While I firmly maintain that if you can't level a new character in a few days, you simply aren't trying, I like the approach taken here to curb the complaint of levelling a character taking too long (seriously, how!?!?).
Just to be clear, a lot of us are not annoyed by the time it takes to level to 50.
We are annoyed that we have a new character template with unique content unavailable to the pre-template type, and we are annoyed that our huge investment in stuff is not applicable. It's an opportunity cost to decide should I focus building up alts with this new player template if I have any interest in the future post-50 content that is unique to it.
It creates two classes of player templates. And if we see this same approach again, each new template type would mean abandoning very expensive well-kitted toons to see the new content.
It's been suggested by others and I agree - make account bound everything that is currently character bound. I also agree with others I'm confused why there are windows to create the new template.
It all sounds like either way the last five years will not apply to the new temporal content. Is there precedent in the MMO industry for such a concerted exclusion of the longest running customer base for new content?
Anyway I expect we will see some course corrections. What we have heard currently sounds very incomplete.
just how op will the new trait whatever impact my existing characters
If its huge I may level one to get that perk then at the cut off line the new alt will sit
no desire at all to spec out another toon
No...just no...seriously no
Indeed, I hate alts. They are a waste of time. If and a big IF, this unlock is worth my time wasting, I will get it and shut the character out completely after going through it.
To others that talk of "hiatus". There is no such thing as "hiatus", you either put yourself into it or you don't. I will leave my judgement of this untill all the info is out. But I forsee myself becoming pissed with what it may be.
It creates two classes of player templates. And if we see this same approach again, each new template type would mean abandoning very expensive well-kitted toons to see the new content.
If STO were still an alt friendly game, like CO (which gives you a new slot for hitting max level while gold) or CoH (before Incarnates), I wouldn't have a problem with it. IDIC might get me to buy some ships I wouldn't have otherwise.
But along comes Spec Points and out goes alts.
This is my Risian Corvette. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
This whole thing gives me an ominous sense of dread. Even though the teaser post is light on details it sounds like more grind to me. And no, I will absolutely never dump my main character. There is no way to incentivize me to do such a thing. Planned obsolescence indeed.
Where does it say you must "abandon" or "dump" your main character? It does not say that at all. You can still play your main characters as you want, but you also can play your alts when you want to take a small break from playing your main characters. There's nothing wrong with doing it that way.
You can argue that it'll cost money to properly gear the alt, but that's only if you care about having "epic" gear or the best gear. For me, I couldn't care less about that sort of thing, which is why I don't upgrade my items, I don't see a point to ever doing it.
"Planned Obsolescence," eh? Proof of this is where exactly? I'm not seeing how this is a sign that the older characters are going to be made obsolete just by having one additional character in your roster of characters, even with the rewards gained by this additional character as a Delta Recruit.
But "excluding" older characters? They've already gone and done all of those missions. Their personal histories -- their timelines, if you will -- are already set. They never did any of the things that these 'Delta Recruits' will do. From a role-playing perspective, this makes perfect sense to me. This isn't about pimping out your old characters with the latest gimmick, although there will be plenty of that.
They're putting a little of the RPG back into the MMO. I see that as a good thing, unless the execution of it leaves me wanting.
I suppose that's one way to look at it. But I don't agree. It doesn't matter to me if I make a new character or just hit the episode replay button. I don't need the game to dictate my characters' history to me, I can just replay it and say "this is what really happened." From a role-playing perspective, letting old characters do this event would be no different from the mission revamps. Either way, the character's history is changed.
And I'd be happy to pimp out a new character with the latest gimmick instead. But then I'd lose all previous event rewards. It's a lose-lose situation. Whatever I do, the character will end up missing something.
Except for the shotgun, I don't use any of the event special gear/doffs. The episode rerun items I do use, and it seems they replaced that with this Delta event. As for the accolades, well, it doesn't affect gameplay and frankly, I only do them in a single toon because they are a a pain to obtain.
I do accolades on a single toon, too. And don't like the idea of being forced into starting from scratch because I have to make a new main toon for this event.
