> @wideningxgyre said: > Of course, the long-run averages are the safest bet when making spending choices. > > But, you really cannot underestimate the quirkiness of RNG. Over the years, I've never opened more than 10 boxes here and there and have gotten 3 grand prize ships. During the recent 50% lobi sale, I was 20 lobi short and figured I'd buy five keys from the exchange to get my 20 lobi. I won my fourth grand prize ship, the Dhailkhina, from one of those five keys. > > I've certainly never opened more than 500 boxes the entire time I've been playing.
Still, I'm sure Cryptic appreciates you sharing your experience. Every time someone shares a story like that, some other poor person thinks it might happen to them and Cryptic makes a lot of money from them.
If I was into marketing & not regulated it isn't inconceivable to use Tribble as a gateway to entice consumers with better odds.
If they were trying to do that the odds would be much better than what the test results say, plus they would be risking accidentally pushing a patch to Holodeck with the adjusted Tribble odds still in effect which is something they REALLY wouldn't want to happen. People already open plenty of boxes anyway so they have no reason to do it at all.
Well that's the merger of art & science within marketing & the allure of gambling too, a simple nudge here & there nothing usually too drastic.
Now you're idea of "accidently pushing a patch" to Holodeck that would be intended for Tribble I'm sure is a possibility, but being different servers I'm sure allows some safeguard from that ever happening, I'd hope, though part of me would find something like that funny.
All of this is of course speculation of Holodeck & Tribble having different statistics which is just as valid as the idea speculating that Holodeck & Tribble have the same statistics, only Cryptic knows & I'm sure a few others: CBS & PWE.
I disagree with the "just as valid" part of your speculation.
It's less work, more ethical, and less risky (because of the chance of being exposed) to have the odds be the same.
I need more evidence than "it could've happened" to believe in a conspiracy, especially one that has been kept secret for 6+ years without any ex-employees breaking the silence.
Your whole "exposure" would only matter if there was a reason to be held accountable. Currently there isn't & ethical seems to be fluid & subjective perhaps too much.
I never cited any "evidence" nor considered it "evidence" there's simply none when we're outside looking in.
My point is still this was done on Tribble & it should be thought of as research conducted for Tribble only not conflated with conjecture that it's good data for Holodeck too.
Your whole 6+ years is self-serving conjecture too just because you haven't heard anything or some whistleblower hasn't exposed it lol if that's the case & all has been the same all this time there'd be no need to conduct one after another of these "testing the odds".
I look at the gambling odds for STO similar to social media "influencers" praising STO if/when I view them. It very well might be legitimate but it might very well be bought & paid for in someway which isn't illegal just a bit unethical if not disclosed.
(response to redacted material removed) - darkbladejk
Of course, the long-run averages are the safest bet when making spending choices.
But, you really cannot underestimate the quirkiness of RNG. Over the years, I've never opened more than 10 boxes here and there and have gotten 3 grand prize ships. During the recent 50% lobi sale, I was 20 lobi short and figured I'd buy five keys from the exchange to get my 20 lobi. I won my fourth grand prize ship, the Dhailkhina, from one of those five keys.
I've certainly never opened more than 500 boxes the entire time I've been playing.
So you're extremely lucky...I've been opening up lock boxes since they were introduced and I've only gotten 1 grand prize, and It's 7 going on 8 years of drought
Can't have a honest conversation because of a white knight with power
In the realm of baseless speculation, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they use a variable chance like other scummy corporations(why else would you refuse to disclose the odds?).
A little over a year ago, I got an Infinity AND Promo choice pack from those holiday giveaways. I also got the 'Daikatana' Warbird on the first day while burning some keys in an attempt to get some Zhat Vash weapon packs(and some lobi pocket-change, for the klingon recruit). The 'hot-streaks' just seem way too suspicious to me, and I confess I'm quite jaded after seeing seeing some really shady stuff that other companies do with their gambling mechanics.
