"Nobody Messes wit' Moider Inc!"

You've brought the fight to the Family's doorstep. You've defeated over 100 of their bosses, and the city has awarded you their Untouchable badge. But nobody has that kind of impact on the Family and gets away clean....

...You've been marked for death.

Suggestion for a new mission story arc:
1: This story arc begin without prompting from a contact. Upon attaining the Untouchable badge (defeat 100 Family bosses), the hero will be attacked by ambushes of Freakshows at random times and places. After defeating 5 such ambushes, the last Freak says (via dialog box like those of contacts), "You may have stopped me, hero, but you're a dead man! There's a price on your head, and the Freaks intend to collect it! And you'll never know who wants you dead! We'll never talk!" Mission: Defeat 30 Freakshow. Find lead on contract. The hero can choose not to follow this lead, but ambushes will continue until he does.

2: After 30 Freaks have been defeated, the last one will be found to be carrying a short list of heroes' names, including the mission hero's name. Mission: Take list to City Representative.

3: The City Representative will recognize the names on the list as being heroes who have recently hit the Family's organized crime activities especially hard. All the heroes on the list have been accounted for except a hero named Gangbuster, who was recently seen following a Freakshow boss into the city sewers. Gangbuster is overdue in meeting up with his contact. Mission: Rescue Gangbuster.

4: The heroes must rescue Gangbuster from the sewers. He's been captured by a Freak boss. Gangbuster must be rescued and escorted out of the sewers. Once freed, Gangbuster will help the hero fight his way back out of the sewer. Near the Freak boss is the body of a fallen Family member. Once defeated, the Freak boss will be carrying a safety deposit box key. Mission: Investigate safety deposit box.

5: The key is to a safety deposit box in a local international bank. Inside the bank, the hero will find it being occupied and searched, not by the Freaks... but by the Council. The bodies of Freaks are scattered about, and some are being cornered and attacked or terrorized by Council soldiers. In some places, if a Freak body is approached too closely, it will regenerate and attack. In the basement is the safety deposit box room (we've all seen it, unused, in other mission maps) where many of the boxes have been broken into. A Freak boss and a Council boss are fighting here. In the corner is a terrified Family man (a "victim," not a targetable villain). Once the bosses are defeated, the Family thug will spill his guts. The Freaks came here to claim the gold that the Family promised for the contract on Gangbuster, but found the Council here and the gold already gone. The Family's "Banker" has found out that the Council is taking his gold out of the country on a ship and will be assembling a recovery team. And the Council will surely be able to use the gold to fund huge advances in their criminal plans. If the hero moves quickly, he can recover the gold and head off a battle that would certainly harm many bystanders in the crossfire. Mission: Recover the Banker's gold.

6. The trail leads to a ship in either Independence Port or Talos Island. If the hero has acted quickly on the mission, it will be a ship still docked; if the hero has waited to act on the mission, the ship will be one of the ones already sailing in IP or TI waters. The hero must fight Council on their way through the ship to the gold. The gold itself is in a room behind a guarded and locked door but has no other guards in its immediate vicinity. The guards must be defeated and more will spawn until the locked door is destroyed. Upon reaching the gold an ambush will be triggered, and the Banker & his men will storm into the room. The Banker will make some dramatic proclaimation of the hero's death, and the group will attack. Once defeated, the Banker will confess and give up the location of the Family boss who put out the hit on the hero. Mission: Arrest the Family boss.

7: This is a fairly simple "seek and destroy" mission. The Family boss's headquarters is somewhere in the city. The hero fights his way through unusually heavy numbers of Family thugs and finally must confront the boss. This would be an excellent place for a Family archvillain, of which there are surprisingly none in CoH. Alternately, when the Boss is reached, this unusual situation could take place: When the hero comes within normal visual range, a dialog box will open (like those that open when talking to a contact). The Boss will offer the hero one last chance to survive and basically offer him a payoff to let the Boss escape. The payoff amounts to a high level Enhancement (like the hero would get at the end of the mission anyway) and a 50% increase on Influence gained from all future (non-Family) kills and missions. The downside of accepting the offer is that all contacts will charge the hero twice as much for Enhancements and Inspirations, no contact will every consider the hero a "friend" nor allow the hero to call him, it will cost twice as much to change the hero's reputation, and the hero will lose the Untouchable badge. Should the hero refuse the Boss's offer or just take him down normally, the mission will conclude with the reward of an appropriate Enhancement (and the ending of hit squad ambushes).

As you can see, this story arc is designed to break some traditional molds in CoH missions, something the game needs very badly. The story and game balance are rough, but I think it offers a new direction in CoH missions. More story arcs to come.