Who wants to be a villian?

psychicslug

When the dream that was CoH was here in a world far far away the awesomeness that was to play as a hero or villain and any were in between. I would love to see this again, I did hear around that its possibility in this maybe at some point.

decorumfriends

No thanks. I found CoV awful. Running around punching stuff is a great way to work super-heroes, but the core of super-villains are plots and sneaky tricks and narrow escapes and contingency plans and there was simply no way to recreate that in CoX (or probably in an MMO at all), so CoV just ended up being a more or less reskinned CoH. Didn't feel villainous in the least, it felt like being someone's errand boy.

biffsmackwell

Zero interest in both CoH and being a villain. It's a superhero game. Let's stick with that.

championshewolf

psychicslug wrote: »

When the dream that was CoH was here in a world far far away the awesomeness that was to play as a hero or villain and any were in between. I would love to see this again, I did hear around that its possibility in this maybe at some point.

CoV wasn't really City of Villains. It was more of the antihero story, with a few dark moments thrown in the mix. It made the whole alignment thing rather laughable. Story wise, CoV was far superior than CoH was at the base, but CoV was abandoned hard core, and even more so once they got Going Rogue up. I think they only kept CoV up just for appearances and saying they had an alignment system. But once Going Rogue happened well the Villain side practically dried up. Everyone hung out on heroes, and honestly seeing heroic masterminds and dominators and corruptors just sickened me.

chaelk

oh look this thread again.
no there is no mention at any time of having a villain faction in CO, that would require a large amount of resources being spent on making a completely different set of missions and NPC's.
Try DCUO, you can play a villain. You do the same missions as the heroes but you attack the opposite people.

flyingfinn

If you could be a true villain. Not some lackey or errand boy.
But not in this game.
Since when all the hero stuff are on hold, do you really expect to have a full other game made as an expansion.
You can be plenty evil in CO allready. Like don't accept any missions from distress citizens....'Who will help you now, worm!!!'


'Evil will always triumph because good is dumb'.​​

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themightyzenith

biffsmackwell wrote: »

Zero interest in both CoH and being a villain. It's a superhero game. Let's stick with that.

windupduck

There are people who want to play as Villains?
....they must be weirdos

ealford1985

I played CoV because I could be a villain. I'm all for options...but in reality it won't happen.

Renegade 4 Life!

sterga

Being a hero or a villain sucks.

Heroes end up being targeted by villains because who wouldn't get mad about having some jerk ruin their plans all the time. Villains end up being targeted by rival villains and heroes, so they get doubly screwed.

Either way, you have a whole bunch of people that keep attacking you. Sure, it might be exciting at first. But after the 10th time being attacked in the grocery store, it'd get old.

jonsills

sterga wrote: »

Being a hero or a villain sucks.

Heroes end up being targeted by villains because who wouldn't get mad about having some jerk ruin their plans all the time. Villains end up being targeted by rival villains and heroes, so they get doubly screwed.

Either way, you have a whole bunch of people that keep attacking you. Sure, it might be exciting at first. But after the 10th time being attacked in the grocery store, it'd get old.

That's why we wear funny costumes that distract attention from our (usually masked) faces. Nobody ever gave Clark Kent a second look, because he wore fairly shapeless suits, not a skintight blue-and-red getup with a cape. I've only got a couple of toons who can't go out in public without being recognized, and one of those is a seven-foot-tall robot with a cube-shaped head who generally doesn't need to go to the grocery store in the first place. (Now, the hardware store and the Radio Shack are another story...)

sistersilicon

Practical answer: Six years after launch is way, way too late to add a faction system to any MMO. The incumbent faction will always dominate. Cryptic already has experience with delayed faction launches, and both games have suffered for it.

City of Villains was only 18 months behind City of Heroes, but redside was never strong enough to stand up to blueside.

Star Trek Online was rushed to production after Cryptic picked up development from another studio, and the low-level Klingon Defense Force missions had to be cut to make Paramount's deadline. It took Cryptic years to back-fill those lower levels and allow players to start KDF toons at level 1, but not even adding Pandaren Romulans who can choose either faction could fix the Federation-heavy imbalance.

