Sorry for the double post, but, this idea is I think one I want to make separate enough of an idea.
If magically, tomorrow, the Fleet Mark reward missions like incursion or Blockade gave DOUBLE their current rewards. 34 for 15 minute mission, 68 for within the bonus time.
What do you think would happen to the players attitude for the IOR Repeatable Mission?
I may be so bold to say the root cause of this problem isn't anything to do with the Foundry. It's the Fleets Progression.
Sorry for the double post, but, this idea is I think one I want to make separate enough of an idea.
If magically, tomorrow, the Fleet Mark reward missions like incursion or Blockade gave DOUBLE their current rewards. 34 for 15 minute mission, 68 for within the bonus time.
What do you think would happen to the players attitude for the IOR Repeatable Mission?
I may be so bold to say the root cause of this problem isn't anything to do with the Foundry. It's the Fleets Progression.
This, in conjunction with removing the FM reward for the foundry, but leaving the dil, might help to alleviate the problem. There are more sources of dil so that is not quite so much a driver for grinding as a fleet marks source which would make more sense attached to fleet events anyway.
It would also mean a reduction in overall plays of course, but those would primarily be the hard core grinders anyhow.
Maybe it would help to reward the best foundry (the real missions!) with a onetime reward like lobi or purple loot?
they spent so much time and energy to filter mission for the daily, why not supporting the hardworking foundry authors and "decorate" this misions with goodies?
like the content missions!
the foundry missions still dont have the important status they should have.
and its on the devs to correct this!!
People wind grind period, its just a question of direction. In the end a better search UI is the best way for people who want specific content to find it.
Diplomacy, space combat, ground combat, mixed combat, time travel, mirror universe, story driven single episodes, chained story episodes, humor/satire, exploration, grinder, etc. Have LOTS of categories and allow each mission to get 1 to 3 tags set by the author.
If people could look for very specific things that they wanted to do it would greatly increase traffic and avoid lots of unnecessary bad rating by people who didn't get what they expected, and so on. This is the best way to mitigate the problems we are having. It also has the virtue of being nice and simple. In game design simple as possible on the mechanics end is almost always the way to go. Little alterations made to address symptoms and not the problem also have a way of causing un-intended consequences and can interact in unexpected ways.
This, in conjunction with removing the FM reward for the foundry, but leaving the dil, might help to alleviate the problem. There are more sources of dil so that is not quite so much a driver for grinding as a fleet marks source which would make more sense attached to fleet events anyway.
It would also mean a reduction in overall plays of course, but those would primarily be the hard core grinders anyhow.
Dude, never ever suggest making Cryptic's grinds harder. The ways to get X resources should increase not decrease since the game has gone Zynga.
You're just being spiteful against a playstyle you don't like.
The Fleet Marks are why I do grinders. I often don't have time or energy to focus on a story. My fleet desperately needs fleet marks. So... yeah. Fleet Marks mean that I often run grinders -- but if there were no grinders, I would probably just not use Foundry as often.
Mmm. I think grinders slightly interfere with playing regular missions, but for the most part 'when I want to sit down to a cool Foundry story' is an essentially different time and focus than 'when I want to farm up some resources I want.'
The EC isn't as big of a problem because running 2 grinders or so can max out the loot you are permitted from Foundry missions. That's already capped, and, personally, repeating patrols in Tau Dewa might not be quite as efficient, but is pretty easy and you can do it until you want to jump out a window.
I would support removing the Fleet Mark reward combined with increasing the fleet mark rewards of other stuff, but I'm mostly in favor of the filtering/tags/pulldown stuff discussed previously.
Campaign: The Fenwick Cycle NWS-DKR9GB7KH
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
Please, mark the word "play", not afk-time. I don't want to see more Boff-Grinders, that reward you for afk-time.
You realize the workaround for that is a simple macro. Whatever scheme you come up with to try and quash playstyles you hate, there will always be a workaround until the game becomes so unplayable, you'll be left all alone.
