Since the PR materials indicate that the deceased will be at least one (I'm pretty sure nothing has been said that indicates that it's ONLY one) of the 'Surviving Eight,' here are my thoughts on which may be getting it:
Babs: The most likely to get the big rewrite, imo. He's the only one of the eight that isn't a TF contact and his home zone (Galaxy City) is being completely redone.
Statesman: If the devs go for maximum impact he's a strong possibility. But an awful lot of existing content would have be be changed if he's a goner.
Citadel: A strong contender. His being a machine makes it relatively easy for him to have a 'comic book death' since a year down the road a backup of his personality could be discovered and dumped into a shiny new body. He would also be easy to replace in game as a new version of the same bot with the same personality but lacking all the memories.
Sister P and Manticore: Killing one of these off could be a strong story since it would allow the other to be driven toward a darker nature. Sissy's the more likely of the two to go since her mind riding ability would make bringing her back in the future fairly easy.
Synapse: Not very likely, but for some reason (nothing logical I can back up) he seems to me to be the one most likely to turn out to have been a Nemesis automaton.
Positron: I just can't see a good story purpose in killing him off.
Numina: Least likely since she's dead already unless the devs want to make a big deal about the big bad being a soul destroyer.
_________
@Inquisitor
The email I received today said that someone "could" die, not that someone would.
Avatar: "Cheeky Jack O Lantern" by dimarie
Quote:
They've confirmed that at the end of the 7 month story arc, one of the Freedom Phalanx will die |
Originally Posted by peterpeter
The email I received today said that someone "could" die, not that someone would.
|
@Golden Girl
City of Heroes comics and artwork
Did they say the death would come at the end of the 7 month storyline? I thought the death would come first then we would spend the next few months figuring out who did it? did I read that wrong?
Quote:
If you're referring to what I wrote, that was speculation, not reporting of verified fact. Despite Golden Girl's faith in her opinions, the reveal at the end of the story is also speculation as far as I've heard. There are no hard details about the story except that it will be seven chapters, someone will die and the villain missions will have a different viewpoint on the story from that of the hero missions. |
Originally Posted by Core_Tap
Did they say the death would come at the end of the 7 month storyline? I thought the death would come first then we would spend the next few months figuring out who did it? did I read that wrong?
|
Matt referred to it in the Ustream interview as a "murder mystery". What that means is anyone's guess, but most "murder mysteries" require that someone die under mysterious circumstances and that at least some part of the story resolution is the discovery of the culprit. Given that, I find the likelihood of the reveal in the final chapter to be small, but I have no more basis for that opinion than Golden Girl has for hers; at least until she gives some sort of citation for the facts that she's basing her opinion upon.
You know what I loved about Legend of the 5 Rings? That players could affect the outcome of the story. What I would like to see is the Praetorian style morality choices that affect what would happen in the next arc. If more people chose to let the villain live, then in the next months arc X happens. If they kill him, Y happens. It would let us actually affect the game world for one in a lasting fashion.
That's a many-years-old request though I have to be honest and say that I don't know that it was actually requested by anyone besides me. *laugh*
<-- Ex-L5R player
Quote:
Then you've not heard the SDCC panel |
Originally Posted by SlickRiptide
the reveal at the end of the story is also speculation as far as I've heard.
|
@Golden Girl
City of Heroes comics and artwork
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
I so want to kill Statesman ...
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
"Pony up, Torchy."
It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Redlynne
Please let *ME* kill Statesman.
Please let *ME* kill Statesman. Please let *ME* kill Statesman. Please let *ME* kill Statesman. Please let *ME* kill Statesman. Please let *ME* kill Statesman. I so want to kill Statesman ... Please let *ME* kill Statesman. Please let *ME* kill Statesman. "Pony up, Torchy." |
You might just get your chance. Statesman's down to 4 HP in the forum game.
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=266570
Quote:
Back Alley Brawler. |
Originally Posted by SlickRiptide
Who do you think is going to die in the signature arcs?
|
He makes the most sense.
A) They're destroying the zone he is a trainer in anyway, so they can remove his character model without impacting anything.
