Must Do, Must See Content - CoH

What are some areas, missions or feats that you feel should be part of the "Must Experience" at least once in CoH.

Please avoid acronyms and try to give a few details.

Mayhem missions redside. }:>

trick or treat - Halloween events
Lord Recluse Strike Force
Rikti Mothership raid
Hami
Giving prezzies on Christmas event

Midnight Squad mission line to be a Member of the Midnight Squad. This was a hidden gem for me and I thought the mission line was great. Not to mention you get access to a new area Cimerora

Freaklympics If just for the map at the end.

And for the same reason The Clockwork Captive.

There are quite a few.

Blue side: At least once, you should go through the Hollows arcs. The Frostfire Mission is a lot of fun, and great XP. After level 5, you get sent to Officer Wincott anyway.

The new Positron TFs (two parts) are a lot of fun. In fact, all the Task Force Commander TFs are worth doing -- at least for the merits. Positron for 10-15, Synapse for 16-20, Sister Psyche at 20-25, Citadel at 25-30, Manticore at 30-35 and Numina at 35-40. The Eden Trial is really unique, at levels 38-41.

At level 15 (although you can wait until 17 or 18), you should do the Faultline arc. Go to Faultline and talk to Jim Trembler near in the middle of the park near the front. (Also, make sure to fly through the middle of the doughnut for a badge!)

In the 20's, there are several story arcs that are fun. The Wheel of Destruction, Freaklympics are two that stand out.

Starting at level 20, you can go to Striga Isle. The missions there give some nice temp powers and help you get the vampire and werewolf badges, which you need for the Atlas Medalion. The Hess TF is a must do.

At level 25, you can start the Croatoa arcs. After you complete those 4 contacts, you can do the Katie Hannon TF.

Starting at level 35, you can do the Rikti War zone arcs. There are also a few story arcs in the 30's that are good, like Cado Kestral (but many of the maps are annoying). Also at level 35, you can do the Midnighter arc to get into Cimerroa.

Tina McIntyre at 40 in Peregrine Isle. Unai and Maria Jenkins at 45-50.

At 50, you need to do the Statesman's TF, the Lady Grey TF and the Imperious TF. You should go on a Rikti Ship Raid and a Hamidon Raid at least once.

The Shadow Shard - not many reasons to go there other than that, if you haven't, you should.

There are repeatable missions, a TF, and a Jetpack vendor, but not much else besides a totally unique, freaky-looking zone made up of floating islands and other-worldly creatures.


On Peregrine Island, open your map and find the Firebase Zulu marker in Portal Court.

Follow that into the building and through the portal.

Talk to the guys on the other side for an introduction to the zone, especially traveling between the floating islands via Force Geysers.

Then go explore.

Hmm on a "What you must do" list:

Getting into the Shadow shard and travel via the "jump" system. (weeee)

Being part of a Rikti invasion team (Talos hill) & doing a Rikti Mothership raid.

Be a part of a successful Hamidon Raid.

Do Tina Macintyre and Maria Jenkins story arc and fight them Praetorians. Now mind the Devs have said that these arcs will get an overhaul in the near future as part of the launch of GR.

Do an Eden Trial (not speedrun) and go down into the earth. Did I say "wee"? If not I'll say it "wee".

Hmm for more low level.
Natural origin lvl 1. Do the missions that take you to a rather... funky mission set. Or Azuras (magic) hellion mission, that had a lot of fire...

Do one level run in the Hollows, without doing the Kings Row/safeguard for transport power (to appreciate running... mind its not as dangerous as it was), then follow through as you level with more safeguards.

Do the 4 contacts and task force in Croatoa (I love that zone).
Also make certain you do the contacts in Striga at the same time.

Oh yes the arc Freak-olympics.

PVP Zone:
Enter Bloody Bay and dodging villains (if you play heroes) manage to get the shivan shards, destroy the gunner base and thus be rewarded when you return with the Shivan shard temp power.

Warburg: Again if you don't fear other players, manage to get the 3 codes and Launch a rocket into the air. Just seeing it go up up up is fun.

Holiday events:
Skiing down the hill in the Lounge of D. With or without speedboost or Inertia R.
Collect a few candy canes.

Create a story arc in the MA.

And a whole lot more...

What you must do: NOT GET ON SPEEDRUNNING TEAMS For any of the above.

I love the Eden trial. People skip through damn near all of it. What do people possibly have to do that's more fun than Eden? I don't know.

Imperious TF: They've got a checklist. Boom, boom, go here and beat 180 of these guys, skip to the end and do that thing. Everything's out of order, maximum efficiency, minimum coherence.

Redside new arc's, from Dean MacArthur, and Leonard were pretty well done I thought. The last part of Leonard's arc was intense.

