Small dil sink idea: Ship bridges

jkwrangler2010

Let us buy ship bridges with dil.

baddmoonrizin

What ship bridges? All the available ship bridges are either free or in the Zen Store. Why would they pull them from the Zen Store or charge Dilithium for something that's already free?

husanakx

Well you did just say some are in the zen store. I can't imagine Cryptic ever pulling something off the zen store though to put it in the dill store.

davefenestrator

As far as adding new bridges, Cryptic has pretty much given up on that even for zen let alone for dil. :sadface:

phoenixc

The fact that almost everything that could only be done on a player's ship was moved out into tabs around the minimap was probably the main thing that made potential bridge sales a flop, but still, a big part of the bridges not selling is that people don't trust that they can be used in whatever ship they want them for. If they did something like make it so that a c-store bridge is guaranteed to go in every ship a person might want to put it in, then they might sell a little better.

One problem if they made bridges sell for dil is that they take so much time and effort that the dil cost would be insanely high. Just look at how much the vanity shields sold for when they sold them for dill during a special sale, those are a tiny fraction of the production cost of making a new bridge.

baddmoonrizin

Well, if this is about NEW bridges, then this idea is right out. Bridges are expensive in terms of time and resources to develop, and therefore only tend to happen anymore when they're needed for episode content. I don't see this as a viable, repeatable Dilithium sink.

garaks31

unique bridges to use on regular ships could be worth the dill

quicker ways to get from dil to ec with some ,dil interest could be made

sthe91

I would rather have bridges in the C-Store or in a set there not as a dilithium sink.

paradox

waiting for this bridge to be added, just copy the constitution bridge, dim the lights and add Terran Empire symbols on the doors and walls, also make the captain's chair taller.

krisxr400

A bit off topic, has anyone seen the t3 Perseus ship interior? Thats a really neat interior, TOS bridge layout with a round corridor that circles the saucer, and has a shooting range. It's not a customization option, comes with that ship, and can't be place on the t6 version of the temporal escort. I keep that ship in active roster just to visit it every now and then.

I do like visiting ship interiors, and a few of them have ship management and dry dock features, like the voyager bridge set.

rattler2

krisxr400 wrote: »

A bit off topic, has anyone seen the t3 Perseus ship interior? Thats a really neat interior, TOS bridge layout with a round corridor that circles the saucer, and has a shooting range. It's not a customization option, comes with that ship, and can't be place on the t6 version of the temporal escort. I keep that ship in active roster just to visit it every now and then.

It uses the Pioneer interior, which is a pretty nice, smaller scale TOS interior.

davefenestrator

krisxr400 wrote: »

A bit off topic, has anyone seen the t3 Perseus ship interior? Thats a really neat interior, TOS bridge layout with a round corridor that circles the saucer, and has a shooting range. It's not a customization option, comes with that ship, and can't be place on the t6 version of the temporal escort. I keep that ship in active roster just to visit it every now and then.

I do like visiting ship interiors, and a few of them have ship management and dry dock features, like the voyager bridge set.

This is a chance to bring up this request to the devs once again:

Please let us use every bridge we have unlocked on every ship we own, unless there is a valid faction-conflict reason like the crew would attack the captain or boffs.

krisxr400

Right the pioneer! Thanks for clarifying for me. Wicked cool interior, and agreed, I would like to put that on a few of my ships. lol @davefenestrator load in and crew are fighting boffs!

terransecurity

paradox#7391 wrote: »

waiting for this bridge to be added, just copy the constitution bridge, dim the lights and add Terran Empire symbols on the doors and walls, also make the captain's chair taller.

This...so much this...

Terran Bridges would be AWESOME!!!!

telbasta7386

baddmoonrizin wrote: »

Well, if this is about NEW bridges, then this idea is right out. Bridges are expensive in terms of time and resources to develop, and therefore only tend to happen anymore when they're needed for episode content. I don't see this as a viable, repeatable Dilithium sink.

The very least y'all could do is unlock bridges for use on any ship. I can't even put into words how annoying it is to have an expensive lockbox or zen store ship and be stuck with a basic bridge that can't even be swapped out.