Maybe a studio with a good track record for PvP could pull it off, but this is the first time in recorded history that someone has ever attempted to put "good track record for PvP" and "Cryptic Studios" in the same sentence.

Philosophical answer: Factional MMOs don't do "good vs. evil", they do "ideological differences". CoV tried, but couldn't really get all the way down to "evil". You were really just choosing between "Arachnos hireling" or "anarchist". You were never launching your own orbital death ray satellites or anything like that. LOTRO... well, there's Monster Play, but Creeps are just pre-defined characters with a simplified PvP-based leveling system that never leave the Ettenmoors or (soon) Osgiliath. They're not the traditional, full-fledged, questing player characters that Freeps are.

About the only way I could see faction play entering CO would be something like Marvel's Civil War, where the existing player base gets forced into separate factions. Maybe something like the AAA Act being repealed, forcing characters with alien/undead/AI/extraplanar origins into a separate faction from "natural-born" heroes? Or maybe CoH Bittervets vs. Plan Z Saboteurs? That seems to be a great way to get a pissing contest started in the forums these days.

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flyingfinn

So she has Kryptonian ability to shroud peoples minds. Just not wearing the glasses.

nepht

Been playing a bad guy now in CO for 4 years. Randomly dueling Hero types. Hitting then with the Sapphire backup device. Drinking their salty tears. So sad ;_;

klitty

I don't like being a bad guy, I still have problems playing WildStar on Dominion side while I'm rubbing my neck making funny faces.

canadascott

bluegrassbeast wrote: »

One of my major characters is a villain. Others are more or less amoral mercs.

You can do this already, quite easily.

Run alerts. Just look at your teammates, and ask yourself are you really running with the good guys here?

kemmicals

canadascott wrote: »

bluegrassbeast wrote: »

One of my major characters is a villain. Others are more or less amoral mercs.

You can do this already, quite easily.

Run alerts. Just look at your teammates, and ask yourself are you really running with the good guys here?

Well, there's Captain Edgelord, Mr. Tryhard, The Obligatory Wolf Tail Guy, The Amazing Ink Blot Man and Mostly Naked Lady.

biffsmackwell

klitty wrote: »

I don't like being a bad guy, I still have problems playing WildStar on Dominion side while I'm rubbing my neck making funny faces.

Dominion's not really bad. The Chua maybe, a bit, but overall they just have a different viewpoint on things. Kinda like in WoW, the Horde aren't really bad guys.

kemmicals wrote: »

canadascott wrote: »

bluegrassbeast wrote: »

One of my major characters is a villain. Others are more or less amoral mercs.

You can do this already, quite easily.

Run alerts. Just look at your teammates, and ask yourself are you really running with the good guys here?

Well, there's Captain Edgelord, Mr. Tryhard, The Obligatory Wolf Tail Guy, The Amazing Ink Blot Man and Mostly Naked Lady.

Ain't that the truth! I've seen guys running around with names like Insane Killer and the like. What side you you think they're on?

sterga

That's Admrial Blackredder McEdgelord to you! I was promoted.

People on the Interwebz try to be anon and it doesn't always work out. A mask will do nothing to prevent an angry kid from posting your name, address, and favorite color for all to see.

I wish more people would buy the other wolf heads. So tired of seeing the barfy default head all the time.

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ashensnow

I never really got the sense that one was playing a villain in CoV. A minion perhaps. Then again I didn't play it very long so perhaps things evolved.

klitty

biffsmackwell wrote: »

Dominion's not really bad. The Chua maybe, a bit, but overall they just have a different viewpoint on things. Kinda like in WoW, the Horde aren't really bad guys.

Good point, there was this mission where a bunch of moronic aurins tried to terraform as a forest a big chunk of savannah territory. I was actually glad when I stopped them.

Back on topic, is very hard for me to play as a villian. I'm just not wired to be mean or evil :v More power for those who can, I think that a villian side of champions would be nothing more than City of Evil Minions.

