I know this is part and parcel of the case. This isn't what I'm necessarily arguing...
Think of this as a new player. You know, the ones Cryptic is desperately trying to attract - whether it's for fresh blood and/or fleecing...
As soon as he mints L50, he'll have to invest dil into:
1. Reputation Gear
2. Fleet advancement - unless he's lucky enough to land in a T5 fleet doing nothing but the half-rate mark to credit missions.
3. Ships.
4. Fleet Module - unless he's vendortrashed enough stuff to get one off the exchange
5. T5U module
6. Fleet gear
7. Crafted Gear of Mk XII quality.
8. Upgrading all this gear via the new gear update system.
And, he doesn't have the resources to farm away at the "dil mines" of Pi Canis, Contraband Kitty, etc. etc. just to feed his main, so he'll be seriously constrained by the 8k day limit (8.5k if he's lucky and in a big fleet)
Is this what we really want? Do we want new players, or returning players who may be behind the curve, to be that far behind?
Most of that is redundant. For a new player reputation is a source of dil, not a cost. Plus if you buy a rep shield you're not buying a fleet one are you? Unlike existing players the new player won't spend anything on mark 12 gear, he'll skip right to mark 13 via mission rewards. He'll probably skip fleet ships for quite a while too. And its a good bet that most new players will only get a single t6 ship, never get a t5 and upgrade. Every new player I know gets fleet creds from marks, ec and doffs, not one donates dil to fleet projects because they rightly see better uses for it.
That shrinks your list of things to spend dil on to
1. Convert to zen for a single t6 ship
2. 1 or 2 sets from rep
3. A few pieces of fleet gear
4. Upgrading drops from mk13 to mk14
Really, its not too bad until they start making alts, getting multiple builds etc. But at that point they're not really new anymore. Unless they're like I was and did that on day one because I'm insane haha. And even so, all of these four are totally optional, none are required as others have pointed out.
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,676Community Moderator
I can't take it anymore! Could everyone just chill out for two seconds before something CRAZY happens again?!
The nut who actually ground out many packs. The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite colored text = mod mode
To a degree. It is more like a partially player driven economy. The Devs do introduce things like Events, and Currency Sinks, and the EC Price Changes of Drops to alter the economic values.
By the way, to comment on your mentioning of Type 1 Phaser being in the Klingon War arc (from the now-closed thread), couldn't you just use the Skip Mission options to get there at a lower level?
Most of that is redundant. For a new player reputation is a source of dil, not a cost. Plus if you buy a rep shield you're not buying a fleet one are you? Unlike existing players the new player won't spend anything on mark 12 gear, he'll skip right to mark 13 via mission rewards. He'll probably skip fleet ships for quite a while too. And its a good bet that most new players will only get a single t6 ship, never get a t5 and upgrade. Every new player I know gets fleet creds from marks, ec and doffs, not one donates dil to fleet projects because they rightly see better uses for it.
That shrinks your list of things to spend dil on to
1. Convert to zen for a single t6 ship
2. 1 or 2 sets from rep
3. A few pieces of fleet gear
4. Upgrading drops from mk13 to mk14
Really, its not too bad until they start making alts, getting multiple builds etc. But at that point they're not really new anymore. Unless they're like I was and did that on day one because I'm insane haha. And even so, all of these four are totally optional, none are required as others have pointed out.
As of the latest feedback on tribble, there exists at this time exactly ONE Mk XIII mission reward.
No drops, no mission rewards, no fleet projects, no rep projects.
As always, what is on Tribble is by no means final, but from all current appearances this upgrade system is the primary (i.e. maybe a few exceptions) way to acquire higher Mk gear.
As of the latest feedback on tribble, there exists at this time exactly ONE Mk XIII mission reward.
No drops, no mission rewards, no fleet projects, no rep projects.
As always, what is on Tribble is by no means final, but from all current appearances this upgrade system is the primary (i.e. maybe a few exceptions) way to acquire higher Mk gear.
I figured everything cost Dil because Cryptic can't think of anything else to do or is unable to do anything else.
I'm so glad that something so rare that the Federation's top starships couldn't carry a SPARE SET to keep from spiraling down into flaming reentry death. Yet now it's used to buy the captain a new pair of sneakers. GJ Cryptic!
