City of Heroes

Thanks to the "super" cool community...I'll be playing soon enough...umm....which would be one the better servers though?....Its been so long since I have played...I was hoping to get some feedback before I build a new toon...any certain servers PvP focused?...Or RPG oriented?...heh..I know my questions might seem a bit broad or lame...oh well

I played on pennacle for city of heroes and had an amazing time, i met some of the best people and am still friends with them today and I played on justice for CoV and found alot of popularity there. lots of villians and lots of people, good people too( ain't that ironic lol) but I played back and started the game on october of 2005 and beta tested cov and quit about a year after cov but ive always found myself coming back for a few months and still finding great people.

I think the general consensus is that Freedom is the most populated server. If you like teaming a lot, it's a good server to choose. Some also feel it's the most "immature" server. That's probably inevitable due to the "more people you have, the higher the percentage of asshats" rule.  I play on Freedom quite a bit and I have had mostly (95% or more) positive experiences. 

Virtue is the unofficial roleplaying server. I think it's also considered the second highest populated. I play on there a lot also and love it.

There's also a server that's been designated the "drunk" server (Pinnacle?). I've never played on it, but I always thought that was funny.

I'd comment more on PvP for you, but I just don't know anything about it. There's a whole section devoted to PvP on the official forums and I'm sure you could find a lot of good info there.

I really don't know if there is "bad" server. My main is on Virtue, but my main alt is on Infinity. I've never had any trouble finding a group when I wanted one on any of the servers.

Of course, you're going to run into immaturity and jerks on any of them. Don't play on Freedom, so I can't really vouch for it's maturity level. The Virtue crowd does seem to be on the older side.

The most populated server is always Freedom, tats probably the PvP server too..

However, Vir is the most populated Villains server from wat i know

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There's also a server that's been designated the "drunk" server (Pinnacle?). I've never played on it, but I always thought that was funny.

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In the very early days, it was standard to have server downtime every day from 9-11. (This is down to 2-3 times a week now.) Many players would be waiting for them to come back up, so they'd be watching the server status. First would come the West Coast servers (Freedom, Virtue, Justice, Protector...). Then a few minutes later the rest on the East Coast would come up (Infinity, Liberty, Victory, Triumph...). But not Pinnacle (east).

Pinnacle was always several minutes to an hour behind the other servers in coming up after downtime. People started joking that the server was sleeping in. Which led to the server having a hangover. Which led to calling it "the drunk server."

So techincally the server is there, not the players. Although the latter is true often enough as well.

Here is my impression of the different servers from playing on a bunch and talking to other multi-server people. Bear in mind you can find any type of group anywhere. But in theory people gravitate toward similar types.

Freedom: Always has people, sometimes TOO crowded (lockouts during the busiest weekends, spammers love it). Good PvP, decent villain community.
Justice: Casual server, medium population.
Pinnacle: Great for badge collecting, some RP though that has largely shifted to Virtue. Pinnacle is very much a "cult of personality" and thus you are either loud and bold to mix with other loud, bold people, or you have a long ignore list.
Virtue: "Unofficial" RP server. The second most populated, it can lock out but is not as likely to as Freedom. Pretty organized for big events and such too, due to the dedicated RP community.
Liberty: Once known as "the friendly" server, it's still pretty nice (although I think it lost that title to Infinity). Great for badge collecting. Some PvP.
Guardian: Casual server, medium population.
Infinity: Around 3rd-5th largest depending on time of day, this is my adopted home server. :) Well-organized (if a little quiet) badge channel and a friendly population stemming out from it.
Protector: Possibly the only server better for villains than heroes. (Technically heroes may have more people, but there is more continuity, dedicated play, and badging on the villain side.) That may be changing though, as the population overall has been small of late.
Victory: Casual server, smaller population.
Champion: A year or so ago this was voted the "best" server for PvP. Whether that's because it has the most players, or just the ones most likely to vote, I don't know. But it speaks well of them. On the larger side.
Triumph: Casual server, on the smallish side.

The ones I labeled "casual" are often because nothing stands out to me one way or another, which pretty much meets my description of "casual."

In terms of population, the order bounces around a *lot* except for Freedom and Virtue being the most populated. (Servers in-game are ordered least-to-most, with the most recent server you played on being on top.) I've seen Liberty, for example, anywhere from top 4 to bottom 2. That much swing means most are pretty comparable in terms of size, and only vary by time of day. And honestly, with the possible exception of villains, I never really have trouble finding a team anywhere so I tend to favor the non-Freedom ones.