Why City of heroes is the best mmo of all time.

[Pixie_Knight]

In my case, the addiction was bad. It didn't start out that way. Initially I played for hours because I had nothing better to do with my time, and it was fun. But I did still do other things. I watched TV, I read books, I went out with friends and family (mostly family), I was roleplaying a couple times a week (usually). CoH was just one activity among many. I never really noticed it taking over my life. I still went to work, but I no longer was reading (unless you count the CoH forum) or watching TV. The gaming group fell apart due to various reasons, so that stopped being a thing. It wasn't until December that I realized I might be addicted, and by then I was in too deep. I'd blown off my mom's wanting to go out to eat or see a movie in the theater a few times (okay a lot of times), but it wasn't until I blew off visiting my dad for Christmas that I realized I was addicted. I always visit my dad for a couple weeks over Christmas.

 

After I got burned out around June 2006 I still kept playing, but I made sure to limit myself to no more then 4 hours a day and 4 days a week. I added a 2nd MMO being active in any given month. Dividing my time between them helped avoid both addiction and burnout. I use to mock MMO addiction and claimed people getting addicted to Everquest wasn't a thing. Then it happened to me, and I realized it does happen and it does ruin your life. Not as badly for me as for some people. I never had much of a life to begin with. These days I barely play MMOs. I might sign into one for 3-5 hours a day, or 3-5 hours a week in total. Sometimes I'll sign in daily (especially if I subbed for a month) But it can also be weeks between sessions. These days I spend most of my time reading and writing short stories. Two things I love doing, but CoH and MMO addiction had pushed to the wayside for years.

[ILIWAPCT]

 

On 8/1/2021 at 11:26 AM, Pixie_Knight said:

I joined CoH during the 1 year anniversary event in 2005. It was my first MMO, I fell in love, then (if I'm honest with myself) got seriously addicted. Even after a year and a half of doing nothing but eating, sleeping, going to work, or playing CoH and thus burning out it was still my favorite leisure activity. It had managed to replace reading or vegging out watching tv. For nearly a decade I had a subscription to the game. Towards the end I didn't subscribe every month, but that's only because the game had moved to a F2P model, so I was able to play without paying when finances were tight.

 

Going to other MMOs, they felt over balanced towards requiring a team to do anything. You want to fight even a single enemy and you're alone? It had better be lower level then you. Certain classes could maybe fight a single enemy that is their level, but it'd be a close fight. 2 enemies is a death sentence. You don't feel like a hero in most MMOs. Instead you feel like Random Grunt #982.951.734. You not special, you are not a hero, you are in fact quite replaceable and expendable. And the in-game communities reflect that, becoming rather toxic as a result. In City of Heroes however, sure you're just one among many but you feel like a hero. You feel like you can take on anything. And if a threat is too big for any one hero, there are fellow heroes that have your back. It has always done a good job of selling the Superhero concept.

 

And the game community? It reflected that too. Even when there was a flame war (which I participated in more then my fair share of), they tended to be rather polite. You could be engaged in a heated argument with someone in one thread, and chatting with that same person in another thread on another topic. Arguments didn't usually spread across the forum. If you asked for help, you got help rather then insults (usually).

 

THAT is what has always made CoX the best MMO in my opinion.

I never realized until you pointed out the choice you have in playing solo or on teams.

When I think of other MMO's you're right, solo you're going to have a hard time.

 

When the game was live, the developers gave us the choice to run our new alts through the Zig or skip it.

I skipped it once and quickly realized breaking out of the Zig was essential to my alts, (Hero's Journey) so they all do.  

 

Although I'm not a hard core Min/Max I enjoy contemplating my build choice in Mids.

It's the best MMO I've ever played because I am allowed to make choices.  

 

 

 

I'll never forget the day I pursed the forums and read about Permanent Domination.

Up to that point the game was fun, MM's were my favorite and Dominators  were fun.

Permanent Domination was an expensive build, I wasn't rich or a Market player.

 

However I rose to the challenge and found another pathway, leading Strike Force's.

Up to that point I had been a passive player.

Now I was actively leading, forming teams helping new players get up to speed.

 

Eventually I accumulated the elusive LOG's needed and my enjoyment rocketed to the next level.

Although I stayed Red Side, I branched out to try other Archtypes and continued to immerse myself in every mechanic (except PVP).

 

PVP.

Normal PVP you need to be a L33t shooter to have fun and be effective, I can't shoot the broad side of a barn, hence PVP has no appeal.

Back in the day, the original Planet Side (world PVP) was awesome until they nerfed it into the normal PVP experience. 

 

Before the nerf, you could use your Brain and implement Strategy and Tactics.

Numbers crumble before Strategy and Tactics. It didn't matter if I was solo, forming a team just opened up more options. 

 

I remember planning our team's mission and a member complaining that my objective seemed boring and lacking. Before I could reply a veteran teammate chided him to follow my orders and the fun would follow. 30 minutes pass, there's no greater compliment then the former complaining guy  having fun, admits you knew what you were doing, and, oh in the larger bigger picture your side is now winning the war.

 

Which, in a way is the same thing my Master MInd did in COV, the pets hit the targets I direct them.

