What really broke it for me though has been the costs involved with the upgrade system and the stupidly slow spec point gain. I frankly can't bring myself to level my alts because the idea of grinding the equivalent of 60 levels per character to get all the spec points is just, well horrendous.
Eh, I agree. I'm only finding it bearable because I'm a keen DOffer, which means that 30-50 mins gameplay a day gets me 2-3 levels per week on my 4 active alts, plus thousands of Dil (go Marauding!).
However, that's clearly wrong - DOffing is not everyone's cup of tea and is only really profitable for KDF.
I actually have not started playing DR content, because I've had a lot of other goals to complete first. Well, I should say that 2 of my 4 alts have finished "Escalation", but there is no real action in this first mission. I'm still finishing the Dyson missions on my other 2 alts, between the special events Cryptic keeps throwing at us (whatever their motivations may be). In the process, I've managed to level all of my captains to 54, and my T5-U ships are getting their first upgrades completed. The daily missions are gaining XP's while I farm for dil, and I'm finally getting some of the reputation sets mounted.
So, after a year on STO, and now in my second fleet career, I'm nearly ready to start the DR story arc, such as it is. Crafting will have to wait until next year, since that's when my char's will finally reach lvl 15, even after splitting schools between my faction alts. Upgrades will likely wait till then as well, since upgrades are unwieldy and expensive, using more resources for a single upgrade than we were provided in the Zen Crafting Kits. It's sad that paying real $$ still does not yield one complete upgrade... :mad:
Expendables Fleet: Andrew - Bajoran Fed Engineer Ken'taura - Rom/Fed Scientist Gwyllim - Human Fed Delta Tac Savik - Vulcan Fed Temporal Sci Dahar Masters Fleet: Alphal'Fa - Alien KDF Engineer Qun'pau - Rom/KDF Engineer D'nesh - Orion KDF Scientist Ghen'khan - Liberated KDF Tac Welcome to StarBug Online - to boldly Bug where no bug has been before!
STO player since November 2013
And yet here you are, haunting the forums of a game you no longer enjoy. What's the point?
I mean, sure, it's your time to waste, but why waste it? Find something you do like. Enjoy that. Surely the taste of bile isn't that delicious...
Exactly, MY time. I've invested more than enough time,effort and money in STO. I enjoy hanging around the forums, seeing whats going on, i'm just saddened how STO has evolved these days.
You dont like what i'm saying, fine, jog on. I'm sure there are plenty of others who feel like I do and plenty that dont. It wasn't a personal slight on anyone, chill out.
Is it possible that some of the higher-ups in Cryptic are actually getting paid to give the player base a reason to stop playing STO? Is it possible that Cryptic is hoping to get rid of the game? To have an excuse to pull the plug? To actually say, "Ha! No one likes Trek any more... See!"
Hmm...
CM
"Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure science." - Edwin Hubble
Is it possible that some of the higher-ups in Cryptic are actually getting paid to give the player base a reason to stop playing STO? Is it possible that Cryptic is hoping to get rid of the game? To have an excuse to pull the plug? To actually say, "Ha! No one likes Trek any more... See!"
Hmm...
CM
Like a TOS that allows them out of a contract.....oh that puts a different light on things and now so much makes perfect sense.
Space the final frontier. These are the voyages of [your name here] on a five year mission to gain one level after the delta rising xp nerf.
Is it possible that some of the higher-ups in Cryptic are actually getting paid to give the player base a reason to stop playing STO? Is it possible that Cryptic is hoping to get rid of the game? To have an excuse to pull the plug? To actually say, "Ha! No one likes Trek any more... See!"
Hmm...
CM
The following is all my own opinion and suspicion:
I've actually said pretty much just that.
I believe that they're trying to kill this game so they can just be rid of it.
Despite the fact that STO runs on a Cryptic-designed engine, it's NOT designed for what STO needs it to do. I don't think they actually understand the engine - in fact I'd bet the people who created the Champions engine aren't even there any longer.
Every new thing they do to this game adds an unbelievable amount of (often show-stopping) bugs. Some bugs from Beta still exist or are re-introduced.
That tells me a few things. First, it tells me that yeah, they actually don't understand the code. Second, it tells me that they're just writing new code over the old code without going in to find the actual, original problems and then fix them.
