Y'all have given me some ideas for a Foundry Mission. As a long haul truck driver with over twenty years in the business, I think I might be able to come up with just a few ideas for a fun and entertaining story about running freight around the map, lol. Got a career's worth of experience to draw from, after all. It should not be too hard to translate something from that into this game.
Hadn't thought about playing one of my chars as a merchant captain until I saw this. Thanks OP!
I think a "Freelancer" faction is doable along the lines of the Romulan Republic allegiance system.
They'd get a unique set of starter missions and access to unique starter ships T1/T2. After that, they could fly "repurposed" ships from their adopted faction and get access to a special T6 intel/pilot Q-ship at level 50. They'd have access to a wide range of races across every other faction.
Their "home base" could be a private level on Drozana Station. They could "identify" with either Federation or KDF in terms of later content, as contractors, mercenaries, or intelligence assets. In fact, setting them up as eventual operatives for either faction's intelligence arms makes a lot of sense.
While it will probably never happen, I wish that it would.
I have previously discussed the opposite of the Romulan faction idea. After a character reaches level 50 and thus all "faction specific" stories are complete, you have the option of going "rogue" by buying into the Orion Cartels. Would cost something serious too like 2 million dilithium to unlock this option at drozana station? This would be a permanent change on a character as you would be leaving and effectively "stealing" your ship/s from your parent faction. That way you can keep all the stuff you have, PWE doesn't have to come up with more ships, etc. Make a mission or two available at that point, and here's the kicker....remove faction limitations at that point, so at the drozana shipyard (which would need to be added) you can buy ships from ANY faction at a 125% surcharge (so 3000 zen ships would cost you 3750 (kina a moot point as I see the players doing this already have alts from all factions to simply unlock the ships) so the alternate to that would be that all the ships you buy are "hot" so can be bought for 50% of normal cost....but you CAN'T get account unlocks or use account unlocks from other characters. So previously bought ships don't work from your non original faction race. But the theory goes you could have some fun with it. Romulan rogue captain in a Fed Gal-x with orion slavers in the hanger......just my two cents
So I was thinking of ways to make things more interesting in the game for me and I came up with the idea of creating a character specifically designed to be a cargo hauler/freighter captain. Something non-military and I thought I would post here and get suggestions for how best to proceed. Obviously I'd have to choose either Federation or KDF and I figured I'd go with a Ferengi character. Has anyone done something similar and would like to share what they did or have suggestions how best to proceed? I'd like to refrain from using Federation/KDF vessels as much as possible though I don't think I've bought any or unlocked anything that could replace them just yet.
Any suggestions or thoughts would be welcomed.
I created a Bolian freighter captain a long time ago, using the Tuffli freighter. It was on a secondary account so I could invite the characters on my main account (exchange, cheap commodities, trade assignments, additional chance für support-missions etc...) and from level 8 onwards I only ran Doff assignments instead of doing missions.
It was rather boring, since there was no way that you could dress the rest of your boffs in somewhat immersive and varied civilian outfits back then. it's pretty much a dead character/account right now, since cluster were removed.
I have previously discussed the opposite of the Romulan faction idea. After a character reaches level 50 and thus all "faction specific" stories are complete, you have the option of going "rogue" by buying into the Orion Cartels. Would cost something serious too like 2 million dilithium to unlock this option at drozana station? This would be a permanent change on a character as you would be leaving and effectively "stealing" your ship/s from your parent faction. That way you can keep all the stuff you have, PWE doesn't have to come up with more ships, etc. Make a mission or two available at that point, and here's the kicker....remove faction limitations at that point, so at the drozana shipyard (which would need to be added) you can buy ships from ANY faction at a 125% surcharge (so 3000 zen ships would cost you 3750 (kina a moot point as I see the players doing this already have alts from all factions to simply unlock the ships) so the alternate to that would be that all the ships you buy are "hot" so can be bought for 50% of normal cost....but you CAN'T get account unlocks or use account unlocks from other characters. So previously bought ships don't work from your non original faction race. But the theory goes you could have some fun with it. Romulan rogue captain in a Fed Gal-x with orion slavers in the hanger......just my two cents
Kinda cool idea My only issues with it, are the surcharge and unlock fee, and the idea of permanently trashing a character's reputation... If Freighter was a seperate faction, then it can have a unique character, and no need for anyone's characters to have to go to the dark side... Also, having the ships and equipment being purchasable, is how Cryptic would need to run it, to get the funds back, to make it worth their while in coding, so it needs to appeal to the largest audience... It should still have a free to play option, because that would encourage players to actually engage, so by all means, let folks buy upgraded ships/equipment if they want to, but don't make it so they have, because that would then be limiting the faction's appeal to those who can afford to play... They need to appeal to everyone, to get the widest market to which they can then sell little things like upgrades...
