bare minimum amount of time to unlock the necessities per character:
tier 0-5:
100,000 xp /2800 xp per project cycle = 31.7 project cycles
31.7 project cycles * 40 hours per project cycle = 1428.6 hours
mk xii pulsewave: 40 hours
mk xii split beam: 40 hours
mk xii armor: 40 hours
mk xii weapon: 40 hours
mk xii psg: 40 hours
mk xii deflector: 40 hours
mk xii engine: 40 hours
mk xii shield: 40 hours
@ 2 projects per cycle, total time = 320 hours/2 = 160 hours
add 120 hours for the new set of assimilated console, cutting beam and omega torpedo
add 120 hours for the 2nd set
add 120 hours for the adapted set
add 160 hours for all the costume unlocks
@ 2 projects per cycle, total time = 520 hours/2 = 260 hours
+5 hours, 1 for each tier unlock
total time: 1853.6 hours or 77.23 days per every brand spanking new toon.
that's just the waiting time too! insane, no?
the best part? after all this farming, what are you going to do with your new found sets after waiting all this time? more farming. LOL... oh the irony. all the while, picking up the slack of all of those around you who haven't completed the same grind. If you thought public queues and some private games were bad? Just wait until you have all these new, completely under geared guys trying to participate.
Solid math, and you can't argue with numbers! This is just wrong, pre-patch I was able to outfit a new character mk XII STF set (no weapons) in about 2 weeks.
As for the omega skills, I was under the assumption that you could change skills. But if you wanted to switch the skill, you'd have to re-upgrade them in the slot and have to pay for it. But if it's permanent, and no respec? Yikes!
Totally ureasonable you have to spend 58 days unlocking items there were already in the game.
For me I am just gating characters and not playing. I might need some dilithium in 2 months from now should I decide on getting an item, assuming I haven't quit by then.
Leaves me with very little to do which I don't think was the intention of the rep system.
Bad choice locking recycled content up and removing the one thing that actually worked, stf.
Totally ureasonable you have to spend 58 days unlocking items there were already in the game.
For me I am just gating characters and not playing. I might need some dilithium in 2 months from now should I decide on getting an item, assuming I haven't quit by then.
Leaves me with very little to do which I don't think was the intention of the rep system.
Bad choice locking recycled content up and removing the one thing that actually worked, stf.
Unfortunately the 58 days or so is just to get from tier 0 to tier 5. The only thing that is included during that time are the 4 passive and 1 active skill. the items require a separate unlock as described above =(
...but the fact is if you looked at the old vendors you could turn in 40 of the old item to get a new item without having the salvage . The old system was way better.
/and this.
ok, mkxii gear was hard to earn (well, it's mkxii). but we already had the opportunity to change in our edc for (competitve) mkxi sets.
i ran stf's over the whole year, f.e. without getting a single mkxii psg tech-drop. but in that time i farmed enough edc for outfitting 4 boffs with maco/omega, plus 2 sets for myself, and maco and omega stuff for 17 ships(!). and now have on every single ship at least a 2-piece-bonus running (15 out of 17 with 2piece maco/omega + 1 borgpart).
on top was the dil i made off those times. only while i farmed for my 4 boff sets: 'bout 200k dil!.
so i ran several gstf's and never really felt the need for that final mkii tech-drop. only for my collection, performance was more than enough with easily obtainable mkxi sets.
For those saying this new system is better, and they grinded the old system and got nothing your full of it. I ran the stfs prior to season 7 for 3 days on my max Fed and Klingon. I was able to get the borg sets with ease, and I was able to pick up 2 MKXII weapon items on my klingon. To top it off I was able to get my Klingon a MKXII Honor Guard shield for my ship. I am sure I got blessed on this but the fact is if you looked at the old vendors you could turn in 40 of the old item to get a new item without having the salvage . The old system was way better.
You guys are pretty lucky with drops. I've played cure ground for a long time before i could get the proto weapon drop. Not counting the failed missions, stupid PUGs not cooperating, etc.
Sure you can say that you got the stuff easy because you got the correct crowd to play with (Elite STF channel for example). But for the average player, they probably don't even know this channel exist.
