It seems odd that people essentially want a thing that already exists.
The interior starship in general exists as the 'hideout' or player base. It's visually customizable, it has little quests and places to visit, it has stations to access doff reports. You can invite people to it already. There's a trophy room already. This feature is already here.
But it's not done. It's rough, it's bland, it's next to useless (as most of the DOff missions can be accessed via your Department Heads and the rest aren't worth doing), and the "customization" is almost nonexistent. Many people have called for a Ship Interior overhaul. Failing that, we should at least have quarters. I feel like a homeless guy with a spaceship.
By the Prophets, I'm The Doctor (except not a Time Lord, and my ship isn't as cool - also, I'm missing my fez). Having personal quarters, or a planetside home, would add more depth to the game. And, I can see SOME functionality. Maybe there's a relaxation spa/sonic shower that gives a bonus to movement speed and accuracy. Maybe you can get a gym, for increased physical damage. Maybe a personal holodeck for training exercises against holographic enemies. (a way to test builds). Maybe Poker, or Tongo, or Pool. Not to mention the decorative abilities.
- should be customizable
- we should be able to buy stuff to enhance it
- even on lockbox ships there is always a door which can be used as entrance to these quarters
It seems odd that people essentially want a thing that already exists.
The interior starship in general exists as the 'hideout' or player base. It's visually customizable, it has little quests and places to visit, it has stations to access doff reports. You can invite people to it already. There's a trophy room already. This feature is already here.
I honestly don't know whether to take you seriously or not.
Yes, there are ship interiors in-game, but there is little functionality inside them other than the occasional RP or DOff assignments, contrary to what some of us expect from watching Trek Tv series (with entire episodes based around adventures on the ship)
What some of us want in terms of customisation is more than just sticking trophies on the wall - they want:
- deck and room designs from each of the TV series
- mini-games to earn ECs/Dil/Buffs
- dress up the NPC crewmen wandering in the halls
- a new ship-based crafting system
- STFs that use players' own customised ship interiors as arena maps.
Would be cool so see a season based around your ship. Do missions inside of it! Maybe flesh out the Doff rewards and open up new ones.
Missions inside ships, you say?
Centersolace and I authored the ship interior revamp proposal (see sig), and in Section 4.5, we discuss episode missions that are available only in ship interiors (with an "skip" option). For your convenience, I'll repost a snippet from the document:
4.5 ?Shipboard Mystery? Scenario
Works in a similar manner to Starbase Officer of the Watch / System Patrol missions, except they take place/start on the player?s ship interior. Definitely more involved than simply ?Kill 5 enemies? or ?Scan 5 anomalies?..
These are triggered randomly when the player enters their own ship interior. They have the option of doing these missions (which reward EC/XP/Dil/CXP) or skipping them (no rewards).
Some missions could be created by Foundry authors, while others could be adaptations of real Trek episodes.
- A member of an unaligned species wishes to seek asylum. Once they arrive, mysterious malfunctions begin to happen, cumulating to deliberate sabotage, off-screen dialogue-only injury of a BOff or a death of a redshirt. Suspicions fall on the asylum seeker.
- A alien civilian seeks help in repairing his ship. While this is happening, representatives from two feuding governments appear, claim the alien as a notorious criminal, and demand that he/she be handed over to their respective side(s) (TNG: The Outrageous Okona)
- (Galaxy Class exclusive) One of the children accidentally wandered into sickbay / a medical lab and becomes infected with a pathogen. The crew must contain the infection before it overwhelms everyone and potentially spreads to other ships or planets.
- Security detects a transporter signature in various locations throughout the ship (opens a window to allow players to opt into PvE/PvP Boarding Action STFs)
- All is not all work and no play - two crewmembers getting married to each other ask you as the captain to officiate the wedding. (Very rare mission, rewards very large boost in Development CXP)
- A subspace anomaly / Negative Space Wedgie wreaks havoc with shipboard systems.
- A distress call is received from a Starfleet or KDF vessel (cross-faction available). You lead an away team to the ship, and discover the crew dead / incapacitated / struggling with a serious shipboard malfunction.
- A variant of the First Contact mission Jiro Sugihara gives you: Whilst travelling at warp, your ship encounters a never-seen-before alien vessel. One things leads to another, and next thing you know, both the Federation Diplomatic Corps and the alien government authorize you and your alien counterpart to initiate formal First Contact procedures.
