Well, what do you know... the EP has more or less confirmed what I suspected as the main reason they won't throw us under the bus when it comes to T6 ships.
Developing starships takes a lot of dev effort, so Delta Rising is going to include between 7 and 10 new Tier 6 ships at launch, spanning all three factions. This is nowhere near enough breadth in starships to satisfy the player demand, and we know our players love the ships they are already flying. With this in mind, we are dedicated to making sure that players can continue flying the ships they love and still have those ships be competitive at the new level 60 end game. We do not want players to feel that their investment in the current ships is devalued by the expansion, and this is a very challenging thing to do for a game with four years of history since the last level cap increase.
I agree with several posters in this thread - Tier 5 ships need to be made into full Tier 6 ships, not just "competitive" with them, because it took a LOT of time and resources to get Fleet ships, and RL money for those C-Store ships. You claim you don't want them to become devalued, but by saying at the Con that, Tier 6 ships have abilities that will make you WANT to buy them/get them, has devalued our Tier 5 ships already.
SO, if you guys at Cryptic refuse to make the Tier 5 ships, or our favorite ships, into full Tier 6 equivalents, then I suggest that you bring back SHIP COSTUMES, so that we can redress/change the appearance of your aesthetically unpleasing ships, into ships that we players prefer to fly ingame. If I can turn Support Cruisers into Ambassador Class ships, or Science Vessels into the Intrepid Class, or Escorts into the Akira or Defiant class, that would satisfy me. Otherwise, if you honestly think I'm going to waste more time, money, and effort getting a Tier 6 ship that is down right hideous, and be proud to be a Starfleet Officer, you can forget it. I'd rather be a sucky player and disenfranchised with the expansion in a Tier 5 ship that I ADORE because it is a canon ship from Star Trek.
And I don't care if people troll/flame me for my position. I am a true Trek fan - true to the Roddenberry franchise. I will not submit to this Lucasized garbage that Cryptic is peddling as "Star Trek".
I think this is silly. People put a lot of effort into their Heroic raid gear in WoW, yet with each expansion they gleefully leave that work behind and plunge into the next 10 levels of content, quest greens and all.
I think it IS time for a reset! Leave behind all the madness and start fresh with a new, unabashedly more powerful tier.
It's not like people don't fly T3 and T4 ships in T5 content currently anyway for more of a challenge. It's not impossible.
My biggest concern is we are getting T6 ships, but are we getting T6 content? Or T6 versions of current content?
Also, lets do the math, 7 to 10 new ships? That's not nearly enough. That's just about one choice per role per faction. (Sci, Tac, Engi, x3 factions = 9 plus what, a random carrier or BoP?). That's pretty poor.
I would vote for no dev time spent developing some 'upgrade' system for current ships, tack a few months onto release date, and spend time developing two or three options per role, per faction.
First off, people don't pay real money for their raid gear in WoW. And they only get the high end raid gear after completing all the other lower level raids and dungeons. On top of that, there is always the Heroic level, which is difficult to complete, even with gear that are 10 levels better. So, there is always a challenge there. But it doesn't cost real money.
Star Trek's microtransactions do. And people don't want to lose their financial investments because of an expansion.
Secondly, you don't speak for all of us. I vote FOR dev time being spent finding a way to make sure people can upgrade their T5 ships to T6, or dress their T6s to look like their T5s. I don't care about options for ships at T6 other than that. And you're silly for posting this.
And I don't care if people troll/flame me for my position. I am a true Trek fan - true to the Roddenberry franchise. I will not submit to this Lucasized garbage that Cryptic is peddling as "Star Trek"
A substantial part of the playerbase is people that aren't true MMO players, but Trekkies that play the game only because it's Star Trek.
That's the whole point of us playing a Star Trek game. If you're playing Star Trek Online solely because it's a MMO, then please leave. Your kind is not wanted. People like you are why people like JJ Abrams is trying to change Star Trek into something more "popular" and dumbed-down for people that can't handle the episodic content of the first 4 series.
I'm not sure "Excitement" covers the majority of posts about Delta Rising, I think "People Worrying that EVERYTHING they have done over the last 4 years is about to be nullified and made useless", but I guess the truth doesn't have such a nice ring.