Moreover, you need to run every single STF to get the respective drops. Now, the average player, could just do the STF he finds easy enough and still reach the final destination.
What I'm saying is that this new system is preferable to the old random drop system where effort is not equal to reward put in due to randomness of the drops. Now, despite its long and tiring grind, at least its guaranteed result.
I do agree that the new system needs rethinking on the timescale required to unlock and the resources needed for the projects, which is very steep at the moment. But its not necessarily worse than previous random system.
Ensure when posting, you consider the average player's plight who probably has a job, a family and can't spend his entire life decking out all his alts and their respective boffs with Mk12 gear.
With the new system, the average player can log in, play a couple of STFs or Romulan Marks mission he likes and still earn the gear. Last time, you need to literally wait for Vault event to get reman datalogs (I personally set reminders on my Blackberry on vault event timings and I remember once playing vault event on my laptop at Japan Narita Airport on my connecting flight to US - nearly missed my flight!), then do countless failed attempts at Infected Ground, Cure Ground, Cure Space.. and when occassionally you manage to get the quest completed.. you get 2 EDCs, some random blue item and a lockbox.. rinse and repeat..tell me which is better?
So in short, the idea of reputation system is good, the thing needs reworking is the timescale and resources needed for it. Reduce them somewhat and you'll have a really good system in place.
So in short, the idea of reputation system is good, the thing needs reworking is the timescale and resources needed for it. Reduce them somewhat and you'll have a really good system in place.
I can't emphasize this more.. what the community should work towards is to get the requirements for the unlocks reduced rather than asking for old system back.
True you need to spend another 40 hours per each item in addition to the 58 days of permission unlock.
The whole we are helping the casuals argument is invalid, htf can it be our problem you don't have time to play.
So the whole damned server has to wait for you to spend quality time with your wife watching survivor until we can play and get all our items locked up because you gave up on ground missions.
Royally to hell with that, if you don't have time to play be gone. Everyone who is actively supporting the "well I can get my sets new!" are actively sabotaging this game
So it basically comes down to the Elite Special Task Force, "We're better than you" attitude. This is pretty much why I have yet to attempt a single STF, the attitude of the hard core players towards the more casual ones is downright hostile. The new Rep system is actually tempting me, because I can actually progress without having to play STF after STF over and over again. However, it will take a big push for me to take the time and effort to learn the STFs, rather than earn Dilithium or Fleet/Romulan Marks, because I don't really see the STFs as a lot of fun, almost entirely because of the players.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
This character is why I don't play my Romulan any more. Tovan Khev is NOT my BFF! Get him off my bridge!
You guys are pretty lucky with drops. I've played cure ground for a long time before i could get the proto weapon drop. Not counting the failed missions, stupid PUGs not cooperating, etc.
Sure you can say that you got the stuff easy because you got the correct crowd to play with (Elite STF channel for example). But for the average player, they probably don't even know this channel exist.
Moreover, you need to run every single STF to get the respective drops. Now, the average player, could just do the STF he finds easy enough and still reach the final destination.
What I'm saying is that this new system is preferable to the old random drop system where effort is not equal to reward put in due to randomness of the drops. Now, despite its long and tiring grind, at least its guaranteed result.
I do agree that the new system needs rethinking on the timescale required to unlock and the resources needed for the projects, which is very steep at the moment. But its not necessarily worse than previous random system.
Ensure when posting, you consider the average player's plight who probably has a job, a family and can't spend his entire life decking out all his alts and their respective boffs with Mk12 gear.
With the new system, the average player can log in, play a couple of STFs or Romulan Marks mission he likes and still earn the gear. Last time, you need to literally wait for Vault event to get reman datalogs (I personally set reminders on my Blackberry on vault event timings and I remember once playing vault event on my laptop at Japan Narita Airport on my connecting flight to US - nearly missed my flight!), then do countless failed attempts at Infected Ground, Cure Ground, Cure Space.. and when occassionally you manage to get the quest completed.. you get 2 EDCs, some random blue item and a lockbox.. rinse and repeat..tell me which is better?