I have to say, some foundry authors feel so damn entitled and proprietary of a function of the game that is open to all is part of the reason why the Foundry has such a bad rep with the rest of the player base.
You realize the workaround for that is a simple macro. Whatever scheme you come up with to try and quash playstyles you hate, there will always be a workaround until the game becomes so unplayable, you'll be left all alone.
I have to say, some foundry authors feel so damn entitled and proprietary of a function of the game that is open to all is part of the reason why the Foundry has such a bad rep with the rest of the player base.
Or the devs come up with a better way to categorize rewards....
I have to say, some foundry authors feel so damn entitled and proprietary of a function of the game that is open to all is part of the reason why the Foundry has such a bad rep with the rest of the player base.
You know why? Because there is an ocean of MMOs out there with stupid, grindy, mindless pap where you can hit that dang food pellet button to your heart's content. We finally have a game where you can write and create and play other cool stories, and everyone just dogpiles the same old food pellet button yet again.
If we sound 'entitled' and 'proprietary' it's because there's finally ONE place. One. Just one. Where we can be creative and enjoy flavor rather than grind, and we're a bit defensive about efforts that ruin this opportunity.
And the 'bad rep' about Foundry seems to exist only on the part of a few people who make noise here. The only bad rep the Foundry has in the great population, as far as I'm aware of, is 'it's not worth doing.'
Campaign: The Fenwick Cycle NWS-DKR9GB7KH
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
You know why? Because there is an ocean of MMOs out there with stupid, grindy, mindless pap where you can hit that dang food pellet button to your heart's content. We finally have a game where you can write and create and play other cool stories, and everyone just dogpiles the same old food pellet button yet again.
Then ultimately your problem is not other players, nor combat missions in the Foundry. You have a problem with Cryptic who, over the last 3 seasons, has turned the game into a grind.
Lashing out at other Foundry authors may make you feel righteous and just, but you're fooling yourself if it would fix anything.
I'm powerless to fix anything and all words to Cryptic fall on deaf ears, so... what's left to do but grouse and complain?
Plus, it's not exactly 'lashing out,' it's expressing dismay that a bunch of people are crowding into the upscale restaurant to sit down to a fine dining experience and try to get all the appetizers in a bucket so they can gulp it down as fast as possible.
Dude. There's cool opportunity for stories, and all you want to do is put the foie gras, lobster, and caviar in a blender so it goes down more quickly?
Campaign: The Fenwick Cycle NWS-DKR9GB7KH
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
I'm powerless to fix anything and all words to Cryptic fall on deaf ears, so... what's left to do but grouse and complain?
Plus, it's not exactly 'lashing out,' it's expressing dismay that a bunch of people are crowding into the upscale restaurant to sit down to a fine dining experience and try to get all the appetizers in a bucket so they can gulp it down as fast as possible.
Dude. There's cool opportunity for stories, and all you want to do is put the foie gras, lobster, and caviar in a blender so it goes down more quickly?
Your hurdle is not the Flavor of the Month missions.
Your hurdle is players do not want to risk their time on an unknown quantity: namely these "lobster" missions. Perhaps instead of pissing on and pissing off other players, and garnering a negative rep -- maybe you and like minded persons should try and put together some guest blogs and see if Brandon will post them that highlight player made missions that are well written and have good gameplay. No one wants to risk 3 hours on some overwritten piece of fanfiction with questionable game design choices and balance issues -- that's the fear of the average player you need to overcome. But if you can suggest some 20-30 minute player missions that you think people should try, helping getting them to take that jump would be more worthwhile than being a ****.
Yes, I guess it would be helpful to highlight to people things like 'filter for mission length' and other things that might guide them to good content.
Of course, if people are unwilling to look at the UI, I'm not sure how successful it'd be expecting people to go read a blog, mmm?
As for 'bad rep,' you can keep repeating the big lie as often as you want, it doesn't make it true.
The issues I mind stem from Cryptic, not the players, though there is a bit of 'this is really what people want??' that afflicts lots of media.
