You're changing the argument now. In your last post, you said you didn't mind if there were other, more powerful ships, as long as yours was 'in the same range'. Give or take a single BOff slot, with all else being equal, is to me well within the same range.
Now all of a suddent you want 'equal'. Either you're okay with your T5-U not being the best in the game, or you're not. You can't switch back and forth to try to win an internet argument.
You obviously haven't been following the thread, then. I'm sorry if the point has been lost on you; I've made it pretty clear until now.
My position has always been that I really don't care if the T6 ships have specialist boffs or a unique ship trait. I can find ship traits elsewhere. But I think upgraded T5 ships should get the extra bridge officer ability, because bridge officer abilities are the core mechanic of how we build our ships. The lack of one means less versatility and fewer powers.
I don't mind paying zen to get my existing ships up to a level competitive with a T6. But losing out on a bridge officer slot doesn't seem very competitive, at least if it's anything more than an ensign power.
The artist formerly known as PlanetofHats.
Actual join date: Open beta, 2009ish.
Some of the ships I have will be upgraded for free, and I might even go upgrade the Vesta since I have the bundle. I don't really care if they're not going to be "on the level" with tier 6 ships, none of the content being released is going to strictly say "You need to be in a tier 6 ship to continue."
This game is hardly a game, it's a grindfest. Had they actually put out real content, not "repetitive content", people would not be as upset as they are. But they made us work for what we have by continuous grinding & now all that appears to have been for nothing. Work is what I do for a living, gaming is what I do for fun. Grinding is not fun, it's WORK. What's the point in continuing to log in if all we get is shafted over & over again? No wonder they've had a 30% drop off in PC gamers logging in. I predict that number is just going to go higher.
I agree I already have 2 jobs, I don't need another.
I oftain see commends on the forum about balance and fairness but how is it fair that only some people get a free upgrade while everyone else has to buy it. What I mean is this from the developers:
Q: Which ships will be free to upgrade?
A: All Lockbox and Lobi starships, 1000 Day Veteran Destroyers,
Duty Officer promotional starships, and the Dyson, Breen and Risian event starships will all qualify for a free T5-U upgrade.
What about those of us who bought one of your overpriced cash shop ships? How come we have to shell out even more money if we want an upgrade? Take my ship for example, I bought all three Odyssey variants, now if I want the upgrade I have to pay again just because it didn't come out of a lock box??? What a rip off. I say free upgrades for everyone or for no one.
They don't need or have to give anything a free upgrade. For the most part we should be glad about what we do have available to us.
I'm not so much asking for anything free, I just want some equality. Why should a select group get free upgrades and the rest have to pay? Either they should all be free or all pay.
I don't know who makes the calls on business ideas (PWE or Cryptic) but I presume it's PWE because their games are dying. Look at Blacklight Retribution.
This game is going in the right direction to dying and it's a shame but at least there are better games out there which aren't made by money grabbing greedy people.
I'm not so much asking for anything free, I just want some equality. Why should a select group get free upgrades and the rest have to pay? Either they should all be free or all pay.
Simple economics. The game makes most of its money off non-renewable lockbox keys, not C-Store permanent unlocks. That's also why there's never going to be an option to re-box lockbox ships.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Lockbox and Lobi ships are extremely expensive for most people. A standard Lobi ship costs roughly $200.00 and is a single-character unlock. That is far more expensive then spending $50.00 and getting an Ody Pack that is an account-wide unlock that you can use on 50 characters for years. That is why they get free T5U.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
Congrats, you've killed any chance of me buying zen in the future.
I'm a lifer that's bought hundreds of dollars of zen over the years. My criteria for doing so was when something was done to the game that I liked, I bought zen to support that.
This one massive cluster**** of an expansion has done away with any reason to invest further.
I play this game for the ships. The classics, the iconics and the ships I like. I have had long term plans to upgrade my ships with current gear and weapons in order to keep them competitive. This expansion means none of the ships I have invested in will be competitive ever again.
I will still be playing this game, but there's no point in buying zen anymore. There's no point in fleet ships, there's no point in lockbox ships, there's no point in c-store ships, and since the T6 ships look downright repulsive to me, there's no point in them either.
More traits? Why would I care about them? I have 30 or 40 of the things and I can't even use half of them.
Cya around, for as long as the server stays alive with its reduced cash flow.
As far as lock box ships being expensive, to that I say hey, you go into it knowing theres only about a 2% chance of getting the ship so if your still willing to dump all your cash into it that's your problem.