So in short, the idea of reputation system is good, the thing needs reworking is the timescale and resources needed for it. Reduce them somewhat and you'll have a really good system in place.
if your overall concern is for the average player, then consider the following. how is the average player supposed to remain competitive without these luck drops? ensuring that they are forced to grind stfs to make tier 1 and then wait an additional 201 hours so they can have the bare minimum stf sets for ground and space, just so they can be somewhat competitive and not an absolute burden on whatever team they join. how is that fair for them? do you really think that these people are going to stay in the normal queues for the entire length? if you think the quality of the games now are bad, just wait until more and more of these guys show up to work the system, either for the first time or for their alts.
luck is luck. sometimes, you win, sometimes you lose. but all in all, you still had a chance. even if that proto tech didn't drop for you, chances are you got enough proto salvage for your ship's weapons and edc to buy your mk xi set gear. either way, it was still progress. sure, you didn't progress towards the mk xii set gear you wanted... but you still had a fighting shot at being competitive with others. now, after all these changes, how competitive will the average, new player be?
but then again, some of you will like this system regardless. for others, it'll be a constant reminder of something they will never achieve. if you're constantly blowing up and not putting out as much dps as your team would want and they start tearing into you for being a noob or for wrecking their run, how motivated would you be to continue? how motivated would the average player be? how motivated would they be to continue playing the game at all?
my 2 cents. this is not an attack directed at you, but merely a rebuttal towards the argument you make. i have nothing against you personally and this is my disclaimer.
They could have fixed the drops I'n the old system anytime
They just didn't want too
They could have given it to you with a accolade
Or like when admiral Quinn gave you a new ship
They didn't want to fix the old system
So true.
Just find it funny they kept saying they were making it easier. Those who didn't complete their sets, got to grind for 2 more months, and pay 34000 Dilithium per set piece.
So bascially Cryptic they kicked them in the nuts and said "its good for you".
True you need to spend another 40 hours per each item in addition to the 58 days of permission unlock.
The whole we are helping the casuals argument is invalid, htf can it be our problem you don't have time to play.
So the whole damned server has to wait for you to spend quality time with your wife watching survivor until we can play and get all our items locked up because you gave up on ground missions.
Royally to hell with that, if you don't have time to play be gone. Everyone who is actively supporting the "well I can get my sets new!" are actively sabotaging this game
Need I say more?
All the complaints and whines, though some are valid, are mostly just noise. Learn to post logically w/o undermining your argument.
Cryptic made this game to attract large number of people, from all sorts of background. Many of those people may not have the time to play as much as some of the hardcore players who live and breathe STO.
Surely you Trek fans would not go against your very own: "Were I to invoke logic, however, logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." - Captain Spock, Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan.
Moreover, you need to run every single STF to get the respective drops. Now, the average player, could just do the STF he finds easy enough and still reach the final destination.
So, you're implying I am getting punished now for liking ground STFs? When everyone starts only playing the same fast space STFs for the grind as you don't need to ever play a ground STF again in order to get the ground sets?
All the complaints and whines, though some are valid, are mostly just noise. Learn to post logically w/o undermining your argument.
Cryptic made this game to attract large number of people, from all sorts of background. Many of those people may not have the time to play as much as some of the hardcore players who live and breathe STO.
Surely you Trek fans would not go against your very own: "Were I to invoke logic, however, logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." - Captain Spock, Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan.
I just read that the Romulan ground weapons are only wide beam pistol, high density rifle and minigun. That killed about 70% of my motivation. I had hoped to equip my captain and my BOs with matching weapons, but without compression pistol, split beam rifle, shotgun etc? No dice.
FKA K-Tar, grumpy Klingon/El-Aurian hybrid. Now assimilated by PWE.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
So, you're implying I am getting punished now for liking ground STFs? When everyone starts only playing the same fast space STFs for the grind as you don't need to ever play a ground STF again in order to get the ground sets?
I'm not saying that you should be punished for liking ground STFs. I happen to like ground missions more than space ones too.
Not sure if you notice but I did made an argument before S7 launch that now everyone would be playing ISE and KASE and probably just those 2. (Made this comment at the comment box for the news, i think).
So, I'm not happy ground STFs are getting less crowds now.
Notice that my argument is: "Playing STF he likes"
So you didn't get any drops for 5 months? Because that's what he said.
I made a character after blog 8 and I got all the drops and more including leveling.
