Experience Gains Too High (?)

kronos830

So I started playing again for the first time in at least a year with a new character and while I'm enjoying the various improvements that have been added I can't help but noticing that my character seems to be outleveling the available quests way to fast. For example, right now I'm at LC 17 and I'm doing story missions set at LC 1 or 2. I remember when I first played the game I would do all the patrol missions as well as regularly participating in enemy contact situations and exploration missions and at most I would only get a couple of levels ahead. But now I haven't done anything besides the story missions, a couple of fleet actions and a daily exploration for the dilithium and yet I'm 5-6 levels ahead of where I'm supposed to be. I'm concerned that at this rate I'll be VA only halfway through the story missions and that just seems to take a lot of the point out of it. Not to mention that I haven't even had a chance to try the patrols or enemy contacts and don't see ever doing them because I'll hit max level easily and then there will be no real point.

Anyone else who's leveled a character recently notice this? Part of the problem might be the added experience gain from duty officer assignments but I think the main problem is the exp given out from story missions. It's way too high- enough to go up at least a level each mission. I've never played a game where the completion of a single quest or mission bumped you up a whole level. I think the story mission exp needs to be cut in half at the least for the game to maintain a proper pacing in leveling and progression.

duaths1

why is this bothering you?

you'll be replaying the missions once more at lvl 50 to get your starting gear together anyway..

logicalspock

Right before F2P, the developers were talking about how it was too "easy" to level; that someone could do it in a weekend. Then they made it even quicker to get everyone to end game I presume so they could buy VA gear and participate in the VA endgame content they were developing, and also so the Klingon faction would seem more complete and less tedious.

They also came out with low-level c-store ships with the gimmick being that they had something (quad cannons, consoles, et cetera) that would level up with you.

sander233

Completely agree with OP.

I enjoy the challenge of being a low-level player in a low-level ship without all the awesome abilities like Grav Well and EWP and APO. Plus some of the low-level ships (Miranda, Constitution, Nova, Norgh BoP) are some of my favorites, and you just can't use them at endgame unless you join a fleet (or at all in case of Connie and Miranda.)

It's a Role-Playing-Game. In that context (or really in any context) getting promoted from ensign to Vice Admiral in a matter of days is simply absurd.

doffingcomrade

Yes, the gameplay there is nicer, but there's one crippling flaw: It doesn't last, and it can't last. There's no way to turn off the levelling and just stay there. So there's therefore no point in dwelling on it. There is no point in getting attached to something that isn't sustainable.

dashuk2381

Leveling in STO is a joke now. I took a break for about a year from the game, came back recently and just on DOFF missions alone have leveled 2 characters from low 40s to 50 VA in less than a week, just logging in every 3-4 hours and refreshing DOFF missions. Ship hasn't left ESD, haven't done one mission. Not saying leveling should be hard, but it should be part of the game to help you experience the story at a good pace. STO though now is pretty much a race to the end so you can spend your cash on end game ships, etc. and make Cryptic more money.

snoggymack22

sander233 wrote: »

Completely agree with OP.

I enjoy the challenge of being a low-level player in a low-level ship without all the awesome abilities like Grav Well and EWP and APO. Plus some of the low-level ships (Miranda, Constitution, Nova, Norgh BoP) are some of my favorites, and you just can't use them at endgame unless you join a fleet (or at all in case of Connie and Miranda.)

It's a Role-Playing-Game. In that context (or really in any context) getting promoted from ensign to Vice Admiral in a matter of days is simply absurd.

What's EWP?

woodwhity

snoggymack22 wrote: »

What's EWP?

Eject Warp Plasma. Some useless skill that shouldnt be uttered with the almighty gravity well in one sentence.

brendanbuckley

I'm all for making leveling more difficult, as long as the number of story missions per level is increased. Right now it's "finish all missions at your level, then grind" which is insanely boring.

cptvanor

brendanbuckley wrote: »

I'm all for making leveling more difficult, as long as the number of story missions per level is increased. Right now it's "finish all missions at your level, then grind" which is insanely boring.