Who said anything about abandoning old characters? I certainly won't be. Call it a hiatus. Or putting characters I'm not playing anyway on hold for a little while.
I just got done levelling two of my characters to 60. Gratifying as that was, I'm ready to take a break before I start another of my existing alts on the grind to 60. When this is over, I'll go back and start my Romulan back on track to 60.
I will admit that limiting the 'Delta Recruitment' to a specific timeframe, especially if this is intended to be a one-time event, leaves me scratching my head. I don't understand why they would go to a lot of effort to add content that relatively few characters can ever participate in.
But "excluding" older characters? They've already gone and done all of those missions. Their personal histories -- their timelines, if you will -- are already set. They never did any of the things that these 'Delta Recruits' will do. From a role-playing perspective, this makes perfect sense to me. This isn't about pimping out your old characters with the latest gimmick, although there will be plenty of that.
They're putting a little of the RPG back into the MMO. I see that as a good thing, unless the execution of it leaves me wanting.
I am talking about the traits and other things that arent accessable far more than redoing missions. If those things help tip the balance to new characters, it does make the older characters obsolete. I myself want to keep using my current capacity, without a handicap given to new toons to benefit some sort of metric. From what I 've seen, and maybe Im wrong, some of the stuff being given does tip the balance for new toons.
This almost smells similar to the changing of SWG to NGE.
Just to be clear, a lot of us are not annoyed by the time it takes to level to 50.
We are annoyed that we have a new character template with unique content unavailable to the pre-template type, and we are annoyed that our huge investment in stuff is not applicable. It's an opportunity cost to decide should I focus building up alts with this new player template if I have any interest in the future post-50 content that is unique to it.
It creates two classes of player templates. And if we see this same approach again, each new template type would mean abandoning very expensive well-kitted toons to see the new content.
It's been suggested by others and I agree - make account bound everything that is currently character bound. I also agree with others I'm confused why there are windows to create the new template.
It all sounds like either way the last five years will not apply to the new temporal content. Is there precedent in the MMO industry for such a concerted exclusion of the longest running customer base for new content?
Anyway I expect we will see some course corrections. What we have heard currently sounds very incomplete.
I never thought of it that way. It is sort like denyong content from older characters. I could see it if it was a new faction (or even half-faction). Theyre still Feds, KDF, and Romulans, theyre just more prefered. Thatsa pretty messed up.
If this were for april fools we'd have got this blog on april 1st and then told the next day at the latest it was a joke, we wouldn't have been told over three weeks in advance. That would just be stupid. And I mean really mind-numbingly idiotic.
You know, some of the things that have occurred in the past 5 years, strike me as beyond idiotic, and yet they have still happened.
Let me ramble here for a second.
I'm a huge fan of College Basketball. I follow the PAC-12 religiously. One thing about the PAC-12, is they have some of the worst refs in all of college basketball. We're talking horrendously bad. And when those bad calls are made, the home crowd lets them know just how bad the call is. Yet, despite just how dismayed the crowd gets, and no matter how loudly they object, no doubt a few minutes later, another horrendously bad call is likely to be made. I've walked out of PAC-12 basketball games wondering if I'd be deaf the next day from just how loud it was from the booing.
Cryptic...is about like those refs. They hear the home crowd, they know they likely made a bad call, and yet, a few weeks or a couple months, they'll make another one. They are oblivious to the reaction they receive, much like the refs.
In reality, they don't care in the least. To them it's not a bad call. It's a business plan.
Given the momentously bad calls they have made, especially in the past year, I totally wouldn't put it past them to play an April Fool's joke of this magnitutde. It's just what they do! :rolleyes:
"You shoot him, I shoot you, I leave both your bodies here and go out for a late night snack.
I'm thinking maybe pancakes." ~ John Casey
It's been suggested by others and I agree - make account bound everything that is currently character bound.
Yes, and/or make sure most of the stuff you buy are account-wide unlocks. That would potentially fix some of the complaints about the cost of kitting out a new character. You could just pass things back and forth. Which the game allows you to do to some extent anyway.
That said, some things simply won't work that way even though maybe they should. Lockbox ships, for one. And surely they'd lose sales if everything but services were account-wide.
