some things should be looked at. A captains skill points directly effects if they live or die quickly. Cost for respec token 500 zen. Choose and fly any ship in your faction? Truth or lie? I think lie. How you build your skill points also effects your ship. once they are spent you are stuck with that choice, and if you change your ship, but not speced that way your going to be gimped.
Dilithium costs to reputation gear extreme, to put it lightly, so extreme is that the real grind? Consider it for a moment. Someone takes the time to unlock for 5 tiers of a reputation, then they get hit with the truth of each piece costing 20k plus on dilithium. Stf reward 960 dilithium, and we are not even talking about trying to equip your bridge officers. They say they did this to make it easier on the player base, but with the cost of dilithium when it comes to getting the gear itself makes it far more of a grind then the old system ever was. For in three days time of running space elite stfs I got borg shields, deflector, and impulse engines for my Fed and KDF. I also picked up a resiliant maco shield for my fed, and a MK XII Honor guard shield for my klingon. Can anyone using the rep system say the same? Yes mining rights grant large amounts of dilithium, oh but you have to gamble on the lock boxes, with zen. Zen leads to RL money. Something fan boys do not talk about. Then there is the doff system which can gran dilithium for certain missions, and only if you got the right doffs. Sense doffs are random pickings, tied again to what zen. How exactly does any of this bode well for new players.
R&D was the last true system in the game untouched by dilithium, but that soon changed, for the good gear your talking about killing another 10k dilithium for each piece. Even then that is only MK XI. Up top of that you still have to grind the samples.
My opinion on this has somewhat already been stated. The respec token needs to be removed and the cost to respect should be energy credits. IF you want players to stay in your game they need to be able to respec at will. To be clear I am only talking about skill points, not the complete wipe one. If someone wants to do that, then they should have to spend the RL money. For the stfs, if the devs are going to keep to this course, then they should allow someone to unlock all 5 tiers extremely quickly. As unlocking the tiers mean nothing compared to the dilithium grind needed to actually obtain the gear. Then again someone with loads of RL money to spend could down the whole system in a week. Has the light bulbs in the brain started to light up yet? This system needs a overhaul.
Of course this whole topic/post is based on the presumption that the devs wish this game to grow into something larger? The question comes up why beat a dead horse? What I am talking about is three key basic aspects of the game. If the game is to grown I think the system needs to be looked at.
It is hard to blame Cryptic for charging for respec tokens when they are giving 100% of the content away for free and gold members get about a dozen of them for each character plus enough of a stipend to respec for free each month.
I would love for them to go back to energy credits, but they have to pay the bill somehow.
This game's free-to-play model is the best I've seen on the market. Face it, anyone who says SWOTOR, BGO, etc. isn't purely moneygrabby compared to STO hasn't played this or any of the latter ones.
They gave us season 7 and Legacy of Romulus content free of charge and still most of what's attainable in game can be attained in game without spending RL money. Yes it takes longer doing it the hard way, but in my view the game is fun even if I can't get certain ships or gear super quickly. I respect the OP's opinion, but you can indeed fly any ship as any class and if the game adhered to the instant gratification model he or she wants on the rep system, etc. There wouldn't be enough money to keep the lights on and turn a profit. Like I said, if you think this game is too moneygrabby, you haven't looked at the FTP models of many MMO's.
To be fair he does have a point about the rep system, if I put the amount of dilithium that I have put into rep into zen I could have so much stuff it isn't funny
there are several ways to spec that allows you to fly pretty much any ship you want, they might be slightly less effective, but overall they work just fine.
This game's free-to-play model is the best I've seen on the market. Face it, anyone who says SWOTOR, BGO, etc. isn't purely moneygrabby compared to BGO hasn't played this or any of the latter ones.
They gave us season 7 and Legacy of Romulus content free of charge and still most of what's attainable in game can be attained in game without spending RL money. Yes it takes longer doing it the hard way, but in my view the game is fun even if I can't get certain ships or gear super quickly. I respect the OP's opinion, but you can indeed fly any ship as any class and if the game adhered to the instant gratification model he or she wants on the rep system, etc. There wouldn't be enough money to keep the lights on and turn a profit. Like I said, if you think this game is too moneygrabby, you haven't looked at the FTP models of many MMO's.