On a semi-constructive side note: A "Pity System" would probably be a good idea for those packs, if it's not currently a thing. (A guarantee to get the grand prize after X attempts.) It encourages whales to spend however much is needed, upfront/before 'rolling', and it rewards long-term investment/engagement from people who cannot afford as much.
Guys keep it civil and leave the flamethrowers at home.
On a particular point, until there is actual evidence presented there is some mega difference in box odds on tribble vs holodeck, that line of talk is just speculation with neither side being able to prove their case. Also I've talked to some of these guys at length before, and they're all terrible liars. If something like that was going on, one of them would've slipped up and spilled the beans already.
As for publishing the odds, while I'm all for publishing the odds of the boxes in the name of transparency, I don't see it happening without some big change such as a law being passed, and I loath the thought of government getting their grubby hands further into the gaming world than what they already are. However that's another can of worms entirely. Publishing odds isn't going to be some lockbox killer that everyone wishes it would be, it's just not. Folks can easily see the odds of winning the Powerball or Mega Millions, yet tons of folks play it every week like clockwork. I'm not a fan of lockboxes either, but it's my choice on whether I buy them or not. If enough folks refused to buy them then Cryptic and other companies would no longer use lockboxes. However believe me when I say you don't want a SWTOR type model coming to STO, which is what I see happening should lockboxes disappear while STO is in its current state.
"Someone once told me that time was a predator that stalked us all our lives. I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment, because it will never come again." - Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek Generations
So, given that they're unlikely to use 'magic numbers' like 0.417% for something like this, I'd guess that the under-the-hood range is 1 out of 200 for an T6 ship token, or 0.5%. Since each lockbox is $1 each to open, that's definitely in the whale-hunting price range. Far too rich for my tastes.
Why would you assume 1/200 instead of, say, 1/240?
Why would they use 0.417% instead of 0.5%?
Maybe they didn't. Maybe it's really 0.4% (1/250) and the test was slightly lucky? But also... what is to stop them from using a non-round number?
Because that's just not true. You could easily get the same result (or worse) with a 1% chance. They have a drop table with fixed chance of each item dropping. If you had 100 items all at 1% chance of dropping, you're going to get different results for each and every item, and then can claim it's a conspiracy. Even those that do publish their odds, that's all it is, a chance of that item dropping for EACH roll. All this tells me is that the drop-rate is between 0.5 and 1%.....and that '1%' was blurted out on a livestream a few years back.
"You don't want to patrol!? You don't want to escort!? You don't want to defend the Federation's Starbases!? Then why are you flying my Starships!? If you were a Klingon you'd be killed on the spot, but lucky for you.....you WERE in Starfleet. Let's see how New Zealand Penal Colony suits you." Adm A. Necheyev.
I figured most people, at least here on the forums, were well aware that the drop rate for ships was less than 1%. We've seen these tests posted often enough to know that. I know that I personally have never gotten one while opening boxes for lobi. I have no maths to contribute as I didn't keep track of all the boxes I've opened over the past 9 years.
As often as we see that we can know that it represents somewhere between $240 and $300 of revenue for Cryptic.
Not necessarily, the two times that I've won a Promo ship I did it within 3 boxes both times. I've opened plenty since then with no luck, but those first two I got with just a handful of boxes I purchased using my lifetime stipend.
On a particular point, until there is actual evidence presented there is some mega difference in box odds on tribble vs holodeck, that line of talk is just speculation with neither side being able to prove their case.
Until there is actual evidence presented that there is a difference between odds on holodeck vs tribble, there is no reason to think there is.
Also I've talked to some of these guys at length before, and they're all terrible liars. If something like that was going on, one of them would've slipped up and spilled the beans already.
Who are "some of these guys"? And what lies were they trying to tell you that you were able to discern they were lying?
