Foundry is the future. I've played over 10 Romulan-centric missions involving existing STO storylines (Preservers, Iconians, Klingons) this week alone. Spotlighting seems too slow. Especially with the manual voting via private message.
Add in all of the STF changes, the new Fleet Actions, the DOFF system and now we have a situation where there is almost TOO much leveling content on the Fed side and a decent amount on the KDF side. After looking at a lot of data, it is clear that Fed characters that use the duty officer system and run queued event outlevel the patrol and episode content to the point where most players hit max level before completing the Romulan episode series. In our goal to introduce more quality episodes, we now have a leveling curve that is very fast for the FED side.
I just want to raise a point that while its true that a character can level faster with DOFF and fleet actions, part of the reason why most players hit max level before completing all the missions is because most of the missions lack replayablility and cool rewards.
If I have already done the mission on a character or two, then I already know exactly what would happen in each and every mission as there is no variability in the missions. What's more, most of the missions only offer experience points, expertise and maybe an uncommon item that I may or may not require. As a result, there's no real incentive to replay the same old missions again and again.
If you don't believe me, look at the players who stop playing missions before completing the Romulan episode series and look at the percentage of these players who have skipped ahead and completed that least one mission in the Undine Advance episode series for the cool Borg items.
Foundry is the future. I've played over 10 Romulan-centric missions involving existing STO storylines (Preservers, Iconians, Klingons) this week alone. Spotlighting seems too slow. Especially with the manual voting via private message.
It is interesting to see all of the responses in this thread about the feature options for 2013. It is clear that the game has a lot of room to grow and over the next year it is going to be our goal to tackle as many of the features on that list as we can.
When it comes to "factions", one concern I share is that when it comes to Star Trek fans, it is predominantly made up of "Federation" fans. No matter how many other races or factions we consider, the Federation will always be the most popular because they have the "leading role" in the TV shows, Movies, and most Games/Books.
There is also the concern that players have put a lot of effort into their existing characters and fleets. It wouldn't necessarily be a healthy choice to introduce a 3rd faction that has its own fleets, duty officer system, ships, and bridge officers because it would be disruptive to the fleets and friendships you've made in game.
All of this is above and beyond the question of whether or not there would be enough "missions" for a faction to have a solid game experience.
Whenever I think of Federation and KDF mission equality, it reminds me of the challenges we had before we launched the game. There was a drive to get "X hours of mission gameplay" into the box before it shipped. This resulted in a decent amount of episodes and a large amount of lesser quality patrol missions.
Since then we recognized that we wanted to make higher quality episodes AND add KDF as a full PVE faction. What we've been doing over the last two years is adding premium new high quality episodes playable by either faction because it was hitting two birds with one stone.
Add in all of the STF changes, the new Fleet Actions, the DOFF system and now we have a situation where there is almost TOO much leveling content on the Fed side and a decent amount on the KDF side. After looking at a lot of data, it is clear that Fed characters that use the duty officer system and run queued event outlevel the patrol and episode content to the point where most players hit max level before completing the Romulan episode series. In our goal to introduce more quality episodes, we now have a leveling curve that is very fast for the FED side.
When I think of creating "Parity" for the KDF, the goal would *not* be to get KDF to the same place as the FED, because the fact is, the FED curve is too fast. In addition to adding just a few more Episodes for the KDF, we need to weed out some of the less important FED patrols from the leveling path. That is what will get both factions to 1-50 leveling curve parity.
When it comes to a Romulan faction, the question still remains, would it be healthy for the game to introduce an entirely new faction that is now in the situation we just worked to solve? More than likely, if we were to add the ability to play as a Romulan, we would want to make it so that they could have their own experience, but ultimately fit somehow into the confines of our two faction game. Whether or not this means Romulans ultimately having to choose between which faction they support or something else entirely, the idea that Romulans would be a 3rd unique faction unto itself is a road STO may not take, if only to ensure the future health of the game.
Please don't mistake any of this as the "plan of record" but instead me sharing my thoughts on the poll results and what it might mean for STO in 2013. Anything can happen and plans can and do change, but it is fun to discuss and get your feedback when it comes to these ideas.
What about leech console will it remain unique on KDF side or you will throw it on lockboxes just for a couple of EC???
Giving a nice shot to game balance and KDF itself.
Like i said i will quit the game once and for all if you share leech console specificly with federation.
This because its like a pure nerf on KDF faction itself and the console itself.
We wont be getting any power back since drain effects will be cancelled while feds will keep on getting +10 power all over across the board from Maco shields....
One thing I definately want to see fixed with melee combat because its the KDF's main bonus in almost every race is melee damage to make the combat more smooth and less robotic the way it works. Swords are the most choppiest and robotic I've ever seen.
When it comes to "factions", one concern I share is that when it comes to Star Trek fans, it is predominantly made up of "Federation" fans. No matter how many other races or factions we consider, the Federation will always be the most popular because they have the "leading role" in the TV shows, Movies, and most Games/Books.