I'm not so idealistic that I fail to see they have opportunities to make more money on this deal that they're not going to pass up. But the big ticket items are all account-wide unlocks -- those things are usable on all of your characters, even the ones you haven't created yet. Most of the gear that costs you anything is all account-bound.
Assuming that their stated intent to help level the playing field between old and new characters is valid -- and with the understanding that there will never be a completely level playing field against veteran characters -- making everything account bound and account wide would defeat the purpose even more.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Except that the blog clearly stated that all accounts get a free character slot. So, where is it stating that you must buy a character slot to participate in this event? The answer (since the question was rhetorical) is there is no statement that one must buy a character to participate.
I'm... undecided about this. Confused, agitated, anxious, dreadful and wary also come to mind.
By nature, I am an altaholic. I get an idea and it's time for a new character. While I don't role play even in the slightest, once a character is made, I don't retcon. Now, with Star Trek, time travel has a large presence and while going back and changing things has happened, and in some cases I don't even mind it, I DON'T RETCON.
So, with that said, I'm certain I can come up with at least 1 good (enough for me) idea for a new character. If the rewards are worth it, I may even enjoy it. I can't imagine making a character for this simply to throw it away afterwards, that just isn't my style. So I better enjoy it, or I won't bother.
My problem is, that since Delta Rising, my willpower to level a new alt has taken a nose dive. Simply put, the grind to get from 50-60 simply is not fun. Not enough content, too little reward. 1-50 is fine, which sounds like where this event is firmly settled so, perhaps it won't be so bad. But it WILL be another alt to at some point take from 50-60, and that... UGH.
And getting new Spec points? If there was more mission content, or we didn't get penalized for replaying missions, *maybe* they wouldn't be so difficult to obtain. As it is, my first lvl 60 has 14 total Spec points, 10 of which I got leveling from 50-60. So in the nearly 5 months since DR went live, I've managed 14 "levels". I play daily, I don't farm and I don't even know exactly where Argala even is, aside from being in the Delta Quadrant. While Spec points are bonus and not needed, they seem like they kind of are at times. Especially considering new Spec trees are being released and I haven't even been able to finish one yet. It's just too much to do (and enjoy) trying to get the blasted things. But, this is an argument for a different time and place so...
Anyway, I do appreciate something new to do. I just wish, like others have said, that we could use already established characters to do this. It just seems unnecessary to make another alt. Mostly because of the aforementioned grind, but add in the seemingly endless amount of "events" the Devs have been throwing at us and leveling almost seems like a secondary concern.
Call me crazy or a conspiracy nut (you wouldn't be the first), but it seems like all these events are happening so close together simply to pad their numbers to make it *appear* that "DR is the best expansion ever and... yadda yadda". I mean, of course players are logging in every day to play the game, but not because they really want to, they feel they need to in order to "stay competitive".
Winter event, new T6 ship.
Anniversary event, another T6 ship.
Crystalline Entity, a seemingly OP torpedo, tons of marks and Dilithium.
Now here comes Delta Recruits and the bonuses it will give out.
And if I'm not mistaken, after Delta Recruits finishes up, Season 10 should be a short time away.
And then we'll have the Summer/Risa event, with a new T6 ship, most likely.
After that probably another Mirror Invasion.
Perhaps even another Crystalline Entity before the Winter Event starts back up.
And this doesn't include ANY of the weekend events or potential double XP events we may get as well.
I get it, there's a LOT to do in STO and I don't want to come off as ungrateful but good Gawd, enough of the back to back events. Even *I'm* burning out. Could we just have 2-3 months where playing the game simply for the sake of playing was all there was? No new limited time "shiny" to get, just have fun instead of grind grind grind.
I'll wait until more information is released to really start making up my mind.
Hello. My name is iamynaught and I am an altaholic.
Yes, and/or make sure most of the stuff you buy are account-wide unlocks. That would potentially fix some of the complaints about the cost of kitting out a new character. You could just pass things back and forth. Which the game allows you to do to some extent anyway.
