I rather this than get a crappy vanilla ship for free , then the better version gets throw into the fleet store, or a 3 pack.....this way I get the better version for free.
ROFL! Dream on. You're still getting the vanilla version, for grind, not for free. And there will still be a better version thrown in fleet store, for money, not for free.:D
I've read all 13 pages of this thread and I must say,...the general agreement is that grinding is becoming a chore.
But if so many are tired of the senseless grinind,...the only way to stop it is to boycott grinding for these upcoming ships. After a while Cryptic will see the writing on the wall, that they can't continue to have these grinds for features on a ship that should have been their in the first place (for example dual deflectors on science ships).
It's blatantly obvious the Voth lockbox didn't do so well (I hardly see any voth ships while I play). We all agree that Cryptic needs to make money in order to stay in business. Lockboxes are second place to using the Jem'Hadar Attack Ship as a means to generate income.
Yeah, put in my no vote not that it will matter. I guess this is going to be the way of things going forward. More events and event reps, judging by the interview the EPH gave. I heard once that Cryptic keeps going with these 20 hour timers and once a day things where if you want to keep going you have to log in once a day so that people would be forced to come back to the game every day and that some metric says that the more times someone comes back to a game, the more likely they are to spend money there. If that's really the reason for this, I think its a very silly one.
But if that is true or not, I still think this is a bad idea. At least stop giving away ships that do new things. How about change it up, give away ground stuff that does new things, and some ground things to do them with. Or better yet, build a game that isn't all limited time events and repetitive missions and actually gives you something to do. It only took you one season worth of work to put together a full 1-50 mission path for the Romulan Republic. Maybe devote each season to put together a similar amount of missions for all three factions, and further the story line so we are no longer in 2409 by the end of it. Now there is something that would make me play.
It's not mandatory, you don't have to do it, the only thing is that if you want the ship, then yes, you will have to put a little bit more effort into getting it...
What Brandon said in post 115 is the key phrase of all of this:
I will say this again, Cryptic isn't forcing you to do this. If you want the ship, you can go ahead and slot the project for it... However, if you don't want the ship, then don't bother slotting the project. It's as simple as that, and some people can't seem to get over the fact that it's purely optional.
Nothing is mandatory in a videogame. Even playing it is not. For example, eating or breathing is mandatory, playing videogames is not.
Your argument makes no sense.
What kind of free gift is free, but you'll have to work for it, and maybe pay some RL cash (lobis) ? When I offer free gifts to others, they are free, they don't have to work for them, or pay for them, that's the idea behind the "free gift" concept.
Okay, and what about those players who do want the reward, don't mind doing the grinding, but only get to login 2-3 days per week because of their busy personal/professional adult lives?
Cryptic assumes its playerbase gets to login every single day. Many only get to play on days off or the weekends, so a best case scenario for them is getting to play 12 days each month (that being the best case). So they're going to be short in the time needed to complete this tedious event, because of the unnecessary daily timer they slap on their grinds, just so it creates this feeble illusion that the event is a lengthy one.
I have no problem doing the grind it takes to get the ship reward for my desired characters, but because of the 20 hour daily timer, it's not possible to do the tedious grind on my own time. The timer is unnecessary, what's the difference if someone does the mission 15 times over 25 days, or does it 15 times over 2-3 days? Yeah, I'm sure some players would have the reward ship in a few hours after the event launches, but who cares, let them. At least the casual player would have a better chance at getting the reward and not be punished just because they can't login 15 days each month.
The real answer is "too bad so sad..." it's a fact of life for many people with busy lives some choose not to marry, or have kids, some choose to make less money for more personal time, some may choose to play SWTOR instead of STO... You know what they want to get the ship and if you can't do it then you have to set yours sights on something that fits in with your other choices. I've gotten up at 3am to do a mission so I could get my rep done... should it be necessary? Keep in mind there are other options including spending money to get the ship too or grind alternative content for EC/Keys.
As for logging in everyday... that is the F2P model... these types of games make money from keeping people coming back over and over everyday. The more you are logged in the more opportunity there is to sell you something. Think farmville, cand crush, etc... all have timers to keep you logging back in and playing and have ways for you to buy your way out of the grind. Sub models don't have to try as hard.
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
Well, I've managed to read all 34 pages of this thread... and I still think some of the commenters in the first 13 have a valid point.
