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Why don't players want to contribute: Dilithium/Doffs/Commodities?
newromulan1
Member Posts: 2,229
How is any fleet supposed to progress its starbase if people are only willing to part with Fleet marks?
It's seems that most Star Bases have come to a grinding halt or slow crawl - but already I talk to many people in many fleets and no-one except a tiny tiny few want to actually put in anything but fleet marks.
That leaves the bulk of the "real" work to just a few.
Now we have a new holding coming - which will add to the problem again.
So how do you get people to put in the massive amounts of dilithium/ EC /Commodities /doffs that are required when you move past T4 ??
Don't come in this thread with insulting comments like: recruit more people - that in itself is difficult and another full time job that many people don't like. Or: "starbases are long-term projects" sorry most players DON"T think long term and are looking around for right now - and why shouldn't they - this is a game - not a life or a career!!
So what is the solution - or are Starbases just another waste?
With Many fleets offering free access to T5 bases for gear - why build out your own? After a few hundred thousand fleet marks you have enough for any gear a toon could need.
So Solutions? Ideas?
It's seems that most Star Bases have come to a grinding halt or slow crawl - but already I talk to many people in many fleets and no-one except a tiny tiny few want to actually put in anything but fleet marks.
That leaves the bulk of the "real" work to just a few.
Now we have a new holding coming - which will add to the problem again.
So how do you get people to put in the massive amounts of dilithium/ EC /Commodities /doffs that are required when you move past T4 ??
Don't come in this thread with insulting comments like: recruit more people - that in itself is difficult and another full time job that many people don't like. Or: "starbases are long-term projects" sorry most players DON"T think long term and are looking around for right now - and why shouldn't they - this is a game - not a life or a career!!
So what is the solution - or are Starbases just another waste?
With Many fleets offering free access to T5 bases for gear - why build out your own? After a few hundred thousand fleet marks you have enough for any gear a toon could need.
So Solutions? Ideas?
Post edited by newromulan1 on
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Not sure how to really fix it... the problem is more of one of mentality.... the fleet idea is one of groups doing things together, whereas many players are not really all that inter-cooperative, and just want to do things on their own.
I'd say to fix it remove the ability to get things from other's fleet stores.... make it so that nice fleet gear is only accessible from your own fleet, even if you access other stores, and then if people want it they would HAVE to contribute.
Not at all you could simply ask them but that will only work on a few, the hard truth is Cryptic made sure everyone needs all that stuff in one way or another...and in massive quantitys.
If anything you could wirte a "Thank you letter" to the dev's.:D
So you saying run all base provisioning projects and hope they get filled? So the starbase moves at 1/2 speed - and what if they have most gear?
But thanks for letting me know.
I am hoping to hear from some fleets that have solutions to make member want to contribute more.
Now doffs and commodities are mostly an effort thing. I for one have zero white doffs and 100/100 roster so it would be incredibly impractical for me to contribute doffs even if the cost would be small otherwise. Commodities are just a simple EC -> FC transaction and more often than not EC is more valuable and harder to earn (FM's come so amply from a number of grindable sources).
There you have it. For most, building a new fleet with holdings is most certainly not worth it.
My fleet is mostly doing engi projects right now, aiming for the elite fleet weapons unlock, and white ops and engi doffs typically run 30-32k on the Exchange. This can cost a million EC easy to fill the doff requirement for an upper tier project. Not everyone has that kind of dough to throw around: some weeks I count myself lucky if I can afford to throw in a dozen, given I'm also grinding for the Mk 12 Omega gear.
Dil is needed for damn near everything worthwhile in this game (rep requisitions, zen farming, not to mention buying fleet stuff) so I can easily see them being loathe to part with what they can only earn 8500 per day per toon of (especially relevant for people who don't alt a lot).
Then there's dil provisions, which burn the fleet credits you worked so hard to earn. You try to supply those, you'll operate at a loss.
