since Salamiinferno took the reins of EP from Stephen D'Angelo. We are now entering the period where the new EP's policies, vision and drive should be showing some tangible results, and the old EP's policies should be just about run out.
Keep it civil, but let's discuss what expectations from the player-base are there, now that we're about at the end-point of the last-guy's policies, also, what changes have already been made that you, as a player, attribute to the current EP vs. the previous guys (Stahl, D'Angelo)?
A) Are you, as players, seeing net positives from the current EP's term?
B)What do you think is going to show up in the next five to seven months in terms of playability?
C)Will this game ever get to the point it would be successful even if it were NOT tied to the Star Trek name? why or why not.
D) would you recommend this game to a gamer friend who isn't a rabid trekkie? Why, or why not?
E) Do you feel the game is balanced and accessable, able to provide a fun, immersive experience to new players while retaining old players? Why or why not?
F) if you see problems in terms of playability, can you articulate what those problems are, and do you have suggestions to solve those problems?
G) do you think any of your views or answers matter to the development team? Is the game providing a satisfying experience? Why, or why not.
H) what has Cryptic done WELL in the last half year, what would you like to see them do MORE of that they've done well in the last half year?
I) What still needs work, but has potential to be refined and improved in your opinion?
J) what would you feel motivated to pay real-life money to see in the game? How much?
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The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
D) Only with a fair amount of warning to only treat it like a once through single player game.
F) Delta Quadrant patrol grinds or no spec points for you! If they always have a weekly spec point then I'll at least be making some progress on them.
G) Not likely.
A) Yes, I'm seeing many positives from SalamiInferno's term as EP - especially compared to D'Angelo's term, however he still needs to do a lot of good work in order to only bring back the game on the level it was when Stahl left and 'Legacy of Romulus'. Then we can discuss on continuing into the positive direction the game was going in up to LoR.
B ) Things are getting too repetitive atm with every release and they need to break it with something. My guess is they'll attempt to do that with a Cardassian faction and venturing into the Gamma Quadrant.
C) No, because it's too bug ridden and too broken to be financially sucesfull as it is now without the IP. Many, many better games with similar theme out there now and in the near future.
Now, another new Cryptic home made space sci-fi MMO with spaceships and without the Star Trek IP that doesn't suffer from the engine, coding, bug, server and other problems I can see working out and being financially sucessfull.
D) At the moment, not really. Because if they're not rabbid trekkies, there are much better games they could be playing on the similar or even other themes.
E) Accessable, yes. Balanced, nope. Immersion has died a long time ago and fun is very subjective.
F) Things a lot of players are talking for a long time now - bugs, lag, disconects, monotonous gameplay, untested stuff being released, unbalanced stuff, being railroaded....
G) No, I don't think so. At the moment I'm between 'yes' and 'no', so more of a 'meh'. My game time has significantly reduced, but I blame that on D'Angelo's changes. Anyway, atm it's a bit too repetitive for me....it's like 'same old, same old' and the recent quality of FE has decreased in my eyes.
H) Trying to rectify mistakes made by the previous EP. Ricossa has done some very good corrections in that regard. The T6 ship releases as triplets, but one (or three) per faction is also a positive change.
I) Sector space, Doff system, R&D system, grond combat, space combat, implementing exploration.
J) Huh....well, exploration for one. Balanced PvE between careers for another. Then balanced PvP and implementing special PvP sectors with territory contol and PvP based revards. Faction specific storylines. Client side switch so my visuals show standard Star Trek ships and uniforms. These would make me open my wallet again for the first time since the Season 8 fiasco.
Oh, and the obligatory end-game Connie and NX.
C: Without the words Star Trek, it wouldn't have lasted this long. bugs, lag, disconnects, you name it they've got it.
E: It is highly imbalanced. now we have people posting claims of 200K DPS while most of us struggle to do reach 50K.
I am sorry this has become too much a post about DPS but my not doing so doesn't make this game any more friendly, immersive, balanced, anything of the sort.
F: Removing lag for certain. It is not nice to hit Eng team at 24% hull, and 3 seconds later becoming a debris field as the Eng team's effect never happened.
