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Once, Eden was a beautiful suburb of Paragon City called Woodvale. It was the prime location for families to set up residence. There were many parks and it had easy paths for drives into the country. This proved to be its undoing.

Offended by the encroaching urban sprawl, the Devouring Earth launched a massive assault on Woodvale. The creatures destroyed many of the buildings and other man-made objects. The rest they buried or left in ruin, driving all the previous inhabitants into the city proper.

Now, Eden is a sprawling wilderness, with nature slowly taking over completely. If the spread of the forces of the Devouring Earth is not stopped, it could soon begin to swallow other parts of the city.

Sub-board: The Troll Tunnels

In late 2000, these Trolls planted a series of explosive charges throughout the sewers along a row of Eastgate condominiums. They planned to ruin the district, and then move into the rubble before city crews could properly respond. What the Trolls didn’t know was that an extensive series of underground caverns already riddled the area. The cataclysmic chain reaction, known as “the Hollowing,” devastated a huge section of the neighborhood, causing it to fall in upon itself. When the dust settled, the Trolls were ecstatic. They had discovered a perfect region for their needs. They moved into the newly unearthed tunnels, and fought viciously to defend their new territory.

Paragon City officials could not react quickly enough to contain the threat, as the area was still geologically unstable. The tunnels were so extensive, however, that the Trolls simply didn’t have the numbers to control it all. Other criminal elements were quick to take advantage of this opportunity and moved in. A splinter of the Outcasts poured in, unwilling to let their long-time rivals have the region unchallenged. The gang battles raged among the disaster-stricken neighborhoods, but whenever a side was losing, they would melt back into their entrenched, underground warrens.

The district was formerly a hub for many heroes entering Paragon City, seeking aid and training from the famous Back Alley Brawler as they dealt with a local Hellion problem. That comparatively peaceful time ended with a vicious attack, when meteors carrying Shivans landed and devastated the pristine city. Taking advantage of the situation, Lord Recluse and Arachnos entered the area, seeking a way to take advantage in the chaotic aftermath. Vanguard and The Freedom Corps have been called in to assist with the Shivan threat, and many new super-powered beings are caught in the crossfire. Now, it is part of large scale plans to rebuild Paragon, and is seen by many as the district that most models the new attitudes of the city.

Sub-board: Long Bow HQ

In the early days of Paragon City, the area known as Kings Row was a shiny, bustling place filled with hope and promise. Factories manufacturing goods and generating power created a feeling of strong, blue-collar values. At that time, the area was called Kings Row because of one the most productive factories to set up shop there: King Garment Works.

Unfortunately, the prosperity didn’t last long. When the Depression hit Paragon City, no area was affected more. Factories shut down, many workers were laid off, and a great deal of the crime sweeping through the city was centered in the row of closed-down factories. The crime bosses who set themselves up there took on the name of the zone. They became known throughout the city as The Kings.

For a time, Kings Row became a place to avoid. It was dark, dirty, and struck fear into the hearts of upright Paragon citizens. When Statesman began his “war on crime” and formed the Freedom Phalanx, he focused a great deal of his efforts on bringing down the Kings. Eventually, the Freedom Phalanx triumphed over the Kings, but the cost was high. There was some damage to the physical area, but of greater effect was the long-term damage done to the reputation of Kings Row.

Sub-board: Paragon Police Department HQ

Once the prosperous jewelers' district in 19th century Paragon City, many of Steel Canyon's neighborhoods still possess names dating back to that era. The 20th century, however, brought with it an explosion of finance and investment industry. The once prolific mercantile district transformed overnight as brokerage houses, insurance companies, and law firms began taking over real estate. By the 1920s, most companies had erected towering skyscrapers to flaunt their success to the rest of the city. Because these huge buildings loomed over city streets like manmade mountains, the newspapers dubbed the area "Steel Canyon."