And maybe someone could go into the code and tone down the NPC spawns on ship interiors? I don't think a t'varo, defiant, or b'rel needs a thousand crew.

baddmoonrizin

telbasta7386 wrote: »

baddmoonrizin wrote: »

Well, if this is about NEW bridges, then this idea is right out. Bridges are expensive in terms of time and resources to develop, and therefore only tend to happen anymore when they're needed for episode content. I don't see this as a viable, repeatable Dilithium sink.

The very least y'all could do is unlock bridges for use on any ship. I can't even put into words how annoying it is to have an expensive lockbox or zen store ship and be stuck with a basic bridge that can't even be swapped out.

And maybe someone could go into the code and tone down the NPC spawns on ship interiors? I don't think a t'varo, defiant, or b'rel needs a thousand crew.

"Y'all?" 😏

I agree with you. We should be able to use any bridge we own on any ship we own. I also agree that the ship's population could be reduced.

bjorjlen

baddmoonrizin wrote: »

telbasta7386 wrote: »

baddmoonrizin wrote: »

Well, if this is about NEW bridges, then this idea is right out. Bridges are expensive in terms of time and resources to develop, and therefore only tend to happen anymore when they're needed for episode content. I don't see this as a viable, repeatable Dilithium sink.

The very least y'all could do is unlock bridges for use on any ship. I can't even put into words how annoying it is to have an expensive lockbox or zen store ship and be stuck with a basic bridge that can't even be swapped out.

And maybe someone could go into the code and tone down the NPC spawns on ship interiors? I don't think a t'varo, defiant, or b'rel needs a thousand crew.

"Y'all?" 😏

I agree with you. We should be able to use any bridge we own on any ship we own. I also agree that the ship's population could be reduced.

Or at least have it mean something on a interactive level, including any other NPC's in the game that we see just walking around. Like have all of them actually be someone we can click on, and have them say something, anything, like those NPC's in many other games (like Baldur's Gate for example) that don't have an "active" part in the game, and are just there to add more immersion to it overall. Just a suggestion...

Peace...

baronvonboom

I know its a mixed bag with some large, some small but when they can make it so as a rule the bridges & interiors arent the size of football fields then we may see an uptick of interest and sales in that area.

krisxr400

Wow, that's very interesting @sirsitsalot. Sounds fun and engaging, almost a game within itself. I'd play that.

Agreed @baronvonboom, it would be nice if everything was scaled proper. It does throw off the imagination/immersion a bit when a ceiling is waaay up there and corridors are supper wide. And may I add, sit down, sit in the dang chair, get off the floor and take a seat! lol

rattler2

baronvonboom wrote: »

I know its a mixed bag with some large, some small but when they can make it so as a rule the bridges & interiors arent the size of football fields then we may see an uptick of interest and sales in that area.

Its a product of its time. The oversized everything was to accomodate the "camera" as well as the character. The canon interiors have done better in that regard as they figured things out.

baddmoonrizin

sirsitsalot wrote: »

Personally, I think ship interiors could become the future of the holdings mechanic. Upgrading our interiors from stock mode to fully decked out with features and functional room unlocks that actually play into a ship management simulation that ties into that big meta-game I keep going on about. This could give players a chance to fully customize their interiors in a variety of ways that actually have some gameplay meaning. It could be loaded with all sorts of DOff assignments that result in slottable consumable buffs or actions that could be used in actual combat. This would take the whole space barbie aspect of the game to a whole new level while actually giving ship interiors a practical use while still letting it be completely optional. The currencyfor buying the actual base interior would be Zen, like it always has been. The currency for upgrading it would be RD, thus providing a much needed RD sink.

But it all rides on it at least having an engaging minigame wrapped around it. In fact, that minigame of ship management could be used to test the metadata element for a potential game-wide metagame like I talk about. Having those DOff assignments impact a ship's metadata so that ship-board events are triggered or prevented thus adding more assignments and actual directly playable activities.

