One of the things related to this because of how seldom they think of the KDF when they make changes. The KDF never really had to do these exploration clusters because we had pi canis and when dilithium came into the game we also had it for dilithium farming/gathering. Question is if they bothered to revamp the pi canis sorties being they are just about as old content as exploration clusters but they used to be an all in one farm especially for crafting supplies. So I have been wondering if they even bothered to consider what is being done with pi canis but most likely with them saying the war is over they will just remove it altogether like the exploration sectors rather than fixing all the glitches and bugs with it rather than redoing it.
Although as far as the E word goes there used to be one guy who used have a creative character that never left the exploration areas and unless they put a stop to him he's probally still out near the azalea one near KDF space doing his automated collection process.
Honestly, I don't believe Cryptic's claim that people got lost. Because since STO went F2P over 2 years ago, I never seen anything to the effect of they describe. Given simple statistics by what they claim, we would've seen a help or complaint thread at least once or twice per month. So makes me think they are just making excuses to get rid of content.
Completely agreed. There is only a small number of player who would lose their way, and frankly I'd be surprised how they are still functioning in real life, and how do they find their way back home.
It surprises me to no extend that Cryptic decided to give a damn or two for that very tiny minority of players, and chose to ignore the masses of players who have been pointing to game breaking bugs since day 1.
We can just wait and see what 9.5 brings to us.
Note: My critic is towards decision makers, not towards developers who are merely working bees and follow the command.
Grinding for MkIV epic gear?
Ain't Nobody Got Time for That
The Cryptic-made species are just combinations of alien character-generator features, aren't they? I'd have thought it was possible to put together faithful reproductions out of generic "aliens". (The Vito'D, basically, are just heavy-built Vorta with a ruddy skin tone, if I'm remembering aright.)
I guess it would be pretty tedious to match them up in the Foundry's editor, but it should certainly be possible.
Yes, they can be designed, kind of, as aliens. But it doesn't assign them the right ships and stuff. So it's off. Unless that's changed. It's been forever since I tried. But last time I did try, it simply didn't work. After going through each race to match up the characteristics (which I'd have to do extensive research right now to achieve, since after this goes live I won't even be able to find them anymore as the only content they show up in will be removed) ... I end up with them in the wrong ships and being treated like they were a part of the KDF, not something separate.
A lot of tedious work that in the end still came out wrong.
The bottom line is for me, this was one of my favorite things to do in the game. The B'Tran cluster. For years. There's no exploit going on. I don't craft much at all. I get my Dilithium from Borg STFs and the Voth battlezone. I really only went there for the missions. The missions that everyone blasts as being shallow. But they were part of my whole character story and immersion into this game.
And now it's being taken away.
Not replaced. Just taken away.
Makes me angry. And annoyed. And then to read this thread where it suggests there's some sort of exploit being done?
Even more annoying.
Point blank ... if no one else likes these missions ... I DO. I always have.
My feedback to the devs is they are taking away the B'Tran exploration that has been a key aspect of why I even play the game.
That sucks.
And certainly isn't enough motivation for me to care one bit about their new crafting system.
Yes, they can be designed, kind of, as aliens. But it doesn't assign them the right ships and stuff. So it's off. Unless that's changed. It's been forever since I tried. But last time I did try, it simply didn't work. After going through each race to match up the characteristics (which I'd have to do extensive research right now to achieve, since after this goes live I won't even be able to find them anymore as the only content they show up in will be removed) ... I end up with them in the wrong ships and being treated like they were a part of the KDF, not something separate.
A lot of tedious work that in the end still came out wrong.
The bottom line is for me, this was one of my favorite things to do in the game. The B'Tran cluster. For years. There's no exploit going on. I don't craft much at all. I get my Dilithium from Borg STFs and the Voth battlezone. I really only went there for the missions. The missions that everyone blasts as being shallow. But they were part of my whole character story and immersion into this game.
And now it's being taken away.
Not replaced. Just taken away.
Makes me angry. And annoyed. And then to read this thread where it suggests there's some sort of exploit being done?
Even more annoying.
Point blank ... if no one else likes these missions ... I DO. I always have.
