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Season 7 Dev Blog #39

pwebranflakespwebranflakes Member Posts: 7,741
Lead Content Designer Scott "Goatshark" Shicoff shares details about the fourth Embassy Featured Project in this entry of the Season 7 News Dev Blog series.


Link to the blog.
Post edited by pwebranflakes on
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  • amayakitsuneamayakitsune Member Posts: 977 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    Yea... I always thought this room didnt make much sense for an Embassy... it still doesnt... but atleast as a room it will make sense now...
    7NGGeUP.png

  • leviathan99#2867 leviathan99 Member Posts: 7,747 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    These projects need to grant base XP. I'm in a larger fleet and there seems to be discord over whether we'll even do them.

    Usually what seems to happen from my POV is that the Fleet Leader forbids anyone from doing the special cosmetic projects and then someone else queues them up behind his back and finishes them and we get griping about how we can get dilithium for these but not enough for the regular projects, which linger for days with nothing left needed for them except dilithium.

    Either attach XP to the cosmetic projects or shift them over to eat fleet credits instead of dilithium.
  • meurikmeurik Member Posts: 856 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    Yea... I always thought this room didnt make much sense for an Embassy... it still doesnt... but atleast as a room it will make sense now...

    I'm assuming Cryptic is taking reference from the episode 'The Andorian Incident'. Where a seemingly peaceful Vulcan monastery, was secretly designed as a subspace listening post, in order to spy on their 'violent' Andorian neighbours.

    http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/The_Andorian_Incident_(episode)
    Either attach XP to the cosmetic projects or shift them over to eat fleet credits instead of dilithium.

    Can't disagree here. 200k Dilithium is a rather large sum, for something that is nothing more than a cosmetic upgrade. Some form of Fleet Starbase/Embassy XP should be awarded in the very least, and i'd whole-heartedly support the usage of Fleet Credit -instead of- Dilithium. Or atleast, reduce the Dilithium cost, and add a Fleet Credit cost to compensate.
    HvGQ9pH.png
  • leviathan99#2867 leviathan99 Member Posts: 7,747 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    meurik wrote: »
    I'm assuming Cryptic is taking reference from the episode 'The Andorian Incident'. Where a seemingly peaceful Vulcan monastery, was secretly designed as a subspace listening post, in order to spy on their 'violent' Andorian neighbours.

    http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/The_Andorian_Incident_(episode)



    Can't disagree here. 200k Dilithium is a rather large sum, for something that is nothing more than a cosmetic upgrade. Some form of Fleet Starbase/Embassy XP should be awarded in the very least, and i'd whole-heartedly support the usage of Fleet Credit -instead of- Dilithium. Or atleast, reduce the Dilithium cost, and add a Fleet Credit cost to compensate.

    The thing with a fleet credit cost is that it's still basically a dilithium cost because that's how most of your fleet credits get earned in a massive fleet and if there are other worthwhile things to spend fleet credits on, the person is going to focus on getting more dilithium to get more fleet credits.

    But direct dilithium cost gets contentious because it interferes with fleet projects whereas fleet credit cost would only interfere with personal goals.
  • meurikmeurik Member Posts: 856 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    The thing with a fleet credit cost is that it's still basically a dilithium cost because that's how most of your fleet credits get earned in a massive fleet and if there are other worthwhile things to spend fleet credits on, the person is going to focus on getting more dilithium to get more fleet credits.

    But direct dilithium cost gets contentious because it interferes with fleet projects whereas fleet credit cost would only interfere with personal goals.

    I have 400k+ Fleet Credits currently accumulated on my main, which I have no current use for. I've got all the Advanced Fleet Weapons I want, outfitted my Bridge Officers in their own Fleet Weapons, Armors and Shields. At current, I have no further use for Fleet Credits. I would love to spend some of that on something that benefits my Fleet.
    HvGQ9pH.png
  • bluegeekbluegeek Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    {Sigh} 200K Dilithium for another cosmetic "project" that brings no new functionality to the table.

    It's pretty and all, but it's just too much.

    I agree with Leviathan that this would make more sense as a Fleet Credit cost. Either that, or lower the Dil cost, or add some real functionality to these things that makes them worth the cost.

    I guess some folks must be shelling out the Dilithium for these, or they wouldn't do them?

