This does reduce the over-supply of dil by slowing down the farmers.
It really doesn't; it just means they have more set up time per character and need to establish 4x as many characters; they'd go from cycling 192 characters @8k Dil each in 16 hours to cycling 768 characters @2k Dil each in 16 hours (assuming an average 5 minute gap between characters after setting up doffing missions, login/logout, swapping accounts and breaks and all that jazz - I can't deny this may be a low estimate after all factors are reviewed)
It isn't actually that much harder. And in any case these are massive over estimates because you'd use doffing and Admiralty to fill it in, so in actual fact for the time invested the farmers actually gain by going for the 768 characters because then they can use Dil from Admiralty and other doffing missions too to get the 768 characters to pull in 3k+ Dil per day.
Logistically it does have massive disadvantages to have 768 characters, but if it could be done it would be clearly superior to the alternative, because fundamentally the only constraint on the most dedicated farmer is how long it takes to swap characters and having to supply basic life-sustenance; even an account cap wouldn't harm them except by creating another obstacle to overcome by making more accounts.
---
Although, quite frankly, I think they'd stop at some point, we are talking between 1.2 and 2.34 million Dil per day...
All of this will take time and money to set up. Unless they don't mind rolling hundreds of alt accounts. In that case it will only take time. So there will be an adjustment in the interim.
When you see "TRIBBLE" in my posts, it's because I manually typed "TRIBBLE" and censored myself.
More characters must be bought though, and new accounts need zen first.
As with any change, some will welcome it, some will not like it, but astonishingly many people are entirely sure how it will end up in the long run, only they don't seem to agree.
My mother was an epohh and my father smelled of tulaberries
This does reduce the over-supply of dil by slowing down the farmers.
It really doesn't; it just means they have more set up time per character and need to establish 4x as many characters; they'd go from cycling 192 characters @8k Dil each in 16 hours to cycling 768 characters @2k Dil each in 16 hours (assuming an average 5 minute gap between characters after setting up doffing missions, login/logout, swapping accounts and breaks and all that jazz - I can't deny this may be a low estimate after all factors are reviewed)
It isn't actually that much harder. And in any case these are massive over estimates because you'd use doffing and Admiralty to fill it in, so in actual fact for the time invested the farmers actually gain by going for the 768 characters because then they can use Dil from Admiralty and other doffing missions too to get the 768 characters to pull in 3k+ Dil per day.
Logistically it does have massive disadvantages to have 768 characters, but if it could be done it would be clearly superior to the alternative, because fundamentally the only constraint on the most dedicated farmer is how long it takes to swap characters and having to supply basic life-sustenance; even an account cap wouldn't harm them except by creating another obstacle to overcome by making more accounts.
---
Although, quite frankly, I think they'd stop at some point, we are talking between 1.2 and 2.34 million Dil per day...
All of this will take time and money to set up. Unless they don't mind rolling hundreds of alt accounts. In that case it will only take time. So there will be an adjustment in the interim.
A F2P account can support at least 42 characters, IIRC. Therefore the 768 requires 19 accounts. If we assume a 16 hour shift to get a character to level 52, it will take over 2 years for a single farmer to expand from their original 192 to 768.
Hold on...
The thought occurs to me I've made a massive error with my maths here because what I've stated above is the max number of Contraband turn ins, and not the characters; 192 turn ins x 5 minutes each is 960 minutes, 16 hours. therefore they actually go from only needing 48 characters to 192 characters.
So, our revised interim is now down to one year or so. That is not a bad interim.
I may change my mind, because if the aim is to reduce farmers, this would actually work.
---
And as it is I'm probably overestimating the time a farmer would actually spend in STO anyway; because of the 4 hour timer and the fact it takes 4 runs to fill the 8k I've assumed 16 hours, but you would need to be mental -or would go mental- to actually do this and therefore that 16 could be halved or more to allow, you know, an actual life...
If farming dilithium was the problem (according to Cryptic), they would not have introduced Admiralty, which puts contraband to shame. On the way to getting the thousands of dil bonus for Klingon tier 10, you make copious amounts of dilithium along the way (in FED, ROM and KDF). More than enough to reach the 8k daily limit.
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
This doesnt really affect me personally- I have several KDF alts, but play (and gear, ugh) them all. Any incentive the KDF has (had) is being taken away. There are several real disincentives to play anything but FED now. I get that they want people to play where there is more stuff to buy, but things like this are obvious reasons why they can say "no one plays KDF lolz" like they do.
