Okay, so I've had a chance to test out the system a bit, and I'll list out what I think is good and bad with the current set up.
the Good
-Ability to craft Antiproton at lower levels. While it may be considered Vendor trash for some, I see it as a potential asset to pass off to future toons that I will create.
-New things for people to craft that didn't exist in old crafting system: Omnidirectional beams for phasers, disruptors, tetryon, plasma and polaron, new dual heavy cannon that can fire double the arc of other dual heavy cannons, new consoles and a new ground weapon.
-accessible from anywhere.
-having to actually build the parts of whatever we want to make.
-able to craft more than one thing at a time (old system you could only do one thing at a time. New system you can do up to 5 once you unlock the slots)
Neutral
-dilithium cost is a bit high, but it's not the weapons themselves that cost the dilithium, it's crafting the component that they need that is part of the cost.
-can only convert one item at a time, but since there will be a fix coming for this soon, I can remain neutral on it.
Bad
-Everytime you go back to the previous section from looking at what an item requires, it takes you back to the beginning of the list so you have to keep scrolling down each time.
-XP requirement increases sharply. Should adjust it relative to what you are able to craft so it's not as time gated.
-no ability to craft kit modules or melee weapons.
In all, I know that this is still a work in progress, but I think so far it's a step in the right direction. People not in fleets/not interested in reputation can work up to get Mark XII gear. Sure, it'll probably be subpar compared to fleet stuff, but it's something else that they can obtain on their own.
Played through this a bit and a few things immediately apparent (adding to the chorus of already posted comments):
- 99% of the xp comes from crafting items (weapons, shields, etc) that I will never use and just sell.
- In order to level quickly, I just make a basic MkVI item in every category. Doing this blasts me straight to Level 2 (never saw level 1 anything). Honestly, I do not see a need for making any pieces MkV or lower - any new character will be player Level 20 before they have enough materials to make anything based on random drops of material and scans, and all I do is immediately discard them for ECs. I say just make R&D open up at Level 20 and scrap the low end R&D (MkV and below) because 1) no one will use it and 2) it just takes up space.
- The 99% of xp coming from items we will just discard is tedious. Once I get to level 2 in anything, I have to grind out MkVI items until I get to level 5!?! before I can make anything higher. With 1 hour timers on builds, this means I will be spending weeks before I can build anything that is Mk X (and therefore marginally useful) because I am prevented from making blue components. The leveling curve is pretty steep, and honestly a huge turnoff to using the system.
- The probability of rarity thing is not great, but I can deal with it. The disappointing thing is that there is no crit bonus. A MkVI purple and MkVI white award the same crafting xp - if I am building this stuff to grind out crafting xp, so why do I really care about the quality if I am not getting an xp bonus for it (the marginal bonus in EC's when I sell is not really incentive enough).
- The UI is nice looking, though I would appreciate the ability to click on components in the cost pane of an item and "drill-down" to craft that component instead. That would save me a number of clicks, as well as trying to keep track of how many of which component I need when clicking through (right now I am writing little notes on post-its to keep track of how much I need of which components).
- Reduction of material types is nice, but now it has spawned a ton of components. Between materials and components, I would hazard that there are nearly as many crafting items (the lack of schematics is nice however, so kudos on that).
- Using the Doffs is done well.
I definitely think the crafting system misses the mark on a few things:
1) In the old system and the new one, the only reason to build low level components is to gain crafting xp so you can craft things you actually want. In the old system, you could do that much faster, making this system a step back.
2) Lets say I want a Purple MKXII with the right combo of buffs. I am starring down several weeks of grinding materials and building components for low level items I will turn around and sell, before I can make purple components for MkXII's. Then I have to keep grinding those to get enough crafting xp to get a reasonable chance of a crit on a MkXII. Then I have to keep doing that until I get the combo of buffs I want. OR I could buy a MkXII purple off the market that I know has the buffs I want. True, it will cost a lot of ECs. True, the Exchange may not have the exact thing I want. But honestly, I would rather grind out the ECs and search the exchange everyday for the version I want - less time on my part, especially considering anyone who does make it to the top of the crafting trees will be flooding the market with reject MkXIII purples because they didn't hit their perfect set of buffs.
