You know...you might need a dose of fresh new perspective

deokkent

Dooooooooooooooooooooom I say... Dooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmm!!! Alright, enough of that. Incoming wall of text.


I think people have the wrong idea about star trek online. Some of the player community try to grind everything for whatever reasons (oh yeah, shinies... nvm). Anyways, none of it is needed to play star trek online. There are many steps you can take to start enjoying the game again. It is very surprising to read people's comments and their obsession with the belief that sto lacks content. Well, let me break the status quo to admit that every time I log in in the game, I'm overwhelmed with content. There is a grind factor to it, granted a lot of it is time gated and repetitive. But you also have a choice to not do any of it and still perform very well in almost everything. But the most important factor of all is that you can have fun without the endgame shinies. Hear me out in these series of point:

1. Foundry missions:
User created content. Some of it is bad, most of it is good. But it's renewable and almost endless source of content. But I just want to say that some trekkies out there could make money as novelists with the stuff they come up with. It's not always pew pew, boom boom, argh respawn. There is drama, intrigue, comedy, spying, infiltration etc etc. You will find enough variety to spark interest in every sto player, if you bother to read the text. Good foundry missions take at least an hour to play. Besides being rewarding (dilithium wise anyways) and entertaining, they almost always makes you feel like you're immersed in a star trek episode.

And since we're on the foundry subject, I have a small request... Please, author of Rising Phoenix, can you get off your lazy behind and make part two already :P:D!!! Lol lol I joke I joke. Hope no one gets offended, I'm just trying to point out, with horribly misplaced humor, that some foundry missions are memorable, even more so than official cryptic releases (well besides doomsday device). Nothing beats the epicness of the doomsday device mission in star trek online, seriously who doesn't like a heroic but ultimately vain self sacrifice... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBBhZ1zst-s Oh yeah!:cool:

2. PvP:
Space battles with other players. I don't deny there are huge chasms/imbalances in terms of experience/skill/gear etc between new players and veterans... That's only when you go in public queues though. Public queues are notorious for the fact that it's rare to have a good time, something that's not unique to PvP but also exists in PvE. So people have banded together to create fleets and private channels to weed out trolls and "n00bs" (often those that don't want to improve their gameplay). I have to say it's working out fine. So a new player doesn't have the latest new shiny? Well, you see, fleets can create private pvp events where everyone fights with common vendor, or better yet fight in shuttles. That's just one example, but you pretty much can do whatever floats your boat as long as your friends agree to it and have a blast doing it. PvP is a type of content that's always evolving, enticing and new, if players simply agree to simple rules that provide balance and a fair chance between veterans players and new blood. The only downside I can think of is that you can't really do this in public queues. But that's fine, it's pretty much an universal truth in sto that no one should pug, masochists excepted.

That said, I'd like to promote the channel organizedpvp and tyler durden for excellent pvp matches. Go in there if you wanna try out pvp.

3. Doffing:
I haven't done much serious doffing to be honest, and I can't tell you much about it but I hear it's incredibly fun. From what little I understand of doffing, it's pretty much micro managing your ship duty officers and sometimes yields incredible rewards that a lot of people covet. It's all about telling officers under your command to do errands, something you'd expect from a commanding officer. I was surprised to discover that a lot of people take doffing seriously, there is a doff tracker out there (it's on google) and there is also a dedicated channel to doffing. I did some doffing but it wasn't really doffing, mostly completed chain assignments, which actually deserve special mention here. I've obtained some really valuable duty officers just spending a couple of minutes in clusters (oh mah gard how I love my purple technicians, sigh...). I've made my cruiser builds work perfectly to my liking just doing these ship duty assignments. Ah, This is actually a perfect segue to my next point:

