It's empty because there are less players in the game. That's Cryptic's fault.
I would rather say it's because we have monday and in most time zones right now are working hours, so people are in schools or jobs, or late night so they sleep before work.
I would rather say it's because we have monday and in most time zones right now are working hours, so people are in schools or jobs, or late night so they sleep before work.
Nope. It's been busier.
People realize it's BS and a grindfest. Once people get their stuff they are out of it.
SImply, it's Cryptic/PWE/STO Devs fault for the <redactecd>! They already pissed off enougth players especially Geko.
Ok let's see:
Sydney 1:00 AM (middle of the night)
Central Europe 3:00 PM (work hours usually to 4-5 PM)
East Coast 9:00 AM (work hours start)
West Coast 6:00 AM (sleep or preparing to work)
As long majority of STO players aren't Chinese and Russians, then most players are busy with live at that hour.
Man, I really miss Starbase Fleet Defense. And Starbase 24, for that matter. ...And a host of other dead queues. I wish there was a way we could play using our other ships, like how some ground maps you can use your boffs. That seems to be the only way most of these PvEs will ever be playable again.
Sometimes, I really wonder what's up with Geko, honestly. Some say he has Asperger's, or is autistic or something (usually in reference to him ignoring things). I don't believe any of that, actually; but it *does* leave me wondering why he is so blatantly ignoring the empty queues. Is it sheer stubbornness? Pride? Or does he really blind himself to certain realities?
Actually, I think it's pride. Well, I wish he would get over it. Unnerf the queue rewards, make them attractive again.
I recall him saying, in a podcast, right after DR was released, that he was willing to tone down Advanceds a bit; but then immediately added that Elites would have to get at least 10% more difficult. I got no issue with that, per se, but it *did* show me that his ego seems to be in a constant battle with the top 1% of the playerbase. And I think that attitude is bad for the game. For all sane purposes and intent, the best thing to do, IMHO, is to simply flat-out ignore said 1%, and concentrate on jumpstarting the queues again.
Sometimes, I really wonder what's up with Geko, honestly. Some say he has Asperger's, or is autistic or something (usually in reference to him ignoring things). I don't believe any of that, actually; but it *does* leave me wondering why he is so blatantly ignoring the empty queues. Is it sheer stubbornness? Pride? Or does he really blind himself to certain realities?
He is too busy playing SWTOR, or any other game right now. Remember what he said about advanced and optional not being mandatory. You just have to play a single adv queue to see this is wrong. And he is supposed to be lead designer or something.
I don't think he is autistic or whatever, but I think he is controlling STO just like any other business. He is selling ships like he would sell car or anything. When I hear him, I can't hear the passion of doing a Star Trek videogame, he always speak of metrics, money, and stuff like that. Replace STO with anything you want, and it's still the same.
He is too busy playing SWTOR, or any other game right now. Remember what he said about advanced and optional not being mandatory. You just have to play a single adv queue to see this is wrong. And he is supposed to be lead designer or something.
I don't think he is autistic or whatever, but I think he is controlling STO just like any other business. He is selling ships like he would sell car or anything. When I hear him, I can't hear the passion of doing a Star Trek videogame, he always speak of metrics, money, and stuff like that. Replace STO with anything you want, and it's still the same.
*nods*
But you'd think a man so obsessed with metrics would notice the queues being empty, right?! So why is he ignoring those metrics!? For me, I can put up with the Upgrades, XP nerfs, and what not, as long as I can queue up and have some fun; but sans the queues, it's literally Game Over for me.
WEll they should just make the optionals really optional and not mandatory again.
I remembr the old days when you could select anySTF and the game started right away. Now i have to wayt 5-10-15 minutes for even the Borg STFs and thy were always full. And i tried in them orning, afternoon, evening and even during the night.
I loved the STOs thes were fun any even if you failed the optionalsyou stil got decent rewards.
Now its jsut a race against time and everyone is struggeling to get their DOPs output as high as possible as possible.
Its nut fun anymore and ids not interesting enymore. Especially for newbies who just start to get a good build.
