Definitely have to agree with a lot of this thread so far. Even back when they launched the Rep system, people were saying that this was just another grind, a shiny carrot on a long boring stick instead of any real worthwhile content or level increases. It's ridiculous having to grind one, let alone three, let alone three at once for Romulans or new players. It wreaks of shortsightedness as well as poor planning due to the fact that once you have what you want (a few passives, an active, and a few items) it becomes completely useless as do the missions that grant those specific marks. Seriously though, once i pick up a few items i swear off those missions (minus STF's) because they're not needed and after that much grinding they're not fun anymore, and shouldn't this game be more about fun than Grindy grindy grind?
Most people didn't like Nukara missions in the first place for being too grindy, so adding a rep system to it just made it even worse not to mention the fact that it seems entirely wasteful to buy anything before finishing all 5 levels. Grinding to unlock something is a pain, so grinding to unlock something only to grind more for the higher version later on seems ridiculous. Im some cases it just seems like the rep systems are there to make you play terrible content rather than just improving the content and rewards in the first place (fleet actions and Nukara missions this means you). It's bad enough having to grind but don't make us do it on content that we avoided in the first place.
What scare me though is the possibility of new rep systems coming down the pipeline, like a possible crafting reputation. Crafting sucks. I'm sorry but it's true, it sucked from the get go, so when they added a dilithium cost too it, it sucked even harder. If they added a rep system to crafting as it is now people would be kind of upset. As it is, i can buy better items on the Exchange for a lot cheaper than i could craft them, which really just defeats the purpose of crafting at all. To be honest i wasn't really fond of the Cardassian missions or the Dominion missions, so while certain items from them would be fun to have, the grind for them would be horrendously boring. Same with a Terran empire rep.
Why not add a mark to each enemy you defeat, so you can accumulate them faster for each rep you have, regardless of what you're doing? If i'm fighting the borg, i'm getting a mark for each drone i kill, or so many for each probe or what not based on difficulty?
Well, if history applies to anything, the fifth option seems the most likely solution Cryptic will go with.
Though others may argue that it would feel odd fighting Borg in STFs to get gear from New Romulus.....
thats true , it would feel wierd getting new romulus stuff with tokens earned from fighting the borg , but ....
WHAT CAN YOU DO WHEN HALF THE NEW ROMULUS DAILIES SECTOR PATROLS ETC DONT EVEN WORK PROPERLY ?
the dam last wave doesnt spawn in several sectors , i am SICK of wasting my time , even if it is only 3 minutes a time , trying to complete a mission for rep rewards then not getting anything , i am fairly new to this , i dont mind having to work for the rep , but
I WANT THE MISSIONS TO FINISH AND I WANT MY REWARD FOR MY TIME
i am sooo angry at the minute i am off to play something else , i may come back if and when things are fixed , but seeing how much maintenance is happening lately , and how little is being fixed ....
I THINK THIS GAME IS DYING ... WHICH SUCKS ..... BIG TIME .....
i have found some really nice people to play the game with and explore the top end t5 starbase stuff etc , but whats the point in going all out and trying to get rep stuff when the missions dont work properly..... more bugs on this than in SW:TOR and that was released as ONE BIG BUG !!!!!!
i hope to get an email from a friend to tell me that things have been fixed , but i doubt i will, ESPECIALLY as the devs dont read this kind of post , they barely read through the threads that have over 100 pages of people having the same problem , all the while denying there is even a problem most of the time ....
ONE MORE VERY UNHAPPY GAMER LEAVING THIS TITLE ........ WOULD THE LAST ONE OUT PLEASE TURN OFF THE LIGHTS
Why not add a mark to each enemy you defeat, so you can accumulate them faster for each rep you have, regardless of what you're doing? If i'm fighting the borg, i'm getting a mark for each drone i kill, or so many for each probe or what not based on difficulty?
This, or something like this, would make a heck of a lot of sense. At the very least, every encounter with the Borg should give Omegas, every mission against the Tal Shiar should reward Roms, etc.
The EP mentioned Rep and Alts in a recent interview and suggested that Cryptic would prefer to address making the Rep grind less burdensome than make Rep account bound.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Now if you could start accumulating Reputation around level 30-40 on the other hand, you could be making progress while you're doing all of the things you'd be doing to get to level 50.
By the time you get to level 50, you ought to have made some progress in every Reputation and made Tier 1-2 in at least one of them.
This is a very good idea and not just because I also feel this way.
Most other MMOs have you gain reputation as you do missions. The idea of you getting a point of rep each time you, say, blow up a Tactical Cube in Beta Ursae, is also very good.
1. At it's essence, it's just a mechanic made to waste time.
This is true of every reputation in most mmo's. Look at eve, you have to mission for a particular npc corp to get enough tags/points to buy items, and gain with individual mission givers. In wow you have to do the same with raid type reputation systems. STO's big issue imo is the lack of being able to progress OUTSIDE the static 20h turnins...other than hoarding marks, you gain ZERO progress, no matter how much or little you play. THATS what needs to be addressed.
2. It's repetition incarnate.
I've done so many stf's...and since i team with fleet mates/friends who are either learning or on the grind themselves, thats not an issue. What would be nice is say a discount once you reach t5 rep on some items, especially consumables.
3. It makes it hard to take a break..... .......and it makes it even harder to come back.
This is true, depending on the pain in the TRIBBLE factor associated with said reputations. MMO's will always have people who float, hell i do...you get tired of it, you leave, you come back...its part of mmo's for alot of people, regardless of reputations.
Now, I'm not saying we should get rid of reputation. That would be a waste. But we have to accept that the short term benefits have run their course, and from here on out, we are only going to see the downsides. Simply put, Reputation is bad for longevity.
