The Kobold Trapsmith, cast adrift in time until she found the ACME robot catalog, has ended her career. She did not succeed at killing magic with the power of laser cannons. City of Heroes and Villians, Paragon City and the Rogue Isles and the First Ward too, closed their doors friday.

And I received a startlingly anonymous check on Thursday from my credit card. After I spent an hour finding out it came from NCSoft, I logged in for the last time with ninety dollars I had pledged to Paragon Studios sitting next to me. I didn't stand in Atlas Square, I didn't visit either long-abandoned superbase. Instead I finished Black Scorpion's plot arc.

And when robots triumphed I found new places and new systems. Remote contact auto-introductions! Who is this Fireball person and why does he have no face?

Oh. He is a fireball who gained sentience by being cast a lot. In the surreal afterlife of the alternate universe. A jive-talking spell sent me to destroy Antimagic with the help of Counterspell and Restoration. This is not a thing I have done before or, in fact, expect to do again. This ending is better than being sad in a generic cityscape.

In conclusion, this is designed to make you sad: http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/1.....ity-of-heroes/