The problems continue to compound on each other, getting worse and worse with each patch. At this point, it really would be easier for them to just close the game and be done with it. It would be so much less of a headache.
The easiest way to kill the game would be to get people to stop playing, thus making its profits tank and in turn making PWE kill it as a non-money maker.
So yeah. I'm convinced that's exactly what they're doing - that they want to kill STO so they can stop having to deal with the horrible mess that it's been since day one.
"Let's increase the difficulty levels of our NPCs so players have more of a challenging experience. We'll improve the AI, give the NPCs more skills and increase their damage output"
"Er, Doug, it's almost 5:00"
"OK, fine, let's just increase the hull points instead, it'll only take 30 seconds to do it"
^^^
/thread:eek::D;)
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..."
Before DR I had 12 chars. Over the last 2 or 3 years I had easily enough time to get all reputation systems and commendation ranks done. Each char got nice reputation or fleet gear. I could do elite missions with no trouble without being a high "DPSer" (as I play mostly Science captains). So basically my day/evening was: logging in with each char to do doffing (for contraband, dilithium, cxp,.., was like 30 min for all) and then pick one to do an episode, some STFs, trading or even some ground pvp. It felt like playing a game, not like work.
I played the delta story with two chars and I liked it basically. Basically because after each mission I had to do other things to level up before I could continue and because of endless patrol missions. Episodes are an important part of the game for me and I enjoyed them mostly, but the delta part is only fun if you are lvl 58/59 already and skip the patrols, I assume. And leveling up is painfully slow as we all know. And level 60 is not even the end. More and more xp needed for specialization stuff.
The DOFFer in me was looking forward to see something new here, but except some high xp missions, there is nothing, not even different missions in the two sectors. No new exploration clusters, no new doffs except the ones from the delta box, nothing. Only slowly finishing DOFF missions.
Connected to DOFFing, we have R&D. Oh yes! Finally I can make my own cool stuff and the greedy Ferengi sitting beneath the exchange won't get my EC! Hah!...Oh wait,..we need lvl 15 to make the cool stuff and special DOFFs that cost millions of EC....and very rare material that comes from annoying missions or for lots of EC from exchange....and random modifiers .... . OK, but we can upgrade things we already have. Oh nice, finally my beloved Type 3 phaser rifle can....not be upgraded..... . Well, then my other stuff, let's invest a couple of million dilithium...hm, no MK XII should be ok.
Regarding ships: Yes, thanks, finally 5 sci consoles on many sci ships, ship levels and very nice star ship traits. Oh wait, the very nice star ship traits are FED only. For my KDF sci there is ....nothing. Well I guess I could get the Matha ship trait and put an [over] beam on my ship to make some particle bursts....if that works that is. It will look funny at least. Hm, Ok my FED sci will have fun though, I just need to level up the ships in the next months or so.
With DR I thought "Oh nice, lots of buffs for Science captains". We get the particle manipulator trait from lvl 15 R&D science, +15% more dmg from the ships, traits from boxes (feedback loop), an awesome console from crafting and much tougher ships. Does it actually help? I do not have the feeling. In Khitomer space advanced my role is reduced to holding probes. Before DR I could easily hold the probes and take care of the cubes/generators on one side. With all the extra damage my Tykens and my Gravwell now get, I still feel weak. All these massive amounts of particle generators and the high crit chances still do not do much due to the huge hulls of the opponents. I mean for Khitomer it is OK. I know my role (drain, control, hold), but for elite missions or even mirror advanced I am simply too weak. Fortunately I am a passionate ground player and the missions on ground are still enjoyable.
