Could everyone just lean back and think for a moment... do you play the game for the Dilithium? No, you play it for entertainment. Dilithium is just a tiny part of the game.
Besides, to me it looks as if it will actually be easier to get Dilithium by doing the standard fleet actions.
But standart fleet actions are boring :-P
But I really don't understand why people want to grind dilithium so hard. No ones need the ubergear. Except perhaps the few pvp'lers we have -.-
If one doesn't find parts of the game entertaining, one shouldn't play them, regardless of if they give one Dilithium or not.
I, for example, hate ground combat on many levels. So I don't do it. I do what I enjoy, and some of those activities I do enjoy give me Dilithium on top of that.
For rewards alone, I would only do a little console clicking like doff missions or the like, but certainly not something that takes significant time investment. This is a game, me playing it happens solely for the purpose of me having a good time. At current exchange rates, 1600 Dilithium are about 10 Cents. I don't know about you, but if I want to earn money, I have far more profitable things to do than play STO. STO I do for fun and fun alone.
So have a good time, everybody, and don't look out too much for the "rewards".
No. They should. That's what rewards are for. If gameplay was perfectly rewarding, rewards would be irrelevant. Rewards exist to tip the scales and create investment.
I'd rather do something I only 50% enjoy with rewards that persist than something I 100% enjoy, personally.
Fleet actions are un-social play. Go check it. It's a blatant selfish race.
And I'm sorry I don't play a Star Trek game for such a TRIBBLE.
Anti-social is still social. Anti-social and un-social are opposites, as much as social and un-social are. Social doesn't need to be friendly is ultimately what I'm getting at.
What academic work I've read on MMOs suggests that the typical player wants other players around them but doesn't really want to coordinate or engage in combat with those other players. They want them around and they want the interaction to be indirect but pervasive.
Anti-social is still social. Anti-social and un-social are opposites, as much as social and un-social are. Social doesn't need to be friendly is ultimately what I'm getting at.
What academic work I've read on MMOs suggests that the typical player wants other players around them but doesn't really want to coordinate or engage in combat with those other players. They want them around and they want the interaction to be indirect but pervasive.
I don't mind about the opinions of people who didn't play mmo. I'm here to play in a friendly environment to do the stuff I like they way I like, not for a second job. I understand there's a need for some frustration to keep things going but it's gone way too far.
The problema is not that you can gain more or less dilithium in the same time.
On Season 6 you have to gain Dithium, Fleet Marks and Doff.
Doff were chep and easy to get.
Fleet Marks and Dilithium came from two different types of mission. That?s ok, we could afford to play a STF and a Fleet mission.
On Season 7 you have to get: Dilithium, Fleet Marks, Doff, Omega Reputation and Romulan reputation.
Doffs are harder to get now (they ask Dilitium).
But now, you have to play: Fleet Actions for dilithium, Fleet missions for Fleet Marks, STFs (or borg missions) for Omega and the Romulans mission for Romulan rep.
No ... "master troll" he is not .
Trolling get's more sophisticated with age .
With greater age you learn how / where and when to troll .
Al's not there yet ... despite hitting middle age . :cool:
Its not just that they took dilithium out of STF, but they took it out and put it into some of the worst content in the game. FA are horrible. They are buggy, require no team work/cooperation to finish. STF's require coordinated effort to complete, and THEY ARE NOT BOUND BY FACTION. That's one of the things I liked most about them, I could play with friends regardless of what faction their toon was. FA are not like that. When you spend more time in Klingon Scout Force flying in circles waiting for spawns then actually pew pewing, you have a problem.
But dude, seriously. If you buy Dilithium with Zen, Cryptic does not earn a single cent from that transaction. You just trade Zen vs Dilithium with other players. No way for Cryptic to be "greedy" in that. None at all.
Buying Zen with the money going to Cryptic is the only other way to get Zen besides selling dilithium to get Zen.
But will there any dilithium to buy with Zen?
"When measured against the max refining cap of 8000 Dilithium per day, it means that a player may need to invest about 5 days at 4 hours per session for the best MK 10 Purple item, and well over 10 days for the best Mk 12 Purple item (even more if you the item is part of the Fleet or Reputation tiers)."
According to this, it will take over a 40 hour work-week to buy ONE Mark XI item. For that kind of work, I want enough money to live on!
But dude, seriously. If you buy Dilithium with Zen, Cryptic does not earn a single cent from that transaction. You just trade Zen vs Dilithium with other players. No way for Cryptic to be "greedy" in that. None at all.
players had to buy the zen to sell, ergo, profit on cryptics part. i have seen nothing anywhere stating that cryptic puts zen up on the exchange, which would rule out the profiting...so logic, known facts, and simple deductive reasoning all point towards cryptic profiting on all zen posted on the exchange.
this is why myself and a few others call it a money grab since selling zen nulls the 8k cap.
further, dontdrunkimshoot, (from other threads) and several others who don't have issues with S7 are because they have everything (mostly) that they want/need. from the perspective of a new player, the doff systems alone blows chunks now. and the dil costs for a new feddy starting out range into the astronomical. someone trying to stay f2p, soloing...good luck with that.
that is if they want decent doffs, gear, and a ship other than the freebies. if they want good stuff, and faster dilithium to cap they're going to have to join a fleet for fleet actions, gear, etc.
soloers are at a severe handicap now, sooo...S7, if you already have everything, it's *great* if you don't, and were never interested in joining a fleet and/or a newb...got a long climb ahead of you.
no point in giving it a chance, just thinking things through (unlike cryptic) covers it's shortcomings.
