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Fleet Advancement System/Fleet Credits - A critique
sdjkfhlsk
Member Posts: 7 Arc User
While I enjoy the new Fleet Advancement System as well as the Starbases, there are a few things that present a problem as is.
Fleetcredits are almost impossible to earn in large, active Fleets and its not that people don't have the time or the dedication to donate resources to projects.
The problem is that a few players completely dominate the donation process. Every time there is a new upgrade/project, the requirements are immediately filled out by a few top-tier people in a fleet (they apparently don't sleep).
We have 3 people that have +300k FC in our fleet, 12 have above 100k, 40 have 20-50k and it quickly goes downward from there (470 fleet members total, most of them active). I'm sure others would love to donate more resources to the projects to earn some FC but they are immediately filled out when they get posted.
In short, ~10% of our fleet is earning ~90% of the FC.
This of course is not their fault, the system allows for it after all.
This will in the future create an immense imbalance where a few Fleeties will hoard massive amounts of FC and others, while theoretically being able to donate and add to the progression, will be left with nothing or close to nothing.
I could donate around 6k Dillithium every day, but i cant because the second the new upgrade project went up, all 60k D was filled up, like in a second.
Even the special projects ever 30mins are filled up in no time.
Fleet Marks get filled up horrifyingly quickly too.
Right now I have ~15k FC and I would have more resources to donate, gladly if I got the chance. I earned my 15k during the past week, at this rate, I will be able to afford the first fleet-ship in oh about...20 weeks, while the top 3 already could buy ships right now.
This system seems like it doesn't reward the dedication of the player to the fleet or the game but rather his dedication to not sleep and click a button faster than others.
Mind you I'm not complaining about grind, grind i can deal with.
The problem is that we don't have any other way to generate FC than the Starbase projects, and additionally the system serves a "first come first serve" mentality.
Proposed Solutions:
1. A total FC cap that can be earned per character per project, based on the amount of fleet-members. This would prevent 10 people to fund the whole Starbase on their own and earning massive amounts of FC starving other members.
2. Introduce non-project dailies to earn FC "on the side" for those that don't make it to donate to the Starbase projects. (not everyone can be online when a new project goes up, it quickly becomes an exercise in futility)
2.1 A way would be to reward a small amount of FC directly from Starbase Defense missions, i.e. reduce the amount of Fleet Marks rewarded by maybe 1/5th and add that value as FC. Right now, Fleet Marks are quickly becoming dead weight on my account, i got like 50 of them and waiting for an opportunity to add them to the projects.
2.2 Convert the Starbase daily mission from the officer of the watch to FC directly.
2.3 Give a way to directly turn in FM for FC to an NPC.
Right now the system is a curse for anyone in a large well-organized fleet.
I'm pretty sure its not a problem for smaller fleets because the split would be smaller, but for fleets like mine? Over half the people can't earn any FC.
In the end this is a simple currency conversion issue.
Unlike the Dilithium refining-cap this one is shared by the whole fleet, that creates the problem of imbalance inside the fleet.
If this isn't going to get fixed, we have already discussed to game the system by splitting the fleet into smaller 5-man parts to earn FC equally, and then coming back to the main Fleet to take advantage of the upgraded higher-tier Starbase facilities.
Its bothersome but it will work, I just don't see why it has to be necessary to "cheat" on this if we could fix the current system and make it more equal and less opportunistic.
Thanks for reading.
Fleetcredits are almost impossible to earn in large, active Fleets and its not that people don't have the time or the dedication to donate resources to projects.
The problem is that a few players completely dominate the donation process. Every time there is a new upgrade/project, the requirements are immediately filled out by a few top-tier people in a fleet (they apparently don't sleep).
We have 3 people that have +300k FC in our fleet, 12 have above 100k, 40 have 20-50k and it quickly goes downward from there (470 fleet members total, most of them active). I'm sure others would love to donate more resources to the projects to earn some FC but they are immediately filled out when they get posted.
In short, ~10% of our fleet is earning ~90% of the FC.