T6 vessels, to me, should be similar stat-wise to fleet vessels with some sort of unique gimmick (you can choose exactly what BOff stations you want (to a defined max) for example) so that they are a sidegrade with a new mechanic rather than a straight upgrade, which incase you can't tell, would annoy pretty much everyone who took ages building a ship.
Mk XII is fine, a Mk XIII and Mk XIV would just be a menace, even if all existing reputation, fleet, crafted, etc Mk XII gear was upgraded.
If you can't solve it logically, solve it like a moron.
51 + 1 Foundry Character Slots is NOT enough. Some of us love our characters. If I want to buy more character slots, why can't I? I couldn't experience the entire Delta Recruitment event without deleting a character.
The Iconians themselves can't time travel because their memories revert, but there is nothing to say an Iconian couldn't write everything she needed to do on a PADD, pin it to herself, travel back, read the PADD, do the tasks and return. Or just get one of her Non-Herald underlings to go back in time for her.
Oh yeah, I do Foundry missions for both KDFs and Feds. Just search KSTF (Short for Kinas Special Task Force, where Kinas is the name of the Admiral you will be serving under). The earlier ones are less story based and more combat based, while the later ones have a much heavier story element, but keep the large battles.
We do not want players to feel that their investment in the current ships is devalued by the expansion, and this is a very challenging thing to do for a game with four years of history since the last level cap increase...
"But if you think we're not going to monetize the living [Redacted] out of this, boy are you in for a surprise!"
I'm going to keep sharpening my pitchfork, thanks.
The big question everyone is asking is: What does this mean to my existing Tier 5 ships?
No, the big question everyone is asking is why haven't you explained how T5>T6 upgrading will work yet?
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
"With the release of Star Trek Online: Delta Rising, this starship (either from this run of the promotion or from previous runs) will be upgradeable to Tier 6 starship capabilities at no cost."
Almost confirmation that Cryptic do indeed want to [Redacted] all T5 ships, it implies that boxed ships will get a free upgrade, but the wording suggests that non-boxed ships may have to pay for an upgrade.
Incase this point hasn't been made abundantly clear, we like our T5 ships as they are, we don't want to [Redacted] around upgrading them just so they will be slightly worse than the new limited choice of T6 ships.
If you can't solve it logically, solve it like a moron.
51 + 1 Foundry Character Slots is NOT enough. Some of us love our characters. If I want to buy more character slots, why can't I? I couldn't experience the entire Delta Recruitment event without deleting a character.
The Iconians themselves can't time travel because their memories revert, but there is nothing to say an Iconian couldn't write everything she needed to do on a PADD, pin it to herself, travel back, read the PADD, do the tasks and return. Or just get one of her Non-Herald underlings to go back in time for her.
Oh yeah, I do Foundry missions for both KDFs and Feds. Just search KSTF (Short for Kinas Special Task Force, where Kinas is the name of the Admiral you will be serving under). The earlier ones are less story based and more combat based, while the later ones have a much heavier story element, but keep the large battles.
Utterly pointless blog that just repeats what we've already been told and reassures none of the tens of thousands of players who've invested into Tier 5 ships. Get the message and just address it.
After that, you can do whatever you want with the rest of the content rollout blogs.
Yeah, that pretty much sums it up... Address the issue at hand directly. No point in this beating-around-the-bush, which just makes this whole 'competitive' thing seem all the more suspect.
Glad to hear they seem to be taking the community's concerns seriously. So much so that they used their first non-announcement blog to address them (somewhat anyway).
Cause as I'm sure we all know, and Cryptic knows much better; that some people have spent A LOT of money on this game, and the fear of having all of that potentially wasted was really souring the mood for what otherwise seems to be an awesome expansion.
Do Livetimers and 1000 day veterans get early access like that with LOR?
Early Access? You joking? I am a Lifer for about a year before LoR, never got early access to it. It will be up on Tribble before more than likely, this will hopefully help Cryptic to realise that a T6 ship rank is the worst idea they have had.
Any of this horrific idea talk reminding you of LoR's "fan-favourite" Tovan Khev? (At least he didn't actually waste a BOff spot, so not as bad as he could've been).
If you can't solve it logically, solve it like a moron.
51 + 1 Foundry Character Slots is NOT enough. Some of us love our characters. If I want to buy more character slots, why can't I? I couldn't experience the entire Delta Recruitment event without deleting a character.
