The Dead Pool

He said "Someone in this picture."


10:1 it's Citadel.

I would bet BaB, but this sure smells like a cop-out for a signature arc.

Sister Psyche will die and Mantacore will make a deal with Rularuu to bring her back, but the price will be that their marriage never happened and he can never tell anyone that history has been changed. In a fit of mixed feelings of having his 'not wife' back alive he turn vigilante.

Nah, no one would ever do a story similar to that.
People wouldn't buy it!

My hunch is that it will be Citadel that will bite it.

Citadel makes the most sense to kill off as he just sort of exists and doesn't have any sort of real personality behind him. He has never really been a major player in the game and his TF is one of the more bland TFs not only in overall mission design but also storyline wise. So his death can be used to spur on something far more interesting.

Though that brings up an interesting discussion.. can you really kill off an AI...

It's their chance to do something BIG.

7 of 8 Survivors: "Say there, Statesman, it's come to our attention that you... may not be yourself, and maybe you never have been yourself since you became Statesman."

Statesman - "Balderdash! You guys are just jealous!"

7 of 8 Survivors: "Oh, yeah? We'll see about that!"

Statesman: "You'll never take my Precious powers!"

Big fight ensues. States mops the floor with them all. States declares he's taking over, for the good of the world.

The 7 of 8 Survivors call on US to help. Which brings us to:

Issue 23: The Dark Statesman Civil War Saga, in which...

Statesman Takes over the World! Who's Side are YOU On? Hero/Villain vs Hero/Villain in the Biggest Event ever in MMOs! Culminating in...

The Dark Statesman Trial, at the end of which, if you manage to defeat Statesman, Statesman says: "OMGZORZ! You guys are right! I'm a pawn! You've got to help me get rid of my Precious... I mean, these EVIL POWERS before I fly off and eat a planet of broccoli people!"

Which leads us to:

The Well of the Powers Trial in which we directly confront the Well, and States sacrifices himself to give us a chance to defeat it. With the Well defeated (probably not destroyed, but, at least for the moment, barred from our reality/dimension until the stars are wrong again and all that) all Incarnates lose their Well-derived abilities and are returned to 'normal' power levels.

And the peasants rejoice.

Meanwhile, over in the Rogue Isles, a de-powered and broken down Recluse, while digging through trash barrels in search of food, finds a copy of the Wellanomicon...

Aside from my comic bookie speculation above it will probably be Citadel. He's a robot so can easily be brought back in some other form in the future. And it will give them time to revamp the Citadel TF.

My only problem with Citadel or Numina is that I don't actually care if either of them dies. They're mostly ciphers and self-awareness is the only trait they possess that qualifies either of them to count as "alive" in the first place.

I'm also just a little suspicious of this idea of the signature arcs being a "murder mystery". It smacks of the old "faking your own death" gambit. We do have Matt's assurance that the victim "will be removed from the game and any content attached to that character will be dealt with". That sounds permanent, on the face of it.

I created a forum game on the subject here: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showt...=1#post3759544 Visit the thread to harm or heal the heroes you want to live or die.


Kudos to Voodoo Girl for the concept.

I am going to jump on the band wagon and guess Statesman. With so much of the content being geared towards incarnates right now, and if I understand the lore correctly, Statesman is the only hero incarnate in the Freedom Phalanx. It would allow them to do something "dramatic" in regards to the Phalanx, change up the story a bit, and allow them to explore more powers of the well (ie, perhaps bringing Statesman back to life, or the destruction of the well).

With a couple others I've seen posting, I do not agree with the "shock value" aspect of killing off a character, but if the devs are using this story to enhance current lore and tell a good story, allowing themselves to alter and improve content (not just incarnate stuff) or even bring a fresh face (a new hero) to the game, than I support the decision. If the killing of a hero is just an excuse to "fix" a task force (ie, citadel) then I will be disappointed, unless that fix is so amazing that nobody can stand it. They didn't need to kill Positron to take time to improve his task force. I am interested in seeing where this goes, and I have faith that whatever the devs do, will be for the betterment of the game.

