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Admiral Craig Zinkievich - Slayer of the Klingon Empire

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
The Federation-Klingon War is over, and the Federation has won. Writers can sit in the their cubicle and ink paragraphs that suggest otherwise, but the legacy of Craig Zinkievich is that of the Slayer of the Klingon Empire.

She's Dead Jim.

Admiral Zinkievich's secret weapon was apathy. He never examined the problems with the Klingon faction, and each new offering was a solution looking for a problem. Under Admiral Zinkievich, the Federation playerbase who did not play in the Klingon faction regularly was given control over defining both the problems and the solutions. Season 2 is solid evidence that product has nothing in common with problem, unless you don't understand the problem.

The Klingon Empire has been hit by a perfect storm. On one end, a faction built for PvP has been given zero end game content related to PvP through the first two Seasons of the game (sorry, but Shanty Town was dead on Arrival, just like Ground PvP). This has taken its toll on the original Klingon playerbase - with many fleets now found only in Sto'Vo'Kor. After killing the supply side, Admiral Zinkievich approached the demand side by never addressing the barriers to growth in the Klingon Empire - specifically the leveling experience. After insuring the conquest of the Klingon Empire, insult was added to injury by insuring the Klingon playerbase would be treated as second class citizens in the Cryptic Federation - whether the content was customization, the number of ships, access to special abilities, bridge officers, or other enriched content to expand the playing experience.

Cookie cutter and utterly thoughtless battle zone maps were thrown together to supplement two existing leveling systems: a Deep Space Exploration system consisting of the same dozen maps, and a PvP queue system where the functionality of the queue has been given more attention than the actual content of the maps - and not a single new space PvP map has been updated since release.

Put another way, Admiral Zinkievich built a space PvP centric faction community, and never once updated their content. Some might suggest that the 8 Klingon specific PvE missions in Season 2 was part of the solution, but the question to be asked is which problem all that development time and effort addresses? Does it address the end-game problem (2 missions?), or the leveling (XP) barrier problem (6 missions)? Admiral Zinkievich's model for new Klingon content after release has proven broken, we can't glue it together and call it new and improved.

With a maximum of 2500 XP earned from all 6 lower level Klingon missions, those 6 missions have essentially addressed only 2500 XP of the 40,000+ XP gap that in Season 2 will still need to be addressed by a new Klingon players by DSEs, PvP, or the terribly simplistic battle zones. Under Admiral Zinkievich, the leveling experience became worse as XP rewards were reduced - because doing the same thing 500 times wasn't enough - the same thing must be done 700 times instead! The victory conditions of the war tell the tale: the Empire is empty, so it would appear few were willing to live under Admiral Zinkievich's system.

My friends list of Klingon players who now live in STO subscription Sto'Vo'Kor represents the graveyard dug after the Klingon Empire was wiped out by Admiral Zinkievich. Those Warriors have been lost, and the dead planet faction Cryptic has shoved into the bottom right map Sector of the Galaxy map is Admiral Zinkievich's legacy. How long will the Empire rot?

Daniel Stahl, as the new Fleet Admiral, the next move is yours. Will you address the end game content for the PvP faction to lure those lost to Sto'Vo'Kor back? Can you create a new dynamic content based XP system that addresses the 40,000 XP gap yet feels Klingon? The mission XP model of Admiral Zinkievich won't work - the cost of development time and money to Cryptic would never pay off for the Klingons or any new faction - a new XP model is needed. I understand these things aren't easy and don't happen overnight, but until the Klingon faction begins growing again any work your writers do forwarding the storyline of the War in the game is completely wasted - because with an empty Klingon Empire the war is already over, and the Federation won.
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited July 2010
    Darkside,

    I have some respect for you...see my post on page 10 of your other Klingon thread. However, starting another thread epsecially one like this one accomplishes nothing but make you look bad.

    For the record i think the Klingons nees help. The new missions are a step in the right direction. It will help. It will draw fed players to the Klingons and that will be a good thing (my longer post explains this better).
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited July 2010
    Good write up Darkside. Made a point in an RP ish way. Nice.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited July 2010
    Klingons were never REALLY intended to be a PvP-only faction in the first place. When Cryptic acquired STO, they said that both factions would have full PvE content. However, when the game got closer to launch and Cryptic realized they wouldnt be able to finish, they decided to save face by calling Klingons "PvP focused" instead of "unfinished". Of course things change over the development of a game, but the fact that Cryptic waited until just before launch to tell people about their "new plan" for Klingons made it pretty obvious they just didnt have time to finish as opposed to actually changing their development ideas.

    All of that said, what REALLY boggles the mind is how little attention the Klingons have gotten post launch. Even IF we were to believe that Cryptic really wanted them to be a PvP-focused faction, the complete lack of attention and new PvP content is inexcusable. If Klingons werent going to have the PvE they were INTENDED to have when the game launched, they should have at LEAST had the most awesome PvP game possible with open PvP sectors and tons of PvP maps.

    In short, the Klingon faction in STO has been a huge blunder. Most of the people who were originally interested in the faction were so sickened by Cryptic's treatment that they either quit the game or swore off Klingons for good. Klingons had the potential to be an amazing faction, but unfortunately they were just another MMO epic fail.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited July 2010
    Let's not go there, and let's especially not call out present or past employees of Cryptic.
This discussion has been closed.