The Iconians themselves can't time travel because their memories revert, but there is nothing to say an Iconian couldn't write everything she needed to do on a PADD, pin it to herself, travel back, read the PADD, do the tasks and return. Or just get one of her Non-Herald underlings to go back in time for her.
Oh yeah, I do Foundry missions for both KDFs and Feds. Just search KSTF (Short for Kinas Special Task Force, where Kinas is the name of the Admiral you will be serving under). The earlier ones are less story based and more combat based, while the later ones have a much heavier story element, but keep the large battles.
Well, what do you know... the EP has more or less confirmed what I suspected as the main reason they won't throw us under the bus when it comes to T6 ships.
That you were right about it doesn't really improve the situation.
If you're right, what we're essentially looking at is a case of "You know those ships you bought in the past? Yeah, we want you to pay for them again. All of them. At near-as-makes-no-difference full price."
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
That you were right about it doesn't really improve the situation.
If you're right, what we're essentially looking at is a case of "You know those ships you bought in the past? Yeah, we want you to pay for them again. All of them. At near-as-makes-no-difference full price."
I'm okay with this. Cryptic has mouths to pay and bills to feed.
For me just no its not good enough, considering the huge raft of issues that already affect this game like power creep which apparently doesn't exist just suttle differences so essentially we have all been tripping right??? lol and a generally very unhappy and disillusioned community so their solution as per usual is more shinys yeah.....
The worst part of it is most people didn't want a level cap increase mainly because there didn't seem to be any really good reason to and the same goes for a new tier of ships again we all are forced to ask why?
I like how they said it will be coming to tribble and we will be able to test all of it then deliver feedback, until a recent episode of a certain podcast I believed that feedback mattered to them but apparently not it seems since we all just complain???, to a certain extent its true however there are those of us who have given constructive feedback and for the most part none of it was listened to it seems kind of defeats the reason behind asking for it in the first place lol.
However if that episode was anything to go by then its seems we are all just banging our heads against a wall, in the end its being made painfuly clear what is important making money by any means necessary and keep a constant stream of new players coming and going dropping a few bucks here and there before they leave for something else.
Looking at how Cryptic turned "Worried" into "Excited", I fear our last bastion for them to realise will be Tribble. This won't be the first time a small and furry creature will have saved us, remember their involvement on K-7.
If you can't solve it logically, solve it like a moron.
51 + 1 Foundry Character Slots is NOT enough. Some of us love our characters. If I want to buy more character slots, why can't I? I couldn't experience the entire Delta Recruitment event without deleting a character.
The Iconians themselves can't time travel because their memories revert, but there is nothing to say an Iconian couldn't write everything she needed to do on a PADD, pin it to herself, travel back, read the PADD, do the tasks and return. Or just get one of her Non-Herald underlings to go back in time for her.
Oh yeah, I do Foundry missions for both KDFs and Feds. Just search KSTF (Short for Kinas Special Task Force, where Kinas is the name of the Admiral you will be serving under). The earlier ones are less story based and more combat based, while the later ones have a much heavier story element, but keep the large battles.
Looking at how Cryptic turned "Worried" into "Excited", I fear our last bastion for them to realise will be Tribble. This won't be the first time a small and furry creature will have saved us, remember their involvement on K-7.
Speak for yourself, not all of us were clutching our pearls and wetting ourselves at the mere notion of Delta Rising.
Speak for yourself, not all of us were clutching our pearls and wetting ourselves at the mere notion of Delta Rising.
You work for cryptic? Or do you just run 100% stock ships?
I for one have put over 2000 hours into STO, building my ships and characters just so I can fully enjoy the game just to be told "We are making the ships you spend ages building worse unless you pay us again to make them slightly worse than the new ships we are making".
Only thing I see being enjoyable about DR is the new story, I just hope they have made proper feature episodes, not these 1 mission things bulked out by "fly through the battlezones" filler. I have always wanted more story content, not more reps, mechanics, etc.
If you can't solve it logically, solve it like a moron.
51 + 1 Foundry Character Slots is NOT enough. Some of us love our characters. If I want to buy more character slots, why can't I? I couldn't experience the entire Delta Recruitment event without deleting a character.
The Iconians themselves can't time travel because their memories revert, but there is nothing to say an Iconian couldn't write everything she needed to do on a PADD, pin it to herself, travel back, read the PADD, do the tasks and return. Or just get one of her Non-Herald underlings to go back in time for her.