  

 

Edited August 3, 2021 by ILIWAPCT
Challenge

[Col. Kernel]

Without reading any of the thread...

 

CoH is the best MMO of all time because of the flexibility and creativity you don't find in any other MMO.  You're not locked into teaming at all, and when you do team you're not locked into a particular team make up.  The conversation always goes like this, "What should I bring?".  "Bring what you want to play, we'll make it work."

 

Your appearance is in no way tied to your capability - you have the freedom to look how you want to look and build your character to YOUR specification.

 

Not only do all the AT's play differently (to be honest there's only so much you can do for variety in melee ATs) but the powersets make for variations within each AT.

 

I can sum up all of the preceding in one word - replayibility.  And that is what makes CoH great. 

[Pixie_Knight]

Last week I hunted the GM in croatea with a group consisting solely of scrappers and blasters. yeah, several of us went down multiple times. And the fights were rather drawn out. But it was entirely possible. We had no healers, no buffers, no debuffers, and no tanks, just damage dealers. And not even a full team either, there were just 4 of us. Trying to do something like that in most MMOs... not possible.

[Black Talon]

Makes me think of a post I read x-years ago on the original CoH forums, Pixie_Knight; an individual was relating about how he and several others had done a Task Force with nothing but Defenders and Controllers on the team.  He noted that the surprising thing about it was that nothing could stop or touch therm - sure, the individual missions took an inordinately long time to complete, but no one ever went down.  It was like watching a slow-moving steamroller crush everything in its path.  This brings to mind the truth that CoH is, ultimately, a defensive game, which draws it into stark contrast to what - at least as I understand it - is the rule for MMPOGs, especially the fantasy-oriented ones: the Scrappers, Blasters and CoV archetypes specializing in offense can finish a scrap pretty damn quickly, but if they're up against the wrong kind of opponents with the wrong power sets...call the hospital EMT staff and have them on standby.  I've taken my Storm Summoning/Electrical Blast Defender to 27 with virtually no team-ups; almost every mission and mission arc has been solo.  It is definitely possible with him, but he's gotta a) take his time, and b) use real serious tactical intelligence.  I imagine the same holds true with a Defender/Controller team writ large, and I can understand why total offense teams are going to end up eating dirt repeatedly if the target is just too heavy on invulnerability/regeneration.  The Defenders and Controllers are the roots around which the CoH offensive ATs get to blossom.

[Pixie_Knight]

You think an 8 man defender team is slow? Oh, you poor summer child. Teams of all defenders and controllers melt enemies due to all the -def and -res debuffs being thrown around. I use to run with an all defender SG. And to be honest, the weakest members of the SG when we ran task forces was usually any empaths on the team. In fact, one time a 'pure healer' empath defender (you know, a Empathy/doesn't matter who only takes direct heals and the rez) managed to join one of our groups due to only having 7 SG members on at the moment. And he spent half the TF complaining about how bored he was due to nobody taking any damage, so he had nothing to do. The other half, he was yelling at us for not letting him shine.

[biostem]

When CoH first came out, I was already burnt out on sword & sorcery MMOs.  I was also tired of games where some small pile of rocks or lowly wooden fence could block your path.  CoH was the first MMO I played where you could truly explore the entire environment.  It was also nice that you neither looked the same as nor had the same powers as everyone in your "class".  I also really appreciated that enemies reward good XP, instead of having to just rely on quest completion.  I must say, though, that there was a lot of guesswork back in CoH's nascent days, but learning about the power(sets) and which primary worked well with what secondary set was part of the fun.  It was also a much different feeling at launch - 6-slotting the same type of enhancement into some powers, simply because I didn't know any better, and there was no "enhancement diversification" back then.  I remember trying to land on the blimp in Atlas Park, or desperately trying to find my way out of Perez park before I got my travel power.  I remember when they introduced the Shadow Shard, and being nervous about each jump on my super-speeder.  It's tough to put myself into the shoes of someone who is just discovering the game now, but either way, anyone that enriches the community is a plus in my book.  Welcome aboard!

Edited August 3, 2021 by biostem

[srmalloy]

16 hours ago, ILIWAPCT said:

I never realized until you pointed out the choice you have in playing solo or on teams.

When I think of other MMO's you're right, solo you're going to have a hard time.

Particularly with the Asian MMOs, where it rapidly becomes virtually impossible to complete content without a group. But that's part of the way MMOs evolved in Asia.

[RikOz]

On 7/30/2021 at 8:28 AM, Shenanigunner said:

And that says it all. So many MMO's seem to be a grind, gank-fests, tedious or only playable in one way.

The only other MMO I've enjoyed was WoW, and one of my gripes with it was that there were a lot of ways to play the game, but Blizzard has this unfortunate habit of putting most of their focus into only one or two of those ways. And that focus changes from one expansion to the next. They'll come up with something that is fun for more casual players (i.e. non-hardcore raiders) that allows those of us who don't have hours to play every day chip away at rewards at our own pace, and just when you find something you like, they take it away, and suddenly everything is "RAID OR DIE".

[nyhm]

On 8/1/2021 at 10:04 PM, TombTyrant said:

 

Cries in old.

this.