Anything you do to modify the market at this point will cause serious grief and potential problems. I came from an MMO that taxes 30% on AH/exchange listings and honestly it didn't drive down prices. In fact it drove prices up as players raised their minimums to match that percentage.
A tax on dilitium will do no good IMO either as it is already capped at 8k (plus some odd bonuses if you meet the criteria) already.
Honestly at this point the only way to "fix" the economy is to catch people cheating and report the EC sellers as that as far as I am aware is a TOS violation. Sadly I don't think Cryptic even pays attention to those.
As someone who has nicely equipped ships from way before the market ran off the cliff and who doesn't really give a damn about EC, I can say the market as it currently is, is a mess, and new players are pretty screwed by it.
For a new player to be able to make EC off the current state of the game is really hard. They're better off grinding the reps and making their own gear from the R&D system. Too many EC whales using multiple toons to push prices down and push anyone in their way out.
"1) The STO economy is mostly centered on a single item, the [Master Key], the key used to open the many lockboxes which contain valuable and desirable loot."
You mean to tell me there is no Grey/Black Key market going on in STO ? 100% is above board and clean of any manipulation ?
Going back to your very important notation. "The STO economy is mostly centered on a single item. the {Master Key]."
It's pretty simple, control the Key market, control the exchange. Key manipulation itself can send shockwaves throughout the economy. And have repercussions on the price of everything in the game.
Any well Organized group could mount an assault on the master key market. They don't even need to control other aspects of the market, like traits or ships, that's secondary and not nearly as important to the economy structure then the master key.
Now, yes, I may have blown the manipulation of the market out of proportion, but the point I was trying to make is that if enough individuals form a cooperative, they could easily manipulate the price ranges of everything in the game through the control of the key market. By either working in collusion with a large circle of players or employing the use of Bots to buy up any key below a certain price point. (go ahead, have another good laugh) ill wait until you catch your breath....
Now that is out of your system, tell me why that is so hard to believe ? Even if the bot is detected and account banned, another could easily be created to start the cycle a new.
You mean to tell me, this isn't going on ? At all ??? And I'm just being paranoid ? Okay, maybe so, but, riddle me this Mr. Riddler, where's the black market EC coming from ? Its coming from somewhere, or I wouldn't see the spamming in game from EC seller sites on a daily basis. In addition to the EC seller site spam I see daily, I can assume they make some kind of profit or I wouldn't have seen these people spamming the chats for 3+ years (since I joined the game). No profit, no reason to continue spamming. So that leads me to believe that these sites are either semi profitable (enough to keep the charade going) or massively profitable. So it's clear they've got the currency to spare. So where'd they get all their EC if you know so much about the economy ? IMO it's coming from the manipulation of the Key Market.
Look, I'm good myself, I don't need anything atm in game, and if I do, I'll just whale it. So the price points don't really matter to me. I don't care what the cost of a key is or a certain ship is.
All I'm doing here, is putting forth a plausible scenario as to what is going on/influencing the inflation in STO's economy.
Name me 1 mmo that doesn't have a black market ? (an mmo where you can earn RL money currency in game, with game currency exchange - or trade it). There are none ! Where do you think the term gold farming came from ? And why do you think people spend the time doing it ? Because there is profit to be made from games that have tradable currencies. The only exceptions would be games that don't have tradable currency. Like one example, War Thunder, everyone has access to the same planes and tanks, they are leveled and upgraded with battle points essentially, you play, you earn those battle points. But if you want the specialty planes and tanks, you must buy them with RL currency. (there are several per faction) There are no specialty vehicles in the game that you can buy with battle points, there is no battle point/RL currency exchange. There are no Lockboxes or master keys or any other form of gambling. There are no trades, or exchange to buy these things for in game battle points. Therefore there is nothing to exploit.
The closest thing I've seen in that game to market manipulation, were people trying to sell russian IP address's to North American client's. By doing this, the buyer of game currency could get a better return on their dollar as the Russian cost ratio per rupple/dollar to in game RL currency was far more favorable then the American cost ratio per dollar to in game RL currency. But that is just an example of how far exploiters will go to make a buck off the back off someone else work. While there was very little profit margin doing this, they still did, because guess what, there was some form of profit involved !
In STO, the sky really is the limit with the tradable currencies. And made even easier since it's economy revolves around one item as you say; The Master Key. To deny that there is ANY market manipulation going on in STO is just as foolish as me, blowing the manipulation way out of proportion.
So again, where's the black market getting their currency ? If everything is clean and above board in STO ?
If the lockbox ships arent needed/necessary, it truely doesnt impact game play. why fuss about the price of a gimic/luxury item? If people will pay stupid high prices for extremely rare items, let them! Should we be crying shenanigans on the price of rechargable shield batteries too?
As far as someone having 300 million, not that long ago, I sold off all of my spare Romulan Boffs that I picked up leveling my Rommie. 6 boffs made me 50 mill' EC at the lower going rates. Add that to all of the items you pick up in drops, mission rewards, etc. . Selling valuable ones on the exchange and selling the rest to vendors, 300 mill isnt hard to imagine if someone builds it up after several months.
"1) The STO economy is mostly centered on a single item, the [Master Key], the key used to open the many lockboxes which contain valuable and desirable loot."
You mean to tell me there is no Grey/Black Key market going on in STO ?
100% is above board and clean of any manipulation ?
Going back to your very important notation.
"The STO economy is mostly centered on a single item. the {Master Key]."
It's pretty simple, control the Key market, control the exchange. Key manipulation itself can send shockwaves throughout the economy. And have repercussions on the price of everything in the game.
Any well Organized group could mount an assault on the master key market.
They don't even need to control other aspects of the market, like traits or ships, that's secondary and not nearly as important to the economy structure then the master key.
Now, yes, I may have blown the manipulation of the market out of proportion, but the point I was trying to make is that if enough individuals form a cooperative, they could easily manipulate the price ranges of everything in the game through the control of the key market.
By either working in collusion with a large circle of players or employing the use of Bots to buy up any key below a certain price point.
(go ahead, have another good laugh) ill wait until you catch your breath....
Now that is out of your system, tell me why that is so hard to believe ?
Even if the bot is detected and account banned, another could easily be created to start the cycle a new.
You mean to tell me, this isn't going on ? At all ??? And I'm just being paranoid ?
