In the latest state of the game update, Executive Producer Shannon Posniewski revealed that "Champions Online" will be adopting a free-to-play model. In addition, "Heroic Archtypes" were announced, which are intended to help streamline character creation and the selection of powers.
"First of all, you can (and should!) still subscribe to Champions Online. If you continue to subscribe (and become a "Gold Member"), then what you get doesn't change from what you get today. You still get all the zones, all the levels, all existing and future adventure packs, and all the costume parts available today (plus a bunch of new ones). You still have complete control over what powers your hero has (as well as their color), just like today. The only difference you'll see is that there will be more things in the C-Store to buy, if you are so inclined.
Current lifetime subscribers automatically become Gold Members for life and get all the same benefits.
Non-subscribers ("Silver Players") don't get all of that. Most importantly, they don't get complete control over what powers their heroes get. Instead, they can only create heroes by choosing an Archetype. Though the power progression is predefined, the player can tailor the powers with their choice of Advantages. Silver Players are also limited in other ways such as inventory, bank and marketplace space. Of course, Silver Players retain full control over how their character looks using the costume editor. They also get access to all the zones and levels.
If you decide to switch from Gold to Silver, your characters will still be there. However, you won't be able to play them until either you re-subscribe or you convert them into Silver characters. Exactly how this will work is still being determined.
There are several other ways that Gold Members and Silver Players differ. We have a Features Matrix published right here with the exact differences."
Heroic Archetypes:
"The really big thing we're doing is adding a whole new way to choose your hero's powers! When you create a hero, you may choose an Archetype, which will specify which powers you earn as you level up. Archetypes aren't general like classes or roles, nor do they simply map to our frameworks. Archetypes are character builds that mimic a specific kind of superhero from the comic pages. For example, one of the Archetypes is "The Blade." As you might guess, The Blade is a melee based character focused on using single-blade powers. He specializes in doing tons of damage to single targets. For comparison, "The Brute" is also a melee character that dishes out tons of damage, but instead focuses more on group combat and survivability. The Free-to-Play update will have at least eight of these Archetypes available to play right off the bat, and we'll be adding more every month."
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