I’m not a level/mission designer by any means, but I believe that a great way to test this idea with the game’s populace could be to merge all the Borg TFOS into one mega operation (Infected, Cure, Khitomer, and Hive, both ground and space). They could rework some of the boss fights to be more difficult for this queue specifically, for example, take Infected and make it so instead of one single Tactical Cube warping in, it’s a Diamond flanked by a fleet of Tac cubes and spheres (ala Hive Onslaught) and then prompt the players to begin the ground queue, and do the same thing in terms of amping up the difficulty.
If you have been playing this game for as long as you claim you have, you would know that the Borg TFOs used to be combined together into a longer raid type encounter just as you are asking. It was the only way to get what is now the OMEGA rep gear. Players whined and complained about it being too long, too hard, about needing to Mario jump around the map, would not or could not find teams to carry them in the content etc. Basically, raids did exist and they were a resounding flop, so they were removed. Zero reason to bring them back at this point.
Jumping in an online game is never good, not everyone has the fast rock-solid connection needed to do that.
For instance, there is at least one mission that is literally impossible to get through in Secret World Legends without a near perfect connection because it has a section where you have to make quick precision jumps and that cannot be done on the decrepit cable TV based network I am on because of random lag spikes that are not bad enough to stop combat but are enough to throw off accurate jumping. The only way around that one is to team up with someone who has a stable enough connection to do the jumps because if you are teamed only one person in the team has to do it.
Jumping is one of those things that look like they would be a nice change of pace on paper but really do not work out in practice and a lot of people get annoyed by it instead. Making progress depend on something like that with even the minor instabilities of the Internet is just bad design, so STO not making more of it (there is still that horrible Kobali mission with it and that is more than enough jumping nonsense for an online game) is a smart move on their part.
As for the rest, it might be good if they made both the TFO and raid length versions of those things available at the same time, though I suspect that the raid version would never fill up except for the occasional fleet get-together run. One other stumbling block is the crude way teams work in the game and the ongoing problem of people getting dumped during map transfers that makes those transfers completely impractical during a TFO or other group scenario since they are likely to lose people at each transfer without a dependable way of getting them back in to a team scenario like that.
We had a long thread here last year from someone failing over and over and over to get through the jumping section of that dominion arc ground mission. I don't play 3D platformers myself and it took me a few tries on each character to get past it.
Meanwhile, I did that mission just last week and had absolutely no issue whatsoever - didn't even have to pause or slow down once, and the character I was using is significantly faster than most, it should be noted.
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
Meanwhile, I did that mission just last week and had absolutely no issue whatsoever.
People have different strengths and weaknesses. I was often getting max score for the omega particle game before I switched to just buying phoenix packs, and at the same time I'm lousy at the dil mining minigame. (I tell myself that it's because I've only played it 10 or so times over 8 years )
People have different strengths and weaknesses. I was often getting max score for the omega particle game before I switched to just buying phoenix packs, and at the same time I'm lousy at the dil mining minigame. (I tell myself that it's because I've only played it 10 or so times over 8 years )
I use the keyboard on that. Align the brackets via left/right, then adjust size up/down. Its a lot faster than clicking the buttons with the mouse.
This stuff again eh? What I'm about to say is probably going to make both sides of this discussion mad, but it is what it is and it's something I think needs to be said.
For STO, the game used to have pseudo raids of sorts in the form of the old Borg STFs that used to be a combo of space and ground. It used to be that it would drop loot similar to a dungeon or raid run where you would be rolling against other folks for rep drops. While it did indeed function, many folks complained about it for a number of reasons. They felt the STFs were far too long, and many hated having to roll for rep drops. It was changed to what we ended up with today in part based on those complaints, as well as other reasons. Many of the queues with more than 5 people also didn't see as much play as others due to the fact it took so long to fill them up.
Before I came to STO in late 2012 early 2013 time, I was raiding quite a bit in WoW and doing OPs in SWTOR. I've seen raids that are relatively quick and easy, and some that make you want to pull your own hair out. For these raids it requires your tanks, healers, and DPS to bring their A game. They don't have to be gods among men at what they're doing, but they do have to at least be conscious at their keyboard and have a basic understanding of what they're doing with their build. If one person isn't pulling their weight and doesn't know what to do, they can cause a wipe for the other 10-40 people in the run. This is why in games like WoW, SWTOR, and many others that have actual raids, the game itself won't even let you in the door without having a certain amount of stats and gear on paper and/or certain achievements. It's also why many pre-made teams require even higher stats and knowledge than the game itself requires before they will take you on the run. For folks who aren't yet ready to enter raids, these games have paths for people to up their skill level and obtain gear. WoW has the dungeon journal to help prepare people by giving them a very basic rundown of what foes will do, dungeon journal also tells them where they can get certain bits of gear for their class and such, and the proving grounds help them practice. I've been a raid leader in other games, and a raid member. I can tell you from experience that trying to keep a raid together and on track is like herding cats. When you join a raid you are telling folks by default that you have at least the minimum required gear to be there, a basic knowledge of what you'll be doing with your class, can follow directions, and have at least a passing knowledge of the encounter. At the same time I can't tell you the number of times people would try to get into raids with subpar gear, and clearly not knowing what they were doing.