And yes, I did have to continually farm the same map I already beta 900 times, that I can solo, and yes I did have a tsunami wave of rookies ragequitting on me and yes I did hate every second.
But I got it done, albeit it was easy to get motivated knowing what season 7 was bringing :rolleyes:
That aside they didn't have to kill the one thing that was actually working in the game, you could have kept everything as it were and simply added thet set to the c-store.
Or like you said increased the drop rate.
OR like with lockboxes and lobis, if you have 200 hundred you are guaranteed the item.
Part of what makes me sick about the reputation system is the amount of recycled content.
Like it was too fragile to stand alone and had to hog from stf, now they are both equally worthless, terrific
I just read that the Romulan ground weapons are only wide beam pistol, high density rifle and minigun. That killed about 70% of my motivation. I had hoped to equip my captain and my BOs with matching weapons, but without compression pistol, split beam rifle, shotgun etc? No dice.
Too bad the Romulan consoles aren't part of the reputation system, they are actually worth it.
Too bad the Embassy System is even worse than the Fleet and Reputation systems combined. Mega Dilithum Sinks here.
I can't emphasize this more.. what the community should work towards is to get the requirements for the unlocks reduced rather than asking for old system back.
There was nothing wrong with the old system.
If PWE wanted to fix the problem, they would have increased prototype-level drops but they didn't.
They brought in this very disruptive system that isn't making gameplay better.
In theory, it makes it easier to get Mk XII Omega/MACO/Borg gear.
The opposite is evident.
BUT, gameplay wasn't the motivating factor was it?
No.
PWE wanted to increase revenue.
They tried to sneak it in...well, its obvious now.
I don't blame a business for trying to create more revenue.
All PWE had to say was "we'd like to switch to this reward system to generate more income so we can continue to offer this game as F2P."
NO to ARC RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
I like it. It's a similar concept to Eve's long term character development, and Eve has some of the best player retention in the MMO market. You'll really be able to build on a character in the long-term with these reputation passives; as opposed to characters not having changed in the last 2 years.
I always thought the rate at which you could get "best in slot" gear was comically fast. Hell, it only took 1-2 days of hard grinding and you could have Mark XII borg stuff in every slot. It was a bit much, especially for a f2p game. It also killed the exchange economy at the Mk X-XII levels; since XII and Set pieces were so easy to come by.
I think people will get used to the fact that entry level gear at cap is now going to be Mark X or XI stuff. That's the way it should have been in the first place, and it shouldn't be that big of an issue for anyone, the difference is not in performance between a set of X gear and a set of XI or XII gear is pretty marginal.
I was actually having fun doing stf's prior to season 7. You got the EDC's, you could save up to get MK XI M.A.C.O./KHG or OMEGA gear. For me, the new system you have to start all over again.
Season 7 killed the fun in stf's especially ground stf's. Now I only bother to do space stf's. Yes there are the accolades for ground, but won't bother with these, since. Well you know. Ground stf dead.
And 40 hours + costs just to get one piece of gear, is it either ground or space. No. It is only a couple a weeks ago I bought a LTS. I regret it. If I knew how much they would change (yes I could had gone on tribble and looked for myself) but I have faith in the devs. thinking they know what they are doing and can have foresight to see what the community wants and change that accordingly.
Coming from EVE Online, I got fed up looking at timers. With the new Omega reputation system, well timers, hello there.
if your overall concern is for the average player, then consider the following. how is the average player supposed to remain competitive without these luck drops? ensuring that they are forced to grind stfs to make tier 1 and then wait an additional 201 hours so they can have the bare minimum stf sets for ground and space, just so they can be somewhat competitive and not an absolute burden on whatever team they join. how is that fair for them? do you really think that these people are going to stay in the normal queues for the entire length? if you think the quality of the games now are bad, just wait until more and more of these guys show up to work the system, either for the first time or for their alts.
luck is luck. sometimes, you win, sometimes you lose. but all in all, you still had a chance. even if that proto tech didn't drop for you, chances are you got enough proto salvage for your ship's weapons and edc to buy your mk xi set gear. either way, it was still progress. sure, you didn't progress towards the mk xii set gear you wanted... but you still had a fighting shot at being competitive with others. now, after all these changes, how competitive will the average, new player be?
but then again, some of you will like this system regardless. for others, it'll be a constant reminder of something they will never achieve. if you're constantly blowing up and not putting out as much dps as your team would want and they start tearing into you for being a noob or for wrecking their run, how motivated would you be to continue? how motivated would the average player be? how motivated would they be to continue playing the game at all?
my 2 cents. this is not an attack directed at you, but merely a rebuttal towards the argument you make. i have nothing against you personally and this is my disclaimer.