Sub-board: University of Paragon, Steel Canyon

The once peaceful burgh of Baumton became the site of the showdown between the Paragon City heroes and the invading Rikti aliens. Now called "Boomtown," it is as dead as Steel Canyon is alive. Choked with smoke, flames and debris from the Rikti attack, this area took the brunt of the damage to the city. Skyscrapers as tall as those found in Steel Canyon lie toppled and broken, stumps of concrete and steel jutting into the blackened sky like rotting teeth. Train tracks lie twisted and deformed, while burning and broken carcasses of cars can be found in alleys, rubble piles and even tossed into the remains of park trees -- a testimony to the savage fury of the attacks in this region. Huge craters, many still smoking, dot the landscape, contributing to the area's apocalyptic feel. Given the chaos that reigns here, the city's law enforcement officials have walled it off and are fighting a stalemated battle with its denizens, a menagerie of the city's villain population.

Back in the 1970s, with traffic congestion in Paragon City reaching major headache levels, the solution seemed obvious: build upwards! Create graceful sweeping highways! Take the pressure off surface streets by moving traffic above the city on high-spanning bridges. As a result, Skyway City - the big highway in the sky - was born.

The epitome of modern efficiency, Skyway City was destined to be a model for the future. Instead, it became a model of cold concrete and steel - a soulless passageway on the way to more interesting destinations. Soon, the original plans for extending the Skyway bridges throughout the city fell by the wayside.

More recently, Skyway City has become home to a street gang known as the Trolls. Found camped out under the many bridges in the area, the Trolls have made the unstable and dangerous street drug Superadine an integral part of gang membership.

Sub-board: The Troll's Head Pub

The Overbrook Dam was an amazing step forward for Paragon City, and it began a new area of prosperity. When the Arch-villain Faultline held Overbrook ransom with his earthquake device, not many took him seriously. A group of fledgling superheroes did attempt to stop him but failed, and the master of tectonics set off his device, wiping out Overbrook. Faultline disappeared and has not been seen since. The ruins of Overbrook adopted his name, and many villains began to inhabit the area.

Faultline officials recently provided funding for reconstruction and work was underway in the first neighborhood, when major disaster struck. Due to strange seismic activity on the moon, tidal anomalies caused the Overbrook Dam to rupture flooding the zone. Additional crews have been called in to assess the Dam and shore up the rest of the zone, however, they are continually thwarted by the recent arrival of new villain groups to the area and one group, in particular, that no one expected: Arachnos. It appears Arachnos has been poking around supergroup base wreckage in Faultline for some time, searching for technology that will further Lord Recluse’s nefarious plans.

During the 1980’s, with dollar signs in their eyes, developers seized the financial opportunity of an island so close to Paragon City. Thus began the Talos Island land boom. Within a matter of months, the once barren island was abuzz with construction sites. As a publicity stunt, the real estate moguls even agreed to name the island after the city’s mythic giant. An anonymous benefactor donated the huge statue, which now stands several hundred yards from the island.

Today, Talos Island is home to many hi-tech and venture capital firms and is still considered prime real estate. Oddly enough, during the Rikti War, the aliens avoided attacking that area. Consequently, many superstitions have sprung up about the island, including the belief that Talos’ statue gives the place good luck. This has only driven the real estate prices higher.

Currently, the once peaceful Talos Island is a battleground between two rival gangs. The Warriors, who claim the island as their own private playground, have found themselves embroiled in a bloody turf war with a recently arrived gang known as the Tsoo.

Sub-board: Spanky's Boardwalk

Dark Astoria is the decayed, urban epitaph to the dark god Mot. Largely unbeknownst to the original founders of this doomed city, a terrible being was entombed here in ages past. The death of the city has been steady, inexorable and irreversible. In recent years, Dark Astoria has been a dangerous place, but now that the last strands of Mot's bindings begin to erode, the city exerts its mysterious pull, drawing the doomed to its streets to struggle or serve.

Even after Mot's defeat, these days his followers work to bring him back.

The roots of Independence Port go all the way back to the founding of Paragon City. As Paragon City continued to grow, Independence Port stood proudly as the premiere point of commerce on the eastern coast of the United States. This is the location where Atlas and several other heroes gave their lives in World War II when the 5th Column attempted to invade.