All this talk about getting new people in, and everything they do tells a new player "No, no, you don't want to play KDF or Romulan. Play FED. You get this, and this, and this..."
If farming dilithium was the problem (according to Cryptic), they would not have introduced Admiralty, which puts contraband to shame. On the way to getting the thousands of dil bonus for Klingon tier 10, you make copious amounts of dilithium along the way (in FED, ROM and KDF). More than enough to reach the 8k daily limit.
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
This doesnt really affect me personally- I have several KDF alts, but play (and gear, ugh) them all. Any incentive the KDF has (had) is being taken away. There are several real disincentives to play anything but FED now. I get that they want people to play where there is more stuff to buy, but things like this are obvious reasons why they can say "no one plays KDF lolz" like they do.
All this talk about getting new people in, and everything they do tells a new player "No, no, you don't want to play KDF or Romulan. Play FED. You get this, and this, and this..."
Like When they made it so that the only way to get ALL of the rewards on a Delta recruit was to play one per faction?
If farming dilithium was the problem (according to Cryptic), they would not have introduced Admiralty, which puts contraband to shame. On the way to getting the thousands of dil bonus for Klingon tier 10, you make copious amounts of dilithium along the way (in FED, ROM and KDF). More than enough to reach the 8k daily limit.
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
This doesnt really affect me personally- I have several KDF alts, but play (and gear, ugh) them all. Any incentive the KDF has (had) is being taken away. There are several real disincentives to play anything but FED now. I get that they want people to play where there is more stuff to buy, but things like this are obvious reasons why they can say "no one plays KDF lolz" like they do.
All this talk about getting new people in, and everything they do tells a new player "No, no, you don't want to play KDF or Romulan. Play FED. You get this, and this, and this..."
Like When they made it so that the only way to get ALL of the rewards on a Delta recruit was to play one per faction?
No, like making the new Delta recruits FED only. You're talking about something that went on close to 2 years ago, I'm talking about what's going on now. XD
I'm pretty sure that the zen to dilithium exchange (You know, the most important system in the game. The thing that keeps the game going and the F2P model stable) is a bigger priority than people's precious SRO's.
Which uses refined Dilithium, The duty officer mission generates Unrefined Dilithium, so with the 9k hard cap per day per toon, still doesn't solve the issue does it?
There we totally agree at least. I don't see a contraband nerf affecting exchange prices at all.
By the way speeding research is also a dill sink, as is buying fleet gear.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
If farming dilithium was the problem (according to Cryptic), they would not have introduced Admiralty, which puts contraband to shame. On the way to getting the thousands of dil bonus for Klingon tier 10, you make copious amounts of dilithium along the way (in FED, ROM and KDF). More than enough to reach the 8k daily limit.
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
This doesnt really affect me personally- I have several KDF alts, but play (and gear, ugh) them all. Any incentive the KDF has (had) is being taken away. There are several real disincentives to play anything but FED now. I get that they want people to play where there is more stuff to buy, but things like this are obvious reasons why they can say "no one plays KDF lolz" like they do.
All this talk about getting new people in, and everything they do tells a new player "No, no, you don't want to play KDF or Romulan. Play FED. You get this, and this, and this..."
I disagree. Admiralty greatly increased the supply of dil, EC and mats, but it did that for the casual players not the farmers who already were set up to max the 8K/alt/day.
Like I said earlier, Cryptic (to me) seems to be intending to shift wealth from farmers / grinders / hoarders to casuals more than to reduce the total wealth.
Cryptic (to me) seems to be intending to shift wealth from farmers / grinders / hoarders to casuals more than to reduce the total wealth.
If this is the case I applaud them. I just hope they take the right actions to do so efficiently.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
Don't use it. And I doubt it will prevent me from making dil. lol
"Great men are not peacemakers, Great men are conquerors!" - Captain Archer" "When diplomacy fails, there's only one alternative - violence. Force must be applied without apology. It's the Starfleet way." - Captain Janeway #Support Mirror Universe I.S.S. Prefixes
I disagree. Admiralty greatly increased the supply of dil, EC and mats, but it did that for the casual players not the farmers who already were set up to max the 8K/alt/day.
Like I said earlier, Cryptic (to me) seems to be intending to shift wealth from farmers / grinders / hoarders to casuals more than to reduce the total wealth.
