Unity Rally

This article contains information about a past event in Homecoming: City of Heroes/Villains. It is provided for historical purposes.

Overview

In response to the Black Friday announcement, City of Heroes players gathered in Atlas Park on the Virtue server on September 8, 2012, at 5:00 PM Eastern, in a show of support for the developers at Paragon Studios.

Before the Rally

Precursor

An "All Servers' Vigil" on September 3, 2012 was organized by Rubberlad through the official City of Heroes forums. People from several servers turned out, and while it did not have the same response as the later Unity Rally, some servers had multiple instances of Atlas Park running during the vigil.

Announcement

The event was first announced by TonyV on the City of Heroes and Titan Network forums in the early hours of September 5. DJ Pheonyx of The Cape Radio was quick to offer to broadcast the Unity Rally live, and word began to spread rapidly on various social media sites. Players began suggesting that those in attendance should hold torches as a symbolic display of the flame that they carried for the game.

Rally Day

Players began to gather on Virtue several hours before the start of the rally. Many started flashback or Architect Entertainment missions in order to prevent the game from automatically logging them out while they camped out for the event. By the time the rally began at 5:00 PM Eastern, Virtue had filled with a backlog of 200 queued players waiting to join the server. Players began to overflow to Freedom in order to continue filling Atlas Park.

In addition to The Cape's brodcast, AFKRadio broadcast superhero music during the event and Massively covered the rally via live stream on Twitch TV.

Transcript of TonyV's Speech

Editor's Note:

This speech was delivered in Virtue's Help channel in-game. It has been modified from its original format of multiple single-line channel messages to a more readable paragraph format. Punctuation, spelling, and all other aspects of the message have not been changed, except where absolutely necessary to maintain readability.

TonyV: Heya all, I wish I could tell you words to describe how I'm feeling right now. Oh wait, the mods aren't here... I CAN tell you those words!  ;) (I kid, I kid!) I can sum up what I'm seeing right now in two words: MIND. BLOWN. I stand here in the train station on Atlas 13, I am seeing 33 instances of Atlas Park. Now if I remember correctly, each instance holds 100 people. (I don't know that for a fact, so don't bust my chops if I'm off by a little.) That's upwards of 3300 people all in one place at one time. That's simply incredible. I just wanted to tell you all that this is the most amazing community. EVER.

So let me tell you a little bit about what we've done in just ONE WEEK. We've mobilized people across a ton of social media outlets. Facebook has been exploding with Likes, Shares, tags, and a bunch of boards dedicated to the cause of saving our beloved Paragon City. Right now on Twitter, #SaveCoH is the TOP trending topic. We've put out press releases, and thanks to our friends in the gaming, comic, and technology media, we have over a hundred articles posted on blogs, news sites, video podcats, etc. I have to give a really special shoutout to Massively, who is broadcasting our Unity Rally LIVE at http://www.twitch.tv/massivelytv You guys at Massively rock, and I can't tell you how much gratitude we have for your excellent coverage of our game.

(33 Atlas Parks and counting!)

At the Titan Network, we have welcomed people who want to congregate and be part of the effort to Save Paragon City. Our own membership numbers have positively exploded by an order of magnitude. We organized a letter-writing campaign to NCsoft, and I've read a bunch of the letters people have posted and copied us on. They are amazing stories of how incredibly strong our community is, and how much City of Heroes means to us. And I can tell you, they WILL make a difference.

In the coming week, we're going to be organizing a couple of other important campaigns. One, we'll tell you about today and post information on during the Unity Rally. One, we'll tell you about within a day or two. Your unwavering support is GREATLY appreciated. I've reached out to NCsoft, and I have gathered some contact information for other key people that we'll need to community with, people who have the decision-making ability for us all to win. I KNOW they are paying attention, and I am VERY optimistic that these effots really are getting a lot of attention within the company. I've also talked to some of the staffers at Paragon Studios. I can't really say anything, but everyone I've talked to is also optimistic and upbeat, and they all are VERY appreciative of our efforts and the outpouring of support. As much as this game is our baby, it is even moreso theirs. It is what they've poured their life's passion into, many of them for 10 years or more. Our willingness to stand up for what it represents really is giving them a morale booster shot.

So with that, let's talk about our next campaign! I've been working with one of the members of our community. She told me about an idea she had, and as soon as I heard it, I thought, "Wow, that's EXACTLY what we need!" So since she came up with the idea and has been driving it, I want her to tell you about it. Her name is @Maressa, and she'll show up as Meticulous Meta in the channel. @Maressa, I'll turn it over to you!!!

