I used to make heavy use of crafting, even in its simplistic form on Holodeck now, and this is gonna ruin it for me and quite literally every other subscriber. Why was this deemed necessary? Can we at least have a Dev response clarifying the reasoning behind it all?
If nothing else, can we at least switch the Dilithium requirement to EC (which there's practically NO use for anymore) or back to the olden days of common-level gear required in the recipe?
Of the 80+ posts that I have read thus far, I am in favor of one of the two solutions.
1. 0% to 25% dilithum cost (compared to buying it from the vendor directly) for crafting even level items
2. No Dilithium cost for Gold accounts and a slightly reduced Dilithium cost for Silver players.
I'm in favor of option number 1, with some modifications for social crafters.
Take the reduced dilithium cost and turn it into a schematic-like crafting component, so any player with enough dilithium for new weapons can get it without crafting experience. As an example, player Y would buy a 'Weapon Power Converter mk X' at a crafting vendor. Then they give that component to the crafter, who actually needs their accumulated experience and the anomalies to make the final weapon.
It would go like this:
1) Customer pays dilithium for Premium Component (less than 25% whole item cost)
2) Customer gives Premium Component to Crafter
3) Crafter uses anomalies, schematic, and Premium Component to craft even-level or high-end gear
4) Crafter gives completed gear back to Customer
Players could theoretically start trading dilithium-bought components just for their intrinsic value, but in the end they can only be turned into crafted items and not converted back to dilithium or traded for c-points.
I'm not sure at all how this change is to designed to help players or improve the game. All it does is shoe horn the need for Dilithium into a place where its not needed.
The Dilithium cost if any should be tiny to craft and even if the system is left as in no one is going to spend real money on Cstore points to trade for delithium just so they can craft.
So Cryptic change it for the better please or no one will craft anything.
And again I've been on the F2P server since the start and have almost maxed out my toon. So far I have seen Zero things worth spending Dilithium on.
More and more it feels like They really are trying to drive a large section of Their current player-base..., Away.
It's almost like They believe that even if that happens, They'll still have a grandious supply of new players, with F2P...
The only problem with this line of thinking, is that those of US that They do drive away...
Will spread the word that this game isn't worth bothering with, unless you have a Very Large Bank Account Balance.
And if I'm thinking this way..., imagine what the more vocal folks are gonna do...
Wait.. DaveyNY and I are in agreement on something? On the same side? Dare I say, Allies?
Whelp, that's it, the ship is sinking into a gravity well, the game is doomed, goodnight everybody, I'll be here to the last, but after the servers are shut down, I will seek you out, likely on Infinite Space or TOR.
LOL, I seriously love how Cryptic devs have been avoiding all the negative feed back like animals from a wild fire. These days I regret ever buying the life subscription. This game is dying to PW's pay to win mentality.
I have to add my displeasure at the change. Crafting should not require dilithium. Also, crafting should provide a significant amount of unique gear not available elsewhere.
As a fleet crafter, I will not craft if dilithium is a requirement.
*snip
Of the 80+ posts that I have read thus far, I am in favor of one of the two solutions.
1. 0% to 25% dilithum cost (compared to buying it from the vendor directly) for crafting even level items
2. No Dilithium cost for Gold accounts and a slightly reduced Dilithium cost for Silver players.
I understand that this is "Pass #1" on the crafting but this is a bad. Please figure out a compromise.
Matt
I would be real $ that choice #1 is what was/is originally intended..and they put up the inflated prices so we'd rage about them and then accept the lower ones. These prices are nothing but a PR stunt. Lets save all the rage for next week when we see what they actually want to hose us with!
I have to throw in my 2 cents here, not like it hasn't already been said countless times in this thread...
This is a terrible idea, and it essentially kills crafting in the game entirely. Bringing in more Mks is great, but charging dilithium for the even numbered equipment in addition to mats is foolish. People invest a great deal of time into tracking these mats down, and now you're going to make them wait extended periods of time just to refine enough dilithium to put them to use. The fact that dilithium is bound doesn't help at all, either. Good bye fleet crafting, Hello "buy it yourself".
You're essentially turning crafting into yet another store. This doesn't sit well with me to say the least.
Abandon this (horrific) Dilithium as part of recipes idea entirely and do something constructive for crafting, such as adding more unique crafting only items.
If you *really* want to prevent players mass producing gear *without* causing a huge ruckus then make each item so it can be crated in two 'modes'
'bind on craft'
and
'bind on equip'
Then make the bind on equip version (AKA tradable one) cost 20-50% more in anomalies depending on rarity.