Refined Dilithium differs from energy credits because there is a maximum cap that can be obtained by any character per day of 8000 Refined Dilithium (9000 for 800 day subscription veterans or lifetime subscribers) . This cap serves two purposes: to keep players on equal footing in the acquisition of Refined Dilithium (vital to the player-to-player trade economy) and to prevent or catch potential exploits.
this is incorrect
the *Veteran* Assignment to get these 1000 Dilitihium Ore refined takes 2 days, so you can Refine 8500 per day, not 9000.
reading the rest of it now, not sure if i want to...
Obviously each of us enjoys the game in certain ways. Obviously, here the way you enjoy STO is not affected by these changes. Maybe in Season 8, they will be - an aspect of the game you prefer will be removed and then you'll suddenly find yourself in the same spatial anomaly that many of us are now in with Season 7. So you may not understand why we are unsatisfied with the unnecessary changes made b/c it doesn't affect you.
However, since it does affect my gameplaying and enjoyment of STO, then I have every right to voice my concerns here (as I've been doing for weeks).
When they remove something you enjoy from the game (season 8 perhaps?), then I'll respect your right to voice your concerns about it - without trying to explain their side of things, or that we should just not do those things anymore, or say its ok that they took away the reasons you played the game, or that you can play it some other way, or whatever...
If one doesn't find parts of the game entertaining, one shouldn't play them, regardless of if they give one Dilithium or not.
I, for example, hate ground combat on many levels. So I don't do it. I do what I enjoy, and some of those activities I do enjoy give me Dilithium on top of that.
Could everyone just lean back and think for a moment... do you play the game for the Dilithium? No, you play it for entertainment. Dilithium is just a tiny part of the game.
Besides, to me it looks as if it will actually be easier to get Dilithium by doing the standard fleet actions.
The starbase projects require far too much dilithium. I'll say this straight off.
You have intentionally created conflicts. Does the average player donate dilithium to their fleet, (for the starbase projects), or do they horde it for themselves, (to trade for zen, or to purchase better character gear THAT THEY HAVE ALREADY EARNED through previous dilithium donations to said starbase projects) ?
Your explanation is circular reasoning at it's finest, because all time and DILITHIUM, spent actually ALREADY EARNING the ability to obtain said rewards, require yet MORE of the same time spent currency to ACTUALLY GET THEM.
DOUBLE DIPPING !
Since you are cleaning up all dilithium exploits, you might wanna clean up the double dipping as well, in all fairness.......
You know full well, that MOST will resort to the money/zen conversion process, either to avoid the excessive grind, or simply to relieve the strain of the a fore mentioned conflicts. Or even still, TO GET THE REWARDS THEY HAVE ALREADY SPENT THE TIME, DILITHUIM AND EVEN CASH TO EARN.
AND I'M MORE THAN SURE that this thought crossed a few minds over there.
SO write a wall o text blending the obvious along with huge heaps of gobbledygook if that helps you sleep.
You folks over at Cryptic might actually believe this great work of fiction you've come up with, (and who says you don't give us stories), BUT YOUR PLAYERS ARE FEELIN THE STRAIN. This is the reality of the situation and you folks might want to get acquainted with it.
If I may offer a solution with my harsh criticism, offer more dilithium straight across the board, for ALL kinds of popular game play. Including running the older missions and the old weekly missions. They don't have to be huge, but enough so that a GREAT DEAL of FUN activities that players WANT to do, will add up.
Lessen the perception of a grind through excessive repetition. Vary things.
Oh and as a damned good customer, (who just spent another fifty dollars on the game btw), I'll leave you with one more bit of advise, Your post reads like you're slightly annoyed over this.
Anti-social is still social. Anti-social and un-social are opposites, as much as social and un-social are. Social doesn't need to be friendly is ultimately what I'm getting at.
What academic work I've read on MMOs suggests that the typical player wants other players around them but doesn't really want to coordinate or engage in combat with those other players. They want them around and they want the interaction to be indirect but pervasive.
Lol,
Faux-Intellectualism, I knew I'd come across it eventually.
Anti-Social is any act that is damaging, i.e. takes away from Social interaction. Unsocial is merely the avoidance of social interaction. Being social is actually meant to be read as being "pro-social" and that is how everyone currently interprets the phrase "being social". Being social requires being friendly to foster and compel beneficial social interaction from others.
When you say academic work, if you don't quote or reference original sources, it's meaningless and simply comes off as someone trying to legitimize their line of argument by making others believe it is authority and substantiated by dropping a word like academic.
It's not hard to read a few articles on the matter.
Disclaimer: Historically all MMORPG studies tend to be from relatively small data sample pools.
Here are some interesting statistics to crunch.
Most played MMORPGs. The most-played MMORPGs
were World of ******** (48.9%), City of Heroes
(7.6%), Ultima Online (4.5%), EverQuest 2 (4.1%),
Lineage II (3.8%), ********* (3.7%), Guild Wars
(3.1%), and Blade Mistress (3%). Another 58 games
were named and comprised the remaining 21.4%
most-played MMORPGs. World of ******** was
significantly more popular among female (60.5%)
than male (44.1%) participants (2 117.3, p
0.001).