My feedback to the devs is they are taking away the B'Tran exploration that has been a key aspect of why I even play the game.
That sucks.
And certainly isn't enough motivation for me to care one bit about their new crafting system.
i see it more as removing any content that dont have you in zombie voice grind.......grind.........grind.......i........need........more........marks...........grind.......grind..........grind............
ppl say this game is better off without them well game be way better off without lockboxes without rep mark grind mission without fleet grind mission but O wait that take all cryptic money making out of the game i only see expiration coming back if cryptic can tie a money scheme to it
Every sector block is removed from the game and replaced with 1 system for everyone to park there ships on and 24 hours a day, 7 days a week we'll be expected to sit and click a button to mass produce marks and send Cryptic our money. Welcome to Grindtrek Online, where we don't need exploration, we only need to be spit out of Cryptics grind factory.
Unless they are planning to put in something else to replace it all I got is "I gotta bad feeling about this".
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
I have a feeling that they have been removed to make way for a proper exploration mechanic in the new Delta Quadrant expansion, which is full of unexplored space and potential first contacts.
But positive thoughts seem to be taboo on these forums, so i'll stop now.
I have a feeling that they have been removed to make way for a proper exploration mechanic in the new Delta Quadrant expansion, which is full of unexplored space and potential first contacts.
But positive thoughts seem to be taboo on these forums, so i'll stop now.
No that's not a bad hope to have. Many of us are hoping and praying they do something to this effect.
But we are not holding our breaths. Asphyxiation is a horrible way to go.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
I have a feeling that they have been removed to make way for a proper exploration mechanic in the new Delta Quadrant expansion, which is full of unexplored space and potential first contacts.
But positive thoughts seem to be taboo on these forums, so i'll stop now.
I think the reason for the rage over losing star clusters is because apparently the reasoning behind it is that new players get too lost and confused by them being there, so there wouldn't be any sort of replacement, just removal. The logic being that if they dumb the game down, strip and scrap everything, it would make them even more money.
I think the reason for the rage over losing star clusters is because apparently the reasoning behind it is that new players get too lost and confused by them being there, so there wouldn't be any sort of replacement, just removal. The logic being that if they dumb the game down, strip and scrap everything, it would make them even more money.
This was the actual quote that has been misquoted out the wahzoo...
I can answer this succinctly without touching on the rest of the thread yet - The Star Cluster missions were really out of date and a generally awful game experience for any new players who stumbled upon them. While those of us who are veterans of the game were able to accept them as their own thing and do them only when we wanted to, new players would (with moderate frequency) enter a star cluster mission, get lost or get blocked on an unclear objective, and then quit and never return.
Additionally, the Star Cluster missions took up a sizable portion of the game's install size. This also negatively impacts new players, as the longer it takes to download and install the game, the less likely they are to actually complete the process and give it a shot. So the very existence of Star Cluster missions was essentially dinging our player retention at least twice for each new player.
We recognize that removing them has removed a feeling of exploration from the game, and we know that the feeling of exploration is important to the Star Trek vision and feel - we'll want to rectify that. However, the presence of the Star Cluster missions in the game just provided so many negatives that they outweighed the positive of holding on to that feel of exploration.
We're looking in to modifying the Exploration Accolades so that they're still obtainable.
except that there isn't really any exploration in the clusters either. You visit randomly generated environments that you can never go back to after you leave....
It's the closest thing we have to exploration, otherwise it's the rest is war zones or storylines.
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
I'm pretty sure that was one of several reasons they had for doing it. the devs also mentioned that the missions sucked, and well.... they were pretty boring.
It's also pretty boring going through the marks grinds in the contested zones and STFs, should those be removed too?
The exploration clusters are the only thing that could be considered "exploration" left in the game. No matter how bad it may be, once it's gone it's unlikely that they would come back.
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
Imagine yourself as a new STO player. You've avoided STO for four years because someone who played it at launch told you it was terrible. But you're a trekkie and you're starting to twitch. You need some Star Trek again. It's free, the web site says. Just one hit.
You download it and make a character. I'm going to be a Trill science officer, you say. That's cool. I like spots. The tutorial is kind of fun, you start at the Academy, kill some Borg, now you're in command of ship. It's small and slow, but it's yours. You rescue the Azura and it feels pretty good. ESD is nice, too. Your friend said it was terrible, but it looks nice.