You wanna make people *really* happy you set the bind on craft version so that it can still be traded to fleet-mates and placed in fleet-banks.
Not only is this change a bad idea, it makes me wonder if you guys actually converse with each other about good ideas/bad ideas to try on the players before actually trying them on the players.
Off topic but a really odd coincidence...Asian Grind Fest was the name I was planning on using for my new cover band comprised entirely of Filipino Strippers.
More and more it feels like They really are trying to drive a large section of Their current player-base..., Away....
You're right. They want to get rid of all the Lifers.
Or more specifically the Magnificent Lifetime Subscribers.
You see, we're no longer assets, in fact we're the opposite.
If you've paid $300 for an LTS, that pays for 20 months worth of subcription. If you're a "Magnificent" Veteran, you've been playing for 600 days. You've used up your $300 worth. Some people used up their "value" sooner if they got the LTS on discount.
Add to that the 400CP/mo stipend, your strain on system resources for continued game use, etc.
Sorry what heck is this for bs you ruin the hole crafting.
even this guy's post is more intelligent-sounding than dilithium crafting
i am going to be with the majority of the group (which, btw, is EVERYONE) and warn you Cryptic, if you carry on with this cockamamie scheme of yours, STO will die
no if's, and's, but's, or maybe's about it....it will if you don't read this thread and UN-implement this change, or as some people have suggested, actually put recipes to some of the items instead of just tacking on an actual fee to craft
Runes of Magic never had anything like this, just the rarer materials that you'd have to go out and find, and also the uber-extra refining processes for tier 3, 4, and even 5 weapons of one kind
Unfortunately this just goes to show the Devs are either completely out of touch with the playerbase, or no longer have control of their own game(due to PW). Either way its a very bad sign.
Any good will garnered with the changes made to the game so far, and with the many new things coming up was burned at the stake, screaming with this change. I don't see any changes or additions that could be made to overcome my dismay/anger/outrage generated by this dilithium tax. :mad:
For all intents and purposes you will have buried crafting in this game. Now people will have to pay a huge tax just to level the skill to get the the MK XI stuff. Why bother crafting anything under MK XI, when you will end up leveling out of it soon enough and save your dilithium for later? This then begs the question, "Why bother crafting at all?".
I play this game for entertainment, not as a second job. I play games to have fun. When the fun goes away, so will I, and my money with me to play another game, that entertains me.
I am not in a contest with anyone, and play at my own pace. I don't terribly mind leveling up and trying new and different things...I have a bunch of alts and don't mind not having the most elite gear possible, since I don't pvp that much, and I can hold my own against npcs.
Crafting provided me (and many others) a way to get pretty good equipment without the grinding required for the very best. It also made it possible to get decent gear while and for leveling up.
The locked episode chain was horrible, the dilithium tax is abyssmal.
The idea of a crafting tax needs to be burned, not encouraged with variations of the same theme. Burn it now, and devise something else, far far away from the ashes of the old.
This appears to be a poorly thought out idea, implemented in an economy that is only partially rolled out. If anything, it should have been discussed after all the economy changes had been made on tribble.
I very...*VERY* rarely post on here. This might even be my 4th or 5th post ever. I've sat back, and bit my tongue hoping that they weren't as stupid as I was thinking they are. Surprise, Surprise. They're much more stupid than I thought. This proves it.
And to top it all off, they really don't care how much we post, how many times we post. This is already set, and going to happen. As many many posts before this one has stated, crafting it now dead.
BOW DOWN TO THE MIGHTY DOLLAR! Cause that's all it's about now. Thanks PWI. :mad:
Yeah . . . I also have to vote an emphatic NO on this change Cryptic. :(
I've made a crafting alt and my fleet has a guy that does our primary crafting. I will never craft again nor will I ask my friend to craft me something if you implement this. I will simply go without the special crafting sets.
The second effect may actually a goal of this new crafting, I don't know.
Hint to the Devs: it goes without saying that there are always going to be some people who hate anything you do. But when "everyone" hates something, it might just be a bad idea. But alas, this goes back to my previous post, so hints might not make a difference.
The Nagus is 100% correct. I would be very surprised to find any player (be it here or in the "silent majority") that thinks this change is a good idea.
Please do not discount the opinions of many of us just because a few people are over the top in their hatred of everything you do.