Hours of MMORPG play per week. The mean average
time spent playing per week was 22.85 h
(SD 17.95). Males (23.3 h) played slightly more
hours per week than females (21.7 h), but this difference
was not significant (t 1.28, p 0.2). Figure
1 shows the distribution of hours played per
week by all players. It indicates that 3.6% of claim to play 60 hours per week.
Social Interactions in Massively Multiplayer
Online Role-Playing Gamers
HELENA COLE, B.Sc. and MARK D. GRIFFITHS, Ph.D. Link
Currently by DStahl's estimate we all need to be playing a minimum of 20 hours dilithium content orientated (not STF's) per week per character... which is completely out of whack with the research above that states the average weekly game time is a mere 22.85 hours per week. Let us also remember that due to Dilithium gating such time cannot be split over two days in a weekend and must be split over all 5 days Stahl cites as being required. If the intended aim of the changes was to get end game players to get more Dilithium over a short amount of time their model is critically flawed.
Social activities of gamers
Friendships within MMORPGs. Approximately
three quarters of both males (76.2%) and females
(74.7%) said they had made good friends within the
game. The mean number of ?good friends? made
within a MMORPG for participants was seven.
Males were found to have significantly more good
friends than females (7.7 versus 3.1; t 3.06, p
0.002). Results showed that females (55.4%) were
significantly more likely than males (37.6%) to have
met up with online friends in real life (2 23.1, p
0.001). Participants were also asked in what situations
they were most likely to meet up with other
players socially. Table 1 shows the five different categories
of situations and the number of times such
meetings happened. It should be noted that individuals
may have met online friends in one or more
situation. Males were significantly more likely than
females to meet up with online friends at a LAN
meeting (2 13.5, p 0.001), but there were no
other gender differences.
Social Interactions in Massively Multiplayer
Online Role-Playing Gamers
HELENA COLE, B.Sc. and MARK D. GRIFFITHS, Ph.D. Link
From this study we can see that your final sentence is also seemingly flawed as over 70% of respondents confirmed that they had made good friends and enjoyed interacting with them.
Let us look at another study,
Only For Teenagers?
The stereotype that only teenagers partake in these environments discourages broader interest in studying these environments. Indeed, the Journal of Adolescence recently dedicated an entire special issue to the topic of video game violence (February, 2004), fostering the stereotype that adults don?t engage in these kinds of activities, or that somehow adolescents interact with video games in an entirely different way from how adults interact with them. Data from Griffiths? study [27] as well my survey study [28] challenge that stereotype. The average age of MMORPG respondents was 26.57 (n = 5509, SD = 9.19); the median was 25, with a range from 11 to 68. The lower and upper quartile boundaries were 19 and 32 respectively. Thus, in fact only 25% of MMORPG users are teenagers.
Many MMORPG users have stable careers and families of their own [28]. 50% of respondents (n = 2846) worked full-time, 36% were married, and 22% had children. The data showed that teenagers, college students, early adult professionals, middle-aged homemakers, as well as retirees were part of these environments. Indeed, these seemingly disparate demographic groups would oftentimes be collaborating and working together to achieve the same goals similar to the ones mentioned earlier. This finding is particularly striking given that these disparate demographic groups seldom collaborate in any real life situation.
Time Investment
The demographic reality of these environments is important to establish to frame the significance of the following data on usage patterns. Users spend on average 22.72 hours (n = 5471, SD = 14.98) each week in their chosen MMORPG. The lower quartile and upper quartile boundaries were 11 and 30 respectively.
The distribution showed that about 8% of users spend 40 hours per week or more in these environments the equivalent of a normal work week. The significant amount of time that users are willing to invest in these environments is further highlighted by the finding that 60.9% of respondents (n = 3445) had spent at least 10 hours continuously in an MMORPG. The correlation between age and hours spent per week was not significant, implying that the appeal of these environments is comparable for high-school students, middle-aged professionals and retirees.
The Psychology of Massively Multi-User Online
Role-Playing Games:
Motivations, Emotional Investment, Relationships and Problematic Usage
by Nicholas Yee
[ Yee, N. (2006). The Psychology of MMORPGs: Emotional Investment, Motivations, Relationship Formation, and Problematic Usage. In R. Schroeder & A. Axelsson (Eds.), Avatars at Work and Play: Collaboration and Interaction in Shared Virtual Environments (pp. 187-207). London: Springer-Verlag. ]
As you can see from this 2nd study the hours per week is exactly the same, perhaps they used the same dataset for that calculation, but look at the average economic demography of players, yes 50% of people playing work full time and 36% are married. This tells you if STO is typical that at least 50% are of our player base is already at peak investment in hours and time. Thus an extension to time required to achieve the end-game rewards we have the effect of turning off many of these players.
There are no doubt countless other surveys and academic work but these two were the most popular hits on google... and though they are dated (2006/2007) one assumes the demographic in western markets has not changed in their social habits in any great way.
You don't "convert" Zen to Dilithium. You trade it with other players. Cryptic does not earn anything from that.
Could everyone just lean back and think for a moment... do you play the game for the Dilithium? No, you play it for entertainment. Dilithium is just a tiny part of the game.
