They are a gaming company. They should know their demographic at least.
Oh gee, a dil reward for this.
Guess what, gamers are going to find a way to hit "this" as much as they can.
You don't need a freaking crystal ball to know how gamers play. The fact that they didn't see this is, in fact, a fail on their part, not the community for doing what they do. This is basic gaming. The entire game is built around grinding, this community KNOWS how to grind, and knows how to find the best way to grind effectively.
If they had a working testing system in place, they would have caught it.
Sorry, this is on them.
^^^
Yep, Cryptic DATAMINE's everything the players do. If Gekko and his team of STO Devs had no idea that what occurred was a good possibility BEFORE they released DR Live -- it's because Gekko's more concerned with meeting and partying, and getting Star Trek actors to officiate at his wedding vow renewal renewal ceremony at the Star Trek Vegas Conventions then developing/expanding STO.
he didn't need to be omniscient; he just needed to know how to read an STO datamined spreadsheet on a game he's supposedly been working on for the past 5 years of his career.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
Yeah it had nothing to do with the bug that was causing the NPC's to spawn at lower weaker levels which made farming them easy.
Sorry dude, but that's a strawman argument. This was a perfectly acceptable mechanic 2 weeks ago. All that happened is that cryptic screwed up and their players (experts in grinding) found the best way to grind.
For the moment, I am standing by my assertion that this is all about timegating the playerbase.
Umm, the patch note CONFIRM the reason for the Tau Dewa take down... They explicitly mention the removal of dil rewards for post 110 which would only be as a result of running Dewa patrols in it's previous state owing to a bg with the patrols Cryptic have fixed.. Or rather they deemed what a small number of players were doing an exploit.
As for your bit about the skills.. yes, deffo a similar bug, possibly caused by changing things after realizing the problem...
No they don't. They say that Dilithium for skill points after 60 have been removed.
Sorry dude, but that's a strawman argument. This was a perfectly acceptable mechanic 2 weeks ago. All that happened is that cryptic screwed up and their players (experts in grinding) found the best way to grind.
For the moment, I am standing by my assertion that this is all about timegating the playerbase.
Cheers!
Incorrect usage of term. Five points from Hufflepuff.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
I'd say that it was mostly about the dilithium. Anytime there is an exploit that features dilithium, they have to do something to correct it.
Remember guys that Dilithium is supposed to be rewarded for your efforts based on how much time you spent doing them.
They attached a high sum of dilithium at the end of the specialization level process probably because they initially didn't figure people would be purposely level up just to get the dilithium. Oh how wrong they were.
Now because of the few that did this, cryptic has to take away a reward that was supposed to be a reward for the effort of going through and maxing out the specialization system, something that they designed to take a while. Cryptic had good intentions, but they forget to remember that exploiters will find anyway to get ahead.
I can't see what difference there is with any of they changes they making you can still choose to match levels in your group so they are still going to spawn at level 50 if the lowest member in your group is level 50 which is what people were doing before.
Becaues the level 50s were still giving out level 60 exp to the level 60 players essentially
Has it been mentioned that Tau Dewa, and pretty much all the 51+ ship combat for that matter, is just ridiculously boring? Jacking up the HP on a patrol so it takes 10 minutes to chip away at the first couple of waves is just tedious.
Fine, they want to match the level to avoid farming, but giving the smallest ships in a faction 350K HP isn't exactly the best way to go about it.
I've said it before in other threads about this, but the dil issue is a red herring.
There are plenty of other ways to get far more dil than what people were getting from max specialisation grinding.
I think the larger issue is that a very small group of players figured out a variation on this that is faster than what you were aware of or may have done. This strategy included them buying XP boosters (which is why XP boosters temporarily had to be nerfed) and likely involved a way to bypass the standard dilithium cap.
The fallacy in most of the player outrage is in assuming that nobody was doing anything worse than you were doing or that those people were interested in playing the game/leveling or the reasons why you did what you did.
I can see right now how those other players likely bypassed the dilithium refinement cap and likely earned dilithium at a rate far greater than you think they did.
In fact, I can think of a few potential loopholes still out there.
While I'm sure what you may have done fell outside Cryptic's design goals and was perceived as a threat to their monetization model, you likely did not see the extent of this.
I did not set foot in Tau Dewa. I have not communicated with the more serious exploiters. But I can see ways to take this further and if these people were buying XP boosts on the C-Store to fuel progress (which they clearly were due to the temporary nerf) and this was cost effective for them to do on many alts, you should at least be able to appreciate that they had a means of taking this much, much further than you did.