Admiral Quinn calls you. He's got a mission. "Explore strange new worlds," he says. Go to Delta Volanis, right next to Sol. Why is there unexplored space so close to Earth? Oh, well, it's pretty obvious what to do- fly up to an anomaly and scan it. There are a couple of other people doing the same thing. A button pops up, "Explore System." Let's do some Star Trek.
You are immediately blinded by Planet Bloom. It's like looking at the sun. I'm supposed to beam down to that? But it has colonists who need help, apparently. The Klingon has sent an Overseer to search for artifacts from their 3rd Dynasty. You beam down to confront The Klingon. The environment on Planet Bloom is strange, with holographic plants and ground that looks almost like Borg technology. Surely, Starfleet wants detailed scans of this.
The mission log updates. Kill five groups of enemies. So much for scanning the strange environment. You set off for the first group. It's a tough fight, they've got a Swordmaster. But you prevail, and then you see why it was so tough- two of your boffs are 200m away. You head back to try to find them. Are the stuck on something?
At the beam-in point, you turn just in time to see your remaining two boffs vanish- they've fallen through the ground somehow. They're now a hundred meters below you. How could that happen? Planet Bloom is a silly place. You decide to try beaming up and then back down. The second time, none of your boffs make it to the first group of enemies with you. "This system is bugged," your science officer reports. Find another.
Back in Delta Volanis, You type into Zone chat. "Is the rest of the game this bad?"
There was no exploit, it's just that they are removing another part of the game and if they replace it at all, it will probably be with another damn grind.
At this point, what this game really needs is a name change.
If something is not broken, don't fix it, if it is broken, don't leave it broken.
Alright, you want to know what I'm hiding? Fine. I met the man of my dreams in STO, and when we first started playing together some two years ago or so, we used to go do "Explore the D'Kel Star Cluster" (and sometimes "Explore the Asleza Expanse" or one of the two nebula exploration missions) a lot, because I thought the idea of exploring a star cluster sounded romantic. So now they're taking that out, and I've been going with him to the D'Kel Star Cluster daily since I found out about the impending removal of something that has meaning to me, because it is kind of our special place in the game. There. Now you know the only "secret" reason I am vehemently opposed to the removal of these exploration zones. I've already given other reasons. But you're convinced there's some secret activity going on, so yes, there's my "secret" activity, which several of my friends and fleetmates know (so calling it a "secret" is a bit ... well, wrong, and insisting that I'm somehow "exploiting" something simply because I don't want these zones and missions removed is not only unimaginative, but also disrespectful).
Well, there's something like 850 Accolade points for accolades that many people will never be able to finish. Also, Star Trek is sort of supposed to be about exploration. Instead of working on a useless update to a crafting system that no sane person would use, it might have been better to field some ideas to make exploration more fun and not just get rid of it.
agreed, its a pity they couldn't update some of the existing random missions to make them more interesting and perhaps add a few new missions maybe and even add a few from the foundry but to take the existing stuff away like this is just crazy.
at the end of the day although it wasn't the best part of the game by a long way it was still about the only exploration type content the game had.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
The Foundry, when last I tried making anything on it, did not allow me to use Cryptic created Enemies.
So my whole story, "The Battle of the B'Tran" featuring the Vito'D, Starlians and Strekkelans can't be made in the foundry.
It can only be experienced through the Exploration Cluster missions specifically in the B'Tran cluster.
And those are going away.
Which has me pissed off.
It's just that simple. It's a part of the game I LIKED to play. In a massively multiplayer online ROLE PLAYING GAME I came up with a role playing game story using assets that Cryptic put in there from the very beginning.
Soon, that will all be gone.
And why? Because players get lost in nebulas? Because people on Steam don't want to download a file that size?
That's bull.
It's the crafting materials.
And since I don't care about crafting at all, not even the new system, my anger is only stoked by this change.
Interesting, my second character is half Vito'd. I even advocated for Cryptic to flesh out these factions since they control the rights to them completely, although there is something nice about only knowing a small amount about them. It allowed us to fill in the blanks ourselves as you seem to have.