This is an anniversary event. Something that helps the participators to celebrate being around for 4 years. If this 25-day event comes and goes and I have not had the chance to run the required 48 mission so I can enjoy each of the 3 ships (one for each faction), then it is tantamount to receiving an invitation to a party a day after it happened. Herein lies my disappointment...
I understand everyone's point of view here (well, almost... there were a few that spoke about getting with Branflakes... and not that there's anything wrong with that, I'm not interested in that sort of thing). I plan on running through the grind with the hopes of earning three nifty ships (I hope to goodness sakes the FED one is NOT the one in the posted pics from the first 5 or so pages). However, if I have not made it through all three grinds for all three ships, then everyone who complained about the grind will have been proven right. They are anniversary ships that we need to work "a tad more for" (to quote Bran's original #30 post), with the great and grand possibility that we will not earn them... I could wind up with 960 points toward the KDF version, and be completely out of luck... and that sucks...
Just my two cents...
CM
"Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure science." - Edwin Hubble
Thank you Cryptic for making again Grind fest. :mad:
First i will start of telling the truth about season 8.
I have never played any story mission in season 8 besides the STF-s (they are long and boring).
Why?
Because i must GRIND all the time and because of GRIND i don't have time to play any new content.
Did you ask yourself Cryptic about that possibility?
So can you tell me where did you get the idea that it is so frikin awesome and cool to make players GRINDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD for anniversary gift and doing same mission over and over and over again
till we bleed and die just so you can tell : "we had a more players on servers."
Let me tell you something,
yeah this looks cool on paper but did you know that you are harassing your players with this GRIND policy, that players are starting to rejecting the game.
Do you know why Cryptic?
STO is not game anymore, it is WORK , who the hell after 10 hours at job wants to come home and WORK in the game for 7 hours to get something?
Cryptic you are not paying me enough for doing that, and i am not spending any money on your game until you pay me for playing your game.
The whining is premature until we see the exact specs of the ships. For all we know at this point, it could be the greatest thing ever.
Once the grind is upon us, it'll be too late to whine. You see a truck speeding towards you, you get out of the way. You don't wait to see if it kills you.:D
While the OP is perhaps... overly emotional, I must admit the "grind creep" is kind of bothering me, too. I play for story, and I really don't like that you had to grind to unlock the story content in the Dyson Sphere, and I have spent hardly any time there. I just haven't found the snippets of story I expect (I imagine them to be similar to the Romulan rep) to be worth putting in all those hours.
While I'm not necessarily against grinding for a good-quality ship, turning the Anniversary event which has traditionally been (to the best of my knowledge) a giveaway into a grind bothers me. Perhaps I'm over-extrapolating, but I'm perceiving a shift where more and more material is a grind and grinding is, well... a grind.
The whining is premature until we see the exact specs of the ships. For all we know at this point, it could be the greatest thing ever.
I'll second that.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
Thank you Cryptic for making again Grind fest. :mad:
First i will start of telling the truth about season 8.
I have never played any story mission in season 8 besides the STF-s (they are long and boring).
Why?
Because i must GRIND all the time and because of GRIND i don't have time to play any new content.
Did you ask yourself Cryptic about that possibility?
So can you tell me where did you get the idea that it is so frikin awesome and cool to make players GRINDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD for anniversary gift and doing same mission over and over and over again
till we bleed and die just so you can tell : "we had a more players on servers."
Let me tell you something,
yeah this looks cool on paper but did you know that you are harassing your players with this GRIND policy, that players are starting to rejecting the game.
Do you know why Cryptic?
STO is not game anymore, it is WORK , who the hell after 10 hours at job wants to come home and WORK in the game for 7 hours to get something?
Cryptic you are not paying me enough for doing that, and i am not spending any money on your game until you pay me for playing your game.
You have NOT read branflakes comment relating to the anniversary ships have you. For completing the anniversary FE you will receive 400 of the marks required totally and utterly free. that will leave you with only 600 to get. You will receive 40 for completing Q's event daily thus only taking you 15 days to get your anniversary event ship, which btw is AWESOME.
Grinding on this event will in the long run only be minimal compared to other events in the year
Grinding is not compulsory. It is a matter of personal player choice, as is the amount of time you wish to spend playing.
I would have preferred 6 non-skippable missions than a 15 day grind. WE WANT MORE STORY AND LESS MONOTONY!
We don't know if it will be a grind util details of the event are released. It may be one of the easiest STO has ever offered. Who knows what they have instore.