If they are struggeling with STFs and feel useless or even get insulted they will probably think twice before they play another STO.
But there many people who talked about that, many reasons for that (optionals, difficulty, less rewards) but then come the few elitists screaming "NOOO, its perfect, we are super-OP don´t change anything" and nothing changes. But those guys probably hve everything already so their opinion isn´t reallyrealted to the matter.
I wish er had the old system back, with normal and Elite and maybe a Super-Elite and overlord difficulty wor those who want everything. ELite would have the same difficulty it had before, with the same rewards (including 1 processor/Cell/implant...) and the super elite and overlord would reward 2-3 times as much .
I've played this game for over 3300 hours (yes, I almost had no RL ), so I thought I add my thoughts on this issue. Since DR a few things have changed in my gamestyle:
1) All my characters are stuck somewhere between rank 53-55. Then I lost interest in playing DR content, because it took too much time to advance in the story.
2) I also lost interest in queues because of the decreased rewards. I do play ISA every once in a while to check my new builds, but it has come down to mere mark grinding and getting Dili through other parts of the game, mainly my KDF toons, which have more possibilities to earn more Dili. This issue collides with the Dili I additionally need for upgrading.
Another thing is just that there already are so many empty queues. Most of the time I don't even bother to check if some of them fill up, as I have been disappointed by empty queues too often. Just a simple learning process.
I am so glad that I stopped my subscription some time ago and that I bought the Delta Pack with nothing but Dili earned in game, because I thought about lifetime and dropped the idea pretty quickly.
If I was an investor in online gaming companies...
This would tell me 2 things.
1) Since the most recent expansion aimed at retention over expansion... numbers are in fact up and even 3 months after the DR launch the online steam numbers are as strong as they have been this year.
2) If DR did in fact grow the game by more then just a handful they are almost for sure using the arc launcher now.
Bottom line if people keep posting this to show the game is dying... they are sort of proving the devs right the game is doing exactly what they want it to do. lol
Seriously though to a MMO... I hate to break it to you handful of steam players... steam means nothing.
I know right now... 30 min after there server went back up for the daily reboot there are 20,000 people logged into eve. Cause there a developer who isn't to scared to admit there player numbers. Average almost every month is just under 30k http://eve-offline.net/?server=tranquility (on Tranquility anyway not counting the other test servers ect) So I think you can assume steam don't mean much of anything.
The simple fact is that the queues were probably being propped up and filled out with casual players pre-DR. Regardless of how crappy you think the average casual player is or how poor their DPS is they were still probably the majority of the players in the game queues.
rofl... Approximately three to four weeks ago, I decided to find an entirely different game to play. I gave up. 'Star Trek: Online' is currently a crappy product. Players have already posted their concerns. 'Delta Rising' makes up a small portion of what is wrong.
If Cryptic doesn't want to listen to players, they can watch the queues sink into oblivion.
Man, I really miss Starbase Fleet Defense. And Starbase 24, for that matter. ...And a host of other dead queues.
It'd be nice if they put a weekend boost to the awards to each in turn and present them as weekend attractions .
Something like: this weekend is SB defense weekend or SB24 weekend ect. .
... and I don't mean that joke of an award like the Elachi replays were ...
Sounds like the old Hourly system which was pretty good for the most part.
Chris Robert's on SC:
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
The steam numbers don't have to be 100% accurate to tell you a picture. Steam itself is as popular as ever, the number of people using it overall isn't shrinking, people aren't leaving Steam.
If the number for STO steam users are shrinking, its probably a pretty accurate representation that STO's numbers are shrinking too. Last time steam pop on STO was this low it was more than 2 years ago. Also, year over year, they are way way down.
Just as the forums is a representation your users, it is a bad thing to ignore them, because people from all opinions are posting. If they turn negative, then there is also unvocal people in the game who are negative and walking away.
If you are unable to see the coorelation, then you need to be quiet.
The steam numbers don't have to be 100% accurate to tell you a picture. Steam itself is as popular as ever, the number of people using it overall isn't shrinking, people aren't leaving Steam.