In STO I would say about 85% of the population we have in game wouldn't last 5 minutes in a more traditional MMO and are definitely NOT ready for any kind of raid content. Too many can't follow basic directions the game itself gives. They ignore basic mechanics trying sit there and space bar spam, then wonder why they're getting rolled. Too many folks go into TFOs with subpar rainbow builds thinking they're going to steamroll the instance, but do less overall damage than someone's hangar pets just auto attacking anything in range. When you dare try to offer legitimate help, they come at you with "quit being an elitist" or "I've been playing since beta so I know what i'm doing," yet are doing sub 3k DPS with a fully golded out ship. Just because you've been playing since beta doesn't mean you've been doing it right since beta. To illustrate this point, there is a guy in my fleet who has begged me for years to take him into a Battle of Korfez which is an Elite only queue. If anyone who may read this has ever played Korfez, you know you need to bring the thunder and your A game if you intend to get through that queue. If you don't make the DPS check off the initial groups and stay out of bad stuff, you will automatically fail the queue. I keep telling the dude that when he demonstrates to me he has reached the appropriate damage output level, and has improved his overall gameplay, I will happily take him into a Korfez. He says he wants to get better, yet anything myself or anyone else says goes in one ear and out the other. But somehow when I tell him he's not ready yet, I'm being an elitist by insisting he meet the basic criteria the game itself sets out, or it's too hard and needs to be nerfed. There are far far too many people like that in the STO community who fit that bill.
To make raids work in STO, there would need to be safeguards in place to prevent people from joining who are not yet ready so it doesn't ruin it for the rest of the people in the run. I'm all for folks getting access to content, but not before they're ready for it. You wouldn't just hand car keys to a kid who wasn't taught how to drive, so why would you want teammates in your raid group who aren't ready yet. Before anyone says anything note that I am saying YET meaning that once they've gotten the appropriate gear and knowledge, I'm all for them coming along. No matter where Cryptic set the bar, be it in the attic of Sto'vo'kor, or the basement of Gret'hor, there are always going to be people who simply cannot cut it for one reason or another, be it something out of their control, or something in their control. There would be people who would have to accept that they are not the target audience of said raid content. There are enough folks of that crowd who would feel alienated due to being unable to get into the raids, and it would get nerfed as a result or they would cry for the restrictions to be removed leading to raids being no better off than 5 man content is now. Again I'm all for folks playing content, but not before they're ready.
Now that I've probably made the "everyone should get to play" crowd mad, time to make the "we need raids" crowd mad. True raids like those you may see in WoW, SWTOR, or other games would not work in STO as it is right now. To make a raid work, you would need more than just spacebar and sci spam. While DPS has it's place, you would need Tanks, you would need support builds and builds dedicated to fulfilling the objectives. What form those builds would take I'll leave to you folks to imagine. If all you do is go into said raid and just DPS spam things to death, then it's not a true raid, but little more than a scaled up 5 man free for all.
Raids in other games work because you typically already have the holy trinity of Tank, DPS, Healer in place. Those roles already exist and were designed with that in mind from the ground up. With STO they would need to design around having more than just DPS and Tanks in there. I know to some folks that's like blasphemy but it is what it is. Also with those raids you would need to come up with a loot structure that is fair for all involved. This way you don't have one person ending up with every single piece of loot in there, especially if they already have better and are just taking it from folks who could use it. You would also need to decide what kind of loot is going to drop, and balance said loot drops so they don't impact other sources too negatively. If STO had done this earlier in its life, I could see it being possible. But now the adjustments needed wouldn't be worth the return. Folks already don't queue up for certain TFOs now that are deemed "too hard" or "too long". They sure as gret'hor won't join a raid. STO is what I would call baby's first MMO, or for folks who want to say they play an MMO without every single thing that comes with a traditional mmo.
In terms of balance they would also need to balance around a certain intended setup. Do they want to balance around all cruisers? Do they balance around all DPS and no tanks? Do they balance around a mix of DPS and tank? There's alot to consider when adding some of this magnitude and in STO's current life, it's just not going to happen barring radical changes I doubt most of the population would stomach. I don't think the "just add raids" crowd has thought through their proposal as far as they need to.
"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
I don't think anything like that is being asked for here.
Just a little variety perhaps for those that may sometimes like a change from the junk food diet the game can serve up.
Not everybody is necessarily a fan of an auto-complete orientated end game. Some may even find it shallow or boring.
The point I was trying to make was that they DID try something different, and it wasn't exactly popular. I think Battlezones were relatively popular, but Gon'Cra ended up buggy and Gamma was glorified patrols. Badlands, Undine, and Voth are still relatively popular as far as I am aware.
I like the objectives for Gamma. the problem with it is 1. access to the gamma quadrant (if you don't have an alpha quadrant transwarp) and then once in the gamma quadrant having to schlep across the quadrant, and that there are only 3 zones. they should increase the zones to 6 at a minimum
This game is way too messy mechanically and designwise to support the conventional concept of a "raid". It's a nice fantasy, but the reality is that they just don't fit with where the game is at(The dyson BZ would be a great place for them to 'practice' working on raid-concepts if they ever actually did decide to allocate resources towards a goal like this).