    I can only guess that these are for large fleets that are starved for Fleet Credits. I can't imagine any other good reason to keep doing these.
    My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here
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  • edna#7310 edna Member Posts: 21 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    I like how people invest in decorations for a map which is in a area rarely used (even more rare if your fleet is small).I have a toon in one of the biggest fleets in game and the embassy is the most private place in the game after my bridge lol.

    a good 200,000 dilithium project would be "move all stores from embassy on fleet base".:rolleyes:
  • amayakitsuneamayakitsune Member Posts: 977 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    bluegeek wrote: »
    I can only guess that these are for large fleets that are starved for Fleet Credits. I can't imagine any other good reason to keep doing these.

    Or perhaps that people just like things that look pretty?
    7NGGeUP.png

  • leviathan99#2867 leviathan99 Member Posts: 7,747 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    bluegeek wrote: »
    {Sigh} 200K Dilithium for another cosmetic "project" that brings no new functionality to the table.

    It's pretty and all, but it's just too much.

    I agree with Leviathan that this would make more sense as a Fleet Credit cost. Either that, or lower the Dil cost, or add some real functionality to these things that makes them worth the cost.

    I guess some folks must be shelling out the Dilithium for these, or they wouldn't do them?

    I can only guess that these are for large fleets that are starved for Fleet Credits. I can't imagine any other good reason to keep doing these.

    There may be large fleets that are starved for fleet credits but Stahl himself said large fleets tend to be dilithium starved. This doesn't improve that situation. It just creates conflict between fleet members who care about progress and fleet members who care about cosmetics because you'll have regular projects go unfilled when somebody queues up these and contributes 200k. Then the fleet leadership will say, "But we just need 80k to finish out our standard projects and it took us six weeks to get the 2 million for the embassy upgrade! Where did the 200k for this come from?"
  • wolfpacknzwolfpacknz Member Posts: 783 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    Woohoo another shiney to sink 200k of damned hard earned dili into. Yeah no thanks. How about something actually useful or drop the price!!
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  • usscapitalusscapital Member Posts: 985 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    a project that is worth while and does something useful next please :(
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  • jonpark020979jonpark020979 Member Posts: 41 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    i agree the price for these projects are getting out of hand, why would we spend 200,000 dil for this when we can't even finish the regular projects. I get why you use dil for it i just say downgrade how much.

    i would also agree to some kind of xp reward or maybe you could make it like trade xp for the commadations reputation.
  • hrisvalarhrisvalar Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    These projects need to grant base XP.

    That's not a bad idea. Can't be too much XP, I suppose, but at 100 XP per project it might work, if Cryptic's not completely married to the idea of having to finish at least one subsection's tier X before you get corresponding base upgrade. I think they needn't be. At least for the starbase, those things bring enough incentives of their own to still get done. The embassies have a bit less ground to cover (six subtiers minimum instead of thirteen) so the impact there'd be bigger. Though it'll be more than a few more months before there'll have been enough embassy projects to make that dent. And in the meanwhile, really... two million dilithium for a 1000 starbase or embassy XP would hardly feel to me like I was robbing Cryptic.

    Other than that, as for the cost of the projects, they could go for a middle ground. We already have Embassy provisions in our replicator. Add Fleet Entertainment provisions (needs better name). Require 2000 for the project. Make them replicatable at 1000 FC a piece from your replicator, maybe with % drops for the industrial replicator, and put them in the D-store for a flat 100 dilithium a piece (no discounts). Same potential for Dilithium outflow (200K), but with a technically more costly alternative for those who have more FC than they know what to do with.
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  • leveslylevesly Member Posts: 53 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    That looks a great addition to the Embassy. But I have a question.

    How come the Embassy Ops area is huge and impressive for a relatively small operation.....yet the Starbase 'Ops' is small and insignificant for a HUGE Starbase that has on-board tens of thousands of people.

    It would be far nicer to allow us to customise our Starbase's layout and make Ops either more Ops like or make it more of a promenade and public area (which is what it seems like on the Federation one atm)
  • tsurutafan01tsurutafan01 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    Our fleet is barely Tier II and I'm sitting on 500K fleet credit.

    There is absolutely nothing useful to do with it. My best current option with it is to burn it on buying duty officers then converting them into EC on the exchange.

    Unless they plan to let you buy Fleet Ship Modules with fleet credit at some point, this entire system needs a redesign from the ground up.


