Until they make foundry mission rewards comparable to official missions, it would take forever to level simply from the xp you get from killing NPCs in foundry missions. So if they actually get the rewards up to par, then what you said would be a viable option.
Until they make foundry mission rewards comparable to official missions, it would take forever to level simply from the xp you get from killing NPCs in foundry missions. So if they actually get the rewards up to par, then what you said would be a viable option.
That's what I'm saying. It would take forever right now under the Fed side to lvl playing ugc. But, if they had a decent timer-based rewards system that prevent clicker exploit missions, then players could get just as good xp playing ugc than playing a FE.
2 hours ugc = 2 hour main game XP. If a player wants to spend two hours clicking 300 console missions, fine. Or, play 1 really long ugc mission. Both grant same XP to lvl, based on a timer.
They could test this on the KDF side if they have a Foundry rewards timer in place. Make the ugc rewards equal mission rewards, while getting rid of the clicker exploits. I want to see what that does to the KDF when there is suddenly a huge amount of unplayed XP content available on the KDF side.
We'd also see more foundry authors creating kdf missions. We don't do so now, because nobody plays them. I spent over 100 hours making my KDF mission. After 6 months or so, it has had 40 or so plays.
That's what I'm saying. It would take forever right now under the Fed side to lvl playing ugc. But, if they had a decent timer-based rewards system that prevent clicker exploit missions, then players could get just as good xp playing ugc than playing a FE.
2 hours ugc = 2 hour main game XP. If a player wants to spend two hours clicking 300 console missions, fine. Or, play 1 really long ugc mission. Both grant same XP to lvl, based on a timer.
They could test this on the KDF side if they have a Foundry rewards timer in place. Make the ugc rewards equal mission rewards, while getting rid of the clicker exploits. I want to see what that suddenly does to the KDF when there is suddenly a huge amount of unplayed XP content suddenly available on the KDF side.
I agree. And from what I have read, this is how it will work in NW.
Until they make foundry mission rewards comparable to official missions, it would take forever to level simply from the xp you get from killing NPCs in foundry missions. So if they actually get the rewards up to par, then what you said would be a viable option.
i do agree things need to be beefed up big time. i think the so called 'daily' for them also needs a greater reward to encourage people to play 3 foundry missions more often.
authors should be rewarded as well. maybe get some dilth every time some one plays a mission of theirs and if there mission is spotlighted or even added as an offical ep. then maybe get rewarded in zen. some truely great missions in the foundry for both feds and kdf.
only problem is .... them sneaky ferengi missions lol that are far too quick. i hope they have a way to counter that. or a way for the system to determine how best to reward a high quality mission over a ferengi grind mission.
i do agree things need to be beefed up big time. i think the so called 'daily' for them also needs a greater reward to encourage people to play 3 foundry missions more often.
authors should be rewarded as well. maybe get some dilth every time some one plays a mission of theirs and if there mission is spotlighted or even added as an offical ep. then maybe get rewarded in zen. some truely great missions in the foundry for both feds and kdf.
only problem is .... them sneaky ferengi missions lol that are far too quick. i hope they have a way to counter that. or a way for the system to determine how best to reward a high quality mission over a ferengi grind mission.
Basing mission rewards on average completion time would solve the exploit problem. Note that I said "average", meaning there is nothing you could personally do to game the system. And if there were a problem with a group of people try to farm a specific mission, they could add a cooldown on getting rewards from the same mission. For example, you could only get the rewards from any given mission once a week.
only problem is .... them sneaky ferengi missions lol that are far too quick. i hope they have a way to counter that. or a way for the system to determine how best to reward a high quality mission over a ferengi grind mission.
The problem is that Cryptic encouraged the quickies by making it "Hey go play 3 missions," instead of "Hey you, just spend 2 hours playing ugc and you'll get cool goodies!"
Hopefully the mechanic for a timer based rewards system is there. Otherwise, maybe it could be part of someone's job to review 4 or 5 missions a day to check to see if they are quickies. If not, pick those for rewards.
There are so many ways that it could be done. Play 3 of 3 and earn rewards is the reason we have those quickies. No one is going to play them if the rewards were based on a timer.
The problem is that Cryptic encouraged the quickies by making it "Hey go play 3 missions," instead of "Hey you, just spend 2 hours playing ugc and you'll get cool goodies!"
i do not want to spend 2 hours on any mission not even stfs but back in the day they could take up to 6 hours with the wrong team
Basing mission rewards on average completion time would solve the exploit problem. Note that I said "average", meaning there is nothing you could personally do to game the system. And if there were a problem with a group of people try to farm a specific mission, they could add a cooldown on getting rewards from the same mission. For example, you could only get the rewards from any given mission once a week.
I really hope that this is what the spotlight rewards are being used for: to test such a new type of completion time-based reward system. If all goes well with the spotlight, maybe it could be fully opened up, first to test on the KDF side to see what that does to it.
If all goes, they could add a third faction in one season maybe.
step 1: foundry rewards system revamp
step 2: open it up on the kdf side, thus instantly adding tons of xp playable content there.
step 3: A Romulan foudry faction. They'd need to give us the bones, ships, UI, and assets. We'll build the rest.