We don't all hate everything, but it sure looks like a bunch of us don't like this change very much.
I understand that they need to have natural dilithium sinks in the economy but the only thing this will do is
1. Devalue all other materiel's- No one is going to think about buying particle traces for 100k in bulk, when they have to buy Refined Dilithium which is going to cost a lot EC to get in the quantities needed for the "improved" crafting system.
2. Over inflate the prices of all equipment about XIII- This is essentially TRIBBLE over any new player coming to Trek after F2P conversion because now they have to go through an absolutely dreadful grind to make either enough Refined Dilithium or EC in order to get the crafted equipment (Since anyone crafting after this will almost certainly charge more in either EC or RD since they had to spend so much just to make it). The reason they'd have to grind for RD is because they've spending it all along trying to buy the next tier ship, and they'll have to grind for EC since particle traces will be worth a lot less relative to how hard it is to find them meaning they'll have to do everything on the cheap until endgame if they want to afford anything which can lead to frustration to the build up to that. This would pretty much affect any player, gold or silver.
3. It will leave any Pre-F2P player as a god amongst mortals- Now don't get me wrong, I'd love to sit there and destroy new F2P players all day, but odds are we'd be able to do this regardless of the crafting system. Anyone who got something like the Aegis set before having to spend fortunes to get even a green level item is obviously going to have a huge advantage in equipment. Think about it; if the new players can't afford stuff as good as ours now, they'll be forced to either stay away from PvP until they've gone through a horrendous grindfest to get the new equipment, or go into PvP with sub-standard equipment while we blow them to pieces every time with our ultra-awesome equipment we were able to procure before the switch that destroyed the economy.
This is more of a worst case scenario, but you get my point; It screws over any new customers to the game. Some would argue they will be screwed already, I personally don't think so, but if you do this certainly adds to it.
Yeah...I feel the 'economy' at work here....I wouldn't be surprised if there are PW owned 'sweat shops' with Dilithium 'farmers' posing as players waiting,to 'provide' us with enough Dilithium for C-points when this economy revamp goes live.
I'm sorry, but this blog does absolutely nothing to explain to me why you think it is necessary to take a system that already requires massive grinding and make it worse. What exactly was your intention here? To upset your entire crafting community? For what? For some better future down the road? For a chance to revamp the back-end of the system to allow for "cooler" stuff in the future? I really want to know.
Tell me, are you planning to release new content that would justify this change? What about your decision to remove already unique content such as the Delta Flyer while adding steeper grinds to bland items that I craft just to be competitive? What are you adding to justify the change? Better yet, why not just increase the emblems needed per item instead of this. That would have been palatable, maybe even supported by the crafting community. (higher creation cost = higher item value = win for crafters)
Unacceptable post. I need a better explanation than this to rest easy about this change.
Words cannot describe exactly how bad this new crafting system is. Mats are no trouble. It can take weeks to find the right combination of traces for one item however. Now we get the wonderment of farming more! In some cases up to 32,000DC! WOOHOO!
I craft for my fleeties. I do it for nothing, and with mats and traces we farm and bank for the fleet. Apparently the plan is we can't trade DC so effectively i'm out of a job in the fleet, or i spend the majority of my time farming dilithium, and traces, and mats just so i can continue to do it.
If someone does it as a way to make EC i say good luck to finding anyone willing to pay even an Nth of the amount of time it'll take to gather the resources to make one high tier item.
So let me add this up:
Dilithium for items.
Dilithium for VA ship.
Dilithium to craft.
Will it cost me dilithium to respawn soon? Maybe i'll need it to level up myself or my crew next?
Crafting already involves farming. Why on earth do you feel you need to add more to it?
An Aegis set will cost, in dilithium alone, 54,450DC. At a cap of 8000 refining it's effectively 7 days total just for dilithium. You're talking one of the hardest sets to make because of all the mats, and brown are difficult to farm already, combined with some of the harder to find traces.
What you've done is turned something that was "grindy" to begin with, and made it even worse. Bravo!
How to fix this huge mistake? Several ways can be thought of:
1. Remove, or at the very least greatly reduce, DC costs from crafting.
2. Make traces so easy to find it reduces the farming effect from them as we're already grinding DC for enough stuff already.
3. Remove DC costs for Gold members thus adding one thing to the nonexistent list of why i should keep blowing $15 a month for this game.