The fact that grinder missions bury others in listings, the fact that grinders are so rewarding, is a UI and design issue.
And, to be fair, it's VERY hard to fight exploits in an open creation system. The only other big effort to do this was City of Heroes, and their UGC became a constant battleground of devs vs. farms. To a degree that many people think that farming Mission Architect broke the game. (I don't necessarily agree, but there's an argument there)
Campaign: The Fenwick Cycle NWS-DKR9GB7KH
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
Your hurdle is not the Flavor of the Month missions.
Your hurdle is players do not want to risk their time on an unknown quantity: namely these "lobster" missions. Perhaps instead of pissing on and pissing off other players, and garnering a negative rep -- maybe you and like minded persons should try and put together some guest blogs and see if Brandon will post them that highlight player made missions that are well written and have good gameplay. No one wants to risk 3 hours on some overwritten piece of fanfiction with questionable game design choices and balance issues -- that's the fear of the average player you need to overcome. But if you can suggest some 20-30 minute player missions that you think people should try, helping getting them to take that jump would be more worthwhile than being a ****.
Really? Isn't that what the Foundry spotlight is for? Isn't that the purpose behind the Foundry challenges?
Then ultimately your problem is not other players, nor combat missions in the Foundry. You have a problem with Cryptic who, over the last 3 seasons, has turned the game into a grind.
Lashing out at other Foundry authors may make you feel righteous and just, but you're fooling yourself if it would fix anything.
I think the point being made here is found in your above statement. Lashing out at other Foundry "Authors".
Definition of an Author is a writer. If we who have written story missions wanted to build the grinder missions, it would take 10 minutes. There is no authoring involved with these farming grinder or boff missions, it is simply picking out a map, adding in countless enemy NPC groups, and typing in one paragraph of text to tell you to blow up ships and collect the loot.
We simply want them seperated from the story based content some of us have spent countless hours painstakingly building, trying to add more quality content to the game by some type of UI search system.
I agree that the grind is required to keep up with the fleet marks and dilithium grinds, but to have these missions blocking new and existing authors of "real" missions because they are popular simply for the loot they provide is skewing the use for the Foundry. It is being abused to cheat the system, and it is not authoring.
I created a short grinder mission to help out some of my fleet members, but I have used my custom maps, included a short story and additional tasks to engage the player, not just picked a random map and NPC's to destroy.
The main point is there needs to be a system to seperate stories from exploits and battle grinders, that is the best bet to allow the players who wish to experience story missions so they can find them easier, and also allow newer authors to showcase their work without being pushed into oblivion, very rarely played.
DoR
ABI-Artificial Borg Intelligence by Duke-of-Rock Available on Holodeck
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Also play Spawn of Medusa - The 5 Part series
by Duke-of-Rock Available on Holodeck
Definition of an Author is a writer. If we who have written story missions wanted to build the grinder missions, it would take 10 minutes.
Then build that mission mission. Build grinder missions that are better than the ones that are already out there. And at the fifteen minute mark, where the mission ends, you can throw up a leaflet advertising what you really want them to play. Make them unrelated, or make your grinders the off-screen battles or between mission bits from your 12-mission magnum opus, or truncated endings (cliffhangers, go here for the full story), alternate endings, whatever you can think of that raises these things past the norm.
As her highness would say: Adapt. (Or Resistance is Futile. You can choose.)
It's an unfortunate fact that the Knights in User Generated Armor brought their current predicament on themselves. It was never going to be a surprise that there would be a new low point on the chart, where people could most easily get what they wanted. Except, while with the clickers people just clicked away the review screens, after fifteen minutes in space battles which most people tend to rather enjoy in this game, they're now taking the time to rate them. Worse yet, a lot of people are inclined to think in either 1's or 5's, and rate different missions for different things. I don't imagine many people rate the grinders negatively for the absense of storyline. They'll rate it for what they wanted and expected to get, which depends on their mood and, unfortunately for serious authors, on how much time they have. And if you can't get at them with your main missions anymore, you're just going to have to sneak in advertising.