But what can we do about it? Well there are several things:
1. Better integration of the foundry.
The major problem with this is possible abuse. As much as i would like to see rep rewards in the foundry, the oversight as it is on existing content is very limited. Add in the possible problems rep in foundry would cause...meh, no thanks.
2. Territory Control.
pvp...for a pve reputation system...
no, just no.
3. Ship interiors!
So back to basically the foundry issue, since this content would pretty much need to be formed there.
4. Account bound reputation.
Now this i can totally agree with, however it shouldn't be just "unlock on 1, free for all". It should be a vastly shortened progression on alts, say 1/3 or half the time/marks needed to complete the tiers.
5. One mark to rule them all.
This would basically eliminate the desire to do different events. On 1 hand, some of the existing changes made it so you have a choice in marks.....on another hand all people do now is the shortest route to a goal. Look at colony invasion. EVERY mark event there would be on average 20-40 people running it...now your lucky to see 5-10. I would rather see a larger variety in existing events for marks, and the addition of more ground hards for nakura...hell more nakura events/mark rewards period...that grind is HORRID as it is.
One thing we're failing or refusing to take into consideration.
There are no 'epic' level toons in sto.
We all hit 50 relatively quickly and all that is left to grind is EC Dil and Reputation, perhaps the starbase grind.
Past that, there is no difference between a beta vet and a 3 month vet.
There couldn't possibly be. aside from ingame wealth.
'n even then, visa mastercard is always a valid shortcut.
The rep system may be the start of an avenue towards that end.
It would make sense in the context of 'reputation'
What if tomorrow we logged in and there were 10 more reputation grinds.
What if it was entirely IMPOSSIBLE to grind your multiple toons in all of them in any "reasonable" amount of time.
What if you were FORCED to choose. In so doing, customizing your character to something that is more unique in sto
This is the elephant in the room, not just one more grind, many more grinds.
There may be a time when we're forced to realize that our different characters may NOT be able to "Max Out" in every available area.
This to me, seems like a good thing.
Our 'main' would actually become our 'main' again.
oh, and DOFF Missions for rep marks would be freaking awesome.
i started my account in beta and came back when it whent ftp so i been here a while and i can honestly say i wont be doing the rep grind on any of my other toons save my romie on my main account it's way to boring and way to costly in time ec and dilli nor will i be buying any fleet items any time soon for the same reason sorry to all those who wanna rage and say but it's so easy but i have a life out side sto and i have kids that are more entertaining
then sitting here grinding for rep all day every day i come in game long enough to do a bit of grinding on my romie set my rep up for training then im off again there just isn't any thing intersting in game except on the ocasion when i switch over to my fed toon and run with the fleet but honestly kdf side is severly limited on ways to gain rep do to an over population of the playerbase going fed
Contrary to design intentions, I've been playing way less time than before (barring Romulan launch spike, b/c of really nice story content). Previously, I progressed roughly evenly across 8 characters, spending some time on whichever I felt like, with one of them slightly ahead of the others.
Now? I've completed T5 Romulan and Omega on 1 (mainly pvp-oriented) character and decided not to bother on any of the others, or on any new characters, really. Even for that one character I dread the Nukara rep, because it's just going to be slow going, and time-gated, at that. Might not do it, and stick to my current guns&gear.
Everyone is making some very valid points.
I use to have about four to five avatars. After going through the Omega Reputation system once, I made the decision to delete two of my avatars. One avatar has T5 Omega and T4 Romulus completed. Both of my other two avatars have T1 Omega done. I am going nowhere nears the Nukara reputation system.
If it was not for the 20 hour timers, I would try to make my way through the systems. Every time I see the 20 hour timer, I end up shutting the game down for days on end. Legacy of Romulus was good for the new missions, ships, and species; however, the endgame elements and missions do nothing to motivate me.
...and, that bring me to the conundrum behind the 'Bonus Marks Weekend Event'. While you may be able to accumulate a large amount of marks, the 20 hour cool down timers prevent you from achieving substantial progress. You only obtain three days worth of progress. Its similar to watching water boil.
I have other more important things to accomplish. Life stuff.
Suggestion to Cryptic:
(1) Make stf gear and weapons account bound.
(2) Reduce the 20 hour cool down timers to about two hours.
(3) Make species specific marks available in all associated missions such as: stfs, episodes, and events.
(4) Bring the daily dilithium cap up to between 9,000 to 10,000.
(5) Make more ways to get more expertise.
Tackling the reputation system with one avatar, while trying to help complete a fleet base, can become an uphill battle. Boredom takes over really quickly. Its game stopping.
I'm at that point where the game just isn't fun any more from all the grinding. My main has everything i wanted from the Rep and fleet systems, but the missions to grind for are pretty much the endgame content. I have over 100K of of fleet marks alone that aren't getting used i'm only accumulating more while helping to build the fleet. He's even mailing things to the alts just to help them earn some credits, but i'm still sitting on a huge stockpile of Fleet/Omega/Rom marks. It's the same problem we had with the Borg Marks Before the rep system. People are just building up too many and by the time Cryptic goes to change anything we're going to hear the same old argument of "well we'd like to do X, but some people just have way too much Y stored up". Like the original marks from season one, or Gold Pressed Latinum, or the old STF marks.
It's this exact situation that people were warning Cryptic about when they first announced rep. It's just another grind that eventually makes the game useless since you get so tired of the same missions over and over. Then once you're sick of it, you still have way too much of the currencies left to do anything with.
Making the rep systems account bound would be a huge relief in this incredibly short sighted system Cryptic has built. I would still have to play and earn the marks, i would still have to progress the characters through the systems, but my alts would be able to help the next one out with all their leftovers. They complain about how some people are stockpiling marks or credits or currencies, but then they only give us new ways to stockpile new currencies without actually fixing the problem in the first place.
