Who would want to live in Paragon?

[0th Power]

Why do people live there?

Its riddled with crime.  Street level to world ending and everything in-between

There's a prison in the middle of the city.  Not good for property values.

Literally giant monsters roam free.

Home to a nuclear reactor that is attacked weekly.

No recreation.  What is there to do besides go to a park (and get mugged)?  The only night club still operating is interdimensional.  Why dont we have any sports stadiums, golf course, etc.? (I think there is a bowling alley, right?) 

 

If it was me I'd take the first plane outta there.... Oh wait... No airport...

[Glacier Peak]

17 minutes ago, 0th Power said:

Why do people live there?

Its riddled with crime.  Street level to world ending and everything in-between

There's a prison in the middle of the city.  Not good for property values.

Literally giant monsters roam free.

Home to a nuclear reactor that is attacked weekly.

No recreation.  What is there to do besides go to a park (and get mugged)?  The only night club still operating is interdimensional.  Why dont we have any sports stadiums, golf course, etc.? (I think there is a bowling alley, right?) 

 

If it was me I'd take the first plane outta there.... Oh wait... No airport...

At the risk of applying reality to a fictional world... I would like to operate the blimp that patrols Atlas Park. (Move over Captain James Finney, the Spirit of Freedom is mine!!!)

 

Edit: There are indeed airports, but I would recommend the many maritime vessels around Paragon City, as it is a port city first and foremost.

Edited September 30, 2021 by Glacier Peak

[Xenosone]

Think of all the free octopus meat blue side also pumpkin pie. 

[Parabola]

It's not just that it's riddled with crime - it's also chock full of superheroes who routinely ignore that crime to go and do something more interesting. Being the victim of a never ending mugging must be made all the more galling by watching hero after hero fly past. If the citizens knew that half the heroes spend all their time playing a glorified training virtual reality mission in the AE buildings and most of the rest are obsessed with travelling back in time to do some roman thing while the city burns in the here and now there would be rioting in the streets. Sorry, more rioting in the streets.

[Glacier Peak]

Somebody should watch Free Guy 🤣

[Without_Pause]

There should be amazing crops with all of the farming the heroes are doing.

[The_Warpact]

Better than Chi Town, Philly, NYC, or Cleve-Land (shudders).😏

 

I'm almost thinking the actual population of Paragon are npc villains, with some civilian elements. Think about how many actual villain to civilian ratio you see, its like 20 villain to 1 civilian. I think that's why there are so many issues plus 1 hero to 100 villain and 1 cop to 5 villain and this is just basing it on what I have seen over the years. Actual numbers are probably worse.

So it is City of Villains regardless of what side/zone/world or dimension you play on.

 

So its no small wonder stuff is screwed up everywhere with giant calamari eating people, dimensional riffs releasing dog deer mutants, zones that look like all of Roland Emmerich movies hit them, and demon city underground. 

I'd still rather live there than Cleve-Land...*shudders*

[Black Zot]

The rent's gotta be dirt cheap; midrange prices anywhere else become outright gouging when there's always a chance a couple superpowered loons are gonna come crashing through the window and fight it out on your sofa.

 

(Not that landlords don't categorically gouge renters anyway, but that's a different can of worms.)

[Doomguide2005]

     Sure, I'm just going to completely avoid owning anything remotely resembling a purse.   I mean even if hit by a vehicle you never get hurt, just pushed around.  The 'bad guys' are always fighting each other and unless you've got a purse pretty much ignore you.   Cars if you own one appear to be immune to being stolen or broken into.   Those guys can go for hours trying to get into a car and nary a scratch.  Which is good as the bus drivers must all be on strike ... for a couple decades (so that career path seems like a bad idea.  And nanny or teachers.).  There's only like 4 buildings that ever catch fire and worse case I've never seen it spread beyond them to nearby structures.  Like never.

Never.

Ever.

Own 

A 

Purse.

And you're going to be endlessly entertained by crazy bat%#&@ stuff and never need those mediports I hear about.  Worst case is some hero coming by asking weird stuff about how many hours have I been in game?  How the hell should I know!  

 

Signed,

Karen

[ZorkNemesis]

2 hours ago, 0th Power said:

Why dont we have any sports stadiums,

 

There's one half built in the redside area of Kalisti Wharf.  Also the arena has spectator modes, watching your favorite supers duke it out has to be exciting in some capacity.

[Luminara]

Major pluses to living in Paragon City:

• All citizens have super strength, above and beyond what even Incarnates have.  Pesky heroes interrupting your daily stroll with a fight on the sidewalk?  Move them.
• All citizens are invulnerable to all damage.  Hug that giant octopus!  Meander casually in and out of burning buildings!  Smile and wave as highly toxic radiation passes through you harmlessly!
• All citizens can phase shift at will.  Locked out of your apartment?  No problem!  Worn out after the walk to work and anxious to reach your office?  Take the straight path, right through the walls!  Cute neighbor taking a showe- wait, no, don't do that.

