Interesting reading the Tribble thread, only read the first few pages but it's amazing how easy it is to miss problems or possible problems because of never really bothering with that content much.
Someone pointed out that the same people that started all this with their complaining will also be affected because people will actually use their text missions so that they can go AFK. Like I said that was something I wouldn't have thought of because I don't usually bother with that content. It did make me wonder if that's why the foundry got pulled altogether though, it did get pulled didn't it? Wouldn't know for sure with not being in there since the patch on Thursday and generally being tired at the moment.
every friday i spend 80$ and every monday i spend another 40$ on this game. since thursdays patch i havent spent 0$. So that 120$ Cryptic has lost out on. If its going to be till May untill you give us our 50 FM's back, that will be 1,440$ that Cryptic has lost out because of some foundry authors. You guys crossed the line with this BS. Im happy to give you my money as long as im happy with the game. You killed the only GOOD source of FM's that i use to contribute to the fleet. Turnabout is fair play i think. No FM's for me, no $ for you.
Considering we're not getting much from them, that is about the most we can do. I as well am no longer spending money with them.
No, I am not who you think I am. I am someone different. I am instead a banana.
Oh, just a heads up guys... they "Stealth Nerfed" "Fleet Defense Fleet Action". We just finished playing it with all the objectives completely and we all got 40 Fleet Marks over the usual 70-80. I am so annoyed about this...
Just another way for Cryptic to try and con the player base. :mad:
A bunch of stuff I am inclined to agree with, as is just and fair and also out of fear of Marie's righteous boot heel
Pretty much this. Arbitrarily funneling our play time into boring, repetitive tedium makes the game feel stale real quick. Let people advance their fleets by playing the way that they enjoy playing. You don't even need to add much more content, just let more of the existing content provide viable ways of advancing the fleet system.
The point is, Cryptic... we are willing to grind for marks. But you are FAILING TO PROVIDE A VARIETY OF ENVIRONMENTS AND MISSIONS TO DO SO.
I have to disagree. There are some on this forum that would say 'Yes, I am willing to grind.' Unfortunately the majority of players are tired of the grind.
grind [grahynd] Show IPA
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: tedious job
Synonyms: chore, drudgery, groove, grubwork, hard work, labor, moil, pace, rote, routine, rut, sweat, task, toil, travail, treadmill
Drudgery is what people are feeling. This game being more like a second job is the majority concern. A certain amount of grind may be a part of MMOs but how they go about it, whether making it blatantly tedious and laborious or making it less apparent is what differentiates a good game from the sea of MMOs.
I have to disagree. There are some on this forum that would say 'Yes, I am willing to grind.' Unfortunately the majority of players are tired of the grind.
grind [grahynd] Show IPA
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: tedious job
Synonyms: chore, drudgery, groove, grubwork, hard work, labor, moil, pace, rote, routine, rut, sweat, task, toil, travail, treadmill
Drudgery is what people are feeling. This game being more like a second job is the majority concern. A certain amount of grind may be a part of MMOs but how they go about it, whether making it blatantly tedious and laborious or making it less apparent is what differentiates a good game from the sea of MMOs.
I actually agree, I think that its got to the point that I actually dread having to manage my Fleet now..
Oh, just a heads up guys... they "Stealth Nerfed" "Fleet Defense Fleet Action". We just finished playing it with all the objectives completely and we all got 40 Fleet Marks over the usual 70-80. I am so annoyed about this...
Just another way for Cryptic to try and con the player base. :mad:
I am not surprised in the least on this.
If they can nerf The Foundry, why not the other crappy sources of FMs as well. They need to slow starbase construction to a crawl. The mega-fleets are hitting their goals at a much faster pace than Cryptic anticipated. Lets face it, if it wasn't time gated, there would be Tier 5 fleets already.
I don't think their ready for Tier 5 starbases, period. Maybe they have glitches to work out or something. But I think their afraid of fleets hitting Tier 5 before their ready. That's what this nerf was about in the first place. Not an attack on rep system, but on the fleet project system.
Oh, just a heads up guys... they "Stealth Nerfed" "Fleet Defense Fleet Action". We just finished playing it with all the objectives completely and we all got 40 Fleet Marks over the usual 70-80. I am so annoyed about this...
Just another way for Cryptic to try and con the player base. :mad:
They stealth nerf a lot of things. This is what I mean by they are not completely honest with us in patch notes as some other MMO companies are.
It might just be me and I may be wrong, but I remember when you could turn in 5 white DOFFs for a green and it didn't cost anything. Then after a patch it went up to 500 dilithium. We were all annoyed by that. Even though I do not use that assignment, I went and looked again and now it costs 600 dilithium. I do not recall a patch note stating that there was to be another increase.
Seriously, it makes you think. How many other changes have been made to make this game harder that they haven't cared to mention?
No, I am not who you think I am. I am someone different. I am instead a banana.
Interesting reading the Tribble thread, only read the first few pages but it's amazing how easy it is to miss problems or possible problems because of never really bothering with that content much.