- A crewman is found dead in his/her quarters or at his/her post. Determine the guilt of three or four suspects - possible outcomes include all innocent (terrible accident), all guilty of conspiring to murder this individual, one or more guilty of conspiracy, or merely negligence leading to death of victim.
- (Intrepid Class exclusive) A subspace anomaly / Negative Space Wedgie knocks your ship off-course into uncharted space - find a way back home (outcome is always successful, rewards based on the player's skill in dealing with the situation).
Laws of thermodynamics as applied to life: 0 - You must play the game. 1 - You can't win. 2 - You can't break even. 3 - You can't quit.
I honestly don't know whether to take you seriously or not.
At your preference.
Well you know if you feel some features could be added that would be fine, things can always have more features. But for some to say 'I want a private area with a trophy room where I can invite my friends', well. Lucky them. I went back in time and gave them one.
Adding another type of private player room on top of ship interiors is redundant busywork. Improving ship interiors -- the hideout we already have-- is reasonable.
They did this (sort of) in the form of hideouts in Champions Online. They made Cryptic a bit of cash, then became of little real use. They were no different than the inside of the starship we already have.
The question is, How much time do you really spend on your bridge or interior decks now? Most of us, not much. The time loading and unloading the map, loading and unloading each deck, moving room to room to access officers, its all time. Lots of time. Isn't the grind going on right now more than enough?!
Player and forumite formerly known as FEELTHETHUNDER
Hideouts in Champions have a few more customization options than we do for ship interiors for STO.
The hideout system in Champs is fairly robust actually. Not quite on par with the bases in CoH, but still pretty decent. A lot better then the few trophies we can do in STO.
Having the same level of customization in the captains cabin as my CO Hideout would be rather cool.
It's more accurate say that most don't do much with interiors because there isn't much to do with them.
This is the thing I've never understood and it's true of every MMO I've played that offers any sort of housing option.
The Dev's spend X hours and Y $'s making the system, but then never give anyone a real reason to actually use them. In the best case, such as CoH they had some practical use as a travel hub, but the most you did then was run though it to the teleporters. In CO, you can access your bank and the tailor from your hideout.
But none of those things really offer much reason to go there. In every case it seems to be that the Dev's spend all that time and money to make a customizable social area.
What they need to do is offer missions, slightly higher rewarding doff stuff, and other events to player housing so people actually have some use for going there.
This is something I have wanted badly for a long time now.
Player housing is a huge money maker, if done right, its also potentially incredibly satisfying to players and makes them more likely to stay around once they have something to call their own.
The SB and embassy are generic, bland, and nothing you can really be proud of. Why invite someone to our star base? It looks exactly like theirs.
Our ship interiors are a mess, wasting away and under utilized from in episode content to general ship interactivity.
Having housing on different locations around the galaxy seems like a great idea, but whos going to do that? You'd need different rooms on each location so they all don't feel the same, that is a major project with even more upkeep in the long run.
I think our ship interior is the best place for an overhaul. An admiral's quarters should be large and.. empty. Yes, empty to start with. Our quarters are the ultimate fluff, give us some basics free, and let us choose where to put them, and let us remove them when we want.
I'd imagine our quarters with 50+ slots to put stuff on, the slots could be categorized as to generic size. So you might have 5 ground (large) slots you can position a bed or other large equipment. You'll have a few large wall and maybe a dozen small wall spots, along with small ground areas then paint and floors, etc.
I would think we would get a basic bed, table, etc for free, with a nominal 10ec or so charge to put them up, and 10ec to remove them and then to reposition. If you want more than a basic anything they would be available via zen unlocks (and 10ec to remove/reposition.) Some items should be unlocked by in game accolades as well.
The trick is creating the perfect room layout that isn't totally mechanical, where your defined spaces don't feel too spaced out or too cramped. If you just put a bunch of wall spots side by side in a long row it loses it's appeal.
To me the room doesn't have to be entirely functional, you could sell extra storage, a wall safe, install a closet for tailor access, etc. It just has to be mine, and I would pay entirely too much for it if it were.
Hideouts in Champions have a few more customization options than we do for ship interiors for STO.
It's more accurate say that most don't do much with interiors because there isn't much to do with them. Were we to be able to fully customize it, have access to the exchange/mail/bank, participate in missions on them, then we would spend more time inside our ships.
You have load times (in some cases, several) for most all missions anyway. Using load screens as an argument doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Customization without any real use. Ooo, look, I changed the color of the carpet, the style of the shower, and what's outside the moon base. Oooo, ah. But it doesn't DO anything.
