Fleet Uniforms.
When my fleet first heard of the uniforms coming in Season 6 with Starbases, we were all pretty excited. It was our hope to design and use a uniform for all members. We knew it would take time. We knew it would take effort and cordination. We accepted this. What we
didn't expect, the Uniforms would cost 8000 Fleet Credits and 16000 Dilithium.
Speaking from my own personal perspective, the cost didn't really bother me. I had more than enough Fleet Credits and Dilithium stocked. Really didn't invest too much thought into it. Until, a new member joined my fleet.
A discussion started several days later about using the Odyssey Uniforms as the fleet uniform. Since this was our goal originally, I was thrilled to hear support from the membershp. As I was about to make it official and design the uniform, our new recruit voiced her opinion.
Since she was new to the fleet and new to the game in general, she wouldn't have an easy method of farming Dilithium and Fleet Marks. She couldn't devote much time into the game on a daily basis to get the necessary requirements. Which is when I started to question, why? Why is there a cost on the uniforms?
Prior to season 6, dilithium wasn't as valuable as it is now. Most players back then used it for Cryptic Points, now known as Zen. So for Season 6, I can see how important it was to make this resource more valuable.
Still it didn't answer my question on why is there a cost on the uniforms? Considering the time and effort fleets put forward to acquire them.
Upgrade Starbase I- 1080 Fleet Marks
- 64000 Dilithium
- 48 Common Non-Civilian Duty Officers
- 825 Industrial Energy Cells
- 400 Self Sealing Stem Bolts
- 25 Particle Traces
- 20 Hours
Upgrade Starbase II- 3600 Fleet Marks
- 216000 Dilithium
- 180 Common Non-Civilian Duty Officers
- 3000 Industrial Energy Cells
- 1625 Self Sealing Stem Bolts
- 50 Particle Traces
- 4 Days
Upgrade Starbase III
- 10800 Fleet Marks
- 648000 Dilithium
- 240 Uncommon Non-Civilian Duty Officers
- 9000 Industrial Energy Cells
- 5500 Self Sealing Stem Bolts
- 100 Particle Traces
- 7 days
Personal Tailor- 2700 Fleet Marks
- 160000 Dilithium
- 15 Very Rare Civilian Duty Officers
- 180000 Expertise
- 2500 Entertainment Provisions
- 20 Hours
Total- 18180 Fleet Marks
- 1088000 Dilithium
- 180000 Expertise
- 15 Very Rare Civilian Duty Officers
- 228 Common Duty Officers
- 240 Uncommon Duty Officers
- 2500 Entertainment Provisions
- 12825 Industrial Energy Cells
- 7525 Self Sealing Stem Bolts
- 175 Particle Traces
- 12 Days, 16 Hours
There is no way to calculate what other fleets have spent on the Tactical, Engineering and Science reports, as well no way to calculate the actual time it took to unlock each project, so I left them out. However, I feel the figures listed above proves my point. There shouldn't be a need for a steep price on the fleet uniforms.
To paraphrase Daniel Stahl from Priority One's Podcast #97, "
Season 6, will establish the baseline of all fleets, and to bring players together." I believe in Mr. Stahl's words. Season 6 really did bring fleets and players together to work on a common goal.
As a player and fleet leader, I am asking for the game developers to take one more step to solidify that baseline. By reducing the cost on the uniforms. Not only will this make it easier for newer players, it will enable fleets to fully utilize this feature.
Comments
This seems like an unnecessarily restrictive and onerous requirement on fleet members, to have to pay 8k credits and 16k dilithium to purchase a uniform to match their fleet.
I understand the use of the Odyssey uniform is optional, just as any other uniform is optional, but if the goal here is to bring people together, it needs to be accessible for all players, even at early stages of the game.
A uniform might seem like a small thing, but it really can unite fleetmates in an important way - it makes them feel like they are one functional unit, when they play together. Putting such a huge price tag on uniforms makes them too difficult to attain for the vast majority of players, and thus they just won't even bother, completely defeating the purpose of it all.
And also..
With the Embassy and new personal holdings coming out in Season 7, I would put a request that dil costs associated with any holding purchases be re-visited. Some of the items in these shops cost more than a single toon's daily refining limit. But now TWO new sinks for dilithium are being introduced it seems.. I think the items in the shops should have their fleet credit costs increased, and dilithium costs eliminated. Or at least raise the daily refining limit.. dilithium is only getting valued more, and with this new stuff being introduced in S7, it's just going to devalue Zen even more if some kind of balance is not made.
