Why CoH over other Superhero MMOs?

[Nealix]

One of my big disappointments when I started playing COH was not being able to have a travel power at the start. 
That was a deliberate time sink mechanic.

Another was not having any defense for a blaster.


One thing I do like about CO: after playing the tutorial once with any new characters you can opt to skip the tutorial and start at level 6 when a travel power is available.

Well as the game progressed they lowered the level you get travel powers at and with enhancements you could add defense to your blaster.  In CO its pretty much the same unless you are freeform.  I guess they refer the blaster equivalent a "glass cannon" in CO.  They are usually great at clearing out large numbers of the lowest level minions but other than that its a quick dirtnap if you get agro on the Squall or Inferno characters.

If you skip the tutorial though, in CO, you never get the chance to talk to Sapphire right?  That means no "we are the champions" perk if you are the badge hunter type.

[JaguarX]

Well as the game progressed they lowered the level you get travel powers at and with enhancements you could add defense to your blaster.  In CO its pretty much the same unless you are freeform.  I guess they refer the blaster equivalent a "glass cannon" in CO.  They are usually great at clearing out large numbers of the lowest level minions but other than that its a quick dirtnap if you get agro on the Squall or Inferno characters.

If you skip the tutorial though, in CO, you never get the chance to talk to Sapphire right?  That means no "we are the champions" perk if you are the badge hunter type.

besides the events she appears and perform. Think the anniversary event.

[Botzo]

For me it was reading about the builds and trying them out myself. While admittedly my builds typically ended up quite terrible, I loved the forum banter over what builds could or couldn't do when it came to soloing or putting out the most DPS possible without dying. The amount of knowledge was (is) enormous. And learning about different play styles often made characters I thought was terrible into nigh unstoppable freight trains ( I'm looking at you Darkness debuff pool).

But most of all, while some archetypes may arguably been better or worse than others, they were all viable and could pull their own weight. There wasn't much emphasis on the trinity of mmos either. If I want to run into a mob by my own I could, but I better know my character well. And I better not drag the mob over to the team if I can't. Nothing made me feel better than often being one of the two left standing on a team as a Super Reflexes scrapper when the Tank would grab too much aggro.

Champions just felt wrong. Like a step back. I liked the cell shading. I liked the characters. But not all powers are equal. It felt like the way WoW ( and a lot of mmos) does to me and that's the monotony of following a rotation. Sure you don't have to. But you'll do much better if you do. Don't get me wrong, CoX most certainly had rotations. But you didn't have to follow it in order to succeed. DCUO just took it a step further and added "clipping" which is just using your hotbar skills while using a mouse click attack,canceling the animation but still dealing more damage. It's fun but when I just want to relax  it's a pain. Kinda like playing a RTS with a mouse and your opponent is a master of piano playing of hotkeys on their keyboards, making their reactions ten times faster than yours.

And while I stated the biggest thing I liked was something else, the Truth is the community for CoX. Sure people got angry and yelled at each other like brothers and sisters from time to time. But there was always a grain of truth/help to what they were saying. And while I'm just the homeless guy (sometimes werid, sometimes cool, mostly people yelling at me to leave) that wandered into a party I wasn't invited to, I felt as if I could just butt my way into different groups and make friends. People would talk to each other during pick up groups. None of this run in silent Rambo style just to get a dungeon done quicker just for loot or XP. Heck I remember getting into a super group just because someone recognized that my character was a homage to the Claymore anime and they just happened to have a Claymore SG. I know I kinda said my goodbyes to CoX a while ago but when it comes back ( or the City of Titans proves to be close enough) I will be there. Bottle of booze in hand and tin foil hat on head.

[JaguarX]

For me it was reading about the builds and trying them out myself. While admittedly my builds typically ended up quite terrible, I loved the forum banter over what builds could or couldn't do when it came to soloing or putting out the most DPS possible without dying. The amount of knowledge was (is) enormous. And learning about different play styles often made characters I thought was terrible into nigh unstoppable freight trains ( I'm looking at you Darkness debuff pool).

But most of all, while some archetypes may arguably been better or worse than others, they were all viable and could pull their own weight. There wasn't much emphasis on the trinity of mmos either. If I want to run into a mob by my own I could, but I better know my character well. And I better not drag the mob over to the team if I can't. Nothing made me feel better than often being one of the two left standing on a team as a Super Reflexes scrapper when the Tank would grab too much aggro.

Champions just felt wrong. Like a step back. I liked the cell shading. I liked the characters. But not all powers are equal. It felt like the way WoW ( and a lot of mmos) does to me and that's the monotony of following a rotation. Sure you don't have to. But you'll do much better if you do. Don't get me wrong, CoX most certainly had rotations. But you didn't have to follow it in order to succeed. DCUO just took it a step further and added "clipping" which is just using your hotbar skills while using a mouse click attack,canceling the animation but still dealing more damage. It's fun but when I just want to relax  it's a pain. Kinda like playing a RTS with a mouse and your opponent is a master of piano playing of hotkeys on their keyboards, making their reactions ten times faster than yours.