It isn't an issue of "more accurate" on your second point. My point was perfectly accurate. But you are correct in saying if there was more to do in the ship interior people might spend more time there. I doubt it though. The game is outside the ship flying through space, shooting stuff.
Time spent loading is important. Every time we add something more to load in and out of is time not doing the core of the game. The core of the game is out there in space, in teams , ground and space instances, in social zones and doing missions with our fleets.
Player and forumite formerly known as FEELTHETHUNDER
I'm sure we could have consoles unlock in our private quarters. I would like to see a "butler" who would double as a tailor give a uniform unique to the locations. They could even have a consumables console to sell different types of consumables (say a blue Hypo, a hypo with an attribute).
Another place to consider putting this is at Captain's Table. Give that place some purpose!
"If you have never used Cello, I'm not interested in your browser opinion."
___________________________
In game: Commadore_Bob; Joined Jul 2009; That post count + 20,000
LotRO, plenty of cashshop options for housing ... in fat they just altered housing on the last expansion.
Yes; and forum threads complaining about how show-stopper housing bugs go unfixed for long periods, and devs saying in interviews that improvements "aren't even on their radar". Where's the evidence it's a "huge money-maker"?
I suspect if it was a huge money-maker, more games would be doing it, and it would be getting more regular attention from LotRO devs.
Former moderator of these forums. Lifetime sub since before launch. Been here since before public betas. Foundry author of "Franklin Drake Must Die".
Yes; and forum threads complaining about how show-stopper housing bugs go unfixed for long periods, and devs saying in interviews that improvements "aren't even on their radar". Where's the evidence it's a "huge money-maker"?
I suspect if it was a huge money-maker, more games would be doing it, and it would be getting more regular attention from LotRO devs.
Housing in LOTRO is pretty useless. The entire time I played the game I didn't need or use it. And the development of it has been glacial. I think Everquest 2 has far more robust housing. And even that, while fun because of how much customization is available, is overall useless.
(Just in case it's not apparent this is me agreeing with you, that's why I quoted you).
Customization without any real use. Ooo, look, I changed the color of the carpet, the style of the shower, and what's outside the moon base. Oooo, ah. But it doesn't DO anything.
Yeah. I wouldn't mind more customization and the ability to change/control the look of my interiors more than what we currently have. But as you note here with Champions, even if they did add more customization and more areas for us to display things in this game, the issue would be that they didn't add anything to do in the interiors.
Also, it's a bit trickier in this game since they did give us stuff to "do" in the interiors. They gave us the DOFF thingies (though most folks just access them without walking around inside the ship). And they let us use interiors for some of the foundry stuff, so there are tools available to do a lot of things inside a ship's interior.
I'm not sure what else this dev team could do. Or even has the resources for.
They could still do this with ship interiors. There are only a handful of interiors to modify. All they have to do is place the object in the existing rooms and have an unlock you work on. Once unlocked, the device appears.
So regardless of which interior you have, the device appears when the instance is created. Even if you change ships, the devices appear in those interiors.
Again, it would be just like the current Fleet Starbase and Embassy systems except this one is controlled by a single person.
"If you have never used Cello, I'm not interested in your browser opinion."
___________________________
In game: Commadore_Bob; Joined Jul 2009; That post count + 20,000
Some of the most desired interiors in the game are the Bug and the D'Kora. Why? Because just about everything is accessible without changing maps and not running room to room through corridor and too much wasted space. The Tuffli would be near perfect if that corridor was short or if the non social things like the commodities, crafting, bank echange and mail were terminals on the bridge.
Why do people like these small sets? Because they conserve time by allowing players to get things done quickly so they can get back outside to the real game. Because they spend time not loading maps.
Valoreah. Never mind. Addressing your personal criticism is useless. You are wrong on everything you said. Done with you.
Player and forumite formerly known as FEELTHETHUNDER
I never understood why the Belfast bridge had to be a seperate map from the rest of Deck one. There are places where the interiors need some work.
"If you have never used Cello, I'm not interested in your browser opinion."
___________________________
In game: Commadore_Bob; Joined Jul 2009; That post count + 20,000
Definitely interested in see more interior customisation, and the idea of ESD/Fleet Starbase quarters sounds even better. That said, not to be put above many other things that need work...
It seems odd that people essentially want a thing that already exists.