Fleet ships could become mobile fleet holdings. They could be deployed to any point of interest on the sector map and be boardable by fellow fleet mates and armada members. They would get extended features unique to fleets like fleet holdings do, with the regular upgrades being harable as well. A fleet ship would max out its basic upgrades as several players contributing the RD to the projects would be able to fill the contribution pools very quickly. But the fleet-specific projects would cost what they do on pre-existing fleet holdings.

Now while they are at it, they could start putting NPC ships at random POIs, each with some sort of ship-board activity that needs doing for Metadata and for normal rewards. Anything from meeting with dignitaries to helping repair battle damage to delivering or picking up special cargo. This way, the ship board mechanics would factor into regular repeatable mission gameplay. So they won't just be building interiors for player ships. It would expand upon what we actually do in regular gameplay... And these NPC ships would have their interior modifications completely randomized so very few will look the exact same and allow players to see what some of their own interiors could be made to look like.

One of the very first shipboard projects would be setting the uniform worn by the NPCs so they match a players Captain and BOffs. This is something that people have been asking for.

Now add to this by adding starbases and ground facilities that factor into logistical metadata. One of these would be an office at Starfleet Headquarters on Earth across the bay from the Academy, or in the first City on Q'onos. Or on New Romulus. Above-ground or Subteranian (give the Reman Quarter some love finally).

These offices would factor into the a metadata-driven expansion to the Admiralty system. The interiors would be upgradable like ships, and here, BOffs can be promoted beyond commander and all the way up to Admiral, with fleet admiral remaining the maximum player rank. These lesser admiralty BOffs would make up the fleet admiral's senior staff. And these could be personal or fleet as desired by players. Again the fleet versions would have extended fleet-related functionality, And like in the ship suggestion above, there would be simulated activities based on metadata that always keep something happening that a player can react to.

Also... A change to the way DOffs work would be good, so that we assign DOffs to ships and facilities we control. Not just being slottable to gain whatever bonuses they provide, but where they actually have their place. This could bring back the crew stat that got removed. How many DOFFscan be assigned would depend on the ship.

Use of generic DOFFs that aren't given names with the most basic of qualifying stats could be used to fill a ship's crew compliment. A science vessel obviously carrying at least half science crew members with the other divisions filling the remainder as desired. I've always felt that both Admiralty and DOff mechanics could be a lot more robust. Also, when putting say a group of DOffs on assignment on Andoria, they would actually be on Andoria until either picked up by the player, or the player uses the admiralty system to send a ship TO pick them up, in which case, they become passengers of that ship.

Also, building an Admiralty Card ship would be interesting. Have the basic ship card, assign BOffs to the command positions and Start assigning the rest of the crew using DOffs. The DOffs and BOffs used would impact the ship's stats. which based on the ship class itself would start off awith certain values. Finalizing the details would crunch all the numbers and produce a ship card that can be deployed wherever the player wants.

With this we get into the potential of heavy logistics gameplay such as deploying ships to build facilities, haul cargo and other wide-reaching assignments that impact global metadata based on outcomes. Sending a cargo vessel to a planet in the outer rim to supply an installation with no support could result in a random encounter with pirates. This would trigger a distress call that players can respond to. If they do so before the encounter's timer expires, the ship can be saved and will continue on its way once the pirates are dealt with.

All this sort of thing would be made possible at the core by adding fundamental mechanics to player-owned interiors that have their own metagames running based on the purpose the ship or installation serves. Much of it would be number crunching going on behind the scenes using timers and such. Scenarios wold trigger or not based on how certain numbers fall at certain time intervals, or some could just be dormant until/unless certain numbers hit specific thresholds either due to player activity or lack thereof.

But it should all begin as functionality attached to player-owned interiors... Fleet andmirals (which most of us are) could really play that role by engaging in the metagame. Everything has meaning and purpose in that situation. It's no longer just going through daily motions. that have no impact beyond one's own personal experience, but rather would have the game as a whole responding to actions and inactions in ways that logically fit the circumstances.

A few years ago, I had advocated adapting the Fleet System to Starship Interiors. While a lot of this sounds cool and interesting, it's honestly too much. It seems like it would require too much new tech and new systems to work as you propose. My proposal from a few years ago, adapted pre-existing systems to make Starship Interiors work, leaving the major work to developing the art assets.

