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State of the game - players perspective

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
Well, i'm back after my temporary forum ban, and you do not know how annoying it is not being able to take part in discussions on here. Anyway, without further ado, i've wrote this nice big post that only 10% of people that reply will probably even read.

6 Simple Steps to improving the game and adding content.

0.5 Just a couple pet peeves I want to get out of the way first: Could you guys improve the TNG Movie uniform commbadge model? it is really bad quality and just looks terrible, infact nothing like the actual movie commbadge, and the colours for it are really off too.
The lighting bug on "facility" type exploration maps is STILL NOT FIXED! neither is anomalies spawning underground.

1. Dailies. Let us do the B'tran Daily in any nebula. Scale the nebula missions to award 5th tier marks when doing the missions in any nebula. Fix the PVP dailies, it is very unclear which PVP maps will actually reward credit for the mission, and the PVP queue itself is an awful mess. Fix this.

2. Patrol missions. Let us re-do patrol missions from every sector so we have a reason to go back to them. I'm getting rather bored of fighting borg in B'tran all day. Why are Saurians still the only BO's that have the Efficient trait? where the heck are Benzite BO's?

3. Fix bugs and annoyances. Still no way to turn off those hints when going near certain NPC's, still no enemies in some exploration missions, patch 1.1 is really buggy, repairing my ship is called fixing an "injury" rather than repairing damage, etc, when I hide/show Kits/Armour on my character/BO's, it STILL says "Hide from Costume". I'm wearing a freakin' UNIFORM, not a COSTUME! Someone needs to print out a sheet of A4 and write on it in big letters "THERE ARE NO COSTUMES IN STAR TREK ONLINE" and stick it to the door of the Cryptic offices. Much more time on tribble is obviously required in order to iron out bugs and release quality patches.

4. Let Klingons and the Federation join forces for STF's, and some fleet actions like the Crystalline Entity. (which, by the way, needs nerfing because I still havn't killed it once since I started playing). Let us set our transwarp to any station. Exchange updates, great, but why is sorting by price restricted to Ascending and not Descending aswell? Why is every interactable object in the universe glowing? why the heck are the exchange consoles on Sol glowing? the bank? the mailbox? why are my BRIDGE DOORS on my BRIDGE glowing? KHHAAAAAAAN.

5. Skill system. Cryptic, buddy, pal, you need to overhaul this. We know that you added on a skill cap at the last minute, and so far you have done nothing to sort out the skills since then. Ground and Space skills need to be separate. Weapon types (energy and projectile) need to cost the same amount. You did a nice job adding all weapons available at Rear Admiral, but it's no good if nobody wants to spec into them because they cost more valuable points than another one, and they offer no real improvement over other weapons.
Skill descriptions need to be improved, nice job with the drop-down that you can select which tells you what skills affect what abilities (I actually suggested this a week before we saw it on tribble, did you take my advice on that or was it already planned?) but this system is quite buggy and cumbersome, you have abilities there like Rifle Butt, it needs to be cleaner and sorted more, separate ground and space abilities and only show abilities from your currently assigned bridge officers, not every single bridge officer.

6. Instances. Okay, we have to live with them.. but why are you not using them better? I'm on Sol station right now, there's about 10 instances all with only 20 people in them. I thought the instances could hold at least 50? why are new instances being created when old ones are not yet full? it's just needlessly spreading the community out and it makes it look like the game is empty. FILL UP THE INSTANCES! I go to the B'tran cluster, and there's 2 or 3 instances each with 10-13 people in them, why not put them into the same instance? what the hell?

Supplemental:
Stop listening to people complain and nerfing things. I have been playing on Elite (ground and space) and doing perfectly fine, please don't nerf it just to satisfy bad players on the forums. It's SUPPOSED to be difficult. if they can't do it, tough luck for them, they need to play better. oh and by the way, higher difficulties doesns't seem to offer any more merits or anything at the end, or if it does it's unnoticable.

Disable allowing players to use their abilities and Kit abilities on stations like DS9 and Sol. People are using Cover Shields to push NPC's around everywhere and it just looks ridiculous having a group of NPC's pressing buttons in mid air in the middle of the room. It's really an immersion killer, and I don't think starfleet would really enjoy having it's captains running around building phaser turrets and shield generators in the middle of the starbase. Perhaps also disable the ability to Jump in areas like this too. You have people climbing on top of the lights on the ceiling and everything, jumping on top of consoles and tables and such, same for your ship bridge.

