What in heavens happened to Malta?

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I find Titans much more fun to fight now. Wasn't much of a challenge beating on a heavily armed robot flailing clumsily with its fists.

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No, but it was fun not being two-shotted and actually winning.

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Yeah well, you're soloing Malta on a Blaster, what do you expect?

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That it's be more like soloing Malta with a Scrapper? Or a Brute, or a Mastermind, or a Stalker or... Pretty much anything else. Blasters don't really have any intrinsic team powers, after all. Plus, they solo just about everything else just fine.

---

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Grandville would be spotless, with neat rows of identical soulless buildings where citizens dressed neatly in what might as well be uniforms proceed orderly to their mandated occupations, then go home and watch approved entcom before going to bed for the prescribed amount of sleep before getting up to do it all over again.

Pretty much a description of the most terrifying stronghold of evil I've seen in any MMO: Sanctus Seru back in EverQuest's Luclin expansion. The place made you feel like you'd get guardkilled if you stepped on the grass.
"Welcome to Sanctus, such a perfect town...."

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That's actually what I'm hoping going Rogue will be like. Much as the rest of the Praetorians may be [censored], Tyrant seems like a savvy leader with an deathchoke grip on his population and a keen understanding of order and obedience. "This looks like a perfect place." "Looks can be deceiving." I'm not really a fan of the barbarian wilderness that is the Rogue Isles and I really hope the expansion will give us a world where being a villain is actually more meaningful than being a bully and stomping over a broken world.

And even so, I'd STILL like to see a Rogue Isles island that was NOT a pig sty slum.

---

Eh, I think it fits. As I said, the Rogue Isles is what happens when you let supervillains run a country- they're a bunch of greedy, selfish psychopaths with little to no regard for law and order, why would you expect them to be good at ruling the world? Heh, makes me think Wanted...

Tyrant has just made sure he's the biggest bully in the playground, Lord Recluse knows he's in a world overpopulated with supers and tries to get the best on his side.

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Tyrant has just made sure he's the biggest bully in the playground, Lord Recluse knows he's in a world overpopulated with supers and tries to get the best on his side.

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I think that's a good point of distinction. Tyrant's a control freak - he's made sure that most people are either under his thumb, or dead. Small pockets of resistance may be here and there, but that may be intentional to keep him from being bored. There's only one road, and it's his. Pay up or perish.

Recluse, on the other hand, is looking at things from a Darwinist/anarchy angle... He wants to be more powerful. He wants the most powerful villains on his side. How do you decide who is, and isn't, the most powerful, though? You throw them into the jungle and anyone that survives to make it up to the top without being crushed is at least capable of furthering one of his many goals. And if not, taking them down and ripping the power from them will make him more powerful.. or validate his existance as the most dangerous predator. And if nothing else, it gives him a nation of pawns to use in his plans, most of which may or may not be aware of the fact that they're being used. It also forces them to compete for survival, and competition is one of the best ways to foster innovation.

Two different ways to look at the entire villainy angle.

---

Recluse, on the other hand, is looking at things from a Darwinist/anarchy angle...

That's a canard though, as Westin Phipps adequately demonstrates. If Arachnos was truly interested in "survival of the fittest" they would neither help nor hinder people trying to climb out of the gutter. Instead they do their best to smack everyone down.

They're just bullies with a bad excuse for poor behavior. And if the Rogue Isles are a slum while Praetoria is a seeming paradise, it's because Tyrant is a better arch-villain than Recluse. Recluse is a short-sighted moron whose own inadequacies should have tripped him up decades ago were it not for his script immunity.

---

Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"

I'd say it's more that Tyrant honestly thinks the world is better off under his boot, while Recluse is just a power-hungry, merciless SOB who doesn't care about people at all.

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I'd say it's more that Tyrant honestly thinks the world is better off under his boot, while Recluse is just a power-hungry, merciless SOB who doesn't care about people at all.