I really hope that this is what the spotlight rewards are being used for: to test such a new type of completion time-based reward system. If all goes well with the spotlight, maybe it could be fully opened up, first to test on the KDF side to see what that does to it.
If all goes, they could add a third faction in one season maybe.
step 1: foundry rewards system revamp
step 2: open it up on the kdf side, thus instantly adding tons of xp playable content there.
step 3: A Romulan foudry faction. They'd need to give us the bones, ships, UI, and assets. We'll build the rest.
Unfortunately that plan sounds too good to be true.
Why not make it a Foundry faction? Give us the bones to work with and we'll create the content. Players would level playing ugc, and every lvling experience would be different for every Rom toon.
Plus, you guys could not deliver a full-fleshed out third faction, even if it was the focus of two seasons. That should be obvious to everyone at this point. If you need an excuse to make another half-finished faction, you have it. Use the foundry, instead of slapping a few good missions together with a stew pot of patrols and explorations.
Ships, skins, costumes, and foundry assets, plus a way to level playing that ugc. Don't worry about doffs or starbases or any of that. Just a way to level as a Rom playing ugc spy missions. There's your third faction.
Go ahead and test it with the KDF. Reduce the mission xp and put in foundry rewards. See if the kdf grows, when people have a reason to play ugc as a mechanism for progressing up. You'd hugely increase the amount of playable xp content on the kdf side, and there would be no reason for a player to say there is a "lack of content." Chicken v. egg debate? Let's test it.
Doing something that incorporates ugc into the lvl process could please the top two groups here.
Q: (tovalmorgan) Are you ever going to fix the decloaking bug? Whenever your bridge officers talk to you or any kind of interaction window pops up on the screen while you are cloaked, the pop up window forces your ship to decloak.
Dstahl: To clear up some confusion about this issue, let me shed some light on how cloak is intended to relate to interactions within the game. It is our intention that any interaction within the game will remove stealth. Anytime you are expected to take a game action of clicking on a button to respond, whether it is to scan something, or acknowledge a bridge officer, or make a command decision via a contact option, it should pull you out of stealth. With that said, there are undoubtedly missions out there that were made prior to the inception of the mini-contacts (the ones that fly across your screen) which are just providing information and shouldn?t need to be acknowledged. One reason we created mini-contacts was to allow information to be given by your bridge crew without you needing to acknowledge it for game design purposes. If you feel that a specific mission contact could be switched to a mini-contact that doesn?t need acknowledgement, then that is the type of suggestion that should be made. We can then look at the mission specifically and determine whether it warrants a mini-contact or not.
So I understand this would make sense if you're talking to a contact on another ship, on a planet, or on a starbase. By why would the cloak deactivate when talking to your own crew, folks who are at the very least on the same vessel as you, if not on the bridge with you.
Adding: The only exploit I can think of is that fleets could create social zones like a pub and just hang out in there earning xp while playing trivia contests or something.
Why not? That kind of community building is good for the game. Want to spend 1 hour just dancing in a custom made bar? Go ahead, and the game rewards you with XP.
Adding: The only exploit I can think of is that fleets could create social zones like a pub and just hang out in there earning xp while playing trivia contests or something.
Why not? That kind of community building is good for the game. Want to spend 1 hour just dancing in a custom made bar? Go ahead, and the game rewards you with XP.
As previously mentioned, the solution is simply to put a cooldown on getting rewards from the same mission. For example, you could only get rewards from any given mission once a week. Or every other week. Or even once a month. Whatever length of time works the best.
And while community building is well and good, you have to remember that you can only have a small group of people in any given foundry mission. You arent going to be able to have any real fleet events like that.
When it comes to "factions", one concern I share is that when it comes to Star Trek fans, it is predominantly made up of "Federation" fans. No matter how many other races or factions we consider, the Federation will always be the most popular because they have the "leading role" in the TV shows, Movies, and most Games/Books.
There is also the concern that players have put a lot of effort into their existing characters and fleets. It wouldn't necessarily be a healthy choice to introduce a 3rd faction that has its own fleets, duty officer system, ships, and bridge officers because it would be disruptive to the fleets and friendships you've made in game.
The Federation is the most popular in your metrics for one simple reason: Its the only faction people can start playing the game in. Until they reach 50 and grind the STF/mk12 out (can take a month or two) people dont usually try KDF. When they do they are greeted with a side that has a blithely static ship set and where the only variety comes from the zstore.
Why pay money to 'try' KDF when the fed side already has plenty of different ships -and- federation is being given, for FREE in most cases, the best KDF zen ship consoles?
Because I tell you, as much as I'd love a subspace jump console on my bird of prey I'm not buying the ship for it.. my fed escort character got his for free (EC on exchange).
I also disagree with your concept of a new faction disrupting friends and fleets. The way the fleet system is set up there is zero disruption by having your other-faction character in another fleet. You can contribute as much items,fleetmarks, etc with one character as you do another. Fleet events , by having two or more fleets, only means the individual has a lot more player-created variety content/activities in a game that is chronically stale and static.
