If you are referring to the non-commissioned ranks then yes, Star Trek has always revolved around commissioned officers. Non-commissioned officers would never be command of a ship and although they are an integral part of any unit, are subordinate to commissioned officers. There is a difference between enlisted troops, non-commissioned officers, and commissioned officers.
I know the difference. There are quite a few commissioned officer ranks missing from the game. Fleet Captain, Commodore, as well as positions like Yeoman, are missing as well.
I know the difference. There are quite a few commissioned officer ranks missing from the game. Fleet Captain, Commodore, as well as positions like Yeoman, are missing as well.
Star Trek rank is based upon US Navy rank.
Fleet Captain - A title, not a rank, and a rare title (usually for a single mission). If a group of 5 ships together on mission all have an O-6 Captain in command of each individual ship, one Captain (usually the senior one) will be bestowed with the temporary title of Fleet Captain and be in charge of all the ships.
Commodore - Replaced by Rear Admiral Lower Half in the early 1980s.
Yeoman - Not a commissioned officer but a warrant officer usually tasked with secretarial or administrative duties. Warrant Officer is lower on the totem pole than a commissioned officer but higher than a non-commissioned officer.
The only commissioned officer ranks missing from STO are Lt. Junior Grade and Admiral (which we haven't gotten to yet).
I'm usually in late Cardassian/Early Borg content (in a duo) before hitting VA, and it takes about as long as it did when I first started playing.
The problem is you, not the game.
I totally disagree there as well as I have quite a few lvl 50s who never played a story-line mission. They leveled 100% through the Doff system (part of the game).
I totally disagree there as well as I have quite a few lvl 50s who never played a story-line mission. They leveled 100% through the Doff system (part of the game).
Because obviously, the game forced you to do that instead of leveling up via story missions.
♪ I'm going around not in circles but in spirographs.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
Because obviously, the game forced you to do that instead of leveling up via story missions.
I think you are missing the point. The game should force you to follow the story but it does not. I could get to VA without ever knowing who B'Vat or Taris are and that's kinda lame. I can't speak for the OP but I think that's kinda what he was driving at. That and even if you played nothing but story-line missions and patrol, you will outlevel the content (leveling is too fast).
I think you are missing the point. The game should force you to follow the story but it does not. I could get to VA without ever knowing who B'Vat or Taris are and that's kinda lame. I can't speak for the OP but I think that's kinda what he was driving at. That and even if you played nothing but story-line missions and patrol, you will outlevel the content (leveling is too fast).
Its an MMO, the game shouldn't force you to do anything. Some folks are mad the KDF tutorial is manditory.
And who cares if you max level before you finish the story missions. The loot and mobs scale.
I could get to VA without ever knowing who B'Vat or Taris are and that's kinda lame.
Explain why this matters. Not everyone cares about the story. Obviously, I do, but I actually have a close personal friend who thinks stories are a waste of time (which offends me, but I also find it highly ironic considering his profession). The devs obviously believe that a player should be able to choose which kind of content suits them. I agree. I suppose you feel like Skyrim should force you to finish the main story before doing side quests or guilds?
That and even if you played nothing but story-line missions and patrol, you will outlevel the content (leveling is too fast).
You would prefer to run out of primary storyline content the exact moment that you hit VA so that you now have nothing to do but foundry missions (lol) and STFs (no story at all) with your now max level character?
.....
Okay.
♪ I'm going around not in circles but in spirographs.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
Its an MMO, the game shouldn't force you to do anything. Some folks are mad the KDF tutorial is manditory.
And who cares if you max level before you finish the story missions. The loot and mobs scale.
I agree with you to an extent but any MMO I've ever played has told a story. Also, what is point of having story-line leveling missions if there is no need for them? If this game allowed SP for Foundry and had a decent PvP system that would be one thing, but in STO there is story-line missions and Doffs and that's it.
@commanderkassy - Rawr. Someone drank their angry juice this afternoon. :rolleyes:
@commanderkassy - Rawr. Someone drank their angry juice this afternoon. :rolleyes:
I drank my critical thinking juice this morning. I asked several important questions. Questions you should answer if you want to support your views. If you cannot effectively answer them in a logical manner, instead choosing to point out your personal perception of my attitude, then I will go ahead and pat myself on the back.
♪ I'm going around not in circles but in spirographs.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I agree with you to an extent but any MMO I've ever played has told a story.