Well, Admiralty greatly increased the dilithium supply, to everyone. As a result, the "problem" (which it either is, or isn't, depending on who you ask) of the high dil/zen ratio has been on a constant and steady increase. If this is meant to remedy that situation, then it seems to me that this problem is not being addressed.
There were farmers when I started playing, and I never saw the massive dil/zen ratio until Admiralty, which has more than halved the value of dilithium on the market since its inception.
For casuals, extra dil from Admiralty, episodes, STFs and events means they have it to use during the Upgrade Weekends and to earn Fleet Credits.
The extra EC from Admiralty means they can buy either mats or pre-made tech upgrades and gear. Yes, inflation raised prices by up to 100%, but if their own EC income went up 1,000% they are still ahead. They also have money for commodities and consumables for fleet projects.
The extra VR mats from Admiralty means they can craft upgrades and the rank 15 gear if they want to.
Anyone earning enough dil to buy 2,400 zen for a ship should probably be considered a grinder even if not a farmer. Cryptic seems to have decided the priority for rewards should be casuals, then grinders, then farmers.
They already nerfed xp rewards. Screwed up special doff/ultra rare doff missions with the space sector revamp, In turn broke Tuffi Freighters, now this change. Not needed or required.
So i can earn 2k dil every 4hrs on 1 or multiple toons. I still have to login and start/collect those missions. This change doesn't make any logical sense. It will make 0 change to the dil exchange. All i can see it doing is hurting the KDF as being able to farm contraband is a perk of their doff chain assignments.
Admiralty already rewards superior dilithium to this mission. I was fortunate enough to run a good chain on the Fed Camp tonight and walked away with over 14k dil for less than 3hrs of mission queuing. I wonder how long it will take before that takes a nerf bat to the knee.
If this is all about doing something about the dil exchange it is a fail and will continue to fail unless the cap is altered from 500 to a lower number, "why" ? Zen Sellers will sell Zen for what they think its market value is and Zen Buyers will buy Zen for what they are happy to trade Dil for. Its a free market. The only people that truly effect the price of Zen-Dil is the people using the exchange. If People stopped buying Zen the value would drop as Sellers wanting to move on that Zen would remove and list it at a lower price. Some won't and will stick to their guns but others would and you'd see the rate fall if Zen wasn't moving. Whilst its moving/selling the value of Zen will continue to hold or increase.
Cryptic are tackling this the wrong way unless this change to Contraband mission is the 1st of many steps to decrease the availability of Dilithium.
Don't be surprised to see Feature Episodes no longer pay Dilithium, Sector Patrols and i wouldn't be surprised if Reputation Marks is somewhere on their list not that i want to give them any ideas.
They already nerfed xp rewards. Screwed up special doff/ultra rare doff missions with the space sector revamp, In turn broke Tuffi Freighters, now this change. Not needed or required.
So i can earn 2k dil every 4hrs on 1 or multiple toons. I still have to login and start/collect those missions. This change doesn't make any logical sense. It will make 0 change to the dil exchange. All i can see it doing is hurting the KDF as being able to farm contraband is a perk of their doff chain assignments.
Admiralty already rewards superior dilithium to this mission. I was fortunate enough to run a good chain on the Fed Camp tonight and walked away with over 14k dil for less than 3hrs of mission queuing. I wonder how long it will take before that takes a nerf bat to the knee.
If this is all about doing something about the dil exchange it is a fail and will continue to fail unless the cap is altered from 500 to a lower number, "why" ? Zen Sellers will sell Zen for what they think its market value is and Zen Buyers will buy Zen for what they are happy to trade Dil for. Its a free market. The only people that truly effect the price of Zen-Dil is the people using the exchange. If People stopped buying Zen the value would drop as Sellers wanting to move on that Zen would remove and list it at a lower price. Some won't and will stick to their guns but others would and you'd see the rate fall if Zen wasn't moving. Whilst its moving/selling the value of Zen will continue to hold or increase.
Cryptic are tackling this the wrong way unless this change to Contraband mission is the 1st of many steps to decrease the availability of Dilithium.
Don't be surprised to see Feature Episodes no longer pay Dilithium, Sector Patrols and i wouldn't be surprised if Reputation Marks is somewhere on their list not that i want to give them any ideas.
And none of that will make a difference unless they nerf it to the point where it becomes a painful grind just to hit the daily cap. and with the game demanding you spend so much dilithium as is, people will leave.
