I mean, I know that is the real reason. But it is BS to have an NDA on a game that has already gone live, with a community more or less starving for new material to consume. They come out with a cool new featured episode, then they turn around and implement systemic changes that are detrimental to the enjoyment of the community. They don't tell us what they are doing. We have no way to prepare for it, and then BAM, they dump it on us and the community explodes.
I have a hard time taking Cryptic seriously, especially when they make up all sorts of excuses why doing this or that isn't possible, and then turn around and add in stuff that doesn't even FIT in a Star Trek setting which can be abused by a bunch of jerks to whom the devs turn a blind eye in spite of the shouts of outrage to which they turn a deaf ear.
In terms of the IP this game is supposed to be based, it is turning into a huge joke. It's becoming eaiser and easier to spend more and more time away from the game. Especially with Lord Cryptic's policy of "we giveth and then taketh away and then giveth back in gimped form with a money hook.
No, it's not BS. It's reasonable. MMOs are ever-growing games. Things are subject to change at the drop of a hat, no matter what. What you want is for Cryptic to come to us, lay out what they have planned so you can cherry pick what you want and don't want. If Cryptic did that, there would be targ-dungstorm the likes that have never been seen before.
As many people said, what is or isn't Star Trek is different for everyone. You got your Kirk-wannabes, your Picard-wannabes, your Sisko-wannabes, your Janeway-wannabes (Heaven forbid), your Archer-wannabes and then you have people like myself who want, oh, I dunno, to be their own captain.
STO is only becoming a "huge joke" to you because it's not becoming your game.
It's no conspiracy. How many times have they released something that the community did not ask for or want, or if they did ask for it or want it, ended up manifesting in a way that nobody asked for or wanted?
For example, the community wanted a Romulan faction. We got a Romulan fraction.
they did that to keep things centered on the UFP-KDF war. And then they turned around and ended the war.
So what is the excuse now? Tell me?
You are misinterpreting the facts here.
Adding the Romulans had nothing to do with keeping things centered on the Fed/KDF war. Adding the Romulans was about adding Romulans into the game and selling Romulan ships - players get Roms and 35 new Missions and Cryptic gets ship, species, and clothing Zen income.
The alliance system was put into place because the current Engine is not programmed for three-way PvP. Thus the Roms need to ally with Fed or KDF to use the Red/Blue two-way PvP system. It has nothing to do with keeping things centered on the war.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
The alliance system was put into place because the current Engine is not programmed for three-way PvP. Thus the Roms need to ally with Fed or KDF to use the Red/Blue two-way PvP system.
The game still has PvP. The Engine still only allows two-way PvP. Nothing has changed in that regard. How many wish to do it is meaningless, as PvP has always been played by only a fraction of the player-base.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
Big thanks to jon59650 for creating an entire transcript of the show during my absence.
I am gonna give him a reward for doing so, that was awesome of him.
Just to clarify, I am indeed under a NDA (as are all of our employees at PWE and Cryptic) and that does limit what I can discuss/answer, and it will continue to do so.
Until we get clearance to talk about certain things, we can only hint.
Since this Q & A with our livestream is fairly new, it will get better given time.
What I want is for them to shoot straight with us... From Day One, we've been met with either outright deception or extreme ambiguity. I know things are subject to change... But SOME things have to be etched in stone. Otherwise, NOTHING would be done. It's the things that are etched in stone I wish they would let us know about.
People are going to throw a tantrum regardless. I just want to know what the roadmap is.
And here's the problem with that: things change, even the things that are etched in stone. That's why Cryptic and other gaming companies dance around this. I remember way back when Sonic 2006 was first mentioned, Sega was going off about how the game was gonna have this and that and this and be able to do whatever. What did we get? A crappy game that retconned itself.
Cryptic can't say that they're going to do X for absolutely sure because things change. That's a matter of fact.
I find myself in the latter category as well.
What I want out of this game the most, and it seems to be the least likely, is for Cryptic to look at what star trek is presented as in the TV shows and... I don't know... BUILD MECHANICS THAT LET US DO THAT!
That's another problem: Star Trek has evolved so much since the days of Kirk and Picard, it's not funny. I mean, if the series after TNG followed the same forumla, sure, but DS9, Voyager and Enterprise took the concept and went different directions with it. So, "how it's presented in the TV shows" is not a valid option.