However believe me when I say you don't want a SWTOR type model coming to STO,
Hasn't SWTOR actually started selling what used to be lockbox items in it's store for set prices? I've bought a number of armor sets that used to be in lockboxes and was happy to be able to do so. And for the items they aren't selling in the store, can't people buy them from other players on the in game exchange like in STO? What is bad about either of those things?
Hasn't SWTOR actually started selling what used to be lockbox items in it's store for set prices?
Yep, much better than lootboxes imo (AND you can account unlock anything you own for an additional cost), though I think Dark is referring to the fact that you need to subscribe to get access to the newest content (a single month subscription permanently unlocks all content available at that time). I personally prefer that monetization method over unregulated gambling, everyone likes to say that sub models don't work but the two top MMOs (WoW and FF14) are still fully subscription+paid expansion based. The reason the sub model didn't work for STO is because the game was rather terrible at launch which caused the playerbase to quickly fall, and though the existence of the Lifetime sub option gave them plenty of cash upfront it would have become a hindrance later on.
As often as we see that we can know that it represents somewhere between $240 and $300 of revenue for Cryptic.
Not necessarily, the two times that I've won a Promo ship I did it within 3 boxes both times. I've opened plenty since then with no luck, but those first two I got with just a handful of boxes I purchased using my lifetime stipend.
An average 250 boxes per ship. One person opens 3 boxes and gets a ship, another person opens 500 and gets 0 ships.
I opened 300+ phoenix boxes and got no UR or Epic. I opened another 470 phoenix boxes in the recent event and got one UR phoenix token. I opened 10 more and got a second UR token. Put that together and the odds are likely to be at least 1:250 for UR tokens, maybe higher. Saying an UR gains Cryptic 1+ million dil seems accurate.
Yep, much better than lootboxes imo (AND you can account unlock anything you own for an additional cost), though I think Dark is referring to the fact that you need to subscribe to get access to the newest content (a single month subscription permanently unlocks all content available at that time).
Ah, that would make more sense (if he meant that). Because like I/we said, being able to buy the lockbox items in the normal game store is actually a great thing.
I personally prefer that monetization method over unregulated gambling, everyone likes to say that sub models don't work but the two top MMOs (WoW and FF14) are still fully subscription+paid expansion based. The reason the sub model didn't work for STO is because the game was rather terrible at launch which caused the playerbase to quickly fall, and though the existence of the Lifetime sub option gave them plenty of cash upfront it would have become a hindrance later on.
Yeah, I actually prefer it too for one simple reason: when they are making money from (something) they have a greater motivation to make it, and make it more often. Because STO makes money from ships and not missions, they make many more ships than they do missions. If STO were selling missions/content packs, they would have a financial motivation to make more of them more often.
That said, the business model thing is a completely different topic and I wasn't trying to go down that rabbit hole.
These results are worse than even the worst gacha games out there, and those games make all of their money from RNG
This game is so predatory these days it isn't even funny. You want a new ship? Pay us a 100+ dollars for a pack full of stuff you don't want or gamble potentially hundreds of dollars and get lots of stuff you don't want
Can't have a honest conversation because of a white knight with power
Or do events and get a FREE ship. 3 regular event ships a year, every year, plus meta events for 1+ ships a year.
Plus, people have the option of doing what I said earlier: grind dil, trade for zen, buy keys/promo packs, sell them on the exchange for EC, then use that EC to buy the ship you want off the exchange (if it's there).
That said, you would be surprised how many people don't actually know you can do that and think the only way to get ships is to open boxes. The devs have said before that the majority of players don't read the forums, so those folks are probably where a good chunk of the box profits come from.
> @wideningxgyre said:
> Of course, the long-run averages are the safest bet when making spending choices.
>
> But, you really cannot underestimate the quirkiness of RNG. Over the years, I've never opened more than 10 boxes here and there and have gotten 3 grand prize ships. During the recent 50% lobi sale, I was 20 lobi short and figured I'd buy five keys from the exchange to get my 20 lobi. I won my fourth grand prize ship, the Dhailkhina, from one of those five keys.