Honestly, I don't think it's time to throw the towel in the ring just yet. But stomping down the opposition hasn't yielded much in the way of results, so I figure, if you can't beat them that way, beat them the other way.
Then build that mission mission. Build grinder missions that are better than the ones that are already out there. And at the fifteen minute mark, where the mission ends, you can throw up a leaflet advertising what you really want them to play. Make them unrelated, or make your grinders the off-screen battles or between mission bits from your 12-mission magnum opus, or truncated endings (cliffhangers, go here for the full story), alternate endings, whatever you can think of that raises these things past the norm.
As her highness would say: Adapt. (Or Resistance is Futile. You can choose.)
It's an unfortunate fact that Knights in User Generated Armor brought their current predicament on themselves. It was never going to be a surprise that there would be a new low point on the chart, where people could most easily get what they wanted. Except, while with the clickers people just clicked away the review screens, after fifteen minutes in space battles which most people tend to rather enjoy in this game, they're now taking the time to rate them. Worse yet, a lot of people are inclined to think in either 1's or 5's, and rate different missions for different things. I don't imagine many people rate the grinders negatively for the absense of storyline. They'll rate it for what they wanted and expected to get, which depends on their mood and, unfortunately for serious authors, on how much time they have. And if you can't get at them with your main missions anymore, you're just going to have to sneak in advertising.
Honestly, I don't think it's time to throw the towel in the ring just yet. But stomping down the opposition hasn't yielded much in the way of results, so I figure, if you can't beat them that way, beat them the other way.
I actually tried to do this. "Gladiator Rumble" took me about 6 hours to make, due to at least some customization of the arena. However, what seems to be happening is the grinders only really want the space loot, and when it comes to grinding, the most popular are the ones where you go afk for 20 minutes and hope your boffs don't die.
Even within the grinders there is a rush to get the most for doing as little as possible. People don't seem to want to earn their drops.
Still, my grinder (that took 6 hours to make) is my second highest rated mission, only slightly below the new zombie mission, "The Dance of the Dead."
Speaking for myself, I have finished the storyline with every ship in my inventory (including shuttles) so i finally turned to the foundry to get some new stories and EC farming other than STF elite.
There are far too many farm missions though and a separate tab for those I would welcome.
I don't feel the developers promote the foundry though. You have to pay to get access to the tools and any rewards for the time spent to make a mission has to come from player donations. If PWE gave mission makers some reward for actual missions with HQ content then maybe we would see more of those.
There are too few good storyline missions.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
There are actually quite a few that I like. But it helps to know what is out there. If you find a mission that you like, then you can search the author's name to find all of their missions.
Both Kirkfat and I have spotlight missions, so we are getting plays in our missions, the fact is that there are other authors out there that don't have that advantage at the moment, and they are not being seen because of these loot and exploit missions, that's why there needs to be a better system seperating these. I could care less if they keep them, just put them somewhere where they don't cloud the existing and new mission creators from having a chance to be seen in a catagory seperate from them.
I too built a grinder type mssion "Argus Array Defense", but I too took some time making it because of maps and interaction triggers, but Kirkfat is right, the ones dominating are the mindless grinds seeking drops, drops, drops, because of the economy the game has created.
They should be seperated from the story missions. That is what we are saying.
DoR
ABI-Artificial Borg Intelligence by Duke-of-Rock Available on Holodeck
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Also play Spawn of Medusa - The 5 Part series
by Duke-of-Rock Available on Holodeck
To address the concerns Cryptic not knowing or carrying or leaving us to our doom, I doubt that's the case. Slow and careful response and doing nothing are two very different things. In 72 hours we've built a 9 page post that actually contains a lot of decent feedback considering the subject matter. I bet someone's read it, or is still reading it. That's why I posted in here.
As for the concept that the last three seasons have been turning this into a grind fest of a game.
Ha.