Actually, STO doesn't have the best FTP model, at least in my opinion. A certain game starting with A and ending in ion (for some very weird reason it would censor the name), Rift and TERA are slightly better in that regard. STO would be better if it didn't require cash shop items (Fleet modules) for the Fleet ships or if it didn't constantly put the better ships in the cash shop or lockboxes. That's similar to putting raid gear in the cash shop. Sure, you can get the fleet modules from the exchange with energy credits, but my point still stands. Those things shouldn't be there to begin with. Let people acquire them by actually doing content, not by grinding dilithium/energy credits or by buying them with real money.
And I agree with the OP, especially with the reputation grind. It has the advantage of removing the random factor, but it is tedious and it can turn the game into a routine (log in, claim the project reward, queue in the next ones, queue for some events to get more marks for the next days and then you'll probably have to grind some dilithium to actually be able to buy the stuff you worked for for weeks).
Actually, STO doesn't have the best FTP model, at least in my opinion. A certain game starting with A and ending in ion (for some very weird reason it would censor the name), Rift and TERA are slightly better in that regard. STO would be better if it didn't require cash shop items (Fleet modules) for the Fleet ships or if it didn't constantly put the better ships in the cash shop or lockboxes. That's similar to putting raid gear in the cash shop. Sure, you can get the fleet modules from the exchange with energy credits, but my point still stands. Those things shouldn't be there to begin with. Let people acquire them by actually doing content, not by grinding dilithium/energy credits or by buying them with real money.
How much time do you need to spend grinding content in other games to get the best gear?
How much time do you need to spend grinding content in this game to get the best gear?
Then there is the doff system which can gran dilithium for certain missions, and only if you got the right doffs. Sense doffs are random pickings, tied again to what zen
You can farm Dilithium through the Doff system without spending any Zen, Dilthium or buying anything that came from something purchased with Zen. Some of the better Doffs come from Doff chains, episode missions and the commendation system.
There are also thousands of high-quality Doffs on the exchange that came out of downgrinding support purples, asylums, cultural exchanges, recruitment assignments, etc...
It's easily possible to net 12k+ dilithium each day, just by using the free characters everyone gets, the free Doffs from Ferra and 15 minutes of time invested.
How much time do you need to spend grinding content in other games to get the best gear?
How much time do you need to spend grinding content in this game to get the best gear?
True. And you can do it without having fixed appointments each week and without running the danger of getting benched.
The skill respec tokens bothers me too, mainly because its an artificial roadblock that they put in your way as a shakedown mechanism. Skills are something you learn about as you progress, and everybody is faced with the need to respec skills early and often as they learn the basics of the game mechanics. So to charge for it is really kind of a rude thing IMO; you made this opaque system that is fundamental to everything I do then you want me to pay to correct my naive mistakes? Wow... Since they do it to make you pay, it would seem that being annoyed is the right response. It would be like, hey lets charge for changes to BOFFs... I think most people would find it extremely annoying.
The take-away for me is that the game isnt really Free to Play so much as it is Extended Evaluation, and after a while you have to start paying if you want to develop past the very low (free) levels. You can either pay a little here and there (account bank, upgraded inventory slots, etc) or you can buy a subscription and pay that way. I will sometimes buy a month of game time for ranking up, and ride the perks that way, since its cheaper than buying inventory slot upgrades and bank slot upgrades and blahblah, and I get some respec tokens out of it.
Interestingly there are a lot of things that paying doesnt get you. You only get skill respec tokens for every 10 levels (I think?), and you dont get free unlimited respecs while you are a paying customer in good standing. So even paying customer still get squeezed.
I also agree that the high-end in-game items do cost a lot. Not just the reputation items, but plain even the plain gear on the dil store, and the craftable items, it all just costs too much. But it does keep us playing, and a lot of people will buy some zen and turn it into dil, so it is a big source of cash flow for Cryptic. Its unlikely to change anytime soon.
Ships seem to be priced fairly. There are a lot of ships you can fly at very little cost. There are more ships that are (much) more expensive, but you dont NEED those ships for anything.
