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66K+ Dil for a Commander Level Ship

keepcalmchiveonkeepcalmchiveon Member Posts: 4,292 Arc User
so i did a test, based on the many past threads of dil cost for lower tier ships.

i set up a delta recruit and have thus far not picked up any "available" items unlocked from other toons, and chose to run it as a new person playing the game.

up until CDR, i was using the basic ships, and once i got the promotion, i figured id look at other options since the gameplay has been more defined and slower as a rule so i can enjoy the promotions and missions again. (even though i cringe at several in the list)

so i get to the ship dude, and see the ones for CDR. i see one i want to try, but then i look and its 66K in dil to purchase this. wtf?

now to be fair, i knew there was a dil fee, but not this much. it also, at that price of 66K, said it applied a 9% discount. i am taking it that comes from being in a fleet. could be wrong, but i think that it is correct.

so, while i am sure many would say, just xfer dil from one to another, or some other method to get it, my take on this is that at the cost of 66K for me in a fleet, and higher for those not, what other valid methods are there to get the 66K by the time you hit CDR?

i am asking in a real way, while also being somewhat sarcastic about it at the high dil cost for a ship for one rank level as by then it will be outdated and no longer viable once i get promoted again.

so from a new player perspective, what and how, would you all do in order to get the 66k in record time without the standard methods employed by people with many toons etc.

note: i also ask this from a new player PoV since i have a friend whom has decided to play the game.

(aside from the above, i admit it pissed me off to see that the cost was so high for that level ship. my take. yours may be different)
meh

Post edited by baddmoonrizin on

Comments

  • iamynaughtiamynaught Member Posts: 1,285 Arc User
    Admiralty cards. That's about the only use I see in the T1-T4 former Zen ships these days. Although, yes, there are some consoles that may be of some use and cosmetic unlocks are rarely a bad thing.

    As the OP pointed out, it would be difficult to get the amount of Dil saved up in time to actually make use of the ships. And since the cost increases as the tiers do, getting a ship at each tier would be difficult without outside means.

    So in my view, the only way to get them as a player would level would be to buy Zen and trade for Dil.

    I do agree with the OP that the price is too high, but I also understand the argument that it's probably just about right. It's just one of those times where they weren't going to make everyone happy. The one thing that would make it sit well with me is if they allowed the ship upgrade tokens to apply to these ships. By using an upgrade on one, it would make the ship an account unlock. It might even get people to buy those old ship upgrade tokens, I can't imagine they sell many these days.
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  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    edited April 2021
    i am asking in a real way, while also being somewhat sarcastic about it at the high dil cost for a ship for one rank level as by then it will be outdated and no longer viable once i get promoted again.

    It's under $1.50 from the dil exchange, but that's to use a ship that used to cost $20.

    And no new player needs to do this since they get a token that lets them pick a free ship. Just not every ship. Those new players could also buy the T6 ship they want to fly at endgame and use the scaling feature.

    You're asking "why doesn't Cryptic give away every level up ship for approximately free?" in a F2P game with no monthly or episode fees.

    Servers and staff aren't free. This is an optional cosmetic item purchase, which helps support the game.
  • ltminnsltminns Member Posts: 12,569 Arc User
    After my Klingon Recruit moved out of the Starter Ship I moved into a T6 Ship (Legendary T'Liss). Once this person gets an Event T6, new Characters will be able to claim it and ride it up through the Ranks.
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  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    edited April 2021
    Alternatively, the old 'zen store ships' could have a scaling dil cost based on the highest level captain on the account. So brand new players can get them without too much fuss, while established players will have to pay the full price. Somewhere between the two. After all, T6 ships autoscaling these days makes most of these ships and their respective prices kind of absurd. The days where they were remotely relevant are long gone.

    They already are 90% off the old price (for account-wide) so people who want them instead of a T6 scaling or free token ship already have gotten a discount compared to STO-geezers like me.

    No one needs them, so why do they need a discount on top of that discount ? If a new player doesn't want to spend $1.50, they can take one of the free token ships.

  • discojerdiscojer Member Posts: 533 Arc User
    Those ships are just for admiralty.