My point is why should we buy ships only to have to rebuy them later and then what? they add a T6 upgrade to the cash shop so we buy for a 3rd time? then make them obsolete with even newer, better T6 ships in the cash shop for a 4th time around? Just how many times are we expected to buy the same ship from the cash shop? Then theres the comment about permanent c shop unlocks, how is that permanent? We have to keep buying the ship over again just to compete
As someone who hasn't played in some time, just wasn't interested in being a Romulan, and whose friends lost interest too so the social element is missing... I popped back to see what the expanded level cap would involve, and like many many here, I have to admit I'm scratching my head at the logic behind this expansion. It's almost certainly been said in the now 162 pages I don't have time to read, but here is my perspective possibly repeated;
The logic for preventing earlier ships taking the benefits of older technology has always been theme consistency; but with ships now from multiple different races, timelines and television series playing together this has long since failed to have any meaning. Now you're adding the concept that everyone will be behind the curve if they don't buy specific T6 ships... you can argue that they won't be locked out of content, but whilst running at the same time multiple Events which give better, desirable rewards for coming 1st? And what's worse, adding a "Level Up" mechanic to T6 ships, that you can buy for T5 (with lower powers)... but apparently our crews forget how to learn how to "Get The Best" or learn anything from every other ship in their fleets... how does that make any sense at all?
And what Cryptic don't seem to understand about their own game is that your ships are actually your player on the space map; not just a set of powers. I understand power-creep and that in a MMO you start again with equipment when a new expansion hits, but asking people to get rid of their ships in any other MMO would be they equivalent of demanding they redesign their physical appearance, recolour their hair, eyes etc to play the new content. It may be bearable when there's variants of the classics at the end game, and you can still play your older ships, at their correct tier and even beyond with skill and care... I've taken a TOS Enterprise into STFs before and beat it (Put the debate about doing that in PuGs aside for now) but this expansion now outright says "any character pre-Tier 5 is being deliberately locked out of the new mechanics".
It's not like where your previous baby City of Heroes went with it's own 50+ game; yes the content was locked out until you could get new powers or pay for certain account types... but it didn't make us pay to redesign the physical look of our superheroes at the same time either. You just unlocked the powers by purchase or levelling up, slotted the new upgrades (which scaled back down when your premium account lapsed) and carried on. That's what makes STO so confusing; you had such a better system in CoH, and one that would fit into the STO universe so much more convincingly... why wouldn't a Starship, which after all is just a shell of metal, be able to fit the latest, more powerful, often so much smaller new technology on board and keep up with everyone else?
It would make much more sense to fund the expansion by allowing people to pay an even smaller cost to bring ALL SHIPS into the new system and let them level up too. Frankly I don't see why you couldn't use the already included Hard Capping of Boff Seats/Weapon Slots/HPs etc to keep the tiers distinct... that TOS Enterprise levelled to max is never going to be as good as my T5 Odyssey, but it also won't be driven so far off the power creep curve when levelled either that it's effectively locked out...
Or rather, I can see why Cryptic are doing it, because I suspect the current design is to encourage people to upgrade T5 out of love but also catch the "I want the exclusives" crowd on top of that. But that will fail because it's such an obviously unlovable grab for as much of the cash that's possibly on the table that any sense of fun and fairness is gone; remember that if you've a C Store ship at T5 it's because you love it enough to have spent extra money on it. If you're still using an NPC bought ship, it's because you prefer it to anything in the store. So either way, you lose with the new switch over because neither of those will ever be as good as what limited choice of new hulls/looks will be in the T6 class.
As someone who likes to play with certain ships and themes only, you're completely alienating myself from the game. Why would I go back and bring new friends through the content when the classic ships can't be "learnt", and every story we tell before the cap is instantly abandoned to progress beyond it? Why would I upgrade to ships I have no love for at all, at a much higher cost, when I'm struggling to stay engaged with the content I still have to do?
Sorry Cryptic, this is where you probably lose me completely then. I never got into Fleet Ships because the grind was just too much, and it seemed like forced socialising which you then needed to pay real cash for. The redesign of the reputation grinds just threw me out because having to relearn them and grind them was alienating. I'd log in every now and then and do a bit of doffing because that was simple and useful, as a tide me over until interest or friends I genuinely liked came back, in the hopes the game would catch the magic of the 1-50 ride back. If these designs go ahead though... I really don't feel like anything past 50 is worth my time any more.
Because at an average of 120 keys for a Lobi ship and 400ish for a Lockbox ship, the upgrade has been paid for through a number of seasons.
