Before I start, please spare us all your oversimplified commentary from that one econ class you took that one time with stupid comments like "Capitalism!" or "Supply and Demand!" because that's not the topic. I am also not asking for a lesson in farming dilithium or rolling a KDF character (I have several, thanks).
The in-game economy is spiraling out of reach of all but the very rich, and there's opportunities for Cryptic to help level the playing field and make some money in the process.
The Dilithium store is woefully underutilized in STO. Cryptic is missing a huge opportunity to accomplish several objectives that are leading to massive inflation of ships, keys, everything and letting the D-Store rot as a cesspool of nerfed Fleet items. At best it's decent for alts that you don't want to go super-expensive on.
Dilithium Store Opportunities Missed:
- Lockbox Traits. It was a mistake to ever put these in Lockboxes to begin with, meaning they're wildly out of reach of most players who aren't farming EC and high-end doffs 24/7. This would go a long way toward leveling the playing field and give newer characters the ability to keep up with the rising power creep.
- Cross-Faction Consoles. Plasmonic Leech chief among them, but also Magnometric Overload, Isolinear Charge, Point Defense, all of these should also be moved out of Lockboxes and into the Dilithium Store. Prices on Leech for non-KDF aligned characters are flat-out insane right now.
- Reclaimable Bridge Officers. This would be the PERFECT place to purchase bridge officers. You need to let us dismiss bridge officers like Tovan Khev (I know this would break some of the early Romulan missions if you tried to replay them, the simple fix seems to not make them replayable if you dismiss Tovan), K'Gan, and Elisa Flores we could reclaim them here for a nominal dilithium fee. Same thing for the other bridge officers like Satra, Hiven, etc. I had to reroll a toon because I later wanted these guys.
- "Discontinued" Duty Officer Packs. Doffs from older packs are out of control on the exchange right now. These packs cost nothing to keep in circulation and should be made available this way as a simple way of keeping inflation down.
The Lobi store is better, but it needs to make its niche as upgrades to premium lockbox ships and unique cross-faction ground equipment.
Lobi Store Opportunities Missed:
- Upgradeable Breen Set. It's a crime for this set to still be at Mk XI. It should get the same treatment the Jem'Hadar set got where you could upgrade it for 200 Lobi and a full Mk XI set.
- Upgradeable Aegis set. This set is flipping gorgeous and performs relatively poorly against top-end equipment (though it's a decent "starter" endgame set). This needs an upgrade option to Mk XII for 200 Lobi as well.
- Deprecated Mk XI Item Upgrades. With Mk XI items leaving the reputation system in Season 9, there needs to be a way for people to upgrade their Mk XI equipment without grinding all over again.
- Certain Unique or Ultra Rare Duty Officer Packs. Let's say you want the collection of all 5 Xindi doffs. Or if you want purple versions of all the Bynars. Or maybe the Klingons including Dahar Master Kor or something. This would be a great way to make those available.
- Unique Shuttle Sets. Think about selling items like the Metaphasic Shield, Tetryon-Plasma Engines, Subatomic Deflector, etc. on here. Especially as these aren't available cross-faction. The other opportunity would be to make some cool new sets that give bonuses geared to small craft.
The C-Store/Z-Store or whatever it's being called these days is also pretty clear on what it offers, but there's even a few things missing here too.
C-Store Opportunities Missed:
- Preorder Items. You already said the RMC wouldn't be available, fine, but there's still the EMH Console, Neodymium Deflector Dish, etc. I can't understand why you haven't gotten around to putting this stuff out. Sure it's not going to be big income per transaction, but you know people want these items so why cut off income on stuff you've already got made and aren't selling? But make it account-wide, no character-bound silliness please.
Delta Rising is the best expansion ever and the players love it! No, seriously! ...Why are you laughing so hard?

Comments
Think of it this way: a lottery box has a chance of getting something cool. It's exiting and thrilling to open a few, right? Well, people are going to buy a LOT of them when they REALLY want a given item. Also, about the character bound thing -- I think you know they do that so you have to spend more money. That one goes without saying. The Bind to Account thing is nice, but only used to make the appearance of appeasement. They will NEVER make lockbox content account bind or instantly purchasable.
Remember PWE's mantra: if it isn't profitable it isn't worthwhile. Period.
