Achieving a certain failrate for STFs will fail itself.
If the pugs I'm in fail more than once in a blue moon, I will not pug said STF anymore. I shall then only run private queues until I can carry any pug with great success.
I can tell from the timer that most pugs will fail now, so Bug Hunt it is. I don't mind that one though.
Just expect to see a decline in failrate on any popular stf, either because the undergeared player learns to stay out of it the hard way, or - and we humans are known to do that - learn to be better at it.
And either increase the difficulty or decrease the reward. Doing both will overshoot for sure.
Another round of PvE queue updates have been made and are making their way to Tribble for extra testing. This particular batch of updates has focused on increasing difficulty for queues that are being completed at a higher rate than expected and decreasing rewards for queues that have been over-rewarding as compared to the reward levels we have established across all PvE queues. We expect that these will be the only queues changed in such ways during this first pass of updates. As mentioned previously, this is an ongoing effort to improve STO and this update (and those that came before) are not the entirety of what will be done.
Riddle me this: What happens when you make something MORE difficult while simultaneously making it LESS rewarding?
Answer: People. Stop. Doing. It.
You're not improving anything with these PvE changes, absolutely nothing. You are, in fact, making the PvE queues WORSE. The thing that boggles my mind is that you have the audacity to try to make it sound like a good thing.
NEWS FLASH: It isn't! Is somebody off their medication over there or something?
When this thing goes live your end game content (i.e. the PvE queues) will take yet another nosedive, and it was already well on its way to becoming a ghost town. And the player reaction, well ... I don't expect that to be pretty, to say the least.
What, exactly, do you guys expect us to be doing at the end of the game?
It sure seems like reducing rewards for playing the queues - already on the low side IMO - is only going to further drive people away from them and this game in general.
We are not seeing the big picture here. Perhaps you guys (devs) might cue us in a little on some of the long-term vision here? What does reducing rewards for Normal queue missions do for you exactly? I already barely play Advanced since DR and now you're going to make Normal even less worthwhile?
You guys have done a great job with the storyline missions. They have come a long way in the last five years. What you are doing to the game mechanics, I can't follow. Well, I guess I follow - it's going more and more toward using specialized ships, abilities, boffs, etc. to be competitive in "end game."
I dislike this. I'm probably in the minority of players, but I don't necessarily want to have to run around DPS-ing everything just to survive the content. You are pigeon-holing people into a certain playstyle. I want to play this game the way I want to play it. It's my time and money and I certainly have a choice of whether or not I want to spend any more of either here.
Any devs want to give any feedback about where you all are taking this thing?
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. Except for a T5 Connie. That would be f*%#ing awesome." - Mr. Spock
You remember some time ago when PWE made some sort of comment or announcement that Cryptic is their "R&D" department? (or something to that effect) The "R&D" they are doing isn't related to game engines or graphics ..
It's R&D into WTF the "Pain Threshold" is for a western MMO audience. How long until we say "frak it!" and drop the mic on the way out; How much TRIBBLE we put up with before we leave or open our wallets.
So yeah, pretty much a lot of this is jut to see how much TRIBBLE we're willing to deal with - how long it takes for the frog to recognize its' being boiled.
In today's world, this is a definite possibility. Sick but a possibility.
I like Trek, but I'm tired of feeling like a slave to your grind. My ships are now way too powerful for normal queues, and not yet strong enough for Elite. Advanced takes too long to be rewarding when I am lucky enough to be in a pug that has a skill set similar to mine & we succeed.
What should have happened was the introduction of a difficulty tier beyond elite to satisfy the needs of the few who wanted that. Instead, 99% of us got the shaft. You made us have to re-purchase everything we'd already worked or paid for, and it still won't get us over the paywall that bars the way to the new Elite. It is cost prohibitive, and too much of a gamble.
Fix upgrades, and fix rewards to benefit the players; or reap what you sow with every nerf.
So, do you mind telling me how DEcreasing rewards is going to ENcourage me to play? Sorry, but it doesn't work that way.
This is an extremely reasonable question, and I would very much be interested in a response from Cryptic on how and why they came to this decision from a "quality improvement" perspective.
What, exactly, do you guys expect us to be doing at the end of the game?
Allow yourself to be herded into new content, spend earned resources on gear related to that content right around the time you get bored of it, stop playing older content for dilithium, deplete your dilithium reserves on upgrades, and wait patiently with a fistful of dollars for new content and ships.