Speaking of the mirror event. Terrible, just terrible. I do it only on normal, after i marvelously failed an "advanced" pug. So now my day starts with doffing (that is waiting for minutes until missions that ended hours ago can be finished), R&D (the daily missions), fill up delta reputation, retrieve "exchange expired" mails and put things back on exchange and fill some fleet projects. Start mirror, wait a minute after I muted Obisek, close rifts, close rifts, close rifts, drain mirror dreadnought, get random marks, be sad, that there are no delta marks. Switching to char number two. Repeat, repeat, repeat. After a few hours I wonder what I am actually doing. Well, I need tons of dilithium for upgrading, marks and there is a nice unique ground weapon (you know, the collector in me wants it). Ah wait, before I can go to bed, I will need delta marks for delta rep. One or two bug hunts will do it.... :eek:
I now decided to focus on two chars. A FED sci and a KDF sci. The other chars will be send to dOFFing only for contraband and materials. There is no other way. STO is not alt friendly anymore. Too much grinding everywhere. I know, one could say: "you don't have to do it". I used to say that a lot, but now I wonder what to do. I want to do crafting, elite missions and so on, I want some challenge, but in the current state I think I better go back to Defera and run around there. I can even do some crafting that does not include endless grinding...I do not even need DOFFs that cost 100 million EC for that.
I didn't do any pvp for a while now. Not sure how this is at the moment, but I cannot imagine that it is in a good state. just speculating though.
Things I like in DR:
- the hierarchy boff ! I really like him.
- the music in the delta sector. It is so motivating, so forward looking. At least for a moment before you start grinding
- bug hunt. Very nice, even on elite pug-friendly
- delta story content (not the patrols though)
- Upgrading gear, kind of. At least I can upgrade items to MK XIV for a reasonable price and there were some free upgrade techs. Upgrading rarity is too much gambling and way too expensive, though.
- the delta rifle
- ships get a more specific role now. Sci ships get more sciency, cruiser more tanky,...
I discussed things I do not like above. One thing that really disappointed me further, was that I expected to see the Iconians finally. Especially after "Surface tension". Also, where are the Xindi? Part of the conference, 2 ships, a boff and some DOFFs no one can afford.... I expected a bit more like traveling to the delphi expanse, visiting their planet or a little featured episode at least.
Well, enough whining from me. I need to work out how to get more fun out of DR. But I think alt-reducing might be the best start for it, sadly.
Hey, I've seen your posts around, and I've always thought them to be well thought out.
Am I having fun in Delta Rising? Yes*, certainly.
Why the asterisk? Simple - I'm not too worried about leveling up to 60 and burning through all the content. I'm also not too worried about queues yet, but if I don't either get my ship up to par soon, or queues change to reward BNPs and the new Ancient Power Cells at lower levels, I will eventually get antsy.
My main is now level 56, and I'm enjoying the new Kobali Prime battlezone.
The new story missions are pretty decent, but there are only a handful, which is why I'm not burning through them. The adventure zone is pretty decent.
The patrols - well, they are patrols. If you disliked them before, you'll dislike them now. I personally don't think they should have been presented as "story" content, BUT I think easy filler missions like patrols should be released more often as part of the game to give more to do, and more ways to level, so my opinion on them is very divided.
The queue changes - a lot of work. I can't really pug advanced. I can complete it on a team, but it takes a long time. They're still adjusting them though, and with each level, my ship gets more powerful, so not too worried about it in the short term.
I'd say the flaws in DR aren't worth quitting over. The new story missions are decent, and the grind to level 60 isn't THAT bad, if you're willing to take a few weeks to do it. Open missions on Kobali Prime offer about 1K SP each, and if you doff, picking and choosing which doff assignments award more SP will help a lot.
Basically, with the story changes, I'd say it's worth a try. Worse case, you'll experience some of the new story and voice acting, then get angry with the XP wall - what is there to lose?
Comments
Eh, I agree. I'm only finding it bearable because I'm a keen DOffer, which means that 30-50 mins gameplay a day gets me 2-3 levels per week on my 4 active alts, plus thousands of Dil (go Marauding!).
However, that's clearly wrong - DOffing is not everyone's cup of tea and is only really profitable for KDF.
So, after a year on STO, and now in my second fleet career, I'm nearly ready to start the DR story arc, such as it is. Crafting will have to wait until next year, since that's when my char's will finally reach lvl 15, even after splitting schools between my faction alts. Upgrades will likely wait till then as well, since upgrades are unwieldy and expensive, using more resources for a single upgrade than we were provided in the Zen Crafting Kits. It's sad that paying real $$ still does not yield one complete upgrade... :mad:
Savik - Vulcan Fed Temporal Sci
Dahar Masters Fleet: Alphal'Fa - Alien KDF Engineer Qun'pau - Rom/KDF Engineer D'nesh - Orion KDF Scientist Ghen'khan - Liberated KDF Tac
Welcome to StarBug Online - to boldly Bug where no bug has been before!
