A CoH History: What do you remember?

I remember I0.
I remember seeing my first level 40, and wondering just how many hours they had played to get so high.
I remember the days of the /Devices blaster, with amazingly powerful smoke grenades.
I remember slotting my first character badly, and thinking the world was over because respeccing was impossible.

I remember I1.
I remember the outdoor missions.
I remember Portal Corp, and the giant monsters on Monster Isle
I remember getting to 50 the first time

I remember respecs, APPs, villains, limitless numbers of TFs and storyarcs, and the thrill of playing a new powerset for the first time. I remember making friends, joining a supergroup, and awesome moments with strangers. I remember Hami-Raids, old and new, and even the new incarnate raids.

But I never expected to remember crying about the end of the game.

I remember being hooked by the sights and sounds of the character creation screen, the unique feel of all of it.

Slogging to level 8 or 9 solo then finding out Teaming got things done so much faster


Seeing the first person flying over head in Atlas on my way to the hollows for the first time. I'm obsessed with flying, I asked what I needed to do to get flight, people told me I had to be level 14. I was level 8 or so at the time. By the time I got to 14 and got flight. I was hooked.


I remember the first handful of characters I ever started, wondering if I or the game would last long enough for me to get them to 50. It did, I got 23 of my guys to 50. 1 of each AT

I remember how awesome this community always was at helping me learn more about this great game.

I remember both the original tutorials. When Radio missions were introduced, when veteran rewards was a new, novel idea.

I remember being cornered in the Hallows and a group of luchadors dropped down screaming wrestling manuevers while saving me from the mob I had foolishly aggroed.


And I remember thinking "This is the greatest game ever."

Getting lost in Kings Row.

Hover Sniping enemies and thinking it was great XP.

The Empty bug on CoH EU Beta. (Your character name would show as 'empty' and your friends list wiped)

Global Chat being introduced.

The old Origin icons.

8 Slots per server with no extras till CoV came along giving us 4 more.

ED/GDN.

P-strings.

I remember how hilariously Reactive Interface was bugged when it came out. My AR/Dev Blaster had the time of his life

I remember spending a good hour crafting my first villain and having him spring out into Mercy in the midst of an I10 Rikti invasion. That was the moment I knew I was staying.

----- Union's finest underachiever -----
Farewell CITY of HEROES
The First, the Last, the One.
Union: @ominousvoice2059

I remember the invasion event at the end of beta, with the Rikti Mothership and the massive showdown in Steel Canyon, followed by taking down marching ground troops in King's Row.

I remember gathering a horde of players to bring down what was being advertised as unkillable juggernauts in the sky just to prove we could.

I remember the PvP community's heartfelt arguments against I13's massive changes.

I remember the Praetorian Invasion Zone Event and leading the League that tore down their force on Peregrine Island.

But most importantly, I remember the Devs who treated our opinions with respect and consideration while sharing insights on the path in which the game was always leading towards.

I remember being something like the 20th person to register on the newly-opened forums back before the game even went into Beta.

I remember the disappointment when a lot of the stuff that had me interested in the game was dropped before Beta, and when the system requirements changed to be just over what my processor had so I couldn't stick around but rather had to rejoin later after I upgraded my computing situation.

I remember my first encounter with the Psychic Clockwork King, as a regen scrapper. The entire team wiped with his initial AOE nuke, including three other regen scrappers... Save for me as I was in perma MoG (it worked against psi at the time, but blocked your regen and put you at 25% HP). Managed to hold out until they all got back.

In the same vein, herding entire maps on my I4 Inv/EM tanker and killing them - and myself - with one Energy Transfer, using the stacking bug (mobs were literally into each other, and due to the way Tanker gauntlet worked, your damage on ST attacks would apply to each and every mob in the stack).

I remember being part of the second group that beat the LRSF (germans beat us to the punch), which on Vigilance, limited population and all that, involved much organisation, alliances and strategies - couldn't expect people to play specific builds, getting 8 people online and motivated was often hard enough.

It also meant we were the only group with access to HOs, as hami raids were a rarity on that server; which created much drama and rivalries. Some of us being relatively successful PVPers at the time got flak for being "all HOs and no skill". The high point for me personally was when I rerolled a dominator with a name a friend suggested to poke fun at that, Agent G183HO ("G" sounding like "j'ai" meaning "I have"), and people started flamewars on the forums about that character being utterly unfair to other players due to her HO slotting... Even though she was level 30.