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I'd say both can work in a fictional context, but Recluse's "survival of the fittest" is... Well, a whole lot more boring. Everything is dirty, everything is trashed, everyone is a jerk, everything is corrupt and everything you do is evil. Snore! I'd like to see some variety, some order amid the chaos, some islands cleaner than others, some places that look like they could almost be good. No such luck. Even recluse's own residence is a dump, and even his own administration is a mess. I'm with Venture on this one - how the hell does a man who runs a country like he's running tribe manage to have a functioning organization on top of it?

I like how Paragon City has its shiny, gleaming towers in clean, beautiful neighbourhoods next to broken-down slums packed full of abandoned warehouses and run-down buildings, next to war-torn areas strewn with debris, monsters and dangers. There's variety there. The isles are just one big dump broken up into seven islands. I'm hoping Praetoria will retain the variety of City of Heroes by offering both run-down and orderly locations, even if this order is imposed by force. It'll be more interesting than another brown slum built over black soil and another grey town next to a landfill.

---

'Better' is purely subjective in this case; I'd say that they're both different, but equally effective in their own ways. I personally think Captain Mako is a better and more interesting villain then Ghost Widow, but I'm happy to be the minority on that case. It's just my opinion.

There's Big Two canon examples of both kinds of villainy, and I think having both as counter-points to each other and the good, heroic portions of the game-world are certainly awesome.

When we look at Lord Recluse, we sort of see a version of a somewhat more honest Magneto (in both Genosha and Asteroid M), and Darkseid (ruling despot of Apokolips). All three are fixiated on a singular goal, and don't really give much of a damn (Magneto sort of does, and has crossed the line between hero and villain many times to this effect) about anything else other then the pursuit of that goal. By all rights, a nation of super-powered being should be able to build their own utopia, right? Genosha was a squallid third-world hellhole (and Asteroid M wasn't really that much better), and Apokolips was a dark, gritty industrial nightmare full of sadistic freaks. The analogue here being the Rogue Isles... Recluse sort of sits at an empasse between the two methodologies - on the one hand, it's clearly not that impressive of a nation. But there's examples of huge, gritty technological wonders and advancements that prop it all up. And all three are still fixiated on that one shining goal - Recluse wants raw power, Magneto wants to create a world of mutant supremacy, and Darkseid is looking for the Anti-Life Equation (for reasons that tend to vary).

Tyrant, on the other hand, has built up an empire more like less chaotic individuals. He may actually care about the people he dominates, and assuming that's true, that puts him up in a similar villainous mindset as Doctor Victor von Doom (FOR SUCH IS THE MIGHT OF DOOM! - Sorry, I had to get that out of the way) and Lex Luthor. All three have (at one point or another) shown that they're capable of creating utopian environments - Doctor Doom actually did rule the world in a 'What If' and it was a better place; Lex was president of the U.S. and actually making it a better place while advancing his own schemes - and still ending up to be the 'big, bad villain' on occasion when it was necessary for the plot (or using the utopia as a facade to hide greater evils or bait an opponent). Things actually seem to have gone well for Praetoria's common citizens as long as they obey Tyrant (much like Latervia does under Doom, and the U.S. did under Luthor). If he's convinced that what he's doing is for the best, and damn what anyone else thinks... that's certainly a great story to tell, especially in the context of side-switching becoming available at the same time.

Honestly? I find parts of both branches of villainy rather faskinating, and have to say that I find villains in both categories (Darkseid and Doctor Doom) to be far more interesting then less defined would-be-conquerors. I don't think the trait themselves necessarily makes one or the other a better villain, though.

Personally, I find Tyrant rather bland in the typical goatee-evil-mirror sort of way. It's damn-near obligatory, and he even comes complete with the Justice L- er, Praetorian Phalanx.

EDIT: Fully willing to admit that Lex is a pretty lame-[censored] comparison to Tyrant, given that their motivations are somewhat different, but the obvious choice there was the Justice Lords version of Superman and that's just not as interesting to talk about. Apparently, that Earth was a Utopia as well... Still, just going out and saying that technically that's a lame call on my part. I stand by everything else.

