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Exploration and Ship Interiors: Capturing that "Star Trek" Feeling
maiewski
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
While talking about STO with one of my buddies, we started lamenting about the underused, under-loved Genesis System. The fact that STO really doesn't have an "explore strange new worlds" feel about it. We all know about the complaints; the Exploration blocks don't feel like exploration, more like flying around in a sand box digging for missions to fill your quota. There's no "Set a course...that way" and you go off and eventually run into a mission, or a planet, or a nebulae, or some giant space monster that just wants to hug your ship with its hull crushing tentacles because it's lonely.
Another occasional complaint is the fact that we all have these awesome ship interiors that never get used. Almost never seen. Almost never utilized.
It got me thinking of a way to utilize and re-energize both aspects; to combine the Exploration (where you feel like you're exploring a closet) while placing you on your starship and giving you that "it's like I'm in the show!" feeling.
What about something like this?
Maiewski's Exploration Revamp Suggestion
Just my thoughts and ideas to try and enhance some underused aspects of the game.
*hands out salt shakers*
Another occasional complaint is the fact that we all have these awesome ship interiors that never get used. Almost never seen. Almost never utilized.
It got me thinking of a way to utilize and re-energize both aspects; to combine the Exploration (where you feel like you're exploring a closet) while placing you on your starship and giving you that "it's like I'm in the show!" feeling.
What about something like this?
Maiewski's Exploration Revamp Suggestion
- Somewhere in the galaxy *big wavey hands* you have a link or option to engage in a true Exploration mission set. Maybe you have to go to the Exploration Block to start the mission.
- Once you enter the Block, a new option pops up: call it "Explore Strange New Worlds" or "Seek out New Life and New Civilizations" or "Boldly Go Where No One Has Gone Before" or something that isn't so damn long.
- When you click that button you get transferred to a new instance of your ship's interior.
- You appear in your Captain's chair, and a new text window pops up with your Operations BOFF asking for your orders. You have a series of headings (3-5) and a final option to "Return to Federation Space" which will dump you back into the Exploration Block you just left.
- When you choose a heading, an animation plays where your captain stands up, states "I'll be in my ready room/quarters/holodeck" and heads off screen. Or maybe he stays there and some patty officer in a skirt walks up with a PADD for your captain to review.
- Fade To Black
- The message "Captain to the Bridge!" appears. Fade in with your Captain arriving on the bridge and the Genesis Mission appears on the screen. If it's a scan anomaly mission, your Science officer informs you that there are some unique readings in the area that could be fruitful to Federation Research if the ship were to investigate. If it's a new planet, your Tactical officer states there are hostile ships in the area, or your First Officer announces there's some sort of facility detected on a nearby asteroid.
- You can elect to move on, ignoring the mission, or you have the option to move in for a closer look, at which point you drop out of warp and play the Exploration mission as normal.
- Alternately; and here's where the folks who want more things to do in your ship get some love, maybe the "random mission" is something in your ship. Your Security Boffs invites you to the Holodeck for phaser training, or you head to the forward lounge to participate in a concert (could do some sort of Frequency/Rock Band/Guitar Hero mechanic to reflect how well the concert goes. If you're an engineer, maybe your Chief Engineer wants you to come down and give your opinion on something in the Warp Drive, or the forward Deflector Array. Science Officers might get an invite to the Research Lab, where your Science Officer asks for your opinion or help with the latest data they received (maybe engaging in a little crafting mission too). Or you get notified by your First Officer that there are some reports that need your reviewing, and those reports are special DOFF missions.
- Each of these mini-games count as one of your "Exploration" missions for the Cluster quota, because even if your ship finds nothing, you're still doing something.
- Finish three missions and your Operations BOFF asks if you want to return to Federation Space, or keep going. The Daily enters the standard 20 hour cooldown, but you could still explore for nominal individual rewards.
- The "invite player to bridge" command is disabled (Because you're going off into the greater galaxy, you don't have time to invite over Captain Stubing and Admiral Ballsey for tea and blood pie)
Just my thoughts and ideas to try and enhance some underused aspects of the game.
*hands out salt shakers*
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Currently cruising the Pi Canis Sector Block...
Currently cruising the Pi Canis Sector Block...
