Ground Weapons made it to lvl 10, just XP for the other schools.
Another good day for the Rep boxes, 2 pieces of gear and another Borg Neural Processor. Do the chances of getting these things increase as you level through the rep system, or is the RNG just being really nice to me lately? Either way, I'll take it
Day 29
Xp for the schools, looks like Engineering and Shields will level again before I finish this experiment.
Great day for Rep box stuf, 3 pieces of gear and another Voth Cybernetic Implant.
It's hard to stay positive about the crafting system when compared to the Rep system. Even before you can buy anything from the Rep system, with the way it's structured now, you can at least get something USEFUL simply by leveling up. Why on Earth they didn't design crafting to be the same way, I dont think I'll ever understand.
Day 30
More school XP.
A couple of okay ground weapons for BOff's from the rep boxes.
Today marks the 1 month point of this experiment. 30 days in and still not to able to reliably craft anything for my lvl 50. It's been almost 3 weeks since I hit lvl 50.
Just 3 more days to go until I hit t5 in all the reps.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
This is good for new players looking for newer gear! I did give it a try but it's too time consuming. The timer clock when it reaches 4 mins (in other games that use such a system) they gave you instant finish for free. This one wants 75 in Di-lithium to complete now. Got up to level 2 and quit! I'll keep looking on EC or Rep Tier 4 or 5 for 8472 (got that right lol), Dyson, Rom, Task/OMG for new gear.
Right now my battleship has all Mark 12 purple just have to see what's comes out of DR in Oct 2014!
Engineering hit lvl 10, Shields hit lvl 8. XP for the other schools.
Only one okay piece of gear from the Rep boxes today. But even the 'junk' is worth some EC, so I'm getting something at least.
Day 32
School XP, nothing more.
A decent ground weapon for one of my BOff's from Rep boxes.
Tomorrow I hit t5 in all reps.
Day 33
Well, this is it. After 33 days I've hit lvl 50 and then gone on to T5 in all the reps. Sure, I used sponsorship tokens to speed up the rep, but who wouldn't if you have the ability to do so?
Anyway, on to how each of the schools finished.
Beams ended up at lvl 10 with a total of 226,061 XP.
Ground Weapons ended up at lvl 10 with 215,000 XP.
Engineering ended up at lvl 10 with 195,000 XP.
Shields ended up at lvl 8 with 137,000 XP.
Now I need to sit back and think about this whole experiment. I'll post my overall thoughts a little later.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I'm sad to say that I'm glad this is over, I really am.
Cryptic, if you're reading this, please do something to make this system fun and worthwhile. Working on something for 3 months with essentially nothing to show for it until the end... WHY?
I get that I *could* craft MK XII items, but there's no way I'm blowing VR anything or Dilithium on something that'll likely be uncommon at best. I also get that I can craft MK X items (and below) and sell them and/or use them for alts. But why would I waste Rare anything when I'm going to need them for when (if) I start crafting MK XII items? The answer is, *I* wouldn't.
To be fair, there are good things in the system.
-Being able to make any energy weapon or console we want at any level we want. AP beams on my lvl 1 ship? Cool!
-Crafting things for alts to use as they level.
-The fact that crafted items are account bound even at at the VR level instead of becoming character bound.
-Crafting is also cheaper than buying Rep gear, or even items from the Rep stores. Of course, it could be argued that Rep gear is also better than almost anything you can craft so the higher price is warranted.
The flaws with the system though, good grief where do I begin.
1. Taking almost 3 months to get to a crafting level where you can actually craft something for level 50. Considering it takes about 2-3 WEEKS to get from lvl 1-50 for 'casual' players, it just boggles my mind.
2. Long wait times on the actual crafting. 10-15 minutes to craft something, I can understand that. 5 hours for "basic" items? A little much. I can see the reasoning behind the "unique" items taking 20 hours though, like the Aegis stuff, the Omni beams and the TR116 Rifle.
Everything else should have the time restraint lowered since it just doesn't make sense. Granted, the Devs tied crafting time into XP gain so you can't really do that now unless you capped the number of items that could be crafted before they stopped giving XP. Similar to what was done with the 1 hour Rep projects. That could work, though it may not be ideal.
3. And just how in the world do you get an Aegis DOff so you can craft the Aegis set? From what I can find by searching, there aren't any common ones that can drop from the Request R&D Assistance (1k Dil) mission from the Academies. You can get the Rare one (Gumarre) that players who maxed out the old crafting system got as compensation, but that Blue DOff is Bind on Pickup. So where it made sense (to me) to run that 1k Dil R&D mish on ALL my alts, if I actually happen to get 'lucky' enough to get that Blue DOff on one of them, he's stuck there and can't be traded to an alt that can actually USE it?
*headdesk*
'Simple' solution to this problem. Make the Rare DOff that can drop not BoP and everyone is happy. Otherwise, I'm going to stop running that R&D mission since the odds of getting the Rare, currently BoP, DOff on an alt that can use it is extremely rare. Would it really break the game if those Rare DOff's started showing up on the exchange? *I* don't think so but that's my opinion.
4. Give set VR rewards for running content. Not a chance to get set VR rewards, ACTUAL VR rewards! I'm tired of running elite queues only to get rares. I run elite, I want guaranteed VR rewards.
Apparently though, doing this would upset the apple cart in some way, or it would already be this way.
My solution? Lower the number of guaranteed rewards given. I'd settle for being guaranteed I'd get 1 VR for running elite. Leave the other drops as they are, perhaps even make the chance at additional VR's being totally random. Meaning that you might get a VR that the queue doesn't 'normally' give.
Doing that would also help with the feeling of being "forced" to run content that the player doesn't want to run. They could keep playing what they like and take a chance at eventually getting something. Which is better than how it is currently.
"Oh, you don't like queue X? Well, if you want VR reward Y, suck it up and do it anyway."
5. Increase the number of material drops from nodes, including making rares more plentiful. Or, lower the number of mats needed to craft components.
I wanted to craft as I leveled up. I tried to craft as I leveled, but I simply ran out of mats in order to craft the components to make anything. The items I did end up crafting, I had to buy mats off the exchange in order to do so. I was hitting every node I could to collect as much as possible and by lvl 20 I didn't have enough to make 4 beam arrays and a console? Something seems off to me.
I get that the exchange is there for a reason, to fill in gaps like this. But for someone who would be starting out fresh, without a large bank roll or a sugar daddy, may find the prices on the exchange out of their reach. I had enough EC to buy what I needed, but it wasn't cheap. And it was enough of a pain that I decided that if I didn't have the mats to craft, I wasn't going to.
In the end, my overall opinion of the crating system is this...
It takes WAY the hell too long to get anywhere in the new system. Just over a month for me to hit 50 and max out rep and I still have around 2 months before I can reliably craft anything for lvl 50. In that time, if I were so inclined, I could easily save up for and buy any rep gear I wanted. Maybe even 2-3 sets.
It could be a fun system for people who have plans on making a LOT of alts, such as myself. If you play only one or two characters, maybe not so much. In the end though, it's a long waiting game and even once you GET there, some things may not be possible for you to make unless you get really lucky. I'm looking at the Aegis set and Gumarre here.
I will keep going since all it takes right now is 1 common per school per day and less than a minute of button pushing.
On a scale of 1-10, my opinion of the crafting system has dropped since I did my lvl 50 summation. It's sitting at 3/10.
Here's hoping some improvements are made to make the system better.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I agree that there should be NO chance of crafting white items unless we choose to. The resources going into it are extremely pricey, not to mention the dil that goes into the XII gear.
I wasn't sure if I was going to post any more updates, but I figured I may as well.
It's been almost 2 weeks since I last posted and progress has all but ground to a halt. Beams, Ground Weapons and Engineering are at lvl 11 while Shields has made it to lvl 10. 2 weeks and a grand total of 5 levels between the 4 schools. PATHETIC.
Seriously, something needs to be done to make leveling the crafting system more worthwhile. I've nearly forgotten about slotting new projects several times simply because there is nothing worth remembering. If we got some sort of bonus for slotting XP projects, similar to the Rep system, maybe it'd make things easier.
Give out a component for doing the XP projects, a pack of materials, SOMETHING! The absurd nature of taking so long to get to lvl 15 in order to reliably craft MK XII items... GHAAA!
Honestly, if I wasn't so far along on my main crafters, I would just quit now. I see NO reason to continue other than stubbornness (stupidity?) on my part.
And I've heard rumors that Cryptic is thinking of putting Kit frameworks and modules into the crafting system. All I can say to that is, it better be included into the Ground Weapon school. If they introduce an entirely new school this late in the game, and expect players to be HAPPY about it, they are delusional.
By the time a player gets an entirely new school to lvl 15, they could have gone 1-60, maxed out T5 in all the reps, probably including the new one coming with the expansion, saved up enough Dil and marks to buy Fleet level frameworks and mods as well as saved up enough Dil to turn it into Zen to buy Lock Box Keys to take a shot at getting some of the shiny kits in the Lock Boxes!
I understand Cryptic wants us to stick around for the long haul. Sadly, they seem to think that by making us do something so utterly bland as logging in for 30 seconds a day for 3+ months to slot R&D XP missions is keeping players happy.
It isn't.
I'm not asking to be able to hit lvl 15 in the crafting schools in a day, a week or even 2 or 3 weeks. A month however, seems decent enough to *me*. And considering that at most, you can run 4 XP missions per day until you hit lvl 15, that means you'd have another month leveling up the other 3 schools.
I do plan on taking my main 7 crafters to lvl 20 in the ONE school they will specialize in. The other non-specialized schools will stop at lvl 15. That will take an additional 3 months(?) after I hit lvl 15, if memory serves. And this is if I don't just plain old give up.
