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craigthemaster
Member Posts: 74 Arc User
Im a little miffed to say the least. Firstly we were all happy with the old way getting drops data chips and what not the old way to get the MK XII MACO gear and we were told that this "new" way of a reputation would be for one, Quincker, Easyer and less of a grind. All I have done since they swaped it over is spray bugs STF's and fill up reputations with yet MORE currancies that have appeared in game. I have just reached Teir 5 and started filling some of the Romulan stuff and was suprised to see it only has a 2 minute cool down on he project but you don't get items from this you get accsess to a store where each item cost anything from 20.000 Dilithium upwards. What an absalut insult and joke to those of us that have played the game for so long and done nothing but constantly get punished with the constant grind of gear and time comnsuming up hill struggle to get the top level Gear. I really feel sorry for new players starting, who want to do PvP and get involved with the new Academy starting on the 29th of december. They can't get decent gear. Sheilds or anything and will have to constantly grind for about three months just to get to tear 5. Then constantly grind another few months just to get a half decent build. So by the time Star trek online is celibrating its 4th birthday next year you new starters should have atleast two decent forward guns and a turret or two. For the new MK XII Romulan sheilds you need 500 marks a bunch off dilithium 18.000 to be exact. (JOKE) So what more lies are in store for future releases. Are they ever going to do anything with the PvP areaner and culture. Probably not. It seems all the game is at the miniute is lock box hell and PAY TO PLAY OR WIN. What are your thoughts...
Post edited by craigthemaster on
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Are you on crack??
NOBODY was happy with the old system, or were you simply not aware of the HUNDREDS of threads where we all denounced how unfair random tech drops were when thousands of Elite STF runs will still not yield a full set while at the same time a lucky first timer would max out.
In the new system, you know what you're getting and how long it will take. Simple as that.
The solution should have been put the XII gear in the store for a very large amount of chips (100+ chips each piece). Or perhaps some sort of crafting element to it. (50 chips, X samples, Y samples, Z unrep material).
The rep system is ok, but the policy of having to re-grind from scratch, with little to no acknowledgment of previous effort has turned me off to the game. I haven't STF'd in four days, I'm just burnt out totally on running the same eight raids over and over and over and over some more.
Even if I come back and finish Tier Five, all I've done is unlock store where I have to grind hours across days to earn things... it's just not worth playing anymore.
The 8,000 a day cap sucks. The utter lack of "easy" sources of dilth sucks.
My suggestions to "fix" the system:
1) Eliminate the refine-cap. If I get lucky and end up with 10,000 dilth a day I should be able to process all of it.
2) Reduce the cost of everything globally in the unlock stores. We already toiled to get permission to buy these items, I should NOT have to grind another 54,000 dilth just to get the gun I want. At most AT MOST items should cost 3 days of max-refine. 24,000 should be the HIGH END price.
3) More sources for dilth. How about a vender that turns unwanted items into 100 dilth? A dilth auction-house where people can post XI and XII items for dilth. A box of 1024 dilth should be mission reward option for each and every mission, every day. There is no incentive to go back and play FEs and other plot missions once you have all the gear across all your toons.
The Romulus weapons are a joke really makes me lol when someone fires a volley of gimmick green torpedoes at my plasma resistant adaptive shield array which just about everyone runs these days for stf purposes
As for this "you can easily get mk12 stuff with two stfs a day" your having a laugh aren't you isn't it about 600 marks just for one item plus however many thousand dilithium
But can't complain too much as nothin will change for the better they'll just add more new content and forget about the severely bugged in places content that already exists or they could go one better In the new year and buff the jemhadar pay2win machine even more just for a right ol' laugh
My Sci toon need more than 200 STF's to achieve only one set of Shields, Deflector and Engines. I ended up buying fleet weapons as I could not seem to get anything better than rare. Don't get me started on the ground sets.
The old system was at best random and inconsistent. From a players standpoint, it was the quintessential grind.