Yeah...I feel the 'economy' at work here....I wouldn't be surprised if there are PW owned 'sweat shops' with Dilithium 'farmers' posing as players waiting,to 'provide' us with enough Dilithium for C-points when this economy revamp goes live.
You know, a few blog posts back there was a massive discussion about if this system is farmable. Well, the way they are pushing dilithium on everything I think we are coming to our answer.
I'm sorry, but this blog does absolutely nothing to explain to me why you think it is necessary to take a system that already requires massive grinding and make it worse. What exactly was your intention here? To upset your entire crafting community? For what? For some better future down the road? For a chance to revamp the back-end of the system to allow for "cooler" stuff in the future? I really want to know.
Tell me, are you planning to release new content that would justify this change? What about your decision to remove already unique content such as the Delta Flyer while adding steeper grinds to bland items that I craft just to be competitive? What are you adding to justify the change? Better yet, why not just increase the emblems needed per item instead of this. That would have been palatable, maybe even supported by the crafting community. (higher creation cost = higher item value = win for crafters)
Unacceptable post. I need a better explanation than this to rest easy about this change.
Simple, by adding Dilithium to the crafting requirements of even-mark Gear, they hope impatient crafters will buy C-Store points in order to trade them for the requisite dilithium rather than grind.
it's another line on the C-Store railroad. Toot-toot.
Add to that the 400CP/mo stipend, your strain on system resources for continued game use, etc.
Congradulations, you are now a liability.
The Bean Counters Want to Get Rid Of You!
I hope the bean counters want us to stay in some way because we're the loyal ones. The ones who bought multiple preorder boxes and collectors editions, who paid for CO just so we could get into the STO Beta. The ones who have been sticking with Cryptic even though they didn't have the resources to publish a finished game or do all the things Jack Emmert advertised to mass audiences.
I wasted so much money on this game before it launched it's ridiculous. Some would even call if foolish which isn't far from the truth. And we've been faithfully spending money on the C-Store to boot.
I'm still waiting to hear more about our stipend. They are not C-Points, they are "Promotional Points" according to the F2P Matrix. Makes me wonder if they are not tradable for Dilithium.
The issue is that Cryptic is trying to put the Genii back in the bottle, and that rarely works out well.
I understand that Cryptic is trying to make the epic gear feel like its worth something, but in hindsight they never should have let us craft top end gear so easily. People constantly call odd mark gear useless, but its was always good enough to level with. It was only useless because how easy it was to get even marked gear. Compound this with the fact that its so easy to craft max level gear and you can have a ship set up in max level epic gear the second you hit RAUH1. It has always felt a little to easy to outfit a ship that way. This is the first MMO I've played that has allowed such high end gear to be so easy to make.
I support a change that does make that gear feel more special. Do I think adding Dilithium prices is the right way to correct these past mistakes? It seems not. Its obvious all it is doing is breeding ill will (although truth be told, the idea doesn't bother me that much).
Some observations I do have on the current implantation is
1. The price of dilithium on the crafting gear seems too high
2. If you are putting dilithium cost on both Marks 10 and 11; do you really need the dilithium on Mark 9 gear
Wait.. DaveyNY and I are in agreement on something? On the same side? Dare I say, Allies?
Whelp, that's it, the ship is sinking into a gravity well, the game is doomed, goodnight everybody, I'll be here to the last, but after the servers are shut down, I will seek you out, likely on Infinite Space or TOR.
rotflmao...
I'm apparently going be spending too much time Grinding Dilithium at my Second Job, :eek: to have any time for anything else...
Seriously though, I can't afford to put extra money into two MMO's, and if this one starts to become any less Fun, then TOR here I come...
(of course it won't be till the TOR box price drops to $39.99 though)
I'll be saving what little money I now spend on STO to move over there some day... :eek:
I know it's just the Test Server, but I am soooo glad I got my Agies Gear... Yesterday! <wheeshoo - whiping brow>
Simple, by adding Dilithium to the crafting requirements of even-mark Gear, they hope impatient crafters will buy C-Store points in order to trade them for the requisite dilithium rather than grind.
it's another line on the C-Store railroad. Toot-toot.
DING DING DING ... You hit the nail on the head with the hammer of understanding.
Everything they have done has been with the C-Store in mind. .... EVERYTHING.
You should not be adding a dilithium component to crafting. Crafting is collecting raw materials and when you have collected enough of the raw materials you build (Craft) the item you want with the powers you want. Once a Dilithium component is added it is no longer crafting, it is buying.