Long story short, the longer I do this crafting grind, the more I detest it. And the system. And by association, the Devs. I don't want to feel this way, but my GAWD, how can anyone with any common sense not look at this current system and the way it's set up and NOT think "the Devs hate us".
My opinion on the crafting system, as it stands today? 1/10.
If you're not into it now, don't waste your time.
As for me, well, I'm apparently a TRIBBLE.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Long story short, the longer I do this crafting grind, the more I detest it. And the system. And by association, the Devs. I don't want to feel this way, but my GAWD, how can anyone with any common sense not look at this current system and the way it's set up and NOT think "the Devs hate us".
This very closely mirrors my own position on all of this. I try very hard not to be That Complaining Guy On The Internet, but this... this is not a good system.
I've got 6 chars. Each has primarily focused on one R&D school (obviously I had to leave one out, I think it was Cannons, but who can even tell anymore). That "good school" on each char is currently in the 10-12 range, then three other schools in the area of 9, and the other three up to 5.
The kindest thing I can say about my R&D progress is that it hasn't really cost me anything, some marginal amounts of time to cash out old XP projects and start new ones, and a bare minimal cost of in-game materials. But by the same token, it has provided precisely no benefit at all, and probably won't for months, if ever.
I don't know what the Devs were aiming for when they designed this system, but I have to believe they were trying for more than "just barely short of even from a cost-benefit standpoint." So, you know, not quite Mission Accomplished, guys.
Pardon my soapboxing, and thank you for your time.
Generator
=================
I'm sure your DPS is great, but as Kahless said, "a petaQ with high system mastery is still a petaQ." (Well, he should have said it...!)
It's been a couple of weeks, and with the maintenance today, I had some time so... I'm back with another update. Perhaps I *will* continue updating, but just every couple of weeks or so.
Slow progress is still progress. I'm trying to look on the positive side of things, but it's not easy.
Shields is sitting at lvl 11. Beams, Ground Weapons and Engineering are all at lvl 12. Based on how far ahead my "main" crafters are, this character will not hit lvl 15 before the expansion is released. Heck, it's possible some of my main crafters may not hit 15 before then. I've been having terrible luck with the RNG and not getting that extra 1k R&D XP from crits.
While I started late with this character, the others have been going on the crafting system since just a few days after it went live. That was 2+ months ago and still not one character to lvl 15. Of the 7 main crafters (one specialization per alt), only 2 of them have a school at lvl 14, and they just hit that yesterday and today. The other 5 will hit lvl 14 in their spec school in the next day or two. Considering the "edge" they got from being able to slot multiple copies of the 20 hour project those first few days, I thought they'd be further along. Oh well.
I have crafted with my main crafters, albeit rarely. I do plan on crafting much more often for new alts that I plan on making with Delta Rising, but that will only happen once I get my current stable to 60. Considering how long that may take, the new alts may not see the light of day until well after the new year. (Don't take this as a complaint, having new content to play through is something I've been wanting for a long while. I'm looking forward to it.)
My opinion on the R&D system hasn't changed much since the last update, so I'll just quote this...
The kindest thing I can say about my R&D progress is that it hasn't really cost me anything, some marginal amounts of time to cash out old XP projects and start new ones, and a bare minimal cost of in-game materials. But by the same token, it has provided precisely no benefit at all, and probably won't for months, if ever.
I don't know what the Devs were aiming for when they designed this system, but I have to believe they were trying for more than "just barely short of even from a cost-benefit standpoint." So, you know, not quite Mission Accomplished, guys.
Pardon my soapboxing, and thank you for your time.
Generator
If anyone here is soapboxing, it would be me. :P
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
EDIT: I thought the 50% bonus was permanent due to the patch, but apparently it's just the weekend event... still, once you reach level 15, it doesn't take much time to jump to level 20 afterwards.
EDIT: I thought the 50% bonus was permanent due to the patch, but apparently it's just the weekend event... still, once you reach level 15, it doesn't take much time to jump to level 20 afterwards.
It takes a LOT more time getting from lvl 15 to 20.
You need 630k XP to get from lvl 0 to lvl 15. It then takes an additional 1.44 MILLION XP to go from 15 to 20. So it'll take roughly twice as long to get those last 5 levels as it did going 1-15.
If you are very lucky and crit every single day after hitting lvl 15, it'll still take 200-ish days to get that last 1.4 mil XP. Not counting how many times the R&D bonus event may run during that near 7 months. I'd guess at least 3-4 times, so cut that 7-ish months down to 6 months.
Granted, no one *needs* to get to 20, it's a choice since all the unique items open up at 15. But getting to a higher level of R&D skill makes your chances at getting crits all that much better. Every little bit helps.
On a side note, actually looking at that span of XP/time between lvl 15 and lvl 20... why do I have to be so stubborn/stupid to try for lvl 20? I truly wish the 50% bonus was permanent, it'd make things much easier. Oh well, I'll take what I can get.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
It takes a LOT more time getting from lvl 15 to 20.
You need 630k XP to get from lvl 0 to lvl 15. It then takes an additional 1.44 MILLION XP to go from 15 to 20. So it'll take roughly twice as long to get those last 5 levels as it did going 1-15.
If you are very lucky and crit every single day after hitting lvl 15, it'll still take 200-ish days to get that last 1.4 mil XP. Not counting how many times the R&D bonus event may run during that near 7 months. I'd guess at least 3-4 times, so cut that 7-ish months down to 6 months.
You're thinking about it wrong... the point of a crafting system is to actually craft things
From level 0 to level 15, you get a nice project that gives you 6000 R&D XP per 20 hours, and you can only run one of these per school. Once you get to level 15, a new project unlocks that gives you 12000 R&D XP per 20 hours (eg double the efficiency), and you can run as many of this same project as you want from a single school. So, run 5, and that's 60k R&D XP a day for a single school, instead of 6k R&D XP, so you can level up 10x as fast, and now it only takes an additional 24 days to get to level 20.
I ran low on my components, so building more, but as you can see, I have 3 of these 12k (*currently* 18k, yay for the 50% bonus weekend ) projects going, so it is possible to level this fast without spending crazy amounts of dilithium to speed the whole process up, but only once you reach level 15.
EDIT: And this is how you get 90k R&D XP a day without spending any dilithium speeding up the process http://imgur.com/XKdRHzW, although some poor luck with the Ultra Rare hits
I understand your point, and it is very valid. With actual crafting, you can get from 15 to 20 pretty quickly.
IF you have the resources to craft those lvl 15 unique items. I don't.
Considering how many VR mats the VR components take*, along with the amount of dilithium needed, buying the components off the exchange would be the only way I could do any crafting. And I can't afford that, especially considering that buying the components cost more than selling the finished crafted item. At least in the case of the Exotic Particle Field Exciter.
To craft one of these, you need 3 VR Signal Enhancement Modules that are selling for 3 million per on the exchange as I write this. Also needed are 4 VR Emitter Arrays each going for 400k per. That's 10.6 million EC. I won't even bother with the rare and lesser components because those are somewhat easier to get/craft.
Now, looking on the exchange right now, a VR Exotic Particle Field Exciter is selling for roughly 7.8 million EC. Ultra Rare versions are currently going for 10 million EC.
Not only do I not have enough mats or components to craft, I don't have the amount of EC to craft and LOSE 600k-2.8 million EC per item.
I will concede that there are probably items that I could craft that would make a hefty return on my investment, so running those particular projects may be something I do when I hit lvl 15. As for those schools that don't have those big ticket items, my previous estimate on leveling the schools stands.
When I play the game, I do so to have fun. Crafting can be fun, collecting the mats not so much. I will craft items for alts while leveling. I will craft max level items for myself, and possible profit, when I can afford to. That time isn't now.
And since I can't do these big XP crafting projects currently, all I have to go on is the 20 hour daily.
* I'm actually going to do a breakdown of this in my next post, since it really doesn't belong in this one.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I decided to look and see how much it would cost to craft the components over just buying them off the exchange. Turns out, it can be cheaper to buy the components. Prices fluctuate on the exchange, so my previous example is not the same as this one due to that.
In order to craft the Exotic Particle Field Exciter, you need 3 Signal Enhancement Modules and 4 Emitter Arrays.
A breakdown of the cost for each is below. I am only including the cost of the VR mats, not the lower tier items.
Each S.E.M. needs 3 Argonite Gas and 5 Plekton.
Agonite Gas is selling for 490k per, so 1.47 mil EC.
Plekton is selling for 285k per, so 1.425 mil EC.
So a total of 2.9 mil EC (rounded up) to craft one of the S.E.M.'s compared to buying one off the exchange for 3.2 mil EC. To me, saving the 4k dilithium is worth spending that extra 300k EC. Especially considering you need 3 of them.
Now to the Emitter Arrays. Each E.A. needs 3 Craylon Gas and 2 Trellium-K.
Craylon Gas is selling for 420k per, so 1.26 mil EC.
Trellium-K is selling for 12k per, so 24k EC.
So a total of 1.3 mil EC (rounded up) to craft one of the E.A.'s compared to buying one off the exchange for 400k. This saves me 900k EC and 500 dilithium, so it's a no brainer.
Now to add everything up and we get this...
Craft cost
S.E.M. x 3 = 8.7 million EC + 12k dilithium
E.A. x 4 = 5.2 million EC + 2k dilithium
Total cost, 13.9 million EC + 14k dilithium
Exchange cost
S.E.M. x 3 = 9.6 million EC (and no dilithium)
E.A. x 4 = 1.6 million EC (and no dilithium)
Total cost, 11.2 million EC (and no dilithium)
This is a bit odd to me, but crafting is NOT cheaper.