Meticulous Meta: Hi everyone! A huge thank you to everyone here! And an even bigger one for Tony! I am super excited to have been here with you all for the last 12 hours. It has been amazing. I know there have been a lot of calls for people to send things in to the NCSoft Offices. Well now we're going to! But its not food. We're SEnding in Capes and Masks! I'll be posting some information on the forums soon. Addresses, links to masks and capes you can send in. City of Heroes forums and Titan forums both. Also, be taking screenshots today. We have a plan which will be announced in a few days. Thank you all for coming. Keep yup those tweets: @NCSoftGames we are Heroes. This is what we do! #SaveCoH Ok everyone! I'm going to turn it back over to Tony now. Thanks for listening!

TonyV: Thanks, @Maressa! So just a couple more notes, and then I'll leave you all to party.  :) First, be sure to keep track of our efforts at the Titan Network forums: http://www.cohtitan.com/forum In particular, the Save Paragon City! forum. Second, I cannot emphasize this enough: PLEASE continue to get the word out! Join one of the City of Heroes groups. One in particular I've been active on is Save City Of Heroes. On Twitter, please tweet out our activities using the hash tag #SaveCoH We're in the process of setting up a YouTube channel for multimedia expressions of our commitment. (Side note: Be sure to search for Save City of Zero Wing for a treat.) Keep posting your support for our awesome Paragon Studios staff on the official forums. These people build the world in which our imaginations have lived for over eight and a half years, and they deserve all of our kudos and support. When you run across media coverage of our efforts, please engage in any comment sections or discussion forums they have, and let them know that we REALLY appreciate their coverage of our effotts. *efforts. I knew I couldn't get through this without a typo.  ;) Be sure to tune in to The Cape Radio (www.thecaperadio.com), who has been an incredible source of entertainment for our community and who is covering the rally today. Oh, and THANK YOU, citizens of Virtue for hosting our party today and for being such gracious and wonderful hosts! Don't forget to stick around at 6:00 Eastern for the Paragon Appreciation Costume Contest, the LARGEST costume contest held in a gaming community EVER.

I'll wrap up with one more thought. A famous man once said, 'Y'all got on this boat for different reasons, but y'all come to the same place. So now I'm asking more of you than I have before.' Some people think that this is the end of our incredible community. Well, I can tell you that I do not hold to that. No more runnin'. I aim to misbehave.  ;)

Because of the overwhelming response, the servers had to spawn multiple instances of of Atlas Park in order to bear the load of the characters that were entering the zone. Before the rally ended, 33 instances of Atlas Park had been spawned on Virtue with approximately 300+ people in the server's queue. Another 11 instances of Atlas Park had been spawned on Freedom and spillover from Freedom had started logging into Infinity.

Aftermath

At it's peak, the Unity Rally produced 33 instances of Atlas Park on the Virtue server. Atlas Park 33 (or AP33) - as well as the HoldTorch emote used by many participants in the rally - became a symbol for the community's unity and strength in numbers. AP33 became a rallying cry of the #SaveCoH movement.

When the Unity Rally ended, several players left their characters logged in to Atlas Park 33, holding torches and standing vigil in order to hold the zone open for as long as possible. It was originally assumed that the vigil would only last until the next shutdown of the servers for maintenance. This, however, proved not to be the case. Through the aid of one or more employees who remained employed either by Paragon Studios or NCsoft, each time the severs were brought back up, Atlas Park 33 was respawned on Virtue for players to reenter and resume standing vigil. These torchlight vigils continued right up to the final moments when the servers were brought down for the last time.

Gallery

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  The Cape Radio's Unity Rally Flyer
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  Atlas 8
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  Atlas 9
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  Atlas 10
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  Atlas 11
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  Atlas 12
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  Atlas 14
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  Atlas 15
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  Atlas 17
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  Atlas 18
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  Atlas 19
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  Atlas 20
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  Atlas 21
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  Atlas 22
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  Atlas 23
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  Atlas 24
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  Atlas 25
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  Atlas 26
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  Atlas 27
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  Atlas 28
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  Atlas 29
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  Atlas 30
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  Atlas 32
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  AP33 Logo by Captain Bacon
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  AP33 Coin by Thirty7
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  Atlas Park 33 Torch by EspionageDB7
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  Real World Hero 2012 Commemorative AP33 Patch

Media Response

• City of Heroes Protest Takes Its Case to City Hall at Kotaku.com

See Also

• Call to Action: Unity Rally on the Titan Network forums
• [Call to Action: Unity Rally] archived from City of Heroes official forums at Archive.org
• Heroes composite video of characters present across all instances of Atlas Park by Leandro
• The Ballad of Tony V on the Titan Network forums