I think the larger issue is that a very small group of players figured out a variation on this that is faster than what you were aware of or may have done. This strategy included them buying XP boosters (which is why XP boosters temporarily had to be nerfed) and likely involved a way to bypass the standard dilithium cap.
And let's, for argument's sake, assume they did indeed use XP booster packs, then, in what universe is that an exploit!? Those packs are BOUGHT for the *exact* purpose of boosting your XP!
Seriously, I'm getting sick of Cryptic branding everything an exploit, up and including using Zen items that are blatantly sold for the precise reason ppl use them for! This is getting insane.
And let's, for argument's sake, assume they did indeed use XP booster packs, then, in what universe is that an exploit!? Those packs are BOUGHT for the *exact* purpose of boosting your XP!
Seriously, I'm getting sick of Cryptic branding everything an exploit, up and including using Zen items that are blatantly sold for the precise reason ppl use them for! This is getting insane.
I'm pretty sure he's implying that they were using the XP packs for something other than the intended purpose, that they allowed them to bypass the dil refining cap somehow. I have no idea how or if that's possible - it certainly does seem from their one public statement and pointed silence since that the rolled back levels people are complaining about was an intentional response to the power-levelling as opposed to any more sinister exploit though, albeit a pretty huge overreaction if so.
I'm pretty sure he's implying that they were using the XP packs for something other than the intended purpose, that they allowed them to bypass the dil refining cap somehow. I have no idea how or if that's possible - it certainly does seem from their one public statement and pointed silence since that the rolled back levels people are complaining about was an intentional response to the power-levelling as opposed to any more sinister exploit though, albeit a pretty huge overreaction if so.
Bypassing the daily refining limit with an XP booster pack, sounds like a neat trick. But that sounds close to impossible. Yet I understand where's coming from: denial. No, seriously, he probably can't fathom why using an XP booster pack, all by itself, pack could possibly be deemed exploitive. Nor can I, for that matter.
Bypassing the daily refining limit with an XP booster pack, sounds like a neat trick. But that sounds close to impossible. Yet I understand where's coming from: denial. No, seriously, he probably can't fathom why using an XP booster pack, all by itself, pack could possibly be deemed exploitive. Nor can I, for that matter.
to me sounds like a tin foil hat theory xp booster to bypass refinement daily cap...........
Well for starters devs are good at hitting things with the nerf bat in any game ... now then since I can't make post cause their bad at coming up with things why is it the GM's are bad at this game and can't do simple things
Well for starters devs are good at hitting things with the nerf bat in any game ... now then since I can't make post cause their bad at coming up with things why is it the GM's are bad at this game and can't do simple things
Because there are no in-game GMs, for one. Still boggles me.
I think the larger issue is that a very small group of players figured out a variation on this that is faster than what you were aware of or may have done. This strategy included them buying XP boosters (which is why XP boosters temporarily had to be nerfed) and likely involved a way to bypass the standard dilithium cap.
Ok,
That is a plausible scenario. But please explain why so many (and there has been a shed load of people) have had Spec points taken off them if this was all about a "very small group" exploiting dil?
The perceived solution they have rolled out does not match your hypothesis.
Bypassing the daily refining limit with an XP booster pack, sounds like a neat trick. But that sounds close to impossible. Yet I understand where's coming from: denial. No, seriously, he probably can't fathom why using an XP booster pack, all by itself, pack could possibly be deemed exploitive. Nor can I, for that matter.
Without any hard specifics...
I'm NOT saying the XP pack is what allowed the limit bypass although I think I can identify how a limit bypass would come into play.
I am saying that I think an organized operation kicked in, employing a combination of unintended game mechanics to multiplicative effect, likely with the intent of amassing personal economic power or on behalf of a resale operation.
I want to point out: Those XP bonuses max out at 1k XP and sell for 200 ZEN.
At 60, it is around 50k XP per level.
A single level's worth of use would cost $10 ordinarily for an extra 5k XP.
Unless... Unless you have a single source of XP that grands more than 5000 skillpoints at once, in which case you would get additional benefit from the XP booster, I believe.
200 ZEN is 31,200 dilithium or so.
Basically, after running the math here, for the skillpoint boosters to be useful in a cost effective way, one of four things would need to be the case:
1) You are earning 10 levels worth of skillpoints from a single kill or turn-in and this turn-in is boosted. That would generate the dilithium necessary to convert and break even on the boosters.
2) You have an insane amount of energy credits which you are attempting to convert into another form like dilithium and are buying XP boosters on the exchange. Implication: botting. Because this should be inefficient use of a conscious player's time.