Valid argument there on luck, but lets consider if there're no drops at all for common tech, it still takes 60 normal STF runs to get your full mkX ground set. Which probably works out to be longer than the current system.. unless you do the STFs consecutively and just STF after STF. Plus, if you're a new player.. you have no business in Elite STFs right? You don't get blown up that easily in Normal STF if you know whats going on.
Lets see.. 60 STFs = 1800 marks (30 Marks per STF). You don't need that many marks to unlock all the MkX gear right? Plus 10.5K dils which you can earn other way and some token items like generators, shield charges, easily obtained from vendors.
If you include the time taken to run the 60 STFs, everything can be quite tiring.. now you can load the project, go to sleep or watch survivor with your wife, play hide and seek with your children, checking your investment portfolio, go to the gym, play some golf then come back with your gear completed. That's for the average player.
IF you're hardcore.. and you haven't gotten your Mk12 gear for all your alts and boffs by now, i'd say you're not hardcore enough
My argument remains: New system is good, but the requirements (both time and resources) are steep.. reduce that by say 30% and you have a nice system in place.
**I'm off to catch a connecting flight to London, so I may not reply for sometime. Be nice guys
Notice that my argument is: "Playing STF he likes"
This still leaves the Problem. In my experience most people will play space as it gives them what they need with much less effort and time. New people will might try out ground for once, but with longer queue times and longer play times per match with the same rewards, they simply wont bother doing them often (or at all).
PS: I know this is just speculation, but it wouldn't surprise me if it comes to this...
I like it. It's a similar concept to Eve's long term character development, and Eve has some of the best player retention in the MMO market. You'll really be able to build on a character in the long-term with these reputation passives; as opposed to characters not having changed in the last 2 years.
QUOTE]
since you brought it up,
eve also has great PVP.
this game does not, and pvp keeps getting backhanded.
My problem is I struggle to see the point in getting the gear at all.
By the end of all the tiers, all the unlocks and all the purchases I'll bet you'd be pretty sick of STF's and any other 'end game' content too. All the gear is letting you do is run through them faster.
It just feels like such a minimal payout for all that time invested, not to mention the ec and dil you'd be draining into them (on top of fleet projects, and embassy projects...AND Romulan reputation projects).
I don't NEED this gear to run through normal STF's, elite doesn't interest me since they are exactly the same missions only harder and all you get for it is a few more marks and a processor - whoopdie doo.
I may try to get to mkxi gear, I'm not even sure I have the patience for that.
Side note. I predict that soon you will be able to buy MACO, Borg or Omega gear in the Zen store for those who don't want to wait for projects - calling it now.
system's actually a kick in the balls to CASUAL players, the old system was BETTER for casuals-even if you could not manage the MkXII sets (myself in case of point), you COULD manage, wihtout spending a full work-day grinding, MkXI sets on a pretty regular basis, and the 3 non-console bits from Assimilated were fairly readily available (yes, I actually DID run Borg Shields and no console-it was still better than most of the TRIBBLE on the Exchange and cost less at the time than less-capable dilith. gear.)
Comparable time investment (not to mention materiel investment, including things that cost EDC or were actively useful IN the STFs, like regenerators, large hypo, etc.) was significantly less, even WITHOUT drops.
This Rep system ONLY works if your whole universe revolves around playing STO from the time you get up, until you finally MUST sleep.
I couldn't disagree with you more. Random drops in the old system meant people like my dad (Who works 7-5) could never get his ship up to par with mine, (Even mx xi , 40edc's took him ages).
However, with the new reputation system. All he needs to do is around 1 elite STF a week, that's 75 omega marks which is enough for 3-4 Omega force projects. And i don't really see how its" from the time you get up, untill you finally must sleep" you don't have to watch the timer you know? You can just leave it run?