Great, great ideas so far. Just adding a few heroside ideas.

Steel Canyon Hellion arson

Look for "Fire alarm sounded" in hero event messages. Just make sure there are other heroes with you. I don't think only one or two heroes can pull it off. Hint: there are three booms. One when the event starts (you won't see this unless you happen to be there), one halfway through when the Hellions stop respawning, and if you don't get the fires put out beforehand, the third boom packs a wallop, better run!

Any Giant Monster

If you see a team forming to take down a giant monster, go for it! Chances are all you need to do is add some extra damage to the team. They'll let you know if there's a support power you need to use (like Benumb, Lingering Radiation or buffs).

Field Agent Keith Nance

For level 20-29, starting in Talos Island, with the missions in Faultline. His mission arc is a blast. The follow-up arc with Special Agent Jenni Adair, not so much, unless you like AVs, one of which has lots of defense.

One thing no one mentioned:

PLAQUES and BADGES!

Scattered all throughout the city are exploration badges and plaques, most of which give a small bit of history behind that part of the city, a former hero, or something along those lines. It's a small way of adding a bit of depth to the game's lore.

You might also want to check out the City of Heroes comics (available in PDF format on the main site). TBH, aside from Mark Waid's run, the stories are a bit mweh and the later issues sacrifice good story telling for trying to implement in-game situations, but it's a good way to get a feel for the lore and several of the issues were retroactively made into in-game story arcs. Also, it's the only time that the "main" characters get any development whatsoever. Otherwise you're running around in-game wondering who this guy with the glowing ring at his feet is and just why he gets to boss you around.

As far as actually playing? Avoid "the sewer run" for now. When you've made your 3rd or 4th "alt" and are looking for a quick way to get the first 5 or 6 levels, then definitely join a team and hit the sewers; otherwise go through your origin contact's first arc and just talk to whoever you're pointed at. Especially do the Hollows arcs, at least once.

At level 6+, go to King's Row and pick up a Police Radio from the Detective (he'll be marked on your map). This will give you random, repeatable non-story missions which cumulate in preventing a bank robbery, and gives you a special temporary power (like a jetpack). Useful for getting around or filling any lulls in between story arcs.

And pretty much what everyone else already said. =)

Most of my favorites have already been mentioned, but I would add the Mercedes Sheldon missions heroside, three arcs available from 20-24 (why are the best arcs heroside all available in the 20s?). You have to do Montague Castanella first to unlock it, since you need access to the Midnighter club. Well-written, some unusual missions (especially the last one in the Magic man arc), and with difficulty that scales well if you solo them (very doable by almost any character without bosses, a real challenge if you turn them on).

Hmmm.... Get ALL of the History Plaques (CoH, CoV). I think there is some fun information on those that you just don't really see anywhere else. It also gives you an excuse to go to basically EVERY zone in the game and do nothing other than look around.

There are SOOOO many things in the game world that most people just whizzzzz right passed and never really look at. I remember the first time I entered Ouroboros, for instance. I spent a good 15+ minutes flying to the various islands seeing if I could find anything interesting, and just LOOKING. (I admit I also took advantage of the teleporting into the pool thing for entirely too long.)

Quote:

Originally Posted by TerraShock Redside new arc's, from Dean MacArthur, and Leonard were pretty well done I thought. The last part of Leonard's arc was intense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bunny_Slippers "Oh Wretched Man" Seer Marino, Mercy Island By far one of the best written story arcs either side IMO. Most lvl 15 contacts will introduce you to her via a meet and greet mish (they'll also send you to a PvP zone liaison)

These are the things I would have recommended. As well as the new arcs for heroside from i17! (Though I think the redside one is better.)

For me, the Hollows Trial is a must-do-once thing. Love the maps.

Steel Canyon Arson - I just want to suggest that you create an Ice blaster that flies to do this. Its so much easier to just use your ice attacks, then to have to run back to the fire chief all the time for an extinguisher.

Supa Trolls - Killing Supas should be a part of everyones experience, at least once. They are found in Skyway, lvl 15 I believe. If you find any Calibans or Ogres, take them down too. But be careful, they are Boss level. Supas are lieutenants. Start killing them at lvl 12, when youve just added your lvl 15 DO enhancers. Take a friend, it is safer, but mad XPees can be had for you both. If you've already outleveled Supas, you can always go to the ice crystal, pick an arc that auto exemplars you to level 15, then dont do the arc, just run to Skyway and kill Supas.

Supa Trolls are fun. To make it more interesting position your self along the path they use to gather at one of their meeting points and try to defeat them one at a time as they pass before the next one shows up.

Striga Task Forces especially Hess's. Two words, Volcano Base.