I mean, did you play at launch? I didn't, I joined up at the half year mark and -that- was a grind fest. I played a foundry mission of an old friend, designed off of the old ground combat and in the style of the original STFs. It was a different game that had nothing. At least this grind gets you something appreciable. But, I don't know, exploring three systems every day for a few months to get one ship... yeah. That wasn't grindy at all.
I don't think removing any reward, DL or FM is worth it or the wise thing to do. I've opened up a thread in general discussion talking some of the ideas involving tweaking the FM rewards from other missions and IOR to see what a lot of people think on it, aiming for those outside of the Foundry community. It's by far wishful thinking that I don't expect to get any direct change from but I do hope to learn something. What it is the player base wants from IOR, and by extension the Foundry.
I don't want to see IOR or any of the rewards removed. Perhaps the one or the other would be nice when it comes to FM or DL, but still, if we design the missions to the length of the standard cryptic 30-1h mission anything less is not worth it. If there was a way to make the worth even across the board, which, is no small feat, I think it would be at least easier.
I guess it just means the best option we can have and pursue from the devs right now is a better way to filter and search through published missions. We've got a full list of over 100 solid story based missions listed here on the forums and people in this post have said "there are just no good story missions" because they frankly haven't seen any in game.
Repeating what I've said elsewhere/before, I think it's important for Foundry missions to have enough reward so you don't feel like you're utterly sacrificing valuable potential advancement/loot/whatever by participating, but not so much that it warps the essential point of Foundry and gets farmed/exploited.
The thing is, that balance is really, really, really hard to achieve, and I don't fault Cryptic for struggling to find it. (I mean, heck, they are doing much better in this regard than City of Heroes did)
Campaign: The Fenwick Cycle NWS-DKR9GB7KH
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
I actually tried to do this. "Gladiator Rumble" took me about 6 hours to make, due to at least some customization of the arena. However, what seems to be happening is the grinders only really want the space loot, and when it comes to grinding, the most popular are the ones where you go afk for 20 minutes and hope your boffs don't die.
Your BOffs can survive most (only the mobs with insane AoE are luck of the draw and you can't fix the dumb AI) with a certain configuration and even with white/green gear.
Your BOffs can survive most (only the mobs with insane AoE are luck of the draw and you can't fix the dumb AI) with a certain configuration and even with white/green gear.
But... "I won't tell you how though."
My boffs die in those missions all the time, and I have them set up with fleet gear with skills maxed out. And no matter what, the damn enemies come to find me, whether or not I'm behind the walls or invisible walls etc.
What saddens me most about those missions, is the author seems to have fun building a set, only to expect the players to go afk. That person is getting better at building sets that are meant not to be seen or cared about.
Still, my grinder (that took 6 hours to make) is my second highest rated mission, only slightly below the new zombie mission, "The Dance of the Dead."
Yes, but when did you publish your missions? Check all the missions on the list. They're all pretty much newly published within the last month or two. They're all pretty much post-ratings change. I suspect if you just copy one of your missions and republish it the rating will be higher-- that is unless the rating was below 3 stars before (so you were getting dragged down by the default ratings rather than up) , but I'm sure that wasn't the case.
I think part of what's going on has nothing to do with grinders and everything to do with the ratings change. I don't even intend this so much as a complaint as an observation. Before the recent change having a sliver in the fifth star put you up near the top of the list. Now that puts you quite a ways down the list, and not every mission above you is a grinder.
That isn't to say that the grinders aren't a separate issue. I just think your older missions are from a different era when ratings were a little bit more stingy. So, it's no real surprise your newest mission is more highly rated.
Comments
If magically, tomorrow, the Fleet Mark reward missions like incursion or Blockade gave DOUBLE their current rewards. 34 for 15 minute mission, 68 for within the bonus time.
What do you think would happen to the players attitude for the IOR Repeatable Mission?
I may be so bold to say the root cause of this problem isn't anything to do with the Foundry. It's the Fleets Progression.
This, in conjunction with removing the FM reward for the foundry, but leaving the dil, might help to alleviate the problem. There are more sources of dil so that is not quite so much a driver for grinding as a fleet marks source which would make more sense attached to fleet events anyway.