MY Star Trek game would be one in which Star Trek is at its core, rather than just the skin. I guess I just expect too much.
Again, your Star Trek =/= my Star Trek nor anyone else's.
Let's see... Until you make that decision to join either faction, the game treats romulans as separate entities. They have their own unique character slots. Their own unique species and costume sets. For all intents and purposes, they ARE a third faction... except for where it matters.
Really, the only thing needed is for them to grant the ability to do their own fleet holdings and to engage in PvP... Oh wait... that would mean production of more unique romulan-specific assets. That means more work than putting in yet another reputation grindfest and raking in the money from the indirect monetization.
And you forget one important tidbit: there was no faction. At the point of the game where you, as a Romulan (or Romulan-aligned), come in to play, the Federation/KDF war has been raging in the background and you have not wanted to do anything with it. It's only until Hakeev decides to be a jerk do you even decide to take up arms. The Romulan Republic isn't even founded until the stage you have to join up with the Federation or the Klingons. The only reason you're part of either side is because you're asked to make the first, big choice as a sign of peace.
Technically speaking, the Romulan Republic isn't going to suddenly grow numbers out of their pointy-eared rear end in less than a year.
All true... But it doesn't change the fact that the pro-romulan portion of this community wanted a THIRD faction but was given a half-baked bastardization. Mechanically speaking, it's doable, but with more work than what goes into the reputation grindfests, and that seems to be Cryptic's comfort zone right now.
No. It was not doable. The game Engine made a third, independent Faction, impossible to implement - there is no way in the game to have three-way PvP. We are not talking about some minor change here as you seem to say - which is a classic indicator of someone who has no actual game coding experience and so assumes because it is easy to say it is easy to do.
Now compound that with CBS's "no evil Faction rule," and the Tal Shiar storyline is purely evil as they destroyed their own people. Now throw in a dash of players wanting reunificationist Romulans to play and we got what we got. An Engine restricted, CBS restricted, players demanding "I want" Faction.
And the more you post the more it comes off sounding like you want YOUR concept of Trek and no one else's can possibly be correct. As others have tried to explain to you in this thread, Trek means different things to different people. Trek has been off the air for 10 years and people still argue about canon goofs, and which series were part of canon, and which series were better, and so on - heck, there is a whole group of people who say Enterprise never happened and it was all a Holodeck story. Contrary to what you might believe Trek fans are not unified on what they think Trek is.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
I am trying to understand something here...when Romulans were added to the game they got their own set of missions.
To me, they are still a brand new faction. Why does having this alliance system make it seem like it is not an entire faction?
I believe it was explained, possibly by Captain Smirk, that they didn't want to isolate new Romulan characters and force them to make their own fleets and "start over". They wanted to make them join existing fleets and interact with them. I can understand why that would be the case. Building a fleet to T4 can be a massive undertaking.
There is also the storyline aspect. They are rebuilding their civilization, they are going to need allies.
I think that people are just thinking way too much into this KDF or Fed-aligned stuff. Once you look past that, it doesn't make the Romulans seem any more less as a faction.
You get to play as a Romulan or Reman, you get to play some Romulan-exclusive missions.
Just like how Federation players can play any of those Federation races and get to play Federation missions.
Klingon players can play any of those KDF races and get to play Klingon missions.
Hell, at least you didn't have to start at level 25 when starting a Romulan character.
No. I was not doable. The game Engine made a third, independent Faction, impossible to implement - there is no way in the game to have three-way PvP. We are not talking about some minor change here as you seem to say - which is a classic indicator of someone who has no actual game coding experience and so assumes because it is easy to say it is easy to do.
Now compound that with CBS's "no evil Faction rule," and the Tal Shiar storyline is purely evil as they destroyed their own people. Now throw in a dash of players wanting reunificationist Romulans to play and we got what we got. An Engine restricted, CBS restricted, players demanding "I want" Faction.
And the more you post the more it comes off sounding like you want YOUR concept of Trek and no one else's can possibly be correct. As others have tried to explain to you in this thread, Trek means different things to different people. Trek has been off the air for 10 years and people still argue about canon goofs, and which series were part of canon, and which series were better, and so on - heck, there is a whole group of people who say Enterprise never happened and it was all a Holodeck story. Contrary to what you might believe Trek fans are not unified on what they think Trek is.
