Honestly, I wonder how you did that. Unless you either grinded tau dewa when it was up, or you grinded some DR patrol afterward.
I log in once or twice a day. I slot doff mission on every char I have (5). I check PESTF (before DR probably the most popular channel when it came to do queued content), and except for sometime a call for ground, it's more or less empty.
Then I log off, no team, no queues. Even if I found a STF in my channel, that would have been 2K xp, which isn't much.
Since QWW started, I haven't done a SINGLE spec point. I mean, I did one on some char because the XP bar was almost full, but on a character with an empty bar, no lvlup. How do I know ? because this char was 58 when the event started, and is still 58.
So yeah, I'm really curious.
What missions are you slotting that give such poor xp? I get thousands without even leaving ESD...
What missions are you slotting that give such poor xp? I get thousands without even leaving ESD...
Right now, the maximum xp I can find in ESD is 672xp from a 72h mission. Followed by a 400ish (entertain dignitaries or something) for a 6h mission (and 10k ec).
Otherwise, 87-112xp, which is pretty much nothing.
Also, they said it was something we earned though our favorite activities. Not everyone is doffing.
Maybe I'm flashing back to my teenage years in food service but you don't keep eating a plate of food you intend to send back to the kitchen. And any restaurant worth their salt? Will keep escalating your complaint to the next level up until it's resolved.
As far as I'm concerned, patrol grinding is a dish I want sent back to the kitchen. If I kept eating the dish, I'd be indicating it was acceptable.
And as for complaints about the design, I sincerely hope those don't stop at Smirk or Geko but keep getting escalated over their heads as a matter of procedure if they don't personally see it as a problem but also have no intent of resolving it.
Maybe I'm flashing back to my teenage years in food service but you don't keep eating a plate of food you intend to send back to the kitchen. And any restaurant worth their salt? Will keep escalating your complaint to the next level up until it's resolved.
As far as I'm concerned, patrol grinding is a dish I want sent back to the kitchen. If I kept eating the dish, I'd be indicating it was acceptable.
Not a perfect analogy, but it works. You definitely said it better than me.
Honestly, I wonder how you did that. Unless you either grinded tau dewa when it was up, or you grinded some DR patrol afterward.
I log in once or twice a day. I slot doff mission on every char I have (5). I check PESTF (before DR probably the most popular channel when it came to do queued content), and except for sometime a call for ground, it's more or less empty.
Then I log off, no team, no queues. Even if I found a STF in my channel, that would have been 2K xp, which isn't much.
Since QWW started, I haven't done a SINGLE spec point. I mean, I did one on some char because the XP bar was almost full, but on a character with an empty bar, no lvlup. How do I know ? because this char was 58 when the event started, and is still 58.
Maybe I'm doing it wrong, and spend 2h of my life grinding argala, trying to queue for ISA, and fail because pug don't understand it's not ISE anymore, or perhaps I should make the tour of the galaxy daily to find the rare DOFF missions with lot of xp. I don't know.
Then it was said it is something we earned through our favorite activities, and we didn't had to grind for it. But it's obviously not, unless grinding patrol is your favorite activity. Dyson sphere BZ : no xp reward from quests, low xp. Kobali BZ : ground xp is low, low xp from quests. 2K xp from an stf. DOFFING : most mission award 100-200xp (max), and some rare ones offer 1K (20h length), except for a single KDF mission that seems to award a lot (I heard 10k) when critted.
So yeah, I'm really curious.
Patrol missions ? adv/elite q's ? its easy wtf , i mean ... you just don't have any reason to complain about it , bugs , true , unbalanced classes , true , but xp ? is this the first mmo you are playing ?
Argala patrol takes about ... 5-7 mins , Borg battlefield even less like 5 mins or so.
Maybe I'm flashing back to my teenage years in food service but you don't keep eating a plate of food you intend to send back to the kitchen. And any restaurant worth their salt? Will keep escalating your complaint to the next level up until it's resolved.
As far as I'm concerned, patrol grinding is a dish I want sent back to the kitchen. If I kept eating the dish, I'd be indicating it was acceptable.