Have you leveled up a character recently?

I'm working on a Tact captain and right not at lvl 48 I'm doing missions for lvl 25-27. I've done Doff stuff, some fleet events, a few of the dailies, some mirrior universe, ect... But the the bulk of my leveling has been PvE content.

There is way more content then is needed to get you to lvl 50 currently, even if all you did was story missions and Doff. About 2 times as much in fact.

cmdrscarlet

Man, I love EWP. Useless my plasma manifold ...

I'm all for making leveling more challenging without conditions. In fact, one very easy way to make it more challenging is to remove the Skill and Experience Point rewards from DOffing. Quite literally, once a player can start Doffing, they never have to actually play the game to level through it.

nicha0

We levelled up an alt in 3 hours a couple weeks ago, not sure why they have a levelling system at all anymore.

Why should one care? Here is why.
Levelling is supposed to teach you game mechanics.

People level so fast that they can't even get gear for their 10 level rank range before moving to the next range.

People spend so little time using ship abilities and being able to test things because their ship is changed in just a few hours anyway.

When you combine this with crazy easy gameplay that lets anyone with common quality weapons 4 tiers back and no Boffs assigned at all complete it, you have seriously end game balance issues.

They've placed the bar so incredibly low that the high end is completely out of control.

shockwave85

Game mechanics is the main issue I'd have with this. I sure don't mind being able to level up an alt quickly, but for people on their first time through the game needs to make sure they're competent. You can get all the way to VA50 without knowing what most of your skills do, or what's even available to you. To say nothing of how to properly set up your ship. Yeah, you can run endgame content with cheap gear, but you have to know what to get. That's the problem with people just hitting the endgame. The game has not, until that point, punished them for their subpar builds and lack of understanding the game's mechanics. So they jump into an STF or, heaven forbid, PvP, get murdered, and frustrate themselves and everyone in there with them.

I don't care how long it takes to level, I just wish it properly introduced everything to you and required you to understand.

grouchyotaku

kronos830 wrote: »

...

Anyone else who's leveled a character recently notice this? Part of the problem might be the added experience gain from duty officer assignments but I think the main problem is the exp given out from story missions. It's way too high- enough to go up at least a level each mission. I've never played a game where the completion of a single quest or mission bumped you up a whole level. I think the story mission exp needs to be cut in half at the least for the game to maintain a proper pacing in leveling and progression.

At the end of the first year of STO, game statistics were showing that the majority of accounts had only advanced up to Lt.Cmdr, while the hard-core players were at level cap and demanding new content. The decision was evidently made to make ranking up a much faster process, so that new content can concentrate VA level characters...

Take for example 'New Romulas'. Implementation would have been much more complex if the content had to accommodate lower ranked characters...

cmdrskyfaller

logicalspock wrote: »

Right before F2P, the developers were talking about how it was too "easy" to level; that someone could do it in a weekend. Then they made it even quicker to get everyone to end game I presume so they could buy VA gear and participate in the VA endgame content they were developing, and also so the Klingon faction would seem more complete and less tedious.

They also came out with low-level c-store ships with the gimmick being that they had something (quad cannons, consoles, et cetera) that would level up with you.

The end game will be quick to reach because this is F2P. The monetization items are all end game hence they want people there as quickly as possible.

snoggymack22

dashuk2381 wrote: »

Leveling in STO is a joke now. I took a break for about a year from the game, came back recently and just on DOFF missions alone have leveled 2 characters from low 40s to 50 VA in less than a week, just logging in every 3-4 hours and refreshing DOFF missions. Ship hasn't left ESD, haven't done one mission. Not saying leveling should be hard, but it should be part of the game to help you experience the story at a good pace. STO though now is pretty much a race to the end so you can spend your cash on end game ships, etc. and make Cryptic more money.