It seems to me that you guys have been removing items from the free column and putting them in the C-Store since the announcement of going to F2P. Since then items we have been getting for free we now have to purchase, and I don't feel that is right...
In the F2P FAQ there is these two little lines:
Lifetime subscribers also become Gold Members automatically and will not be charged a continuing subscription fee. Basically, nothing changes for Lifetime subscribers: They continue to have complete access to the same content, items and episodes the way they always have.
This said that "nothing changes for Lifetime Subscribers", but that is not true. There is also the line about having access to the same content they always have had, but that is not true.
Cryptic has taken away 2 T-3 ships that are now in the C-Store, you no longer get 1 free refit when you become a VA. They have removed the way to get the Delta Flyer for free by doing missions. Now they also add Dilithium to Crafting.
Ever since the F2P announcement almost everything in the game has a Dilithium component. The amount of Dilithium you are allow to have is limited, so you will have to grind out days in order to purchase most high level items. I don't know what you were trying to do but IMO you have taken a game that was fun and turned it into a grindfest. I play this game to have fun. I'll go out on a limb and say that most, if not all, other players play this game for fun. By adding the Dilithium this game has become whatever the opposite of fun is. I do not want to play a game that becoimes nothing but grinding and grinding. With all these changes it looks to me like you guys are trying to kill STO.
Playing an MMO is suppose to be Fun, Grinding is not fun.
I am pleading with you guys, please reverse the changes that have taken away anything from the players.
Reinstate the T-3 ships, Reinstate the free refit at VA, reinstate the Delta Flyer mission, remove the Dilithium from Crafting .... and most of all listen to your player base. Each time you have taken something away the players have been going to the forum in droves to complain about these changes. We were told that nothing would change for subscribers, but every week there is another item that is taken away and put into the C-Store. I hate to say this but with each item you change you are adding more grinding. With each item you add Dilithium to you are adding to the grinding.
I love this game. I have played this game almost every single day since I was in Closed Beta. These changes you are making IMO is going to start killing the game. So many things are requiring Dilithium, it seems like more and more every item you add is going to need Dilithium. On Holodeck you can get a high level times by doing 1 or 2 missions. For items that are purchased by Dilithium it is going to take a few days to get the amount you need and at least 2 days just to refine the Dilithium. IMO That is grinding and grinding is not fun...... Becuase grinding is not fun and I don't think that I am the only one who feels this way. Please reconsider taking the free ships and putting them in the C-Store. Please reconsider the removal of the Delta Flyer mission ... and most of all re-examine adding a Dilithium conponent to all the new items. I know I may have jumped all over the place here, but IMO these changes are not helping the game they are hurting it....
Comments
Don't worry, the mythical 'new target audience' will rush in once the vocal minority of veterans have been bulldozed out.
Any time now.
...
Just wait.
...
Oh.
I used to make heavy use of crafting, even in its simplistic form on Holodeck now, and this is gonna ruin it for me and quite literally every other subscriber. Why was this deemed necessary? Can we at least have a Dev response clarifying the reasoning behind it all?
If nothing else, can we at least switch the Dilithium requirement to EC (which there's practically NO use for anymore) or back to the olden days of common-level gear required in the recipe?
I'm in favor of option number 1, with some modifications for social crafters.
Take the reduced dilithium cost and turn it into a schematic-like crafting component, so any player with enough dilithium for new weapons can get it without crafting experience. As an example, player Y would buy a 'Weapon Power Converter mk X' at a crafting vendor. Then they give that component to the crafter, who actually needs their accumulated experience and the anomalies to make the final weapon.
It would go like this:
1) Customer pays dilithium for Premium Component (less than 25% whole item cost)
2) Customer gives Premium Component to Crafter
3) Crafter uses anomalies, schematic, and Premium Component to craft even-level or high-end gear
4) Crafter gives completed gear back to Customer
Players could theoretically start trading dilithium-bought components just for their intrinsic value, but in the end they can only be turned into crafted items and not converted back to dilithium or traded for c-points.
The Dilithium cost if any should be tiny to craft and even if the system is left as in no one is going to spend real money on Cstore points to trade for delithium just so they can craft.
So Cryptic change it for the better please or no one will craft anything.
And again I've been on the F2P server since the start and have almost maxed out my toon. So far I have seen Zero things worth spending Dilithium on.
Wait.. DaveyNY and I are in agreement on something? On the same side? Dare I say, Allies?