Someone pointed out that the same people that started all this with their complaining will also be affected because people will actually use their text missions so that they can go AFK. Like I said that was something I wouldn't have thought of because I don't usually bother with that content. It did make me wonder if that's why the foundry got pulled altogether though, it did get pulled didn't it? Wouldn't know for sure with not being in there since the patch on Thursday and generally being tired at the moment.
It was down for a supposed server crash for about 6 or 7 hours. You can still AFK in some of these ship battle missions and ground BOFF missions... they didn't stop that, all they did was nerf the rewards.. you get about 600 dil for 20 minutes of play. They took away 300 dil and 50 fm but that's it.
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
I don't think their ready for Tier 5 starbases, period. Maybe they have glitches to work out or something. But I think their afraid of fleets hitting Tier 5 before their ready. That's what this nerf was about in the first place. Not an attack on rep system, but on the fleet project system.
Considering how badly bugged the T3-T5 stuff was and is in the Omega/Rommie rep system, it wouldn't surprise me in the least to learn that they pulled another "we'll release a completely unfinished system and try to fix it before people level up high enough to notice that we didn't actually release what we say we did".
Seriously, it makes you think. How many other changes have been made to make this game harder that they haven't cared to mention?
one thing i noticed is that any inspect freighter/confiscate contraband i do with purple doffs and 1-2 crit traits each fail 8 times out of 10 and 5 times out of 10 its a disaster with injuries.
and when it does crit (1 time out of 10 is my guess) all i get is 1 contraband and a bunch of other junk.
and we all remember when they bumped up the amount of contraband and the completion time for the turn in contraband assignment . . .
They stealth nerf a lot of things. This is what I mean by they are not completely honest with us in patch notes as some other MMO companies are.
It might just be me and I may be wrong, but I remember when you could turn in 5 white DOFFs for a green and it didn't cost anything. Then after a patch it went up to 500 dilithium. We were all annoyed by that. Even though I do not use that assignment, I went and looked again and now it costs 600 dilithium. I do not recall a patch note stating that there was to be another increase.
Seriously, it makes you think. How many other changes have been made to make this game harder that they haven't cared to mention?
I haven't used the personnel officer since they drove the price up. You can get the officers with fleet credits far easier just buying career specific ones. I used to spend a lot of dilithium on officers when it was like 10 dilithium. it used to be 5 white+10dil to get green, 5 green+50 dil to get blue, and 5 blue+500 dil to get pink. I quit that as soon as they raised the price outrageously. It's like a big shell game... watch the hand over here and see it give you something you like while missing the stealthy slap in the face with the other hand stealing something away.
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
Considering how badly bugged the T3-T5 stuff was and is in the Omega/Rommie rep system, it wouldn't surprise me in the least to learn that they pulled another "we'll release a completely unfinished system and try to fix it before people level up high enough to notice that we didn't actually release what we say we did".
That could very well be.
Dev: 'But Dan, its not ready yet!'
D.Stahl: 'Don't worry, we have over a year or so to fix it before people even begin to come close to Tier 5. They'll never know..'
Almost a year later...
Dev: 'ZOMG!! A fleets going to be Tier 5 in a week!'
D.Stahl: 'Nerf EVERYTHING that has to do with Fleet Marks! That'll slow them down..'
Dev: "But, what about the backlash from players?'
D.Stahl: 'Don't worry, we got a 3 day weekend. It'll blow over...'
"The problem is more complicated than most players comprehend."
This 174 pages are the proof that Therilynn Shull is right.
This is an interesting article.
Personally I have thought this for a long time - I don't think that you can just write code that's going to adequately determine what missions are good and what missions are not.
I think what this may need is a couple of employees by Cryptic specifically to review Foundry missions.
Sadly this will likely end with them being flamed to death, too. However, that's the best solution that I think is viable (and maybe even realistic). They could reclassify the missions as necessary.
I wish I knew how many missions in the Foundry there actually were, that might give a better idea of how practical this sort of thing might actually be, although I suspect "a whole lot" is the most specific we're going to be getting.
Note I do not say that such a review system is necessarily a GOOD solution... just one of the less bad ones.
The Foundry and it's associated reward system is just a cursory issue. The Foundry is the focus right now because it was our only venue to relieve the tedium that is the grindfest of the rest of the game.
Anyway...Power to the People! Keep up The Good Fight!
They stealth nerf a lot of things. This is what I mean by they are not completely honest with us in patch notes as some other MMO companies are.
It might just be me and I may be wrong, but I remember when you could turn in 5 white DOFFs for a green and it didn't cost anything. Then after a patch it went up to 500 dilithium. We were all annoyed by that. Even though I do not use that assignment, I went and looked again and now it costs 600 dilithium. I do not recall a patch note stating that there was to be another increase.
Seriously, it makes you think. How many other changes have been made to make this game harder that they haven't cared to mention?
I said it before but I'll say it again... I think it's time to take the bigger issues to the people who make the financial and hiring decisions at PWE and Cryptic Studios. I'm sure by now since some articles are being written on other gaming websites outside the STO forums that the big wigs will get involved anyways at this point.