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flyingfinn

-Master of evil, nukes MC from orbit

windupduck

Masterminds, Con-men, Mercenaries? That's too much trouble all around. Give me Anarchy any day of the week! Except Tuesdays. Tuesdays are just for me; sleep in a little, have a nosh, maybe a walk along the bluffs...

Then Wednesday it's back to narchy!!

meedacthunist

CoH had the "villain" side added long after launch and it always had less population than the hero side. Also, wasn't a big financial success for them.

STO had Klingon faction added after launch and it took them years and a lot of effort to get it roughly on pair with Federation side. Some may argue that it's still not exactly on pair, but it's close enough.
STO KDF finally got better only because Klingon players were extremely loyal to their faction and willing to spend on it.

Factional MMO works really well only if all factions are there right from the start.

CO can't have proper development even for its superheroic core, let alone for adding and fleshing out yet another parallel game added into it.

And what you gonna do as a villain with CO writing style? Steal lollipops and cookies? Or be kidnapping kitten?

dialamx

People seem to forget, CoV was an unfinished rush job. Cryptic said a few times that NCSoft pushed them to get it out, which forced them to scrap most of their plans for it. Personally, I'd love to see a Nemesis Online game that ties into CO, where Cryptic has the chance to do everything they didn't get to do with CoV. Of course, given the current state of CO, I don't see a playable villain side ever coming out. At this point I'd be happy if they put a little effort into the current Nemesis system.

kemmicals

meedacthunist wrote: »

And what you gonna do as a villain with CO writing style? Steal lollipops and cookies? Or be kidnapping kitten?

Probably be a grimdark vampire werewolf god thing that kills people..

Over incredibly petty things like not getting candy.

guyhumual

I don't think I've ever played a straight up Villain, I have made characters that are defiantly not heroes though. I usually enjoy playing a hero, my main Masquerade has a twisted and tragic background where she was forced to do bad things, but she more then makes up for it now as a hero. My concern though is most players play villains as nasty violent anti social psychopaths, and sadly their heroes aren't much better, but for some reason they have the idea that being a villain is all about being a horrible person, whereas for me, the best villains are usually characters that could be heroes if circumstances were slightly different or if the story was told from their point of view.

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xrazamax

You might not be able to be cartoonishly evil in CO, but you don't don't have to be a hero. The stories and flexibility in where you decided to go and do allows you to be the anti-hero or someone acting in their own self interest.

So this really comes down to, "Should there be two separate factions?" and I say, "Nah, there isn't really a good reason to do that "

sterga

It's funny that people keep asking for factions in CO, but in many other games with factions, the barriers have been eroded. I know in Rift, they finally let both factions be in the same guild. Even WoW is changing their Battlegrounds so that you could end up on either team. Both games have story elements that bring the sides together.

I wouldn't want factions in CO, especially if it meant opposing factions couldn't be in the same guild. I'd either need to maintain two different guilds or drop half the roster. I guess it's not a big deal with custom chat channels, but it would be irritating for sharing stuff in the guild bank. And what about grouping together? If it's faction based, then it would suck just trying to play with friends.

Using my imagination to pretend I'm a good-guy / bad-guy is more fun than splitting everyone.

windupduck

sterga wrote: »

Using my imagination to pretend I'm a good-guy / bad-guy is more fun than splitting everyone.

Or being both!

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cynicool

So you wouldn't have to split anyone, you'd just have to rewrite every quest to stovepipe a kludgy morality system on to it? Oh that sounds like a treat.​​

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jonsills

Okay, slug, while you're very ambitious for a gastropod, I don't think you've got any idea what kind of undertaking you're proposing here. This would require not only a fair bit of software engineering, including possibly some breakthroughs in the field of artificial intelligence, it would also require replacing Cryptic's servers with something more akin to Watson and probably involve making all of us replace our current computers with some sort of hypothetical Cray home system.

