What's New in Homecoming for Returning Players (2025)

Player Guide Notice

This article is a Player Guide. The Homecoming Wiki takes no responsibility for the content within.

Questions and concerns should be posed to the authors of the article using the article's talk page.

Contents

  • 1 Assumptions
  • 2 Starting Out
    • 2.1 Before you begin
    • 2.2 Client
    • 2.3 Starting the Game
      • 2.3.1 Live Service
      • 2.3.2 Beta Service
  • 3 Basic Play
    • 3.1 Character Creation: Heroes or Villains
    • 3.2 Experienced Players: Epic and Praetorian Characters
    • 3.3 Beginning Play: Everyone starts HC with nothing.
    • 3.4 Mission Management: What now?
  • 4 Overview of Additional Changes Since Live
    • 4.1 Architect
    • 4.3 Costumes
    • 4.4 Custom XP Rates
    • 4.5 Day Jobs/Patrol XP
    • 4.6 Debt
    • 4.7 Enhancement Upgrades (New to HC: Upgrade button for DO/SOs)
    • 4.8 Flashback
    • 4.9 Incarnate
    • 4.10 Mission Arcs
    • 4.11 Ouroboros
    • 4.12 PvP (New to HC: Temporal Warrior Mode)
    • 4.13 Pocket D
    • 4.14 Power Pools
    • 4.16 Respec
    • 4.17 Roleplaying
    • 4.19 Seasonal Events
    • 4.20 Shopping
    • 4.21 Signature Story Arcs
    • 4.22 Supergroups and Bases
    • 4.23 Task Forces, Trials, iTrials and Raids
    • 4.24 Temp Powers / S.T.A.R.T.
    • 4.25 Travel
    • 4.26 Veteran Levels
    • 4.27 Zones
  • 5 Adjustments From Live
  • 6 Updated Tools (Build Planner, Mods)
  • 7 Support

Assumptions

The reader is finding out about Homecoming: City of Heroes for the first time since the Live shutdown and want to get started quickly. Here's what to know.

This is a quick reference to years of patch notes concerning changes Homecoming made over the live game. For more details:

Topics below "Starting Out" are collapsed by default to avoid overwhelming a reader.

Starting Out

Before you begin

All vestiges of Microtransactions (Paragon Market, Paragon Rewards) and Game Subscription Fees (Veteran Rewards Program) have been eliminated. Players do not need a form of payment to play at all. Old NCSoft Software Keys no longer function and do nothing to grant access to Homecoming.

  • Create a forum account at Homecoming Servers first. A player needs to have an email address ready to check for a link before signing in.
    • Only one game account per Email Address for password recovery. For multiboxing or other players in your house, a different email address for each account is required.
    • Once the Forum Account is made, a player can control their game account here. Without a Game Account, the Client will not log in. (A forum name and password will not start City of Heroes.)
  • There are System Requirements, however, most modern PC and Mac computers since 2018 with some form of on-board graphics can play the game even if it is not a "Gaming PC".
    • Use Mac or Linux? No problem. See Homecoming Launcher for more info specific to those Operating Systems.

Client

PLAYERS DO NOT NEED THE NCSOFT LAUNCHER OR PRIOR COH PATCHER.

Those are both hard-coded to connect to NCSoft's servers which are no longer available.

The Homecoming: City of Heroes Game Client is downloaded with the HC Launcher app, which can be obtained from the Getting Started guide on the Homecoming Forums.

All players start over in Homecoming with nothing. They can copy Architect, Costumes, and Power Customization files from a prior installation over if preferred.

Starting the Game

There are three choices from the Homecoming Launcher (in bold and numbered.) A player can optionally hide any of these choices by clicking the gear icon to open Settings and pick which launcher on the left they want to change and checking "Hide".

Live Service

#1: Homecoming - This is the main service. It contains six servers, or shards, to create a character on:

  • Torchbearer
  • Excelsior
  • Everlasting (Unofficial RP Server)
  • Indomitable (Unofficial PvP Server)
  • Victory
  • Reunion (Official EU Server, located in Germany)

The top five shards are based in Canada on the North American Eastern Time Zone. Server "stress level" still works on login and shows when the server is closer to being full (three red dots). This information is also visible in the HC Launcher on the bottom panel. Weekly Server Maintenance is typically Tuesday Mornings in the AM. A server maintenance period can also happen anytime an Issue or Page release is imminent.

There is also a Diagnostic Client available for 64-bit installations which is hidden by default. More information can be found here.

Beta Service

#2: Staging (Shadow) - This Server holds the Staging Copy of the server. For Beta, Staging is the final test of the Beta Release before it goes live to all five Homecoming shards. Staging is also used to test 'quick release' changes to the Server which happen infrequently.

#3: Beta (Brainstorm) - This Server holds the Public Beta Test of the next Issue Release. (At the time of this writing, Issue 27.) Smaller releases, called Pages (Issue 27, Page 6) are also tested in Beta.

Advice here applies to Beta Shards with three key differences:

  • Beta Shards can be wiped with no prior notice.
  • While players can make a copy of their live service characters for play on Beta, no content on the Beta Shards you make or play will ever be transferred back to Live.
  • To help test Quality of Life and Endgame changes, Beta servers may have "cheats" enabled optionally to boost characters, grant Influence or populate enhancements to slot on demand.

Further information about the Beta Shards can be found here.

Basic Play

Character Creation: Heroes or Villains

Click to Read

Experienced Players: Epic and Praetorian Characters

Click to Read

Beginning Play: Everyone starts HC with nothing.

Click to Read

Mission Management: What now?

Click to Read

Overview of Additional Changes Since Live

Architect

Click to Read

Alignment & Tip Missions

Click to Read

Costumes

Click to Read

Custom XP Rates

Click to Read

Day Jobs/Patrol XP

Click to Read

Debt

Click to Read

Enhancement Upgrades (New to HC: Upgrade button for DO/SOs)

Click to Read

Flashback

Click to Read

Incarnate

Click to Read

Mission Arcs

Click to Read

Ouroboros

Click to Read

PvP (New to HC: Temporal Warrior Mode)

Click to Read

Pocket D

Click to Read

Power Pools

Click to Read

Prismatic & Monstrous Aether (New to HC: Prestige Costumes)

Click to Read

Respec

Click to Read

Roleplaying

Click to Read

Safeguard/Mayhem (Radio & Newspaper)

Click to Read

Seasonal Events

Click to Read

Shopping

Click to Read

Signature Story Arcs

Click to Read

Supergroups and Bases

Click to Read

Task Forces, Trials, iTrials and Raids

Click to Read

Temp Powers / S.T.A.R.T.

Click to Read

Travel

Click to Read

Veteran Levels

Click to Read

Zones

Click to Read

Adjustments From Live

Click to Read

Updated Tools (Build Planner, Mods)

Click to Read

Support

Click to Read

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