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
Based on decades in management... and my experience running a successful business I am going to make the following observations:
1) Time Management: I don't think that internally Cryptic practices any form of time management. This shows in the sheer number of items that are not finished or unobtainable (Flamethrower, Robes for KDF, Android Officer, among others ) despite being promised is astounding. Brandon comes on here and via his blog postings and his links to other Dev postings... we are promised things that just never arrive. So what does a Cryptic Dev DO all day? It seems to me three months is more than enough time to finish a flamethrower code or to install uniform options on the KDF side.... I don't think the leaders monitor their workers... who do NOT stay on task... resulting in yet another half-baked mostly unfinished season. Getting four consecutive Romulan Data Chips that state "PLACEHOLDER TEXT -- STORY GOES HERE" turned me off to the history collection REAL quick. Projects need to be completed on time, or the season needs to be delayed. I would have rather waited an extra month and a half for a FINISHED WORKABLE Season Seven rather than what we have now.
2) Quality Assurance: My question to Cryptic and I really would like an answer: Do you test internally? At all? After seeing the severity of the bugs in this latest patch... I really would like to learn all about your internal process. This is something that I can actually help you with, should you care to improve. If you wish to hire a Quality Engineer, please contact me!
Lets look at it from the player POV: A) Broken major healing power that jams controls for 120 sec, and totally screws up cloak and any sort of "transform" or "mode switch" power. Promised store unlocks... not available after unlocking the store.
How did you not notice that the unlocks in the store were not hooked up? I'm not criticizing I'm genuinely curious! Do devs self-check their code segments before integrating? What about after Or does someone check the code and send it back for further tuning? Does anyone check the game on a production build?
What about the starship powers that are broken? Did no one sit down and run a handful of missions on both factions? The lockout glitch was discovered by me within ten min of patching. First mission I ran. The cloak and transform glitches shortly thereafter. Would have taken an internal tester the same amount of time... and the code could have been adjusted or not released.
Same thing with the store unlocks. Did no one fire up the game, run the unlock mission and alert the Dev that the store wasn't stocking? Apparently not.
Finally, we warn you via Tribble that something is broken -- I've seen it happen -- yet the next day the patch releases and breaks the game. Why not stop the patch release and fix what we discovered? I don't think you have an internal process to get the Tribble info to someone who can abort the live-patch in time to avoid breaking the game.
In order to fix this, you need a dedicated playtest team. You need to test on the actual live environment under real-world conditions. Not just your ultra-tuned totally debugged internal Dev shard. Finally you need to release patches to Tribble a week to two weeks before "live" and put a process in place to abort patch release if the testers discover broken stuff.
3) Old Bugs: This goes with the above questions and observations. I know I've submitted tickets on the Romulan and Klingon weapon glitches for the plot missions. I did so back in Season Five, and I submit tickets every few months. I've talked to Das Overflake and I've emailed Dan... problem is untouched.
Is there a process in place, or anyone even assigned to fix long-standing bugs? Does not look like it. Ties into time management above. Time needs to be dedicated to fixing what is already broken before releasing more broken content.
4) Lastly and this is a personal call -- feel free to disregard. There is a distinct lack of creativity in this game. Plasma Beams, Plasma Torpedoes, Omega Plasma, Plasma Energy Bolts, Plasma Riders, Plasma Consoles... do I need to go on? We also have multiple colored-cloud dispensers that all basically do the same thing. Theta, Warp Plasma, Tetyron Plasma, and the gas canisters on the Regent.
We have beams. We have pulses. We have torpedo. We have mines. There are other weapons in the Star Trek universe -- Merculite Rockets for example. What about really primitive weapons like X-ray pulse lasers and NPB beams? Dual-cannon turrets? Voyager had a IsoKinetic Cannon. This is where other Trek games shined... Unique gimmicks and abilities above and beyond the standard pew pew.
I would like to see more variety in weapons going forward. And for the love of all that's important PLEASE give plasma and cloud-dispensers a break for awhile!
My final thoughts on the matter are this: The fan outrage isn't just about the fleet-marks. You dumped a massively broken patch on us for a three day weekend and made no attempt to roll it back. I would have tolerated the fleet-mark nonsense grudgingly... but on top of being unable to play my favorite ships for WHO KNOWS how long -- it's intolerable.
It all comes down to listening to your fans. We are fed up with the lack of quality assurance and we are fed up with the heavy-handed adjustments and nerfing of the reward systems.
Based on decades in management... and my experience running a successful business I am going to make the following observations:
1) Time Management: I don't think that internally Cryptic practices any form of time management. This shows in the sheer number of items that are not finished or unobtainable (Flamethrower, Robes for KDF, Android Officer, among others ) despite being promised is astounding. Brandon comes on here and via his blog postings and his links to other Dev postings... we are promised things that just never arrive. So what does a Cryptic Dev DO all day? It seems to me three months is more than enough time to finish a flamethrower code or to install uniform options on the KDF side.... I don't think the leaders monitor their workers... who do NOT stay on task... resulting in yet another half-baked mostly unfinished season. Getting four consecutive Romulan Data Chips that state "PLACEHOLDER TEXT -- STORY GOES HERE" turned me off to the history collection REAL quick. Projects need to be completed on time, or the season needs to be delayed. I would have rather waited an extra month and a half for a FINISHED WORKABLE Season Seven rather than what we have now.
