Is it just me or are the gaps between the ranks just way too small? I am by no means rushing through the game I've only been playing just over two weeks and have only completed the very first season of missions (Klingon War) and yet I'm already a level 32 Captain.
Literally as soon as I get used to a ship it's already time to upgrade to a new one, the game is running much too fast and at this rate I'll be an Admiral within another two weeks.
It's pretty much a case of do one mission and you earn a promotion so there's no real sense of achievement
Compare this to another online game I used to play a lot called World of Tanks where it can take a good six months+ of play to get to the highest tier of vehicles of just one faction.
I think the game needs to be stretched out a lot more, say make the gaps between the ranks four or five times larger than they are now so you have to spend a good month on a ship before upgrading to the next one.
Comments
It is fast for a first character. However, once you're leveling your third or fourth character of the same faction - that's when it's slow. You don't want to spend weeks trawling through stuff you've done more than once already.
There used to be a picture here, but they changed signatures and I can't be bothered to replace it.
Count your blessings then. If you like the grind so much, go check out NavyField: 5 years of unending grind for top tier battleships!
STO is a boon for me in terms of grind length; a weekend of storyline progression and you're top level. Everything from Reputation to Dilithium is just stuff you do on the side.
http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news/detail/10052253
Why are you not rejoicing?
The reason people want the Mirror Universe back is mainly due to how long and boring the mission content becomes once you've been through it about five times on previous characters. The MU event was a great way to level up alternate characters quickly without the need to sleepwalk through the story content. Thankfully it seems Cryptic does intend to re-release the MU event in a similar fashion to the Crystalline Catastrophe, but who knows how long that could be.
... And then too, this is why Cryptic have Admiral level versions of many ships, so that the Captain level ship you like is available ... for a price ... Which means Cryptic doesn't want you at low rank using "free" equipment, they want you at level 50 so that you have to decide whether to "do the grind" or spend real world money ...
Guess which one Cryptic prefers? And guess which one many plyers prefer?
If it was up to me there would not be any levels at all. Ranking provides everything that's needed.
Um... the reason people need the MU event is for the experience for the rep grinds, not to actually level up.
Support 90 degree arc limitation on BFaW! Save our ships from looking like flying disco balls of dumb!
Good luck with that. Apparently STO is "all about teh endgame lol!!!1!!!" thus your experience. Wait until your 3rd character or so, without effort you'll have 1-50 down to 4 days or so.
I got one to 50 in two and a half days. Though that was during the Q experience boost event.
Support 90 degree arc limitation on BFaW! Save our ships from looking like flying disco balls of dumb!
What's the Mirror Universe? a search on Yahoo doesn't really bring up much information (outside of the TV episode of course) and is this where all the mirror ships that are for sale on the exchange came from?
Nonsense! I have 4 lvl 50's currently...and NONE of them made it past the nimbus missions before they maxed....
Not sure how anyone could get through all the episodes without hitting 50 first....
Not turning them all in.
Support 90 degree arc limitation on BFaW! Save our ships from looking like flying disco balls of dumb!
The Mirror event used to be one hour a day where you did a mission repetitively to obtain max experience for a full our. It was a relatively easy stf that could gain I'd guess an average of about 10 levels in that one hour.
The Mirror universe ships on the exchange are from Lock Boxes being opened, and the only connection is the tie in to the idea of the mirror universe.
When grinding the MU event when they had the hourly events, on my level 50 character I'd get between 150,000, and 200,000 expertise to use for projects. It was very useful for when the exp would run low.
There are many ways built in to the game get expertise, but it was considered by many the most efficient way of obtaining it because it was like Costco: Buying in Bulk.
Tip: Stop using Yahoo searching for STO information, and start going here instead.
Do you by chance have XP boosts active? I've run up a couple of new characters recently, and both made it to the Borg arc before hitting 50.
There used to be a picture here, but they changed signatures and I can't be bothered to replace it.
The problem IMO is that the final level is "Vice Admiral" when it should be "Captain", with Admiral ranks reserved for the Fleet system. After all, Admirals as flag officers look after fleets not single ships. Introduction of a long-term toon rank of the honorific "Commodore" rank would be welcome (e.g. upon completion of all Commendations) rather than the VA thing. These would denote both Admiralty and a "Commodore" rank with some meaning, while everyone would be a "Captain".
