What do you think the Cardassian Struggle revamp is going to be like?

vegeta50024

Back when they started to do revamps of whole mission arcs with the Klingon war for the Federation, they left the arc mostly intact except for one episode that they decided to remove from the game (War is good for Business). When it came time to redo another mission arc, they essentially gutted two arcs and combined them into one removing two episodes in the process.

-A Gathering Darkness: Collateral Damage and Asset Recovery from original Borg Collective arc went into the overall feel of this mission.
-Assimilation: This mission was revamped from the original Undine Advance arc.
-Where Angels Fear to Tread: This mission replaced The Return and omits an appearance of an Iconian ship.
-Fluid Dynamics: Completely revamped from the original intent.

State of Q and A Light in the Dark both got removed from the game, with the former possibly returning to the game one day.

Most recently, Cryptic revamped the Romulan Mystery arc, but unlike the previous revamps where they either left a majority of the episodes intact or combined them into a newer version, Cryptic gutted all the episodes and replaced them with just four episodes, a move that some people didn't like. The main reason being that this arc didn't even take the Romulan Republic into account. Some of the episodes though they kept elements of.

-Empress Sela: Completely new episode.
-Desperate Measures: This episode was made up of elements from By any Means and S'harien's Swords.
-Shadow Play: Completely new episode, has the player participate in the last part of the Elachi battle during the Romulan faction story Devil's Choice.
-Taris: This episode was made up of elements from Ground Zero and the original Taris while taking the Romulan faction story Revelations into account.

So now we have the Cardassian Struggle, which for the Federation is the last aging original story arc that launched with the game. About half the arc got tweaked so that they could give the Klingons and Romulans some more missions in which they could use to level up. Nonetheless, they are still aged in quality compared the new episodes. Since this arc is to serve as a background to the new mirror universe stuff coming, which one of the options do you think Cryptic took in giving this arc a fresh feel?

Feel free to comment below based on your poll choice!

graleron

Shorter. /10ch

gulberat

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

In particular there are some horrific maps (Cage of Fire and that awful Thomas Riker map) that need redone. However, what I would ideally like to see is the Mirror Universe stuff completely removed from the Cardassian arc, and integrated into any upcoming Tholian material there is, given that in canon we actually have an affiliation between the Tholians and MU. (Whereas in the Cardassian arc, it's just pure happenstance that both elements happened on DS9.)

kyrrok

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

There were snoozers of episodes in the Romulan and Cardassian arcs that I'd just rather hit skip and do patrols instead. The new Romulan episodes up to Vault (the whole arc actually) were much better and I look forward to that being the case in the Cardassian arc too.

leviathan99

Here is my prediction:

State of Q will return. As part of the Cardassian Struggle. Without present Borg or Iconian references. Because Iconians sponsoring time travel now makes zero sense.

We've known for awhile Geko wanted it back in some form and found that they have rights to use audio (including voices) from the show. They specifically investigated using audio of Sisko on the Saratoga.

The bullet points of my rough vision for where I see Cryptic going:

Season 11: New Dawn. Mirror (with repurposed Undine missions as Mirror missions). Removal of Dominion episodes with Cryptic (tm) comments. Winter event.

Season 11.5: New-ish Brunch. Cardassian missions remastered. Probably 6th anniversary stuff around this point. Teasers and maybe a title released for Expansion 3. State of Q returns here.

Season 12: Restoration of the Dominion missions, remastered. Prelude to Expansion 3. 50th anniversary Trek celebration and scattered throughout. Summer event begins.

Expansion 3: Late 3rd or early 4th quarter 2016. No level cap or ship tier increase but some major new mechanics, likely "away teams in space", playing up the connection to Dominion War style fleet battles. Maybe personal starbases. Fleet Captain system for BOffs and Admiralty system.

A Fleet Captain, treated as a cross between Flag Captain and Captain of the Fleet, will serve as the player's personal assistant. Sisko to our Ross. Other BOffs promoted to Captain will handle dormant ships. My prediction is that we'll be able to use the Flag Captain's specialization abilities in non-specialization slots.

dragnridr

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

I voted other, because we don't need episodes removed, just revamped. Romulan arc lost some good episodes because some people didn't think they were trekkie enough.

But knowing Cryptic's track record, at least 4 episodes will be gone and replaced with 1 maybe 2 episodes. Now, unless Cryptic can prove me wrong by making the episodes better WITHOUT removing them, then I doubt many players would even care anymore.

aesica

Go the route of the Klingon Arc (Improve on flow and quality, remove missions if not needed)

Hopefully they'll do the following:

1) Increase the reward quality to make them worth running. Currently, both the experience and loot rewards are bad enough to justify skipping the entire arc, up until you reach the Dominion arc.