And as for complaints about the design, I sincerely hope those don't stop at Smirk or Geko but keep getting escalated over their heads as a matter of procedure if they don't personally see it as a problem but also have no intent of resolving it.
I have the feeling that whatever ends up higher up in the company is more like
"DR is the best expansion ever and players love it". I get the media propaganda they spread with the good old shotgun approach, but what if they handle things the same internally ? I hope they don't.
What missions are you slotting that give such poor xp? I get thousands without even leaving ESD...
Do you really want doffing to get even more nerfs?:(
I think it doesnt matter how much thousands of exp you get when you need 150k for a lvl.
Doffing allready was scaled back with the recent "adjustment". Delta patrols got 2x exp, yet doffing got only 0.7x, while the exp needed for 1 lvl was 3x-ed:eek:
I am more upset that its such a big difference between doff xp from kdf vs fed. I get the federation doesnt "supress";) anyone, but still, its a huge imbalance
Anyway, on topic, this is kinda sucky. I am usualy not the one to complain about new content, but this is absurd. The majority of ppl havent even unlocked the ability to train lvl 3 intel skills and we get hit with another spec?
And as usual, the new one will probably be more strong then the other(s), thus probably making the old one(s) obsolete.
Patrol missions ? adv/elite q's ? its easy wtf , i mean ... you just don't have any reason to complain about it , bugs , true , unbalanced classes , true , but xp ? is this the first mmo you are playing ?
Argala patrol takes about ... 5-7 mins , Borg battlefield even less like 5 mins or so.
So yeah, back at grinding patrols. So much for a sideway to earn something while doing our favorite content, right ?
And no, that's not my first MMO. In fact, I have a LTS in LOTRO, which is grindy, but you know what, at least they never lied about that.
I played/tested so many MMO I think I forgot some. That alone should say something.
I have the feeling that whatever ends up higher up in the company is more like
"DR is the best expansion ever and players love it". I get the media propaganda they spread with the good old shotgun approach, but what if they handle things the same internally ? I hope they don't.
At a certain point, I may just write a good old fashioned snail mail letter with a collection of customer insights in a polished form. I think the medium of forum posting has become tainted as a means of feedback and that the internet itself makes a lot of these guys go into silo mode because of things like gamergate and perceptions of developer persecution. Unfortunately, I think a lot of developers perpetuate the cycle by making the same logical fallacies and low EQ, left brained thinking that anti-game developers online have made.
It is apparent from Rivera's Twitter that he is an intelligent, educated, mathematical guy with a certain kind of sense of humor and a passion for social justice causes and a high level of outrage over the mistreatment of video game developers online in 2014. I think he also has more in common with the anti-game developer guys in gamergate than I do and it comes down to the thinking style he's using. And I think a reasonable conversation could be had about that if I could ever sit down with one of these guys at a pub or a coffeeshop because my impression is that many game developers and the Cryptic ones in particular are people who are VERY MUCH LIKE people that I am friends with. The difference is that my friends who are AI programmers or programmers for Amazon are people who I can call up and we can sit down and discuss things and there are personal stakes to arrive at some kind of consensus. And the game's developers are people who, while I agree very much with many of their positions and tastes, are people I cannot access in the same way and have a reasonable discussion with where we can discuss the validity of opinions or strategies. And it frustrates the heck out of me that the forums are seen as a tainted venue of discussion.
I'm trying to avoid stereotyping but I saw something online recently where a number of people posted their Myers Briggs personality types. And I noticed something. Every game developer cited INTJ as their personality type. Heck, let's start there. I'd love to have a conversation about THAT and how that may or may not influence decisions in a game like STO because it seems to me to have interesting implications that may require some course correction.
But where do you start that discussion? I don't want to send anyone into their shell. As best as I can figure, that would be a nightmare in the forums because it would turn into a bunch of people trying to discredit one another over points that are tangential to that discussion.
About the best idea I can come up with would be to either try to get a presentation at a game conference or Tedx event or sell a piece to Kotaku. 'Cause I don't see that discussion being able to flourish here. It would turn into people citing that one study about Myers Briggs from the 70s and whether they agree with the measurement when my interest is actually in game developers self-identifying as a particular personality type (which is rare for people in the general population to self-identify as). The validity of the test is irrelevant (even though I can see that being the driver of forum discussion). It's the self-identification that would matter and it's one that I have noticed people using in the tech sector and game development at a disproportionate rate. And from there, whether we as consumers and they as developers would benefit from correcting for that skew with procedures and business plans that enable better communications and marketing strategies.