Besides, to me it looks as if it will actually be easier to get Dilithium by doing the standard fleet actions.
Nice and pretentious there, answering your own question for everyone.
It's grinding, after I've done the same mission for the 50th time, I am, at that point, most certainly ONLY doing it for the rewards. If the rewards that I want go from that particular grind, I stop doing that particular grind.
"People are refining a lot less Dillthium than we expected... Let's remove it directly from STF's, make it take a lot longer to get via Foundry, and remove the extra 1440 from B'tran. Now they'll refine a lot more!"
This. How is removing our ways to get dilithium going to make us refine MORE?
And why bother to tell your players that they will be getting dilithium from STF's and then
simply take it out? It's like the worst move you could have made. Just come out and tell us
what we already know - that the point of all this is to make us buy zen and convert to
dilithium. Stop with the sugar-coated lies and just be straight with your playerbase.
Joined in March, 2011. Lifer since December, 2011.
im 1 of the few F2P that spends money on this game and have decided not to spend any more cash because of the changes to rewards in the so called end game content. i dont wont to kill klingons to earn dilithium i wont to kill borg, or any over race thats not klingons . in this game you start with klingons so why would i wont to go back to them .
i did spend ?40.00 UK Pounds a month about $55 US Dollers say good bye to it.
:mad:
Fleet actions are un-social play. Go check it. It's a blatant selfish race.
And I'm sorry I don't play a Star Trek game for such a TRIBBLE.
Truth.
I don't LIKE competetive group play, be it PVP, fleet actions, whatever. I was never a massive fan of the STFs, but they are at least about cooperation... working as a team to get the job done, not trying to outdo/shaft everyone else to 'win' the instance.
So yeah, congratulations to Comrade Stahl-in, my incentive to engage in group play in STO is now hovering around the zero mark.
- Redneck Academy - / Legio XVI 'CARDASSIA'
All generalizations are false, including this one.
- Mark Twain
This. How is removing our ways to get dilithium going to make us refine MORE?
And why bother to tell your players that they will be getting dilithium from STF's and then
simply take it out? It's like the worst move you could have made. Just come out and tell us
what we already know - that the point of all this is to make us buy zen and convert to
dilithium. Stop with the sugar-coated lies and just be straight with your playerbase.
Because DSTahl has gone back to the way he was before he left .... giving us false promises and not giving a --bleep-- about how the players feel about it.
They hide behind reports and point to those reports and completely ignore the human players in the equation.
First all. These changes deserved a rage post from me, because rage was the first feeling that come after reading this Dev Blog. But I will contain myself and try to give constructive feedback.
I believe you say that the average player plays 3.5 hours/day. But I don't think most of them spend all this time running only dilithium missions. Therefore the logic "let's make them to barely hit dilithium cap in this time" is flawed. Unless you start to attach dilithium rewards on EVERY single mission (what is not a bad idea by the way). This is supported by your own data showing players were refining approximatelly half than you expected.
STF Dilithium. Adding dilithium to the other fleet actions was a good move, indeed. Now Dilithium is in fact more accessible and not on an exploitative way to players not playing elite missions. But removing it from STF you make it MUCH less accesible to players playing elite missions. This goes against what you want: To make Dilithium more accessible to everyone. I wouldn't be surprised if you observe on the next few months the amount of people playing STF's dropping drastically. I speak for myself here. With the addition of New Romulus I won't be playing STF's for awhile.
Yet about STF Dilithium. The excuse about given indirectly does not convince. You will have to grind the rep system all the way to T5 to unlock the indirect Dilithium reward. And even then, you will receive a much less dilithium than previously. And much less then playing another part of the game. Not worth it.
Duty Officers Reasignment: They were NOT undervaluated. Think that for getting a purple DOFF you need 125 common DOFFS plus 5*10+50*5+250 = 550 Dil. Collecting all these DOFFS is a lot. Specially if you consider they are input at the fleet projects as well, so they are very valuable (just look at the prices at exchange to see this). Now, to get a purple you will need the 125 common Doffs plus 500*5+2500*5+3000 = 18000 Dilithium. Just in comparison, the Very Rare DOff bought from Lt. Ferra costs 12500 Dil. And you don't need to give anything more as input rather than dilithium.
Other changes. Nothing to comment. Most of them were really balance issue that I understand they needed to be adressed (like B'Tran and foundry missions). I perhaps would just try to evaluate better the change on general recruitment. I always saw it as the most basic way to replenish lost common doff. Putting 1000 dilithium as requirement for this seens a bit harsh. But it is not a problem as big as the others.
Just to conclude: I really appreciate the effort you guys are doing. Just, please. Find a better solution for these problems. Once these things are solved, balance will be restored (and deferans will be happy )
Pre-forum change name: Captain Wilhelm Join Date: March 2009
Thanks Cryptic for introducing the Kelvin Timeline. It remembered why I decided to never more put any money on this game.
That you don't play for the DIl, but for the thrill? Hell, if that's different for you, I have a job for you. At pre-season-7 STF pay rate, I am sure I will find a way to get rich from your work.
And why would that be bad, then?
It's bad because then not nearly enough people do it, this affects those few who DO play that grind content just for fun because they will find less people, and thus less opportunity to enjoy said content.
