In the STOked before last, I got the very definate impression they weren't even going to try. Too much effort needed, not enough ways to monetise it.
Sadly, its just more of the same old, same old. The KDF has always been and continues to be a "long term" goal TWO YEARS after the game's launch. I hate to say it, but I've given up on the KDF. Not on the desire to see them expanded, but on any real hope that Cryptic can actually do it.
I'm at the point now where I wish they would just say "Star Trek has always focused mainly on the story of the Federation, and this game will be too" and just add Roms and Cards as "mini factions":
Romulan "mini faction" announced!
Have you ever wanted to fly your own Romulan war bird? Now you can in Star Trek Online with the introduction of the Romulan "mini faction"!
What is a "mini faction" anyway? Well, basically it means they wont have the same amount of faction specific PvE episode missions as the "main" Federation faction. The Romulans will be launched with their own faction specific episode series introducing players to the storyline of the Romulans in the time period that STO takes place, but after completing that storyline Romulan players will have access to more generic types of content:
Star clusters/exploration
PvP
Special Task Forces
The Foundry
Fleet Actions
Daily events
Featured Episodes
The Romulans will also have their own home world that they start on, as well as fleet of ships to acquire and ranking system to progress through. The Romulan faction will be launching on 2/3/13 to celebrate STO's 3 year anniversary, so stay tuned for more details and enjoy the Romulan mini faction preview!
Then they could do the same thing with the Cardassians on the 4 year. I might not be everything I'd like to see, but I can honestly say I would enjoy playing Rom/Card alts on the side even with limited content.
Sadly, its just more of the same old, same old. The KDF has always been and continues to be a "long term" goal TWO YEARS after the game's launch. I hate to say it, but I've given up on the KDF. Not on the desire to see them expanded, but on any real hope that Cryptic can actually do it.
I'm at the point now where I wish they would just say "Star Trek has always focused mainly on the story of the Federation, and this game will be too" and just add Roms and Cards as "mini factions":
Then they could do the same thing with the Cardassians on the 4 year. I might not be everything I'd like to see, but I can honestly say I would enjoy playing Rom/Card alts on the side even with limited content.
War hammer was focused on the alliance. Wow focussed on humans and elves. Star wars focused on jedis. After the initial flood of subscribers factions always even out.
Even in star trek. Despite the poll you took
War hammer was focused on the alliance. Wow focussed on humans and elves. Star wars focused on jedis. After the initial flood of subscribers factions always even out.
Even in star trek. Despite the poll you took
You can keep saying that all you want, but it will never be true in this game. And while I havent played WH or WoW and therefore cant comment on the stories, you are completely wrong about SW. The original trilogy constantly jumped back and forth between scenes of the good guys and the bad guys, and the prequals told the story of a good guy who became a bad guy. So the story of SW was much more balanced between "good guys" and "bad guys" than Trek is.
You can keep saying that all you want, but it will never be true in this game. And while I havent played WH or WoW and therefore cant comment on the stories, you are completely wrong about SW. The original trilogy constantly jumped back and forth between scenes of the good guys and the bad guys, and the prequals told the story of a good guy who became a bad guy. So the story of SW was much more balanced between "good guys" and "bad guys" than Trek is.
I really do think you may need more information to make an accurate conclusion.
I'm so glad aion is going f2p soon will get into that for a year or two before spending another dime on this thing. Its obvious theres not going to be anything done this year besides grab bags...
Title: Dan Stahl Interview
Transcriber(s): Yumene, Berryshine
Date: March 17, 2012
Original Air Date: March 9, 2012
--- START ---
<Music playing> Tanner: Ok, hopefully we have everything fixed this time. Not completely sure Dan: Im still here <laugh> Tanner: <laugh> still got Dan I can hear on my end; hopefully you can hear him on your end. Dan: Or else its going to be a very private interview. Tanner: Yea, which Im sure all our listeners... <scrambled> Dan: Or you could just make up things that I say, you could be like, well I was talking to Dan Tanner: <laugh> Dan: And he said <scrambled> Jahner: Yea, I got you both Tanner: Ok, so awesome <laugh><scrambled> Dan: He basically said we could do whatever we wanted in game, and he said everyone getting free, free ships from now until the end of time, so yes <scrambled> Tanner: Yea that would be totally awesome, a free Galor would be awesome right? Alright so, <scrambled> Now we <scrambled> Now that we got this issue fixed, which never happened, but okay, were good, so with that I got a list of questions here for Dan, and for those of you that dont know, Dan is the executive producer of Star Trek Online, the game that we play here at Subspace Radio <laugh> So, yea, if you are ready, well go ahead and get started with some questions here for you. Dan: I am ready, I have the questions and I am ready to answer the questions, lets just say that. Lets see how we do. Tanner: Alrighty, sounds good, Im going to start with some of the qui questions that we had picked out here from us. The biggest one that, here is a question on the server stability, as of late, it seems to have reached a boiling point recently with two or three downtimes, in as many weeks, are there any plans to add more servers to not only handle the load but also improve queue times especially with queues reaching to the sixteen hundreds on weekends Dan: So lets talk about that server stability because its a great question, Im glad someone asked this, Ive been wanting to bring it up. The problem is not hardware, weve identified the problem, we've been adding hardware since we launched free to play so it's really not that, what it boils down to some operating system issues with our servers so honestly it has to do with our database and you know some windows architecture issues and so what what's been happening is that it's not a matter of having capacity or things being too full the software team has been trying to debug whatever this is that has been causing the servers to go offline every once in a while so we are really close to tracking that down and in fact have been working on it, they been pretty much working on it twenty four hours a day, they would ever come by my office today to say that they're making progress um and I don't think were, they said we're not completely of the woods yet but the hope is that this whatever this operating system issue is well get this ironed out, they have multiple new machines in the data center to switch over to try different OS configs, so we can get this all ironed out, but honestly it has very little to do with not having capacity or having a bug in the game it's really a bug with how the, all of this technicality behind running a MMO with this many players on the database that's really where were at. In terms of the queues on we have been seeing just a ridiculous amount of people on the weekends for key, for the featured episode series to my expectation is that <scrambled>I do expect the intentionality of time the finale tomorrow, featured episode five, theres a very good chance there could be a queue, but I just say, bear with us but were really trying to get as everybody into these episodes as possible there's tons and tons and tons of people all at one specific time trying to log in. <scrambled>Typically you dont have everyone trying to log into a MMO all at once. Most MMOs only a percentage of your user base is logged in at any given time. But with these episodes you just get these shear humongous spike, so its not like that capacity isn't there it's just that the of the land rush is there so we're working it out and, we could definitely get everybody in but itd be rubber band city so we dont want to do that, <scrambled> trying to keep the performance were trying to balance performance versus how many people can we get. Tanner: Right, we dont want to be sitting there trying to go against the JemHadar and be bouncing back and forth and totally missing and yeah. Dan: Yeah. And so were trying to find a balance between that and having eight minutes between you and firing your weapons. Thats terrible, we dont want to do that. Tanner: Right. Exactly. Alright, so that definitely answered that question. That was one that was definitely on my mind, I know for sure. So, alright, another one from here, from the list is about PvP. One of the biggest complaints seen about PvP is getting continuously getting steamrolled by PvP fleets or premades. Are there any plans for making any quote unquote tier system for PvP that will match players against each other with similar skills or, to a lesser extent, gear levels? Or perhaps a premade versus premade or PUGs versus PUGs system? Dan: <scrambled> Ill answer some of those questions. In terms of coming up with a PvP system that uses a ranking system or some sort of leveling system in order for matchmaking, which I think were talking about
Tanner: Right Dan: In terms of a matchmaking system, we are looking at some new tech like I said in a previous interview I was talking about, theres a team at Cryptic thats been working on a PvP game over the last year and they built out a lot of this tech that allows us to do things like matchmaking. So were actually getting our hands dirty on that code right now, trying to figure out if we can port it over to Star Trek and what we can and cant use out of that system. So I fully expect in season six, as we get closer Ill have a better idea of whether or not well have something. Id certainly love to have something like that. But in the meantime what I really want to do is get our new, is get the PvP maps updated and working on this better code, so that we can make our PvP maps better than theyve ever been. And were just trying to fix some of the issues that we have in some of them and in addition Im hoping that well also add some new modes, or changing some of the PvP maps over to different types of gameplay. Because I know for example, one of the things that we theres a capture the flag mode, maybe theres a king of the hill mode in this new tech, so if we can get some of our maps ported over to that, or new maps made in that system, were definitely gonna do that. We have dedicated resources for season six to add that PvP update. Tanner: Okay, awesome. Now another question along that line that was in here was about any chance of a tournament or ranking system for the PvP. Dan: That would be, in my mind the third thing that we could do. We could certainly do leaderboards and thats one of the things we are talking about doing that I didnt mention. First of all we want leaderboards working for PvP and once we get once get, not just match leaderboards, but an overall standing leaderboard, that kinda goes <scrambled> So, once we get matchmaking, once we get leaderboards then I could see us maybe doing something along the lines of a tournament. But thats sorta the last thing that we would do in that list of stuff. Tanner: Alright, lets see here. Um, how bout the, another question that was in here was about the specialty ships like the JemHadar ship and the Cardassian Galor. Is Cryptic gonna continue to offer specialty ships like this? Has there been any thought of just putting it on the Cstore and having it be there for people to buy instead of getting it randomly? Just trying to get a better understanding of the reasoning behind the way its currently being done. Any thoughts on that? Dan: Sure. The question, are we gonna continue to offer specialty ships like the JemHadar ship, yeah? Tanner: Yeah Dan: The answer is yes. Were gonna continue to offer ships in every way we possibly can. Some ships you can earn in-game, some ships you can buy with energy credits, some you can buy with microtransactions, some you get in what people are calling these chance boxes, so yeah. Were gonna continue to do that, and were gonna add new ways to get ships as well. So, for example, one of the ways Im looking at is I would love to put in high-end ship crafting for fleets. I think fleets should be able to build a starbase or a drydock and be able to craft their own ships as well. Tanner: That would be cool