I remember pretending to be a woman for three years simply because I was too embarrassed to tell my friends I had been lying to them. It didn't even start on purpose, when people asked "are you a girl in real life?" I would answer "does it matter?" and they'd take it as a "yes". I guess I should have just said "no", but while I'm not a roleplayer I tend to get immersed into games, and if I validated this kind of real-life intrusion to my pretendy game time it'd have spoiled my fun.

As time passed I grew more and more annoyed with the situation and acted more and more like a stereotypical guy-pretending-to-be-female - flirty in ridiculous ways, obvious lies about myself, "girl talk" only a boy could think was genuine, overly aggressive, obsessive over numbers, etc., hoping people would get the hint. The result wasn't exactly what I hoped for: my at the time best ingame friend "fell in love" with me and went around behind my back telling his RL friends we had met and slept together... Never underestimate a man's credulity when boobs might be involved.

I remember moving to the US servers, making a brand new account (unrelated to the above, I have commitment issues with people in general and wanted a fresh start), only to run into the same people I was playing with on Vigilance, and become friends with them again, using a completely different personality, speech mannerisms and such. After a few months, one of my pals confronted me, although with hesitation, and I 'fessed up to it. What gave it away? "You're still the charging ahead maniac you've always been". Turns out changing your whole personality is much easier than changing your CoH playstyle.

I remember spending all my liquid influence at the time, 300 millions, right as I...13? was released to buy one of the first Gladiator's Armor +3 defense listed - and going around telling my friends how silly I was to have paid this much for it. Within days, prices went up, eventually all the way to the influence cap and above and stayed at that point for years.

I remember TFs most of all, the numerous TFs I've done with friends, the heated arguments as to what strategy worked best - said strategies often being about how to coerce one player who went AFK half of the time to actually play, or trying to turn a few others who played like Leeroy Jenkins on speed in the right direction. Actually accomplishing the mission objectives was secondary. Minmaxing people - people you like - is so much more fun than crunching numbers; especially when it goes horribly wrong. It often did.

I remember stumbling through the old tunnel from where I started in Galaxy City into Kings Row, and immediately getting flattened by a Paladin. I remember seeing a call in broadcast for a team to take down said Paladin, and joining it. I remember being level 8 at most, and helping take down what in any other game would probably be a raid boss for maximum level players only.

I remember a week or so later getting a trial for CoV as well just so I could keep playing for another two weeks, and laughing hysterically as I watched my robot minions lay waste to an alley full of random boxes and crates in a level 15 or so mayhem mission.

I remember finally finding a copy of the game on a store shelf six months later, and immediately buying both CoH and CoV, back when they were seperate games. I remember buying all three 60 day timecards the store had in stock at the time, because I knew I'd need them.

I remember being subscribed uninterrupted from then until now, five and a half years later. I remember staying up late at night to play the new issue or buy the latest booster pack the moment it was possible to do so.

I remember trying other games, and lasting all of a couple of months on them. I remember not even considering cancelling my CoH subscription while I did, because I knew even before trying whatever game that it wouldn't be enough to make me leave CoH. Notably, I remember trying Aion when it was in Beta, and I remember it being the only game I've ever cancelled my purchase of. To this day there is a permanently banned Aion account attached to the same master account as my CoH one is, after they refunded my purchase mere days after I made it.

I remember seeing other games, from the lowliest startup company to WoW itself, adding 'new' features that CoH had for years beforehand. I remember seeing games without these features and wondering why, given how universally loved they are here.

I remember saying on these very forums only a few months ago that it'd be years before I'd have to type a post like this. And now, writing this, I'm openly crying.

But most of all.... I remember the awesome people I've met and played with along the way. And I'm happy to say that I have skype or steam details for most of them, so we'll be able to keep in touch.

I remember my first flight.


I remember running an all-blaster old posi task force. We died like a 176 times in total..


The game dies, but the friendships remain, and really, that's the best part.

"WHERE R THE LOST IN KINGS ROW"
"If we told you that, then they wouldn't be Lost, would they?"

I remember less than a minute after logging in my first character, some passerby gave me an awaken.

I remember failing respec trials.

I remember finding Pete at the end of a backloaded Lost mission I thought would never end.

I remember the first 8 man all-defender team just wiping everything in Talos Island.