2) Quality Assurance: My question to Cryptic and I really would like an answer: Do you test internally? At all? After seeing the severity of the bugs in this latest patch... I really would like to learn all about your internal process. This is something that I can actually help you with, should you care to improve. If you wish to hire a Quality Engineer, please contact me!
Lets look at it from the player POV: A) Broken major healing power that jams controls for 120 sec, and totally screws up cloak and any sort of "transform" or "mode switch" power. Promised store unlocks... not available after unlocking the store.
How did you not notice that the unlocks in the store were not hooked up? I'm not criticizing I'm genuinely curious! Do devs self-check their code segments before integrating? What about after Or does someone check the code and send it back for further tuning? Does anyone check the game on a production build?
What about the starship powers that are broken? Did no one sit down and run a handful of missions on both factions? The lockout glitch was discovered by me within ten min of patching. First mission I ran. The cloak and transform glitches shortly thereafter. Would have taken an internal tester the same amount of time... and the code could have been adjusted or not released.
Same thing with the store unlocks. Did no one fire up the game, run the unlock mission and alert the Dev that the store wasn't stocking? Apparently not.
Finally, we warn you via Tribble that something is broken -- I've seen it happen -- yet the next day the patch releases and breaks the game. Why not stop the patch release and fix what we discovered? I don't think you have an internal process to get the Tribble info to someone who can abort the live-patch in time to avoid breaking the game.
In order to fix this, you need a dedicated playtest team. You need to test on the actual live environment under real-world conditions. Not just your ultra-tuned totally debugged internal Dev shard. Finally you need to release patches to Tribble a week to two weeks before "live" and put a process in place to abort patch release if the testers discover broken stuff.
3) Old Bugs: This goes with the above questions and observations. I know I've submitted tickets on the Romulan and Klingon weapon glitches for the plot missions. I did so back in Season Five, and I submit tickets every few months. I've talked to Das Overflake and I've emailed Dan... problem is untouched.
Is there a process in place, or anyone even assigned to fix long-standing bugs? Does not look like it. Ties into time management above. Time needs to be dedicated to fixing what is already broken before releasing more broken content.
4) Lastly and this is a personal call -- feel free to disregard. There is a distinct lack of creativity in this game. Plasma Beams, Plasma Torpedoes, Omega Plasma, Plasma Energy Bolts, Plasma Riders, Plasma Consoles... do I need to go on? We also have multiple colored-cloud dispensers that all basically do the same thing. Theta, Warp Plasma, Tetyron Plasma, and the gas canisters on the Regent.
We have beams. We have pulses. We have torpedo. We have mines. There are other weapons in the Star Trek universe -- Merculite Rockets for example. What about really primitive weapons like X-ray pulse lasers and NPB beams? Dual-cannon turrets? Voyager had a IsoKinetic Cannon. This is where other Trek games shined... Unique gimmicks and abilities above and beyond the standard pew pew.
I would like to see more variety in weapons going forward. And for the love of all that's important PLEASE give plasma and cloud-dispensers a break for awhile!
My final thoughts on the matter are this: The fan outrage isn't just about the fleet-marks. You dumped a massively broken patch on us for a three day weekend and made no attempt to roll it back. I would have tolerated the fleet-mark nonsense grudgingly... but on top of being unable to play my favorite ships for WHO KNOWS how long -- it's intolerable.
It all comes down to listening to your fans. We are fed up with the lack of quality assurance and we are fed up with the heavy-handed adjustments and nerfing of the reward systems.
Please. Fix. This.
You sir are a very intelligent man and I am in complete agreement, 100%
The cost for upgrading (duty officer reassignment) was a terrible change, however it has not had a more recent price increase as you stated (on Holodeck, at least). It's still 500/2500/5000 to get a green/blue/purple from 5 of a lower rarity.
I think, I know whats going on with that.
the 500/2500/5000 is from the personnel officer. If you go to the three racial ones, its more the 5 white to green is 600, the five blue to purple is 6000, I don't know what the green to blue is, as i don't ever do it on them, Either way, its way to damn much. And just adds in to the overly large demand for an overly restricted resource. Yet another time gate that Cryptic is so very very fond of.
its ok, I'm adapting their tactics, I'm gating my time in STO now.
If they can nerf The Foundry, why not the other crappy sources of FMs as well. They need to slow starbase construction to a crawl. The mega-fleets are hitting their goals at a much faster pace than Cryptic anticipated. Lets face it, if it wasn't time gated, there would be Tier 5 fleets already.
I don't think their ready for Tier 5 starbases, period. Maybe they have glitches to work out or something. But I think their afraid of fleets hitting Tier 5 before their ready. That's what this nerf was about in the first place. Not an attack on rep system, but on the fleet project system.
^^^
This actually makes sense. What other reason could there possibly be to basically bring Starbase construction to a halt? They simply aren't ready for there to be Tier 5 Starbases in the game yet.
Perhaps they should've put a cap on the maximum number of members that a Fleet could have in it. Thereby preventing any Fleet from advancing faster than they had anticipated.