Dan:: And some new specialty ship. So maybe theres something like that. I really like the idea of being able to drop parts or have people pick up parts for ships in that mode where they can sort of mix and max things and make their own ship. Those are all things we definitely want to do. So I dont think .. so yes. The answer is were definitely gonna continue to offer ships in every way possible so that we can just have a wide variety in terms of how ships are available. Now, were, you know, if theres some ship that people want to get <scrambled> Im a big proponent of there needs to be a <scrambled> to get a lot of this stuff, so thats sort of the mindframe Im going at when I look at things like chance boxes. I really want people to have a way ... for example, the JemHadar bug, I never got that ship, I want a way that I can go get that ship again. So, you can look at me to once its past its exclusivity timeframe, whether thats a year, six months, I think Stephen DeAngelo had talked about it being some timeframe. It would certainly be nice if people who had missed out on that ship had another way to get it. So, you can look for me to do something like that in the future. Tanner:: Alright, another addition to the question about the specialty ships was about the global announcement thing that goes across for the Cardassian ship. Basically, just wondering why have that, and are there any plans to completely turn it off? Dan:: Yeah <scrambled> The question is marketing, right? So why do you see TV commercials on Hulu, why not just offer me the movie for free, or the TV show for free? It sells, it makes money right? So whether people like it or not, you can just turn it off. Thats why I, I agree. I dont necessarily like the spam, I turned it off on mine. But, you know, it equates to money and in a free to play game thats one of the ways we make money. So, sorry. <laughs> But thats why we added the option for you to turn it off, right. I dont think youre gonna see us turn that off any time soon Tanner:: Right. At least were able to turn it off individually on our end. Dan:: Yes. Tanner:: Thats a plus. Alight, lets see. Weve got that the, um since were talking about ships lets go on to the other question about ships. What kind of ships are in line to be brought into the game? Are there any consideration into allowing players to I dont exactly understand how he had this worded, but Im guessing, kitbash their own ships to offer better customisation, maybe a T5 Akira or Fed Carrier or real battlecruiser? Dan:: So, similar to what we were just talking about with, you know, ships and ideas for opening up new ships. Were definitely going to be bringing more ships into the game. I dont have the list of all the ships were working on, theres a lot of ships I used to talk about back in the engineering reports, most of them are actually in the game now. So we will continue to be coming up with a list of existing IP ships that we want to add into the game. But then on top of that, the second part of that question, whether or not we will allow people to kitbash their own ships for better customisation, I think youre going to see something like this but it might not be exactly make a T5 Akira or make a Fed carrier. It could be something where you can take an existing ship and you can, like I said, can craft a better version of it. Or maybe you can <scrambled> Kind of the kind of station configuration that you like. Or maybe one that has four nodes in the front and two in the back, or vice versa. Maybe thats the kind of customisation were looking at. Im not sure because we havent gotten that far. But what we do know, is that in our future is starship crafting, we just havent worked out a design exactly I mean, theres tons of designs, we just havent figured out which one were gonna do. But in terms of ships coming, yes, there are ships coming. Im not gonna spoil any of them because I just havent looked at Als whiteboard lately. <laugh> Tanner:: <laugh> Okay. Alright, lets, er alright. Next question here is about the state of the game. Someone argue that many promises or near promises have been broken along the path between your departure and your return, to PWEs purchase of Cryptic and then the released free to play. Um, Klingon Content, weekly episode, bugs that are reported on Tribble are still released onto the Holodeck. Bugs that are still around from launch, or closely thereafter. What are your thoughts and what are your plans to win the, quote unquote, naysayers? Whats your focus for the next year with Star Trek Online? Dan:: Well that sounded like a pretty good rant. Let me try and focus on a few things there. So, um, lets go back to the bro- to the promises. So you said something about arguing that promises have been broken. Um, so, in terms of promises, if youre referring to the engineering reports, the engineering reports had a pretty good caveat on them that everythings subject to change. And I think my feedback, that I took away when I left, is that that caveat just didnt work and that anything I said on the forums and anything that I said on the engineering reports just got taken as verbatim or a promise and that all my good intentions should have just <scrambled> in my head. So yes, I can see where someone whos watching the engineering reports looking at everything we were talking about can say wheres this content, where are they gonna fix this, and despite our, our continued efforts and our continuing improvement of this game, it might not be going as fast as some people might want. But I also think the game is getting better every day and every week. I look at the game now and I play the game far more than I ever played. I look at all the people online, theres something about the energy of having so many people on the universe in Star Trek with free to play, its a lot of fun and Im enjoying it. So I think the games getting better and Im having more <scrambled> than I think I ever have. Er, but in terms of, er talking about Klingon content and weekly episodes and bugs. Lets talk about bugs, right. Yes, theres bugs in MMOs, theres bugs in our game. Were trying to improve that, I mean, theres been some pretty good <scrambled> about all the bugs that have been going out since the dawn of time. But it really boils down to the teams need to really focus on bugs. They need to focus on not checking in bugs. So its a constant struggle between production and QA to just get all these bugs out and to get them ironed out and discover them. So thats one of our continued efforts and one that everyone here at the company gets involved with, and we take seriously. Its not that we like, nobody likes putting bugs in software but it happens. And when it happens we need to figure out why its happening and address those issues. And so right now bugs are happening, so we have to figure out why certain bugs are happening and address that any way we can. In terms of, lets see, winning over the naysayers, Um, if Im gonna say naysayers, theres always gonna be naysayers and theres no way to win over naysays because naysayer are gonna stay naysayers. <scrambled> Its almost like arguing against someone whos agreed not to agree with you. Um, I think that main thing is for me to just continue doing my job and just continue making Star Trek as awesome as it can be, and I think the last question was around focus, um. Tanner:: Right. Focus over the next year. Dan:: So, focusing for the next year, you know, a lot of it is looking at where the game is at, looking at what were gonna do next and where were gonna spend our resources and making sure that were doing the right things. I mean, if I look at whats the focus for Star Trek in year 2012, its putting the content and features in the game that need to be there next. Theres no end to that list of things we want to put in the game, but does that really need to be the next thing that we do? And so coming up and making sure that were clear about whats going to be our priorities and what gonna be the healthiest thing for the game. I mean, sure I would love to do content X or content Y, or feature B, but if thats not gonna help the <scrambled> If thats not gonna improve things, you really have to justify why that content is being made and why were spending our dollars there. So, if anything, youre gonna see a continued effort from me to make sure that were spending our dollars wisely and were making the content thats making the game just that much more awesome. And, you know, I think weve added some really good things over the last year and two years for that matter and weve continued to improve the game since day one.The game I play right now, like I said, is a heck of a lot better than the game I played day one. And thats just credit to our efforts to continue to add to this game and I think the games gonna continue to get better. Im very committed to it, thats why Im here. Tanner:: Right. And were glad your committed. We enjoy all the content that you help bring to us and Ive only been playing for within the last year myself. I started playing about ack in early November of last year, so coming up on a number of months. About five months or something like that. And in just that time period Ive seen a lot of great improvements that I absolutely love. Dan:: Well, good! Tanner:: just me. A buddy of mine got me into the game and I just absolutely love it, so for me, I appreciate everything youve done to make the game what it is. Dan:: And the whole team. Its not just me, Im just trying to make sure that were staying focused.