3) The lack of an ability to break down, level up, or enhance existing components seems like a big miss. It makes sense (RP-wise and mechanically) to take an existing engine and 1) break it down for parts (at a loss obviously - cannot get materials or components out 1-for-1), 2) upgrade it to have better output (i.e. level), or 3) enhance the engine to get additional buffs.
4) The Aegis set was never game breaking - why, because it had decent but not exceptional stats. The bigger benefits came through set bonuses which typically require a tradeoff with other items (individually) or set bonus opportunities. Why this was (and still is) the only craftable set I will never understand. I am not really interested in grinding for a random drop generator - I will grind for unique items, even if they are not uber powerful. The top tier items that have been inserted do seem pretty game breaking and concern me about balance.
5) In order for me to want to invest any time in this, it has to give me something that I cannot get otherwise - be it unique items, ability to upgrade items, ability to craft the exact item I want. What has been created is a grindy random drop-generator - not seeing how this brings anything to the game other than allowing me to specialize in one type of random drop.
The UI, Doff system integration, reduced materials, etc. are all good but if this system does not deliver on giving us a better way of getting the components we desire than the current random drop mechanism, I do not think this system will be successful.
Okay, so I've had a chance to test out the system a bit, and I'll list out what I think...
-XP requirement increases sharply. Should adjust it relative to what you are able to craft so it's not as time gated.
I agree with the need for increasing xp gained per hour as you level up.
Here are some quick and dirty hard numbers from my time crafting with the new system..
With 600 being the standard XP received per hour, no matter what you craft (other than the AEGIS shield) it comes out to 600xp per hour.
Here is the hourly cost to level up to 8th.
1st to 2nd = 0.38
2nd to 3rd = 16.2
3rd to 4th = 33.3
4th to 5th = 30
5th to 6th = 34
6th to 7th = 42
7th to 8th = 45
8th to 9th = 48
9th to 10th = 51
The above is if you don't use dilithium to "finish now". You also need to add the hours together to get a total time for going from 1st level to 8th in just that one school (in this case 299.88 hours).
Don't sound to bad ..right? Just under 13 days and you could be level 10!
So lets look at the numbers going from level 10 to 15.
You finally made level 10 and now you can make all the components but you want better chances to get purples so you need to get to level 15 to have a decent chance.
10th to 11th = 120
11th to 12th = 135
12th to 13th = 150
13th to 14th = 165
14th to 15th = 180
So 750 hours if you don't "finish now". Well.. that's over 31 days if you keep on top of things and can manage the materials required to keep things moving.
Still with me? (13 days plus 31 days is 44 days so far..)
But then you notice something.. you want to max out the school but level 16 requires a hefty price.., what most games call a "HELL LEVEL". It cost 420 hours just to go from 15 to 16!
15th to 16th = 420
16th to 17th = 450
17th to 18th = 480
18th to 19th = 510
19th to 20th = 540
(Basically 100 days)
So 44 + 100 = 144 days or nearly 5 months just to max out one school.
So why did Al say in that podcast that he expected it to take a couple of months? Simple, once you unlock the other 4 R&D slots you can double up on jobs or use some to advance another school. That can cut the time spent to leveling in half or even more if you can get enough materials to keep things running smoothly throughout the duration.
Those are the "quick and dirty" numbers for you.
I hope this was helpful.
Operational Support Team
Squishing Bugs for a better future
Well having watched the tribble timewarp on the subject and had a short play with the system I agree with virtually everyone here in that the implementation is bad, it would have been better to use the new kit system as the base for the new crafting as this would allow people to choose their own mods thus making the dilithium cost worth it.
Here here.
I can live with a measure of randomisation in the rarity, after all one is asking a doff to do it and doffs can never be trusted to do things properly, but I don't think the mods should be random. That said, one could sensibly make the mods based on components that once built into the item are given the [Fused] mod themselves, this would force a player to make a new weapon and mods if they wanted to use different mods so the dilithium cost could be brought down per item because between mods and random rarity chances are people are going to make a lot of each item.
I don't like the randomization, but the idea of fuse mods fits nicely, and I like it a lot.
But being able to salvage one mod component from breaking down an item could work nicely too.