These people are playing the story missions... The OP is correct. You are a VA by the time a FED is in Romulan space.
You only play about have of the story or less before you are at max level. That's without playing any patrols, sector space encounters, exploration, etc. just the story. It's been a problem since the game went F2P and they adjusted the leveling so people got to end game fast.
I'm assuming this is so people can start grinding/spending money on end game items. It may also be because of the nature of people these days to have everything now with as little effort as possible.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
I find it very unbalanced. The way it used to be you had to do a balance of ALL content. If you only played the story then yes you would have to replay missions to be at the correct level. Under the original leveling method you should have done the patrols and the story as well as some nebula exploration to get to the next level.
You shouldn't get to captain until DS9 missions but now you are a VA before you get there. RA was when doing Borg and UA with Undine. VA was after the story was done.
I would like to see the story content re-done but I don't see it happening as there is no money to be made from players playing that content. If they could find a way to monetize lower level ships better than I'm sure the possibility might be explored but no one is going to spend any money for something you play for a couple hours and then need to upgrade again.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
4 days? That long huh. Last character I leveled took 34.5 hours, from 1 to 50. And yes I have the screen shot to prove it.
As to the op, Yea it goes quick, This particular toon I mentioned has NOT finished the Romulan episodes. I think I finished the Vault was the last one I did before hitting 50.
Fleet leader Nova Elite
Fleet Leader House of Nova elite
@ren_larreck
I've NEVER seen the Borg Arc....have 4 50's, a 35 and a 15......
As for boosts.....I may have gotten a couple via lock boxes....but by no means relying on it....
I do participate in the Ker'rat warzones, perhaps every other day...and I do actively run Doffs once I get them.
But yeah....I way outpace the episodic content.....
If I "didn't turn them in," I wouldn't get the XP....my issue is I level faster than the missions....not slower....
"A dozen???' More like 3 dozen....lol
It is nice that we can replay old missions for upgraded versions of the rewards though......Star Wars: The TRIBBLE Republic has nothing like that.....
Well, the warzones and doffs would be why. If you're running story-only, it's actually possible to level too slow for the next mission in a couple of places, so you have to go do a patrol mission or two to make up the difference.
There used to be a picture here, but they changed signatures and I can't be bothered to replace it.
Only suggestion I have is to not do any side/extra content (including DOFFs) until you hit 50, that way you can stretch your ships out over the story as well as possible.
Of course, if you're the kind of player who wants a "good" ship fast, this is great for you, since as others said the difficulty does scale. But personally, I find the gameplay and ships at level 20-30 more fun the endgame stuff.
There is also the different between those who just want to quickly bring up their new alts and the 1st character players... I believe the mirror addicts are the first kind of ones^^
And funny enough, at endgame they totally ignore the very content that is considered the best by many and is only valuable for leveling: the story mission.
Instead they enforce dump grind.
35 (or 34.5) is not that impressive if you constantly play, the 4 days is people with a full job in a working week. Not 4 days constantly ingame.
However I agree with the op.
When I leveled my far to many kdf and fed characters before f2p, it was usually an area per rank, I was at the romulan episodes as commander and captain for the cardassians.
When I made my romulan was particularly looking forward to flying the norexan warbird. I had litarally ONE fight in this ship before it outranked it...
Edit:
Actually: yes it has.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
The mirror universe was a few story parts through out the Star Trek shows. It was an alternate reality where everything was backwards. It would be like meeting yourself but they acted the exact opposite. A general good person, would be evil for example. The mirror ships is from lock boxes rewards. Some of them are very nice ships. I picked up a couple myself to use.
You will get a nice mirror story once you get to Deep Space Nine. You will learn a little more about them there as well.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
I recently rolled a new fed character and I got to VA in the final part of the Romulan series. I boosted leveling by doing a couple of patrol missions. I am quite happy since I can skip missions and just pick the interesting ones for the rewards and/or work on the reputation projects.
I also can start working on outfitting one of my endgame ships.
Do realize endgame here is more or less a grind, but it is a free grind. You can do it or not do it and you can do what you want. Level up your fleet base, reputation, making dilithium to use for projects or buy zen for stuff. At the leveling stage you are railroaded into a story. A nice story, but there isn't much freedom.