2) Greatly increase the quality of each mission. Someone mentioned the Riker episode, which is a prime example of poor map flow in what could otherwise have been a decent mission for its time.

3) Separate it from the Dominion arc, as the Dominion arc really has little to do with Cardassians aside from maybe the bald guy who wanted a bottle of Bajoran tears

kayajay

Go the route of the Klingon Arc (Improve on flow and quality, remove missions if not needed)

You know the first episode of the Romulan faction? You're on that planet, things are starting to get done...I think Cardassia was decimated by the Dominion and they should still be in a shambles, even all these years later. You could have the Obsidian Order back on their feet faster, with either Garak in charge, or he's just a plain old leader of the Cardy survivors. You could be there to help and get caught up in something, etc.

mirrorchaos

Go the route of the Borg Arc (Combining elements of two arcs into one and removing episodes)

i cant see the cryptic team spending forever creating a whole new set of missions when they can combined the episodes and make some sense out of them along the way. why create a whole masnion for 2.4 kids when they can build a standard house instead with far less risk and costs? businesses like cryptic put their money ahead of their players so i dont expect them to be more forthcoming then that.

whitewhale80

I don't see a Cardassian faction ever happening, they have no where near the amount of cultural relevance of the Klingons and Romulans who already are struggling to get much attention in a very federation heavy game. For most of the series they were bit players who only existed as a military power as the Federation couldn't be bothered to deal with them. A single Nebula class kerb-stomped Cardy ships before being stopped by O'Brian.

Revamp the missions for a bit more drama and flow (and colour! Too much of that orangey brown everywhere), add some nice bonus rewards for doing the series along with non-faction specific Cardassian and Jem Hadar BOFFS/DOFFS and moderate range of ownable ships. Job done.

A teeny tiny request though, expand the range of non zen store ships by having a mission to capture a couple of mid-tier ships so that the player could choose say a basic Galor as a tier 3 ship etc. The Mid tier F2P ships are pretty horrific and more choice is *long* overdue.

artan42

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

gulberat wrote: »

In particular there are some horrific maps (Cage of Fire and that awful Thomas Riker map) that need redone. However, what I would ideally like to see is the Mirror Universe stuff completely removed from the Cardassian arc, and integrated into any upcoming Tholian material there is, given that in canon we actually have an affiliation between the Tholians and MU. (Whereas in the Cardassian arc, it's just pure happenstance that both elements happened on DS9.)

I'd agree with this one as well. Cardassian / Dominion focus, hell, you could even throw he Breen series in if you need to rework them.
Move the Terren stuff to a new arc along with any Tholian stuff from the Nukara map that could be turned into episodes.​​

inferiority

The Klingon War revamp was handled well. OK, one episode was removed, but it didn't need to be removed.

The Romulan Mystery revamp was not done well. Fourteen missions were removed/condensed into just five, and the amount of Skill Points rewarded is lower than the previous missions. This makes levelling through those missions slower and often requires a Klingon War replay of a mission or two to progress. Thankfully, "The Vault" and onwards were left alone.

I am quite worried about the Cardassian Struggle arc being revamped. Currently, there are a whopping fifteen missions and they are likely to be removed/condensed into just five or six...

I'm not sure I like the current pattern of stuff being removed from the game - Exploration Clusters & their corresponding missions, First Contact missions, 9 missions from the Romulan Myster arc and now, who knows how many from the Cardassian Struggle!

I know it's not a popular arc with many players, but I thoroughly enjoy it and I'd love it to be brought up to the same level of quality as the Klingon War arc, rather than turned into a 'edited highlights' like the Romulan Mystery arc.

sirmayday

Go the route of the Romulan Arc (Gut arc and replace with new episodes)

The current Cardassian Struggle arc is chock full of boring filler with few and weak plot threads connecting them. While I'd like to see the existing story integrated, it's going to have to be remarkably streamlined and the writing vastly improved; the end result will look like a complete overhaul rather than a bunch of tweaks.

Also, in a move rather the opposite of the Borg/Undine arcs, I'd like to see the Mirror Universe mini-arc separated from the Cardassian Struggle arc and expanded to be a proper part of the game's story, rather than a footnote like it is now.

crm14916

Go the route of the Romulan Arc (Gut arc and replace with new episodes)

They're gonna remove content, of course...