A mate and his brother were playing a game online they said rocked. My son tried it, while I watched on 1 of their computers. He wanted it bad, he was hooked. then his sisters saw it. Here we go, now we have 2 accounts. Later on we ended up with 3 accounts. I remember teaming with my kids, friends and the people I became friends with online. Throughout this I was dealing with the end of a relationship with my de facto wife. I was a emotional wreck trying to keep my life on track. I joined a SG on Freedom Vills called the Devils Rejects. The members of the Devils Rejects, and others I met online. Helped me get my life together.
I remember teaming with my son on SG raids. It was fantastic and a great way to let off some steam. If I felt angry, on would come 1 of my brutes.(Brute Smash lmao) The toon I would play earlier on was sometimes accordingly to how I was feeling at that time.
I remember Whitestone and his SS Stone Brute. Thinking wow if I could be half as good as him. I would be a gun brute. I remember my mates bro's toon Lady Of Dishonour. A deadly Hamidoned PVP dominator. There are so many I looked up to their ability to play. Those who were just awesome people to team with. Those who became your mates on Teamspeak.
So many things have changed and now I have 6 kids playing at some level. We have hordes of 50's between us. Not a horde of Pl'ed toons. I could go on and on. But I wont do that.
The Devs are awesome, the community is magnificent. I will miss all of you guys.
Cheers from DOA HEAT, Sinita, Polartica, Lord Thuggery, Raw Heat, Aeon Destruction amongst hordes of other family toons.

I remember the Winter Lord PLs.

I remember Yellow Dawns.

I remember fighting the Kronos Titan in Siren's Call.

I remember ambush spawns in Atlas. (especially one that happened right at the train)

I remember having 2-3 teams take down Lusca.

I remember farming Kora fruit for tier 3 inspirations.

Probably my best memory though, is the time when my SG finally completed the STF. 3 failures, then we finally succeeded. This was the same time IOs were invented, yet most of us were still on SOs. It was a big thing for us.

I don't remember much, I haven't been here long. But I remember coming into the game as an elec/elec Blaster in Mercy Island during the Halloween event... I remember seeing a fifty foot tall pumpkin monster named "Eochai" and thinking "I can take it!"

I remember being proved horribly, horribly wrong. I was shot out of the sky by a flaming pumpkin and landed three hundred feet down, in the water. I remember coming back with a vengeance with a team and finally defeating him.

I remember getting flight and thinking "They can't possibly let me... oh, they can". Then it got even better when I found out that I could go up and down without ramping off buildings.

I remember my first Mastermind, when the only experience I had was a pre-i22 Stalker and a Blaster, and thinking "This is OP." Because I didn't know about increasing the difficulty.

I remember seeing my first tank, an (though I didn't know it then) invuln/martial tank and thinking "wow." I remember that tank helping me through so much... she's still the first thing I think of when I think Tank.

I remember my first ever 50, Shadow of Kronos, who remains both my favorite and most powerful character. I remember defeating my first Giant Monster, the Kraken. I remember going on to believe I conquered the game... only to find Incarnate Trials.

I remember never being able to do those trials due to my computer. I am now finally getting a computer capable of it... and the game is ending.

But I also believe in the Titan Network. I still hold out hope that something can be done.

I remember coming in third place in a costume contest with the first toon I ever created.
I remember making friends in Infinity and regularly playing with them for my first 6 months in the game.
I remember the first toon I created that felt really powerful, Heh Man, a BS/inv scrapper.
I remember mg first level 50 toon, Combat Fembot.
I remember the time I joined a lowbie sewer team (before DFB) and we steamrolled it all the way to Kings row and our first bank mission. We had so much fun together that we later formed a short-lived Supergroup, Team Extream.
I remember the first time I played the mission arcs in First Ward and being in awe of how well it was done.
I remember being the lone tank on an otherwise all controller team and being in awe of the combined power they brought to bear. I wasn't able to contribute anything of importance.
I remember the Strong and Pretty thread that kept getting necr'd over the years. It was always good for a laugh.

Trying a two-week subscription of City of Villains from PC Powerplay, wondering what the hell kind of game this was, and having fun ordering my soldiers around to shoot whatever I told them from behind my force fields.
Being in Scrapperlock with Sabre Justice, my BS/SR high-tech knight, for WEEKS on end, and loving every second of it.
Trying to figure out what the heck Inventions were.
Running through area plots and getting to know them well- fighting hard to save Croatoa, uncover the mystery of Faultline, and kicking Nemesis' *** for killing that awesome Longbow dude in the Rikti War Zone.
The complete mayhem of Rikti invasions, Rikti mothership raids, Halloween zombie invasions, Task Forces... most big teams in general, actually.
Getting on board the 'DEFENDERS ARE NOT HEALERS' bandwagon til I was blue in the face, even though I didn't actually play one.
Wasting tons of time on these forums while at school.

I remember when we hunted Outbreak for the Isolator badge.