>
> I've certainly never opened more than 500 boxes the entire time I've been playing.
Still, I'm sure Cryptic appreciates you sharing your experience. Every time someone shares a story like that, some other poor person thinks it might happen to them and Cryptic makes a lot of money from them.
My point was not to shill for Cryptic.
As I stated, when making spending decisions, a person is going to optimize expected value by focusing on the the long-run probabilities of particular outcomes. Obviously, people win the Powerball and Megamillions jackpots, but that doesn't mean someone should run out and buy lottery tickets expecting to win.
My point was merely to note that RNG can have a wide range of outcomes at the individual level.
So, given that they're unlikely to use 'magic numbers' like 0.417% for something like this, I'd guess that the under-the-hood range is 1 out of 200 for an T6 ship token, or 0.5%. Since each lockbox is $1 each to open, that's definitely in the whale-hunting price range. Far too rich for my tastes.
Why would you assume 1/200 instead of, say, 1/240?
Why would they use 0.417% instead of 0.5%?
Maybe they didn't. Maybe it's really 0.4% (1/250) and the test was slightly lucky? But also... what is to stop them from using a non-round number?
Because that's just not true. You could easily get the same result (or worse) with a 1% chance. They have a drop table with fixed chance of each item dropping. If you had 100 items all at 1% chance of dropping, you're going to get different results for each and every item, and then can claim it's a conspiracy. Even those that do publish their odds, that's all it is, a chance of that item dropping for EACH roll. All this tells me is that the drop-rate is between 0.5 and 1%.....and that '1%' was blurted out on a livestream a few years back.
I think you missed my point entirely... I was replying to someone who, completely baselessly, is insisting that the odds must be 1/200 (0.5%) because "why would they make it a strange number".
I was just trying to say that while the test showed something like 1/240, it wasn't necessarily that either, but that there's also no reason to assume it's a round number. It could be just as easily 1/263 if someone programmed that.
Apologies, That was not my intention and what you said was exactly my point and I was equivocating. Folk who use tribble draws to state actual odds are 1 in 250 etc have no idea about statistical probabilities and odds....trust they are the bane of my life at the moment! Running statistics is just some annoying in science, but they do give me an informed opinion
"You don't want to patrol!? You don't want to escort!? You don't want to defend the Federation's Starbases!? Then why are you flying my Starships!? If you were a Klingon you'd be killed on the spot, but lucky for you.....you WERE in Starfleet. Let's see how New Zealand Penal Colony suits you." Adm A. Necheyev.
Or do events and get a FREE ship. 3 regular event ships a year, every year, plus meta events for 1+ ships a year.
Oh...so I just need to do a event and get my favorite ship, the D7 for free? And then the next event I can get the Discovery D7...then after that the Kelvin too?
Thanks...I didn't know I could get any ship I want for free by just doing a event!
Can't have a honest conversation because of a white knight with power
Or do events and get a FREE ship. 3 regular event ships a year, every year, plus meta events for 1+ ships a year.
Oh...so I just need to do a event and get my favorite ship, the D7 for free? And then the next event I can get the Discovery D7...then after that the Kelvin too?
Thanks...I didn't know I could get any ship I want for free by just doing a event!
I didn't say "any ship" but actually you CAN get a free D7 from the meta-event. In previous years we've been given free C-Store tokens for any regular (not Mudds or Legendary) C-Store ship.
You claimed "This game is so predatory these days it isn't even funny" which is of course an opinion you're entitled to. It just doesn't seem like a reasonable opinion to me given how much free stuff we're given, much more than is needed to play all endgame content.
Or do events and get a FREE ship. 3 regular event ships a year, every year, plus meta events for 1+ ships a year.
Oh...so I just need to do a event and get my favorite ship, the D7 for free? And then the next event I can get the Discovery D7...then after that the Kelvin too?
Thanks...I didn't know I could get any ship I want for free by just doing a event!