@commanderkassy - Rawr. Someone drank their angry juice this afternoon. :rolleyes:
I really like WoW's basic model there, which I think a lot of people have tried to imitate without understanding.
In WoW, you have a zone with a central problem. That problem is apparent everywhere you go there. It's apparent in the dailies, the simple gather missions, and the storylines -- which may got off on tangents but build from a central problem.
You progress through the zone. Then through reputation grinds, an epic questline, and/or a dungeon, you decisively confront an enemy, a loss, or a shortage which is somehow central to the problem in that zone.
You are presented with the idea you made a difference. In later expansions, you actually see the zone transform. And then you move on for the most part, with that zone being turned into a social hub/PvP area/crafting location.
The idea is simple and brilliant. You have sandbox elements but are held back from playing in the sandbox until you have experienced a linear story that builds an emotional tie between you and the expanded sandbox you are about to receive.
I drank my critical thinking juice this morning. I asked several important questions. Questions you should answer if you want to support your views. If you cannot effectively answer them in a logical manner, instead choosing to point out your personal perception of my attitude, then I will go ahead and pat myself on the back.
I have 0 interest in sharing my thoughts with someone who wants to devolve a conversation into 'No you' and multi-quotes. Present your thoughts logically and maybe we have a conversation.
I really like WoW's basic model there, which I think a lot of people have tried to imitate without understanding.
In WoW, you have a zone with a central problem. That problem is apparent everywhere you go there. It's apparent in the dailies, the simple gather missions, and the storylines -- which may got off on tangents but build from a central problem.
You progress through the zone. Then through reputation grinds, an epic questline, and/or a dungeon, you decisively confront an enemy, a loss, or a shortage which is somehow central to the problem in that zone.
You are presented with the idea you made a difference. In later expansions, you actually see the zone transform. And then you move on for the most part, with that zone being turned into a social hub/PvP area/crafting location.
The idea is simple and brilliant. You have sandbox elements but are held back from playing in the sandbox until you have experienced a linear story that builds an emotional tie between you and the expanded sandbox you are about to receive.
I like this idea as well. Perhaps an answer would be to remove XP from Doff missions and only award CXP, but make reaching lvl 4 in any one of the Doff catagories worth something more than just earning a title and a purple doff. Maybe make exploration sectors worth only Exploration CXP and dilithium. Redalerts dilithium and fleet marks. Just some ideas that would make leveling content worth playing and a necessity to level a character to VA.
I drank my critical thinking juice this morning. I asked several important questions. Questions you should answer if you want to support your views. If you cannot effectively answer them in a logical manner, instead choosing to point out your personal perception of my attitude, then I will go ahead and pat myself on the back.
We were having a nice and pleasant conversation and debate until you came charging into my thread. Now it will likely be closed. Thanks for that.
I really like WoW's basic model there, which I think a lot of people have tried to imitate without understanding.
In WoW, you have a zone with a central problem. That problem is apparent everywhere you go there. It's apparent in the dailies, the simple gather missions, and the storylines -- which may got off on tangents but build from a central problem.
You progress through the zone. Then through reputation grinds, an epic questline, and/or a dungeon, you decisively confront an enemy, a loss, or a shortage which is somehow central to the problem in that zone.
You are presented with the idea you made a difference. In later expansions, you actually see the zone transform. And then you move on for the most part, with that zone being turned into a social hub/PvP area/crafting location.
This is going back to your "Intro" missions-Zone- "Outro" Missions is it not? The more I've thought about it, the better it sounds. It wouldn't work in every case, but I think that STO should do something like that more often.
I like this idea as well. Perhaps an answer would be to remove XP from Doff missions and only award CXP, but make reaching lvl 4 in any one of the Doff catagories worth something more than just earning a title and a purple doff. Maybe make exploration sectors worth only Exploration CXP and dilithium. Redalerts dilithium and fleet marks. Just some ideas that would make leveling content worth playing and a necessity to level a character to VA.
Adding to what I was saying, what if story-line content was the only means of gaining XP outside of PvP. For one, PvP would need a revamp and we know that is already in the works. Second, everything else would need a reward whether that be CXP, Fleet Marks, Latinum, or Dilithium. That seems doable. The final change would be giving the player the option to either a) play the storyline mission appropriate to their level or b) playing a developer-approved Foundry mission for equal XP. Maybe give the player a handful of Foundry tokens to use per rank so that the player at some point must keep up with what's going on with the STO storyline but can still play UGC at their discretion or bypass a mission they don't care for.