This will probably always be the case, given the multitude of TV series and films from the view point of the Federation. The Federation is synonymous with Star Trek in a way. You can't realistically go about changing that perception, and any attempt to do so would likely be futile.
However by offering a solid, engaging and entertaining different experience will sway some over permanently, or others to visit from time to time.
There is also the concern that players have put a lot of effort into their existing characters and fleets. It wouldn't necessarily be a healthy choice to introduce a 3rd faction that has its own fleets, duty officer system, ships, and bridge officers because it would be disruptive to the fleets and friendships you've made in game.
Communities (Guilds) have managed in previous games, and will do so in STO. As will players whom already have dedicated time to a specific faction. Some will change in a heart beat, some will dabble and some will ignore it. That has really always been the case when new classes or races were introduced in MMORPGs. But it isn't much different from a launch period where a "Community" will choose one or the other and stick together. It certainly shouldn't be a hindrance for introducing a new Faction, especially in a two faction setup where a third could break a tie in the event of future PvP considerations and designs.
All of this is above and beyond the question of whether or not there would be enough "missions" for a faction to have a solid game experience.
Whenever I think of Federation and KDF mission equality, it reminds me of the challenges we had before we launched the game. There was a drive to get "X hours of mission gameplay" into the box before it shipped. This resulted in a decent amount of episodes and a large amount of lesser quality patrol missions.
Since then we recognized that we wanted to make higher quality episodes AND add KDF as a full PVE faction. What we've been doing over the last two years is adding premium new high quality episodes playable by either faction because it was hitting two birds with one stone.
Add in all of the STF changes, the new Fleet Actions, the DOFF system and now we have a situation where there is almost TOO much leveling content on the Fed side and a decent amount on the KDF side. After looking at a lot of data, it is clear that Fed characters that use the duty officer system and run queued event outlevel the patrol and episode content to the point where most players hit max level before completing the Romulan episode series. In our goal to introduce more quality episodes, we now have a leveling curve that is very fast for the FED side.
When I think of creating "Parity" for the KDF, the goal would *not* be to get KDF to the same place as the FED, because the fact is, the FED curve is too fast. In addition to adding just a few more Episodes for the KDF, we need to weed out some of the less important FED patrols from the leveling path. That is what will get both factions to 1-50 leveling curve parity.
You should strongly consider doing away with the notion of level segregation when it comes to content, current and future.
With the proposed Reputation system coming up in Season 7 and beyond, it's an ideal situation to reevaluate the necessity for levels.
Story based Missions could be considered as such. They are there not as the classic leveling curve from 1-50, but there to offer an engaging and entertaining story filled experience. Stress less about having missions available for a specific level bracket. After all STO PvE content scales to match players levels under the current implementation.
Under this "Ideal Level less system", players would be gaining skill points, and ship tier access via the reputation system. It could be tied to a point score system as well as being tied to specific story based missions being completed to unlock access to a given Tier of ships.
Skill points could be rewarded at set intervals via the Reputation system, or via mission completion as it is now or both.
Disparity between factions could be compensated/adjusted via a hidden modifier in the reputation system, so that the faction with less content, would gain an increased modifier. This would serve to lessen any disparity between the factions in terms of advancing through a reputation system.
Any future story content developed would only have to worry about offering engaging and interesting storytelling, versus it fitting in with a specific level, existing/new campaign or region.
Without levels players could from the get go of character creation, and until the heat death of the sun, be considered Captains at all times. Ranks would have been dissociated with skill points and ship tiers via the Reputation system and no longer hold a relevance to the systems.
Do away with the different Item Marks and rely on the rarity tiers to separate fresh players from more experienced players. Establish a baseline powerlevel that players should reasonably have at completion of STF content, Story content, ect. And work down from there until you hit a baseline starting point for new characters. Adjust NPCs accordingly. The leveling experience is so fast anyway that all the interim MKs are for the most part entirely pointless and only functions as a very brief stepping stone. It wouldn't lessen the experience if everyone started off to what amounts today to MK12 white vs lvl 50 NPCs as their baseline.
It is by no mean minor changes, but given a levelless game all content in STO would be considered "End Game" at all times, never obsolete or outdated, in part due to the possibilities of the Reputation system.
It is by no mean minor changes, but given a levelless game all content in STO would be considered "End Game" at all times, never obsolete or outdated, in part due to the possibilities of the Reputation system.
With all due respect, completely redesigning the game like that is not the solution to this problem. The solution is in fact already in game: the foundry. The only thing that needs to be done is to give foundry missions comparable rewards to official missions. If they did that, people would actually be motivated to play them, and it would solve the content disparity issue for the KDF and any future factions.