As for new players trying to grind fleet and rep gear with perpetually empty queues and tight fail conditions at the difficulty levels that actually reward currency for said gear, I'm not sure what Cryptic expects them to do. Not play, I expect. I don't think they care anymore. I think they're doubling down on established players, and trying to tweak things to get them to open their wallets more often.
Allow yourself to be herded into new content, spend earned resources on gear related to that content right around the time you get bored of it, stop playing older content for dilithium, deplete your dilithium reserves on upgrades, and wait patiently with a fistful of dollars for new content and ships.
As for new players trying to grind fleet and rep gear with perpetually empty queues and tight fail conditions at the difficulty levels that actually reward currency for said gear, I'm not sure what Cryptic expects them to do. Not play, I expect. I don't think they care anymore. I think they're doubling down on established players, and trying to tweak things to get them to open their wallets more often.
It sure as [REDACTED] seems that way.
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. Except for a T5 Connie. That would be f*%#ing awesome." - Mr. Spock
Jesus Christ guys. It really is scary how out of touch you are with the game. Queues are dead across the board, and you start nerfing marks? I can't defend you any more. You deserve all the flak you are getting in this thread.
Said this in the other thread already, but since I'd really like for this feedback to be taken into consideration, I'll throw it in here too...
People want to make the most out of the limited playing time they have. If they want Fleet Marks, they will grind Fleet Alert and NWS. If they want Expertise/Skill Points they will grind Argala. If they want whatever reputation currency, they will pick the easiest mission that requires the least amount of thought and skill, and is populated by like-minded players who do not need to think or use skill and still have a reasonably high chance for success.
If you nerf the rewards without offering something in return, you encourage less participation.
People are already limited to joining 3 missions at a time. People who are casual will just pick the three most popular events there are.
If you want my constructive solution?
A: Remove the queue limit. Queue for as many missions as you want. This has the immediate short-term effect of making the queues look way more populated, which can bait other players into queueing for them since they actually see players in them and think it might actually pop for them in a reasonable amount of wait time.
B: Remove or reduce the timer between events. With more people able to queue for a mission they actually enjoy doing, this means it will pop more often.
C: Remove the timer entirely for failed events, but also remove any failure rewards entirely. This incentivizes people into doing the Advanced and Elite queues more often. I have little interest in doing Elite missions because the chance of failure is so high, but also because it puts me on a 30 minute cooldown regardless of whether I fail or succeed. I will make the smart gamble and simply get less reward for a higher likelihood of success from the PUG members in the queue.
Remove the timer if you fail, and more people will be willing to try it out and learn from their mistakes, instead of playing it safe. The 30 minute penalty is too harsh for people on limited time. I can't really learn anything if there is a 30 minute window between trial-and-error motions.
Just give us 4 super-buffed AI friendlies to let us solo queued content. I trust Cryptic's AI more than I trust some of these players I run into. At least AI has 0 chance of being an AFKer or Leecher. Similarly, just give us 16 AI NPCs for 20-man content.
E: Remove the timers for 20-man content entirely. This is pretty self-explanatory. One reason Mine Trap was so popular (at one time) is because there was no cooldown for that mission. I thought that was intentional -- but it turns out it wasn't.
The odds of finding 19 other people at the same time willing to do a 20-man event is hard enough as it is. If someone just got finished with a 20-man, they may be willing to go at it again. But those 19 other people will have to wait 30 minutes. Incentivize 20-man events as being lucrative by removing their timers to allow more players the opportunity to participate.
F: Make queues as lucrative as Argala in terms of Skill Point and Expertise gain. If you want players in the queues, start making it the one-stop-shop for everything you need to progress in the game. What do you have to lose, really?
Friend: "Lets go do Bug Hunt, I need Ancient Power Cells and Delta Marks for my Delta Alliance Rep Gear."
Iconians: "I really want more spec points for the Command and Intelligence trees, and the Commando tree which I haven't started on... Bug Hunt just doesn't have that big of a payout as compared to Argala."
Friend: "The alternate advancement specialization trees are not that appealing to me, though. Okay, so we both want to play the game and play it together, but we both want two different things and because there are only so many hours in the day in which to play, we're going to be fragmented."
Iconians: "Pretty much, unless Cryptic starts making some changes."
Said this in the other thread already, but since I'd really like for this feedback to be taken into consideration, I'll throw it in here too...