I like to think they're smarter than that.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
If Cryptic really wanted to make a dent in this, they should nerf contraband rewards from doffing as well. Wouldn't surprise me if they already did this as an unlisted change.
No, not really necessary. People use contraband mostly to convert to Dil. There are some Doff missions that uses contraband, but does not reward Dil. All this means is that the supply of contraband will outstrip the demand for contraband because of the 20 hour cool down to convert contraband to Dil. The result is the value of contraband will decrease, thus making it less expensive to purchase on the Exchange.
Not necessarily.
Right now:
5 contraband is required for 2000 dil every 4 hours
All they have to do for a 20 hour cool down is increase the amount of contraband required for turn in for 2000 dil.
So, 20 hours divided by 4 hours = 5
5 contraband required X 5 = 25 contraband required for the (new/up incoming) 20 hour assignment.
The "average" EC (Exchange value) for contraband has been around (or closely centered to) about 40,000 EC per unit of contraband (i.e. 400,000 EC for a 10-stack; 10,000,000 EC for a 250-stack).
By increasing/multiplying the amount of contraband required for turn in to 25 (5 times the current 4 hour amount), the EC value shouldn't change very much.
In fact, it may very well increase for a time, making contraband more (if not just as) valuable to those of us (namely myself. I ONLY sell/"turn in" contraband to the Exchange ) grinding/collecting it for EC.
The problem with that reasoning is if it takes 25 contraband for a mere 2000 dill on 20 hours cooldown, people will simply stop bothering with the doff mission, and contraband becomes irrelevant.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
By increasing/multiplying the amount of contraband required for turn in to 25 (5 times the current 4 hour amount), the EC value shouldn't change very much.
That reasoning doesn't take into account what I think Cryptic's goal is - slow down farmers without harming casuals.
Raising the cost for the contraband mission hurts casuals, because they don't earn much contraband.
Raising the time gate for contraband only hurts farmers, because they are the ones who farm enough to want to use the mission multiple times a day. Many casuals only log in once a day anyway.
Well it's nice to see Cryptic clearly doesn't understand the economy of their own game if they think nerfing contraband will lower the exchange rate. Why do people pay real money for zen in order to get dil? Cause they don't have the time to grind/farm dil and they have things to spend it on. With AoY and the upgrade weekend coming up, more people are buying zen to get dil and the rate drops. The last fleet holding, there was a frenzy to be the first to complete it and so people were buying up dil and the rate dropped. But of course Cryptic looks in the wrong direction in order to "fix" the problem.
If farming dilithium was the problem (according to Cryptic), they would not have introduced Admiralty, which puts contraband to shame. On the way to getting the thousands of dil bonus for Klingon tier 10, you make copious amounts of dilithium along the way (in FED, ROM and KDF). More than enough to reach the 8k daily limit.
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
This doesnt really affect me personally- I have several KDF alts, but play (and gear, ugh) them all. Any incentive the KDF has (had) is being taken away. There are several real disincentives to play anything but FED now. I get that they want people to play where there is more stuff to buy, but things like this are obvious reasons why they can say "no one plays KDF lolz" like they do.
All this talk about getting new people in, and everything they do tells a new player "No, no, you don't want to play KDF or Romulan. Play FED. You get this, and this, and this..."
If Cryptic really wanted to make a dent in this, they should nerf contraband rewards from doffing as well. Wouldn't surprise me if they already did this as an unlisted change.
No, not really necessary. People use contraband mostly to convert to Dil. There are some Doff missions that uses contraband, but does not reward Dil. All this means is that the supply of contraband will outstrip the demand for contraband because of the 20 hour cool down to convert contraband to Dil. The result is the value of contraband will decrease, thus making it less expensive to purchase on the Exchange.
Not necessarily.
Right now:
5 contraband is required for 2000 dil every 4 hours
All they have to do for a 20 hour cool down is increase the amount of contraband required for turn in for 2000 dil.
So, 20 hours divided by 4 hours = 5
5 contraband required X 5 = 25 contraband required for the (new/up incoming) 20 hour assignment.
The "average" EC (Exchange value) for contraband has been around (or closely centered to) about 40,000 EC per unit of contraband (i.e. 400,000 EC for a 10-stack; 10,000,000 EC for a 250-stack).
By increasing/multiplying the amount of contraband required for turn in to 25 (5 times the current 4 hour amount), the EC value shouldn't change very much.