Whelp, that's it, the ship is sinking into a gravity well, the game is doomed, goodnight everybody, I'll be here to the last, but after the servers are shut down, I will seek you out, likely on Infinite Space or TOR.
KazumaKat
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=3820777
Katic
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=3820788
The Grand Nagus
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=3820856
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=3820922
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=3820979
fuzun
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=3821081
As a fleet crafter, I will not craft if dilithium is a requirement.
I would be real $ that choice #1 is what was/is originally intended..and they put up the inflated prices so we'd rage about them and then accept the lower ones. These prices are nothing but a PR stunt. Lets save all the rage for next week when we see what they actually want to hose us with!
This is a terrible idea, and it essentially kills crafting in the game entirely. Bringing in more Mks is great, but charging dilithium for the even numbered equipment in addition to mats is foolish. People invest a great deal of time into tracking these mats down, and now you're going to make them wait extended periods of time just to refine enough dilithium to put them to use. The fact that dilithium is bound doesn't help at all, either. Good bye fleet crafting, Hello "buy it yourself".
You're essentially turning crafting into yet another store. This doesn't sit well with me to say the least.
NO THANKS CRYPTIC.
Abandon this (horrific) Dilithium as part of recipes idea entirely and do something constructive for crafting, such as adding more unique crafting only items.
If you *really* want to prevent players mass producing gear *without* causing a huge ruckus then make each item so it can be crated in two 'modes'
'bind on craft'
and
'bind on equip'
Then make the bind on equip version (AKA tradable one) cost 20-50% more in anomalies depending on rarity.
You wanna make people *really* happy you set the bind on craft version so that it can still be traded to fleet-mates and placed in fleet-banks.
Off topic but a really odd coincidence...Asian Grind Fest was the name I was planning on using for my new cover band comprised entirely of Filipino Strippers.
Or more specifically the Magnificent Lifetime Subscribers.
You see, we're no longer assets, in fact we're the opposite.
If you've paid $300 for an LTS, that pays for 20 months worth of subcription. If you're a "Magnificent" Veteran, you've been playing for 600 days. You've used up your $300 worth. Some people used up their "value" sooner if they got the LTS on discount.
Add to that the 400CP/mo stipend, your strain on system resources for continued game use, etc.
Congradulations, you are now a liability.
The Bean Counters Want to Get Rid Of You!
even this guy's post is more intelligent-sounding than dilithium crafting
i am going to be with the majority of the group (which, btw, is EVERYONE) and warn you Cryptic, if you carry on with this cockamamie scheme of yours, STO will die
no if's, and's, but's, or maybe's about it....it will if you don't read this thread and UN-implement this change, or as some people have suggested, actually put recipes to some of the items instead of just tacking on an actual fee to craft
Runes of Magic never had anything like this, just the rarer materials that you'd have to go out and find, and also the uber-extra refining processes for tier 3, 4, and even 5 weapons of one kind
This is the simple truth.
For all intents and purposes you will have buried crafting in this game. Now people will have to pay a huge tax just to level the skill to get the the MK XI stuff. Why bother crafting anything under MK XI, when you will end up leveling out of it soon enough and save your dilithium for later? This then begs the question, "Why bother crafting at all?".
I play this game for entertainment, not as a second job. I play games to have fun. When the fun goes away, so will I, and my money with me to play another game, that entertains me.
I am not in a contest with anyone, and play at my own pace. I don't terribly mind leveling up and trying new and different things...I have a bunch of alts and don't mind not having the most elite gear possible, since I don't pvp that much, and I can hold my own against npcs.
Crafting provided me (and many others) a way to get pretty good equipment without the grinding required for the very best. It also made it possible to get decent gear while and for leveling up.
The locked episode chain was horrible, the dilithium tax is abyssmal.
The idea of a crafting tax needs to be burned, not encouraged with variations of the same theme. Burn it now, and devise something else, far far away from the ashes of the old.
This appears to be a poorly thought out idea, implemented in an economy that is only partially rolled out. If anything, it should have been discussed after all the economy changes had been made on tribble.
Flamethrowers and pitchforks set to "stun"
And to top it all off, they really don't care how much we post, how many times we post. This is already set, and going to happen. As many many posts before this one has stated, crafting it now dead.
BOW DOWN TO THE MIGHTY DOLLAR! Cause that's all it's about now. Thanks PWI. :mad:
I've made a crafting alt and my fleet has a guy that does our primary crafting. I will never craft again nor will I ask my friend to craft me something if you implement this. I will simply go without the special crafting sets.