All of this. Outside of the AI stuff, having watched a fleet support Negh'var cause an ISA to fail the other night. But everything else on this list is a great suggestion and will really improve the state of queued missions.
Frankly, effort needs to be rewarded more. The adventure/battlezones are great fun and reward really well! (ehh, maybe not New Romulus or Kobali, but the latter's biggest draw seems to be skill points) The queues are the opposite, most of them are long, they're tedious and can fail outright if you get in with a bad team. The rewards are pitiful in comparison, and it seems all queues have going for them now are R&D materials.
All of this. Outside of the AI stuff, having watched a fleet support Negh'var cause an ISA to fail the other night.
I've been there too. Only with the Typhoon Battleship that used Tractor Beam Repulsors at the wrong time...
Frankly, effort needs to be rewarded more. The adventure/battlezones are great fun and reward really well! (ehh, maybe not New Romulus or Kobali, but the latter's biggest draw seems to be skill points) The queues are the opposite, most of them are long, they're tedious and can fail outright if you get in with a bad team. The rewards are pitiful in comparison, and it seems all queues have going for them now are R&D materials.
The biggest draw to the battlezones for me is the consistency in playership. Before the battlezones I was happy as a clam doing Starbase Fleet Defense and Mine Trap. Even if all I was doing was rolling my eyes and condescendingly mocking the bad players in them, I was having fun and the rewards were nice.
I don't want to grind Argala. But if I want Skill Points/Expertise, that's where I'm going to have to go. I would much rather hang out in the Voth or Undine Battlezones and see all the different ships players are using, or the costumes they're wearing. You know, actually feeling like part of a team. But then I don't get the Skill Points/Expertise in a reasonable amount of time, so the Battlezones then become a false choice.
NWS is obviously challenging, and I do understand where Cryptic is coming from in some respects. But they're really going about this the wrong way, I think.
The reason the No Win Scenario is losing its 'Unwinnability' factor is because of the private channels that focus specifically on NWS and DPS numbers. While the DPS Meta is not my cup of tea, and I've stated that many times -- do not confuse that with being blind to the fact it creates a fellowship between STO players in a way other content in the game does not.
Removing the NWS removes another facet of STO players being able to play with each other, united in a common goal (in this case the No Win Scenario). You nullify the importance of these private channels because the players are now too successful.
This is the biggest problem in Cryptic's decision making.
Stop punishing players who are too successful. Because you not only penalize them, you penalize everybody. For what? The sake of fairness?
What is the point of even having a challenging game if you're going to have to remove it and make some alterations to it because now players are just becoming too good at winning it?
I have to agree with your statement. I have an toon that needs Omega rep. I tried advanced a couple of times, (PUG) (for BNPs) and got my TRIBBLE handed to me. I just gave up working on the rep completely.
Delta Rising has practically killed the game for me due to insane cost of upgrades (280 hours of farm to upgrade single set of equipment from mk xii to xiv on single toon, I have six) and easily fail-able advanced instances - decreasing rewards won't improve that.
It look like devs are simply sabotaging the game and want to shut it down. Decrease advanced difficulty and upgrades cost by 2.5 factor maybe?
Decreasing rewards on old content is a very bad idea. You will kill the last of running PvE-queues with your decision. Increasing rewards on DR content is like you force us to play your new shiny content.
My good old fleet from the first days of STO is dying more and more. We need over 29.000 fleet marks for an upgrade. Now you decrease the rewards and we are taking longer and longer and loosing our motivation and loosing members.
You are killing the last PUG queues which are instantly running. Is that your answer on the dead queues?
I have a real life and i have limited time to play. I don't want to play the same missions x time. I want variety and fun in my free time. And i want to make progress in a game. You force me to play the same mission x times to get a reward for play. This is no fun.
Whats coming up next? Mark boxes in C-Store? Buying mark boxes to leave the bad grind behind me for upgrading the fleet and my reputation? so that i can play your (good) story missions and foundry?
The base mark rewards for successfully completing this PvE queue have been decreased from 40 to 30 marks.
Fleet Alert
The mark rewards for completing waves one and two have been decreased from 10 to 5 marks. The mark rewards for completing wave five has been decreased from 18 to 15. The mark rewards for completing waves three and four remain unchanged at 10 marks.
Way to kick a dead horse... Can't remember when was the last time I managed to get a full team for these on the KDF side. Now it's going to be even less desirable. Thanks, Cryptic, that was totally necessary and will certainly help bring these dead queues back to life... oh, wait...
