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aelbourne
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
While seeing that most of this is work in progress, I am not going to nit pick on small things.
After a few weeks, our fleet has noticed a couple of elements (we are focusing on Fed side for testing purposes).
1. A big aggravation I am getting from my fleet is the clunkiness in the general contribution mechanisms for projects, I think most are fine, but there has to be a better way for DOFF contribution and data sample/particle trace contribution. For example, when a project requires 250 data samples or 30 DOFFs, you should be able to contribute MORE THAN ONE AT A TIME...
2. This is a particular criticism of the FED starbases in general. Why are the interiors so boring? They appear as slightly dressed up versions of existing maps in many cases. For something that will be considered the cornerstone for social fleet interaction, is there any real reason why they couldn't have made something that looks sharp more in the sense of the Utopia Planitia maps or the Odyssey bridge? I feel like I am taking a step back in technology when going into a NEW base that is being constructed, complete with cosmetic mods of the chunky old generic consoles you interact with in the bland patrol missions.
(A side note, the KDF interiors have real potential for some authentic KDF-feeling texture and are FAR superior to Fed side, but they have a ways to go as well, including the need for a big bubbling blood wine well in the room with the awesome fireplace as well as other ambience effects. A suggestion that would be outstanding is for ambient noise in the KDF section, it would be atmospheric to have the sounds of klingon drinking songs and a taproom)
3. The last criticism I have in a mechanical sense is the last mission of the special items. I understand the rationale of them is to provide a rapidly refreshing opportunity for fleet members to get fleet credits for purchasing items in the fleet stores, but as one of the directors of our starbase development, I will likely be directing our members to NEVER contribute or do these missions for the numerous months (Cryptic's projection) that it will take to develop our Starbases. Frankly, the rewards aren't REMOTELY worth it for the fleet as a whole. We are much more inclined to direct those similar resources, particularly dilithium and DOFF's to missions that actually advance our starbases (750 to 1000 xp vs 5 xp, REALLY?, no provision vouchers REALLY?). For the purposes of advancing the base, they will never be worth their fleet mark expenditures.
4. External art. Likely the cake is already baked here, but for something that is supposed to be building, the externals are pretty sterile. Without any construction scaffolding, worker bees flitting about, or even general too and from traffic outside the station, I have a pretty hard time not being pissed as a Vice Admiral walking around a station with (not yet unlocked) generic officers telling me they are too busy for me to access their wares. At least do SOMETHING visually to make our starbases externally look like they are living, breathing things, instead of upgrades just magically appearing at the end of a timer. I like what I am seeing, I just wish there was an organic feel of the exterior like is being attempted with the staff milling around in the interior.
These sentiments, for what they are worth, are pretty representative of the majority of the fleet I serve. While we aren't probably the largest, I feel that we are representative of what would be considered a robust and active fleet. Aside from the project criticism (#3), I am not getting into values for rewards and timers because all of that is obviously under review as fleets are being watched in their progressions on Tribble. I think I will leave that as well as the costs of the fleet gear in the capable hands of the holodeck rantmasters when that goes live.
Rating thus far: 2.5 / 4 -- potential is seen, but it is just boring, boring, boring!
After a few weeks, our fleet has noticed a couple of elements (we are focusing on Fed side for testing purposes).
1. A big aggravation I am getting from my fleet is the clunkiness in the general contribution mechanisms for projects, I think most are fine, but there has to be a better way for DOFF contribution and data sample/particle trace contribution. For example, when a project requires 250 data samples or 30 DOFFs, you should be able to contribute MORE THAN ONE AT A TIME...
2. This is a particular criticism of the FED starbases in general. Why are the interiors so boring? They appear as slightly dressed up versions of existing maps in many cases. For something that will be considered the cornerstone for social fleet interaction, is there any real reason why they couldn't have made something that looks sharp more in the sense of the Utopia Planitia maps or the Odyssey bridge? I feel like I am taking a step back in technology when going into a NEW base that is being constructed, complete with cosmetic mods of the chunky old generic consoles you interact with in the bland patrol missions.