With all due respect, completely redesigning the game like that is not the solution to this problem. The solution is in fact already in game: the foundry. The only thing that needs to be done is to give foundry missions comparable rewards to official missions. If they did that, people would actually be motivated to play them, and it would solve the content disparity issue for the KDF and any future factions.
only way i will every play foundry mission is the Dev adopt and make them apart of the main story line
missions comparable rewards is not the key to geting me to play them
like i said before player made mission are like the books of star trek they are not prime universe cannon Dev mission are like prime universe cannon again to me
only way i will every play foundry mission is the Dev adopt and make them apart of the main story line
missions comparable rewards is not the key to geting me to play them
like i said before player made mission are like the books of star trek they are not prime universe cannon Dev mission are like prime universe cannon again to me
And thats ok. One universal truth of game development is you will never be able to please everyone, and you are simply one of those folks. So if the devs do what I am talking about with the foundry, you can sit around and wish you had something to do while most people are playing missions. That is your choice to make.
And thats ok. One universal truth of game development is you will never be able to please everyone, and you are simply one of those folks. So if the devs do what I am talking about with the foundry, you can sit around and wish you had something to do while most people are playing missions. That is your choice to make.
ok..... so what is to stop them from just adopting them? if they cant do that then if ppl are not really playing them now rewards not going to make a big difference for all the best stuff will still come from STF's other then that what elss is left to reward ? other then a lockbox and some dill and something tell me you would still get more dill from STF's
In a way I'm torn -- I'd love to see a fully 0-50 level Romulan faction with its own ships, races, green UI, and unique story episodes. While it'd be true that this would be a lot of work for the devs, as well as the players (imagine doing the whole fleet starbase thing from scratch a year from now) it could be worth it. Large expansion-style updates are not unheard of, and Romulans could always start as a minifaction (10-30 levels of content and add 5-10 levels each season) to better stagger the workload.
The downside is what would happen to the player base if it's then split three ways -- perhaps this can be resolved by cross-faction teaming as we've seen in PvP and STFs.
The road ahead may be tough but it's doable. KDF *can* be completed by adding some costumes, ~15-25 episodes, a half dozen Tier 1 and Tier 2 ships from the non-Klingon races, and an extra sector block or two (lets visit Ty'Gokor!). My thoughts on that matter are described here.
Speaking for myself, I think "playable Romulans" is missing a trick. STO had the Klingons brought in too quickly and look what happened. While they've now got Perfect World's backing that doesn't mean that the Romulans will land fully complete and ready to roll.
lets not take jj movie as example for alot of his story had lots of holes
also i dont beleave most of the RST was bottled up in one system galaxy is a big place ya know
and to be blunt stop compering star trek to real life equations you dont know how many planet where in the RSE how many system they had or even what the entier population of RSE is all you do is a guessing game
The JJ film IS history for STO, at least with regards to Spock and Romulus. It is canon. STO is a licensed product which has to acknowledge it.
The devs were working on Romulus when they got the news about the movie and CBS told them that Romulus had to be destroyed in game.
You can either bite back against that or you can run with it. And Cryptic is simply not allowed, as a licensee, to bite back against that.
I can tolerate costumes and ships that mimick people's favorites from other eras but I think it's a mistake to try that with factions.
It's dramatically and emotionally dishonest not to heavily acknowledge the 18 billion dead in a big way.
I can see ways that you play with that. You could fold in Mirror Romulans and claim that the factions are identical aside from the loss of Romulus. You could suggest that the Preservers saved a great many Romulans and placed them somewhere distant, like the Delta Quadrant.
But pretending the J.J. movie didn't happen because it's inconvenient is cheating when it comes to serial fiction... and beyond that is not something CBS would allow.
When it comes to "factions", one concern I share is that when it comes to Star Trek fans, it is predominantly made up of "Federation" fans. No matter how many other races or factions we consider, the Federation will always be the most popular because they have the "leading role" in the TV shows, Movies, and most Games/Books...
While I am in agreement with the remainder of your post, this piece I simply do not agree with. Were one to examine the non-gaming interest in Sith vrs Jedi, I'm sure you would find there is less of a fan pull to the Sith. Yet when they revealed their player numbers at the guild summit, it showed MORE players on the Sith side:
Obviously, that IP has a higher number of fans at its base who side with the Sith. But Surely not 57%?
My point is, I am a firm believer that the IP's popularity is a great starting point, but ultimately there will always be "Redside" gamers, if there is a fully functional second faction. As you said in the Raptr Q&A: If you build it, they will come. You're more likely going to be able to cater directly to "gamers" with Redside improvement, not "fans," so while a Galaxy class ship model may go through dozens and dozens of tiny corrections to the minor imperfections a Purist Fed playerbase demand, I'd venture the playerbase you can attract for a starting KDF faction - true (redside) gamers - will be more interested in ability balance, engaging repeatable content, and strong game mechanics.