Oh yeah, I do Foundry missions for both KDFs and Feds. Just search KSTF (Short for Kinas Special Task Force, where Kinas is the name of the Admiral you will be serving under). The earlier ones are less story based and more combat based, while the later ones have a much heavier story element, but keep the large battles.
I'm okay with this. Cryptic has mouths to pay and bills to feed.
And Lockbox keys, C-Store ships, R&D Packs, Doff Packs, Subscriptions, LoR Packs, LTS' and Special Event grind-shorteners aren't enough to provide this?
Don't get me wrong; it's a company, it needs to make money.
It just doesn't need to monetize everything.
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
They sure as hell didn't upgrade the D'kyr. Or the regent once the avenger came out. They haven't suddenly pulled t4 or old t5 ships as the newer, better ones have crept out. They just kept pumping the latter out. This won't be any different.
C store ships get left behind all the time, nobody cares.
Your argument is fine. But you forget the existence of the Tier 5 Retrofit's in the game: Defiant Retrofit, Intrepid Retrofit, and Galaxy Retrofit. All of which are originally Tier 4 ships, yet they exist as full fledged EQUALS to the rest of the Tier 5 ships, such as the Sovereign, Prometheus or Luna Classes. They are not sub-standard or "competitive" to the Tier 5's. They are equals.
While I fully expect many will make the switch to some of Cryptic's designs for Tier 6, there's also the nagging problem of many of Cryptic's designs being considered generally sub-par compared to the canon designs. The "old and busted" may be Tier 5, but they most likely look better than most of the Cryptic designs. From the leaks so far from the convention, I'll fly my Defiant or Excelsior any day, over what has been seen so far of the Tier 6's.
You work for cryptic? Or do you just run 100% stock ships?
Nope and nope.
I for one have put over 2000 hours into STO, building my ships and characters just so I can fully enjoy the game just to be told "We are making the ships you spend ages building worse unless you pay us again to make them slightly worse than the new ships we are making".
Do you ever improve your ships? Do you ever get equipment better than what you already have at stock? Do you participate in the reputation systems? Do you purchase awesome gear on the exchange?
If you don't, then you have a point. If you do? Then you are improving your ship. You are improving yourself. You are improving your abilities.
And Lockbox keys, C-Store ships, R&D Packs, Doff Packs, Subscriptions, LoR Packs, LTS' and Special Event grind-shorteners aren't enough to provide this?
Don't get me wrong; it's a company, it needs to make money.
It just doesn't need to monetize everything.
It's never enough, because that money is never stagnant. The money you spent a few years ago is gone now. It's continual. It's like anything else that has dedicated support. And money must be continually fed into them for continual development and support -- which will result in more money.
It's an MMO. They are always in development. There isn't a line that is drawn that says, "Okay, I'm only going to give you guys this much money before I expect you to work for free on additional things."
That being said, the concern is monetization... which I understand.
But I think some of us think that a paywall is an absolution. It isn't. It is highly unlikely we will be forced to pay money to upgrade our ships to be competitive.
But it doesn't mean we're going to get it for free, either.
Upgrades in Delta Rising I anticipate will be like all the other current upgrades. Decided by factors like dilithium, time gates, EC, and time spent playing the game itself. There isn't going to be a solid paywall. To think there will be is paranoia.
But like everything else in STO, it's going to be pay4convenience. You can pay to upgrade your ship(s) right off the bat to be competitive, or you can work to improve them by playing the game on a regular basis.
And that isn't monetization. That is called game progression. And game progression shouldn't be demonized.
I agree with several posters in this thread - Tier 5 ships need to be made into full Tier 6 ships, not just "competitive" with them, because it took a LOT of time and resources to get Fleet ships, and RL money for those C-Store ships. You claim you don't want them to become devalued, but by saying at the Con that, Tier 6 ships have abilities that will make you WANT to buy them/get them, has devalued our Tier 5 ships already.