Players screaming for more content? Take it from them, ha ha ha ha!!

CM

mustrumridcully0

A little bit of everything? I suppose the Romulan Arc might represent the best example. The Cardassian Struggle is more "The Player's Struggle" and needs a lot of pruning and rework to be acceptable by the current standards for mission design.

It seems by now that many of the newer arcs feature some form of recurring PCs, particularly antagonists. The Romulan Arc has Sela and Hakeev, the Delta Rising Arc has Gaul. The Jem'Hadar story has the Vorta and her Jem'Hadar First. The Deferi Arc has the Breen Leader (but it's arguably the weakest here). The Klingon Arc has B'Vat.

I think that is something that the Cardassian Struggle lacked. There might be some major NPCs in there, but they are only in one episode and are essentially non-recurring. If they can address that, they can probably also make the story much more engaging and satisfying.

vegeta50024

Go the route of the Klingon Arc (Improve on flow and quality, remove missions if not needed)

So I just went back to read the Season 11 stuff we know so far and the Priority One interview mentioned that the cardassian revamp will include the backstory for the new mirror universe stuff, so that leads me to believe that we're going to see a Klingon War arc style revamp. Mirror Leeta could be retroactively added in as the recurring PC for mirror universe arc.

thay8472

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

Some of the current missions have an interesting plot... they could just use an update...

So what do we have?

Undine Missions (Maybe a mission or two about the Undine trying to infiltrate the Cardassian government for sneaky reasons.)

Cardassian Missions (Maybe something to do with Garak.. then end it off with a mission about the wormhole doing crazy stuff... then 2800.

Mirror Missions. (Missions where we play as our counterpart from the Mirror Universe! You have the ability to slap us in fixed ships... throw everyone in a Mirror Oddy. (KDF/ROMs... your enslaved... no arguing now!)

Then boom... plot twist... the mirror oddy on Nukara Prime was "ours".

tigeraries

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

All of the above...

Gut arc (cut and remove episodes) and replace with new episodes by combining elements of two or more arcs into one to Improve on flow and quality.

thomaselkins

Perhaps something like this?

Forging Bonds/Badlands

I would personally merge Forging Bonds and Badlands together. Perhaps after we rescue the freighter and discover the mine, we can defeat Glinn Majet and then pursue Gul Brun to the Badlands where we rescue Joshua Riker and his people. Maybe the mine itself could be replaced with a Jem'Hadar cloning facility, and New Dominion forces could engage the True Way and us at the same time.

Seeds of Dissent/The Long Night

From here, the players could go to Goralis System where we find the inhabitents being bullied by True Way forces. The mission could probably play out pretty much the same as before, but after we defeat Gul Granspir, we can learn of the True Way's base of operations at Empok Nor. Afterwards we go to Empok Nor and already find it under attack by New Dominion forces. After saving the station and boarding it for ourselves, we'll clean up what's left of the True Way and arrest Gul Madred.

The New Link

After we believe we've broken the True Way in this sector, we will then take the fight to the New Dominion. After tracking their forces to Orias III, we will do what we did before and take Laas into custody.

Suspect/War Games/Shutdown

The Romulan Mystery lost its Undine mission entirely, so it's possible these could be removed as well. If they do stay, then I think I might move them around. Unless Franklin Drake knew the Undine were already replacing people in this sector, (which I suppose is possible), then it seems a little odd that he tests your loyalty right before the Undine capture a ship. A little convenient right? I think Suspect should be moved around to make it so he tests your loyalty after your encounter with the Undine on the USS Athens.

The Rapier

I thought about forgetting this one, but it could be worth staying for a couple of reasons. For one, it would be nice to remaster the interior of the Wormhole to look more canon. We get to see a more canon interior in Operation Gamma, so it would be nice here as well. Another reason to keep it is because this is where we meet Eraun for the first time. He of course plays a larger role in The 4800.

The final reason for keeping it is because it could actually help foreshadow The 4800. A Starfleet ship disappeared in the Wormhole and then mysteriously reappears? Our characters should make note of this mystery as worth investigating at another time, only to be called to DS9 for a meeting. Of course that meeting is where the Dominion fleet returns just as the Rapier did. The 4800 would then continue unchanged.

Tears of the Prophets/Crack in the Mirror

This could actually be made into its own campaign. Split it off from The Cardassian Struggle and place the new Mirror campaign between Struggle and Borg Advance.