"Critics who say that the optimistic utopia Star Trek depicted is now outmoded forget the cultural context that gave birth to it: Star Trek was not a manifestation of optimism when optimism was easy. Star Trek declared a hope for a future that nobody stuck in the present could believe in. For all our struggles today, we haven’t outgrown the need for stories like Star Trek. We need tales of optimism, of heroes, of courage and goodness now as much as we’ve ever needed them." -Thomas Marrone
This is going back to your "Intro" missions-Zone- "Outro" Missions is it not? The more I've thought about it, the better it sounds. It wouldn't work in every case, but I think that STO should do something like that more often.
Yeah, kinda.
The WoW model doesn't work perfectly here because everything is so instanced.
But I think you could have *A* social hub and *An* invasion zone open up in each sector as the result of missions.
I'd probably look at giving the hubs 4x XP boost and make them roughly on scale with Nukara Prime. I'd also look at turning some Fleet Actions into these via a remastering process.
The cool part about an intro mission (and I'd make this standard) is that your actions there can influence the zone since only people who did the mission get the zone.
So in the mission, you knock over a statue. You order an orbital bombardment. You free captives.
And then in the follow up zone, it starts that way. So you see a toppled over statue every time you visit the zone and think, "Hey! I knocked that over when I first came here."
And then in the follow up zone, it starts that way. So you see a toppled over statue every time you visit the zone and think, "Hey! I knocked that over when I first came here."
Yeah... STO needs more stuff like that. Right now we it's all: "Yay! We saved DS9! Again..." :rolleyes:
"So... bad guy of the day... Same time next week?"
:P
And I really would like to have Zones available only for those that played the intro mission. It would work as a nice gate, without it actually being gated. :cool:
I really like WoW's basic model there, which I think a lot of people have tried to imitate without understanding.
In WoW, you have a zone with a central problem. That problem is apparent everywhere you go there. It's apparent in the dailies, the simple gather missions, and the storylines -- which may got off on tangents but build from a central problem.
You progress through the zone. Then through reputation grinds, an epic questline, and/or a dungeon, you decisively confront an enemy, a loss, or a shortage which is somehow central to the problem in that zone.
You are presented with the idea you made a difference. In later expansions, you actually see the zone transform. And then you move on for the most part, with that zone being turned into a social hub/PvP area/crafting location.
The idea is simple and brilliant. You have sandbox elements but are held back from playing in the sandbox until you have experienced a linear story that builds an emotional tie between you and the expanded sandbox you are about to receive.
^^^^
STO was that way before the F2P conversion. the Sirus Sector area had what is now the KDF stoyarc portion. You could play missions for it as they came up or not. Around Level 20, you got a mission to go to Starbase 39 in the Alpha Centauri that started the Romulan arc, and agin, you could play that string while still playing teh KDF stuff if you liked. At around level 30 you got a mission to go to DS9 and the Cardassion stuff started.
However, for F2P, the dev felt the need to siimplyfy the progression as, supposedly, in most F2P games, if a new F2P player finds something too confusing or frustrating, they'll quit as they don't have the 'investment' of paying for a client on a set of discs in a box.
As for WoW's 'phasing' tech, that was added in just before the 'Cataclysm' expansion; so it's fairly new (considering WoW's overall age.) Overall, the trick of any non-sandbox MMO is to indeed give you a guided track, BUT make it feel like you have some open ended choices, or multiple leveling track so when you create an Alt, the story progression isn't neccesarily exactly the same as your first character (unless you decide you want it to be by making the exact same mission choices in the exact same order.
That's one thing I'm rather dissapointed in with STO - that there's one linear story track and it's all laid out in advance, front to back. Yes, they give you the option to skip missions if you so choose; but it's now like a railroad with every stop clearly labeled. Any illusion of open-endedness is 100% gone.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
What's the point of an MMO without a continuing story?
The whole point of playing a game is to be entertained. Grinding is only "fun" for a short time.
I agree, that's how I play the game. That's how many others play the game. Those who do not want to play it that way should not be forced into it though. They should have the freedom to play however they want as long as they are not exploiting the system or otherwise playing in a way the devs did not intend. It's clear the developers intended for people to be able to do what they are doing, whether that fits into our little world or not.
♪ I'm going around not in circles but in spirographs.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
The WoW model doesn't work perfectly here because everything is so instanced.
I think the instancing merely hinders it. What really hurts it is the disjointed nature of the storylines themselves. They need to be cleaned up quite badly, and some stories obviously need to be completely rewritten.
