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I'm brainstorming a new character with an adult horror foundation that involves Demons and Hell along with twisted rituals and malevolent intent. I'd love to go about this with established Lore in mind and work with it rather than against it especially concerning depictions of hell, who are it's allies, the pecking order, or if 'Hell' even exists at all in the universe of COH- I'm inclined to believe it does. There is an awful lot to read up on this games lore when you scratch the surface and this is one of the aspects I know very little about, but here's what I can take a guess at; "Cap Au Diable" translates to "Heading to Hell" Bat'Zul the final Archvillain of the Virgil Tarikoss strike force is a 'Demon-Lord from the lowest planes of existence' The Circle of Thorns seem to be connected to some form of Hell. Several Heroes and Villains have connections to Demons or Hell itself, including Demonic Armor and the like. If you know more about Demonic lore and where they come from, please share!

One of the best things about COH/V is that you can create pretty much any type of character and get away with it. I think it's why this game always had and always will have a very dedicated Roleplaying community because creativity is allowed to flourish much more here than almost every other MMOG. Any attempt to quell that creativity into a more narrow scope should be argued against, the lore of this game offers such a broad scope that anyone (in my opinion) debating to narrow said scope wants the world to fit into a dogmatic view of how they perceive Heroes, Villains and inbetween. I still love lore and characters should fit into the constrains of the games universe, but there are practically unlimited ways any character can fit into the lore of the game. I'd consider characters like The Punisher, The Comedian, even Wolverine to be pretty edgy. But they're still entertaining just like a Roleplayers take, you can be edgy and still create a character that's fun to play and collab with. I think problems occur when 'edgy' characters make their outlooks lack depth and reason, exploring these branches of character backstory, motivation and goals is how you flesh out an idea and make them a lot more interesting no matter how edgy and grimdark they are.

I wish superspeed had the ability to speed up the faces of skyscrapers or up walls. SS isn't very good for the Rogue Isles, I usually take it with superjump.

If you want THICC and not STICC pump Physique Slider to max. For the abs that's probably Bodysuit Muscular Gloss or Matte.

If I recall correctly Praetorian Clockworks or rather WarWorks models were reverse engineered by Primal Earth's elite - namely Longbow and Arachnos - so you sometimes see the bots helping them in some missions (with matching paintjobs), they mostly seem to be healer type bots, can't recall seeing a "Victoria" unit used by Arachnos or Longbow.

Some lore stuff on Praetorian Clockwork; http://web.archive.org/web/20111028072434/http://goingrogue.na.cityofheroes.com/en/game-info/enemy-groups/praetorian-clockwork.html

Heroes v Villains needs some sort of proper arrangement and structure. The adage 'The Villain always loses' needs to be thrown out the window, loss is good for character development, guaranteed loss is predictable and bad. Then you've got to question what makes a Villain a Villain? Most topics that aren't 'Saturday morning cartoon Villain' might involve more adult themes such as torture, blackmail, manipulation, widespread terror, a lot of Roleplayers muddy the waters here, IC/OOC blend and drama can occur. This is why the Hero group and Villain group need to trust each other OOC to have fun IC, that takes organization and setup which is time and effort.

You know what makes Superman, Invincible and Homelander interesting despite their absurd power? Their flaws. Story would not exist without them, players who neglect flaws in their character are not Roleplaying to their full potential.

Katana/Anything Scrapper Katana's attack combos are so fluid and smooth, you have a proper combo chain and the damage is insane.

I've met and engaged in spontaneous RP with plenty of people around the world, Mercy Isle a few times, places like Atlas Park, a couple of scenes at Kings Row monorail, St. Martial, Grandville. Anyone with the Roleplaying tag on is pretty much fair game, I take initiative jump in and engage with some random line like 'Your costume looks like a green-screen' or 'You know where X is?' or if their bio has them as some big name Hero or Villain I'll entertain it, if they happen to be totally AFK stood around and haven't responded at all to IC attempts I'll send an OOC tell. Trying to engage with established groups already Roleplaying and knowing one another is a different ball game, you will generally have a tougher time just like you would in reality. The crux of it is that you'd only need a few friends to start networking further, a few global adds of consistent Roleplayers to really broaden your friend circle, friends introduce you to their friends so on and so forth. The other good way to getting there is to join an active SG obviously.