(A side note, the KDF interiors have real potential for some authentic KDF-feeling texture and are FAR superior to Fed side, but they have a ways to go as well, including the need for a big bubbling blood wine well in the room with the awesome fireplace as well as other ambience effects. A suggestion that would be outstanding is for ambient noise in the KDF section, it would be atmospheric to have the sounds of klingon drinking songs and a taproom)
3. The last criticism I have in a mechanical sense is the last mission of the special items. I understand the rationale of them is to provide a rapidly refreshing opportunity for fleet members to get fleet credits for purchasing items in the fleet stores, but as one of the directors of our starbase development, I will likely be directing our members to NEVER contribute or do these missions for the numerous months (Cryptic's projection) that it will take to develop our Starbases. Frankly, the rewards aren't REMOTELY worth it for the fleet as a whole. We are much more inclined to direct those similar resources, particularly dilithium and DOFF's to missions that actually advance our starbases (750 to 1000 xp vs 5 xp, REALLY?, no provision vouchers REALLY?). For the purposes of advancing the base, they will never be worth their fleet mark expenditures.
4. External art. Likely the cake is already baked here, but for something that is supposed to be building, the externals are pretty sterile. Without any construction scaffolding, worker bees flitting about, or even general too and from traffic outside the station, I have a pretty hard time not being pissed as a Vice Admiral walking around a station with (not yet unlocked) generic officers telling me they are too busy for me to access their wares. At least do SOMETHING visually to make our starbases externally look like they are living, breathing things, instead of upgrades just magically appearing at the end of a timer. I like what I am seeing, I just wish there was an organic feel of the exterior like is being attempted with the staff milling around in the interior.
These sentiments, for what they are worth, are pretty representative of the majority of the fleet I serve. While we aren't probably the largest, I feel that we are representative of what would be considered a robust and active fleet. Aside from the project criticism (#3), I am not getting into values for rewards and timers because all of that is obviously under review as fleets are being watched in their progressions on Tribble. I think I will leave that as well as the costs of the fleet gear in the capable hands of the holodeck rantmasters when that goes live.
Rating thus far: 2.5 / 4 -- potential is seen, but it is just boring, boring, boring!
Post edited by aelbourne on
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There's a thread now that mentions that this is done in way of a cap. That way no single player is the one who contributes everything and gets all of the points.
Considering that the data samples only give back 5 fleet credits while the fleet marks give back a hundred, even if they all come from a single person, I don;t think it;s going to make any difference.
Do what I did. Watched an episode of Buffy while doing it.
I really need to copy and paste this somewhere.
The crux of my post is mainly that aside from some potential with the KDF interiors, the Starbases (internally and externally) are visually BORING! and that the 2nd special project item that lasts 30 minutes is USELESS during the long construction process.
It actually takes about 30 minutes to move 450 stupid datasamples from one place to another. And I imagine higher tiers would require it to be 10000 datasamples. So that's 200 hours of playtime just to move the datasamples?
The interface of this game is amasingly tedius already, but spending 200 hours just to click one button?
Is this what developers want us to do? My sarcastic side tells me that they wont us to be stupid to buy all stupid cstore stuff, but honestly I want to believe they are better than that. After all the original star trek universe was based on different ideas.
In this way Fleet leaders of large fleets can ensure the progress is measured and the rewards are spread out, and small fleets aren't penalized.
But in this game, the goal is to spend next 6 - 12 months grinding the same 6 missions (3 of them ground) to get an extra tac slot, 2k hull and +1 tac console in defiantR, which you still have to buy from the cstore. And you may not actually get the item... For many reasons: you lost interest or fleet decides on a different project, or even a fleet leader had booted you from the fleet after you contributed 100k dil and whatnot.
Ah, and yes, while grinding the starbases you will have to buy ship plans, and other cstore items like do'ju fighters and whatnot.
So brace for S6: "we milk you while you grind"...
Simply wonderful.