how should the stories of CoX be structured?

CoX has a storytelling problem. It has a bunch of different stories about the same characters and places. The stories can be accessed at different times and in different orders, and they can be repeated.

The classic way of handling this issue is strictly episodic. At the end of the story everything is back the way it was at the beginning. The problem with this being that people come to see the stories as pointless because they know nothing ever changes. Who Will Die is always answered "nobody important" - and some redshirt gets it.

The old CoX way of handling the issue was level based. Flower Knight is in the tutorial you see at level 1, then in Ouroboros that you cannot enter until level 25. It works great for Flower Knight, you never see her again in the tutorial unless you go back in time through Oro.

But the old CoX way has issues with sidekicking - you can do a high level arc that tells some story, then do a lower level arc that no longer makes sense.

And the old CoX way has issues with the game changing. Flower Knight is no longer in the tutorial. There is no MAGI vault in Galaxy City. The changing game has broken some stories and made others different.

I am torn. I like finding out FrostFire's life arc, or Fusionette's. Having an NPC only appear in one arc would remove a lot of the "world" feeling from the game.

But in general I don't care about the story. I want enough story so that I am not just incinerating people for fun, I am a hero, but not so much that I have to read a wall of text or know anything.

CoH = comicbook game
Story arcs = comic issues

You can always reread the earlier stories

I have soloed redside 3 or 4 times. I am talking every arc, and every side mission, from every contact. I am currently soloing Blueside, every story arc, every side mission, from every contact. This does not make me an expert, just saying I have looked at the content a little.

City of X gets around the problem that you discuss quite beautifully. That's right, a very high compliment from me to the Devs. One that not everyone will agree with I am sure. Yet I can give them this compliment, and I am happy to do so. Here is why. Ouroboros.

City of X has put your character in a world(s) in flux. You are saying the problem is they are fixed. Yes and no. You can run through the stories, and see in the stories/arcs you are running that you are affecting reality. You are saving the city. Or, as a villain, you are amassing sky high stacks yo. Does it stay saved? Heh. Like as if.

For those instances where you feel a story arc you ran should have a major impact? Did you ever consider a Mender was running along behind you and "fixing" what you did? Or, maybe it's all a Nemesis plot.

Yet at the end of your post you say you do not care about the story. Easy fix, either just be on someone else's team and get a lot less story, or ignore the dialogue, or RP and build your own community and stories that you do like.

I like the way CoH tells its stories - centered on you, and also assuming that your progress through levels is a proxy for the passage of time. When you meet someone at level X+10, they refer to things you might have done with them at level X in the past tense.

It's not perfect for reasons you mention, but I think much more highly than most of the alternatives I have seen or considered.

I prefer a level-based timeline, myself. Plot time progresses as you progress through the levels. That way, a player can have a consistent, continuous experience the whole way through without worrying about the world changing from under him.

That said, a time-based timeline has a very elegant way of working in City of Heroes - Ourobors. Previously, the Welcome to Ourobors arc claimed that the Shiva meteorite landed in Atlas Park. This no longer makes sense, as that time has come and the Meteorite landed in Galaxy City. Silos acknowledges this, saying that someone is messing with the timeline, and they had seen a future in which the meteorite landed on Atlas Park instead. Neither history is "wrong," they are just two different versions of time, with the "old" ones being left as echos.

This actually makes sense for the world to change from right under people and still stay in-canon. One day your character's got his powers from something that happened in Galaxy City, the next day Galaxy City has been destroyed too long ago for this to have happened, and that's STILL not a plot hole. The time-line changed, but your character didn't. In his story, he still got his powers from Galaxy City, and remained unchanged because gaining access to Ouroboros protects you from time changing on you. You keep your original memories and experiences.

I honestly wish that every time they make a real-time-based change to the story, Ouroboros would make a note of it. Captain Level 50 ran the Statesman Task Force yesterday and logged out next to the Statesman on the boat. After this morning's patch, he's standing on the ship, but the Statesman is gone, and he's been gone for a long time. Confused, Captain Level 50 hops into Ouroboros, goes up to Mender Silos and says "What the hell, man! What the hell!" Silos, unsurprised, responds "Ah, this. Something happened to the timeline. Someone changed the past and killed the Statesman many months before this moment. However, being one of the Menders, you were not affected by these changes." Suddenly, it makes sense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.