That said, some things simply won't work that way even though maybe they should. Lockbox ships, for one. And surely they'd lose sales if everything but services were account-wide.
It would be enough for me if at least the things that can no longer be acquired anywhere were made transferable. I can always get lockbox ships for a new toon, but I can't get a shotgun, a Samsar cruiser or a Kobali uniform costume.
And accolades. Accolades should be account-wide. Not only for "alt-friendliness," but also to level the playing field between the factions when it comes to accolade points. Currently, different amount of points are available depending on faction.
This isn't a criticism of this new initiative because so much is still unknown, but with so much now character bound, I'd need a really good reason to break from my main characters (all two of them) and start a brand new one from scratch.
I'm a casual player and don't have the time to go back to the beginning to start again.
Considering how often Cryptic ignores our opinions, I'm beginning to wonder if they speak English at all.
The consistent posting of, "Hey, forget new content, fix the frakkin' bugs." seems to fall on deaf ears. Instead, we get gimmick after gimmick and nerf after nerf. Neither of which increases the enjoyability of the game or brings players back long term.
Cryptic needs to learn that, "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should." and roll with it when they work on new ideas. I know, you can't please everyone, but they seem to TRIBBLE players off more frequently than make players happy.
Frankly, the only time I ever want to play an alt now is on XP weekends. The grindiness has sucked the fun out of levelling new characters.
More account bound stuff would be great. Something that can also be used to drop the price on reputation items (which are character bound) cost less on alts would be nice as well.
Hell, being able to trade marks between characters would be awesome.
Ultimately these are things I find more interesting than the idea of levelling up against for account wide bonuses.
Is it just me or do they seem to shoot themselves in the foot when so called "events" are so far out that a teaser blog like this creates forum fires instead of getting people hyped?
Gosh guys, there's a lot of complaining and not reading the whole blog going on.
You DO get a free character slot
You DO get the ship trait account wide
There WILL be XP boosts
The rewards go through the Breen Arc, so you don't have to grind Delta Rising to get most of the stuff (unclear language about the starship trait though)
So, if you want the stuff, start an alt to run through the story and get the stuff, and transfer everything you can to your main when you're done, and buy ZEN with your leftover Dilithium.
I am really confused by this new attempt to have people make alts in a very unfriendly alt STO since DR. I only have three characters and definitely don't have the time to play all of them. All of them are level 60 but only one has finished the DR content and are all resource poor.
My main KDF tac finished the DR storyline. She is broke and would like to do some other things in the game but is stuck with grinding things like omega particles so she can upgrade her equipment. She commands a Bastion and only flew the grind Kaboli and Breen Carrier ships for the traits.
My Fed Eng is in the same boat except she did buy a T6 Eclipse to command because she had no other options when her Mirror Star Cruiser became obsolete. She has done DR up to Kobali Prime but can't bring herself to go back to the Delta Quadrant with all of the grinding she has to do. She flew the Kobali ship for the trait before she returned to her Eclipse. She does not want to touch the command ships because she has not finished the the intel tree and she did buy an intel ship.
My poor KDF Sci is in the same boat as my other two, probably worse. She upgraded and flew the Varanus because it was pretty much the only sci ship available to her. She switched to the Breen Carrier and only flew the Kobali ship for the trait. She has not even gone to the Delta Quadrant.
I had decided not to buy any slots and not make anymore alts because I think three are enough for me. Now Cryptic wants me to make another alt for an alt unfriendly game. I will probably do it to get the free slot but I am not very happy about it. I hope making that new alt is worth it.
If the trait and other big stuff is account wide, and I misread it, that would be okay. I didnt see it,but have been known to cross my eyes reading alot of text. Bulletpoints might help.
the only thing they have outright said is account-wide is the ship trait. they also said that delta toons would earn 'other rewards beneficial not just to the Delta Recruit, but to all characters on the same account'. thats actually kind of a worrying comment imo.
What I like about this (as I said in another thread) is that we actually get to determine our rate of consumption even if the total amount of time is relatively fixed.
I'm traveling for 10 days in March so I can't get an antiproton torpedo even though my total playtime has been more than enough.