Fast forward to today, and I am nearly complete Reputation T5 for both Romulan and OMEGA. The process has not been a grind beyond the troubles and cost resets of the first few weeks. My only complaint is that 2 of my toons actually lack the experience necessary to complete 2 assignments per day. My other two toons have more than 5 million unused expertise.
Some of the early new consumables and and consoles are 'not bad'. Many of the T4 elements are 'very good to excellent'. The passive bonuses are 'alot of fun', and I'm looking forward to building a Romulan 'all plasma' vessel at some point. Given the damage I have seen a few deal in PvE, I am certainly intrigued.
The new reputation system is fun, offers opportunities to see new micro factions implemented AND add consistency to the development of characters. What more could you want?
I imagine I did over 100 STF's and never got a complete set of Omega. I never even tried to get MACO.
I hate the new system because it is still a grind. There are too many grinds in this game. You grind for your starbase, your grind for your embassy, your grind for reputation... They are all trash compactor mechanics where you log in, feed the compactor some valuable items, log out, and then rinse and repeat 100 times.
All I want is some set items. You shouldn't have to punish yourself this hard to get them!
Next "feature" to be released by Cryptic: Mail order blood donations! Send us your blood, get free items!
I don't get on and play all that much any more simply because this game has gone from being a great way to spend time to being almost like a second job because i'm stuck doing content i don't really like (usually at inconvenient times for bonus') for little to no pay off at the end. Grinding for a reward isn't so bad, but Cryptic has made it grinding to the level requirement needed to grind to unlock the item in a store you have to grind to pay for with the possibility to grind to unlock to upgrade it later on.
It just seems like an excessive way of saying we've given up on new content or game improvements because this was just easier.
P.S. I know it sounds a little harsh and i'm sorry for that, but this game really seems to have lost that great Star Trek feel only to become 'Generic Space Game the MMO'
New system grind, but not as much as you did before and you don't have to do the same STF over and over again. You get Dilithium each run you do, so giving some of that back is not that big of a deal.
I like the new system compared to the previous.
to get all ground sets you will need:
8250 Marks
135.000 dilithium
Borg Pro's 90
this is just for ground all ground sets mk X, XI, MK XII
for all space sets MK XII, MK XI, MK X
417.000 Dilithium
16.500 Marks
90 Borg Pro's
For the borg Sets MK X, MK XI, MK XII and the special torp and cutting beams along with anything else you need:
7.575 marks
238.500 dilithium
15 Borg pro's
for all store unlocks or consumables you need
1.350 marks
so in total you will need.
790.500 Dilithium
33.675 marks
195 borg pro's
This is just for the Omega Reputation i have not taken into account the Romulan Grind yet. But for those who think that the old way was unfair or worse these type of numbers kind of say otherwise. Now consider you have two toons or three. I myself have 14. But only 4 are main toons.....
Try to work out how many STF's it takes to get this much and then try to say its better. We never spent Dilithium on our MACO gear before hand. We got the drops that we converted into Dilithium. now were grinding it to spend it on the vry stuff were grinding for. Its one bit CON.
The fact that you've been able to break down exactly what's required not to mention your progress is nicely tracked means I prefer the new way. I never even bothered with STFs after getting the Borg space set previously because I've got no patience for random drops.
Also your calculations assume that you get every single item/set, I (and probably a lot of people) skipped Mk X entirely and got only 1 Mk XI ground set for the instant remodulation while I save up for the Mk XII sets.
If you're someone who has to have every item the moment it comes out then yea sorry, it sucks, but I'm happy to keep working on it gradually getting the gear I want, so it's all good.
Just my opinion.
1. Here's a game with actual grind I'd like you to try out. Questing falls by the wayside pretty quickly and you're just killing X number of mobs. Pretty looking game, mind you.
What you should have typed was "Tagging Epohhs is repetitive and boring."
2. "Pay to win" might apply to PvP. But this isn't a PvP game nor should the development be focused in that direction. What you mean to say is "Pay to kill Borg NPCs five seconds faster." and I'm quite fine with letting people spend their money to do that.