That's the gamble you take when you go into the whole lock box thing, That's like playing a slot machine over and over, hopping to hit the jackpot and just when your money runs out you hit it then say you want the jackpot plus a few free spins.
Oh, don't forget, even with free upgrade, you still missing the new features.
So, you pay, and pay more, still got half of it.
Yes, I WILL pay for the upgrade, even for lockbox ships, I'm willing to grind, but FULL or nothing, cheap knock off is nothing more than an insult.
No, not at all. Anyone who believes we should pay to grind or pay to win is just wrong. New content does not mean new grinding. Nor should we pay to make the new content fun. Especially since we have already paid and ground for what we have.
why its that way in every other MMO. Maybe you should play online games any more. Of course no one is forcing you to buy anything.
Q: Will there be any story content that requires a T5-U or T6 starship?
A: Absolutely not.
Our goal here is to allow players to play through all of the games story content without requiring the purchase of a starship.
Owning one of these top notch ships will certainly give you an edge, but story content isnt designed to require these ships.
so what are the T6 ships actually good for?
unless your planning cryptic to revamp PVE ques to cater to you bank wallet masters of PWE..
first and only insult i will give cryptic is this.....
SWORDSMAN!
for the love of the almighty dont follow that path!
That's the gamble you take when you go into the whole lock box thing, That's like playing a slot machine over and over, hopping to hit the jackpot and just when your money runs out you hit it then say you want the jackpot plus a few free spins.
Lobi ships aren't a gamble, they cost 800 Lobi, which requires an average of 120 lockboxes opened. The Lockbox ships may be a gamble, but that gamble is paying for Expansion #2. Look at the exchange. They key market is just about the most active section. Old lockboxes continue to provide income so of course Cryptic will perpetuate their continued relevance by offering free upgrades.
Because at an average of 120 keys for a Lobi ship and 400ish for a Lockbox ship, the upgrade has been paid for through a number of seasons.
I received all my Lobi ships, Lockbox ships, and special promotion as gifts. Some took one lockbox to open, others took 200, fair enough. But you can't use this logic to dictate: "Hey, they obviously payed more money for those ships! Freebie for all of ships too." I've bought multiple fleet ships of the same type on multiple toons, in total I've spent at least $60 upgrading my ships to fleet versions. Real money has gone into getting the C-Store ships, as well as the the Fleet versions of them, which are on par with Lockbox, lobi and special promotion ships stat wise, anyway and they are getting ignored because PWE (Cryptic, whoever really) wants to promote their almighty Lockbox, another scam to say the least (all those ships could be available from the C-Store, even if $10 expensive or something, if they really wanted to get consistent sales out those "special" ships).
I received all my Lobi ships, Lockbox ships, and special promotion as gifts. Some took one lockbox to open, others took 200, fair enough. But you can't use this logic to dictate: "Hey, they obviously payed more money for those ships! Freebie for all of them." Real money has gone into getting the C-Store ships, as well as the the Fleet versions of them, which are on par with Lockbox, lobi and special promotion ships stat wise, anyway and they are getting ignored because PWE (Cryptic, whoever really) wants to promote their almighty Lockbox, another scam to say the least (all those ships could be available from the C-Store, even if $10 expensive or something, if they really wanted to get consistent sales out those "special" ships).
A LOT of people with lockbox ships paid 0 zen or real money for them. They simply used energy credits and the exchange.
I received all my Lobi ships, Lockbox ships, and special promotion as gifts. Some took one lockbox to open, others took 200, fair enough. But you can't use this logic to dictate: "Hey, they obviously payed more money for those ships! Freebie for all of them." Real money has gone into getting the C-Store ships, as well as the the Fleet versions of them, which are on par with Lockbox, lobi and special promotion ships stat wise, anyway and they are getting ignored because PWE (Cryptic, whoever really) wants to promote their almighty Lockbox, another scam to say the least (all those ships could be available from the C-Store, even if $10 expensive or something, if they really wanted to get consistent sales out those "special" ships).
That's great that you got them as gifts. I'd wager that most people do not have such luck. Lobi ships still cost 800 lobi, which requires opening 120 lockboxes, approximate value $200. I'm not defending lockboxes as a practice; I do not work for Cryptic. I'm just explaining why the decision was made - they are evidently getting very consistent sales out of the 'special' ships, via master keys. If it wasn't working they wouldn't be doing it.
Comments
You obviously haven't been following the thread, then. I'm sorry if the point has been lost on you; I've made it pretty clear until now.