Seems I'm finding myself scanning the forums more of late but only to see what's happening in STO and seeing if it bring me back/drives me away further though I'm down to turning over 3 characters R&D as it is and I've already got 1 character who's done it all!
I can see what Cryptic might be trying to do; alter reward and difficulty rather than heavily affect one or the other and other changes might make these seem more reaonable later. This may also be an effort to address 'balance' though this is not what I meant.
That being said I'm not supporting Cryptic on this heck no I'm just trying to see it from their perpective even if they don't care about mine or other peoples (and not acting or even responding to feedback is as good as ignoring). It took a resounding voice from the community to get an opt out for this ship transition the moment it was posted and even then we have to opt out but I'll take that as a win.
Really though I'm not that bothered by these changes oddly enough because I'm not really playing the content as it is. It's hard to be critical of something that you're not affected by and it's probably more reason not to return to that content. Besides Cryptic will push this through anyway.
New lockbox coming and I'm thinking.....given I barely play do I need to invest even if it's through the exchange? Do I need to grind XP or anything for that matter? As a LTS I can't say I quit, I can come back anytime, play the free story content and wait until the next story and I think time will answer that for me rather than make a conscious decision. Cryptpic can decide whther I play more or not but I've given a lot of the last 5 years to STO so it's not like I've not got my fill and maybe I just need a break but breaks are only worth it if you're looking forward to coming back, which I'm not. Monetizing only works if you get people to play your game and for me that isn't happening.
So if we aren't happy with these changes adapt as best you can I guess until you're left between not playing (not the same as quitting I might add, can still come back) and playing that bit of content you've simply had enough of or refuse to play and then make a choice.
I'm just waiting for the day when all of this comes back to bite Cryptic and they're forced to make a U-turn or just close up shop saying STO's run it's course not long after they've said the latest season was the most successful ever .
The rewards were already not worth the time invested and now they're going to be reduced further?
What genius decided this was a good thing? Must be some high quality stuff you're smokin' to be so disconnected from reality. Pretty obvious pwe/cryptic doesn't have a drug screen policy
Stopped playing the Ques right after I tried a few out post DR. Finishing the Storyline and the Reps because I want to. After this, probably just log in to Doff and do the Foundry. At least the Foundry Authors care about a positive experience for the player.
"Let's see. I have about thirty minutes to waste in the waiting room of the dentist's office. Which browser game am I going to use to help me kill this, Farmville or STO?"
Did Zynga buy Cryptic when no one was looking?
A six year old boy and his starship. Living the dream.
Wow, genius, I can really see why more and more people would want to rush back to lay all the old queues, especially the dying ones, you really gave a fresh new motivation to do so.
Just remove the queues you don't want people to play (as you just did with NWS), you don't have to gradually kill them off, just remove them and bring them back twice a year, they players love that (see the Mirror Invasion), or just remove them all together and ignore any requests for obviously popular content (see Terradome).
Or alternatively improve them, introduce cross teaming all over, lower the required levels for some of the Rep easy queues to 40 or something (whenever the reps are unlocked), lower the team numbers (down from 20 to 10), most people are OP now apparently, bring back the full length STFs (alongside the new shorter ones), and finally make the rewards worth peoples time, 30 marks is worth nobody's time.
Bug Hunt
The rewards for successfully completing the Normal difficulty version of this PvE queue have been increased by an additional 25% above what they have been previously, while the rewards for successfully completing the Advanced difficulty version have been increased by an additional 50% and the rewards for successfully completing the Elite difficulty version have been increased by 75%.
Atmosphere Assault
The rewards for successfully completing the Normal difficulty version of this PvE queue have been increased by an additional 250% above what they have been previously while the rewards for successfully completing the Advanced difficulty version have been increased by an additional 400% above what they have been previously. Additionally, the Elachi Walkers have had their hull and shields reduced.
Not bad, so why aren't the others getting a boost in marks or other rewards?
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
as an intp i am really trying to understand the thought process behind this, yet the only thing i can come up with is the realisation that grinding isnt enough. i need to grind DR for it to even matter.
great work cryptic. DR is the best expansion ever, and i love it.
Well thanks. It's been a (mostly) fun five years, now you can go file this game where the sun don't shine. You've very effectively removed all enjoyment from playing.
Join date is wrong, I've actually been around since STO Beta.
True alters don't have a "main". Account wide unlocks for all unique event rewards!!