SO, if you guys at Cryptic refuse to make the Tier 5 ships, or our favorite ships, into full Tier 6 equivalents, then I suggest that you bring back SHIP COSTUMES, so that we can redress/change the appearance of your aesthetically unpleasing ships, into ships that we players prefer to fly ingame. If I can turn Support Cruisers into Ambassador Class ships, or Science Vessels into the Intrepid Class, or Escorts into the Akira or Defiant class, that would satisfy me. Otherwise, if you honestly think I'm going to waste more time, money, and effort getting a Tier 6 ship that is down right hideous, and be proud to be a Starfleet Officer, you can forget it. I'd rather be a sucky player and disenfranchised with the expansion in a Tier 5 ship that I ADORE because it is a canon ship from Star Trek.
And I don't care if people troll/flame me for my position. I am a true Trek fan - true to the Roddenberry franchise. I will not submit to this Lucasized garbage that Cryptic is peddling as "Star Trek".
First off, people don't pay real money for their raid gear in WoW. And they only get the high end raid gear after completing all the other lower level raids and dungeons. On top of that, there is always the Heroic level, which is difficult to complete, even with gear that are 10 levels better. So, there is always a challenge there. But it doesn't cost real money.
Star Trek's microtransactions do. And people don't want to lose their financial investments because of an expansion.
Secondly, you don't speak for all of us. I vote FOR dev time being spent finding a way to make sure people can upgrade their T5 ships to T6, or dress their T6s to look like their T5s. I don't care about options for ships at T6 other than that. And you're silly for posting this.
In your opinion. In my opinion, you're silly for buying and playing an MMO and not expecting standard MMO progression rules to apply. You're also silly for thinking people don't pay real money for their raid gear in WoW. Where do you think that sub goes? Same thing, just different purchasing scheme. You've gotten lucky so far that there haven't been level cap and gear progression increases to make the previous iteration trivial. Now it comes! And I welcome it.
I only agree with you on one thing. All classic fed ships should be T6 costumes on their nearest equivalent. (But then, I'm the guy that thinks ALL escort costumes should be usable on ANY escort, etc, etc...)
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Pay no attention to the dates and titles under my name at the left! I am a Career Officer, Lifetime Sub since launch, was in the Beta. Having problems with my forum account.
I think this is silly. People put a lot of effort into their Heroic raid gear in WoW, yet with each expansion they gleefully leave that work behind and plunge into the next 10 levels of content, quest greens and all.
I think it IS time for a reset! Leave behind all the madness and start fresh with a new, unabashedly more powerful tier.
It's not like people don't fly T3 and T4 ships in T5 content currently anyway for more of a challenge. It's not impossible.
My biggest concern is we are getting T6 ships, but are we getting T6 content? Or T6 versions of current content?
Also, lets do the math, 7 to 10 new ships? That's not nearly enough. That's just about one choice per role per faction. (Sci, Tac, Engi, x3 factions = 9 plus what, a random carrier or BoP?). That's pretty poor.
I would vote for no dev time spent developing some 'upgrade' system for current ships, tack a few months onto release date, and spend time developing two or three options per role, per faction.
Why then whats the point of doing tier 6. I swear I think some of you have never played any other MMO before.
By your logic all ships should be the same tier then why wasn't tier 1 upgradeable to tier 5 or any other tier for that matter.
Leave the tiers they way are and offer retrofits for some of them in tier 6, and no they are not free you should have to work for them.
It's been answered before, but just in case someone missed that, the difference is $$$.
Paying a monthly subscription to play a game is one thing. You pay to access the game, and you get whatever you get along the way.
They increase the level cap? Nothing changes. You continue to pay the sub to play the game and to try and get the best gear.
Here? People paid money to get top-end ships.
This isn't about that guy that paid 1000 zen for the Advanced Heavy Cruiser or the Heavy Escort Refit. Those were mid-level ships when they bought them.
But the people that paid for the Odysseys, Vestas, Andorian Escorts, or whatever did so with the expectation that their money was being spent on the best ships in the game.
If WoW was charging people real money for a piece of gear, and people spent their money to get endgame gear sets, do you not think that those same people would suddenly have a problem if WoW raised the level cap and made the gear that those people had paid for obsolete?
After reading this thread, I find it hillarious to see how many people here can't tell the difference between a P2P MMO and bying an avatar in a F2P one.
I'm okay with spending Zen to upgrade the old ships. There are plenty of ships I've bought that I'll likely never use again (Nebula, cough), so it's really only a few I'd need to upgrade, but will we even have that option? Will the upgrades be account-wide or will I have to buy them for every character who uses the Tempest or Regent or whatever? I don't know. Information blackouts are bad.