My position has always been that I really don't care if the T6 ships have specialist boffs or a unique ship trait. I can find ship traits elsewhere. But I think upgraded T5 ships should get the extra bridge officer ability, because bridge officer abilities are the core mechanic of how we build our ships. The lack of one means less versatility and fewer powers.
I don't mind paying zen to get my existing ships up to a level competitive with a T6. But losing out on a bridge officer slot doesn't seem very competitive, at least if it's anything more than an ensign power.
Actual join date: Open beta, 2009ish.
"There... are... four... lights!" ~Jean Luc Picard
I agree I already have 2 jobs, I don't need another.
Q: Which ships will be free to upgrade?
A: All Lockbox and Lobi starships, 1000 Day Veteran Destroyers,
Duty Officer promotional starships, and the Dyson, Breen and Risian event starships will all qualify for a free T5-U upgrade.
What about those of us who bought one of your overpriced cash shop ships? How come we have to shell out even more money if we want an upgrade? Take my ship for example, I bought all three Odyssey variants, now if I want the upgrade I have to pay again just because it didn't come out of a lock box??? What a rip off. I say free upgrades for everyone or for no one.
Still waiting to be able to use forum titles
I'm not so much asking for anything free, I just want some equality. Why should a select group get free upgrades and the rest have to pay? Either they should all be free or all pay.
I don't know who makes the calls on business ideas (PWE or Cryptic) but I presume it's PWE because their games are dying. Look at Blacklight Retribution.
This game is going in the right direction to dying and it's a shame but at least there are better games out there which aren't made by money grabbing greedy people.
Have fun losing your playerbase
Simple economics. The game makes most of its money off non-renewable lockbox keys, not C-Store permanent unlocks. That's also why there's never going to be an option to re-box lockbox ships.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
I'm a lifer that's bought hundreds of dollars of zen over the years. My criteria for doing so was when something was done to the game that I liked, I bought zen to support that.
This one massive cluster**** of an expansion has done away with any reason to invest further.
I play this game for the ships. The classics, the iconics and the ships I like. I have had long term plans to upgrade my ships with current gear and weapons in order to keep them competitive. This expansion means none of the ships I have invested in will be competitive ever again.
I will still be playing this game, but there's no point in buying zen anymore. There's no point in fleet ships, there's no point in lockbox ships, there's no point in c-store ships, and since the T6 ships look downright repulsive to me, there's no point in them either.
More traits? Why would I care about them? I have 30 or 40 of the things and I can't even use half of them.
Cya around, for as long as the server stays alive with its reduced cash flow.
My point is why should we buy ships only to have to rebuy them later and then what? they add a T6 upgrade to the cash shop so we buy for a 3rd time? then make them obsolete with even newer, better T6 ships in the cash shop for a 4th time around? Just how many times are we expected to buy the same ship from the cash shop? Then theres the comment about permanent c shop unlocks, how is that permanent? We have to keep buying the ship over again just to compete
The logic for preventing earlier ships taking the benefits of older technology has always been theme consistency; but with ships now from multiple different races, timelines and television series playing together this has long since failed to have any meaning. Now you're adding the concept that everyone will be behind the curve if they don't buy specific T6 ships... you can argue that they won't be locked out of content, but whilst running at the same time multiple Events which give better, desirable rewards for coming 1st? And what's worse, adding a "Level Up" mechanic to T6 ships, that you can buy for T5 (with lower powers)... but apparently our crews forget how to learn how to "Get The Best" or learn anything from every other ship in their fleets... how does that make any sense at all?
And what Cryptic don't seem to understand about their own game is that your ships are actually your player on the space map; not just a set of powers. I understand power-creep and that in a MMO you start again with equipment when a new expansion hits, but asking people to get rid of their ships in any other MMO would be they equivalent of demanding they redesign their physical appearance, recolour their hair, eyes etc to play the new content. It may be bearable when there's variants of the classics at the end game, and you can still play your older ships, at their correct tier and even beyond with skill and care... I've taken a TOS Enterprise into STFs before and beat it (Put the debate about doing that in PuGs aside for now) but this expansion now outright says "any character pre-Tier 5 is being deliberately locked out of the new mechanics".
It's not like where your previous baby City of Heroes went with it's own 50+ game; yes the content was locked out until you could get new powers or pay for certain account types... but it didn't make us pay to redesign the physical look of our superheroes at the same time either. You just unlocked the powers by purchase or levelling up, slotted the new upgrades (which scaled back down when your premium account lapsed) and carried on. That's what makes STO so confusing; you had such a better system in CoH, and one that would fit into the STO universe so much more convincingly... why wouldn't a Starship, which after all is just a shell of metal, be able to fit the latest, more powerful, often so much smaller new technology on board and keep up with everyone else?