But to put a 16,000 Dilithium price tag on a uniform, optional though it may be, after the mind-boggling amount paid just to access the Fleet Personal Tailor?
Too much.
the cost is pretty silly.
Don't expect this to change significantly in our favor as Zen sales make a significant portion of the bottom line.
Look at it another way. By doing this they sell the same amount of Zen as before but without the added expense of actually producing content for the store.
Fair for us? Not even a little bit. Good for the company? You bet. TONS of money to be made until we get sick of it and find other games to play.
It's simple. Spend all your farmed dilithium for overpriced items.
Without enough dilithium you foced to buy Zen for all other items. ;-)
I would prefer more interesting items in the store and a dilithium free fleet management.
A last-ditch third cost of the uniform itself after a fleet has paid the hefty fees to get first to the appropriate tier, then the bribery to convince the tailor to open her wares, may be a bit much. The only saving grace probably exists in the devs' intention to make it a long-term thing where people can't just throw down credits and take care of it immediately but what they've possibly succeeded in doing is frustrating lower levels that have no easy means of making the cost.
My own fleet has not reached III yet. I have yet to see how they will react to the tailor, so I have no direct experience with this. But, as someone who would be able to afford a fleet uniform, I can still say that it irks me to be charged a third time just to wear an item when there's a huge variety of costumes I already wear. And like.
On that note: Just how customizable is the Fleet Uniform anyway? Its quality? Is it worth its price in cost? I've felt the KDF fleet uniform looked superior in style and form to the crisp, bland, cadet-like Starfleet one modeled in their coming attractions trailer.
The Artist Formerly Known As Nikotaka ][ Join Date: Jan 2010
"Can anyone remember when we used to be explorers...?"
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If the cost is too high for you, don't buy it. Getting to the tailor isn't really a good end goal for starbase development; it's a nice bonus along the way for large fleets that are doing every project.
16000 dlithium is 2 days. 48 hours. Less than most of the Starbase upgrades take to complete and not too much longer than some of the Doff missions. It's the equivalent of running 8 Elite STF's, which if they run smoothly is no more than 4 active hours out of that 48 - and there are quicker and less fun ways to get dilithium out there. And if you've unlocked the tailor on the base, you are probably already a fleet credit millionaire.
Like I say, I agree that there shouldn't be a cost, it is ridiculous for the reasons you say, but I also don't see why it merits a forum complaint as in all honesty, it's not difficult or particularly time consuming. I'm just happy they made it cost in a currency I can actually earn in-game and not Zen. An increase in the dilithium cap to 12k or so would be nice too..
it is one thing to ask for a big amount of fleet credits (I know, it is not that much, but considering that you have to use two currencies), but to ask an even higher amount of much much more valuable other currency? ridiculous.
especially since you have to dump your dilithium into the fleet upgrades too. make things more expensive for fleet credits, and stop asking for dilithium.
I mean in the case of the uniform the dili is not much, it is one days worth (for a F2Per, with two characters shuch as myself - right I should not complain ), but when it comes to fleet weaponry...
make the uniform for example 32000 fleet credits. that would ensure that you contribute to the fleet, and it feels more accessible, because you do not dump a currency for a uniform, that you could spend on many other, more useful things
10k DPS Vesta threads: 1; 2
I also want to hit back at the notion that anyone who has been playing for long enough is a "fleet millionaire" by this point. I have been playing for nearly a year and have at no point had more than 5 million ECs in my account. It's because there are really only two ways to get ECs in any significant quantity in the game: Tour the Galaxy and the Exchange. I do Tour the Galaxy every chance I get but it only yields 1.4 million ECs in a sitting. I have sold some things on the Exchange too, but on the whole there are only three ways to make a significant amount of ECs there, none of which are particularly interesting to me. (I would rather use my lock box keys than sell them, I would rather do the DOFF assignments to trade up my DOFFs to see if I can get better ones than sell them, and I hate the crafting system so much that I haven't gone back to Memory Alpha since I was a Lieutenant.) I also spend my credits when I have them, mostly on lock box keys and DOFFs, because dilithium is a way more important currency.