This of course is not their fault, the system allows for it after all.
This will in the future create an immense imbalance where a few Fleeties will hoard massive amounts of FC and others, while theoretically being able to donate and add to the progression, will be left with nothing or close to nothing.
I could donate around 6k Dillithium every day, but i cant because the second the new upgrade project went up, all 60k D was filled up, like in a second.
Even the special projects ever 30mins are filled up in no time.
Fleet Marks get filled up horrifyingly quickly too.
Right now I have ~15k FC and I would have more resources to donate, gladly if I got the chance. I earned my 15k during the past week, at this rate, I will be able to afford the first fleet-ship in oh about...20 weeks, while the top 3 already could buy ships right now.
This system seems like it doesn't reward the dedication of the player to the fleet or the game but rather his dedication to not sleep and click a button faster than others.
Mind you I'm not complaining about grind, grind i can deal with.
The problem is that we don't have any other way to generate FC than the Starbase projects, and additionally the system serves a "first come first serve" mentality.
Proposed Solutions:
1. A total FC cap that can be earned per character per project, based on the amount of fleet-members. This would prevent 10 people to fund the whole Starbase on their own and earning massive amounts of FC starving other members.
2. Introduce non-project dailies to earn FC "on the side" for those that don't make it to donate to the Starbase projects. (not everyone can be online when a new project goes up, it quickly becomes an exercise in futility)
2.1 A way would be to reward a small amount of FC directly from Starbase Defense missions, i.e. reduce the amount of Fleet Marks rewarded by maybe 1/5th and add that value as FC. Right now, Fleet Marks are quickly becoming dead weight on my account, i got like 50 of them and waiting for an opportunity to add them to the projects.
2.2 Convert the Starbase daily mission from the officer of the watch to FC directly.
2.3 Give a way to directly turn in FM for FC to an NPC.
Right now the system is a curse for anyone in a large well-organized fleet.
I'm pretty sure its not a problem for smaller fleets because the split would be smaller, but for fleets like mine? Over half the people can't earn any FC.
In the end this is a simple currency conversion issue.
Unlike the Dilithium refining-cap this one is shared by the whole fleet, that creates the problem of imbalance inside the fleet.
If this isn't going to get fixed, we have already discussed to game the system by splitting the fleet into smaller 5-man parts to earn FC equally, and then coming back to the main Fleet to take advantage of the upgraded higher-tier Starbase facilities.
Its bothersome but it will work, I just don't see why it has to be necessary to "cheat" on this if we could fix the current system and make it more equal and less opportunistic.
Thanks for reading.
Post edited by sdjkfhlsk on
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For the first week or so people will be dumping all their excess dilithium, doffs etc into these projects. Once their well of resources are used up, everyone will be getting a chance. This goes especially when you start upgrading your starbase.
Trust me, if you grind FM you will never be short of fleet credits because these are going to be much in demand. Before you know it you'll easily be in the 200,000 FC area.
So let me underline this - You will get a chance to contribute. Infact there will be a time you wish you didn't get a chance to contribute.
Daizen - Lvl 60 Tactical - Eclipse
Selia - Lvl 60 Tactical - Eclipse
I'm absolutely appreciate the scale of the grind, but I went over the numbers and unless they changed the cost, we will still have this problem way into T3 upgrades.
With a Fleet like ours where 100 people can steadily donate towards these goals (like i said, well organized and active) those 100 won't have a problem with donating ~1500 FM 600k D etc per day (and thats the complete minimum I see happening because thats 1-2 STFs and 1-2 Starbase Defense/person/day, which I would say is the definition of casual)
Factor in we have ~450+ active members, I'm not seeing how we will run into a problem of immediately (in an hour-two) fielding upgrades/projects way into T3 (aka around two months from now?)
I'm really not hot on waiting till everyone runs out of "well off resources" because the grinders will always field more and always lock out my opportunity to donate faster.
Of course some time in the future this might not be that "big" of a disparity, but it will still be there.
