Dev Diary - Blackwing Industries: On Wings of Hexagons & Chrome

[Cobalt Arachne]

 

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Hey everyone, it's Cobalt Arachne!
I'm one of the senior designers here on the Homecoming Team!

For those who are unfamiliar with my past projects, I was designer behind the Dr. Aeon Strike Force (ASF), Advanced Mode Content, Sheathed/Holstered Weapons, Aether Rewards, the Labyrinth of Fog (LoF), and a buncha other stuff... and now on to today's focus!

 

Issue 28, Page 2's new enemy group: Blackwing Industries!  

 

It's a bit funny writing about the group today in 2025. The majority of Blacking Industries work was actually completed the month after the ASF was finished all the way back in late 2021, but then they sat shelved for many years until Kallisti Wharf was ready to go since they existed for that zone.

 

But time flies! And so do these new enemies! Watch out!

Let's dive into how Blackwing Industries came to be, how they ended up in my hands to finish, and why I chose the things I did in designing their enemy group specifics!

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 🧠 Blackwing Industries Concept Origins

I will be upfront, I did not write Blackwing Industries narratively. When I joined the Homecoming Team I was informed there was an unfinished group of enemies written for Kallisti Wharf that needed work badly. During the first couple demo sessions with Piecemeal, they showcased some of the prototype Blackwing critters and it was fairly obvious they were using placeholder costumes/powersets that came from Architect Entertainment.

Since Piecemeal had already invested a heavy amount of work in creating/designing the Freaklok, they offered this unfinished Blackwing Industries project to me.

 

Not thinking too much of it, I proceeded to finish out the remainder of the ASF for the majority of 2021, but after it released, I found myself with nothing specific to work on. Remembering that we had that unfinished Blackwing Industries group, I decided how I wanted to use my time off (the Homecoming devs typically go on break for the duration of December).

 

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📓 Writing Ingredient List

 

As I mentioned, what Blackwing Industries needed to be came from a writing contributor, so I didn't have complete liberty to do anything I wanted.

All of the critters had finished names, finished descriptions, placeholder costumes, placeholder powers... Additionally I had an internal concept explanation for what the group needed to be, with their role in the Kallisti Wharf narrative.

 

With these things in-hand I knew the group needed to fulfill the following based on the writer's notes:

• The leader was to be a member of Ultimatum, the elite government team that Going Rogue's Maelstrom formerly belonged to.
• They were a technology/natural based villain group.
• They were one of the world's best private military companies (PMC) that was assuming jurisdictional control of Kallisti Wharf from the PPD.
• They were trained and specialized in taking down super-powered targets in a non-lethal capacity.
• They had regular operatives that looked like police officers, and they had special operatives that looked more like black ops agents.
• Many of the critters had details of what their weapons/attack method should be.
• The group featured a pair of wings motif on the back of their uniforms.
• Breachers / Vanguards using shotguns / piston boots.
• Ballistiers using grenade launchers and rocket wings.

 

Elements I personally decided on to add to the group in order to promote thematic and visual cohesion:

• That leader Ultimatum member's writing, look, and powers.
• Parity in difficulty with endgame groups like Soldiers of Rularuu or Vanguard
  • Narratively, Blackwing was written to be one of the world's most competent PMC groups, they had to actually be dangerous or that story bit would feel fake to players.
• Defensive countermeasures in the form of kinetic-dampening hex plate armor. Visuals for this would be the group's unifying element.
• Black and blue visuals to communicate their name and convey what they do to players who aren't careful. 😉
  • I say this lovingly, I've died so many times to BWI in Kallisti Wharf while street sweeping for that rare pet recipe on my player account. 💀
• Coordinator Boss rank added to give the group a support-oriented boss with a unique mechanic (reverse taunt) to make them stand out.
• Neutralizer Elite Boss rank to give the group every enemy rank to use in content. Then later @ViridianDev finished their power set.
• Keeper Giant Monster rank for the zone event, BWI was in control of the district, they should have a show of power.