That, and I'm curious to know if your numbers indicate the majority of new *accounts* are finding other, super fast, non story mission paths to leveling. Or is it players on their 2nd or 8th time through? Personally, I would rather see multiple paths to 50 than removing fast tracks, or even gating them to second characters only, unlocking secondary paths as you go.
Just a thought, but its not Parity that will fix this, its the *perception* of Parity.
Wampaq@Jnoh, Fleet Leader: ..Bloodbath and Beyond[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]'Iw HaH je Hoch! ALL HOLDINGS FINISHED! - Starbase 5-5-5-5 || Embassy 3-3-3 || Mine 3-3-3 || Spire 3-3-3 A laid back KDF fleet welcoming independent, casual, & part-time players and groups. Roms & alts welcome. Send in-game mail to Wampaq@Jnoh, visit our recruitment thread and FB page for more info.
The JJ film IS history for STO, at least with regards to Spock and Romulus. It is canon. STO is a licensed product which has to acknowledge it.
The devs were working on Romulus when they got the news about the movie and CBS told them that Romulus had to be destroyed in game.
You can either bite back against that or you can run with it. And Cryptic is simply not allowed, as a licensee, to bite back against that.
I can tolerate costumes and ships that mimick people's favorites from other eras but I think it's a mistake to try that with factions.
It's dramatically and emotionally dishonest not to heavily acknowledge the 18 billion dead in a big way.
I can see ways that you play with that. You could fold in Mirror Romulans and claim that the factions are identical aside from the loss of Romulus. You could suggest that the Preservers saved a great many Romulans and placed them somewhere distant, like the Delta Quadrant.
But pretending the J.J. movie didn't happen because it's inconvenient is cheating when it comes to serial fiction... and beyond that is not something CBS would allow.
i did in no way say it didnt happen just it had a lot of hole and was not a good thing to use as a example
The poll from the last question of the Ask Cryptic can be found above.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
i am in need of assistance. i know that this is a ask cryptic page but i am asking cryptic for assistance while playing a few months back sto blew the capacitors of my video card. i replaced it with a well capable card and i had to re-install sto from the disk i purchased in 2009, the launcher will not update itself and crashes. I have tried numerous times to goto the pwe support page and contact us and my firefox and IE browsers cannot load the page. however i am able to ping a address related to sto that i found on the forums and it went successful. please help ty
While I am in agreement with the remainder of your post, this piece I simply do not agree with. Were one to examine the non-gaming interest in Sith vrs Jedi, I'm sure you would find there is less of a fan pull to the Sith. Yet when they revealed their player numbers at the guild summit, it showed MORE players on the Sith side:
Obviously, that IP has a higher number of fans at its base who side with the Sith. But Surely not 57%?
This is a terrible comparison. The story of SW was split between both factions. In the movies the scenes were constantly jumping back and forth between the "good guys" and the "bad guys", and the main character of the entire series changed factions. Because of that, I would expect a fairly even split in faction players. That is nothing like the story of Trek, which is 99% focused on the Feds.
only way i will every play foundry mission is the Dev adopt and make them apart of the main story line
missions comparable rewards is not the key to geting me to play them
like i said before player made mission are like the books of star trek they are not prime universe cannon Dev mission are like prime universe cannon again to me
It is interesting to see all of the responses in this thread about the feature options for 2013. It is clear that the game has a lot of room to grow and over the next year it is going to be our goal to tackle as many of the features on that list as we can.
When it comes to "factions", one concern I share is that when it comes to Star Trek fans, it is predominantly made up of "Federation" fans. No matter how many other races or factions we consider, the Federation will always be the most popular because they have the "leading role" in the TV shows, Movies, and most Games/Books.
Dan, unfortunately people aren?t going to see it that way nor do i think you really think that. Yes, when one thinks of Star Trek they think of the Federation. However, all indications from the STO story is that the Federation isn't as it once was or suppose to be and we don?t see that. Star Trek is suppose to be deep and meaningful within the franchise, instead STO/Cryptic have gone in the direction of a very poor stories, with no clear indication of what is suppose to going on. What needs to be focused, which is your job is to stir the direction of this title. Currently and for the last few years, it has improved greatly, but what has also hurt the game still remains and now Cryptic has the funding from PWE to do what needs to be done. Currently, you have a great asset which is being under utilized, that is the foundry to fill in that gap, Cryptic just needs to give the community a listing of guidelines and go from there.
Good post dstahl. Fortunately there is a solution to your content disparity problem, and it is called the foundry. But until you guys actually make it so that foundry missions reward you equally to official content, that solution will continue to elude you. Yes, I saw your earlier post about Spotlight missions getting rewards in October, and that is good. But there are simply not enough spotlight missions to make up for the content disparity with the KDF.
You have to find a way to make it work for all foundry missions, and you also have to get the foundry missions out of the dark and dusty corner of the mission journal UI they are currently in and shine a light on them. Then and only then will you solve your content problem. And if you actually pull that off, then you wont have to worry about content disparity with future factions like Romulans either.