EDIT: added stuff
...Why, exactly?
Of course i agree with the Breen set and other items, we need MK XII versions right away, but i dunno why i think we will never get em.
About the special traits, i ve already got about 5 or 6 in about 2 months. Yes, maybe that is a lot of time, but i only open 1 box every day. I think a lot of people already gathered a few special traits doing this. I dont think more ways to gather em will be an improvement.
Because he doesn't understand Metrics?
I think he's oblivious to PWE's business model.
I think it's you who doesn't understand. Ships are the big draw of lockboxes, the rest of the TRIBBLE in there is a consolation prize and was only put in while the word "lawsuit" was being thrown around to put a stop to the practice. Lockboxes in ships should continue, but Cryptic should start doing the occasional rerun to help keep prices from getting ridiculous (JHAS was at 600m+ before the current promotion).
Your logic is flawed, perfect example being Gozer's STF grab-bag system. When all of that was dismantled and put into reputation, you saw a lot more people willing to put in the effort to get the equipment, which meant more playtime and more happy players. The same principle applies here. In my opinion selling power like traits and consoles should only occur if it's widely available. Note I didn't say free.
Thanks for your comment but please don't infer what I know or do not know.
I am sure if Hawk gets his way and puts traits back so that you pick 5 space and 5 ground or 4-4 - whatever - then the prices will drop as people will be locked out of maxing their roster with all space traits.
How is it not widely available? If I want to get a certain lockbox trait, then I can work to get enough EC to purchase it. It might take a couple of weeks to get it, but the best things in life are the ones that are acquired through hard work.
I think it is your logic overall that is flawed. You are assuming that Cryptic has an issue with rare items being equated to large (as you see it) EC prices. Well I hate to break it to you they don't.
They have given you a way to spend Dilhitum to earn anything you wish in game.
16,625 Dilihitum -> 125 zen -> 2.5 Million EC
So if a leech console is selling for say 15 Million It costs 750 Zen... or 99,750 Dilithum.
Do you really think Cryptic has an issue with that ? They charge more Zen for the klingon unlock, Granted its a faction unlock console... still not really out of balance is it. Its not a federation console, even still its cheaper to get one on a toon then to unlock it on a Klingon. Sure it gets more expensive if you are picking them up for multiple toons. Really though I doubt Cryptic sees an issue there.
Your idea of moving anything of value out of the lockboxes would kill there sales. They know that so it won't be happening. Right now people open lockboxes with 1% chances to pull a ship... they are ok with that because on average they pull items that are worth 1/2 as much as the keys they are using to open them. Its a gamble of course, if you open 10 boxes... I would say on average you will end up with 12 million EC or so worth of stuff. That is half the cost of the keys you used... so there system entices the gamblers to keep going. With out that return from the boxes (if they had nothing but VIP mining contracts and cheap doff packs) people wouldn't open them.... Cryptic knows that so good luck with your request.
PS... also remember there is a Bug ship promo on and the gamblers are not gambling on lock boxs right now which has inflated the cost of stuff out of the lockboxs. (for now that won't last). If you really can't wait right now you have to pay... but if you wait till the 10th when that promo ends... chances are with in a day everything will drop 20-40%, the first day or two might even see prices drop as much as 60% as people rush to cash in on the inflated prices.
This would completely devalue the lockboxes. Which would then begin to devalue zen - D conversion rates... which would very much effect there income. So I don't think you can expect that to happen.
An interesting counterpoint and the first good one I've seen yet. I tend to agree with your point that these are high-value items that offset key costs but there has to be a better means of acquisition than 100k dilithium per item or lockbox lotto. I'd say wait until after the box ran to get the items but then if you didn't want the ship you'd just bypass the lock box entirely. You could play the long game and only put up traits and consoles from 2-3+ lock boxes ago as a solution to that.
So there's that, but consider the wild inflation going on across the board in boffs, doffs, lockbox items, ships, etc.. My point is that all of this seems wildly broken and the rich are getting richer and those without immense amounts of space wealth have no chance of ever getting the good stuff (100k dil is a Mk XII space set, to expect that for 1 console, even a very good one, is silly).
You can say "that's F2P" to that, but I think that's a flip answer and there's a real danger brewing here that all but the richest lockbox players who average a lockbox ship every 90 minutes will be priced out of the p2w market soon, which means no hope of catching up, which means no reason to play or roll a new character. Cryptic has an opportunity to level the playing field.