So yeah, back at grinding patrols. So much for a sideway to earn something while doing our favorite content, right ?
And no, that's not my first MMO. In fact, I have a LTS in LOTRO, which is grindy, but you know what, at least they never lied about that.
I played/tested so many MMO I think I forgot some. That alone should say something.
Whats Your purpose in this game? , and What is the content You like?
Right now, the maximum xp I can find in ESD is 672xp from a 72h mission. Followed by a 400ish (entertain dignitaries or something) for a 6h mission (and 10k ec).
Otherwise, 87-112xp, which is pretty much nothing.
Also, they said it was something we earned though our favorite activities. Not everyone is doffing.
*scurries off to ESD to queue doffs and record them*
Missions collected and the xp received:
Entertain foreign dignitaries - 1737
Perform artificial intelligence research - 2127
Yeah I was in a hurry and didn't queue much on this char last I was on. But these were NON-crits.
Queued stuff:
personal:
update universal translators - base 164 (this doesn't take into account the quality reward bonus you get for usign doffs that aren't commons)
Provide ambassadorial tour of ship - 180
Current map(ESD)
Entertain foreign dignitaries - 481 (yeah I actually got around 4x that)
Additional analysis of the biological reactions to Jevonite - 673
Correlate historical record using digestive remains - 338
Play Tridimensional chess - 280
Participate in velocity tournament - 269
Dabo - 187
Engineering department head: (while in ESD)
Dilithium mining in an unstable asteroid cluster - 356
assist with demolitions for dilithium mining - 330
Operations department head: (while in ESD)
Compete with a stratagema master - 314
Additional evaluation of the biological properties of Unrefined Ketracel - 673
Provide medical support in combat zone - 673
Recover Repressed Memories from Refugee - 187
I'm trying to avoid stereotyping but I saw something online recently where a number of people posted their Myers Briggs personality types. And I noticed something. Every game developer cited INTJ as their personality type. Heck, let's start there. I'd love to have a conversation about THAT and how that may or may not influence decisions in a game like STO because it seems to me to have interesting implications that may require some course correction.
Let's look at the flip side.... what personality type is more likely to become a game designer?
Right now, the maximum xp I can find in ESD is 672xp from a 72h mission. Followed by a 400ish (entertain dignitaries or something) for a 6h mission (and 10k ec).
Otherwise, 87-112xp, which is pretty much nothing.
Also, they said it was something we earned though our favorite activities. Not everyone is doffing.
I log in daily to start DOFF activities on 3 characters.
There are lots of DOFF mission in the 200 skill point area, and some in the 300 area, and I don't refuse the 149 point missions either (though I might check for better ones first). I try to pick these primarily, though I also often take anomaly gathering missions even though they pay out a lot less.
Never pick assignments that last longer than 24 hours (and even 24 hours is too long if you play really regular). Unless of course you know you won't play on that character for a few days.
At ESD, moving between the station, space and academy you can get different selections of assignments, and often you'll find additional 200+ skill points assingments this way. That applies also to the Department Head assignments (don't forget to look there), by the way, though the difference is small, it can be important But for example, the Colonist "Recruitment" missions are never on ESD or Academy, but they are available in Earth Orbit (if not on cooldown, of course).
Winter Wonderland also has its own Winter Wonderland assignments that are different from the ones on the Academy or Earth Space Dock.
I don't just optimize for skill points, however. I also tend to do crafting mat gathering missions, since I got two crafters (each filling half of the available crafting specializations). The Colonization missions and the various Sabotage Something / Repair Something missions can be lucrative for Dilithium, too.
There are also the occassional well paying out missions in other Sector Blocks, but I usually don't go there. That said, if you're in the Delta Quadrant, there is at least one mission that grants a bit over 1000 skill points and is done in less than 24 hours.