Tanner:: Right, yeah. The whole team over there at Cryptic has done a wonderful job. Um, the lets see here, looking through the questions here, uh, got some questions that were submitted by some of the listeners here. The first question here is what are the long term plans for the Romulan and/or Cardassian factions? In Ask Cryptic it was mentioned that it was being worked on, so what kind of hurdles are involved with bringing this to fruition? Dan:: <scrambled> Well, thats sort of a misperception. I dont think I ever said that were working on Romulan or Caradassian factions. I did say that we would love to do them and what do we need to do in order for us to start working on Romulan and Cardassian factions. So, those are the questions there at the top of my mind and one of the things, reasons why Im back in this role is I really think we need to get to a point where, you know, theres a lot of Romulan and Cardassian fans out there, Id love for them to have their own faction and for that matter, that adds to the Klingon faction, what are we doing about the Klingon faction. In terms of long term plans, I think the long, long term plan is that there are four factions and that theres Federation, theres the Klingons, theres the Romulans and theres the Cardassians. And maybe even more than that. But we need to make sure that faction gameplay is fun, that theres a reason to play other factions and that the factions have enough gameplay and fun gameplay to justify you wanting to <scrambled> The biggest questions I have in my mind is when you roll a Klingon is the experience enough that you feel like youre creating a different character and thats really the ultimate test in my mind as to whether or not that factions viable. Does that faction have any conflict with the other factions? In our game its a little bit of both, right? Theres a little bit of faction gameplay in PvP, then we also let you team up. Its, theres a lot of oddities to how weve done factions and how factions have evolved in Star Trek Online. So before we start working on Romulan and Cardassian factions we definitely have to solve this question and come up with the right answer. And it is something Im working on, Im just not gonna talk about how specifically were gonna get there because theres a lot of ifs and buts in there and I dont want to, uh, I dont want someone to say but youve been working on Kling- on Cardassians since you did that interview and Im, we havent started working on it yet. Tanner:: Right. So, thank you for clearing that up. Um, the, another thing, another question that was asked that Ive actually seen and been keeping track of a forum post on the Star Trek Online Forums was talk of making more usefulness of the bridge of the ship interior. The one post I had seen was talking about making it possible to travel from system to system while on your bridge. Im assuming that might be one of the things theyre talking about with the question. So, the question is, are there any plans to add more usefulness or interactivity to the bridge, the ship interior like being able to use the viewscreen to show game specs of ships, adding poker to the mess hall, Star Trek chess, holodeck games? Dan:: Sure. Thats a great, theres a lot of great ideas there like doing the chess and the holodeck and the poker. In fact I think weve been talking about this for a long time as these being great ideas. Even the idea of travelling across the galaxy <scrambled> For those who might be new to the game Ive been answering that question since beta. So, in terms of what are the plans, there are no plans at this time to add anything to your bridge and ship interiors because we would like to change how your interiors work. Another problem I dont like how bridges and ship interiors were made is A; you cant customise them other than the trophy room and B: We cant make content in them. Like for example, you make your starship interior look like, you know, configuration X and someone else makes their starship interior look like configuration Y, its very challenging for us to make a mission in which someone boards your ship or something happens because we have to tell the enemies where to go and what to do and theres a lot tech to that. Now, one of the things wed need to do, wed sorta reengineer how all of that works so we can get to the ultimate goal of your bridge and ship interiors having functionality. Now that said, were absolutely looking at what we can do in the short term to make ship interiors useful. Like, I think were super close to being able to do things similar to duty officers system. I would love to be able to go to my engine room and have some duty officers do something in my engine room and have different assignments that are available on my ship. I think that would, thats a cool thing. I would love to be able to craft on my ship, I would love to be able to have a poker game on my ship. Those are all things we absolutely want to do and some of those things are closer to reality than others, but nothing Im ready to say yes, thats coming yet. But they are all ideas that are out there and weve been thinking about them for a really long time. The one caveat that I would say is that travelling through the sector from your bridge has been the oldest question that I can think of where Ive continually said were probably not going to get there any time soon if ever. But that <Scrambled> is just to say with the current thinking the idea of travelling through the sector from your bridge, we made the call we wanted you to travel in ship mode so that you can see your ship, you can see other ships and get a sense of where you are in the galaxy. Tanner:: Right, and one of the other things that I had remembered reading from that forum post about the travelling from the ship interior was the fact that area is all, its a social zone and youre effectively bypassing that travelling from your bridge, of which the whole point is socialisation. Dan:: But who knows? Ive heard some great proposals over the last two years. One of the ones that I really like is that, is the idea of maybe at some point you can head off on your own on exploration, in which case you dont need there to be a social zone and you can go explore the Gamma Quadrant or something on your own, and maybe in that case it makes sense to be okay to do that. Tanner:: Right. Dan:: <scrambled> When youre on your bridge your on a different space <scrambled> than when youre in sector. Its a completely different world. We could make it happen, but its just not something in the <scrambled> future. Tanner:: Alright, so you, youre breaking up a little bit there. So, its something that you could make happen, but nothing thats gonna be happening any time soon, is that what youre saying? Dan:: Yeah, not the immediate future for travelling from your bridge. Tanner:: Alright, gotcha. Just wanted to make sure that was clearly said. <laughs> Dan:: <laughs> It wasnt me fiddling with the cords going Ah, I think Im breaking up! Tanner:: <laughs> Yeah <scrambled> no. Alright, next question on the lsit here is about a chance of maybe some new STFs. The current formats great, but is there any chance that there could be at least one or two of the old style of STF? Theres a real sense of accomplishment getting through all of the Cure with the old style. But now some people are feeling that the STFs seem to be a little less rewarding. Is there any possibility of having both styles? Dan:: Im really glad someone asked this question because I want to talk a little bit about this. So, the previous STFs, the way - Special Task Forces, thats what it stands for for someone who may not have heard that before. Special Task Forces are content in the game that was originally designed to be very challenging content for a well co-ordinate group of people to be able to undertake. And it was very difficult and especially with the difficulty slider was almost impossible in some cases to finish without good gear and without good tactics. What we found is not many people played them. Partly because of the challenge, partly because of the rewards, partly because of time involved and you know, youd get an hour in and if there was a bug or something it would just be frustrating. So, we made the <scrambled> shorter, to break them up into sections, and to add good rewards. Now, I think youve seen a lot more people playing the STFs than have ever played the STFs because of that. Now, thats not an excuse to say were not gonna do Special Task Forces in the future, but heres kinda what Im thinking and how we want to tackle this. We do want to add challenging group-based gameplay, but I think that needs to be for fleets. I think that is something that well-organised groups of people, which are fleets, should be able to undertake challenges that, um, that allow them to progress their fleet or to have a unique challenge that is specifically designed for fleets. I mean, in a sense, thats kinda what fleet actions were expected to be, you know, fleet actions made for the fleets but fleet actions have sorta become group PUG content. And I can see, I can see something in the future where, maybe in the near future, where we look at making <scrambled> high-level challenging content with good gear progression, with good rewards and maybe even some new enemies for, uh, that might make people reminiscent of the old STFs. But really, part of that is thinking out is this a five man thing, is this a twenty man thing? How many people are we talking about? If this is for fleets, maybe these are twenty man instances. That would be something kinda new for Star Trek to do something that challenging for that amount of time. But maybe thats where were headed <scrambled> talking about guilds and fleets. Maybe thats the kind of content that Im looking for. So, stay tuned on that. Its a definite were looking at it and its something that could be coming as part of season six.