Star Trek Online Volunteer Community Moderator and Resident She-Wolf
Community Moderators are Unpaid Volunteers and NOT Employees of Gearbox/Cryptic
Views and Opinions May Not Reflect the Views and Opinions of Gearbox/Cryptic
Personally I have thought this for a long time - I don't think that you can just write code that's going to adequately determine what missions are good and what missions are not.
I think what this may need is a couple of employees by Cryptic specifically to review Foundry missions.
Sadly this will likely end with them being flamed to death, too. However, that's the best solution that I think is viable (and maybe even realistic). They could reclassify the missions as necessary.
I wish I knew how many missions in the Foundry there actually were, that might give a better idea of how practical this sort of thing might actually be, although I suspect "a whole lot" is the most specific we're going to be getting.
Note I do not say that such a review system is necessarily a GOOD solution... just one of the less bad ones.
I think that content is in the eye of beholder. Just because it has Cryptic's blessing isn't going to tell me its good. All the spotlighted missions have been played by branflakes and that's how they become spotlighted. I still think player driven ratings are better but if there was a better sorting UI people could filter for their mission style first and then by ratings.
Someone had proposed that the system that actually measure the average playtime to qualify a mission be used to categorize missions by playtime into buckets that you can filter. Authors could also choose diplomatic (story) or combat mission or both buckets to further filter the missions.
As it stands with searching either author or keyword it doesn't really do much and it sometimes even fails at doing that. Top Rated doesn't have an algorithm to analyze how many plays either so new missions that are highly rated end up higher on the list. Missions that have been played more or been out for a longer time need to be weighted heavier or a mission should be out for a prerequisite time period before it qualifies to be top rated or have at least minimum number of ratings.
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
We have beams. We have pulses. We have torpedo. We have mines. There are other weapons in the Star Trek universe -- Merculite Rockets for example. What about really primitive weapons like X-ray pulse lasers and NPB beams? Dual-cannon turrets? Voyager had a IsoKinetic Cannon. This is where other Trek games shined... Unique gimmicks and abilities above and beyond the standard pew pew.
I would like to see more variety in weapons going forward. And for the love of all that's important PLEASE give plasma and cloud-dispensers a break for awhile!
The photonic cannon.
I see what you are saying though. Too much of the same thing. Sadly, bugs are all too common in this game. Heck, if they can't fix a bug, bring in an outsider so he can look at the code with fresh eyes.
It feels like they spend more time nerfing things and not enough time working out real bugs. I am sure they are smart people. Why can't these things be figured out already?
No, I am not who you think I am. I am someone different. I am instead a banana.
too bl**dy right ill give thumbs up from the brits :P
Seconded, thirded, and so on...
Fleet Commander
Caprica's Revenge (...actually active since November 2010, which may one day be important to archaeologists, but not to anyone else...)
Based on decades in management... and my experience running a successful business I am going to make the following observations:
1) Time Management: I don't think that internally Cryptic practices any form of time management. This shows in the sheer number of items that are not finished or unobtainable (Flamethrower, Robes for KDF, Android Officer, among others ) despite being promised is astounding. Brandon comes on here and via his blog postings and his links to other Dev postings... we are promised things that just never arrive. So what does a Cryptic Dev DO all day? It seems to me three months is more than enough time to finish a flamethrower code or to install uniform options on the KDF side.... I don't think the leaders monitor their workers... who do NOT stay on task... resulting in yet another half-baked mostly unfinished season. Getting four consecutive Romulan Data Chips that state "PLACEHOLDER TEXT -- STORY GOES HERE" turned me off to the history collection REAL quick. Projects need to be completed on time, or the season needs to be delayed. I would have rather waited an extra month and a half for a FINISHED WORKABLE Season Seven rather than what we have now.
2) Quality Assurance: My question to Cryptic and I really would like an answer: Do you test internally? At all? After seeing the severity of the bugs in this latest patch... I really would like to learn all about your internal process. This is something that I can actually help you with, should you care to improve. If you wish to hire a Quality Engineer, please contact me!
Lets look at it from the player POV: A) Broken major healing power that jams controls for 120 sec, and totally screws up cloak and any sort of "transform" or "mode switch" power. Promised store unlocks... not available after unlocking the store.
How did you not notice that the unlocks in the store were not hooked up? I'm not criticizing I'm genuinely curious! Do devs self-check their code segments before integrating? What about after Or does someone check the code and send it back for further tuning? Does anyone check the game on a production build?
What about the starship powers that are broken? Did no one sit down and run a handful of missions on both factions? The lockout glitch was discovered by me within ten min of patching. First mission I ran. The cloak and transform glitches shortly thereafter. Would have taken an internal tester the same amount of time... and the code could have been adjusted or not released.
Same thing with the store unlocks. Did no one fire up the game, run the unlock mission and alert the Dev that the store wasn't stocking? Apparently not.
Finally, we warn you via Tribble that something is broken -- I've seen it happen -- yet the next day the patch releases and breaks the game. Why not stop the patch release and fix what we discovered? I don't think you have an internal process to get the Tribble info to someone who can abort the live-patch in time to avoid breaking the game.