As for the weird job offer, I'm afraid I'm unsure what you're getting at. Either way I already have a job that pays AND manages to be enjoyable so thanks, but no thanks.
[*]STF Dilithium. Adding dilithium to the other fleet actions was a good move, indeed. Now Dilithium is in fact more accessible and not on an exploitative way to players not playing elite missions. But removing it from STF you make it MUCH less accesible to players playing elite missions. This goes against what you want: To make Dilithium more accessible to everyone. I wouldn't be surprised if you observe on the next few months the amount of people playing STF's dropping drastically. I speak for myself here. With the addition of New Romulus I won't be playing STF's for awhile.
Next few month? I did 3 stf today, and gonna do less just to get marks. Just need me one day to know STF are waste of time
Just been doing the maths and it looks like it's just a little over 53 hours of non-stop STF grinding to get a MK XII space set, that's assuming you have huge amounts of luck and doesn't take into account all the grinding and time wasted sitting around getting up to Tier 5.
One MK XII space item will set you back 1000 OM, 10 BNP & 34,000 Dilithium
One Elite STF with optional will get you 75 OM & 1 BNP.
So 14 STF's will get you all the OM's you need, with 50 OM and 4 BNP to spare.
That, using Dsthal's figures, is worth 900 dil, so only another 33100 to go, which you need another 39 runs converting everything into dil.
That's 53 runs per piece or 159 runs per set.
Assume an Elite STF is around 20 mins, that comes out at 53 hours of grinding STF's hitting every optional along the way. Yeah that sure does sounds like a great way to improve the entertainment value of STO.
As has been stated before, the low average of refining Dilithium is due to 2 factors
1. New players levelling up, there isn't too much oppertunity to get huge amounts of Dilithium on your way to level 50 if you spend your time playing the missions.
2. Alt toons on account.
The first point is fair enough, give dilithium for fleet events so that low level players have a chance to get more dilithium to refine, this makes sense, 15 mins out of playing missions or between missions when you need to increase in rank slightly and it makes the time worth it.
As to the 2nd point, I will say I have only two alts atm, and neither of them have refined any dilithium in the past 6 months so surely this proves that it is bringing the averages down.
STFs were meant to be end game content, something for the player base to do when reaching VA.
These missions require tactics and teamwork, they are fun and the rewards at the end made them worth the time, unlike Fleet events you could get MK XII weapons or other drops that were worth someting for your time along with Dilithium.
Now all we get is Omega marks and that useless item (forget the name) that'll require 5 runs to get any dilithium out of it, there is no incentive to play these STFs anymore, and what the hell is the use of the Optional anymore either? Oh look we got the optional on elite... 15 extra omega marks... that was worth it...
Bring back the Dilithium and Drops for STFs!!!
Fleet events on the other hand do not require any skill, tactics or team play whatsoever, they are boring as hell as you don't need to think at all.
Anyone know if you get anything extra from rescuing the runabouts in the Klingon one? I haven't noticed anything.
Fleet events are biased towards Tactical captains/ships, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd placements are determined by DPS, this makes it nearly impossible for any science or engineering ships to rank 1st to get the Purple drops, at least int Stfs you had a chance.
If Cryptic really think they can change the game so that you will need to grind for upto 4 hours a day to get the 8K dilithium to increase refining they are sorely mistaken.
I can see the following things happen now
1. Less players play STFs
2. More players will play fleet events or other content alone to get the dilithium needed, thus detracting from being a MMO
3. There will be more people camping in fleet events to get the diltihium without doing anything.... while this can be seen good and bad by other players its annoying as hell still
4. Alts will not be played as often if at all as people will not have time to grind 2 or more toons to get dilithium/fleet marks/romulan marks/omega marks to level up their equipment
5. players will leave in droves to other MMO's
One of the best features as a lifetime player is the ability to refine upto a weeks worth of Dilithium upon logging in if you haven't been active for a few days. I have taken oppertunity of this so many times where I am away on holiday for a week or away for the weekend, I could grind for dilithium for a evening or 2 before going away to ensure I had enough to last me when I could not log in.
Now this is not going to be able to happen due to restricting dilithium and the time it takes to get it now
Lets go by Dahl's estimate of 4 hours to get 8K
To get enough dilithium to cover a week of being away from the game to refine when you return you will need 56,000 dilithium
This is equal to 28 hours straight playing only events which give dilithium, now this is will be over 2 days so you will obviously want 8k refined both of these days too, so we shall add another 8 hours to this time frame giving 36 straight hours gaming
Now no-one is going to game for this long at once, so to stick with the 2 day frame that equals to breaks of 6 hours for sleep and food... and to think Season 7 was supposed to stop the long grind.
Realistically to the causal gold player, you will rarely have enough time in game to accrue Dilithium for this gold benefit to be worth it
that comes out at 53 hours of grinding STF's hitting every optional along the way.
And how many hours of STF grinding was required to get a complete Mk XII space set under the old system? Oh yeah, that's right, under the old system there was no guarantee you would EVER get the Mk XII set even after thousands of hours of grinding. How is the new system worse again?
So you would not work for something like 30 Eurocents an hour for me? A pity.
But why would you then do that for a comparable amount of Dilithium? My conclusion: You wouldn't. You'd rather do things that are fun.
Which is the best approach to a game anyway.