Tanner: Okay, that would be awesome. Um, I know that, for me, I finally got around to playing the STFs once I hit that Rear Admiral level and once I got into them I cant stop playing them. I just love them myself. So that would be really cool to see come around. I know that the one fleet that I was around for a little while they loved doing group events and thats something that I can guarantee that they would love. So thats something to look forward to. Dan:: Let me add one thing to that. For the person whos like Im not in a fleet, I dont want to be in a fleet, well, uh, for those people I think the idea is we want to offer the idea of a public fleet where youre just sort of loosely, casually tied to other groups of players, maybe thats one solution Ive seen in other games, something that were considering for Star Trek. Tanner:: Alright, yeah, um, alright, cool. Lets see here, thats all for the listener questions and the main part of the question list except for, down at the bottom here, the wonderful question that Im sure everyone is wanting to know at some point. Whats a typical day in the office like for you? Dan:: Well, what is typical? I moved to San Fransisco, Cryptic Studio offices are in <srambled> California which is about, uh, fifty miles from where I live. So my day starts early in the morning, getting in the car and driving down beautiful 280 on the east bay. Or not east bay, the, uh, basically south bay. And its a beautiful drive first of all, and its one that I actually enjoy right now, I love living in the city. So, by the time I get to the office Ive usually listened to a bit of NPR and some radio, maybe checked my email a little bit. By the time I get into the office Im well ready for the day. First thing we do is we have the production meeting, where myself and the other producers uh, and the other leads, sit down and talk about what the teams doing that day, talk about any issues weve had overnight and talk about game <scrambled> that needs to be followed up on immediately. So thats our first touchpoint of the day. And to be fair, emails happening 24 hours a day on this team. Any live service, you see, thats why I was sending emails at one oclock in the morning last night, its a 24 hour game. Uh, so were constantly working. But once Im in the office first thing that happens is that we have that production meeting. And then from there really depends on the meeting schedule, whether or not were looking at planning, or scheduling or maybe were talking about new features. So my days a lot of the time filled with meetings and reading lots of emails and responding to issues and trying to quickly answer questions and to make sure that were on track with as many things as possible. So, for example, today we were talking about season six, we had a company meeting, we talked a little bit about, you know, how the companys doing, how Star Treks doing, how Champion Onlines doing, <scrambled> coming out they were just doing presentations at GDC, so we had a good sort of day today at talking about that kind of stuff. But, you know, a lot of times Im walking around looking, checking in with my leads, going in their office, seeing how things are going, seeing if theres anything I can do to help. And in terms of the rest of the day, thats kind of what my day is. And thats the fun of it, you never know from day to day what youre gonna be doing uh, and if I didnt have my phone with me 24 hours a day, checking my calender, telling me where I need to be next, I wouldnt necessarily, I would get kind of lost. In fact,e very once in a while, I see Jack wandering around, looking at his phone trying to figure out where hes supposed to be. And <laughs> and so its kind of that little thing you know, where at the EP level were really trying to be involved in as many thigns as possible. But theres a great team here, especially the team on Star Trek Online, really proud of this team. You know, theres a great <scrambled> effort going on day in, day out to making new things. So even today we were talking about season six, we were talking about fleets and starbases and all kinds of crazy stuff, and every once in a while I get a break and get to sit in my office and do a fun interview like this and even during that Ive got people like Jack and Craig outside my window dancing and trying to make me laugh. So thats, theyre doing it right now, its hilarious. Tanner:: <laughs> Nice. So, yeah, um, wow, time sure flies. Holy cow. Its been forty minutes plus so far. Jahner:: I have one question , though, for you Dan. Dan:: Sure. Jahner:: When aCe- Dan:: This is the mysterious, whos this? Is this Scott? Jahner:: This is Jahner Dan:: Okay. <laughs> Tanner:: <laughs> Yes, Jahner is in the house as well. Jahner:: When we interviewed you a while back, its been a little while, you had said you had a plan to bring VGer in the game, that was like on thing that you really wanted. So, is that gonna happen? Dan:: Well that was, was sort of a dream. I really like the story of VGer, I really do think that there, you know, the Motion Picture is one of my favourite movies and so I really enjoy anything having to do with that. That said, theres a hint of VGer in the Borg Red Alerts, and, um, whether or not we ever get to that story is sort of up in the air. I would certainly love to do it. The team would certainly maybe or maybe not like to do it. <laughs> They might be sick of me talking about VGer. Um, but theres so many things that we want to get into the game that I cant be selfish and say, you know, lets do VGer next. Um, I think Iconians and Tholians and other critters are going to get into the game well before VGer does. But thats not to say Im giving up. Im not giving up. VGer is out there somewhere and theres some connection now between VGer and the Borg and we have to figure out what it is and I want to tell that story, or actually, I want someone to <scrambled> Great question, I love VGer. Tanner:: <laughs> Jahner:: Well I know you had mentioned earlier that its a different game than when you first started and I mean, Ive been around since closed beta and it is definitely just the difference between night and day. And I mean thats one thing that we do hear a lot of, is when people come back into the game theyve said, you know its been six months, eight months, twelve months since Ive played, I dont even recognise the game. So I mean, obviously you guys are doing, making a lot of additions and doing the right thing because its a totally different game, its a lot better experience and you know, I speak on behalf of most everybody else that even plays, were anxious to see what you guys have in store for us. Dan:: Well, thank you a lot. I really appreciate you saying that, its going back to the question about, you know, why isnt this feature done yet or why is there still bugs or why is the server crashing, i mean, yes. Its been a labour and a challenge but its <scrambled> the game. We have made the game better, and were gonna continue to do that. And like I said were hiring, had two new people start in the last week, so our team just continues to get bigger and in addition to that were also to get resources, you know, Perfect World Studios has armies of people working in their studios in Beijing and elsewhere, so were trying to hook up with them. I know that theyre looking at doing some, what would be called insourcing, I guess, and so theres all this opportunity and potential for Star Trek Online to get more effort and more energy poured into it than ever there ever has been. And so for me, its an exciting time for Star Trek because yes, weve been growing as fast as we can, but were gonna start growing even faster. And thats what Im looking forward to day in, day out. And what Im really, I cant wait to see where were at in year three because its, were gonna have so much fun over the next year. Im gonna be planning <scrambled> that you didnt even think we were thinking of, and <scrambled> a lot of fun and we can really continue to grow this game and you know, when we have our five year, ten year anniversary, well be looking back, kind of like how the five and ten year games are looking back now. Look at, you know, remember how WoW was in its first years, and I play WoW now and its such a different game, you know. Same thing with EVE, same thing with any MMO thats been out for that long and I really think Star Treks gonna be one of those games. Its gonna be one of those MMOs where five, ten years down the road, youre gonna take for granted everything thats been added and youre gonna go wow, this game continues to get bigger and better.
Jahner:: Awesome. I, Im anxious to see it. Tanner? You got anything else? Tanner:: may as well. Im totally excited to see what you and the team over at Cryptic are capable of over the next years with new coding, new technologies that come out, its just gonna be amazing, I see it now. Dan:: Weill I <scrambled> and heres a self plug here, you know, the team, tomorrows episode is probably gonna be the craziest thing weve ever done. It is probably the most effort and the most crazy weve ever tried to put into one episode. So, uh, if you, if youre listening to this, then you owe it to yourself to play through the Featured Episode series, the Dominion series, the 2800, play through all the episodes so that youre ready to go tomorrow because, because its gonna be a treat, its going to be something completely different, something youve never done before in the game and, you know, its just one of those episodes where theres so many little, little things packed into it that youre gonna be going oh my gosh I cant believe this is one episode, uh, and hopefully itll be a lot of fun. Not to oversell it, I mean its just a Featured Episode, Featured Episodes are only really designed to be, you know, thirty minutes or less of content, but man, if this Featured Episode isnt pushing the boundary of that, I dont know what weve ever done in the past to push boundaries. Uh, and hopefully that doesnt mean <scrambled> just bear with us. Were trying to get this episode out of the door and make it as badass as possible. So, you owe it to yourself. Make sure you log in, play this latest episode, finish out the series, find out how the story ends and get your Shard of Possibilities. And uh, really just enjoy all the amazing rewards weve made for this series. I dont know if you guys saw the blog post but they posted all the rewards that have been given out during this series, there is a ton of rewards guys. I mean theres more rewards than weve ever done for anything else. I hope you continue to see that moving forward. Tanner:: I hope so to. I know Ive palyed, uh, Im pretty sure Ive played every single episode so far uh, and Ive absolutely loved every single one of them. I think its great, uh, its definitely answered a lot of questions uh, especially with the 2800 returning, uh, totally awesome, I myself definitely cant wait until tomorrow. Dan:: Ill see you guys tomorrow morning then. Ill be online and Ill be playing it along with you. As long as Im not, as long as <scrambled> Tanner:: <laughs> Right. I guess before, uh, I guess before we let you go, was there anything else that you want to add that maybe wasnt a question that was asked that you wanted to mention? Uh, anything at all? Dan:: I think thats, thats <scrambled> for me. I, plugging the 2800 was really what I wanted to say. The teams just done a phenomenal job you know, weve got three great content designers here and one great, great writer. Uh, and thanks to the audio team and the environment team. I think youre really gonna see the labour of love this team has for Star Trek. Not only in this series but in the game in general and this series is just a great way to see just how much people care about Star Trek, how much we care about the story and how much we care about, you know, wrapping up loose ends and letting you know what happened to people and little insider tidbits here and there. It all makes sense and its all good writing and <scrambled> I really hope you enjoy it. Tanner:: Awesome. Thank you, uh thank you very much, uh Dan for answering all of those questions. Id like to thank our listeners for, um, joining us for this wonderful interview and so, uh, yeah. It was great to sit down and have this chat with you uh, and I look forwards to playing tomorrows featured episode. Dan:: Thank you, thank you very much. Im going to go back to dancing in my office. Tanner:: Alright, take care. Jahner:: Thanks, Dan. Dan:: Cheers.