What does "competitive" even mean in Cryptic-speak?
IT IS TIME! Tier 6 Constitution Class Modern-Rebirth-Retro-Refit
You cannot justify denying this dream any longer. Starfleet has an outrageous amount of non-Federation vessels in active service. Even Species 8472 Ships that can "call" more Undine Ships from Fluidic Space.
Not to mention... Dinosaurs that shoot laser beams from their mouths! CBS... Cryptic... PWE... Whoever you are that is blocking End-Game Constitution Refit. Just stop it already! Let is go and let it happen.
Ok...
First ''WoW players didn't buy their heroic gear''. True. They are renting it for 14.99 a month.
There is already a mess with the refitting, retrofitting, fleet upgrading and mirror varianting.
I vote for making the ships scale-able with lvl (reasonably. No fancy toys like t6 are looking to have, but good enough to compensate).
All the lock-box and rep stuff has to be upgradable to Mk XIV. Which I suspect it will be. They are really hinting at it with crafting and I hope this will be old stuff only, I don't want to have crafting part of the progression on any new characters (like new rep requisition would give Mk XIV right away).
One of the reasons I like STO is because each new rep system felt more like side-grade than an upgrade. So I didn't feel like my grind was wiped clean with new update. I hope it remains that way.
Or... or, if the Cryptic adopts my suggestion for customizable crafting (choosing stats and effects). Then whatever. No need to upgrade the old stuff - I would just make new one that is the same, only scaled for Mk XIV (even though I dislike crafting).
Comments
Which is a lot like what I said here.
SO, if you guys at Cryptic refuse to make the Tier 5 ships, or our favorite ships, into full Tier 6 equivalents, then I suggest that you bring back SHIP COSTUMES, so that we can redress/change the appearance of your aesthetically unpleasing ships, into ships that we players prefer to fly ingame. If I can turn Support Cruisers into Ambassador Class ships, or Science Vessels into the Intrepid Class, or Escorts into the Akira or Defiant class, that would satisfy me. Otherwise, if you honestly think I'm going to waste more time, money, and effort getting a Tier 6 ship that is down right hideous, and be proud to be a Starfleet Officer, you can forget it. I'd rather be a sucky player and disenfranchised with the expansion in a Tier 5 ship that I ADORE because it is a canon ship from Star Trek.
And I don't care if people troll/flame me for my position. I am a true Trek fan - true to the Roddenberry franchise. I will not submit to this Lucasized garbage that Cryptic is peddling as "Star Trek".
First off, people don't pay real money for their raid gear in WoW. And they only get the high end raid gear after completing all the other lower level raids and dungeons. On top of that, there is always the Heroic level, which is difficult to complete, even with gear that are 10 levels better. So, there is always a challenge there. But it doesn't cost real money.
Star Trek's microtransactions do. And people don't want to lose their financial investments because of an expansion.
Secondly, you don't speak for all of us. I vote FOR dev time being spent finding a way to make sure people can upgrade their T5 ships to T6, or dress their T6s to look like their T5s. I don't care about options for ships at T6 other than that. And you're silly for posting this.
I never opened my Bug Ship so I wonder if I open it after Season 6 ships will it spawn as a Tier 6 or a Tier 5?
Here's your card.
That's the whole point of us playing a Star Trek game. If you're playing Star Trek Online solely because it's a MMO, then please leave. Your kind is not wanted. People like you are why people like JJ Abrams is trying to change Star Trek into something more "popular" and dumbed-down for people that can't handle the episodic content of the first 4 series.
T6 vessels, to me, should be similar stat-wise to fleet vessels with some sort of unique gimmick (you can choose exactly what BOff stations you want (to a defined max) for example) so that they are a sidegrade with a new mechanic rather than a straight upgrade, which incase you can't tell, would annoy pretty much everyone who took ages building a ship.
Mk XII is fine, a Mk XIII and Mk XIV would just be a menace, even if all existing reputation, fleet, crafted, etc Mk XII gear was upgraded.
What modifiers did you get for the pitchforks? I got + pointing
"But if you think we're not going to monetize the living [Redacted] out of this, boy are you in for a surprise!"
I'm going to keep sharpening my pitchfork, thanks.