In order to fix this, you need a dedicated playtest team. You need to test on the actual live environment under real-world conditions. Not just your ultra-tuned totally debugged internal Dev shard. Finally you need to release patches to Tribble a week to two weeks before "live" and put a process in place to abort patch release if the testers discover broken stuff.
3) Old Bugs: This goes with the above questions and observations. I know I've submitted tickets on the Romulan and Klingon weapon glitches for the plot missions. I did so back in Season Five, and I submit tickets every few months. I've talked to Das Overflake and I've emailed Dan... problem is untouched.
Is there a process in place, or anyone even assigned to fix long-standing bugs? Does not look like it. Ties into time management above. Time needs to be dedicated to fixing what is already broken before releasing more broken content.
4) Lastly and this is a personal call -- feel free to disregard. There is a distinct lack of creativity in this game. Plasma Beams, Plasma Torpedoes, Omega Plasma, Plasma Energy Bolts, Plasma Riders, Plasma Consoles... do I need to go on? We also have multiple colored-cloud dispensers that all basically do the same thing. Theta, Warp Plasma, Tetyron Plasma, and the gas canisters on the Regent.
We have beams. We have pulses. We have torpedo. We have mines. There are other weapons in the Star Trek universe -- Merculite Rockets for example. What about really primitive weapons like X-ray pulse lasers and NPB beams? Dual-cannon turrets? Voyager had a IsoKinetic Cannon. This is where other Trek games shined... Unique gimmicks and abilities above and beyond the standard pew pew.
I would like to see more variety in weapons going forward. And for the love of all that's important PLEASE give plasma and cloud-dispensers a break for awhile!
My final thoughts on the matter are this: The fan outrage isn't just about the fleet-marks. You dumped a massively broken patch on us for a three day weekend and made no attempt to roll it back. I would have tolerated the fleet-mark nonsense grudgingly... but on top of being unable to play my favorite ships for WHO KNOWS how long -- it's intolerable.
It all comes down to listening to your fans. We are fed up with the lack of quality assurance and we are fed up with the heavy-handed adjustments and nerfing of the reward systems.
Please. Fix. This.
Can we just quote this post as a reply for the rest of the life of this thread? Pretty much sums up the management of STO.
I think, I know whats going on with that.
the 500/2500/5000 is from the personnel officer. If you go to the three racial ones, its more the 5 white to green is 600, the five blue to purple is 6000, I don't know what the green to blue is, as i don't ever do it on them, Either way, its way to damn much. And just adds in to the overly large demand for an overly restricted resource. Yet another time gate that Cryptic is so very very fond of.
its ok, I'm adapting their tactics, I'm gating my time in STO now.
Ah, the racial ones do cost more. 600/3000/6000 instead of 500/2500/5000 for a random species.
Comments
Someone pointed out that the same people that started all this with their complaining will also be affected because people will actually use their text missions so that they can go AFK. Like I said that was something I wouldn't have thought of because I don't usually bother with that content. It did make me wonder if that's why the foundry got pulled altogether though, it did get pulled didn't it? Wouldn't know for sure with not being in there since the patch on Thursday and generally being tired at the moment.
Considering we're not getting much from them, that is about the most we can do. I as well am no longer spending money with them.
Just another way for Cryptic to try and con the player base. :mad:
Pretty much this. Arbitrarily funneling our play time into boring, repetitive tedium makes the game feel stale real quick. Let people advance their fleets by playing the way that they enjoy playing. You don't even need to add much more content, just let more of the existing content provide viable ways of advancing the fleet system.
I have to disagree. There are some on this forum that would say 'Yes, I am willing to grind.' Unfortunately the majority of players are tired of the grind.
grind [grahynd] Show IPA
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: tedious job
Synonyms: chore, drudgery, groove, grubwork, hard work, labor, moil, pace, rote, routine, rut, sweat, task, toil, travail, treadmill
Drudgery is what people are feeling. This game being more like a second job is the majority concern. A certain amount of grind may be a part of MMOs but how they go about it, whether making it blatantly tedious and laborious or making it less apparent is what differentiates a good game from the sea of MMOs.
I actually agree, I think that its got to the point that I actually dread having to manage my Fleet now..
I am not surprised in the least on this.
If they can nerf The Foundry, why not the other crappy sources of FMs as well. They need to slow starbase construction to a crawl. The mega-fleets are hitting their goals at a much faster pace than Cryptic anticipated. Lets face it, if it wasn't time gated, there would be Tier 5 fleets already.
I don't think their ready for Tier 5 starbases, period. Maybe they have glitches to work out or something. But I think their afraid of fleets hitting Tier 5 before their ready. That's what this nerf was about in the first place. Not an attack on rep system, but on the fleet project system.
They stealth nerf a lot of things. This is what I mean by they are not completely honest with us in patch notes as some other MMO companies are.
It might just be me and I may be wrong, but I remember when you could turn in 5 white DOFFs for a green and it didn't cost anything. Then after a patch it went up to 500 dilithium. We were all annoyed by that. Even though I do not use that assignment, I went and looked again and now it costs 600 dilithium. I do not recall a patch note stating that there was to be another increase.