It would also mean a reduction in overall plays of course, but those would primarily be the hard core grinders anyhow.
Foundry Mission Database
Check out my Foundry missions:
Standalone - The Great Escape - The Galaxy's Fair - Purity I: Of Denial - Return to Oblivion
Untitled Series - Duritanium Man - The Improbable Bulk - Commander Rihan
they spent so much time and energy to filter mission for the daily, why not supporting the hardworking foundry authors and "decorate" this misions with goodies?
like the content missions!
the foundry missions still dont have the important status they should have.
and its on the devs to correct this!!
Diplomacy, space combat, ground combat, mixed combat, time travel, mirror universe, story driven single episodes, chained story episodes, humor/satire, exploration, grinder, etc. Have LOTS of categories and allow each mission to get 1 to 3 tags set by the author.
If people could look for very specific things that they wanted to do it would greatly increase traffic and avoid lots of unnecessary bad rating by people who didn't get what they expected, and so on. This is the best way to mitigate the problems we are having. It also has the virtue of being nice and simple. In game design simple as possible on the mechanics end is almost always the way to go. Little alterations made to address symptoms and not the problem also have a way of causing un-intended consequences and can interact in unexpected ways.
Dude, never ever suggest making Cryptic's grinds harder. The ways to get X resources should increase not decrease since the game has gone Zynga.
You're just being spiteful against a playstyle you don't like.
My character Tsin'xing
Fleet ships. This game is all about the ships for me.
No.
Please, mark the word "play", not afk-time. I don't want to see more Boff-Grinders, that reward you for afk-time.
If Star Trek Online was an Open-Source (GPL) Game, we would have a low-grind fork.
Mmm. I think grinders slightly interfere with playing regular missions, but for the most part 'when I want to sit down to a cool Foundry story' is an essentially different time and focus than 'when I want to farm up some resources I want.'
The EC isn't as big of a problem because running 2 grinders or so can max out the loot you are permitted from Foundry missions. That's already capped, and, personally, repeating patrols in Tau Dewa might not be quite as efficient, but is pretty easy and you can do it until you want to jump out a window.
I would support removing the Fleet Mark reward combined with increasing the fleet mark rewards of other stuff, but I'm mostly in favor of the filtering/tags/pulldown stuff discussed previously.
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
You realize the workaround for that is a simple macro. Whatever scheme you come up with to try and quash playstyles you hate, there will always be a workaround until the game becomes so unplayable, you'll be left all alone.
I have to say, some foundry authors feel so damn entitled and proprietary of a function of the game that is open to all is part of the reason why the Foundry has such a bad rep with the rest of the player base.
My character Tsin'xing
You know why? Because there is an ocean of MMOs out there with stupid, grindy, mindless pap where you can hit that dang food pellet button to your heart's content. We finally have a game where you can write and create and play other cool stories, and everyone just dogpiles the same old food pellet button yet again.
If we sound 'entitled' and 'proprietary' it's because there's finally ONE place. One. Just one. Where we can be creative and enjoy flavor rather than grind, and we're a bit defensive about efforts that ruin this opportunity.
And the 'bad rep' about Foundry seems to exist only on the part of a few people who make noise here. The only bad rep the Foundry has in the great population, as far as I'm aware of, is 'it's not worth doing.'
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
Then ultimately your problem is not other players, nor combat missions in the Foundry. You have a problem with Cryptic who, over the last 3 seasons, has turned the game into a grind.
Lashing out at other Foundry authors may make you feel righteous and just, but you're fooling yourself if it would fix anything.
Plus, it's not exactly 'lashing out,' it's expressing dismay that a bunch of people are crowding into the upscale restaurant to sit down to a fine dining experience and try to get all the appetizers in a bucket so they can gulp it down as fast as possible.
Dude. There's cool opportunity for stories, and all you want to do is put the foie gras, lobster, and caviar in a blender so it goes down more quickly?
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
Your hurdle is not the Flavor of the Month missions.