In fact, it may very well increase for a time, making contraband more (if not just as) valuable to those of us (namely myself. I ONLY sell/"turn in" contraband to the Exchange ) grinding/collecting it for EC.
The problem here is you've slashed the relative value of each individual item of contraband: They used to be worth 400 Dil each, but under the proposed situation they are worth 80 Dil each, and 80 Dil is not worth 40,000 EC - indexed by keys 1 Zen is worth about 5,900,000 EC/125 which equals 47,250 EC.
Now currently, at 400 Dil each it requires 130 contraband to equal 1 key. Under your proposal it would take 650 contraband to equal 1 key, which means the price of contraband has to go down in order for it to maintain it's value.
Of course, contraband itself is currently down to the 35k EC area, the first 40k EC result on the exchange right now is about the 340th result.
For casuals, extra dil from Admiralty, episodes, STFs and events means they have it to use during the Upgrade Weekends and to earn Fleet Credits.
The extra EC from Admiralty means they can buy either mats or pre-made tech upgrades and gear. Yes, inflation raised prices by up to 100%, but if their own EC income went up 1,000% they are still ahead. They also have money for commodities and consumables for fleet projects.
The extra VR mats from Admiralty means they can craft upgrades and the rank 15 gear if they want to.
Anyone earning enough dil to buy 2,400 zen for a ship should probably be considered a grinder even if not a farmer. Cryptic seems to have decided the priority for rewards should be casuals, then grinders, then farmers.
Since this is obviously a measure they're taking due to the dil/zen ratio, I'm not sure any of that ^ is relevant.
This will likely have little to no effect on the problem they're "looking at." If they wanted to slow people gaming the dil/zen system, they probably should look at reducing the amount of zen an account can buy daily with dilithium. Not only does that reduce hardcore dilithium farming (per account), but it discourages spending hours gaming/botting the dil exchange.
Look , it's quite simple :
What is easier -- building elaborate "holdings" to suck out the access Dil , or to fiddle with a timer ?
And if we go by Cryptic "thinking" , they will nerf the smaller fries first and then point to the "big one" that is "standing out" (Admiralty) and nerf that too in the name of "normalizing the game" .
One thing you can be sure of -- the Dinozone won't take a hit .
Nobody's touching Geko's "precious" .
You get more stuff and Upgrade that to check out alternative builds. You treat your Boffs to Gold-plated Uniforms. There is always the next thing to Upgrade.
'But to be logical is not to be right', and 'nothing' on God's earth could ever 'make it' right!'
Judge Dan Haywood
'As l speak now, the words are forming in my head.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
Yeah, they are constantly doing bone-headed stuff like this. In another Thread I said:
"Will the other shoe drop on Contraband? - 'To make the turning in of Contraband valuable all year round, it will no be eligible for the bonus during Dilithium Events'."
'But to be logical is not to be right', and 'nothing' on God's earth could ever 'make it' right!'
Judge Dan Haywood
'As l speak now, the words are forming in my head.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
Look , it's quite simple :
What is easier -- building elaborate "holdings" to suck out the access Dil , or to fiddle with a timer ?
And if we go by Cryptic "thinking" , they will nerf the smaller fries first and then point to the "big one" that is "standing out" (Admiralty) and nerf that too in the name of "normalizing the game" .
One thing you can be sure of -- the Dinozone won't take a hit .
Nobody's touching Geko's "precious" .
Typical Cryptic way of thinking, always take the easy way out. As far as I'm concerned this will be the thing that breaks the camels back. But I'd like to ask has anyone stopped to consider that the constant ship releases, the introduction of the infinity box (and the subsequent effect its had on exchange item price) might be the reason why the dil - zen exchange has sky rocketed in recent months?
The one thing that both KDF and Romulan factions have always lacked are a decent selection of science ships for both general game play and for use in admiralty. With the introduction of the the Temporal ships this has provided players with a much needed science ship, without the need to purchase Lobi or lock box ships. And as such I stumped up the zen necessary to purchase these ships
Instead of hurting the players that have taken the time to figure these systems out for themselves, maybe Cryptic should spend the time going after the bot farmers, the exploiters and start looking at those that have openly admitted to manipulating various facets of the game for their own ends.
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
DING DING DING winner. There was like what - 2 events since the TRIBBLE system rolled out, all with a high payout? I would surmise with the addition of the level 10 KDF payout, yeah - suddenly a lot of people had more Dil than normal laying around.