Of course, there's also the laziness motive. (Somebody had to say it.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
In the past I would grind it out... but anymore, not so much... As a fleet leader, I generally will contribute 10-20% of the project cost (if there is anything open to contribute). If the project sits... it sits...
We are grinding towards T5... but you are correct... it seems that the wind has come out of the sails for a lot of people.
I am of two opinions on the whole invite to others base to go shopping... First is I like the idea, because it allows those in smaller fleets to get equipment without having to leave their fleet (except for a fleet ship)... but on the other hand, making free access available does stunt a fleets ability to get to T5... yes, your fleet will need provisions... but those are relatively small xp projects... and unless you think this is Pokemon (gotta get em all (so you would need a TRIBBLE ton of fleet credit) ... your incentive to get your own fleet to T5 is drastically reduced (why put in the effort when you already have whatever the fleet will grind on to get over months).
Star Trek Online, Now with out the Trek....
Also as you said, why bother trying to build up my base when I can just get what I need from others? I use my fleet holdings right now just as a method to generate FCs/provisions and then I take them and snag an invite off of NoP Public Service and get whatever I want.
If someday Cryptic decides to change that and make fleet gear work like how fleet ships currently do, then I'd just wouldn't use the fleet system at all.
Maybe that sounds completely selfish, and maybe it is. But that's how I feel about it. Then again I've never been a fan of how the fleet system as a whole has been implemented, so who knows.
Mine Trap Supporter
Part of the problem is that some players are tired of only grinding away to do endless contributions, instead of directly playing the game. How many times should a person want to do a particular STF or mine for dilithium? I am sure that is part of the reason why my fleet has dwindled and most are off playing another MMO that-will-not-be-mentioned.
Another issue is that buying things in the Fleet Starbase costs the same things as it does to add to the starbase, so people are left with the question of, "do I add my dilithium to build 'X' in the starbase, or buy my ship its Elite Weapon 'X's'?"
I have long argued for an y=mx+b (based on a fleets player count over a six month period) approach to determining project costs.
This way, smaller fleets wont take forever to level up, and larger fleets players have an opportunity to contribute to the base (some players I know have thousands of fleet marks and can never get in quick enough to contribute them before someone else fills it up). It also encourages for fleet leaders to keep its fleet roster active and keep players involved.
Big fleet advocates will argue that my solution wont create a reason to have larger fleets, but if the base of the price slope is right, a larger fleet will offset it much quicker than a small fleet will.
Doff prices are rising, especially whites, and again people aren't willing to buy fleet doffs with fleet credits because of the need to buy fleet gear (access to which can be improved by donating said doffs to advance fleet... it's a catch-22).
And as everyone scrambles to get access to this top level gear which has now become the new standard, many people wonder why bother grinding fleets when all you need is some provisions, and to ask the kind people in channels like NoP PS for access?
Ok, there are reasons why people don't want to put their Dilithium/ECs and Doffs into fleetprojects:
- For a new character it is hard to get to 100 or 200 Doffs, they need the Doffs they recruit themselves. After they have got enough Doffs, they should start to contribute the old ones.
- Dilithium can be exchanged for Zen, it is needed for gear and so on. New characters will need their Dilithium for themselves first, but again, when you've got those things you want, you should start to contribute to the fleet (nobody tells you, that you've got to contribute everything).
- ECs or Commodities purchased with ECs are the same thing: You will need some ECs to buy gear or a lockbox-ship from the Exchange, but after you are geared, you should start to contribute to your fleet.
As soon as you've got enough Fleetcredits, you can also think about buying Doffs for Fleetcredits.
If Star Trek Online was an Open-Source (GPL) Game, we would have a low-grind fork.
Doffs = whites in most cases, i have no idea why you would not part with these, however if you wnat best chances to succeed in doff missions you want higher quality doffs in many areas. With only 100 possibles and 11(?) categories, that gets hard to have many whites.
Commodities = Rep advancement. Unfortunately we have the same problem with these that we had with data samples at one time for crafting (changing the crafting system gutted the use of crafting) but they redistrubed how we used them for crafting. They really need to change what is used for the 2 systems (doff and rep) to balance it all out. If i need 40 per pop in my Omega rep and i am in a 300 person fleet, into my Omega they go.