Consider adding a weekly or bi-weekly story mission to the game, STF's are great for the people that play them, but what about everyone else? Yes I KNOW you are working on RA5 to RA10 content and that is coming soon, but that's not the point.
And I recall dev posts saying we would be getting STF's every 2 weeks, so far it's been more like once a month.
Are there more STF's planned after Terrordome and the final STF from the Infected storyline?

On the subject of STF's, I strongly believe that you need to tone down the amount of borg on the ground parts. Khitomer accord took me two days and about 8 hours to finish, and i'm never doing it again until changes are made. Why are the borg 2 levels higher than those in Infected? it doesn't make them harder, it just makes them take much longer to kill and much more frustrating. it also makes the ground part take extremely long because you have to kill group after group after group of borg with elite heavy tactical drones and TRIBBLE like that. seriously, the borg level in Cure/Khitomer does not need to be increased above 0 relative to the players level, the borg in infected are fine. I know you have this idea that you want them to increase in difficulty, but why? You don't get any better items from them, or more Valour marks, or anything, it just makes them take longer and makes them annoying. Lower the levels of the borg in those STF's to the same as Infected and they will be a lot more fun. Trust me on this. Please.
Oh by the way, I still don't have my Borg BO from getting the accolade in Khitomer Accord, when is this going to be fixed?

Oh and by the way Borg should never become a playable faction. Just wanted to throw this in there. Undine too.

Oh and by the way, ship warping out/in since the patch is really buggy and looks stupid, your ship will slide before warping out, and then when you warp in the camera pans around and then quickly JERKS back. it never used to do this. oh, and when your ship is finding a clear warp out point, it spins around far too quicky..

Looking towards the future:
Ship interiors. God I hope they get these right. no loading screens are a must, as is no gigantic cooridoors and hallways.
Diplomatic missions? can't say I ever really cared for these but I hope they do these right too.

If any Cryptic employees read this and take even a single part of this away with them, then i'll be happy.
Boy it felt good to get all that off my chest.
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited April 2010
    I don't really see borg as being playable, they'd have a wide range of races to play as, but they don't really have a diverse selection of ships, they all follow the orders of the queen and so the only quests they could do would be to assimilate the galaxy or create an omega particle, not really what i'd want to spend my time in the game doing
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited April 2010
    i wish people, instead of complaining all the time, would get out thier and do the coding themselves and learn how hard and how long it takes to make any type of changes or updates to anything =.=' devs are not magical we don't just push a button or flip a switch and pow! your wishes come true, we have to write the code, implement the code, and then test the code, and even if you know exactly what you're doing, writing one string of coding can take all day if not longer, TRIBBLE rocket science, rocket science is childs play compared to videogame design implementation and maintance =.=;
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited April 2010
    Well, joining forces on Khitomer would require a re-write. The whole goal of that is getting the cure to the other faction.

    That said, if feds were grouped with KDF, you'd essentially be giving each other the same things you received in The Cure.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited April 2010
    Well, joining forces on Khitomer would require a re-write. The whole goal of that is getting the cure to the other faction.

    That said, if feds were grouped with KDF, you'd essentially be giving each other the same things you received in The Cure.

    quite a few missions while levelling up have you join forces with klingons, though!
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited April 2010
    i wish people, instead of complaining all the time, would get out thier and do the coding themselves and learn how hard and how long it takes to make any type of changes or updates to anything =.=' devs are not magical we don't just push a button or flip a switch and pow! your wishes come true, we have to write the code, implement the code, and then test the code, and even if you know exactly what you're doing, writing one string of coding can take all day if not longer, TRIBBLE rocket science, rocket science is childs play compared to videogame design implementation and maintance =.=;

    I have asked for an SDK or at least a content development kit so that we can submit player created content to Cryptic. I have been told by dstahl that it is in the pipeline but nothing yet concrete.
    If they can keep me playing for as long as it takes to bring out an SDK? I'll be happy to churn out episodes of content.
    I'll want to add my own models though ;) ( oh the complaining never ends ;))
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I have asked for an SDK or at least a content development kit so that we can submit player created content to Cryptic. I have been told by dstahl that it is in the pipeline but nothing yet concrete.
    If they can keep me playing for as long as it takes to bring out an SDK? I'll be happy to churn out episodes of content.
    I'll want to add my own models though ;) ( oh the complaining never ends ;))