And while I stated the biggest thing I liked was something else, the Truth is the community for CoX. Sure people got angry and yelled at each other like brothers and sisters from time to time. But there was always a grain of truth/help to what they were saying. And while I'm just the homeless guy (sometimes werid, sometimes cool, mostly people yelling at me to leave) that wandered into a party I wasn't invited to, I felt as if I could just butt my way into different groups and make friends. People would talk to each other during pick up groups. None of this run in silent Rambo style just to get a dungeon done quicker just for loot or XP. Heck I remember getting into a super group just because someone recognized that my character was a homage to the Claymore anime and they just happened to have a Claymore SG. I know I kinda said my goodbyes to CoX a while ago but when it comes back ( or the City of Titans proves to be close enough) I will be there. Bottle of booze in hand and tin foil hat on head.

I'm starting to think I was on the wrong servers.
Seem like on the servers I been on it was all about getting through the mission/TF as fast as possible for the end loot/reward. Except without the Rambo part because usually the speed runs didn't involve killing much of anything and more like playing or watching someone play a stealth game and sneak around.

[Nealix]

besides the events she appears and perform. Think the anniversary event.

I never could find her during the anniversary event.

[Stone Daemon]

Oh! I forgot another very important thing I look for in other MMO's. It was, in the end, the key feature that caused me to set aside Star Wars. I could have overlooked the awful travel times...maybe. For a time anyway. (In case you were curious, the missions are what made me give up CO--or more specifically, the Desert Zone. Oh my god that place was awful.)

But anyway! My fourth requirement for a good MMO is a purple patch.

Now, we all know how the purple patch in CoH affected us when trying to hit enemies. The stronger in level, the more badass they were and the less effective we were. What I never really thought about, at least until I missed it in other games, was how it affected enemies trying to hit us. Example;

CoH: You're 5 levels higher conning than the enemy fighting you, you're basically a god. They can't do anything to you, and you can easily crush them and listen to the lamentations of their women.

SWTOR: You're 5 levels higher, and they still take forever to kill. There is essentially no difference, except you may have a couple extra powers and a little more hp.

I like the feeling of progress CoH had. Of actually getting stronger and dealing with bigger threats as I gain levels. Being able to go back to Atlas on your level 30+ guy and punting around hellions that used be able to actually hurt you. Going back to one of the first worlds (in Star Wars) on my level 30~ dude and getting my arse handed to me by what was basically a level 10 giant monster was incredibly disappointing.

[Eoraptor]

Definitely truth in that, Demon. I loved bugging back to Atlas or KR with a Dark or psi character, dropping down into the middle of a bunch f Hellions who at one time would have chewed me up and spit me out, and just hitting 3 on my keyboard and watching the lot of them drop dead.

Like you say, it gave you a certain feeling of accomplishment to know you had grown beyond what you once were. To know that hellions and skuls who had once been your bane were now so much trash to be taken out, but that you still had new and difficult foes like the knives and the freakshow that you could look forward to being challenged by.

[General Idiot]

besides the events she appears and perform. Think the anniversary event.

She's also one of the ones who'll randomly appear and help in UNITY missions - if you do the first five each day and then go back, you'll get one more. And in that one, a random NPC will be hanging out in the first room to offer their help. I think all the Champions can spawn there. Also Foxbat for some reason.

[JaguarX]

I never could find her during the anniversary event.

She can be on stage performing and flaying around there. It's easier to catch her when she is back stage.

[Cinnder]

I like the feeling of progress CoH had. Of actually getting stronger and dealing with bigger threats as I gain levels. Being able to go back to Atlas on your level 30+ guy and punting around hellions that used be able to actually hurt you. Going back to one of the first worlds (in Star Wars) on my level 30~ dude and getting my arse handed to me by what was basically a level 10 giant monster was incredibly disappointing.

So true!  I remember how disillusioned I became with SWTOR when I realised at lvl 40 I couldn't take on any more mobs than I could handle at 1.

[JaguarX]

So true!  I remember how disillusioned I became with SWTOR when I realised at lvl 40 I couldn't take on any more mobs than I could handle at 1.

yeah, but I think it's like that in an attempt to prevent higher levels from going back and interrupting game play of the lower levels by killing off a bunch of mob that cant hurt the high level but now the low level have nothing to kill and have to compete with high levels even in low level zones.

Luckily COX had some zones that were not frequented by low levels much and high levels could go punt around level 10s like veggie cans.

But then there was others that preferred to do that in Atlas when low level toons are trying to complete missions and follow low levels around and defeating things before the low level could get to them. That kind of killed street sweeping for xp. Cant go two mobs in steel canyon without a group of level 50s running in and blasting everything in the are to bits which means the low levels have to try and find some mob and try and kill it before the 50s get wind of it or wait around waiting for respawn. So much for street sweeping.

But the side effect of that type of control is that yeah it don't seem the progression of getting powerful as one level is there.

[Cinnder]

yeah, but I think it's like that in an attempt to prevent higher levels from going back and interrupting game play of the lower levels by killing off a bunch of mob that cant hurt the high level but now the low level have nothing to kill and have to compete with high levels even in low level zones.

Huh.  I never saw that once in the 7 years I played CoX.  Maybe the fact that more content was instanced in CoX than in SWTOR made it less of an issue.

