Debt
Overview
When a hero or villain is defeated, he accrues experience debt, which slows his ability to reach the next level.
Debt does not accrue until the character reaches experience level ten. As the character rises in level, the amount of debt he accrues per defeat increases, as does the maximum total amount of debt he can accumulate. A character can have a maximum of five full defeats' worth of debt.
Some powers and situations reduce or even eliminate the amount of debt earned by a defeat. Most prominently, a character defeated while in an instanced mission accrues only half the normal amount of debt. Also, some resurrection effects render the revived character immune to debt for a brief period, in the event that he is immediately defeated again. In addition, if a character has Patrol Experience, it is used to pay off any debt earned up to the amount of Patrol XP the character has accumulated.
Working Off Debt
When a character has experience debt, up to half of any experience reward earned is subtracted from the reward and applied toward debt repayment. (If the amount of a character's remaining debt is less than the value of half the experience reward, only an amount equal to the character's remaining debt is subtracted from the reward and applied toward debt repayment.) The remaining experience reward is applied toward the character's advancement.
With the introduction of Supersidekicking in Issue 16, players earn experience rewards as normal while Exemplared or Malefactored. As a result, there is currently no way to prevent debt from being payed off, nor is there a way to pay off at a higher rate during normal game play.
It is, however, possible to pay off debt while logged out by accumulating Patrol XP.
Strategic Use of Debt
This section contains information about changes that took place in Homecoming: City of Heroes/Villains. It is provided for historical purposes.
This type of debt usage is not needed anymore as XP can be turned off in the Options window.
On certain occasions, a character may not want to level up. In such cases, the player may deliberately accrue debt to slow the character's progression.
For example, a player may not want to outlevel his Contacts. He may be trying to get a specific badge mission or Story Arc from a Contact, or he may be a villain trying to unlock an unlockable CoV Contact while that Contact will still speak with him.
Since debt also counts toward debt badges, hardcore badge-collecting players may want to generate debt specifically to work on earning the debt badges.
Also, a character might want to earn badges for Accolades at a lower level to have access them in a PvP zone like Bloody Bay, as the game remembers what level the accolade was earned at, and will deny a character the use of the accolade power if it was earned it at a higher level than the level of the zone.
Additionally, debt can be used to increase the amount of inf that a character gains at each level, since he will spend more time playing between levels.
To work off debt more quickly, a character may serve as an Exemplar or Malefactor. While this arrangement exists, all experience the character earns is applied toward his debt.
It should be noted that several of these goals may be accomplished by being an Exemplar/Malefactor to a lower-level player as well, particularly the last one. Serving as an Exemplar halts a character's leveling progress completely. Debt only slows it to half speed.
Debt Table
Debt values up to date as of August 20, 2009.
| Level | Debt | Debt Cap | Level | Debt | Debt Cap |
| 1 | 0 | 0 | 26 | 4,400 | 22,000 |
| 2 | 0 | 0 | 27 | 5,400 | 27,000 |
| 3 | 0 | 0 | 28 | 6,400 | 32,000 |
| 4 | 0 | 0 | 29 | 7,200 | 36,000 |
| 5 | 0 | 0 | 30 | 8,000 | 40,000 |
| 6 | 0 | 0 | 31 | 9,200 | 46,000 |
| 7 | 0 | 0 | 32 | 10,400 | 52,000 |
| 8 | 0 | 0 | 33 | 11,600 | 58,000 |
| 9 | 0 | 0 | 34 | 12,800 | 64,000 |
| 10 | 160 | 800 | 35 | 14,800 | 74,000 |
| 11 | 220 | 1,100 | 36 | 16,800 | 84,000 |
| 12 | 280 | 1,400 | 37 | 18,400 | 92,000 |
| 13 | 320 | 1,600 | 38 | 20,800 | 104,000 |
| 14 | 380 | 1,900 | 39 | 24,000 | 120,000 |
| 15 | 440 | 2,200 | 40 | 26,800 | 134,000 |
| 16 | 520 | 2,600 | 41 | 30,000 | 150,000 |
| 17 | 640 | 3,200 | 42 | 34,000 | 170,000 |
| 18 | 760 | 3,800 | 43 | 38,400 | 192,000 |
| 19 | 880 | 4,400 | 44 | 43,200 | 216,000 |
| 20 | 1,000 | 5,000 | 45 | 48,800 | 244,000 |
| 21 | 1400 | 7,000 | 46 | 55,200 | 276,000 |
| 22 | 1,800 | 9,000 | 47 | 61,600 | 308,000 |
| 23 | 2,200 | 11,000 | 48 | 69,600 | 348,000 |
| 24 | 2,800 | 14,000 | 49 | 79,200 | 396,000 |
| 25 | 3,400 | 17,000 | 50 | 88,000 | 440,000 |