I've been through all the story content, and I've complained heavily about the low quality of the exploration missions, but I still preferred them to reruns. I love landscapes, ground maps to look at. I like knowing about how long the mission will run, as opposed to foundry where I'd have to search for times. The rewards for foundry seem to fluctuate with every patch, these didn't. I love random, I've made my own little randomizer apps for pencil and paper games I play, I'm into that.
I do have alts, that I actually enjoyed leveling up using mirror invasion and these clusters. That was my preferred route. Game's kinda dead to me now without them. I have mostly moved on, I just still listen in here for the shock and awe factor. Steam thanks you cryptic, I'm buying games again.
While I haven't read the entire thread, I can't help but wonder how you'll be able to earn the Colonization Duty Officers.
While not a great big deal, I do like collecting special Doffs, and thanks to not knowing about them for quite a long time (and somehow missing the window to get the next assignment constantly), I never got them except for a few of them on my main.
Imagine yourself as a new STO player. You've avoided STO for four years because someone who played it at launch told you it was terrible. But you're a trekkie and you're starting to twitch. You need some Star Trek again. It's free, the web site says. Just one hit.
You download it and make a character. I'm going to be a Trill science officer, you say. That's cool. I like spots. The tutorial is kind of fun, you start at the Academy, kill some Borg, now you're in command of ship. It's small and slow, but it's yours. You rescue the Azura and it feels pretty good. ESD is nice, too. Your friend said it was terrible, but it looks nice.
Admiral Quinn calls you. He's got a mission. "Explore strange new worlds," he says. Go to Delta Volanis, right next to Sol. Why is there unexplored space so close to Earth? Oh, well, it's pretty obvious what to do- fly up to an anomaly and scan it. There are a couple of other people doing the same thing. A button pops up, "Explore System." Let's do some Star Trek.
You are immediately blinded by Planet Bloom. It's like looking at the sun. I'm supposed to beam down to that? But it has colonists who need help, apparently. The Klingon has sent an Overseer to search for artifacts from their 3rd Dynasty. You beam down to confront The Klingon. The environment on Planet Bloom is strange, with holographic plants and ground that looks almost like Borg technology. Surely, Starfleet wants detailed scans of this.
The mission log updates. Kill five groups of enemies. So much for scanning the strange environment. You set off for the first group. It's a tough fight, they've got a Swordmaster. But you prevail, and then you see why it was so tough- two of your boffs are 200m away. You head back to try to find them. Are the stuck on something?
At the beam-in point, you turn just in time to see your remaining two boffs vanish- they've fallen through the ground somehow. They're now a hundred meters below you. How could that happen? Planet Bloom is a silly place. You decide to try beaming up and then back down. The second time, none of your boffs make it to the first group of enemies with you. "This system is bugged," your science officer reports. Find another.
Back in Delta Volanis, You type into Zone chat. "Is the rest of the game this bad?"
Minutes pass, before a reply comes: "LOL YES."
Didn't I see that episode on TV? I think it was Enterprise...
Seriously, yes it's sad that they are not willing to go back and fix these. They should be bound it fix it because it's the only exploration that STO has.
Star Trek is about exploration. Yes there are many episodes involving battles, but this is not the ultimate goal for Star Trek.
So let's so where STO is going from a logical perspective...
In Star Trek, trek is meant to express going on a journey to explore.
Without the exploring part in STO, what's left? War zones, STFs and other places to battle, right?
So what do we end up with? Star Wars!
It's already 98% there. Do you really want them to drop that 2%, no matter how bad it is, forever? Or do you want them to FIX IT?
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
I have a feeling that they have been removed to make way for a proper exploration mechanic in the new Delta Quadrant expansion, which is full of unexplored space and potential first contacts.
But positive thoughts seem to be taboo on these forums, so i'll stop now.
Then it would be wise for them to start saying something about it. People are getting really mad.
Most likely it would be a replaced with random Foundry mission encounters, that would be the easy way out, but a lot of the Foundry missions are not about exploration and new contacts.