Okay, maybe so, but, riddle me this Mr. Riddler, where's the black market EC coming from ?
Its coming from somewhere, or I wouldn't see the spamming in game from EC seller sites on a daily basis.
In addition to the EC seller site spam I see daily, I can assume they make some kind of profit or I wouldn't have seen these people spamming the chats for 3+ years (since I joined the game). No profit, no reason to continue spamming.
So that leads me to believe that these sites are either semi profitable (enough to keep the charade going) or massively profitable.
So it's clear they've got the currency to spare.
So where'd they get all their EC if you know so much about the economy ?
IMO it's coming from the manipulation of the Key Market.
Look, I'm good myself, I don't need anything atm in game, and if I do, I'll just whale it. So the price points don't really matter to me. I don't care what the cost of a key is or a certain ship is.
All I'm doing here, is putting forth a plausible scenario as to what is going on/influencing the inflation in STO's economy.
Name me 1 mmo that doesn't have a black market ? (an mmo where you can earn RL money currency in game, with game currency exchange - or trade it). There are none !
Where do you think the term gold farming came from ?
And why do you think people spend the time doing it ? Because there is profit to be made from games that have tradable currencies.
The only exceptions would be games that don't have tradable currency.
Like one example, War Thunder, everyone has access to the same planes and tanks, they are leveled and upgraded with battle points essentially, you play, you earn those battle points. But if you want the specialty planes and tanks, you must buy them with RL currency. (there are several per faction)
There are no specialty vehicles in the game that you can buy with battle points, there is no battle point/RL currency exchange.
There are no Lockboxes or master keys or any other form of gambling.
There are no trades, or exchange to buy these things for in game battle points.
Therefore there is nothing to exploit.
The closest thing I've seen in that game to market manipulation, were people trying to sell russian IP address's to North American client's.
By doing this, the buyer of game currency could get a better return on their dollar as the Russian cost ratio per rupple/dollar to in game RL currency was far more favorable then the American cost ratio per dollar to in game RL currency. But that is just an example of how far exploiters will go to make a buck off the back off someone else work.
While there was very little profit margin doing this, they still did, because guess what, there was some form of profit involved !
In STO, the sky really is the limit with the tradable currencies. And made even easier since it's economy revolves around one item as you say; The Master Key.
To deny that there is ANY market manipulation going on in STO is just as foolish as me, blowing the manipulation way out of proportion.
So again, where's the black market getting their currency ? If everything is clean and above board in STO ?
The problem with collusion is that you need to get all the people doing it to stay on side, and its very hard to limit the benefits of collusion just to that group.
Like, if 5 guys are colluding to push up the price of keys, and one of the guys says TRIBBLE it, i'm selling under their noses, he gets money at their expense, the rest lose money to him.
Also, the problem with defending a price fix (buying up everything under the price you want to fix, hoping you can sell it at a profit afterwards) is that it gets more and more expensive over time, and also more and more risky. And the money you pay to defend the fix translated to profits for other people who aren't helping you, but undermining you. If you try to push a price from 4m to 5m, anyone who sells in the high 4m range, to you, is profiting from your work and your investment. Also anyone undercutting your 5m price.
The market price, especially for keys, reflects a very broad supply/demand consensus. One guy, or a group of guys, buying up keys -but not using them- doesn't really increase the demand or decrease the supply. If they want to turn around and sell the keys again at a profit, they go right back into the market. They were never consumed, the supply goes right back up.
If you want to understand why there are across the board price shifts, look at fundamental stuff, facts about the game. What's changed?
Admiralty is a big one. Its generating more ec, raising the ec supply and causing inflation. It's also made pretty much every lockbox more profitable to open.
Mirror ships used to be on the very edge of vendor trash. Now they are worth millions of ec. This is an increase in the expected value of opening any lockbox, lockboxes suddenly became more valuable to open. It's not surprising key prices would go up until there was equilibrium again.
Because the game has ec inflation, we should expect that key prices will always be going up. They are, and ec inflation explains it. When lockboxes become more valuable to open, we should expect key prices to go up. Lockboxes did become more valuable to open, and that also explains key prices being up.
Anyway, the words 'market manipulation' are not some talisman that condemns STO. Repeating those words does not have any effect as an invocation. Can people try to fix prices? Sure. Does it matter much? No. Why? There's no way to control the supply for items in sto, everything has just about limitless supply, and other people will profit from your labor, robbing you of the benefits.
Fair enough. I'm not necessarily arguing your views on how the economy works and fluctuates.
In fact everything you've said thus far makes good sense.
But what I'm still having a hard time with, is the EC seller sites, and how they acquire their bankroll. (Not sure why I keep coming back to this, except that I feel its having "some" impact on the game)
But...I suppose you wouldn't know for certain anyway, and we could only speculate on the subject at hand.
Unless however, you have some ideas on it, and wish to share them, since you seem to know more about the economy then most, I'd be interested to hear your theory...
If not, well, just disregard. I understand if you don't wish to speculate.
If the lockbox ships arent needed/necessary, it truely doesnt impact game play. why fuss about the price of a gimic/luxury item? If people will pay stupid high prices for extremely rare items, let them! Should we be crying shenanigans on the price of rechargable shield batteries too?
As far as someone having 300 million, not that long ago, I sold off all of my spare Romulan Boffs that I picked up leveling my Rommie. 6 boffs made me 50 mill' EC at the lower going rates. Add that to all of the items you pick up in drops, mission rewards, etc. . Selling valuable ones on the exchange and selling the rest to vendors, 300 mill isnt hard to imagine if someone builds it up after several months.
I think you misunderstood my post completely. I'm not complaining about the prices, even though I personally don't like paying them(but I do when I can save up enough EC if I want something badly enough). The shenanigans I was calling was on Mr. Hypocrite,(@beameddown) who complains about the "exchange trolls" who make their money from trading/selling. He was able to drop 300 million EC on upgrade weekend after complaining about the high prices, but yet anyone else who has this kind of EC must be a troll/exploiter. No shenanigans on the prices, even though they are high. When taken into consideration that someone probably used ALOT of RL money(or got REALLY lucky) I have no issues with the prices of ships and other lockbox/lobi items.