I agree, however STO really really does run on Pay to Play. And they are NEVER going to dump enough resources into creating a whole new faction and ships and all that....doing it as an end-game jump ship works from that perspective because it give them the chance to make money on additional ship sales and clothing etc.....while still having the "free" perspective that you could do this with a free character and use dilithium they gave you for free. IDK. I would be happy if they did anything like this though.
I agree, however STO really really does run on Pay to Play. And they are NEVER going to dump enough resources into creating a whole new faction and ships and all that....doing it as an end-game jump ship works from that perspective because it give them the chance to make money on additional ship sales and clothing etc.....while still having the "free" perspective that you could do this with a free character and use dilithium they gave you for free. IDK. I would be happy if they did anything like this though.
I would say it runs as Pay to Play(Better), rather than Pay to Play(at all) or Pay to Win... That's why I think that a faction shouldn't ever require a player to play just to be able to play, because IMHO, it wouldn't have a wide appeal, which, given it may not be a universally appealing faction, needs to have as wide appeal as possible
I have previously discussed the opposite of the Romulan faction idea. After a character reaches level 50 and thus all "faction specific" stories are complete, you have the option of going "rogue" by buying into the Orion Cartels. Would cost something serious too like 2 million dilithium to unlock this option at drozana station? This would be a permanent change on a character as you would be leaving and effectively "stealing" your ship/s from your parent faction. That way you can keep all the stuff you have, PWE doesn't have to come up with more ships, etc. Make a mission or two available at that point, and here's the kicker....remove faction limitations at that point, so at the drozana shipyard (which would need to be added) you can buy ships from ANY faction at a 125% surcharge (so 3000 zen ships would cost you 3750 (kina a moot point as I see the players doing this already have alts from all factions to simply unlock the ships) so the alternate to that would be that all the ships you buy are "hot" so can be bought for 50% of normal cost....but you CAN'T get account unlocks or use account unlocks from other characters. So previously bought ships don't work from your non original faction race. But the theory goes you could have some fun with it. Romulan rogue captain in a Fed Gal-x with orion slavers in the hanger......just my two cents
Kinda cool idea My only issues with it, are the surcharge and unlock fee, and the idea of permanently trashing a character's reputation... If Freighter was a seperate faction, then it can have a unique character, and no need for anyone's characters to have to go to the dark side... Also, having the ships and equipment being purchasable, is how Cryptic would need to run it, to get the funds back, to make it worth their while in coding, so it needs to appeal to the largest audience... It should still have a free to play option, because that would encourage players to actually engage, so by all means, let folks buy upgraded ships/equipment if they want to, but don't make it so they have, because that would then be limiting the faction's appeal to those who can afford to play... They need to appeal to everyone, to get the widest market to which they can then sell little things like upgrades...
Maybe there is something else that could work. Does anyone recall way back when people still played the FASA STRPG?
I was GM for a campaign where I alternated the story between factions. Once I had a clue which players liked what factions best, I arranged to put the appropriate characters together at a crucial moment where they had to unite in a vital mission. Afterwards they were prompted partly from obvious necessity, and partly by gentle guiding from an NPC or two, to create a secret faction with the purpose of protecting the galaxy. Sort of like superheroes in practice.
Maybe being a freighter captain could be sort of like a secret identity? You would need to keep it up to protect the secret side of things.