Star Trek Battles Channel - Play Star Trek like they did in the series!Avatar: pinterest-com/pin/14003448816884219Are you sure it isn't time for a "colorful metaphor"? --Spock in 'The Voyage Home' SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
No that's just Federation propaganda. Star trek is about imperialist expansion. The Federation constantly sends out armed vessels pretending to be peaceful explorers for the sole purpose of violating the territories of other star-faring governments and starting wars with any that resist them.
Edit: Darn, I just joined the poo flinging didn't I.
Heh, but it's what the Federation is...gunboat diplomatic imperialism. The Borg were at least honest about it...the Federation not so much.
No that's just Federation propaganda. Star trek is about imperialist expansion. The Federation constantly sends out armed vessels pretending to be peaceful explorers for the sole purpose of violating the territories of other star-faring governments and starting wars with any that resist them.
Edit: Darn, I just joined the poo flinging didn't I.
How much actual exploration actually happened in most Trek?
ToS: Pretty much want to some known location every week.
TNG: Ditto
DS9: Some through the wormhole stuff, but a lot of known locations too.
Voyager: They had to explore by default.
Enterprise: Couldn't say, never watched most of it.
Just sayin...not as much exploration as the propaganda says
I used them for running Duty Officer missions that had a chance to obtain a purple duty officer of a known type, or a refugee that could be used to potentially obtain unbound duty officers. It is a prospecting-like feature of the game that I very much enjoy.
Me, too. It's a great source of refugees for the assylum missions on Earth, Andoria, Vulcan, and Tellar Prime.
How much actual exploration actually happened in most Trek?
ToS: Pretty much want to some known location every week.
TNG: Ditto
DS9: Some through the wormhole stuff, but a lot of known locations too.
Voyager: They had to explore by default.
Enterprise: Couldn't say, never watched most of it.
Just sayin...not as much exploration as the propaganda says
The theory in TNG's series bible was that most of Federation space was uncharted. They had boundaries but they weren't altogether sure what was inside their borders.
A thing to keep in mind is that while the Klingons and Romulans and Cardassians control the worlds in their space, the Federation is more like the coast guard. They control the waters but not the shore (planets). And even then, they let anyone not affiliated with an empire pretty much run around doing what they please as long as they have licenses and permits and aren't engaged in fraud or violence. They exercise very few commercial controls and mostly just keep foreign militariies out.
Comments
Although as far as the E word goes there used to be one guy who used have a creative character that never left the exploration areas and unless they put a stop to him he's probally still out near the azalea one near KDF space doing his automated collection process.
Completely agreed. There is only a small number of player who would lose their way, and frankly I'd be surprised how they are still functioning in real life, and how do they find their way back home.
It surprises me to no extend that Cryptic decided to give a damn or two for that very tiny minority of players, and chose to ignore the masses of players who have been pointing to game breaking bugs since day 1.
We can just wait and see what 9.5 brings to us.
Note: My critic is towards decision makers, not towards developers who are merely working bees and follow the command.
Ain't Nobody Got Time for That
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Yes, they can be designed, kind of, as aliens. But it doesn't assign them the right ships and stuff. So it's off. Unless that's changed. It's been forever since I tried. But last time I did try, it simply didn't work. After going through each race to match up the characteristics (which I'd have to do extensive research right now to achieve, since after this goes live I won't even be able to find them anymore as the only content they show up in will be removed) ... I end up with them in the wrong ships and being treated like they were a part of the KDF, not something separate.
A lot of tedious work that in the end still came out wrong.
The bottom line is for me, this was one of my favorite things to do in the game. The B'Tran cluster. For years. There's no exploit going on. I don't craft much at all. I get my Dilithium from Borg STFs and the Voth battlezone. I really only went there for the missions. The missions that everyone blasts as being shallow. But they were part of my whole character story and immersion into this game.
And now it's being taken away.
Not replaced. Just taken away.
Makes me angry. And annoyed. And then to read this thread where it suggests there's some sort of exploit being done?
Even more annoying.
Point blank ... if no one else likes these missions ... I DO. I always have.
My feedback to the devs is they are taking away the B'Tran exploration that has been a key aspect of why I even play the game.
That sucks.