STO player since November 2013
AND TPS Reports!!!
Exactly, MY time. I've invested more than enough time,effort and money in STO. I enjoy hanging around the forums, seeing whats going on, i'm just saddened how STO has evolved these days.
You dont like what i'm saying, fine, jog on. I'm sure there are plenty of others who feel like I do and plenty that dont. It wasn't a personal slight on anyone, chill out.
Hmm...
CM
Like a TOS that allows them out of a contract.....oh that puts a different light on things and now so much makes perfect sense.
The following is all my own opinion and suspicion:
I've actually said pretty much just that.
I believe that they're trying to kill this game so they can just be rid of it.
Despite the fact that STO runs on a Cryptic-designed engine, it's NOT designed for what STO needs it to do. I don't think they actually understand the engine - in fact I'd bet the people who created the Champions engine aren't even there any longer.
Every new thing they do to this game adds an unbelievable amount of (often show-stopping) bugs. Some bugs from Beta still exist or are re-introduced.
That tells me a few things. First, it tells me that yeah, they actually don't understand the code. Second, it tells me that they're just writing new code over the old code without going in to find the actual, original problems and then fix them.
The problems continue to compound on each other, getting worse and worse with each patch. At this point, it really would be easier for them to just close the game and be done with it. It would be so much less of a headache.
The easiest way to kill the game would be to get people to stop playing, thus making its profits tank and in turn making PWE kill it as a non-money maker.
So yeah. I'm convinced that's exactly what they're doing - that they want to kill STO so they can stop having to deal with the horrible mess that it's been since day one.
^^^
/thread:eek::D;)
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..."
Before DR I had 12 chars. Over the last 2 or 3 years I had easily enough time to get all reputation systems and commendation ranks done. Each char got nice reputation or fleet gear. I could do elite missions with no trouble without being a high "DPSer" (as I play mostly Science captains). So basically my day/evening was: logging in with each char to do doffing (for contraband, dilithium, cxp,.., was like 30 min for all) and then pick one to do an episode, some STFs, trading or even some ground pvp. It felt like playing a game, not like work.
I played the delta story with two chars and I liked it basically. Basically because after each mission I had to do other things to level up before I could continue and because of endless patrol missions. Episodes are an important part of the game for me and I enjoyed them mostly, but the delta part is only fun if you are lvl 58/59 already and skip the patrols, I assume. And leveling up is painfully slow as we all know. And level 60 is not even the end. More and more xp needed for specialization stuff.
The DOFFer in me was looking forward to see something new here, but except some high xp missions, there is nothing, not even different missions in the two sectors. No new exploration clusters, no new doffs except the ones from the delta box, nothing. Only slowly finishing DOFF missions.
Connected to DOFFing, we have R&D. Oh yes! Finally I can make my own cool stuff and the greedy Ferengi sitting beneath the exchange won't get my EC! Hah!...Oh wait,..we need lvl 15 to make the cool stuff and special DOFFs that cost millions of EC....and very rare material that comes from annoying missions or for lots of EC from exchange....and random modifiers .... . OK, but we can upgrade things we already have. Oh nice, finally my beloved Type 3 phaser rifle can....not be upgraded..... . Well, then my other stuff, let's invest a couple of million dilithium...hm, no MK XII should be ok.
Regarding ships: Yes, thanks, finally 5 sci consoles on many sci ships, ship levels and very nice star ship traits. Oh wait, the very nice star ship traits are FED only. For my KDF sci there is ....nothing. Well I guess I could get the Matha ship trait and put an [over] beam on my ship to make some particle bursts....if that works that is. It will look funny at least. Hm, Ok my FED sci will have fun though, I just need to level up the ships in the next months or so.