I don't know what is best here. I do think we need to make some of this work somehow. Even if it just a channel for people that pick certain toons to use, and agree not to kill each other at Ker'rat or other overlap areas. (although, it looks like I am going to BE killing people at Ker'rat, so at least some of my toons will be busy with that)
I have previously discussed the opposite of the Romulan faction idea. After a character reaches level 50 and thus all "faction specific" stories are complete, you have the option of going "rogue" by buying into the Orion Cartels. Would cost something serious too like 2 million dilithium to unlock this option at drozana station? This would be a permanent change on a character as you would be leaving and effectively "stealing" your ship/s from your parent faction. That way you can keep all the stuff you have, PWE doesn't have to come up with more ships, etc. Make a mission or two available at that point, and here's the kicker....remove faction limitations at that point, so at the drozana shipyard (which would need to be added) you can buy ships from ANY faction at a 125% surcharge (so 3000 zen ships would cost you 3750 (kina a moot point as I see the players doing this already have alts from all factions to simply unlock the ships) so the alternate to that would be that all the ships you buy are "hot" so can be bought for 50% of normal cost....but you CAN'T get account unlocks or use account unlocks from other characters. So previously bought ships don't work from your non original faction race. But the theory goes you could have some fun with it. Romulan rogue captain in a Fed Gal-x with orion slavers in the hanger......just my two cents
Kinda cool idea My only issues with it, are the surcharge and unlock fee, and the idea of permanently trashing a character's reputation... If Freighter was a seperate faction, then it can have a unique character, and no need for anyone's characters to have to go to the dark side... Also, having the ships and equipment being purchasable, is how Cryptic would need to run it, to get the funds back, to make it worth their while in coding, so it needs to appeal to the largest audience... It should still have a free to play option, because that would encourage players to actually engage, so by all means, let folks buy upgraded ships/equipment if they want to, but don't make it so they have, because that would then be limiting the faction's appeal to those who can afford to play... They need to appeal to everyone, to get the widest market to which they can then sell little things like upgrades...
Maybe there is something else that could work. Does anyone recall way back when people still played the FASA STRPG?
I was GM for a campaign where I alternated the story between factions. Once I had a clue which players liked what factions best, I arranged to put the appropriate characters together at a crucial moment where they had to unite in a vital mission. Afterwards they were prompted partly from obvious necessity, and partly by gentle guiding from an NPC or two, to create a secret faction with the purpose of protecting the galaxy. Sort of like superheroes in practice.
Maybe being a freighter captain could be sort of like a secret identity? You would need to keep it up to protect the secret side of things.
I don't know what is best here. I do think we need to make some of this work somehow. Even if it just a channel for people that pick certain toons to use, and agree not to kill each other at Ker'rat or other overlap areas. (although, it looks like I am going to BE killing people at Ker'rat, so at least some of my toons will be busy with that)
Qapla!
That does sound like a cool idea
My idea for the freighter 'faction', is that a player can't choose Freighter until they have completed a tutorial on a main faction toon (ie they have to know how to play, so the story can begin immediately, without the need for a tutorial) The player crafts a character in a faction of their choice (I'll discuss Fed for discussion) and the story begins with them getting lectured by Quinn, stripped of rank, and escorted to the transporter platform for transport to New Zealand. They beam out... ...only to rematerialize on the transporter pad of a freighter (ie Azura Layout) They are then greeted by someone who introduces themself as a friend of the family, who owed the character's father a favor, which they are repaying with the 'jail break'... They make their way to the bridge, where the player must then disable some Starfleet ships to escape the Sol System (item drops then give the freighter ablative armor, dual canons, quantum torpedoes) As they leave the system, a hail from Quinn informs them that they were once his greatest student, but now they are his greatest disappointment, and that they are now a fugitive from Justice, who will be unwelcome anywhere in Federation territory... And then the fun begins
So I was thinking of ways to make things more interesting in the game for me and I came up with the idea of creating a character specifically designed to be a cargo hauler/freighter captain. Something non-military and I thought I would post here and get suggestions for how best to proceed. Obviously I'd have to choose either Federation or KDF and I figured I'd go with a Ferengi character. Has anyone done something similar and would like to share what they did or have suggestions how best to proceed? I'd like to refrain from using Federation/KDF vessels as much as possible though I don't think I've bought any or unlocked anything that could replace them just yet.
Any suggestions or thoughts would be welcomed.
