Time to promote boffs and give them command

admiraljaneway1

As the title states some of us have had the same BOFFs since the beginning. While it's not uncommon in Star Trek lore for one to go several years without a promotion these BOFFs have been with us through many battles and the Iconian War. They have seen things that they most likely wouldn't see on a normal starship. All of their hardwork has gone unrewarded and I know I would be unhappy if I didn't receive at least one promotion during all of that. So why not promote them to captain we are fleet admirals after all and we have such authority to give out field promotions. As being promoted to captain your BOFF should have the responsibilites as such and that is to command a starship.

What I'm suggesting is a companion system for STO where they get to command their own ship right beside your own. We have them as ground companions why not get a space one too. Companions make the game more enjoyable to play especially if you like to solo. Now you could only promote one BOFF of your choosing and you could give them any ship in your arsenal and outfit it with anything that you like. Of course to keep things balanced their damage capabilities would not be as strong as yours. Yes, some will say the game is easy enough already and we don't need anymore addition to DPS. While this maybe true in some aspects you can choose whether or not to have your BOFF's ship with you. Yes, there would have to be a general difficulty increase across the board to accompany it to prevent it from being too easy.

As STO continues to grow ideas need to be more innovative to keep it in competition with other MMOs. A lot of MMOs have a companion system and they are quite enjoyable to play. I feel that this would make game more enjoyable for some. All comments and suggestions are welcome. What are your thoughts about this? How do you think such a system should be implemented?

I look forward to seeing everyone's response on this lets get creative here people

cidjack

[Unnecessary & derailing post modded]

carasucia83

I don't like this idea. At all. I don't want to play a 3rd person RTS.

Why are people so intent on trying to ruin my solo captain immersion? I wanna be like Admiral Kirk in ST:III Search for Spock. That's how I got my hands on all these ships that aren't from my own faction.


If you must RP your BOffs all the way to Captain, here a couple of ideas for you:

Delete them and then RP that they are captains of one of the ships in the ADMIRALty system that we were recently given.

Use the Command Specialization line Starship Trait, delete the BOff and RP that they are the captain of the ship that your fleet support ability calls in. Be sure to give them my regards as they randomly TBR stuff out of weapons range.

I would, however, like a dev to give a definitive answer on this so that further threads on this topic can be added to the long list on the FCT post.

evilmark444

THIS is what admiralty should have been, not the pointless doff revamp they gave us

nephitis

[Reaction to previously moderated post removed]

carasucia83 wrote: »

I don't like this idea. At all. I don't want to play a 3rd person RTS.
If you must RP your BOffs all the way to Captain, here a couple of ideas for you:

Delete them and then RP that they are captains of one of the ships in the ADMIRALty system that we were recently given.

Use the Command Specialization line Starship Trait, delete the BOff and RP that they are the captain of the ship that your fleet support ability calls in. Be sure to give them my regards as they randomly TBR stuff out of weapons range.

I would, however, like a dev to give a definitive answer on this so that further threads on this topic can be added to the long list on the FCT post.

I wouldn't call this idea a real time strategy. Secondly, one or two too many abbreviations for me on a Friday evening and long week of work.

Either way, personally I think the current Admiratly system was one of the most over hyped and most lame feature implementation Cryptic has ever done. There is nothing interesting about it and nothing to write home about. It is just another click-and-forget feature and I think they need to move away from that idea because it adds little gameplay value.

Moreover, I would adjust this idea majorly and not incorporate the BOFFs, Admiralty and Specialization features at all. By space companion system I would implement a partially NPC/player controlled vessel with fully slottable gear, with the latter being a crucial part of the system that will not be like the current fixed hangar pet system. The ship you can activate as your companion will be one of your playable ships, and it will have the layout inherent by its playable version.

You then incorporate a more advanced command system than the current hangar pet system to control that companion ship. Things like Attack anything within 25 km (allows it fly away from you), Protect me, Protect my target, Be passive, Follow me, Follow me and attack and so forth. It shouldn't be too difficult to implement since they already have a similiar feature and AI like this in the form of hangar pets. Yes, I am aware that the current hangar pet system is somewhat flawed and significantly flawed when it comes to cannon pets. But if your companion ship inherits the stats from the playable version (including consoles and other changes) it would be possible for you as player to change entirely how you want your ship to perform. Not only would you be able to pick what ship and what type of ship, you would also be able to customize it to your liking and see you be in control of its performance.

All of this would give people intentive to buy more ships and I think it would add a nice value and boost to the actual gameplay. Of course, this gameplay could unlock at let's say level 65 if they were to implement a level increase, and then be the opening sequence for exploring the unknown Andromeda galaxy. This end-level gameplay could also mean a significant boost in difficulty for that portion of leveling and section of the map.

I personally hope they will implement something like this because the current ideas they keep coming up with and implement I see as somewhat dry and unimaginative. I know they have restricted access to the Star Trek universe with rights and all, but from a gameplay standpoint each major season doesn't offer much in the form of gameplay. We barely get content, and the new SWTOR - Knights of the Fallen Empire showed how it can be done. They completely dwarved the supposedly season 11 of STO. All we got this time was an awfully designed space battlezone and no ground zone... and their expansions are incremental and accumulative so on the initial launch date we get like a third of it. Even the "New Dawn" title was extremely misleading. I thought we would be exploring a new galaxy or something, not play around with old and reused ideas such as the Mirror Universe and Tholians. They cannot keep revamping old content and hope that people see it as new. What STO needs is not evolution but rather revolution - something impactful and meaningful.

At least this is what I think and hope for.

bernatk

I would like to court-martial Tovan Khev. He regularly leaves his designated post and troll my XO spot. He's a repeat offender and can't throw him off my ship. Dafuq...