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Borg Cooperative/Liberated Borg Faction closer than we think!
quiiliitiila
Member Posts: 309 Arc User
Just finished up listening to the latest Priority One episode with Gecko and boy was I surprised to hear that the Borg Cooperative or some sort of Liberated Borg faction was seriously considered as a new faction with Delta Rising. So much so that they did out an entire flight model with how Borg ships would fly. Listen HERE at around 1 hour and 15 minutes.
Gecko went on to say that in the future, the two leading factions for playability are Liberated Borg/Cooperative and Dominion, but because they've already given away all of the Dominion ships it'd be awkward to do.
Well, color me excited.
-Quiiliitiila
Gecko went on to say that in the future, the two leading factions for playability are Liberated Borg/Cooperative and Dominion, but because they've already given away all of the Dominion ships it'd be awkward to do.
Well, color me excited.
-Quiiliitiila
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Honestly though, I think more factions is exactly what the game needs to diversify and give something for everyone. Yes I get that the Star Trek universe is mainly about the Federation and to a lesser extent the KDF, but when they added the Romulan Republic it added so much story wise that I think it brought a lot to the game over all. Could it have been done better? Yeah, that's not in dispute, but we know that it was fresh and new and brought a bunch of players back. I'll be honest, I was thinking of leaving the game for a while before LoR came out. Then I saw the announcement and was pumped. Something other that Federation and KDF?! I made a Reman and never looked back, I honestly wouldn't want to play as one of the other two factions now. :eek:
I guess to sum it up; adding another faction and possibly even more after that some time down the road can only got to enhancing the game, I don't see any detractors as they've already said it'll take a while before they get to it because of quality of
life improvements and more endgame stuff.
Still, I can't wait. My cube is calling to me :P
-Q
Agreed. New faction has the greatest novelty factor but there's plenty of room to fill out the KDF. For what a new faction could do a Fel'khir revamp + QOL improvements (including new KDF species) would improve the game so much more (because its directly complimenting existing content while rectifying that content's deficiencies. The effects are additive.)
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
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I'm really not into a Borg faction. I would like them to do a Dominion faction, but like you said with the lockboxes, it seems improbable now.
Borg faction just seems unnecessary and takes away from some of the things we need in this game including improvements to the factions already here. A dominion wouldn't be so bad if only because we've never really had a chance to get to know the Gamma Quadrant. I'd love to have that feeling of going some place that I've never been before.
if its not wrriten down anywhere, i cant take it seriously.
Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
I got to agree with this... and add that I think the Romulan faction needs work too.
part of me likes that the Romulans have to decide between the Federation and the KDF, but what if you don't want either... the Romulans (in my limited opinion) should be able to choose the Tal Shiar or the Star Empire as well and not be a Federation or KDF lacky.
At a certain point a new faction will have to be added to inject life into the lower-end content (which may have been the point of the Delta Recruitment event, stimulate new character creation to stop people from burning out on perpetually grinding end-game content.) But I think the point to be made here is that's only one option among several to "refresh" the game (and IMO not the most promising).
Borg mini-faction? Yah that would be cool and it should be said that it may be the most promising new faction option (both the xindi and dominion have sizable shipyard issues and I doubt that cryptic would ever seriously consider the Ferengi). But, as cool as that may be you could also effectively create a new faction by revamping the KDF (some of the early missions, the Fel'Khir series, the hubs, customization options, ect.) supported by a multi-faction series with a strong KDF bent (similar to Nimbus in the romulan arc) so long as you also include some extra reasons for creating a new KDF character (ie. new KDF species options for all).
That work would then lead into an existing end-game shipyard of KDF vessels that would only need a few add-ons to really flush out (ex. T6 KDF gorn sci carrier, T6 BOP, T6 Nausicaan Raider) which would immensely help existing KDF characters.
Its a much more sensible challenge that fills in some fairly large holes in the game, and could occupy the space of a season (leaving the next expansion, should it ever come, to refresh the end-game, maybe still with playable borg content but perhaps worked in as a new specialization instead of a faction.)
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
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I see the issue, but I wouldn't say that it "dilutes" the fanbase. I'd say it improves the fanbase. I've always been a huge fan of the Borg. I HATE what STOs done to make them so weak and the punching bag of literally everything in the galaxy. I'd be so happy to finally be in a Borg faction (Cooperative) that even slightly resembled the progression of the LoR faction. In the end, all of the factions have the same end-game content anyway, so as long as there is some story arc leading you there, most fans of the faction should be happy.