That is the solution, the foundry and its community. It is the closes you get to modding, modding in the past is what allowed and continued the success of sales of titles which is no longer supported in the gaming world. This is the closes it will get when it comes to an MMO.
Commander Shran - You tell Archer, that is three the pink skin owes me!
The JJ film IS history for STO, at least with regards to Spock and Romulus. It is canon. STO is a licensed product which has to acknowledge it.
The devs were working on Romulus when they got the news about the movie and CBS told them that Romulus had to be destroyed in game.
You can either bite back against that or you can run with it. And Cryptic is simply not allowed, as a licensee, to bite back against that.
I can tolerate costumes and ships that mimick people's favorites from other eras but I think it's a mistake to try that with factions.
It's dramatically and emotionally dishonest not to heavily acknowledge the 18 billion dead in a big way.
I can see ways that you play with that. You could fold in Mirror Romulans and claim that the factions are identical aside from the loss of Romulus. You could suggest that the Preservers saved a great many Romulans and placed them somewhere distant, like the Delta Quadrant.
But pretending the J.J. movie didn't happen because it's inconvenient is cheating when it comes to serial fiction... and beyond that is not something CBS would allow.
the film is flawed $$........ in the past romulus isn't destroyed yet...... vulcan is ...... which not doubt will change everything. making stos history pointless aswell as tos, tng, ds9 and voyager. it's the butterfly effect. the smallest change can change everything and i'd say vulcan being blown up was pretty important. why is vulcan here in the game now? it was blown up in the past?!?!
also something as major as vulcan getting blown up would easily change the course of all history and events across the entire galaxy affecting many of the major races/powers along with scientifc discoveries etc etc temperal mechanics geezzz
anyway maybe the next film actually restores the time line?? otherwise the entire time line yes everything we've spents years watching and worthless.
the film is flawed $$........ in the past romulus isn't destroyed yet...... vulcan is ...... which not doubt will change everything. making stos history pointless aswell as tos, tng, ds9 and voyager. it's the butterfly effect. the smallest change can change everything and i'd say vulcan being blown up was pretty important. why is vulcan here in the game now? it was blown up in the past?!?!
also something as major as vulcan getting blown up would easily change the course of all history and events across the entire galaxy affecting many of the major races/powers along with scientifc discoveries etc etc temperal mechanics geezzz
anyway maybe the next film actually restores the time line?? otherwise the entire time line yes everything we've spents years watching and worthless.
The story takes place in an alternate reality[2][3] due to time travel by both Nero and the original Spock (Leonard Nimoy). The alternate timeline was created in an effort to free the film and the franchise from established continuity constraints while simultaneously preserving original story elements.
only things from that move that are cannon in the prime universe is romulas going boom vulcan is safe and spock disappearing
The story takes place in an alternate reality[2][3] due to time travel by both Nero and the original Spock (Leonard Nimoy). The alternate timeline was created in an effort to free the film and the franchise from established continuity constraints while simultaneously preserving original story elements.
only things from that move that are cannon in the prime universe is romulas going boom vulcan is safe and spock disappearing
i take your point but like i said it's flawed and if the 2nd film is a fresh story and they don't restore the timeline then it really wasn't very well thought out.... thought the likes of cbs was protective ...
i take your point but like i said it's flawed and if the 2nd film is a fresh story and they don't restore the timeline then it really wasn't very well thought out.... thought the likes of cbs was protective ...
and i soo agree with you the hole movie played more like a star wars movie with a star trek skin
This is a terrible comparison. The story of SW was split between both factions. In the movies the scenes were constantly jumping back and forth between the "good guys" and the "bad guys", and the main character of the entire series changed factions. Because of that, I would expect a fairly even split in faction players. That is nothing like the story of Trek, which is 99% focused on the Feds.
While true, I think there are takeaway lessons.
While Worf pops up in two KDF missions, he's not really a very dynamic character in STO.
Now, if you could leverage that better, you'd get more out of more KDF content.
And there's a big dangling question how Worf and the KDF really works. If the KDF was prepared to take out the Titan with Troi and Riker aboard, would Worf stop them? What about Dax?
Maybe a part of the issue here is that the shows always found a human window into the KDF's struggles whereas STO is "old school Klingon mentality or GTFO." When even the shows tried to get away from an old school Klingon mentality.
I can see a variety of avenues to go beyond Worf becoming more dynamic and conflicted. One is to focus on introducing more Chang-style Klingons, showcasing more variety when it comes the Klingon perspective. Another is possibly to have more non-Klingon characters acknowledge the Klingon perspective on things and have a high level defection. For example: Dax. For another example: Tom and B'Elanna.
And as near as I can figure, Cryptic could probably use a new Dax (no Ezri likeness issues) as long as they don't discuss the circumstances of Ezri's death.
