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The Tribble with Dilithium

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
Dear D'Angelo,

There is a serious problem with your current economic implementation of the tribble test shard. It needs fixed. As EP of Star Trek Online, I feel you are very much responsible for this game and the system being introduced. Especially with the economy changes in transition to Free to Play. The dilithium economy currently on tribble is poorly conceived, poorly developed, & has been poorly implemented. I am going to explain why also. That's not to say improvements haven't been made, but the overly granular currency puts the focus on creating an in game poverty line rather than implementing anything remotely viable. This can be seen in three areas. First is definition of what dilithium is. Second is how items are marketed using dilithium. Thirdly is how the system is perceived by the player.

What is dilithium?
I am going to start with something that may seem superficial, but should not be overlooked. A dilithium is by no definition an increment of measurement. While it isn't a bad idea for a currency we don't really have a tangible comparison on what we have. Energy Credits are Credits, Bars of Latinum are Bars. There is a standardization of what they are in size and relevance to the player. However, dilithium does not have this. Dilithium crystals, as all crystals, vary in size. So we must be dealing with in increment of measure either by weight, mass, or volume. Such as pounds, kilograms, or cubic meters. Now this may not seem very important, but helps create a connection between the player and the currency, it also helps define why you are being given X amount of the currency for completing various tasks & why you have to give up Y amount of the currency to get certain things.

Why is the LCARS interface blue? In the next generation series it was primarily yellow. Well that is actually explained in Star Trek Online. Visit Memory Alpha and there is an NPC there that explains it. The dilithium system is not explained in Star Trek terms. One fan even went so far as to suggest using deuterium instead. While I don't agree with that as deuterium is an isotope of hydrogen and a single deuterium would be very very tiny. The point is people don't understand what a dilithium is, why they are earning it, and why they have to give it away to get items.

The Tribble with the Current System
Right now the economy in the game is forcing players to earn rather substantial amounts amount of dilithium in order to buy ... well just about anything. I know the argument has come and gone that players can still get "quality" gear without spending dilithium. That gear, however, is far sub par to what else is available. Mk X equipment should not cost dilithium even to get a weapon, let alone three or four days of dilithium. Players will simply start buying weapons of equal or better value from the exchange for ECs. In fact that is what happened on tribble, the people selling such weapons on the exchange were doing so either from drops (which are infrequent) or from crafting. When the dilithium system was being avoided by the player base you changed the system. You punished the crafters by forcing them to use dilithium. Alright, so you really want players to use dilithium. Dilithium can not be avoided. Even if they hate the system, and try to avoid it. There is only one big reason for this.

When players first heard of exchanging dilithium for c-store points they saw it as a way to use in game currency to get special items that would normally require actual money to purchase. We can claim that it only requires c-store points, but ultimately someone has to buy those points. So it's in game currency for real money. What is on tribble is not an easy subsidization for players to use ingame currency to get items that normally cost money, quite the opposite. When I transferred over my character from holodeck she seemed to have a lot of dilithium, but after buying equipment for her I realized she didn't. She ran through her amount of dilithium very quickly. My point here is prices are high. It costs way more dilithium than it should to buy most equipment.

Now I know Cryptic has to make money. So I understand the thinking here. If players want MORE dilithium they can buy c-store points and then trade them with another player for dilithium. This will help players earn more dilithium than could normally earn in a single day. Meaning if players put down real money they can get that in game item days earlier than if they actually worked for it in game. Now don't insult our intelligence again arguing that this isn't the case. That you "aren't trying to box players into buying c-store points to trade for the dilithium to get in game items as a way to make money". I almost bought that argument until the crafting changes. The only reason these crafting changes would be necessary is if you needed another dilithium currency sync to force everyone to use it and therefore force them to seek out new ways of getting it. So don't patronize use with economy is not designed for our financial benefit speech.

Now I am going to explain why this plan is going to end very badly for Cryptic. See although you can force players to buy c-store points to exchange for dilithium, the truth is someone actually has to have an abundance of dilithium to exchange back for c-store points. With the current economic set up that simply isn't true. You have created nonconomy instead of an economy, Were everyone is a have-not. If everyone is a have not then there is noone who is going to exchange dilithium for c-store points with the exception of the most grindy hardcore players. As someone once said "MMO players will do what is most efficient, not what is the most fun." Grinding endlessly for dilithium in an attempt to be a have, not a have not, is not fun. While this system won't phase us die hard lovers of the game. It will destroy any hope of bring in and sustaining a new player base.