I personally sell an item that I craft, with materials I get just from playing, that everyone wants to have in order to improve their gear. Some don't want to invest the time in R&D, so I take that pain away and make those items accessible to them...for a fee, of course. My profit margins aren't huge, by any means, but I can make enough to buy items I want, i.e., the high priced shinies. I always sell at the same price, all the time, usually undercutting other sellers, in an attempt to make those products available to everybody, whether a casher or F2P. I then use the profits to buy myself something I want, usually a ship/trait/doff. I absolutely DO NOT belong to any kind of shadowy cabal, buying up everything and hoarding it for later re-sale, according to a delusional poster from this thread. I DO NOT buy up the items that are priced below mine, so that mine will sell. Mine stay on the exchange(albeit not for very long) until they sell. I'm just a normal player who found a way to make EC from the exchange to buy the shiny stuff, and now these idiots want to take that away, or somehow penalize me, because they're too lazy/ignorant/entitled to do the same thing.
People need to realize that this game takes time, it's not a FB game, where you play for 10 minutes then logout for the day. To complete a reputation line, without a sponsorship token, takes 40 days. Then, you need marks/elite marks to get the gear from the rep line. This is not a short term game, nor was it designed to be one. If you want those shiny things, be prepared to invest the time it takes to get it. If you don't have that kind of time, then I suggest you not even attempt this game, or any others like it. They also require a time sinkhole to play and you won't get their shiny stuff in a week either. I want new players to join and enjoy the game as much as I do, but they need to understand what the game is, and how long it takes to get some of the things they want to have. This game is not instant gratification, and never will be. Either you accept that fact and just play the game the way it's designed and presented to us, or you move along and find something else. Enough whining about exchange prices/grinding/time-gates. Play or don't play, the ultimate decision is yours to make.
Instant gratification is that, instant, buying a ship off of the exchange IS instant. The effort to try to have Cryptic force the prices down so new players can readily buy it is forcing instant gratification even more so. Whats even worse is that the impression that lockbox ships/items are required to be competitive is entirely false, which makes the whole debate worse.
Your basic point of view, as stated is the the "greedy exchange people" have jacked prices so high for lockbox ships/items that a new player cant be competitive. If a new players saw this, and believed it, that statement disincentivizes them to play. The fact is that a new player doesnt need lockbox stuff to compete. One can easily buy ships that are just as effective, without all if the fluff and exclusivity of the lockbox ships. Consoles/weapons? Even if one hasnt ground out all of the rep' items, theres some pretty good stuff alongside those, plus old fashion energy type tac consoles and similar eng and sci consoles are still quite effective and readily available as drops, and its not insane to get those to mk xiv.
How long should a player take on that situation given? three to six months (leaning closer to six) where its really clicking, but it also shouldnt take depending on lockbox stuff to do it either. Insisting that new players need lockbox stuff is a disservice to them.
Instant gratification is that, instant, buying a ship off of the exchange IS instant. The effort to try to have Cryptic force the prices down so new players can readily buy it is forcing instant gratification even more so. Whats even worse is that the impression that lockbox ships/items are required to be competitive is entirely false, which makes the whole debate worse.
Your basic point of view, as stated is the the "greedy exchange people" have jacked prices so high for lockbox ships/items that a new player cant be competitive. If a new players saw this, and believed it, that statement disincentivizes them to play. The fact is that a new player doesnt need lockbox stuff to compete. One can easily buy ships that are just as effective, without all if the fluff and exclusivity of the lockbox ships. Consoles/weapons? Even if one hasnt ground out all of the rep' items, theres some pretty good stuff alongside those, plus old fashion energy type tac consoles and similar eng and sci consoles are still quite effective and readily available as drops, and its not insane to get those to mk xiv.
How long should a player take on that situation given? three to six months (leaning closer to six) where its really clicking, but it also shouldnt take depending on lockbox stuff to do it either. Insisting that new players need lockbox stuff is a disservice to them.
This. Just this right here.
Sums up my feelings without the (perceived) anger by me. I'm actually quite pleasant by nature but sometimes the posts here just yank my chain. I actually don't harbor any bad feelings towards anyone in the game and only want people to play and enjoy as much as I have over the last 3 years.
Is this game perfect? No, not by a long shot. I would like to see some changes made, such as a better system explaining builds/boff skills and the like so new players have a better understanding of the systems. Unless a newbie joins a helpful fleet, it is difficult to get answers about the basics. I've seen newbies try to ask simple questions in local/zone chat and get completely flamed by trolls, which is something that would certainly chase me away from the game way before I started worrying about exchange prices. This concerns me more than somebody jacking up prices on unnecessary items. If more people were to actually help new players, this would go a long way towards increasing our player base, which we need to continue playing.
I'm open to ideas on game improvements, if they make sense. Changes to the exchange seem to be pretty low on the list to me at this point in time. Not only that, but is anyone at Cryptic/PWE actually listening? I see many good ideas put forth by players in the forums but how many have actually been implemented ingame? We see testing done on Tribble server, players report bugs/broken mechanics and yet they roll them out anyway, in the process breaking other things that were WAI. These are the issues that should cause concern for players who care about the game and it's long term survivability. These are supposed to be the official forums, but other than Bort, it's rare to see any interaction between devs and players. If they're not listening, we can all rage at each other until the cows come home and it won't do a bit of good.
I think you've pretty much hit the head on the nail. Learning curves are based off of, wait for it... Learning!
The exchange lockbox ship/item prices arent the limiting factor for new players becomming competitive/better, its the lack of education. Give someone, who doesnt know what they are doing, nice shineys, and you'll get a guy who doesn't know what they are doing with nice shineys that is poorer than before he/she bought said shineys.
Forcing the slashing of exhange prices would only make shineys cheaper, not players any better, they will still be less competitive than the more experienced player who DOESN'T have nice shiney lockbox items.
This game is time-intensive and people should realize that coming in. Without a credit card it will take quite some time to get the shiny stuff that you don't even NEED to play the game.
A couple years ago I calculated how much real money you 'make' by converting Dil to Zen. It was less than a dollar per hour (30 to 70 cents, I forget exactly). So yeah, you're gonna work a bit to earn that $30 ship. And that was back when the Dil/Zen ratio was a better than it is now.
So even if you're working at McDonald's for minimum wage, you'd be better off picking up a few extra hours of work over grinding Dil. Just sayin'.
