I setup a poll to see how many of you feel about Peace Missions in Star Trek Online. Do you want more, less, same?
Question:
How Many Peace Missions Do You Want In Star Trek Online? Peace Missions = Diplomacy, Exploration, Logic, etc.
To Make your vote visit -
http://modpoll.com/view/agdwb2xsMmdvcgwLEgRQb2xsGJz3Nww
Comments
For instance, in STO, you want a space fight, you go to a deep space encounter and shoot. I'd like the same in STO : you go to such star cluster and you have peaceful missions. Don't want them ? You don't enter this star cluster and you won't even see it.
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=111459&page=3
"I would like a flexible enough mission system such that I could choose violence or diplomacy/etc to solve many, if not most/all missions."
I realize that would be monumentally difficult to implement, but we're talking "dream world" here aren't we?
I voted 50/50, but this would be my answer too. It might not be as "dream world" as it sounds. There would need to be a minigame of some sort, ideally as robust as the idea in my signature. Then just give us the option to hail "enemy" ships before we close in to weapons range. Bam. Any mission has the potential for diplomacy. Mind you, if that is a borg ship you just hailed... expect the talking to last only as long as it takes them to close into weapons range.
PS - There is a typo in the poll. One option is listed as 25% peaceful/25% combat.
EDIT: The downside to this is that we'd need some way to measure our "diplomacy" in game and a charisma type stat or something.
If Cryptic would give us a better reason for fighting (rather than "It's war!"), I'd like it more. In the shows and movies (Abrams movie aside since that was a mindless sci-fi film and not Star Trek), fighting was viewed as a last resort.
When I'm in an exploration mission and randomly it's "Kill these 3 mobs." I sigh and drop that section. I'd rather have more diplomatic options with choice trees.
Yeah, I liked that one too.
I'd like to see the explore/examine/etc type missions expanded as some sort of mini game rather than a single keypress interaction.
And a detailed diplomacy system would rock. Vanguard has a very good one, implemented as a sort of strategy card game.
The idea of "peaceful" missions is noble and it is one I often see it floating around the forum in numerous threads. But I have yet to see anyone translate this idea into a real ingame feature that wouldn't be both A) boring and
If your answer is "dialogue options" then stop right there. That's single player game mentality, not MMO. There is zero skill involved in picking dialogue and be assured that web sites will have the correct path laid out for every mission within days. Googling is not an MMO skill. Not to mention if they are repeatable. People have also said diplomacy could be a skill you dump points into. How will this work? Oh... it unlocks certain dialogue options.
I just don't see how it could work. At best, peaceful missions would have to involve a time sink. Which would be what? Go collect X of this item to appease the angry chief? We already have missions like this and I bet 90% of the players dump these within 10 seconds. Beam over to the enemy ship and use computer terminals to fix their replicators? Scan rocks?
Sure... Kirk's corbomite maneuver made for great drama on TV. Picard brokering a peace deal sitting around a table in the conference room is the stuff of legend. But they just don't translate into viable MMO game play. And you know what? Show me an episode's storyline that involves a "peaceful mission" and I bet you anything that phasers are being fired or someone is getting punched in the face at some point.
I'm not trying to be confrontational. All I'm saying that if this whole "give us peaceful missions" thing is going to continue on and on, then be constructive. Star Trek fans are a pretty creative bunch... so use your brain and come up with a system that won't be boring or exploitable, offers the appropriate risk versus reward and can be done as a team.
I see no reason why there can not be two, three or four chunks of green text the player can select each of which reflects a difference stance you can take (overly agressince, overly diplomatic, subtle threats and neutral as an example) each leading to a different dialouge branch. It would at least mean something more than "Press F to continue" when talking to NPC's.
I wouldnt mind a non peace non combat quest also.
Perhaps discovering a strange ship crashed on a planet that leads to a few discoveries, a few crewmen get sick and you have to investigate OR
your appearance is changed to retieve some computer hardware from a downed satelite on an unknown planet.
the locals have never made first contact and you musnt let them know who you are. etc
also, HOLODECK missions/training.. lots of potential there..
Indeed, it's difficult because except in the main episodic content (and those missions are expansive to produce), you can't create a real dialog system. The only way to make this works in bulk missions IMHO would be to use abstracted diplomacy.
Several different systems were suggested already.
Im talking about missions with the miners, missions where you scan objects on the planets and learn about why they are there.
Alot of really cool Star Trek missions could be taken from Star Trek A Final Unity, which had alot of logic, puzzle, etc. challenges that was very immersive. Missions like that can be done for STO.
Thats a GREAT MISSION. Would love to play osmething like that
Diplomacy
Several different systems were suggested already.
Minigames to simulate actions
They would simulate the non combat actions. They should be skippable because they could be boring to the most action driven players. Here is a thread with awesome examples of minigames especially designed for STO (with pictures !)
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=72963
With minigames, you can simulate doors unlocking, equipment sabotage, computers hacking, cure creation etc. etc. Used in many MMOs like Runescape and in many RPGs like Mass Effect for instance.
Games at Quarks
We could play games at Quarks : dabo, domjot, poker, 3D Chess, fizzbin, darts, whatever, vs AI or other players (that PVP I'd play !). Of course, we would bet energy credits !
Scanning with tricorders
Can become a non combat activity on its own. It's another kind of minigame but it is so iconic that it deserves its own category. A powerful tricorders system has been proposed by JP. Just have a look here (with pictures !) :
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=59035
Quick and dirty exploration system
This would be ADDED to the game, it would NOT replace the star clusters. How does it work :
1) You can scan anywhere except during fight (tricorder on ground / sensors in space). You get a % of finding something based upon skills, equipment and the location (deep dangerous space = more chances to find something)
2) Activate scan. Cryptic computes (rolls dice) : did you find something ?
No ? You cannot scan again before leaving the system or the planet.
Yes ? What did you find ? Depends on your success, it can be :
1 - crafting stuff
2 - Lore info (just informations about the ST universe, for instance an old holodisc or an archeological thing)
3 - Hidden Klingon's base, let's go get them
4 - Rare or semi rare gear
5 - Someone in distress you need to save
6 - Gateway to the mirror universe
7 - A cool pet
8 - The bat'leth of Kahless floating in space ;-)
etc. etc.
The good things :
- it works everywhere, when you want => feeling of freedom
- Cryptic can add new things to discover easily : any time a dev has an idea, he can add it to the "discoveries" database and release it with the next update. It is a good way to give the players perks for instance.
All this does exist already in an MMO (EvE Online), in a much more complex system. I realize that STO is not EvE (fortunately) but we can keep it very simple and it would help the "exploration feeling" a great deal IMHO.
Really like these ideas, especially The games at Quarks !
And the games at Quark are 100% MMO : I bet a lot of us would spend huge amounts of time playing vs other players there
Oh, I'm all for mini games like that - Dabo, poker, Tri-D Chess, Dom-jot, etc. Heck, I'd even play a few rounds of Fizzbin or bet a few thousand quatoos on scantily clad, green haired gladiators
That's just polished content. Give the game time and I'm sure stuff like this will be implemented.
i have so far encountered one (1) diplomacy mission, and one (1) mission where you had a chance to choose between two outcomes.
would love to see more of this.
besides that, it would add greatly to exploration.
"kill ship x, then ship x's reinforcements, then depart system", "click item x, then click item x's friends, then depart system" and "kill peep x, then peep x's reinforcements, then beam up to your ship and depart system" gets boring considering thats pretty much all pve endgame that is out there.
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=113754