Seriously, it makes you think. How many other changes have been made to make this game harder that they haven't cared to mention?
It was down for a supposed server crash for about 6 or 7 hours. You can still AFK in some of these ship battle missions and ground BOFF missions... they didn't stop that, all they did was nerf the rewards.. you get about 600 dil for 20 minutes of play. They took away 300 dil and 50 fm but that's it.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
Considering how badly bugged the T3-T5 stuff was and is in the Omega/Rommie rep system, it wouldn't surprise me in the least to learn that they pulled another "we'll release a completely unfinished system and try to fix it before people level up high enough to notice that we didn't actually release what we say we did".
and when it does crit (1 time out of 10 is my guess) all i get is 1 contraband and a bunch of other junk.
and we all remember when they bumped up the amount of contraband and the completion time for the turn in contraband assignment . . .
I haven't used the personnel officer since they drove the price up. You can get the officers with fleet credits far easier just buying career specific ones. I used to spend a lot of dilithium on officers when it was like 10 dilithium. it used to be 5 white+10dil to get green, 5 green+50 dil to get blue, and 5 blue+500 dil to get pink. I quit that as soon as they raised the price outrageously. It's like a big shell game... watch the hand over here and see it give you something you like while missing the stealthy slap in the face with the other hand stealing something away.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
That could very well be.
Dev: 'But Dan, its not ready yet!'
D.Stahl: 'Don't worry, we have over a year or so to fix it before people even begin to come close to Tier 5. They'll never know..'
Almost a year later...
Dev: 'ZOMG!! A fleets going to be Tier 5 in a week!'
D.Stahl: 'Nerf EVERYTHING that has to do with Fleet Marks! That'll slow them down..'
Dev: "But, what about the backlash from players?'
D.Stahl: 'Don't worry, we got a 3 day weekend. It'll blow over...'
XD
This is an interesting article.
Personally I have thought this for a long time - I don't think that you can just write code that's going to adequately determine what missions are good and what missions are not.
I think what this may need is a couple of employees by Cryptic specifically to review Foundry missions.
Sadly this will likely end with them being flamed to death, too. However, that's the best solution that I think is viable (and maybe even realistic). They could reclassify the missions as necessary.
I wish I knew how many missions in the Foundry there actually were, that might give a better idea of how practical this sort of thing might actually be, although I suspect "a whole lot" is the most specific we're going to be getting.
Note I do not say that such a review system is necessarily a GOOD solution... just one of the less bad ones.
Anyway...Power to the People! Keep up The Good Fight!
The cost for upgrading (duty officer reassignment) was a terrible change, however it has not had a more recent price increase as you stated (on Holodeck, at least). It's still 500/2500/5000 to get a green/blue/purple from 5 of a lower rarity.
My STOwiki page | Reachable in-game @PhyrexianHero
Fed Armada: Section 31 (level 730, 2700+ members)
KDF Armada: Klingon Intelligence (level 699, 2100+ members)
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
1) Time Management: I don't think that internally Cryptic practices any form of time management. This shows in the sheer number of items that are not finished or unobtainable (Flamethrower, Robes for KDF, Android Officer, among others ) despite being promised is astounding. Brandon comes on here and via his blog postings and his links to other Dev postings... we are promised things that just never arrive. So what does a Cryptic Dev DO all day? It seems to me three months is more than enough time to finish a flamethrower code or to install uniform options on the KDF side.... I don't think the leaders monitor their workers... who do NOT stay on task... resulting in yet another half-baked mostly unfinished season. Getting four consecutive Romulan Data Chips that state "PLACEHOLDER TEXT -- STORY GOES HERE" turned me off to the history collection REAL quick. Projects need to be completed on time, or the season needs to be delayed. I would have rather waited an extra month and a half for a FINISHED WORKABLE Season Seven rather than what we have now.
2) Quality Assurance: My question to Cryptic and I really would like an answer: Do you test internally? At all? After seeing the severity of the bugs in this latest patch... I really would like to learn all about your internal process. This is something that I can actually help you with, should you care to improve. If you wish to hire a Quality Engineer, please contact me!
Lets look at it from the player POV: A) Broken major healing power that jams controls for 120 sec, and totally screws up cloak and any sort of "transform" or "mode switch" power.
How did you not notice that the unlocks in the store were not hooked up? I'm not criticizing I'm genuinely curious! Do devs self-check their code segments before integrating? What about after Or does someone check the code and send it back for further tuning? Does anyone check the game on a production build?
What about the starship powers that are broken? Did no one sit down and run a handful of missions on both factions? The lockout glitch was discovered by me within ten min of patching. First mission I ran. The cloak and transform glitches shortly thereafter. Would have taken an internal tester the same amount of time... and the code could have been adjusted or not released.
Same thing with the store unlocks. Did no one fire up the game, run the unlock mission and alert the Dev that the store wasn't stocking? Apparently not.
Finally, we warn you via Tribble that something is broken -- I've seen it happen -- yet the next day the patch releases and breaks the game. Why not stop the patch release and fix what we discovered? I don't think you have an internal process to get the Tribble info to someone who can abort the live-patch in time to avoid breaking the game.