All of this is above and beyond the question of whether or not there would be enough "missions" for a faction to have a solid game experience.
Whenever I think of Federation and KDF mission equality, it reminds me of the challenges we had before we launched the game. There was a drive to get "X hours of mission gameplay" into the box before it shipped. This resulted in a decent amount of episodes and a large amount of lesser quality patrol missions.
Since then we recognized that we wanted to make higher quality episodes AND add KDF as a full PVE faction. What we've been doing over the last two years is adding premium new high quality episodes playable by either faction because it was hitting two birds with one stone.
Here's a hint: Open foundry to everyone. For free. No dilithium cost for project slots, no having to buy character slots to use the darn thing. Make Foundry work for you.
Crowdsource that part of the development. Create incentives/awards for people to make this stuff for you. You can turn these crowdsourced missions into full fledged episodes.. just add the rewards for mission win yourselves.
If you haven't had the time to play some of the content made by players you may be surprised to see the dozens upon dozens of multi-stage, story-driven missions players have made. The quality of them far surpasses that of the episodes found in the game. There are even missions that are tutorials for the game.
Its no different than what Bethesda does with their rabidly talented and loyal mod/fan base. Why has Cryptic not picked up on this very visible and successful practice? The tool is there, it works... give it a small effort to make it accessible and do rewards and let it take momentum.
When it comes to a Romulan faction, the question still remains, would it be healthy for the game to introduce an entirely new faction that is now in the situation we just worked to solve? More than likely, if we were to add the ability to play as a Romulan, we would want to make it so that they could have their own experience, but ultimately fit somehow into the confines of our two faction game. Whether or not this means Romulans ultimately having to choose between which faction they support or something else entirely, the idea that Romulans would be a 3rd unique faction unto itself is a road STO may not take, if only to ensure the future health of the game.
Just add the ships, the home planet and a couple of other canon locations (ground/space) and crowdsource the episode/mission making. I assure you in less than a month or two of JUST releasing the ships/boffs/doffs for the romulan faction you will be having a hard time choosing between the many missions people will have made for them to turn into the 'official' episodes.
Here's a hint: Open foundry to everyone. For free. No dilithium cost for project slots, no having to buy character slots to use the darn thing. Make Foundry work for you.
Crowdsource that part of the development. Create incentives/awards for people to make this stuff for you. You can turn these crowdsourced missions into full fledged episodes.. just add the rewards for mission win yourselves.
Lack of missions isnt the problem. There are already tons of great missions. The problem is there is no measurable incentive to play them, because they do not award you anything comparable to the official content.
Lack of missions isnt the problem. There are already tons of great missions. The problem is there is no measurable incentive to play them, because they do not award you anything comparable to the official content.
I think dstahl would agree. Whether it's associated with a longer term plan to address the desires expressed in the poll is unknown.
I want to hope that there is, especially since our starbases have a holodeck. A good spot for ugc but nothing is hooked up yet.
I'll add something I was saving in case I ever got the full interview with Cryptic.
There are ways to do this.
First of all, the Romulans get Featured Episodes. That's 20 missions.
Then maybe they get 5 unique ones, which are Feature quality.
Then what you do before launching Romulans is focus on creating around 15 Rom/KDF missions, written from the two perspectives but with similar content. This sets the KDF up to be "finished" along with a tutorial mission (They will be light but creating an in-depth mission with more XP is easier than creating 2 missions... so some of these will be "level and a half" missions.) The joint missions could involve the idea of teaming in a few but would mostly be stuff like Alpha. Beam down to planet, encounter intriguing threat, react in an aggressive, non-Fed way. (In fact...? Give them Alpha too.)
Then you create 5 highly polished Romulan/Fed missions. Some of these could be remasters. You do this because, yes, Feds are where the money is at.
This puts everyone in a similar range, parity wise, for getting to endgame.
You finance it by bundling T1-5 Romulan ships and Romulan species into an expansion bundle. Upgraded versions of the ships would be available later. Additional species like Reman and Hirogen would be ala carte.
None of the content aside from the Romulan introduction is, strictly speaking, paywalled because Klingons are free and get 15 missions free. Feds are free and get the 5 missions free.
However, the rewards from those missions would interlock in ways that only a Romulan could fully benefit from.
And maybe bundle in Romulan Deserter playable species options for Fed and KDF for people who get the bundle. (So unlocking the faction unlocks the species for all three factions, albeit maybe in an altered form for Feds and KDF.)
Add in all of the STF changes, the new Fleet Actions, the DOFF system and now we have a situation where there is almost TOO much leveling content on the Fed side and a decent amount on the KDF side. After looking at a lot of data, it is clear that Fed characters that use the duty officer system and run queued event outlevel the patrol and episode content to the point where most players hit max level before completing the Romulan episode series. In our goal to introduce more quality episodes, we now have a leveling curve that is very fast for the FED side.