I don't think anything like that is being asked for here.
Just a little variety perhaps for those that may sometimes like a change from the junk food diet the game can serve up.
Not everybody is necessarily a fan of an auto-complete orientated end game. Some may even find it shallow or boring.
The point I was trying to make was that they DID try something different, and it wasn't exactly popular. I think Battlezones were relatively popular, but Gon'Cra ended up buggy and Gamma was glorified patrols. Badlands, Undine, and Voth are still relatively popular as far as I am aware.
I like the objectives for Gamma. the problem with it is 1. access to the gamma quadrant (if you don't have an alpha quadrant transwarp) and then once in the gamma quadrant having to schlep across the quadrant, and that there are only 3 zones. they should increase the zones to 6 at a minimum
You can unlock a Gamma transwarp through the Beta Dyson sphere via the Gamma storyline, plus you have the mission transwarp anyway via several ways.
Can't and won't happen. A large portion of the playerbase wants quick and easy, partly due to having 17 billion characters and partly because they want to gawk at their parses. Anything over 10-15 minutes is no bueno.
The cost/benefit to Cryptic -especially with the current multi-hat dev team setup- probably won't lean in favour of anything extravagant, I sure as heck wouldn't risk it given the temperature of this particular room.
MAYBE an event raid.
Speaking on a personal level, I'd like something meaty to take my ships into.
And largely because they have fled to STO to escape things like WoW Raiding and all of it's inherent drama. I think it would be nice if they put some of the older stuff back in. It would be nice to play through the Borg TFO's in it's original long form Story mode. But then you stumble into the loot trap. The only way to get players to reliably show up to do the content is to dangle must have loot in front of them. Which leads to the viscious cycle of players doing stuff they don't necessarily like in order to progress, and subjecting themselves to ever more drama, abuse and anti social behavior. STO sits in a weird niche MMO wise.
Can't and won't happen. A large portion of the playerbase wants quick and easy, partly due to having 17 billion characters and partly because they want to gawk at their parses. Anything over 10-15 minutes is no bueno.
The cost/benefit to Cryptic -especially with the current multi-hat dev team setup- probably won't lean in favour of anything extravagant, I sure as heck wouldn't risk it given the temperature of this particular room.
MAYBE an event raid.
Speaking on a personal level, I'd like something meaty to take my ships into.
And largely because they have fled to STO to escape things like WoW Raiding and all of it's inherent drama. I think it would be nice if they put some of the older stuff back in. It would be nice to play through the Borg TFO's in it's original long form Story mode. But then you stumble into the loot trap. The only way to get players to reliably show up to do the content is to dangle must have loot in front of them. Which leads to the viscious cycle of players doing stuff they don't necessarily like in order to progress, and subjecting themselves to ever more drama, abuse and anti social behavior. STO sits in a weird niche MMO wise.
True enough. This game is actually quite relaxing due to limited drama......aside from zone chat anyway but that can be turned off.
However, you say loot is a carrot yet people insist on playing Romulan Minefield ad nauseam. I can't see the point of that TFO at all, especially seeing as I get the purple vendor trash usually anyway. If they want vendor trash there's patrols for that and XP.
Fleet marks? You get far more from the other queues.
I mean unless they scorched earth when they removed the old stuff, they could put it back in.
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,596Community Moderator
IMO there really is no "must have" loot. STO is a casual MMO that with even the right basic gear you can get through the story just fine with a T5 ship. And yea we have event loot, but if you look at it... NONE of it is absolutely required to play. All nice to have, but not required. Hell... I'm not using the current event's console at all even though I unlocked it. And we still have at least 3 events a year where you can earn a free T6, and all through pretty mundane, easy methods. Especially Summer and Winter.
If you wanna min/max the shtako out of your ship then maybe there are must haves, like the DOMINO for a phaser build. But not everyone is in it for the uberDEEPS to see how quickly they can nuke a Tac Cube. Some people just wanna have fun and experience the story.
I mean unless they scorched earth when they removed the old stuff, they could put it back in.
Check out the list at the top of this recent article from r/STO. It seems like removing things from the game is similar to logging old growth forest. Chances are you won't see much of either again.
Jumping in an online game is never good, not everyone has the fast rock-solid connection needed to do that.
For instance, there is at least one mission that is literally impossible to get through in Secret World Legends without a near perfect connection because it has a section where you have to make quick precision jumps and that cannot be done on the decrepit cable TV based network I am on because of random lag spikes that are not bad enough to stop combat but are enough to throw off accurate jumping. The only way around that one is to team up with someone who has a stable enough connection to do the jumps because if you are teamed only one person in the team has to do it.
Jumping is one of those things that look like they would be a nice change of pace on paper but really do not work out in practice and a lot of people get annoyed by it instead. Making progress depend on something like that with even the minor instabilities of the Internet is just bad design, so STO not making more of it (there is still that horrible Kobali mission with it and that is more than enough jumping nonsense for an online game) is a smart move on their part.
