Blueside: Alternate Starting areas or Level bump stuff?

That is a fabulous idea!

You can start as a Hero in AP, or a Vig/Rog in KR... and then stories would naturally branch from there into either the 'clean' zones or the 'grittier' ones.

Love that idea to death!

They could even do a Praetorian "going undercover" style mission format, where you'd make choices during missions that would be either Vigilante or Rogue choices, and culminating in an alignment story mission where you'd cement your alignment on one side or the other, and which would affect your contacts and mission choices.

I'd especially like it if it fleshed out Hero Corps more (an organization well suited to the "shades of grey" style of play), as well as putting a "good" face on the Crey Corporation- they can't be entirely evil, can they?

I'm against any changes to Kings Row's atmosphere in any way (although, I might agree to an updating of the zone Lima AP/MI). It has its own place in the game.

However, I would absolutely support more low-level content there! The more options the better!

There's more Praetoria in I24

Hmmm....

Well, on the one hand, I'd love to have an alternate starting choice again in the form of Kings Row.

But on the other hand, I'd also like to have new content AFTER the already-new content we got courtesy of Atlas Park. (Yes, the lack of variety in Atlas Park is annoying, and I don't even really read the mission text anymore, but I do think it was a nice upgrade.)

It would be a nice flow, from the clean/new environment of Atlas Park to the gritty, darker tone of Kings Row. I agree that the police headquarters should be made into a more central hub of the zone. Perhaps model it after the Gotham City Police Department.

Bumping the level up to 10-15 would be really nice, because I do like Kings Row and it would be nice to have new content after Atlas Park. Once you hit 15, then you have the option of doing the Steel Canyon arcs or going to Faultline and doing those - or both, since you'd probably have the time.

By having Kings Row and new content be present in 10-15, it'd help fill a gap. Then you'd have fairly new content present all the way to 30.

20-30, however, is getting massively crowded with new content, so in the future, after Kings Row, I really hope the devs focus on content beyond 30. Night Ward is a nice start, but I want more blue/red stuff too.

I think a lot of the abandoned hazard zones could be made into co-op zones, but that's getting off topic, so I'll end it here.

I'm not sure there's a whole lot of point to making KR a starting zone, when it's so easy to get to level 3 by street sweeping in Atlas, then head on over to KR and do the same to rapidly get to 5.

But I'm fine with making changes to KR so that mobs spawn in an orderly pattern from 1-20, with lower mobs near the train and higher ones toward the periphery. That's the actual range of the Skulls and Hellions, so it makes sense. Vazhilok and Clockwork also cover that level range, as do Arachnos (if you wish to put any on the street), and Lost, Circle, Family, Outcasts, and Trolls are close at 5-20.

As an accompaniment to a texture update, the spawns could be re-ordered so as to put Skulls throughout, Hellions near the train and higher levels near the old Galaxy Gate in High Park, Clocks around power stations (with occasional loot-bearing patrols in industrial areas), add some Family near the Independence Port gate (or in general throughout the King Garment Works district), put some Trolls along with the Lost near the Skyway Gate (at the eastern end of Industrial Avenue), Vahzilok mainly in Aqueduct district, and confine the Circle to The Gish district.

Texturally, I'd like to keep the grittiness of the area, but add a bit of a gothic theme in places, and make the few tech style buildings stand out a little more; though not necessarily all bright and shiny. (The building that has the Upgraded badge on it is supposed to be a high tech lab, by the way; not an old apartment tower.)

I'd like to keep all the unique features in the zone, such as the Guns'n Ammo building and the Crey building. And of course the giant coin or medallion at the city center has to stay.

If the game ever does introduce rain for zones, I'd have it rain at least a portion of every night in KR, perhaps as part of a mild Circle event, where torch-bearing Circle patrols would file toward a location between the Gish and High Park, conduct a ritual, and depart.

