[GRUMBLE!]

Look, you powerleveling brain trust, if I've declined your first 4 invitations to team in the past 5 minutes, it's pretty likely that I'm going to decline the 5th! Knock it off!

I just discovered the /ignore command doesn't apply to Team Invites. It should.

Passing Thought #1

"Red Zones." Not sure where this came from or if there's any merit to it. Cities can be dangerous places. You don't walk down back alleys at night, even in better parts of the city. Why? Because the risk of danger is higher. I wonder if the various zones of Paragon City couldn't be broken down a little more for added realism. Most of the city's zones have those "bad areas" like alleys, abandoned lots, etc. Maybe these small areas should be red zones regardless of the color zone they appear in. Spawns in these areas would be much higher level than the area would normally spawn. Maybe the danger level could be synched with the arrival of "night" in Paragon City. More complicated, yes, but it might bring added realism.

[stops to look at a zone map of King's Row] Hmm. Trying to illustrate these zones on the maps might make them too cluttered. Perhaps just a general understanding/announcement that areas off the well-traveled paths of the city are more dangerous.

/end musing

Peeve #1

Deceive. I often solo a Controller. This makes it hard enough to advance, as they're not great for dealing damage (yeahyeah, until level 20+) but still get missions loaded with the same resistance a Tanker would face. Blasters get XP for doing damage at a nice safe range... Controllers should as well for damage caused by Deceived thug. Reduced XP, perhaps (some serious thought should be put into that), but some XP is appropriate.

Gotta Start Somewhere

One of the first things I noticed during my first 5 or 6 levels of character growth is that once the newness and coolness of the game wears off, the villains are incredibly boring. Defeat Skulls. Defeat Hellions. Lather, rinse, repeat. Pretty much all there is is beatin up thugs. And I understand, I really do, that the intention is for heroes to encounter more and more interesting villains as they advance in level. But I can see there being a substancial "is this all?" factor for new players, causing them to dump the game before getting to the cooler stuff. So I put my mind (albeit briefy) to considering how the game could present low level villains in new ways that would fit the level progression curve and be reletively easy for the programmers while still providing variety and surprises for the players. (I should say at this point that while I don't know them in detail, I do understand that there are practical programming limits and hurdles to just "adding things" to the game. Creating "from whole cloth" is rare and limited to the larger Issue expansions.) The first idea that came to mind was:

Drive-by Shootings
This seemed to me a fairly ideal addition to the game's surprises/hazzards at lower levels. It employs existing graphics and programming with hopefully very little new programming needed. The game is already filled with cars, travelling here and there, radios blairing. However, some of those cars are filled with gang bangers, itching to score some street cred by capping a hero. It works like this. Nothing changes about the automobile graphics as they appear in game, driving around. However, these cars have "life bars" to allow them to be damaged. (more on this in a sec.) The drive-by cars actually do damage to nearby heroes in much the same way as the crystals in many of the Tsoo lairs, accompanied by the sound of gunfire. The cars do not stop, but continue in their preprogrammed pathes. However, if a drive-by car is dealt damage, it "dies." At this point, thugs emerge from the car (just as Gears appear from a defeated Clockwork Prince) and attack the heroes. Could be Skulls, Hellions, or even Family. I think it's a cool concept and seems reletively easy to impliment. Illustrated (poorly) here:


Our hero, standing on the street, minding his own business, stands a little too close to the wrong car. "Bangbangbangbangbangbang!"



Hero chases down the car, pounding it until it can no longer run.



Out of the car spring a bunch of ugly Hellions. Time for more ass-kicking!

Brief Introduction

I created this blog to give me a place to jot down thoughts and ideas that come to mind about the online computer game, City of Heroes. Personally, I've been involved with traditional tabletop gaming (card, board, and roleplaying) and the gaming industry since 1980. And while those types of games still interest me most, I have begun to play City of Heroes and am generally enjoying it. However, being a designer and generally creative person, I'm always thinking of things I'd like to do or change in the CoH game. I intend to use this blog to document those things. If y'all get some use or enjoyment out of this, so much the better. Who know, maybe the nice folks at Cryptic will lend me their ears occasionally.