Decision Paralysis - Who to play?

[Sif]

So, you want to play some City of Heroes. But, you have a dozen+ ^{or way more} characters, and you can't decide which.

 

Do other people ever find themselves in this situation? Found any good strategies for dealing with it?

[Myrmidon]

I have 36 Actives and 4 level 1 Prospects awaiting their IO compliment to begin. If one of mine is Active, then it’s always open to being played at any moment (otherwise, it wouldn’t be Active).

[CrudeVileTerror]

Ahem.

https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/10583-vileterrors-roleplay-characters-as-of-2020-04-27/

 

 

 

My method is to usually log in to my main first and see who's online in my Global Friend list.  Poke around a little.  Say some greetings.  See if anyone is having a bad day and is in need of any help.  If everyone's good, but looking for some fun of one variety or another, I then ask them if they have any preferences to who/what I bring along.  If they're not picky, then I do my best to bring someone/something that matches the themes or content we'll be playing with.

[Greycat]

SG night - nope, easy choice.

Other than that? Depends who I feel like playing. I'll sometimes spin the (mouse) wheel and pick from my... hundred or so that way.

[EmmySky]

If I cannot decide, I just start logging in lowest level first moving up my list and burning patrol until I am done playing or hit on one I cannot put down.  Also, sometimes I will open mids and work on a build for a specific one and that usually inspires me to log them in and get some shinies.

[Yomo Kimyata]

It depends on how much time I think I’ll have.  Usually it’s 15-30 minutes.  If I’m marketing that day, I’ll make my marketing circuit which is 5-10 characters.

 

For longer blocks, I usually have themed supergroups that I will focus on for a few weeks at a time.  Then I will usually play 2-3 missions on one at a time.

 

Finally I will periodically check my list to see if anyone hasn’t been touched in 60 days, in which case I take them out for a spin and gain a level or three.

[Six-Six]

I'm usually levelling up one or two toons through regular story content. those are usually new power set combos that I'm trying out, so slow levelling works for me. Then on weekends when there are iTrial runs in Reunion, I choose one of my toons working on their incarnates--I usually stick to just one until it gets all of its T4s. The rest of the week I try to catch themed runs. I usually have a dedicated toon for those, but those usually last for only a couple of hours at the most. Other than those 4-5 "currently active" toons, I work on one of my hardcore toons or my project toons (currently learning an MM and a tri-form WS) when I find that I have enough time to really concentrate on the play... that is if I'm not tempted by the costume creator. 😃

[roleki]

Sadly, I keep a spreadsheet to track what level/vet level my characters are at, and  use that to try and keep the same "generation" of characters within reasonable level of each other.  I usually cycle through the 4 or 5 of that group, and play them until I get a catalyst, then switch up.  That "backpressure" keeps me from just running the same four or five characters over and over, or from being logged out of a character so long that I forget how to run it.

[Ghost]

I log into whichever character I feel like playing (usually the one I played the last time) - and wait.

Once I see someone broadcast something Im interested in - Ill relog to whichever character fits the requirements  (lvl, powers, etc)

 

For me, its more about playing, than which character I play  

[zenijos10]

20 hours ago, Sif said:

So, you want to play some City of Heroes. But, you have a dozen+ ^{or way more} characters, and you can't decide which.

 

Do other people ever find themselves in this situation? Found any good strategies for dealing with it?

I don't have any strategies for you.   However,  please remember the choice of which character you play next is the single most important decision of your life! If you choose poorly, what pitiful fate awaits you? 

 

Everything you do in life after this choice will simply be an epilogue to your decision. Choose wisely, the universe itself hinges upon it!!!

[Lunchmoney]

Lately I tend to pick one of my blasters. Or my sentinel. Or blasting warshade.

Or a blaster.

I think I might like blasting things....

[ZorkNemesis]

I've sort of been in this rut myself.  I never found endgame that appealing (not helped by endgame basically being nonexistent until close to shutdown) so I have most of my 50s somewhat abandoned after getting Alpha.  Some exceptions but my 50s usually get shelved unless I find myself on a team lacking something (in which case I usually grab my Thermal Defender because she can seemingly fix any party she joins).  Despite that I do occasionally run some content with a few of them.  15 50s means a steady supply of catalysts per day with a little effort.