No, there were a select few very vocal people who simply did not have the hand-eye coordination skills to click the space bar and W key at the same time. It had nothing to do with unstable connections or lag spikes. The jumping that was required is quite literally a piece of cake compared to other games on other platforms.
Whatever floats your boat. If it makes you feel better to think that the jumping problem is hand-eye coordination instead of unstable internet speeds and the intermittent control issues (like the game not always detecting button presses in a timely manner) that people have been talking about for a long time, that is up to you. It does not change the fact that those problems exist and take all the fun out of scenarios that depend on quick, squeaky clean connections and make them irritating (or worse) instead.
Your hand-eye coordination theory also fails to address the equally real disconnection during map transfers problem I mentioned in the comment you partially quoted (I get disconnected about three in five times for instance) that would make keeping a raid party together for the whole thing difficult since some would not be able to get back into the raid after disconnection with the haphazard way group content is handled currently.
Another factor is that the lack of a functional ingame voice system would make coordinating raids somewhat problematic, and the third-party ones are not a good solution for it because not everyone uses the same system, nor are they all in the same Discord/Teamspeak/whatever group. Those third-party voice applications are only good for pre-arranged fleet runs.
I’m not a level/mission designer by any means, but I believe that a great way to test this idea with the game’s populace could be to merge all the Borg TFOS into one mega operation (Infected, Cure, Khitomer, and Hive, both ground and space). They could rework some of the boss fights to be more difficult for this queue specifically, for example, take Infected and make it so instead of one single Tactical Cube warping in, it’s a Diamond flanked by a fleet of Tac cubes and spheres (ala Hive Onslaught) and then prompt the players to begin the ground queue, and do the same thing in terms of amping up the difficulty.
If you have been playing this game for as long as you claim you have, you would know that the Borg TFOs used to be combined together into a longer raid type encounter just as you are asking. It was the only way to get what is now the OMEGA rep gear. Players whined and complained about it being too long, too hard, about needing to Mario jump around the map, would not or could not find teams to carry them in the content etc. Basically, raids did exist and they were a resounding flop, so they were removed. Zero reason to bring them back at this point.
Ah good times good times. We had a fleet who regularly ran those STF's and had alot of fun back then unless the Queen was bugged wich was about 1 out 3 runs. Though playing with Pugs was pretty much impossible. It's like today's TFO's if I didn't have the gear and knowledge to do most TFO's by myself I wouldn't even bother. People sign up for Advanced and have no clue what they are doing or why which I have to assum is more then 90% of the Player base. I have seen thing in Infected normal for Event I get nightmares about...
But yeah we shouldn't have raids in here because most people are not willing to invest time to actually know what to do and farm the gear to do it.
C-Store Inc. is still looking for active members on the fed side. If you don't have a fleet feel free to contact me in game @stegi.
Whatever floats your boat. If it makes you feel better to think that the jumping problem is hand-eye coordination instead of unstable internet speeds and the intermittent control issues (like the game not always detecting button presses in a timely manner) that people have been talking about for a long time, that is up to you. It does not change the fact that those problems exist and take all the fun out of scenarios that depend on quick, squeaky clean connections and make them irritating (or worse) instead.
It does not make me feel any better or any worse. I am simply stating historical fact about the complaints most people had back when the Borg TF/raid was in its original form. I do not recall ever hearing or reading any comments about the jumping being problematic due to bad internet connections. The jumping required was not anything elaborate. They were simple hops where most people lacked the proper timing and situational awareness to execute them. It was no different than hopping up on a crate in a ground map.
I don't know what they said back then, what I was talking about was that in general jumping is not really practical nowadays with so much in the way of high-priority VOIP and video packets flying around the lower-capacity older and more decrepit parts of the internet last-mile areas causing momentary lag spikes.
Rubberbanding is not entirely gone, it is just down to the point where it is not noticeable most of the time, and that can really make anything that takes precision timing (such as jumping tricks) annoying instead of fun. If you are in an area where spikes like that never happen then I am happy for you, but I can tell you from experience that not everyone has that solid of a connection.
And specifically to STO, it is a simple fact that the controls in the game are not completely reliable, pressing a button, whether virtual or mechanical, does not always perform the action right away, and sometimes not at all (though it often causes the cooldown timer to start on things that have cooldowns despite not triggering the action).
Your hand-eye coordination theory also fails to address the equally real disconnection during map transfers problem I mentioned in the comment you partially quoted (I get disconnected about three in five times for instance) that would make keeping a raid party together for the whole thing difficult since some would not be able to get back into the raid after disconnection with the haphazard way group content is handled currently.
If you have already transferred to a map, you could perform the required jumping unless your hand-eye coordination and play skills were insufficient to do it properly. Unless you want to try and say that you will connect to a map, then suddenly only when you need to jump you will get disconnected again.
I never said the map transfer failures had anything to do with jumping on ground maps, I am not sure how you confused that with the jumping issue. The map transfer failures are a problem in keeping a raid group intact when switching maps (the devs have mentioned that the transfer failures are a major reason why no current TFOs use more than one map in fact).