When I think of creating "Parity" for the KDF, the goal would *not* be to get KDF to the same place as the FED, because the fact is, the FED curve is too fast. In addition to adding just a few more Episodes for the KDF, we need to weed out some of the less important FED patrols from the leveling path. That is what will get both factions to 1-50 leveling curve parity.
Frankly Dan, this was already known BEFORE Season 5 came out. Stormshade had made the statement that it only in took "a weekend and 6 pack of Redbull" to get a new character to max level by an expirienced player. He had said this was an issue already, being able to level too fast preS5, and we the players recognised this and agreed.
...
But what we got, in the form of a fix to leveling too fast, was an Increase in how fast we could level, plus the doff systems, which speed it up more.
So what we started to get was more End Game content because how all the maxed level characters that had gotten there in good time. Which didn't fix the fast leveling problem, but encouraged players to go even faster to get to more end game.
If players are just bypassing the content that is there because they don't "need" to do it, then a means to encourage people to play it needs to be introduced.
Patrol Dailies?
Complete a Sector Patrol (Dilithium)?
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Frankly Dan, this was already known BEFORE Season 5 came out. Stormshade had made the statement that it only in took "a weekend and 6 pack of Redbull" to get a new character to max level by an expirienced player. He had said this was an issue already, being able to level too fast preS5, and we the players recognised this and agreed.
...
But what we got, in the form of a fix to leveling too fast, was an Increase in how fast we could level, plus the doff systems, which speed it up more.
So what we started to get was more End Game content because how all the maxed level characters that had gotten there in good time. Which didn't fix the fast leveling problem, but encouraged players to go even faster to get to more end game.
If players are just bypassing the content that is there because they don't "need" to do it, then a means to encourage people to play it needs to be introduced.
Patrol Dailies?
Complete a Sector Patrol (Dilithium)?
You're reading his statement backwards. He's not complaining about the speed when leveling from main story episodes alone. He's talking about getting rid of patrols and upping the XP from standard missions to keep people from getting ahead without following the linear path.
The problem is not how long it takes Feds but that they hit 50 before they've done the story missions due to having other options.
You're reading his statement backwards. He's not complaining about the speed when leveling from main story episodes alone. He's talking about getting rid of patrols and upping the XP from standard missions to keep people from getting ahead without following the linear path.
The problem is not how long it takes Feds but that they hit 50 before they've done the story missions due to having other options.
They wouldnt even need to up the standard mission xp now that we have the Doff system. However it is highly ironic how they complained people were leveling too fast prior to F2P, only to make it even faster, and now complain its too fast again :rolleyes:
Additionally, think of how good it would sound. I'm not sure how many KDF foundry missions have been made. I'll guess somewhere around 500 as a conservative estimate.
Dstahl could say: "With the introduction of foundry rewards, over 500 kdf missions have been added to the KDF faction experience. In our estimation, a player can reach max level on three different toon without having to repeat the same mission twice."
Additionally, think of how good it would sound. I'm not sure how many KDF foundry missions have been made. I'll guess somewhere around 500 as a conservative estimate.
Dstahl: "With the introduction of foundry rewards, over 500 kdf missions have been added to the KDF faction experience. In our estimation, a player can reach max level on three different toon without having to repeat the same mission twice."
While that does sound good, I highly doubt the majority of those 500 missions are anything they would want to brag about. I would guesstimate that there are no more than 100 "quality" KDF missions. Still, that is a big number compared to what they currently have.
While that does sound good, I highly doubt they would be proud of the majority of those 500. I would guesstimate that there are no more than 100 "quality" KDF missions. Still, that is a big number compared to what they currently have.
True, but how many quality kdf missions exist now as official content?
1 out of 5 ain't bad.
Would Cryptic have a 1 out of 5 ain't bad score, if we're including patrols and clusters together with FEs? They'd have far less typos, I'm sure.
True, but how many quality kdf missions exist now as official content?
1 out of 5 ain't bad.
Would Cryptic have a 1 out of 5 ain't bad score, if we're including patrols and clusters together with FEs? They'd have far less typos, I'm sure.
Well its obvious you and I are in agreement. The question is, how do we get Dan/Cryptic to realize how important this is? On the surface most people think this is just a foundry issue, but the truth is the is the key to solving content problems for the KDF, Romulans, and any future factions.
A big thank you to everyone who has been participating in this poll and commenting in this thread. There have been some very compelling and thoughtful arguments for and against the various features listed in the poll.
Keep in mind that neither the poll nor my comments should be treated as "the plan" for 2013. Due to the complexity of building an MMO, we have a pretty good idea of what we will be tackling in 2013 already, but having this dialog sheds light on the different opinions that exist within the player base. It also allows me to throw out ideas that we have discussed internally to see if you have a similar reaction.
At the end of the day, the STO team has a responsibility to Cryptic, CBS and Perfect World to ensure the sustained growth and health of this MMO. In addition to these goals, we also have a responsibility to the many players who have made STO their game of choice and to Star Trek fans to carry on the fine tradition of "Trek".
When it comes to the future, the decisions we make will be in everyone's best interest and will weigh all the various concerns and desires against the reality of where our game is at and where it is growing.