You have NOT read branflakes comment relating to the anniversary ships have you. For completing the anniversary FE you will receive 400 of the marks required totally and utterly free. that will leave you with only 600 to get. You will receive 40 for completing Q's event daily thus only taking you 15 days to get your anniversary event ship, which btw is AWESOME.
Grinding on this event will in the long run only be minimal compared to other events in the year
Grinding is not compulsory. It is a matter of personal player choice, as is the amount of time you wish to spend playing.
Then why bother having an anniversary event at all? Personally, I liked doing the shakedown mission for the oddy when it was released. I thought that was awesome. I also enjoyed the mission to get the ambassador, which they tied into the storyline rather nicely (it was much like a TNG episode). I don't see why this is suddenly turning into a grind. I didn't bother with the bs of winter wonderland because it simply wasn't worth my time. And besides all that, if its true that this is a sci ship, then just how awesome could it be? Unless its gonna have at least a 4/3 weapon setup, there's no point.
Then why bother having an anniversary event at all? Personally, I liked doing the shakedown mission for the oddy when it was released. I thought that was awesome. I also enjoyed the mission to get the ambassador, which they tied into the storyline rather nicely (it was much like a TNG episode). I don't see why this is suddenly turning into a grind. I didn't bother with the bs of winter wonderland because it simply wasn't worth my time. And besides all that, if its true that this is a sci ship, then just how awesome could it be? Unless its gonna have at least a 4/3 weapon setup, there's no point.
No point in speculating, until full details are released
Believe me from branflakes comment the anniversary ship (s) are gonna be nothing like STO has offered before.
Maybe or maybe not. truth is that we won't know until specifics are released.
Either way it is premature to complain.
It's probable that PWE really needs another week after the anniversary starts to remove the last quirks from the new ships and their rumored new mechanics.
PWE probably has the saved loadouts as their priority since that is one of the first things people will try after 8.5 is released and they'd really look incompetent if it was bugged at the launch.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
Then why bother having an anniversary event at all? Personally, I liked doing the shakedown mission for the oddy when it was released. I thought that was awesome. I also enjoyed the mission to get the ambassador, which they tied into the storyline rather nicely (it was much like a TNG episode). I don't see why this is suddenly turning into a grind. I didn't bother with the bs of winter wonderland because it simply wasn't worth my time. And besides all that, if its true that this is a sci ship, then just how awesome could it be? Unless its gonna have at least a 4/3 weapon setup, there's no point.
That's kind of the point though isn't it? We don't have enough info yet decide if its worth your time or not. I would suggest waiting for the ship stats and daily mission desc. to determine if a little effort is worth your time or not. I think if there is going to be more work involved the ship is probably got some extras that make it worth while.
This image was taken from Tribble, but I wanted to provide a few important notes about this. The free ships this year are not your average Anniversary ship; they've got some extremely amazing bells and whistles, and even 2 new mechanics being introduced for the first time (more info soon). Because of this, you'll need to work a tad bit harder for a free ship over just running an episode one time. However! You will receive a package of 400 Qmendations as a one-time reward the first time you complete the Featured Episode, "A Step Between Stars." That means you only need to collect 600 more, which at 40 a day from completing a short daily, will take 15 days out of the 25+ days the event runs. There should also be a Lobi option for additional/ substitute Qmendations.
All of this info and much more will be coming up in our Dev Blogs next week, and I think once you see the ships, you'll see why a little extra effort for the ships will be more than worth it.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
Yes but it would stop having a point, although I doubt that it has one now (beside the fact that I hardly found any one in that other pretty long post on that subject who liked that... more like 90% said they wouldn't even try... they probably won't change that).
Problem with grinding in general is:
An MMO can hardly work WITHOUT it. If you have nothing to achieve most ppl will get bored als leave.
The little problem in STO is: they don't get that the little secret to make grinding not FEEL like grinding.
Its kind of sad, STO had a lot of content nobody plays because they are kind of tied to the little but of content where they can get stuff.
No incentive to replay story missions at all, little incentive for foundry missions... you get your dillithium faster while grinding marks.... same for exploration missions.
So I see the OPs point. I do not play story missions.
The only reason why i recently played some is because I leveled another romulan, and I was surprised how much more I enjoyed myself playing STO doing so.
But now.... why bother? They don't give marks, and because of being away from the game for quiet a long time haven't completed ANY reputation yet.