B) There is no need to rewrite a Task Force with a new contact upon his death. The other 7 all have Task Forces that they are the contact for, Back Alley Brawler does not.
C) The developer who used him as his pseudonym no longer works for Paragon Studios, and it is unlikely someone new will use it. Same could be said for Statesman, but States has always been the game's flagship character used on all it's promotional material, so it's less likely they'd kill him off.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately. |
Two things have come to mind as I think about this:
1. Devs, do *NOT* have the character die to save us. That would be the ultimate way of minimizing the worth of the PCs.
2. I'm wondering about the possibility of it being Sissy and Manti. With everyone knowing that a hero is going to die, the emotional impact of that death is going to be reduced. A second, unexpected death could restore the intended level of drama.
"Trust me, it worked in the Simpsons." - Calash
Quote:
Good point. It would've had quite a bit of impact, I think, if the death had not been announced. Of course, then fewer people would have played the arcs to get to see it, so it's a lose/lose from the arc writer's perspective.|
Originally Posted by Jasra
2. I'm wondering about the possibility of it being Sissy and Manti. With everyone knowing that a hero is going to die, the emotional impact of that death is going to be reduced. A second, unexpected death could restore the intended level of drama.
|
And I'd be happy if it were Sister Psyche and Manticore, both of whom I can't stand. But my 500 catgirls are on Back Alley Brawler at this point, just because he'd require the least rewriting of other content. (Don't expect him to vanish from the three or so villain arcs where you fight him, though.)
The thing I find oddest is that if it turns out to be, say, Citadel or Synapse (i.e., a third-stringer), dozens of posters will come out of the woodwork moaning about how the only one of the Phalangites with any personality was killed off. See the arguments that Galaxy City has so much more "character" than other city zones for an example. For what it's worth, I happen to feel this way about Citadel myself. (I just wish his TF weren't so awful.)
"Bombarding the CoH/V fora with verbosity since January, 2006"
Djinniman, level 50 inv/fire tanker, on Victory
-and 40 others on various servers
A CoH Comic: Kid Eros in "One Light"
Quote:
On the one hand, I know what you mean - we're heroes, it's our own damn decision to risk our lives.|
Originally Posted by Jasra
Two things have come to mind as I think about this:
1. Devs, do *NOT* have the character die to save us. That would be the ultimate way of minimizing the worth of the PCs. |
On the other hand, with the way that the Jenni Adair arc ends, that had IMPACT because now it's my responsibility to carry on a legacy. And that's with a character we barely knew - imagine that with a long-standing canon character...
Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite
Dark_Respite's Farewell Video: "One Last Day"
THE COURSE OF SUPERHERO ROMANCE CONTINUES!
Book I: A Tale of Nerd Flirting! ~*~ Book II: Courtship and Crime Fighting - Chap Nine live!
MA Arcs - 3430: Hell Hath No Fury / 3515: Positron Gets Some / 6600: Dyne of the Times / 351572: For All the Wrong Reasons
378944: Too Clever by Half / 459581: Kill or Cure / 551680: Clerical Errors (NEW!)
THE COURSE OF SUPERHERO ROMANCE CONTINUES!
Book I: A Tale of Nerd Flirting! ~*~ Book II: Courtship and Crime Fighting - Chap Nine live!
MA Arcs - 3430: Hell Hath No Fury / 3515: Positron Gets Some / 6600: Dyne of the Times / 351572: For All the Wrong Reasons
378944: Too Clever by Half / 459581: Kill or Cure / 551680: Clerical Errors (NEW!)
Quote:
True, but I guess that now I'll make the effort. Thanks for listing where your information came from.|
Originally Posted by Golden Girl
Then you've not heard the SDCC panel
|
I have to say that I'm at lot less interested in a story that sounds rather more like what Venture described than a story where someone dies and you have to bring some meaning to their death. I prefer something like that to a monthly cliff-hanger, ala the old Republic serials.
Oh, well. Different strokes.
Quote:
Statesman was the "First To Die" in that forum game, and people are already dancing on his grave (starting around post #63 in thread).|
Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
You might just get your chance. Statesman's down to 4 HP in the forum game.