In the middle of the zone lies Valor Bridge, once a symbol of sacrifice, now a ravaged memory. Sadly, since Terra Volta has been overrun, Valor Bridge has become a no man's land filled with abandoned vehicles, transport containers and constant battles between the Tsoo, 5th Column and The Family.

Sub-board: Terra Volta

It's a name that conjures up images both mysterious and fantastical. Toward the Autumnal Equinox, strange creatures began showing up in this popular resort town just outside Paragon City. Salamanca had been a very popular vacation point for more than a year, but the invasion of monsters has put an end to the tourist trade. The Paragon City Monorail still takes passengers here, even though the town is filled to the brim with monsters, and the surrounding waterway and forested area are infested with all manner of ghouls and ghosts. The legendary Salamanca lake monster, dubbed "Sally," has also been spotted since then. Witches, goblins, pumpkinheads, and even members of the Devouring Earth can be found here. The dank forests crawl with spooky threats, including the pumpkin king Eochai and the vicious Jack in Irons.

Sub-boards: University of Paragon, Croatoa, The Forest, The Country Side

When Paragon City began to grow from a small group of colonial townships, the heart of the coalition was Smithtown. Founders' Falls encompasses the area from which that seed began to grow, eventually developing into the sprawling metropolis that is Paragon City.

The most opulent place to live, Founders' Falls is where you are most likely to meet members of the Paragon Yacht Club. Then again, with water instead of major roadways, yacht might be the only way to travel. When the Red River rose, much of the area was left underwater, but the buildings that jut out provide a Venice-like feel to the region. The more modern structures of this zone were built out onto the water to avoid harming many of the historic sites that lie in the area.

Sub-board: University of Paragon, Founder's Falls

Once, Eden was a beautiful suburb of Paragon City called Woodvale. It was the prime location for families to set up residence. There were many parks and it had easy paths for drives into the country. This proved to be its undoing.

Offended by the encroaching urban sprawl, the Devouring Earth launched a massive assault on Woodvale. The creatures destroyed many of the buildings and other man-made objects. The rest they buried or left in ruin, driving all the previous inhabitants into the city proper.

Now, Eden is a sprawling wilderness, with nature slowly taking over completely. If the spread of the forces of the Devouring Earth is not stopped, it could soon begin to swallow other parts of the city.

Sub-board: The Hive

Brickstown lies above a series of natural caverns, and could theoretically be destroyed if those caverns were collapsed. The Freakshow are aware of this weakness and have already made several failed attempts to do just that in order to free their brethren held within the Zig. Due to this structure, Brickstown is also one of the most topographically complex areas of the city. Its surface streets and structures reveal only part of the neighborhood's navigable areas, the rest being tucked underneath in the form of underpasses, canals, and service doors.

Sub-board: Zigursky Penitentiary

In the 1940s and 50s, increased awareness of the environment provided the impetus for change in the neighborhood. Slowly, new technology allowed corporations to change their previous methods and cut down on the pollution in the area. While the zone would never become an area for family living, it no longer posed an imminent threat to the health of the city. Saying that one worked in "Venice" no longer carried the connotations of dismal and deadly working conditions. In fact, the area became the poster-child of the 70's environmental movement; it was used as proof that profitability could indeed go hand in hand with environmental responsibility.

This all changed with the Rikti War. The alien invaders targeted a Crey facility in the area in their initial assault. The resulting explosion (of a most likely illegal and unethical Crey experiment) not only devastated the Crey labs, but also created a strange element that poisoned the area. A greenish miasma now lies as a thick mist everywhere. The once clean waters that made the area famous are now filled with brackish muck. During the war, the area was quickly abandoned; it no longer had any strategic use. The area is now named "Crey's Folly" because everyone knew exactly whose fault the disaster was.

Once a large and affluent neighborhood, White Plains is ground zero of the crashed Rikti Space Ship and where Vanguard fights a desperate fights to keep the aliens from returning to power. All hands are on deck here.