Further EDIT: And in discussion with another person, I've found that my Magneto analogue is a bit weaker as well. Bah! At least I'm 1/1 here. I shouldn't try to form arguments while jacked up on allergy and cold meds. Sorry, guys.

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The way I put it?

Recluse has immense technological means but absurd and camp motivations. Nemesis and Malta have absurd and camp means but cutting-edge motivations. They win.

---

Has been killed by the DoT on Throwing Knives and proud of it.

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Eh, that kind of setting doesn't really fit a crime-ridden hellhole infested with superpowered mercenaries, though. Anyone busting supervillains out of prison and letting them run free in their backyard can't be all that interested in order. The Rogue Isles seem to fit being anarchic, and Arachnos fits that.

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The rest of the Rogue Isles are Recluse's proving ground, where the purse-snatcher wannabe villains freed from the Zig are thrown to sink or swim on their own to prove their fitness in a Darwinian struggle. But Grandville should be the Potemkin Village set up to prove what a utopia Recluse's vision of the world will be. Beneath the surface, it's a stereotyped anarchy, where your ability to have your orders obeyed start and end with your ability to enforce them, and everyone is scrambling to reach the next tier above them while stomping on the feet of the people trying to climb up to their tier. But the facade is Order. The System is absolute, and everyone has their place within it -- but where your place is will be determined by the power you can amass.

---

"But in our enthusiasm, we could not resist a radical overhaul of the system, in which all of its major weaknesses have been exposed, analyzed, and replaced with new weaknesses."
-- Bruce Leverett, Register Allocation in Optimizing Compilers

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Pretty much a description of the most terrifying stronghold of evil I've seen in any MMO: Sanctus Seru back in EverQuest's Luclin expansion. The place made you feel like you'd get guardkilled if you stepped on the grass.

"Welcome to Sanctus, such a perfect town...."

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That place was indeed evil, I still remember getting lost in the endless, unadorned, white halls and teleporters. While having worked for Katta Castellum before hand . Thankfully, I was on my Beastlord and could survive quite well against the guards, but my god was it a long and arduous trek to get back to the gates that lead to Marus Seru.

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This is why they should have let Nemesis be in charge. At least Nemesis would have cute little steam-powered robots picking up all the garbage. And shooting you in the face if you step on the grass.

---

Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper

Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World

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The way I put it?

Recluse has immense technological means but absurd and camp motivations. Nemesis and Malta have absurd and camp means but cutting-edge motivations. They win.

[/ QUOTE ]
I think what I like about Nemesis is that from all angles he seems like a goofy, campy villain with a garish theme, but all of that is merely a façade for a fiendish intellect and utter ruthlessness in accomplishing his goals. His entire theme is to put heroes off guard until they see his true face.

---

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The way I put it?
Recluse has immense technological means but absurd and camp motivations. Nemesis and Malta have absurd and camp means but cutting-edge motivations. They win.

[/ QUOTE ]
I think what I like about Nemesis is that from all angles he seems like a goofy, campy villain with a garish theme, but all of that is merely a façade for a fiendish intellect and utter ruthlessness in accomplishing his goals. His entire theme is to put heroes off guard until they see his true face.

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That's how I've always seen it. His entire premise may be absurd to an exception, but the fact of the matter is that below it all is a fiercely-intelligent, plotting mind that actually succeeds as much as he fails, which is more than we can say for most villains.

Recluse, on the other hand, seems like a slovenly slob. He has the resources of an entire nation and with all that he just barely manages to run a couple of plots - the Destined One ordeal that ties into Recluse's Victory, and The Web in Grandville. Granted, both are massive and ambitious, but he's pretty much squandering the resources of a whole chain of islands for them, because his method of rule is excessively wasteful. Simply put, history has shown that a state built on infighting does not last.