Unfortunately, I don't keep track on when I earn spec points. I have the feeling it can actually take less than week by doing just DOFF missions and the Winter Wonderland race on a character.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
One person did a poll of his Facebook friends (and he describes half as being game designers) and INTJ came in second place on the poll at 13% of his friends. Substantially more than the 2% of the general population estimated to be INTJs.
Reading this, I thought a LOT about Cryptic's communication style and design approach.
The following stands out:
The INTJ will work tirelessly to change flawed methods, moving quickly and without permission.
...
All of this analysis, coupled with an inability to explain these processes to others, plus their ultimate need to create systems that work means that the INTJ takes confident action while ignoring complainers, naysayers, and doubters. So what you have is a man who knows what he is doing and doesnt care what other people think about it.
...
INTJs are so used to systems thinking that what seems glaringly obvious to them isnt always obvious to others. This is genuinely confusing to the INTJ.
Some INTJs are openly disdainful in these situations, assuming that the other person is not just different but stupid. This is because INTJs have just as much trouble understanding others as others have understanding the INTJ.
I think it's a great type for designers when you look at the positives but it also needs to be carefully managed, particularly in a service marketing field like MMOs that requires effective communication and not just sound metrics.
All that is needed is to play smart instead of grinding Argala like a flock of brainless sheep.
Hear hear! Been trying to say this. But some people keep saying, "The patrols don't give you enough skill points. All I can do is grind at Argala. And I don't do the doffing system." The doffing system pays you back for investing in it (and you can sell on the Exchange the blue and purple doffs you don't need; I've only sold blue ones, but I've heard that the purple ones sell quite nicely). No, you won't consistently get 1K skill points for each successful mission, but criticals often pay anywhere from 1K to over 4K. Each. But if you prefer to only fight fight fight ... fine. Me, I prefer my brain to my fists. My brain's alot bigger.
Unfortunately, I don't keep track on when I earn spec points. I have the feeling it can actually take less than week by doing just DOFF missions and the Winter Wonderland race on a character.
No. I would say 10 characters, but then someone might argue I didn't say why.
As I said earlier, I'm in QWW/ESD (depending on where I spawn) everyday, and I log in everyday. Do all the QWW doff mission (around 100xp each), and did enough race for a ship. And not even a single spec point for a character with an empty bar.
Also, as I said earlier, spec tree were said to be something we earn while doing whatever we like. And so far, the only "advice" I had about how to makes spec point in a reasonably fast fashion is to run DOFF missions everyday, or Argala/patrol.
As for STF, 2K xp is nowhere near enough. Especially when most queues are empty.
If it was another reward related to Doffing, then why it's not a commendation ?
Man did I pick a bad time to roll a new character. I want Intel for my Fed Sci's theme (section 31 spooky man), but I might have to level up this other spec tree on one of my characters if it looks cool.
Well, first i've gotta hit 60 on the fed. C'mon bonus XP weekend, daddy needs a new trait.
Sardak (Science Officer): Captain of a 23k DPS R'Mor Temporal Science Vessel, R.R.W. Vathos Odan Brota (Science Officer): Captain of a 28k DPS Scryer Intel Science Vessel, U.S.S. Kepler Patiently waiting for a Romulan Science Vessel
Comments
My character Tsin'xing
Otherwise, 87-112xp, which is pretty much nothing.
Also, they said it was something we earned though our favorite activities. Not everyone is doffing.
As far as I'm concerned, patrol grinding is a dish I want sent back to the kitchen. If I kept eating the dish, I'd be indicating it was acceptable.
And as for complaints about the design, I sincerely hope those don't stop at Smirk or Geko but keep getting escalated over their heads as a matter of procedure if they don't personally see it as a problem but also have no intent of resolving it.
Helpful Tools: Dictionary.com - Logical fallacies - Random generator - Word generator - Color tool - Extra Credits - List of common English language errors - New T6 Big booty tutorial
Argala patrol takes about ... 5-7 mins , Borg battlefield even less like 5 mins or so.
I have the feeling that whatever ends up higher up in the company is more like
"DR is the best expansion ever and players love it". I get the media propaganda they spread with the good old shotgun approach, but what if they handle things the same internally ? I hope they don't.