The proposal I made years ago in case anyone wants to read it:

It's too bad that something isn't being done with ship interiors, because most of Star Trek took place on the ship. I think it's something that would be worth investing development time in, because the work put into it could then be used as a basis for so many other things: episode mission maps, PVE/PVP queue maps, etc.

I've said before that I'd love to see Starship Interiors done the way Fleet Starbases are done, but scaled to a personal level. Fleet Starbases have their various leveling projects and cosmetic projects. Starship Interiors could work the same way with project inputs scaled to the individual rather than an entire fleet. Leveling one's Starship Interior would give a player access to more things: Bank, Email, Tailor, etc. Cosmetic projects could allow for decor in the Captain's Quarters, Ten Forward, or even allow to toggle between TOS, TMP, TNG, and 2410 aesthetics.

Fleet Starbases have holdings that can also be leveled and have cosmetic projects. On Starship Interiors this would be represented by adding new decks, for example:

Crew Deck: Captain's Quarters with possible Tailor access and trophy displays. Ten Forward with a variety of games that we've seen played in Star Trek and possibly a dance floor. Assign quarters to various BOFFS, visit them and they could give you a daily mission to be done aboard ship.

Life Sciences: a menagerie for storing and displaying pets bought and earned, possible breeding projects for said pets to be unlocked, games for scanning, detecting, identifying life forms.

Stellar Cartography: scanning games for locating, identifying various stellar phenomenon.

Sick Bay: triaging patients game (similar to the Kobali triage mission) for crew members that wander into Sick Bay.

Shuttle Bay: small craft that we own could be displayed here, switching to small craft could be done here, traveling to Fleet Holding could be done here, queueing for shuttle PVE/PVP could be done here, perhaps some unique shuttle piloting/racing missions could be done from here.

Engineering: engineering diagnostic games (warp field, plasma flow adjustments), detecting problems on the ship somewhere then going there and fixing it, a Jefferies tube scavenger hunt type game (using a blank map like Temporal Ambassador), crafting of unique items available only here.

Allow our designated Department Heads to be assigned to occupy the relevant station on board, ex) CMO would be in Sick Bay, Chief Engineer would be in Engineering.

Allow us some (at least limited) choices on crew composition. Perhaps using toggles for species, uniforms that they wear. These options could also be made available through cosmetic projects. Personally, I'd love to see the DOFF roster used to determine crew composition. Allow a toggle or slider for number of crew on a given map with 0 being an option as well. Interacting with random crew members could yield a daily mission or unique DOFF assignment.

The maps themselves could be used to update older episode missions that take place aboard a ship and future missions that need to take place aboard a ship. Also, ship boarding/repel boarders PVE/PVP queues could use the maps as well. Perhaps even a capture the flag type CPVE mission: two teams beam in, Team A captures the bridge, Team B captures engineering. First one to their goal wins.

Additionally, the Starship Interiors maps would be separate and independent from the bridge, so one could use the bridge of their choice. There could be an option to sync visuals between the bridge and interior for ships that only have a bridge and no other decks to re-skin those decks with the same aesthetics. For example, using a Hirogen ship would re-skin the Starship Interiors deck maps using Hirogen textures, using a Tholian ship would re-skin them using Tholian textures.

Unless there is a way to connect them via map moving in the turbolift, unique ship interiors would be retained as they are. They just wouldn't utilize this system. So your full TOS, Defiant, Voyager, etc. interiors would be retained and could be used separately. This proposed Starship Interiors system would be the new default interior for your ship, though. There might be uproar about that, but it's the best way to preserve previous ship interior/bridge purchases with (hopefully) minimal uproar. Perhaps have those purchases automatically unlock texturing/lighting aesthetics to give them an extra bonus. So, those canon interior aesthetics could be applied to the new interiors. It wouldn't be an exact TOS interior, but it would look like that era. It wouldn't be an exact TNG interior, but it would use that aesthetic. It wouldn't be an exact Tholian interior, but it would fit that style.