Instead of bottling everyone up into a faction they sorta like; but having them yearn for a day when they could play for another faction, have them actually be in said faction. As I said, we're all fans of Star Trek, but we all like different things about. I'd also like a full Gorn faction where we can throw off the oppressive yoke of the filthy Klingon dogs. But that probably won't happen. People like getting what they want to play. Someone who wants to play a certain faction, won't be complaining because they only got 20 missions, they'll be damn happy that they are playing that faction at all.
They are already planning the Fel'khir revamp and numerous QOL improvements. Any new faction would be in the future. Also, there will always be need for QOL improvements. Saying that they shouldn't add new content until they finish QOL improvements is akin to saying we should try to dry our clothes in the rain, it'll never happen. There will always be something that needs improvement, halting new content to focus on QOL would halt the entire game advancement. Look a Champions Online, they don't have enough funding to actually add any new content so all they do are QOL improvements. That's all they've been doing for over three years and they STILL have more to do. I don't want that to be STO.
-Quiil
Why? What's idiotic about adding new factions to the game?
I've always been a proponent that the Romulans choose between not the KDF and Federation, but the Star Empire and Tal'Shiar or remain just neutral. But I see why the devs did what they did. The entirety of the game always differentiated between Fed and KDF. All of the featured episodes, all of the endgame content prior to LoR. They all were scripted with only those two factions in mind. The devs never considered a third faction when making them and only wrote in lines for the KDF or Federation. It would've cost far to much to re do them all.
Re-vamping the KDF would not be akin to a new faction, it'd be nice though. But at the end of the day, people who don't like the KDF wouldn't really care. I sincerely doubt that aside from re-tooling the Fel'khir (which they are planning) and adding a bunch of new ships (which I hope will have some of the KDF contributor races in there *cough* Gorn *cough*) I don't see much more happening on the KDF side, or the Fed side. They're just moving forward with endgame and possible new expansions. I just hope one of them's the Cooperative/Liberated Borg.
-Q
Well, that's taking what he said a little too far.
That does not mean a Libbie Borg faction is coming. I think the only definite thing to take from that is: there will never be a "Borg Lock Box," because they want to save the ships for an eventual faction.
That does NOT mean that Liberated Borg are next up... logically speaking, he's right to point out that that it'll happen eventually (it would be wildly popular). I still think the smart money is on the Cardassians (read: different from "The Dominion").
In short, I think this segment was the "dreamer/speculative" side of Geko-speak... with the nugget of, "hey, this is possible because of this flight system."
As far as cooperating with the other factions for faction agnostic missions, it's mainly due to needing to find out more about what's going on with the Iconians as well as trying to temporarily build alliances until Sela is recovered, then follow her decisions. And on the side, do something similar to the Iconian relic bit exclusive to DR players; except instead as an Imperial Romulan, you discreetly hack some data concerning your allies and your enemies in some missions.
As well, have some unique dialogue that shows you don't really give a damn about the groups your aiding, but just doing it because Iconians and Sela is your primary concern. Such as in Dust to Dust, you'd insult the Samsar captain when storming the temple solo (telling him how worthless they are despite all the memories of the dead they have that they could have relied on to fight back), tell Jhetlya and Kim to shut up with their arguments or you'll just strand them in the maze or pit room, and either punch out Keten or bluntly tell him he died, he's mutating, and he cannot go back.
The Delta Recruit campaign shows they can go back and come up with some unique personalization of missions for a specific group, so I don't see why they can't show things from the Imperial side now. As well, add faction-specific optionals that have different results, similar to the old class-specific optionals.
Well I'm thinking that the QOL improvements would be those things a new faction would get (customes, species, bridge officer types) except applied to the KDF to make up for existing content gaps. That, along with the revamp, would serve as the basis of a KDF revival. The rest would be a new season that ties into the KDF-upgrades (by including end-game episodes that directly related to the KDF content, while including something like a revamp of Qo'Nos.)
Basically what I'm asking for is a themed KDF season with a focus on how the faction is setup to encourage players to take another look at it, even if they've done so already. That satisfied the mechanical needs of a new faction (ie. new characters) and structures content in such a way that makes sense post-iconians (opening up new aspects of the STO universe without banging on the same types of plot threads. Ie. they're coming.)