You are the epitome of bombast, aren't you? I find your know-it-all attitude to be quite onerous to deal with.
You are the epitome of bombast, aren't you? I find your know-it-all attitude to be quite onerous to deal with.
I am crushed. Some nobody who rage-quit the game and then snuck back on the forum under a different handle does not like me. How will I ever sleep tonight?
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
I just want there to be more of a concerted effort on Cryptic's part to produce an MMO based on Star Trek, rather than Star Trek based on an MMO. I don't think this is unfair or unreasonable to hope for.
Unfortunately, I think we will be seeing more of a "Star Trek" based on the limits of a MMORPG than a MMORPG based on the limits of "Star Trek". Mainly because I feel that a MMORPG based on the limits of "Star Trek" would be single player game with a multiplayer feature. The best you can get out of it would be a Battle.net/League of Legends setup in multiplayer.
Having their own "Star Trek" conform to a MMORPG makes more sense to me and much more manageable.
Member since November 2009... I think. (UFP) Ragnar
Uhm... That's what we have right now. This game can be leveled from 1 to max SOLO. The featured episodes can all be completed SOLO. The content that is exclusively multiplayer is more of an afterthought than a central focus. How many new PvP maps have come out? How many new STFs have there been?
It all depends on the design decisions. I am not saying it would be easy... ALL of this is difficult. Doing what I suggest would simply be a different form of difficult, requiring more imagination and less brute force.
I guess my definition of a multiplayer is that a player hosts a game/match and then invite other players to join them before starting. Whereas my definition of a MMORPG is while you can definitely try to solo content, you have the ability to "pick up" or have people join along the way. Getting from 1 to max solo isn't an issue (heck, there was that guy who got from 1 to max in WoW by doing non-lethal things like gathering herbs or fetch quests!) We do have some multiplayer features, but as you said they are more of an afterthought which makes our Star Trek more of an MMORPG than a single player game with multiplayer.
As for design decisions, I agree. As players, we won't be clued in on the design decisions until we see them patched in-game. However, after the rushed launch, F2P conversion, and selling of Cryptic from Atari to PWE, I fully expect Cryptic stay in its comfort zone until it feels more secure and stable.
Member since November 2009... I think. (UFP) Ragnar
you [smirk] answer no questions of any substance at all ever. and at this point no one cares anymore what you have to sayas everyone already knows you are FOS.
At least we got another official "no" on the T5 Connie situation.
Just as commentary, I highly doubt it's completely off the table, being that as an MMO based on a property like Star Trek it's unlikely they'll leave any juicy stone unturned as they progress. After all, that's why we have lockboxes now.
The T5 Connie (presumably the movie refit, I'm not talking about the TOS Connie, though I'm for all ships having T5 variants) has more fans than it has ever had detractors, and Cryptic (and CBS by extension) isn't afraid of stepping on a few hardliners' toes to put out content that is desired. I still remember the brouhaha over carriers and the handful of people who supposedly left the game over that.
The fact that there are so few "official" notices like this about the T5 Connie issue raises a flag to me that they recognize its popularity enough to not want to completely avoid the possibility of it. Especially given that this isn't even an "official" proclamation (not from someone higher up in the chain running the business/license, having to say he "thinks" it won't ever happen, etc.). These kinds of decisions, soft or hard decisions, change with time, like depending on who is currently working at Cryptic, PWE, and CBS, and other such factors. Say they want to do an anniversary event for a specific TMP-era film and suddenly decide to put out content for it, give away a free T5 Connie-refit for instance.
I do enjoy the fact that this is basically confirmation that it's recognized as being much-desired, and going by the fact that they've added previous era classes of ships with T5 variants, a Connie movie-refit still seems more likely than not. All the later era Enterprises are well-represented at T5, so what's left? What brings in the money happens.
That's all I really want to say about it for now, carry on =P
Just as commentary, I highly doubt it's completely off the table, being that as an MMO based on a property like Star Trek it's unlikely they'll leave any juicy stone unturned as they progress. After all, that's why we have lockboxes now.