I find it to be extremely unfortunate that the only times I ever felt emotionally connected to the story in STO on any meaningful level was when I was being forced to do things that felt very non-trek. Then again, perhaps that's not so much emotional connection as just being very angry that I'm murdering Romulans and killing Jem'Hadar babies without being given a personal choice on what I want to do.
and *An* invasion zone open up in each sector as the result of missions.
I like this idea a lot, but how would you structure them if you had that kind of control? In what way would you make these even matter? This is of course, beyond what you mention below with the statue. What I mean to say is, would this simply be another fleet mark dump, or would you in some way use these to help tie up the disjointed storylines that already exist in the area? Please explain.
The cool part about an intro mission (and I'd make this standard) is that your actions there can influence the zone since only people who did the mission get the zone.
So in the mission, you knock over a statue. You order an orbital bombardment. You free captives.
And then in the follow up zone, it starts that way. So you see a toppled over statue every time you visit the zone and think, "Hey! I knocked that over when I first came here."
A very good idea, but while a statue I knocked over would help immersion in the immediate, it will ultimately only matter if the rest of the zone supports that level of immersion and storytelling.
♪ I'm going around not in circles but in spirographs.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I am personally shocked and appalled that people here are suggesting to make this game any more like WoW.
WoW was successful in part because it did a lot of things right and polished the hell out of it.
Do I like the game? No. I hate that game.
But in terms of pure structure, it had a winning formula.
What has been suggested is not a simple copy and paste job, but using that structure as inspiration for creating better structure in STO. STO badly needs it.
♪ I'm going around not in circles but in spirographs.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
As for WoW's 'phasing' tech, that was added in just before the 'Cataclysm' expansion; so it's fairly new (considering WoW's overall age.)
Phasing was introduced as a fix for a bug in some Burning Crusade content. It became heavily used for story progression in Wrath of the Lich King, which came out in 2007.
It predates Champions Online.
Former moderator of these forums. Lifetime sub since before launch. Been here since before public betas. Foundry author of "Franklin Drake Must Die".
Stroke of genius. Best idea I have heard in a long time. If you care to, perhaps you could give us an example, such as the dig site?.
While I can't give examples using already in-game Fleet Actions, here's an idea I've been tossing around in my head after I first read Levy's suggestion of this plan. A KDF focused idea no less.
<Wall O' Text Inbound>
The Hur'q
(Instanced Story Mission) Captain! A large Fek'lhr force is deceding upon <Klingon Colony>, we must assist our brothers in arms!Objective: Save the Colony.
(Instanced Story Mission) With info taken from <Several Klingon Outposts> we have determined that the Fek'lhr appear to be gathering in <Certain Area>. You have had a great deal of experience with these new foes. Take your ship and crew to the <Certain Area> and investigate the matter.Objective: Attempt to uncover the explination behind the appearance of the Fek'lhr hoard.[/COLOR]
(Instanced Story Mission) This is indeed great cause for trouble Captain. The Grand Counsel is in your debt finding this information. While your ship is being repaired, we urge you find some way to deal with this new threat.Objective: Listen to tales of the Hur'q and Fek'lhr in order to find some way to deal with this new threat.
(Instanced Story Mission) Captain, we are reciveing a distress call from a nearby <Klingon Colony Separate from the one above>, I realize that we are already on a mission, and that the Federations standing with the Empire is strained, it would be wrong to abandon Klingon lives for scanning Planetary Rings.Objective: Defend the Klingon Colony
(Instanced Story Mission) Captain, While your ship was out of commission, a Hur'q and Fek'lhr force attacked and destroyed <Klingon Colony>! A small Federation Fleet was able to assist in the evacuation of many of our people. But countless warriors died in the assault, Take your ship and crew to <Zone> where we have established a staging point for our revenge!Objective: Proceed to <Social Zone> for new assignments
(Instanced Story Mission) Hmph, the fact that the Federation is staffed with nothing but nosy Qa'Hom's has worked in our favour for once. But while you may have saved many present and future Warriors, rejoice not, for many Klingons died that day. Many had friends and family on that world and wish to seek revenge! And as it seems that the Hur'q have begun to attack Federation Outposts, as much as members of the counsel would protest, it would benefit us both if you would join us in our fight.Objective: Proceed to <Social Zone> for new assignments
After the player passes all of this and gains access to the <Social Zone> they would also gain access to the following:
EDIT: I may have not made this clear, but when I say "all the above" I mean KDF characters would have to play the missions in red, and Feds would have to play the missions in blue. Sorry of I confused anyone.