Don't forget about starbase/embassy/mine fleet grind, another painful process that is truly geared towards huge fleets...Cryptic says 25, but that would be 25 super-active members.
The bigggest issue I have with the system is that I can't easily play multiple alts now, so I'm forced to focus on an ever smaller number of characters.
_________________________________________________ [Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth] [Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk] [D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
This, or something like this, would make a heck of a lot of sense. At the very least, every encounter with the Borg should give Omegas, every mission against the Tal Shiar should reward Roms, etc.
The EP mentioned Rep and Alts in a recent interview and suggested that Cryptic would prefer to address making the Rep grind less burdensome than make Rep account bound.
Sounds like a good idea.
But then again, I dont mind the reputation stuff. Got mark V omega and romulan on ten characters already.
You can do it, you just need to run like 2 estfs a day, and epoh tag your chars. Can be done in an hour or so.
Let us wear Swimsuits on Foundry maps or bridges please! I would pay zen for that.
Don't forget about starbase/embassy/mine fleet grind, another painful process that is truly geared towards huge fleets...Cryptic says 25, but that would be 25 super-active members.
According to the infographic linked above, "Star Trek: Online" has two million captains and 16,500 fleets. I am sure the number has changed, so I will consider it to be the lowest possible estimate.
What I do not understand is why Cryptic has created a system, which benefits an estimated 16,500 players out of 2 million. It is the most dumbest thing I have ever seen. Only a very tiny-tiny-tiny-tiny-tiny-tiny sliver of the population will own fleet bases.
If they reduced the resource requirements and cool down timers, across the reputation system and bases, I am willing to bet the fleet ownership population would skyrocket. Cryptic would have more than 16,500 happy fleet owners with bases.
:: My Pipe Dream One :: I would love to play through a fleet base system, which would allow five to twenty people to hit T5 within five to six weeks (two months tops). :: Pipe Dream One ::
:: My Pipe Dream Two :: I would also love to play through a reputation system, which would allow you to hit T5 within two weeks. :: Pipe Dream Two ::
uh, 16,500 fleets, not players, a fleet is up to 500 players.
You missed the point by a mile.
Only one individual can 'own' the fleet; therefore, 16,500 fleets are owned by 16,500 individual fleet owners. Even though a fleet may contain 500 members, only one individual has overall ownership. Fleets and fleet bases are not designed to have 500 owners. Only one account has absolute control over the fleet and fleet bases.
Out of two million "Star Trek: Online" players, only 16,500 individuals own fleets and fleet bases.
If you consider the fact that many fleet owners run more than one fleet, KDF and Fed, the number of actual fleet and fleet base owners could be extremely lower.
Note: Keep in mind that the infograph was based upon information released in January 2013.
Other words, the fleet base resource requirements only allow a minority of players to own fleet bases.
Only one individual can 'own' the fleet; therefore, 16,500 fleets are owned by 16,500 individual fleet owners. Even though a fleet may contain 500 members, only one individual has overall ownership. Fleets and fleet bases are not designed to have 500 owners. Only one account has absolute control over the fleet and fleet bases.
Out of two million "Star Trek: Online" players, only 16,500 individuals own fleets and fleet bases.
If you consider the fact that many fleet owners run more than one fleet, KDF and Fed, the number of actual fleet and fleet base owners could be extremely lower.
Note: Keep in mind that the infograph was based upon information released in January 2013.
Other words, the fleet base resource requirements only allow a minority of players to own fleet bases.
It's entirely possible for a fleet to have multiple people at the Fleet Leader rank... even all 500 of them if you're crazy enough to allow that kind of anarchy. Nor are fleets necessarily "owned" by a single account. Fleet membership is not on a per-account basis.
If all 16,500 fleets had 500 members, the number is over 8 million so the overall numbers sound right to me. (The average is probably well under 500 per fleet...)
Running a fleet is not all fun and games, either. If I had to do it over again and knowing what I know now, I'm not sure I would've decided to start one. A lot of those 2 million might think they'd enjoy running their own fleet, but many of those would find it a lot more work than they're willing to do.
Regarding the "pipe dreams":
I'd be happy if the fleet advancement system routinely allowed a 5-man fleet to build a T-5 Starbase in a year. And if a casual player (4-5 hours a week) could hit one T-5 reputation on one character in three months with only moderate effort.
But I'm not going to get my wish, either.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Basically you earn one type of reputation marks: reputation marks. Doing any and all reputation missions lets you contribute to any and all reputation types. It makes things simple, and it allows nothing to be outdated. That being said, this suggestion is the one open to the most abuse, and is most likely the one to be shied away from because of that. It could still work, but it might require more balancing than cryptic may want to do.
Then everyone would just grind Infected Space and Khitomer Ground ad infinitum because they award a **** ton of marks.
No one would do Romulan or Tholian content anymore.
Then everyone would just grind Infected Space and Khitomer Ground ad infinitum because they award a **** ton of marks.
No one would do Romulan or Tholian content anymore.
Not true. If there was 1 consolidated mark for the Rep system and all content that awarded marks awarded the same amount or time based amounts then people would simply play the content they want to play and not what they are forced to play for a specific mark.
This would also give Cryptic much more valid data on what content players are playing the most and by that which content players are liking the most.
The Rep system will be just like the Fleet system is, an endless grind that they will constantly add more to because they think that's the only end-game content that will keep people engaged until the next season release.
There are so many different gameplay dynamics they could add to end-game content that would be so much more liked than that constant grind of these systems. For example look at games like Freelancer, etc. just going around buying commodities from base 1 to sell for profit or potentially loss at base 2 kept people entertained long after the story content was done.