Statesman artwork has just been added to the new log-in screen.
Statesman artwork has been added to the new play-style selection screen in the revamped costume creator as an example of a tank.
Statesman featrues in the tutorial comic loading screen, where he confronts Recluse, recapping the the personal conflcit at the heart of the Hero vs Villain set-up.
Statesman continues to be the face of the game, and is the only signature charatcer featured in the CoH: Freedom promotional artwork.
he's now more prominent in the game than ever before - it seems unlikely he'd be removed - plus, his TF is one of the newer ones, so it'd be harder to remove it and rewrite it without causing complaints - the other Freedon Phalanx TFs, apart from Positron, could be removed with very little complaint.
The developer who used the name is no longer with Paragon Studios.

Back Alley Brawler features in new artwork in the play-style selection screen in the revamped costume creator as an example of a melee fighter.
Back Alley brawler features in the new Galaxy City tutorial.
The developer who used the name is no longer with Paragon Studios.

Positron has had his TF revamped quite recently, making it harder to rewrite it for someone else, unlike the other 5 Freedom Phalanx TFs.
Positron is a charater that Matt Miller has been playing in various PnP games for almost 20 years, and is also his official name on the forums.
Positron was recently added as an opponent in the Mortimer Kal SF, with his role as the keeper of the Flames of Prometheus making an appearance form the comics.
Positron was recently revealed to have started a relationship with Numina.

Numina features in a pop-up window during the new Galaxy City tutorial.
Numina was recently added as an opponent in the Mortimer Kal SF.
Numina was recently revealed to have started a relationship with Positron.
Numina's TF is a good candidate for a rewrite.

Sister Psyche has been added to the new Galaxy City tutorial.
Sister Psyche continues to be used in promotional artwork for the game.
Sister Psyche artwork has been added to the new play-style selection screen in the revamped costume creator as an example of support.
Sister Psyche's TF is a good candidate for a rewrite.

Manticore continues to be used in Promotional artwork for the game.
Manticore's TF is a good candidate for a rewrite.
The developer who used the name is no longer with Paragon Studios.

Synapse has had no recent activity, but is the official forum name of Phil Zeleski.
Synapse's TF is a good candidate for a rewrite.

Citadel has had no recent activity.
Citadel's TF is a good candidate for a rewrite.

*From the depths of time immortal comes a vision of the future*
After a long and lengthy bought of speculation and intrigue on these boards and elsewhere, filled with comments both bitter and humorous the future will reveal...
<.<
>.>
That the dev team forgot to put a T on the end of "Who will die"

Outrage will spill upon these boards like fire through the driest tinder until at last a peace offering is given to the playerbase.

Then there will be cake.
Everyone will eat it except for BAB who is the one who was chosen.
To die!...
Er...diet!
*end vision*
500 bones on BAB

I wonder if Desdemona is being lined up as a replacement for whoever dies? She features in the playstyle selection screen of the nw costume creator, along with more famous/older signature charatcers, and she's also part of the Underground Trial, where she seems to be listed as a Hero rather than a Rogue.
Currently the Freedom Phalqnx is 6-2 in favor of the boys, but killing one of them off and putting Desdemona in would make it a fairer 5-3 split - plus, the Freedom Phalanx currently is pretty light on pet summoners, even though it's a popular type of AT to play.
A refromed Villain who uses demon pets would also make the Freedom Phalanx more "edgier" for the post-GR game world.

Hey, check this out!

The SDCC 2011 Presentation

If you hit the Prezi link, surf around in there til you find the "Who Will Die" campaign pictures... they have the UNEDITED version of that shot of the Phalanx. Take a good look and see if that might change your mind on who buys it!

(I posted my own theory in the thread of the presentation itself...)

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

Here's the "cover" for the first arc:







And here's a screenshot from one of the maps, which looks like it's in the Hollows, going by the background:






The pillar has spikes/thorns at the bases, so the CoT could be invovled.