Not that that doesn't have a place in the game, mind you, but not as the rule-all big bad, especially not in a contemporary civilised world where he has to hide behind the UN to avoid being bombed back to the stone age. In a fantasy world, or a post-apocalyptic Earth or something like that, sure. But not in this universe.

Personally, much as it pains me to admit it, I think the Malta would be the best candidates for being nation rulers, simply because they seem to ACTUALLY have an understanding of government and economy. The way I see it, they'd have a USSR-style despotism, where people would go to designated workplaces, live in designated homes and watch designated programming where sock puppet politicians pretend to argue with each other to give the people some semblance of belief in justice and freedom while the Malta Group's board of directors actually run it all from behind the scenes. And that would be a lot more believable and, at the same time, a lot more terrifying than "Raar! I R evil!" Arachnos anarchy. Seriously, it's like Recluse is only one step above Dreck.

The worst part is a phenomenon I've noticed that happens with sci-fi when authors try too hard. See, sci-fi is generally about... Well, science and technology. However, when people go so overboard that they get into the white togas and glass spires or space god aliens from outer space, there comes a point where sci-fi actually crosses over into fantasy, and almost completely. I give the Chronicles of Riddick vs. Pitch Black as an example. Where the prequel was an almost Aliens-style space horror, the sequel had an empire with an emperor that did with religion and their spaceships had faces carved into them and so forth.

This is how I see Arachnos and the Rogue Isles. In a world that's mostly contemporary, we suddenly have this futuristic odd-looking monarchy with black spires and ornate buildings of Combine architecture, soldiers in power armour built after spiders and a distinctly impractical ideology. I'd buy a ruler if his soldiers looked like soldiers and his buildings like buildings, but Arachnos looks like something that escaped from a fantasy colouring book and had magic replaced with technology, cut-n-paste.

To me, that's just unbelievable, and that's saying something in a game with aliens, ninja, zombies and robots.

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I kinda love it when sci-fi crosses back over into fantasy. It's the kind of over-the-top weirdness that superheroes are all about. Then again, I love it the most when sci-fi has a head-on collision with fantasy, which is also why I love superheroes. (see also: Warhammer 40,000)

As I said: The Rogue Isles wouldn't be nearly as fun as a tightly controlled police state or rather decently run dictatorship. It's meant to be a supervillain's paradise, and the world is built around that.

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As I said: The Rogue Isles wouldn't be nearly as fun as a tightly controlled police state or rather decently run dictatorship. It's meant to be a supervillain's paradise, and the world is built around that.

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But that itself is a self-defeating idea, because there isn't anything for villains to DO if there aren't heroes to fight. And there aren't. The game doesn't feel epic. It feels incredibly petty as villains fight each other for whatever scraps are left to be had. There is simply no place for a world-conquering villain with a vision and the power to pull off amazing schemes. We're all punks and thugs that off people for little reason more than getting the next meal.

I sincerely hope Going Rogue returns to the CLASSY villains that City of Heroes made famous. Villains like Requiem, Nemesis, Tyrant (obviously), Countess Crey, Vanessa DeVore, Hro'Dohz or whatever bastardisation of Herodotus they picked to sound Rikti and so on and so forth. With all due respect for the Soldiers of Arachnos, I don't want to play a soldier of Arachnos. I want to play the LEADER of Arachnos. Obviously, that's not possible as that's a canon enemy group, but having my own to lord over would have been really cool. Except we can't even invite our own alts to our own SGs and our leaders keep getting demoted for stupid reasons. Eh!

CoV is a big giant dump with everyone scraping by. That is NOT classy or impressive. It's sad and pathetic.

Even if it's just a farce, much of City of Heroes plays out like you are THE hero. You save a thousand world, you stop Dr. Vahzilok, you rescue the Statesman, you prevent a Rikti Invasion (that's already happening...), you prevent the Banished Pantheon from trapping a full-blown goddess. In City of Villains, on the other hand, you are A villain, just one more of many. All you ever do is get paid and that's pretty much it. Time After Time is, obviously, very impressive, but it is about the ONLY arc that's actually about you being THE villain of the story. Everything else is just mercenary work.