The deck/room layouts would be generic, so that they could be easily used for missions. As it is, doing a 5-man Starbase defense, the queue randomly chooses a Fleet Starbase from among the participants. Whatever level/visuals that base is in is the map that's used. Same would go for a potential 5-man ship boarding/repelling queue maps. Someone in the team's ship map will be used. The layouts are all the same, but the look might be different.

Yes, FED, KDF, and ROM would need 3 separate layouts, but only for the crew deck and engineering deck. New decks added, like holdings, could be a generic corridor with rooms branching off. What would make them unique would be the skin that's applied to them: a Starfleet skin, Klingon skin, Romulan skin as the basic default look depending on the character. Other skins would be unlocked via cosmetic projects, C-Store purchases, Lock Box ships, etc. The Reputation System could be tied into it, too: Tier 5 Reputation Project that allows for unique Starship Interior visuals.

Oh, and this would be a per character system, not account wide, unless a certain purchase unlocks for the account.

I think that threads and polls like this try to show Cryptic that there might be support to do this, that players would be willing to buy it into it if it were made. And while Cryptic does indeed want to make money, I don't think that is the real hold up here. I think that this is something they might be willing to do, if they knew how they could best implement it and get the most bang for their buck for the time and development that they'd put into it.

The best example I can point to is the Voyager interior. It's beautiful, iconic, and screen accurate. One of the reasons we got that interior with that level of detail, though, was because it was extensively used during the Delta Rising story arc missions. And so, it could be used for future story missions as well. Bonus that it could sold to the masses as a Starship Bridge/Interior.

What I've tried to do with the proposal that I made was less about how much or whether players would be willing to spend real money for it, but rather try to show Cryptic: a direction they could go to implement it; to tie it into systems that they already have; to use it as an asset for future story/mission development; how to expand on it, so that it shows potential for future growth rather than a one-and-done project; to make it an integral part of one's daily game play; and yeah, maybe there are some aspects that can be monetized, too.

We've got to give them more than just saying, "Hey, I'd buy it, if you make it." That's easy to ignore or pass on by. I want to get them interested. I want to give them an idea that gets them excited enough to say, "That's awesome! I'd love to build that into the game!"

paradox

what about re-adding the foundry system into ship interiors and rebranding it as the Holodeck, it sounds like good way to kill time while waiting for the next content drop (sorry TFOs, but I only do you if there's a point to it, like being part of the event campaign or part of my mission journal) and it gives people more of a reason to use their ship interiors more, it effectively kills two birds with one stone.

nixie50

you use to have to schlep around the ship to get some doff missions.. I remember a multi tiered mission set involving the bartender. I wonder if it's even in the game anymore

meimeitoo

I will pay good money for a full bridge unlock; aka, allow me to outfit any bridge I own (including from Zen/Promo ships) onto any ship. That would be such a huge quality of life improvement. And something I'd be willing to reach deep into my pockets for (instead of say, 500k Dilithium for an extremely underwhelming, useless Admiralty card).

Cryptic never seems to get these sinks right. Either a lame Maco suit, or a weird Admiralty card: just offer something people actually WANT.

rattler2

Honestly... at the very least I would have liked to see them adapt the old trophy node system that still exists in most of the stock interiors to be usable with other things to allow for a level of customization. Also bring back trophies. We haven't had any new ones since before the Dyson Sphere.

nixie50 wrote: »

you use to have to schlep around the ship to get some doff missions.. I remember a multi tiered mission set involving the bartender. I wonder if it's even in the game anymore

Probably still there.

telbasta7386

baddmoonrizin wrote: »

telbasta7386 wrote: »

baddmoonrizin wrote: »

Well, if this is about NEW bridges, then this idea is right out. Bridges are expensive in terms of time and resources to develop, and therefore only tend to happen anymore when they're needed for episode content. I don't see this as a viable, repeatable Dilithium sink.

The very least y'all could do is unlock bridges for use on any ship. I can't even put into words how annoying it is to have an expensive lockbox or zen store ship and be stuck with a basic bridge that can't even be swapped out.

And maybe someone could go into the code and tone down the NPC spawns on ship interiors? I don't think a t'varo, defiant, or b'rel needs a thousand crew.

"Y'all?" 😏

Sorry, Texan, it's habit =P