But concerning that particular event:
I'm fine with working for ships. In fact I believe adding a ship project to the t5-level of the reputation systems would increase the incentive to do reps by A LOT.
I don't even have a problem with working for that ship within the limited time of an event.
But not CONSTANTLY.
Once in a half year is ok... already kind of annoying but ok. Grinding for them is kind of a nice break from.... well... the other grinding.
But winter event went offline 2 weeks ago. We should be done with this.
If they want us to grind us for that other ship, as for me, they should keep it for the summer event or they can keep it entirely.
Even if it has a function to instantly morph into every c-store or lockbox ship, comes with those yellow mkXII weapons and has an instant kill everything button, I won't care (well Ill take it if it is a Hegh'ta refit... but im crazy so that doenst count)
Like many my time to play is limited. Recently I spent the majority of the time running that stupid race, now i actually want to go back and PLAY THE ACTUAL GAME.
Here on the forums you have some people saying "we don't like grind." But I'm willing to bet that Cryptic's metrics show people participating in the "grindy" content in massive numbers. I can't prove that, I just know I see tons of people doing things like the winter event. So given that disparity, why should they give weight to your feedback when their metrics say that "grindy" content works?
Here's an experiment. All you folks who are coming down on the "we hate grind" side of things, don't participate in this event. Don't do the content. Show their internal metrics how you feel with actions instead of words, and see what happens.
I'm fine with working for ships. In fact I believe adding a ship project to the t5-level of the reputation systems would increase the incentive to do reps by A LOT.
I don't even have a problem with working for that ship within the limited time of an event.
But not CONSTANTLY.
Once in a half year is ok... already kind of annoying but ok. Grinding for them is kind of a nice break from.... well... the other grinding.
But winter event went offline 2 weeks ago. We should be done with this for now.
If they want us to grind for that other ship, as for me, they should keep it for the summer event or they can keep it entirely.
Even if it has a function to instantly morph into every c-store or lockbox ship, comes with those yellow mkXII weapons and has an instant kill everything button, I won't care (well Ill take it if it is a Hegh'ta refit... but im crazy so that doenst count)
Like many my time to play is limited. Recently I spent the majority of the time running that stupid race, now i actually want to go back and PLAY THE ACTUAL GAME.
Here on the forums you have some people saying "we don't like grind." But I'm willing to bet that Cryptic's metrics show people participating in the "grindy" content in massive numbers. I can't prove that, I just know I see tons of people doing things like the winter event. So given that disparity, why should they give weight to your feedback when their metrics say that "grindy" content works?
Here's an experiment. All you folks who are coming down on the "we hate grind" side of things, don't participate in this event. Don't do the content. Show their internal metrics how you feel with actions instead of words, and see what happens.
That is a bit of bad logic though. If you want to enjoy any of the good equipment and higher end ships to any degree of completion you must grind. If you want the Romulan and Dyson Story Arc you must grind.
So if you want to play the game to the largest extent: You MUST GRIND.
So yes, their metric will show that lots of people grind... but then they have little choice but TO grind.
However, Cryptic DOES want to show that lots of people are online at any time because the higher the number the more they can beg PWE to give them money to do further development and prove that they should be fed lol. So... it is a rough issue.
Metrics wise you are talking statistics and they are a very good tool to say whatever you like them to say.
You could say that since i ran the Winter event on 5 toons this year I was keenly involved and happy to grind.
However if it was a comparison between this year and last year:
Last year I ran the races on 17 toons.
So the pattern is there grind is one of those things which wears people down even when it is only occasional. Having it so close together is just a recipe for disaster. Right now I would just be happy if Cryptic would have the Anniversary event a precursor to be able to discover the new tech and then save the new tech for Summer as a possible alternative to the corvette.
Or an answer to the question of 'will we be able to buy a variant in the Store (ala Odyssey) so the event can be more or less skipped?' would be nice.
Comments
ROFL! Dream on. You're still getting the vanilla version, for grind, not for free. And there will still be a better version thrown in fleet store, for money, not for free.:D
This everyone
But if that is true or not, I still think this is a bad idea. At least stop giving away ships that do new things. How about change it up, give away ground stuff that does new things, and some ground things to do them with. Or better yet, build a game that isn't all limited time events and repetitive missions and actually gives you something to do. It only took you one season worth of work to put together a full 1-50 mission path for the Romulan Republic. Maybe devote each season to put together a similar amount of missions for all three factions, and further the story line so we are no longer in 2409 by the end of it. Now there is something that would make me play.
