Longbow .. Friend? Foe? or whatever

Exactly the point I've been making all along. Longbow = Academa, Hero Corps = Wackenhut, Wyvern = Executive Outcomes. The only reason they dress like superheroes instead of dressing like soldiers is that back in 1930, Statesman and his friends made tights, not BDUs with epaulets, the uniform that most people respect, that they recognize as authority.

Edited to add:... and in my opinion, Hero Corps is sadly under-used in the storyline. The closest we ever come to seeing them in action is one badly-outleveled, pathetic bank rent-a-cop in one of the tip missions.

It's called a trope.

Like from TV and stuff.

CAUTION : NOT SAFE FOR TIME LIMITED SCENARIOS

Someone else beat me to it. Well done, sir.

Not surprised to see GG in this thread, because IMO the mindset is very similar: "We're the Good Guys, wherever we go and whatever we do, because we just are, and anyone who opposes us is Bad! HOO RAH! "

I'll agree with you on this, but I don't think Longbow is the group that fits, or -ever- was.

Paragon Police are the ones I'd put here. Blue Steel may have his issues, but he's not in charge. They work within the laws and despite their lack of powers remain a true force to be reckoned with all through the game.

Leveling up Redside, especially before inventions, there was one thing that was painfully obvious. Longbow are Vigilantes, people who are willing to violate the law, because they feel they are above it. If it weren't for Arachnos's mediporters, they'd have flamethrowered numerous villains to death.

PPD, they were the heroes. When you attack Paragon city proper, they're the ones defending the city, whereas Longbow are just trying to take you out. PPD are a group that operate within the law, despite the disadvantages it brings.

And their biggest display of corruption is a group splitting off to force a corporation into giving mediporters to the general population. Which is also, I believe, the only example of a blueside group policing their own. (Freaking awesome mission "Just put... your weapons... down!")

Basically, PPD are awesome and Longbow can ferry me around, but should stay out of the way.

Agreed. Whenever "generic heroes" were required, Longbow always showed up in storyline. A genuinely feel more could have been done with them, but the story just never really went beyond "bad things happen, Longbow responds." Introducing them as antagonists to player characters for a good year also didn't help.

Ugh... Yeah, t3h pWnXx0rZ was funny the first few times I saw him, but the bulk of his joke was that he was so unexpected. When I first saw him, I had to do a double-take, and I did chuckle quite a bit. Then they drove the joke into the ground and stomped on it for good measure to the point where that's expected of the Freakshow. Instead of being funny, it's become annoying because it's just hard to read.

It's like people's entire view of the Freakshow is informed solely by a selective reading of the Freaklympics, completely ignoring arcs like A Hand of Iron or the Freakshow Wars where they're shown as ruthless killers, amoral thugs and actual sadists. The Freakshow should be the kind of faction who scream at the top of their lungs in ecstasy over thing that horrify us. They shouldn't be seen as quaint and cute and adorable.

I agree that the PPD are handled quite well when they're used... They're just almost never used for anything. Villains aren't in Paragon City (can we see why that was a mistake now?) and heroes should have no reason to fight them, so it's easy to forget the police even exists.

I disagree. In the beginning, Longbow were presented as true-blue heroes fighting for the side of good. They were the de-facto heroes in every PvP zone, they were the ones who showed up to combat villains even in the isles and THEY were the ones protecting Paragon City before the PPD existed. Run the first of the Radio's missions and you'll find Longbow, not PPD, protecting the streets of Kings Row.

I recall a fair few arcs talking about the difference between Longbow and Wyvern, how Longbow do everything by the book and stick to morality whereas Wyvern don't mind breaking laws in their pursuit of criminals. There was a time when this is what Longbow were specifically said to NOT be like. And that arc is still in the game, I just can't remember who gave it. I want to say someone in Sharkhead, but I don't remember. Maybe someone in Cap?