 

With those things decided, I started with the basics. The group was using very obvious placeholder models that were constructed using the costume editor and lacked group unifying-elements. For me the fundamentals of any starting point of design is figuring out your recognizable/unifying thematic visual elements, so I started experimenting with ways to make Blackwing Industries look like what their name implied.

 

For me personally, fighting a new NPC group was always a fun mix of: Seeing their cool new visuals, discovering what their powers were, and learning how to fight against them mechanically.

In each of those departments I aimed to deliver with focus.

 

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👁️‍🗨️ Building Blackwing Visually

 

I eventually settled on the idea of them being outfitted with high-tech kinetic impact-dampening armor, and the visual element that would unify them thematically would be glowing hexagonal energy fields. I always loved the looks of scrolling glow masks, and have used them liberally throughout my work for Homecoming.

 

In-order to make the hexagonal mesh stand out further, I opted to take their namesake, Blackwing, more literally, and opted to use black as a central color in their visual identity. This worked out really nicely with the bright blue energy fields, as it made them stand out more.

 

 Lovely lovely glow masks! 

 

With visuals decided, I looked through all the placeholders... It was obvious there was some intent behind them, so I didn't want to just toss out everything the original writer had created.

 

 Recreation of a prototype P.E.A.C.E. Ballistier; Not exact, but very obviously a costume placeholder. 

 

To this end, nearly all the Blackwing critters retain some original design elements from their prototypes. The big domed helmet on the Breachers, the shotgun-using piston boot-kicking Vanguards, the flying grenade-launching Ballistiers. Additionally the male/female variety (for minions 8 each, 16 models total) showed that the original creator placed value on diversity within the group, so I ensured that my costume variety met their own, and most of the lesser-armored Blackwing critters looks came from their prototypes.

 

As I designed the critters, I tried to ensure that the various and many ranks were distinct, as the author had included quite a variety of Blackwing critters. Of the full roster, the only types added by me were the P.E.A.C.E Coordinator bosses, Neutralizer elite bosses, and the Keeper giant monster.

 

All the rest were there from the original prototype concept!

 

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💥 Pumping Out Powers

 

So now we had their looks, but they needed to become a functioning villain group, designed with intent. When it came to what I wanted to deliver, I simply focused on 'something different' but 'threatening like Vanguard'.
This new group was meant to be the unstoppable authority in Kallisti Wharf, if they were complete push-overs, it would weaken the narrative angle.

 

Additionally players on Homecoming have accessible Incarnate Powers and Invention Origin enhancements, so I designed the group with some countermeasures to common gameplay styles seen against other groups such as jumping in and dropping Judgement. (The content that Blackwing features in is 40-50, but that means in teams, most groups that can will make the leader 50, as players often prefer having their Incarnates when they can)

 

 Well trained and ready to engage hostiles! 

A trait that the entire Blackwing Industries group shares is when they drop below 75% health, they gain access to additional powers; This was specifically to make throwing a Judgement into a fresh pack an extremely dangerous idea, encouraging players instead use Judgements as finishers rather than openers.

 

To reinforce that idea, I designed the group to utilize Traps powers, which are very 'dig-in and entrench' in terms of how they operate, meaning it's unwise to engage Blackwing critters where they spawned inside a mission. If you decide to just jump blindly into a pack and not move them, you'll potentially be dealing with:

 

• A force field drone being summoned by the Engineer if that didn't get interrupted.
• A Triage Beacon being summoned by the Medic near their allies.
• Getting hit by the Nitrogen Trip Mines that Breachers/Vanguards automatically drop in missions.
• Being exposed to the Ballistier's grenade debuff patches like Sonic/Glue Grenades.
• Taking on the entire group's attacks/debuffs at the same time, with a lot of incoming Energy (-end) melee and Cold/Toxic (-heal) ranged attacks. 
• Exposing yourself to the Coordinator's Focused Targeting, which will make it much harder to disengage.
• No counterplay to avoiding the Phantom's Assassin Strike combo by moving away until their Placate expires.