I know the feeling. I only have one single character doing any sort of crafting. I can't be bothered to do that on even a second character.
Forgot to mention I've already got 1 character that's done the R&D so I have 'no' reason to do alts as well it's only so that I can craft more items with a higher chance but since I'm not playing, no need to craft so....no need to grind R&D? Everything revolves around having a reason to log in and play the game. If I'm logging in just to grind all to get better stuff to play the same content I just used for grinding seems a waste of time and it's not like I can just do tougher missions because it's a team effort and that's if the queues aren't dead (which this reinforces that point).
Why do I login at all? As a fleet leader, and a chat channel Admin, I simply have this going beside me so I can monitor the chat and fleet while I do actual work. My office desk is a very handy L shape, so I can have my work in front of me, and the computer beside me.
But do I ever login during my free time to actually PLAY? That is a rare thing, at best.
Comments
If the pugs I'm in fail more than once in a blue moon, I will not pug said STF anymore. I shall then only run private queues until I can carry any pug with great success.
I can tell from the timer that most pugs will fail now, so Bug Hunt it is. I don't mind that one though.
Just expect to see a decline in failrate on any popular stf, either because the undergeared player learns to stay out of it the hard way, or - and we humans are known to do that - learn to be better at it.
And either increase the difficulty or decrease the reward. Doing both will overshoot for sure.
Riddle me this: What happens when you make something MORE difficult while simultaneously making it LESS rewarding?
Answer: People. Stop. Doing. It.
You're not improving anything with these PvE changes, absolutely nothing. You are, in fact, making the PvE queues WORSE. The thing that boggles my mind is that you have the audacity to try to make it sound like a good thing.
NEWS FLASH: It isn't! Is somebody off their medication over there or something?
When this thing goes live your end game content (i.e. the PvE queues) will take yet another nosedive, and it was already well on its way to becoming a ghost town. And the player reaction, well ... I don't expect that to be pretty, to say the least.
What, exactly, do you guys expect us to be doing at the end of the game?
It sure seems like reducing rewards for playing the queues - already on the low side IMO - is only going to further drive people away from them and this game in general.
We are not seeing the big picture here. Perhaps you guys (devs) might cue us in a little on some of the long-term vision here? What does reducing rewards for Normal queue missions do for you exactly? I already barely play Advanced since DR and now you're going to make Normal even less worthwhile?
You guys have done a great job with the storyline missions. They have come a long way in the last five years. What you are doing to the game mechanics, I can't follow. Well, I guess I follow - it's going more and more toward using specialized ships, abilities, boffs, etc. to be competitive in "end game."
I dislike this. I'm probably in the minority of players, but I don't necessarily want to have to run around DPS-ing everything just to survive the content. You are pigeon-holing people into a certain playstyle. I want to play this game the way I want to play it. It's my time and money and I certainly have a choice of whether or not I want to spend any more of either here.
Any devs want to give any feedback about where you all are taking this thing?
In today's world, this is a definite possibility. Sick but a possibility.
Games are supposed to be the opposite of work.
I like Trek, but I'm tired of feeling like a slave to your grind. My ships are now way too powerful for normal queues, and not yet strong enough for Elite. Advanced takes too long to be rewarding when I am lucky enough to be in a pug that has a skill set similar to mine & we succeed.
What should have happened was the introduction of a difficulty tier beyond elite to satisfy the needs of the few who wanted that. Instead, 99% of us got the shaft. You made us have to re-purchase everything we'd already worked or paid for, and it still won't get us over the paywall that bars the way to the new Elite. It is cost prohibitive, and too much of a gamble.
Fix upgrades, and fix rewards to benefit the players; or reap what you sow with every nerf.
:mad::mad::mad:
This is an extremely reasonable question, and I would very much be interested in a response from Cryptic on how and why they came to this decision from a "quality improvement" perspective.
Allow yourself to be herded into new content, spend earned resources on gear related to that content right around the time you get bored of it, stop playing older content for dilithium, deplete your dilithium reserves on upgrades, and wait patiently with a fistful of dollars for new content and ships.
As for new players trying to grind fleet and rep gear with perpetually empty queues and tight fail conditions at the difficulty levels that actually reward currency for said gear, I'm not sure what Cryptic expects them to do. Not play, I expect. I don't think they care anymore. I think they're doubling down on established players, and trying to tweak things to get them to open their wallets more often.
It sure as [REDACTED] seems that way.