Or how about adding random encounters in the cluster sectors, that could even be tied to the rep system as an exploration one. Add in random combat, diplomatic situations, missions of mercy (even something as simple as diverting some asteroids from a planet's orbit, etc) and other things that are completely random and randomly encountered, truly exploring the unknown. Sure it would still be a grind if it was part of the Rep system, but the unknown nature of it every time you enter those sectors wouldn't make it feel like a grind.
Too often Dan and the devs say how complex STO is, and database wise it might be, but gameplay wise it's shallower than a kiddie pool.
Then everyone would just grind Infected Space and Khitomer Ground ad infinitum because they award a **** ton of marks.
No one would do Romulan or Tholian content anymore.
Unless they made Romulan and Tholian missions actually fun to play. There is way too much waiting around in VE and ANR. You have to wait for things to spawn, then you have to fly across the map to get to them, and then you are back to waiting, looking around for something else to kill. ISE is a go-to not only because of its rewards (which are admittedly MUCH better), but also because of its intensity and brevity - short and sweet, I guess you'd say. I shouldn't only want to do a mission to get marks. I should want to do it because I enjoy it. But so far, I find little joy in either of those missions. The least they could do is remove the ridiculous movie from VE and make the spawns Vault Weavers spawn as soon as the last ally is rescued. And for ANR, ensure that there are at least 3 concurrent spawns at all times by drastically reducing the time between spawns. Short and sweet, Cryptic. That's the ticket.
Disclaimer: there should also be lengthier matches, but more epic and more rewarding.
Add in random combat, diplomatic situations, missions of mercy (even something as simple as diverting some asteroids from a planet's orbit, etc) and other things that are completely random and randomly encountered, truly exploring the unknown.
I couldn't agree with this more. This is what STO is really missing. Other games have random attacks and other things popping up all the time. There's literally always something close by to get into. Often I find myself wanting to just jump into the middle of a battle (not wait out a queue or see if I can scratch some fleet mates together), but most of the times I enter a random encounter or Borg invasion, everything is dead or I'm warped out immediately. It's useless.
They should have random Starbase 24 level invasions in home systems. Cardassians attacking DS9. Tholians attacking the Sol system. Tal Shadar attacking New Romulus. Etc, etc. Give marks to all those who showed up and helped fight off the invaders. They could also do what you see in virtually every episode of Star Trek and give you a random hail from someone who either needs your help or wants to kick your ***. You either go help the person in need, or kick the everloving TRIBBLE out of your attacker - or ignore the hail and keep on truckin'. How cool would it be that if you lose the space battle, you have to go to your ship's interior and close a hull breach as you fight off the intruders.
They could do so much with this game to make it feel more epic, more fun, less grindy and time-restrained. As it is now, I only have to log in every 20 hours and earn some marks, set up my rep tasks, and after about two weeks, I'll have the best gear in the game (save a considerable dilithium shortage). At least when the game's best loot was a random drop in STFs, players had incentive to play those missions all the time, all hours of the day, possibly forever.
Then everyone would just grind Infected Space and Khitomer Ground ad infinitum because they award a **** ton of marks.
No one would do Romulan or Tholian content anymore.
There will be grinding o'plenty, regardless.
It doesn't matter if it's 2 STF's or all of them.
I was partial to Nukara myself.
NO to ARC RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
It's not just the marks, though (though the rarity of nukara marks for those not really into ground stuff is disheartening too).
It's the inescapable harshness of the timegating in this system that I find depressing too. I just finished T1 of the Nukara rep on my one reputation-running character (out of 11 total, go figure), and I feel a deep dread in my stomach that T1 was only a fraction of the entire time it takes, just because these projects take 20 hours each. I mean, really? 20 hours? I just don't feel like I'm really making any headway towards T5, for most of the stretch. I really think I won't progress beyond T2, just to be shot of the "obligation" of logging in on that character every day in order to make a tiny bit of progress.
Don't get me wrong, I love the LoR update, but the way the rep systems are set up is just not for me. It's not even that I need instant gratification - I'm one of the most patient people I know -, it's just that the required task (moving some sliders to input some random stuff, so a timer starts running so I can do it again tomorrow) is so senseless and random that I can't feel it is game content.
Warning: Ideas incoming
There should've been better ways to earn progression in rep tracks. Just of the top of my head (and echoing what other people said here), it would've made way more sense to just earn 15 points, or something, for every being or ship you defeat that's linked to that rep track.
Want to get T1 Nukara track? Blow up 1000 Tholians. Any Tholians, be they story-related, event related or heck, players flying Tholian vessels in PvP.
Want to get T3 Romulan track? Blow up x amount of opponent Romulans, either Tal Shiar, PvP or whatever. Want to get there faster or through another way? Do stuff for them (either through the Episodes, the Events or New Romulus.
Want to get T5 Omega track? Blow x (where x is a large number) of Borg to kingdom come. No matter whether they're in story content, STF's, random encounters or even the tutorial, potentially.
Maintain the bonus mark hour for queued stuff, and just let people get bonus marks to buy stuff with from the Rep stores and/or let people earn double points for blowing up their enemy of choice.
That way you progress in the rep tracks as you play, not 20 hours after you play.
Ok, as I started typing, I got into the thought process and now I think maybe I'm on to something here. What do you guys think?
Somehow, I haven't been registered long enough to start a new thread (been registered for well over a year, so...), so I'm reduced to replying to this thread.
I am becoming extremely frustrated with the leave penalty in STF missions. The Reputation Mark system requires an INSANE amount of marks to progress through, but I've bitten the bullet, and I'm constantly replaying the same 6 missions over and over and over again. Fine.
But I get into these sessions with 4 other people, and then 2-3 of them leave mid-game. Impossible to complete the mission with the 2-3 of us left. So, not only have we wasted 20-30 minutes trying to get through the mission with NOTHING to show for it, but the only way for us to leave the map is to also have to accept a time penalty on re-joining the PvE queue? Not fair.