With what we do know of this system, we can a few things that I DO like:
1) There is at least one account wide reward for participation. No need to go do a token claim on each alt or worry about characters created after the event. Good. I got a bit disorganized on a couple of events and didn't claim holiday ships/Kobali ship/etc. on some alts. This one has alts covered.
2) The big one: we dictate rate of acquisition. I can take ten days off in April and it doesn't keep me from getting the reward. I could probably get the reward in something like 12 hours but it's any 12-15 hours and sounds as though people who come late to the event have a great chance of completing it because the time investment doesn't dictate whether I play 30 minutes a day for 30 days or 15 hours in one.
3) It emphasizes replay of story missions. This is the surest way to convince Cryptic to make story missions. Their interest in making them is tied to how much those missions get played and replayed. Offering an incentive to play them could create an incentive to create more.
Now... The downside:
1) My main may get excluded from some rewards.
2) My alt may not have access to rewards that I would consider essential from my main and I am in no hurry to re-purchase things like the temporal ships and costumes on my main.
I would like this considerably more if the goal were simply to replay the pre-DR story missions with new side objectives on ANY character, old OR new, in a reasonable time period. And I'd prefer a window a BIT bigger like 45-60 days. Additionally, this seems to put me even farther behind in my hunt for specialization points, which seems like a huge waste. I've earned maybe 5 since hitting level 60. I just want to fill out a primary and secondary specialization and be able to equip 4 traits on a ship. It seems out of reach and encouraging an alt seems like it takes me further out of the running. *sigh*
Flee from Ahemstory just to play STOstory. STO finally heading to this route... :eek:
Similarity?
Free character slot / Free character slot
XP boost / EXP, drop rate boost
Delta Symbol / Medal, Title Account wide ship trait / LINK SKILL Account wide item / LINK RING
Like many have stated, this event is both positive and negative. The positive is obvious, more stuff for our account. The negative is more about how this seems to focus on doing more for metrics than making the game more fun for the players with multiple alts. I have 26 alts spread across the three factions/fractions and have a use for all of them (I spread out my ships among them all and use specific toons with specific ships).
This events just wants us to create another toon just for the purpose of this event. If I do this then all I am going to do is use the current ships on my account and drops/rewards to complete the missions up to level 50. then I will just delete the toon. I really have no interest to create another Fed/Rom/KDF toon just to meet some requirement for an event.
I hope more information will shed light on the benefits of this event; especially since I will only be able to do the first 9 days and then the last 12 days. It does not take a lot to level to 50, but will I get enough out of it to make the time with a new toon worthwhile?
Right now I kind of see it as I'll level up the character using white gear and any Bind on Account gear I may have and then siphon off the dilithium and EC at the end. Doing actually content for dilithium has got to be better then redoing the same queues over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over... with a mine mini-game or two thrown in from time to time...
Once it's done and it's siphoned away I'll shelve the character with the possibility that maybe in the future these events will come back and my delta recruit will be able to do it again.
I will be HIGHLY angry though if somehow my recruit gets a free t6 ship or highly over powered BOff or something that my main or my other 3 main-alts, or 6 other alts can use. Or is somehow this alt is given free faction rep and junk that my other alts can't get relegated the alts I've spent months and years trying to get even viable to backyard TRIBBLE while this one character is fast tracked to OPness.
Comments
We are annoyed that we have a new character template with unique content unavailable to the pre-template type, and we are annoyed that our huge investment in stuff is not applicable. It's an opportunity cost to decide should I focus building up alts with this new player template if I have any interest in the future post-50 content that is unique to it.
It creates two classes of player templates. And if we see this same approach again, each new template type would mean abandoning very expensive well-kitted toons to see the new content.
It's been suggested by others and I agree - make account bound everything that is currently character bound. I also agree with others I'm confused why there are windows to create the new template.
It all sounds like either way the last five years will not apply to the new temporal content. Is there precedent in the MMO industry for such a concerted exclusion of the longest running customer base for new content?
Anyway I expect we will see some course corrections. What we have heard currently sounds very incomplete.
Indeed, I hate alts. They are a waste of time. If and a big IF, this unlock is worth my time wasting, I will get it and shut the character out completely after going through it.