Now to see just how much the Exotic Particle Field Exciter is selling for. Looks like the VR version is currently going for 7 mil EC and the UR version is currently at 10 mil. So buy an UR and save 1.2-3.9 mil EC, or settle for the VR version and save 4.2-6.9 mil EC.
This is only 1 item out of several, during an extremely narrow time frame so this should NOT be taken as an absolute.
And another point, a LOT of the people who are selling these items are likely NOT buying mats/components off the market. They are likely getting the mats from running Elite content and crafting as they go.
*I* don't run Elite (aside from the odd Crystalline Entity, that one isn't as taxing for me) due to some limitations on my end and I will not cause others to fail due to my inadequacy. So my only recourse is the exchange and the odd VR I get from the Research R&D mission from the academies.
Yes, the whole point of my posts lately have been to show how long it takes to level the crafting system, but this also shows that it's actually cheaper to NOT craft, from a purely resource based point of view. For those that can get out there and earn their mats, most of this is moot.
However, this thread is being based on my personal experience with the crafting system as a whole and since I can't (or won't, depending on how you want to look at it) run Elite, my ability to gain VR anything is somewhat limited. That isn't purely a fault of the system, but it is something that could be marginally improved.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
You are right, it can be expensive, but you've missed a few key points:
When crafting components from materials, when you crit, you get 3x the amount of components. While you don't crit 100% of the time, it's often enough to make a significant impact in both EC and Dilithium savings.
You are only looking at the minimum sales for ultra rares. A few hours ago, I just sold a UR Exotic Particle Field Generator with a [SHHP] mode for almost 100 million. I've also sold [Shldpwr] mod for about 35 million. [Wpnpwr] was around 40 million. If you get a part mod or a gen mod, those also give decent returns. It's hit or miss, but after a few good hits, you're pretty much set for the rest of your crafting career in terms of EC (Dilithium is admittedly a pain... alts come in handy, but still a pain - but with the crits, I find I only spend around 10k dilithium a day, so alts are barely necessary).
I admittedly spend a lot of time watching the exchange and zone chat, and buy the cheapest materials I can, so tend to have gotten prices slightly better than you posted - but this is time consuming, so it makes sense to not factor it in.
I don't believe I've ever sold a console for less than what it cost me to make it (minus Dilithium, but I just consider that a cost of blasting through crafting, so am ok with that).
I buy raw materials off the exchange... it does take some initial EC to invest in it, but I found it to be worth it.
Also, just to make it clear, I'm not arguing with you or trying to hijack your thread, I have enjoyed reading it, I just wanted to throw out some other ideas to help speed things along if you want to shoot for level 20... you look disheartened at one point, so just wanted to throw out that 1-15 really does suck, afterwards it's at least doable with some (non-$) investment
Also, just to make it clear, I'm not arguing with you or trying to hijack your thread, I have enjoyed reading it, I just wanted to throw out some other ideas to help speed things along if you want to shoot for level 20... you look disheartened at one point, so just wanted to throw out that 1-15 really does suck, afterwards it's at least doable with some (non-$) investment
Oh, I know you're not arguing and I also don't think you're hijacking. If anything you're presenting more options and for that I'm grateful. Just because I started this to document my experience with the system, it doesn't mean others can't post about their own.
After all, knowledge is meant to be shared so others can learn.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I feel this post very much. What buggs me the most is the too random ness of anything, Random chances of getting the R/VR mats you need, Random mods. Im L10/11 in 4 schools on 4 of the main toons I use, and its really starting to slow down now, Though it's not that big deal, its just another one of those things you do first thing, claim your daily dil, set any reps off, check Doffs and now set off crafting. It takes a long time, but has real endgame matrial so go *shrug* at the time it takes.. "oh well" mkxiv isnt here yet, no ques need it so right now before DR, so anyone with mk xiii is just showing off! =p no offense ^^
GRIPE TIME,
So you spend all that time and/or money whatever your flavour, for a chance at something(and lets not joke around, a lot of time and/or money)? Crafting mk vi gear is cheaper to do, but then if you get the mods you want, prepare to spend a lot in upgrading to mk xii/i So double edged really. I feel this is going to be a massive run around for very little payoff.
What buggs me is this is will simply not work for the current weapons I have. Ima one ship one toon kinda guy. I have 7 toons with a slot left, so this doesnt effect me as much as others who have 32 toons and 4+ ships on each toon... little OTT for my taste, didnt even know there was enough hours in a day to have that many lol, But besides that, point still stands.
Example 1.
The modifiers for a start, random. So if I took my recently bought biomatter beam arrays, with [acc]x2[crtD] (x4) and biomatter dual beams [crtd]x3 (x2), Works for me, now if I where too uprade these items, chances are im not going to get the mod I want. And since they are bound to me, boom, useless wepons. I would have to repeated purchase the weapons I want and try my luck with upgrading them again, since biomatter cannot be crafted. I could aaccept an acc mod or a crtD mod, but crtH/dmg and the others are really of no use to that ship. Getting a mod that will accept, not overly happy with, but will accept? Acceptable? No.
This is just for my situation, Im sure there are many that will only want 1 mod. There are now 10 mods that can be put onto a ship if that's correct? I hear that only [crtH/D, acc & dmg] are the only possibilites for UR, though I havent checked into that, but otherwise its a 1/10 chance of getting the 4th mod I want. still thats potentally 60-80 weapons id have to try my luck on, if I wanted the setup on 1 ship. 1 ship? ONE SHIP? UNO.
Example 2.
Fleet weapons are now useless, and also bound to char, forget the mods on fleet weapons, which personally I think suck, THEY ARE BOUND TO CHAR!!! I only have 1 set of fleet weapons on 2 toons, so greatful that I havent lost out on too much there, Still.
So "advanced" or "elite" weapons from fleetyard are nothing better or anything more than having 4 pre determind mods already. [acc]x2 being the only sort of choice, [dmg]x3? no no no. So for this reason the weapons on thoose toons are now pretty pointless. Not only do the new UR weapons have potentially better mods, they are bound to account, not char, so you can share the gear between toons, which I think a lot of people will have to do because of the stupidly high value and risk.
Ive always said this game is good fun, prices I have felt have never been ridiculas, as in ingame currency (real money is another subject) for things, and everything is obtainable in a relatively enjoyable amount of time, not too much, not too little, as stated nobody wants max gear after a day of playing, but on the flip side, no one wants to be bored waiting for what could a totally endless time to finally get the right gear or mods.
I really hope things are sorted because aside from the dil/ec cost on just getting your gear upped, the random chance factor could easy tripple, quadruple and so on. its going to be spending more time standing around esd waiting than actually enjoying a good space battle, Please dont let this become EveOnline. =\
**Overall review of my post** (if its too much to read) =p
I could forgive the time it takes, the cost of dil, the cost of EC, IF there wasnt so much random involved, To go several Estf's and not get a VR, or when you have eventually spent the days/weeks/months trying to get lucky with drops, to have it smashed away by the random craft/upgrade system that gives you the random mod, most likely NOT the one you want, to have to start over, its well, I think you all know.
Hope it was all readable, its late im tired and I have a had spliff to calm ones nerves after revewing the crafting information.
I was really curious about the new crafting system, so once I hit level 15 I started crafting by doing the 20 hour thing.
I'm now Captain level and haven't crafted anything.
Reason being;
a) I didn't have the mats, despite waveforming everything in every mission and patrol I've been on.
Getting anything 'on level' was like 70% white, by the time I gain the mats and stuff either I'm getting better stuff from loot or I'm on the next tier already.
Admittedly, I did a lot of borg red alerts so that may have contributed to the acceleration of levels but I do feel I should be leveling up in line with crafting tbh. At the moment I'm just spamming the 2,000 exp missions because there's nothing really for me to craft, either on level or mats permitting. =(
As of yesterday, my 7 main crafting characters have hit lvl 15 in their crafting schools. The character I used for this experiment has 2 schools at lvl 14 now with the other 2 at 13. The first school will be lvl 15 in about 12 days and a few days later the second will be there. Numbers 3 & 4 will be roughly a month from now.
Now it's simply a matter of finding the school specific DOff's so I can at least begin planning on crafting the unique lvl 15 items. Of course, getting lucky enough to get a Gumarre from the academy R&D mish is going to REALLY hamper any attempts at crafting the Aegis set, since I will need that DOff on the 3 crafting alts that have the Aegis related schools at lvl 15.
I really wish I'd known that the Aegis parts would need such a specific DOff ahead of time. It would have made the choice as whether to consolidate crafting to two alts much easier. Meaning I WOULD have gone with just 2 instead of 7 specializing in a single school each. Having a shot at a common Aegis DOff from the academy R&D mission would be great, but...
Oh well, live and learn.
The other 4 schools, I have common white school specific DOff's so I can at least start planning there. Whether I have the mats/components to craft anything, or the EC to buy missing ones, remains to be seen.
*Edit*
Needed to fix some dates to be more accurate, since I originally wrote this before I was in-game and was going from memory.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
You are right, it can be expensive, but you've missed a few key points:
When crafting components from materials, when you crit, you get 3x the amount of components. While you don't crit 100% of the time, it's often enough to make a significant impact in both EC and Dilithium savings.
You are only looking at the minimum sales for ultra rares. A few hours ago, I just sold a UR Exotic Particle Field Generator with a [SHHP] mode for almost 100 million. I've also sold [Shldpwr] mod for about 35 million. [Wpnpwr] was around 40 million. If you get a part mod or a gen mod, those also give decent returns. It's hit or miss, but after a few good hits, you're pretty much set for the rest of your crafting career in terms of EC (Dilithium is admittedly a pain... alts come in handy, but still a pain - but with the crits, I find I only spend around 10k dilithium a day, so alts are barely necessary).