And most of the players still won't choose to be villains. Being the "bad guy" seems cool sometimes when you're a disaffected youth, but let's be honest, the disaffected youth market isn't very big and for the most part doesn't really determine how it spends its money.​​

chaelk

designation is on all NPC's as well.
hero villain, master villain, tough etc.

ok, so what missions are the villains going to use to level?
are they going to have separate alert queues?
which NPC's will train and buy/sell to them?

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so which level zones were you planning on making unusable for levelling by some of the players by having them designated one side or the other.?

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Whitelist duels- problem solved, nobody can challenge you.

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oh look PvP zones, otherwise known as. "I can only do missions in these few areas or I'm going to have random people attacking me because they can."
from WOW;
most common times to be attacked in world pvp,
while getting or handing in missions,
while trying to buy or sell stuff.
while in combat
just finished combat and injured
when a high level character is bored and goes to the lowest level zone

Rift as slightly better, the high levels used to troll the NPCS more by climbing on the roof of the capital.
but still they would hang around in the invasion areas, hoping to get hit by accident so they would be able to attack someone.

---

NW has Icewind dale with a nice big PvP area in the center, which is also good for mining. Zone chat has a lot of " why are you attacking me?" " sure a group attacks me, why don't you go one on one?"

because it's 2 teams and its allowed to do it.

they also have a dungeon, which had a Pvp element and you had to choose a side. Guess what, people found out which side was winning most and joined that one.​​

sterga

A morality system like in the Fallout games? ... Bethesda knew it wanted to make Fallout 4 back in 2004. Even if they didn't do the bulk of the production until after Skyrim's released, that's still 4+ years of development for a single player game. And they're using an updated version of the same dev tools they've been using for years, which probably significantly reduces the time it takes to create a game.

I'd like to see Cryptic hire professional writers first.

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meedacthunist

Unless CO had its writing style altered, I can't really see a villain side of things.

And I don't think CO could be seriously deviating from its style without creating a serious dissonance.

Romulan and KDF sides kinda work in STO, but: a) they aren't really villainous, just focused on themselves at the expense of everyone else and b) the style and quality of writing for STO is somewhat higher/different.

The game wasn't really created for having playable villains. CoH wasn't that way as well, but it had different style.​​

itsbrou

I'd love a system where your actions could make you a friend of Viper and "okay" by the Champions, but a target for elimination by UNTIL. Of course, other players you team with could always vouch for you(by being teamed together) so that you don't get locked out of content. Simply changing the reactions of each NPC faction would add villainous options without tearing players apart.

They could also add PvP-enabled instances to each action zone map. For example, the game will always spawn Millennium City #1 and Millennium City #1(PvP) and each will grow in number of instance normally. The latter zone could have, as an example, hotspots where a group of players who are well-liked by VIPER are performing operations in ARGENT territory and ARGENT-loyal players have a hit out on them from a radio alert, or the Sovereign Sons send you to mess with the Trismegistus Council, but players revered by DEMON are ordered to intercept you and steal the victory.

guyhumual

The big fear I think anyone familiar with pen and paper role playing games is that have a villainous character in a group sometimes creates a situation where everyone else is having to play clean up for the actions of one sociopath which naturally leads to everyone resenting the villain, which usually leads to groups and DMs banning evil characters. A good villain can justify their actions, and I'm not just talking about "I needed money so I murdered the innkeeper" kind of justification, I mean genuine "I need to do this to save all humanity" kind of justification. There's nothing particularly endearing about someone that lives on a whim and there's certainly nothing that would make others want to work with one self centered mass murderer.

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heavynosferatu

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/335/feature/10007/Champions-Online-Get-Ready-to-Unleash-Your-Inner-Villain.html

I'll just leave this here...

Actually, I'll make a new topic.

ladygadfly

This is a great idea, we'll get right on it :P.

heavynosferatu

ladygadfly wrote: »

This is a great idea, we'll get right on it :P.

I'm guessing someone let this out of the bag a wee bit early?

klitty

ladygadfly wrote: »

This is a great idea, we'll get right on it :P.

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuh...

Get the foundry first!!!

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