The interior starship in general exists as the 'hideout' or player base. It's visually customizable, it has little quests and places to visit, it has stations to access doff reports. You can invite people to it already. There's a trophy room already. This feature is already here.
But it's not done. It's rough, it's bland, it's next to useless (as most of the DOff missions can be accessed via your Department Heads and the rest aren't worth doing), and the "customization" is almost nonexistent. Many people have called for a Ship Interior overhaul. Failing that, we should at least have quarters. I feel like a homeless guy with a spaceship.
By the Prophets, I'm The Doctor (except not a Time Lord, and my ship isn't as cool - also, I'm missing my fez). Having personal quarters, or a planetside home, would add more depth to the game. And, I can see SOME functionality. Maybe there's a relaxation spa/sonic shower that gives a bonus to movement speed and accuracy. Maybe you can get a gym, for increased physical damage. Maybe a personal holodeck for training exercises against holographic enemies. (a way to test builds). Maybe Poker, or Tongo, or Pool. Not to mention the decorative abilities.
Comments
But it's not done. It's rough, it's bland, it's next to useless (as most of the DOff missions can be accessed via your Department Heads and the rest aren't worth doing), and the "customization" is almost nonexistent. Many people have called for a Ship Interior overhaul. Failing that, we should at least have quarters. I feel like a homeless guy with a spaceship.
By the Prophets, I'm The Doctor (except not a Time Lord, and my ship isn't as cool - also, I'm missing my fez). Having personal quarters, or a planetside home, would add more depth to the game. And, I can see SOME functionality. Maybe there's a relaxation spa/sonic shower that gives a bonus to movement speed and accuracy. Maybe you can get a gym, for increased physical damage. Maybe a personal holodeck for training exercises against holographic enemies. (a way to test builds). Maybe Poker, or Tongo, or Pool. Not to mention the decorative abilities.
There's a lot we could do that we're not doing.
- should be customizable
- we should be able to buy stuff to enhance it
- even on lockbox ships there is always a door which can be used as entrance to these quarters
I honestly don't know whether to take you seriously or not.
Yes, there are ship interiors in-game, but there is little functionality inside them other than the occasional RP or DOff assignments, contrary to what some of us expect from watching Trek Tv series (with entire episodes based around adventures on the ship)
What some of us want in terms of customisation is more than just sticking trophies on the wall - they want:
- deck and room designs from each of the TV series
- mini-games to earn ECs/Dil/Buffs
- dress up the NPC crewmen wandering in the halls
- a new ship-based crafting system
- STFs that use players' own customised ship interiors as arena maps.
Missions inside ships, you say?
Centersolace and I authored the ship interior revamp proposal (see sig), and in Section 4.5, we discuss episode missions that are available only in ship interiors (with an "skip" option). For your convenience, I'll repost a snippet from the document:
At your preference.
Well you know if you feel some features could be added that would be fine, things can always have more features. But for some to say 'I want a private area with a trophy room where I can invite my friends', well. Lucky them. I went back in time and gave them one.
Adding another type of private player room on top of ship interiors is redundant busywork. Improving ship interiors -- the hideout we already have-- is reasonable.
Parallels: my second mission for Fed aligned Romulans.
The question is, How much time do you really spend on your bridge or interior decks now? Most of us, not much. The time loading and unloading the map, loading and unloading each deck, moving room to room to access officers, its all time. Lots of time. Isn't the grind going on right now more than enough?!
Player and forumite formerly known as FEELTHETHUNDER
Expatriot Might Characters in EXILE
The hideout system in Champs is fairly robust actually. Not quite on par with the bases in CoH, but still pretty decent. A lot better then the few trophies we can do in STO.
Having the same level of customization in the captains cabin as my CO Hideout would be rather cool.
This is the thing I've never understood and it's true of every MMO I've played that offers any sort of housing option.
The Dev's spend X hours and Y $'s making the system, but then never give anyone a real reason to actually use them. In the best case, such as CoH they had some practical use as a travel hub, but the most you did then was run though it to the teleporters. In CO, you can access your bank and the tailor from your hideout.
But none of those things really offer much reason to go there. In every case it seems to be that the Dev's spend all that time and money to make a customizable social area.
What they need to do is offer missions, slightly higher rewarding doff stuff, and other events to player housing so people actually have some use for going there.
Player housing is a huge money maker, if done right, its also potentially incredibly satisfying to players and makes them more likely to stay around once they have something to call their own.
The SB and embassy are generic, bland, and nothing you can really be proud of. Why invite someone to our star base? It looks exactly like theirs.