Awesome! Every faction has those as well so it would be a nice fit!
I have previously discussed the opposite of the Romulan faction idea. After a character reaches level 50 and thus all "faction specific" stories are complete, you have the option of going "rogue" by buying into the Orion Cartels. Would cost something serious too like 2 million dilithium to unlock this option at drozana station? This would be a permanent change on a character as you would be leaving and effectively "stealing" your ship/s from your parent faction. That way you can keep all the stuff you have, PWE doesn't have to come up with more ships, etc. Make a mission or two available at that point, and here's the kicker....remove faction limitations at that point, so at the drozana shipyard (which would need to be added) you can buy ships from ANY faction at a 125% surcharge (so 3000 zen ships would cost you 3750 (kina a moot point as I see the players doing this already have alts from all factions to simply unlock the ships) so the alternate to that would be that all the ships you buy are "hot" so can be bought for 50% of normal cost....but you CAN'T get account unlocks or use account unlocks from other characters. So previously bought ships don't work from your non original faction race. But the theory goes you could have some fun with it. Romulan rogue captain in a Fed Gal-x with orion slavers in the hanger......just my two cents
Kinda cool idea My only issues with it, are the surcharge and unlock fee, and the idea of permanently trashing a character's reputation... If Freighter was a seperate faction, then it can have a unique character, and no need for anyone's characters to have to go to the dark side... Also, having the ships and equipment being purchasable, is how Cryptic would need to run it, to get the funds back, to make it worth their while in coding, so it needs to appeal to the largest audience... It should still have a free to play option, because that would encourage players to actually engage, so by all means, let folks buy upgraded ships/equipment if they want to, but don't make it so they have, because that would then be limiting the faction's appeal to those who can afford to play... They need to appeal to everyone, to get the widest market to which they can then sell little things like upgrades...
Maybe there is something else that could work. Does anyone recall way back when people still played the FASA STRPG?
I was GM for a campaign where I alternated the story between factions. Once I had a clue which players liked what factions best, I arranged to put the appropriate characters together at a crucial moment where they had to unite in a vital mission. Afterwards they were prompted partly from obvious necessity, and partly by gentle guiding from an NPC or two, to create a secret faction with the purpose of protecting the galaxy. Sort of like superheroes in practice.
Maybe being a freighter captain could be sort of like a secret identity? You would need to keep it up to protect the secret side of things.
I don't know what is best here. I do think we need to make some of this work somehow. Even if it just a channel for people that pick certain toons to use, and agree not to kill each other at Ker'rat or other overlap areas. (although, it looks like I am going to BE killing people at Ker'rat, so at least some of my toons will be busy with that)
Qapla!
That does sound like a cool idea
My idea for the freighter 'faction', is that a player can't choose Freighter until they have completed a tutorial on a main faction toon (ie they have to know how to play, so the story can begin immediately, without the need for a tutorial) The player crafts a character in a faction of their choice (I'll discuss Fed for discussion) and the story begins with them getting lectured by Quinn, stripped of rank, and escorted to the transporter platform for transport to New Zealand. They beam out... ...only to rematerialize on the transporter pad of a freighter (ie Azura Layout) They are then greeted by someone who introduces themself as a friend of the family, who owed the character's father a favor, which they are repaying with the 'jail break'... They make their way to the bridge, where the player must then disable some Starfleet ships to escape the Sol System (item drops then give the freighter ablative armor, dual canons, quantum torpedoes) As they leave the system, a hail from Quinn informs them that they were once his greatest student, but now they are his greatest disappointment, and that they are now a fugitive from Justice, who will be unwelcome anywhere in Federation territory... And then the fun begins
Y'all have given me some ideas for a Foundry Mission. As a long haul truck driver with over twenty years in the business, I think I might be able to come up with just a few ideas for a fun and entertaining story about running freight around the map, lol. Got a career's worth of experience to draw from, after all. It should not be too hard to translate something from that into this game.
Hadn't thought about playing one of my chars as a merchant captain until I saw this. Thanks OP!
LSHIPM! Ya know, ya coulda put that in spoilers and warned a fella, but noooo....
Thanks for the laugh! Much appreciated!