3. What minor grind there is is for vanity items and gear you don't need outside of specific situations. It's your choice to stick your hand in that particular cookie jar, but you're not forced into it by the game.
I like having goals to accomplish and with the reputation system you actually have attainable goals. The previous system was entirely random.
2. Earning marks is stupid easy. The required marks can be earned in under 100 STF runs for an entire MACO set... vs 1000's with no results under the old system due to a bad RNG. I wasn't one of the dopes that traded all their edc's and what not for DL even though it was a bad deal, so I barely had to run STFs anyway. With the winter event and the Tau Dewa sector block, I am sitting on 2000 Romulan marks and I don't know what I want to do with them....
3. Earning the EC to buy the other stuff is flat out disgustingly easy. When playing the game on Elite... I stumble upon the required EC in the first hour of play.
4. Doing officer reports and "Battleship Royal Rumble" every 30 minutes makes me so rich and is so fun that it makes me want to puke......
There is no grind for the rep system. I never ever went to myself... "TRIBBLE I gotta sign on to do some stfs or my rep projects wont keep moving..." Just regular play earned my way through and I work 50 hour work weeks and have a baby to take care of.. It is clear that some just don't understand STO or the numbers, or would rather chat on Drozana with their left hand on the keyboard and their right hand elsewhere...
Exactly this, but this conflict will NEVER be resolved, because what pro-diceroll folks want is diametrically opposed to what pro-rep folks want.
Pro-Rep folks want to know what they're getting, when they're getting it, and how much it will cost. The rep system does this, and at that point the only quibble is over the exact price. For the record, I'm pro-Rep, but it is generally a load of TRIBBLE that I have to pay to unlock, then pay again to buy.
Pro-roll folks basically want to opportunity to luck out, regardless of whether or not this affects people other than themselves. They want to be the lucky first-timers that won the roll, or the person that opened a lockbox and got a Bug or whatever (though they're often the same folks that hypocritically complain about drop chances in lockboxes). They have time, and that's the only currency they want to pay, on the very small chance that they won't actually have to spend the time and get a windfall.
I don't like to sound accusatory, but Pro-Roll folks are basically being selfish, and the way gear works in STO works against the fairness of rolls. Why? Any drop in the game that's not a battery can make you money. As a free-to-play game, accumulating currencies is VERY important for advancement at the endgame. As a result, EVERYONE rolls need on EVERYTHING. The Need/Greed/Pass system and the etiquette that's built up around it is destroyed. It is nothing but a mad scramble for random chance.
I'm pro-Rep not because it makes it easier for me to get my sets (I lucked out pre-S7 on my Mk XI Borg and Maco sets). At the rate I make resources I'll be buying my Mk XIIs by STO's 6th Anniversary. Instead I'm pro-Rep but because it guarantees that EVERYONE will get their sets...eventually (including me). I've seen too many friends and guildmates go YEARS and never see the drop they want or need.
There's too much unhelpful randomness in the world as it is, we don't that much of it in our entertainments.
Another improvement would be to actually list what I am getting. The MACO stuff will display the item I'm getting with full details. The Romulan stuff on the other hand only says it will unlock MK (tier here) Purple Rifles. Which I unlocked only to find there are NO split beams!
Plus the whole fact you have to do projects to get to the Tier level, I get that, but then have to "claim" the tier reward, then pay to unlock each weapon type, then pay who knows what for the actual item in the store, as it doesn't even tell you how much they will cost after you've spend the resource just to View it in the store tab.
Very Rare Romulan Plasma Beam Arrays Mk XII... ok what are they? What are the stats, the procs? Can I get a better one in the Exchange for a few million EC instead. No way to tell ATM. It just seems as a big rushed joke. I'll admin I have been only playing for 3 months now so perhaps this is the best of the best way of doing things in comparison to the past.
I agree the new system needs some fine tuning (things cost a little too much, etc...) but I take the new system over the old anytime.