To others that talk of "hiatus". There is no such thing as "hiatus", you either put yourself into it or you don't. I will leave my judgement of this untill all the info is out. But I forsee myself becoming pissed with what it may be.
If STO were still an alt friendly game, like CO (which gives you a new slot for hitting max level while gold) or CoH (before Incarnates), I wouldn't have a problem with it. IDIC might get me to buy some ships I wouldn't have otherwise.
But along comes Spec Points and out goes alts.
You can argue that it'll cost money to properly gear the alt, but that's only if you care about having "epic" gear or the best gear. For me, I couldn't care less about that sort of thing, which is why I don't upgrade my items, I don't see a point to ever doing it.
"Planned Obsolescence," eh? Proof of this is where exactly? I'm not seeing how this is a sign that the older characters are going to be made obsolete just by having one additional character in your roster of characters, even with the rewards gained by this additional character as a Delta Recruit.
And I'd be happy to pimp out a new character with the latest gimmick instead. But then I'd lose all previous event rewards. It's a lose-lose situation. Whatever I do, the character will end up missing something.
I do accolades on a single toon, too. And don't like the idea of being forced into starting from scratch because I have to make a new main toon for this event.
I am talking about the traits and other things that arent accessable far more than redoing missions. If those things help tip the balance to new characters, it does make the older characters obsolete. I myself want to keep using my current capacity, without a handicap given to new toons to benefit some sort of metric. From what I 've seen, and maybe Im wrong, some of the stuff being given does tip the balance for new toons.
This almost smells similar to the changing of SWG to NGE.
I never thought of it that way. It is sort like denyong content from older characters. I could see it if it was a new faction (or even half-faction). Theyre still Feds, KDF, and Romulans, theyre just more prefered. Thatsa pretty messed up.
You know, some of the things that have occurred in the past 5 years, strike me as beyond idiotic, and yet they have still happened.
Let me ramble here for a second.
I'm a huge fan of College Basketball. I follow the PAC-12 religiously. One thing about the PAC-12, is they have some of the worst refs in all of college basketball. We're talking horrendously bad. And when those bad calls are made, the home crowd lets them know just how bad the call is. Yet, despite just how dismayed the crowd gets, and no matter how loudly they object, no doubt a few minutes later, another horrendously bad call is likely to be made. I've walked out of PAC-12 basketball games wondering if I'd be deaf the next day from just how loud it was from the booing.
Cryptic...is about like those refs. They hear the home crowd, they know they likely made a bad call, and yet, a few weeks or a couple months, they'll make another one. They are oblivious to the reaction they receive, much like the refs.
In reality, they don't care in the least. To them it's not a bad call. It's a business plan.
Given the momentously bad calls they have made, especially in the past year, I totally wouldn't put it past them to play an April Fool's joke of this magnitutde. It's just what they do! :rolleyes:
"You shoot him, I shoot you, I leave both your bodies here and go out for a late night snack.
I'm thinking maybe pancakes." ~ John Casey
Yes, and/or make sure most of the stuff you buy are account-wide unlocks. That would potentially fix some of the complaints about the cost of kitting out a new character. You could just pass things back and forth. Which the game allows you to do to some extent anyway.
That said, some things simply won't work that way even though maybe they should. Lockbox ships, for one. And surely they'd lose sales if everything but services were account-wide.
I'm not so idealistic that I fail to see they have opportunities to make more money on this deal that they're not going to pass up. But the big ticket items are all account-wide unlocks -- those things are usable on all of your characters, even the ones you haven't created yet. Most of the gear that costs you anything is all account-bound.
Assuming that their stated intent to help level the playing field between old and new characters is valid -- and with the understanding that there will never be a completely level playing field against veteran characters -- making everything account bound and account wide would defeat the purpose even more.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
One but watch how it will need to be done multiple times when it gets here.
"There is no problem in the universe that can't be solved with a bribe, a paid assassin, or an overpowered fighter." - Chubain from Jumpgate Evolution
By nature, I am an altaholic. I get an idea and it's time for a new character. While I don't role play even in the slightest, once a character is made, I don't retcon. Now, with Star Trek, time travel has a large presence and while going back and changing things has happened, and in some cases I don't even mind it, I DON'T RETCON.