I admittedly spend a lot of time watching the exchange and zone chat, and buy the cheapest materials I can, so tend to have gotten prices slightly better than you posted - but this is time consuming, so it makes sense to not factor it in.
I don't believe I've ever sold a console for less than what it cost me to make it (minus Dilithium, but I just consider that a cost of blasting through crafting, so am ok with that).
I buy raw materials off the exchange... it does take some initial EC to invest in it, but I found it to be worth it.
Also, just to make it clear, I'm not arguing with you or trying to hijack your thread, I have enjoyed reading it, I just wanted to throw out some other ideas to help speed things along if you want to shoot for level 20... you look disheartened at one point, so just wanted to throw out that 1-15 really does suck, afterwards it's at least doable with some (non-$) investment
Lol, anyone paying that much for any +power mods instead of just buying a plasmonic leech console is throwing EC down the drain.
So looking back at when this all started, it's taken me 88 days to get one school to lvl 15. Looks like that 3 month guess was pretty much right on target. And I did what crafting I could while leveling. Once I hit 50, I gave up even trying to craft on level items, though I have done some component crafting in an attempt to speed things up as best I could.
Now that I have my first school at lvl 15, I've opened up a 5th project slot. Since I've decided to get all 7 schools to 15 on this test character, I'm obviously not done. I now have only one other school to start on the road to lvl 15 at this point and with luck it'll start that journey by next weekend.
I am going to set a date of January 25th as the day I get that last school to 15. We'll see how close I am.
Based on my personal experience, in order for a new player coming in to this system fresh, it's going to take an estimated minimum of 85 days to get that first school to lvl 15. If all they do is the 20 hour project. I took 3 days off simply because I didn't get very many crits (it seemed) for this character and I know I missed at least one day of crafting, perhaps two. Double that time before that new player has all 7 schools to lvl 15, 170 days.
Crafting will of course bring the number of days down by a large number. However, that's only if the player has enough resources to actually do the crafting. Crafting Mk II and Mk IV gear is fairly easy to do with what mats drop from nodes in missions, but you will run out unless you farm for the mats or buy them off the exchange. This is somewhat viable for certain mats, especially if you get lucky enough to sell your crafted items on the Exchange for a decent amount. Doing that can keep you in common and maybe some uncommon mats for a while.
Once you start needing large numbers of rares though, starting with Mk VIII gear, you can quickly run out of rares and be unable to afford purchasing them off the Exchange.
Now, if a player has the time to be able to log into the game several times a day, crafting things absolutely is the way to go. Since I don't log in several times a day and tend to play for set periods of time, crafting isn't for me currently. I can either earn 6k XP for each school running the 20 hour project, or 1200 XP or so per school if I do actual crafting. I'll probably be logged out before the crafting finishes and therefor would be unable to start up the 20 hour project before logging. If I could guarantee I could get that 20 hour project in as well as some crafting, I would be making much more progress than I am. But since I can't, the 20 hour project is my only option.
I guess my best advice would be to craft what you can when you can if all you are wanting is progress. If you're looking to make money, crafting can get some decent returns but sometimes actually selling the mats is the better choice.
My opinion of the crafting system has gone up, but only back into the "meh" category. A 5/10, if you will. If you're a die hard want to craft because it's more immersive type person, go for it. Also, if you're planning on crafting for profit, or even for friends, it could be worth it too. If you're on the fence though, or not willing to put in the time, don't bother. This is not something you'll be seeing results with quickly, unless you want to spend a lot of Dilithium to rush things. That's personal choice and not one I happen to follow.
My biggest problem with the crafting system now is that when it was released, we were told it was going to be for crafting top end gear. Now with the release of Delta Rising, that's (currently) no longer the case. Spend huge amounts of time and/or resources to get Mk XII gear, only to have it not be top tier anymore and having to spend even more resources to UPGRADE it to be top tier. Seems like double dipping to me.
Anyway, the journey isn't bad, it's just boring. Once you get to lvl 15 and can craft the lvl 15 unique items, then it has a chance to improve. I only wish I could craft some Omni beams, but it turns out I don't have a crafting DOff with the beam school. I wonder if I accidentally donated it to a fleet project because I swear I had one. Oh well, hopefully I can find that list of crafting school DOff's and can afford to buy one off the exchange.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Crafting system is pointless if you know some crafters. Just get 1 level in all the schools, and at level 60, all the craft traits are opened up. that's the only decent thing about the system, other than that its a waste.
Crafting system is pointless if you know some crafters. Just get 1 level in all the schools, and at level 60, all the craft traits are opened up. that's the only decent thing about the system, other than that its a waste.
I believe that actually is a bug... They're "addressing" it right now. Most likely they will be gone before you know it.
Been a few weeks since my last update and I have some spare time so... update time.
I got the 4th school to 15 earlier this week so now just working on those last 3.
It's tough for me to figure out exactly what I want to do with the crafting system. I really want to craft the Mk 12 stuff, but you need to get to 15 to do that reliably. And getting to 15 takes forever if you don't craft. Crafting lower level items seems like such a waste, unless you're doing it for alts or friends. Or simply to level the schools.
Since my altitis has been severely cut due to Delta Rising and how alt unfriendly it is, crafting for alts simply isn't happening. My friends no longer play the game and my fleet mates have dedicated crafters already. Not that I could fill that void anyway due to my not being lvl 15 in all the schools yet. And even if I were AND there were no dedicated crafters, there's only a handful who are even bothering with crafting. Most tend to just buy stuff of the Exchange.
Catch-22 it seems. Can't reliably craft until 15, but can't get there (in a reasonable amount of time) without crafting. I'm just stubborn and will keep going. I think eventually I *will* enjoy the system, it's just not an instant gratification system.
And I knew this going in.
My biggest gripe now has to be with upgrading. Since it seems that we will NOT be crafting Mk 14 items, it means spending time and resources crafting what Mk 12 stuff we want and then spending even more resources (and time collecting them) to upgrade. To me, this is double dipping and really ticks me off.
But, it's making them money and they are a business so I can see why they did it this way. I just don't agree with it. I'll get my Mk 12 stuff and probably call it good. If I happen to get enough upgrade items, maybe I'll upgrade some stuff, but I won't be going out of my way to get those items.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Since my altitis has been severely cut due to Delta Rising and how alt unfriendly it is, crafting for alts simply isn't happening
Altitis can now be treated with Minidling.
Minidling lessens the feel of endless level grinding for alts.
Be sure to talk to your doctor before using Minidling. Common side effects include:
Hatred by fellow teammates
Spaces of 18-20 minutes of time seemingly gone.
In rare cases, death due to NPC firing
Start taking Minidling during the next 7 days, and you shall feel all better.
My biggest gripe now has to be with upgrading. Since it seems that we will NOT be crafting Mk 14 items, it means spending time and resources crafting what Mk 12 stuff we want and then spending even more resources (and time collecting them) to upgrade. To me, this is double dipping and really ticks me off.
Mind you I haven't actually done any upgrading yet (refined dilithium usage prioritized elsewhere for the foreseeable future), but the extra step of upgrading to top end gear kind'a works for me from a crafting standpoint. One step to craft the components from resources, another step to craft a base weapon/console/..., and a final step to get it to the top of the line. This actually meshes with the concept of crafting a lot of cheaper MkIIs (instead of one MkXIV) to get modifiers that interest you and upgrading from that starting point to maximize the chances of some quality upgrades as well.
EDIT: Of course for crafting I would like a better method of getting my modifiers than an RNG, but what Cryptic has now is better than their old system and one can only hope that other crafting improvements will be made in the future.
Minidling lessens the feel of endless level grinding for alts.
Be sure to talk to your doctor before using Minidling. Common side effects include:
Hatred by fellow teammates
Spaces of 18-20 minutes of time seemingly gone.
In rare cases, death due to NPC firing
Start taking Minidling during the next 7 days, and you shall feel all better.
Apologies for not responding to this earlier.
I wasn't sure just what you were talking about, though I did get the gist of the joke. Yes, I admit I had to Google it.
While I know you were joking, I just have never gotten the reasoning behind people taking the time to create an account, download a game, create a character, do some things and then just essentially give up and just sit there and go AFK while leeching off the work of others.
I mean, I do get there are 'dead spots' while leveling sometimes, or content you grow tired of and want to skip while continuing to level, but to just leech...
If I'm not having fun playing a game, I don't play. And by that, I mean I don't log in. I'm not going to be a burden on other players simply because *I'm* not having fun.
Now, I have power-leveled before, but I am one of those that even if I'm woefully underpowered and not bringing much to the fight, I still give it a shot. If for nothing else I'm learning things about future NPC foes and maybe learning how to avoid attacks. If I have abilities that can actually help the people doing all the work, by throwing heals/buffs/debuffs, I do that as well.
Now, if they tell me specifically to stay back due to possible over aggro or setting off an ambush early, I do. But if I'm not allowed to follow around, I get bored quick and will kindly leave to find something else to do. Or just log out.
Way off topic, I know. Just something that has always bothered me in MMO's.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
It's been a few weeks and we've had some changes to the crafting system. Minor changes, but positive ones. In my opinion, anything that makes this system easier is a plus and it's nice to see that the Devs are still willing to change it, even this long after launch.
But...
With the Winter Event now live and the new items that accompany it, why oh why was none of it added to the crafting system? I feel this was a HUGE opportunity to introduce more players to the crafting system, and the Devs missed it.