Hur'q opponents for the Feds and KDF in Starbase Fleet actions and Incursions.
Fek'lhr opponents for the Feds in Starbase Fleet actions and Incursions. (Cause KDF already has them)
Invasion! Hourly Mission. The social zone introduced in the Hur'q missions is unique because it is the only social zone that can come under attack. During this hourly mission you must defend it from Fek'lhr and Hur'q attackers, and you gain XP at a faster rate, better loot than normal, Fleet Marks, and Dilithium for doing so. (In my opinion this is what Defera Invasion Zone should have been)
Hur'q and Fek'lhr Raiders Daily Patrols. (Fed and KDF variants) These are just like regular Daily Patrols, but they award Fleet Marks as well as Dilithium.
The four below all award Fleet Marks:
Retaking the Colony: Combined Fed and KDF Fleet Action.
Retaking the Colony: Combined Fed and KDF Ground Assault.
The Hur'q Shipyards: Combined Fed and KDF Fleet Action.
The Hur'q Shipyards: Combined Fed and KDF Ground Assault.
Special Vendors in the Social Zone.
After doing all the above a certain amount of times, you gain access to:
Final Boss Fleet Action: Combined Fed and KDF Fleet Action.
(Instanced Story Mission) Resolution Mission.
(Instanced Story Mission) Resolution Mission.
As you can see this is just the Cliff Notes version. If enough people like this idea, I can go into it a bit deeper, as well as share my other ideas like this one.
^^^^
STO was that way before the F2P conversion. the Sirus Sector area had what is now the KDF stoyarc portion. You could play missions for it as they came up or not. Around Level 20, you got a mission to go to Starbase 39 in the Alpha Centauri that started the Romulan arc, and agin, you could play that string while still playing teh KDF stuff if you liked. At around level 30 you got a mission to go to DS9 and the Cardassion stuff started.
However, for F2P, the dev felt the need to siimplyfy the progression as, supposedly, in most F2P games, if a new F2P player finds something too confusing or frustrating, they'll quit as they don't have the 'investment' of paying for a client on a set of discs in a box.
As for WoW's 'phasing' tech, that was added in just before the 'Cataclysm' expansion; so it's fairly new (considering WoW's overall age.) Overall, the trick of any non-sandbox MMO is to indeed give you a guided track, BUT make it feel like you have some open ended choices, or multiple leveling track so when you create an Alt, the story progression isn't neccesarily exactly the same as your first character (unless you decide you want it to be by making the exact same mission choices in the exact same order.
That's one thing I'm rather dissapointed in with STO - that there's one linear story track and it's all laid out in advance, front to back. Yes, they give you the option to skip missions if you so choose; but it's now like a railroad with every stop clearly labeled. Any illusion of open-endedness is 100% gone.
That's now really how I see STO.
But there's been phasing in WoW since Burning Crusade and it was used heavily in WotLK. To the point where some zones have no friendly hubs when you first visit them.
But there's been phasing in WoW since Burning Crusade and it was used heavily in WotLK. To the point where some zones have no friendly hubs when you first visit them.
I don't think that would work in STO, I mean, in WoW everyone is on the same plane, in STO we kind of have spaceships. :P
Though, we could do something with the sector space encounters. That could be interesting.
Comments
I know the difference. There are quite a few commissioned officer ranks missing from the game. Fleet Captain, Commodore, as well as positions like Yeoman, are missing as well.
Star Trek rank is based upon US Navy rank.
Fleet Captain - A title, not a rank, and a rare title (usually for a single mission). If a group of 5 ships together on mission all have an O-6 Captain in command of each individual ship, one Captain (usually the senior one) will be bestowed with the temporary title of Fleet Captain and be in charge of all the ships.
Commodore - Replaced by Rear Admiral Lower Half in the early 1980s.
Yeoman - Not a commissioned officer but a warrant officer usually tasked with secretarial or administrative duties. Warrant Officer is lower on the totem pole than a commissioned officer but higher than a non-commissioned officer.
The only commissioned officer ranks missing from STO are Lt. Junior Grade and Admiral (which we haven't gotten to yet).
No.
I'm usually in late Cardassian/Early Borg content (in a duo) before hitting VA, and it takes about as long as it did when I first started playing.