Have Dax re-join Worf, now as a brother or sister in arms (seeing as how Worf is married now), and have Paris/Torres/Miral side with the Klingons.
That injects more Trek audience POV into the Klingon side and makes it less "Old school Klingons! RAR! Your ship is a garbage scow!"
i take your point but like i said it's flawed and if the 2nd film is a fresh story and they don't restore the timeline then it really wasn't very well thought out.... thought the likes of cbs was protective ...
Why does it have to restore the timeline? The whole point is that there are now two timelines coexisting.
There is just one minor thing that will bite you in the back most certainly then. Territorial control pvp just doesn't work right in a two faction game with huge population gaps between the factions. I've been there. I've played more than 5 years on a **** Server with a 2.5A/1M/0.75H relation and that server was considered 'mostly' balanced because most of the time there was some kind of truce between the smaller realms. When some parts of the community switched to warhammer and its two faction game the smaller faction got steamrolled over and over again, with a much smaller advantage of population (1 Chaos/1.2 Order [yes that is correct, I had the 'luck' to play on one of the few servers were order actually had more players]). Same company, mostly the same playerbase, very different outcomes.
This reminds me of an arcade game I used to play alot. Soul Calibur 2's arcade version had a conquest mode where each human player would play for one of 4 kingdoms and the kingdoms were ranked based on how often the players won while playing them. This wasn't based on the number of players, or even how often they played, but how often they won. Each player had an individual rating and the factions were rated based on the combined rating of the players.
Why does it have to restore the timeline? The whole point is that there are now two timelines coexisting.
Not just timelines, but alternate universes. The JJ-verse is the same thing as the Mirror Universe; it is an alternate universe that exists alongside the prime universe. What happens in one has nothing to do with what happens in the other, with the rare exception of crossovers from one to the other. But the main point which you obviously understand, yet others do not, is that after Nero/Spock disappeared, the prime universe continued to go on unchanged. It's history was not rewritten.
Comments
you can have them called make a alien they be no different then what the shortcut/lap dogs romulans would be
system Lord Baal is dead
I just want to raise a point that while its true that a character can level faster with DOFF and fleet actions, part of the reason why most players hit max level before completing all the missions is because most of the missions lack replayablility and cool rewards.
If I have already done the mission on a character or two, then I already know exactly what would happen in each and every mission as there is no variability in the missions. What's more, most of the missions only offer experience points, expertise and maybe an uncommon item that I may or may not require. As a result, there's no real incentive to replay the same old missions again and again.
If you don't believe me, look at the players who stop playing missions before completing the Romulan episode series and look at the percentage of these players who have skipped ahead and completed that least one mission in the Undine Advance episode series for the cool Borg items.
You've got the right idea:
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=383751
What about leech console will it remain unique on KDF side or you will throw it on lockboxes just for a couple of EC???
Giving a nice shot to game balance and KDF itself.
Like i said i will quit the game once and for all if you share leech console specificly with federation.
This because its like a pure nerf on KDF faction itself and the console itself.
We wont be getting any power back since drain effects will be cancelled while feds will keep on getting +10 power all over across the board from Maco shields....
Qapla!
This will probably always be the case, given the multitude of TV series and films from the view point of the Federation. The Federation is synonymous with Star Trek in a way. You can't realistically go about changing that perception, and any attempt to do so would likely be futile.
However by offering a solid, engaging and entertaining different experience will sway some over permanently, or others to visit from time to time.
Communities (Guilds) have managed in previous games, and will do so in STO. As will players whom already have dedicated time to a specific faction. Some will change in a heart beat, some will dabble and some will ignore it. That has really always been the case when new classes or races were introduced in MMORPGs. But it isn't much different from a launch period where a "Community" will choose one or the other and stick together. It certainly shouldn't be a hindrance for introducing a new Faction, especially in a two faction setup where a third could break a tie in the event of future PvP considerations and designs.
You should strongly consider doing away with the notion of level segregation when it comes to content, current and future.
With the proposed Reputation system coming up in Season 7 and beyond, it's an ideal situation to reevaluate the necessity for levels.
Story based Missions could be considered as such. They are there not as the classic leveling curve from 1-50, but there to offer an engaging and entertaining story filled experience. Stress less about having missions available for a specific level bracket. After all STO PvE content scales to match players levels under the current implementation.
Under this "Ideal Level less system", players would be gaining skill points, and ship tier access via the reputation system. It could be tied to a point score system as well as being tied to specific story based missions being completed to unlock access to a given Tier of ships.
Skill points could be rewarded at set intervals via the Reputation system, or via mission completion as it is now or both.
Disparity between factions could be compensated/adjusted via a hidden modifier in the reputation system, so that the faction with less content, would gain an increased modifier. This would serve to lessen any disparity between the factions in terms of advancing through a reputation system.
Any future story content developed would only have to worry about offering engaging and interesting storytelling, versus it fitting in with a specific level, existing/new campaign or region.