Comments
As with any change, some will welcome it, some will not like it, but astonishingly many people are entirely sure how it will end up in the long run, only they don't seem to agree.
A F2P account can support at least 42 characters, IIRC. Therefore the 768 requires 19 accounts. If we assume a 16 hour shift to get a character to level 52, it will take over 2 years for a single farmer to expand from their original 192 to 768.
Hold on...
The thought occurs to me I've made a massive error with my maths here because what I've stated above is the max number of Contraband turn ins, and not the characters; 192 turn ins x 5 minutes each is 960 minutes, 16 hours. therefore they actually go from only needing 48 characters to 192 characters.
So, our revised interim is now down to one year or so. That is not a bad interim.
I may change my mind, because if the aim is to reduce farmers, this would actually work.
---
And as it is I'm probably overestimating the time a farmer would actually spend in STO anyway; because of the 4 hour timer and the fact it takes 4 runs to fill the 8k I've assumed 16 hours, but you would need to be mental -or would go mental- to actually do this and therefore that 16 could be halved or more to allow, you know, an actual life...
My character Tsin'xing
The exchange "problem" wasn't with KDF farmers, it was when everybody got massive amounts of dilithium.
This doesnt really affect me personally- I have several KDF alts, but play (and gear, ugh) them all. Any incentive the KDF has (had) is being taken away. There are several real disincentives to play anything but FED now. I get that they want people to play where there is more stuff to buy, but things like this are obvious reasons why they can say "no one plays KDF lolz" like they do.
All this talk about getting new people in, and everything they do tells a new player "No, no, you don't want to play KDF or Romulan. Play FED. You get this, and this, and this..."
My character Tsin'xing
No, like making the new Delta recruits FED only. You're talking about something that went on close to 2 years ago, I'm talking about what's going on now. XD
There we totally agree at least. I don't see a contraband nerf affecting exchange prices at all.
By the way speeding research is also a dill sink, as is buying fleet gear.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
I disagree. Admiralty greatly increased the supply of dil, EC and mats, but it did that for the casual players not the farmers who already were set up to max the 8K/alt/day.
Like I said earlier, Cryptic (to me) seems to be intending to shift wealth from farmers / grinders / hoarders to casuals more than to reduce the total wealth.
If this is the case I applaud them. I just hope they take the right actions to do so efficiently.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
"When diplomacy fails, there's only one alternative - violence. Force must be applied without apology. It's the Starfleet way." - Captain Janeway
#Support Mirror Universe I.S.S. Prefixes
Well, Admiralty greatly increased the dilithium supply, to everyone. As a result, the "problem" (which it either is, or isn't, depending on who you ask) of the high dil/zen ratio has been on a constant and steady increase. If this is meant to remedy that situation, then it seems to me that this problem is not being addressed.
There were farmers when I started playing, and I never saw the massive dil/zen ratio until Admiralty, which has more than halved the value of dilithium on the market since its inception.
The extra EC from Admiralty means they can buy either mats or pre-made tech upgrades and gear. Yes, inflation raised prices by up to 100%, but if their own EC income went up 1,000% they are still ahead. They also have money for commodities and consumables for fleet projects.
The extra VR mats from Admiralty means they can craft upgrades and the rank 15 gear if they want to.
Anyone earning enough dil to buy 2,400 zen for a ship should probably be considered a grinder even if not a farmer. Cryptic seems to have decided the priority for rewards should be casuals, then grinders, then farmers.
So i can earn 2k dil every 4hrs on 1 or multiple toons. I still have to login and start/collect those missions. This change doesn't make any logical sense. It will make 0 change to the dil exchange. All i can see it doing is hurting the KDF as being able to farm contraband is a perk of their doff chain assignments.
Admiralty already rewards superior dilithium to this mission. I was fortunate enough to run a good chain on the Fed Camp tonight and walked away with over 14k dil for less than 3hrs of mission queuing. I wonder how long it will take before that takes a nerf bat to the knee.
If this is all about doing something about the dil exchange it is a fail and will continue to fail unless the cap is altered from 500 to a lower number, "why" ? Zen Sellers will sell Zen for what they think its market value is and Zen Buyers will buy Zen for what they are happy to trade Dil for. Its a free market. The only people that truly effect the price of Zen-Dil is the people using the exchange. If People stopped buying Zen the value would drop as Sellers wanting to move on that Zen would remove and list it at a lower price. Some won't and will stick to their guns but others would and you'd see the rate fall if Zen wasn't moving. Whilst its moving/selling the value of Zen will continue to hold or increase.