A raid tends to fall apart if people keep dropping out and cannot get back in. And with the hit-or-miss way grouping works in STO there is a very high chance that a person who gets dumped during map transfer also gets dumped from the group and is unable to rejoin the group while they are in the raid. Raids probably would not be practical unless they reworked how grouping (and hopefully map transfers as well) works in the game.
Another factor is that the lack of a functional ingame voice system would make coordinating raids somewhat problematic, and the third-party ones are not a good solution for it because not everyone uses the same system, nor are they all in the same Discord/Teamspeak/whatever group. Those third-party voice applications are only good for pre-arranged fleet runs.
The old Borg TF did not require voice communication. They simply were not that hard or had that difficult of scripted encounters that required it.
I never played the old Borg TF (I first signed up for STO in 2016 but left a few days later and didn't return until 2018 when I started playing it regularly), but since apparently in-game voice never worked properly (judging by comments from the oldtimers), it logically follows that it would not be an absolute requirement.
On the other hand, without voice a raid tends to be extremely chaotic unless it is done by a group that has worked together on it enough times to work out the kinks since everyone is essentially isolated (I have been in intricate dungeons and raids in other games and have seen firsthand the difference voice makes).
Not everyone needs to talk (though it helps), but a coordinator on voice calling out reminders and tactics helps a lot in other games. The current TFOs illustrate the problem on a small scale since they are very simple designs but in pugs people still wander around lost for longer than they would with a caller giving tips.
So, Val, now you're an expert on how clean everyone's internet connection is? You don't remember the debacle a couple years back with the nodes that interpreted MMO traffic as a DDoS attack and slowed things down?
IMO there really is no "must have" loot. STO is a casual MMO that with even the right basic gear you can get through the story just fine with a T5 ship.
And yet when I tell people this, and tell them I've done it, they say I'm lying.
Here's a list in rough chronological order of reasons given why raid like content wouldn't work in Star Trek Online -
it's like PvP
players can't learn even simple things so how can they learn this
....
Good summary (really, not being snarky)
And it's all true for many, many players.
Yes, there are people here who learn the TFOs, who follow directions, who would enjoy and do well in a STO raid.
But are there enough of them for it to be a good business decision to give up making multiple TFOs or a story episode to make a raid?
I'm not against raids, it's just content creation is a zero-sum game and we're dealing with a small sum to divide up already. I'm not convinced adding raids would bring in a wave of new players to add resources (money) either.
To me this goes on the "never going to happen" wish list along with new ship interiors, ship interiors with customizable crews, unified weapon visuals ....
I'd say is less "Don't have the ability to learn even the simple things" and more "don't have the desire to learn even the simple things".
As for connections there's this nasty thing MMOs can do if you connection is flaky and that's essentially "forget" inputs, there's been plenty of times during jump puzzles both in STO and in other MMOs where I've pressed my space bar as far down as it goes and my character still desided I must mean "march to your death and not jump" instead of "take a jump forward".
Here's a list in rough chronological order of reasons given why raid like content wouldn't work in Star Trek Online -
it's like PvP
players can't learn even simple things so how can they learn this
....
Good summary (really, not being snarky)
It can make for an entertaining read if taken lightly
And it's all true for many, many players.
It's just the summarized opinions of less than a dozen regular posters with only a single persistent assenting opinion. I wouldn't read too much into it.
Yes, there are people here who learn the TFOs, who follow directions, who would enjoy and do well in a STO raid.
But are there enough of them for it to be a good business decision to give up making multiple TFOs or a story episode to make a raid?
This plays very nicely into the "we are just a small studio" line that's been actively promoted the past while. It's a great way to shut down a request for much of anything. Just look at how you had to phrase the question (and I'm not saying you phrased it wrong).
There are ways I could rephrase the small studio line but I won't.
I'm not against raids, it's just content creation is a zero-sum game and we're dealing with a small sum to divide up already. I'm not convinced adding raids would bring in a wave of new players to add resources (money) either.
What I've been advocating over the course of 2 pages is some variety in the menu to bolster the diversity of the end game. I doubt much of anything is achievable without some investment into the game.
To me this goes on the "never going to happen" wish list along with new ship interiors, ship interiors with customizable crews, unified weapon visuals ....
This is close to what I was getting at when I said earlier that we all really want the same thing - more of the things we each like.
As for connections there's this nasty thing MMOs can do if you connection is flaky and that's essentially "forget" inputs, there's been plenty of times during jump puzzles both in STO and in other MMOs where I've pressed my space bar as far down as it goes and my character still desided I must mean "march to your death and not jump" instead of "take a jump forward".
This would affect everything, not just jumping.
It does. But firing a weapon isn't generally as time-sensitive as jumping from one platform to another before the current platform becomes inaccessible/lethal.
Who's having trouble with reading comprehension again?
(Oh, and you did say that people complaining about that delay were just poorly-coordinated. Go back and reread your posts.)
Comments
Jumping in an online game is never good, not everyone has the fast rock-solid connection needed to do that.
For instance, there is at least one mission that is literally impossible to get through in Secret World Legends without a near perfect connection because it has a section where you have to make quick precision jumps and that cannot be done on the decrepit cable TV based network I am on because of random lag spikes that are not bad enough to stop combat but are enough to throw off accurate jumping. The only way around that one is to team up with someone who has a stable enough connection to do the jumps because if you are teamed only one person in the team has to do it.