Nouveau riche LTS member
Your argument makes no sense.
What kind of free gift is free, but you'll have to work for it, and maybe pay some RL cash (lobis) ? When I offer free gifts to others, they are free, they don't have to work for them, or pay for them, that's the idea behind the "free gift" concept.
The real answer is "too bad so sad..." it's a fact of life for many people with busy lives some choose not to marry, or have kids, some choose to make less money for more personal time, some may choose to play SWTOR instead of STO... You know what they want to get the ship and if you can't do it then you have to set yours sights on something that fits in with your other choices. I've gotten up at 3am to do a mission so I could get my rep done... should it be necessary? Keep in mind there are other options including spending money to get the ship too or grind alternative content for EC/Keys.
As for logging in everyday... that is the F2P model... these types of games make money from keeping people coming back over and over everyday. The more you are logged in the more opportunity there is to sell you something. Think farmville, cand crush, etc... all have timers to keep you logging back in and playing and have ways for you to buy your way out of the grind. Sub models don't have to try as hard.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
This is an anniversary event. Something that helps the participators to celebrate being around for 4 years. If this 25-day event comes and goes and I have not had the chance to run the required 48 mission so I can enjoy each of the 3 ships (one for each faction), then it is tantamount to receiving an invitation to a party a day after it happened. Herein lies my disappointment...
I understand everyone's point of view here (well, almost... there were a few that spoke about getting with Branflakes... and not that there's anything wrong with that, I'm not interested in that sort of thing). I plan on running through the grind with the hopes of earning three nifty ships (I hope to goodness sakes the FED one is NOT the one in the posted pics from the first 5 or so pages). However, if I have not made it through all three grinds for all three ships, then everyone who complained about the grind will have been proven right. They are anniversary ships that we need to work "a tad more for" (to quote Bran's original #30 post), with the great and grand possibility that we will not earn them... I could wind up with 960 points toward the KDF version, and be completely out of luck... and that sucks...
Just my two cents...
CM
First i will start of telling the truth about season 8.
I have never played any story mission in season 8 besides the STF-s (they are long and boring).
Why?
Because i must GRIND all the time and because of GRIND i don't have time to play any new content.
Did you ask yourself Cryptic about that possibility?
So can you tell me where did you get the idea that it is so frikin awesome and cool to make players GRINDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD for anniversary gift and doing
same mission over and over and over again
till we bleed and die just so you can tell : "we had a more players on servers."
Let me tell you something,
yeah this looks cool on paper but did you know that you are harassing your players with this GRIND policy, that players are starting to rejecting the game.
Do you know why Cryptic?
STO is not game anymore, it is WORK , who the hell after 10 hours at job wants to come home and WORK in the game for 7 hours to get something?
Cryptic you are not paying me enough for doing that, and i am not spending any money on your game until you pay me for playing your game.
Never change forums....never change lol
Cryptic - coming up with new ways to make your sto suck. They know everyone hate grinds, therefore they shall give us more of what we hate.:D
Once the grind is upon us, it'll be too late to whine. You see a truck speeding towards you, you get out of the way. You don't wait to see if it kills you.:D
Never stopped the forums.
We also hate new ships. Especially new ships. New ships suck and cryptic should be ashamed :P
While I'm not necessarily against grinding for a good-quality ship, turning the Anniversary event which has traditionally been (to the best of my knowledge) a giveaway into a grind bothers me. Perhaps I'm over-extrapolating, but I'm perceiving a shift where more and more material is a grind and grinding is, well... a grind.
I'll second that.
You have NOT read branflakes comment relating to the anniversary ships have you. For completing the anniversary FE you will receive 400 of the marks required totally and utterly free. that will leave you with only 600 to get. You will receive 40 for completing Q's event daily thus only taking you 15 days to get your anniversary event ship, which btw is AWESOME.
Grinding on this event will in the long run only be minimal compared to other events in the year
Grinding is not compulsory. It is a matter of personal player choice, as is the amount of time you wish to spend playing.
Believe me from branflakes comment the anniversary ship (s) are gonna be nothing like STO has offered before.
We don't know if it will be a grind util details of the event are released. It may be one of the easiest STO has ever offered. Who knows what they have instore.