Taking down Adamastor solo in the old DA cemetery. Inv/SS tanker. He couldn't kill me but my hits were doing mega low damage. Put on hover and follow and auto attacked him for an hour while I cleaned up the house.

Hami raids. The lag and the fun.

And flying. I'll never forget flying for the first time.

I remember beeing on the first team that beat Master of STF on live EU Server, good old times, and i remember not able to check it on US Forums because we had no access to it.

I remember the best Server ever - Zukunft.

I remember my very first foray into Atlas Park on my very first character, more-or-less at launch, my first MMO experience ever (previously strictly a FPS player). Wandering around like a slack-jawed tourist, killstealing because I didn't know any better, and blurting out in-character nonsense on Broadcast. The archetypal nooblet...

I remember getting a character to lvl14 for the first time and being utterly amazed at how much fun Superjump was.

I remember founding the Carnival of Light roleplayer SG on Triumph, based on the tiny snippets of lore available about that organization at the time, and trying to make plausible "carnie" costumes out of what was available in the creator at the time. Smiling smugly right now at Festival's signature white and gold motif...created years before that look became official canon.

I remember the lonely life of a Dark/Dark Defender back when teams only wanted Empaths and Bubblers (despite D3s actually being hideously overpowered at the time). I remember my joy when getting invited to a team that had apparently been struggling and the first thing I heard in Team chat being "It's going to be okay: I found us a Dark Defender."

I remember the golden era of Firetanks.

I remember the rage avalanche over ED.

I remember being part of the first successful all-Defender, all-Defender-ATs (there were only eight at the time) STF.

I remember getting the MSTF badge...on a Stalker.


And so very much more...

Proper things I remember:

Finding Pocket D on the Union server. First proper dip into RP'ing. My first RP character was Ganglord Brack, and when I look back at how I was, it makes me cringe.

Then came the invite to the Union Roleplayer's channel. Up until then, yes, I had been RP'ing with a crowd, but I didn't know the players. Heck, the only person I played with was a RL friend who played semi-regularly (Then dropped altogether)

I was amazed at how friendly everyone was, after coming from WoW, and RuneScape before that!

The first person I really struck up a friendship with was TheOrrery (Who came back for a bit not so long ago, then disappeared again), then others followed until I considered the entire channel my friends.

I also got to partake in proper teaming, like, not just two people. Big teams of eight! EIGHT! How fun it was.

Then, after about 1.5 years of playing, I was introduced to Task Forces. And I wondered why I always shied away from them! It was Ammon who introduced me, and it was ITF, and I used my first ever 50, Doctor Fallout.

It's been good times since then, and CoX is the only game where i've had more than one character at max level. Slowly but surely, they appeared. I can name them all off by heart:

Doctor Fallout
Aerial Assault (which is what my chat handle is)
Fury of the Gods
Tomb Guard
Executioner Cyrus
Steam Centurion (Undoubtedly my favorite)
Azurewing (Who was the first to get a seriously tricked out build, and incarnate in everything)
Pursuit (Who got to 50 in under a month, which was FAST for me)
Mganga
Arch Bishop (Who got 50 last week)

I'll remember all of them, and all my other favorite characters and the times I had.

I'll remember all the people here and how they influenced me as a person. Mostly oreso, whose constant nudging to 'do things now' made my characters more likeable not just for everyone else, but also for me.

I'll never forget the 3, nearly 4 years of super awesome time i've had here, and i'm glad to stay in contact with all the friends i've made, and hopefully play some other games with them as well (Not just MMOs, get Dungeon Defenders, or Killing Floor. Seriously)

Edit: I also remember my proper, ever actual character. It was made on a friend's account when he was showing me the game, I THINK he was called Shade Blade or something like that.

After that, my first character on the Union server was Kronicus, who never made it to 50, mainly because I didn't understand the mechanics fully, and that to me, Inv/SS was pretty dull.

I now have 44 characters, all of whom i'll wish a fond farewell. Their adventures, and future adventures, will live on with me.

Long live Paragon City! (And the Isles, and Prae- ... oh)

Out of nostalgia, I started flipping through some of the old screenshots I had. Some of they really got me cackling.

I remember these...anyone else here do?

Blaster forums:

Blasterpalooza! Everyone nuke the AV!


Everyone nu...zzzzzzz


Anyone from the A-- Clowns still around?
(Level 11s vs Epidural! We won...eventually)



Defender forums:

Absorb pain to death competition...last one standing loses
A crowd of curious lowbies gather to mourn the selfless empaths.


Sadly I lost the pictures of the dark defenders herding giant monsters until a giant mushroom came along, mezzed and killed everyone.


Anyone from the Eventful Eight still around?