 

As you can see, 'Don't fight us where we spawned' was a big design focus for the group, and many of them are made to be quite nasty if played with the typical 'Jump in and drop a Judgement' play seen at high level while fighting other groups. It was intended that players try pulling/retreat tactics to get the enemies to move, or utilize corner pulling in maps. Players regularly have extremely high movement speeds, and it's an advantage they can take fully against BWI who can't keep up.

 Owchie, shouldn't have gone in carelessly... 

 

Will this make the group more popular?

Potentially not, but as stated from the beginning, my goal with the group was 'something different', and I believe that Blackwing offers a challenge that is quite unlike any other existing enemy group, if it can give the game more variety, than it's a worthwhile addition in my head.

For me, I always aim to deliver something unlike other existing things, so we can expand the game's appeal to new fans and explore design elements more creatively.

 

Something else that sets Blacking apart further is individualized AI prioritization based on the target's Archetype.

Here's a breakdown of the special AI critters and their priority focused targets; Knowing these will help players to be aware of which Blackwing critter are likely to take a special interest in you. Obviously this only impacts team gameplay as when soloing you're the only target to prioritize.

• P.E.A.C.E. Phantoms / P.E.A.C.E. Commanders / P.E.A.C.E. Coordinators:
  • Blaster, Defender, Controller, Corruptor, Dominator, Mastermind (targets to prioritize damage/control)

 

• P.E.A.C.E. Heavy / P.E.A.C.E. Ballistier
  • Brute, Scrapper, Tanker, Stalker (targets to prioritize debuffs)

 

This should make the role of tank more important as they work to control the flow of aggro, ensuring they taunt the Coordinator's early so their Taunt redirect lands on the tank. Additionally the most dangerous critters in-terms of burst damage (Phantoms/Commanders) will try and prioritize squishy teammates, making the role of keeping them Taunted and on you even more important.

In terms of what I added to the group to round out their roster, I felt they needed a unique mechanical boss disruptor. An enemy role I commonly add to content I design. Something that serves as a mix-up trump card that can totally flip the status quo if their special mechanic lands unfavorably against the players. For Blackwing Industries, this shaped into the P.E.A.C.E Coordinator enemies and their unique reverse taunt mechanic! 

 

 These dome heads are a real pain in the neck! 

 

After taking enough damage, the Coordinators will target somebody for Focused Targeting (which if you recall above, they're going to try and prioritize ATs who don't want that attention!). This power causes all nearby Blackwing critters to be taunted onto whoever the Coordinator focused on. This means the aggro can't be avoided unless they're taunted, so squishy characters will want to be careful with their aggro around the Coordinators!

 

Since I covered the other main threats in the group in the Patch Notes for Issue 28, Page 2 I won't go over them all individually here again, rather, I'll let players test and experience the group for themselves, with the design intent in-mind to help guide their counterplay!

 

That's it for this Dev Diary, hope you gained some helpful insight as you stand against the forces of these new enemies!

 

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A super big thanks to everyone involved in testing, feedback, and helping to make Blackwing the best they could be!

 

As always, a big thank you to all the support of our players & community, you guys are what makes City of Heroes!

 

🎖️

[Glacier Peak]

Where did the name concept come from? 

[Cobalt Arachne]

1 minute ago, Glacier Peak said:

Where did the name concept come from? 

Unsure, but the group's name, bird/wing motifs were things that were established from before where my work began.

[starro]

I would love to see the more villain groups from the HC Dev Team and have it all tied into future storylines and game events.  Thank you for the content.

[Sakura Tenshi]

Still got money on them having Malta ties (admittedly have not played all the new arcs yet).

 

As a side note, okay, so the 'don't fight where they spawn' aspect was on purpose. Which kind of makes an early bug I had reported about the shield drones not moving feel like it had been intentional.

 

Also, as I keep saying, while I understand why, as someone who likes to play swordfighters and martial artists, it stings to see yet another mob with "big, fat, Smash/lethal resistance".

Edited 6 hours ago by Sakura Tenshi

[TauntingMonk]

So... who is the leader of the Blackwing Industries?