    "We are smart." - Grebnedlog

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  • kingdoxykingdoxy Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    bluegeek wrote: »
    {Sigh} 200K Dilithium for another cosmetic "project" that brings no new functionality to the table.

    It's pretty and all, but it's just too much.

    I agree with Leviathan that this would make more sense as a Fleet Credit cost. Either that, or lower the Dil cost, or add some real functionality to these things that makes them worth the cost.

    I guess some folks must be shelling out the Dilithium for these, or they wouldn't do them?

    I can only guess that these are for large fleets that are starved for Fleet Credits. I can't imagine any other good reason to keep doing these.

    Its an MMO of course there are going to be items that serve no purpose other then to show off to other players how awesome you are. That's what these are.

    Maybe when smaller fleets have hit T5 and they re-run them folks in smaller fleets will queue them up. No one says every fleet must have it now. Smaller fleets just need to setup priorities and skip on them until they come back.
  • thay8472thay8472 Member Posts: 6,376 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    bla bla bla.. can we have something useful please!
    zx2t8tuj4i10.png
    Thank you for the Typhoon!
  • kiriseekirisee Member Posts: 446 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    Hi Branflakes,


    Glad to see we get another overpriced project to run. Like i've said before, the projects need to actually DO something, not be another "look pretty" for how much Dilthium Cryptic is asking for them.

    And even if its forever going to be getting "look prettys", the cost of them needs to come waaaay down.

    So, like before, my fleetmates and i pass on another special project.....sigh
    "If everyone used Macs, we'd be working on how to get to Alpha Centauri rather than how to get to Mars."
  • sfc#5932 sfc Member Posts: 992 Bug Hunter
    edited February 2013
    The graphics are nice, but not worth the DIL, but our fleet still manages it anyway.
  • kylelockekylelocke Member Posts: 182 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    What would be cool is if these projects were later turned into regular special projects or at least cycle through past ones every so often.
    "I will make the Orion Syndicate face the light of justice or burn them with it." - Captainl Kyle Nathaniel Locke, U.S.S. Excalibur NCC-98105-C
  • centersolacecentersolace Member Posts: 11,178 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    These projects need to grant base XP. I'm in a larger fleet and there seems to be discord over whether we'll even do them.

    Usually what seems to happen from my POV is that the Fleet Leader forbids anyone from doing the special cosmetic projects and then someone else queues them up behind his back and finishes them and we get griping about how we can get dilithium for these but not enough for the regular projects, which linger for days with nothing left needed for them except dilithium.

    Either attach XP to the cosmetic projects or shift them over to eat fleet credits instead of dilithium.

    I agree. If either one of these changes happened, I would be much more inclined to assist with them. ;)
  • robeasomrobeasom Member Posts: 1,911 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    As my fleet seems virtually dead for a while and nobody in the KDF sister fleet doubt we would be doing these as fleet marks have taken a turn for the worse so think I will pass on this and future ones
    NO TO ARC
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  • ukomegaukomega Member Posts: 41 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    These projects need to grant base XP. I'm in a larger fleet and there seems to be discord over whether we'll even do them.

    Usually what seems to happen from my POV is that the Fleet Leader forbids anyone from doing the special cosmetic projects and then someone else queues them up behind his back and finishes them and we get griping about how we can get dilithium for these but not enough for the regular projects, which linger for days with nothing left needed for them except dilithium.

    Either attach XP to the cosmetic projects or shift them over to eat fleet credits instead of dilithium.

    Agreed!

    Personally, I'm drowning in Fleet Credits. I don't want a fleet ship, and I'm not too impressed with the Advanced fleet weapons, kits and armour. I'd even settle for some ridiculous Fleet cred to Dlithium conversion, but these 200k Dilithium things are just insanely annoying. Maybe less so for bigger fleets, but we are a small bunch and doing 2 of these at any time, and then having to spend 215k ish for base upgrade.. it's unrealistic.