 

I have 10-15 more characters sitting in the 30s and 40s, and 10-15 more still in the 20s.  I have a bad habbit of starting new characters then losing interest partway through (often after burning my spare cash on them).  Sometimes I just poke around my character select for a minute or two deciding on someone to play.  Often it just amounts to throwing a nonexistent dart.  Sometimes it reinvigorates my passion for the character reminding me why they have merit, other times I wonder how I even got to that point in the first place.

[Frostbiter]

I don't have this problem per se, but I am having a terrible time trying to find a Scrapper that I want to play. I'd like it to be Martial Arts, but just can't find a secondary to go with that that clicks for me. I've scrapped so many concepts so far.

[KC4800]

I play a character until he gets defeated, then rest him.

 

Sometimes I need to put the character into a completely different situation, just to make it interesting again. For instance, I have a lvl 50 Fire/Savage tank that I can easily get burned out(yuk,yuk) doing fire farms, So I will exemp him through Ouro to say, lvl 19, and go burn up Lost and Trolls in Skyway. Just so I can remember what I loved about the combination. I do that instead of starting another Alt. (I only have 20 total over 4 shards). 

 

11 of my 20 Alts are at some degree of incarnate. Playing only high level stuff gets boring. Incarnate power I am afraid trivializes too much. Then a defeat seems like "out of the blue, the game just cheated me, unfair". Time to do something different. This game is too good to get mad at because I got defeated once.

[kiramon]

---

I do.

 

Sometimes there's so many things I want to play, I won't play any.

 

[Coyotedancer]

Once in awhile...

 

I take the inability to make a choice as a good sign that I'm not really as into playing as I thought I'd be, so it usually ends in my logging off and doing something else entirely.

[Lusiphur Malache]

Most of the time I pick something randomly during the day. Scrape the rust off and see if I can accomplish something meaningful with them.

 

Nights and weekends I'm either doing SG stuff or lvl50 content so I plug a hole first, then pick a toon that I need a group for them to function well.

[Twinkle]

Like every hour of every day. Seemingly no matter what I make I end up feeling bad/weak/useless in some situation and it makes me wanna swap. I'd really like to have a main character I try to push through most of the story content with for completion but I just can't find it. 89 Characters and counting.

[KauaiJim]

To quote the OP:   or way more

 

Now that CoH is back I seem to be going absolutely ape nuts creating and trying everything (after recreating my favorites from Live).  53 so far and counting.  I keep getting ideas...  It's just so fun...  I cannot stop...  

 

Once I get the alt-itis under control (or at least somewhat satiated) I plan to go back through and pick out a handful of favorites that I will primarily play.  I will probably try to narrow it down to one toon from each AT like favorite Blaster, favorite Scrapper, favorite Brute, favorite Controller, favorite Dominator, favorite Stalker and so on.  I have also created some rather awesome Peacebringers, a Warshade, a Night Widow and a Crab Spider that I never got around to playing on Live and I am really enjoying those too.  And of course I have all the rest too (Masterminds, Sentinels, Tankers, Defenders and a Corruptor).

 

I have to say though...  Having so many great toons to pick from is a 'good' kind of problem to have! 

 

[Player2]

On 10/25/2020 at 1:58 AM, Sif said:

So, you want to play some City of Heroes. But, you have a dozen+ ^{or way more} characters, and you can't decide which.

 

Do other people ever find themselves in this situation? Found any good strategies for dealing with it?

A dozen??

 

[Six-Six]

On 10/28/2020 at 9:13 AM, Twinkle said:

Like every hour of every day. Seemingly no matter what I make I end up feeling bad/weak/useless in some situation and it makes me wanna swap. I'd really like to have a main character I try to push through most of the story content with for completion but I just can't find it. 89 Characters and counting.

All of us start out weak, and every level makes you stronger. Don't let this get to you. As long as you're having fun developing your toon, then all is good.

 

[RubyRed]

Easy, I just pick the Scrapper

looks at character screen and sees that 80% of them are Scrappers

Uh hmm.