Champions Online: just doesn't cut it.

Nothing is being taken away from you. All the time and money I spent on my characters is worth it to me because of all the fun I had in the process. All good things come to an end, and it seems to me like you're just choosing to adopt a very cynical attitude. NCSoft can't take away your memories or the fun you had already. You'll just have to look elsewhere for future fun, that's all.

I definitely keep that in mind. I actually think I know the rescue and the building missions you are talking about. I ran into another problem there - the first soldier you rescue triggers the ambushes, which you have to defeat before freeing the other three soldiers. Problem is the ambushes will attack that first soldier and can kill him - particularly if you are defeated and have to respawn. But after you free soldier #4, you have to talk to soldier #1 to advance the mission, which you can't do if he's dead. So I just had to quit out and start the mission over again.

Oh geez; blocking won't keep the hold from taking effect? Yech...

Thanks for the advice. I've got Sparkstorm with Electric Personality - it actually looks like it does damage that is on par with Lead Tempest (but has a much tighter area - which doesn't really matter against a single foe). Electric Sheath looks like it is the 'electric' version of Lock 'n Load, and I've suspected at some point I'll need to pick up an effective self heal anyway if I want to keep soloing. By the time I get finished picking all of those powers up (and I don't for those to necessarily be my next powers - there on the list to get, sure, but there are others I'd like too - like the hold power) I'll be in my low to mid 30s anyway.

Basicaly you are saying:"for me the things that have ACTUAL MONETARY VALUE are those related to my entertainment (BTW entertainment is a part of life too and not a lesser one nor it is an optional for those that want to remain sane) and evil NCsoft is taking them away from me. Well I will tell you this : in my life I had worse loss than a videogame and these I will never recover. So I will enjoy the next videogame (even it would be only for a week) and the next one after that. In fact I am curious about Sword and Soul. Maybe at the end I will not play it but it will be because I will not like the game enough not because "it is by an evil publisher"

Yeah, CO is and was designed to be a comic book game and nothing else

while CoH was merely a "super hero" game that could be whatever you wanted it to be. I've seen people play it as a comic book, a detective drama, or the Avengers Movie.

So, because we have all suffered horrible, unrecoverable losses in real life, NCSoft yanking the rug out from under us ought to be ok, and we shouldn't mind?

Truly, some of us are from mars, others from venus or some suitable analogy of your choice. If you dont want to get bent out of shape at losing access to the game, that is your right. That does NOT invalidate the opinions of others, to whom it is a big deal indeed, causing future severe lack of trust in any given publisher.

I'm not happy. I won't be trusting any MMO "house" for a very long time to come, and if that upsets anyone I am sorry - but that is my business. I am the one paying for my games, and investing my time and my cash .... and my love for my various alts.

Yeah, that was their goal. They specifically wanted to capture the feel of super hero COMIC books, and they succeeded. I personally don't like it, but they wanted everything to look and feel like a comic book.

I wasn't complaining, I was stating a fact.

CO was designed to be the online version of the pen and paper RPG "Champions".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champio...e-playing_game)
http://www.herogames.com/aboutChampions.htm
by the publisher hero games
http://www.herogames.com/home.htm

The idea, in the paper game was to let you recreate any character that you have seen in the comic books, movies or any other media and they succeded fairy well. The computer game try to do the same but it is more limited in that way

When your source system allows someone create a character who generates flaming Kender with rune knives that rush around a room and only kill insubstantial enemies while simply dropping everyone else to the ground with a crippling fear effect something has to give.

(And that's going easy on the poor GM who gets roped into running an old school champions game. So. Very. Easy. I've seen so much worse.)

It's that "just" at the end that's the problem.

For me, that's exactly what's being taken away from me - the future. I still had many characters I still wanted to get to 50, many characters still in my head waiting to be created, many storylines I'll never get to see in the actual game, many new powersets and powerset combinations I wanted to try (including some that aren't actually in the game yet - my Wind/Storm Controller, for example).

People have compared it to losing beloved family members or pets, but maybe a better analogy would be finally finding a small but beautiful house for you and your family, spending years learning about the house's little quirks, and enjoying decorating and redecorating it to suit your whims.

And then, while you're reading about a new chair that's coming out in a few weeks that would look perfect in your living room, some big corporation comes along, throws you out on the street, rips your house out of the ground, puts it on a truck, and moves it to somewhere unknown. Everything you spent on that house is gone. All the things you created and built for it are gone. Everything you were planning to add to the house is now just a "what might have been".

Sure, you still have your happy memories of living in that house, but you're still homeless. Your comfortable routine in a familiar environment has still been shattered and tossed to the winds by some uncaring third party. And, worst of all, your house still physically exists, but some faceless organization refuses to give it back to you (even at a new location) and won't even say why.