I have an idea for what Season 11 should be; Season 11: The Big Bug Fix.
I have not been able to read my bug tickets in over a year, not even the tickets about not being able to see my tickets.
I find the drama of your signature proof of your immaturity, this means you, DR whiners.
Ditto. Mine blocks buying until you've put in 100k worth of stuff. Seems to work pretty well, though we do get the occasional complainer. As I put it one time in fleet chat, those guys want the perks but not the work.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
The second difficulty is that a number of my fleeties do not understand how to get massive quantities of doffs. They are unaware of the fleet doff vendor; nor are they aware that you can make money by selling doffs the fleet does not need (engineering and tac doffs)(1) while cracking down Colonial Support chain doffs (2).
The third issue is that not all of my fleeties have 400 spaces for doffs, which contributes to the time delay because of UI issues.
So, to combat this, me and my KDF fleet manager counterpart have a number of solutions. We will restrict access to fleet stores if projects go unfilled for too long. I simply refused to slot any dilithium mine provisioning projects until we finished both the Mine and the Comms Array. And then when a fleetie would complain about progress, I would politely encourage them to fill the doffs.
We also have a 100K contribution requirement. I may need to make alterations, because right now my fleet is lacking in fleet credit obtainment opportunities.
-Cath
(1) To the people who buy starbase doffs from the exchange, my wallet thanks you.
(2) Many of them are unaware of colonial support chain doffs, at that.
I think Dilithium is easy to understand, and I wouldn't think 'fair' to ask of a player to invest it on the fleet projects until they have their C-Store ship and the reputations done on their main. And even afterwards I would expect just to donate what they can, someone who can't understand and accept that shouldn't be starting a fleet.
Scrounging on doffs and commodities however is just plain old assholitude. And what can you do about that other than send them packing and looking for good people to recruit?
However, something I have seen in several fleets I have been part of is that players who are actually close to each other, play with each other, and help each other rarely act like that. The fleet projects are more of something they are doing along people they like and known than just another grind for the benefit of some random internet dood, and they actually want to help. I am in a good fleet presently (and Lord it was a long search) and more than once had to remember people not to over-donate so that they don't gimp their advancement further ahead.
So this may sound trite but dudes and dudettes not donating is not the problem as much as it is the symptom. People who likes to be with each other and doing things together will take care of the fleet because it is something they are enjoying (because they are doing it with people they enjoy being with and playing with). The mutes and the lone wolves don't do so, and why should they? They are not part of something, they are just there for the benefits or because they did click 'accept' on a random invite and couldn't care less.
Which is maybe part of the problem. You join a fleet with several hundreds of people. You don't talk with anyone. You don't play with anyone. You check and see no one but, say, a dozen people are donating with any dedication. Why would you donate? There's no peer presure, there's no natural sense of belonging. And we are here to have fun, not to have a second job. And to be honest the horror stories about people investing a lot of effort and resources on building a starbase just to be booted afterwards do not help.
You can't force people to participate, you have to make them want to participate. And for that you need to be having fun together, slowly knowing each other and trusting each other.
Ewww. I'm starting to sound like a true Feddie. They kind of just rub on you, you know? It's like something you catch. T.T
Some players are excited about the new holding and asking when will we start it and I am like - **** that you guys have 2 open projects in the mine - 2 in the Embassy and 3 in the Starbase!!
They are like well - just have to go to a bigger fleet when they get the new holding.
Sure you can have caps on buying stuff - but even a 200k FC cap is going to be hit really quickly on most fleets - then what do you do? Close the fleet stores to everyone unless things get done?
Break out the whips and chains and start beating people to do stuff in a video game!!??? Ifs Frickin' laser beam on your head nuts!!
/rant
There is alot of EC price gouging in the exchange for white duty officers, and the only alternative is to spend Fleet Credits at the Star base to buy white officers of each profession at the station near the order of the watch.