Sometimes I think I play STO just to have something to complain about on the forums.
some players put too much emphasis on the exchange, they seem to think that a new player cant get on in the game unless they buy all the gear they need and upgrade their ships to fleet status or by buying stuff from other players for exorbitant sums,
I say hogwash.
since I have been playing I have not had one fleet module ship, all of my ships I got from the game from levelling up, doing events and trading dil for zen to buy the odd c-store ship pack.
all of my gear from the lowest mk12 rare up to the epic I have just from in game drops and upgrading them myself, I can count the things I have now that I bought from the exchange on one hand and I got them for peanuts.
sure I have a few alts I use to gain a little extra dil but I only really doff with them and play them in events like mirror for the dil, I don't really need the dil for myself as I have all the gear I need for a good while, I just want the dil to fill fleet projects.
its taken me a few years to get where I am now but its been fun and I haven't had to rely on other players to do the work for me, I did it all by myself and its that much more rewarding because of that fact.
if I had started playing during the delta event and the alt characters I created then were my mains I could have them to the same state as my current mains in about the same time frame as it took me to get my actual mains to get there, sure I might be missing a few event ships but as most of them are only T5 that's not too much of a loss.
if other players feel the need to waste their time spending silly amounts on exchange items or even worse non-exchange items they don't need well BOO-HOO! that's their choice, perhaps they would be better off being more self reliant rather then spending out wads of EC or real money so others can do the work for them, I don't see why the devs should change anything about the game just to make it easier for them to get what they need off of the backs of others rather then just play the game as I have and get the stuff they need themselves.
if other players haven't got the patience it takes that's their problem.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
I just want to mention something in response to all the "play the exchange and you have no issues with EC". The only EC in this game comes from loot, doffing and now the admiralty system. Playing the exchange does not generate more EC it just shifts it from one player to another. Usually from poorer, inexperienced players to a richer, more experienced players. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer. Prices go up and less people can afford items.
Just selling loot doesn't get you anywhere nowadays, which is a real issue for new players. Especially since loot drops have practically no value for more advanced builds, they could really just drop the EC directly as it is incredibly rare that a drop sells for more than vendor-value on the exchange.
I'm not whining, I'm not space rich, but at 400m EC and a decked out main character I'm not exactly poor either. I'm just concerned that it gets increasingly difficult for new players to catch up, because the only way to get the amounts of EC you need is either real money (which is fine, but shouldn't be the only option) or playing Ferengi on the exchange.
I just want to mention something in response to all the "play the exchange and you have no issues with EC". The only EC in this game comes from loot, doffing and now the admiralty system. Playing the exchange does not generate more EC it just shifts it from one player to another. Usually from poorer, inexperienced players to a richer, more experienced players. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer. Prices go up and less people can afford items.
Just selling loot doesn't get you anywhere nowadays, which is a real issue for new players. Especially since loot drops have practically no value for more advanced builds, they could really just drop the EC directly as it is incredibly rare that a drop sells for more than vendor-value on the exchange.
I'm not whining, I'm not space rich, but at 400m EC and a decked out main character I'm not exactly poor either. I'm just concerned that it gets increasingly difficult for new players to catch up, because the only way to get the amounts of EC you need is either real money (which is fine, but shouldn't be the only option) or playing Ferengi on the exchange.
personally most game drops go strait into the replicator and get recycled, about the only stuff I sell on the exchange is stuff that cant be recycled or has no recycle value and then its mostly just sold for a token fee of a few EC.
anything else I don't want just gets discarded, in most instances I cant see much point in buying drop gear off the exchange, if it drops for them then chances are it will drop for me or else something as good or better will.
providing players set their loot threshold to epic at the earliest opportunity they really should not need to buy anything from the exchange.
its not unusual for me to get MKXII rare gear or better in a game drop and then there are the later mission rewards, doff rewards and reputation sets, with all that going on who needs the exchange.
I'm not the best player in the game by a long way but if I can kit out every ship on all my main characters with nothing but MKXII rare or better then I must be doing something right.
like I said in my last comment if new players were to make use of drop gear replacing stuff as better stuff comes available, discarding or recycling stuff they cant use on other ships gradually they will get all they need.
sure it takes time, you cant expect to get all the gear you need overnight but eventually they will look at the gear they have and knowing they didn't rely on others but accomplished it themselves will feel better for it.
Post edited by bobbydazlers on
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
I just play the game. That's all. I play the game because Star Trek. I stopped worrying about whether or not I have all the very latest shinys and other stuff like the Big Kids do a very long time ago.
"Dammit, Jim! I'm an MMO! Not a graduate level economics course!"
One of the reasons some items in this game are so expensive in imaginary currency is because there are fools out there willing to pay that imaginary currency price.
You want prices on the Exchange to come down to a reasonable level? Fine.
Method one: Flood the market with the item in question. Worked with crafting mats, didn't it?
Method two: Stop buying stuff with stupid prices attached to them.
Doesn't take a Ph.D. in economics or a lot of fifty dollar explanations by alleged 'experts' about how to 'fix' the ingame economy to figure this out.
One last thing: I also learned awhile ago the shinys arrive in your inventory when they want to, Not when you want them to.
A six year old boy and his starship. Living the dream.
The game is free what more could you want!?! There is no paid content to speak of, the ONLY thing they make you pay for is nice ships and they even give those away for free three times a year!!! There are less than fifty people on the DEV team who get paid dirt compared to most but they do it because they love it.
MMORPG magazine even listed STO as the best F2P game on the market. It is literally listed as the most generous free to play game in existence and even that isn't enough for you whining morons!
Just kill me now i hate this whole goddamn planet.
I was in Open Beta test and until a few weeks ago, playing World of Warships by Wargaming. I will tell you now, those guys put the playerbase through the wringer milking everything they can from them. For that game, there arose a dirty tactic: They'd take a ship that they were prepping for release that was highly anticipated, then instead of just selling the ship on its own like everything else, they'd only put it out as part of some "fancy bundle" with a lot of TRIBBLE you don't care about but in total, is very expensive. They did this with the Tirpitz.
Then there was the whole Premium and Non-Premium account with marked disparity in XP & Credits earned. Big deal as the grind at higher tiers takes longer and higher tiered ships costed a lot to repair. There was no way to earn premium currency (doubloons) ingame, only with RL money. Wargaming makes PWE & Cryptic look tons better.