[Ukase]

 

Here's your airport! At least, a runway and some planes.

 

[srmalloy]

2 hours ago, Parabola said:

it's also chock full of superheroes who routinely ignore that crime to go and do something more interesting.

PVP Online nailed it back in 2004:

[Kismet Cowboy]

Okay, but even ignoring the whole video game MMO mechanics thing of their literally being a mugging every 50 feet, this is a good question: like a good 50% or more of the city is rubble or otherwise so completely overrun by bad guys as to be uninhabitable by the general population.

 

Astoria, Baumton/Boomtown, Eastgate/Hollows, Perez, Striga, Venice/Crey's Folly, White Plains/RWZ, Woodvale/Eden, and then Galaxy as the latest victim. Faultline/Overbrook is only just getting back on its feet, and is still mostly ruins. At the time of sunset, this was all stuff that had happened in the previous decade or so of the game's timeline. You could remove every street villian in the regular zones and Paragon would still be ludicrously dangerous for the average citizen! Heroes are honestly fighting a losing battle: at the rate zones met disaster on live, then another decade and there wouldn't have been a Paragon left to save.

[Blackfeather]

I mean, excellent public transport in an American city, with wait times in the seconds? Sign me up! 😉

[Techwright]

1 hour ago, Kismet Cowboy said:

Okay, but even ignoring the whole video game MMO mechanics thing of their literally being a mugging every 50 feet,

 

And that's exactly the problem: the game, to provide targets for the heroes, overstocks the streets and warehouses with villains.  The "reality" would be more like 20% of the population are villains, 10% are heroes (I seem to recall reading somewhere that it was believed the heroes numbered less than 10, 000), and 70% are citizens.  That still makes for a very lethal city to live in.  There's a reason kids are almost never seen.  You don't live in Paragon unless you need to live in Paragon.

 

And that brings up another point.  A lot of these citizens have to work here because their companies require it and in some cases because their companies provide protection.  Take Crey, for instance.  Sure we know they're rotten to the core, but on the surface they provide "heroes" which would probably act as a deterrent to crime against their workers, maybe even escort duty to/from work.  But in exchange, their workers are tightly bound to the will of the company.  So you want to work with Crey? You come to the big city, despite the danger.

 

On another note.  it's Rhode Island.  It's about 55 miles top to bottom.  There's an international airport half that distance from Paragon City in Province.  Not sure we have to have another (though I'm sure I'd love it if such a zone were developed.)

[Marshal_General]

3 hours ago, Luminara said:

Major pluses to living in Paragon City:

• All citizens have super strength, above and beyond what even Incarnates have.  Pesky heroes interrupting your daily stroll with a fight on the sidewalk?  Move them.
• All citizens are invulnerable to all damage.  Hug that giant octopus!  Meander casually in and out of burning buildings!  Smile and wave as highly toxic radiation passes through you harmlessly!
• All citizens can phase shift at will.  Locked out of your apartment?  No problem!  Worn out after the walk to work and anxious to reach your office?  Take the straight path, right through the walls!  Cute neighbor taking a showe- wait, no, don't do that.

"Thanks for saving me hero!"

Steps off a 10 story building and casually walks away.

[SeraphimKensai]

god forbid trying to get home owner's insurance.

[Techwright]

3 hours ago, SeraphimKensai said:

god forbid trying to get home owner's insurance.

And the turf is coastal in a state that hurricanes do hit.  There's just no winning with that insurance.

[DoctorDitko]

Weather? What's that? We sometimes get snow...

[Clave Dark 5]

On 9/30/2021 at 11:27 AM, 0th Power said:

Oh wait... No airport...

And to think that people pick on red side for being worse than blue side!

[Clave Dark 5]

On 9/30/2021 at 2:46 PM, srmalloy said:

That strip got me thinking, maybe we need to give out badges for stopping purse thievery and other "street crimes".

[Blackfeather]

5 hours ago, Clave Dark 5 said:

That strip got me thinking, maybe we need to give out badges for stopping purse thievery and other "street crimes".

 

There are Tour Guide missions now at least, which are gained via street sweeping:

Each one leads to an exploration badge within the zone map, which is nice for people who want to find them without relying on a third party tool.

[Clave Dark 5]

Yeah, but  meant to like get people to help.  Sometimes I set me MM pets at aggressive and just trawl through the streets looking for grey targets for the hell of it, might as well assign badges for that too!

[srmalloy]

6 hours ago, Clave Dark 5 said:

That strip got me thinking, maybe we need to give out badges for stopping purse thievery and other "street crimes".

Some time ago, I thought about suggesting a change that would have any street encounter where you defeated mobs threatening a civilian -- attempted purse snatching or whatever -- to give a reward of 1 inf even if the character would not normally get any reward (i.e., for being too high level, or with a 2x XP boost active). 1 inf is a negligible reward, but it does represent the fact that you're out in public defending civilians. Because I couldn't think of a good way to match it for redside or goldside, I stuck the idea away until I could come up with a solution that worked for each side.