Having to participate in the Tides of Ice event up to 10 times, per character, to be able to unlock everything is a HUGE mistake. It turns something that should be fun into just another grind. Add in that the event itself is bugged as far as registering participation and well, I have given up on the event. I've been there well before the event starts, fought through each of the 10 waves, received rewards for all 10 waves and the end of event rewards as well. I've done this event at least 5 times so far and yet, I can't buy a single new item off the Event store. Five full runs of Tides of Ice and I can't even buy one of the new weapons or devices let alone any of the new clothes or kit mods. I have plenty of ornaments, heck I have enough to buy 2 warp cores at this point but the game isn't registering the fact I've completed the event.
I get that the Devs worked hard on the new stuff and also understand that they want players to actually play the new event. But by making it mandatory in order to unlock the new items just seems so unfun. And with it apparently broken, it's made me give up on even bothering with the new items. Apparently there is a fix on the way, but for now, I simply won't bother anymore, and frankly, I'm tempted to just walk away from the game for a while.
And that is huge for me since I LOVE the summer and winter events in STO, they are a great distraction and let me decompress from the game without having to take a break from the game. Normally, when I feel like I'm burning out, I just stop playing for a while. With the events, I get to do something different for a couple weeks and when it's over I go back to the normal game.
One of the reasons I'm hearing behind the Devs locking the items behind participation was that if they didn't, players who had stockpiled ornaments from last year, or ones who are willing to blow tons of EC to buy the ornaments off the exchange, could just bypass the new event, get what they want and never set foot inside Q's Winter Wonderland. Aside from getting the new stuff, that is.
I get that as well. Why go through all the trouble of creating the new stuff if people are going to skip it on day one? So lock the new items behind a participation wall and it forces players into the new content. Well, that hasn't worked out well this time. I'm hearing lots of people complain about it and again, there is a fix coming that will make participation account wide so that those of us with multiple alts can enjoy the new items without having to run the event ad nauseum.
And this is where the Devs dropped the ball, IMO. If they'd just set up the new items to be craftable a lot of this could have been avoided. Use the ornaments to craft the items. Oh sure, same thing as if they just opened up the store, players with stockpiles yada yada. This is where the Devs could time gate things.
Require the crafting of the items to be unlocked by using ornaments, say 5 of each simply to unlock the ability to craft, but keep it character locked. Meaning that every character that wants some of the new items needs to get their own ornaments, however they get them is besides the point.
Once open, there is only one crafting slot, but allow up to 2 others to be purchased with ornaments, say 10-20 of each to open an extra slot. Whatever the item currently cost to buy would be what they would cost to craft.
Put a 5-10 minute craft time for the devices. 15-20 minutes for the weapons. 2-4 hours for the clothes and maybe 8 or so for the kit mods. The warp/sing cores could be 20 hour projects. Anything that is currently character bound would stay that way and items that are freely tradable would remain this way as well.
Once the event ends, the crafting window for these would close after the last project has finished and is claimed. It would reopen with the event next year exactly how the players left it, with any extra slots already unlocked.
This is just a quick and dirty, 'typing it up as I think of it' method, but looking back on it, it seems halfway decent. Yes, it creates more work for the Devs since they would have to recode some things, but this would have been a decent way to get more folks involved in the crafting process. It also would have created a time sink without forcing players into the Tides of Ice like we currently have.
Just my opinion on this matter. I'm sure others could come up with better ideas than the ones I presented. I just wish the Devs would stop making the game such a chore to play. I'm here to forget about the daily grind of the real world. Lately though, it seems there's more grind here, in a game, than I have in real life.
Make a man a fire and keep him warm for the day.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Comments
Ground Weapons made it to lvl 10, just XP for the other schools.
Another good day for the Rep boxes, 2 pieces of gear and another Borg Neural Processor. Do the chances of getting these things increase as you level through the rep system, or is the RNG just being really nice to me lately? Either way, I'll take it
Day 29
Xp for the schools, looks like Engineering and Shields will level again before I finish this experiment.
Great day for Rep box stuf, 3 pieces of gear and another Voth Cybernetic Implant.
It's hard to stay positive about the crafting system when compared to the Rep system. Even before you can buy anything from the Rep system, with the way it's structured now, you can at least get something USEFUL simply by leveling up. Why on Earth they didn't design crafting to be the same way, I dont think I'll ever understand.
Day 30
More school XP.
A couple of okay ground weapons for BOff's from the rep boxes.
Today marks the 1 month point of this experiment. 30 days in and still not to able to reliably craft anything for my lvl 50. It's been almost 3 weeks since I hit lvl 50.
Just 3 more days to go until I hit t5 in all the reps.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Right now my battleship has all Mark 12 purple just have to see what's comes out of DR in Oct 2014!
Time will only tell!
Engineering hit lvl 10, Shields hit lvl 8. XP for the other schools.
Only one okay piece of gear from the Rep boxes today. But even the 'junk' is worth some EC, so I'm getting something at least.
Day 32
School XP, nothing more.
A decent ground weapon for one of my BOff's from Rep boxes.
Tomorrow I hit t5 in all reps.
Day 33
Well, this is it. After 33 days I've hit lvl 50 and then gone on to T5 in all the reps. Sure, I used sponsorship tokens to speed up the rep, but who wouldn't if you have the ability to do so?
Anyway, on to how each of the schools finished.
Beams ended up at lvl 10 with a total of 226,061 XP.
Ground Weapons ended up at lvl 10 with 215,000 XP.
Engineering ended up at lvl 10 with 195,000 XP.
Shields ended up at lvl 8 with 137,000 XP.
Now I need to sit back and think about this whole experiment. I'll post my overall thoughts a little later.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I'm sad to say that I'm glad this is over, I really am.
Cryptic, if you're reading this, please do something to make this system fun and worthwhile. Working on something for 3 months with essentially nothing to show for it until the end... WHY?
I get that I *could* craft MK XII items, but there's no way I'm blowing VR anything or Dilithium on something that'll likely be uncommon at best. I also get that I can craft MK X items (and below) and sell them and/or use them for alts. But why would I waste Rare anything when I'm going to need them for when (if) I start crafting MK XII items? The answer is, *I* wouldn't.
To be fair, there are good things in the system.
-Being able to make any energy weapon or console we want at any level we want. AP beams on my lvl 1 ship? Cool!
-Crafting things for alts to use as they level.
-The fact that crafted items are account bound even at at the VR level instead of becoming character bound.
-Crafting is also cheaper than buying Rep gear, or even items from the Rep stores. Of course, it could be argued that Rep gear is also better than almost anything you can craft so the higher price is warranted.
The flaws with the system though, good grief where do I begin.
1. Taking almost 3 months to get to a crafting level where you can actually craft something for level 50. Considering it takes about 2-3 WEEKS to get from lvl 1-50 for 'casual' players, it just boggles my mind.
2. Long wait times on the actual crafting. 10-15 minutes to craft something, I can understand that. 5 hours for "basic" items? A little much. I can see the reasoning behind the "unique" items taking 20 hours though, like the Aegis stuff, the Omni beams and the TR116 Rifle.
Everything else should have the time restraint lowered since it just doesn't make sense. Granted, the Devs tied crafting time into XP gain so you can't really do that now unless you capped the number of items that could be crafted before they stopped giving XP. Similar to what was done with the 1 hour Rep projects. That could work, though it may not be ideal.
3. And just how in the world do you get an Aegis DOff so you can craft the Aegis set? From what I can find by searching, there aren't any common ones that can drop from the Request R&D Assistance (1k Dil) mission from the Academies. You can get the Rare one (Gumarre) that players who maxed out the old crafting system got as compensation, but that Blue DOff is Bind on Pickup. So where it made sense (to me) to run that 1k Dil R&D mish on ALL my alts, if I actually happen to get 'lucky' enough to get that Blue DOff on one of them, he's stuck there and can't be traded to an alt that can actually USE it?
*headdesk*
'Simple' solution to this problem. Make the Rare DOff that can drop not BoP and everyone is happy. Otherwise, I'm going to stop running that R&D mission since the odds of getting the Rare, currently BoP, DOff on an alt that can use it is extremely rare. Would it really break the game if those Rare DOff's started showing up on the exchange? *I* don't think so but that's my opinion.
4. Give set VR rewards for running content. Not a chance to get set VR rewards, ACTUAL VR rewards! I'm tired of running elite queues only to get rares. I run elite, I want guaranteed VR rewards.
Apparently though, doing this would upset the apple cart in some way, or it would already be this way.
My solution? Lower the number of guaranteed rewards given. I'd settle for being guaranteed I'd get 1 VR for running elite. Leave the other drops as they are, perhaps even make the chance at additional VR's being totally random. Meaning that you might get a VR that the queue doesn't 'normally' give.
Doing that would also help with the feeling of being "forced" to run content that the player doesn't want to run. They could keep playing what they like and take a chance at eventually getting something. Which is better than how it is currently.
"Oh, you don't like queue X? Well, if you want VR reward Y, suck it up and do it anyway."
5. Increase the number of material drops from nodes, including making rares more plentiful. Or, lower the number of mats needed to craft components.
I wanted to craft as I leveled up. I tried to craft as I leveled, but I simply ran out of mats in order to craft the components to make anything. The items I did end up crafting, I had to buy mats off the exchange in order to do so. I was hitting every node I could to collect as much as possible and by lvl 20 I didn't have enough to make 4 beam arrays and a console? Something seems off to me.
I get that the exchange is there for a reason, to fill in gaps like this. But for someone who would be starting out fresh, without a large bank roll or a sugar daddy, may find the prices on the exchange out of their reach. I had enough EC to buy what I needed, but it wasn't cheap. And it was enough of a pain that I decided that if I didn't have the mats to craft, I wasn't going to.