<music plays>
Grave, I'm not hearing impaired at all, but I would like to thank you profusely for providing that transcript for our players. It is very much appreciated.
Grave and to the team, wanted to say biiiig thanks for transcribing the interview! It is deeply appreciated! I'm sure many others feel the same way as well! Big thanks! Looking forward to seeing your future interviews!
Comments
Ooooooo. Thank you
i noticed the same thing on stoked. i think dan needs a new mic.
There's a surprise, huh?
In the STOked before last, I got the very definate impression they weren't even going to try. Too much effort needed, not enough ways to monetise it.
yep. and you know that they will say the EXACT same thing with the fe's.
Too hard. Not financially feasible.
Rofl @ Dan "It wasn't me fiddling the cords 'Ugh, I'm breaking Up'" ^^
I'm now convinced that Dan Stahl is the voice behind Microsoft Sam.
Sadly, its just more of the same old, same old. The KDF has always been and continues to be a "long term" goal TWO YEARS after the game's launch. I hate to say it, but I've given up on the KDF. Not on the desire to see them expanded, but on any real hope that Cryptic can actually do it.
I'm at the point now where I wish they would just say "Star Trek has always focused mainly on the story of the Federation, and this game will be too" and just add Roms and Cards as "mini factions":
Then they could do the same thing with the Cardassians on the 4 year. I might not be everything I'd like to see, but I can honestly say I would enjoy playing Rom/Card alts on the side even with limited content.
War hammer was focused on the alliance. Wow focussed on humans and elves. Star wars focused on jedis. After the initial flood of subscribers factions always even out.
Even in star trek. Despite the poll you took
You can keep saying that all you want, but it will never be true in this game. And while I havent played WH or WoW and therefore cant comment on the stories, you are completely wrong about SW. The original trilogy constantly jumped back and forth between scenes of the good guys and the bad guys, and the prequals told the story of a good guy who became a bad guy. So the story of SW was much more balanced between "good guys" and "bad guys" than Trek is.
I really do think you may need more information to make an accurate conclusion.
About you being completely wrong about SW?
That ip based dual-faction mmo populations even out.
It may not be 50/50 but it is definitely 45/55.
Transcriber(s): Yumene, Berryshine
Date: March 17, 2012
Original Air Date: March 9, 2012
--- START ---
<Music playing>
Tanner: Ok, hopefully we have everything fixed this time. Not completely sure
Dan: Im still here <laugh>
Tanner: <laugh> still got Dan I can hear on my end; hopefully you can hear him on your end.
Dan: Or else its going to be a very private interview.
Tanner: Yea, which Im sure all our listeners... <scrambled>
Dan: Or you could just make up things that I say, you could be like, well I was talking to Dan
Tanner: <laugh>
Dan: And he said <scrambled>
Jahner: Yea, I got you both
Tanner: Ok, so awesome <laugh><scrambled>
Dan: He basically said we could do whatever we wanted in game, and he said everyone getting free, free ships from now until the end of time, so yes <scrambled>
Tanner: Yea that would be totally awesome, a free Galor would be awesome right? Alright so, <scrambled> Now we <scrambled> Now that we got this issue fixed, which never happened, but okay, were good, so with that I got a list of questions here for Dan, and for those of you that dont know, Dan is the executive producer of Star Trek Online, the game that we play here at Subspace Radio <laugh> So, yea, if you are ready, well go ahead and get started with some questions here for you.
Dan: I am ready, I have the questions and I am ready to answer the questions, lets just say that. Lets see how we do.
Tanner: Alrighty, sounds good, Im going to start with some of the qui questions that we had picked out here from us. The biggest one that, here is a question on the server stability, as of late, it seems to have reached a boiling point recently with two or three downtimes, in as many weeks, are there any plans to add more servers to not only handle the load but also improve queue times especially with queues reaching to the sixteen hundreds on weekends
Dan: So lets talk about that server stability because its a great question, Im glad someone asked this, Ive been wanting to bring it up. The problem is not hardware, weve identified the problem, we've been adding hardware since we launched free to play so it's really not that, what it boils down to some operating system issues with our servers so honestly it has to do with our database and you know some windows architecture issues and so what what's been happening is that it's not a matter of having capacity or things being too full the software team has been trying to debug whatever this is that has been causing the servers to go offline every once in a while so we are really close to tracking that down and in fact have been working on it, they been pretty much working on it twenty four hours a day, they would ever come by my office today to say that they're making progress um and I don't think were, they said we're not completely of the woods yet but the hope is that this whatever this operating system issue is well get this ironed out, they have multiple new machines in the data center to switch over to try different OS configs, so we can get this all ironed out, but honestly it has very little to do with not having capacity or having a bug in the game it's really a bug with how the, all of this technicality behind running a MMO with this many players on the database that's really where were at. In terms of the queues on we have been seeing just a ridiculous amount of people on the weekends for key, for the featured episode series to my expectation is that <scrambled>I do expect the intentionality of time the finale tomorrow, featured episode five, theres a very good chance there could be a queue, but I just say, bear with us but were really trying to get as everybody into these episodes as possible there's tons and tons and tons of people all at one specific time trying to log in. <scrambled>Typically you dont have everyone trying to log into a MMO all at once. Most MMOs only a percentage of your user base is logged in at any given time. But with these episodes you just get these shear humongous spike, so its not like that capacity isn't there it's just that the of the land rush is there so we're working it out and, we could definitely get everybody in but itd be rubber band city so we dont want to do that, <scrambled> trying to keep the performance were trying to balance performance versus how many people can we get.
Tanner: Right, we dont want to be sitting there trying to go against the JemHadar and be bouncing back and forth and totally missing and yeah.
Dan: Yeah. And so were trying to find a balance between that and having eight minutes between you and firing your weapons. Thats terrible, we dont want to do that.
Tanner: Right. Exactly. Alright, so that definitely answered that question. That was one that was definitely on my mind, I know for sure. So, alright, another one from here, from the list is about PvP. One of the biggest complaints seen about PvP is getting continuously getting steamrolled by PvP fleets or premades. Are there any plans for making any quote unquote tier system for PvP that will match players against each other with similar skills or, to a lesser extent, gear levels? Or perhaps a premade versus premade or PUGs versus PUGs system?
Dan: <scrambled> Ill answer some of those questions. In terms of coming up with a PvP system that uses a ranking system or some sort of leveling system in order for matchmaking, which I think were talking about
Tanner: Right
Dan: In terms of a matchmaking system, we are looking at some new tech like I said in a previous interview I was talking about, theres a team at Cryptic thats been working on a PvP game over the last year and they built out a lot of this tech that allows us to do things like matchmaking. So were actually getting our hands dirty on that code right now, trying to figure out if we can port it over to Star Trek and what we can and cant use out of that system. So I fully expect in season six, as we get closer Ill have a better idea of whether or not well have something. Id certainly love to have something like that. But in the meantime what I really want to do is get our new, is get the PvP maps updated and working on this better code, so that we can make our PvP maps better than theyve ever been. And were just trying to fix some of the issues that we have in some of them and in addition Im hoping that well also add some new modes, or changing some of the PvP maps over to different types of gameplay. Because I know for example, one of the things that we theres a capture the flag mode, maybe theres a king of the hill mode in this new tech, so if we can get some of our maps ported over to that, or new maps made in that system, were definitely gonna do that. We have dedicated resources for season six to add that PvP update.