I didn't say "any ship" but actually you CAN get a free D7 from the meta-event. In previous years we've been given free C-Store tokens for any regular (not Mudds or Legendary) C-Store ship.
You claimed "This game is so predatory these days it isn't even funny" which is of course an opinion you're entitled to. It just doesn't seem like a reasonable opinion to me given how much free stuff we're given. The gatcha games you mention often won't even let you play more than x minutes a day before you run out of energy, and I doubt you'll find many without a cash shop stuffed with many $30+ items and/or gamble boxes.
Yeah, I don't care for a number of Cryptic's marketing practices (but I can say that about every B2P or F2P game. but many times a year you can get a good (T6 Zen Ship account wide unlock) Free in game item (not just a TRIBBLE throwaway <-- though they also do that from time to time too); a couple of times a year (at the launch of some event - celebration tie in of a new Star Trek TV/Film release - or some in game STO anniversary) - just by logging in and clicking on a Free Claim in the Zen store.
So yeah, if you're just a really casual player, they still hand out enough 'good' free items that you can still play what little end game their is well without ever spending a real world dime.
Not many other F2P games are that consistently 'generous'.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
things we do not know, and probably never will, is how the lockboxes are coded. are they all the same, so if I have 10 lockboxes the chances are identical, or is there some randomness? for example, and follow me if you have lottos in your area...
are the lockboxes like the pick 6? you have X chance of each number popping? or is it like a scratcher where you have X amount of cards but only Y amount of winning cards? the chances can be the same in either scenario.
the only way to really test that is to schlep the same box over to Tribble intil you have enough to test, and also schlep over as many different boxes as you can, just to broaden the sample as much as you can. if you were crazy enough to get the same box over 1500 times, and then bring over 1500 different boxes, and the drop rate would be plausible, in my opinion. and then again, the TYPE of box is also going to figure in,
I remeber thinking I wanted to open boxes for lobi, and I researched out the lobi drop rates and they are indeed different, or at least they were several years ago.
so are tester was opening lockboxes.. Infinity? the latest one> sons? I'm willing to wager the drop rates change depending on the box
things we do not know, and probably never will, is how the lockboxes are coded. are they all the same, so if I have 10 lockboxes the chances are identical, or is there some randomness? for example, and follow me if you have lottos in your area...
are the lockboxes like the pick 6? you have X chance of each number popping? or is it like a scratcher where you have X amount of cards but only Y amount of winning cards? the chances can be the same in either scenario.
the only way to really test that is to schlep the same box over to Tribble intil you have enough to test, and also schlep over as many different boxes as you can, just to broaden the sample as much as you can. if you were crazy enough to get the same box over 1500 times, and then bring over 1500 different boxes, and the drop rate would be plausible, in my opinion. and then again, the TYPE of box is also going to figure in,
I remeber thinking I wanted to open boxes for lobi, and I researched out the lobi drop rates and they are indeed different, or at least they were several years ago.
so are tester was opening lockboxes.. Infinity? the latest one> sons? I'm willing to wager the drop rates change depending on the box
A few questions for you:
1: Did you read the comments of the tester I quoted in the OP?
2: Did you read the part where he said his results line up with a test 7 years ago?
3: Did infinity lockboxes exist 7 years ago?
4: If you think different boxes have different drop rates, how could OP's results match a test 7 years ago when infinity lockboxes did not exist?
Or do events and get a FREE ship. 3 regular event ships a year, every year, plus meta events for 1+ ships a year.
Oh...so I just need to do a event and get my favorite ship, the D7 for free? And then the next event I can get the Discovery D7...then after that the Kelvin too?
Thanks...I didn't know I could get any ship I want for free by just doing a event!
I didn't say "any ship" but actually you CAN get a free D7 from the meta-event. In previous years we've been given free C-Store tokens for any regular (not Mudds or Legendary) C-Store ship.