4. Min maxing and starship builds:
I don't know about you, but I enjoy building my ships to perform to the best of its abilities. I like flying one type of ships, escorts or escort hybrids! You'd think I'd be limited into the amount of builds I could play with. But no, I really can't tell you how many escort builds I've experimented with, how much dilithium I've wasted trying one skill tree or another. When I feel like I've mastered one build, I would drop it and start all over again with something new. Why am I using the past tense? I'm still doing this. I'm obsessed with build stats, gear synergies and performance. I'm not going to pretend I'm the best at it, but I do know one thing. It's insane how easy it is to get absorbed in testing your ship's performance. The kicker is that you don't even need all those purple ultra rare items. You can do all that with regular exchange gear. I've done some ridiculous tests like what gives the best dps, activating emergency power to weapons first followed by tactical team or vice versa... What happens if you stack some abilities on top of another, how fast can you kill something with one tactic or another. Things like that. Takes me hours at a time. I've been playing sto for almost a year and a half, but really got into it maybe 8 months ago. I'm still discovering new things that literally shatter my virtual sto reality of how something works and you realize you've been playing wrong all this time. Makes you wish you had earned a degree in sto mechanics when you first started playing.

5. Forums debates:
Reason why I post and start threads in here. Share knowledge, discussion things relevant to sto. I consider the forum a type of sto content, which kinda gives insight to the game's complexity. We all spend a significant amount of time posting in here. Suffice it to say, I'd be one of those people who are miserable if we had computers and no smartphones and having to wait all day to vent our frustrations. It's nice to read about other people's sto experience, to share your own and be heard.

6. My next and last point point will be another post I spotted in another GD thread:
Link. I believe there are some truth elements in that user's post. The way you see sto either as an enjoyable experience or as a horrible waste of time grind is a matter of perspective. In any case, Mister johnny111971 makes a very valid point and I won't say anymore so I don't risk corrupting it.

Message of the day: Take your time to grind that shiny, don't take the grind too seriously, those are nice things to have but you really don't have to have it now. You will get caught up in it and very likely lose sight of what's more important: having fun playing one of the best star trek games. If you're not convinced that there isn't any truth to what I'm saying, not even a little bit, then I am sorry to inform you that STO is not a game for you. You better quit before you become too bitter, and that bitterness stains your personality.

Congratulations for reading this far. I never expected this to be so long, really didn't take me long to type it... What the hell. You deserve a cookie if you read this far lol. Cookie for ya !

buccaneerdtb

I can't find my cookie! Do I have to grind for it?

galadiman

Well put, sir!

malnificent

Agreed 100%

Said simply I play those aspects of STO that I enjoy. Yes I play them over and over (and over) but each time there is usually something different. And it's an efficient use of my time (Seven would be so proud).

Furthermore I would agree there is a lot of content. So much so I don't take advantage of most of it. But for me the reason for my myopic game experience comes from my sense of reward payoff. I find I can earn more dilithuim in STFs than from the Foundry so I "grind" STFs. By the time I'm out of STFs to do I'm back to the top of my cooldowns or I'm off to cycling through Fleet Mark events. If I'm bored with FMs (you can never have enough FMs; FCs yes, FMs no), I'm back to STFs or SB24 like events or frankly staring at the Exchange for 20mins trying to make 2 ECs to rub together.

I enjoy the rep systems. I enjoy the pop up events (Borg attacking sector space ... We need more of these). I find enough reasons here with STO to stay ... here with STO.

The day that changes, no harm no foul ... I'll take my ball and find another park to play in. For now I like it here and appreciate the effort Cryptic has put forth.


More to do, sure. Can STO be better, oh yea. Will I be here to see further growth, that's the plan.

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phoenicius

Yes, there is a lot of content, but almost all of it doesn't give any reward, or barely gives any, the ones that do give decent reward are awfully repetitive(elite STFs), and this could be fixed by adding another 5-6 STFs at least(that aren't insane/boring like hive) and making sure story missions actually reward you decently(some story missions take 30+ mins, why should they give you a damn green item?), and yes most players DO care about rewards.

1 - foundry missions would be better if cryptic actually gave more tools for players to create their missions, and i don't know about you, but i think most foundry missions actually suck, it would be nice if cryptic took the very best missions and added as actual missions(provided they meet a certain standard).

2 - a lot of people hate PvP utterly, especially since you need a looooot of EC(or dil and FM) to gear properly, and the game doesn't even teaches you most of its mechanics, lets not even get into premades and how they put off newer players from even trying.

3 - doffing can be/generally is extremely repetitive, also not everyone likes it.

4 - not everyone likes to min/max , if anything some actually hate it.