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.

you know, just because people keep bringing this up, how many times have villians in their missions, as agents of arachnos, attacked the united states? the original tutorial begins with arachnos killing prison guards and releasing wanted criminals en masse(and yes, im aware nerva would have been set up before the prison break, but it seems their mo to make direct military raids against the united states whenever it can). It seems more like an Afghanistan type setting where arachnos made the first move, or series of moves as it were and longbow retaliated. do we have a canon example of the first aggression?

I would support this. I dislike the terrorist organization they are portrayed as.

As far as I'm aware, Nerva Archipelago is not under Arachnos jurisdiction and the Longbow installation is there legally, with support from local authorities. It's Arachnos who are there illegally.

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.

Terrorist? They're an organization of basically the low powered heroes, taking on an evil organization (have people forgotten Arachnos?).

Nevermind that other organizations do it, they're just not as grand. You know, like those pesky hero supergroups who invade the Isles to take down Recluse and his machine.

And Longbow bases are in an area that isn't even part of the nation, it was just close to the nation.

The PPD werent always effective in Paragon either. In the beginning they were outgunned, outmanned, and the only thing they had going for them was the fact they were considered the most upright police force in the nation.

To bad they were always cowering and getting mugged by every villain that walked the street.

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.

The only Canon example of the first aggression I can think of is an old Paragon Times article(and geez typing that makes me mss Arctic _Sun) celebrating the victory Statesman achieved in his attack on the Etolie Islands on October 27,2005.

Found the article on wiki.

here's a particular quote I didn't even know about all these years.

So given that, it's quite obvious that Statesman,The Freedom Phalanx and Longbow launched a coordinated attack first.

Note that COV and Issue 6 launched on October 31,2005 so the original Villain tutorial can be said to have taken place after Statesman's attack.

Along this line I'm still waiting for Ms Liberty to be arrested for environmental pollution. If you go to Oil Spill in Port Oakes, there's a tanker that was split in half at the surface of the water. ON that tanker is an explore badge explaining how it was ms Lib that split the tanker while apprehending a criminal.

Heck since it's the Oil Spill that's causing the hostility between the Coralax and Port Oakes, you can also show Ms Lib's actions as destabilizing an entire area.

EDIT: Apologies for the double posting, but these are two separate replies and I didn't think about combining them

It's a bit of a dilemma, they're done well, by being seen almost exclusively by villains, but that means heroes get little interaction with them. I'd like to see more done with them, but how often can you do the kind of portrayal we see in Roy Cooling's before they suffer from overexposure and become another Longbow type group. Or as you might say "Get Maltaed"

Nerva, not Cap. Some Russian chick, it's been a while since I've done the 1-30 legacy redside so I can't be a bit more specific.

Basically, she makes the same comparison of Longbow and Wyvern that I did for PPD vs Longbow. My problem with this, is that Longbow's pressence in the Rogue Isles defies this portrayal. Something that PPD doesn't suffer from. Except for Blue Steel, but Blue Steel doesn't violate foreign sovereignty with aggressive attacks; foreign countries invite him to participate in surprise exhibition matches against their armies.

And it could very well be perspective shaped by our different starting points. I started Redside, and didn't play Blueside for a couple of years. I'm not too terribly up on the legacy blueside, so I don't know if they're portrayed that differently, but heavy redside play has shaped the opinion PPD->hero Longbow->Vigilante Wyvern->Villain/Vigilante (Depending on individual storylines).

This -is- an important question. I think it's mostly along the lines of the different types of Vigilante.

Batman Vs. Punisher type deal. They're both Vigilantes, but there's no arguing that one is more traditionaly heroic.

Superman's a hero, but he'll X-Ray vision someone without a warrant.

However, there's a difference between a hero, being portrayed as a hero, that bends the rules every now and then and someone else, being described as a hero, who's primary portrayal is violations of law and huge ethical breaches.

I don't know if I'd call invading a country filled with known supervillains and being run by them, as an ethical breach. For one, this isn't the real world, it's a world filled with superpowers.