People want to make the most out of the limited playing time they have. If they want Fleet Marks, they will grind Fleet Alert and NWS. If they want Expertise/Skill Points they will grind Argala. If they want whatever reputation currency, they will pick the easiest mission that requires the least amount of thought and skill, and is populated by like-minded players who do not need to think or use skill and still have a reasonably high chance for success.
If you nerf the rewards without offering something in return, you encourage less participation.
People are already limited to joining 3 missions at a time. People who are casual will just pick the three most popular events there are.
If you want my constructive solution?
A: Remove the queue limit. Queue for as many missions as you want. This has the immediate short-term effect of making the queues look way more populated, which can bait other players into queueing for them since they actually see players in them and think it might actually pop for them in a reasonable amount of wait time.
B: Remove or reduce the timer between events. With more people able to queue for a mission they actually enjoy doing, this means it will pop more often.
C: Remove the timer entirely for failed events, but also remove any failure rewards entirely. This incentivizes people into doing the Advanced and Elite queues more often. I have little interest in doing Elite missions because the chance of failure is so high, but also because it puts me on a 30 minute cooldown regardless of whether I fail or succeed. I will make the smart gamble and simply get less reward for a higher likelihood of success from the PUG members in the queue.
Remove the timer if you fail, and more people will be willing to try it out and learn from their mistakes, instead of playing it safe. The 30 minute penalty is too harsh for people on limited time. I can't really learn anything if there is a 30 minute window between trial-and-error motions.
E: Remove the timers for 20-man content entirely. This is pretty self-explanatory. One reason Mine Trap was so popular (at one time) is because there was no cooldown for that mission. I thought that was intentional -- but it turns out it wasn't.
The odds of finding 19 other people at the same time willing to do a 20-man event is hard enough as it is. If someone just got finished with a 20-man, they may be willing to go at it again. But those 19 other people will have to wait 30 minutes. Incentivize 20-man events as being lucrative by removing their timers to allow more players the opportunity to participate.
F: Make queues as lucrative as Argala in terms of Skill Point and Expertise gain. If you want players in the queues, start making it the one-stop-shop for everything you need to progress in the game. What do you have to lose, really?
All of this. Outside of the AI stuff, having watched a fleet support Negh'var cause an ISA to fail the other night. But everything else on this list is a great suggestion and will really improve the state of queued missions.
Frankly, effort needs to be rewarded more. The adventure/battlezones are great fun and reward really well! (ehh, maybe not New Romulus or Kobali, but the latter's biggest draw seems to be skill points) The queues are the opposite, most of them are long, they're tedious and can fail outright if you get in with a bad team. The rewards are pitiful in comparison, and it seems all queues have going for them now are R&D materials.
I've been there too. Only with the Typhoon Battleship that used Tractor Beam Repulsors at the wrong time...
The biggest draw to the battlezones for me is the consistency in playership. Before the battlezones I was happy as a clam doing Starbase Fleet Defense and Mine Trap. Even if all I was doing was rolling my eyes and condescendingly mocking the bad players in them, I was having fun and the rewards were nice.
I don't want to grind Argala. But if I want Skill Points/Expertise, that's where I'm going to have to go. I would much rather hang out in the Voth or Undine Battlezones and see all the different ships players are using, or the costumes they're wearing. You know, actually feeling like part of a team. But then I don't get the Skill Points/Expertise in a reasonable amount of time, so the Battlezones then become a false choice.
NWS is obviously challenging, and I do understand where Cryptic is coming from in some respects. But they're really going about this the wrong way, I think.
The reason the No Win Scenario is losing its 'Unwinnability' factor is because of the private channels that focus specifically on NWS and DPS numbers. While the DPS Meta is not my cup of tea, and I've stated that many times -- do not confuse that with being blind to the fact it creates a fellowship between STO players in a way other content in the game does not.
Removing the NWS removes another facet of STO players being able to play with each other, united in a common goal (in this case the No Win Scenario). You nullify the importance of these private channels because the players are now too successful.
This is the biggest problem in Cryptic's decision making.
Stop punishing players who are too successful. Because you not only penalize them, you penalize everybody. For what? The sake of fairness?
What is the point of even having a challenging game if you're going to have to remove it and make some alterations to it because now players are just becoming too good at winning it?
I have to agree with your statement. I have an toon that needs Omega rep. I tried advanced a couple of times, (PUG) (for BNPs) and got my TRIBBLE handed to me. I just gave up working on the rep completely.