After everything that has happened recently, the Cardassians decide to send a gift to the Bajorans. When we go to Cardassia we find remnants of the True Way attempting to steal the Orb, but then Terran Federation ships show up and take it for themselves. When they leave, you're contacted by the Prophets who warn you about the Mirror Orb. When you return to DS9 you engage Mirror ships in orbit attempting to change the Wormhole to allow their invasion force to come through.

The Other Side

After we prevent the invasion we can take the fight to them and take the Orb back. The mission could probably play out as it did before but with various gameplay updates to make the mission more interesting. If we don't kill O'Brien in the previous mission, we could do so here. Or maybe we don't kill him, (We're Starfleet), but after defeating him we arrest him or the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance could kill him.

Cage of Fire

The Orb doesn't play a role in this mission but it could now. Perhaps Cerin Teresa could request the Orb at the Temple where she attempts to use it for a Pah Wraith ceremony.

markhawkman

Go the route of the Klingon Arc (Improve on flow and quality, remove missions if not needed)

Good ideas Thomas... but I don't think that they will give the "New Dominion" as you called it a black hat.

But yeah, that mission arc grows mold fast. and like someone said, the rewards stink. Green quality generic crud as a mission reward? feh.

dareau

What doesn't help the "Cardassian" Arc, at least Fedside, is the fact that it's kinda/sorta/really three "arcs", 4 if you count 4028 was originally a FE "tacked onto" the Cardie Arc (like Spectres = Klingon Arc & Vault = Romulan Arc,) woven together in a DS9-ish intertwined plots manner...

Start wtih an "introduction" to the Cardassians. Get "distracted" by S31. See another Cardassian. Deal with the Undine that S31 was "messing with". Have a Mirror incursion drop by. Deal more with Cardassians, wrapping up the new dominion. Wrap up the Mirror incursion. Ace the Pah-wraith that was kinda/sorta/tossed in for the sake of tossing in the reference. "Slide" right into 2048...

So, since the Mirror forces are getting their own opposition, I can see the "Smiley" Mirror forces get dropped, and the "new" Mirror arc will "replace" them. Who knows if we'll keep the Anti-Undine "Section 31 mini-arc", and one could count the Tribble episode as something under the S31 deal. The rest of the Cardassian section would be left behind, being remastered if/when they decide to buff up the Cardassian / Dominion presence (maybe S12?)​​

thomaselkins

markhawkman wrote: »

Good ideas Thomas... but I don't think that they will give the "New Dominion" as you called it a black hat.

But yeah, that mission arc grows mold fast. and like someone said, the rewards stink. Green quality generic crud as a mission reward? feh.

Eh, I never cared for the True Way/New Dominion Alliance. After what the Dominion did to Cardassia and the fact that the New Dominion has an intense hatred of solids, their whole alliance doesn't make any real sense to me. Putting them at odds would be better, IMO.

Another thing they need to do is introduce Cerin Teresa earlier in the story and increase her role. Originally she betrays us the first time we meet her so the betrayal doesn't have any impact. I'd say she should be the one who attempts to give us the Orb when the Terrans show up and she should help us try to retrieve it. Make it so we get to know her and trust her so when we find out her true goals, it actually has meaning.

breadandcircuses

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

The pessimist in me expects it to:
Go the route of the Romulan Arc (Gut arc and replace with new episodes)
A lot of the design decisions lately have been oriented towards removing older content that isn't up to current standards (or something). Couple this with how much easier it is to remove something than actually fix/improve it, and I see more of the same in the future.

The optimist in me hopes they decide to:
Go the route of the Klingon Arc (Improve on flow and quality, remove missions if not needed)
The Klingon Arc is still one of my favorite parts of the game, one that actually feels closer to the faction's core than most of the rest of the game. The redesigned missions flow better than the originals, and have some neat little goodies to make them worth running (no KDF Warrior should be without his loyal Jakal Mastiff!). Best of all, they retained the majority of the missions, rearranging them into a more coherent whole, and actually added some new content. Plus... nobody has been through hell in this game like a KDF Warrior.

medalionemissary

They are gonna cut episodes... and that is a GOOD thing.

ashrod63

medalionemissary wrote: »

They are gonna cut episodes... and that is a GOOD thing.

It will be so long as it doesn't TRIBBLE up the natural level progression. Replacing poor missions with poor grinding is not a sensible option, but is what they want.