Reading through this thread reaffirms several constructive criticisms about STO and helps provide a baseline for our internal development discussions.
Examples:
The Foundry could be better integrated with the game. It could offer better rewards and fill content voids where they exist if Cryptic could adopt the missions and ensure they are integrated with the overal arch of the game.
PvP has suffered from a lack of development effort and could become a much more compelling aspect of STO gameplay. We are at war, and yet the PvP doesn't reflect the conflict in a meaningful way. Territorial gameplay or iPvP matches would go a long way towards improving this part of the game.
The KDF faction has a long history of trying to establish itself and has suffered greatly from the "What is it going to be" thrash. While there is a passionate contingent of KDF players at max level who want more KDF specific content, there is also a large number of players who pass on playing in the KDF because you cannot build a KDF character as your first. In either case, the KDF wants to feel established and have their own agenda in the game instead of always playing the "foil" to the Feds.
Similarly, there are many players who would like to play as a Romulan, but don't want that experience to be as simple as a "playable species". Playing a Romulan should mean your own story and agenda, your own ships, and your own experience. Given the games development history with the KDF, there is skepticism that a Romulan experience would be any better than what the KDF had shortly after launch. The fate of the Romulans is also a topic of debate. What has happened to them since Romulus was destroyed? Are they splintered? How many are left? Who's in charge? Any effort with the Romulans should start from a perspective of "Telling their Story" so that the design is fulfilling to fans.
While that is my personal synopsis of the hot topics, think about what it takes to run an MMO in today's highly competitive marketplace. Despite what some may think, we have a deliberate path and long term goals that we've been tracking quite well against. STO has not only survived but is thriving at a time when many MMOs have kicked or are about to kick the bucket. The STO community has been a big part of our success and has truly impacted both the development and health of this MMO.
As we move forward into Season 7 and then on towards 2013, the STO development team will be keeping all of these hot topics close to our heart so that we can ensure that the features we deliver in upcoming Seasons reflect the best decision of where the game needs to go next. You may not always agree with the priorities, but so far the game is benefiting from the path we are on and has never been healthier.
So please continue to discuss the game as it is and what it could and should be. We are listening and do find value in our dialog together.
If you don't mind, I'd also like to give a shout out to this amazing STO team. Since my return as EP last February, STO has been on a steady pace to deliver fun new content and address some of the top issues in the game.
As a reflection of what we've been able to accomplish, check out what we've done in the past 6 months:
Dominion Featured Episode Series
"Alpha" one-off KDF Episode
Dilithium Mining Event with new Minigame
KDF Federation Blockade Fleet Action
First Contact Day Event
Vault Shuttle Event
Ferasan Playable Species
Fleet Advancement Starbase System
New Starbase Fleet Events
Over 40 new ships
2 new Duty Officer Packs
Half a dozen new costumes
Ravamp of Defera Adventure Zone world missions
New Tholian Adventure Zone with two new boss battles
New Foundry features and assets
Lots of new loot
In the next 6 months we are working on the following:
New Personal Advancement System with Reputation based personal projects
New Embassy Fleet Holding with related projects and rewards
Several new 5 and 20 man Fleet Events some of which are cross-faction teamable
New Max Level Sector with Daily Patrols
New Romulan Colony "Adventure Zone" - our biggest to date - includes BOFF gameplay
Into the Hive STF - Finally fight the Borg Queen
New Ships including the Vesta class
New Duty Officer Pack
New Loot
New Foundry Spotlight feature
New Foundry assets
UI improvements including the Queues
Updated Winter Event
3 Year Anniversary Event
In addition to that, a small subset of the team have also been working on the ships, costumes, and consumables that appear in the C-Store. There are probably things that I even left out including bugs that we continually squash week to week, but the gist is, we are aggressively moving forward.
All together that is a healthy amount of new updates this awesome little team has delivered since we launched F2P . In 2013 will will deliver even more as we continue to staff up and train our new team members.
So while we may not be able to address the feature you voted for immediately, the goal is that everything on the poll list will be addressed in the future. It is only a matter of time before all of these systems get the development resources they need to move forward.
Thank you for taking the time to participate and communicate.
Well its obvious you and I are in agreement. The question is, how do we get Dan/Cryptic to realize how important this is? On the surface most people think this is just a foundry issue, but the truth is the is the key to solving content problems for the KDF, Romulans, and any future factions.
You're reading his statement backwards. He's not complaining about the speed when leveling from main story episodes alone. He's talking about getting rid of patrols and upping the XP from standard missions to keep people from getting ahead without following the linear path.
The problem is not how long it takes Feds but that they hit 50 before they've done the story missions due to having other options.
No I didn't. My point was that you don't ever need to touch a patrol mission to get to 50 since Doffs fills in the gaps. Which essentially leaves a lot of content as unneeded or unplayed.
The storyline missions need restructured to provide the gaps needed and the Patrols reinserted.
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A big thank you to everyone who has been participating in this poll and commenting in this thread. There have been some very compelling and thoughtful arguments for and against the various features listed in the poll.