IMO, the new system is much more freindly to casuals than the old one. Untill they unlock the store. Once the hugely inflated Dilithum prices are removed/reduced then my statement will be completely true.
I like it. It's a similar concept to Eve's long term character development, and Eve has some of the best player retention in the MMO market. You'll really be able to build on a character in the long-term with these reputation passives; as opposed to characters not having changed in the last 2 years.
QUOTE]
since you brought it up,
eve also has great PVP.
this game does not, and pvp keeps getting backhanded.
Eve's PvP is fantastic if you have 4 hours to find a fight.
if all the rep gear was new and not just old gear with huge time gate on it, then it wouldnt have been so bad. i hate this bloody new system im not logging back in til its fixed.
Comments
Solid math, and you can't argue with numbers! This is just wrong, pre-patch I was able to outfit a new character mk XII STF set (no weapons) in about 2 weeks.
As for the omega skills, I was under the assumption that you could change skills. But if you wanted to switch the skill, you'd have to re-upgrade them in the slot and have to pay for it. But if it's permanent, and no respec? Yikes!
For me I am just gating characters and not playing. I might need some dilithium in 2 months from now should I decide on getting an item, assuming I haven't quit by then.
Leaves me with very little to do which I don't think was the intention of the rep system.
Bad choice locking recycled content up and removing the one thing that actually worked, stf.
Unfortunately the 58 days or so is just to get from tier 0 to tier 5. The only thing that is included during that time are the 4 passive and 1 active skill. the items require a separate unlock as described above =(
/and this.
ok, mkxii gear was hard to earn (well, it's mkxii). but we already had the opportunity to change in our edc for (competitve) mkxi sets.
i ran stf's over the whole year, f.e. without getting a single mkxii psg tech-drop. but in that time i farmed enough edc for outfitting 4 boffs with maco/omega, plus 2 sets for myself, and maco and omega stuff for 17 ships(!). and now have on every single ship at least a 2-piece-bonus running (15 out of 17 with 2piece maco/omega + 1 borgpart).
on top was the dil i made off those times. only while i farmed for my 4 boff sets: 'bout 200k dil!.
so i ran several gstf's and never really felt the need for that final mkii tech-drop. only for my collection, performance was more than enough with easily obtainable mkxi sets.
You guys are pretty lucky with drops. I've played cure ground for a long time before i could get the proto weapon drop. Not counting the failed missions, stupid PUGs not cooperating, etc.
Sure you can say that you got the stuff easy because you got the correct crowd to play with (Elite STF channel for example). But for the average player, they probably don't even know this channel exist.
Moreover, you need to run every single STF to get the respective drops. Now, the average player, could just do the STF he finds easy enough and still reach the final destination.
What I'm saying is that this new system is preferable to the old random drop system where effort is not equal to reward put in due to randomness of the drops. Now, despite its long and tiring grind, at least its guaranteed result.
I do agree that the new system needs rethinking on the timescale required to unlock and the resources needed for the projects, which is very steep at the moment. But its not necessarily worse than previous random system.
Ensure when posting, you consider the average player's plight who probably has a job, a family and can't spend his entire life decking out all his alts and their respective boffs with Mk12 gear.
With the new system, the average player can log in, play a couple of STFs or Romulan Marks mission he likes and still earn the gear. Last time, you need to literally wait for Vault event to get reman datalogs (I personally set reminders on my Blackberry on vault event timings and I remember once playing vault event on my laptop at Japan Narita Airport on my connecting flight to US - nearly missed my flight!), then do countless failed attempts at Infected Ground, Cure Ground, Cure Space.. and when occassionally you manage to get the quest completed.. you get 2 EDCs, some random blue item and a lockbox.. rinse and repeat..tell me which is better?
So in short, the idea of reputation system is good, the thing needs reworking is the timescale and resources needed for it. Reduce them somewhat and you'll have a really good system in place.
I can't emphasize this more.. what the community should work towards is to get the requirements for the unlocks reduced rather than asking for old system back.
The whole we are helping the casuals argument is invalid, htf can it be our problem you don't have time to play.
So the whole damned server has to wait for you to spend quality time with your wife watching survivor until we can play and get all our items locked up because you gave up on ground missions.