Then people will gravitate to them yes, but they could have done that without cryptic gimping STF rewards. Here's a mind blowing thought, add dilithium to FA's and... leave the dilithium in STFs aswell. :eek:
I'm still not seeing the point of what you're talking about here (particularly now that you're using European currency...) could you please be more clear with your analogy?
And you bet I'd rather do things that are fun. This is why at the moment I'm Playing through S.T.A.L.K.E.R. call of pripyat, GTA4/stories, retro city rampage, the witcher 2, the walking dead and eagerly awaiting hitman absolution INSTEAD of "enjoying" the new changes in STO.
With a lack of viable reward, the fun things in STO just aren't fun enough to compete with the fun those other game provide me. With a viable reward I'm more willing to put myself through it for the eventual satisfaction a reward brings.
Comments
But standart fleet actions are boring :-P
But I really don't understand why people want to grind dilithium so hard. No ones need the ubergear. Except perhaps the few pvp'lers we have -.-
No. They should. That's what rewards are for. If gameplay was perfectly rewarding, rewards would be irrelevant. Rewards exist to tip the scales and create investment.
I'd rather do something I only 50% enjoy with rewards that persist than something I 100% enjoy, personally.
Anti-social is still social. Anti-social and un-social are opposites, as much as social and un-social are. Social doesn't need to be friendly is ultimately what I'm getting at.
What academic work I've read on MMOs suggests that the typical player wants other players around them but doesn't really want to coordinate or engage in combat with those other players. They want them around and they want the interaction to be indirect but pervasive.
I don't mind about the opinions of people who didn't play mmo. I'm here to play in a friendly environment to do the stuff I like they way I like, not for a second job. I understand there's a need for some frustration to keep things going but it's gone way too far.
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
On Season 6 you have to gain Dithium, Fleet Marks and Doff.
Doff were chep and easy to get.
Fleet Marks and Dilithium came from two different types of mission. That?s ok, we could afford to play a STF and a Fleet mission.
On Season 7 you have to get: Dilithium, Fleet Marks, Doff, Omega Reputation and Romulan reputation.
Doffs are harder to get now (they ask Dilitium).
But now, you have to play: Fleet Actions for dilithium, Fleet missions for Fleet Marks, STFs (or borg missions) for Omega and the Romulans mission for Romulan rep.
All that, in a single day?.
I am sorry Cryptic, but is too much.
Division Hispana
www.divisionhispana.com
Original Join Date: January 30th, 2010
Ha! Touche....
Buying Zen with the money going to Cryptic is the only other way to get Zen besides selling dilithium to get Zen.
But will there any dilithium to buy with Zen?
"When measured against the max refining cap of 8000 Dilithium per day, it means that a player may need to invest about 5 days at 4 hours per session for the best MK 10 Purple item, and well over 10 days for the best Mk 12 Purple item (even more if you the item is part of the Fleet or Reputation tiers)."
According to this, it will take over a 40 hour work-week to buy ONE Mark XI item. For that kind of work, I want enough money to live on!
Member since December 2009
players had to buy the zen to sell, ergo, profit on cryptics part. i have seen nothing anywhere stating that cryptic puts zen up on the exchange, which would rule out the profiting...so logic, known facts, and simple deductive reasoning all point towards cryptic profiting on all zen posted on the exchange.
this is why myself and a few others call it a money grab since selling zen nulls the 8k cap.
further, dontdrunkimshoot, (from other threads) and several others who don't have issues with S7 are because they have everything (mostly) that they want/need. from the perspective of a new player, the doff systems alone blows chunks now. and the dil costs for a new feddy starting out range into the astronomical. someone trying to stay f2p, soloing...good luck with that.
that is if they want decent doffs, gear, and a ship other than the freebies. if they want good stuff, and faster dilithium to cap they're going to have to join a fleet for fleet actions, gear, etc.
soloers are at a severe handicap now, sooo...S7, if you already have everything, it's *great* if you don't, and were never interested in joining a fleet and/or a newb...got a long climb ahead of you.
no point in giving it a chance, just thinking things through (unlike cryptic) covers it's shortcomings.
love the sig:D
Donate Brains, zombies in Washington DC are starving.
this is incorrect
the *Veteran* Assignment to get these 1000 Dilitihium Ore refined takes 2 days, so you can Refine 8500 per day, not 9000.
reading the rest of it now, not sure if i want to...
However, since it does affect my gameplaying and enjoyment of STO, then I have every right to voice my concerns here (as I've been doing for weeks).
When they remove something you enjoy from the game (season 8 perhaps?), then I'll respect your right to voice your concerns about it - without trying to explain their side of things, or that we should just not do those things anymore, or say its ok that they took away the reasons you played the game, or that you can play it some other way, or whatever...
That's exactly what we were trying to have before Season 7.
Fleet: 1st Order of Role-Players' Guild - gaming together since 2004
Sorry Sir,
NOT BUYIN IT -
The starbase projects require far too much dilithium. I'll say this straight off.
You have intentionally created conflicts. Does the average player donate dilithium to their fleet, (for the starbase projects), or do they horde it for themselves, (to trade for zen, or to purchase better character gear THAT THEY HAVE ALREADY EARNED through previous dilithium donations to said starbase projects) ?