Even if Statesman and company went there first (before Arachnos started robbing banks), it's agreed upon by the world at large, they're evil supervillains with plans to take over the world. They even say as much in their propoganda!

Do you realise just how close we are to someone quoting real world events and having the thread locked? But it won't be me. My pile of moderator warnings is high enough.

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.

Quite possibly when it's a group of super powered A-Listers (remember, Arachnos and his LTs where the top super powers of the WORLD fromt he start. Player characters were always B-listers compared to the signature characters at that point) saying...

"We're going to kill you all. Bow down before us!"

Yeeeeaaah. When they make such threats and have the power to enforce it, you saying you'd sit around and wait for them to make the first move, killing millions, and then retaliate?

Mhmmm.

Those saying that, are they the same ones who keep wondering "Why doesn't Batman just kill the Joker and save millions of lives"? Only, they didn't kill anyone. They went in, gave the bully a black eye and left.

No mention of killing and Arachnos is still alive and going strong.

This reminds me:

Originally, I really found Archanco's "out" of not being invaded by a coalition of other countries to be quite clever. Whether or not it may be ruled by super villains, the Rogue Isles is still a sovereign state and thus protected by international law. But like the Crey corporation, that law only works to prevent first aggression. Once a sovereign state starts taking hostile military actions against another state, then hostile military action may be taken against them. If Recluse were smart, he's hide behind that law, conduct his operations covertly and when an angry Statesmean went kicking down his door and accusing him of war crimes, Recluse could just shrug is shoulders and say "Prove it."

The trouble, really, is that Recluse ISN'T smart. At all. Say I'm a brand new player just starting out. What's the first thing I see? Lord Recluse IN ******* PERSON invading Paragon City, leading an aggressive military action on US soil and punching the Statesman into a building, demolishing it and no doubt killing dozens of innocent civilians. Then we start the game and we find Arachnos forces invading with ground troops, setting up bases of operation, taking prisoners of war and acting exactly like a hostile invading force. Then we level up a bit and go to respond to a bank robbery and who shows up to rob it? Ghost Widow in person, with Arachnos troops helping her. What? So then I switch sides and go evil since clearly the bad guys go unpunished, take the ferry to Grandville Island and I'm greeted by giant monitors playing a loop of Recluse saying "The heroes are doomed!" to massive applause.

And we worry about Longbow holding a fort near an island not part of Arachnos' sovereign state and doing nothing more than providing local policing? I mean, either it goes both ways, or we ignore both cases. We can't keep focusing on Longbow and keep ignoring all the other ways in which the game isn't consistent with its legality.

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.

Yeah, quite obvious if you completely distort an out of context statement and then lie about the rest.

Statesmans Strike was the 'event' at the end of the CoV beta, using it to claim 'the heroes struck first' is....utterly absurd. At this point Arachnos is already a terrorist organisation that invaded and occupied the 'sovereign nation' people keep talking about, and villains started the game having been broken out of the Zig. His statement is basically that they should attack Arachnos instead of just defending themselves when Arachnos attacks, which has already happened. It's that age-old problem that heroes are always having to be reactive to villains instead of proactive. Now, the initial Longbow presence....

....was out of the territory of the openly aggressive supervillain President anyway, but since then Arachnos has made a bid for world domination by assaulting every single superpowered individual on the entire planet with The Web, and recently openly invaded Atlas Park...the real one, not just the attempt to change time itself. After, of course, he'd already openly invaded Faultline. Maybe people forgot that actually means he invaded the United States of America. You know, like he already had by sending his men to break all those villains out the Zig? That little thing? Arachnos are the army of that 'sovereign nation' and they invaded the United States first.