So, with that said, I'm certain I can come up with at least 1 good (enough for me) idea for a new character. If the rewards are worth it, I may even enjoy it. I can't imagine making a character for this simply to throw it away afterwards, that just isn't my style. So I better enjoy it, or I won't bother.
My problem is, that since Delta Rising, my willpower to level a new alt has taken a nose dive. Simply put, the grind to get from 50-60 simply is not fun. Not enough content, too little reward. 1-50 is fine, which sounds like where this event is firmly settled so, perhaps it won't be so bad. But it WILL be another alt to at some point take from 50-60, and that... UGH.
And getting new Spec points? If there was more mission content, or we didn't get penalized for replaying missions, *maybe* they wouldn't be so difficult to obtain. As it is, my first lvl 60 has 14 total Spec points, 10 of which I got leveling from 50-60. So in the nearly 5 months since DR went live, I've managed 14 "levels". I play daily, I don't farm and I don't even know exactly where Argala even is, aside from being in the Delta Quadrant. While Spec points are bonus and not needed, they seem like they kind of are at times. Especially considering new Spec trees are being released and I haven't even been able to finish one yet. It's just too much to do (and enjoy) trying to get the blasted things. But, this is an argument for a different time and place so...
Anyway, I do appreciate something new to do. I just wish, like others have said, that we could use already established characters to do this. It just seems unnecessary to make another alt. Mostly because of the aforementioned grind, but add in the seemingly endless amount of "events" the Devs have been throwing at us and leveling almost seems like a secondary concern.
Call me crazy or a conspiracy nut (you wouldn't be the first), but it seems like all these events are happening so close together simply to pad their numbers to make it *appear* that "DR is the best expansion ever and... yadda yadda". I mean, of course players are logging in every day to play the game, but not because they really want to, they feel they need to in order to "stay competitive".
Winter event, new T6 ship.
Anniversary event, another T6 ship.
Crystalline Entity, a seemingly OP torpedo, tons of marks and Dilithium.
Now here comes Delta Recruits and the bonuses it will give out.
And if I'm not mistaken, after Delta Recruits finishes up, Season 10 should be a short time away.
And then we'll have the Summer/Risa event, with a new T6 ship, most likely.
After that probably another Mirror Invasion.
Perhaps even another Crystalline Entity before the Winter Event starts back up.
And this doesn't include ANY of the weekend events or potential double XP events we may get as well.
I get it, there's a LOT to do in STO and I don't want to come off as ungrateful but good Gawd, enough of the back to back events. Even *I'm* burning out. Could we just have 2-3 months where playing the game simply for the sake of playing was all there was? No new limited time "shiny" to get, just have fun instead of grind grind grind.
I'll wait until more information is released to really start making up my mind.
Losing faith in humanity, one person at a time.
And accolades. Accolades should be account-wide. Not only for "alt-friendliness," but also to level the playing field between the factions when it comes to accolade points. Currently, different amount of points are available depending on faction.
Do it now.
I'm a casual player and don't have the time to go back to the beginning to start again.
Sorry.
The consistent posting of, "Hey, forget new content, fix the frakkin' bugs." seems to fall on deaf ears. Instead, we get gimmick after gimmick and nerf after nerf. Neither of which increases the enjoyability of the game or brings players back long term.
Cryptic needs to learn that, "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should." and roll with it when they work on new ideas. I know, you can't please everyone, but they seem to TRIBBLE players off more frequently than make players happy.
Frankly, the only time I ever want to play an alt now is on XP weekends. The grindiness has sucked the fun out of levelling new characters.
Hell, being able to trade marks between characters would be awesome.
Ultimately these are things I find more interesting than the idea of levelling up against for account wide bonuses.
1 - 50 is pretty much a level per mission.
I just pretend the counter stops at 50, spec points don't exist, and rep items fresh out of the project are still good enough.
For the most part, I do too. Of course, I was never interested in Elite STFs anyway.