The problem is you, not the game.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I totally disagree there as well as I have quite a few lvl 50s who never played a story-line mission. They leveled 100% through the Doff system (part of the game).
Because obviously, the game forced you to do that instead of leveling up via story missions.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I think you are missing the point. The game should force you to follow the story but it does not. I could get to VA without ever knowing who B'Vat or Taris are and that's kinda lame. I can't speak for the OP but I think that's kinda what he was driving at. That and even if you played nothing but story-line missions and patrol, you will outlevel the content (leveling is too fast).
Its an MMO, the game shouldn't force you to do anything. Some folks are mad the KDF tutorial is manditory.
And who cares if you max level before you finish the story missions. The loot and mobs scale.
No you.
Why?
I do not ask rhetorical questions. In the interests of critical thinking, seriously, why?
Explain why this matters. Not everyone cares about the story. Obviously, I do, but I actually have a close personal friend who thinks stories are a waste of time (which offends me, but I also find it highly ironic considering his profession). The devs obviously believe that a player should be able to choose which kind of content suits them. I agree. I suppose you feel like Skyrim should force you to finish the main story before doing side quests or guilds?
Sure can't.
So? What does this have to do with you?
You would prefer to run out of primary storyline content the exact moment that you hit VA so that you now have nothing to do but foundry missions (lol) and STFs (no story at all) with your now max level character?
.....
Okay.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I agree with you to an extent but any MMO I've ever played has told a story. Also, what is point of having story-line leveling missions if there is no need for them? If this game allowed SP for Foundry and had a decent PvP system that would be one thing, but in STO there is story-line missions and Doffs and that's it.
@commanderkassy - Rawr. Someone drank their angry juice this afternoon. :rolleyes:
I drank my critical thinking juice this morning. I asked several important questions. Questions you should answer if you want to support your views. If you cannot effectively answer them in a logical manner, instead choosing to point out your personal perception of my attitude, then I will go ahead and pat myself on the back.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I really like WoW's basic model there, which I think a lot of people have tried to imitate without understanding.
In WoW, you have a zone with a central problem. That problem is apparent everywhere you go there. It's apparent in the dailies, the simple gather missions, and the storylines -- which may got off on tangents but build from a central problem.
You progress through the zone. Then through reputation grinds, an epic questline, and/or a dungeon, you decisively confront an enemy, a loss, or a shortage which is somehow central to the problem in that zone.
You are presented with the idea you made a difference. In later expansions, you actually see the zone transform. And then you move on for the most part, with that zone being turned into a social hub/PvP area/crafting location.
The idea is simple and brilliant. You have sandbox elements but are held back from playing in the sandbox until you have experienced a linear story that builds an emotional tie between you and the expanded sandbox you are about to receive.
I have 0 interest in sharing my thoughts with someone who wants to devolve a conversation into 'No you' and multi-quotes. Present your thoughts logically and maybe we have a conversation.
I was only reflecting in my statement the attitude you presented. You cannot have it both ways.
What's wrong with multi-quotes? It allows me to address individual ideas and concepts in the debate in an organized manner.
I already did. You chose to ignore my questions.
Simple facts:
I went after the basic concepts in your post (which I felt were flawed).
You went after me.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I like this idea as well. Perhaps an answer would be to remove XP from Doff missions and only award CXP, but make reaching lvl 4 in any one of the Doff catagories worth something more than just earning a title and a purple doff. Maybe make exploration sectors worth only Exploration CXP and dilithium. Redalerts dilithium and fleet marks. Just some ideas that would make leveling content worth playing and a necessity to level a character to VA.
We were having a nice and pleasant conversation and debate until you came charging into my thread. Now it will likely be closed. Thanks for that.
I'm always very pleasant.
I added to the debate. People got defensive when they couldn't counter my argument and made it personal instead.
Remember, I did not make this personal, Rickie did. I was critical of his post, he was critical of me.
Thank him.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
This is going back to your "Intro" missions-Zone- "Outro" Missions is it not? The more I've thought about it, the better it sounds. It wouldn't work in every case, but I think that STO should do something like that more often.
Adding to what I was saying, what if story-line content was the only means of gaining XP outside of PvP. For one, PvP would need a revamp and we know that is already in the works. Second, everything else would need a reward whether that be CXP, Fleet Marks, Latinum, or Dilithium. That seems doable. The final change would be giving the player the option to either a) play the storyline mission appropriate to their level or b) playing a developer-approved Foundry mission for equal XP. Maybe give the player a handful of Foundry tokens to use per rank so that the player at some point must keep up with what's going on with the STO storyline but can still play UGC at their discretion or bypass a mission they don't care for.