Jumping is one of those things that look like they would be a nice change of pace on paper but really do not work out in practice and a lot of people get annoyed by it instead. Making progress depend on something like that with even the minor instabilities of the Internet is just bad design, so STO not making more of it (there is still that horrible Kobali mission with it and that is more than enough jumping nonsense for an online game) is a smart move on their part.
As for the rest, it might be good if they made both the TFO and raid length versions of those things available at the same time, though I suspect that the raid version would never fill up except for the occasional fleet get-together run. One other stumbling block is the crude way teams work in the game and the ongoing problem of people getting dumped during map transfers that makes those transfers completely impractical during a TFO or other group scenario since they are likely to lose people at each transfer without a dependable way of getting them back in to a team scenario like that.
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
People have different strengths and weaknesses. I was often getting max score for the omega particle game before I switched to just buying phoenix packs, and at the same time I'm lousy at the dil mining minigame. (I tell myself that it's because I've only played it 10 or so times over 8 years
I use the keyboard on that. Align the brackets via left/right, then adjust size up/down. Its a lot faster than clicking the buttons with the mouse.
For STO, the game used to have pseudo raids of sorts in the form of the old Borg STFs that used to be a combo of space and ground. It used to be that it would drop loot similar to a dungeon or raid run where you would be rolling against other folks for rep drops. While it did indeed function, many folks complained about it for a number of reasons. They felt the STFs were far too long, and many hated having to roll for rep drops. It was changed to what we ended up with today in part based on those complaints, as well as other reasons. Many of the queues with more than 5 people also didn't see as much play as others due to the fact it took so long to fill them up.
Before I came to STO in late 2012 early 2013 time, I was raiding quite a bit in WoW and doing OPs in SWTOR. I've seen raids that are relatively quick and easy, and some that make you want to pull your own hair out. For these raids it requires your tanks, healers, and DPS to bring their A game. They don't have to be gods among men at what they're doing, but they do have to at least be conscious at their keyboard and have a basic understanding of what they're doing with their build. If one person isn't pulling their weight and doesn't know what to do, they can cause a wipe for the other 10-40 people in the run. This is why in games like WoW, SWTOR, and many others that have actual raids, the game itself won't even let you in the door without having a certain amount of stats and gear on paper and/or certain achievements. It's also why many pre-made teams require even higher stats and knowledge than the game itself requires before they will take you on the run. For folks who aren't yet ready to enter raids, these games have paths for people to up their skill level and obtain gear. WoW has the dungeon journal to help prepare people by giving them a very basic rundown of what foes will do, dungeon journal also tells them where they can get certain bits of gear for their class and such, and the proving grounds help them practice. I've been a raid leader in other games, and a raid member. I can tell you from experience that trying to keep a raid together and on track is like herding cats. When you join a raid you are telling folks by default that you have at least the minimum required gear to be there, a basic knowledge of what you'll be doing with your class, can follow directions, and have at least a passing knowledge of the encounter. At the same time I can't tell you the number of times people would try to get into raids with subpar gear, and clearly not knowing what they were doing.
In STO I would say about 85% of the population we have in game wouldn't last 5 minutes in a more traditional MMO and are definitely NOT ready for any kind of raid content. Too many can't follow basic directions the game itself gives. They ignore basic mechanics trying sit there and space bar spam, then wonder why they're getting rolled. Too many folks go into TFOs with subpar rainbow builds thinking they're going to steamroll the instance, but do less overall damage than someone's hangar pets just auto attacking anything in range. When you dare try to offer legitimate help, they come at you with "quit being an elitist" or "I've been playing since beta so I know what i'm doing," yet are doing sub 3k DPS with a fully golded out ship. Just because you've been playing since beta doesn't mean you've been doing it right since beta. To illustrate this point, there is a guy in my fleet who has begged me for years to take him into a Battle of Korfez which is an Elite only queue. If anyone who may read this has ever played Korfez, you know you need to bring the thunder and your A game if you intend to get through that queue. If you don't make the DPS check off the initial groups and stay out of bad stuff, you will automatically fail the queue. I keep telling the dude that when he demonstrates to me he has reached the appropriate damage output level, and has improved his overall gameplay, I will happily take him into a Korfez. He says he wants to get better, yet anything myself or anyone else says goes in one ear and out the other. But somehow when I tell him he's not ready yet, I'm being an elitist by insisting he meet the basic criteria the game itself sets out, or it's too hard and needs to be nerfed. There are far far too many people like that in the STO community who fit that bill.