It would make much more sense to fund the expansion by allowing people to pay an even smaller cost to bring ALL SHIPS into the new system and let them level up too. Frankly I don't see why you couldn't use the already included Hard Capping of Boff Seats/Weapon Slots/HPs etc to keep the tiers distinct... that TOS Enterprise levelled to max is never going to be as good as my T5 Odyssey, but it also won't be driven so far off the power creep curve when levelled either that it's effectively locked out...
Or rather, I can see why Cryptic are doing it, because I suspect the current design is to encourage people to upgrade T5 out of love but also catch the "I want the exclusives" crowd on top of that. But that will fail because it's such an obviously unlovable grab for as much of the cash that's possibly on the table that any sense of fun and fairness is gone; remember that if you've a C Store ship at T5 it's because you love it enough to have spent extra money on it. If you're still using an NPC bought ship, it's because you prefer it to anything in the store. So either way, you lose with the new switch over because neither of those will ever be as good as what limited choice of new hulls/looks will be in the T6 class.
As someone who likes to play with certain ships and themes only, you're completely alienating myself from the game. Why would I go back and bring new friends through the content when the classic ships can't be "learnt", and every story we tell before the cap is instantly abandoned to progress beyond it? Why would I upgrade to ships I have no love for at all, at a much higher cost, when I'm struggling to stay engaged with the content I still have to do?
Sorry Cryptic, this is where you probably lose me completely then. I never got into Fleet Ships because the grind was just too much, and it seemed like forced socialising which you then needed to pay real cash for. The redesign of the reputation grinds just threw me out because having to relearn them and grind them was alienating. I'd log in every now and then and do a bit of doffing because that was simple and useful, as a tide me over until interest or friends I genuinely liked came back, in the hopes the game would catch the magic of the 1-50 ride back. If these designs go ahead though... I really don't feel like anything past 50 is worth my time any more.
Can say the same to someone using a lobi or lock box ship yet they still get a freebie, whats your point?
Because at an average of 120 keys for a Lobi ship and 400ish for a Lockbox ship, the upgrade has been paid for through a number of seasons.
That's the gamble you take when you go into the whole lock box thing, That's like playing a slot machine over and over, hopping to hit the jackpot and just when your money runs out you hit it then say you want the jackpot plus a few free spins.
So, you pay, and pay more, still got half of it.
Yes, I WILL pay for the upgrade, even for lockbox ships, I'm willing to grind, but FULL or nothing, cheap knock off is nothing more than an insult.
why its that way in every other MMO. Maybe you should play online games any more. Of course no one is forcing you to buy anything.
so what are the T6 ships actually good for?
unless your planning cryptic to revamp PVE ques to cater to you bank wallet masters of PWE..
first and only insult i will give cryptic is this.....
SWORDSMAN!
for the love of the almighty dont follow that path!
Lobi ships aren't a gamble, they cost 800 Lobi, which requires an average of 120 lockboxes opened. The Lockbox ships may be a gamble, but that gamble is paying for Expansion #2. Look at the exchange. They key market is just about the most active section. Old lockboxes continue to provide income so of course Cryptic will perpetuate their continued relevance by offering free upgrades.
I received all my Lobi ships, Lockbox ships, and special promotion as gifts. Some took one lockbox to open, others took 200, fair enough. But you can't use this logic to dictate: "Hey, they obviously payed more money for those ships! Freebie for all of ships too." I've bought multiple fleet ships of the same type on multiple toons, in total I've spent at least $60 upgrading my ships to fleet versions. Real money has gone into getting the C-Store ships, as well as the the Fleet versions of them, which are on par with Lockbox, lobi and special promotion ships stat wise, anyway and they are getting ignored because PWE (Cryptic, whoever really) wants to promote their almighty Lockbox, another scam to say the least (all those ships could be available from the C-Store, even if $10 expensive or something, if they really wanted to get consistent sales out those "special" ships).
A LOT of people with lockbox ships paid 0 zen or real money for them. They simply used energy credits and the exchange.
That's great that you got them as gifts. I'd wager that most people do not have such luck. Lobi ships still cost 800 lobi, which requires opening 120 lockboxes, approximate value $200. I'm not defending lockboxes as a practice; I do not work for Cryptic. I'm just explaining why the decision was made - they are evidently getting very consistent sales out of the 'special' ships, via master keys. If it wasn't working they wouldn't be doing it.
I don't care if other MMOs do it. Its a terrible concept.