Your hurdle is players do not want to risk their time on an unknown quantity: namely these "lobster" missions. Perhaps instead of pissing on and pissing off other players, and garnering a negative rep -- maybe you and like minded persons should try and put together some guest blogs and see if Brandon will post them that highlight player made missions that are well written and have good gameplay. No one wants to risk 3 hours on some overwritten piece of fanfiction with questionable game design choices and balance issues -- that's the fear of the average player you need to overcome. But if you can suggest some 20-30 minute player missions that you think people should try, helping getting them to take that jump would be more worthwhile than being a ****.
oh no you didn't.
Awoken Dead
Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
Of course, if people are unwilling to look at the UI, I'm not sure how successful it'd be expecting people to go read a blog, mmm?
As for 'bad rep,' you can keep repeating the big lie as often as you want, it doesn't make it true.
The issues I mind stem from Cryptic, not the players, though there is a bit of 'this is really what people want??' that afflicts lots of media.
The fact that grinder missions bury others in listings, the fact that grinders are so rewarding, is a UI and design issue.
And, to be fair, it's VERY hard to fight exploits in an open creation system. The only other big effort to do this was City of Heroes, and their UGC became a constant battleground of devs vs. farms. To a degree that many people think that farming Mission Architect broke the game. (I don't necessarily agree, but there's an argument there)
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
My character Tsin'xing
I think the point being made here is found in your above statement. Lashing out at other Foundry "Authors".
Definition of an Author is a writer. If we who have written story missions wanted to build the grinder missions, it would take 10 minutes. There is no authoring involved with these farming grinder or boff missions, it is simply picking out a map, adding in countless enemy NPC groups, and typing in one paragraph of text to tell you to blow up ships and collect the loot.
We simply want them seperated from the story based content some of us have spent countless hours painstakingly building, trying to add more quality content to the game by some type of UI search system.
I agree that the grind is required to keep up with the fleet marks and dilithium grinds, but to have these missions blocking new and existing authors of "real" missions because they are popular simply for the loot they provide is skewing the use for the Foundry. It is being abused to cheat the system, and it is not authoring.
I created a short grinder mission to help out some of my fleet members, but I have used my custom maps, included a short story and additional tasks to engage the player, not just picked a random map and NPC's to destroy.
The main point is there needs to be a system to seperate stories from exploits and battle grinders, that is the best bet to allow the players who wish to experience story missions so they can find them easier, and also allow newer authors to showcase their work without being pushed into oblivion, very rarely played.
DoR
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
by Duke-of-Rock Available on Holodeck
Then build that mission mission. Build grinder missions that are better than the ones that are already out there. And at the fifteen minute mark, where the mission ends, you can throw up a leaflet advertising what you really want them to play. Make them unrelated, or make your grinders the off-screen battles or between mission bits from your 12-mission magnum opus, or truncated endings (cliffhangers, go here for the full story), alternate endings, whatever you can think of that raises these things past the norm.
As her highness would say: Adapt. (Or Resistance is Futile. You can choose.)
It's an unfortunate fact that the Knights in User Generated Armor brought their current predicament on themselves. It was never going to be a surprise that there would be a new low point on the chart, where people could most easily get what they wanted. Except, while with the clickers people just clicked away the review screens, after fifteen minutes in space battles which most people tend to rather enjoy in this game, they're now taking the time to rate them. Worse yet, a lot of people are inclined to think in either 1's or 5's, and rate different missions for different things. I don't imagine many people rate the grinders negatively for the absense of storyline. They'll rate it for what they wanted and expected to get, which depends on their mood and, unfortunately for serious authors, on how much time they have. And if you can't get at them with your main missions anymore, you're just going to have to sneak in advertising.
Honestly, I don't think it's time to throw the towel in the ring just yet. But stomping down the opposition hasn't yielded much in the way of results, so I figure, if you can't beat them that way, beat them the other way.
I actually tried to do this. "Gladiator Rumble" took me about 6 hours to make, due to at least some customization of the arena. However, what seems to be happening is the grinders only really want the space loot, and when it comes to grinding, the most popular are the ones where you go afk for 20 minutes and hope your boffs don't die.