3) You are reselling the product of the dilithium in some way for real money, at a rate that exceeds dilithium exchange rate. (Ie. a botting or sweatshop operation that involved lockbox opening and Lobi transfer.)
4) The system is being used to launder money/points from compromised credit cards and/or accounts.
None of these would be good things. But you have to consider why the skillpoint booster was temporarily nerfed in there.
I'm NOT saying the XP pack is what allowed the limit bypass although I think I can identify how a limit bypass would come into play.
I am saying that I think an organized operation kicked in, employing a combination of unintended game mechanics to multiplicative effect, likely with the intent of amassing personal economic power or on behalf of a resale operation.
I want to point out: Those XP bonuses max out at 1k XP and sell for 200 ZEN.
At 60, it is around 50k XP per level.
A single level's worth of use would cost $10 ordinarily for an extra 5k XP.
Unless... Unless you have a single source of XP that grands more than 5000 skillpoints at once, in which case you would get additional benefit from the XP booster, I believe.
200 ZEN is 31,200 dilithium or so.
Basically, after running the math here, for the skillpoint boosters to be useful in a cost effective way, one of four things would need to be the case:
1) You are earning 10 levels worth of skillpoints from a single kill or turn-in and this turn-in is boosted. That would generate the dilithium necessary to convert and break even on the boosters.
2) You have an insane amount of energy credits which you are attempting to convert into another form like dilithium and are buying XP boosters on the exchange. Implication: botting. Because this should be inefficient use of a conscious player's time.
3) You are reselling the product of the dilithium in some way for real money, at a rate that exceeds dilithium exchange rate. (Ie. a botting or sweatshop operation that involved lockbox opening and Lobi transfer.)
4) The system is being used to launder money/points from compromised credit cards and/or accounts.
None of these would be good things. But you have to consider why the skillpoint booster was temporarily nerfed in there.
That is a plausible scenario. But please explain why so many (and there has been a shed load of people) have had Spec points taken off them if this was all about a "very small group" exploiting dil?
The perceived solution they have rolled out does not match your hypothesis.
Cheers!
If they said the problem was tau dewa (they did) and people who never went to tau dewa got hit, then just maybe the problem is a bug in whatever tool they used to determine guilt.
We are talking about the same cryptic here right? Like the "oops the potato man wasn't supposed to be customizable that's a bug" people?
If they said the problem was tau dewa (they did) and people who never went to tau dewa got hit, then just maybe the problem is a bug in whatever tool they used to determine guilt.
We are talking about the same cryptic here right? Like the "oops the potato man wasn't supposed to be customizable that's a bug" people?
That's my take on it. Too random to be intentional. Couple thoughts are:
A) A mistake made to skill points scaling/accrual for launch; correction messes with folks randomly.
A mistake made when 'fixing' Tau Dewa affects the entire game, messing with folks randomly.
Either way, it would indicate that there are some other issues at play/lurking in the coding.
We have Talaxian BOFFs that aren't able to use their racial Salvage Trait and the Devs don't give a Targ's TRIBBLE let alone make any effort to fix it, but if there is FUN detected in a particular sector? The Devs will go into Red Alert and Transwarp their asses to shut down that fun like it was an Omega Particle asap!
Tells you where the Dev's priorities really are, don't it?
That's my take on it. Too random to be intentional. Couple thoughts are:
A) A mistake made to skill points scaling/accrual for launch; correction messes with folks randomly.
A mistake made when 'fixing' Tau Dewa affects the entire game, messing with folks randomly.
Either way, it would indicate that there are some other issues at play/lurking in the coding.
Let's hop into the Wayback Machine for a quick look at the kind of coding Cryptic's programmers have done in the past (and probably why those same programmers are no longer with the company).
A couple of years ago, STO's sister game Champions Online added a neat new event. They introduced the lore character Nighthawk into the game, and at the same time gave everyone a chance to try out the new vehicles they were introducing (you got to use a spare Nighthawk Jet during the climactic battle).
Somehow, adding in these missions managed to disable the chat server. For about two weeks, nobody could directly communicate in-game. People took to using the /killme command to spell out words with their dead bodies in screenshots just to pass messages.
Point is, this is spaghetti code. When one thing is changed, there appears to be no reliable way to tell for sure what else is getting changed. So when they went to punish the guilty in the Tau Dewa incident? A whole lot of people got caught up in it by accident, it would appear.