"It's okay, other places to live exist" is not comforting. "Why, there's a rat-infested apartment in the slums available!" is not comforting. However, "Hey, there's a billion-dollar mansion available! It's much better than your old one!" is not comforting either when it costs more than you could ever afford to pay.

So, telling me that I'll just have to start yet another ten-year search to find a second game that suited me as much as CoH did, some other place that lets me create all the characters that are in my head (once I recreate all the ones I already had at my fingertips), some other place where the devs are as open and talkative and excited as they were in CoH, some other game that will run on a three-year-old Macintosh in less than 5 GB of HD space (this is the "billion-dollar mansion" part of the analogy: my computer can't run brand-new games like The Secret World, so it doesn't matter how good they are), "that's all", not only isn't comforting, it's downright condescending.

"That's all" is not the same as "that's easy". Not even close.

I want my home back.

Yeah the government actually does that house thing from time to time, but not exactly as described though. Sometimes it's to build something else or build a park or as in at least one town in the states, I think Virginia, the area is unstable.
*Using the analogy provided* But I dont think COX and the files will exist for much time after Nov. 30th. and wont exist, like being bulldozed. Aug 31st was like getting the letter in the mail thing saying they are taking the house, the refunds is liek the money the gov. gives you to move, and Nov. 30th is the deadline when they are coming in to claim it.

Originally Posted by mauk2 Evil_Legacy became one of my favorite posters with two words. "Kick Rocks." I laffed so hard. Never change, E_L!

Originally Posted by mauk2 Evil_Legacy became one of my favorite posters with two words. "Kick Rocks." I laffed so hard. Never change, E_L!

It's more accurate to say Cryptic licenced the setting of Champions. They didn't licence the Hero System. The funny thing is that i've played Champions many times over the years not once i have i seen anyone use the stock setting out of the box other than using one of the sample adventures as a quick introduction. Every single game i've played either reworked the setting extensively or abandoned it completely.

Still, it works as a somewhat silly, cheesy superheroic game. Still not overly fond of the 1980s action figure character aesthetic, but that's just personal aesthetics.

My way of looking at it - City of Heroes was drawn by Bryan Hitch. Champions Online is drawn by Amanda Conner. I like both art styles.

You're taking the analogy too literally.

My point was that, as much fun as I had in the past, I wanted to continue to have fun in the future, in the "house" I was already "living" in, and not have to start a new search hoping that maybe one of them won't suck.

(Though the analogy is beter than you think - again, I have a three-year-old Macintosh. Most of the games suggested as replacements don't run on a computer with my specs. I'd have to buy a brand-new top-end gaming computer to play most of them, so there's your "ton of money". I don't have thousands of dollars to spend on a new machine)

It's not that easy to just "replace" a home, even a virtual one, and CoH felt like home. A comfortable place where I loved its design and could roll with its quirks, where there were still things I wanted to do, and where I was expecting to stay for years to come. Now I have to start from square one and hope to find some place that has things I won't hate after a week (or, worse, after a few minutes - hello, CO Tutorial).

but a computer isnt a ton of money. Relatively small amount especuially compared to the amount of money it takes to buy a house.


makes sense.

How many years were you, or most people for that matter, were actually expecting to have the ability to stay?

Originally Posted by mauk2 Evil_Legacy became one of my favorite posters with two words. "Kick Rocks." I laffed so hard. Never change, E_L!

Again, you're being WAY too literal.

Compared to a house, true, it's not much money. Compared to my entertainment budget, however, a few thousand dollars is more money than I have to spend. It's more money than I have to spend for the next few years. I'm not a rich man, I don't have a high-paying job, and I'm on a tight budget. I can afford to spend $100 or so a year on a game subscription. I could even afford to spend $200-300 a year if I went without any other form of entertainment. However, I can't even begin to afford to spend $2000 or even $500 for a new high-end computer to run a new game and then pay for a subscription on top of it.

CoH was a free download, $15 a month to subscribe (with the ability to splurge now and then on Paragon Points - I spent a bit on Staff Fighting), and it ran on my existing machine. That's what I have a budget for. Any new game, in addition to scratching the same gaming "itch" that CoH was scratching, has to have the same requirements to fit into that same budget.

You do understand what an analogy is, don't you? "A is analogous to B" doesn't mean "A and B are exactly the same in every single way," it means "A and B are similar in ways that are relevant to the discussion, and may be different in terms of scale or in ways not related to the discussion."

In this case, the costs of a house and a computer compared to one's housing or computer budget are a matter of scale, and "Things you'd say to someone who lost their house" is something not related to the discusion.