It look like devs are simply sabotaging the game and want to shut it down. Decrease advanced difficulty and upgrades cost by 2.5 factor maybe?
My good old fleet from the first days of STO is dying more and more. We need over 29.000 fleet marks for an upgrade. Now you decrease the rewards and we are taking longer and longer and loosing our motivation and loosing members.
You are killing the last PUG queues which are instantly running. Is that your answer on the dead queues?
I have a real life and i have limited time to play. I don't want to play the same missions x time. I want variety and fun in my free time. And i want to make progress in a game. You force me to play the same mission x times to get a reward for play. This is no fun.
Whats coming up next? Mark boxes in C-Store? Buying mark boxes to leave the bad grind behind me for upgrading the fleet and my reputation? so that i can play your (good) story missions and foundry?
I can see what Cryptic might be trying to do; alter reward and difficulty rather than heavily affect one or the other and other changes might make these seem more reaonable later. This may also be an effort to address 'balance' though this is not what I meant.
That being said I'm not supporting Cryptic on this heck no I'm just trying to see it from their perpective even if they don't care about mine or other peoples (and not acting or even responding to feedback is as good as ignoring). It took a resounding voice from the community to get an opt out for this ship transition the moment it was posted and even then we have to opt out but I'll take that as a win.
Really though I'm not that bothered by these changes oddly enough because I'm not really playing the content as it is. It's hard to be critical of something that you're not affected by and it's probably more reason not to return to that content. Besides Cryptic will push this through anyway.
New lockbox coming and I'm thinking.....given I barely play do I need to invest even if it's through the exchange? Do I need to grind XP or anything for that matter? As a LTS I can't say I quit, I can come back anytime, play the free story content and wait until the next story and I think time will answer that for me rather than make a conscious decision. Cryptpic can decide whther I play more or not but I've given a lot of the last 5 years to STO so it's not like I've not got my fill and maybe I just need a break but breaks are only worth it if you're looking forward to coming back, which I'm not. Monetizing only works if you get people to play your game and for me that isn't happening.
So if we aren't happy with these changes adapt as best you can I guess until you're left between not playing (not the same as quitting I might add, can still come back) and playing that bit of content you've simply had enough of or refuse to play and then make a choice.
I'm just waiting for the day when all of this comes back to bite Cryptic and they're forced to make a U-turn or just close up shop saying STO's run it's course not long after they've said the latest season was the most successful ever
What genius decided this was a good thing? Must be some high quality stuff you're smokin' to be so disconnected from reality. Pretty obvious pwe/cryptic doesn't have a drug screen policy
Stopped playing the Ques right after I tried a few out post DR. Finishing the Storyline and the Reps because I want to. After this, probably just log in to Doff and do the Foundry. At least the Foundry Authors care about a positive experience for the player.
"Let's see. I have about thirty minutes to waste in the waiting room of the dentist's office. Which browser game am I going to use to help me kill this, Farmville or STO?"
Did Zynga buy Cryptic when no one was looking?
Just remove the queues you don't want people to play (as you just did with NWS), you don't have to gradually kill them off, just remove them and bring them back twice a year, they players love that (see the Mirror Invasion), or just remove them all together and ignore any requests for obviously popular content (see Terradome).
Or alternatively improve them, introduce cross teaming all over, lower the required levels for some of the Rep easy queues to 40 or something (whenever the reps are unlocked), lower the team numbers (down from 20 to 10), most people are OP now apparently, bring back the full length STFs (alongside the new shorter ones), and finally make the rewards worth peoples time, 30 marks is worth nobody's time.
Not bad, so why aren't the others getting a boost in marks or other rewards?
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
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great work cryptic. DR is the best expansion ever, and i love it.
free jkname
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Forgot to mention I've already got 1 character that's done the R&D so I have 'no' reason to do alts as well it's only so that I can craft more items with a higher chance but since I'm not playing, no need to craft so....no need to grind R&D? Everything revolves around having a reason to log in and play the game. If I'm logging in just to grind all to get better stuff to play the same content I just used for grinding seems a waste of time and it's not like I can just do tougher missions because it's a team effort and that's if the queues aren't dead (which this reinforces that point).
But do I ever login during my free time to actually PLAY? That is a rare thing, at best.
My Ship Builds: USS Conqueror, HMS Victorious, HMS Concord, ISS Queen Elizabeth, Black Widow III
Click here to view my DeviantArt.