If the number for STO steam users are shrinking, its probably a pretty accurate representation that STO's numbers are shrinking too. Last time steam pop on STO was this low it was more than 2 years ago. Also, year over year, they are way way down.
Just as the forums is a representation your users, it is a bad thing to ignore them, because people from all opinions are posting. If they turn negative, then there is also unvocal people in the game who are negative and walking away.
If you are unable to see the coorelation, then you need to be quiet.
I won't argue that its possible STOs population is shinking. I would bet it is.
I am simply wondering how the heck you are reading the steam chart. lol
Nov 2014 - 2156 Avg 4216 Peek.... Nov 2013 1573 Avg 3218 peek (around 25% increase in players)
Last 30 days Vs 150 days ago (pre delta)
1907 Avg players 3756 Peek Vs 1401 Avg Players 2540 Peek (around 33% increase in players)
Bottom link my friend... not sure what your smoking but your math is really really really off.
Steam numbers support a pretty sizable increase in STO players using steam. Which is sad but true.
If your right and steam was a big enough sample of STO players to make a guess about total login (Which it is NOT... I posted the eve example where Steam accounts for like 5% of the online players, STO won't be any different) then STO is in fact growing 25% on the year... and 33% over pre delta only counting the last 30 days.
I personally come and go when it comes to playing this game. Its not a full time game for me like it used to be, I've got other games that have taken up that slot. That said, it is also the holidays, so its quite possible that alot of the people who would normally be around playing may be doing other things, such as getting ready for personal things, such as family coming over for said holidays. And my third point is the winter event. I am sure that alot of people are using this event as time for a break from the grind. (like myself) Log in to take care of the winter event stuff, stick around for an hour, maybe less, and then log out and go about other things.
Who knows to be honest, but I wouldn't worry much, this happens often. And while alot of you seem insistent on calling DOOOOOOM!, I personally think its a matter of over reacting and that things will resume their course eventually.
I will admit that I have queued up recently and had to wait a bit for things to happen, but look at the game itself, right now its very grindy. I wouldnt say that its always that way. But with the introduction of DR into the mix it kinda turned into that again. I still very much enjoy this game, and I have many many alts, but lets face it, to get all those alts, to the very least, level cap takes a great amount of patience since you are using the same content over and over and over. After a while it gets old and you kinda want to do something else. Which is what I have done and have been playing other things. Not to mention November was a big influx of various game titles that I am still wallowing thru and trying to finish or still play.
well if sto is growing by 25% where are all the noobs hiding at?
not at esd or drozana or ds9 new romulas or sector space not in the delta Quadrent
and if steam is only 5% that's 25,0000 new noobs on during peak...............I don't see a fraction of that on any day
seems like less players to me than last year............A lot less
but I use my eyes and simple basic math counting the instances and numbers in a given place
I never believe numbers given by a company after living thru sony and SWG
Jellico....Engineer ground.....Da'val Romulan space Sci
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
I'm not arguing your numbers but if you look overall although there might be a percentage difference. The playerbase on average decrease in the playerbase playing.
How a company managed to loss enough players of two expansions? Amazes me.
I won't argue that its possible STOs population is shinking. I would bet it is.
I am simply wondering how the heck you are reading the steam chart. lol
Nov 2014 - 2156 Avg 4216 Peek.... Nov 2013 1573 Avg 3218 peek (around 25% increase in players)
Last 30 days Vs 150 days ago (pre delta)
1907 Avg players 3756 Peek Vs 1401 Avg Players 2540 Peek (around 33% increase in players)
Bottom link my friend... not sure what your smoking but your math is really really really off.
If your right and steam was a big enough sample of STO players to make a guess about total login (Which it is NOT... I posted the eve example where Steam accounts for like 5% of the online players, STO won't be any different) then STO is in fact growing 25% on the year... and 33% over pre delta only counting the last 30 days.
Comments
Guess....
Winter Invasion.
The flagship STF in the winter event is now empty too.
Free Tibet!
So you want to tell that Winter Invasion is empty for same reasons as other queues? It's too hard?