Cryptic are tackling this the wrong way unless this change to Contraband mission is the 1st of many steps to decrease the availability of Dilithium.
Don't be surprised to see Feature Episodes no longer pay Dilithium, Sector Patrols and i wouldn't be surprised if Reputation Marks is somewhere on their list not that i want to give them any ideas.
And none of that will make a difference unless they nerf it to the point where it becomes a painful grind just to hit the daily cap. and with the game demanding you spend so much dilithium as is, people will leave.
I like to think they're smarter than that.
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
Not necessarily.
Right now:
5 contraband is required for 2000 dil every 4 hours
All they have to do for a 20 hour cool down is increase the amount of contraband required for turn in for 2000 dil.
So, 20 hours divided by 4 hours = 5
5 contraband required X 5 = 25 contraband required for the (new/up incoming) 20 hour assignment.
The "average" EC (Exchange value) for contraband has been around (or closely centered to) about 40,000 EC per unit of contraband (i.e. 400,000 EC for a 10-stack; 10,000,000 EC for a 250-stack).
By increasing/multiplying the amount of contraband required for turn in to 25 (5 times the current 4 hour amount), the EC value shouldn't change very much.
In fact, it may very well increase for a time, making contraband more (if not just as) valuable to those of us (namely myself. I ONLY sell/"turn in" contraband to the Exchange
"He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
That reasoning doesn't take into account what I think Cryptic's goal is - slow down farmers without harming casuals.
Raising the cost for the contraband mission hurts casuals, because they don't earn much contraband.
Raising the time gate for contraband only hurts farmers, because they are the ones who farm enough to want to use the mission multiple times a day. Many casuals only log in once a day anyway.
The problem here is you've slashed the relative value of each individual item of contraband: They used to be worth 400 Dil each, but under the proposed situation they are worth 80 Dil each, and 80 Dil is not worth 40,000 EC - indexed by keys 1 Zen is worth about 5,900,000 EC/125 which equals 47,250 EC.
Now currently, at 400 Dil each it requires 130 contraband to equal 1 key. Under your proposal it would take 650 contraband to equal 1 key, which means the price of contraband has to go down in order for it to maintain it's value.
Of course, contraband itself is currently down to the 35k EC area, the first 40k EC result on the exchange right now is about the 340th result.
Since this is obviously a measure they're taking due to the dil/zen ratio, I'm not sure any of that ^ is relevant.
This will likely have little to no effect on the problem they're "looking at." If they wanted to slow people gaming the dil/zen system, they probably should look at reducing the amount of zen an account can buy daily with dilithium. Not only does that reduce hardcore dilithium farming (per account), but it discourages spending hours gaming/botting the dil exchange.
What is easier -- building elaborate "holdings" to suck out the access Dil , or to fiddle with a timer ?
And if we go by Cryptic "thinking" , they will nerf the smaller fries first and then point to the "big one" that is "standing out" (Admiralty) and nerf that too in the name of "normalizing the game" .
One thing you can be sure of -- the Dinozone won't take a hit .
Nobody's touching Geko's "precious" .
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
"Will the other shoe drop on Contraband? - 'To make the turning in of Contraband valuable all year round, it will no be eligible for the bonus during Dilithium Events'."
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
Typical Cryptic way of thinking, always take the easy way out. As far as I'm concerned this will be the thing that breaks the camels back. But I'd like to ask has anyone stopped to consider that the constant ship releases, the introduction of the infinity box (and the subsequent effect its had on exchange item price) might be the reason why the dil - zen exchange has sky rocketed in recent months?
The one thing that both KDF and Romulan factions have always lacked are a decent selection of science ships for both general game play and for use in admiralty. With the introduction of the the Temporal ships this has provided players with a much needed science ship, without the need to purchase Lobi or lock box ships. And as such I stumped up the zen necessary to purchase these ships
Instead of hurting the players that have taken the time to figure these systems out for themselves, maybe Cryptic should spend the time going after the bot farmers, the exploiters and start looking at those that have openly admitted to manipulating various facets of the game for their own ends.
DING DING DING winner. There was like what - 2 events since the TRIBBLE system rolled out, all with a high payout? I would surmise with the addition of the level 10 KDF payout, yeah - suddenly a lot of people had more Dil than normal laying around.