In the end, my overall opinion of the crating system is this...
It takes WAY the hell too long to get anywhere in the new system. Just over a month for me to hit 50 and max out rep and I still have around 2 months before I can reliably craft anything for lvl 50. In that time, if I were so inclined, I could easily save up for and buy any rep gear I wanted. Maybe even 2-3 sets.
It could be a fun system for people who have plans on making a LOT of alts, such as myself. If you play only one or two characters, maybe not so much. In the end though, it's a long waiting game and even once you GET there, some things may not be possible for you to make unless you get really lucky. I'm looking at the Aegis set and Gumarre here.
I will keep going since all it takes right now is 1 common per school per day and less than a minute of button pushing.
On a scale of 1-10, my opinion of the crafting system has dropped since I did my lvl 50 summation. It's sitting at 3/10.
Here's hoping some improvements are made to make the system better.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
It's been almost 2 weeks since I last posted and progress has all but ground to a halt. Beams, Ground Weapons and Engineering are at lvl 11 while Shields has made it to lvl 10. 2 weeks and a grand total of 5 levels between the 4 schools. PATHETIC.
Seriously, something needs to be done to make leveling the crafting system more worthwhile. I've nearly forgotten about slotting new projects several times simply because there is nothing worth remembering. If we got some sort of bonus for slotting XP projects, similar to the Rep system, maybe it'd make things easier.
Give out a component for doing the XP projects, a pack of materials, SOMETHING! The absurd nature of taking so long to get to lvl 15 in order to reliably craft MK XII items... GHAAA!
Honestly, if I wasn't so far along on my main crafters, I would just quit now. I see NO reason to continue other than stubbornness (stupidity?) on my part.
And I've heard rumors that Cryptic is thinking of putting Kit frameworks and modules into the crafting system. All I can say to that is, it better be included into the Ground Weapon school. If they introduce an entirely new school this late in the game, and expect players to be HAPPY about it, they are delusional.
By the time a player gets an entirely new school to lvl 15, they could have gone 1-60, maxed out T5 in all the reps, probably including the new one coming with the expansion, saved up enough Dil and marks to buy Fleet level frameworks and mods as well as saved up enough Dil to turn it into Zen to buy Lock Box Keys to take a shot at getting some of the shiny kits in the Lock Boxes!
I understand Cryptic wants us to stick around for the long haul. Sadly, they seem to think that by making us do something so utterly bland as logging in for 30 seconds a day for 3+ months to slot R&D XP missions is keeping players happy.
It isn't.
I'm not asking to be able to hit lvl 15 in the crafting schools in a day, a week or even 2 or 3 weeks. A month however, seems decent enough to *me*. And considering that at most, you can run 4 XP missions per day until you hit lvl 15, that means you'd have another month leveling up the other 3 schools.
I do plan on taking my main 7 crafters to lvl 20 in the ONE school they will specialize in. The other non-specialized schools will stop at lvl 15. That will take an additional 3 months(?) after I hit lvl 15, if memory serves. And this is if I don't just plain old give up.
Long story short, the longer I do this crafting grind, the more I detest it. And the system. And by association, the Devs. I don't want to feel this way, but my GAWD, how can anyone with any common sense not look at this current system and the way it's set up and NOT think "the Devs hate us".
My opinion on the crafting system, as it stands today? 1/10.
If you're not into it now, don't waste your time.
As for me, well, I'm apparently a TRIBBLE.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
This very closely mirrors my own position on all of this. I try very hard not to be That Complaining Guy On The Internet, but this... this is not a good system.
I've got 6 chars. Each has primarily focused on one R&D school (obviously I had to leave one out, I think it was Cannons, but who can even tell anymore). That "good school" on each char is currently in the 10-12 range, then three other schools in the area of 9, and the other three up to 5.
The kindest thing I can say about my R&D progress is that it hasn't really cost me anything, some marginal amounts of time to cash out old XP projects and start new ones, and a bare minimal cost of in-game materials. But by the same token, it has provided precisely no benefit at all, and probably won't for months, if ever.
I don't know what the Devs were aiming for when they designed this system, but I have to believe they were trying for more than "just barely short of even from a cost-benefit standpoint." So, you know, not quite Mission Accomplished, guys.
Pardon my soapboxing, and thank you for your time.
Generator
I'm sure your DPS is great, but as Kahless said, "a petaQ with high system mastery is still a petaQ." (Well, he should have said it...!)
Slow progress is still progress. I'm trying to look on the positive side of things, but it's not easy.
Shields is sitting at lvl 11. Beams, Ground Weapons and Engineering are all at lvl 12. Based on how far ahead my "main" crafters are, this character will not hit lvl 15 before the expansion is released. Heck, it's possible some of my main crafters may not hit 15 before then. I've been having terrible luck with the RNG and not getting that extra 1k R&D XP from crits.
While I started late with this character, the others have been going on the crafting system since just a few days after it went live. That was 2+ months ago and still not one character to lvl 15. Of the 7 main crafters (one specialization per alt), only 2 of them have a school at lvl 14, and they just hit that yesterday and today. The other 5 will hit lvl 14 in their spec school in the next day or two. Considering the "edge" they got from being able to slot multiple copies of the 20 hour project those first few days, I thought they'd be further along. Oh well.
I have crafted with my main crafters, albeit rarely. I do plan on crafting much more often for new alts that I plan on making with Delta Rising, but that will only happen once I get my current stable to 60. Considering how long that may take, the new alts may not see the light of day until well after the new year. (Don't take this as a complaint, having new content to play through is something I've been wanting for a long while. I'm looking forward to it.)
My opinion on the R&D system hasn't changed much since the last update, so I'll just quote this...
If anyone here is soapboxing, it would be me. :P
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
It takes a LOT more time getting from lvl 15 to 20.
You need 630k XP to get from lvl 0 to lvl 15. It then takes an additional 1.44 MILLION XP to go from 15 to 20. So it'll take roughly twice as long to get those last 5 levels as it did going 1-15.
If you are very lucky and crit every single day after hitting lvl 15, it'll still take 200-ish days to get that last 1.4 mil XP. Not counting how many times the R&D bonus event may run during that near 7 months. I'd guess at least 3-4 times, so cut that 7-ish months down to 6 months.
Granted, no one *needs* to get to 20, it's a choice since all the unique items open up at 15. But getting to a higher level of R&D skill makes your chances at getting crits all that much better. Every little bit helps.
On a side note, actually looking at that span of XP/time between lvl 15 and lvl 20... why do I have to be so stubborn/stupid to try for lvl 20? I truly wish the 50% bonus was permanent, it'd make things much easier. Oh well, I'll take what I can get.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
You're thinking about it wrong... the point of a crafting system is to actually craft things
From level 0 to level 15, you get a nice project that gives you 6000 R&D XP per 20 hours, and you can only run one of these per school. Once you get to level 15, a new project unlocks that gives you 12000 R&D XP per 20 hours (eg double the efficiency), and you can run as many of this same project as you want from a single school. So, run 5, and that's 60k R&D XP a day for a single school, instead of 6k R&D XP, so you can level up 10x as fast, and now it only takes an additional 24 days to get to level 20.
http://imgur.com/M7Yuw5o
http://imgur.com/27zFwgb
I ran low on my components, so building more, but as you can see, I have 3 of these 12k (*currently* 18k, yay for the 50% bonus weekend
EDIT: And this is how you get 90k R&D XP a day without spending any dilithium speeding up the process
IF you have the resources to craft those lvl 15 unique items. I don't.
Considering how many VR mats the VR components take*, along with the amount of dilithium needed, buying the components off the exchange would be the only way I could do any crafting. And I can't afford that, especially considering that buying the components cost more than selling the finished crafted item. At least in the case of the Exotic Particle Field Exciter.
To craft one of these, you need 3 VR Signal Enhancement Modules that are selling for 3 million per on the exchange as I write this. Also needed are 4 VR Emitter Arrays each going for 400k per. That's 10.6 million EC. I won't even bother with the rare and lesser components because those are somewhat easier to get/craft.
Now, looking on the exchange right now, a VR Exotic Particle Field Exciter is selling for roughly 7.8 million EC. Ultra Rare versions are currently going for 10 million EC.
Not only do I not have enough mats or components to craft, I don't have the amount of EC to craft and LOSE 600k-2.8 million EC per item.
I will concede that there are probably items that I could craft that would make a hefty return on my investment, so running those particular projects may be something I do when I hit lvl 15. As for those schools that don't have those big ticket items, my previous estimate on leveling the schools stands.
When I play the game, I do so to have fun. Crafting can be fun, collecting the mats not so much. I will craft items for alts while leveling. I will craft max level items for myself, and possible profit, when I can afford to. That time isn't now.
And since I can't do these big XP crafting projects currently, all I have to go on is the 20 hour daily.
* I'm actually going to do a breakdown of this in my next post, since it really doesn't belong in this one.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
In order to craft the Exotic Particle Field Exciter, you need 3 Signal Enhancement Modules and 4 Emitter Arrays.
A breakdown of the cost for each is below. I am only including the cost of the VR mats, not the lower tier items.
Each S.E.M. needs 3 Argonite Gas and 5 Plekton.
Agonite Gas is selling for 490k per, so 1.47 mil EC.
Plekton is selling for 285k per, so 1.425 mil EC.
So a total of 2.9 mil EC (rounded up) to craft one of the S.E.M.'s compared to buying one off the exchange for 3.2 mil EC. To me, saving the 4k dilithium is worth spending that extra 300k EC. Especially considering you need 3 of them.