You claimed "This game is so predatory these days it isn't even funny" which is of course an opinion you're entitled to. It just doesn't seem like a reasonable opinion to me given how much free stuff we're given, much more than is needed to play all endgame content.
Do you know why people play STO? So they can live out their Star Trek fantasies...and do you know what the devs to? Grow more and more predatory towards those fantasies. Do you think a player started playing STO so he could fly a Risian sciecne vessel or Fekihri carrier?
No they play STO because they want to command the legendary ships they see on the screens! But as time goes on the devs are more and more predatory with those ships...be it costly legendary packs or gamble boxes with such abysmal pull rates they make gacha games look generous...basically if you see something on screen for more than a few minutes, from now on they're going to gouge you.
Crossfield: (Discovery) Lock box, promo, and legendary
Inquiry: (Mass produced ship Riker commanded) promo
Connie: (Same with the D7) Lock box, promo, and legendary
La Sirena: Promo
Dhailkhina: Lock box
Janeway: (Voyager J) Promo
Discovery/Picard are supposed to bring in new players? Gonna have a hard time retaining them when you're so damn greedy and predatory and they find out they need to spend hundreds of dollars to get the ship they dream of commanding
Can't have a honest conversation because of a white knight with power
Comments
> Of course, the long-run averages are the safest bet when making spending choices.
>
> But, you really cannot underestimate the quirkiness of RNG. Over the years, I've never opened more than 10 boxes here and there and have gotten 3 grand prize ships. During the recent 50% lobi sale, I was 20 lobi short and figured I'd buy five keys from the exchange to get my 20 lobi. I won my fourth grand prize ship, the Dhailkhina, from one of those five keys.
>
> I've certainly never opened more than 500 boxes the entire time I've been playing.
Cool. And yet, extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely extremely unreprensentative of the actual average odds.
Still, I'm sure Cryptic appreciates you sharing your experience. Every time someone shares a story like that, some other poor person thinks it might happen to them and Cryptic makes a lot of money from them.
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
Your whole "exposure" would only matter if there was a reason to be held accountable. Currently there isn't & ethical seems to be fluid & subjective perhaps too much.
I never cited any "evidence" nor considered it "evidence" there's simply none when we're outside looking in.
My point is still this was done on Tribble & it should be thought of as research conducted for Tribble only not conflated with conjecture that it's good data for Holodeck too.
Your whole 6+ years is self-serving conjecture too just because you haven't heard anything or some whistleblower hasn't exposed it lol if that's the case & all has been the same all this time there'd be no need to conduct one after another of these "testing the odds".
I look at the gambling odds for STO similar to social media "influencers" praising STO if/when I view them. It very well might be legitimate but it might very well be bought & paid for in someway which isn't illegal just a bit unethical if not disclosed.
(response to redacted material removed) - darkbladejk
So you're extremely lucky...I've been opening up lock boxes since they were introduced and I've only gotten 1 grand prize, and It's 7 going on 8 years of drought
A little over a year ago, I got an Infinity AND Promo choice pack from those holiday giveaways. I also got the 'Daikatana' Warbird on the first day while burning some keys in an attempt to get some Zhat Vash weapon packs(and some lobi pocket-change, for the klingon recruit). The 'hot-streaks' just seem way too suspicious to me, and I confess I'm quite jaded after seeing seeing some really shady stuff that other companies do with their gambling mechanics.
On a semi-constructive side note: A "Pity System" would probably be a good idea for those packs, if it's not currently a thing. (A guarantee to get the grand prize after X attempts.) It encourages whales to spend however much is needed, upfront/before 'rolling', and it rewards long-term investment/engagement from people who cannot afford as much.
On a particular point, until there is actual evidence presented there is some mega difference in box odds on tribble vs holodeck, that line of talk is just speculation with neither side being able to prove their case. Also I've talked to some of these guys at length before, and they're all terrible liars. If something like that was going on, one of them would've slipped up and spilled the beans already.