I would expect that the current staff is working on a resolution to this issue - but are trying very hard to find one that doesn't just make things worse. To quote one of Dr. Bowman's handlers in the webcomic Freefall, "The urge to do something during an emergency is very strong. It takes discipline and training to do nothing."
and then ppl scream because it wasn't fixed back on tribble when it was first reported. at the time they probl thought fixing it would lead to more problems down the line and left it alone. I guess its their "fault" for not expecting the players to abuse it in huge numbers :rolleyes:
Let's hop into the Wayback Machine for a quick look at the kind of coding Cryptic's programmers have done in the past (and probably why those same programmers are no longer with the company).
A couple of years ago, STO's sister game Champions Online added a neat new event. They introduced the lore character Nighthawk into the game, and at the same time gave everyone a chance to try out the new vehicles they were introducing (you got to use a spare Nighthawk Jet during the climactic battle).
Somehow, adding in these missions managed to disable the chat server. For about two weeks, nobody could directly communicate in-game. People took to using the /killme command to spell out words with their dead bodies in screenshots just to pass messages.
Point is, this is spaghetti code. When one thing is changed, there appears to be no reliable way to tell for sure what else is getting changed. So when they went to punish the guilty in the Tau Dewa incident? A whole lot of people got caught up in it by accident, it would appear.
I would expect that the current staff is working on a resolution to this issue - but are trying very hard to find one that doesn't just make things worse. To quote one of Dr. Bowman's handlers in the webcomic Freefall, "The urge to do something during an emergency is very strong. It takes discipline and training to do nothing."
I also liked the " permanently revert max level characters to level 1" bug from the first mega d anniversary event. As far as I know they never could fix that, people had to relevel without access to any missions.
We have Talaxian BOFFs that aren't able to use their racial Salvage Trait and the Devs don't give a Targ's TRIBBLE let alone make any effort to fix it, but if there is FUN detected in a particular sector? The Devs will go into Red Alert and Transwarp their asses to shut down that fun like it was an Omega Particle asap!
Tells you where the Dev's priorities really are, don't it?
you act like the devs care about players they say they do but they really don't rofl
Comments
Yep, Cryptic DATAMINE's everything the players do. If Gekko and his team of STO Devs had no idea that what occurred was a good possibility BEFORE they released DR Live -- it's because Gekko's more concerned with meeting and partying, and getting Star Trek actors to officiate at his wedding vow renewal renewal ceremony at the Star Trek Vegas Conventions then developing/expanding STO.
he didn't need to be omniscient; he just needed to know how to read an STO datamined spreadsheet on a game he's supposedly been working on for the past 5 years of his career.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
last i looked how it worked for 3 years :rolleyes:
system Lord Baal is dead
For the moment, I am standing by my assertion that this is all about timegating the playerbase.
Cheers!
No they don't. They say that Dilithium for skill points after 60 have been removed.
They do not state this was the reason for it tho.
That is correct, the release notes do not say the reason.
But the Official Tau Dewa thread in the Galactic News Network says it's closed due to an exploit.
That exploit was farming Dilithium and/or not grinding in the appropriate sector. Take your pick.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1268701
Incorrect usage of term. Five points from Hufflepuff.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
I'd say that it was mostly about the dilithium. Anytime there is an exploit that features dilithium, they have to do something to correct it.
Remember guys that Dilithium is supposed to be rewarded for your efforts based on how much time you spent doing them.
They attached a high sum of dilithium at the end of the specialization level process probably because they initially didn't figure people would be purposely level up just to get the dilithium. Oh how wrong they were.
Now because of the few that did this, cryptic has to take away a reward that was supposed to be a reward for the effort of going through and maxing out the specialization system, something that they designed to take a while. Cryptic had good intentions, but they forget to remember that exploiters will find anyway to get ahead.
Becaues the level 50s were still giving out level 60 exp to the level 60 players essentially
system Lord Baal is dead
Fine, they want to match the level to avoid farming, but giving the smallest ships in a faction 350K HP isn't exactly the best way to go about it.
I think the larger issue is that a very small group of players figured out a variation on this that is faster than what you were aware of or may have done. This strategy included them buying XP boosters (which is why XP boosters temporarily had to be nerfed) and likely involved a way to bypass the standard dilithium cap.
The fallacy in most of the player outrage is in assuming that nobody was doing anything worse than you were doing or that those people were interested in playing the game/leveling or the reasons why you did what you did.
I can see right now how those other players likely bypassed the dilithium refinement cap and likely earned dilithium at a rate far greater than you think they did.
In fact, I can think of a few potential loopholes still out there.
While I'm sure what you may have done fell outside Cryptic's design goals and was perceived as a threat to their monetization model, you likely did not see the extent of this.