I get that PvE is supposed to be co-op, but I'm tired of wasting my time because other people give up. This system needs to be tweaked, or I'm giving up on STO.
There really are a ton of problems with reputation. Just looking at all the things my Roms will have to do just to get ahead on the XP points needed makes me want to commit self harm. The disparity between Omega grinding and everything else is terrible in regards to rewards, variety, and challenge too.
I personally don't have much of a problem with the reputation system by itself. The only things I'd like are better mark rewards for New Romulus and Nukara, since you can get through Omega so easily. While it is a grind, I prefer a grind to the RNG luck-based system from the past, any day.
HOWEVER, the reputation system also kills the value of alts, since you need to grind reputation on every one of them separately. This means that players are more likely to stick to a single main for everything, which means they're less likely to try out different play styles. As a tac captain, why should I bother making an engineer or science captain, or even any alt, when I just need to grind reputation all over again? This ends up killing the value of every single C-store item that isn't account-wide and universally useful. A simple way to fix this is to make an "account bind on pickup" item requisition from each rep track that automatically increases rep in that faction, so my main can get one, toss it in the account bank, and then my alt gets rep without worrying about grinding. You can justify it in-game with "Character has contributed enough to the faction that he can make personnel recommendations" or something like that. Improving the value of alt accounts will improve the value of C-store items and result in more money for Cryptic, since more people will be willing to load up their alts.
I couldn't agree with this more. This is what STO is really missing. Other games have random attacks and other things popping up all the time. There's literally always something close by to get into. Often I find myself wanting to just jump into the middle of a battle (not wait out a queue or see if I can scratch some fleet mates together), but most of the times I enter a random encounter or Borg invasion, everything is dead or I'm warped out immediately. It's useless.
They should have random Starbase 24 level invasions in home systems. Cardassians attacking DS9. Tholians attacking the Sol system. Tal Shadar attacking New Romulus. Etc, etc. Give marks to all those who showed up and helped fight off the invaders. They could also do what you see in virtually every episode of Star Trek and give you a random hail from someone who either needs your help or wants to kick your ***. You either go help the person in need, or kick the everloving TRIBBLE out of your attacker - or ignore the hail and keep on truckin'. How cool would it be that if you lose the space battle, you have to go to your ship's interior and close a hull breach as you fight off the intruders.
They could do so much with this game to make it feel more epic, more fun, less grindy and time-restrained. As it is now, I only have to log in every 20 hours and earn some marks, set up my rep tasks, and after about two weeks, I'll have the best gear in the game (save a considerable dilithium shortage). At least when the game's best loot was a random drop in STFs, players had incentive to play those missions all the time, all hours of the day, possibly forever.
not bad idieas honestly though i like the missions i play them alot and some i even repeat alot i realy dont see the point in adding more rep systems to the game to further ruin sto it's already realy expencive if you want an efective fleet and the reputation system to get gear is just bad least cryptic could have done was make the xp gain for the rep tiers go up as you rise in rank instead the costs go up and xp stays the same gaining marks is pretty easy although extremely boring getting to lvl 50 is no challenge stf's no real challenge although fun to run with the right people but at lvl 50 most of the missions give no insentive to replay unless you farming MK XI gear for grinding mission reward gear should be increased to MK XII give the players options rather then the standerd 2 sided option of either play or don't play i always hated playing on servers that give you either play there way or not at all line
I really like the Rep systems. They're not terribly difficult, and they guarantee access to the items. As opposed to the old system, where I spent way too many hours playing elite STFs and got a grand total of one piece of any of the sets.
i ran stf alot with my fleet mates and even pugs elite and normal i completely fit out my ship in a week with give or take it was much easyier that way then how it is now i just wish cryptic and pwe would actualy think about what there doing rather then just throw some thing together like they did with this rep system my 1 y/o could have done better on it and so could i for that matter
One of the ways they can fix/improve this is creating a reputation token that is account bound, you contribute to reputation and gain a token that you can send to your alt. Use it and advance reputation.
You need to take into consideration that reputation grinding has a purpose of removing EC from the game, while it doesn't seem much you can imagine how much EC gets removed for every player that buys commodities every day.
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Most people didn't like Nukara missions in the first place for being too grindy, so adding a rep system to it just made it even worse not to mention the fact that it seems entirely wasteful to buy anything before finishing all 5 levels. Grinding to unlock something is a pain, so grinding to unlock something only to grind more for the higher version later on seems ridiculous. Im some cases it just seems like the rep systems are there to make you play terrible content rather than just improving the content and rewards in the first place (fleet actions and Nukara missions this means you). It's bad enough having to grind but don't make us do it on content that we avoided in the first place.
What scare me though is the possibility of new rep systems coming down the pipeline, like a possible crafting reputation. Crafting sucks. I'm sorry but it's true, it sucked from the get go, so when they added a dilithium cost too it, it sucked even harder. If they added a rep system to crafting as it is now people would be kind of upset. As it is, i can buy better items on the Exchange for a lot cheaper than i could craft them, which really just defeats the purpose of crafting at all. To be honest i wasn't really fond of the Cardassian missions or the Dominion missions, so while certain items from them would be fun to have, the grind for them would be horrendously boring. Same with a Terran empire rep.
Why not add a mark to each enemy you defeat, so you can accumulate them faster for each rep you have, regardless of what you're doing? If i'm fighting the borg, i'm getting a mark for each drone i kill, or so many for each probe or what not based on difficulty?
thats true , it would feel wierd getting new romulus stuff with tokens earned from fighting the borg , but ....
