# Help me decide: Champions Online vs. City of Heroes/Villians **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [April 17, 2010, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442 "2010-04-17T08:22:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/41 "2010-09-03T12:18:50Z")
> [@Jayt443](#): > > > [@Bosstone](#): > > > > Then don’t play a Defender, play a Tanker. Absolutely none of what you said here is what a Defender does, but Tankers have all of it. > > Oo.o tanker can utilize 2 elements plus weapon now? Well, you could make an Electric Armor Tanker with battle Axe secondary and use the Ice Ancillary pool. Electric Armor won’t shoot lightning bolts but it will do lightning damage to foes, you can chop them down with the big sword, and you can use some chilling/cold powers from the ancillary. That’s not _too_ far off. Last time I saw WoW was a few years ago, but the combat was basically just stand there and swing, swing, swing, win – completely primitive next to the highly dynamic COH/V combat with colorful energies, wildly differing animations, and enemies flying through the air tumbling like ragdolls. But maybe they’ve completely replaced WoW’s combat engine since then, for all I know. No experience with CO, but everyone I know personally who’s played both CO and COH/V is back in the City now. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/42 "2010-09-03T13:29:58Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > No experience with CO, but everyone I know personally who’s played both CO and COH/V is back in the City now. I tried to get back into CoX just before Going Rogue came out… but I just couldn’t handle it anymore. Compared to CO, combat in COX is boring- just a bunch of mashing buttons when they light up, and most of the abilities are canceled if you try to move. CO’s combat is much more dynamic- there are very few abilities which lock you into place. I can’t stand the character dimensions in CoX, either- everyone’s arms are too short and their heads are too small. CoX also felt like a ghost town- it used to be that everyone was right out in front of City Hall. But when I logged in, I spent two hours wandering around and saw a total of maybe five people- and three of them were AFK. I think that CoX has more content (hell, it’d have to, considering how much older it is). But in other categories, CO beats it, hands down. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/43 "2010-09-03T13:40:20Z")
> [@Jayt443](#): > > > [@Bosstone](#): > > > > Then don’t play a Defender, play a Tanker. Absolutely none of what you said here is what a Defender does, but Tankers have all of it. > > Oo.o tanker can utilize 2 elements plus weapon now? You want an Axe? Tanker has Battle Axe for a secondary. You want frost armor? It has Ice Armor as a primary. You want to shoot lightning? You can either take Laser Beam Eyes from the Energy Mastery power pool which opens up at level 41 or Mu Lightning from the Mu Mastery power pool, which used to be only available to villains but has recently been opened up to heroes as well. Now, if you want to be able to shoot lightning as your primary method of attack and have ice armor, City can’t do that. The thing is, tankmages are incredibly difficult to balance, and while City does restrict you a little in exactly what powers you can take, it does so for the sake of balance, which means a more stable game that’s fun for a longer period of time. There’s still a significant amount of freedom in what you can do, though. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/44 "2010-09-03T14:36:28Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > Now, if you want to be able to shoot lightning as your primary method of attack and have ice armor, City can’t do that. Sorta. Ice armor/electrical melee Tanker can cause lightning to randomly shoot from mob to mob starting at level 28. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/45 "2010-09-03T14:43:24Z")
There’s also a short-range cone lightning attack available at level 4. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/46 "2010-09-03T18:56:49Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > CoX also felt like a ghost town- it used to be that everyone was right out in front of City Hall. But when I logged in, I spent two hours wandering around and saw a total of maybe five people- and three of them were AFK. For one thing, a great many people are off in Praetoria, especially the low level ones who would normally start there. And CoX always is going to feel like a ghost town compared to games that don’t make as heavy a use of instanced missions. CoX is actually unusually busy at the moment. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/47 "2010-09-03T19:35:45Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > > [@Lightnin](#): > > > > CoX also felt like a ghost town- it used to be that everyone was right out in front of City Hall. But when I logged in, I spent two hours wandering around and saw a total of maybe five people- and three of them were AFK. > > For one thing, a great many people are off in Praetoria, especially the low level ones who would normally start there. And CoX always is going to feel like a ghost town compared to games that don’t make as heavy a use of instanced missions. CoX is actually unusually busy at the moment. It really is. When I last played last year, the typical server pops would be Virtue and Freedom at yellow and the rest at green. The only exceptions were double XP weekends. Every time I’ve logged in since purchasing Going Rogue, though, Virtue and Freedom have consistently been at red and the others at yellow. It’s to the point where I’m making characters off Virtue just so I don’t have to deal with so much server lag. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/48 "2010-09-03T21:15:38Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > This is relevant: > > [A Star is Born:Let’s Play Champions Online Pt. 1 - Twenty Sided](http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=5015) > > SHamus Young did a Let’s PLay of CoH. Aside from being a fantastic read, it’s also somewhat painful to see his intital love, and how it slowly got worn down by bad design, minimal content, insultingly stupid quest design\*, and bad balance. > > \*Hint: Just because some people sprint past the quest and storyline explanation does not mean you, as a designer, get to mock everyone and ignore cool stuff for dumbassery. Heh. I didn’t get to play the beta (the fool thing kept crashing on me), but when I translated that game I was as tickled by the concept of Ego damage and powers as the Let’sPlayer. I LOVE MYSELF SO MUCH IT HURTS \*\*YOU \*\*! ---
**Author:** ![Jayt443](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8797f3/32.png) [@Jayt443](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jayt443)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2010, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/49 "2010-09-04T04:15:34Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > > [@Jayt443](#): > > > > Oo.o tanker can utilize 2 elements plus weapon now? > > You want an Axe? Tanker has Battle Axe for a secondary. You want frost armor? It has Ice Armor as a primary. You want to shoot lightning? You can either take Laser Beam Eyes from the Energy Mastery power pool which opens up at level 41 or Mu Lightning from the Mu Mastery power pool, which used to be only available to villains but has recently been opened up to h. I understand that, the one tune I managed to max out was invul EM tanker but it’s just kinda sucks u gotta wait til lvl 41 for that last pool which ofcourse Is the least dynamic and hardly as “epic” as it should be after all that. I feel that both of these games kinda peak at creation and although having access to all pools at every level does allow much more room for balancing issue, at least it’s more interesting and allows a greater chance to even make it to the cap. I played both CoH and CoV for like half a year and only got 1 hero to 50. Lol just hard to stay interested. But I guess I just appreciate more flashy modernized appeal vs features and content/story. Can’t see how so many people can stand runescape.. lol ---
**Author:** ![demonkillerX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7feea3/32.png) [@demonkillerX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/demonkillerX)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2011, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/50 "2011-10-22T22:56:23Z")
i personally think that coh is better because these days (10/22/11) Champion online sucked up:o it was so bad because of its graphic issues + champion online’s quest was not as fun as coh/cov coh got me hooked on for along time im about to be level 29 currently 28 but champion online only got my intrest up to level 8 i didnt like it while i did the quest because it felt boring and its like u dont need any experience in mmorpg’s to play its bs wat do u think? coh/cov or champion online ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2011, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442/51 "2011-10-23T03:36:47Z")
Zombie thread. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decide-champions-online-vs-city-of-heroes-villians/536442.md?page=2)