go pretend and buddy up to steal some industrial secrets for him, you just happen to remeber some of them afterwards
Could violate your whole char ofcourse, hard to tell from a 1 paragraph synopsus.
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Oh yes EvilGeko, because your opinion is so not valid. We're always right.
Jeez, all we are saying is to get a better opinion is to wait until it is on Test because we dont know full details. Is that an evil thing to say?
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But whatever goes on test is IRRELEVANT. We know your choice of patron is permanent. So discussing that cannot be premature.
The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
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I don't believe that the powers are permanent. The power set is permanent. Isn't that the case?
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Actually we don't know for sure, but based on what Bridger said it's only the pool that's permanent.
The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
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Oh yes EvilGeko, because your opinion is so not valid. We're always right.
Jeez, all we are saying is to get a better opinion is to wait until it is on Test because we dont know full details. Is that an evil thing to say?
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But whatever goes on test is IRRELEVANT. We know your choice of patron is permanent. So discussing that cannot be premature.
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But what if there's enough powers in each set so that almost anything is possible? The set is permanent, but what if there's enough powers in the set that are respeccable?
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If the design doesn't provide a clear and understandable motive for making the choices permanent, then I'm right over there with the 'this may not have been the best of ideas' crowd.
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But there is a fairly clear reason for locking in the Patron choice. I don't necessarily disagree with it either. It's patently ignoring min/maxing a character and nudging people to focus on the narrative of your character - choice & consequence. I think it's an interesting design choice. The truly obsessive can find a post of mine from last year when they teased this exact concept in the CGW article on CoV and future CoX developments where I commented that it'd be neat if APPs were more tightly-connected to Paragon City hero organizations and unlocked storyarcs.
However, it's tricky business to do this in a MMOG because the numbers of people who don't give a fart about their character narrative. In the villain sandbox, high-mindedness is less inherent in the theme of the game. Min/maxing can be a bit tawdry in CoH, but not so much in CoV. Additionally, some players will be torn from wanting to perhaps ally with Patron A, but Patron B's PPPs make more sense with their character's power concept.
Like I said before, it's not the time to gnash teeth and tear out hair, but it is appropriate to register concern about pitfalls in the PPP concept to help the devs read the tea leaves of playerbase mood. It's helping the devs help us have a good time.
Beyond that, the forum vets in this discussion can allay misconceptions and misunderstandings because you know how these parsed early promos lead to a game of 'telephone' amongst players. Double fees to play CoV+CoH, anyone? I think the spat yesterday between Revolver and you and Taser went overboard, but maybe it was necessary venting. I'd include myself as a full partner in that spat, but I was late to the party and don't think my contributions were half as entertaining to the hoi polloi.
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This thread is barely 24 hrs old and is already 34 pages long......you'd think this would send a message to the devs.
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What message? That's there's a small group of players who get hysterical over incomplete information and post multiple times?
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Feeble attempt at Trolling---specious and disingenuous backbiting.
Cal2