And certainly isn't enough motivation for me to care one bit about their new crafting system.
i see it more as removing any content that dont have you in zombie voice grind.......grind.........grind.......i........need........more........marks...........grind.......grind..........grind............
ppl say this game is better off without them well game be way better off without lockboxes without rep mark grind mission without fleet grind mission but O wait that take all cryptic money making out of the game i only see expiration coming back if cryptic can tie a money scheme to it
system Lord Baal is dead
Every sector block is removed from the game and replaced with 1 system for everyone to park there ships on and 24 hours a day, 7 days a week we'll be expected to sit and click a button to mass produce marks and send Cryptic our money. Welcome to Grindtrek Online, where we don't need exploration, we only need to be spit out of Cryptics grind factory.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/1145998/star-trek-battles-channel-got-canon/p1
But positive thoughts seem to be taboo on these forums, so i'll stop now.
No that's not a bad hope to have. Many of us are hoping and praying they do something to this effect.
But we are not holding our breaths. Asphyxiation is a horrible way to go.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
http://forum.arcgames.com/startrekonline/discussion/1145998/star-trek-battles-channel-got-canon/p1
I think the reason for the rage over losing star clusters is because apparently the reasoning behind it is that new players get too lost and confused by them being there, so there wouldn't be any sort of replacement, just removal. The logic being that if they dumb the game down, strip and scrap everything, it would make them even more money.
This was the actual quote that has been misquoted out the wahzoo...
It's the closest thing we have to exploration, otherwise it's the rest is war zones or storylines.
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
It's also pretty boring going through the marks grinds in the contested zones and STFs, should those be removed too?
The exploration clusters are the only thing that could be considered "exploration" left in the game. No matter how bad it may be, once it's gone it's unlikely that they would come back.
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
Girlfriend: Didn't you just go for a smoke?
Me: Yeah, well, I'm going for another...
Ahem...lol.
You download it and make a character. I'm going to be a Trill science officer, you say. That's cool. I like spots. The tutorial is kind of fun, you start at the Academy, kill some Borg, now you're in command of ship. It's small and slow, but it's yours. You rescue the Azura and it feels pretty good. ESD is nice, too. Your friend said it was terrible, but it looks nice.
Admiral Quinn calls you. He's got a mission. "Explore strange new worlds," he says. Go to Delta Volanis, right next to Sol. Why is there unexplored space so close to Earth? Oh, well, it's pretty obvious what to do- fly up to an anomaly and scan it. There are a couple of other people doing the same thing. A button pops up, "Explore System." Let's do some Star Trek.
You are immediately blinded by Planet Bloom. It's like looking at the sun. I'm supposed to beam down to that? But it has colonists who need help, apparently. The Klingon has sent an Overseer to search for artifacts from their 3rd Dynasty. You beam down to confront The Klingon. The environment on Planet Bloom is strange, with holographic plants and ground that looks almost like Borg technology. Surely, Starfleet wants detailed scans of this.
The mission log updates. Kill five groups of enemies. So much for scanning the strange environment. You set off for the first group. It's a tough fight, they've got a Swordmaster. But you prevail, and then you see why it was so tough- two of your boffs are 200m away. You head back to try to find them. Are the stuck on something?
At the beam-in point, you turn just in time to see your remaining two boffs vanish- they've fallen through the ground somehow. They're now a hundred meters below you. How could that happen? Planet Bloom is a silly place. You decide to try beaming up and then back down. The second time, none of your boffs make it to the first group of enemies with you. "This system is bugged," your science officer reports. Find another.
Back in Delta Volanis, You type into Zone chat. "Is the rest of the game this bad?"
Minutes pass, before a reply comes: "LOL YES."
Sooo....what you're saying is - they should remove the entire game, right?
At this point, what this game really needs is a name change.