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As I said: The Rogue Isles wouldn't be nearly as fun as a tightly controlled police state or rather decently run dictatorship. It's meant to be a supervillain's paradise, and the world is built around that.

[/ QUOTE ]

But that itself is a self-defeating idea, because there isn't anything for villains to DO if there aren't heroes to fight. And there aren't. The game doesn't feel epic. It feels incredibly petty as villains fight each other for whatever scraps are left to be had. There is simply no place for a world-conquering villain with a vision and the power to pull off amazing schemes. We're all punks and thugs that off people for little reason more than getting the next meal.

I sincerely hope Going Rogue returns to the CLASSY villains that City of Heroes made famous. Villains like Requiem, Nemesis, Tyrant (obviously), Countess Crey, Vanessa DeVore, Hro'Dohz or whatever bastardisation of Herodotus they picked to sound Rikti and so on and so forth. With all due respect for the Soldiers of Arachnos, I don't want to play a soldier of Arachnos. I want to play the LEADER of Arachnos. Obviously, that's not possible as that's a canon enemy group, but having my own to lord over would have been really cool. Except we can't even invite our own alts to our own SGs and our leaders keep getting demoted for stupid reasons. Eh!

CoV is a big giant dump with everyone scraping by. That is NOT classy or impressive. It's sad and pathetic.

Even if it's just a farce, much of City of Heroes plays out like you are THE hero. You save a thousand world, you stop Dr. Vahzilok, you rescue the Statesman, you prevent a Rikti Invasion (that's already happening...), you prevent the Banished Pantheon from trapping a full-blown goddess. In City of Villains, on the other hand, you are A villain, just one more of many. All you ever do is get paid and that's pretty much it. Time After Time is, obviously, very impressive, but it is about the ONLY arc that's actually about you being THE villain of the story. Everything else is just mercenary work.

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What you want is impossible in an MMO.

The heroside is false, as well, because what you've done to "save the world" is the same thing everyone before you has already done. You are, in practice, just a hero, one of many.

The nature of the MMO requires it to be static and unaffected by the actions of hundreds of thousands of players. In that, CoV actually succeeds better than CoH.

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"Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty."

"Nothing is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man."

- Thomas Jefferson

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Time After Time is, obviously, very impressive, but it is about the ONLY arc that's actually about you being THE villain of the story. Everything else is just mercenary work.

[/ QUOTE ]

And what is your reward for finishing it?

You get the opportunity to go beat up Recluse's archnemesis, because he can't, so you can prove what a good little Servant of Recluse you are.

As one of my teammates said on my first successful LRSF run: "Servant of Recluse? WTF? He should serve ME!"

At that point, the only reason you can't storm his inner sanctum with your team and beat up Recluse and all the patrons is because the Game Says So. You're not given any motivation not to.

---

Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper

Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World

[ QUOTE ]
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Time After Time is, obviously, very impressive, but it is about the ONLY arc that's actually about you being THE villain of the story. Everything else is just mercenary work.

[/ QUOTE ]
And what is your reward for finishing it?
You get the opportunity to go beat up Recluse's archnemesis, because he can't, so you can prove what a good little Servant of Recluse you are.
As one of my teammates said on my first successful LRSF run: "Servant of Recluse? WTF? He should serve ME!"
At that point, the only reason you can't storm his inner sanctum with your team and beat up Recluse and all the patrons is because the Game Says So. You're not given any motivation not to.

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Err... What? No, my reward for doing Time After Time is beating up Lord Recluse at the height of his power and then rubbing his face in it. Hearing him say I'm too powerful for him to try to mess with me any more is just the cherry on top. If you're talking about the Recluse SF, I wouldn't know. Needing 7 other people isn't my idea of fun. Far as I'm concerned, the game ends with Time After Time.

