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Issue 19 goes live in City of Heroes
While World of Warcraft goes through its own world-shattering events, City of Heroes is getting hit hard as well. Issue 19 has just gone live, allowing players to experience the first step of the Praetorian invasion. Luckily, the patch also brings with it the Alpha Slot, empowering players with the first tier of the Incarnate system and allowing characters to stand against the invasion at a heretofore unseen level of power. There's also a surfeit of assorted quality-of-life improvements, not the least of which is the movement of Fitness to a baseline set of powers. Issue 19's features have been getting talked up for some time, so players will likely find many familiar entries among the official patch notes. Most noteworthy is the free respec token that's being given out to all characters, with a second free token being awarded on December 8th for characters who have used the first free token. It's the perfect time for City of Heroes players to log in, get playing, and start fighting back against the Praetorian invaders with all the might they can muster -- and with the new systems, that's quite a lot of might indeed.
NYCC 2010: The City of Heroes Issue 19 panel
It's the end of the convention season, and City of Heroes fans on the East Coast managed to get one last treat -- another chance with the development team that had long been anchored firmly on the other side of the country. The team's panel in March at PAX East saw the revelation of several new facts about the game, including the first announcement of Kinetic Melee and Electric Control, and the panel that closes out the year at New York Comic Con contained several interesting new facts as well. Melissa Bianco, David Nakayama, and Jesse Caceres were all in attendance, with the panel overseen by community representative Tia Parurahi. With Going Rogue having been out for nearly two months, this panel focused on the upcoming Issue 19 and what the changes mean for the game, as well as how much the development team is ramping up production to improve the game all around.
City of Heroes previews the coming Issue 19
We've known about the bare basics of Issue 19 for a little while now, but City of Heroes players have just been treated to a new explosion of information about the game's next major content patch. And it promises to be quite a big update, with two new task forces, new events in Praetoria, and some alternate animations and auras that had not been previously announced. Several powers will now have a number of locations that can be used as a launching point, so you could fire your Radiation Blasts from your eyes, one hand, both hands, or other possibilities. More tip and morality missions are being added, as well as the option for characters who were not from Praetoria to enter the city. It couldn't come at a better time, as Praetoria's infiltration and invasion are the center of the two new task forces. Overseen by Apex and Tin Mage, two important lore figures, the chains have characters face off against Praetors and uniquely Praetorian enemies to keep their world safe from Emperor Cole's designs. There are also new live events being added in Praetoria, such as a mass protest that heroes can take part in or help shut down. With the previously announced first Incarnate slot and the move of Fitness to inherent (with a slight clarification of unclear wording), the update promises to be an infusion of both content and systems for City of Heroes, so take a look at the official rundown for more.
A Mild-Mannered Reporter: Places to go, questions to answer
It's hard to believe that in just two weeks, all of the debates about whether or not Going Rogue will revitalize City of Heroes will be out of the land of theory and into the realm of practice. And while we've still got another week in the land of theory, right now we're taking a trip... well, still into the land of theory, but into the land of theories you asked for. Which is different, in a way! I have a hard time writing these introductions. Haggs asked: "...now that you're getting new lower-level content, why would you want to go through it as fast as you're going through the old content?" It's not always a question of "want." Levels 1-20 in City of Heroes are not nearly as slow as the later levels -- they don't start to really feel long until you reach the 30s, but it's much faster to go from 1-20 than from 20-30 even if you're just playing casually. The flow of leveling appears to be tuned so that players will be able to hit a level of moderate competence fairly quickly, spend a bit of time fleshing out their powers, and then spend quite some time filing off any rough edges via the 40+ powers.