Member Since: 08/09
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Regarding the exploration there has to be something done but I'm not sure more clunky cutscenes will do the trick. I would like a roguelike exploration experience involving randomly generated space and ground maps you can explore alone or in teams. The important part is that you PLAY those parts, no cheap DOFF or menu slider cop-outs. Maybe you need to establish a ground base/colony, placing guards, defend from raiders, scan the topography, send out exploration teams etc etc, same in space. Construct an outpost, guard the facilities, order NPC patrols and science ships do stuff. The rogulike element would also bear the possiblity that your mission fails - imagine the dice say a Borg cube warps in and trashes your outpost - you either have a tough five man player team to beat or you have to evacuate and abandon the outpost. Those are missions I'd like to see
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Basically the idea was to remove sector space and travel from ship interiors (not transwarp-instant-travel but based on a timer) and missions would randomly appear on the way in a "similar" way the op suggests.
If there was actually SOMETHING TO DO then I feel it might be a different story all together. Something based around this might actually be an opportunity to release some new bridge packs. Still amazes me the fact that the majority of Trek happened on-board the hero ship in question only a few cases exist where there are a lot of external scenes or fights (budget aside, it wasn't necessary for the story).
Would jump at the chance to do something like this. It just seems like a criminal waste of assets which are already in place. They just have to get their brains engaged and do something with them.
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Indeed.....
...You'd better believe that a lot of people would be shelling out to change their interiors.
I would, at least for some of my characters and some of my ships.
I don't think it's a case of 'never'... I think it's more a case of, 'not now, not on the radar, maybe never'.
The idea that your ship could be boarded by hostile invaders... that's simply too compelling to ignore the possibilities.
The Devs just need to have a plan for how to do it and the time and resources to implement it.
Long way off, if ever. But never is a very strong word and I don't recall any Dev using that particular word to describe the difficulty.
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Its not that i don't believe you but if the devs/marking people in cryptic believe that then why did they bother creating unique bridges on the lockbox ships? why did they bother creating the origin bridge and interior? honest questions
I think the issue is moreso that interiors are not modular. There aren't many marketable 'parts' of the inside of a ship.
I don't know about anyone else, but I'd be willing to sink some zen into being able to install some neon lighting along the corridors and change between different wall/floor designs. Likewise, being able to unlock a really swag-looking warpcore/engineering room or Science Lab from Nukara rep might actually compel me to invest in that reputation. In my head-canon, one of my characters runs sort of covert ops for the Federation/Starfleet, and it's always disappointing I'm not able to modify the interior of my ship more to reflect that. I always find myself disappointed with the shelf and floor customization options within the ships..
Also, I would invest in Orion themed rooms and corridor themes in a heartbeat for my Corsair. KDF interiors only really work on Klingon ships.. and there are a lot of 'alliance' ships in the fleet.
- FULL Ship interiors cost a LOT of time/manpower/money to develop.
- There is, as players repeat constantly, nothing to do there, so players don't USE their interiors.
- There used to be more to DO in your interior, but people complained about having to run all over their ship, so all of that was consolidated to your bridge.
- There is no good reason to throw money at making these huge interiors with nothing to do in them, when players are going to run around them once, and then ignore them for the rest of time.
- Currently we've been focused more on story content, which I believe is what more players are into atm.
In other words, we won't be developing new FULL interiors without some kind of major rework to the whole system, new content surrounding them, or other major improvement to them.
Note that bridges are NOT Full interiors, and we will continue making them, I'm sure.
That doesn't mean that someday we won't shift focus away from story content, back to interiors, develop fun stuff to do there, and/or put in something like the above exploration system. It's just not going to happen right now. We have other priorities at the moment.
Amen to that. some of my favorite star trek episodes are just that, Starship Mine and Macrocosm for example. even the mission in star trek judgment rites where you had to fix the enterprise is one of my favorites.
I always thought it was a missed opportunity in the Enterprise C FE that you didn't have to fight your way through the corridors of the ENT C to get to the bridge to undock from the station
At least it's better than people asking you for new interiors constantly when you know that's not the focus, right?
We can all be pleasantly surprised someday in the distant future. And then people will be saying, "but Taco said it would never happen!" But they'll get over it.
