You do understand how script driven events work right?
If you ever wondered why so many of the feds missions are so similar its because theres a ton of cut and paste action going on with them.
This is based on I dont know how many game engines Ive done this with over and over and over again:
When your laying out an away mission you load an area map(10 seconds to load, no telling how long for the person to decide what map they want to load). You place static entites on the map. Aka boxes, crates, etc.
You now have eye candy.
Next we add bounding box settings for the items we need people to interact with. This can range from an area field to a static point that the game allows a player to interact with. This has a script to it that allows for the mini dialog that gives rewards or sets a flag condition to the quest. Can range from finding someting in a box for a quest to scanning the box or item.
Now if this covers some of the dead simple fed quest then thats it, a dialog is tripped for the player to beam up and contact starfleet for their reward.
The story line missions require more tinkering. With the story line quest we need spawners for the enemy groups you will fight. This is choosen from a list of premade enemy spawn entities. These spawners can be done thru pathing drop points with some engines and some use bounding rules to keep to a given path. Depends on how they want to write it there. Either requires seconds to drop in place. Thus populating a map area requires hardly any effort. The quality of an encounter to be honest is more determined by how artful the spawn placements are whats spawned verses what you expect the player to be able to handle at the point they make it to the given map.
This is why I find it strange content is taking so long.
What I find strange is everything you just wrote is supposed to be happening EVEN FASTER with their Genesis System. The GS is/was supposed to be able to help streamline content creation.
Sadly, I think this why the exploration missions feel so empty and meaningless and not at all what most people had pictured in their head. Missions are created using a system that has only has a few basic mission types/objectives available. All of which are designed to be housed in simple ground and space maps, so that similar scripting can be used.
In my opinion, Cryptic should expand the "PVP-ness" of the Klingon faction. PVP is what defines the KDF faction. We have people that get to Brigadier General level 45 from playing a handful of the same PVP maps over and over and over. The reason is because every PVP battle is varied and different, so it is possible for fights to stay interesting even though we're just playing the same 3 or 4 maps endlessly.
Simply adding more PVP maps, some more PVP activities and such, is enough to keep the KDF faction fresh and interesting. It's less work for the programmers, as all they have to do is throw in a few more PVP maps, and it boosts the entertainment of the KDF faction by loads.
I'd rather have Cryptic programmers give me a couple more interesting PVP maps that I can play on for hours and hours, days and weeks, rather than a few PvE missions that I will get bored of within minutes. If I wanted PvE, I'd simply hop on my Fed. The KDF faction should be unique from the Federation and distinguished by a more robust PVP system.
In my opinion, Cryptic should expand the "PVP-ness" of the Klingon faction. PVP is what defines the KDF faction. We have people that get to Brigadier General level 45 from playing a handful of the same PVP maps over and over and over. The reason is because every PVP battle is varied and different, so it is possible for fights to stay interesting even though we're just playing the same 3 or 4 maps endlessly.
Simply adding more PVP maps, some more PVP activities and such, is enough to keep the KDF faction fresh and interesting. It's less work for the programmers, as all they have to do is throw in a few more PVP maps, and it boosts the entertainment of the KDF faction by loads.
I'd rather have Cryptic programmers give me a couple more interesting PVP maps that I can play on for hours and hours, days and weeks, rather than a few PvE missions that I will get bored of within minutes. If I wanted PvE, I'd simply hop on my Fed. The KDF faction should be unique from the Federation and distinguished by a more robust PVP system.
PvP maps are fun for any side and needs to be added no matter what. I want PvE for Klingons too. Sometimes you just want a good storyarc mission and not just a battle to entertain yourself with.
Some of the stories are really good on the Fed side. If you just had more diplomacy options they would be amazing.
Cryptic already stated they wont add any territorial conquest maps for PvP.
So I fail to see how they will keep entertaining the PvP community after they reach rank 45.
Scenarios only go that far before they get tedious and boring.
Also there was official mentions of trying to get 2-man fleet making in game, third faction and more pve...all before end of beta.
None of em happend, and having to ask "what faction we want next" means they havent even started on it and we're looking at 3-6months before we even get another half finished faction like Romulans or Cardassians in game.
Only reason I even stayed after Beta, was the hope to play Romulans and have open pvp areas and a real PvP possible end game.
Seeing this wont happen in the near future, I at least have cancelled my sub. Might come back once those things get here. If they ever do.
One less Klingon =/
Ultiamtly this game suffers from the same problem ive seen in all the outher Cyrptic game....they only do enough to get buy ....the game is interesting in concepet and on the surface is realy enjoyable....but lacks any real meat.