It's empty because there are less players in the game. That's Cryptic's fault.
Free Tibet!
I would rather say it's because we have monday and in most time zones right now are working hours, so people are in schools or jobs, or late night so they sleep before work.
Nope. It's been busier.
People realize it's BS and a grindfest. Once people get their stuff they are out of it.
SImply, it's Cryptic/PWE/STO Devs fault for the <redactecd>! They already pissed off enougth players especially Geko.
Ok let's see:
Sydney 1:00 AM (middle of the night)
Central Europe 3:00 PM (work hours usually to 4-5 PM)
East Coast 9:00 AM (work hours start)
West Coast 6:00 AM (sleep or preparing to work)
As long majority of STO players aren't Chinese and Russians, then most players are busy with live at that hour.
But majority of players is from those time zones.
Actually that information was provided some time ago in some podcast or info-graphic.
Sometimes, I really wonder what's up with Geko, honestly. Some say he has Asperger's, or is autistic or something (usually in reference to him ignoring things). I don't believe any of that, actually; but it *does* leave me wondering why he is so blatantly ignoring the empty queues. Is it sheer stubbornness? Pride? Or does he really blind himself to certain realities?
Actually, I think it's pride. Well, I wish he would get over it. Unnerf the queue rewards, make them attractive again.
I recall him saying, in a podcast, right after DR was released, that he was willing to tone down Advanceds a bit; but then immediately added that Elites would have to get at least 10% more difficult. I got no issue with that, per se, but it *did* show me that his ego seems to be in a constant battle with the top 1% of the playerbase. And I think that attitude is bad for the game. For all sane purposes and intent, the best thing to do, IMHO, is to simply flat-out ignore said 1%, and concentrate on jumpstarting the queues again.
I don't think he is autistic or whatever, but I think he is controlling STO just like any other business. He is selling ships like he would sell car or anything. When I hear him, I can't hear the passion of doing a Star Trek videogame, he always speak of metrics, money, and stuff like that. Replace STO with anything you want, and it's still the same.
*nods*
But you'd think a man so obsessed with metrics would notice the queues being empty, right?! So why is he ignoring those metrics!? For me, I can put up with the Upgrades, XP nerfs, and what not, as long as I can queue up and have some fun; but sans the queues, it's literally Game Over for me.
http://steamcharts.com/app/9900
I'm not a metrics whiz, like Geko, *g*, but those numbers could just meant less people are using STEAM, and went to Arc.
But if people really *are* leaving, all the more reason to get on the ball, and get those queues back up! And take other steps to stop the exodus.
I remembr the old days when you could select anySTF and the game started right away. Now i have to wayt 5-10-15 minutes for even the Borg STFs and thy were always full. And i tried in them orning, afternoon, evening and even during the night.
I loved the STOs thes were fun any even if you failed the optionalsyou stil got decent rewards.
Now its jsut a race against time and everyone is struggeling to get their DOPs output as high as possible as possible.
Its nut fun anymore and ids not interesting enymore. Especially for newbies who just start to get a good build.
If they are struggeling with STFs and feel useless or even get insulted they will probably think twice before they play another STO.
But there many people who talked about that, many reasons for that (optionals, difficulty, less rewards) but then come the few elitists screaming "NOOO, its perfect, we are super-OP don´t change anything" and nothing changes. But those guys probably hve everything already so their opinion isn´t reallyrealted to the matter.
I wish er had the old system back, with normal and Elite and maybe a Super-Elite and overlord difficulty wor those who want everything. ELite would have the same difficulty it had before, with the same rewards (including 1 processor/Cell/implant...) and the super elite and overlord would reward 2-3 times as much .
1) All my characters are stuck somewhere between rank 53-55. Then I lost interest in playing DR content, because it took too much time to advance in the story.
2) I also lost interest in queues because of the decreased rewards. I do play ISA every once in a while to check my new builds, but it has come down to mere mark grinding and getting Dili through other parts of the game, mainly my KDF toons, which have more possibilities to earn more Dili. This issue collides with the Dili I additionally need for upgrading.