Royally to hell with that, if you don't have time to play be gone. Everyone who is actively supporting the "well I can get my sets new!" are actively sabotaging this game
This character is why I don't play my Romulan any more. Tovan Khev is NOT my BFF! Get him off my bridge!
if your overall concern is for the average player, then consider the following. how is the average player supposed to remain competitive without these luck drops? ensuring that they are forced to grind stfs to make tier 1 and then wait an additional 201 hours so they can have the bare minimum stf sets for ground and space, just so they can be somewhat competitive and not an absolute burden on whatever team they join. how is that fair for them? do you really think that these people are going to stay in the normal queues for the entire length? if you think the quality of the games now are bad, just wait until more and more of these guys show up to work the system, either for the first time or for their alts.
luck is luck. sometimes, you win, sometimes you lose. but all in all, you still had a chance. even if that proto tech didn't drop for you, chances are you got enough proto salvage for your ship's weapons and edc to buy your mk xi set gear. either way, it was still progress. sure, you didn't progress towards the mk xii set gear you wanted... but you still had a fighting shot at being competitive with others. now, after all these changes, how competitive will the average, new player be?
but then again, some of you will like this system regardless. for others, it'll be a constant reminder of something they will never achieve. if you're constantly blowing up and not putting out as much dps as your team would want and they start tearing into you for being a noob or for wrecking their run, how motivated would you be to continue? how motivated would the average player be? how motivated would they be to continue playing the game at all?
my 2 cents. this is not an attack directed at you, but merely a rebuttal towards the argument you make. i have nothing against you personally and this is my disclaimer.
It took me 8 months to complete my first set, thank you very much.
And I know people who been playing since Day 1 and didn't even complete any sets by the time S7 launched.
So true.
Just find it funny they kept saying they were making it easier. Those who didn't complete their sets, got to grind for 2 more months, and pay 34000 Dilithium per set piece.
So bascially Cryptic they kicked them in the nuts and said "its good for you".
Need I say more?
All the complaints and whines, though some are valid, are mostly just noise. Learn to post logically w/o undermining your argument.
Cryptic made this game to attract large number of people, from all sorts of background. Many of those people may not have the time to play as much as some of the hardcore players who live and breathe STO.
Surely you Trek fans would not go against your very own: "Were I to invoke logic, however, logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." - Captain Spock, Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan.
Are you bipolar or something ?:D
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
I'm not saying that you should be punished for liking ground STFs. I happen to like ground missions more than space ones too.
Not sure if you notice but I did made an argument before S7 launch that now everyone would be playing ISE and KASE and probably just those 2. (Made this comment at the comment box for the news, i think).
So, I'm not happy ground STFs are getting less crowds now.
Notice that my argument is: "Playing STF he likes"
I made a character after blog 8 and I got all the drops and more including leveling.
And yes, I did have to continually farm the same map I already beta 900 times, that I can solo, and yes I did have a tsunami wave of rookies ragequitting on me and yes I did hate every second.
But I got it done, albeit it was easy to get motivated knowing what season 7 was bringing :rolleyes:
That aside they didn't have to kill the one thing that was actually working in the game, you could have kept everything as it were and simply added thet set to the c-store.
Or like you said increased the drop rate.
OR like with lockboxes and lobis, if you have 200 hundred you are guaranteed the item.
Part of what makes me sick about the reputation system is the amount of recycled content.
Like it was too fragile to stand alone and had to hog from stf, now they are both equally worthless, terrific
Too bad the Romulan consoles aren't part of the reputation system, they are actually worth it.
Too bad the Embassy System is even worse than the Fleet and Reputation systems combined. Mega Dilithum Sinks here.
There was nothing wrong with the old system.
If PWE wanted to fix the problem, they would have increased prototype-level drops but they didn't.
They brought in this very disruptive system that isn't making gameplay better.
In theory, it makes it easier to get Mk XII Omega/MACO/Borg gear.
The opposite is evident.
BUT, gameplay wasn't the motivating factor was it?
No.
PWE wanted to increase revenue.
They tried to sneak it in...well, its obvious now.
I don't blame a business for trying to create more revenue.