Tanner: Okay, awesome. Now another question along that line that was in here was about any chance of a tournament or ranking system for the PvP.
Dan: That would be, in my mind the third thing that we could do. We could certainly do leaderboards and thats one of the things we are talking about doing that I didnt mention. First of all we want leaderboards working for PvP and once we get once get, not just match leaderboards, but an overall standing leaderboard, that kinda goes <scrambled> So, once we get matchmaking, once we get leaderboards then I could see us maybe doing something along the lines of a tournament. But thats sorta the last thing that we would do in that list of stuff.
Tanner: Alright, lets see here. Um, how bout the, another question that was in here was about the specialty ships like the JemHadar ship and the Cardassian Galor. Is Cryptic gonna continue to offer specialty ships like this? Has there been any thought of just putting it on the Cstore and having it be there for people to buy instead of getting it randomly? Just trying to get a better understanding of the reasoning behind the way its currently being done. Any thoughts on that?
Dan: Sure. The question, are we gonna continue to offer specialty ships like the JemHadar ship, yeah?
Tanner: Yeah
Dan: The answer is yes. Were gonna continue to offer ships in every way we possibly can. Some ships you can earn in-game, some ships you can buy with energy credits, some you can buy with microtransactions, some you get in what people are calling these chance boxes, so yeah. Were gonna continue to do that, and were gonna add new ways to get ships as well. So, for example, one of the ways Im looking at is I would love to put in high-end ship crafting for fleets. I think fleets should be able to build a starbase or a drydock and be able to craft their own ships as well.
Tanner: That would be cool
Tanner:: Alright, another addition to the question about the specialty ships was about the global announcement thing that goes across for the Cardassian ship. Basically, just wondering why have that, and are there any plans to completely turn it off?
Dan:: Yeah <scrambled> The question is marketing, right? So why do you see TV commercials on Hulu, why not just offer me the movie for free, or the TV show for free? It sells, it makes money right? So whether people like it or not, you can just turn it off. Thats why I, I agree. I dont necessarily like the spam, I turned it off on mine. But, you know, it equates to money and in a free to play game thats one of the ways we make money. So, sorry. <laughs> But thats why we added the option for you to turn it off, right. I dont think youre gonna see us turn that off any time soon
Tanner:: Right. At least were able to turn it off individually on our end.
Dan:: Yes.
Tanner:: Thats a plus. Alight, lets see. Weve got that the, um since were talking about ships lets go on to the other question about ships. What kind of ships are in line to be brought into the game? Are there any consideration into allowing players to I dont exactly understand how he had this worded, but Im guessing, kitbash their own ships to offer better customisation, maybe a T5 Akira or Fed Carrier or real battlecruiser?
Dan:: So, similar to what we were just talking about with, you know, ships and ideas for opening up new ships. Were definitely going to be bringing more ships into the game. I dont have the list of all the ships were working on, theres a lot of ships I used to talk about back in the engineering reports, most of them are actually in the game now. So we will continue to be coming up with a list of existing IP ships that we want to add into the game. But then on top of that, the second part of that question, whether or not we will allow people to kitbash their own ships for better customisation, I think youre going to see something like this but it might not be exactly make a T5 Akira or make a Fed carrier. It could be something where you can take an existing ship and you can, like I said, can craft a better version of it. Or maybe you can <scrambled> Kind of the kind of station configuration that you like. Or maybe one that has four nodes in the front and two in the back, or vice versa. Maybe thats the kind of customisation were looking at. Im not sure because we havent gotten that far. But what we do know, is that in our future is starship crafting, we just havent worked out a design exactly I mean, theres tons of designs, we just havent figured out which one were gonna do. But in terms of ships coming, yes, there are ships coming. Im not gonna spoil any of them because I just havent looked at Als whiteboard lately. <laugh>
Tanner:: <laugh> Okay. Alright, lets, er alright. Next question here is about the state of the game. Someone argue that many promises or near promises have been broken along the path between your departure and your return, to PWEs purchase of Cryptic and then the released free to play. Um, Klingon Content, weekly episode, bugs that are reported on Tribble are still released onto the Holodeck. Bugs that are still around from launch, or closely thereafter. What are your thoughts and what are your plans to win the, quote unquote, naysayers? Whats your focus for the next year with Star Trek Online?
Dan:: Well that sounded like a pretty good rant. Let me try and focus on a few things there. So, um, lets go back to the bro- to the promises. So you said something about arguing that promises have been broken. Um, so, in terms of promises, if youre referring to the engineering reports, the engineering reports had a pretty good caveat on them that everythings subject to change. And I think my feedback, that I took away when I left, is that that caveat just didnt work and that anything I said on the forums and anything that I said on the engineering reports just got taken as verbatim or a promise and that all my good intentions should have just <scrambled> in my head. So yes, I can see where someone whos watching the engineering reports looking at everything we were talking about can say wheres this content, where are they gonna fix this, and despite our, our continued efforts and our continuing improvement of this game, it might not be going as fast as some people might want. But I also think the game is getting better every day and every week. I look at the game now and I play the game far more than I ever played. I look at all the people online, theres something about the energy of having so many people on the universe in Star Trek with free to play, its a lot of fun and Im enjoying it. So I think the games getting better and Im having more <scrambled> than I think I ever have. Er, but in terms of, er talking about Klingon content and weekly episodes and bugs. Lets talk about bugs, right. Yes, theres bugs in MMOs, theres bugs in our game. Were trying to improve that, I mean, theres been some pretty good <scrambled> about all the bugs that have been going out since the dawn of time. But it really boils down to the teams need to really focus on bugs. They need to focus on not checking in bugs. So its a constant struggle between production and QA to just get all these bugs out and to get them ironed out and discover them. So thats one of our continued efforts and one that everyone here at the company gets involved with, and we take seriously. Its not that we like, nobody likes putting bugs in software but it happens. And when it happens we need to figure out why its happening and address those issues. And so right now bugs are happening, so we have to figure out why certain bugs are happening and address that any way we can. In terms of, lets see, winning over the naysayers, Um, if Im gonna say naysayers, theres always gonna be naysayers and theres no way to win over naysays because naysayer are gonna stay naysayers. <scrambled> Its almost like arguing against someone whos agreed not to agree with you. Um, I think that main thing is for me to just continue doing my job and just continue making Star Trek as awesome as it can be, and I think the last question was around focus, um.
Tanner:: Right. Focus over the next year.
Dan:: So, focusing for the next year, you know, a lot of it is looking at where the game is at, looking at what were gonna do next and where were gonna spend our resources and making sure that were doing the right things. I mean, if I look at whats the focus for Star Trek in year 2012, its putting the content and features in the game that need to be there next. Theres no end to that list of things we want to put in the game, but does that really need to be the next thing that we do? And so coming up and making sure that were clear about whats going to be our priorities and what gonna be the healthiest thing for the game. I mean, sure I would love to do content X or content Y, or feature B, but if thats not gonna help the <scrambled> If thats not gonna improve things, you really have to justify why that content is being made and why were spending our dollars there. So, if anything, youre gonna see a continued effort from me to make sure that were spending our dollars wisely and were making the content thats making the game just that much more awesome. And, you know, I think weve added some really good things over the last year and two years for that matter and weve continued to improve the game since day one.The game I play right now, like I said, is a heck of a lot better than the game I played day one. And thats just credit to our efforts to continue to add to this game and I think the games gonna continue to get better. Im very committed to it, thats why Im here.
Tanner:: Right. And were glad your committed. We enjoy all the content that you help bring to us and Ive only been playing for within the last year myself. I started playing about ack in early November of last year, so coming up on a number of months. About five months or something like that. And in just that time period Ive seen a lot of great improvements that I absolutely love.
Dan:: Well, good!
Tanner:: just me. A buddy of mine got me into the game and I just absolutely love it, so for me, I appreciate everything youve done to make the game what it is.
Dan:: And the whole team. Its not just me, Im just trying to make sure that were staying focused.