NOW do you understand the analogy, or are you going to tell me some more about how houses cost more than computers?

Given that Everquest opened in 1999 and is still going strong and getting updates, with no signs of closing any time soon, and CoH was still making money, I'd say "for quite a while".

What is quite a while? For some, 8 years is more than quite a while for other it is not, given it is said that the overall life span of most MMOs, hundreds that are out there lifecycle is a mere 2-4 years. If Everquest was to shutdown tomorrow would it justify the shutdown of this game for you?


But a few points about everquest; It reached 225,000 players not long after opening, and reached about 425,000 by 2003, which then is said to peaked more than 3000 players per server with nearly 400 servers, which equates to a little more than 1 million players, which COX barely broke 15% at peak. That's a lot of money. Now neither game have anywhere near that population. Yet, COX is heading to the pasture and Everquest seems to be able to live on, even with a part two at the same time. Why did NCSOft decide that COX wasnt worth keeping anymore but Sony keeps Everquest? Who knows. Maybe Sony can afford that risk more than NCSoft. Why have some housing projects in Chicago and Atlanta been razed to the ground, actual homes of people, while in other cities, homes that are older, and in even worse condition gets to stay? Why do some people collect every penny while other throw pennies away? Why didnt this game have Everquest's population size? Who knows and the way the population is said to be currently at Everquest, it may not be around much longer either but they have a sequel to go over to and here there dont seem to be one.

Maybe it's that SOny isnt planning on any realignment or maybe their realignment is different process than NCSOft. Or maybe Sony is so big that if Everquest is losing money they dont notice. Or maybe that havea different threshold/tolerance/stockholders/view/CEO than Sony just as people have different ways of looking at things.

That question of why Everquest gets to live and COX must die is the million dollar question.

Originally Posted by mauk2 Evil_Legacy became one of my favorite posters with two words. "Kick Rocks." I laffed so hard. Never change, E_L!

I know, I know. But the MMO itself is drenched in comic book aesthetics. From the word bubbles, to the action bubbles, to the outline option, to the comic sans.

It doesn't matter what it's based off of, its a silver age comic book game.

YET AGAIN, you're ignoring the forest and focusing on a bug hanging on one leaf in one tree, and then declaring that the bug in question is really a fairy ninja from space.

"Quite a while" in this case means "For the foreseeable future", because the game was still making money and updates were still being made and even more were still being planned and a new powerset had just been released and the studio had just started hiring and there was even a huge update in beta that was due to release any time now. How many of those games that shut down did so under those circumstances?

How I'd feel if Everquest were to shut down tomorrow is irrelevant, because it's not shutting. And whever it does shut down, I don't expect it to do so a couple of weeks before a major game update that had been hyped to death for months and had the entire playerbase drooling with anticipation, with the entire dev team kicked to the curb in the process. I expect one final "grand finale" update to let the game go out with a bang, then letting the game drift into eternal maintenance mode.

And your argument is circling right back to where I started: telling me "eight years is a long time to live in a house you love", while I'm now reduced to living in a cardboard box surrounded by newer fancier shinier houses I can't afford.

That can't be right - I don't remember EQ ever having 400 servers. I don't think they even reached 40.

Hey, I'm not saying the process is right or wrong. I thought this was focused on the end result, which I thought what was mattered. Yet I'm confused. One day it's about the game closing and people sayign they should have kept it running or should sell it. The next day it's about the way they did it. What is the TRUE reason most people are upset? The process or the end result?

Yea figured Everquest was irrelevant and was wondering why you introduced it as since everquest is still running since 1999 then expectation of COX running "for quite a while".


But I guess I should have worded my question about the time period a little better and been a bit more clear of what I'm actually asking about.

I mean, should have NCSOft waited until COX ran into the red? Or how low should the population be low to before taking action or how else should they have realigned the company if COX had to be a victim? That is what more I was tryign to ask in a shorter way. Didnt work apparently.

Do most other games run into maintance mode and who finance the game after that and who is in charge of it and who's books is it under? How long do a game run in maintance mode? How do this maintence mode works? Who makes money when the game is maintence mode and what are the cost difference between runnign the game full time and when it slips into maintanence mode?

Originally Posted by mauk2 Evil_Legacy became one of my favorite posters with two words. "Kick Rocks." I laffed so hard. Never change, E_L!

Didn't Cryptic buy the whole shebang, or was it just the Champions 'verse?

Blood Widow Ricki * Tide Shifter * T-34 * Opposite Reaction * Shaolin Midnight * ChernobylCheerleader

Entropy Legion * Hyperion Force * Hero Heights

They licensed the IP, the pen and paper RPG is still published by Hero Games.