Player Perceptions
This setup will be perceived by the player base as a pay to win structure. You have to buy c-store points, to buy dilithium, to get good items, to actually play. It will also come across as overly grindy in many places, especially towards end game. And to be perfectly honest as a new player on a silver account I would get to Captain rank and become extremely frustrated and quit. Now many people from Cryptic have argued that the way things are on tribble won't represent how things will be in a larger economy on the live server. But the simple fact is it isn't working here, and if it doesn't work in small scale it simply won't work in a large scale. That being said most of the player base that plays on live on a regular basis is now on tribble testing it. It doesn't have much larger to get. And while it could get slightly better on a larger scale, simply the current incarnation of the system will be disastrous.

How do We Fix This?
First thing first, re-balance the current marketing system for in game items. Especially for ship weapons & ship equipment. This also means either removing dilithium from the crafting system, or reducing the amount of materials needed to craft those items. I would guess quite a bit of both.

However the big things that need to be changed are the ways in which we earn dilithium. Merits were earned from just about everything and were far less granular than dilithium. So we should earn dilithium from everything that we onced earned merits from. Missions, mission replays, everything. First mission play through should earn a small amount of refined dilithium, while replays should earn ore. I see ore has been added to DOFF missions to be earned, but there are still many missions that don't earn a drop of it. This needs to be changed.

As to how dilithium is refined. It isn't very Trek, and I have an idea on how that could be changed. Instead of refining in bulk and having an instant return, how about having the refinement process take time. You can only refine a given increment, but it takes a given amount of time to refine that increment. That increment and that time span determines how miuch you can do in a day. Not a hard limit that hits you and says go no further. By loading up a hopper or a queue for a given amount of dilithium ore, the system takes a small amount from that hopper and refines it chunk at a time over a given time span. Further more you could assign duty officers to take an amount of dilithium ore to a refinement center to refine it over a different period of time and come back with refined amount. Although this process may take longer it would have a greater return and allow players to, every so many days, overcome their cap of dilithium needed. As well you could allow players to increase their refinement rates at the cost of something else, perhaps warp speed and/or transwarp capabilities. The big thing here is make it feel Star Trek-y. Make me feel like the Captain even when I am assigning a simple task of refining dilithium to my chief engineer.

The Short of It
The dilithium system needs changed. I shouldn't feel like I am getting mugged for using it. As it is I feel all my hardwork I put into my character is being taken advantage of. Yes it feels grindy, yes it appears Cryptic has some ulterior motives for the way its implements. In a word it's broken.

Please fix it!

Sincerely,
A dear and loyal fan.


I am going to apologize upfront. This is the 5th rewrite of this post. After reading through the first draft I realized it was almost exclusively the words F---, S---, & D'Angelo. My second draft referred a myriad of ways of removing D'Angelo's organs while he was still alive. My third draft threatened legal action, which I have no way to execute. Finally my fourth draft threatened to quit, which would accomplish nothing. I have also cooled off a bit since the beginning and will try typing this out rationally. More over if you agree with me in any way, doesn't have to be exact; but just agree the SYSTEM NEEDS CHANGED, please leave a comment. Enough and maybe we will get a response.
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Just checking, but methinks the crafting modification isn't going over that well, is it?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Some people just don't try right.
    Not because they are evil or lazy or something. Just because nobody ever took the time to teach them.


    don't fix it. kill it.
    Next time. try correctly.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Griggitz wrote:
    Some people just don't try right.
    Not because they are evil or lazy or something. Just because nobody ever took the time to teach them.


    don't fix it. kill it.
    Next time. try correctly.

    Wow, the was insulting, condescending, and not helpful at all. I guess you did't try correctly.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Was NOT directed at you Jami.
    Don't troll me friend. I'm agreeing with you.
    You had a very excellent post.
    I was just reiterating what you said in a very tiny amount of words.
    People dont like reading a bunch, but i did because what you had to say was good.
    so back off me dude, I got you on this.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Griggitz wrote:
    Was NOT directed at you Jami.
    Don't troll me friend. I'm agreeing with you.
    You had a very excellent post.
    I was just reiterating what you said in a very tiny amount of words.
    People dont like reading a bunch, but i did because what you had to say was good.
    so back off me dude, I got you on this.