[JaguarX]

Huh.  I never saw that once in the 7 years I played CoX.  Maybe the fact that more content was instanced in CoX than in SWTOR made it less of an issue.

yup in COX, it was less issue mostly because most stuff was instanced, but many time some low level group out street sweeping get their party crashed by a mob of higher level players trying to show off how far they can "punt" low level enemies.

In CO, that issue is a bigger issue as many missions are outside open world missions, especially during Q hour.

[GamingGlen]

In COX you were a super so of course you had powers to easily defeat weak opponents.  In other genres it should not be so easy.  Easier, yes, but not easy.


I started playing SWTOR again, and hate all the running around and constant fighting I have to do to get to missions locations on Coruscant.  Seems like there's this lack of comms devices on a future setting going on (like old CoX when you HAD to return to the contact after every mission).  I just wish the street mobs would go to a neutral stance instead of attack on sight, though, when you have "defeated" the area (or a disguise option so I don't have to fight every Tom, Dick, and Hans along the way).  I want my frakkin' ship already, dammit. 

[Eoraptor]

Another thing, for me at least, was the variety of types of player. With most other games you either have hitter/blaster/healer or striker/tank/healer, the so-called holy trinities of MMO. In the City, there were as many different roles to play as there were costumes on the street, you could be a hitter, blaster, healer, offensive crowd control, defensive crowd control, or a hybrid of most of these. It made every mission most people ran as teams a bit different. And everyone could contribute, instead of people kicking you because you didn't perfectly meet their idea of the perfect pre-programmed battle plan. You also learned the benefits and drawbacks fo having teams made up entirely of blasters or entirely of scrappers when you suddenly found yourself pinned down with no heals and no one to draw the spawns off you.

[thunderforce]

One of my SGs used to run the Caverns every day. If done right you can stealth the whole thing with recall and a Mind controller with Confuse. We would do it in 7-9 minutes.

I wouldn't even consider doing it without stealthing it.

[Exo-buster]

Sorry if I'm late to the party but here's my two pence.

After trying out Champions Online for a bit, I can decisively say that I'm much more fond of CoX for several reasons.  Firstly, CO's lore was just...well, obscenely generic.  I get that they were going for a silver agey feel, but the NPC's are ridiculous cardboard cut outs and I can only remember two of them.  Kevin Poe and Doctor Destroyer.  Sure there was voice acting, but it was bad, really, really bad. 

But with city of heroes, I actually wanted to care and learn about the setting.  I actually wanted to delve into the story of things and try to make my characters work in it.  I like how, even though superhero settings are often mocked for not really making much sense, City of Heroes, due to being built from the ground up, was in my opinion, a more sensible and well thought out setting than either Marvel or DC. 

Also, teaming up in City of Heroes was not a monumental exercise in frustration as is common in many other games.  It didn't matter what level you were, everyone could pull their weight and everyone was sidekicked or exemplar'd to an appropriate level.  The lack of emphasis on the holy trinity of MMORPGs also made pick up groups far more diverse and entertaining and honestly was more reminiscent of D&D than the standard MMORPG formula.   

That is, D&D without the ridiculous imbalance of the classes (I'm looking at you Clericzillas and Batman Wizards).  Which made every team up, every get together unique and exciting.  It was far more fun to be kicking ass with a kinetic controller while explosions were detonating everywhere or a force fieldy defender than it was to just have some big brick soak up hits, a wizard flinging a fireball while a priest just heals people up.

I especially love how colourful the battlefields in CoX get at high levels as everyone lets loose with some of the most fascinating to watch SFX combinations in a game, nevermind a MMORPG.  The entire world just seemed to *work* and I was glad to play in it and study it in depth.   And I was tremendously saddened when it all went away.   

Also, the Character Creator was amazing and always seemed to let you make just what you wanted, while things like DCUO and CO tended to have a certain "aesthetic" that you had to keep to even if they technically had more options like in CO's case, or in DCUO's case they actually had *less* options.  Try as I might, in CO I could never quite make a character who didn't look too...cartoonish for what I had in mind. 

Nothing else just...clicked so well.   

[WildFire15]

Why I prefer CoH over other Superhero MMOs? Because I had literally unlimited options for creating a character. Excluding having more power sets and costume pieces, seeing as CoH had time to implement them, I never felt like a character wouldn't fit within the world or work with their own goals. DCUO pretty much forces you to be within a realm of sort of gritty characters that play second fiddle to the main DC guys while CO's overly goofy world means certain characters don't fit and certain options simply weren't open.

In CoH, I could create a magic character who only chased magic groups or a former Vahzilok who works for the group before going his own way. In CO and DCUO, you had only one or two plot lines to follow to advance while in CoH you could follow a number of contacts or ignore them completely and use paper/police band missions or just the AE.

To me, superhero MMOs are about being a character you want to be. While CO seems to understand this, it's design based solely around combat and goofy aesthetic hamper the idea while DCUO is built around the idea you just want to ape existing characters and again assumes you want to be fighting. While it wasn't my cup of tea, I'm surprised so few games support controller, defender or mastermind style classes.