Without levels players could from the get go of character creation, and until the heat death of the sun, be considered Captains at all times. Ranks would have been dissociated with skill points and ship tiers via the Reputation system and no longer hold a relevance to the systems.
Do away with the different Item Marks and rely on the rarity tiers to separate fresh players from more experienced players. Establish a baseline powerlevel that players should reasonably have at completion of STF content, Story content, ect. And work down from there until you hit a baseline starting point for new characters. Adjust NPCs accordingly. The leveling experience is so fast anyway that all the interim MKs are for the most part entirely pointless and only functions as a very brief stepping stone. It wouldn't lessen the experience if everyone started off to what amounts today to MK12 white vs lvl 50 NPCs as their baseline.
It is by no mean minor changes, but given a levelless game all content in STO would be considered "End Game" at all times, never obsolete or outdated, in part due to the possibilities of the Reputation system.
With all due respect, completely redesigning the game like that is not the solution to this problem. The solution is in fact already in game: the foundry. The only thing that needs to be done is to give foundry missions comparable rewards to official missions. If they did that, people would actually be motivated to play them, and it would solve the content disparity issue for the KDF and any future factions.
only way i will every play foundry mission is the Dev adopt and make them apart of the main story line
missions comparable rewards is not the key to geting me to play them
like i said before player made mission are like the books of star trek they are not prime universe cannon Dev mission are like prime universe cannon again to me
system Lord Baal is dead
And thats ok. One universal truth of game development is you will never be able to please everyone, and you are simply one of those folks. So if the devs do what I am talking about with the foundry, you can sit around and wish you had something to do while most people are playing missions. That is your choice to make.
ok..... so what is to stop them from just adopting them? if they cant do that then if ppl are not really playing them now rewards not going to make a big difference for all the best stuff will still come from STF's other then that what elss is left to reward ? other then a lockbox and some dill and something tell me you would still get more dill from STF's
system Lord Baal is dead
The downside is what would happen to the player base if it's then split three ways -- perhaps this can be resolved by cross-faction teaming as we've seen in PvP and STFs.
The road ahead may be tough but it's doable. KDF *can* be completed by adding some costumes, ~15-25 episodes, a half dozen Tier 1 and Tier 2 ships from the non-Klingon races, and an extra sector block or two (lets visit Ty'Gokor!). My thoughts on that matter are described here.
My STOwiki page | Reachable in-game @PhyrexianHero
Fed Armada: Section 31 (level 730, 2700+ members)
KDF Armada: Klingon Intelligence (level 699, 2100+ members)
What? You don't like doing Stabase Blockade with 2 Connies and a Dakota?
The JJ film IS history for STO, at least with regards to Spock and Romulus. It is canon. STO is a licensed product which has to acknowledge it.
The devs were working on Romulus when they got the news about the movie and CBS told them that Romulus had to be destroyed in game.
You can either bite back against that or you can run with it. And Cryptic is simply not allowed, as a licensee, to bite back against that.
I can tolerate costumes and ships that mimick people's favorites from other eras but I think it's a mistake to try that with factions.
It's dramatically and emotionally dishonest not to heavily acknowledge the 18 billion dead in a big way.
I can see ways that you play with that. You could fold in Mirror Romulans and claim that the factions are identical aside from the loss of Romulus. You could suggest that the Preservers saved a great many Romulans and placed them somewhere distant, like the Delta Quadrant.
But pretending the J.J. movie didn't happen because it's inconvenient is cheating when it comes to serial fiction... and beyond that is not something CBS would allow.
While I am in agreement with the remainder of your post, this piece I simply do not agree with. Were one to examine the non-gaming interest in Sith vrs Jedi, I'm sure you would find there is less of a fan pull to the Sith. Yet when they revealed their player numbers at the guild summit, it showed MORE players on the Sith side:
SWToR: 57% of players play Empire
Obviously, that IP has a higher number of fans at its base who side with the Sith. But Surely not 57%?
My point is, I am a firm believer that the IP's popularity is a great starting point, but ultimately there will always be "Redside" gamers, if there is a fully functional second faction. As you said in the Raptr Q&A: If you build it, they will come. You're more likely going to be able to cater directly to "gamers" with Redside improvement, not "fans," so while a Galaxy class ship model may go through dozens and dozens of tiny corrections to the minor imperfections a Purist Fed playerbase demand, I'd venture the playerbase you can attract for a starting KDF faction - true (redside) gamers - will be more interested in ability balance, engaging repeatable content, and strong game mechanics.
That, and I'm curious to know if your numbers indicate the majority of new *accounts* are finding other, super fast, non story mission paths to leveling. Or is it players on their 2nd or 8th time through? Personally, I would rather see multiple paths to 50 than removing fast tracks, or even gating them to second characters only, unlocking secondary paths as you go.
Just a thought, but its not Parity that will fix this, its the *perception* of Parity.
