If you’re like me then you might be curious about how the City of Heroes Homecoming server is doing. You’ll certainly have noticed that the population has declined quite a bit. Well, recently the Homecoming developers released a few statistics to help shed some light on the situation.
Since the servers launched in April 2019 159,537 accounts have been made on the Homecoming servers. At its peak, in May 2019 the servers had 9,998 users online concurrently. You can compare that to the 3,495 peak in February 2020, a pretty significant difference. The average number of concurrent users in February 2020 was 1,861. In May 2019 that number was 5,297. So yes, it is pretty clear that the population of the servers is on the decline. Check out the table below for a month by month breakdown of accounts and concurrent users.
It’s also interesting to see that since the start of the year the Homecoming team has started tracking the number of active accounts. In January, that number was 31,061 and in February it actually climbed a bit to 32,164. So, while all those numbers before talking about concurrent players may sound scary and a little bit low, the reality is there are more than 30,000 people playing on the City of Heroes Homecoming servers right now AND that number is climbing!
Since Homecoming launched in April the game has been played for 47,360,000 hours, that’s an amazing 5,402 years. Broken down by server Excelsior accounts for the largest chunk, 14,060,000 hours. It’s all the roleplayers standing around in Pocket D. But I won’t admit to how many of those hours are mine…it’s a lot though. Reunion takes up the rear with just 4,232,000 hours, the slackers.
1,207,409 characters have been made on Homecoming so far. At least half of those are mine…seriously, I’ve got a terrible alt addiction…send help. Once again Excelsior is in the lead, accounting for 336,026 of those characters. So if you’re ever trying to come up with a name for a new character and all your ideas are taken…well, now you know why. Reunion is again at the bottom with 141,732 characters.
Of the 1.2 million characters that have been made on Homecoming 330,397 of them have been played this year. 105,017 of them are from Excelsior while 34,748 are from Reunion.
1,706,264 Veteran Levels have been earned across all the servers. The highest character, Veracor from Everlasting tops the charts at Veteran Level 2,273!
When those Veteran Levels are broken down by server though, Excelsior is once again the king of the hill with 539,566 Veteran Levels. So clearly not EVERYONE is standing around the D…at least not all the time. Reunion is at the bottom, and it’s starting to feel a bit like I’m picking on them, but I swear I’m not, they have earned 118,713 Veteran Levels.
There is some good news for Reunion though! They aren’t at the bottom when it comes to the single person with the highest number of Veteran Levels. That goes to Indomitable whose highest is 555. As mentioned before, Veracor takes the top for Everlasting.
Character Stats
When it comes to a character’s origin Magic is the most picked, accounting for 347,517 characters. Science is at the bottom with 173,432.
A breakdown of character Archetypes shows that Brutes are the most popular, there are 178,213 of them. Meanwhile, there are only 14,613 Widows.
When it comes to the amount of time spent playing each Archetype…well…ya’ll…we gotta talk about this. Brutes account for 19,259,963 hours. Remember, all players have played for 47,360,000 hours. The next highest is Tankers, with 3,963,430 hours. I mean… look at this chart!
It’s practically comical! Why are Brutes so popular? Brute Fiery Aura. Farming.
It distorts everything so much in fact that charts have also been made that exclude specifically Brute Fiery Aura. In fact, when you do that there are actually more Blasters in the game than Brutes. For time played Brute is still on top by a significant margin but it isn’t quite as comically bad.
There are 27,473 Brutes at level 50, once again, Fiery Aura distorts the whole thing and when that Powerset is removed Brute drops down to third with 11,362. That means there are 16,111 Fiery Aura Brutes at level 50. That’s more than any archetype in the game. Warshade is the least popular at 50, there are only 1,333 of them.
When it comes to the amount of time played by archetype at level 50 Fiery Aura distorts everything again. Brutes account for 14,747,882 hours. If Fiery Aura Brutes are removed that number drops to 2,619,209. Widows are at the bottom once again with just 178,853 hours played at level 50.
Archetype Breakdown
Blasters
When it comes to Blasters at level 50 Fire Blast is by far the most popular. They account for 2,793 of the 12,926 who are at 50. The secondary powerset is a bit better spread out, Energy Manipulation is the most popular and Ninja Training is the least. Fire/Fire is the most popular combination though, 970 characters have that combination. Meanwhile, at the bottom, there are just 2 Assault Rifle/Elec characters.
Brutes
At level 50 Spines is the most popular primary and Fiery Aura is the most popular secondary. Kinetic Attack is the least popular primary, there are just 163 of them at 50. Ice armor is the least popular secondary with 237. It should come as no surprise that Spines/Fiery Aura is the most popular combination. There are 8,864 of them. The next highest is Radiation/Fiery Aura at 3,423. It isn’t until number 4 that you see something that isn’t Fiery Aura, it is Elec/Shield with 695. As someone who is one of those 695 let me tell you…it is a blast. At the bottom of the pile 5 combinations are tied, each of them with only 1 level 50. They are Stone/Super Reflexes, Broad Sword/Stone, Battle Axe/Super Reflexes, Kinetic Attack/Ice, and Claws/Ice.