The T5 Connie (presumably the movie refit, I'm not talking about the TOS Connie, though I'm for all ships having T5 variants) has more fans than it has ever had detractors, and Cryptic (and CBS by extension) isn't afraid of stepping on a few hardliners' toes to put out content that is desired. I still remember the brouhaha over carriers and the handful of people who supposedly left the game over that.
The fact that there are so few "official" notices like this about the T5 Connie issue raises a flag to me that they recognize its popularity enough to not want to completely avoid the possibility of it. Especially given that this isn't even an "official" proclamation (not from someone higher up in the chain running the business/license, having to say he "thinks" it won't ever happen, etc.). These kinds of decisions, soft or hard decisions, change with time, like depending on who is currently working at Cryptic, PWE, and CBS, and other such factors. Say they want to do an anniversary event for a specific TMP-era film and suddenly decide to put out content for it, give away a free T5 Connie-refit for instance.
I do enjoy the fact that this is basically confirmation that it's recognized as being much-desired, and going by the fact that they've added previous era classes of ships with T5 variants, a Connie movie-refit still seems more likely than not. All the later era Enterprises are well-represented at T5, so what's left? What brings in the money happens.
That's all I really want to say about it for now, carry on =P
Hold on to every bit of hope you can. As the old saying goes: hope for the best, prepare for the worst.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
Comments
No, it's not BS. It's reasonable. MMOs are ever-growing games. Things are subject to change at the drop of a hat, no matter what. What you want is for Cryptic to come to us, lay out what they have planned so you can cherry pick what you want and don't want. If Cryptic did that, there would be targ-dungstorm the likes that have never been seen before.
As many people said, what is or isn't Star Trek is different for everyone. You got your Kirk-wannabes, your Picard-wannabes, your Sisko-wannabes, your Janeway-wannabes (Heaven forbid), your Archer-wannabes and then you have people like myself who want, oh, I dunno, to be their own captain.
STO is only becoming a "huge joke" to you because it's not becoming your game.
Adding the Romulans had nothing to do with keeping things centered on the Fed/KDF war. Adding the Romulans was about adding Romulans into the game and selling Romulan ships - players get Roms and 35 new Missions and Cryptic gets ship, species, and clothing Zen income.
The alliance system was put into place because the current Engine is not programmed for three-way PvP. Thus the Roms need to ally with Fed or KDF to use the Red/Blue two-way PvP system. It has nothing to do with keeping things centered on the war.
lol
If that was the reason, it got removed, too.
I am gonna give him a reward for doing so, that was awesome of him.
Just to clarify, I am indeed under a NDA (as are all of our employees at PWE and Cryptic) and that does limit what I can discuss/answer, and it will continue to do so.
Until we get clearance to talk about certain things, we can only hint.
Since this Q & A with our livestream is fairly new, it will get better given time.
Off to post in the OP. See you all soon!
~CaptainSmirk
And here's the problem with that: things change, even the things that are etched in stone. That's why Cryptic and other gaming companies dance around this. I remember way back when Sonic 2006 was first mentioned, Sega was going off about how the game was gonna have this and that and this and be able to do whatever. What did we get? A crappy game that retconned itself.
Cryptic can't say that they're going to do X for absolutely sure because things change. That's a matter of fact.
That's another problem: Star Trek has evolved so much since the days of Kirk and Picard, it's not funny. I mean, if the series after TNG followed the same forumla, sure, but DS9, Voyager and Enterprise took the concept and went different directions with it. So, "how it's presented in the TV shows" is not a valid option.
Again, your Star Trek =/= my Star Trek nor anyone else's.
And you forget one important tidbit: there was no faction. At the point of the game where you, as a Romulan (or Romulan-aligned), come in to play, the Federation/KDF war has been raging in the background and you have not wanted to do anything with it. It's only until Hakeev decides to be a jerk do you even decide to take up arms. The Romulan Republic isn't even founded until the stage you have to join up with the Federation or the Klingons. The only reason you're part of either side is because you're asked to make the first, big choice as a sign of peace.
Technically speaking, the Romulan Republic isn't going to suddenly grow numbers out of their pointy-eared rear end in less than a year.