5 - forums are mostly a joke, game is bug ridden/imbalanced, and you see people more often than not, asking for trivial things instead of fixes(oh! oh! why don't you turn ESD BEIGE!1), the fact devs tend to post in silly threads and BARELY post in bug topics, plus when they do, it is to say "we're looking into it" and not fix anything lol, isn't exactly stellar either(where is my fixed marauder boff? and KHG chest?), you might as well call the forums a huge hug box/circle jerk(the "doom thread" is a good example of that).

6 - harder content doesn't necessarily mean one will have fun, look at WoW heroic raids for instance, you have people that enjoy it, you have some that nearly rip each other's throat out, on the other hand i don't see a problem with harder content, as long as it is totally and utterly optional(no extra insane rewards or anything, except maybe a title or something like no-win scenario, the extra dificulty is its own reward), that way it doesn't force anyone to do what they don't want to.


i'm still astonished how cryptic manages to have arguably the best possible IP for a MMO that several studios would probably be willing to kill to get it(alongside star wars) because its essentially guaranteed profit, and not manage to do it properly(yeah atari is to blame for the horrible launch/first year, but come on, cryptic had 2 years to improve after going f2p), they would be swimming in money(even more than they are now) if they actually tried.

saekiith

phoenicius wrote: »

1 - foundry missions would be better if cryptic actually gave more tools for players to create their missions, and i don't know about you, but i think most foundry missions actually suck, it would be nice if cryptic took the very best missions and added as actual missions(provided they meet a certain standard).

I think the bigger problem is that most people do not know how to use the Foundry properly...
Oh and you know about the Spotlights? And the Rating System that you can use to see if you would like to try the mission?
Those are very helpful

phoenicius

saekiith wrote: »

I think the bigger problem is that most people do not know how to use the Foundry properly...
Oh and you know about the Spotlights? And the Rating System that you can use to see if you would like to try the mission?
Those are very helpful

i don't mean spotlights, i mean directly adding the very best ones to the mission roster, hell even encourage players to make missions based on the current plot.

stirling191

phoenicius wrote: »

i don't mean spotlights, i mean directly adding the very best ones to the mission roster, hell even encourage players to make missions based on the current plot.

The fact that you seem to think encouraging Cryptic to be lazy is a good thing worries me a bit. User created content has its place. That place is not to replace the work the devs should be doing.

phoenicius

stirling191 wrote: »

The fact that you seem to think encouraging Cryptic to be lazy is a good thing worries me a bit. User created content has its place. That place is not to replace the work the devs should be doing.

i'm not encouraging cryptic to be lazy, i simply think we could have both, i never said player missions should act as substitute.

but yeah, i guess considering how cryptic is, they would simply take advantage.

smoovious

saekiith wrote: »

I think the bigger problem is that most people do not know how to use the Foundry properly...
Oh and you know about the Spotlights? And the Rating System that you can use to see if you would like to try the mission?
Those are very helpful

From what I understand (and correct me if I'm wrong as I haven't used the editor) is that the editor itself is insufficient for the task at hand.

The editor is a 2d map that you place your objects on, and can't even go into a 3d view to see if you're getting your positioning right? And, you are very limited on the content you can actually put in?

I've also been told that it lacks control about who can enter the mission and what kind of ship you're in. So, if you were to make a small-craft mission, you're stuck with a space environment, and anyone running a big ship can still join. Also, if your mission is intended to be the KDF invading Starfleet Academy, that UFP can invade too?

Again, correct me if I'm wrong about any of this. I'm going by replies to questions I had about it when I was wanting to make some small-craft content (and I abandoned the plans) and from skimming the foundry sections looking for more info about how things are done.

I believe the main problem with foundry missions has much to do with the tools that are available, that just won't do the job for the things some of us have ideas for, but can't end up making work.

-- Smoov

jonsills

Phoenicus, one of your first points seems to be exactly what the OP was talking about. What's the reward for running this or that mission? How about "the fun you had doing it"? Why does it have to be profitable in order to be enjoyable? Heck, I enjoy playing through the Nimbus III mission chain enough that I take it at the first opportunity on each toon, and there's no really great reward until the very end (in the end, you can get a purple DOff and a device that summons your pirate buddies). I don't play it for Law or the pirates, though - I play it because I have fun.