One thing is for sure... They get that that STO is significant enough because when I uninstalled World of Warships, I actually did the survey and when it asked about other games I played, STO is one of the default selections.
This game is time-intensive and people should realize that coming in. Without a credit card it will take quite some time to get the shiny stuff that you don't even NEED to play the game.
A couple years ago I calculated how much real money you 'make' by converting Dil to Zen. It was less than a dollar per hour (30 to 70 cents, I forget exactly). So yeah, you're gonna work a bit to earn that $30 ship. And that was back when the Dil/Zen ratio was a better than it is now.
So even if you're working at McDonald's for minimum wage, you'd be better off picking up a few extra hours of work over grinding Dil. Just sayin'.
Well, I can grind out 8k dil in about an hour. At current rate of around 240 zen, that is 33 1/3 zen per hour...so...yeah.....
Wooohooo, a whopping $0.333 per hour per toon, you go grinder lol
My dilemma in regards to exchange prices, is the extreme gap between Fed & KDF prices on certain items!
I get more people play Feds, and more people trade/sell items exclusively to this faction, but really in the world of EC & keys, it isn't all that different IMO.
You can freely move mass EC between account banking, as well as keys.
So, why the huge differential?
Well, I suppose it could relate to odds being better a Fed buying your items over KDF, but when you start seeing price gaps of 2:1 [KDF vs Fed] or even 3:1, it makes me wonder why!
If it takes 2 or even 3 Fed sales to equal the 1 KDF, than the effort/profitability seems a little redundant, because the odds of the KDF item selling at such a high # with fewer odds of a player(s) buying it, just doesn't factor to well IMO.
Not to say someone won't buy it, but watching such an item sit for god knows how long not selling, and the seller not bringing the price(s) down to better suite the demand, nor people really even supplying the demand on the KDF faction side, seems very lopsided IMO.
I don't know the exact # difference between active KDF vs Fed, but I am willing to bet the Fed side is higher, which is understandable why more supply is usually available, and why price competition is more relevant.
But, the KDF side price on similar/exact same items, tends to get blown out of proportion sometimes [not always].
Especially when the supply is kept low, and the demand starts drying up due to the overpriced supply there is, if you can even call it supply!!!
This game is time-intensive and people should realize that coming in. Without a credit card it will take quite some time to get the shiny stuff that you don't even NEED to play the game.
A couple years ago I calculated how much real money you 'make' by converting Dil to Zen. It was less than a dollar per hour (30 to 70 cents, I forget exactly). So yeah, you're gonna work a bit to earn that $30 ship. And that was back when the Dil/Zen ratio was a better than it is now.
So even if you're working at McDonald's for minimum wage, you'd be better off picking up a few extra hours of work over grinding Dil. Just sayin'.
Well, I can grind out 8k dil in about an hour. At current rate of around 240 zen, that is 33 1/3 zen per hour...so...yeah.....
Wooohooo, a whopping $0.333 per hour per toon, you go grinder lol
Yeah...but most other free MMO actually are sub 10 cents an hour conversion and many are sub 5 cents...so really STO is pretty generous. At 33 cents an hour, it is actually feasable to get stuff you want by just playing the game...and if you like to actually PLAY the game instead of what people on this board seem to want to do and just AFK and leech and make everyone else's life harder...then that 33 cents is kinda just a bonus really.
My dilemma in regards to exchange prices, is the extreme gap between Fed & KDF prices on certain items!
I get more people play Feds, and more people trade/sell items exclusively to this faction, but really in the world of EC & keys, it isn't all that different IMO.
You can freely move mass EC between account banking, as well as keys.
So, why the huge differential?
Well, I suppose it could relate to odds being better a Fed buying your items over KDF, but when you start seeing price gaps of 2:1 [KDF vs Fed] or even 3:1, it makes me wonder why!
If it takes 2 or even 3 Fed sales to equal the 1 KDF, than the effort/profitability seems a little redundant, because the odds of the KDF item selling at such a high # with fewer odds of a player(s) buying it, just doesn't factor to well IMO.
Not to say someone won't buy it, but watching such an item sit for god knows how long not selling, and the seller not bringing the price(s) down to better suite the demand, nor people really even supplying the demand on the KDF faction side, seems very lopsided IMO.
I don't know the exact # difference between active KDF vs Fed, but I am willing to bet the Fed side is higher, which is understandable why more supply is usually available, and why price competition is more relevant.
But, the KDF side price on similar/exact same items, tends to get blown out of proportion sometimes [not always].
Especially when the supply is kept low, and the demand starts drying up due to the overpriced supply there is, if you can even call it supply!!!
KDF gear being more expensive has been a fact of life in sto as far back as I can remember.
A great many fewer people play kdf and therefore many fewer lockboxes are opened kdf-side.
At the same time, the people who do play KDF tend to be passionate about it, and willing to spend extra.
To anyone out there opening lockboxes to make a space buck, always open them on KDF toons, and always open doff packs on KDF toons too. You can sell the loot for more if it is KDF-specific.
Well, that's kind of my point, it really doesn't cost any more to open boxes for either faction really, it just boils down to more people not wanting to bother with the KDF faction, but it's their loss of potential revenue by either overpricing, or simply not making anything available.
I myself don't mind spending a little bit more, but 2X - 3X+ vs Fed is by far rediculous [granted not on everything], especially if they aren't going to offer a decent supply to boot.
I have a Klingon toon, I would probably play it more if the UI wasn't so painful to look at. I just wish there was a neutral setting for that interface and display.
I am still waiting for a good argument being made on how exchange sold lock box ships and other "high end gear" is the only/must have way for a newer player to be "competitive" in this game.
Aren't the KDF still just contraband farming alts for rich Feddy mains?
MY God, the dishonor...
Living life as a Klingon, only to farm contraband for the Federation...
There will be no Sto'Vo'Kor for these sad, lame, warriors.
Never knowing the glory of battle, never knowing the weighted feel of a bat'leth in hand.
Fading away, rather then burning out in glorious battle.
I am still waiting for a good argument being made on how exchange sold lock box ships and other "high end gear" is the only/must have way for a newer player to be "competitive" in this game.
Its not ! End of story.