I'm not saying what's on Tribble ISN'T all the Klingon-side is going to be enjoying, but you may be a bit too hasty with the righteous indignation. You've also been heartily responded to over there, but to share the important parts here ...
1) KDF wasn't intended to be a PVE faction
2) Fed PVE has had a year or two of development to get where it's at
3) KDF is going to have to be patient so that our content is delicious and meaningful. 45 days isn't enough to develop and code 45 levels of content.
Um, the problem is:
1) You believed the comment that the KDF was only supposed to be PvP only. This was pretty much a lame cover up for their inability to have content on hand at launch. Lets be truthful that it is more likely that other forces were at play such as Atari / Cryptic wanting a cash flow.
2) If that is the case then the game should have been delayed. Again this can relate back to #1 that they needed the cash or it would have never come out.
3) KDF will be gone. Please o Please don't rehash old fanboi comments from so many game fanboys that stated "o please let the developers have another year of your life to come up with some content." If you have played more than one new MMO I am certain you know what I mean ; )
Klingon faction players are upset, and rightly so. I agree with many that this update will be a make or break thing for many who may just rage quit. Seen it in several MMOs, can't say I'll be one of them until I see the update implemented. However, I am not waiting for Pie-in-the-sky promises : )
Well, it's something. I get the feeling that Klingon PvE content will continue to come in at this pace - nobody should be expecting a Klingon content update that will ever exceed that for the Federation. And now there's talk of an additional faction being added which will divert their attention even further.
But you know, somebody said in some other thread "If you give them a cookie, they'll complain that there isn't any milk." So, I'm happy that they're not ignoring Klingons completely. I have both a Fed and Klingon character, and switch between the two whenever I want to do some piece of content oriented or exclusive to that particular faction.
Klingon faction players are upset, and rightly so. I agree with many that this update will be a make or break thing for many who may just rage quit. Seen it in several MMOs, can't say I'll be one of them until I see the update implemented. However, I am not waiting for Pie-in-the-sky promises : )
There's going to be a lot of rage quitting when this "content " , I use this term lightly because it's really light in the content department is realeased. From what I've witnessed on Tribble , it's all copy and paste material of the most generic sort. Obviously if the trend to ignoring Klingon content continues , the factions will slowly rot away. This offers some insight to the future factions that they plan to introduce. It's become pretty obvious that Cryptic is good at one faction , one dimensional games, and that's about the best we can hope for.
They're going to waste their time on TRIBBLE that offers nothing to the game or gameplay .
You mean you didn't sign up to play Starfleet Sims?
Pfeh, neither did I, but I've also since realized that this fact places us - players who are interested in combat dynamics as gameplay - squarely in the minority. Assuming that the survey results are accurate, the top three "Desired Gameplay Features" are not actually gameplay features at all - they are cosmetic (ship interiors, bridges, First Contact).
PvP shows up as an unpopular feature overall (13% think it's the worst, 2% think it's the best), and I've lost just enough faith in Cryptic to believe that they'll think people rated it low because they dislike PvP, not that they dislike the current state of PvP.
Long story short, if you do not view bridge officer dress-up as an enjoyable use of your time, you should indeed unsubscribe, as your idea of a good MMO clearly will not coincide with Cryptic's.
it's certainly the quickest fix, that being said so help me god if they just transfered the code from fed to klingon, i would be severely disappointed if i were to explore a zone where i was told to gather 5 data samples. The cool thing about the explore missions is any of the explore planet and combat ones reward you extra skill points in addition to the sp from completing the mission; the data sampling does not, nor is there a use for them klingon side.
Klingons could put data samples on the exchange and make some enrgy credits. Or mail them to your Fed alt who "crafts" them into better weapons which are return mailed to your Klingon.
Comments
What part?
You do understand how script driven events work right?
If you ever wondered why so many of the feds missions are so similar its because theres a ton of cut and paste action going on with them.
This is based on I dont know how many game engines Ive done this with over and over and over again:
When your laying out an away mission you load an area map(10 seconds to load, no telling how long for the person to decide what map they want to load). You place static entites on the map. Aka boxes, crates, etc.
You now have eye candy.
Next we add bounding box settings for the items we need people to interact with. This can range from an area field to a static point that the game allows a player to interact with. This has a script to it that allows for the mini dialog that gives rewards or sets a flag condition to the quest. Can range from finding someting in a box for a quest to scanning the box or item.
Now if this covers some of the dead simple fed quest then thats it, a dialog is tripped for the player to beam up and contact starfleet for their reward.