EDIT: Wow, that is a very sensitive chat filter.

koraheaglecry

Go the route of the Romulan Arc (Gut arc and replace with new episodes)

I personally feel like the Arc is a bit bloated. I think they tried to imitate the actual DS9 episode/story arc philosophy which doesnt work so well in a game environment. Its nice to have some side things to do in an MMO that fleshes out the game world, creates a sense of immersion, and allows players to see a side of things they wouldnt other wise get to see in a rollercoaster ride of a single player. BUT. And this is a big but here. Cryptic went with a rollarcoaster style ride of story telling with this game. From start to finish its one quest after the other rather then a primary story arc for a zone and a bunch of secondary throw away stories that are completely voluntary and unnecessary for the player to involve themselves with. With the Cardassian Arc it got to a point where nothing felt like it was moving forward or the Player was accomplishing anything. After awhile you simply 'dozed off' mentally as you smashed the W,D,S,A and SPACEBAR through the missions.

Honestly there are times where I wish Cryptic had been given the time to begin with and had spent the time fleshing out the game. Ive never liked the idea of three different classes of character and one storyline. It always felt cheap and lazy. It was understandable that in a TV Show there was 1 Ship and 1 Captain and 1 Hero Crew of 6-7 characters of varying importance. Its hard to keep an audience up to speed and interested when you have too many storylines going so it was a nice balance. In a video game meant to be a Massively Multiplayer Online game its a different story. You want to feel as if youre making a difference and affecting things while at the same time able to look to your left and right and realize that those two people are also doing the same. Each person is a Hero in their own right and each person has a story for themselves and in this instance for their crew. Its quite immersion breaking to be told youre THE Hero only to realize once the mission is over that everyone else has also been told they are THE Hero. Just makes you feel lied too.

Ive also always hated quests that force you to react to things in a specific manner (agreeing with characters during interaction primarily) when its YOUR character and you should have some sort of freedom to decide how your character would react to the situation. Why even be a Captain of a starship if every decision is made for you? Broken Cycle is a perfect example of this. When Kagran decided he wanted to suicide pact the Iconians and my character was forced to use the dialogue that agreed with Kagran with no option to disagree it annoyed me to no end. Not because I didnt get to refuse to do the mission but because I didnt get to express my view of what my characters view on the matter would be. Would I still have done the mission after being 'ordered to' after disagreeing? Sure. Thats believable. But to assume that everyone walking into that mission would feel comfortable with what they were doing?

Id have loved some minor side mission arcs (Patrol Missions were TERRIBLE at playing the part of side missions as they were simply 'Go here, Blow up this number of ships') or some internal ship missions. With TV Shows you had to either commit a storyline to a single episode or decide to spread it out over the course of a half season or the whole season. In a video game where the world is ever expanding you dont have this limitation. Side missions could be as short or long as the developer saw fit. And completely voluntary and not something people felt if they skipped theyd be losing out on something.

brian334

I do not honestly expect much from a revamp of The Cardassian Struggles.

1) A playable Cardassian character as an unlock, (via Z-store or special limited time reward, or both.)

2) Cardassian ship designs that could easily be implemented with this story arc:
Shuttle/Runabout Hideki - Transport, Patrol, or Pursuit variants
T1 Bok'Nor - an armed freighter (Eng) earned by starting a career as a Cardassian
T2 Cardassian Frigate - a small fast warship (Tac) earned by a Cardassian Captain at level 20
T3 Cardassian Destroyer - Older version of Galor (Sci) earned at Level 30 as one option, with other options determined by faction choice as is currently done by Romulans.
T4 Cardassian Cruiser - Newer version of Galor (Tac) earned at level 40 as one option, with other options determined by faction choice as is currently done by Romulans.
T5 Keldon - Battlecruiser (Eng) earned at Level 50 as one option, with other options determined by faction choice as is currently done by Romulans.
T6 Special variants of the above ships as Z-store purchases, (locked for playable Cardassians only,) or as Lock Box ships.

3) Rewrites of missions such that content no longer in game is not referenced and new content is, with updated mission completion rewards along the way.

If I got 1 and 3 of the above, I would count the new revision worthwhile. I'm not so interested in 2, but it's an opportunity for Z-store to bank a few bucks and players to get the cool ships they have always wanted.

sentinel64

Other (explain your choice in a comment)

Even though it will probably end up being another Rom-like half faction, something different would make it unique so that the Cardies are not tied to either Fed or KDF (the latter would make no sense since they hate each other). A more free lance faction that can tie into any of the story arcs without actually making it a sub-component to either Fed or KDF,