In all fairness the DOFF system IS part of the game and part of the experience.

This game offers three different takes on non-combat advancement:

- Some of the exploration content.
- The Diplomacy system (which is tied into DOFFs and exploration)
- The DOFF system.

These exist as Cryptic's attempts to capture a significant aspect of Star Trek: Non-combat.

The exploration system, which has a zillion faults, is the company's attempt to give its players the chance to boldly go where no one has gone before. To seek out new life and new civilizations. Unfortunately this usually means sending a planet 25 antigens for a green box, scanning columns, or running around an abandoned asteroid facility to tap into their computers.

The DOFF system is an attempt to tap into the administration aspect of a starship, assigning duties to your officers. It started out as a mini-game, was expanded into something a bit larger than an average mini-game. But it too has its faults and limitations.

The Diplomacy system piggybacks off of both of those systems, giving you an added tree of XP through all of that non-combat interaction and opens up the first contact missions, which the first four or five times you do them are novel and really do seem to capture the feel of Trek. But after awhile they too lose their luster.

There are a lot of problems with these systems. Their implementation needs a lot of work and updating. And they are too redundant, too grindy, and have quite a few bugs as well.

But their intent is clear: To offer a non-combat levelling path. Something that is better than the standard "kill rats and bugs" of fantasy MMOs. And something that is distinctly Trek in nature.

So I guess what I'm saying is ... it may be a very shallow set of content, but a Trek game offering its players the chance to level cap without having to pew pew pew, is very key to this game living up to the name Star Trek.

robdmc

I personally feel the issue is with the reward system. Once I'm at level 50 why play the story or do the patrol missions when I can run the stfs and do the rep system for better gear then any of the missions do. Same goes for the patrol missions or the defend/explore missions. If dilithium is given out by time played then maybe they should add dilithium rewards to those missions to encourage people to play them to the end. The content is there we just need incentive. Might even make people do the defend missions too since all you get is an accolade in the end. Just give the defend missions a repeatable wrapper like the investigate officer report mission.

As far as I can tell the leveling at current speeds it to get people use to the gear/ship acquiring treadmill which come level 50 might mean c-store purchases.

tsurutafan01

Considering how much time you end up putting in with a game like this, I do think levelling is a bit fast.

Okay more than a bit. I think if you sneeze while looking at a DOFF menu, you probably level up.

marshalericdavid

I like being able to create new characters and get them into the end game fast. I don't want a long haul with multiple characters the reputation system already put a hurt on new characters with the grind of the reputation system don't need a leveling up grind as well.

sander233

I suggested a few weeks ago that for the first character rolled (in either faction) XP rewards should be reduced by 75% for all content. That would allow players to grow into the game more naturally and progress more in line with other MMOs.

After reaching level 50, any other characters rolled can have an option of "normal" progression (XP rewards reduced as above) or "accelerated" progression (current XP rewards, skip tutorial mission.)

If I had Dan Stahl's job for a day and could implement one sweeping change to the game, that would be it.

By the way I'm not suggesting tinkering with expertise rewards. If anything those should be upped. I'm leveling two characters and its extremely frustrating when I decide at commander level that my senior Tac BOff shoud have APO1 instead of THY3 and I have throw away the expertise invested in the old ability and don't have enough to invest in the new one.

kronos830

I'll admit that I'm glad to see other people thinking the same way I do for no other reason then it's nice to know I'm not just imagining things. As for the multiple people who have taken issue with the exp given out by DOFF missions I will say that while I still maintain that the core of the problem is the massive amounts of exp given out by story missions I do agree that DOFF missions shouldn't give out exp. The whole point of DOFFs should be the commendation system and related experience.

snoggymack22

kronos830 wrote: »

The whole point of DOFFs should be the commendation system and related experience.

That's not true. That's not how they were created. And that's not even why people get involved with them these days.