Could we possibly retain some factional flavor to crafting.
Like KDF gets to do bat'leth
FEd the vulcan thingy
and rommies finally get a factional melee weapon
The Agreed, and I think Romulans would get a Knife or a Sword based on the Sword of the Raptor Star.
what about horta, non-combat pets, ... something to make it worthwhile to interact with the system on multiple toons?
It doesn't have to be the old phaser /disruptor split, but still some kind of falvor showing that fed, republican, and klingon research and development is no identical? The show often displayed the techonologies used by the different galactic players as quite different in war and in peace. Why is it all the same here? Doesn't feel very trek to me.
Maybe even doff, capatain or player race should influence the odds. Like humans are good with phasers. jem'hadar are good with anti-proton because
<RP_argument> they have been working with these techonolgies much more in depth then the other cultures in the star trek universe, hence they are better at developing, disassembling etc them </RP_argument>
Seperate note,the new Doff UI/ RnD UI causes CTD on mac clients quite reliable. Not good!
The Jem'Hadar and all Dominion forces used Phased Polarons, not Antiprotons.
Enhanced ability with the faction's natural weapons does make sense though.
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
So this probably goes without saying, but unless crafted items are actually worth using (i.e. on par or better than reputation gear), crafting is nothing more than a useless money/ec/dil sink. And if they ARE on par, then the rep gear becomes almost useless. Either way, everything is going to be more expensive, so we'll get ripped off no matter what...
I have collated all my feedback from various posts into this one so it is all in one place in the most appropriate forum.
Main Issues with R&D System
1 - Removal of the Exploration Clusters now removes a huge chunk of a player's ability to gather resources. How will this issue be rectified? We need maps somewhere where we can gather resources. Having them in nodes of all missions like before is fine, but a true crafter is going to just want to have the ability to gather. You have removed that option.
2 - The dilithium costs need to go completely. I am tired of having to constantly grind for dilithium for everything in game, especially when dilithium is not rewarded everywhere in game and the refining limit per day is still so low. It is still not the time-based currency as promised. Fix the issues with obtaining refined dilithium.
3 - We need a "deconstruction"/"reverse engineering" mechanic so we can break items down into raw materials. Every decent crafting system has one. If we get an item as a loot drop we should have the ability to either sell it or break it down.
4 - We need to be able to slot the Modifiers we want at the launch of the system. Waiting for it to come later leaves this system incomplete. Right now it feel more like a crafting lockbox system.
5 - Costs for DOFFs at the Academy need to be drastically reduced since this is yet another system that eats or heavily uses DOFFs. Imagine the costs of grinding for a random DOFF to fill one of those slots, let alone use them as a "catalyst"
6 - DOFFs as "catalysts" needs to be replaced with items that are found, replicated, purchased, rewarded etc...
7 - The XP curves between crafting levels are too steep compared to the XP granted from crafting an item. Those need to be brought down more in line with the XP granted.
8 - The timers to complete crafting an item are too long and need to be drastically reduced. This system has way to many grind, timer, and paywalls to be of any fun for players to use.
10 - When crafting components the system does not recognize your "best" DOFF like it does for crafting the item. I put this back up here because it seems to work "sporadically"
11 - There needs to be more diversity in DOFFs used for crafting. With so many different ones there should not really be any duplication and in reality there should be two options to choose from.
12 - The categories are very odd. Breaking weapons into three is just not logical and arbitrarily increases the grind. These need to be more streamlined.
14 - We need a way to make components in bulk, the ability to loop component crafting repeatedly rather than click click click every three seconds.
15 - The UI is not well designed and does not have a good workflow. There are too many alternate popup menus and shifting to different screens. It would be better if there was not as much wasted space with huge icons and blank areas if everything was consolidated onto one page. Take the beam crafting...we should only see one window where we select things and instead of having a separate window for all the subcomps, we should be able to craft them from the beam page etc.. Doff should be in a drop down and not from another popup. The UI just has too many windows.
16 - The timer for the subcomps is routinely going into negative time. Is there really a need for a timer on those items? Especially 5 seconds?
17 - The crafting bonus for DOFFs needs to be upped a bit. perhaps 10, 20, 40.
18 - The number of crafting nodes needs to be drastically increased or the drop stacks need to be upped quite a bit.