The second effect may actually a goal of this new crafting, I don't know.
On a semi-related note:
The Nagus is 100% correct. I would be very surprised to find any player (be it here or in the "silent majority") that thinks this change is a good idea.
Please do not discount the opinions of many of us just because a few people are over the top in their hatred of everything you do.
We don't all hate everything, but it sure looks like a bunch of us don't like this change very much.
1. Devalue all other materiel's- No one is going to think about buying particle traces for 100k in bulk, when they have to buy Refined Dilithium which is going to cost a lot EC to get in the quantities needed for the "improved" crafting system.
2. Over inflate the prices of all equipment about XIII- This is essentially TRIBBLE over any new player coming to Trek after F2P conversion because now they have to go through an absolutely dreadful grind to make either enough Refined Dilithium or EC in order to get the crafted equipment (Since anyone crafting after this will almost certainly charge more in either EC or RD since they had to spend so much just to make it). The reason they'd have to grind for RD is because they've spending it all along trying to buy the next tier ship, and they'll have to grind for EC since particle traces will be worth a lot less relative to how hard it is to find them meaning they'll have to do everything on the cheap until endgame if they want to afford anything which can lead to frustration to the build up to that. This would pretty much affect any player, gold or silver.
3. It will leave any Pre-F2P player as a god amongst mortals- Now don't get me wrong, I'd love to sit there and destroy new F2P players all day, but odds are we'd be able to do this regardless of the crafting system. Anyone who got something like the Aegis set before having to spend fortunes to get even a green level item is obviously going to have a huge advantage in equipment. Think about it; if the new players can't afford stuff as good as ours now, they'll be forced to either stay away from PvP until they've gone through a horrendous grindfest to get the new equipment, or go into PvP with sub-standard equipment while we blow them to pieces every time with our ultra-awesome equipment we were able to procure before the switch that destroyed the economy.
This is more of a worst case scenario, but you get my point; It screws over any new customers to the game. Some would argue they will be screwed already, I personally don't think so, but if you do this certainly adds to it.
Tell me, are you planning to release new content that would justify this change? What about your decision to remove already unique content such as the Delta Flyer while adding steeper grinds to bland items that I craft just to be competitive? What are you adding to justify the change? Better yet, why not just increase the emblems needed per item instead of this. That would have been palatable, maybe even supported by the crafting community. (higher creation cost = higher item value = win for crafters)
Unacceptable post. I need a better explanation than this to rest easy about this change.
I craft for my fleeties. I do it for nothing, and with mats and traces we farm and bank for the fleet. Apparently the plan is we can't trade DC so effectively i'm out of a job in the fleet, or i spend the majority of my time farming dilithium, and traces, and mats just so i can continue to do it.
If someone does it as a way to make EC i say good luck to finding anyone willing to pay even an Nth of the amount of time it'll take to gather the resources to make one high tier item.
So let me add this up:
Dilithium for items.
Dilithium for VA ship.
Dilithium to craft.
Will it cost me dilithium to respawn soon? Maybe i'll need it to level up myself or my crew next?
Crafting already involves farming. Why on earth do you feel you need to add more to it?
An Aegis set will cost, in dilithium alone, 54,450DC. At a cap of 8000 refining it's effectively 7 days total just for dilithium. You're talking one of the hardest sets to make because of all the mats, and brown are difficult to farm already, combined with some of the harder to find traces.
What you've done is turned something that was "grindy" to begin with, and made it even worse. Bravo!
How to fix this huge mistake? Several ways can be thought of:
1. Remove, or at the very least greatly reduce, DC costs from crafting.
2. Make traces so easy to find it reduces the farming effect from them as we're already grinding DC for enough stuff already.
3. Remove DC costs for Gold members thus adding one thing to the nonexistent list of why i should keep blowing $15 a month for this game.
You know, a few blog posts back there was a massive discussion about if this system is farmable. Well, the way they are pushing dilithium on everything I think we are coming to our answer.
Simple, by adding Dilithium to the crafting requirements of even-mark Gear, they hope impatient crafters will buy C-Store points in order to trade them for the requisite dilithium rather than grind.
it's another line on the C-Store railroad. Toot-toot.
I hope the bean counters want us to stay in some way because we're the loyal ones. The ones who bought multiple preorder boxes and collectors editions, who paid for CO just so we could get into the STO Beta. The ones who have been sticking with Cryptic even though they didn't have the resources to publish a finished game or do all the things Jack Emmert advertised to mass audiences.