Thanks for your continued participation in this thread. I would however like to point out something seemingly obvious. You mentioned 4 "hot topic" issues:
1) the foundry
2) PvP
3) the KDF
4) Romulans
I think it is very important to realize that #1 can be used to solve #'s 3 & 4 if you listen to the suggestions that have already been discussed in this thread. Due to that fact, I think you seriously need to consider making that your top priority. Killing 3 birds with 1 stone is not something that should be ignored.
Comments
(A) lvl slow
or
(B) lvl with the same ships same missions
i pick A hands downs then romulan shortcuts
system Lord Baal is dead
Not talking about any shortcuts.
That's what I'm saying. It would take forever right now under the Fed side to lvl playing ugc. But, if they had a decent timer-based rewards system that prevent clicker exploit missions, then players could get just as good xp playing ugc than playing a FE.
2 hours ugc = 2 hour main game XP. If a player wants to spend two hours clicking 300 console missions, fine. Or, play 1 really long ugc mission. Both grant same XP to lvl, based on a timer.
They could test this on the KDF side if they have a Foundry rewards timer in place. Make the ugc rewards equal mission rewards, while getting rid of the clicker exploits. I want to see what that does to the KDF when there is suddenly a huge amount of unplayed XP content available on the KDF side.
We'd also see more foundry authors creating kdf missions. We don't do so now, because nobody plays them. I spent over 100 hours making my KDF mission. After 6 months or so, it has had 40 or so plays.
I agree. And from what I have read, this is how it will work in NW.
i do agree things need to be beefed up big time. i think the so called 'daily' for them also needs a greater reward to encourage people to play 3 foundry missions more often.
authors should be rewarded as well. maybe get some dilth every time some one plays a mission of theirs and if there mission is spotlighted or even added as an offical ep. then maybe get rewarded in zen. some truely great missions in the foundry for both feds and kdf.
only problem is .... them sneaky ferengi missions lol that are far too quick. i hope they have a way to counter that. or a way for the system to determine how best to reward a high quality mission over a ferengi grind mission.
Basing mission rewards on average completion time would solve the exploit problem. Note that I said "average", meaning there is nothing you could personally do to game the system. And if there were a problem with a group of people try to farm a specific mission, they could add a cooldown on getting rewards from the same mission. For example, you could only get the rewards from any given mission once a week.
The problem is that Cryptic encouraged the quickies by making it "Hey go play 3 missions," instead of "Hey you, just spend 2 hours playing ugc and you'll get cool goodies!"
Hopefully the mechanic for a timer based rewards system is there. Otherwise, maybe it could be part of someone's job to review 4 or 5 missions a day to check to see if they are quickies. If not, pick those for rewards.
There are so many ways that it could be done. Play 3 of 3 and earn rewards is the reason we have those quickies. No one is going to play them if the rewards were based on a timer.
i do not want to spend 2 hours on any mission not even stfs but back in the day they could take up to 6 hours with the wrong team
system Lord Baal is dead
I really hope that this is what the spotlight rewards are being used for: to test such a new type of completion time-based reward system. If all goes well with the spotlight, maybe it could be fully opened up, first to test on the KDF side to see what that does to it.
If all goes, they could add a third faction in one season maybe.
step 1: foundry rewards system revamp
step 2: open it up on the kdf side, thus instantly adding tons of xp playable content there.
step 3: A Romulan foudry faction. They'd need to give us the bones, ships, UI, and assets. We'll build the rest.
And the timer based reward system would still rewards you. 30 mins here and there = 1 full hour on one mission, ya know?
Unfortunately that plan sounds too good to be true.
My character Tsin'xing
So I understand this would make sense if you're talking to a contact on another ship, on a planet, or on a starbase. By why would the cloak deactivate when talking to your own crew, folks who are at the very least on the same vessel as you, if not on the bridge with you.
Why not? That kind of community building is good for the game. Want to spend 1 hour just dancing in a custom made bar? Go ahead, and the game rewards you with XP.
As previously mentioned, the solution is simply to put a cooldown on getting rewards from the same mission. For example, you could only get rewards from any given mission once a week. Or every other week. Or even once a month. Whatever length of time works the best.
And while community building is well and good, you have to remember that you can only have a small group of people in any given foundry mission. You arent going to be able to have any real fleet events like that.
The Federation is the most popular in your metrics for one simple reason: Its the only faction people can start playing the game in. Until they reach 50 and grind the STF/mk12 out (can take a month or two) people dont usually try KDF. When they do they are greeted with a side that has a blithely static ship set and where the only variety comes from the zstore.
Why pay money to 'try' KDF when the fed side already has plenty of different ships -and- federation is being given, for FREE in most cases, the best KDF zen ship consoles?
Because I tell you, as much as I'd love a subspace jump console on my bird of prey I'm not buying the ship for it.. my fed escort character got his for free (EC on exchange).
I also disagree with your concept of a new faction disrupting friends and fleets. The way the fleet system is set up there is zero disruption by having your other-faction character in another fleet. You can contribute as much items,fleetmarks, etc with one character as you do another. Fleet events , by having two or more fleets, only means the individual has a lot more player-created variety content/activities in a game that is chronically stale and static.