The problem isn't fielding resources or a too small resource-sink, its the opportunistic nature as well as a fleet-shared cap on contributing to generate FC.
Not to mention there are shared hard caps on Fleet-ships, items, buffs themselves (Provisioning) there will be an obvious FC creep that will break the fleet advancement system from being useful.
Grab'em while you can!
Second they need give fleet leaders a way to restrict how much people can donate. A sliding % scale as a fleet master would allow us to scale things to our individual fleet needs. Some may need very tight restrictions given their size while others are going to struggle from the get go.
Jim
Thats why I said -based on the amount of fleet members-
I.e. the cap is variable depending on the size of your Fleet. So there shouldn't be a problem with smaller fleets.
Also, it would be an FC-earning cap, not a contribution cap.
Since different resources have different conversion rates, with FM being the highest prized (bar purple DOFFs) it would not matter if you donated 3000 provisions or 30 FM (making **** up here as an example) to reach the reward-cap.
Imagine you are nearly at the 200K you need for that shiny new ship. You have everything you need to earn those credits. There are open projects which would allow you to earn those credits. But someone just decided that you shouldn't be able to earn that much all at once.
How aggravating would that be?
A better idea, to my mind, is to have a 'personal project' slot; in addition to the open fleet ones. This could be rationalized as your character's assignment on the station.
That way, everybody has their own means of generating fleet credits; without having to handicap anyone.
I think part of the thing is, if everyone cannot contribute as much as they want, they will lose interest in contributing.
Also, because of the way the projects are, it balances out in the end, a medium sized active fleet would be a good compromise between being able to donate enough and have the projects finish quickly.
Just because members in a mega fleet may feel left out, its a silly excuse to cap contributions, people want to contribute to their fleet's success, and help themselves in the process with Fleet Credits. This is a GOOD thing for everyone involved, the Fleets, the membership and even Cryptic/STO.
Making it difficult by design, such as introducing caps makes little sense. If you cannot contribute to your fleet due to the sheer number of members in the fleet, then perhaps its time to join a fleet that could use you and you can use them to get enough credits to buy the shiny objects you want?
Jim
Response to the part in bold.
Thats already how it is.
Except instead of a hard-cap, we have the top-tier deciding to cap you.
I.e. instead of the system deciding for you, a player does by accident.
PS: the cap system is but -one- solution i suggested. I'm fine with a FC daily/mission that i can do regardless of project-status.
It is different when its forced upon members, by the game, and when its just cause of timing issues. Timing issues, one can see when the next project will come up and will jump on it to help at that time. Game limits really wont fix anything unless they are so small that 100+ member fleets can allow everyone to donate a bit.
Still there are probably hundreds of smaller fleets that could use the help, so I don't see why the multiple threads complaining about lack of ability to put a effort into Fleet Projects.
Take my fleet for example, we are small, (20 total members, about 10 really active members), and yet, we started the fleet projects just two nights ago, and already have 6 projects done, one on cool down to finish, and one requiring two dozen marks. Plus one in the middle we decided to skip for now. So yes, many members even in my Fleet can claim they cannot contribute enough, but that is what the special project is for if they cannot help out in any other way, they can at least help themselves to Fleet Credits for our future upgraded Starbase features.
No one in my fleet is complaining, everyone is just happy to lend a hand.
Jim
Good for your fleet, not so good for my fleet.
The difference between 10 and 100 active members doesn't strike you as a factor?
Also I'm not complaining per-se, because as I said, there are way to "cheat" the system. I just dont see why I should have to do this if we can fix the system for -everyone-.
I'm providing feedback, in the feedback forum, made for feedback.
That is another issue that ties into the problem.
We cant grind for stuff if we dont know what to grind for.
Like I said, I'm all for grinding these starbases out for 7 months or whatever, i can deal with grind, i cant deal with grinding uselessly with no reward for my work.
Your not trying to fix the system for everyone, you want a bigger share of the Fleet Credits available. While remaining in a fleet that clearly does not need you.
If there was a serious problem, such as some things being unbalanced due to player level etc, such as being able to get Mark X verses Mark V equipment for these then you'd have a reason to complain.