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What you want is impossible in an MMO.
The heroside is false, as well, because what you've done to "save the world" is the same thing everyone before you has already done. You are, in practice, just a hero, one of many.
The nature of the MMO requires it to be static and unaffected by the actions of hundreds of thousands of players. In that, CoV actually succeeds better than CoH.

[/ QUOTE ]

It doesn't have to be dynamic. It's all a matter of presentation. It doesn't matter that everyone has defeated Dr. Vahzilok and that all my alts defeated him before, as well. This is META-GAME information which doesn't matter to the plot. As far as I'm concerned, the game is about ME, and almost nowhere in there will you find proof to the contrary. The only exception are those annoying contacts who say "This is too dangerous. You will need 7 other people on your team before you can attempt it." Disregarding them, however, it IS all about me.

Not so CoV-side. Aside from Time After Time and MAYBE Pia's story, it's never about me. It's about those "memorable" contacts. The narrative treats me as some nameless thug who's out for hire. Count the times when CoV makes you feel unique and special IN STORY. I don't mean soloing Scrapyard or doing Invincible missions or crap like that. I mean when the story makes it sound like no-one else could have pulled "this" off as spectacularly as you did, that you really succeeded where everyone else would have failed, that you did the impossible or what have you. Leo Vargass comes close, but in his case it's more habitual over-politeness than actual accomplishment.

Almost nowhere in the game does the narrative make it feel like the game is about ME. That's because it ISN'T. It's about the contacts and their little agendas and intrigues and whatnot. I'm just the hired hand to forward it. I've been saying it over and over and over again that making CoV more villainous and more about our characters isn't a matter of game mechanics, it's a matter of presentation. It's a matter of how the stories are told, and making it seem like it's YOUR character taking the initiative and doing things no-one else could doesn't need a new game. It needs someone to sit on their butt and write flavour text to that effect.

It's not that hard. Matter of fact, I know it's not that hard from experience, as I've written an arc pretty much to that effect and it received generally positive reviews. As long as one wraps his head around writing FOR the villain, not writing for the contact with a villain serving as hired hand, it's actually downright simple. Paper missions have kind of the right idea, but being cut-and-paste and only one mission long, never amount to anything. But it's not rocket science to write an arc in that spirit and keep it both unobtrusive and still feeling proactive.

---

Yes, I am talking about the LRSF. You need the Usurper badge to start it (I think). The text certainly assumes that you have finished Time after Time. Which means he has told you you are too powerful for him to mess with, you are a true villain answerable to no one....except for him. The whole thing is full of "Help Recluse in his plan" and "Lord Recluse is pleased with you, here, have a shiny."

---

Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper

Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World

[ QUOTE ]
Almost nowhere in the game does the narrative make it feel like the game is about ME. That's because it ISN'T. It's about the contacts and their little agendas and intrigues and whatnot. I'm just the hired hand to forward it. I've been saying it over and over and over again that making CoV more villainous and more about our characters isn't a matter of game mechanics, it's a matter of presentation. It's a matter of how the stories are told, and making it seem like it's YOUR character taking the initiative and doing things no-one else could doesn't need a new game. It needs someone to sit on their butt and write flavour text to that effect.

[/ QUOTE ]

Funny thing that. I enjoy CoV's way of doing it much, much more. Blueside has no, no memorable conta-

No wait. It has one. But he's only that due to his introduction/idle/etc dialogue. His missions are just as cookie-cutter and forgettable as the rest of them.

Oh and BTW, you might wanna throw Billie Heck onto that list of yours.

---

What shall claim a Sky Kings' Ransom?

PPD & Resistance Epic Archetypes

[ QUOTE ]
Almost nowhere in the game does the narrative make it feel like the game is about ME. That's because it ISN'T. It's about the contacts and their little agendas and intrigues and whatnot. I'm just the hired hand to forward it. I've been saying it over and over and over again that making CoV more villainous and more about our characters isn't a matter of game mechanics, it's a matter of presentation. It's a matter of how the stories are told, and making it seem like it's YOUR character taking the initiative and doing things no-one else could doesn't need a new game. It needs someone to sit on their butt and write flavour text to that effect.