19 - We will desperately need "farming" areas. If you want a true crafting system you have to provide non-combat opportunities to collect resources. Will resources be included in loot drops as well? Not replacing things, but added as an additional. Active resource gathering missions or areas or do you plan it to be all passive DOFF related?
20 - The new UI for the DOFF system is not very intuitive. Having to hover over everything to see what you need and what you will be rewarded is cumbersome. Also, why were the job categories removed and it put all into one long scrolling mash? Again, there is a great deal of wasted space in the UI interface and the small picture and job bar are not the same height which adds to its awkward look.
22 - The system is far from balanced and it is clear it was not tested for leveling internally. In order for me to advance in beams to make MK VIII Beams, I need to make a Firing Sequencer, which we cannot do until level 5. So we have to slowly and ponderously inch ourselves forward at 600 XP a shot? The XP payout needs to be re-calibrated. For example in the case of the MK VI Beams, 600 should be for a white, and we should get progressively more XP for the higher the quality of an item we make. As it is we get just 600 XP for purple, blue, green, or white. This does not make any sense.
23 - Rare and Very Rare component costs need to be re-assessed as they are too large and depend on too many rare materials for which we have no real active way of harvesting.
24 - Recipes are not progressive: why do lower level beam weapons require a targeting interface but later MK ones (e.g. MK VI) do not? Yes it makes sense that weapons should have targeting arrays. The item recipes need to be progressive and logical. Thus give them a pass.
25 - Subcomponents need to come out at different qualities. Each subcomponent needs to be whit,e green, blue and purple. This should give a bonus toward the final item quality to reduce the gambling. Using all purple subcomponents should then give you a purple crafted item unless there is that rare critical failure.
26 - The dilithium prices on the new DOFF packs at SFA need to be at least cut in half. 1000 dilithium for a purely random draw is again even more gambling int he system. Same for the original packs btw. You put in the reputation system to eliminate player concern and remove the randomness for something guaranteed with progression yet a year later we are now back to another system that just has all randomness.
27 - I know you guys keep saying we can craft anything at any level and are touting that as the big thing for the system. However, all subcomponent recipes are not unlocked at the start of the system. For example in beams I cannot construct a firing sequencer until level 5 or an isolinear chip until level 10. I have to rely on someone else doing it and getting it from them. That means someone still has to level first, which logically means you cannot create anything at any level.
28 - In the recycle tab of your inventory, all the new crafting items have priority. Please give them a lower priority than you main inventory. It is tedious to have to scroll down every time to recycle junk items into EC.
29 - The R&D DOFF job at the academy needs to have its timer drastically reduced. 48hrs? Seriously? Why not just keep it like the rest of the, same timer, same cooldown. Be consistent with the existing rules. The more and different rules and exceptions you have, the further you get from your goal of making the game easier to play for newcomers.
30 - Alright the fact that the particle traces are converting to Common and Uncommon materials in the new system is very disconcerting. Rare for rare. Please re-adjust the tables. This completely renders any previous time and effort we have put into the game a lot less worthy. We have already had this happen to us with Marks...etc... Cryptic please learn from your past mistakes and do not repeat them. It is bad enough you added the Fleet project which awards people half of the fleet credits for the same amount of marks. I will say that the downfall of many MMOs is inconsistency in the rules. Be consistent.
31 - Here is another one where things do not make sense...because some subcomponents are shared among different schools...e.g. Electromagnetic Couplings, subcomponent crafting should be separate of crafting in any of the schools bu subcomponent recipes should be given out for respective levels in particular schools. I say this because let's say I am lvl 5 in Cannons and lvl 0 in Projectiles. If I try to craft an Electromagnetic Coupling for Cannons I have a +50 but in Projectiles to craft the same subcomponent it is +0??? That makes no sense whatsoever even from a design perspective.
Why Dilithium in the Crafting System is Unhealthy for it
Any dilithium cost in this system does not make it broadly appealing. With the amount of work you have to put in on the front end to start getting and making good gear, adding the dilithium grind to it just shoots it pretty much dead out of the gate. Look at how gated the system is already...
Obtain good quality purple DOFFs - probably a dilithium grind at the Academy or lots of credits, zen, etc... Long grind to get to that.