    I think any kind of player content will probably come in the form of holodeck stuff :cool:
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Intrepidox wrote: »
    I think any kind of player content will probably come in the form of holodeck stuff :cool:


    I agree, and it could work well. There could be player created missions which are incorporated into the shops systems as 'crew training holodeck manoeuvres )

    As long as the rewards were real then I can see this being the perfect way for player-created DLC to work (no doubt Cryptic would try and sell it )
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    1: What's the advantage of being able to do them anywhere?

    2: Sidekick system coming that will allow you to do that.

    3: They're being fixed as fast as they can.

    4: Depending on who you ask there's such a balance issue between Blue and Red that I'm not sure how well that would pan out.

    5: Totally agree and assume it's being worked on.

    6: Dstahl just discusses yesterday about why Sol Station is handled the way it is: it has to do with lag issues because Sol and Earth are so heavily used.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Cosmic_One wrote: »
    1: What's the advantage of being able to do them anywhere?
    .

    i'm sick of fighting against the same aliens in B'tran, I want to shoot romulans or klingons or cardassians for a change. there's lots of content with those guys just going to waste because you are forced to stay in B'tran for the daily
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    wrote:
    i'm sick of fighting against the same aliens in B'tran, I want to shoot romulans or klingons or cardassians for a change. there's lots of content with those guys just going to waste because you are forced to stay in B'tran for the daily
    I can see that making sense. I'd agree with that; or at the very least expand the races you encounter in B'tran so that it covers the full gambit.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Intrepidox wrote: »
    I think any kind of player content will probably come in the form of holodeck stuff :cool:

    here's your stick,
    there's your horse,
    have fun with your zombie....

    though having a holodeck where players can create thier own play created content is nice (i'm for the idea) though i'd prefer to see them work on other stuff first =/
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Cosmic_One wrote: »
    I can see that making sense. I'd agree with that; or at the very least expand the races you encounter in B'tran so that it covers the full gambit.

    I would go for that too, but allowing you to do the daily in every area would be better I think, because it gives players somewhere else to fly and a change of scenery, you'd see more players flying around in empty sector spaces making it seem more alive. that's the theory anyway.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Would be nice if the PvP daily was the same for Fed and Klingon.

    Also if I recall correctly Gozer briefly mentioned on the neutralzone.net podcast that they are working on future STF's that will allow K and F to join together. The current ones we have would require a re-write so leave them as is for now.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    wrote:
    I would go for that too, but allowing you to do the daily in every area would be better I think, because it gives players somewhere else to fly and a change of scenery, you'd see more players flying around in empty sector spaces making it seem more alive. that's the theory anyway.
    I personally think you'd just end up with fans complaining about having to waste so much time flying from B'tran to the Eridian Belt, but that's just me. :)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I think that Intrepidox has some points, I generally agree with most of what is said. I dont care about about fluff(characters clothing), but other points as DSE's needing some meaning, End-Game missions having a little more variety, Leaving the Elite settings alone(I love the challenge, both space and ground). STF's having cross faction abilitys to join up, dont know what impact that would have though(never played klingon past LC).
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    We need Holodeck Training programs for ship combat. I love testing out new/different ship setups and seeing what works best for new ships and whatnot. Very sick of going to sb24 to do that.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I have asked for an SDK or at least a content development kit so that we can submit player created content to Cryptic. I have been told by dstahl that it is in the pipeline but nothing yet concrete.
    If they can keep me playing for as long as it takes to bring out an SDK? I'll be happy to churn out episodes of content.
    I'll want to add my own models though ;) ( oh the complaining never ends ;))

    Same here, ZootCadillac. I'm a big proponent of this. I create custom content from the Dark Forces to Quake 3 Arena days.

    Correct if I'm wrong but the Cryptic R&D team (that designs tech for both games) is still developing it - then it needs to get IP licensor approval for a STO variant- then further development/testing, no?

    I'd love to be able to develop content for the game.

    Developing level lists (for appropriate mobs and rewards) or have some system that grades the difficulty level would be prudent to curb exploitation.

    I think many non-combat mechanics need to be refined before it'll get released (i.e. Prime Directive System).
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