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=266570 |
The fun part of that game is that only Numina and Citadel dropped below their starting HP, while everyone else's HP went up. Statesman though, went down like a cheap stuffed animal in the hands of a rampaging 2 year old.
It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...
Quote:
Statesman is very unpopular, I guess. |
Originally Posted by Redlynne
Statesman was the "First To Die" in that forum game, and people are already dancing on his grave (starting around post #63 in thread).
The fun part of that game is that only Numina and Citadel dropped below their starting HP, while everyone else's HP went up. Statesman though, went down like a cheap stuffed animal in the hands of a rampaging 2 year old. |
Despite being the signature hero for the game. I wonder why.
Quote:
If you'd been playing during Issues 4-6, it's an absolute No Brainer for why Statesman is hated and reviled, even to this day.|
Originally Posted by NightErrant
Statesman is very unpopular, I guess.
Despite being the signature hero for the game. I wonder why. |
When you get enough feedback about a game breaking "new feature" that it causes the forums software to melt down and CRASH within days of the announcement ... and over 90% of that feedback is OVERWHELMINGLY NEGATIVE ... and you push it Live anyway ... fundamentally changing how the game "works" at the most underlying levels of gameplay, after promising previously that you'd be doing NO SUCH THING, simply because "you know best" what is "FUN" ...
Um ... yeah.
There is a reason why Jack "Statesman" Emmert is a Persona Non-Grata to the players of this game.
It doesn't help that it took TWO YEARS and the release of Issue 9, Inventions ... under the leadership of Matt "Positron" Miller ... to undo the self-inflicted (and quite unnecessary!) damage of "Statesman's" decisions. During those two years ... I quit CoH and was very happy playing WoW. Needless to say, I was overjoyed to hear that Jack "Statesman" Emmert had been ****canned by NCSoft and would not be a part of the CoH Team after the property got bought out by NCSoft.
And to this day ... I, and many other players, harbor a Not At All Unreasonable complete and absolute HATRED of Statesman, in game, thanks to Jack Emmert.
So don't be AT ALL surprised if there is a significant portion of the Olde Guarde Playerbase who were here prior to City of Villains who are absolutely champing at the bit for the opportunity to remove Statesman from this game ENTIRELY on a permanent basis as a rebuke and repudiation of Jack "Statesman" Emmert for almost (almost!) destroying both this game, and its community, through his arrogance (and in my opinion, stupidity as a developer).
It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...
This thread has mostly run its course so I'm going to go ahead and make a major threadjack here:
Hating Statesman, the superhero, because he was the Mary Sue character of Jack Emmert is silly. The in-game character has nothing to do with Jack Emmert. He barely has a presence in the game, actually. Especially given that when the game launched, the big mystery was "Where is Statesman?" (If you're late to the party, he was being held captive in Praetoria.) His personality and stature have been mostly written in comics, novels, and media clips that have nothing at all to do with Jack Emmert.
Hating Jack Emmert is less silly, but you know - He was just one guy and he moved on to other things and handed the game off to people who cared about it in the end.
For all that people love to hate Jack, we owe a huge amount of the game's design to him. His background in mythology and folklore is responsible for a huge part of what makes this game unique in comparison to other superhero games and in comparison to other games of any genre.
Honestly, while I am happy, from a mechanics and game systems standpoint, with where the game has gone under Matt's guidance, I would be just as happy if they got someone like Jack put back in charge of creating the STORY of the game.
I suppose that it's a touch ironic that Jack, the myth and folklore guy, has in many ways achieved mythical status himself in the context of the game and its community. He might take a certain satisfaction from that, I suppose.
And I'm also running an event for this. It will be fairly long-running, unless they do the reveal early in the series. But if you want to enter, you can send your guess of who dies and who kills them (single person or enemy group) by in game e-mail to @Bubbawheat. First guess requires a 1 million inf entry fee. Each additional guess requires a 10 million inf entry fee. You can guess as many times as you want. Winner will get over 600 million inf. Full thread will be posted soon.