I wasted so much money on this game before it launched it's ridiculous. Some would even call if foolish which isn't far from the truth. And we've been faithfully spending money on the C-Store to boot.
I'm still waiting to hear more about our stipend. They are not C-Points, they are "Promotional Points" according to the F2P Matrix. Makes me wonder if they are not tradable for Dilithium.
I understand that Cryptic is trying to make the epic gear feel like its worth something, but in hindsight they never should have let us craft top end gear so easily. People constantly call odd mark gear useless, but its was always good enough to level with. It was only useless because how easy it was to get even marked gear. Compound this with the fact that its so easy to craft max level gear and you can have a ship set up in max level epic gear the second you hit RAUH1. It has always felt a little to easy to outfit a ship that way. This is the first MMO I've played that has allowed such high end gear to be so easy to make.
I support a change that does make that gear feel more special. Do I think adding Dilithium prices is the right way to correct these past mistakes? It seems not. Its obvious all it is doing is breeding ill will (although truth be told, the idea doesn't bother me that much).
Some observations I do have on the current implantation is
1. The price of dilithium on the crafting gear seems too high
2. If you are putting dilithium cost on both Marks 10 and 11; do you really need the dilithium on Mark 9 gear
rotflmao...
I'm apparently going be spending too much time Grinding Dilithium at my Second Job, :eek: to have any time for anything else...
Seriously though, I can't afford to put extra money into two MMO's, and if this one starts to become any less Fun, then TOR here I come...
(of course it won't be till the TOR box price drops to $39.99 though)
I'll be saving what little money I now spend on STO to move over there some day... :eek:
I know it's just the Test Server, but I am soooo glad I got my Agies Gear... Yesterday! <wheeshoo - whiping brow>
DING DING DING ... You hit the nail on the head with the hammer of understanding.
Everything they have done has been with the C-Store in mind. .... EVERYTHING.
It seems to me that you guys have been removing items from the free column and putting them in the C-Store since the announcement of going to F2P. Since then items we have been getting for free we now have to purchase, and I don't feel that is right...
In the F2P FAQ there is these two little lines:
This said that "nothing changes for Lifetime Subscribers", but that is not true. There is also the line about having access to the same content they always have had, but that is not true.
Cryptic has taken away 2 T-3 ships that are now in the C-Store, you no longer get 1 free refit when you become a VA. They have removed the way to get the Delta Flyer for free by doing missions. Now they also add Dilithium to Crafting.
Ever since the F2P announcement almost everything in the game has a Dilithium component. The amount of Dilithium you are allow to have is limited, so you will have to grind out days in order to purchase most high level items. I don't know what you were trying to do but IMO you have taken a game that was fun and turned it into a grindfest. I play this game to have fun. I'll go out on a limb and say that most, if not all, other players play this game for fun. By adding the Dilithium this game has become whatever the opposite of fun is. I do not want to play a game that becoimes nothing but grinding and grinding. With all these changes it looks to me like you guys are trying to kill STO.
Playing an MMO is suppose to be Fun, Grinding is not fun.
I am pleading with you guys, please reverse the changes that have taken away anything from the players.
Reinstate the T-3 ships, Reinstate the free refit at VA, reinstate the Delta Flyer mission, remove the Dilithium from Crafting .... and most of all listen to your player base. Each time you have taken something away the players have been going to the forum in droves to complain about these changes. We were told that nothing would change for subscribers, but every week there is another item that is taken away and put into the C-Store. I hate to say this but with each item you change you are adding more grinding. With each item you add Dilithium to you are adding to the grinding.
I love this game. I have played this game almost every single day since I was in Closed Beta. These changes you are making IMO is going to start killing the game. So many things are requiring Dilithium, it seems like more and more every item you add is going to need Dilithium. On Holodeck you can get a high level times by doing 1 or 2 missions. For items that are purchased by Dilithium it is going to take a few days to get the amount you need and at least 2 days just to refine the Dilithium. IMO That is grinding and grinding is not fun...... Becuase grinding is not fun and I don't think that I am the only one who feels this way. Please reconsider taking the free ships and putting them in the C-Store. Please reconsider the removal of the Delta Flyer mission ... and most of all re-examine adding a Dilithium conponent to all the new items. I know I may have jumped all over the place here, but IMO these changes are not helping the game they are hurting it....
Thanks for reading my rant.......