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i did in no way say it didnt happen just it had a lot of hole and was not a good thing to use as a example
plus stowiki still says they are a major power
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i for one dont makes them go on longer with lower lvl's
system Lord Baal is dead
i am in need of assistance. i know that this is a ask cryptic page but i am asking cryptic for assistance while playing a few months back sto blew the capacitors of my video card. i replaced it with a well capable card and i had to re-install sto from the disk i purchased in 2009, the launcher will not update itself and crashes. I have tried numerous times to goto the pwe support page and contact us and my firefox and IE browsers cannot load the page. however i am able to ping a address related to sto that i found on the forums and it went successful. please help ty
This is a terrible comparison. The story of SW was split between both factions. In the movies the scenes were constantly jumping back and forth between the "good guys" and the "bad guys", and the main character of the entire series changed factions. Because of that, I would expect a fairly even split in faction players. That is nothing like the story of Trek, which is 99% focused on the Feds.
This ^^^^^100% agree
Dan, unfortunately people aren?t going to see it that way nor do i think you really think that. Yes, when one thinks of Star Trek they think of the Federation. However, all indications from the STO story is that the Federation isn't as it once was or suppose to be and we don?t see that. Star Trek is suppose to be deep and meaningful within the franchise, instead STO/Cryptic have gone in the direction of a very poor stories, with no clear indication of what is suppose to going on. What needs to be focused, which is your job is to stir the direction of this title. Currently and for the last few years, it has improved greatly, but what has also hurt the game still remains and now Cryptic has the funding from PWE to do what needs to be done. Currently, you have a great asset which is being under utilized, that is the foundry to fill in that gap, Cryptic just needs to give the community a listing of guidelines and go from there.
That is the solution, the foundry and its community. It is the closes you get to modding, modding in the past is what allowed and continued the success of sales of titles which is no longer supported in the gaming world. This is the closes it will get when it comes to an MMO.
the film is flawed $$........ in the past romulus isn't destroyed yet...... vulcan is ...... which not doubt will change everything. making stos history pointless aswell as tos, tng, ds9 and voyager. it's the butterfly effect. the smallest change can change everything and i'd say vulcan being blown up was pretty important. why is vulcan here in the game now? it was blown up in the past?!?!
also something as major as vulcan getting blown up would easily change the course of all history and events across the entire galaxy affecting many of the major races/powers along with scientifc discoveries etc etc temperal mechanics geezzz
anyway maybe the next film actually restores the time line?? otherwise the entire time line yes everything we've spents years watching and worthless.
The story takes place in an alternate reality[2][3] due to time travel by both Nero and the original Spock (Leonard Nimoy). The alternate timeline was created in an effort to free the film and the franchise from established continuity constraints while simultaneously preserving original story elements.
only things from that move that are cannon in the prime universe is romulas going boom vulcan is safe and spock disappearing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek_(film)
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i take your point but like i said it's flawed and if the 2nd film is a fresh story and they don't restore the timeline then it really wasn't very well thought out.... thought the likes of cbs was protective ...
and i soo agree with you the hole movie played more like a star wars movie with a star trek skin
system Lord Baal is dead
While true, I think there are takeaway lessons.
While Worf pops up in two KDF missions, he's not really a very dynamic character in STO.
Now, if you could leverage that better, you'd get more out of more KDF content.
And there's a big dangling question how Worf and the KDF really works. If the KDF was prepared to take out the Titan with Troi and Riker aboard, would Worf stop them? What about Dax?
Maybe a part of the issue here is that the shows always found a human window into the KDF's struggles whereas STO is "old school Klingon mentality or GTFO." When even the shows tried to get away from an old school Klingon mentality.
I can see a variety of avenues to go beyond Worf becoming more dynamic and conflicted. One is to focus on introducing more Chang-style Klingons, showcasing more variety when it comes the Klingon perspective. Another is possibly to have more non-Klingon characters acknowledge the Klingon perspective on things and have a high level defection. For example: Dax. For another example: Tom and B'Elanna.
And as near as I can figure, Cryptic could probably use a new Dax (no Ezri likeness issues) as long as they don't discuss the circumstances of Ezri's death.
Have Dax re-join Worf, now as a brother or sister in arms (seeing as how Worf is married now), and have Paris/Torres/Miral side with the Klingons.
That injects more Trek audience POV into the Klingon side and makes it less "Old school Klingons! RAR! Your ship is a garbage scow!"
Why does it have to restore the timeline? The whole point is that there are now two timelines coexisting.
My character Tsin'xing
Not just timelines, but alternate universes. The JJ-verse is the same thing as the Mirror Universe; it is an alternate universe that exists alongside the prime universe. What happens in one has nothing to do with what happens in the other, with the rare exception of crossovers from one to the other. But the main point which you obviously understand, yet others do not, is that after Nero/Spock disappeared, the prime universe continued to go on unchanged. It's history was not rewritten.