Dan:: <scrambled> Well, thats sort of a misperception. I dont think I ever said that were working on Romulan or Caradassian factions. I did say that we would love to do them and what do we need to do in order for us to start working on Romulan and Cardassian factions. So, those are the questions there at the top of my mind and one of the things, reasons why Im back in this role is I really think we need to get to a point where, you know, theres a lot of Romulan and Cardassian fans out there, Id love for them to have their own faction and for that matter, that adds to the Klingon faction, what are we doing about the Klingon faction. In terms of long term plans, I think the long, long term plan is that there are four factions and that theres Federation, theres the Klingons, theres the Romulans and theres the Cardassians. And maybe even more than that. But we need to make sure that faction gameplay is fun, that theres a reason to play other factions and that the factions have enough gameplay and fun gameplay to justify you wanting to <scrambled> The biggest questions I have in my mind is when you roll a Klingon is the experience enough that you feel like youre creating a different character and thats really the ultimate test in my mind as to whether or not that factions viable. Does that faction have any conflict with the other factions? In our game its a little bit of both, right? Theres a little bit of faction gameplay in PvP, then we also let you team up. Its, theres a lot of oddities to how weve done factions and how factions have evolved in Star Trek Online. So before we start working on Romulan and Cardassian factions we definitely have to solve this question and come up with the right answer. And it is something Im working on, Im just not gonna talk about how specifically were gonna get there because theres a lot of ifs and buts in there and I dont want to, uh, I dont want someone to say but youve been working on Kling- on Cardassians since you did that interview and Im, we havent started working on it yet.
Tanner:: Right. So, thank you for clearing that up. Um, the, another thing, another question that was asked that Ive actually seen and been keeping track of a forum post on the Star Trek Online Forums was talk of making more usefulness of the bridge of the ship interior. The one post I had seen was talking about making it possible to travel from system to system while on your bridge. Im assuming that might be one of the things theyre talking about with the question. So, the question is, are there any plans to add more usefulness or interactivity to the bridge, the ship interior like being able to use the viewscreen to show game specs of ships, adding poker to the mess hall, Star Trek chess, holodeck games?
Dan:: Sure. Thats a great, theres a lot of great ideas there like doing the chess and the holodeck and the poker. In fact I think weve been talking about this for a long time as these being great ideas. Even the idea of travelling across the galaxy <scrambled> For those who might be new to the game Ive been answering that question since beta. So, in terms of what are the plans, there are no plans at this time to add anything to your bridge and ship interiors because we would like to change how your interiors work. Another problem I dont like how bridges and ship interiors were made is A; you cant customise them other than the trophy room and B: We cant make content in them. Like for example, you make your starship interior look like, you know, configuration X and someone else makes their starship interior look like configuration Y, its very challenging for us to make a mission in which someone boards your ship or something happens because we have to tell the enemies where to go and what to do and theres a lot tech to that. Now, one of the things wed need to do, wed sorta reengineer how all of that works so we can get to the ultimate goal of your bridge and ship interiors having functionality. Now that said, were absolutely looking at what we can do in the short term to make ship interiors useful. Like, I think were super close to being able to do things similar to duty officers system. I would love to be able to go to my engine room and have some duty officers do something in my engine room and have different assignments that are available on my ship. I think that would, thats a cool thing. I would love to be able to craft on my ship, I would love to be able to have a poker game on my ship. Those are all things we absolutely want to do and some of those things are closer to reality than others, but nothing Im ready to say yes, thats coming yet. But they are all ideas that are out there and weve been thinking about them for a really long time. The one caveat that I would say is that travelling through the sector from your bridge has been the oldest question that I can think of where Ive continually said were probably not going to get there any time soon if ever. But that <Scrambled> is just to say with the current thinking the idea of travelling through the sector from your bridge, we made the call we wanted you to travel in ship mode so that you can see your ship, you can see other ships and get a sense of where you are in the galaxy.
Tanner:: Right, and one of the other things that I had remembered reading from that forum post about the travelling from the ship interior was the fact that area is all, its a social zone and youre effectively bypassing that travelling from your bridge, of which the whole point is socialisation.
Dan:: But who knows? Ive heard some great proposals over the last two years. One of the ones that I really like is that, is the idea of maybe at some point you can head off on your own on exploration, in which case you dont need there to be a social zone and you can go explore the Gamma Quadrant or something on your own, and maybe in that case it makes sense to be okay to do that.
Tanner:: Right.
Dan:: <scrambled> When youre on your bridge your on a different space <scrambled> than when youre in sector. Its a completely different world. We could make it happen, but its just not something in the <scrambled> future.
Tanner:: Alright, so you, youre breaking up a little bit there. So, its something that you could make happen, but nothing thats gonna be happening any time soon, is that what youre saying?
Dan:: Yeah, not the immediate future for travelling from your bridge.
Tanner:: Alright, gotcha. Just wanted to make sure that was clearly said. <laughs>
Dan:: <laughs> It wasnt me fiddling with the cords going Ah, I think Im breaking up!
Tanner:: <laughs> Yeah <scrambled> no. Alright, next question on the lsit here is about a chance of maybe some new STFs. The current formats great, but is there any chance that there could be at least one or two of the old style of STF? Theres a real sense of accomplishment getting through all of the Cure with the old style. But now some people are feeling that the STFs seem to be a little less rewarding. Is there any possibility of having both styles?
Dan:: Im really glad someone asked this question because I want to talk a little bit about this. So, the previous STFs, the way - Special Task Forces, thats what it stands for for someone who may not have heard that before. Special Task Forces are content in the game that was originally designed to be very challenging content for a well co-ordinate group of people to be able to undertake. And it was very difficult and especially with the difficulty slider was almost impossible in some cases to finish without good gear and without good tactics. What we found is not many people played them. Partly because of the challenge, partly because of the rewards, partly because of time involved and you know, youd get an hour in and if there was a bug or something it would just be frustrating. So, we made the <scrambled> shorter, to break them up into sections, and to add good rewards. Now, I think youve seen a lot more people playing the STFs than have ever played the STFs because of that. Now, thats not an excuse to say were not gonna do Special Task Forces in the future, but heres kinda what Im thinking and how we want to tackle this. We do want to add challenging group-based gameplay, but I think that needs to be for fleets. I think that is something that well-organised groups of people, which are fleets, should be able to undertake challenges that, um, that allow them to progress their fleet or to have a unique challenge that is specifically designed for fleets. I mean, in a sense, thats kinda what fleet actions were expected to be, you know, fleet actions made for the fleets but fleet actions have sorta become group PUG content. And I can see, I can see something in the future where, maybe in the near future, where we look at making <scrambled> high-level challenging content with good gear progression, with good rewards and maybe even some new enemies for, uh, that might make people reminiscent of the old STFs. But really, part of that is thinking out is this a five man thing, is this a twenty man thing? How many people are we talking about? If this is for fleets, maybe these are twenty man instances. That would be something kinda new for Star Trek to do something that challenging for that amount of time. But maybe thats where were headed <scrambled> talking about guilds and fleets. Maybe thats the kind of content that Im looking for. So, stay tuned on that. Its a definite were looking at it and its something that could be coming as part of season six.
Dan:: Let me add one thing to that. For the person whos like Im not in a fleet, I dont want to be in a fleet, well, uh, for those people I think the idea is we want to offer the idea of a public fleet where youre just sort of loosely, casually tied to other groups of players, maybe thats one solution Ive seen in other games, something that were considering for Star Trek.
Tanner:: Alright, yeah, um, alright, cool. Lets see here, thats all for the listener questions and the main part of the question list except for, down at the bottom here, the wonderful question that Im sure everyone is wanting to know at some point. Whats a typical day in the office like for you?