No, the big question everyone is asking is why haven't you explained how T5>T6 upgrading will work yet?
Almost confirmation that Cryptic do indeed want to [Redacted] all T5 ships, it implies that boxed ships will get a free upgrade, but the wording suggests that non-boxed ships may have to pay for an upgrade.
Incase this point hasn't been made abundantly clear, we like our T5 ships as they are, we don't want to [Redacted] around upgrading them just so they will be slightly worse than the new limited choice of T6 ships.
Yeah, that pretty much sums it up... Address the issue at hand directly. No point in this beating-around-the-bush, which just makes this whole 'competitive' thing seem all the more suspect.
Cause as I'm sure we all know, and Cryptic knows much better; that some people have spent A LOT of money on this game, and the fear of having all of that potentially wasted was really souring the mood for what otherwise seems to be an awesome expansion.
Early Access? You joking? I am a Lifer for about a year before LoR, never got early access to it. It will be up on Tribble before more than likely, this will hopefully help Cryptic to realise that a T6 ship rank is the worst idea they have had.
Any of this horrific idea talk reminding you of LoR's "fan-favourite" Tovan Khev? (At least he didn't actually waste a BOff spot, so not as bad as he could've been).
That you were right about it doesn't really improve the situation.
If you're right, what we're essentially looking at is a case of "You know those ships you bought in the past? Yeah, we want you to pay for them again. All of them. At near-as-makes-no-difference full price."
I'm okay with this. Cryptic has mouths to pay and bills to feed.
The worst part of it is most people didn't want a level cap increase mainly because there didn't seem to be any really good reason to and the same goes for a new tier of ships again we all are forced to ask why?
I like how they said it will be coming to tribble and we will be able to test all of it then deliver feedback, until a recent episode of a certain podcast I believed that feedback mattered to them but apparently not it seems since we all just complain???, to a certain extent its true however there are those of us who have given constructive feedback and for the most part none of it was listened to it seems kind of defeats the reason behind asking for it in the first place lol.
However if that episode was anything to go by then its seems we are all just banging our heads against a wall, in the end its being made painfuly clear what is important making money by any means necessary and keep a constant stream of new players coming and going dropping a few bucks here and there before they leave for something else.
Speak for yourself, not all of us were clutching our pearls and wetting ourselves at the mere notion of Delta Rising.
You work for cryptic? Or do you just run 100% stock ships?
I for one have put over 2000 hours into STO, building my ships and characters just so I can fully enjoy the game just to be told "We are making the ships you spend ages building worse unless you pay us again to make them slightly worse than the new ships we are making".
Only thing I see being enjoyable about DR is the new story, I just hope they have made proper feature episodes, not these 1 mission things bulked out by "fly through the battlezones" filler. I have always wanted more story content, not more reps, mechanics, etc.
And Lockbox keys, C-Store ships, R&D Packs, Doff Packs, Subscriptions, LoR Packs, LTS' and Special Event grind-shorteners aren't enough to provide this?
Don't get me wrong; it's a company, it needs to make money.
It just doesn't need to monetize everything.
Your argument is fine. But you forget the existence of the Tier 5 Retrofit's in the game: Defiant Retrofit, Intrepid Retrofit, and Galaxy Retrofit. All of which are originally Tier 4 ships, yet they exist as full fledged EQUALS to the rest of the Tier 5 ships, such as the Sovereign, Prometheus or Luna Classes. They are not sub-standard or "competitive" to the Tier 5's. They are equals.
While I fully expect many will make the switch to some of Cryptic's designs for Tier 6, there's also the nagging problem of many of Cryptic's designs being considered generally sub-par compared to the canon designs. The "old and busted" may be Tier 5, but they most likely look better than most of the Cryptic designs. From the leaks so far from the convention, I'll fly my Defiant or Excelsior any day, over what has been seen so far of the Tier 6's.
Nope and nope.
Do you ever improve your ships? Do you ever get equipment better than what you already have at stock? Do you participate in the reputation systems? Do you purchase awesome gear on the exchange?
If you don't, then you have a point. If you do? Then you are improving your ship. You are improving yourself. You are improving your abilities.
It's never enough, because that money is never stagnant. The money you spent a few years ago is gone now. It's continual. It's like anything else that has dedicated support. And money must be continually fed into them for continual development and support -- which will result in more money.