Now to the Emitter Arrays. Each E.A. needs 3 Craylon Gas and 2 Trellium-K.
Craylon Gas is selling for 420k per, so 1.26 mil EC.
Trellium-K is selling for 12k per, so 24k EC.
So a total of 1.3 mil EC (rounded up) to craft one of the E.A.'s compared to buying one off the exchange for 400k. This saves me 900k EC and 500 dilithium, so it's a no brainer.
Now to add everything up and we get this...
Craft cost
S.E.M. x 3 = 8.7 million EC + 12k dilithium
E.A. x 4 = 5.2 million EC + 2k dilithium
Total cost, 13.9 million EC + 14k dilithium
Exchange cost
S.E.M. x 3 = 9.6 million EC (and no dilithium)
E.A. x 4 = 1.6 million EC (and no dilithium)
Total cost, 11.2 million EC (and no dilithium)
This is a bit odd to me, but crafting is NOT cheaper.
Now to see just how much the Exotic Particle Field Exciter is selling for. Looks like the VR version is currently going for 7 mil EC and the UR version is currently at 10 mil. So buy an UR and save 1.2-3.9 mil EC, or settle for the VR version and save 4.2-6.9 mil EC.
This is only 1 item out of several, during an extremely narrow time frame so this should NOT be taken as an absolute.
And another point, a LOT of the people who are selling these items are likely NOT buying mats/components off the market. They are likely getting the mats from running Elite content and crafting as they go.
*I* don't run Elite (aside from the odd Crystalline Entity, that one isn't as taxing for me) due to some limitations on my end and I will not cause others to fail due to my inadequacy. So my only recourse is the exchange and the odd VR I get from the Research R&D mission from the academies.
Yes, the whole point of my posts lately have been to show how long it takes to level the crafting system, but this also shows that it's actually cheaper to NOT craft, from a purely resource based point of view. For those that can get out there and earn their mats, most of this is moot.
However, this thread is being based on my personal experience with the crafting system as a whole and since I can't (or won't, depending on how you want to look at it) run Elite, my ability to gain VR anything is somewhat limited. That isn't purely a fault of the system, but it is something that could be marginally improved.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I don't believe I've ever sold a console for less than what it cost me to make it (minus Dilithium, but I just consider that a cost of blasting through crafting, so am ok with that).
I buy raw materials off the exchange... it does take some initial EC to invest in it, but I found it to be worth it.
Also, just to make it clear, I'm not arguing with you or trying to hijack your thread, I have enjoyed reading it, I just wanted to throw out some other ideas to help speed things along if you want to shoot for level 20... you look disheartened at one point, so just wanted to throw out that 1-15 really does suck, afterwards it's at least doable with some (non-$) investment
Oh, I know you're not arguing and I also don't think you're hijacking. If anything you're presenting more options and for that I'm grateful. Just because I started this to document my experience with the system, it doesn't mean others can't post about their own.
After all, knowledge is meant to be shared so others can learn.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
GRIPE TIME,
So you spend all that time and/or money whatever your flavour, for a chance at something(and lets not joke around, a lot of time and/or money)? Crafting mk vi gear is cheaper to do, but then if you get the mods you want, prepare to spend a lot in upgrading to mk xii/i So double edged really. I feel this is going to be a massive run around for very little payoff.
What buggs me is this is will simply not work for the current weapons I have. Ima one ship one toon kinda guy. I have 7 toons with a slot left, so this doesnt effect me as much as others who have 32 toons and 4+ ships on each toon... little OTT for my taste, didnt even know there was enough hours in a day to have that many lol, But besides that, point still stands.
Example 1.
The modifiers for a start, random. So if I took my recently bought biomatter beam arrays, with [acc]x2[crtD] (x4) and biomatter dual beams [crtd]x3 (x2), Works for me, now if I where too uprade these items, chances are im not going to get the mod I want. And since they are bound to me, boom, useless wepons. I would have to repeated purchase the weapons I want and try my luck with upgrading them again, since biomatter cannot be crafted. I could aaccept an acc mod or a crtD mod, but crtH/dmg and the others are really of no use to that ship. Getting a mod that will accept, not overly happy with, but will accept? Acceptable? No.
This is just for my situation, Im sure there are many that will only want 1 mod. There are now 10 mods that can be put onto a ship if that's correct? I hear that only [crtH/D, acc & dmg] are the only possibilites for UR, though I havent checked into that, but otherwise its a 1/10 chance of getting the 4th mod I want. still thats potentally 60-80 weapons id have to try my luck on, if I wanted the setup on 1 ship. 1 ship? ONE SHIP? UNO.
Example 2.
Fleet weapons are now useless, and also bound to char, forget the mods on fleet weapons, which personally I think suck, THEY ARE BOUND TO CHAR!!! I only have 1 set of fleet weapons on 2 toons, so greatful that I havent lost out on too much there, Still.
So "advanced" or "elite" weapons from fleetyard are nothing better or anything more than having 4 pre determind mods already. [acc]x2 being the only sort of choice, [dmg]x3? no no no. So for this reason the weapons on thoose toons are now pretty pointless. Not only do the new UR weapons have potentially better mods, they are bound to account, not char, so you can share the gear between toons, which I think a lot of people will have to do because of the stupidly high value and risk.
Ive always said this game is good fun, prices I have felt have never been ridiculas, as in ingame currency (real money is another subject) for things, and everything is obtainable in a relatively enjoyable amount of time, not too much, not too little, as stated nobody wants max gear after a day of playing, but on the flip side, no one wants to be bored waiting for what could a totally endless time to finally get the right gear or mods.
I really hope things are sorted because aside from the dil/ec cost on just getting your gear upped, the random chance factor could easy tripple, quadruple and so on. its going to be spending more time standing around esd waiting than actually enjoying a good space battle, Please dont let this become EveOnline. =\
**Overall review of my post** (if its too much to read) =p
I could forgive the time it takes, the cost of dil, the cost of EC, IF there wasnt so much random involved, To go several Estf's and not get a VR, or when you have eventually spent the days/weeks/months trying to get lucky with drops, to have it smashed away by the random craft/upgrade system that gives you the random mod, most likely NOT the one you want, to have to start over, its well, I think you all know.
Hope it was all readable, its late im tired and I have a had spliff to calm ones nerves after revewing the crafting information.
Holla at @k4yd33
Peace ya'll
I'm now Captain level and haven't crafted anything.
Reason being;
a) I didn't have the mats, despite waveforming everything in every mission and patrol I've been on.
Admittedly, I did a lot of borg red alerts so that may have contributed to the acceleration of levels but I do feel I should be leveling up in line with crafting tbh. At the moment I'm just spamming the 2,000 exp missions because there's nothing really for me to craft, either on level or mats permitting. =(
As of yesterday, my 7 main crafting characters have hit lvl 15 in their crafting schools. The character I used for this experiment has 2 schools at lvl 14 now with the other 2 at 13. The first school will be lvl 15 in about 12 days and a few days later the second will be there. Numbers 3 & 4 will be roughly a month from now.
Now it's simply a matter of finding the school specific DOff's so I can at least begin planning on crafting the unique lvl 15 items. Of course, getting lucky enough to get a Gumarre from the academy R&D mish is going to REALLY hamper any attempts at crafting the Aegis set, since I will need that DOff on the 3 crafting alts that have the Aegis related schools at lvl 15.
I really wish I'd known that the Aegis parts would need such a specific DOff ahead of time. It would have made the choice as whether to consolidate crafting to two alts much easier. Meaning I WOULD have gone with just 2 instead of 7 specializing in a single school each. Having a shot at a common Aegis DOff from the academy R&D mission would be great, but...
Oh well, live and learn.
The other 4 schools, I have common white school specific DOff's so I can at least start planning there. Whether I have the mats/components to craft anything, or the EC to buy missing ones, remains to be seen.
*Edit*
Needed to fix some dates to be more accurate, since I originally wrote this before I was in-game and was going from memory.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Lol, anyone paying that much for any +power mods instead of just buying a plasmonic leech console is throwing EC down the drain.
I completely agree, but if someone's willing to buy it for that much, I'm more than willing to sell that high :cool:
I personally prefer my [PrtG] and [Grav] mods that I can swap depending on what I feel like that day
At least in one of the schools.
So looking back at when this all started, it's taken me 88 days to get one school to lvl 15. Looks like that 3 month guess was pretty much right on target. And I did what crafting I could while leveling. Once I hit 50, I gave up even trying to craft on level items, though I have done some component crafting in an attempt to speed things up as best I could.
Now that I have my first school at lvl 15, I've opened up a 5th project slot. Since I've decided to get all 7 schools to 15 on this test character, I'm obviously not done. I now have only one other school to start on the road to lvl 15 at this point and with luck it'll start that journey by next weekend.
I am going to set a date of January 25th as the day I get that last school to 15. We'll see how close I am.
Based on my personal experience, in order for a new player coming in to this system fresh, it's going to take an estimated minimum of 85 days to get that first school to lvl 15. If all they do is the 20 hour project. I took 3 days off simply because I didn't get very many crits (it seemed) for this character and I know I missed at least one day of crafting, perhaps two. Double that time before that new player has all 7 schools to lvl 15, 170 days.
Crafting will of course bring the number of days down by a large number. However, that's only if the player has enough resources to actually do the crafting. Crafting Mk II and Mk IV gear is fairly easy to do with what mats drop from nodes in missions, but you will run out unless you farm for the mats or buy them off the exchange. This is somewhat viable for certain mats, especially if you get lucky enough to sell your crafted items on the Exchange for a decent amount. Doing that can keep you in common and maybe some uncommon mats for a while.