Of course that leads to the conflict of you need those Credits to buy fleet stuff in the first place.
The best plan of action is to remove the refined dil requirement from ALL FLEET STORES, as a TRIBBLE ton of it has already been spent just to get the ability to buy the item (unlock store, provision). Also offer all perishables at a discounted rate at the star base for the projects, making them bound so they could not be sold. Perhaps making a new FLEET Data Sample, or Fleet Large Hypo-spray.
Bottom line is, when asking for REFINED Dil, that is asking for real $ out of the players game, because that can me converted to ZEN. Asking for Dil ORE wouldn't be as bad as we are all still limited to refining 8-9.5k per day, so one can accumulate alot of backlogged ORE.
Maybe have a Fleet Mine project that sends ore to any given fleet project every day.
I looked at the wiki and some projects take 1 million refined dil, some 1.8 million!! that's $100 to $180!! Just for 2 upgrade projects. Plus don't forget the (in total) 7 months worth of cool down time needed to get to T5.
Granted they made it better when they changed it to white/any career type, but it is still tedious to get regular amounts....
Funny you say that - I depend on doffing all 6 of my KDF toons - as doffing on the KDF version of Diplomacy(Marauding) gives incredible amounts of prisoners/ contraband / commodities / dilithium and TRIBBLE gear that can be turned into EC
If it was not for low numbers - a group of experienced KDF doffers with high quality doffs could easily cover the costs of building a starbase.
Since my primary KDF fleet is at T5 in everything - that's not an issue - also I am not involved in leadership in any KDF fleet so I have never worried about those things.
On another sad note: the lack of KDF players in the Q's has pretty much regulated my KDF toons to just doffing anyways - but that is another issue all together:(
Dilithium is limited release over time
Doffs are a huge PITA to get (30k each, or you have to spend your previous fleet credits to get more, or wait 2-4 days at a time to get like 10)
There are your reasons.
Oh and I have probably put 2-3 million of my fleet credits back into the fleets I am in, just to help fill doff stuff. =/ (doffs are universally the last thing to get done because they are the hardest thing to get a lot of)
They really need to do something particularly about the duty officers. They are way too time gated.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
I think there is an idea circulating around by DEVs to re-vamp based on fleet size but needs more design to eliminate over exploits and making balancing more fair for big to small fleets. Final plans still way in the future so don't hold your breath waiting for any changes soon.
There are way too many things to spend dilithium on, and us casual players typically don't earn dilithium very quickly. I'll donate a few thousand here and there, but I like to use my dilithium on some other things too. As we get close to Tier V, a few thousand dilithium here and there is a tiny drop in the bucket for those projects, and the devs keep adding even more dilithium sinks.
You want to motivate your members to contribute? Create EVENTS designed around earning large rewards for your group. Like a 2-hour "We're going to PLOW through STFs like there's NO TOMORROW!!" event. With 5 or 10 people, you could earn OODLES of Dil, marks, EC, whatever you need. (I'd discourage making donation stipulations for the event - let them contribute what they want ... but that's just me.) Feeling part of a group makes people .. feel like part of a group, usually, which makes them more likely to contribute to group goals, I would think.
As for Doffs, that's more individual, and the interface sucks for it.
It seems the vast majority of your most active players (forum regulars) hate the idea... and while that's a small subset of the playerbase, I think it's an important constituency.
THE PLAYERS DO NOT WANT THIS.
That part I understand.
I am in a 5/3/3 totally completed fleet on FED side... but a 4/2/2 about halfway done on the KDF side.
The doffs are killing us, again =/
I honestly wish those of us that have completed one on either side could just... use the TRIBBLE from both sides. Know what I am saying? its like double duty =/
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Absolutely not... and a sure sign of a crappy fleet. Yes, they need 125k for my fleet (others are higher, others lower).... but if you fleet leadership changes this often, or starts gating the provisions... look elsewhere for another fleet.
Star Trek Online, Now with out the Trek....