If I run 400 STFs on the new system I will receive at least:
75 Omega marks (yes, I always get the optional. Just don't pug!) = 30.000 total
960 dil x 400 = 384000 dil
1 BNP x 400 = 400 BNP (there are missions where I get 6 or 11)
With these rewards I can get pretty much what I need (I dont need every set on its X, XI and XII variants, only XII).
Member since Jan 24th 2010 (more or less)
Career Officer
We could have a General reputation system that levels with your Captain. Starting at lvl1 you get LVL 1 gear and so on until LvL 50 where you can unlock MK XII purple gear. But instead of using E?C to buy them it will charge us a mixture Od Dilithium E/C latinum Omega marks Romulan marks. This way we can be 100% sure to get that MK XII purple Phaser rely you been wanting for the last year or so and the Neutronium Alloy MK XII for just as long. Is this not just as important as the MACO gear. Is it not worth just as much and needed also. This way we can be sure we get what we want with no risk of CHANCE or randomnisity ingame. This way we can all out fit our ships get the same gear same build and be all the same. Peolpe want things to easily with hardly any work. The random drop was more of a suprise and felt you worked with something of reward at the end. We still knew how to geth the Gear. What STF's to run to get what. Was a case of just doing it. They could easily have increased the drop rate and took into account who had the gear already and who didnt.
Btw the real problem here is that aside the stf there is no better pve that demand and give better gear, in my opinion this game need stf designed for 20 ships.
I personally feel like they can cut out the store part of it, at least for the STF sets. They are individual pieces of equipment and I think it makes more sense realistically for you to requisition a piece, submit your supplies, and then wait the time to get the piece without having to have the whole store thing in there. Besides, how many copies of the set piece are you going to need to justify having to unlock it in a STORE first?
I created a new character and am now VA since about a week and I'm sorry to say but I doubt I'll be here very much longer. The problem is that this game has little to no activities that feel even remotely "rewarding". I can grind the same 4-5 boring STFs until my fingers begin to rot (or I gouge my eyes out from boredom, whichever comes sooner) and then I don't even get anything except the right to grind some more.
What I also find simply terrible are the 20h time sinks for the reputation grind missions... What is the purpose of that time sink exactly? If you (Cryptic) are worried that people will get reputation too fast then you could at least have used your brains (or better yet: simply copied WOW) and give players the option to grind a maximum of, say, 15'000 reputation per week and faction (but without boring, pointless time sinks).
It's like they are trying to force people to play the game over the period of a few months (like many developers do in subscription-based games because that's how they earn their money) but in STO it would be far better to simply allow people to blast through the game as fast as possible, buy their iWin buttons and then quit.
I have no idea why ANYONE in their right mind would design a pay2win game without a subscription and then attempt to force people to spread out their "enjoyment" of the game over a few months instead of simply being able to blast through it in a few days (like a normal single player game). Because let's be honest: there is simply not enough content to keep a normal gamer entertained for more then a few days.
Isn't that exactly the intended purpose of a front-loaded payment system like STO has? So the developers don't actually have to provide any long-term goals because they don't have to care if people quit quickly, as long as they spent some cash on the store?
Anyway... The thought that I have to grind the same 5 boring STF for the badges and then waste my time by logging in every 20h for the next few months makes me puke. I'm never gonna do that. The game just isn't worth that sort of effort.
Just look at how the loot and reputation system works in WOW. Sure, that's not great either but compared to this utter fail system it wins hands down and makes STO seem like a cheap student project by comparison.
So in conclusion: If you want to keep me hooked to STO long enough so I might actually consider dropping any money on your (horrendously overpriced) store then remove all time sinks and accept that this is not a game that offers any long-term motivation. Better to remove all gating and time sinks and milk the customers more quickly. You'll earn more money and the players will not have to grind (and then, once they're bored they'll move on to other games but you don't have to care because you already got their cash).
This system makes no sense for a cash-shop-driven game. You don't want to keep people here, do you? You want them in McDonalds mode: come in, buy burgers, eat, leave.