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Granted this doesnt solve the issue of 'ship in a bottle' missions...but it could go a long way... (plus some interiors that aren't trashed for the foundry.... *hint hint*
Sorry about that, I edited my posting accordingly. Though it doesn't really change a thing, doesn't it? Please don't get me wrong, that's no complaint. But aren't we running circles stating "No ship interiors until people use them" and "There is nothing to do in ship interiors, so people won't use them"?
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Also not every ship needs an own one. You'd need one generic for all the non kdf/fed/rom ships from lock boxes and then could release them one at a time when it fits.
Sorry if this is impolite, but who's job would it be to change that exactly?
.
So between completely ignoring legit complaints about every aspect of the game, this one is the one you listened to and "fixed" it?
People complain about not all fed ships having cloak too. That has not been done for good reasons. And this change should not have been done.
Well then you might wanna add something to do there... Isn't that what this thread is about ?
Well that is probably true...
Why has it to be only 1 of the 2?
How about adding functions first and see how people are interested in the rest then? But ultimately that would have to start...
How bout some black holes to survey, or that one episode on Enterprise "Catwalk" i run flat into a storm like that and suddenly I have to weather the storm and I get timed on how well I prepare my ship for the storm. Depending on how well I do, I might or might not take slight to serious damage.
Or doing away missions where I get to slip into pre warp societies and I get judged on how well I do not contaminate the society with 1 to 2 boffs.
There are many things that can be done with exploration.
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I'd be more than willing to pay for a DS9-style bundle that included the DS9 bundle Defiant bridge and set. I use that thing all the time.
Well they would have to bite the bullet and add interiors to all ships.
That can be done cheap by just adding the factional interior (it's used on the d'kyr, all gorn, nausican and orion ships too, although it doesn't fit so why not on the others)
Or they bite the bullet and create a new one, as I said, a "generic" interior with no racial specifics. Or they invest a little MORE work (jeah, good joke) and build one that can be quickly adapted. That means one generic interior, too. But it would get different displays and may be changed walk colors to look a little more fitting to the particular ship.
If that kind of interior would be build it wouldn't take more then an hour to change a breen interior into a jem hadar interior, it's just some work to build it in the first place.
I can't imagine that these complaints were from any significant portion of the population. But at any rate, DOff assignments are really minor things to worry about anyway. What about the minigames? Sickbay stuff to do in Sickbay, Engineering stuff to do in Engineering, Science stuff to do in the labs, etc.
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Such as...?
I'm not trying to be rude, what what kind of compelling content could possibly be added to interiors?
Combat is basically out of the question, since there are dozens of potential bridge/interior combinations a player could have, and therefore the devs can't create combat maps (barring some kind of nigh-miraculous redesign).
I don't think many players would be excited about going to their interiors to play minigames, any more than they're currently excited about going there to run doff missions.
Make the minigames more worthwhile by increasing the rewards, and I can guarantee there'd be an uproar about what a pain it is to go to the interior to run them, and why can't they be added to DS9 and/or Drozana? That's exactly what happened with the shipboard doff missions, and I can assure you that it was a pretty significant number of players who complained.
I'm in favour of more/better interiors (I love the Belfast and TOS interiors), but tacofangs is correct on every point, and there really is no clear solution to the problem.
I would, too (I bought both the DS9 and TOS bundles)...but would enough players buy it for it to be worthwhile? We don't have access to sales numbers, but the fact that we don't have TNG or VOY bundles yet suggests that sales weren't super.
I understand the reason, why Cryptic dosn't create new Ship interiors. But there is a big big question:
WHY Is there no Content in the ship-Interiors? When there ar Little missions, some funny dailys. Usallsy poker, and 3D-Chess and so on, why we shouldn't use our Ship-Interiors?
When Cryptic dosn't get us a reason to visit them, then it is your misstake. The Community will get poker and so one for year and year again. But what we get? Stupid Dinos with laserbeams.
I Play STO for 3 and a half year. And in last time I#m really frustrated, beacause, there is more and more non Trek in the game. A New Ship-Interior with some Little Mission can bring new Motivation for some Players. And I talk for longtime Players and Trekkies. Not for this SciFi-players how come to STO after f2P
How long do you think it would take them to design, code, and create art for a full poker, 3D chess, or any other minigame from scratch? I'm guessing that's a pretty big job.