Your explanation is circular reasoning at it's finest, because all time and DILITHIUM, spent actually ALREADY EARNING the ability to obtain said rewards, require yet MORE of the same time spent currency to ACTUALLY GET THEM.
DOUBLE DIPPING !
Since you are cleaning up all dilithium exploits, you might wanna clean up the double dipping as well, in all fairness.......
You know full well, that MOST will resort to the money/zen conversion process, either to avoid the excessive grind, or simply to relieve the strain of the a fore mentioned conflicts. Or even still, TO GET THE REWARDS THEY HAVE ALREADY SPENT THE TIME, DILITHUIM AND EVEN CASH TO EARN.
AND I'M MORE THAN SURE that this thought crossed a few minds over there.
SO write a wall o text blending the obvious along with huge heaps of gobbledygook if that helps you sleep.
You folks over at Cryptic might actually believe this great work of fiction you've come up with, (and who says you don't give us stories), BUT YOUR PLAYERS ARE FEELIN THE STRAIN. This is the reality of the situation and you folks might want to get acquainted with it.
If I may offer a solution with my harsh criticism, offer more dilithium straight across the board, for ALL kinds of popular game play. Including running the older missions and the old weekly missions. They don't have to be huge, but enough so that a GREAT DEAL of FUN activities that players WANT to do, will add up.
Lessen the perception of a grind through excessive repetition. Vary things.
Oh and as a damned good customer, (who just spent another fifty dollars on the game btw), I'll leave you with one more bit of advise, Your post reads like you're slightly annoyed over this.
You wanna keep that in check -
You seriously cut all the fun from one of your best content: STF. We had so much fun with them with our fleet! No there's no interest.
You should put back some loot and/or dilithium as you stated during the test period!a
Lol,
Faux-Intellectualism, I knew I'd come across it eventually.
Anti-Social is any act that is damaging, i.e. takes away from Social interaction. Unsocial is merely the avoidance of social interaction. Being social is actually meant to be read as being "pro-social" and that is how everyone currently interprets the phrase "being social". Being social requires being friendly to foster and compel beneficial social interaction from others.
When you say academic work, if you don't quote or reference original sources, it's meaningless and simply comes off as someone trying to legitimize their line of argument by making others believe it is authority and substantiated by dropping a word like academic.
It's not hard to read a few articles on the matter.
Disclaimer: Historically all MMORPG studies tend to be from relatively small data sample pools.
Here are some interesting statistics to crunch.
Currently by DStahl's estimate we all need to be playing a minimum of 20 hours dilithium content orientated (not STF's) per week per character... which is completely out of whack with the research above that states the average weekly game time is a mere 22.85 hours per week. Let us also remember that due to Dilithium gating such time cannot be split over two days in a weekend and must be split over all 5 days Stahl cites as being required. If the intended aim of the changes was to get end game players to get more Dilithium over a short amount of time their model is critically flawed.
From this study we can see that your final sentence is also seemingly flawed as over 70% of respondents confirmed that they had made good friends and enjoyed interacting with them.
Let us look at another study,
As you can see from this 2nd study the hours per week is exactly the same, perhaps they used the same dataset for that calculation, but look at the average economic demography of players, yes 50% of people playing work full time and 36% are married. This tells you if STO is typical that at least 50% are of our player base is already at peak investment in hours and time. Thus an extension to time required to achieve the end-game rewards we have the effect of turning off many of these players.
There are no doubt countless other surveys and academic work but these two were the most popular hits on google... and though they are dated (2006/2007) one assumes the demographic in western markets has not changed in their social habits in any great way.
#2311#2700#2316#2500
It's grinding, after I've done the same mission for the 50th time, I am, at that point, most certainly ONLY doing it for the rewards. If the rewards that I want go from that particular grind, I stop doing that particular grind.
This. How is removing our ways to get dilithium going to make us refine MORE?
And why bother to tell your players that they will be getting dilithium from STF's and then
simply take it out? It's like the worst move you could have made. Just come out and tell us
what we already know - that the point of all this is to make us buy zen and convert to
dilithium. Stop with the sugar-coated lies and just be straight with your playerbase.
Joined in March, 2011. Lifer since December, 2011.
but those fleet actions are SUCK, while STF's are GREAT.
RnD and upgrade needs less RNG. Less lottery. Something has to change.
i did spend ?40.00 UK Pounds a month about $55 US Dollers say good bye to it.
:mad:
Talk about dropping the ball on this one,DSthal must be so proud of himself :rolleyes:
Truth.
I don't LIKE competetive group play, be it PVP, fleet actions, whatever. I was never a massive fan of the STFs, but they are at least about cooperation... working as a team to get the job done, not trying to outdo/shaft everyone else to 'win' the instance.
So yeah, congratulations to Comrade Stahl-in, my incentive to engage in group play in STO is now hovering around the zero mark.
All generalizations are false, including this one.
- Mark Twain
Because DSTahl has gone back to the way he was before he left .... giving us false promises and not giving a --bleep-- about how the players feel about it.
They hide behind reports and point to those reports and completely ignore the human players in the equation.
