For the record, though the DP as a mandatory game mechanic probably a huge mistake for PR and possibly population stability it is no on the scale of SWG and the NGE. The comparison fails under its own weight much the same way claiming to have played almost every MMORPG on the market (that would be almost all of the 400+ MMORPGs in the western market) fractures ones credibility. Rage and hyperbole does not validate anything.
The DP is close to a fundamental change in the STO system, this is true. Hell, it may even be a game breaking show-stopper for a lot of people. However, it is not a complete alteration to the way STO is played.
The NGE comparison people are making really irritates me as much as various exaggerated claims of MMORPG expertise does. I would like to see more constructive discussion.
I am personally against the DP as a mandatory mechanic because I do think to really is a minority of players who want it. Not only that, I feel that minority is composed of individuals who are pretty much sadists and masochists with little self-control.
STO without a mandatory DP offers something unique in the MMORPG genre: true casual game play. Even if turning off the DP also means disabling the difficulty slider, which logically should be done given the nature of the risk vs. reward the DP represents.
- DP off = current level of difficulty in STO and current level of reward
- Normal has DP and is slightly more difficult and garners slightly better rewards than DP off
- Advanced activates the DP and increases difficulty
- Elite has DP and is more difficult than advanced
Cryptic, at least toss the no DP crowd this type of bone. Chances are the people who dont want the DP would be satisfied with this type of choice. I personally would play at the advanced level with the death penalty because STO as it stands now offers me no challenge what-so-ever.
Blanket application of the DP IS a mistake. You have to see that by now, Cryptic. STO will lose subs if you do the blanket application. If the problem with the DP is it can either be included or not included take the time and figure out how to put in an on/off toggle. No one will fault you for that and it probably will make yall look like heroes. Maybe putting it back a few weeks and putting in the sidekick system in first is not such a bad idea.
The DP is not like NGE but it is going to hurt you more than help you.
Comments
I just found this tidbit... http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?p=2586482#post2586482
Now all we need is the sobriety and I'm cool with this whole DP issue.
All officers and skill trees would be destroyed giving you no choice on what you lspent on different evels.
Your progression would now be placed on a radial menu where by after earning x ammount of skillpoints you would move from 0%-100% of that rank and be given cookie cutter skillls at every 15% tick. IE +2 to proton torpedoes at LT +15% +1 to disruptors at LT +30% +1 ground weapons LT 45% and so on.
Ground combat instead of being 5-7 commands along with BO's filling out your away team would now be click and hope that you got a special attack roll.
You would now see everyone running about in the (1-3) best ship(s) because tactical engineering, and science officers have been (brought more in line respective to one another) and the ships have likewise been brought closer to what we think is representative of the space experience.
All BO's would be the same skills etc with the difference being the slot they filled... which would probably also be removed in next months patch.
All weapons and shields that were crafted would be replaced by the ones given by the vendor. To level the field.
The entire crafting system would be made pointless by high end raid content that was all bind on equip, and only about 10% of the server population would want or have the ability to run the raid.
A card game would be released granting special things to people, but only if they bought the cards. These would have absolutely no impact on game play. Decorative items and such.
Developement of the top things each group wanted to see in-game would no longer be worked on by DEVS of the MMO, instead they would roll out as items that you would get through the card game (NON-MMO DEVS) that wasn't supposed to effect gameplay, at all, seriously, we really mean that.
The best buffs in game would be nerfed and the newest best buffs in-game would come through... you guessed it the Card game. Did we mention that the cards have a random chance of dropping this in a lottery style, so they are outlawed in some countries and even certain states in the US because the people they are marketed towards are minors?
Faction bases that could be purchased and run for great PVP action would be done away with. These will later be introduced in our new raid system, but you will have to get them from our newest 12 person raid that 7% of the server population stands a chance of beating.
The only PVP areas would be places that only a maxed character with the top 10% equipment (also obtained from raiding or card games) is required to do anything.
