New Game Content - Bat'leth Competition Mini-Zone?

caltair

Lately I've been thinking a lot about the Adventure Zones and wanting smaller scale areas that would allow players to interact with the background and culture of their respective faction. I recently rewatched the DS9 episode "Apocolypse Rising" where Sisko and some of the crew impersonate Klingons in the commencement ceremony for the Order of the Bat'leth trying find and kill a Founder.

I think I'd like to see an actual mini-zone of a bat'leth competition. We Klingons already get a piece of this in missions. Where Martok's son is killed and the player has to take his place in the competition and also just after the tutorial where the player has to prove his worthiness to command his ship. But those are very small storyline missions that we don't have a reason to go back to. What I'm talking about is a real mini-sized adventure zone where players can fight more competant NPC's for titles, accolades, trophies and honor. We can fight individually or as teams like in the Adventure Zones.

One thing I would say we would need though is to replace the third attack option for the bat'leth with a block move to defend against incoming attacks. That way the games would actually have some depth besides handing the trophy to whomever has the highest hit points. Or if people want to keep the third attack, have at least defending move added to the melee weapon fights.

What is more Klingon than a Bat'leth Tournament?

wilbor2

Close combat only zone has been asked for a few times it would be fun with my light bat'leth

zeuxidemus001

Although it would be great to have this history shows if it doesn't fall in line with the federation design it won't ever be put in. A lot of this stems from lack of development of ships and no development into the Klingon lore as far as klingon melee/ritualistic type weapons that there is tons of Klingon content in the franchise its just that they refuse to do it unless the whole majority of the game wants it.

davidwford

I would love to see a daily mission that revolves around melee only combat. The mission giver could even be the Pendari Champion(now retired and serving as a "gladiator" trainer). It would be even more awesome if they could get Dwane "The Rock" Johnson to do the voice-over.

vetteguy904

I don't see a way to monetize it, but I would love to see a leaderboard, and every couple months the top 16 get to go through a sweet 16 and get the accolade Forcas III bat'leth champion. once you have completed it, you are no longer eligible to be invited.

shpoks

Ah, the possibility of player bat'leth tournaments on Forcas III has been an ongoing plea to the developers by the KDF playerbase. The place is already there, the map exists and it is pretty genuine and Klingon, all that needs to be done is implement some annual (regardless if it's monthly, quarterly/seasonal, etc.) batleth tournament. Make it reward something symoblic and let players embrace their inner Klingon.

Anyway, I support the idea as always.

vetteguy904 wrote: »

I don't see a way to monetize it, but I would love to see a leaderboard, and every couple months the top 16 get to go through a sweet 16 and get the accolade Forcas III bat'leth champion. once you have completed it, you are no longer eligible to be invited.

One troubling thing about monetization is the possibility of the developer to observe things in a short-sighted manner. For example, if we go by the thesis that everything that gets put in the game must be monetized we might as well give up on STO. Because a developer will never manage to monetize a lot of things that are essential for a good game, especially not without picking up massive rage - so that would mean that those things will never make it in game.
On the other hand, they can be sensible about it and notice that if they broaden the player experience with more to do, the people will be more inclined to spend money on the other things that are monetized in the game simply because they're enjoying themselves more.
For ex., while you're correct that monetizing a bat'leth tournament like this can't be done directly, there are many things they can do to do it indirectly, like:

- Selling C-Store packs of melee weapons of various stats. (similar to the bat'leth/lirpa pack we have now)
- Making an aditional melee only weapon slot (this is inspired by the Gorkon novels) where only smaller melee weapons can be slotted like mek'leths, d'k tahgs and such.
- Selling C-Store packs with these aditional (minor) melee weapons.

I support your idea about a leaderboard, I think that would be a good thing to have. I wouldn't restrict the reigning champion from entering another tournament, he/she has the right to defend their title after all.

What I'm thinking is a mixed tournament on Forcas III, a pure traditional bat'leth stage and a mixed melee stage (where people will be able to also use swords, ushaans, kar'takins, mek'leths, etc.) Make a torunament like this happen annualy for every season, so 4 times per year. Provide some incentives for the people participating, maybe like 30k dilithium for 1-st, 20k for 2-nd and 10k for 3-rd place together with an accolade and maybe a costume unlock for the winner (not necessarilly a costume, it could just be a special badge/emblem) and a special temporary title that the champion gets to use while he/she is reigning champion only.

This would be so good for the variety of the game and so fun!