Sub-board: Vanguard Command

The coming of Arachnos was not unwelcome by the people of Dockside. Arachnos provided security against several mercenary, hero, and government agencies who had threatened to clean up Dockside on several occasions. Several new buildings were erected downtown in Arachnos’ wake, though construction slowed soon after. Heroes who could no longer directly threaten Dockside instead put pressure on those they did business with overseas—generally derailing anyone who traded with Port Oakes. Some of that eventually spilled back into Dockside in the late 1980s, so Arachnos occupied and refurbished the old fort to give the crime bosses more tangible protection. They also finally gave it its name— Fort Hades, for it was truly a place of the dead. Lord Recluse’s agents took quick notice of the Red Hands of Fort Hades. They’ve been studying the ghosts to see if they might be used as a sort of ethereal army. The problem is that the Red Hands are bound to the site of their horrible death. If the spirit-bond could be removed, however, they would make deadly assassins.

At this time, there is no Governor of Port Oakes. The former governor was arrested by Interpol, leaving a power vacuum that has sparked a gang war between his son, Emil Marcone, and his former consigliore, Guido “the Mooch” Verandi. Emil claims the governorship is his by right of blood. Guido has a more “enlightened” view and says there’s no such thing as bloodlines in Arachnos’ “republic.” Lord Recluse could easily end this pointless fight if he were simply to appoint a governor. He finds the fight amusing, however, and firmly believes in “survival of the fittest.” He’ll wait and see who earns the governorship. It won’t hurt to erode The Family’s power a bit in the meantime—they were becoming a bit too strong for Recluse’s tastes.

Settled by loyalists fleeing the colonies after the American Revolution, Cap au Diable quickly became a refuge for those seeking peace in times of conflict. Named for the dormant volcano that looks like a horned demon with its ridge sweeping down to the ocean like a cape, the “Cape of the Devil” is now a city of stark contrasts.

An expanding township, Haven lived up to its name becoming known as a peaceful place for quiet folk who wanted nothing to do with the smuggler towns found throughout the rest of the Rogue Isles. Over the next two centuries, Haven grew prosperous as merchants learned that they would find safe harbor and wealthy customers awaiting them in Cap au Diable. With the industrial revolution, Haven became a hub of innovation and commerce, drawing major businesses to the city rising at its center. Today, most of the world’s major corporations maintain offices in Cap au Diable including Crey Corporation, Portal Corp, Aeon Corp, and ConDev, whose red rook logo acts as the only clue to who might own this mysterious company.

Dominated by The Pit - a huge mining operation - in the southern center of the island, and Port Recluse in the northeast, Sharkhead is heavy on industry. East of The Pit is Villa Requin, and west is Potter's Field cemetery where the Ghost of Scrapyard emerges and the Circle of Thorns hold dominion. Northwest of The Pit is the Hellforge, and north of that is The Crush, almost totally gone to the Freakshow.

Nerva Archipelago consists of a few large neighborhoods placed far apart. Crimson Cove is a series of smaller islands within the archipelago at the south end of the zone. Agincourt in the center-east boasts a large Longbow invasion force; Primeva to the northeast of Agincourt is a large, contested island, where many different enemy factions battle for control. Further northeast is Thorn Isle, where the Thorn Tree grows, Circle of Thorns flock, and magic gathers in strange ways.

St. Martial was once little more than a semicircle of rock in the Atlantic. Birds and sea turtles called it home, and pirates often collected eggs and meat here, but otherwise it was uninhabited and rarely even charted. In the mid- 1970s, everything changed when Manuel Marcone, the Family’s “Captain” in the Rogue Isles, discovered it. Manuel made fortunes in the wake of Arachnos’s takeover and lax drug laws. Some of that money he invested in the Cage Consortium on Sharkhead Isle. The success of Las Vegas for the "old mafia” convinced him
a similar resort town in the Rogue Isles would be even more lucrative. After all, the usual U.S. laws against gambling and other vices were much more…malleable…under Lord Recluse.

So Manuel drew up a plan, presented it to Sebastian Frost of the Family, and won approval to create a new Las Vegas–style resort island in the Atlantic. The lax laws of Arachnos and the lack of any Coast Guard to police drug shipments quickly paid off the substantial costs of construction. High security for VIPs who turned a blind eye to anything that didn’t directly harm the business of St. Martial sealed the deal.