Obtain many crafting resource items - all gated by time and now no real good way to effectively farm so it will be people popping in and out of mission just to harvest nodes.
Craft subcomponents - again all dependent from the grind for resources and your luck at getting rarer mats. Also with a dilithium surcharge on sub components.
Construction times on items - these are too long, I am just at the MK VI for beams and one hour is silly. So there is gate.
XP curve for leveling is not balanced with XP for items made - currently with the time gate and low amount of XP this system is now double gated just in the crafting phase.
Randomness in item - now you go through all of that and you may have to rinse and repeat very slowly to get where you want to. Progression will feel too slow and gated so most player will drop out.
Solutions to Ease the Multiple Time Gates, Paygates, Paywalls, Microtransaction Hooks and Overly Grindy mechanics
You guys went too wild building in gates, micro-transaction hooks, and grinds to the point this system will not be fun at all. I am not trying to be mean, but if something does not give in it, then it will be all for nothing, too few people will use it and then you will not be able to justify additions to it. You want solutions here are some:
Non-combat farming - Put back in the particle scan missions for each star cluster and let us take them from a contact interact when we get to the particular nebula. Put each one on a 15 min cool down (each cluster seperately). This allows players to still complete their Star Cluster accolades and gives people a way to actively obtain resources in a non-combat fashion.
Drastically reduce the dilithium costs of the DOFF grinders - Why double dip now and have dilithium penalties in two places in the system especially if you are not going to up the refining limit per day.
Remove the dilithium costs for crafted items as a whole - this is exactly what killed the crafting/exchange system in the first place and why would it be any different now that a random element has been added. This makes it worse and makes it more of a gambling system rather than a crafting system.
Solutions for Crafting by Fleshing out the Rewards in the DOFF Commendation Categories
Here is another solution...the reward structure in the DOFF system was never completed. We only ever got the leveling rewards for Diplomacy/Marauding. Why not add in related rewards for the other DOFF categories and tiers that are crafting/resource gathering related?...
Increased chance at getting more anomalies
Increased chance of getting higher quality anomalies
A reduction in the time it takes to craft an item
An increased chance and making more components
A each final tier the ability to refine an extra 500 dilithium per day
An increased bonus to crafting something, a special mission that awards you catalysts
I could go on and on and flesh out every tier for each category.
Doing that will bring the DOFF and Crafting System even closer together and provide a means a player can reduce some of the gates.
At Minimum What Needs to be Done before Launch
1 The XP/Timer/Dilithium inputs need to be readjusted to move the extremes in closer to what reality could be.
2 A way to reverse engineer loot items to obtain materials and perhaps modifier circuits (The analogue of modifier bits in many other games).
3 Subcomponents need to be able to come out at different rarities based on your crafting skill+bonuses and those rarities convey a bonus that will afford more of a guaranteed item.
4 Dilithium costs on subcomponents needs to be removed completely. There are already dilithium inputs for the system in the form of the Buy it now button, DOFF packs, and DOFF grinder for better DOFFs. These are already too many.
5 We need to be able to nearly guarantee what we want to craft (given our crafting skill). If I want to craft a Green MK VI Beam array with [ACC], I should be able to do that.
6 Recipes for items need to follow a consistent logical order, if a MK II Beam array requires W and X, a MK VI Beam Array should require W, X, Y, and Z.
7 The UI needs to be reworked to manage the crafting flow better. There are already too many screens, too many clicks, too much scrolling. It all needs to be present on ONE pane. We get a drop down for the item, we get a drop down for what rarity we want (to try for), and we get a drop down for the MODs we want on the item. Then the system gives us what subcomponents we will need, we select X DOFFs that will craft those subcomponents and the system queues them up and cycles through them adding them to our R&D inventory as they finish (no clicking to collect the items). Once finished, we then select the DOFF we want to use to craft the item, we click the craft item button, the system then places the item in our inventory (no clicking to collect the item). We do not need a window to show us empty crafting slots, that just needs to be a number. We do not need a huge scrolling window of subcomponents, that should be taken care in the main crafting UI.