Another thing is just that there already are so many empty queues. Most of the time I don't even bother to check if some of them fill up, as I have been disappointed by empty queues too often. Just a simple learning process.
I am so glad that I stopped my subscription some time ago and that I bought the Delta Pack with nothing but Dili earned in game, because I thought about lifetime and dropped the idea pretty quickly.
Not sure why people keep posting this.
If I was an investor in online gaming companies...
This would tell me 2 things.
1) Since the most recent expansion aimed at retention over expansion... numbers are in fact up and even 3 months after the DR launch the online steam numbers are as strong as they have been this year.
2) If DR did in fact grow the game by more then just a handful they are almost for sure using the arc launcher now.
Bottom line if people keep posting this to show the game is dying... they are sort of proving the devs right the game is doing exactly what they want it to do. lol
Seriously though to a MMO... I hate to break it to you handful of steam players... steam means nothing.
http://steamcharts.com/app/8500
I know right now... 30 min after there server went back up for the daily reboot there are 20,000 people logged into eve. Cause there a developer who isn't to scared to admit there player numbers.
If Cryptic doesn't want to listen to players, they can watch the queues sink into oblivion.
Cryptic told everyone they didn't care.
*shrugs*
I no longer care.
It'd be nice if they put a weekend boost to the awards to each in turn and present them as weekend attractions .
Something like: this weekend is SB defense weekend or SB24 weekend ect. .
... and I don't mean that joke of an award like the Elachi replays were ...
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
If the number for STO steam users are shrinking, its probably a pretty accurate representation that STO's numbers are shrinking too. Last time steam pop on STO was this low it was more than 2 years ago. Also, year over year, they are way way down.
Just as the forums is a representation your users, it is a bad thing to ignore them, because people from all opinions are posting. If they turn negative, then there is also unvocal people in the game who are negative and walking away.
If you are unable to see the coorelation, then you need to be quiet.
Completed Starbase, Embassy, Mine, Spire and No Win Scenario
Nothing to do anymore.
http://dtfleet.com/
Visit our Youtube channel
I won't argue that its possible STOs population is shinking. I would bet it is.
I am simply wondering how the heck you are reading the steam chart. lol
Nov 2014 - 2156 Avg 4216 Peek.... Nov 2013 1573 Avg 3218 peek (around 25% increase in players)
Last 30 days Vs 150 days ago (pre delta)
1907 Avg players 3756 Peek Vs 1401 Avg Players 2540 Peek (around 33% increase in players)
Bottom link my friend... not sure what your smoking but your math is really really really off.
Steam numbers support a pretty sizable increase in STO players using steam. Which is sad but true.
If your right and steam was a big enough sample of STO players to make a guess about total login (Which it is NOT... I posted the eve example where Steam accounts for like 5% of the online players, STO won't be any different) then STO is in fact growing 25% on the year... and 33% over pre delta only counting the last 30 days.
Who knows to be honest, but I wouldn't worry much, this happens often. And while alot of you seem insistent on calling DOOOOOOM!, I personally think its a matter of over reacting and that things will resume their course eventually.
I will admit that I have queued up recently and had to wait a bit for things to happen, but look at the game itself, right now its very grindy. I wouldnt say that its always that way. But with the introduction of DR into the mix it kinda turned into that again. I still very much enjoy this game, and I have many many alts, but lets face it, to get all those alts, to the very least, level cap takes a great amount of patience since you are using the same content over and over and over. After a while it gets old and you kinda want to do something else. Which is what I have done and have been playing other things. Not to mention November was a big influx of various game titles that I am still wallowing thru and trying to finish or still play.
not at esd or drozana or ds9 new romulas or sector space not in the delta Quadrent
and if steam is only 5% that's 25,0000 new noobs on during peak...............I don't see a fraction of that on any day
seems like less players to me than last year............A lot less
but I use my eyes and simple basic math counting the instances and numbers in a given place
I never believe numbers given by a company after living thru sony and SWG
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
How a company managed to loss enough players of two expansions? Amazes me.