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So is the P2W getting too blatant?
reginamala78
Member Posts: 4,593 Arc User
I fully recognize that Cryptic is a business, and to make money they have to get us continually buying new stuff. If we ever 'finish' the game and collect it all, no more money to be made. I get that. Morover I recognize the cool stuff they do too, like the new comm arrays or the summer event, where it was pure 'here's free stuff so long as you stick with us!' I appreciate those, not one of those screaming I HATE CRYPTIC loons.
But all that said, with the latest holding info on Tribble, I can't be the only person who thinks this is really pushing into the territory where the money sinks are getting too aggressive, blatantly invalidating old stuff to try and push us into buying the new?
I mean first we had the Scimitar, flat out better than anything else in the game. Trashy but whatever, I can just not buy it and stick to my D'deridex/Mogai. Then they added the hangar to the Ar'kif because all the Mogai and T'varo drivers were ignoring the thing, so 'hey come buy another +1, shelve that thing you've been driving for 2 months for NEW!!!!' Then the Avenger, again all benefit no drawback for all those people stubbornly clinging to their GalXs/Regents/Excelsiors. Honestly its starting to remind me of that chewing gum commercial where the company mugs people for using the same piece of gum for too long.
But then you get today's Tribble notes.
New warp cores! But your old fleet holding doesn't matter, have to sink money into the new one.
New fleet ships! But that shipyard you spend a year building, dropped a couple hundred bucks into between your fleet members, it doesn't matter, have to sink money into the new one.
Additional Active-Duty DOFF slots! Oy vey...
I will happily support breadth of content, and honestly I've even got a few ships I bought that I'll probably never get around to using (Gal R, Nebula) just because I like the variety and the classics. Furthermore I fully recognize that they've been subtly pushing me as a player along that 'keeping up with the K'joneses' game for a while now, with stuff like the Armitage and the Vesta, but even those had strengths but also weaknesses. But is it reaching a point where its getting TOO heavy handed in the BUY NEW!!! promotion or too aggressive in the power creep to the point where its detracting from the overall game? I'm sure plenty of people will say that point is long past, others say not yet and they love the latest-and-greatest. I recognize that to stay in business, Cryptic has to do some of it (lockboxes for example), but are they overreaching at this point?
Not an angry rant or anything, just what others think about the seeming acceleration of the power creep and money siphons.
But all that said, with the latest holding info on Tribble, I can't be the only person who thinks this is really pushing into the territory where the money sinks are getting too aggressive, blatantly invalidating old stuff to try and push us into buying the new?
I mean first we had the Scimitar, flat out better than anything else in the game. Trashy but whatever, I can just not buy it and stick to my D'deridex/Mogai. Then they added the hangar to the Ar'kif because all the Mogai and T'varo drivers were ignoring the thing, so 'hey come buy another +1, shelve that thing you've been driving for 2 months for NEW!!!!' Then the Avenger, again all benefit no drawback for all those people stubbornly clinging to their GalXs/Regents/Excelsiors. Honestly its starting to remind me of that chewing gum commercial where the company mugs people for using the same piece of gum for too long.
But then you get today's Tribble notes.
New warp cores! But your old fleet holding doesn't matter, have to sink money into the new one.
New fleet ships! But that shipyard you spend a year building, dropped a couple hundred bucks into between your fleet members, it doesn't matter, have to sink money into the new one.
Additional Active-Duty DOFF slots! Oy vey...
I will happily support breadth of content, and honestly I've even got a few ships I bought that I'll probably never get around to using (Gal R, Nebula) just because I like the variety and the classics. Furthermore I fully recognize that they've been subtly pushing me as a player along that 'keeping up with the K'joneses' game for a while now, with stuff like the Armitage and the Vesta, but even those had strengths but also weaknesses. But is it reaching a point where its getting TOO heavy handed in the BUY NEW!!! promotion or too aggressive in the power creep to the point where its detracting from the overall game? I'm sure plenty of people will say that point is long past, others say not yet and they love the latest-and-greatest. I recognize that to stay in business, Cryptic has to do some of it (lockboxes for example), but are they overreaching at this point?
Not an angry rant or anything, just what others think about the seeming acceleration of the power creep and money siphons.
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Why would they do that? People are buying zen now to exchange it for game currency.
Hey.... then they could just let you buy game currency directly.
As the Fleetbases get completed their needs to be new Dilithium sinks. Without them the Dilithum Exchange closes. Thus you have the Embassy, the Mine, and now the Spire - as well as Rep. The whole point of these projects it to keep the Dilithium Exchange going: people buy Zen, trade the Zen for Dilithium, use the Dilithium on their Holdings and Rep. For the Holdings and Rep to work there needs to be adequate rewards for people to want to invest in them. Thus you have an ever-continuing cycle of power creep. It's really the only way the system can work.