WHAT CAN YOU DO WHEN HALF THE NEW ROMULUS DAILIES SECTOR PATROLS ETC DONT EVEN WORK PROPERLY ?
the dam last wave doesnt spawn in several sectors , i am SICK of wasting my time , even if it is only 3 minutes a time , trying to complete a mission for rep rewards then not getting anything , i am fairly new to this , i dont mind having to work for the rep , but
I WANT THE MISSIONS TO FINISH AND I WANT MY REWARD FOR MY TIME
i am sooo angry at the minute i am off to play something else , i may come back if and when things are fixed , but seeing how much maintenance is happening lately , and how little is being fixed ....
I THINK THIS GAME IS DYING ... WHICH SUCKS ..... BIG TIME .....
i have found some really nice people to play the game with and explore the top end t5 starbase stuff etc , but whats the point in going all out and trying to get rep stuff when the missions dont work properly..... more bugs on this than in SW:TOR and that was released as ONE BIG BUG !!!!!!
i hope to get an email from a friend to tell me that things have been fixed , but i doubt i will, ESPECIALLY as the devs dont read this kind of post , they barely read through the threads that have over 100 pages of people having the same problem , all the while denying there is even a problem most of the time ....
ONE MORE VERY UNHAPPY GAMER LEAVING THIS TITLE ........ WOULD THE LAST ONE OUT PLEASE TURN OFF THE LIGHTS
This, or something like this, would make a heck of a lot of sense. At the very least, every encounter with the Borg should give Omegas, every mission against the Tal Shiar should reward Roms, etc.
The EP mentioned Rep and Alts in a recent interview and suggested that Cryptic would prefer to address making the Rep grind less burdensome than make Rep account bound.
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This is a very good idea and not just because I also feel this way.
Most other MMOs have you gain reputation as you do missions. The idea of you getting a point of rep each time you, say, blow up a Tactical Cube in Beta Ursae, is also very good.
This is true of every reputation in most mmo's. Look at eve, you have to mission for a particular npc corp to get enough tags/points to buy items, and gain with individual mission givers. In wow you have to do the same with raid type reputation systems. STO's big issue imo is the lack of being able to progress OUTSIDE the static 20h turnins...other than hoarding marks, you gain ZERO progress, no matter how much or little you play. THATS what needs to be addressed.
2. It's repetition incarnate.
I've done so many stf's...and since i team with fleet mates/friends who are either learning or on the grind themselves, thats not an issue. What would be nice is say a discount once you reach t5 rep on some items, especially consumables.
3. It makes it hard to take a break..... .......and it makes it even harder to come back.
This is true, depending on the pain in the TRIBBLE factor associated with said reputations. MMO's will always have people who float, hell i do...you get tired of it, you leave, you come back...its part of mmo's for alot of people, regardless of reputations.
Now, I'm not saying we should get rid of reputation. That would be a waste. But we have to accept that the short term benefits have run their course, and from here on out, we are only going to see the downsides. Simply put, Reputation is bad for longevity.
But what can we do about it? Well there are several things:
1. Better integration of the foundry.
The major problem with this is possible abuse. As much as i would like to see rep rewards in the foundry, the oversight as it is on existing content is very limited. Add in the possible problems rep in foundry would cause...meh, no thanks.
2. Territory Control.
pvp...for a pve reputation system...
no, just no.
3. Ship interiors!
So back to basically the foundry issue, since this content would pretty much need to be formed there.
4. Account bound reputation.
Now this i can totally agree with, however it shouldn't be just "unlock on 1, free for all". It should be a vastly shortened progression on alts, say 1/3 or half the time/marks needed to complete the tiers.
5. One mark to rule them all.
This would basically eliminate the desire to do different events. On 1 hand, some of the existing changes made it so you have a choice in marks.....on another hand all people do now is the shortest route to a goal. Look at colony invasion. EVERY mark event there would be on average 20-40 people running it...now your lucky to see 5-10. I would rather see a larger variety in existing events for marks, and the addition of more ground hards for nakura...hell more nakura events/mark rewards period...that grind is HORRID as it is.
i started my account in beta and came back when it whent ftp so i been here a while and i can honestly say i wont be doing the rep grind on any of my other toons save my romie on my main account it's way to boring and way to costly in time ec and dilli nor will i be buying any fleet items any time soon for the same reason sorry to all those who wanna rage and say but it's so easy but i have a life out side sto and i have kids that are more entertaining
then sitting here grinding for rep all day every day i come in game long enough to do a bit of grinding on my romie set my rep up for training then im off again there just isn't any thing intersting in game except on the ocasion when i switch over to my fed toon and run with the fleet but honestly kdf side is severly limited on ways to gain rep do to an over population of the playerbase going fed
I use to have about four to five avatars. After going through the Omega Reputation system once, I made the decision to delete two of my avatars. One avatar has T5 Omega and T4 Romulus completed. Both of my other two avatars have T1 Omega done. I am going nowhere nears the Nukara reputation system.
If it was not for the 20 hour timers, I would try to make my way through the systems. Every time I see the 20 hour timer, I end up shutting the game down for days on end. Legacy of Romulus was good for the new missions, ships, and species; however, the endgame elements and missions do nothing to motivate me.
...and, that bring me to the conundrum behind the 'Bonus Marks Weekend Event'. While you may be able to accumulate a large amount of marks, the 20 hour cool down timers prevent you from achieving substantial progress. You only obtain three days worth of progress. Its similar to watching water boil.
I have other more important things to accomplish. Life stuff.
Suggestion to Cryptic:
(1) Make stf gear and weapons account bound.
(2) Reduce the 20 hour cool down timers to about two hours.
(3) Make species specific marks available in all associated missions such as: stfs, episodes, and events.
(4) Bring the daily dilithium cap up to between 9,000 to 10,000.
(5) Make more ways to get more expertise.