The whole point of playing a game is to be entertained. Grinding is only "fun" for a short time.
"Critics who say that the optimistic utopia Star Trek depicted is now outmoded forget the cultural context that gave birth to it: Star Trek was not a manifestation of optimism when optimism was easy. Star Trek declared a hope for a future that nobody stuck in the present could believe in. For all our struggles today, we haven’t outgrown the need for stories like Star Trek. We need tales of optimism, of heroes, of courage and goodness now as much as we’ve ever needed them."
-Thomas Marrone
Yeah, kinda.
The WoW model doesn't work perfectly here because everything is so instanced.
But I think you could have *A* social hub and *An* invasion zone open up in each sector as the result of missions.
I'd probably look at giving the hubs 4x XP boost and make them roughly on scale with Nukara Prime. I'd also look at turning some Fleet Actions into these via a remastering process.
The cool part about an intro mission (and I'd make this standard) is that your actions there can influence the zone since only people who did the mission get the zone.
So in the mission, you knock over a statue. You order an orbital bombardment. You free captives.
And then in the follow up zone, it starts that way. So you see a toppled over statue every time you visit the zone and think, "Hey! I knocked that over when I first came here."
Yeah... STO needs more stuff like that. Right now we it's all: "Yay! We saved DS9! Again..." :rolleyes:
"So... bad guy of the day... Same time next week?"
:P
And I really would like to have Zones available only for those that played the intro mission. It would work as a nice gate, without it actually being gated. :cool:
^^^^
STO was that way before the F2P conversion. the Sirus Sector area had what is now the KDF stoyarc portion. You could play missions for it as they came up or not. Around Level 20, you got a mission to go to Starbase 39 in the Alpha Centauri that started the Romulan arc, and agin, you could play that string while still playing teh KDF stuff if you liked. At around level 30 you got a mission to go to DS9 and the Cardassion stuff started.
However, for F2P, the dev felt the need to siimplyfy the progression as, supposedly, in most F2P games, if a new F2P player finds something too confusing or frustrating, they'll quit as they don't have the 'investment' of paying for a client on a set of discs in a box.
As for WoW's 'phasing' tech, that was added in just before the 'Cataclysm' expansion; so it's fairly new (considering WoW's overall age.) Overall, the trick of any non-sandbox MMO is to indeed give you a guided track, BUT make it feel like you have some open ended choices, or multiple leveling track so when you create an Alt, the story progression isn't neccesarily exactly the same as your first character (unless you decide you want it to be by making the exact same mission choices in the exact same order.
That's one thing I'm rather dissapointed in with STO - that there's one linear story track and it's all laid out in advance, front to back. Yes, they give you the option to skip missions if you so choose; but it's now like a railroad with every stop clearly labeled. Any illusion of open-endedness is 100% gone.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
I agree, that's how I play the game. That's how many others play the game. Those who do not want to play it that way should not be forced into it though. They should have the freedom to play however they want as long as they are not exploiting the system or otherwise playing in a way the devs did not intend. It's clear the developers intended for people to be able to do what they are doing, whether that fits into our little world or not.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
I think the instancing merely hinders it. What really hurts it is the disjointed nature of the storylines themselves. They need to be cleaned up quite badly, and some stories obviously need to be completely rewritten.
I find it to be extremely unfortunate that the only times I ever felt emotionally connected to the story in STO on any meaningful level was when I was being forced to do things that felt very non-trek. Then again, perhaps that's not so much emotional connection as just being very angry that I'm murdering Romulans and killing Jem'Hadar babies without being given a personal choice on what I want to do.
The nice thing, the social hubs for each zone, at least for feds, are already there, unless you had something else in mind.
I like this idea a lot, but how would you structure them if you had that kind of control? In what way would you make these even matter? This is of course, beyond what you mention below with the statue. What I mean to say is, would this simply be another fleet mark dump, or would you in some way use these to help tie up the disjointed storylines that already exist in the area? Please explain.
You are using the word hub in several different contexts. By this, do you specifically mean non-social quest hubs, such as Nukara and Defera?
Stroke of genius. Best idea I have heard in a long time. If you care to, perhaps you could give us an example, such as the dig site?