Once you start needing large numbers of rares though, starting with Mk VIII gear, you can quickly run out of rares and be unable to afford purchasing them off the Exchange.
Now, if a player has the time to be able to log into the game several times a day, crafting things absolutely is the way to go. Since I don't log in several times a day and tend to play for set periods of time, crafting isn't for me currently. I can either earn 6k XP for each school running the 20 hour project, or 1200 XP or so per school if I do actual crafting. I'll probably be logged out before the crafting finishes and therefor would be unable to start up the 20 hour project before logging. If I could guarantee I could get that 20 hour project in as well as some crafting, I would be making much more progress than I am. But since I can't, the 20 hour project is my only option.
I guess my best advice would be to craft what you can when you can if all you are wanting is progress. If you're looking to make money, crafting can get some decent returns but sometimes actually selling the mats is the better choice.
My opinion of the crafting system has gone up, but only back into the "meh" category. A 5/10, if you will. If you're a die hard want to craft because it's more immersive type person, go for it. Also, if you're planning on crafting for profit, or even for friends, it could be worth it too. If you're on the fence though, or not willing to put in the time, don't bother. This is not something you'll be seeing results with quickly, unless you want to spend a lot of Dilithium to rush things. That's personal choice and not one I happen to follow.
My biggest problem with the crafting system now is that when it was released, we were told it was going to be for crafting top end gear. Now with the release of Delta Rising, that's (currently) no longer the case. Spend huge amounts of time and/or resources to get Mk XII gear, only to have it not be top tier anymore and having to spend even more resources to UPGRADE it to be top tier. Seems like double dipping to me.
Anyway, the journey isn't bad, it's just boring. Once you get to lvl 15 and can craft the lvl 15 unique items, then it has a chance to improve. I only wish I could craft some Omni beams, but it turns out I don't have a crafting DOff with the beam school. I wonder if I accidentally donated it to a fleet project because I swear I had one. Oh well, hopefully I can find that list of crafting school DOff's and can afford to buy one off the exchange.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I believe that actually is a bug... They're "addressing" it right now. Most likely they will be gone before you know it.
Yup, they did fix it once, but the fix broke other things so they put the bug back in to avoid making things worse.
Kinda sad, isn't it?
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
I got the 4th school to 15 earlier this week so now just working on those last 3.
It's tough for me to figure out exactly what I want to do with the crafting system. I really want to craft the Mk 12 stuff, but you need to get to 15 to do that reliably. And getting to 15 takes forever if you don't craft. Crafting lower level items seems like such a waste, unless you're doing it for alts or friends. Or simply to level the schools.
Since my altitis has been severely cut due to Delta Rising and how alt unfriendly it is, crafting for alts simply isn't happening. My friends no longer play the game and my fleet mates have dedicated crafters already. Not that I could fill that void anyway due to my not being lvl 15 in all the schools yet. And even if I were AND there were no dedicated crafters, there's only a handful who are even bothering with crafting. Most tend to just buy stuff of the Exchange.
Catch-22 it seems. Can't reliably craft until 15, but can't get there (in a reasonable amount of time) without crafting. I'm just stubborn and will keep going. I think eventually I *will* enjoy the system, it's just not an instant gratification system.
And I knew this going in.
My biggest gripe now has to be with upgrading. Since it seems that we will NOT be crafting Mk 14 items, it means spending time and resources crafting what Mk 12 stuff we want and then spending even more resources (and time collecting them) to upgrade. To me, this is double dipping and really ticks me off.
But, it's making them money and they are a business so I can see why they did it this way. I just don't agree with it. I'll get my Mk 12 stuff and probably call it good. If I happen to get enough upgrade items, maybe I'll upgrade some stuff, but I won't be going out of my way to get those items.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
Altitis can now be treated with Minidling.
Minidling lessens the feel of endless level grinding for alts.
Be sure to talk to your doctor before using Minidling. Common side effects include:
Hatred by fellow teammates
Spaces of 18-20 minutes of time seemingly gone.
In rare cases, death due to NPC firing
Start taking Minidling during the next 7 days, and you shall feel all better.
Mind you I haven't actually done any upgrading yet (refined dilithium usage prioritized elsewhere for the foreseeable future), but the extra step of upgrading to top end gear kind'a works for me from a crafting standpoint. One step to craft the components from resources, another step to craft a base weapon/console/..., and a final step to get it to the top of the line. This actually meshes with the concept of crafting a lot of cheaper MkIIs (instead of one MkXIV) to get modifiers that interest you and upgrading from that starting point to maximize the chances of some quality upgrades as well.
EDIT: Of course for crafting I would like a better method of getting my modifiers than an RNG, but what Cryptic has now is better than their old system and one can only hope that other crafting improvements will be made in the future.
Apologies for not responding to this earlier.
I wasn't sure just what you were talking about, though I did get the gist of the joke. Yes, I admit I had to Google it.
While I know you were joking, I just have never gotten the reasoning behind people taking the time to create an account, download a game, create a character, do some things and then just essentially give up and just sit there and go AFK while leeching off the work of others.
I mean, I do get there are 'dead spots' while leveling sometimes, or content you grow tired of and want to skip while continuing to level, but to just leech...
If I'm not having fun playing a game, I don't play. And by that, I mean I don't log in. I'm not going to be a burden on other players simply because *I'm* not having fun.
Now, I have power-leveled before, but I am one of those that even if I'm woefully underpowered and not bringing much to the fight, I still give it a shot. If for nothing else I'm learning things about future NPC foes and maybe learning how to avoid attacks. If I have abilities that can actually help the people doing all the work, by throwing heals/buffs/debuffs, I do that as well.
Now, if they tell me specifically to stay back due to possible over aggro or setting off an ambush early, I do. But if I'm not allowed to follow around, I get bored quick and will kindly leave to find something else to do. Or just log out.
Way off topic, I know. Just something that has always bothered me in MMO's.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.
But...
With the Winter Event now live and the new items that accompany it, why oh why was none of it added to the crafting system? I feel this was a HUGE opportunity to introduce more players to the crafting system, and the Devs missed it.
Having to participate in the Tides of Ice event up to 10 times, per character, to be able to unlock everything is a HUGE mistake. It turns something that should be fun into just another grind. Add in that the event itself is bugged as far as registering participation and well, I have given up on the event. I've been there well before the event starts, fought through each of the 10 waves, received rewards for all 10 waves and the end of event rewards as well. I've done this event at least 5 times so far and yet, I can't buy a single new item off the Event store. Five full runs of Tides of Ice and I can't even buy one of the new weapons or devices let alone any of the new clothes or kit mods. I have plenty of ornaments, heck I have enough to buy 2 warp cores at this point but the game isn't registering the fact I've completed the event.
I get that the Devs worked hard on the new stuff and also understand that they want players to actually play the new event. But by making it mandatory in order to unlock the new items just seems so unfun. And with it apparently broken, it's made me give up on even bothering with the new items. Apparently there is a fix on the way, but for now, I simply won't bother anymore, and frankly, I'm tempted to just walk away from the game for a while.
And that is huge for me since I LOVE the summer and winter events in STO, they are a great distraction and let me decompress from the game without having to take a break from the game. Normally, when I feel like I'm burning out, I just stop playing for a while. With the events, I get to do something different for a couple weeks and when it's over I go back to the normal game.
One of the reasons I'm hearing behind the Devs locking the items behind participation was that if they didn't, players who had stockpiled ornaments from last year, or ones who are willing to blow tons of EC to buy the ornaments off the exchange, could just bypass the new event, get what they want and never set foot inside Q's Winter Wonderland. Aside from getting the new stuff, that is.
I get that as well. Why go through all the trouble of creating the new stuff if people are going to skip it on day one? So lock the new items behind a participation wall and it forces players into the new content. Well, that hasn't worked out well this time. I'm hearing lots of people complain about it and again, there is a fix coming that will make participation account wide so that those of us with multiple alts can enjoy the new items without having to run the event ad nauseum.
And this is where the Devs dropped the ball, IMO. If they'd just set up the new items to be craftable a lot of this could have been avoided. Use the ornaments to craft the items. Oh sure, same thing as if they just opened up the store, players with stockpiles yada yada. This is where the Devs could time gate things.
Require the crafting of the items to be unlocked by using ornaments, say 5 of each simply to unlock the ability to craft, but keep it character locked. Meaning that every character that wants some of the new items needs to get their own ornaments, however they get them is besides the point.
Once open, there is only one crafting slot, but allow up to 2 others to be purchased with ornaments, say 10-20 of each to open an extra slot. Whatever the item currently cost to buy would be what they would cost to craft.
Put a 5-10 minute craft time for the devices. 15-20 minutes for the weapons. 2-4 hours for the clothes and maybe 8 or so for the kit mods. The warp/sing cores could be 20 hour projects. Anything that is currently character bound would stay that way and items that are freely tradable would remain this way as well.
Once the event ends, the crafting window for these would close after the last project has finished and is claimed. It would reopen with the event next year exactly how the players left it, with any extra slots already unlocked.
This is just a quick and dirty, 'typing it up as I think of it' method, but looking back on it, it seems halfway decent. Yes, it creates more work for the Devs since they would have to recode some things, but this would have been a decent way to get more folks involved in the crafting process. It also would have created a time sink without forcing players into the Tides of Ice like we currently have.
Just my opinion on this matter. I'm sure others could come up with better ideas than the ones I presented. I just wish the Devs would stop making the game such a chore to play. I'm here to forget about the daily grind of the real world. Lately though, it seems there's more grind here, in a game, than I have in real life.
Set a man on fire and keep him warm for the rest of his life.