U.S.S. Maelstrom, NCC-71417 (Constitution III-class/flagship) --- Fleet Admiral Hauk' --|-- Dahar Master Hauk --- I.K.S. qu'In 'an bortaS (D7-class / flagship)
Just to conclude: I really appreciate the effort you guys are doing. Just, please. Find a better solution for these problems. Once these things are solved, balance will be restored (and deferans will be happy
Join Date: March 2009
Thanks Cryptic for introducing the Kelvin Timeline. It remembered why I decided to never more put any money on this game.
As for the weird job offer, I'm afraid I'm unsure what you're getting at. Either way I already have a job that pays AND manages to be enjoyable so thanks, but no thanks.
Next few month? I did 3 stf today, and gonna do less just to get marks. Just need me one day to know STF are waste of time
One MK XII space item will set you back 1000 OM, 10 BNP & 34,000 Dilithium
One Elite STF with optional will get you 75 OM & 1 BNP.
So 14 STF's will get you all the OM's you need, with 50 OM and 4 BNP to spare.
That, using Dsthal's figures, is worth 900 dil, so only another 33100 to go, which you need another 39 runs converting everything into dil.
That's 53 runs per piece or 159 runs per set.
Assume an Elite STF is around 20 mins, that comes out at 53 hours of grinding STF's hitting every optional along the way. Yeah that sure does sounds like a great way to improve the entertainment value of STO.
1. New players levelling up, there isn't too much oppertunity to get huge amounts of Dilithium on your way to level 50 if you spend your time playing the missions.
2. Alt toons on account.
The first point is fair enough, give dilithium for fleet events so that low level players have a chance to get more dilithium to refine, this makes sense, 15 mins out of playing missions or between missions when you need to increase in rank slightly and it makes the time worth it.
As to the 2nd point, I will say I have only two alts atm, and neither of them have refined any dilithium in the past 6 months so surely this proves that it is bringing the averages down.
STFs were meant to be end game content, something for the player base to do when reaching VA.
These missions require tactics and teamwork, they are fun and the rewards at the end made them worth the time, unlike Fleet events you could get MK XII weapons or other drops that were worth someting for your time along with Dilithium.
Now all we get is Omega marks and that useless item (forget the name) that'll require 5 runs to get any dilithium out of it, there is no incentive to play these STFs anymore, and what the hell is the use of the Optional anymore either? Oh look we got the optional on elite... 15 extra omega marks... that was worth it...
Bring back the Dilithium and Drops for STFs!!!
Fleet events on the other hand do not require any skill, tactics or team play whatsoever, they are boring as hell as you don't need to think at all.
Anyone know if you get anything extra from rescuing the runabouts in the Klingon one? I haven't noticed anything.
Fleet events are biased towards Tactical captains/ships, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd placements are determined by DPS, this makes it nearly impossible for any science or engineering ships to rank 1st to get the Purple drops, at least int Stfs you had a chance.
If Cryptic really think they can change the game so that you will need to grind for upto 4 hours a day to get the 8K dilithium to increase refining they are sorely mistaken.
I can see the following things happen now
1. Less players play STFs
2. More players will play fleet events or other content alone to get the dilithium needed, thus detracting from being a MMO
3. There will be more people camping in fleet events to get the diltihium without doing anything.... while this can be seen good and bad by other players its annoying as hell still
4. Alts will not be played as often if at all as people will not have time to grind 2 or more toons to get dilithium/fleet marks/romulan marks/omega marks to level up their equipment
5. players will leave in droves to other MMO's
One of the best features as a lifetime player is the ability to refine upto a weeks worth of Dilithium upon logging in if you haven't been active for a few days. I have taken oppertunity of this so many times where I am away on holiday for a week or away for the weekend, I could grind for dilithium for a evening or 2 before going away to ensure I had enough to last me when I could not log in.
Now this is not going to be able to happen due to restricting dilithium and the time it takes to get it now
Lets go by Dahl's estimate of 4 hours to get 8K
To get enough dilithium to cover a week of being away from the game to refine when you return you will need 56,000 dilithium
This is equal to 28 hours straight playing only events which give dilithium, now this is will be over 2 days so you will obviously want 8k refined both of these days too, so we shall add another 8 hours to this time frame giving 36 straight hours gaming
Now no-one is going to game for this long at once, so to stick with the 2 day frame that equals to breaks of 6 hours for sleep and food... and to think Season 7 was supposed to stop the long grind.
Realistically to the causal gold player, you will rarely have enough time in game to accrue Dilithium for this gold benefit to be worth it
And how many hours of STF grinding was required to get a complete Mk XII space set under the old system? Oh yeah, that's right, under the old system there was no guarantee you would EVER get the Mk XII set even after thousands of hours of grinding. How is the new system worse again?
Then people will gravitate to them yes, but they could have done that without cryptic gimping STF rewards. Here's a mind blowing thought, add dilithium to FA's and... leave the dilithium in STFs aswell. :eek:
I'm still not seeing the point of what you're talking about here (particularly now that you're using European currency...) could you please be more clear with your analogy?
And you bet I'd rather do things that are fun. This is why at the moment I'm Playing through S.T.A.L.K.E.R. call of pripyat, GTA4/stories, retro city rampage, the witcher 2, the walking dead and eagerly awaiting hitman absolution INSTEAD of "enjoying" the new changes in STO.
With a lack of viable reward, the fun things in STO just aren't fun enough to compete with the fun those other game provide me. With a viable reward I'm more willing to put myself through it for the eventual satisfaction a reward brings.
classic. gg