The skill respec tokens bothers me too, mainly because its an artificial roadblock that they put in your way as a shakedown mechanism. Skills are something you learn about as you progress, and everybody is faced with the need to respec skills early and often as they learn the basics of the game mechanics. So to charge for it is really kind of a rude thing IMO; you made this opaque system that is fundamental to everything I do then you want me to pay to correct my naive mistakes? Wow... Since they do it to make you pay, it would seem that being annoyed is the right response. It would be like, hey lets charge for changes to BOFFs... I think most people would find it extremely annoying.
The take-away for me is that the game isnt really Free to Play so much as it is Extended Evaluation, and after a while you have to start paying if you want to develop past the very low (free) levels. You can either pay a little here and there (account bank, upgraded inventory slots, etc) or you can buy a subscription and pay that way. I will sometimes buy a month of game time for ranking up, and ride the perks that way, since its cheaper than buying inventory slot upgrades and bank slot upgrades and blahblah, and I get some respec tokens out of it.
Interestingly there are a lot of things that paying doesnt get you. You only get skill respec tokens for every 10 levels (I think?), and you dont get free unlimited respecs while you are a paying customer in good standing. So even paying customer still get squeezed.
I also agree that the high-end in-game items do cost a lot. Not just the reputation items, but plain even the plain gear on the dil store, and the craftable items, it all just costs too much. But it does keep us playing, and a lot of people will buy some zen and turn it into dil, so it is a big source of cash flow for Cryptic. Its unlikely to change anytime soon.
Ships seem to be priced fairly. There are a lot of ships you can fly at very little cost. There are more ships that are (much) more expensive, but you dont NEED those ships for anything.
I am not sure what you think "free to play" is, but if "free to play" means what you seem to think it means then pretty much no major MMO is "free to play".
Also, as a paying customer who falls within normal bounds, you will probably get enough "free" respecs that you never have to buy one from the cash shop. You would have to be respecing constantly (more than once a month) to be forced to buy a respec token with cash. Furthermore, the game gives you ways to earn dilithium which you can trade to other players for zen to buy respec tokens.
Finally, it only takes a matter of hours to reach level-cap, so if you want to start over once you have learned how the skill tree works, it is not a huge loss. You can even create a new free account.
The only other MMO I have ever played is Lord of the Rings online, and compared to STO, their cash shop is much more intrusive. Sure, you can "respec" for free, but you have to pay for extra slots for your traits. You have to pay for every major new piece of content, and LOTRO is considered one of the best F2P MMOs out there.
I think STO does a much better job. Pretty much everything in the game is free and the cash-shop items can be easily earned through the dilithium rewards.
Too bad the game doesn't offer players a couple of ways to earn free credit/zen for free so they don't have to pay for anything . . .
Oh wait players can earn free credit/zen by farming dilithium or taking surveys and never spend a dime on the game.
Your "shakedown mechanism" argument is invalid.
Well that's a big fat fail retort. FIrst off, the true free-to-play players (still in eval mode) dont have the ability to produce that kind of dilithium. They dont know the mechanics, they dont have the alts, they dont even have the char slots for the alts. So for the true free-to-play crowd (the people still in Eval mode) there is no free zen. So if they want to respec, its $5. Oh accuracy is very important huh, $5. Oh weapon power is important huh, $5
For the older powergamers, who are making changes often, there is no way to produce the kind of dilithium that's required for frequent changes to multiple chars. Lets say I want to change Stealth because I learned some secret black magic about the formula to cloak detection avoidance, so I have to change all my klingons and all my romulans, and my feddie with the Defiant Retrofit too, that's what 2500 zen right there, no way I am going to make that in a reasonable amount of time.
Also, money is fungible. If you use dilithium reserves for this, then you dont get to use it for the other things you wanted to do this month. So its either throw out the plan or buy some zen.
Even the Gold subs only get 500 zen per month, that's ONE resepc. If you want to respec two chars every month, you have to pay one way or the other.
Roadblock, yeah, they do it on purpose. They do it because they know its annoying and you will pay not to be annoyed (same as bank slots). Proper response is to be annoyed by it.
Well its like right now I am thinking about going to fast attack escorts again, Defiant, Bird of prey, and the Romulan T'varo. Well my specs on my three toons could use some work, especially in the area of ground. So thats 1500 zen.
On the Reputation it was a bold face lie, they said enough to get lets make things easier crowd to jump on board, but as I already stated the real grind comes with the Dilithium. I have yet to run across these high yeilding doff dilithium missions. From what I have used of the doff system so far it is extremely random.