How does this have anything to do with what Gozer did?
Stop buying the overpriced items.
Or even better, buy them, and sell them for more!
Does anyone have a valid argument or counterproposal?
Play the game how you want to play and make the best of what you have. Plain and simple. If you are not enjoying the game anymore, you need to reevaluate the reasons for playing the game.
There is my 2nd one-liner
For a long time I have had over $2 billion EC minimum - it just sits their collecting dust. Sometimes if there are people begging for a bit of EC in zone chats I will drop over and give them $5 or $10 million
I stopped playing the exchange regularly a long time ago - although I recently bought like 15 Hirogen ships for around $60 million each - maybe in 6 months I will sell them for $80
I also have perhaps 3000 unbound purple doffs - I could mass sell them for a Few billion more if I wanted to waste the time and effort.
I just don`t buy anything to use for myself - so other than the starbase grind - I just keep accumulating it.
Perhaps if the Undine Lockbox is extra amazing I might actually buy and USE a lockbox ship - but with 30 toons I prefer C-store and have dozens of c-store ships
P.S. I don`t even know why helmsman is worth it now with Armor that has +turn or throw in a Warp core engineer and Damage control engineer and spam EpTx - max out your engine power most of the time - that will get even a 6 turn crusier spinning.
I am not hating on the success you've had, I'm just saying that other players deserve a chance. I think introducing these items to the D-Store and Lobi store, even if on a longish delay of 90 days, is a great middle ground. Those who run space empires get their money immediately and maintain their advantage over others and after a few months those who run a little leaner have access to the good stuff and the exchange isn't overinflated.
I understand what you are saying. Of course cryptic doesn't want gamblers not opening the old boxes either. They even make sure to inject more of the actual boxes into the system every time the boxes switch over. When the current box ends for 1-2 weeks they drop all the old ones again to make sure the gamblers are loaded up.
The lockbox setup is no different then any other form of online gambling. (gambling in general really as the same logic applies to slot machines).
"Smaller-stakes players also have more difficulty appropriately weighting incentive structures with frequent small gains and occasional large losses. " - This is from "Social and Psychological Challenges of Poker" by Kyle Siler published in the Journal of Gambling Studies September 2010, Volume 26, Issue 3. I'll spare you the psycho babble, to sum it up he looked at close to 30 million hands of online poker. After studying peoples betting habits... his study shows people tend to loose up to 2x as much money when they are incentivised with multiple small wins.
This isn't the only study I have read that pretty much says the same thing. Its a well known human behavior. They use that behavior when designing pretty much any major form of gambling. Slot machines, online poker... ect. By keeping people winning small amounts you keep them at the table.
As far as STO though I really still don't see the problem.
15-20 million EC is around 100,000 Dilihitum which is less then 2 weeks of converting on one toon. If you have just 2-3 toons that number drops. You also have to consider that you don't need in anyway to only pay for things off the exchange from Converted Dilhitum... you are capable of using a combination of the payment methods.
So for instance... you want a trait/console/doff that is selling for 20 millon.
So for 6 days... you earn your 8k daily in D. That's 48k.
While playing regular content you average just under 2 Million EC a day in vendor trash / Selling half decent drops on the exchange. (very realistic... just throw in 1-2 rounds of SB24 into your rotation ect) - I played perhaps 20min last night, did one infected got a mk xii purple photon drop with half decent mods. Sold today for 1.7mil.
So after 5 days you have 48k In D... and around 12 million in EC.
So now if you convert that 48k into stuff you can sell yourself on the exchnage (keys / fleet mods ect) you are looking at around 7.5 million in EC from that.
So total earned in 6 days one one toon is around 20 million.
I know there is plenty of other things to spend your Dilihtium on... I am not saying if you where a completely new player it wouldn't be painful...Really though 1 week to grind out "20 million EC through both in game and Dilihitum conversion... ins't really that big a deal to pay for the major traits / boffs / consoles.
And that explains where you got your title of Space-Baron, thank you Mr. Line.
To be honest I wouldn't want them to change the system FOR the new players.