Now compound that with CBS's "no evil Faction rule," and the Tal Shiar storyline is purely evil as they destroyed their own people. Now throw in a dash of players wanting reunificationist Romulans to play and we got what we got. An Engine restricted, CBS restricted, players demanding "I want" Faction.
And the more you post the more it comes off sounding like you want YOUR concept of Trek and no one else's can possibly be correct. As others have tried to explain to you in this thread, Trek means different things to different people. Trek has been off the air for 10 years and people still argue about canon goofs, and which series were part of canon, and which series were better, and so on - heck, there is a whole group of people who say Enterprise never happened and it was all a Holodeck story. Contrary to what you might believe Trek fans are not unified on what they think Trek is.
To me, they are still a brand new faction. Why does having this alliance system make it seem like it is not an entire faction?
I believe it was explained, possibly by Captain Smirk, that they didn't want to isolate new Romulan characters and force them to make their own fleets and "start over". They wanted to make them join existing fleets and interact with them. I can understand why that would be the case. Building a fleet to T4 can be a massive undertaking.
There is also the storyline aspect. They are rebuilding their civilization, they are going to need allies.
I think that people are just thinking way too much into this KDF or Fed-aligned stuff. Once you look past that, it doesn't make the Romulans seem any more less as a faction.
You get to play as a Romulan or Reman, you get to play some Romulan-exclusive missions.
Just like how Federation players can play any of those Federation races and get to play Federation missions.
Klingon players can play any of those KDF races and get to play Klingon missions.
Hell, at least you didn't have to start at level 25 when starting a Romulan character.
You are the epitome of bombast, aren't you? I find your know-it-all attitude to be quite onerous to deal with.
Unfortunately, I think we will be seeing more of a "Star Trek" based on the limits of a MMORPG than a MMORPG based on the limits of "Star Trek". Mainly because I feel that a MMORPG based on the limits of "Star Trek" would be single player game with a multiplayer feature. The best you can get out of it would be a Battle.net/League of Legends setup in multiplayer.
Having their own "Star Trek" conform to a MMORPG makes more sense to me and much more manageable.
(UFP) Ragnar
I guess my definition of a multiplayer is that a player hosts a game/match and then invite other players to join them before starting. Whereas my definition of a MMORPG is while you can definitely try to solo content, you have the ability to "pick up" or have people join along the way. Getting from 1 to max solo isn't an issue (heck, there was that guy who got from 1 to max in WoW by doing non-lethal things like gathering herbs or fetch quests!) We do have some multiplayer features, but as you said they are more of an afterthought which makes our Star Trek more of an MMORPG than a single player game with multiplayer.
As for design decisions, I agree. As players, we won't be clued in on the design decisions until we see them patched in-game. However, after the rushed launch, F2P conversion, and selling of Cryptic from Atari to PWE, I fully expect Cryptic stay in its comfort zone until it feels more secure and stable.
(UFP) Ragnar
Just as commentary, I highly doubt it's completely off the table, being that as an MMO based on a property like Star Trek it's unlikely they'll leave any juicy stone unturned as they progress. After all, that's why we have lockboxes now.
The T5 Connie (presumably the movie refit, I'm not talking about the TOS Connie, though I'm for all ships having T5 variants) has more fans than it has ever had detractors, and Cryptic (and CBS by extension) isn't afraid of stepping on a few hardliners' toes to put out content that is desired. I still remember the brouhaha over carriers and the handful of people who supposedly left the game over that.
The fact that there are so few "official" notices like this about the T5 Connie issue raises a flag to me that they recognize its popularity enough to not want to completely avoid the possibility of it. Especially given that this isn't even an "official" proclamation (not from someone higher up in the chain running the business/license, having to say he "thinks" it won't ever happen, etc.). These kinds of decisions, soft or hard decisions, change with time, like depending on who is currently working at Cryptic, PWE, and CBS, and other such factors. Say they want to do an anniversary event for a specific TMP-era film and suddenly decide to put out content for it, give away a free T5 Connie-refit for instance.
I do enjoy the fact that this is basically confirmation that it's recognized as being much-desired, and going by the fact that they've added previous era classes of ships with T5 variants, a Connie movie-refit still seems more likely than not. All the later era Enterprises are well-represented at T5, so what's left? What brings in the money happens.
That's all I really want to say about it for now, carry on =P