Dabo was relatively simple, being a game of chance, but poker and chess have some pretty complex rules...not an easy task, and not easy to justify over other gameplay content which is more suited for the kind of game STO is.
Yes, that includes dinosaurs with laser beams.
Well, I did give some off-the-cuff suggestions...
I agree with your point; it would be a significant undertaking in time and energy. And would it get utilized? Would the "give it to me now!" players make their voices heard?
Probably.
I was just brainstorming a possible way for Cryptic to use the underperforming assets they've made in a new and possibly compelling way. A Remastering, as it were.
...even if one of my ideas does require them to make 3-5 brand new minigames...and how hard can that be? /sarcasm
:rolleyes:
Currently cruising the Pi Canis Sector Block...
Taco, what is the possibility of modifying the Foundry so that players can create their own Starship Interior? It would take off some of the pressure for devs designing new interiors since players can create it themselves. I know the June 2012 Ask Cryptic mentioned using Neverwinter Foundry Tech to do something like this. The basic Foundry items would be for free, but if someone wanted to add a Borg Alcove or Andorian Sculptures, then they would have to buy the Borg Interior Pack or Andorian Interior Pack from the C-Store. This could generate quite a bit of profit as The Sims has proven.
The argument given for not having decent interiors is invalid. By creating interiors that were a wasteland and poorly designed they complained players don't want to pay for more wastelands. The solution is an obvious one, but it will require work.
1. Put something on player's interiors, something friends and fleets can and want to do together. Games are one option, holodeck usage could be another.
2. Make interiors customizable, this means you need a new system. Customized doesn't mean unlocked like the terrible fleet holdings. Give people the option to acquire what they want, and place it, move it, etc.
3. That's it, the money side looks after itself, if you give people something they want, they'll pay for it. If you can create e-peen contests for ship interiors people will pay stupidly for it. If you give reasons for people to want to go inside, then they'll be able to show everyone their e-peen and be happy.
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Beside the fact that in ship combat is everything but impossible, there are lot of things that could be addet, starting from traveling in the interior instead if sector space up until things like a bank in there, or even just rest zones. Over the time there have been dozends and dozends of suggestions.
Wich, I circle, leads us back to the "stuff to do" part.
I'm not saying it can't be done, but the fact that 1980s computers were doing it doesn't mean it's easy to program - it just means that the final product doesn't require a ton of processing power.
For the sake of argument...
Why do I have to visit my ship interior to play [holodeck game] with my friends? I insist that it be added to the PvE queue system immediately!
This is a good idea, but I don't know how easy this is to implement. Some degree of customization is already in place in the form of shipboard trophies (assuming you're not a Romulan), so we know it's possible. Again, I have no clue what the limitations of the current system are, or how easy it would be to expand customization.
I agree with the statement, but "giving people what they want" is not as easy as it sounds...giving people something they'll pay for is even harder.
This is because the game focuses on one type of play COMBAT. If there were more of a focus on SOCIAL and CRAFTING types of gameplay, then you could make it worth your wild by attracting a more diverse crowd of the Star Trek fanbase and MMO playerbase.
Even if you gave us skeletons of corridors and the main rooms, then this rumored "Room Editor" You would bring in a whole slew of different gameplayers that just like to do deco and create (SWG was full of these type of players). Give them a new non-combat class with a different leveling path etc.. They could create rooms that are saved that you buy from them or you could hire them to work on your ship. In addition, Cryptic could sell pregen rooms or updated rooms to fill the slots. A room/lab could be a reward for a mission. Heck these could even be the missing DOFF rewards. But that is getting into social gameplay and the possibilities are limitless.
Now what to do in the interior? Well if there was a better crafting/resource system that is where you could do minigames in various labs to refine materials and assemble items. There you can monetize, reward, etc.. for the labs. But that is if you had a solid crafting/resource system.
You might say if you do all of this what will happen to social zones? People will not go there. In STO most social zones are chore centers. That would need to be fixed so they are mission/adventure hubs. More akin to what you guys are doing with the adventure zones.
On that note......can we get some more Romulan bridge packs please? Klingons even have a choice of bridges, us Romulans are stuck with one. The interior is fine, I'd just like a different bridge. Can that happen at some point?
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