It's an MMO. They are always in development. There isn't a line that is drawn that says, "Okay, I'm only going to give you guys this much money before I expect you to work for free on additional things."
That being said, the concern is monetization... which I understand.
But I think some of us think that a paywall is an absolution. It isn't. It is highly unlikely we will be forced to pay money to upgrade our ships to be competitive.
But it doesn't mean we're going to get it for free, either.
Upgrades in Delta Rising I anticipate will be like all the other current upgrades. Decided by factors like dilithium, time gates, EC, and time spent playing the game itself. There isn't going to be a solid paywall. To think there will be is paranoia.
But like everything else in STO, it's going to be pay4convenience. You can pay to upgrade your ship(s) right off the bat to be competitive, or you can work to improve them by playing the game on a regular basis.
And that isn't monetization. That is called game progression. And game progression shouldn't be demonized.
Signs of a Trolololololololol
1: Free MMO. I don't mind ponying up a little cash if I want a sparkly new Tier 6 ship. Beats paying monthly just to play.
2: Also don't mind forking over a little coin to soup up my Tier 5 (or Tier 4 Mirror) ship to a competitive level.
3: Call me a Plain Jayne (yay Firefly reference), but I never really buy ships based on the "cool" things the consoles do. I go for looks.
Captaincy, Excelsior-Class U.S.S. Bianca Beauchamp NCC-99947-F
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
In your opinion. In my opinion, you're silly for buying and playing an MMO and not expecting standard MMO progression rules to apply. You're also silly for thinking people don't pay real money for their raid gear in WoW. Where do you think that sub goes? Same thing, just different purchasing scheme. You've gotten lucky so far that there haven't been level cap and gear progression increases to make the previous iteration trivial. Now it comes! And I welcome it.
I only agree with you on one thing. All classic fed ships should be T6 costumes on their nearest equivalent. (But then, I'm the guy that thinks ALL escort costumes should be usable on ANY escort, etc, etc...)
Pay no attention to the dates and titles under my name at the left! I am a Career Officer, Lifetime Sub since launch, was in the Beta. Having problems with my forum account.
It's been answered before, but just in case someone missed that, the difference is $$$.
Paying a monthly subscription to play a game is one thing. You pay to access the game, and you get whatever you get along the way.
They increase the level cap? Nothing changes. You continue to pay the sub to play the game and to try and get the best gear.
Here? People paid money to get top-end ships.
This isn't about that guy that paid 1000 zen for the Advanced Heavy Cruiser or the Heavy Escort Refit. Those were mid-level ships when they bought them.
But the people that paid for the Odysseys, Vestas, Andorian Escorts, or whatever did so with the expectation that their money was being spent on the best ships in the game.
If WoW was charging people real money for a piece of gear, and people spent their money to get endgame gear sets, do you not think that those same people would suddenly have a problem if WoW raised the level cap and made the gear that those people had paid for obsolete?
What does "competitive" even mean in Cryptic-speak?
You cannot justify denying this dream any longer. Starfleet has an outrageous amount of non-Federation vessels in active service. Even Species 8472 Ships that can "call" more Undine Ships from Fluidic Space.
Not to mention... Dinosaurs that shoot laser beams from their mouths! CBS... Cryptic... PWE... Whoever you are that is blocking End-Game Constitution Refit. Just stop it already! Let is go and let it happen.
First ''WoW players didn't buy their heroic gear''. True. They are renting it for 14.99 a month.
There is already a mess with the refitting, retrofitting, fleet upgrading and mirror varianting.
I vote for making the ships scale-able with lvl (reasonably. No fancy toys like t6 are looking to have, but good enough to compensate).
All the lock-box and rep stuff has to be upgradable to Mk XIV. Which I suspect it will be. They are really hinting at it with crafting and I hope this will be old stuff only, I don't want to have crafting part of the progression on any new characters (like new rep requisition would give Mk XIV right away).
One of the reasons I like STO is because each new rep system felt more like side-grade than an upgrade. So I didn't feel like my grind was wiped clean with new update. I hope it remains that way.
Or... or, if the Cryptic adopts my suggestion for customizable crafting (choosing stats and effects). Then whatever. No need to upgrade the old stuff - I would just make new one that is the same, only scaled for Mk XIV (even though I dislike crafting).