In order to fix this, you need a dedicated playtest team. You need to test on the actual live environment under real-world conditions. Not just your ultra-tuned totally debugged internal Dev shard. Finally you need to release patches to Tribble a week to two weeks before "live" and put a process in place to abort patch release if the testers discover broken stuff.
3) Old Bugs: This goes with the above questions and observations. I know I've submitted tickets on the Romulan and Klingon weapon glitches for the plot missions. I did so back in Season Five, and I submit tickets every few months. I've talked to Das Overflake and I've emailed Dan... problem is untouched.
Is there a process in place, or anyone even assigned to fix long-standing bugs? Does not look like it. Ties into time management above. Time needs to be dedicated to fixing what is already broken before releasing more broken content.
4) Lastly and this is a personal call -- feel free to disregard. There is a distinct lack of creativity in this game. Plasma Beams, Plasma Torpedoes, Omega Plasma, Plasma Energy Bolts, Plasma Riders, Plasma Consoles... do I need to go on? We also have multiple colored-cloud dispensers that all basically do the same thing. Theta, Warp Plasma, Tetyron Plasma, and the gas canisters on the Regent.
We have beams. We have pulses. We have torpedo. We have mines. There are other weapons in the Star Trek universe -- Merculite Rockets for example. What about really primitive weapons like X-ray pulse lasers and NPB beams? Dual-cannon turrets? Voyager had a IsoKinetic Cannon. This is where other Trek games shined... Unique gimmicks and abilities above and beyond the standard pew pew.
I would like to see more variety in weapons going forward. And for the love of all that's important PLEASE give plasma and cloud-dispensers a break for awhile!
My final thoughts on the matter are this: The fan outrage isn't just about the fleet-marks. You dumped a massively broken patch on us for a three day weekend and made no attempt to roll it back. I would have tolerated the fleet-mark nonsense grudgingly... but on top of being unable to play my favorite ships for WHO KNOWS how long -- it's intolerable.
It all comes down to listening to your fans. We are fed up with the lack of quality assurance and we are fed up with the heavy-handed adjustments and nerfing of the reward systems.
Please. Fix. This.
You sir are a very intelligent man and I am in complete agreement, 100%
I think, I know whats going on with that.
the 500/2500/5000 is from the personnel officer. If you go to the three racial ones, its more the 5 white to green is 600, the five blue to purple is 6000, I don't know what the green to blue is, as i don't ever do it on them, Either way, its way to damn much. And just adds in to the overly large demand for an overly restricted resource. Yet another time gate that Cryptic is so very very fond of.
its ok, I'm adapting their tactics, I'm gating my time in STO now.
This is the one I was talking about.
https://twitter.com/Executive_Emily/status/303580234777780224/photo/1
Was this always like this?
^^^
This actually makes sense. What other reason could there possibly be to basically bring Starbase construction to a halt? They simply aren't ready for there to be Tier 5 Starbases in the game yet.
Perhaps they should've put a cap on the maximum number of members that a Fleet could have in it. Thereby preventing any Fleet from advancing faster than they had anticipated.
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In a word: nope.
I think that content is in the eye of beholder. Just because it has Cryptic's blessing isn't going to tell me its good. All the spotlighted missions have been played by branflakes and that's how they become spotlighted. I still think player driven ratings are better but if there was a better sorting UI people could filter for their mission style first and then by ratings.
Someone had proposed that the system that actually measure the average playtime to qualify a mission be used to categorize missions by playtime into buckets that you can filter. Authors could also choose diplomatic (story) or combat mission or both buckets to further filter the missions.
As it stands with searching either author or keyword it doesn't really do much and it sometimes even fails at doing that. Top Rated doesn't have an algorithm to analyze how many plays either so new missions that are highly rated end up higher on the list. Missions that have been played more or been out for a longer time need to be weighted heavier or a mission should be out for a prerequisite time period before it qualifies to be top rated or have at least minimum number of ratings.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
The photonic cannon.
I see what you are saying though. Too much of the same thing. Sadly, bugs are all too common in this game. Heck, if they can't fix a bug, bring in an outsider so he can look at the code with fresh eyes.
It feels like they spend more time nerfing things and not enough time working out real bugs. I am sure they are smart people. Why can't these things be figured out already?
Seconded, thirded, and so on...
Fleet Commander
Caprica's Revenge
(...actually active since November 2010, which may one day be important to archaeologists, but not to anyone else...)
IF that is from the Vulcan, Andorian, or Tellarite, yes. Its in the patch notes where they added it.
and I checked the personnel officer just a bit ago, its still 500.
Can we just quote this post as a reply for the rest of the life of this thread? Pretty much sums up the management of STO.
Seconded, that way Cryptic may pay attention to it.
Ah, the racial ones do cost more. 600/3000/6000 instead of 500/2500/5000 for a random species.
Ahh, this is for the Tellarite ones. As far as I can tell, those also went up in price along with the generics for Season 7.
My STOwiki page | Reachable in-game @PhyrexianHero
Fed Armada: Section 31 (level 730, 2700+ members)
KDF Armada: Klingon Intelligence (level 699, 2100+ members)