EDIT: On to New Business. Tossing ideas around with some friends for story ideas on this. We've boarded a few plotlines but none of them have that "Ah-HA!" Factor which a really good Foundry Mission needs to be worth playing.
A six year old boy and his starship. Living the dream.
Given that we just got a new faction for this last expanse, I would say that the fifth expansion can be the new Privateer/Mercenary/Freelancer/Pirate faction. The Gorn Rebellion started and for the Feds to support the Gorn, they hire the new faction while the KDF hire the same in order to save face for the Alliance (due to wanting the exchange of new technology from recent encounters) with the some faction-specific missions where the KDF massacre Gorn rebels and the Feds were outed in a couple of encounters trying to help the rebels. Then we can have bounty hunter contracts, anti-piracy patrols in contested areas, running supplies to fringe colonies, and the new holding can be a planetside-station (colony) that could introduce player housing.
Comments
They'd get a unique set of starter missions and access to unique starter ships T1/T2. After that, they could fly "repurposed" ships from their adopted faction and get access to a special T6 intel/pilot Q-ship at level 50. They'd have access to a wide range of races across every other faction.
Their "home base" could be a private level on Drozana Station. They could "identify" with either Federation or KDF in terms of later content, as contractors, mercenaries, or intelligence assets. In fact, setting them up as eventual operatives for either faction's intelligence arms makes a lot of sense.
While it will probably never happen, I wish that it would.
Qapla!
I created a Bolian freighter captain a long time ago, using the Tuffli freighter. It was on a secondary account so I could invite the characters on my main account (exchange, cheap commodities, trade assignments, additional chance für support-missions etc...) and from level 8 onwards I only ran Doff assignments instead of doing missions.
It was rather boring, since there was no way that you could dress the rest of your boffs in somewhat immersive and varied civilian outfits back then. it's pretty much a dead character/account right now, since cluster were removed.
Maybe there is something else that could work. Does anyone recall way back when people still played the FASA STRPG?
I was GM for a campaign where I alternated the story between factions. Once I had a clue which players liked what factions best, I arranged to put the appropriate characters together at a crucial moment where they had to unite in a vital mission. Afterwards they were prompted partly from obvious necessity, and partly by gentle guiding from an NPC or two, to create a secret faction with the purpose of protecting the galaxy. Sort of like superheroes in practice.
Maybe being a freighter captain could be sort of like a secret identity? You would need to keep it up to protect the secret side of things.
I don't know what is best here. I do think we need to make some of this work somehow. Even if it just a channel for people that pick certain toons to use, and agree not to kill each other at Ker'rat or other overlap areas. (although, it looks like I am going to BE killing people at Ker'rat, so at least some of my toons will be busy with that)
Qapla!
My idea for the freighter 'faction', is that a player can't choose Freighter until they have completed a tutorial on a main faction toon (ie they have to know how to play, so the story can begin immediately, without the need for a tutorial) The player crafts a character in a faction of their choice (I'll discuss Fed for discussion) and the story begins with them getting lectured by Quinn, stripped of rank, and escorted to the transporter platform for transport to New Zealand. They beam out... ...only to rematerialize on the transporter pad of a freighter (ie Azura Layout) They are then greeted by someone who introduces themself as a friend of the family, who owed the character's father a favor, which they are repaying with the 'jail break'... They make their way to the bridge, where the player must then disable some Starfleet ships to escape the Sol System (item drops then give the freighter ablative armor, dual canons, quantum torpedoes) As they leave the system, a hail from Quinn informs them that they were once his greatest student, but now they are his greatest disappointment, and that they are now a fugitive from Justice, who will be unwelcome anywhere in Federation territory... And then the fun begins
Awesome! Every faction has those as well so it would be a nice fit!
Me also!
Qapla!
My Infamous Cargo Ship
It's mean making someone laugh that hard ...
Qapla!
Thanks for the laugh! Much appreciated!
EDIT: On to New Business. Tossing ideas around with some friends for story ideas on this. We've boarded a few plotlines but none of them have that "Ah-HA!" Factor which a really good Foundry Mission needs to be worth playing.
Well there is almost always some overlap in space opera scifi, so why not a little SW ?
Qapla!