Dan:: Well, what is typical? I moved to San Fransisco, Cryptic Studio offices are in <srambled> California which is about, uh, fifty miles from where I live. So my day starts early in the morning, getting in the car and driving down beautiful 280 on the east bay. Or not east bay, the, uh, basically south bay. And its a beautiful drive first of all, and its one that I actually enjoy right now, I love living in the city. So, by the time I get to the office Ive usually listened to a bit of NPR and some radio, maybe checked my email a little bit. By the time I get into the office Im well ready for the day. First thing we do is we have the production meeting, where myself and the other producers uh, and the other leads, sit down and talk about what the teams doing that day, talk about any issues weve had overnight and talk about game <scrambled> that needs to be followed up on immediately. So thats our first touchpoint of the day. And to be fair, emails happening 24 hours a day on this team. Any live service, you see, thats why I was sending emails at one oclock in the morning last night, its a 24 hour game. Uh, so were constantly working. But once Im in the office first thing that happens is that we have that production meeting. And then from there really depends on the meeting schedule, whether or not were looking at planning, or scheduling or maybe were talking about new features. So my days a lot of the time filled with meetings and reading lots of emails and responding to issues and trying to quickly answer questions and to make sure that were on track with as many things as possible. So, for example, today we were talking about season six, we had a company meeting, we talked a little bit about, you know, how the companys doing, how Star Treks doing, how Champion Onlines doing, <scrambled> coming out they were just doing presentations at GDC, so we had a good sort of day today at talking about that kind of stuff. But, you know, a lot of times Im walking around looking, checking in with my leads, going in their office, seeing how things are going, seeing if theres anything I can do to help. And in terms of the rest of the day, thats kind of what my day is. And thats the fun of it, you never know from day to day what youre gonna be doing uh, and if I didnt have my phone with me 24 hours a day, checking my calender, telling me where I need to be next, I wouldnt necessarily, I would get kind of lost. In fact,e very once in a while, I see Jack wandering around, looking at his phone trying to figure out where hes supposed to be. And <laughs> and so its kind of that little thing you know, where at the EP level were really trying to be involved in as many thigns as possible. But theres a great team here, especially the team on Star Trek Online, really proud of this team. You know, theres a great <scrambled> effort going on day in, day out to making new things. So even today we were talking about season six, we were talking about fleets and starbases and all kinds of crazy stuff, and every once in a while I get a break and get to sit in my office and do a fun interview like this and even during that Ive got people like Jack and Craig outside my window dancing and trying to make me laugh. So thats, theyre doing it right now, its hilarious.
Tanner:: <laughs> Nice. So, yeah, um, wow, time sure flies. Holy cow. Its been forty minutes plus so far.
Jahner:: I have one question , though, for you Dan.
Dan:: Sure.
Jahner:: When aCe-
Dan:: This is the mysterious, whos this? Is this Scott?
Jahner:: This is Jahner
Dan:: Okay. <laughs>
Tanner:: <laughs> Yes, Jahner is in the house as well.
Jahner:: When we interviewed you a while back, its been a little while, you had said you had a plan to bring VGer in the game, that was like on thing that you really wanted. So, is that gonna happen?
Dan:: Well that was, was sort of a dream. I really like the story of VGer, I really do think that there, you know, the Motion Picture is one of my favourite movies and so I really enjoy anything having to do with that. That said, theres a hint of VGer in the Borg Red Alerts, and, um, whether or not we ever get to that story is sort of up in the air. I would certainly love to do it. The team would certainly maybe or maybe not like to do it. <laughs> They might be sick of me talking about VGer. Um, but theres so many things that we want to get into the game that I cant be selfish and say, you know, lets do VGer next. Um, I think Iconians and Tholians and other critters are going to get into the game well before VGer does. But thats not to say Im giving up. Im not giving up. VGer is out there somewhere and theres some connection now between VGer and the Borg and we have to figure out what it is and I want to tell that story, or actually, I want someone to <scrambled> Great question, I love VGer.
Tanner:: <laughs>
Jahner:: Well I know you had mentioned earlier that its a different game than when you first started and I mean, Ive been around since closed beta and it is definitely just the difference between night and day. And I mean thats one thing that we do hear a lot of, is when people come back into the game theyve said, you know its been six months, eight months, twelve months since Ive played, I dont even recognise the game. So I mean, obviously you guys are doing, making a lot of additions and doing the right thing because its a totally different game, its a lot better experience and you know, I speak on behalf of most everybody else that even plays, were anxious to see what you guys have in store for us.
Dan:: Well, thank you a lot. I really appreciate you saying that, its going back to the question about, you know, why isnt this feature done yet or why is there still bugs or why is the server crashing, i mean, yes. Its been a labour and a challenge but its <scrambled> the game. We have made the game better, and were gonna continue to do that. And like I said were hiring, had two new people start in the last week, so our team just continues to get bigger and in addition to that were also to get resources, you know, Perfect World Studios has armies of people working in their studios in Beijing and elsewhere, so were trying to hook up with them. I know that theyre looking at doing some, what would be called insourcing, I guess, and so theres all this opportunity and potential for Star Trek Online to get more effort and more energy poured into it than ever there ever has been. And so for me, its an exciting time for Star Trek because yes, weve been growing as fast as we can, but were gonna start growing even faster. And thats what Im looking forward to day in, day out. And what Im really, I cant wait to see where were at in year three because its, were gonna have so much fun over the next year. Im gonna be planning <scrambled> that you didnt even think we were thinking of, and <scrambled> a lot of fun and we can really continue to grow this game and you know, when we have our five year, ten year anniversary, well be looking back, kind of like how the five and ten year games are looking back now. Look at, you know, remember how WoW was in its first years, and I play WoW now and its such a different game, you know. Same thing with EVE, same thing with any MMO thats been out for that long and I really think Star Treks gonna be one of those games. Its gonna be one of those MMOs where five, ten years down the road, youre gonna take for granted everything thats been added and youre gonna go wow, this game continues to get bigger and better.
Tanner:: may as well. Im totally excited to see what you and the team over at Cryptic are capable of over the next years with new coding, new technologies that come out, its just gonna be amazing, I see it now.
Dan:: Weill I <scrambled> and heres a self plug here, you know, the team, tomorrows episode is probably gonna be the craziest thing weve ever done. It is probably the most effort and the most crazy weve ever tried to put into one episode. So, uh, if you, if youre listening to this, then you owe it to yourself to play through the Featured Episode series, the Dominion series, the 2800, play through all the episodes so that youre ready to go tomorrow because, because its gonna be a treat, its going to be something completely different, something youve never done before in the game and, you know, its just one of those episodes where theres so many little, little things packed into it that youre gonna be going oh my gosh I cant believe this is one episode, uh, and hopefully itll be a lot of fun. Not to oversell it, I mean its just a Featured Episode, Featured Episodes are only really designed to be, you know, thirty minutes or less of content, but man, if this Featured Episode isnt pushing the boundary of that, I dont know what weve ever done in the past to push boundaries. Uh, and hopefully that doesnt mean <scrambled> just bear with us. Were trying to get this episode out of the door and make it as badass as possible. So, you owe it to yourself. Make sure you log in, play this latest episode, finish out the series, find out how the story ends and get your Shard of Possibilities. And uh, really just enjoy all the amazing rewards weve made for this series. I dont know if you guys saw the blog post but they posted all the rewards that have been given out during this series, there is a ton of rewards guys. I mean theres more rewards than weve ever done for anything else. I hope you continue to see that moving forward.
Tanner:: I hope so to. I know Ive palyed, uh, Im pretty sure Ive played every single episode so far uh, and Ive absolutely loved every single one of them. I think its great, uh, its definitely answered a lot of questions uh, especially with the 2800 returning, uh, totally awesome, I myself definitely cant wait until tomorrow.
Dan:: Ill see you guys tomorrow morning then. Ill be online and Ill be playing it along with you. As long as Im not, as long as <scrambled>
Tanner:: <laughs> Right. I guess before, uh, I guess before we let you go, was there anything else that you want to add that maybe wasnt a question that was asked that you wanted to mention? Uh, anything at all?
Dan:: I think thats, thats <scrambled> for me. I, plugging the 2800 was really what I wanted to say. The teams just done a phenomenal job you know, weve got three great content designers here and one great, great writer. Uh, and thanks to the audio team and the environment team. I think youre really gonna see the labour of love this team has for Star Trek. Not only in this series but in the game in general and this series is just a great way to see just how much people care about Star Trek, how much we care about the story and how much we care about, you know, wrapping up loose ends and letting you know what happened to people and little insider tidbits here and there. It all makes sense and its all good writing and <scrambled> I really hope you enjoy it.
Tanner:: Awesome. Thank you, uh thank you very much, uh Dan for answering all of those questions. Id like to thank our listeners for, um, joining us for this wonderful interview and so, uh, yeah. It was great to sit down and have this chat with you uh, and I look forwards to playing tomorrows featured episode.
Dan:: Thank you, thank you very much. Im going to go back to dancing in my office.
Tanner:: Alright, take care.
Jahner:: Thanks, Dan.
Dan:: Cheers.
<music plays>
Aaaahhhhh, played perfectly on my rooted HTC Evo 4G Android 2.3.5 phone.
Grave and to the team, wanted to say biiiig thanks for transcribing the interview! It is deeply appreciated! I'm sure many others feel the same way as well!