All PWE had to say was "we'd like to switch to this reward system to generate more income so we can continue to offer this game as F2P."
RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
I always thought the rate at which you could get "best in slot" gear was comically fast. Hell, it only took 1-2 days of hard grinding and you could have Mark XII borg stuff in every slot. It was a bit much, especially for a f2p game. It also killed the exchange economy at the Mk X-XII levels; since XII and Set pieces were so easy to come by.
I think people will get used to the fact that entry level gear at cap is now going to be Mark X or XI stuff. That's the way it should have been in the first place, and it shouldn't be that big of an issue for anyone, the difference is not in performance between a set of X gear and a set of XI or XII gear is pretty marginal.
Season 7 killed the fun in stf's especially ground stf's. Now I only bother to do space stf's. Yes there are the accolades for ground, but won't bother with these, since. Well you know. Ground stf dead.
And 40 hours + costs just to get one piece of gear, is it either ground or space. No. It is only a couple a weeks ago I bought a LTS. I regret it. If I knew how much they would change (yes I could had gone on tribble and looked for myself) but I have faith in the devs. thinking they know what they are doing and can have foresight to see what the community wants and change that accordingly.
Coming from EVE Online, I got fed up looking at timers. With the new Omega reputation system, well timers, hello there.
Valid argument there on luck, but lets consider if there're no drops at all for common tech, it still takes 60 normal STF runs to get your full mkX ground set. Which probably works out to be longer than the current system.. unless you do the STFs consecutively and just STF after STF. Plus, if you're a new player.. you have no business in Elite STFs right? You don't get blown up that easily in Normal STF if you know whats going on.
Lets see.. 60 STFs = 1800 marks (30 Marks per STF). You don't need that many marks to unlock all the MkX gear right? Plus 10.5K dils which you can earn other way and some token items like generators, shield charges, easily obtained from vendors.
If you include the time taken to run the 60 STFs, everything can be quite tiring.. now you can load the project, go to sleep or watch survivor with your wife, play hide and seek with your children, checking your investment portfolio, go to the gym, play some golf then come back with your gear completed. That's for the average player.
IF you're hardcore.. and you haven't gotten your Mk12 gear for all your alts and boffs by now, i'd say you're not hardcore enough
My argument remains: New system is good, but the requirements (both time and resources) are steep.. reduce that by say 30% and you have a nice system in place.
**I'm off to catch a connecting flight to London, so I may not reply for sometime. Be nice guys
PS: I know this is just speculation, but it wouldn't surprise me if it comes to this...
You still need 90 dilithium for the MK X ground set, that's 90 missions sir
At if you had done that under the old system you had have the set PLUS 90 dil (and item drops).
So, you are not just losing the 90 k dil you would have earned along the way, you are also losing the price of the item.
So say goodbye to 190,000 dil under the new regime
/edit.
ps. that's 190 k LOST under the new regime ofc
Do you even Science Bro?
By the end of all the tiers, all the unlocks and all the purchases I'll bet you'd be pretty sick of STF's and any other 'end game' content too. All the gear is letting you do is run through them faster.
It just feels like such a minimal payout for all that time invested, not to mention the ec and dil you'd be draining into them (on top of fleet projects, and embassy projects...AND Romulan reputation projects).
I don't NEED this gear to run through normal STF's, elite doesn't interest me since they are exactly the same missions only harder and all you get for it is a few more marks and a processor - whoopdie doo.
I may try to get to mkxi gear, I'm not even sure I have the patience for that.
Side note. I predict that soon you will be able to buy MACO, Borg or Omega gear in the Zen store for those who don't want to wait for projects - calling it now.
I couldn't disagree with you more. Random drops in the old system meant people like my dad (Who works 7-5) could never get his ship up to par with mine, (Even mx xi , 40edc's took him ages).
However, with the new reputation system. All he needs to do is around 1 elite STF a week, that's 75 omega marks which is enough for 3-4 Omega force projects. And i don't really see how its" from the time you get up, untill you finally must sleep" you don't have to watch the timer you know? You can just leave it run?
IMO, the new system is much more freindly to casuals than the old one. Untill they unlock the store. Once the hugely inflated Dilithum prices are removed/reduced then my statement will be completely true.