Our ship interiors are a mess, wasting away and under utilized from in episode content to general ship interactivity.
Having housing on different locations around the galaxy seems like a great idea, but whos going to do that? You'd need different rooms on each location so they all don't feel the same, that is a major project with even more upkeep in the long run.
I think our ship interior is the best place for an overhaul. An admiral's quarters should be large and.. empty. Yes, empty to start with. Our quarters are the ultimate fluff, give us some basics free, and let us choose where to put them, and let us remove them when we want.
I'd imagine our quarters with 50+ slots to put stuff on, the slots could be categorized as to generic size. So you might have 5 ground (large) slots you can position a bed or other large equipment. You'll have a few large wall and maybe a dozen small wall spots, along with small ground areas then paint and floors, etc.
I would think we would get a basic bed, table, etc for free, with a nominal 10ec or so charge to put them up, and 10ec to remove them and then to reposition. If you want more than a basic anything they would be available via zen unlocks (and 10ec to remove/reposition.) Some items should be unlocked by in game accolades as well.
The trick is creating the perfect room layout that isn't totally mechanical, where your defined spaces don't feel too spaced out or too cramped. If you just put a bunch of wall spots side by side in a long row it loses it's appeal.
To me the room doesn't have to be entirely functional, you could sell extra storage, a wall safe, install a closet for tailor access, etc. It just has to be mine, and I would pay entirely too much for it if it were.
Completed Starbase, Embassy, Mine, Spire and No Win Scenario
Nothing to do anymore.
http://dtfleet.com/
Visit our Youtube channel
Customization without any real use. Ooo, look, I changed the color of the carpet, the style of the shower, and what's outside the moon base. Oooo, ah. But it doesn't DO anything.
It isn't an issue of "more accurate" on your second point. My point was perfectly accurate. But you are correct in saying if there was more to do in the ship interior people might spend more time there. I doubt it though. The game is outside the ship flying through space, shooting stuff.
Time spent loading is important. Every time we add something more to load in and out of is time not doing the core of the game. The core of the game is out there in space, in teams , ground and space instances, in social zones and doing missions with our fleets.
Player and forumite formerly known as FEELTHETHUNDER
Expatriot Might Characters in EXILE
[citation needed]
Another place to consider putting this is at Captain's Table. Give that place some purpose!
___________________________
In game: Commadore_Bob; Joined Jul 2009; That post count + 20,000
Yes; and forum threads complaining about how show-stopper housing bugs go unfixed for long periods, and devs saying in interviews that improvements "aren't even on their radar". Where's the evidence it's a "huge money-maker"?
I suspect if it was a huge money-maker, more games would be doing it, and it would be getting more regular attention from LotRO devs.
Housing in LOTRO is pretty useless. The entire time I played the game I didn't need or use it. And the development of it has been glacial. I think Everquest 2 has far more robust housing. And even that, while fun because of how much customization is available, is overall useless.
(Just in case it's not apparent this is me agreeing with you, that's why I quoted you).
Yeah. I wouldn't mind more customization and the ability to change/control the look of my interiors more than what we currently have. But as you note here with Champions, even if they did add more customization and more areas for us to display things in this game, the issue would be that they didn't add anything to do in the interiors.
Also, it's a bit trickier in this game since they did give us stuff to "do" in the interiors. They gave us the DOFF thingies (though most folks just access them without walking around inside the ship). And they let us use interiors for some of the foundry stuff, so there are tools available to do a lot of things inside a ship's interior.
I'm not sure what else this dev team could do. Or even has the resources for.
So regardless of which interior you have, the device appears when the instance is created. Even if you change ships, the devices appear in those interiors.
Again, it would be just like the current Fleet Starbase and Embassy systems except this one is controlled by a single person.
___________________________
In game: Commadore_Bob; Joined Jul 2009; That post count + 20,000
Beam up to your ship and go down to the crew deck and sleep in your private cabain.
Thanks
Why do people like these small sets? Because they conserve time by allowing players to get things done quickly so they can get back outside to the real game. Because they spend time not loading maps.
Valoreah. Never mind. Addressing your personal criticism is useless. You are wrong on everything you said. Done with you.
Player and forumite formerly known as FEELTHETHUNDER
Expatriot Might Characters in EXILE
___________________________
In game: Commadore_Bob; Joined Jul 2009; That post count + 20,000
Already addressed this. Your argument, invalidated.