Do you really want doffing to get even more nerfs?:(
I think it doesnt matter how much thousands of exp you get when you need 150k for a lvl.
Doffing allready was scaled back with the recent "adjustment". Delta patrols got 2x exp, yet doffing got only 0.7x, while the exp needed for 1 lvl was 3x-ed:eek:
I am more upset that its such a big difference between doff xp from kdf vs fed. I get the federation doesnt "supress";) anyone, but still, its a huge imbalance
Anyway, on topic, this is kinda sucky. I am usualy not the one to complain about new content, but this is absurd. The majority of ppl havent even unlocked the ability to train lvl 3 intel skills and we get hit with another spec?
And as usual, the new one will probably be more strong then the other(s), thus probably making the old one(s) obsolete.
And no, that's not my first MMO. In fact, I have a LTS in LOTRO, which is grindy, but you know what, at least they never lied about that.
I played/tested so many MMO I think I forgot some. That alone should say something.
At a certain point, I may just write a good old fashioned snail mail letter with a collection of customer insights in a polished form. I think the medium of forum posting has become tainted as a means of feedback and that the internet itself makes a lot of these guys go into silo mode because of things like gamergate and perceptions of developer persecution. Unfortunately, I think a lot of developers perpetuate the cycle by making the same logical fallacies and low EQ, left brained thinking that anti-game developers online have made.
It is apparent from Rivera's Twitter that he is an intelligent, educated, mathematical guy with a certain kind of sense of humor and a passion for social justice causes and a high level of outrage over the mistreatment of video game developers online in 2014. I think he also has more in common with the anti-game developer guys in gamergate than I do and it comes down to the thinking style he's using. And I think a reasonable conversation could be had about that if I could ever sit down with one of these guys at a pub or a coffeeshop because my impression is that many game developers and the Cryptic ones in particular are people who are VERY MUCH LIKE people that I am friends with. The difference is that my friends who are AI programmers or programmers for Amazon are people who I can call up and we can sit down and discuss things and there are personal stakes to arrive at some kind of consensus. And the game's developers are people who, while I agree very much with many of their positions and tastes, are people I cannot access in the same way and have a reasonable discussion with where we can discuss the validity of opinions or strategies. And it frustrates the heck out of me that the forums are seen as a tainted venue of discussion.
I'm trying to avoid stereotyping but I saw something online recently where a number of people posted their Myers Briggs personality types. And I noticed something. Every game developer cited INTJ as their personality type. Heck, let's start there. I'd love to have a conversation about THAT and how that may or may not influence decisions in a game like STO because it seems to me to have interesting implications that may require some course correction.
But where do you start that discussion? I don't want to send anyone into their shell. As best as I can figure, that would be a nightmare in the forums because it would turn into a bunch of people trying to discredit one another over points that are tangential to that discussion.
About the best idea I can come up with would be to either try to get a presentation at a game conference or Tedx event or sell a piece to Kotaku. 'Cause I don't see that discussion being able to flourish here. It would turn into people citing that one study about Myers Briggs from the 70s and whether they agree with the measurement when my interest is actually in game developers self-identifying as a particular personality type (which is rare for people in the general population to self-identify as). The validity of the test is irrelevant (even though I can see that being the driver of forum discussion). It's the self-identification that would matter and it's one that I have noticed people using in the tech sector and game development at a disproportionate rate. And from there, whether we as consumers and they as developers would benefit from correcting for that skew with procedures and business plans that enable better communications and marketing strategies.
Whats Your purpose in this game? , and What is the content You like?
Missions collected and the xp received:
Entertain foreign dignitaries - 1737
Perform artificial intelligence research - 2127
Yeah I was in a hurry and didn't queue much on this char last I was on. But these were NON-crits.