To add to this no dilithium reward was added to the Romulan dailies, or the Tholian dailies on the ground. Now why is that? They want dilithium to be a limited hard to get item, forcing people use the exchange. If it was a simple in game mechanic they would not be charging 20k or more for a unlock of a item in the reputation set up.
While I appreciate that there are some who do, and some who simply don't have the time to grind for it, apart from one or two trinkets, there is almost nothing in the game that it is absolutely necessary to pay for with real money. Even the most basic of basic Silver accounts gives you access to 3 characters. 3 toons@level 50 = 24k dil per day. If you're willing to wait a months worth of playing (whatever that translates as for you) for stuff, that's a possible 750k dilithium per month of playtime. That's a lot of Zen or Rep gear to get for paying ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in real cash. All you have to do to get it is have play the game. I can't see where to fault Cryptic on that. Sorry.
How often you get to play is really not an issue to lay at Cryptic's feet.
A game where all the best gear is instantly accessible wouldn't be very interesting.
Anyone who is dedicated enough to the game to require such frequent respecs as suggested above will most likely already have a few different toons specced diferently (on which they grind out 8k daily dil) or have found a way to spec their toons in such a way (as stated in an earlier post) that they can be effective in any ship.
It's all free if you want it to be but it's not a charity either.
"So my fun is wrong?"
No. Your fun makes everyone else's fun wrong by default.
This is not about charity or wanting everything free, this whole system is a messed up from top to bottom. You do not attract new players, that will stay, if your key game mechanics are messed up. Such mechanics like your crafting, skill/talent points, and end game content are completely messed up. Its that simple.
Ain't nothing wrong with the business model, it milks you at every turn. I actually like it this way as long as there's a zen exchange. If you wanna cry about money to respec your skills just delete your damn character and start over. Level 50 is only 4 days work.. gold players get free tokens so there ain't nothing wrong with Cryptic here on this. Rarely would I defend them, specially on dual beams, but this is outrageous!
Lyndon Brewer: 20% chance to capture enemy ship for 60 seconds on successful use of boarding party.
Comments
I would love for them to go back to energy credits, but they have to pay the bill somehow.
They gave us season 7 and Legacy of Romulus content free of charge and still most of what's attainable in game can be attained in game without spending RL money. Yes it takes longer doing it the hard way, but in my view the game is fun even if I can't get certain ships or gear super quickly. I respect the OP's opinion, but you can indeed fly any ship as any class and if the game adhered to the instant gratification model he or she wants on the rep system, etc. There wouldn't be enough money to keep the lights on and turn a profit. Like I said, if you think this game is too moneygrabby, you haven't looked at the FTP models of many MMO's.
Actually, STO doesn't have the best FTP model, at least in my opinion. A certain game starting with A and ending in ion (for some very weird reason it would censor the name), Rift and TERA are slightly better in that regard. STO would be better if it didn't require cash shop items (Fleet modules) for the Fleet ships or if it didn't constantly put the better ships in the cash shop or lockboxes. That's similar to putting raid gear in the cash shop. Sure, you can get the fleet modules from the exchange with energy credits, but my point still stands. Those things shouldn't be there to begin with. Let people acquire them by actually doing content, not by grinding dilithium/energy credits or by buying them with real money.
And I agree with the OP, especially with the reputation grind. It has the advantage of removing the random factor, but it is tedious and it can turn the game into a routine (log in, claim the project reward, queue in the next ones, queue for some events to get more marks for the next days and then you'll probably have to grind some dilithium to actually be able to buy the stuff you worked for for weeks).
How much time do you need to spend grinding content in other games to get the best gear?
How much time do you need to spend grinding content in this game to get the best gear?
You can farm Dilithium through the Doff system without spending any Zen, Dilthium or buying anything that came from something purchased with Zen. Some of the better Doffs come from Doff chains, episode missions and the commendation system.
There are also thousands of high-quality Doffs on the exchange that came out of downgrinding support purples, asylums, cultural exchanges, recruitment assignments, etc...
It's easily possible to net 12k+ dilithium each day, just by using the free characters everyone gets, the free Doffs from Ferra and 15 minutes of time invested.
True. And you can do it without having fixed appointments each week and without running the danger of getting benched.