Personally, I'm surprised there aren't more ship choices in the list. The Vet Reward Fleet ships are only useful for the Gold players and the Carriers, while useful, aren't a major draw. People have gotten better Carriers from the Lobi Store.
they REALLY should do an overhaul on the old ships.
i can't imagine a new player is going to be very pleased with flying a dinky assault/star cruiser(since most new players want to fly a cruiser due to being iconic/main ships on the show), when you have fleet whatevers/lockbox ships flying around.
sure cryptic might be expecting it will force the new player to eventually get one of the fleet/c-store ships, but that doesn't change the fact quite a few suck/are underpowered(galaxy, nebula, D-kyr, etc), and new players have no way of knowing which suck, and which does not, since quite a bit of the playerbase is horribly uninformed.
That wont happen, selling Zen for dilithium is a big income for Cryptic. Players want dilithium for fleet projects or buying things and are more than willing to buy Zen to convert into the needed dilithium. $5 gets you 500 zen, now take a look at the hundreds of thousands of zen on the exchange to get an idea on how much money. Thats not all stipends.
"I'm drunk, whats your excuse for being an idiot?" - Unknown drunk man. :eek:
I'm okay with power creep and a gradual stream of more powerful things to acquire and have fun with, but they have to actually grow in rank, price, and difficulty to obtain, or have the older things reduced in these properties. You can't just keep adding better and better things at the same standard 'top tier' price as everything that came before, when all the older stuff is still the same price, or still gated behind high fleet or reputation tiers. I've said it elsewhere, but it's worth mentioning everywhere: Setting the fleet avenger a tier underneath the fleet regent is a stupid, stupid idea. And even though I like the Avenger, it still stings that it has the same boff AND console layout as the Regent. It's a carbon copy of the ship with one weapon moved forward, extra turn, and cannons! A new ship should be more unique than this!
Are the current warp cores going to have any reason to exist alongside the new ones? If the new ones still have AMP, I would say no. If they don't, probably no one would get them.
People have spent ECs far in excess of what it takes to get the best lockbox ships to fit their boats with Mk XII tactical consoles. Will the fleet versions make these obsolete like the Mine consoles did for engineering?
Will the new reputation equipment offer compelling give-and-take choices when compared to current equipment, or just be better?
That really is a frustrating part. I know I have friends that have looked at my Steam time metrics and asked about why I spend so much time in STO and if they ought to sign up. And then I tell them no, despite that I really would like to play with some of them, because I know they'd be so far behind and have to do so much grind to catch up that they'd never have any time to just play. And then you add in the perpetual rat race where you can never catch up, well I'd be ticked if I were in their situation.
Add to that the accelerating rate of change, and if anything it makes people (me anyways) less likely to buy new stuff. After all, why drop 2500 zen on a new ship, then another 20 million EC gearing it out, when you know its gonna be surpassed in a few months? Thats a waste of money. If the only way to not be obsolete is to constantly buy the latest-and-greatest, then F it, I'll just drive a Gal-R before I play THAT game.
And it's really not hard to earn Zen in this game. An average 8,000 Diltihium player can make 240,000 in a month, which is around 1,700-2,200 Zen, depending on the Exchange. For most people playing 4-6 weeks will allow them to get the best ship in the game for free. Another month and they can have the best gear in the game. 2 months is not a lot of time to earn the best stuff in the game - especially if you're joining an established Fleet.
Its not a question of cost its a question of principle. I've got the resources to get whatever I want, whenever I want, from now till the game shuts down. But I expect my purchases to last, because why buy something if it won't?
What? How does it take that long to catch up? Lets say a week to lvl to 50 and that's giving plenty of time. Look up information on game mechanics and builds, find out the best one. Start grinding the reps (it only takes a month). Join a t5 fleet or just one you like and then use nop public service to get your gear. I'd say between lvl grind/rep grind/fleet gear grind/ec grind a new player could have a decked out ship within 3 months of playing. That is very generous for a mmo.
I'll play Devil's Advocate here.
When it comes to the new Fleet Ships, players wanted them. And the new Warp Cores...I don't think would replace the ones from the Dilithium Mine but give players more of an option of what type. Granted I have not seen their stats, but this is what I assume at this time.
However, I am inclined to agree with the greed factor and PW's influence. STO definitely has evolved into an Eastern-style grindfest MMO. And I honestly don't like it, it leads heavily into burnout and people quitting. They aren't enjoying the game because they don't want to log on and having to work (and yes it's work - DL Grinding, FM Farming, Reputation grinding yada yada). Channels that were once vibrant are now devoid of any conversation. Klingon queues are dead.
Then as mentioned above, the Power Creep is beyond insane. It's so bad that there are some channels actually won't let you join unless you have 11,000+ DPS and doing ESTFs in less than 5 minutes. Which is alienating other players who just want to have fun.
And while people might be pessimistic about "STO Dying", I can say it surely is on the decline because of PW pushing players too far. And IMHO, I think STO will be a shadow of it's former self around 2 years. Very likely the new Everquest or Star Citizen will attract some remaining players, which they should be out by then.