Full disclosure I have multiple lockbox ships almost every fleet ship any weapon set I might feel like using is in a bank somewhere. I think I only have around 600mil or so right now, I just don't bother trying to make more ec all that much anymore. If I go on a spree and spend 200-300 mil I might work for a few days and recoup it. Anyway on to the point.
This game is one of the only MMOs and likely the only A list MMO you are going to find that is going to allow you to earn ANYTHING in this game including cstore ships with out spending one dime.
By making it harder for player markets to exist... you put more control into the market that is controlled with real $. This is the real reason so many of the "baron" style players don't want to see major changes to the economy... because it works and allows players to earn anything in game with Zero money paid. (including "p2w" cstore ships... lockbox ships ect)
All the stuff I have... I did NOT pay for. I have multiple bug ships 3 or 4 galors at least one of eveything else. All paid for with in game currency, all earned without using any real world $. That isn't seen as a bad thing by Cryptic either. People in these types of games willing to Grind build an actual economy that entices the people with the $ to skip some of the grind by using it. With out a thriving market, which includes the brick of gold items that system falls apart. At the end of the day this is about Cryptic making money and as odd as it seems at first... the fact that F2P players can grind and pay nothing and earn EVERYTHING in game makes Cryptic a boat load of money. If People where not in game listing items for 20-30mil and ships for 100+... there would be almost no incentive for people to buy keys and fleet mods to sell. The stock pile of Dilihtium would lead to a devaluation of Cstore ships.
I won't keep going on... really though there system is very well laid out.
Here is the basic advice I give to anyone that asks me new or old.
- Never try to play this game on only one toon. 8k a day is super frustrating. (the new changes to reps will make alts far less painful to take care of as well shortly). I would suggest 1 of each class... because hey its fun to play every type of ship / captain type. Myself I have 16 toons in total split pretty even fed/klink. I didn't roll them just to farm... although I admit as the game has gotten older a few of them are little more then farmers at this point.
- Once you have your stable of 3-5 or so Level 50s. Pick one at a time and work on getting them setup the way you want. This way if you want gear of any kind. With 5 toons you can refine 40k in Dilhitum a day. That's 300-350 Zen each day depending on the rate. So you can choose to save it up and buy Cstore ships. (1 week = 1 2500 point pack for free). Or you can convert that to around 7mil EC a day... combo that with 3-5million EC earned just grinding your 8k Dilhitum... and you are easily looking at 10 million EC daily. Or in other terms with in a week... you can have things like Leech consoles helms traits ect all done on ONE of your toons.
If you do that as a new player... or as an older player that has never thought that way. You can gear up one toon very quickly. It isn't any faster to gear up all 4 or 5... however it feels like you are getting somewhere. lol (its the same psychology behind the gambler being happier with immediate small rewards)
Too funny - actually it`s a description of how easy the game is that it can be played with just 1 button - Spacebar Online!
If a player wants to make a KILLING - roll lots of KDF toons and get doffing!! You will be rolling in contraband and items to vendor AND you could go to the KDF only version of Kerrat and farm Purple items without being bothered by anyone most of the time.
Of course selling drops is not worth it any more with all the new fleet gear. The only item still not in the fleet store are Purple Field Generators - but maybe that`s coming in the next fleet holding - they dropped lesser versions from the Voth rep too.
I also used to mass farm Strange alien artifacts which used to go for as much as 1.4 million with powered ones as high as $2 million - but with fleet gear no-ones crafting and the price is now like 250k each
Purple weapons are often worth selling though. They don't drop from the nvak/kerat systems as often. They do drop from STFs pretty regular though. They will sell from anywhere from 200k-20mil though depending on the mods. Make sure you learn what people are looking for on mods. Lots of players make a good income off of people posting [acc]x2 or 3 [dmg]x3 ect for the basic price of that weapon type. I know more then a few times i have caught [acc]x3 weapons on the exchange for 200-300k and turned them around for 12-15mil in a day.
The consoles yes they are worth far less then they used to be... still Tactical consoles still sell very well. As do RCS and Neutronium armors. Phaser consoles are about to get a small bump when undine drops. Not saying they will be worth millions like the old days... still worth posting MK XI and XII blue and up dmg consoles.
Also if you are really really broke and you have inventory space. Don't vendor the engines shields and deflectors... just head out when your inventory is pretty much full of them and vendor them. It adds up if you have 30-40 to vender at a time.