The take-away for me is that the game isnt really Free to Play so much as it is Extended Evaluation, and after a while you have to start paying if you want to develop past the very low (free) levels. You can either pay a little here and there (account bank, upgraded inventory slots, etc) or you can buy a subscription and pay that way. I will sometimes buy a month of game time for ranking up, and ride the perks that way, since its cheaper than buying inventory slot upgrades and bank slot upgrades and blahblah, and I get some respec tokens out of it.
Interestingly there are a lot of things that paying doesnt get you. You only get skill respec tokens for every 10 levels (I think?), and you dont get free unlimited respecs while you are a paying customer in good standing. So even paying customer still get squeezed.
I also agree that the high-end in-game items do cost a lot. Not just the reputation items, but plain even the plain gear on the dil store, and the craftable items, it all just costs too much. But it does keep us playing, and a lot of people will buy some zen and turn it into dil, so it is a big source of cash flow for Cryptic. Its unlikely to change anytime soon.
Ships seem to be priced fairly. There are a lot of ships you can fly at very little cost. There are more ships that are (much) more expensive, but you dont NEED those ships for anything.
I am not sure what you think "free to play" is, but if "free to play" means what you seem to think it means then pretty much no major MMO is "free to play".
Also, as a paying customer who falls within normal bounds, you will probably get enough "free" respecs that you never have to buy one from the cash shop. You would have to be respecing constantly (more than once a month) to be forced to buy a respec token with cash. Furthermore, the game gives you ways to earn dilithium which you can trade to other players for zen to buy respec tokens.
Finally, it only takes a matter of hours to reach level-cap, so if you want to start over once you have learned how the skill tree works, it is not a huge loss. You can even create a new free account.
The only other MMO I have ever played is Lord of the Rings online, and compared to STO, their cash shop is much more intrusive. Sure, you can "respec" for free, but you have to pay for extra slots for your traits. You have to pay for every major new piece of content, and LOTRO is considered one of the best F2P MMOs out there.
I think STO does a much better job. Pretty much everything in the game is free and the cash-shop items can be easily earned through the dilithium rewards.
Well that's a big fat fail retort. FIrst off, the true free-to-play players (still in eval mode) dont have the ability to produce that kind of dilithium. They dont know the mechanics, they dont have the alts, they dont even have the char slots for the alts. So for the true free-to-play crowd (the people still in Eval mode) there is no free zen. So if they want to respec, its $5. Oh accuracy is very important huh, $5. Oh weapon power is important huh, $5
For the older powergamers, who are making changes often, there is no way to produce the kind of dilithium that's required for frequent changes to multiple chars. Lets say I want to change Stealth because I learned some secret black magic about the formula to cloak detection avoidance, so I have to change all my klingons and all my romulans, and my feddie with the Defiant Retrofit too, that's what 2500 zen right there, no way I am going to make that in a reasonable amount of time.
Also, money is fungible. If you use dilithium reserves for this, then you dont get to use it for the other things you wanted to do this month. So its either throw out the plan or buy some zen.
Even the Gold subs only get 500 zen per month, that's ONE resepc. If you want to respec two chars every month, you have to pay one way or the other.
Roadblock, yeah, they do it on purpose. They do it because they know its annoying and you will pay not to be annoyed (same as bank slots). Proper response is to be annoyed by it.
On the Reputation it was a bold face lie, they said enough to get lets make things easier crowd to jump on board, but as I already stated the real grind comes with the Dilithium. I have yet to run across these high yeilding doff dilithium missions. From what I have used of the doff system so far it is extremely random.
To add to this no dilithium reward was added to the Romulan dailies, or the Tholian dailies on the ground. Now why is that? They want dilithium to be a limited hard to get item, forcing people use the exchange. If it was a simple in game mechanic they would not be charging 20k or more for a unlock of a item in the reputation set up.
How often you get to play is really not an issue to lay at Cryptic's feet.
A game where all the best gear is instantly accessible wouldn't be very interesting.
Anyone who is dedicated enough to the game to require such frequent respecs as suggested above will most likely already have a few different toons specced diferently (on which they grind out 8k daily dil) or have found a way to spec their toons in such a way (as stated in an earlier post) that they can be effective in any ship.
It's all free if you want it to be but it's not a charity either.
No. Your fun makes everyone else's fun wrong by default.
cause sometimes its party time!