Tackling the reputation system with one avatar, while trying to help complete a fleet base, can become an uphill battle. Boredom takes over really quickly. Its game stopping.
It's this exact situation that people were warning Cryptic about when they first announced rep. It's just another grind that eventually makes the game useless since you get so tired of the same missions over and over. Then once you're sick of it, you still have way too much of the currencies left to do anything with.
Making the rep systems account bound would be a huge relief in this incredibly short sighted system Cryptic has built. I would still have to play and earn the marks, i would still have to progress the characters through the systems, but my alts would be able to help the next one out with all their leftovers. They complain about how some people are stockpiling marks or credits or currencies, but then they only give us new ways to stockpile new currencies without actually fixing the problem in the first place.
The bigggest issue I have with the system is that I can't easily play multiple alts now, so I'm forced to focus on an ever smaller number of characters.
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Sounds like a good idea.
But then again, I dont mind the reputation stuff. Got mark V omega and romulan on ten characters already.
You can do it, you just need to run like 2 estfs a day, and epoh tag your chars. Can be done in an hour or so.
According to the infographic linked above, "Star Trek: Online" has two million captains and 16,500 fleets. I am sure the number has changed, so I will consider it to be the lowest possible estimate.
What I do not understand is why Cryptic has created a system, which benefits an estimated 16,500 players out of 2 million. It is the most dumbest thing I have ever seen. Only a very tiny-tiny-tiny-tiny-tiny-tiny sliver of the population will own fleet bases.
If they reduced the resource requirements and cool down timers, across the reputation system and bases, I am willing to bet the fleet ownership population would skyrocket. Cryptic would have more than 16,500 happy fleet owners with bases.
:: My Pipe Dream One :: I would love to play through a fleet base system, which would allow five to twenty people to hit T5 within five to six weeks (two months tops). :: Pipe Dream One ::
:: My Pipe Dream Two :: I would also love to play through a reputation system, which would allow you to hit T5 within two weeks. :: Pipe Dream Two ::
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Only one individual can 'own' the fleet; therefore, 16,500 fleets are owned by 16,500 individual fleet owners. Even though a fleet may contain 500 members, only one individual has overall ownership. Fleets and fleet bases are not designed to have 500 owners. Only one account has absolute control over the fleet and fleet bases.
Out of two million "Star Trek: Online" players, only 16,500 individuals own fleets and fleet bases.
If you consider the fact that many fleet owners run more than one fleet, KDF and Fed, the number of actual fleet and fleet base owners could be extremely lower.
Note: Keep in mind that the infograph was based upon information released in January 2013.
Other words, the fleet base resource requirements only allow a minority of players to own fleet bases.
It's entirely possible for a fleet to have multiple people at the Fleet Leader rank... even all 500 of them if you're crazy enough to allow that kind of anarchy. Nor are fleets necessarily "owned" by a single account. Fleet membership is not on a per-account basis.
If all 16,500 fleets had 500 members, the number is over 8 million so the overall numbers sound right to me. (The average is probably well under 500 per fleet...)
Running a fleet is not all fun and games, either. If I had to do it over again and knowing what I know now, I'm not sure I would've decided to start one. A lot of those 2 million might think they'd enjoy running their own fleet, but many of those would find it a lot more work than they're willing to do.
Regarding the "pipe dreams":
I'd be happy if the fleet advancement system routinely allowed a 5-man fleet to build a T-5 Starbase in a year. And if a casual player (4-5 hours a week) could hit one T-5 reputation on one character in three months with only moderate effort.
But I'm not going to get my wish, either.
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No one would do Romulan or Tholian content anymore.
Not true. If there was 1 consolidated mark for the Rep system and all content that awarded marks awarded the same amount or time based amounts then people would simply play the content they want to play and not what they are forced to play for a specific mark.
This would also give Cryptic much more valid data on what content players are playing the most and by that which content players are liking the most.
The Rep system will be just like the Fleet system is, an endless grind that they will constantly add more to because they think that's the only end-game content that will keep people engaged until the next season release.
There are so many different gameplay dynamics they could add to end-game content that would be so much more liked than that constant grind of these systems. For example look at games like Freelancer, etc. just going around buying commodities from base 1 to sell for profit or potentially loss at base 2 kept people entertained long after the story content was done.
Or how about adding random encounters in the cluster sectors, that could even be tied to the rep system as an exploration one. Add in random combat, diplomatic situations, missions of mercy (even something as simple as diverting some asteroids from a planet's orbit, etc) and other things that are completely random and randomly encountered, truly exploring the unknown. Sure it would still be a grind if it was part of the Rep system, but the unknown nature of it every time you enter those sectors wouldn't make it feel like a grind.
Too often Dan and the devs say how complex STO is, and database wise it might be, but gameplay wise it's shallower than a kiddie pool.
Unless they made Romulan and Tholian missions actually fun to play. There is way too much waiting around in VE and ANR. You have to wait for things to spawn, then you have to fly across the map to get to them, and then you are back to waiting, looking around for something else to kill. ISE is a go-to not only because of its rewards (which are admittedly MUCH better), but also because of its intensity and brevity - short and sweet, I guess you'd say. I shouldn't only want to do a mission to get marks. I should want to do it because I enjoy it. But so far, I find little joy in either of those missions. The least they could do is remove the ridiculous movie from VE and make the spawns Vault Weavers spawn as soon as the last ally is rescued. And for ANR, ensure that there are at least 3 concurrent spawns at all times by drastically reducing the time between spawns. Short and sweet, Cryptic. That's the ticket.
Disclaimer: there should also be lengthier matches, but more epic and more rewarding.