My advice is easier said than done so bare it in mind. Don't bother with any methods of OOC interaction to 'set up' a scene. Why? Players will make judgement on your Roleplaying experience and character without ever meeting you IC, more often than not you will start on an unbalanced footing, they subconsciously didn't like your character bio, you partake in a roleplaying style they dislike, your characters costume is cliché, your characters backstory isn't original, etc etc. The irony is that it's somewhat easy to defeat all these bias' that might be typically against you by 'jumping' people. Anyone with a 'Roleplaying' tag is advertising they're up for Roleplay, jump them wherever they are, whatever they're doing, be creative with greetings and go from there. Sometimes you will get ignored, other times you end up with a new friend and consistent Roleplay, it's worked for me in the past, but you also need a thick skin to handle some of the more ignorant Roleplayers, I think you'd be surprised at how many people are cool (even excited) at the purely organic and totally spontaneous Roleplaying option.

I'm gonna spring on people with the Roleplaying tag in open zones more often, not enough people seem to do that.

Time is the Roleplayers Bane. No matter what setting I Roleplay in I try to ignore it as a thing and remain intentionally vague. Time itself doesn't really serve Roleplay it's generally a detriment. However it's important to not mix up IC and OOC perceptions of time, my character might say "We'll meet sometime soon?" and I'll organize OOC "((This Friday 8pm?))". My character(s) are supposed to be all active all the time with realistic lives and things happening offscreen, I can't be that dedicated as a player, thus time needs to be given leeway.

I log on very sporadically but when I log on I usually end up in RP, if not from a global friend whisping me then I'll head to D and bully someone who looks lonely.

It's a private server in murky water concerning legality. While it's well run by the team it is still a private server not owned, ran or managed by the original creators in any way. Any talk of legality concerning what happens on the server can be wavered because it's blowing hot air, it has no ground to stand on. The decent thing to do for those with access to the back-end chat logs is to discuss incidents as a team 'Yes this player is a problem, permabanned.' and not reveal the details to those that play on the server because it just begins a vortex of never-ending drama and back and forth, they are the arbiters and could ban anyone for anything if they so desired, there is no 'petition' system akin to a corporation like NCSoft might run, most likely this is why they wrote a 'Code of Conduct' so that the rulings they dish out are consistent. As for being harassed I just global ignore, multibox is a problem if that is the case and it's not a one-off you've plenty of evidence to get them perma banned. It's a shit situation either way, I've been on the sharp end of some vile hate-tells myself, I just blank them then when I've screenshotted their rant show my friends, have a laugh, global ignore and move on.

Defeat, genuine defeat near-death, grave injury or psychological trauma will add more to your character than any victory ever will. Don't be afraid of losing, put everything on the line and feel the thrill of it as your creation is not invincible but tangible, real and not immune to the dices fate. My most memorable characters were the ones that came back from defeat because the defeat warped their perception of things, gave them new drive, new outlook, a newfound determination. In one of my characters cases it became vengeance to which she was willing to do unthinkable things, self sacrifice and betraying others to achieve it, many good stories have defeat as one of the key points in a characters story, defeat creates drive, drive creates character motivation, character motivation gives character goals, character goals create Roleplay and plotlines.

Club RP for me - at least in D - is picking out the outliers, the characters that mostly just watch what's going on. I read their character bio, check their costume and if they have some interesting traits I bring them up while displaying my characters own traits so that they have plenty to work off and collab with. Non-public invite only Clubs are dreadful in my experience, they can be the most extreme clique of any place where even if you make any and all attempts to integrate characters would rather gravitate toward other characters they already know and those that attempt to rope outliers into the clique so to speak are quickly reeled in by people they know. It's not much different to the real Club scene, if you go out you take a friend and form your own group in a group.

Overwatch style graphics, this graphics style is very popular right now and works extremely well to highlight unique character designs, it can be colourful and still be grim at times. A theme/lore that doesn't piggyback at all off established superhero mantra. Avengers, DC Universe? It's all been done a million times time to split off and create something a bit more unique which would be Adult in nature. (For me the Invincible series managed this) Embrace the ideas that made City of Heroes mechanically superior, every mission being a 'raid', excellent chat system. Have every mission scale to 24 people instead and make Arch-Villains/Heroes deadlier, maybe some missions require people to group up. The open world should not be limited by the Rikti walls, instead I should be able to fly from Atlas to Mercy Island if I so chose. Open world PVP and territory control with a fully dynamic destructible environment, work on aerial Hero v Villain battles to make fighting in the air feel as visceral as Zod v Superman. IO System is good but suffers badly from power creep, something new needs to be done with itemization, I'd make crafting it's own class. Your mad scientist character is actually the go-to guy to get gear from. Allow player-characters to adapt and change the story outcomes of the actual games story. (Matrix Online did this iirc where key characters were Roleplayed by Devs at huge events) So basically Overwatch MMO with a GTA-esque open world coupled with SWG's crafting system, where crafting was extremely complex indepth and time critical and Warframe style combat that scales up to 24 player in 'normal' missions that turn into raids in large groups.