Here's a hint: Open foundry to everyone. For free. No dilithium cost for project slots, no having to buy character slots to use the darn thing. Make Foundry work for you.
Crowdsource that part of the development. Create incentives/awards for people to make this stuff for you. You can turn these crowdsourced missions into full fledged episodes.. just add the rewards for mission win yourselves.
If you haven't had the time to play some of the content made by players you may be surprised to see the dozens upon dozens of multi-stage, story-driven missions players have made. The quality of them far surpasses that of the episodes found in the game. There are even missions that are tutorials for the game.
Its no different than what Bethesda does with their rabidly talented and loyal mod/fan base. Why has Cryptic not picked up on this very visible and successful practice? The tool is there, it works... give it a small effort to make it accessible and do rewards and let it take momentum.
Just add the ships, the home planet and a couple of other canon locations (ground/space) and crowdsource the episode/mission making. I assure you in less than a month or two of JUST releasing the ships/boffs/doffs for the romulan faction you will be having a hard time choosing between the many missions people will have made for them to turn into the 'official' episodes.
Lack of missions isnt the problem. There are already tons of great missions. The problem is there is no measurable incentive to play them, because they do not award you anything comparable to the official content.
I think dstahl would agree. Whether it's associated with a longer term plan to address the desires expressed in the poll is unknown.
I want to hope that there is, especially since our starbases have a holodeck. A good spot for ugc but nothing is hooked up yet.
There are ways to do this.
First of all, the Romulans get Featured Episodes. That's 20 missions.
Then maybe they get 5 unique ones, which are Feature quality.
Then what you do before launching Romulans is focus on creating around 15 Rom/KDF missions, written from the two perspectives but with similar content. This sets the KDF up to be "finished" along with a tutorial mission (They will be light but creating an in-depth mission with more XP is easier than creating 2 missions... so some of these will be "level and a half" missions.) The joint missions could involve the idea of teaming in a few but would mostly be stuff like Alpha. Beam down to planet, encounter intriguing threat, react in an aggressive, non-Fed way. (In fact...? Give them Alpha too.)
Then you create 5 highly polished Romulan/Fed missions. Some of these could be remasters. You do this because, yes, Feds are where the money is at.
This puts everyone in a similar range, parity wise, for getting to endgame.
You finance it by bundling T1-5 Romulan ships and Romulan species into an expansion bundle. Upgraded versions of the ships would be available later. Additional species like Reman and Hirogen would be ala carte.
None of the content aside from the Romulan introduction is, strictly speaking, paywalled because Klingons are free and get 15 missions free. Feds are free and get the 5 missions free.
However, the rewards from those missions would interlock in ways that only a Romulan could fully benefit from.
And maybe bundle in Romulan Deserter playable species options for Fed and KDF for people who get the bundle. (So unlocking the faction unlocks the species for all three factions, albeit maybe in an altered form for Feds and KDF.)
Frankly Dan, this was already known BEFORE Season 5 came out. Stormshade had made the statement that it only in took "a weekend and 6 pack of Redbull" to get a new character to max level by an expirienced player. He had said this was an issue already, being able to level too fast preS5, and we the players recognised this and agreed.
...
But what we got, in the form of a fix to leveling too fast, was an Increase in how fast we could level, plus the doff systems, which speed it up more.
So what we started to get was more End Game content because how all the maxed level characters that had gotten there in good time. Which didn't fix the fast leveling problem, but encouraged players to go even faster to get to more end game.
If players are just bypassing the content that is there because they don't "need" to do it, then a means to encourage people to play it needs to be introduced.
Patrol Dailies?
Complete a Sector Patrol (Dilithium)?
Registered: Oct/2009 , LTS : Feb/2011
Fleets: Warriors of the Phoenix, Kirian Industries[/SIGPIC]
Three years and still no Captain Klaa hair...
You're reading his statement backwards. He's not complaining about the speed when leveling from main story episodes alone. He's talking about getting rid of patrols and upping the XP from standard missions to keep people from getting ahead without following the linear path.
The problem is not how long it takes Feds but that they hit 50 before they've done the story missions due to having other options.
They wouldnt even need to up the standard mission xp now that we have the Doff system. However it is highly ironic how they complained people were leveling too fast prior to F2P, only to make it even faster, and now complain its too fast again :rolleyes:
Dstahl could say: "With the introduction of foundry rewards, over 500 kdf missions have been added to the KDF faction experience. In our estimation, a player can reach max level on three different toon without having to repeat the same mission twice."
While that does sound good, I highly doubt the majority of those 500 missions are anything they would want to brag about. I would guesstimate that there are no more than 100 "quality" KDF missions. Still, that is a big number compared to what they currently have.
True, but how many quality kdf missions exist now as official content?
1 out of 5 ain't bad.
Would Cryptic have a 1 out of 5 ain't bad score, if we're including patrols and clusters together with FEs? They'd have far less typos, I'm sure.