Raids that move the story along are located inside the above high level PVP area, you are required to PVP to finish an NPC mission.
Space stops being/getting updates for 3 years, when an update does come ou...t the new content overpowers everything else, so now all you see in space combat PVP is the newest ships unless players ban them from PVP events which they have no realistic way of enforcing as a player event is in the only PVP zone in space. A good example of this would be Borg tactical cubes given to players.
I think that gives you some idea of how an NGE works in SOE parlayance.
Takiwa
Which is fantastic news all around. It does restore my hope that STO has a bright future ahead, and it definitely makes me want to renew my sub in June. Yay.
Yeah, the gamer in me was over-jpyed when I ran into that bit about the DP. It is a logical and REALLY smart move on Cryptic's part. It seems, any more, when they are about to drop the ball they actually complete the play and every time they do this the world that surrounds STO seems to get generally brighter.
I have to agree. I put this up here because I'm pretty tired of the NGE comparison to anything that happens in this game people don't like and to put a bug in Cryptic's ear.
What are you referring to?
Just want to correct you on two things. First point above, if you are doing an actual NGE equivalent, many if not most of the best crafted items would be converted to inferior versions of new items. Had this happen to me super awesome T-21, not to mention losing close to 300mil credits worth of buff and stim packs I had stockpiled because they converted to useless TRIBBLE.
Second point. The pilot community brought that down upon ourselves, at least the last couple years worth. Devs offered up gunships for testing, misused a single word "buffs" and instead of testing the system for its merits a knee-jerk reaction and massive nerdrage clamored for immediate change and preferably drawing and quartering of the dev. Pretty much any content we got from that point on was TRIBBLE and hated by pretty much everybody, and the elitist attitudes on the pilot forums grew and festered, with personal verbal attacks on the devs rampant. So they washed their hands of us until things quited down and people got the message. Only recently has space gotten any meaningful content and work. It's been for the most part happily accepted.
The NGE only affected space in one real way. It got pilots thinking they were better than anybody else because of the so few changes to their progression and no changes to mechanics compared to ground. Elitism is a disease and needs to be stamoed out wherever found in any MMO.
That was the SWG people loved to play 24/7 (regardless of the gameplay bugs).
Yeah I tried to illustrate that by saying stuff you would get from a vendor, as in an NPC vendor would be better than the previous elite weapon.
The attituted in space, I mostly agree with. I was there during that time, and it was certainly an issue, but a great deal of that was brought on by the devs.
EXAMPLE: Devs challenged pilots to a fight and then attempted to rig their ships to be invincible, however, they didn't understand the game enough and got destroyed by players.
That sort of thing illustrated to the community several things.
1. The dev team not only didn't understand the game in space, the consistantly mismanaged it because of this lack of understanding.
2. When you are trying to achieve balance and you are offering the tools by which the developers might achieve this, and then are told for various reasons that this would envolve things that cannot happen, it makes people get short tempered. Things like changing various aspects of ships, which devs say is not possible, yet had happened in the past.
3. I was there, and I agree that as a community the pilots kinda brought this upon themselves, at the same time the devs not knowing the game and expecting to make changes to mske it better... I would liken to: A politician trying to fix something they have no experience with and making it worse everytime, even though all of the people effected, with experience, that know how to fix the problem, are telling this guy what actually needs to happen, and keep being told that they are being listened to, and those changes will be put in at the next go round.
4. As always these issues grow from smaller things. The space community were promised a great deal, and then years passed with nothing. No balance, no dev time, no addressal of these issues. It took a guy working on his off time about three months to completely redo the textures for every object in space, he added newer things like alpha channels and newer lighting effects, the bottom line is this could have been done by the developers in less than a week and pushed. That sort of stuff was found all around the issue with space, and the community, just like real pilots, which a good number were, did not take kindly to the BS responses.
Either way, That's a pretty good recap of most of the issues ssurrounding that.
Takiwa