I don't believe for a second that it is overburdened considering the dil price of zen right now.
When dil is abundant, zen prices raise. But if dil is in demand, zen prices fall. And zen is pretty expensive right now.
Precisely, the high zen prices mean that it's actually UNDERburderned, (so to speak).
If everyone is spending dil on things like fleet projects, gear, etc, they have less dil to spend on zen. If people have less dil to spend on zen, people selling zen aren't able to charge as much if they want to move what they're selling in a timely manner (or at all).
Thus, currently, with a lack of things to spend dil on, coupled with all the dil-grantign events (Double weekend, CE, etc.), the price of zen has inflated. It's basic supply and demand- the supply of dilithium is high right now, so you can get away with charging more for zen. When the supply of dil is less, you can't charge as much.
With a little luck, it should drop once the expansion is released and people have stuff other than zen to spend their purple rocks on.
Precisely, the high zen prices mean that it's actually UNDERburderned, (so to speak).
If everyone is spending dil on things like fleet projects, gear, etc, they have less dil to spend on zen. If people have less dil to spend on zen, people selling zen aren't able to charge as much if they want to move what they're selling in a timely manner (or at all).
Thus, currently, with a lack of things to spend dil on, coupled with all the dil-grantign events (Double weekend, CE, etc.), the price of zen has inflated. It's basic supply and demand- the supply of dilithium is high right now, so you can get away with charging more for zen. When the supply of dil is less, you can't charge as much.
With a little luck, it should drop once the expansion is released and people have stuff other than zen to spend their purple rocks on.
I suspect near and post launch the rate will hit 200:1. People will ant ships and Intel boffs, and there will be a new lockbox etc. A week or two after theneed for upgraded gear and new fleet projects will push the price back down closer to 150:1. But I don't see it back to 130:1 for a while.
Comments
That shrinks your list of things to spend dil on to
1. Convert to zen for a single t6 ship
2. 1 or 2 sets from rep
3. A few pieces of fleet gear
4. Upgrading drops from mk13 to mk14
Really, its not too bad until they start making alts, getting multiple builds etc. But at that point they're not really new anymore. Unless they're like I was and did that on day one because I'm insane haha. And even so, all of these four are totally optional, none are required as others have pointed out.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
To a degree. It is more like a partially player driven economy. The Devs do introduce things like Events, and Currency Sinks, and the EC Price Changes of Drops to alter the economic values.
By the way, to comment on your mentioning of Type 1 Phaser being in the Klingon War arc (from the now-closed thread), couldn't you just use the Skip Mission options to get there at a lower level?
As of the latest feedback on tribble, there exists at this time exactly ONE Mk XIII mission reward.
No drops, no mission rewards, no fleet projects, no rep projects.
As always, what is on Tribble is by no means final, but from all current appearances this upgrade system is the primary (i.e. maybe a few exceptions) way to acquire higher Mk gear.
There is a Dev post saying Dr missions will give up to mark 13 gear,mission replays of older missions will not.
Edit, here is the post by borticus
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1224861
I'm so glad that something so rare that the Federation's top starships couldn't carry a SPARE SET to keep from spiraling down into flaming reentry death. Yet now it's used to buy the captain a new pair of sneakers. GJ Cryptic!
Precisely, the high zen prices mean that it's actually UNDERburderned, (so to speak).
If everyone is spending dil on things like fleet projects, gear, etc, they have less dil to spend on zen. If people have less dil to spend on zen, people selling zen aren't able to charge as much if they want to move what they're selling in a timely manner (or at all).
Thus, currently, with a lack of things to spend dil on, coupled with all the dil-grantign events (Double weekend, CE, etc.), the price of zen has inflated. It's basic supply and demand- the supply of dilithium is high right now, so you can get away with charging more for zen. When the supply of dil is less, you can't charge as much.
With a little luck, it should drop once the expansion is released and people have stuff other than zen to spend their purple rocks on.
I suspect near and post launch the rate will hit 200:1. People will ant ships and Intel boffs, and there will be a new lockbox etc. A week or two after theneed for upgraded gear and new fleet projects will push the price back down closer to 150:1. But I don't see it back to 130:1 for a while.