Controllers
Fire and Illusion are both very popular primaries at level 50. The two primary powersets are quite close to one another with 3,322 and 2,923 respectively. Mind control is the least popular with 438. When it comes to secondary powersets there is a clear favorite. 3,718 in Kinetics while the next highest is Radiation Emission at just 1,824. The lowest is Trick Arrow with 109. Fire/Kin is the most popular combination, making up 2,459 of all Controllers at level 50. The next highest is Ill/Rad with 973. Dark/Traps and Ice/Traps are both at the bottom with just 2 each.
Corruptor
Fire Blast is the most popular Corruptor Primary while Assault Rifle is, unsurprisingly, the least popular. Meanwhile in the secondary powersets Kinetics is in the lead while Traps is at the bottom of the pile. So of course, Fire/Kin is the most popular combination with 587 of them at level 50. Meanwhile, there are 7 that have just 1 character at level 50 with these combinations; Assault Rifle/Force Field, Assault Rifle/Thermal Radiation, Energy Blast/Trick Arrow, Dark Blast/Trick Arrow, Sonic/Traps, Psychic Blast/Trick Arrow, and Energy Blast/Poison.
Defender
There is no doubt that Empathy is the most popular primary powerset for a Defender while Traps is the least popular. I’ll admit I was surprised to see that Trick Arrow is more popular than Traps. I was also surprised to see there weren’t more using Kinetics. The Defender secondary powerset are a whole lot more well rounded than others have been, though there are just 86 with Assault Rifle. Empathy/Radiation is actually the most popular combination. There are 326 of them. At the bottom Trick Arrow/Energy Blast, Trick Arrow/Water, Traps/Electrical Blast, Storm/Assault Rifle, Storm/Beam Rifle, and Nature Affinity/Assault Rifle all have just 1 character each.
Dominator
Dominators are very well rounded when it comes to the popularity of primary powersets. Yes, Plant Control is in the lead but it only has a lead of 16 characters. Even the least popular powerset, Ice Control has a decent 341 characters. In the secondary powerset however, things are a bit less balanced. Psionic Assault is by far the most popular, with nearly double the amount of the next highest, Fiery Assault. Mind/Psi is the most popular combination while Elec/Thorns and Ice/Elec are at the bottom with just 4 characters with each combination.
Mastermind
Mastermind is always an interesting one to see statistics on because it is so plainly obvious what they are when you see them out in the open world. So, if you’ve ever felt like you see more Robots than any other type of Mastermind well…you’re most likely right. There are 1,973 Robotics Masterminds at level 50, in comparison to the 368 for Mercenaries at the bottom. Secondary powerset have a pretty decent spread from Trick Arrow at the bottom with 67 characters up to the 1,025 Dark Miasma characters. Robots/Force Fields is the most popular combination while there is just 1 Necromancy/Trick Arrow character.
Scrapper
If it weren’t for Titan Weapons you could say that Scrappers at level 50 are pretty well rounded, but well… Titan Weapons dominates them all while Battle Axe is at the bottom. My personal favorite, Katana is at number 5. Bio Armor is the most popular secondary for Scrappers while Ice Armor is at the bottom with 188. It shouldn’t be a surprise that Titan Weapons/Bio Armor is the most popular combination. The least popular is Ice/Super Reflexes. There’s just 1 of them. My personal favorite, Katana/Super Reflexes is at number 30 with 95 of them at level 50.
Sentinel
Sentinel is the really interesting one because it is the new kid on the block. This Archetype was created by the players, not Paragon Studio developers. Fire Blast is the most popular primary and Regen is the most popular secondary. However, more Sentinels at level 50 are actually playing Fire/Fire. Fire/Regen is the 11th most popular. Assault Rife/Ice Armor is the least popular, there is only one of them.
Stalker
Psionic Melee is clearly the most popular primary for Stalkers at level 50 with Fiery Melee at the bottom. Energy Aura is the most popular secondary. But it is Elec/Shield that is the most popular combination. Broad Sword/Ice, Martial Arts/Ice, Martial Arts/Elec, Dark/Ice, Kin/Ice, Martial Arts/Fiery Aura, and Fiery Melee/Elect account for just 1 character each.
Tanker
Super Strength Tanks dominate the scene, making up almost half of all Tanks at 50. Meanwhile, there are just 74 Claws and 77 with Katana. Invulnerability is the most popular primary powerset while Super Reflexes is the least popular. So, of course, Invulnerability/Super Strength is the most popular powerset combination for Tankers. Stone Armor/Katana and Super Reflexes/War Mace both have just 1.
At the moment this is where the data ends. There are two further post spots reserved on the forum post where this was all announced but there hasn’t been any update for more than a day so I’m not entirely sure what else they have planned, if anything. If you’re counting Archetypes you’ll notice that Peacebringer, Warshade, Arachnos Soldier, and Arachnos Widow aren’t included. In the case of Peacebringers and Warshades, this makes perfect sense. There is only one Primary and Secondary for each archetype. Soldier and Widow are also complicated because of their unusual branching system. So, it is entirely possible that no data about them will be provided. Which is honestly entirely fair.
What I’ve learned from all of this is that there are a whole lot more people playing the Homecoming servers than you might expect, or at least more than I expected. I also learned that there are a few gaps in what is at level 50. In fact, there are a few Primary/Secondary combinations that don’t have any 50 representation at all! I don’t know about you, but I’m planning on rolling up a new character or two to fill those in.
I’d like to say a huge thank you to Cipher over on the Homecoming Forums for posting all of this beautiful data. If you’re interested in seeing the data and the comments about it you can find it on the March 2020 Homecoming Statistics Forum Post.