Well its obvious you and I are in agreement. The question is, how do we get Dan/Cryptic to realize how important this is? On the surface most people think this is just a foundry issue, but the truth is the is the key to solving content problems for the KDF, Romulans, and any future factions.
Here is my impassioned plea:
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=383751
I really dont know what else to do.
Keep in mind that neither the poll nor my comments should be treated as "the plan" for 2013. Due to the complexity of building an MMO, we have a pretty good idea of what we will be tackling in 2013 already, but having this dialog sheds light on the different opinions that exist within the player base. It also allows me to throw out ideas that we have discussed internally to see if you have a similar reaction.
At the end of the day, the STO team has a responsibility to Cryptic, CBS and Perfect World to ensure the sustained growth and health of this MMO. In addition to these goals, we also have a responsibility to the many players who have made STO their game of choice and to Star Trek fans to carry on the fine tradition of "Trek".
When it comes to the future, the decisions we make will be in everyone's best interest and will weigh all the various concerns and desires against the reality of where our game is at and where it is growing.
Reading through this thread reaffirms several constructive criticisms about STO and helps provide a baseline for our internal development discussions.
Examples:
The Foundry could be better integrated with the game. It could offer better rewards and fill content voids where they exist if Cryptic could adopt the missions and ensure they are integrated with the overal arch of the game.
PvP has suffered from a lack of development effort and could become a much more compelling aspect of STO gameplay. We are at war, and yet the PvP doesn't reflect the conflict in a meaningful way. Territorial gameplay or iPvP matches would go a long way towards improving this part of the game.
The KDF faction has a long history of trying to establish itself and has suffered greatly from the "What is it going to be" thrash. While there is a passionate contingent of KDF players at max level who want more KDF specific content, there is also a large number of players who pass on playing in the KDF because you cannot build a KDF character as your first. In either case, the KDF wants to feel established and have their own agenda in the game instead of always playing the "foil" to the Feds.
Similarly, there are many players who would like to play as a Romulan, but don't want that experience to be as simple as a "playable species". Playing a Romulan should mean your own story and agenda, your own ships, and your own experience. Given the games development history with the KDF, there is skepticism that a Romulan experience would be any better than what the KDF had shortly after launch. The fate of the Romulans is also a topic of debate. What has happened to them since Romulus was destroyed? Are they splintered? How many are left? Who's in charge? Any effort with the Romulans should start from a perspective of "Telling their Story" so that the design is fulfilling to fans.
While that is my personal synopsis of the hot topics, think about what it takes to run an MMO in today's highly competitive marketplace. Despite what some may think, we have a deliberate path and long term goals that we've been tracking quite well against. STO has not only survived but is thriving at a time when many MMOs have kicked or are about to kick the bucket. The STO community has been a big part of our success and has truly impacted both the development and health of this MMO.
As we move forward into Season 7 and then on towards 2013, the STO development team will be keeping all of these hot topics close to our heart so that we can ensure that the features we deliver in upcoming Seasons reflect the best decision of where the game needs to go next. You may not always agree with the priorities, but so far the game is benefiting from the path we are on and has never been healthier.
So please continue to discuss the game as it is and what it could and should be. We are listening and do find value in our dialog together.
If you don't mind, I'd also like to give a shout out to this amazing STO team. Since my return as EP last February, STO has been on a steady pace to deliver fun new content and address some of the top issues in the game.
As a reflection of what we've been able to accomplish, check out what we've done in the past 6 months:
In the next 6 months we are working on the following:
In addition to that, a small subset of the team have also been working on the ships, costumes, and consumables that appear in the C-Store. There are probably things that I even left out including bugs that we continually squash week to week, but the gist is, we are aggressively moving forward.
All together that is a healthy amount of new updates this awesome little team has delivered since we launched F2P . In 2013 will will deliver even more as we continue to staff up and train our new team members.
So while we may not be able to address the feature you voted for immediately, the goal is that everything on the poll list will be addressed in the future. It is only a matter of time before all of these systems get the development resources they need to move forward.
Thank you for taking the time to participate and communicate.
Star Trek continues to shine thanks to you.
and like cryptic will ignore it unless it makes them fast money or they can make it a gimmick to make them fast money
system Lord Baal is dead
No I didn't. My point was that you don't ever need to touch a patrol mission to get to 50 since Doffs fills in the gaps. Which essentially leaves a lot of content as unneeded or unplayed.
The storyline missions need restructured to provide the gaps needed and the Patrols reinserted.
Registered: Oct/2009 , LTS : Feb/2011
Fleets: Warriors of the Phoenix, Kirian Industries[/SIGPIC]
Three years and still no Captain Klaa hair...
Thanks for your continued participation in this thread. I would however like to point out something seemingly obvious. You mentioned 4 "hot topic" issues:
1) the foundry
2) PvP
3) the KDF
4) Romulans
I think it is very important to realize that #1 can be used to solve #'s 3 & 4 if you listen to the suggestions that have already been discussed in this thread. Due to that fact, I think you seriously need to consider making that your top priority. Killing 3 birds with 1 stone is not something that should be ignored.