The story line missions require more tinkering. With the story line quest we need spawners for the enemy groups you will fight. This is choosen from a list of premade enemy spawn entities. These spawners can be done thru pathing drop points with some engines and some use bounding rules to keep to a given path. Depends on how they want to write it there. Either requires seconds to drop in place. Thus populating a map area requires hardly any effort. The quality of an encounter to be honest is more determined by how artful the spawn placements are whats spawned verses what you expect the player to be able to handle at the point they make it to the given map.
This is why I find it strange content is taking so long.
Sadly, I think this why the exploration missions feel so empty and meaningless and not at all what most people had pictured in their head. Missions are created using a system that has only has a few basic mission types/objectives available. All of which are designed to be housed in simple ground and space maps, so that similar scripting can be used.
Simply adding more PVP maps, some more PVP activities and such, is enough to keep the KDF faction fresh and interesting. It's less work for the programmers, as all they have to do is throw in a few more PVP maps, and it boosts the entertainment of the KDF faction by loads.
I'd rather have Cryptic programmers give me a couple more interesting PVP maps that I can play on for hours and hours, days and weeks, rather than a few PvE missions that I will get bored of within minutes. If I wanted PvE, I'd simply hop on my Fed. The KDF faction should be unique from the Federation and distinguished by a more robust PVP system.
PvP maps are fun for any side and needs to be added no matter what. I want PvE for Klingons too. Sometimes you just want a good storyarc mission and not just a battle to entertain yourself with.
Some of the stories are really good on the Fed side. If you just had more diplomacy options they would be amazing.
So I fail to see how they will keep entertaining the PvP community after they reach rank 45.
Scenarios only go that far before they get tedious and boring.
Also there was official mentions of trying to get 2-man fleet making in game, third faction and more pve...all before end of beta.
None of em happend, and having to ask "what faction we want next" means they havent even started on it and we're looking at 3-6months before we even get another half finished faction like Romulans or Cardassians in game.
Only reason I even stayed after Beta, was the hope to play Romulans and have open pvp areas and a real PvP possible end game.
Seeing this wont happen in the near future, I at least have cancelled my sub. Might come back once those things get here. If they ever do.
One less Klingon =/
Um, the problem is:
1) You believed the comment that the KDF was only supposed to be PvP only. This was pretty much a lame cover up for their inability to have content on hand at launch. Lets be truthful that it is more likely that other forces were at play such as Atari / Cryptic wanting a cash flow.
2) If that is the case then the game should have been delayed. Again this can relate back to #1 that they needed the cash or it would have never come out.
3) KDF will be gone. Please o Please don't rehash old fanboi comments from so many game fanboys that stated "o please let the developers have another year of your life to come up with some content." If you have played more than one new MMO I am certain you know what I mean ; )
Klingon faction players are upset, and rightly so. I agree with many that this update will be a make or break thing for many who may just rage quit. Seen it in several MMOs, can't say I'll be one of them until I see the update implemented. However, I am not waiting for Pie-in-the-sky promises : )
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MoonTemple - BG5 KDF
Tactical
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But you know, somebody said in some other thread "If you give them a cookie, they'll complain that there isn't any milk." So, I'm happy that they're not ignoring Klingons completely. I have both a Fed and Klingon character, and switch between the two whenever I want to do some piece of content oriented or exclusive to that particular faction.
There's going to be a lot of rage quitting when this "content " , I use this term lightly because it's really light in the content department is realeased. From what I've witnessed on Tribble , it's all copy and paste material of the most generic sort. Obviously if the trend to ignoring Klingon content continues , the factions will slowly rot away. This offers some insight to the future factions that they plan to introduce. It's become pretty obvious that Cryptic is good at one faction , one dimensional games, and that's about the best we can hope for.
Count me as a person with a fading interest in this game, when I see TRIBBLE like this : http://www.startrekonline.com/survey_one_results
They're going to waste their time on TRIBBLE that offers nothing to the game or gameplay .
You mean you didn't sign up to play Starfleet Sims?
Pfeh, neither did I, but I've also since realized that this fact places us - players who are interested in combat dynamics as gameplay - squarely in the minority. Assuming that the survey results are accurate, the top three "Desired Gameplay Features" are not actually gameplay features at all - they are cosmetic (ship interiors, bridges, First Contact).
PvP shows up as an unpopular feature overall (13% think it's the worst, 2% think it's the best), and I've lost just enough faith in Cryptic to believe that they'll think people rated it low because they dislike PvP, not that they dislike the current state of PvP.
Long story short, if you do not view bridge officer dress-up as an enjoyable use of your time, you should indeed unsubscribe, as your idea of a good MMO clearly will not coincide with Cryptic's.