Spiking the HP on advanced queues was a bat'leth slash to the face. In fact for the first few days from when Delta Rising hit, HP was spiked even on Fleet Alert, a normal queue. It seems they backed off the HP spike on normals a few weeks later. The HP spike on normal is probably something we have to get used to, fine I get that. What is this game if not for a bit of challenge? But before we even think of actually trying to progress, to learn what the difference is between the two, we get flamed on the chat box. Now we have people queueing and ditching the moment they see a T5 ship. From bad to worse, we now have seemingly a reprieve, that the insta-fails, no longer instantly fail, but we still get the flamers, the T5 ditchers, the people with a DPSorGTFO mentality. Also it would be nice if the rumor of advanced rewards being gated behind finishing optionals, once again making them NON-optional, is false.
G: It would be nice if our concerns were being listened to but the bug reports are starting to back up my toilet.
H: 3 areas of sector space now mean slipstream is no longer an experiment in hitting a wall. Kudos for making warp 20 worthwhile. Some pretty good ships, particularly for the Romulans. I had only the Mogai for a decent warbird. Now I have a real nice cruiser (Vastam), a real nice attack (pilot) ship. And quite a few Fed and KDF ships as well. My one biggest problem is the increasing amount of yellow on KDF ships. They should be for the most part, red, and a small amount of yellow as on the pilot raptors, not half the lights or more being yellow as on the T6 Mogh. Other than that, I enjoyed those ships quite a bit.
I'd like to see more space battlezones, against enemies that are quite evil. Powerful as the Undine are, they at least seem to have a live and let live idea, aside from phantom invasion fleets and "Cooper"'s manipulation. I would like to see a Herald warzone. Also it would be nice if they redid the Defera war zone. Now it is not just the city alcoves plagued with bugs, the power plant also, forcing the team to change maps. Maybe they can add somewhere we can meet the borg queen herself. It's sad that the borg queen isn't the most malevolent presence in hive ground, given 1 of the 4 in the group could well be a venom spewing elitist in the group.
I: I have rarely upgraded anything that I had. During the Delta Recruit event, it was nice being able to upgrade a few times on a single upgrade, but after Mk X, the gains don't justify the massive dil dumping required. More reasonable dil costs and progress gained would be much preferred. Hundreds of thousands of dil thrown away at the wholesale rate for so little return on investment. I had 2 Mk X UR phaser DHCs that I was holding onto in case I did want to upgrade but in truth I could not punish my already beaten down dil supply for so little result. I hit discard on both of them. If I'm going to upgrade, they have to reduce the dil price, or (at least) increase the progress gained. It wouldn't hurt them for improved upgrades to be available at the requisition shops either.
J: There was a time, recently, I was jazzed up about rumors of upcoming ships. And if I didn't have enough zen saved, I might have gotten some more that way. But now, with all the "nOOb" flaming and T5 ditching on the queues, the sheer malice and hate on the game and forums as well, the queues are something I don't even want to look at anymore, normal or advanced. Given all that's left is just the hunting on Defera and Undine sphere space, I'm hard pressed to find any motivation at all to getting anything at all, cash or dil to zen.
1. I like the Sector Space revamp. I like the fact that sector walls were torn down and I love the way that star system including planets were done. Flying by them is awesome!
2. I like the weekly rewards for missions. I'm able to play normally with my main and earn spec points along the way, and I use the weekly spec point to buff up my most important alt.
3. I like (generally) that after the leveling/XP debacle after the release of DR, that XP has been buffed everywhere instead of just Argala and Gerren. I still think that it takes way too long to level a toon to 60 but I'm ok with the amount xp that it takes to get spec points after hitting level 60.
4. I love the artwork that the devs are doing on new maps in missions. The stars/nebulas/galaxy background is just spectacular.
5. I like the new Armada system and think that it's an excellent addition to fleets
6. I like the upgrading system and I think that the crafting revamp was done nearly perfectly.
7. I am absolutely in love with the way that event ships are handled for alts. The discount to 40 event currency last year was already great but the new system is even better since any new toons get access without ever being involved in the event.
There's probably more but I can't think of it right now.
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