Queued stuff:
personal:
update universal translators - base 164 (this doesn't take into account the quality reward bonus you get for usign doffs that aren't commons)
Provide ambassadorial tour of ship - 180
Current map(ESD)
Entertain foreign dignitaries - 481 (yeah I actually got around 4x that)
Additional analysis of the biological reactions to Jevonite - 673
Correlate historical record using digestive remains - 338
Play Tridimensional chess - 280
Participate in velocity tournament - 269
Dabo - 187
Engineering department head: (while in ESD)
Dilithium mining in an unstable asteroid cluster - 356
assist with demolitions for dilithium mining - 330
Operations department head: (while in ESD)
Compete with a stratagema master - 314
Additional evaluation of the biological properties of Unrefined Ketracel - 673
Provide medical support in combat zone - 673
Recover Repressed Memories from Refugee - 187
My character Tsin'xing
My character Tsin'xing
I log in daily to start DOFF activities on 3 characters.
There are lots of DOFF mission in the 200 skill point area, and some in the 300 area, and I don't refuse the 149 point missions either (though I might check for better ones first). I try to pick these primarily, though I also often take anomaly gathering missions even though they pay out a lot less.
Never pick assignments that last longer than 24 hours (and even 24 hours is too long if you play really regular). Unless of course you know you won't play on that character for a few days.
At ESD, moving between the station, space and academy you can get different selections of assignments, and often you'll find additional 200+ skill points assingments this way. That applies also to the Department Head assignments (don't forget to look there), by the way, though the difference is small, it can be important But for example, the Colonist "Recruitment" missions are never on ESD or Academy, but they are available in Earth Orbit (if not on cooldown, of course).
Winter Wonderland also has its own Winter Wonderland assignments that are different from the ones on the Academy or Earth Space Dock.
I don't just optimize for skill points, however. I also tend to do crafting mat gathering missions, since I got two crafters (each filling half of the available crafting specializations). The Colonization missions and the various Sabotage Something / Repair Something missions can be lucrative for Dilithium, too.
There are also the occassional well paying out missions in other Sector Blocks, but I usually don't go there. That said, if you're in the Delta Quadrant, there is at least one mission that grants a bit over 1000 skill points and is done in less than 24 hours.
Unfortunately, I don't keep track on when I earn spec points. I have the feeling it can actually take less than week by doing just DOFF missions and the Winter Wonderland race on a character.
I think it is very likely INTJ.
Doesn't mean that you don't need correcting.
I found a thread on a personality forum that seems to have people who think a lot about personality types confirm this.
http://personalitycafe.com/guess-type/105784-what-myers-briggs-type-games-designers.html
One person did a poll of his Facebook friends (and he describes half as being game designers) and INTJ came in second place on the poll at 13% of his friends. Substantially more than the 2% of the general population estimated to be INTJs.
Here's an article on writing INTJs:
http://mandywallace.com/the-character-most-writers-get-wrong/
Reading this, I thought a LOT about Cryptic's communication style and design approach.
The following stands out:
I think it's a great type for designers when you look at the positives but it also needs to be carefully managed, particularly in a service marketing field like MMOs that requires effective communication and not just sound metrics.
Hear hear! Been trying to say this. But some people keep saying, "The patrols don't give you enough skill points. All I can do is grind at Argala. And I don't do the doffing system." The doffing system pays you back for investing in it (and you can sell on the Exchange the blue and purple doffs you don't need; I've only sold blue ones, but I've heard that the purple ones sell quite nicely). No, you won't consistently get 1K skill points for each successful mission, but criticals often pay anywhere from 1K to over 4K. Each. But if you prefer to only fight fight fight ... fine. Me, I prefer my brain to my fists. My brain's alot bigger.
As I said earlier, I'm in QWW/ESD (depending on where I spawn) everyday, and I log in everyday. Do all the QWW doff mission (around 100xp each), and did enough race for a ship. And not even a single spec point for a character with an empty bar.
Also, as I said earlier, spec tree were said to be something we earn while doing whatever we like. And so far, the only "advice" I had about how to makes spec point in a reasonably fast fashion is to run DOFF missions everyday, or Argala/patrol.
As for STF, 2K xp is nowhere near enough. Especially when most queues are empty.
If it was another reward related to Doffing, then why it's not a commendation ?
Well, first i've gotta hit 60 on the fed. C'mon bonus XP weekend, daddy needs a new trait.
Odan Brota (Science Officer): Captain of a 28k DPS Scryer Intel Science Vessel, U.S.S. Kepler
Patiently waiting for a Romulan Science Vessel