I'm still wondering where EC seller sites get their bankrolls
Its coming from somewhere !
Maybe those weirdo's/Cultists who were found gathering in the Original Risa Caverns, or more recently off the beaten path on Andoria !?
The EC economy is broken to the point of being unfixable. We've long passed the point where any kind of sink could be introduced that would affect the rich longtime players enough to matter, while also not bankrupting and disadvantaging the newer players. The only thing that can be done is to abandon it as a player to player currency and convert the Exchange to dilithium. Dilithium has plenty of checks on it to maintain its value, so inflation wouldn't be too much of an issue. I even recall one of the devs mention this in an episode of P1 a while back. The problem is that all the players benefiting from the current status quo with EC would riot, making this a somewhat scary change for Cryptic to make. That half a billion EC they're sitting on would suddenly become worthless for anything more than buying a metric s*** ton of standard consumables.
Comments
A tax on dilitium will do no good IMO either as it is already capped at 8k (plus some odd bonuses if you meet the criteria) already.
Honestly at this point the only way to "fix" the economy is to catch people cheating and report the EC sellers as that as far as I am aware is a TOS violation. Sadly I don't think Cryptic even pays attention to those.
For a new player to be able to make EC off the current state of the game is really hard. They're better off grinding the reps and making their own gear from the R&D system. Too many EC whales using multiple toons to push prices down and push anyone in their way out.
Glad you got a laugh from my previous post.
But you said it yourself;
"1) The STO economy is mostly centered on a single item, the [Master Key], the key used to open the many lockboxes which contain valuable and desirable loot."
You mean to tell me there is no Grey/Black Key market going on in STO ?
100% is above board and clean of any manipulation ?
Going back to your very important notation.
"The STO economy is mostly centered on a single item. the {Master Key]."
It's pretty simple, control the Key market, control the exchange. Key manipulation itself can send shockwaves throughout the economy. And have repercussions on the price of everything in the game.
Any well Organized group could mount an assault on the master key market.
They don't even need to control other aspects of the market, like traits or ships, that's secondary and not nearly as important to the economy structure then the master key.
Now, yes, I may have blown the manipulation of the market out of proportion, but the point I was trying to make is that if enough individuals form a cooperative, they could easily manipulate the price ranges of everything in the game through the control of the key market.
By either working in collusion with a large circle of players or employing the use of Bots to buy up any key below a certain price point.
(go ahead, have another good laugh) ill wait until you catch your breath....
Now that is out of your system, tell me why that is so hard to believe ?
Even if the bot is detected and account banned, another could easily be created to start the cycle a new.
You mean to tell me, this isn't going on ? At all ??? And I'm just being paranoid ?
Okay, maybe so, but, riddle me this Mr. Riddler, where's the black market EC coming from ?
Its coming from somewhere, or I wouldn't see the spamming in game from EC seller sites on a daily basis.
In addition to the EC seller site spam I see daily, I can assume they make some kind of profit or I wouldn't have seen these people spamming the chats for 3+ years (since I joined the game). No profit, no reason to continue spamming.
So that leads me to believe that these sites are either semi profitable (enough to keep the charade going) or massively profitable.
So it's clear they've got the currency to spare.
So where'd they get all their EC if you know so much about the economy ?
IMO it's coming from the manipulation of the Key Market.
Look, I'm good myself, I don't need anything atm in game, and if I do, I'll just whale it. So the price points don't really matter to me. I don't care what the cost of a key is or a certain ship is.
All I'm doing here, is putting forth a plausible scenario as to what is going on/influencing the inflation in STO's economy.
Name me 1 mmo that doesn't have a black market ? (an mmo where you can earn RL money currency in game, with game currency exchange - or trade it). There are none !
Where do you think the term gold farming came from ?
And why do you think people spend the time doing it ? Because there is profit to be made from games that have tradable currencies.
The only exceptions would be games that don't have tradable currency.
Like one example, War Thunder, everyone has access to the same planes and tanks, they are leveled and upgraded with battle points essentially, you play, you earn those battle points. But if you want the specialty planes and tanks, you must buy them with RL currency. (there are several per faction)
There are no specialty vehicles in the game that you can buy with battle points, there is no battle point/RL currency exchange.
There are no Lockboxes or master keys or any other form of gambling.
There are no trades, or exchange to buy these things for in game battle points.
Therefore there is nothing to exploit.
The closest thing I've seen in that game to market manipulation, were people trying to sell russian IP address's to North American client's.
By doing this, the buyer of game currency could get a better return on their dollar as the Russian cost ratio per rupple/dollar to in game RL currency was far more favorable then the American cost ratio per dollar to in game RL currency. But that is just an example of how far exploiters will go to make a buck off the back off someone else work.
While there was very little profit margin doing this, they still did, because guess what, there was some form of profit involved !
In STO, the sky really is the limit with the tradable currencies. And made even easier since it's economy revolves around one item as you say; The Master Key.
To deny that there is ANY market manipulation going on in STO is just as foolish as me, blowing the manipulation way out of proportion.
So again, where's the black market getting their currency ? If everything is clean and above board in STO ?
If the lockbox ships arent needed/necessary, it truely doesnt impact game play. why fuss about the price of a gimic/luxury item? If people will pay stupid high prices for extremely rare items, let them! Should we be crying shenanigans on the price of rechargable shield batteries too?
As far as someone having 300 million, not that long ago, I sold off all of my spare Romulan Boffs that I picked up leveling my Rommie. 6 boffs made me 50 mill' EC at the lower going rates. Add that to all of the items you pick up in drops, mission rewards, etc. . Selling valuable ones on the exchange and selling the rest to vendors, 300 mill isnt hard to imagine if someone builds it up after several months.
Fair enough. I'm not necessarily arguing your views on how the economy works and fluctuates.
In fact everything you've said thus far makes good sense.
But what I'm still having a hard time with, is the EC seller sites, and how they acquire their bankroll. (Not sure why I keep coming back to this, except that I feel its having "some" impact on the game)
But...I suppose you wouldn't know for certain anyway, and we could only speculate on the subject at hand.
Unless however, you have some ideas on it, and wish to share them, since you seem to know more about the economy then most, I'd be interested to hear your theory...
If not, well, just disregard. I understand if you don't wish to speculate.