As for arcs, to me there's nothing particularly good or sacred in the KR material. However, if you strip out the extra stuff and keep just the door missions, you can compress the existing arcs by half. The level range on each contact can also be extended from 1-20 on some, and 5-20 on others. Additionally, at least a few of the level 5-9 contacts from Atlas and old Galaxy City are probably better represented in Kings Row.

Tony Kord is an obvious candidate for relocation, as his lab is in Kings Row (site of the Upgraded badge), yet he was originally placed as a contact on the streets of Atlas Park. Rachel Torres is another one who would be better located in Kings Row, as her interest is with the Lost, and there never were any Lost in Galaxy or Atlas.

New material could be added, and old contacts given new missions. For instance, my first week in the game I had Lawrence Mansfield as a contact, and was utterly confused to find that a coroner - who I expected to be interested in the Vazh, who were stealing bodies from the morgue - actually sent me to Perez Park to find the Jewel of Hera. (WTH?) If I was doing a revamp, Larry would send me on a Vahz mission or two, and someone else (maybe Vic Johansson) would send me on a Jewel of Hera mission that was relocated to a spot in the Gish.

As far as new material goes, there's so much to work with in the old lore that was never brought forth.

For one thing, if the devs would introduce an electric guitar weapon model for ax melee, I'd like to see a "Battle of the Bands" arc involving Mullethead and the other bands we see on those Hellions posters.

No to a new starting zone. BUT I would like it to be a 5-20 range of content. Why? It has a connecting door with Independence Port. Makes sense for a logical progression of levelling

A reshuffle of certain contacts, cleaning up their arcs if they have them as well as incorporating the old badge missions into the chains and maybe using the phase tech in a limited fashion to show progress cleaning up one of the dirtiest streets.

There's an ample opportunity for story progression. The Family runs I.P. and IIRC supplies the tools for at least one of the factions; either Hellions or Skulls. We could deal with the gang and work our way up to the source, discovering that the crime gangs of Kings Row are being supplied by the bigger crime in other parts. This could lead to us reclaiming the Row and then moving on to crime in the bigger city. With Galaxy City's door blocked off by PPD; there's ample space in the north of the zone for a set of arc-chains (and it's also the site of the bank, wink-wink).

This would mean revamping at least part of Independence Port with entrees from Kings having arcs starting in the mid-south of the zone and leading down to crime related to Brickstown after dealing with the Family. It could even become a reunion zone for those who head off to Steel and come through the north gate connecting Steel and I.P. with the Steelites taking out the Tsoo and Council encroaching on the northern part of the zone. Of course; more stations would be in order to help get around I.P. like a ship/boat connection or an extension of the (nearly typed Green) tram line. They could even be exposed to the Sky Raiders at 25 and decide if they want to pass through the Smuggler's Ship to Striga; returning to a finish in I.P. or directed to Founders to tackle the Council fighting there.

Brickstown hits into the 30-39 territory so another Vanguard station to direct people to the RWZ should be a given (side-note:same with Nerva which strides up into the mid 30s at least). Connections should be the key.

I could get behind a long-term gameplan like that where each issue was a serious progression of content, utilising older assests with a hint of newer ones for special bosses or contacts, that ultimately returned to giving us a solid path from 1-50 instead of the disjointed ones we have now where we hit 35 and get contacted by Borea(?) to go to the RWZ (And Daedaelus/Sister Airlia if we have Midnighter access and Arbiter Whatshisname if you're a villain). I've recently been redoing legacy content and there's a lot of rich story there that's just waiting to be tapped into with new story mechanics and it should be done.

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Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.

Some interesting ideas, though, again, I don't think the Devs really want to do any major long term overhauls.

So, what's the simplest changes to the low level zones we could do? It's more than just king's Row. We've got -Four- zones in the 1-10+ range that can be played with.

I think it would be kind of cool to see Perez Park get taken to Hell by the Hellions, although that's kind of going OT.