    With that said, the Jem Hadara t5u ship should only be like 1000, And T5 lockbox ships are viable and cheap. The Hirogen even has a free upgrade
  • darkbladejkdarkbladejk Member Posts: 3,698 Community Moderator
    personally I hate that now you can't get them as account wide unlocks unless you had purchased them before, or pick them up as part of one of the old bundles. It sucks because some of those ships have some fairly decent items you can pull off of them and new players are going to have to cough up potentially large chunks of dilithium for a ship that's only good on one toon. If this were lockbox or promo ships this would be a different argument but we're talking t1-t4 ships. I would have rather seen them do different bundles with the lower level ships and still let folks have them as account wide unlocks. As is right now they're just going to waste which is a shame. I already have them as account unlocks but I despise the fact newer folks can't get them as account wide unlocks.
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  • seaofsorrowsseaofsorrows Member Posts: 10,918 Arc User
    personally I hate that now you can't get them as account wide unlocks unless you had purchased them before, or pick them up as part of one of the old bundles. It sucks because some of those ships have some fairly decent items you can pull off of them and new players are going to have to cough up potentially large chunks of dilithium for a ship that's only good on one toon. If this were lockbox or promo ships this would be a different argument but we're talking t1-t4 ships. I would have rather seen them do different bundles with the lower level ships and still let folks have them as account wide unlocks. As is right now they're just going to waste which is a shame. I already have them as account unlocks but I despise the fact newer folks can't get them as account wide unlocks.

    Agreed, this was a change I definitely didn't think was for the better. I think they would have been better served leaving them as Zen items but lowering the cost a bit to make them value items that could remain account wide unlocks. As it is now, these ships are mostly just wasted.
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  • edrickvellorinedrickvellorin Member Posts: 346 Arc User
    edited April 2021
    With scaling T6 ships, the T1-4 refit ships (which used to cost zen) are now mainly there for high level players who want the costumes or gear they come with. (Consoles or in a couple cases weapons.) There are other ships you can buy at each tier (without consoles) that cost a lot less dilithium if you really want to play around with another ship, even so, they're not exactly cheap if you're a new player. I think the T1-4 ship change was partly to create an additional dilithium sink to try and get a handle on the exchange rate. I don't think it worked. Also, any ship you can get as a Legendary version will come with the consoles from it's lower tier variants, and (mostly) can use their costumes too.
  • garaffegaraffe Member Posts: 1,353 Arc User
    I think the entire point of having such a large Dil cost of lower tier ships is that it is not possible for a new player to have that much refined Dil by the time they can buy the ship. This is Cryptic's way to making a new player, that is really interested in a particular ship, buy a little zen. I see no problem with this system.
  • strathkinstrathkin Member Posts: 2,666 Bug Hunter
    edited April 2021
    Yes those higher cost Dilithium Ships used to be ZEN Ships, they have Special Console/Weapon. It actually works to your advantage slightly, as there a less than the Dilithium it use to require to buy the ship; however previously were account-unlocks so now it's just per character if you want an item or weapon.

    If you want to find out what they include you could STO Wiki on:

    https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Main_Page

    As I say if can work to your advantage, depending what Console or Weapon you may require for that Character.
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  • darkbladejkdarkbladejk Member Posts: 3,698 Community Moderator
    strathkin wrote: »
    Yes those higher cost Dilithium Ships used to be ZEN Ships, they have Special Console/Weapon. It actually works to your advantage slightly, as there a less than the Dilithium it use to require to buy the ship; however previously were account-unlocks so now it's just per character if you want an item or weapon.

    If you want to find out what they include you could STO Wiki on:

    https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Main_Page

    As I say if can work to your advantage, depending what Console or Weapon you may require for that Character.

    I have but one gripe here. I hardly call ships going from account unlocks to single character unlocks an advantage. If one only wants it for one toon then perhaps yes, but otherwise those ships lost a tremendous amount of value in going to single character unlocks only. at that juncture they may as well only have the consoles in the cstore, which honestly I think would be better at this point.
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  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    edited April 2021
    strathkin wrote: »
    Yes those higher cost Dilithium Ships used to be ZEN Ships, they have Special Console/Weapon. It actually works to your advantage slightly, as there a less than the Dilithium it use to require to buy the ship; however previously were account-unlocks so now it's just per character if you want an item or weapon.