In-universe one could probably make the argument that the governments of the world are pussies after the Rikti War in the same way Britain and France bent over backwards, to their detriment, to try and avoid another war after WWI. They let Longbow have funding to balls up whatever Arachnos is doing, so NATO doesn't have to cash in political influence (domestic and international) and give opportunities to other nations to interfere if they do the right thing, declare war, and f****** flatten Arachnos directly. Throwing money at what amounts to being a local paramilitary group is WAY more in the style of modern nations than justifying to your war weary civilians why you're stamping all over stuff. If Statesman wants to tear that place down...well get the popcorn and hope he does the job properly.

Out of universe it makes no sense at all. Arachnos would be in a political situation so crap they'd get the entirety of NATO shoved straight up their anus about four seconds after the whole thing with The Web got resolved. They certainly wouldn't be operating the way they always have been. That Longbow base would be a US military base, nothing at all would go in and out of the Rogue Isles (because embargoing rogue nations is how the world works), and if Lord Recluse so much as farted at the mainland he'd be playing tag with thousands of volunteer heroes at the head of the invasion.

Any attempt to make Longbow look like bad guys because they're in a 'sovereign nation' is flawed to the point that it's such a stupid argument it detracts from anyone arguing on a studier platform of....Longbow just kinda being pretty unpleasant. And they are. They're well into the 'vigilante' part of the alignment system. It's got absolutely nothing to do with them invading the Rogue Isles though. At this point, if it were a real world, the US could probably launch a nuclear strike on the Rogue Isles and get away with it. Arachnos have launched multiple overt invasions of US territory, and Longbow are bad guys because they're assaulting the Rogue Isles? Uh....no. Longbow are kinda bad because they're starting to think they should be allowed to do what they want....which, again, has nothing to do with their presence on the Rogue Isles, and everything to do with how they'll wilfully interfere with Vanguard (the actual government and UN-backed military force with total authority) and operate completely outside of their parameters as 'those guys NATO are throwing black ops money at to destabilise Arachnos'. They're becoming self righteous thugs. A giant, well funded gang.

RICO laws. Crey, Inc. would have been seized as soon as the Countess was arrested.

Of course, it's also supposedly canon that the arrest didn't stick, which in and of itself would have all my blue characters either turning vigilante or retiring.

The last time I asked about that during a Coffee Talk, we got some clarity on the issue. How far do you think the Rogue Isles are from the rest of Paragon City? The (current) canonical answer is a couple of miles. As far as the US, and the whole rest of the world, are concerned, the Rogue Isles are still a suburb of Paragon City, a couple of tiny little barrier islands off the coast of Rhode Island.

I know, this isn't even vaguely the impression the early City of Villains web page gave us, but it makes a lot of the devs' writing make more sense once you realize that that's the current canon.

Basically, even if they didn't have government contracts, Longbow would be a registered supergroup of FBSA licensed superheroes (the Longbow Wardens) and their support staff and employees. Where does the Citizen's Crime Fighting Act authorize supers to hire mercenaries to fight alongside them? Beats me, man. I think the FBSA's definition of "super" is the same as Justice Potter-Stewart's classic (and no longer operative) definition of pornography: "I can't define it, but I know it when I see it." Wear BDUs and carry a flamethrower, you're a criminal. Wear patterned spandex and carry a flamethrower, you're a superhero or a supervillain, as long as ... as long as what? As long as you say so? As long as some respected superhero says so? As long as the FBSA says so? *shrug*

If you remember my forum history, you may remember that when CoV first came out, I was under the impression that the Rogue Isles were never officially part of the US, that they were a separate island nation somewhere in the western North Atlantic, say, somewhere vaguely north of Bermuda. If that were the case, Longbow's incursion into Mercy Island wouldn't even vaguely be legal, it'd be an act of war. But if Mercy Island is a suburb of Paragon City that's been a crime-haven since 1964 because some super villain claims it and nobody's managed to evict him yet? Going in there to try to enforce US and Rhode Island law and Paragon City ordinances looks pretty heroic. Even if it's done with pistols and assault rifles and that one chick with psychic powers.

But either way, I stand by my observation that they're a private military company (to use the current euphemism for "mercenary") and as such, there are good soldiers and bad soldiers in Longbow.