I did not set foot in Tau Dewa. I have not communicated with the more serious exploiters. But I can see ways to take this further and if these people were buying XP boosts on the C-Store to fuel progress (which they clearly were due to the temporary nerf) and this was cost effective for them to do on many alts, you should at least be able to appreciate that they had a means of taking this much, much further than you did.
And let's, for argument's sake, assume they did indeed use XP booster packs, then, in what universe is that an exploit!? Those packs are BOUGHT for the *exact* purpose of boosting your XP!
Seriously, I'm getting sick of Cryptic branding everything an exploit, up and including using Zen items that are blatantly sold for the precise reason ppl use them for! This is getting insane.
Bypassing the daily refining limit with an XP booster pack, sounds like a neat trick.
to me sounds like a tin foil hat theory xp booster to bypass refinement daily cap...........
system Lord Baal is dead
Because there are no in-game GMs, for one. Still boggles me.
That is a plausible scenario. But please explain why so many (and there has been a shed load of people) have had Spec points taken off them if this was all about a "very small group" exploiting dil?
The perceived solution they have rolled out does not match your hypothesis.
Cheers!
oh I know as much .. devs and gm won't take responsibility for their TRIBBLE ups just blame the players
Without any hard specifics...
I'm NOT saying the XP pack is what allowed the limit bypass although I think I can identify how a limit bypass would come into play.
I am saying that I think an organized operation kicked in, employing a combination of unintended game mechanics to multiplicative effect, likely with the intent of amassing personal economic power or on behalf of a resale operation.
I want to point out: Those XP bonuses max out at 1k XP and sell for 200 ZEN.
At 60, it is around 50k XP per level.
A single level's worth of use would cost $10 ordinarily for an extra 5k XP.
Unless... Unless you have a single source of XP that grands more than 5000 skillpoints at once, in which case you would get additional benefit from the XP booster, I believe.
200 ZEN is 31,200 dilithium or so.
Basically, after running the math here, for the skillpoint boosters to be useful in a cost effective way, one of four things would need to be the case:
1) You are earning 10 levels worth of skillpoints from a single kill or turn-in and this turn-in is boosted. That would generate the dilithium necessary to convert and break even on the boosters.
2) You have an insane amount of energy credits which you are attempting to convert into another form like dilithium and are buying XP boosters on the exchange. Implication: botting. Because this should be inefficient use of a conscious player's time.
3) You are reselling the product of the dilithium in some way for real money, at a rate that exceeds dilithium exchange rate. (Ie. a botting or sweatshop operation that involved lockbox opening and Lobi transfer.)
4) The system is being used to launder money/points from compromised credit cards and/or accounts.
None of these would be good things. But you have to consider why the skillpoint booster was temporarily nerfed in there.
This is a really good observation
If they said the problem was tau dewa (they did) and people who never went to tau dewa got hit, then just maybe the problem is a bug in whatever tool they used to determine guilt.
We are talking about the same cryptic here right? Like the "oops the potato man wasn't supposed to be customizable that's a bug" people?
That's my take on it. Too random to be intentional. Couple thoughts are:
A) A mistake made to skill points scaling/accrual for launch; correction messes with folks randomly.
Either way, it would indicate that there are some other issues at play/lurking in the coding.
Sarah Knightly - Co-leader; Frontier Explorers - U.S.S. Witchblade
Rias Gremory - Leader; Frontier Marauders - I.K.S. B'ullwinkle
Tells you where the Dev's priorities really are, don't it?
A couple of years ago, STO's sister game Champions Online added a neat new event. They introduced the lore character Nighthawk into the game, and at the same time gave everyone a chance to try out the new vehicles they were introducing (you got to use a spare Nighthawk Jet during the climactic battle).
Somehow, adding in these missions managed to disable the chat server. For about two weeks, nobody could directly communicate in-game. People took to using the /killme command to spell out words with their dead bodies in screenshots just to pass messages.
Point is, this is spaghetti code. When one thing is changed, there appears to be no reliable way to tell for sure what else is getting changed. So when they went to punish the guilty in the Tau Dewa incident? A whole lot of people got caught up in it by accident, it would appear.
I would expect that the current staff is working on a resolution to this issue - but are trying very hard to find one that doesn't just make things worse. To quote one of Dr. Bowman's handlers in the webcomic Freefall, "The urge to do something during an emergency is very strong. It takes discipline and training to do nothing."
I also liked the " permanently revert max level characters to level 1" bug from the first mega d anniversary event. As far as I know they never could fix that, people had to relevel without access to any missions.
you act like the devs care about players they say they do but they really don't rofl