Even within the grinders there is a rush to get the most for doing as little as possible. People don't seem to want to earn their drops.
Still, my grinder (that took 6 hours to make) is my second highest rated mission, only slightly below the new zombie mission, "The Dance of the Dead."
There are far too many farm missions though and a separate tab for those I would welcome.
I don't feel the developers promote the foundry though. You have to pay to get access to the tools and any rewards for the time spent to make a mission has to come from player donations. If PWE gave mission makers some reward for actual missions with HQ content then maybe we would see more of those.
There are too few good storyline missions.
There are actually quite a few that I like. But it helps to know what is out there. If you find a mission that you like, then you can search the author's name to find all of their missions.
I too built a grinder type mssion "Argus Array Defense", but I too took some time making it because of maps and interaction triggers, but Kirkfat is right, the ones dominating are the mindless grinds seeking drops, drops, drops, because of the economy the game has created.
They should be seperated from the story missions. That is what we are saying.
DoR
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
by Duke-of-Rock Available on Holodeck
As for the concept that the last three seasons have been turning this into a grind fest of a game.
Ha.
I mean, did you play at launch? I didn't, I joined up at the half year mark and -that- was a grind fest. I played a foundry mission of an old friend, designed off of the old ground combat and in the style of the original STFs. It was a different game that had nothing. At least this grind gets you something appreciable. But, I don't know, exploring three systems every day for a few months to get one ship... yeah. That wasn't grindy at all.
I don't think removing any reward, DL or FM is worth it or the wise thing to do. I've opened up a thread in general discussion talking some of the ideas involving tweaking the FM rewards from other missions and IOR to see what a lot of people think on it, aiming for those outside of the Foundry community. It's by far wishful thinking that I don't expect to get any direct change from but I do hope to learn something. What it is the player base wants from IOR, and by extension the Foundry.
I don't want to see IOR or any of the rewards removed. Perhaps the one or the other would be nice when it comes to FM or DL, but still, if we design the missions to the length of the standard cryptic 30-1h mission anything less is not worth it. If there was a way to make the worth even across the board, which, is no small feat, I think it would be at least easier.
I guess it just means the best option we can have and pursue from the devs right now is a better way to filter and search through published missions. We've got a full list of over 100 solid story based missions listed here on the forums and people in this post have said "there are just no good story missions" because they frankly haven't seen any in game.
The thing is, that balance is really, really, really hard to achieve, and I don't fault Cryptic for struggling to find it. (I mean, heck, they are doing much better in this regard than City of Heroes did)
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
Your BOffs can survive most (only the mobs with insane AoE are luck of the draw and you can't fix the dumb AI) with a certain configuration and even with white/green gear.
But... "I won't tell you how though."
My boffs die in those missions all the time, and I have them set up with fleet gear with skills maxed out. And no matter what, the damn enemies come to find me, whether or not I'm behind the walls or invisible walls etc.
What saddens me most about those missions, is the author seems to have fun building a set, only to expect the players to go afk. That person is getting better at building sets that are meant not to be seen or cared about.
Yes, but when did you publish your missions? Check all the missions on the list. They're all pretty much newly published within the last month or two. They're all pretty much post-ratings change. I suspect if you just copy one of your missions and republish it the rating will be higher-- that is unless the rating was below 3 stars before (so you were getting dragged down by the default ratings rather than up) , but I'm sure that wasn't the case.
I think part of what's going on has nothing to do with grinders and everything to do with the ratings change. I don't even intend this so much as a complaint as an observation. Before the recent change having a sliver in the fifth star put you up near the top of the list. Now that puts you quite a ways down the list, and not every mission above you is a grinder.
That isn't to say that the grinders aren't a separate issue. I just think your older missions are from a different era when ratings were a little bit more stingy. So, it's no real surprise your newest mission is more highly rated.
Click here for my Foundry tutorial on Creating A Custom Interior Map.