Its like the other thread, where the guy is complaining he is willing to donate tons to his Fleet but then they decided to stone wall him away from getting a Fleet ship, well that is his fleets policies, if he doesn't like it complaining on a open forum isn't really the answer. Doing something about it and finding a fleet where he can get what he wants is however.
Fact is, Fleets don't have to please then entire membership, and as a fleet gets larger, the "core" group tends to get preferential treatment on most games never mind just STO. If that makes donating impossible for some members, or it makes some members unable to get the ship they want. Its not really Prefect World's problem, and doesn't really belong in a feedback forum.
This is the kind of thing you need to take up with your Fleet's leadership to fix and if they wont fix it, you'll either have to deal with it or move on.
Jim
You are still operating under the assumption that a flawed system is a feature.
Congrats on drinking the Kool-aid.
Nobody in my fleet is "getting" preferential treatment. The people on the top contribution tier aren't core members, dont make stuff up to fit your worldview.
Its PW/Cryptics problem if people won't buy their Fleet Ship Modules and their whole progression system leads to a currency-creep.
PW/C designed a resource sink, if the resource-sink doesn't work its a problem.
Just because you are well off in your minifleet doesn't mean it isn't a problem for others.
Stop being entitled and show some empathy.
A time-cooldown for contributions.
Lets say you can only contribute every minute and only a set amount.
That way a person can't fill up the complete project by himself essentially with one click.
It is not a flawed system to anyone but a handful of posters on these forums so far.
Maybe, just maybe, Cryptic wants to push people into smaller to medium sized fleets so that unlike what your saying here ...
Actually the way I see it, the bigger sink is getting to the top Fleet tiers in the first place. Especially for medium to smaller fleets. To get there in any reasonable amount of time these sized fleets will have to spend actual Zen to boost themselves to get things like Doff's and Dilithium quick enough to compete with the larger fleets.
A couple of Fleet Ship Modules is virtually nothing in the way of Zen sales compared what could be amassed by them through people pushing their fleets ahead.
You are the one who is entitled, otherwise there wouldn't be a thread. While I'll atleast agree with you I don't have empathy for people who do not work with the situation, get over it, life isn't fair, but you can always play the game of life to your advantage.
And sometimes playing the game to your advantage sometimes means doing things you do not want to do just so that you can succeed.
Jim
In our fleet, we communicate, try to make sure everyone gets to at least 20k. Even if it means some people can't donate for that day or days.
They don't have a problem with it, thats what our fleet is for, what most fleets should be for: HELPING OTHERS.
I understand 400+ people is a lot, but at this point, those that have over 250,000 FC's in your fleet, should give others the chance to make some FC's as well.
Again, thats where your Fleet Leadership needs to step in. Unless its said Leadership that doesn't care about the rest of the fleet's FC levels, in which case (worst case) you'll probably want to look into another fleet.
Just a thought, and my 2 cents.
I think with the current set-up, the super fleets are either going to have to learn superior management skills in order to keep their people happy or start losing them to smaller fleets. I'm interested to watch what happens...
If this is still a problem in a few months, you should consider finding another fleet (at least temporarily, to earn FC, before coming back to your large fleet to spend them). Long term, the temporary frustration of being unable to earn FC now is balanced by the fact that a large fleet will finish their base much faster.
Not sure why he needed so many points when he said he had no plans to buy any ships. Why would you need 300k+ points if you're not buy the non-Fleet Ship Module ships?
It was working out that there were 4-5 people running away on the Leaderboard, but the Fleet Message of the Day was all about "Help us with the Starbase. We need Fleet Marks!" Which I took as "You do the Grinding, we'll do the easy contributions."
Dill and Duty Officers are the hard part.
About 20 Marks per mission, and you need 180 for the lower tiers, me and a buddy would get enough for 2 projects within a couple hours.
But yes, you are right a fleet should not ask you to only give up one thing, its up to your what you are willing to spare, not up to your Fleet.
Jim