Alright, you want to know what I'm hiding? Fine. I met the man of my dreams in STO, and when we first started playing together some two years ago or so, we used to go do "Explore the D'Kel Star Cluster" (and sometimes "Explore the Asleza Expanse" or one of the two nebula exploration missions) a lot, because I thought the idea of exploring a star cluster sounded romantic. So now they're taking that out, and I've been going with him to the D'Kel Star Cluster daily since I found out about the impending removal of something that has meaning to me, because it is kind of our special place in the game. There. Now you know the only "secret" reason I am vehemently opposed to the removal of these exploration zones. I've already given other reasons. But you're convinced there's some secret activity going on, so yes, there's my "secret" activity, which several of my friends and fleetmates know (so calling it a "secret" is a bit ... well, wrong, and insisting that I'm somehow "exploiting" something simply because I don't want these zones and missions removed is not only unimaginative, but also disrespectful).
agreed, its a pity they couldn't update some of the existing random missions to make them more interesting and perhaps add a few new missions maybe and even add a few from the foundry but to take the existing stuff away like this is just crazy.
at the end of the day although it wasn't the best part of the game by a long way it was still about the only exploration type content the game had.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Interesting, my second character is half Vito'd. I even advocated for Cryptic to flesh out these factions since they control the rights to them completely, although there is something nice about only knowing a small amount about them. It allowed us to fill in the blanks ourselves as you seem to have.
I've been through all the story content, and I've complained heavily about the low quality of the exploration missions, but I still preferred them to reruns. I love landscapes, ground maps to look at. I like knowing about how long the mission will run, as opposed to foundry where I'd have to search for times. The rewards for foundry seem to fluctuate with every patch, these didn't. I love random, I've made my own little randomizer apps for pencil and paper games I play, I'm into that.
I do have alts, that I actually enjoyed leveling up using mirror invasion and these clusters. That was my preferred route. Game's kinda dead to me now without them. I have mostly moved on, I just still listen in here for the shock and awe factor. Steam thanks you cryptic, I'm buying games again.
While not a great big deal, I do like collecting special Doffs, and thanks to not knowing about them for quite a long time (and somehow missing the window to get the next assignment constantly), I never got them except for a few of them on my main.
Didn't I see that episode on TV? I think it was Enterprise...
Seriously, yes it's sad that they are not willing to go back and fix these. They should be bound it fix it because it's the only exploration that STO has.
Star Trek is about exploration. Yes there are many episodes involving battles, but this is not the ultimate goal for Star Trek.
So let's so where STO is going from a logical perspective...
In Star Trek, trek is meant to express going on a journey to explore.
Without the exploring part in STO, what's left? War zones, STFs and other places to battle, right?
So what do we end up with? Star Wars!
It's already 98% there. Do you really want them to drop that 2%, no matter how bad it is, forever? Or do you want them to FIX IT?
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
I made the silly mistake of trying to start STO without my friend who was already playing it.
Got the Delta Volcanis mission, went there, got a commodities mission that asked for commodities that cost more than ten times the EC I had.
Then there was the fighting with the not so intuitive interface to leave.
I think my wallet would have been happier had Delta Volcanus won and I gave up on STO.
I still avoid those like the plague.
Then it would be wise for them to start saying something about it. People are getting really mad.
Most likely it would be a replaced with random Foundry mission encounters, that would be the easy way out, but a lot of the Foundry missions are not about exploration and new contacts.
SCE ADVISORY NOTICE: Improper Impulse Engine maintenance can result in REAR THRUSTER LEAKAGE. ALWAYS have your work inspected by another qualified officer.
Heh, but it's what the Federation is...gunboat diplomatic imperialism. The Borg were at least honest about it...the Federation not so much.
How much actual exploration actually happened in most Trek?
ToS: Pretty much want to some known location every week.
TNG: Ditto
DS9: Some through the wormhole stuff, but a lot of known locations too.
Voyager: They had to explore by default.
Enterprise: Couldn't say, never watched most of it.
Just sayin...not as much exploration as the propaganda says
Me, too. It's a great source of refugees for the assylum missions on Earth, Andoria, Vulcan, and Tellar Prime.
The theory in TNG's series bible was that most of Federation space was uncharted. They had boundaries but they weren't altogether sure what was inside their borders.
A thing to keep in mind is that while the Klingons and Romulans and Cardassians control the worlds in their space, the Federation is more like the coast guard. They control the waters but not the shore (planets). And even then, they let anyone not affiliated with an empire pretty much run around doing what they please as long as they have licenses and permits and aren't engaged in fraud or violence. They exercise very few commercial controls and mostly just keep foreign militariies out.