With that taken care of then you can approach the next content batch (ie. the borg) with some other idea than "LET'S DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN!" (for example: a borg specialization available to all characters, assimilated ship upgrades, and co-operative ships as the new spec ship type) which would be very progressive indeed.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Having said that and using the Romulan faction as a template, this might not be quite as much work as you're worried about. A few missions for leveling up to the merge point in the Cardassia sector and after that ships. Ships being less labor intensive to design than interiors, it's not unreasonable to expect them to be able to maintain a fourth or fifth faction.
In the current climate, I just cannot see another half faction being added and it getting full support like KDF and RP don't...
That a playable Cooperative faction makes a hash out of the stories of the Cardassian Struggle and Delta Quadrant missions is an issue, but one that I could live with. Neither am I too concerned about splitting the player base further, if the cross-faction alliance against the Iconians is going to be a long term status quo. The bigger questions, in my mind, would be whether the Cooperative Captain gets a bridge crew of fellow Liberated Borg? If so, what are their Traits? What happens to the Liberated Borg Bridge Officers already in the Zen and Lobi stores? Does the [AMP] stat on Fleet Warp Cores make it necessary to nerf the Efficient trait, once players can stack it on every Boff on their bridges? I think details like these would have to be worked out before the developers really go through with it.
I never said that it was going to happen SOON, merely that it may actually happen at all. For a while it seemed as though we may never get a Cooperative/Liberated Borg faction, considering all the hate the idea gets by a vocal few. :rolleyes:
I didn't get the impression of it being dreamer/speculative. It was actually something they toyed about with doing, to the point that they took the time to come up with, code and test a flight system for Borg ships. Seems like more work for a merely a dream than I'd expect. They probably wanted to focus on other things for Delta rising and figured another faction would take to many resources away from all of the plans for the Iconians and featured episodes they were working on.
I can totally get behind revamping KDF stuff. Trust me. I dropped my Federation character for a Gorn and then rolled a Reman allied with the KDF with Legacy of Romulus. I enjoy playing STO from the eyes of a different species/allegiance than just the Federation, I love that STO allows me to do that. With a Cooperative/Liberated Borg faction, I'd get to play as one of my all time favorite "species"... The Borg. The amount of story writing that could go into that would be amazing, it'd allow us to see and live as one of the most frightening and intriguing species that Star Trek has ever invented. We'd get to explore implications of past actions and future ones, deal with the scars of our past "life" and struggle to find a future in a universe that hates us.
I think the story alone would be simply stunning, and I look forward to it dearly. Frankly I think the story writers for STO have done a great job so far (with the exception of a few things) and I think they'd do a great job with a Liberated Borg/Cooperative faction.
-Q
I'd imagine we'd get other Liberated/Cooperative Borg as bridge officers. Nothing else would make sense, plus they already have the models for it. As you said, there are plenty of Borgified aliens and species as assets in the game already, not to mention the normal Borg models. We know that many Cooperative Borg still retain their cybernetic implants, and we've actually only seen a select few who look like the game's "traditional" liberated Borg.
I expect to have a "Borg" race with a selection of customizations we've seen IG already plus a few more I'd think. Then we may have some other more "liberated" Borg race that could be one of the normal races only borgified. Mayhaps a Gorn?
The Liberated Borg bridge officers in the Lobi store and Zen store would stay the same, just because we'd have a Borg faction doesn't mean other factions would get Borg officers. They'd still have to earn them or buy them.
As for the AMP modifier and Efficient trait, well... It's possible they may come up with another trait for the Cooperative Borg, who knows.
Do Cubes and Sphere's have warp cores?
But unfortunately, I really believe that existing factions, and their refinement, is more important for the game now, than to add up yet another faction. I believe we all would be unhappy, if they released another faction, without proper time invested into it again, only to see it neglected - in the end, there's only so much time and so many resources people can invest, and it's clear they are limited, as far as things go.
Would I be happy to see more Liberated Borg theme & all that? Heck.. yes, sign me up. But, reitrating... faction, any faction, would not be good for the game, imho.
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"bIghojchugh DaneH, Dumev pagh. bIghojqangbe'chugh, DuQaHlaH pagh."
"Learn lots. Don't judge. Laugh for no reason. Be nice. Seek happiness." ~Day[9]
"Your fun isn't wrong." ~LaughingTrendy
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Personally before anything else (personally and otherwise) Cardassians should be next as they placed 2nd in the vote below Romulans...
Besides it scares me how powerful they would make pseudo-borg to sell them
not really if the dominion did arrive as a faction then they could spin the lock box stuff as what the xindi have done and while its very un-dominion like it would still work and people would be fine with it.