So my advice to Cryptic, if you truly want STO to continue years from now, it's time you guys get some gumption and talk to the PW leadership and tell them Westerners do not like their Eastern-style of gameplay. And start developing content that is designed for long-term play without grinds.
adding "fleet variants" is rather horrible, that would likely increase the power creep by making previous fleet versions obsolete(we both know thats the path cryptic would choose).
buffing the already existing ships that are in dire need of a buff on the other hand goes a long way to fix the power creep.
the galaxy could be fixed for instance, by giving a layout identical to the romulan warbird, afterall they are supposed to be equivalents of one another.
the negh'var for instance is waaaaay too engineer heavy for a klingon ship, it needs to have at least the option of more tac focus, the same goes to the vor'cha.
/Fail
- Judge Aaron Satie
Derrick - Fed Eng
not really, you assume people play STO for PvP, they play mostly because its trek, and most care about PvE, not PvP.
now if wargaming somehow managed to get its hands in a ST license, thats a different story.
And saying 'in a month, you can have any endgame ship for free' is sort of missing the point. Because in that whole month you're playing, you're NOT playing with that endgame ship that you want. And I've done this before, so I know what it's like. Dilithium refining caters to OCD inclinations more so than almost anything else about this game. At least for me. It got to the point where I was refining 8k a day with half a dozen alts and needing to spend hours doing so.
Then again, I am more or less happy with the ships I currently have. I don't feel a need to 'keep up with the Jones' in that regard. At this point I'm more inclined to buy zen to sell for dilithium than anything else. I agree with you on that part, if one were to guess I'd say the Fleet Advancement System is Cryptic's true money maker.
Let me give another side of this:
Why would they need to catch up? To complete ESTFs? I can do that with green mark 11 gear on a level 50 engineer that has spent zero skill points flying a free ship. And I'm not talking about leaning on other players, or just getting carried along for the ride I'm pulling 2nd and 3rd place in elite crystals, and being a key contributor for pre-made (non pug) teams with fleet mates who have far more powerful gear on their ships.
For PvP? Are they really going to bother with it?
Honestly, for what reason would your friends need anything they can't get as a drop from a foundry farming mission?
I can have fun with my friends in a TRIBBLE ship with TRIBBLE gear. I'm sure I'm not the only one. I know there's a lot of other people who can too. Maybe it helps that no one I play with even has a DPS meter. STO has a lot of fun missions. It's got a big map, and there's rather a lot to do. And none of it requires the kind of gear Cryptic are selling. Sure that stuff helps. But no one needs it. Unless your friends have a driving need to have a bigger epeen than the next guy they can completely ignore the power creep and just enjoy the game.
You can too. It's less shiny and it's much slower paced on this side of the fence, but we laugh a lot more.
True enough. I am sitting on, I think a tad over a million dilithium and I have not a single ship with more than 3 weapons that cost dil to buy (omega turret, romulan torp or omega torp, and a couple have the romulan experimental beam array; I have exactly one fleet weapon and that's sitting in it's owner's bank, it's not even equipped).
I can say I'm glad I have the option to get anything I want and that I know I don't need it. It would really be sad to be in the opposite camp.
Same here. PvP's the only thing I really thoroughly enjoy in-game, but I'm FORCED to grind PvE in order to gain resources like dilithium, marks, w/e. If they made it possible to do these things effectively in PvP, I'd spend a hell of a lot more time playing. As it is, I've been on a sort of temporary leave from STO the last week, 'cause I felt myself losing interest in logging in to play, a sign I'm approaching burnout on PvE. . .and I don't even PvE as much as some folks I know. I just can't stand the PvE repetition. Another issue with me is the state of the BoP class, my favorite class of ships. They're just too weak now, at least for PvP. There's so much superpowered TRIBBLE out there I can't keep up. And Cryptic just keeps making it worse with every addition. New stuff, new power creep, new gear you generally have to grind PvE for in order to remain competitive in PvP.
There are several big reasons players follow carrots, one is they always have to own the best carrots, another is they want the best carrots to show off to others and if everyone had the same carrots they wouldnt be a special snowflake anymore. Another is competitive mule cart pulling(PvP) where you need the best carrots to be competitive at the top of the cart pulling. For new players these new carrots are like the old ones you dropped and the cart you are pulling squashed it.
And no you other mules cannot have my carrot as I earned it pulling my own cart. Oh wait... Oh a new carrot.. MuSt HaVe!!!:D
"I'm drunk, whats your excuse for being an idiot?" - Unknown drunk man. :eek:
you could say thats how most games work like that through, the problem isn't the "carrot" hunting, the problem is whatever its fun or not, and/or if the carrot is so ridiculously far away, you can't even see it(the main issue with power creep).
also if you don't pvp, you don't need to care about the "tastiest carrots".
Maybe so, only thing we can do is voice our concern to our representatives or congressmen and voice our concerns.
Actually, I assume people play STO for Trek. I also realize that most care about PVE. i was merely pointing out a woefully underdeveloped facet of their business model. I PVP very little, but it truly is the only endgame content where the best gear (whether or not you consider C-store/fleet/lockbox gear P2W) matters the most....well a very close second to crazy good piloting skills
Derrick - Fed Eng
Uh, I'm euro, I don't have such a thing as representatives...