[/ QUOTE ]

Villains is what you make of it. When I first started out I basically decided that if I liked a given contact's scheme I would basically co-op it. Other times, I would work on certain contacts because it served some long-term goal.

Examples of Co-oping a scheme: Hardcase's Pied piper arc, Vernon Von Grunn's story arcs. Pretty much every newspaper arc ever.

Examples of long-term strategy: Working with Westin Phipps to meet with Aribter Daos.

Also I made a game of building a contact network. Figuring out who'd be useful in my "Organization" and who wouldn't be.

With Heroes there's less incentive to do that since you're not trying to cultivate an army of lackeys and fixers.

Of course multiple playthroughs make the content fairly stale, and you begin to care more about what a given powerset combination will look like at level 40-50 than re-running old content.

With regards to Recluse: Most use Social Darwinism as a justification to put themselves on top. So of course Recluse comes across as a giant hypocrite.

One thing I've noticed about Arachnos as a fighting force is they're arranged in such a way that each faction is a check on another. You have psychics as a check on the regular troopers, robots as a check on the psychics, electrical sorcerers as a check on the robots, and then troopers as a check on the sorcerers. It doesn't always work perfectly, but it does prevent the various groups from splitting off where there's at least one group that they would be at a disadvantage fighting against.

The problem with making the Rogue Isles like what is probably planned for Praetoria (except for isolated instances like Aeon City or the Golden Giza) is that it would have been too similar to Paragon City, which is what they were trying to avoid.

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"Steady as a mountain, attack like fire, still as a wood, swift as the wind.
In heaven and earth I alone am to be revered."
- Motto on the war banner of Takeda Shingen (1521-1573)

[ QUOTE ]
The problem with making the Rogue Isles like what is probably planned for Praetoria (except for isolated instances like Aeon City or the Golden Giza) is that it would have been too similar to Paragon City, which is what they were trying to avoid.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's the big thing - Paragon City, but with villains, is exactly what most people were expecting, and I dare say what most people wanted. Not merely a city LIKE Pagaon City, but villains IN Paragon City. Simply put, if you play Batman, you're in Gotham City. Wouldn't it make sense that if you wanted to play the Joker, you would ALSO be in Gotham City?

I stand behind Rick Dakan - it is silly to have one city that's all heroes and one city that is all villains. You can STILL have the villain-side and hero-side separate in different instances of the same zone to avoid open-world PvP, but being a good villain requires a strong sense of good in the world. It's no fun being a villain if everyone else is a villain, too.

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[ QUOTE ]
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The problem with making the Rogue Isles like what is probably planned for Praetoria (except for isolated instances like Aeon City or the Golden Giza) is that it would have been too similar to Paragon City, which is what they were trying to avoid.

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That's the big thing - Paragon City, but with villains, is exactly what most people were expecting, and I dare say what most people wanted. Not merely a city LIKE Pagaon City, but villains IN Paragon City. Simply put, if you play Batman, you're in Gotham City. Wouldn't it make sense that if you wanted to play the Joker, you would ALSO be in Gotham City?

I stand behind Rick Dakan - it is silly to have one city that's all heroes and one city that is all villains. You can STILL have the villain-side and hero-side separate in different instances of the same zone to avoid open-world PvP, but being a good villain requires a strong sense of good in the world. It's no fun being a villain if everyone else is a villain, too.

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But then who'd want to play Villains if it was all exactly the same as Heroes, except for ATs and contacts?

CoV's zones are made with an entirely new design philosophy from Heroes, to be more self-contained and require much, MUCH less zone-hopping just to do regular missions. They also show a different side of the world than Paragon City- they're not in America, much less one big sprawling half-ruined city, and you really feel like you're in a different place. That, and I think having Heroes and Villains essentially invisible to each other is kinda silly.

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