With DR I thought "Oh nice, lots of buffs for Science captains". We get the particle manipulator trait from lvl 15 R&D science, +15% more dmg from the ships, traits from boxes (feedback loop), an awesome console from crafting and much tougher ships. Does it actually help? I do not have the feeling. In Khitomer space advanced my role is reduced to holding probes. Before DR I could easily hold the probes and take care of the cubes/generators on one side. With all the extra damage my Tykens and my Gravwell now get, I still feel weak. All these massive amounts of particle generators and the high crit chances still do not do much due to the huge hulls of the opponents. I mean for Khitomer it is OK. I know my role (drain, control, hold), but for elite missions or even mirror advanced I am simply too weak. Fortunately I am a passionate ground player and the missions on ground are still enjoyable.
Speaking of the mirror event. Terrible, just terrible. I do it only on normal, after i marvelously failed an "advanced" pug. So now my day starts with doffing (that is waiting for minutes until missions that ended hours ago can be finished), R&D (the daily missions), fill up delta reputation, retrieve "exchange expired" mails and put things back on exchange and fill some fleet projects. Start mirror, wait a minute after I muted Obisek, close rifts, close rifts, close rifts, drain mirror dreadnought, get random marks, be sad, that there are no delta marks. Switching to char number two. Repeat, repeat, repeat. After a few hours I wonder what I am actually doing. Well, I need tons of dilithium for upgrading, marks and there is a nice unique ground weapon (you know, the collector in me wants it). Ah wait, before I can go to bed, I will need delta marks for delta rep. One or two bug hunts will do it.... :eek:
I now decided to focus on two chars. A FED sci and a KDF sci. The other chars will be send to dOFFing only for contraband and materials. There is no other way. STO is not alt friendly anymore. Too much grinding everywhere. I know, one could say: "you don't have to do it". I used to say that a lot, but now I wonder what to do. I want to do crafting, elite missions and so on, I want some challenge, but in the current state I think I better go back to Defera and run around there. I can even do some crafting that does not include endless grinding...I do not even need DOFFs that cost 100 million EC for that.
I didn't do any pvp for a while now. Not sure how this is at the moment, but I cannot imagine that it is in a good state. just speculating though.
Things I like in DR:
- the hierarchy boff ! I really like him.
- the music in the delta sector. It is so motivating, so forward looking. At least for a moment before you start grinding
- bug hunt. Very nice, even on elite pug-friendly
- delta story content (not the patrols though)
- Upgrading gear, kind of. At least I can upgrade items to MK XIV for a reasonable price and there were some free upgrade techs. Upgrading rarity is too much gambling and way too expensive, though.
- the delta rifle
- ships get a more specific role now. Sci ships get more sciency, cruiser more tanky,...
I discussed things I do not like above. One thing that really disappointed me further, was that I expected to see the Iconians finally. Especially after "Surface tension". Also, where are the Xindi? Part of the conference, 2 ships, a boff and some DOFFs no one can afford.... I expected a bit more like traveling to the delphi expanse, visiting their planet or a little featured episode at least.
Well, enough whining from me. I need to work out how to get more fun out of DR. But I think alt-reducing might be the best start for it, sadly.
Am I having fun in Delta Rising? Yes*, certainly.
Why the asterisk? Simple - I'm not too worried about leveling up to 60 and burning through all the content. I'm also not too worried about queues yet, but if I don't either get my ship up to par soon, or queues change to reward BNPs and the new Ancient Power Cells at lower levels, I will eventually get antsy.
My main is now level 56, and I'm enjoying the new Kobali Prime battlezone.
The new story missions are pretty decent, but there are only a handful, which is why I'm not burning through them. The adventure zone is pretty decent.
The patrols - well, they are patrols. If you disliked them before, you'll dislike them now. I personally don't think they should have been presented as "story" content, BUT I think easy filler missions like patrols should be released more often as part of the game to give more to do, and more ways to level, so my opinion on them is very divided.
The queue changes - a lot of work. I can't really pug advanced. I can complete it on a team, but it takes a long time. They're still adjusting them though, and with each level, my ship gets more powerful, so not too worried about it in the short term.
I'd say the flaws in DR aren't worth quitting over. The new story missions are decent, and the grind to level 60 isn't THAT bad, if you're willing to take a few weeks to do it. Open missions on Kobali Prime offer about 1K SP each, and if you doff, picking and choosing which doff assignments award more SP will help a lot.
Basically, with the story changes, I'd say it's worth a try. Worse case, you'll experience some of the new story and voice acting, then get angry with the XP wall - what is there to lose?