    If you want to find out what they include you could STO Wiki on:

    https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Main_Page

    As I say if can work to your advantage, depending what Console or Weapon you may require for that Character.

    I have but one gripe here. I hardly call ships going from account unlocks to single character unlocks an advantage. If one only wants it for one toon then perhaps yes, but otherwise those ships lost a tremendous amount of value in going to single character unlocks only. at that juncture they may as well only have the consoles in the cstore, which honestly I think would be better at this point.

    They dropped the price to about 1/10th, and did it long before allowing cross-faction flying between KDF and Fed.

    That means everyone with less than 11 Fed or KDF alts saved at least some money on those faction ships. There was an infographic a few years back showing most players had 3 or fewer alts total. So almost everybody saved money.

    With the ship walls fallen that changes for a few people. If you have 11+ alts and want all of them to equip a Plasmonic Leech console then you now lose money on buying 11+ Vandal destoryers.

    Other than that, how many people really want 11+ costume unlocks from one specific ship? How many people want to assemble 11+ copies of a console set that includes a low-level ship?

    It might feels like you're paying more if you buy a ship 3 times for a console, but remind yourself that that is still only 1/3 of the old zen cost.

    The exception if you really value low-level admiralty cards, enough to be willing to pay $20 to have the vandal's ( 12 27 15 - Ignores +/-TAC from Events) on 11 or more alts. For that case you now lose money.

  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    In the end, no, I don't feel this change benefited players at all. For most players it was a wash, and for everyone else, it was a net negative.

    Even using your 1/6 number, most players have less than 6 alts. I have 12+ (a lot) but I still only want 1-2 copies of most low level ships, for either a costume unlock or a set console.

    There are a couple of exceptions I'd agree with you on: Not being able to reclaim the T1 Connie for the beams, since you need 4 copies for 8 beams. Maybe the Vandal, though plasmonic leech hasn't been "must have" for years now.

    If you really feel "most" players really need 7+ copies of every T3 ship they want to use then we'll need to agree to disagree.
  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    westmetals wrote: »
    All that said however... I stand by my initial assessment, which is that even at that lower amount it's not reasonable for a brand-new player (someone on their first character, so can't transfer dil from other characters) to grind that much dilithium before they would level out of the ship's level range anyway. Which seems to be the OP's objection to the pricing. (That would certainly have also been true when they were Zen ships, though.)

    Yes, if they were pure F2P they had no hope of grinding enough dil to earn $15 worth of zen. So they either spent $15 of real world cash monies or did without by picking one of the free ships with their token.

    Now they have to spend $1.50 or do without. I still claim that $1.50 is less than $15, and that most players do not have 10 alts so most players do save money.



  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,501 Arc User
    edited April 2021

    i brought up the post since it does lend to a disparity of cost vs feature/fun vs other. and i say other since i am sure there is something else that others may find that doesnt seem to fit just right.

    i wanted to try this certain ship out for fun, to be different than the basic 3 types offered. to do something different and experience a certain aspect of game play at a lower level for some fun and self immersion.

    but now it will be what, 3-4 missions and "poof," out of that ship. (maybe its been talked about, and yeah, naysayers will come forward, or cyrptic supporters, but just make all ships a minimum of t6 scalable then and drop the t1 to t5 all together)

    suffice to say, i chose to get it for the 1.5 and will see if its fun or not. again, not that it will last that long.

    You're right, if you go pure F2P you miss out on some fun.

    That's understandable though: people who open their wallets and support the game deserve that extra fun.

    Back in the day, I paid zen for the T1 Connie, which means I had it and unlimited copies of the beams for leveling up. Does every player "deserve" a T1 Connie? Why? The game is free to play but selling optional add-on fun for real money is what keeps the lights on.

    Cryptic did acknowledge that scaling ships and level up speed made this optional fun less valuable, and cut the list price of the optional fun by 90%. It's fair to argue that it could have been even more, but they did make a positive change that lowered costs for most players.
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