I don't look forward to killing Hakeev on Brea in order to collect some reward - it barely even pays out. I look forward to it because Hakeev's such a rat TRIBBLE that it gives me a warm feeling inside every time he takes a faceful of disruptor fire.

See, it doesn't take goodies to make some of us play - just enjoyment.

drogyn1701

smoovious wrote: »

From what I understand (and correct me if I'm wrong as I haven't used the editor) is that the editor itself is insufficient for the task at hand.

The editor is a 2d map that you place your objects on, and can't even go into a 3d view to see if you're getting your positioning right? And, you are very limited on the content you can actually put in?

I've also been told that it lacks control about who can enter the mission and what kind of ship you're in. So, if you were to make a small-craft mission, you're stuck with a space environment, and anyone running a big ship can still join. Also, if your mission is intended to be the KDF invading Starfleet Academy, that UFP can invade too?

Again, correct me if I'm wrong about any of this. I'm going by replies to questions I had about it when I was wanting to make some small-craft content (and I abandoned the plans) and from skimming the foundry sections looking for more info about how things are done.

I believe the main problem with foundry missions has much to do with the tools that are available, that just won't do the job for the things some of us have ideas for, but can't end up making work.

-- Smoov

Yes the map editor is in 2 dimensions, but you can go directly and in and preview a map, which puts your Foundry test character on the map so you experience it in 3D just like it would be in-game.

No, we have very little control over the player. We can't designate a mission as small-craft only, all we can do is request that people bring a shuttle and hope they read the mission description. We can't force the player the fly another ship (like in Temporal Ambassador), we can't change the player's appearance, make them beam down solo, or take away their weapons.

Missions are separated into Klingon and Federation Factions. If you make a mission for the KDF, only KDF and KDF-allied Romulans can play it. If you make a mission for the Federation, only Feds and Fed-allied Romulans can play it.

Yes, there are many times when the Foundry just isn't suited to something the author wants to do. Those of us who stick with it tend to be those who either find creative ways around the limitations, or find way to alter their desires to fit the limitations (for most its probably a combination of that).

Sure the Foundry could use a lot of development, and in the author community we spend a lot of time talking about that, but I've always felt like the it does exactly what it is supposed to do, which is allow me to make missions for Star Trek Online similar, even if not exact, to what the devs' story missions are like. It will never be as comprehensive as the devs' tools, but to my mind it doesn't need to be and trust me, there are thousands of excellent missions out there.

smoovious

drogyn1701 wrote: »

Yes the map editor is in 2 dimensions, but you can go directly and in and preview a map, which puts your Foundry test character on the map so you experience it in 3D just like it would be in-game.

Yeah... that's the problem... need to be able to edit a 3d map with a 3d editor.

No, we have very little control over the player. We can't designate a mission as small-craft only, all we can do is request that people bring a shuttle and hope they read the mission description. We can't force the player the fly another ship (like in Temporal Ambassador), we can't change the player's appearance, make them beam down solo, or take away their weapons.

I didn't even think about putting them into a different ship or away team control.

I would think at the very least, being able to set how many away team they could bring would be a pretty basic configuration option in the map.

Missions are separated into Klingon and Federation Factions. If you make a mission for the KDF, only KDF and KDF-allied Romulans can play it. If you make a mission for the Federation, only Feds and Fed-allied Romulans can play it.

Ok, good, so I was wrong on this one. That's good to know, thank you.

Yes, there are many times when the Foundry just isn't suited to something the author wants to do. Those of us who stick with it tend to be those who either find creative ways around the limitations, or find way to alter their desires to fit the limitations (for most its probably a combination of that).

Sure the Foundry could use a lot of development, and in the author community we spend a lot of time talking about that, but I've always felt like the it does exactly what it is supposed to do, which is allow me to make missions for Star Trek Online similar, even if not exact, to what the devs' story missions are like. It will never be as comprehensive as the devs' tools, but to my mind it doesn't need to be and trust me, there are thousands of excellent missions out there.

I just want some more flexibility in it... like, to be able to do another atmospheric type map or a different vault-style mission.

Like, this kind of story arc... your objective is to capture (as a KDF) a UFP agent that is being held by (insert whatever race) on one of their planets...

You have to come in and fight your way through the space patrols and defenses in your ship.