    Sorry, it's just could be read either way. Wasn't entirely sure what you meant.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Well that at least gives you a bump. and if your well concieved, finely crafted. if a little verbose, post gets a little more airtime because of some percieved drama between OP and responder then all the better. (I'm just kidding about the whole "wordy" thing. . . . some people really do like that sort of thing. )
    LLAP
    Qapla'
    Blessed Be
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    The F2P will be released late Nov to early Dec, there is still a lot of testing and more patches to go before it hits holodeck. the date i listed is my best guess.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    The original poster has some really good points, though I don't agree with all of it.

    I do think that;
    • Dilithium charged for crafting should be 25% at most, compared to vendors
    • Dilithium should become tradeable between players like EC is (you're literally killing our entire crafting division in the fleet with the current system and forcing all our members to pick up crafting themselves, I can't even effectively craft items for my own alts any more like this)
    • Missions should give dilithium on the first play through, grinding for the stuff through dailies is incredibly boring. I don't want to play a boring game.

    I'm also miffed about the terrible exchange rate we're getting with our current chars for our badges/marks/emblems, this should also improve. On top of that we should also have a way again to earn respecs through in-game means and have our merits turned into respec tokens. I didn't get my amount of merits for the fun of it, I got it with the prospect of being able to use it for respecs when I ran out of my free tokens.


    For the first time in this testing cycle I'm feeling myself turning more negative about all of this. With the current increases in C-Store points charged, high dilithium costs for just about anything, low conversion rates for our current currencies and losing access to many of the things we had before (like VA ship tokens, earnable respec tokens etc.) I'm actually starting to feel like I should be looking for another game to play. And I'm a lifer. :-s

    I don't know if Cryptic noticed, but the world is in a financial crisis that isn't getting any better any time soon. Increasing the money you're charging for all those things is making it a lot harder to play the game. Money is tight as it is on people and you're not making it any easier. This month alone you're putting up enough stuff in the C-store that's worth 2 subscription months, I only get enough stipends when f2p goes live for 0.33 subcription month.

    I can understand the need for money on Cryptic's side all too well, but have some mercy on us already. We're not all millionaires that can easily pay for all that you're charging.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    Crafting systems are to my mind one of the most important economy parts of any MMO and most have real issues in creating a good system.

    My suggestion to the crafting system woudl be:
    • Change the Refined Dilithium requirement to Dilithium Ore
    • Reduce the Dilithium requirement further (50% of what is currently is especially if you ignore point 1)
    • Make Dilithium Ore tradeable
    • Allow Dilithium Ore to be stored in Fleetbanks

    This would solve the issue people have with teh ore conversion rate per day and allow for a more flexible economy.

    Another idea would be to add a crafting daily mission that gives out some dilitium for crafting three items to counter the cost of crafting by rewarding the actual crafting time spend.

    Crafting like it is not on Tribble is not the right move. Please consider some of the suggested changes.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited October 2011
    The original poster makes some good points whuich I very nearly mirror in a post of my own.

    Refined Dithium needs to be a medium of exchange. It should not be a material component for crafting.

    Dithium ore would make more sense as a crafting material as it is quite simple as of this moment to gain far more of it then you can refine, and making Ore the crafting material takes its potential out of the game ecnomey and provide a sink for it. there by improving its "Rarity" which I undersand in theory is supposed to giveit it's value.

    I'm doing STF's now on Triible. So far I've made well over 140 STF runs.. at a little over 1k dilithium ore per run I'm sitting on an awefull lot of Dilithium ore..with more coming in every day. I've been doing 20-30
    STF runs per day over the past week esentially gaing 4x the amount of ore I can refine per day.

    I don't even bother putting anything less then a purple quality item on the exchange. Theres just not that much need for E-credits for me at Lt. General in a t-5 starship that allready has the best availble weapons and equipment I can put on it. And I've made several million EC just feeding blue items and below back to the replicator as I consider at this point anything less then a purple quality drop "trash" . The experience I want from STO is going out and doing things. Boldly going and all that. I have a starship, a disruptor and Bat'leth, and my trusty crew.. All else is rubbish. Its not how much you have, its what you do.

    And that is what Star Trek is all about.
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