As for publishing the odds, while I'm all for publishing the odds of the boxes in the name of transparency, I don't see it happening without some big change such as a law being passed, and I loath the thought of government getting their grubby hands further into the gaming world than what they already are. However that's another can of worms entirely. Publishing odds isn't going to be some lockbox killer that everyone wishes it would be, it's just not. Folks can easily see the odds of winning the Powerball or Mega Millions, yet tons of folks play it every week like clockwork. I'm not a fan of lockboxes either, but it's my choice on whether I buy them or not. If enough folks refused to buy them then Cryptic and other companies would no longer use lockboxes. However believe me when I say you don't want a SWTOR type model coming to STO, which is what I see happening should lockboxes disappear while STO is in its current state.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
Because that's just not true. You could easily get the same result (or worse) with a 1% chance. They have a drop table with fixed chance of each item dropping. If you had 100 items all at 1% chance of dropping, you're going to get different results for each and every item, and then can claim it's a conspiracy. Even those that do publish their odds, that's all it is, a chance of that item dropping for EACH roll. All this tells me is that the drop-rate is between 0.5 and 1%.....and that '1%' was blurted out on a livestream a few years back.
Not necessarily, the two times that I've won a Promo ship I did it within 3 boxes both times. I've opened plenty since then with no luck, but those first two I got with just a handful of boxes I purchased using my lifetime stipend.
Until there is actual evidence presented that there is a difference between odds on holodeck vs tribble, there is no reason to think there is.
Who are "some of these guys"? And what lies were they trying to tell you that you were able to discern they were lying?
Hasn't SWTOR actually started selling what used to be lockbox items in it's store for set prices? I've bought a number of armor sets that used to be in lockboxes and was happy to be able to do so. And for the items they aren't selling in the store, can't people buy them from other players on the in game exchange like in STO? What is bad about either of those things?
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
Yep, much better than lootboxes imo (AND you can account unlock anything you own for an additional cost), though I think Dark is referring to the fact that you need to subscribe to get access to the newest content (a single month subscription permanently unlocks all content available at that time). I personally prefer that monetization method over unregulated gambling, everyone likes to say that sub models don't work but the two top MMOs (WoW and FF14) are still fully subscription+paid expansion based. The reason the sub model didn't work for STO is because the game was rather terrible at launch which caused the playerbase to quickly fall, and though the existence of the Lifetime sub option gave them plenty of cash upfront it would have become a hindrance later on.
An average 250 boxes per ship. One person opens 3 boxes and gets a ship, another person opens 500 and gets 0 ships.
I opened 300+ phoenix boxes and got no UR or Epic. I opened another 470 phoenix boxes in the recent event and got one UR phoenix token. I opened 10 more and got a second UR token. Put that together and the odds are likely to be at least 1:250 for UR tokens, maybe higher. Saying an UR gains Cryptic 1+ million dil seems accurate.
Ah, that would make more sense (if he meant that). Because like I/we said, being able to buy the lockbox items in the normal game store is actually a great thing.
Yeah, I actually prefer it too for one simple reason: when they are making money from (something) they have a greater motivation to make it, and make it more often. Because STO makes money from ships and not missions, they make many more ships than they do missions. If STO were selling missions/content packs, they would have a financial motivation to make more of them more often.
That said, the business model thing is a completely different topic and I wasn't trying to go down that rabbit hole.
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
This game is so predatory these days it isn't even funny. You want a new ship? Pay us a 100+ dollars for a pack full of stuff you don't want or gamble potentially hundreds of dollars and get lots of stuff you don't want
Plus, people have the option of doing what I said earlier: grind dil, trade for zen, buy keys/promo packs, sell them on the exchange for EC, then use that EC to buy the ship you want off the exchange (if it's there).
That said, you would be surprised how many people don't actually know you can do that and think the only way to get ships is to open boxes. The devs have said before that the majority of players don't read the forums, so those folks are probably where a good chunk of the box profits come from.