↑ This. That is all.
My main KDF tac finished the DR storyline. She is broke and would like to do some other things in the game but is stuck with grinding things like omega particles so she can upgrade her equipment. She commands a Bastion and only flew the grind Kaboli and Breen Carrier ships for the traits.
My Fed Eng is in the same boat except she did buy a T6 Eclipse to command because she had no other options when her Mirror Star Cruiser became obsolete. She has done DR up to Kobali Prime but can't bring herself to go back to the Delta Quadrant with all of the grinding she has to do. She flew the Kobali ship for the trait before she returned to her Eclipse. She does not want to touch the command ships because she has not finished the the intel tree and she did buy an intel ship.
My poor KDF Sci is in the same boat as my other two, probably worse. She upgraded and flew the Varanus because it was pretty much the only sci ship available to her. She switched to the Breen Carrier and only flew the Kobali ship for the trait. She has not even gone to the Delta Quadrant.
I had decided not to buy any slots and not make anymore alts because I think three are enough for me. Now Cryptic wants me to make another alt for an alt unfriendly game. I will probably do it to get the free slot but I am not very happy about it. I hope making that new alt is worth it.
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We're working off very limited information.
What I like about this (as I said in another thread) is that we actually get to determine our rate of consumption even if the total amount of time is relatively fixed.
I'm traveling for 10 days in March so I can't get an antiproton torpedo even though my total playtime has been more than enough.
With what we do know of this system, we can a few things that I DO like:
1) There is at least one account wide reward for participation. No need to go do a token claim on each alt or worry about characters created after the event. Good. I got a bit disorganized on a couple of events and didn't claim holiday ships/Kobali ship/etc. on some alts. This one has alts covered.
2) The big one: we dictate rate of acquisition. I can take ten days off in April and it doesn't keep me from getting the reward. I could probably get the reward in something like 12 hours but it's any 12-15 hours and sounds as though people who come late to the event have a great chance of completing it because the time investment doesn't dictate whether I play 30 minutes a day for 30 days or 15 hours in one.
3) It emphasizes replay of story missions. This is the surest way to convince Cryptic to make story missions. Their interest in making them is tied to how much those missions get played and replayed. Offering an incentive to play them could create an incentive to create more.
Now... The downside:
1) My main may get excluded from some rewards.
2) My alt may not have access to rewards that I would consider essential from my main and I am in no hurry to re-purchase things like the temporal ships and costumes on my main.
I would like this considerably more if the goal were simply to replay the pre-DR story missions with new side objectives on ANY character, old OR new, in a reasonable time period. And I'd prefer a window a BIT bigger like 45-60 days. Additionally, this seems to put me even farther behind in my hunt for specialization points, which seems like a huge waste. I've earned maybe 5 since hitting level 60. I just want to fill out a primary and secondary specialization and be able to equip 4 traits on a ship. It seems out of reach and encouraging an alt seems like it takes me further out of the running. *sigh*
Similarity?
Free character slot / Free character slot
XP boost / EXP, drop rate boost
Delta Symbol / Medal, Title
Account wide ship trait / LINK SKILL
Account wide item / LINK RING
This events just wants us to create another toon just for the purpose of this event. If I do this then all I am going to do is use the current ships on my account and drops/rewards to complete the missions up to level 50. then I will just delete the toon. I really have no interest to create another Fed/Rom/KDF toon just to meet some requirement for an event.
I hope more information will shed light on the benefits of this event; especially since I will only be able to do the first 9 days and then the last 12 days. It does not take a lot to level to 50, but will I get enough out of it to make the time with a new toon worthwhile?
Once it's done and it's siphoned away I'll shelve the character with the possibility that maybe in the future these events will come back and my delta recruit will be able to do it again.
I will be HIGHLY angry though if somehow my recruit gets a free t6 ship or highly over powered BOff or something that my main or my other 3 main-alts, or 6 other alts can use. Or is somehow this alt is given free faction rep and junk that my other alts can't get relegated the alts I've spent months and years trying to get even viable to backyard TRIBBLE while this one character is fast tracked to OPness.