I think you misunderstood my post completely. I'm not complaining about the prices, even though I personally don't like paying them(but I do when I can save up enough EC if I want something badly enough). The shenanigans I was calling was on Mr. Hypocrite,(@beameddown) who complains about the "exchange trolls" who make their money from trading/selling. He was able to drop 300 million EC on upgrade weekend after complaining about the high prices, but yet anyone else who has this kind of EC must be a troll/exploiter. No shenanigans on the prices, even though they are high. When taken into consideration that someone probably used ALOT of RL money(or got REALLY lucky) I have no issues with the prices of ships and other lockbox/lobi items.
I personally sell an item that I craft, with materials I get just from playing, that everyone wants to have in order to improve their gear. Some don't want to invest the time in R&D, so I take that pain away and make those items accessible to them...for a fee, of course. My profit margins aren't huge, by any means, but I can make enough to buy items I want, i.e., the high priced shinies. I always sell at the same price, all the time, usually undercutting other sellers, in an attempt to make those products available to everybody, whether a casher or F2P. I then use the profits to buy myself something I want, usually a ship/trait/doff. I absolutely DO NOT belong to any kind of shadowy cabal, buying up everything and hoarding it for later re-sale, according to a delusional poster from this thread. I DO NOT buy up the items that are priced below mine, so that mine will sell. Mine stay on the exchange(albeit not for very long) until they sell. I'm just a normal player who found a way to make EC from the exchange to buy the shiny stuff, and now these idiots want to take that away, or somehow penalize me, because they're too lazy/ignorant/entitled to do the same thing.
People need to realize that this game takes time, it's not a FB game, where you play for 10 minutes then logout for the day. To complete a reputation line, without a sponsorship token, takes 40 days. Then, you need marks/elite marks to get the gear from the rep line. This is not a short term game, nor was it designed to be one. If you want those shiny things, be prepared to invest the time it takes to get it. If you don't have that kind of time, then I suggest you not even attempt this game, or any others like it. They also require a time sinkhole to play and you won't get their shiny stuff in a week either. I want new players to join and enjoy the game as much as I do, but they need to understand what the game is, and how long it takes to get some of the things they want to have. This game is not instant gratification, and never will be. Either you accept that fact and just play the game the way it's designed and presented to us, or you move along and find something else. Enough whining about exchange prices/grinding/time-gates. Play or don't play, the ultimate decision is yours to make.
Instant gratification is that, instant, buying a ship off of the exchange IS instant. The effort to try to have Cryptic force the prices down so new players can readily buy it is forcing instant gratification even more so. Whats even worse is that the impression that lockbox ships/items are required to be competitive is entirely false, which makes the whole debate worse.
Your basic point of view, as stated is the the "greedy exchange people" have jacked prices so high for lockbox ships/items that a new player cant be competitive. If a new players saw this, and believed it, that statement disincentivizes them to play. The fact is that a new player doesnt need lockbox stuff to compete. One can easily buy ships that are just as effective, without all if the fluff and exclusivity of the lockbox ships. Consoles/weapons? Even if one hasnt ground out all of the rep' items, theres some pretty good stuff alongside those, plus old fashion energy type tac consoles and similar eng and sci consoles are still quite effective and readily available as drops, and its not insane to get those to mk xiv.
How long should a player take on that situation given? three to six months (leaning closer to six) where its really clicking, but it also shouldnt take depending on lockbox stuff to do it either. Insisting that new players need lockbox stuff is a disservice to them.
This. Just this right here.
Sums up my feelings without the (perceived) anger by me. I'm actually quite pleasant by nature but sometimes the posts here just yank my chain. I actually don't harbor any bad feelings towards anyone in the game and only want people to play and enjoy as much as I have over the last 3 years.
Is this game perfect? No, not by a long shot. I would like to see some changes made, such as a better system explaining builds/boff skills and the like so new players have a better understanding of the systems. Unless a newbie joins a helpful fleet, it is difficult to get answers about the basics. I've seen newbies try to ask simple questions in local/zone chat and get completely flamed by trolls, which is something that would certainly chase me away from the game way before I started worrying about exchange prices. This concerns me more than somebody jacking up prices on unnecessary items. If more people were to actually help new players, this would go a long way towards increasing our player base, which we need to continue playing.
I'm open to ideas on game improvements, if they make sense. Changes to the exchange seem to be pretty low on the list to me at this point in time. Not only that, but is anyone at Cryptic/PWE actually listening? I see many good ideas put forth by players in the forums but how many have actually been implemented ingame? We see testing done on Tribble server, players report bugs/broken mechanics and yet they roll them out anyway, in the process breaking other things that were WAI. These are the issues that should cause concern for players who care about the game and it's long term survivability. These are supposed to be the official forums, but other than Bort, it's rare to see any interaction between devs and players. If they're not listening, we can all rage at each other until the cows come home and it won't do a bit of good.
I think you've pretty much hit the head on the nail. Learning curves are based off of, wait for it... Learning!
The exchange lockbox ship/item prices arent the limiting factor for new players becomming competitive/better, its the lack of education. Give someone, who doesnt know what they are doing, nice shineys, and you'll get a guy who doesn't know what they are doing with nice shineys that is poorer than before he/she bought said shineys.
Forcing the slashing of exhange prices would only make shineys cheaper, not players any better, they will still be less competitive than the more experienced player who DOESN'T have nice shiney lockbox items.
A couple years ago I calculated how much real money you 'make' by converting Dil to Zen. It was less than a dollar per hour (30 to 70 cents, I forget exactly). So yeah, you're gonna work a bit to earn that $30 ship. And that was back when the Dil/Zen ratio was a better than it is now.
So even if you're working at McDonald's for minimum wage, you'd be better off picking up a few extra hours of work over grinding Dil. Just sayin'.