I couldn't agree with this more. This is what STO is really missing. Other games have random attacks and other things popping up all the time. There's literally always something close by to get into. Often I find myself wanting to just jump into the middle of a battle (not wait out a queue or see if I can scratch some fleet mates together), but most of the times I enter a random encounter or Borg invasion, everything is dead or I'm warped out immediately. It's useless.
They should have random Starbase 24 level invasions in home systems. Cardassians attacking DS9. Tholians attacking the Sol system. Tal Shadar attacking New Romulus. Etc, etc. Give marks to all those who showed up and helped fight off the invaders. They could also do what you see in virtually every episode of Star Trek and give you a random hail from someone who either needs your help or wants to kick your ***. You either go help the person in need, or kick the everloving TRIBBLE out of your attacker - or ignore the hail and keep on truckin'. How cool would it be that if you lose the space battle, you have to go to your ship's interior and close a hull breach as you fight off the intruders.
They could do so much with this game to make it feel more epic, more fun, less grindy and time-restrained. As it is now, I only have to log in every 20 hours and earn some marks, set up my rep tasks, and after about two weeks, I'll have the best gear in the game (save a considerable dilithium shortage). At least when the game's best loot was a random drop in STFs, players had incentive to play those missions all the time, all hours of the day, possibly forever.
There will be grinding o'plenty, regardless.
It doesn't matter if it's 2 STF's or all of them.
I was partial to Nukara myself.
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It's the inescapable harshness of the timegating in this system that I find depressing too. I just finished T1 of the Nukara rep on my one reputation-running character (out of 11 total, go figure), and I feel a deep dread in my stomach that T1 was only a fraction of the entire time it takes, just because these projects take 20 hours each. I mean, really? 20 hours? I just don't feel like I'm really making any headway towards T5, for most of the stretch. I really think I won't progress beyond T2, just to be shot of the "obligation" of logging in on that character every day in order to make a tiny bit of progress.
Don't get me wrong, I love the LoR update, but the way the rep systems are set up is just not for me. It's not even that I need instant gratification - I'm one of the most patient people I know -, it's just that the required task (moving some sliders to input some random stuff, so a timer starts running so I can do it again tomorrow) is so senseless and random that I can't feel it is game content.
Warning: Ideas incoming
There should've been better ways to earn progression in rep tracks. Just of the top of my head (and echoing what other people said here), it would've made way more sense to just earn 15 points, or something, for every being or ship you defeat that's linked to that rep track.
Want to get T1 Nukara track? Blow up 1000 Tholians. Any Tholians, be they story-related, event related or heck, players flying Tholian vessels in PvP.
Want to get T3 Romulan track? Blow up x amount of opponent Romulans, either Tal Shiar, PvP or whatever. Want to get there faster or through another way? Do stuff for them (either through the Episodes, the Events or New Romulus.
Want to get T5 Omega track? Blow x (where x is a large number) of Borg to kingdom come. No matter whether they're in story content, STF's, random encounters or even the tutorial, potentially.
Maintain the bonus mark hour for queued stuff, and just let people get bonus marks to buy stuff with from the Rep stores and/or let people earn double points for blowing up their enemy of choice.
That way you progress in the rep tracks as you play, not 20 hours after you play.
Ok, as I started typing, I got into the thought process and now I think maybe I'm on to something here. What do you guys think?
I am becoming extremely frustrated with the leave penalty in STF missions. The Reputation Mark system requires an INSANE amount of marks to progress through, but I've bitten the bullet, and I'm constantly replaying the same 6 missions over and over and over again. Fine.
But I get into these sessions with 4 other people, and then 2-3 of them leave mid-game. Impossible to complete the mission with the 2-3 of us left. So, not only have we wasted 20-30 minutes trying to get through the mission with NOTHING to show for it, but the only way for us to leave the map is to also have to accept a time penalty on re-joining the PvE queue? Not fair.
I get that PvE is supposed to be co-op, but I'm tired of wasting my time because other people give up. This system needs to be tweaked, or I'm giving up on STO.
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HOWEVER, the reputation system also kills the value of alts, since you need to grind reputation on every one of them separately. This means that players are more likely to stick to a single main for everything, which means they're less likely to try out different play styles. As a tac captain, why should I bother making an engineer or science captain, or even any alt, when I just need to grind reputation all over again? This ends up killing the value of every single C-store item that isn't account-wide and universally useful. A simple way to fix this is to make an "account bind on pickup" item requisition from each rep track that automatically increases rep in that faction, so my main can get one, toss it in the account bank, and then my alt gets rep without worrying about grinding. You can justify it in-game with "Character has contributed enough to the faction that he can make personnel recommendations" or something like that. Improving the value of alt accounts will improve the value of C-store items and result in more money for Cryptic, since more people will be willing to load up their alts.
not bad idieas honestly though i like the missions i play them alot and some i even repeat alot i realy dont see the point in adding more rep systems to the game to further ruin sto it's already realy expencive if you want an efective fleet and the reputation system to get gear is just bad least cryptic could have done was make the xp gain for the rep tiers go up as you rise in rank instead the costs go up and xp stays the same gaining marks is pretty easy although extremely boring getting to lvl 50 is no challenge stf's no real challenge although fun to run with the right people but at lvl 50 most of the missions give no insentive to replay unless you farming MK XI gear for grinding mission reward gear should be increased to MK XII give the players options rather then the standerd 2 sided option of either play or don't play i always hated playing on servers that give you either play there way or not at all line
i ran stf alot with my fleet mates and even pugs elite and normal i completely fit out my ship in a week with give or take it was much easyier that way then how it is now i just wish cryptic and pwe would actualy think about what there doing rather then just throw some thing together like they did with this rep system my 1 y/o could have done better on it and so could i for that matter
You need to take into consideration that reputation grinding has a purpose of removing EC from the game, while it doesn't seem much you can imagine how much EC gets removed for every player that buys commodities every day.