To make raids work in STO, there would need to be safeguards in place to prevent people from joining who are not yet ready so it doesn't ruin it for the rest of the people in the run. I'm all for folks getting access to content, but not before they're ready for it. You wouldn't just hand car keys to a kid who wasn't taught how to drive, so why would you want teammates in your raid group who aren't ready yet. Before anyone says anything note that I am saying YET meaning that once they've gotten the appropriate gear and knowledge, I'm all for them coming along. No matter where Cryptic set the bar, be it in the attic of Sto'vo'kor, or the basement of Gret'hor, there are always going to be people who simply cannot cut it for one reason or another, be it something out of their control, or something in their control. There would be people who would have to accept that they are not the target audience of said raid content. There are enough folks of that crowd who would feel alienated due to being unable to get into the raids, and it would get nerfed as a result or they would cry for the restrictions to be removed leading to raids being no better off than 5 man content is now. Again I'm all for folks playing content, but not before they're ready.
Now that I've probably made the "everyone should get to play" crowd mad, time to make the "we need raids" crowd mad. True raids like those you may see in WoW, SWTOR, or other games would not work in STO as it is right now. To make a raid work, you would need more than just spacebar and sci spam. While DPS has it's place, you would need Tanks, you would need support builds and builds dedicated to fulfilling the objectives. What form those builds would take I'll leave to you folks to imagine. If all you do is go into said raid and just DPS spam things to death, then it's not a true raid, but little more than a scaled up 5 man free for all.
Raids in other games work because you typically already have the holy trinity of Tank, DPS, Healer in place. Those roles already exist and were designed with that in mind from the ground up. With STO they would need to design around having more than just DPS and Tanks in there. I know to some folks that's like blasphemy but it is what it is. Also with those raids you would need to come up with a loot structure that is fair for all involved. This way you don't have one person ending up with every single piece of loot in there, especially if they already have better and are just taking it from folks who could use it. You would also need to decide what kind of loot is going to drop, and balance said loot drops so they don't impact other sources too negatively. If STO had done this earlier in its life, I could see it being possible. But now the adjustments needed wouldn't be worth the return. Folks already don't queue up for certain TFOs now that are deemed "too hard" or "too long". They sure as gret'hor won't join a raid. STO is what I would call baby's first MMO, or for folks who want to say they play an MMO without every single thing that comes with a traditional mmo.
In terms of balance they would also need to balance around a certain intended setup. Do they want to balance around all cruisers? Do they balance around all DPS and no tanks? Do they balance around a mix of DPS and tank? There's alot to consider when adding some of this magnitude and in STO's current life, it's just not going to happen barring radical changes I doubt most of the population would stomach. I don't think the "just add raids" crowd has thought through their proposal as far as they need to.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
I like the objectives for Gamma. the problem with it is 1. access to the gamma quadrant (if you don't have an alpha quadrant transwarp) and then once in the gamma quadrant having to schlep across the quadrant, and that there are only 3 zones. they should increase the zones to 6 at a minimum
Sigh.
You can unlock a Gamma transwarp through the Beta Dyson sphere via the Gamma storyline, plus you have the mission transwarp anyway via several ways.
And largely because they have fled to STO to escape things like WoW Raiding and all of it's inherent drama. I think it would be nice if they put some of the older stuff back in. It would be nice to play through the Borg TFO's in it's original long form Story mode. But then you stumble into the loot trap. The only way to get players to reliably show up to do the content is to dangle must have loot in front of them. Which leads to the viscious cycle of players doing stuff they don't necessarily like in order to progress, and subjecting themselves to ever more drama, abuse and anti social behavior. STO sits in a weird niche MMO wise.
True enough. This game is actually quite relaxing due to limited drama......aside from zone chat anyway but that can be turned off.
However, you say loot is a carrot yet people insist on playing Romulan Minefield ad nauseam. I can't see the point of that TFO at all, especially seeing as I get the purple vendor trash usually anyway. If they want vendor trash there's patrols for that and XP.
Fleet marks? You get far more from the other queues.
I mean unless they scorched earth when they removed the old stuff, they could put it back in.
If you wanna min/max the shtako out of your ship then maybe there are must haves, like the DOMINO for a phaser build. But not everyone is in it for the uberDEEPS to see how quickly they can nuke a Tac Cube. Some people just wanna have fun and experience the story.
Whatever floats your boat. If it makes you feel better to think that the jumping problem is hand-eye coordination instead of unstable internet speeds and the intermittent control issues (like the game not always detecting button presses in a timely manner) that people have been talking about for a long time, that is up to you. It does not change the fact that those problems exist and take all the fun out of scenarios that depend on quick, squeaky clean connections and make them irritating (or worse) instead.
Your hand-eye coordination theory also fails to address the equally real disconnection during map transfers problem I mentioned in the comment you partially quoted (I get disconnected about three in five times for instance) that would make keeping a raid party together for the whole thing difficult since some would not be able to get back into the raid after disconnection with the haphazard way group content is handled currently.