I love writing bio's and love giving and receiving compliments based on them, it's a good conversation starter and a good place to attract like minded players especially those who might be intrigued by my characters concept or brief synopsis.

The Roleplayer that impresses me has a multi-faceted, multi-layered character grounded in some degree of City of Heroes/Villains' setting, you've done your homework with the lore and created a character that fits perfectly in it, you could be outlandish but somehow you make it work. Every time I discover something about your character there is another layer you have ready that is simply insatiable and I want to find out more about your written artwork. You collaborate with my own characters, the back and forth is pure magic of organic roleplay with very little OOC input. You leave OOC arrangements at the wayside and always use initiative to make meetings in-character by using every feasible IC tool there is, you laid the groundwork for plots where you offer my character opportunity to shape yours via my characters actions and vice versa, Hero vs Villain or moral decisions that are not foreseeable because the surprises haven't been ruined. There is OOC friendship but not OOC obsessiveness, we're in it to collaborate write together and have fun no matter what type of scene is underway, action, romance, drama, loss. One more important factor would be a player that sees loss for what it is; there isn't a Superhero alive in any media where 'loss' didn't shape them, didn't drive them, defeat is one of the most character-changing events that can ever occur and the Roleplayer that impresses me knows this and doesn't blow up OOC when confronted with character-changing events.

It's an SG thing for sure to find those multi-layered character strings. Deeper plots require deeper connections, requires more time investment and connection with like-minded people. You're not going to find out a characters fatal flaw on Week 1 of meeting them, that might be a Supergroup plot in itself. Roleplayers that approach plot-themed Roleplay with the idea in mind being strong makes your char interesting could not be more wrong, character flaws make characters interesting, conflict of interest, temptation to cross lines of morality due to driving factors like vengeance or hate, dozens more driving factors not tied to outright strength, your character shapes itself when presented with difficult situations. As for the emotes and description in Roleplay you are doing more than speaking, it's equally important to showcase body language or odd/quirky character traits. I play a sentient robot for example and when she moves servos and pistons ignite into life to give her those human-like movements, the tone of her voice is important, the texture or of her clothing or state of her chassis, if her chassis was dented, scratched perhaps she was recently in a fight? Every emote should be a hook you set out to fish and entice your fellow Roleplayer, raise questions to keep conversation above the stale stagnant level of "How are you?" you want to passively put across your character through not even talking at times. or describe things that are simply not accomplished in game with the costume creator, the only limiter here is your imagination, absorb that inspiration from things you enjoy, manifest it into a character and think about every tiny nuance that would make it interesting. This is how you add layers to a character, layers that each lead off to interesting lines of conversation. Got a scar? How'd you get it? In a fight with an archvillain? Why is your cape red with a black star? Perhaps it's a flag of some hidden civilization. Your costume has a spatter of blood on it, your Hero might not be all they seem. Think about these things when creating the character in the game world itself, it's like environmental storytelling in video games, telling a story without having to speak it due to placement of a few props.

Rogue here! My character sees truth in Humanity when it comes to the Rogue Isles. Humans are willing to claw, scratch and kill each other should opportunities be too difficult to pass up and the Rogue Isles is very much that; "Survival of the fittest." it's a baseline truth, but she sees humans as having two sides the opposite side is false facades built on gleaming statues of self-narcissism in Paragon City. Her view of Heroes is rather jaded, they're tolerated for as long as it's useful to her own goals. Shes not a Vigilante pushing the barrier of mortality to do good but as a Rogue as she is not particularly evil either, humans are just evolved apes that can pull a trigger. A Praetorian elitist who also thought Emperor Cole was doing right until Primal Earth meddled in another dimensions affairs and she mostly blames PE's Humans for that, thus not beyond killing meta-humans.

Yep, it's plausible they had further plans for the zone. I view it equally as interesting as Paragon City and the Rogue Isles, it's the disconnect with timelines that really hinders Roleplayers to, well, Roleplay there, but it suits being an origin story or a dedicated Supergroup area.

I am absorbing this juicy Clockwork lore, I'm all over that!

The Origin of Superman is also the origin of General Zod who I think is one of the best "Villains" of all time, it's an example of how this trope can define several characters that are drastically different and still interesting. You could argue any Hero or Villain from Praetoria is in the same vein, a dying dimension/world that has technology far above that of Primal Earth.