Once you succeed, the next stage is an atmospheric air strike taking out ground defenses clearing the way for your landing parties, using your shuttles and fighters.

Once you succeed, you land (not shown) and join the landing parties fighting your way into the complex searching for the prisoner you have to capture and take with you.

That whole 2nd part, I wouldn't be able to do... and that was the part I wanted to do most, so when I learned I couldn't set that up, I abandoned the plan to make it.

-- Smoov

macronius

Wall of text ... fanboi incoherent rambling ... more walls of text ... pointless thread. *yawns*

rickeyredshirt

saekiith wrote: »

I think the bigger problem is that most people do not know how to use the Foundry properly...
Oh and you know about the Spotlights? And the Rating System that you can use to see if you would like to try the mission?
Those are very helpful

I think the issue is that the Foundry isn't supported as much as it should be by Cryptic. I made a Foundry mission after season 3 and it took about 24 hours to make total time. Then season 4 hit the live server and 'broke' the mission completely. I lost interest in spending another 12+ hours fixing it and using the inept tool set given to us. I haven't looked at the Foundry since, too much time/risk for little to no reward. I imagine there are a lot of other players who feel the same way.

smoovious

macronius wrote: »

Wall of text ... fanboi incoherent rambling ... more walls of text ... pointless thread. *yawns*

Reading, and comprehension, man... such a downer...

-- Smoov

rickeyredshirt

jonsills wrote: »

Phoenicus, one of your first points seems to be exactly what the OP was talking about. What's the reward for running this or that mission? How about "the fun you had doing it"? Why does it have to be profitable in order to be enjoyable? Heck, I enjoy playing through the Nimbus III mission chain enough that I take it at the first opportunity on each toon, and there's no really great reward until the very end (in the end, you can get a purple DOff and a device that summons your pirate buddies). I don't play it for Law or the pirates, though - I play it because I have fun.

I don't look forward to killing Hakeev on Brea in order to collect some reward - it barely even pays out. I look forward to it because Hakeev's such a rat TRIBBLE that it gives me a warm feeling inside every time he takes a faceful of disruptor fire.

See, it doesn't take goodies to make some of us play - just enjoyment.

I agree with what you are saying. I want to game for the enjoyment of it. Where it becomes unenjoyable is the grind that is endgame. Nobody wants to be the weak-link in their PvE/PvP team because their equipment doesn't provide them with uber-critz. So to remedy that you grind better gear and that in itself has become a vicious cycle of pain - you have to have good ground out (or dilithium bought) gear to stay competitive in those environments. It's not as big of a deal in a story-line mission environment.

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snoggymack22

DOFFing took a big hit in season 9.5. And has been really inconsistent and somewhat abandoned for the past few seasons.

It's a great concept. But it's really in need of some assistance that doesn't seem to be coming from the developers. These kinds of things require caretaking and they haven't kept up with it.

shpoks

deokkent wrote: »

I regret posting this. Bad Geko Bad.

Good to know you have no respect at all for the playerbase. I'll continue not giving you a dime from my wallet.

Isn't that, like, some 2 years old and didn't he personally apologize for stating that back then? Or is it a new thing again?

As much as I strongly disagree with most of Geko's decisions for STO and his behavior, I don't think it would be ok to dig up past already resolved conflicts once again.

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shpoks

deokkent wrote: »

I never seen it before, but I now know where he stands with pvp.

Oh, we all know where Cryptic in general stand with PvP.

However, I vaguely remember this statement from.....well, I think it was more than 1.5 year ago. There was an expected reaction on the forum, especially in the PvP section and I remember Geko apologizing afterwards for making that statement.

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shpoks

deokkent wrote: »

Are you sure Geko apologized? Or was it Flakes that did it for him?

Not 100% sure, but I believe he did. I'm sure it was not BranFlakes doing it on his behalf.
Probably some of the people more present in the PvP section remember this better then me.

bluegeek

"Captain! A Necro-class Thread just decloaked!"

"Photon torpedoes, full spread! Phasers, fire!"

"Direct hit, Captain!"

"Mod, send a priority message to Starfleet. We have disabled a Necro. Advise them that this Necro was hidden for more than 30 days before it suddenly decloaked and we had to neutralize it."

OOC: Please don't post in threads that have been "cloaked" for 30 days or more. Start a new one.