Another factor is that the lack of a functional ingame voice system would make coordinating raids somewhat problematic, and the third-party ones are not a good solution for it because not everyone uses the same system, nor are they all in the same Discord/Teamspeak/whatever group. Those third-party voice applications are only good for pre-arranged fleet runs.
it's like PvP
players can't learn even simple things so how can they learn this
most players are very casual and lazy and just want to play with space barbie dolls
too long
too hard
they did try something different once, a long time ago
players whined and complained about the first ones
players couldn't find teams to carry them
needing to jump
not a good business decision given the numbers
rant threads about them 10 years ago
players refused to do the old ones
you're joking right?
devs can't get an in-game calendar to work so raids are too complicated for them also
jumping isn't good without a near perfect connection
the game has map transfer issues
most players wouldn't last 5 minutes
players aren't ready
players can't follow basic directions
players have poor builds
players think build advice is given by elitist a$$ holes
players think that since they've been here since beta they know what they're doing when some don't
there would need to be safeguards
the game would need the holy trinity of Tank, DPS, Healer in place
the loot system would have to be restructured
STO is an MMO for babies
the game would have to have balance or something
the game is too messy mechanically
the game is too messy design wise
STO players are refugees from other games
drama, abuse, and anti-social behavior
uberDEEPS (?)
the game lacks a proper in-game voice system
the game suffers from input lag
Ah good times good times. We had a fleet who regularly ran those STF's and had alot of fun back then unless the Queen was bugged wich was about 1 out 3 runs. Though playing with Pugs was pretty much impossible. It's like today's TFO's if I didn't have the gear and knowledge to do most TFO's by myself I wouldn't even bother. People sign up for Advanced and have no clue what they are doing or why which I have to assum is more then 90% of the Player base. I have seen thing in Infected normal for Event I get nightmares about...
But yeah we shouldn't have raids in here because most people are not willing to invest time to actually know what to do and farm the gear to do it.
I don't know what they said back then, what I was talking about was that in general jumping is not really practical nowadays with so much in the way of high-priority VOIP and video packets flying around the lower-capacity older and more decrepit parts of the internet last-mile areas causing momentary lag spikes.
Rubberbanding is not entirely gone, it is just down to the point where it is not noticeable most of the time, and that can really make anything that takes precision timing (such as jumping tricks) annoying instead of fun. If you are in an area where spikes like that never happen then I am happy for you, but I can tell you from experience that not everyone has that solid of a connection.
And specifically to STO, it is a simple fact that the controls in the game are not completely reliable, pressing a button, whether virtual or mechanical, does not always perform the action right away, and sometimes not at all (though it often causes the cooldown timer to start on things that have cooldowns despite not triggering the action).
I never said the map transfer failures had anything to do with jumping on ground maps, I am not sure how you confused that with the jumping issue. The map transfer failures are a problem in keeping a raid group intact when switching maps (the devs have mentioned that the transfer failures are a major reason why no current TFOs use more than one map in fact).
A raid tends to fall apart if people keep dropping out and cannot get back in. And with the hit-or-miss way grouping works in STO there is a very high chance that a person who gets dumped during map transfer also gets dumped from the group and is unable to rejoin the group while they are in the raid. Raids probably would not be practical unless they reworked how grouping (and hopefully map transfers as well) works in the game.
I never played the old Borg TF (I first signed up for STO in 2016 but left a few days later and didn't return until 2018 when I started playing it regularly), but since apparently in-game voice never worked properly (judging by comments from the oldtimers), it logically follows that it would not be an absolute requirement.
On the other hand, without voice a raid tends to be extremely chaotic unless it is done by a group that has worked together on it enough times to work out the kinks since everyone is essentially isolated (I have been in intricate dungeons and raids in other games and have seen firsthand the difference voice makes).
Not everyone needs to talk (though it helps), but a coordinator on voice calling out reminders and tactics helps a lot in other games. The current TFOs illustrate the problem on a small scale since they are very simple designs but in pugs people still wander around lost for longer than they would with a caller giving tips.
And yet when I tell people this, and tell them I've done it, they say I'm lying.
Good summary (really, not being snarky)
And it's all true for many, many players.
Yes, there are people here who learn the TFOs, who follow directions, who would enjoy and do well in a STO raid.
But are there enough of them for it to be a good business decision to give up making multiple TFOs or a story episode to make a raid?
I'm not against raids, it's just content creation is a zero-sum game and we're dealing with a small sum to divide up already. I'm not convinced adding raids would bring in a wave of new players to add resources (money) either.
To me this goes on the "never going to happen" wish list along with new ship interiors, ship interiors with customizable crews, unified weapon visuals
As for connections there's this nasty thing MMOs can do if you connection is flaky and that's essentially "forget" inputs, there's been plenty of times during jump puzzles both in STO and in other MMOs where I've pressed my space bar as far down as it goes and my character still desided I must mean "march to your death and not jump" instead of "take a jump forward".
It can make for an entertaining read if taken lightly
It's just the summarized opinions of less than a dozen regular posters with only a single persistent assenting opinion. I wouldn't read too much into it.
This plays very nicely into the "we are just a small studio" line that's been actively promoted the past while. It's a great way to shut down a request for much of anything. Just look at how you had to phrase the question (and I'm not saying you phrased it wrong).
There are ways I could rephrase the small studio line but I won't.
What I've been advocating over the course of 2 pages is some variety in the menu to bolster the diversity of the end game. I doubt much of anything is achievable without some investment into the game.
This is close to what I was getting at when I said earlier that we all really want the same thing - more of the things we each like.
Who's having trouble with reading comprehension again?
(Oh, and you did say that people complaining about that delay were just poorly-coordinated. Go back and reread your posts.)