I think that one of two things happened when the Devs created the Fleet system. They have said time and time again that they did an extensive study of existing fleets and the sizes and activity levels of those fleets in determining the cost of things within the system. What I think happened though is that they either only looked at how many people are in the average fleet and assumed that they'd all end up contributing to the fleet or they way overestimated the number of people who have actually ended up contributing. I was in a fleet and left it for two big reasons, the primary one being that the founder was rude and dictatorial toward members, and the secondary being that, in a fleet of 150 people, about 30 of us were actively contributing. And of those 30, I was one of only about six or seven that was contributing any appreciable amount of resources. Beyond the fact that if I'm going to be primarily responsible for growing a starbase, I want it to be with people who are respectful of one another, my point is this: the endgame sinks are already huge and they only seem to be getting bigger. Maybe a break for something as simple and purely aesthetic as fleet uniforms could be an acceptable option for the Devs. For my money (and I do mean literally, since I pay to play), I'd rather see the focus of things to sink currency into directed at playable content.
Fleet Credits are overshadowed by the vital need for dilithium when making purchases. Buying most items comes off as 'This thing costs DILITHIUM! ...Oh and some thing called Fleet Credits, I have a billion of those..'
Dilithium is harder to come by the lower your rank, but fleet bases are supposed to have items available to all ranks, no? If possible, why not eliminate the dilithium requirement but increase the Fleet Credit cost to something considerate? Many of us are swimming in FCr but pinching every dilithium grain we have, soon to be looking with a doctor's triage eye towards reputation, embassies, and fleet starbases as to what starving little bird gets the crumbs next. Why not spare the things we earn from the dilithium we spent to unlock them?
Items that simply cost fleet credits seem, to my layman's eye, to be more likely to promote contribution to fleet projects to make the FCr (since you cannot make dilithium from projects) in order to afford the items that cost it. And that way it gets lower ranks into the pool easier than if they had to first acquire a fat load of refined dil from their limited sources.
This will never happen; I am pessimistic there and assume that Cryptic probably had that mapped out before discarding the idea for their own reasons. But it just seems more honorable of the new currency that is Fleet Credits which is feeling right now only a step up from GPL.
The Artist Formerly Known As Nikotaka ][ Join Date: Jan 2010
"Can anyone remember when we used to be explorers...?"
it is rediculous that we cant use fleet uniforms.....as a fleet uniform...........
join date: Jan. 2012
Totally cede this to you. I guess I missed it the first go around.
As the transaction for fleet uniforms at least sounds identical to that of fleet store requisitions, I would assume you could do that...
...which further distorts the meaning behind 'Fleet Uniform' and suggests it should be more of a 'Designer Outfit for the Enterprising Officer'. Har. But then there're probably fleets out there that would let you.
The Artist Formerly Known As Nikotaka ][ Join Date: Jan 2010
"Can anyone remember when we used to be explorers...?"
First off, I would like to thank everyone who has agreed and understood my views. For those who saw this as a complaint of not being able to get the uniform; It's not about that. It's a real drag, even on those of us who have mains to acquire the uniforms for our own alts. I wouldn't mind if they were account bound.
Though, I wouldn't mind having the cost reduced. It would help out the casual players acquire them sooner. As it stands, my fleet is undecided on an official look. Since we can't exactly use the new uniforms without making the casual players feel left out. I have even considered making two official uniforms, even then, it's still leaving players left out. Some may even feel singled out, not as 'good' as those with the Ody uniforms.
In some way, I feel this is some sick twist on Cryptics part. They made us give up x amount of hours and resources for the ability to unlock the uniforms. Only, to tell us later that fleets cannot fully utilize them as we originally thought we would.
All you really need to do is have someone that's in a fleet that has the Tailor invite you to their Starbase, you can buy the fleet uniform from their tailor regardless if you're in their fleet or not.
That would require somebody willing to let me do that... so far I havent found anyone...
I wouldn't mind it. I mean, it's just a uniform, not something more massive like a fleet ship. It takes no provisions or anything.
Managed to find someone tonight, by asking in zone chat for a few minutes. But I'll keep you in mind... I have 2 alts that will need to get it eventually... and its listed as basic... so I can only imagine there will be another one.
Hey, mimey whats your ingame name, Im looking to grab the uniforms on another couple characters.