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
My point was not to shill for Cryptic.
As I stated, when making spending decisions, a person is going to optimize expected value by focusing on the the long-run probabilities of particular outcomes. Obviously, people win the Powerball and Megamillions jackpots, but that doesn't mean someone should run out and buy lottery tickets expecting to win.
My point was merely to note that RNG can have a wide range of outcomes at the individual level.
Apologies, That was not my intention and what you said was exactly my point and I was equivocating. Folk who use tribble draws to state actual odds are 1 in 250 etc have no idea about statistical probabilities and odds....trust they are the bane of my life at the moment!
Oh...so I just need to do a event and get my favorite ship, the D7 for free? And then the next event I can get the Discovery D7...then after that the Kelvin too?
Thanks...I didn't know I could get any ship I want for free by just doing a event!
I didn't say "any ship" but actually you CAN get a free D7 from the meta-event. In previous years we've been given free C-Store tokens for any regular (not Mudds or Legendary) C-Store ship.
You claimed "This game is so predatory these days it isn't even funny" which is of course an opinion you're entitled to. It just doesn't seem like a reasonable opinion to me given how much free stuff we're given, much more than is needed to play all endgame content.
Yeah, I don't care for a number of Cryptic's marketing practices (but I can say that about every B2P or F2P game. but many times a year you can get a good (T6 Zen Ship account wide unlock) Free in game item (not just a TRIBBLE throwaway <-- though they also do that from time to time too); a couple of times a year (at the launch of some event - celebration tie in of a new Star Trek TV/Film release - or some in game STO anniversary) - just by logging in and clicking on a Free Claim in the Zen store.
So yeah, if you're just a really casual player, they still hand out enough 'good' free items that you can still play what little end game their is well without ever spending a real world dime.
Not many other F2P games are that consistently 'generous'.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
are the lockboxes like the pick 6? you have X chance of each number popping? or is it like a scratcher where you have X amount of cards but only Y amount of winning cards? the chances can be the same in either scenario.
the only way to really test that is to schlep the same box over to Tribble intil you have enough to test, and also schlep over as many different boxes as you can, just to broaden the sample as much as you can. if you were crazy enough to get the same box over 1500 times, and then bring over 1500 different boxes, and the drop rate would be plausible, in my opinion. and then again, the TYPE of box is also going to figure in,
I remeber thinking I wanted to open boxes for lobi, and I researched out the lobi drop rates and they are indeed different, or at least they were several years ago.
so are tester was opening lockboxes.. Infinity? the latest one> sons? I'm willing to wager the drop rates change depending on the box
A few questions for you:
1: Did you read the comments of the tester I quoted in the OP?
2: Did you read the part where he said his results line up with a test 7 years ago?
3: Did infinity lockboxes exist 7 years ago?
4: If you think different boxes have different drop rates, how could OP's results match a test 7 years ago when infinity lockboxes did not exist?
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
Do you know why people play STO? So they can live out their Star Trek fantasies...and do you know what the devs to? Grow more and more predatory towards those fantasies. Do you think a player started playing STO so he could fly a Risian sciecne vessel or Fekihri carrier?
No they play STO because they want to command the legendary ships they see on the screens! But as time goes on the devs are more and more predatory with those ships...be it costly legendary packs or gamble boxes with such abysmal pull rates they make gacha games look generous...basically if you see something on screen for more than a few minutes, from now on they're going to gouge you.
Crossfield: (Discovery) Lock box, promo, and legendary
Inquiry: (Mass produced ship Riker commanded) promo
Connie: (Same with the D7) Lock box, promo, and legendary
La Sirena: Promo
Dhailkhina: Lock box
Janeway: (Voyager J) Promo
Discovery/Picard are supposed to bring in new players? Gonna have a hard time retaining them when you're so damn greedy and predatory and they find out they need to spend hundreds of dollars to get the ship they dream of commanding