Then why bother having an anniversary event at all? Personally, I liked doing the shakedown mission for the oddy when it was released. I thought that was awesome. I also enjoyed the mission to get the ambassador, which they tied into the storyline rather nicely (it was much like a TNG episode). I don't see why this is suddenly turning into a grind. I didn't bother with the bs of winter wonderland because it simply wasn't worth my time. And besides all that, if its true that this is a sci ship, then just how awesome could it be? Unless its gonna have at least a 4/3 weapon setup, there's no point.
No point in speculating, until full details are released
Maybe or maybe not. truth is that we won't know until specifics are released.
Either way it is premature to complain.
It's probable that PWE really needs another week after the anniversary starts to remove the last quirks from the new ships and their rumored new mechanics.
PWE probably has the saved loadouts as their priority since that is one of the first things people will try after 8.5 is released and they'd really look incompetent if it was bugged at the launch.
That's kind of the point though isn't it? We don't have enough info yet decide if its worth your time or not. I would suggest waiting for the ship stats and daily mission desc. to determine if a little effort is worth your time or not. I think if there is going to be more work involved the ship is probably got some extras that make it worth while.
Branflakes post from alternate thread on same subject:
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=991321&page=3
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
Yes but it would stop having a point, although I doubt that it has one now (beside the fact that I hardly found any one in that other pretty long post on that subject who liked that... more like 90% said they wouldn't even try... they probably won't change that).
Problem with grinding in general is:
An MMO can hardly work WITHOUT it. If you have nothing to achieve most ppl will get bored als leave.
The little problem in STO is: they don't get that the little secret to make grinding not FEEL like grinding.
Its kind of sad, STO had a lot of content nobody plays because they are kind of tied to the little but of content where they can get stuff.
No incentive to replay story missions at all, little incentive for foundry missions... you get your dillithium faster while grinding marks.... same for exploration missions.
So I see the OPs point. I do not play story missions.
The only reason why i recently played some is because I leveled another romulan, and I was surprised how much more I enjoyed myself playing STO doing so.
But now.... why bother? They don't give marks, and because of being away from the game for quiet a long time haven't completed ANY reputation yet.
But concerning that particular event:
I'm fine with working for ships. In fact I believe adding a ship project to the t5-level of the reputation systems would increase the incentive to do reps by A LOT.
I don't even have a problem with working for that ship within the limited time of an event.
But not CONSTANTLY.
Once in a half year is ok... already kind of annoying but ok. Grinding for them is kind of a nice break from.... well... the other grinding.
But winter event went offline 2 weeks ago. We should be done with this.
If they want us to grind us for that other ship, as for me, they should keep it for the summer event or they can keep it entirely.
Even if it has a function to instantly morph into every c-store or lockbox ship, comes with those yellow mkXII weapons and has an instant kill everything button, I won't care (well Ill take it if it is a Hegh'ta refit... but im crazy so that doenst count)
Like many my time to play is limited. Recently I spent the majority of the time running that stupid race, now i actually want to go back and PLAY THE ACTUAL GAME.
Here on the forums you have some people saying "we don't like grind." But I'm willing to bet that Cryptic's metrics show people participating in the "grindy" content in massive numbers. I can't prove that, I just know I see tons of people doing things like the winter event. So given that disparity, why should they give weight to your feedback when their metrics say that "grindy" content works?
Here's an experiment. All you folks who are coming down on the "we hate grind" side of things, don't participate in this event. Don't do the content. Show their internal metrics how you feel with actions instead of words, and see what happens.
That is a bit of bad logic though. If you want to enjoy any of the good equipment and higher end ships to any degree of completion you must grind. If you want the Romulan and Dyson Story Arc you must grind.
So if you want to play the game to the largest extent: You MUST GRIND.
So yes, their metric will show that lots of people grind... but then they have little choice but TO grind.
However, Cryptic DOES want to show that lots of people are online at any time because the higher the number the more they can beg PWE to give them money to do further development and prove that they should be fed lol. So... it is a rough issue.
You could say that since i ran the Winter event on 5 toons this year I was keenly involved and happy to grind.
However if it was a comparison between this year and last year:
Last year I ran the races on 17 toons.
So the pattern is there grind is one of those things which wears people down even when it is only occasional. Having it so close together is just a recipe for disaster. Right now I would just be happy if Cryptic would have the Anniversary event a precursor to be able to discover the new tech and then save the new tech for Summer as a possible alternative to the corvette.
Or an answer to the question of 'will we be able to buy a variant in the Store (ala Odyssey) so the event can be more or less skipped?' would be nice.
Still waiting to be able to use forum titles