I say hogwash.
since I have been playing I have not had one fleet module ship, all of my ships I got from the game from levelling up, doing events and trading dil for zen to buy the odd c-store ship pack.
all of my gear from the lowest mk12 rare up to the epic I have just from in game drops and upgrading them myself, I can count the things I have now that I bought from the exchange on one hand and I got them for peanuts.
sure I have a few alts I use to gain a little extra dil but I only really doff with them and play them in events like mirror for the dil, I don't really need the dil for myself as I have all the gear I need for a good while, I just want the dil to fill fleet projects.
its taken me a few years to get where I am now but its been fun and I haven't had to rely on other players to do the work for me, I did it all by myself and its that much more rewarding because of that fact.
if I had started playing during the delta event and the alt characters I created then were my mains I could have them to the same state as my current mains in about the same time frame as it took me to get my actual mains to get there, sure I might be missing a few event ships but as most of them are only T5 that's not too much of a loss.
if other players feel the need to waste their time spending silly amounts on exchange items or even worse non-exchange items they don't need well BOO-HOO! that's their choice, perhaps they would be better off being more self reliant rather then spending out wads of EC or real money so others can do the work for them, I don't see why the devs should change anything about the game just to make it easier for them to get what they need off of the backs of others rather then just play the game as I have and get the stuff they need themselves.
if other players haven't got the patience it takes that's their problem.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Just selling loot doesn't get you anywhere nowadays, which is a real issue for new players. Especially since loot drops have practically no value for more advanced builds, they could really just drop the EC directly as it is incredibly rare that a drop sells for more than vendor-value on the exchange.
I'm not whining, I'm not space rich, but at 400m EC and a decked out main character I'm not exactly poor either. I'm just concerned that it gets increasingly difficult for new players to catch up, because the only way to get the amounts of EC you need is either real money (which is fine, but shouldn't be the only option) or playing Ferengi on the exchange.
personally most game drops go strait into the replicator and get recycled, about the only stuff I sell on the exchange is stuff that cant be recycled or has no recycle value and then its mostly just sold for a token fee of a few EC.
anything else I don't want just gets discarded, in most instances I cant see much point in buying drop gear off the exchange, if it drops for them then chances are it will drop for me or else something as good or better will.
providing players set their loot threshold to epic at the earliest opportunity they really should not need to buy anything from the exchange.
its not unusual for me to get MKXII rare gear or better in a game drop and then there are the later mission rewards, doff rewards and reputation sets, with all that going on who needs the exchange.
I'm not the best player in the game by a long way but if I can kit out every ship on all my main characters with nothing but MKXII rare or better then I must be doing something right.
like I said in my last comment if new players were to make use of drop gear replacing stuff as better stuff comes available, discarding or recycling stuff they cant use on other ships gradually they will get all they need.
sure it takes time, you cant expect to get all the gear you need overnight but eventually they will look at the gear they have and knowing they didn't rely on others but accomplished it themselves will feel better for it.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
"Dammit, Jim! I'm an MMO! Not a graduate level economics course!"
One of the reasons some items in this game are so expensive in imaginary currency is because there are fools out there willing to pay that imaginary currency price.
You want prices on the Exchange to come down to a reasonable level? Fine.
Method one: Flood the market with the item in question. Worked with crafting mats, didn't it?
Method two: Stop buying stuff with stupid prices attached to them.
Doesn't take a Ph.D. in economics or a lot of fifty dollar explanations by alleged 'experts' about how to 'fix' the ingame economy to figure this out.
One last thing: I also learned awhile ago the shinys arrive in your inventory when they want to, Not when you want them to.
I was in Open Beta test and until a few weeks ago, playing World of Warships by Wargaming. I will tell you now, those guys put the playerbase through the wringer milking everything they can from them. For that game, there arose a dirty tactic: They'd take a ship that they were prepping for release that was highly anticipated, then instead of just selling the ship on its own like everything else, they'd only put it out as part of some "fancy bundle" with a lot of TRIBBLE you don't care about but in total, is very expensive. They did this with the Tirpitz.
Then there was the whole Premium and Non-Premium account with marked disparity in XP & Credits earned. Big deal as the grind at higher tiers takes longer and higher tiered ships costed a lot to repair. There was no way to earn premium currency (doubloons) ingame, only with RL money. Wargaming makes PWE & Cryptic look tons better.
One thing is for sure... They get that that STO is significant enough because when I uninstalled World of Warships, I actually did the survey and when it asked about other games I played, STO is one of the default selections.
Wooohooo, a whopping $0.333 per hour per toon, you go grinder lol
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
I get more people play Feds, and more people trade/sell items exclusively to this faction, but really in the world of EC & keys, it isn't all that different IMO.
You can freely move mass EC between account banking, as well as keys.
So, why the huge differential?
Well, I suppose it could relate to odds being better a Fed buying your items over KDF, but when you start seeing price gaps of 2:1 [KDF vs Fed] or even 3:1, it makes me wonder why!
If it takes 2 or even 3 Fed sales to equal the 1 KDF, than the effort/profitability seems a little redundant, because the odds of the KDF item selling at such a high # with fewer odds of a player(s) buying it, just doesn't factor to well IMO.
Not to say someone won't buy it, but watching such an item sit for god knows how long not selling, and the seller not bringing the price(s) down to better suite the demand, nor people really even supplying the demand on the KDF faction side, seems very lopsided IMO.
I don't know the exact # difference between active KDF vs Fed, but I am willing to bet the Fed side is higher, which is understandable why more supply is usually available, and why price competition is more relevant.
But, the KDF side price on similar/exact same items, tends to get blown out of proportion sometimes [not always].
Especially when the supply is kept low, and the demand starts drying up due to the overpriced supply there is, if you can even call it supply!!!
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
Agreed!
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
Well, that's kind of my point, it really doesn't cost any more to open boxes for either faction really, it just boils down to more people not wanting to bother with the KDF faction, but it's their loss of potential revenue by either overpricing, or simply not making anything available.
I myself don't mind spending a little bit more, but 2X - 3X+ vs Fed is by far rediculous [granted not on everything], especially if they aren't going to offer a decent supply to boot.
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
Didnt like the Klingon choices when I tried it back whenthey did that, dont remember if they made the Fed ones an option on KDF
MY God, the dishonor...
Living life as a Klingon, only to farm contraband for the Federation...
There will be no Sto'Vo'Kor for these sad, lame, warriors.
Never knowing the glory of battle, never knowing the weighted feel of a bat'leth in hand.
Fading away, rather then burning out in glorious battle.
Its not !
I'm still wondering where EC seller sites get their bankrolls
Its coming from somewhere !
Maybe those weirdo's/Cultists who were found gathering in the Original Risa Caverns, or more recently off the beaten path on Andoria !?
The Keylluminati is alive and well !