A very good idea, but while a statue I knocked over would help immersion in the immediate, it will ultimately only matter if the rest of the zone supports that level of immersion and storytelling.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
Raptr profile
WoW was successful in part because it did a lot of things right and polished the hell out of it.
Do I like the game? No. I hate that game.
But in terms of pure structure, it had a winning formula.
What has been suggested is not a simple copy and paste job, but using that structure as inspiration for creating better structure in STO. STO badly needs it.
It's pretty much this hard to keep just one timeline intact. ♪
Phasing was introduced as a fix for a bug in some Burning Crusade content. It became heavily used for story progression in Wrath of the Lich King, which came out in 2007.
It predates Champions Online.
While I can't give examples using already in-game Fleet Actions, here's an idea I've been tossing around in my head after I first read Levy's suggestion of this plan. A KDF focused idea no less.
(Instanced Story Mission) Captain! A large Fek'lhr force is deceding upon <Klingon Colony>, we must assist our brothers in arms! Objective: Save the Colony.
(Instanced Story Mission) With info taken from <Several Klingon Outposts> we have determined that the Fek'lhr appear to be gathering in <Certain Area>. You have had a great deal of experience with these new foes. Take your ship and crew to the <Certain Area> and investigate the matter. Objective: Attempt to uncover the explination behind the appearance of the Fek'lhr hoard.[/COLOR]
(Instanced Story Mission) This is indeed great cause for trouble Captain. The Grand Counsel is in your debt finding this information. While your ship is being repaired, we urge you find some way to deal with this new threat. Objective: Listen to tales of the Hur'q and Fek'lhr in order to find some way to deal with this new threat.
(Instanced Story Mission) Captain, we are reciveing a distress call from a nearby <Klingon Colony Separate from the one above>, I realize that we are already on a mission, and that the Federations standing with the Empire is strained, it would be wrong to abandon Klingon lives for scanning Planetary Rings. Objective: Defend the Klingon Colony
(Instanced Story Mission) Captain, While your ship was out of commission, a Hur'q and Fek'lhr force attacked and destroyed <Klingon Colony>! A small Federation Fleet was able to assist in the evacuation of many of our people. But countless warriors died in the assault, Take your ship and crew to <Zone> where we have established a staging point for our revenge! Objective: Proceed to <Social Zone> for new assignments
(Instanced Story Mission) Hmph, the fact that the Federation is staffed with nothing but nosy Qa'Hom's has worked in our favour for once. But while you may have saved many present and future Warriors, rejoice not, for many Klingons died that day. Many had friends and family on that world and wish to seek revenge! And as it seems that the Hur'q have begun to attack Federation Outposts, as much as members of the counsel would protest, it would benefit us both if you would join us in our fight. Objective: Proceed to <Social Zone> for new assignments
After the player passes all of this and gains access to the <Social Zone> they would also gain access to the following:
EDIT: I may have not made this clear, but when I say "all the above" I mean KDF characters would have to play the missions in red, and Feds would have to play the missions in blue. Sorry of I confused anyone.
Hur'q opponents for the Feds and KDF in Starbase Fleet actions and Incursions.
Fek'lhr opponents for the Feds in Starbase Fleet actions and Incursions. (Cause KDF already has them)
Invasion! Hourly Mission. The social zone introduced in the Hur'q missions is unique because it is the only social zone that can come under attack. During this hourly mission you must defend it from Fek'lhr and Hur'q attackers, and you gain XP at a faster rate, better loot than normal, Fleet Marks, and Dilithium for doing so. (In my opinion this is what Defera Invasion Zone should have been)
Hur'q and Fek'lhr Raiders Daily Patrols. (Fed and KDF variants) These are just like regular Daily Patrols, but they award Fleet Marks as well as Dilithium.
The four below all award Fleet Marks:
Special Vendors in the Social Zone.
After doing all the above a certain amount of times, you gain access to:
Final Boss Fleet Action: Combined Fed and KDF Fleet Action.
(Instanced Story Mission) Resolution Mission.
(Instanced Story Mission) Resolution Mission.
As you can see this is just the Cliff Notes version. If enough people like this idea, I can go into it a bit deeper, as well as share my other ideas like this one.
That's now really how I see STO.
But there's been phasing in WoW since Burning Crusade and it was used heavily in WotLK. To the point where some zones have no friendly hubs when you first visit them.
I don't think that would work in STO, I mean, in WoW everyone is on the same plane, in STO we kind of have spaceships. :P
Though, we could do something with the sector space encounters. That could be interesting.