    Remove the daily Dilithium Cap or drastically lower the cost for vanity things.
    Transaprent2.png
  • captainmikeccaptainmikec Member Posts: 94 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    yea stahl told us the metrics said fleets are starved for dilithium..... so why do they keep pumping out functionless DL sinks?

    adding XP to them would be a good idea, but 200k DL is just way overpriced even with XP added
    i can do a real project and get 1k xp for 10k DL compared to 200k DL for curtains and throw pillows
    "Tickle us, do we not laugh? Prick us, do we not bleed? Wrong us, shall we not revenge?"
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  • syberghostsyberghost Member Posts: 1,712 Arc User
    edited February 2013
    thay8472 wrote: »
    bla bla bla.. can we have something useful please!

    Remember, art people make pretty; content people make useful. Some people like the pretties; it's OK if not everything is useful. :)

    These fleet projects are totally optional; you don't have to contribute to them. Think of them as a reward for large fleets that doesn't stop small fleets from progressing. That's a good thing, right?
    Former moderator of these forums. Lifetime sub since before launch. Been here since before public betas. Foundry author of "Franklin Drake Must Die".
  • dragonsbitedragonsbite Member Posts: 530 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    There was mention previously of being able to cancel personal rep projects. Why has this not been implimented?

    For me i hate grinding and repeating the same thing over and over. Although i don't mind so much when i'm doing it for a specific purpose. I hit the wrong project and now i need to grind more omega marks for a project i'll never use. This is extremely frustrating for me. I haven't been playing long but i've spent 80 bucks plus i pay monthly. Now i don't even want to play because of this mistake. How can Cryptic and Perfect World make money when people like me get frustrated into quitting because you can't cancel a project.

    I'd highly suggest you look into fixing this issue which is loosing you customers.
    U.S. ARMY CAVALRY SCOUT/DRAGOON DISABLED VETERAN
  • allenscottallenscott Member Posts: 30 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    I agree with the sentiment of most of the responses to this post - too costly for pretty and function-less additions. HOWEVER, I was struck with an idea. Why not add some non-essential yet, USEFUL function to these types of projects. My first thought when I read about this project was this: Wouldn't it be great if this project let you actually gather intel? What if it allowed fleet members to access a feature to monitor where Borg or Tholian incursion events were? While on a star base or planet-side, we can't see whats going on in space.
    Other projects have similar potential. The key is making the features worthwhile but keeping them non-essential to fleet advancement. Reduce dilithium costs. Make up the difference with other cost options. The current dilithium costs would be fine if cool functions were added to star bases and embassy. Players would then have more incentives to use the fleet base maps. Players would experience added depth and functionality. Tome this all sounds like increased user activity (which could indirectly stimulate C-store activity?...sorry had to throw that in there in case anyone at Cryptic or PWE is Ferengi)
  • giaranagiarana Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    allenscott wrote: »
    My first thought when I read about this project was this: Wouldn't it be great if this project let you actually gather intel? What if it allowed fleet members to access a feature to monitor where Borg or Tholian incursion events were?

    This would make the project worthwhile, I thought pretty much the same when I first saw it.
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  • kylelockekylelocke Member Posts: 182 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    I wouldn't mind something that is aesthetic but also serves a useful purpose myself. While the Dev team is working on that why not cycle through previous limited of time special projects or make them readily available at Tier IV or V for the usual Fleet Marks, Exp Points and ect?
    "I will make the Orion Syndicate face the light of justice or burn them with it." - Captainl Kyle Nathaniel Locke, U.S.S. Excalibur NCC-98105-C
  • bluegeekbluegeek Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    allenscott wrote: »
    I agree with the sentiment of most of the responses to this post - too costly for pretty and function-less additions. HOWEVER, I was struck with an idea. Why not add some non-essential yet, USEFUL function to these types of projects. My first thought when I read about this project was this: Wouldn't it be great if this project let you actually gather intel? What if it allowed fleet members to access a feature to monitor where Borg or Tholian incursion events were? While on a star base or planet-side, we can't see whats going on in space.

    Here's an idea... What if this particular special project had also unlocked a special repeatable 3-5 man mission that granted both Fleet marks and Romulan marks?

    Fleets would have been falling all over themselves to complete it, even at 200K.

    I, and others, will continue to advocate and call for functional upgrades. I understand that this gives the art teams a chance to shine and create something that wouldn't exist otherwise, and that it probably takes few resources outside of the art department to continue creating these. But functional is cooler and gives more value.

    My fleet has fulfilled three Starbase special projects (four if you count the holiday hologram). The place doesn't look barren and it's enough for me. The Embassy has gotten no love at all, and probably won't.
    My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here
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