Bottom line is, if crafting is going to serve the purposes of:
1 - Enhancing the economics and social interaction of the game
2 - An alternative method of obtaining base gear for leveling
3 - In essence, and end game activity
Then it,
1 - Needs to complimentary not competitive with the other gear systems.
2 - Needs to start at a lower level AND have the same progression as character leveling so there is not lag (why are there even crafting recipes for items lower than lvl 15 then?)
3 - Has to provide some unique items that are highly needed (stacks of phaser charges for example).
Noncombat Methods of Resource Gathering and more on Fleshing Out DOFF Commendation Categories
If you want to entice the type of people who do crafting in MMOs then you are going to need to add more active non-combat methods to farm materials. Herding people into the PvE queues is not going to cut it. Yes we have the DOFF missions, but the costs to crew your ship full of good DOFFs is extremely expensive in terms of Zen (for packs), ec, DOFF grinders (dilithium costs in those are way too high), fleet marks etc..
Something has to give and it is all way too random as it is.
We should just have a DOFF store where we can buy the DOFFs we want that come in game. Zen packs perhaps not but definitely for the free stuff. We should also have parallel stores for each track as we do for diplomacy. Heck, you do not even have to create new DOFFs, just allocate some of the uncommons, rares, and very rares already in the system. You should be able to flesh out all the final tier rewards easy. Have us do chain missions to unlock the stores for the Leethean, Andorian, Vulcan, etc... contacts. Divorce these from costing dilithium and make dismissing them give you "requisitions" which are then the currency for the DOFF system. We seem to be adding so many new currencies anyhow.
Fixed/addressed so far
9 - There are a few errors in item names, e.g. in Beams Component - Subprocessor Unit is really the Emitter Module.
13 - We need to be able to turn in old data samples in bulk, there is already entirely too much clicking in this game and clicking for no real reason.
21 - When making a MK VI beam, I see at the bottom I will get 10 beam XP and the duration takes one minute. However, in reality, I get 600 Beam XP and the duration is ONE HOUR. Is this a typo on the UI or did someone misplace a few decimal points?
I think we might have a two birds one stone situation here:
The models for high mark ground weapons, in many people's eyes, are inferior to the earlier marks. When crafting ground weapons, could we get some way of manipulating their appearance? For instance, if you crafted a Mk XII phaser pistol, you could make it look like the standard issue phaser instead of that huge thing with holograms all over it you get as a random drop. Or make a plasma pistol look like a Romulan disruptor, for Republic players, instead of the other plasma gun style.
The style of the end game weapon models (some fleet and reputation aside) have always been disappointing to me. Letting us change them through the crafting system would be great, but I don't know if the tech's actually there to do it or not.
I have to say, I don't like the new assignment system, it's more difficult to navigate and assign officers, popping up showing me who they think would be a good choice, well is as silly as it was before, but now I can assign the same officer to 5 different slots in the same assignment which requires 5 officers, I couldn't do that before. Also, stop making me click view details to collect my reward, gosh that's really irritating when I want to collect awards from 15 missions!
I'm confused honestly by how the new research and development system is supposed to work, given I haven't watched any videos on it, but I shouldn't have to either, period. It should be self-explanatory, or there needs to be more documentation or a walk-through on how to bring it all together, make it a mission to assemble a mk II beam or something and give the player everything he/she needs to make it happen, that'll at least get everyone started in the right direction.
I like the numerous different lenses and whatnot that can be built, and traded on the exchange, that was a good idea there. It would be even better with the ability to build slotted weapons or armor which at first is only available through the R/D system. Additionally, instead of choosing a weapon on the outset to be a disruptor or phaser, the player simply chooses that's how the weapon appears when it fires and procs could then be added to it via special lenses or other developed items, and it would either boost the damage capacity or add a proc, but if adding a proc, then the damage capability it reduced, something like that. To add even more complication it would really be cool if for example I could choose to have an anti-proton beam chassis, add 4 plasma lenses which would produce a anti-proton beam with a slight visually plasma-green hue and plasma proc DoT effect chance which would stack to up perhaps a 10% chance and have x4 the average DoT effects (4 lenses)and and a anti-proton lens(which would boost the average overall damage of the beam), so the end result would be a beam which is relatively weak, but has a high chance of inflicting x4 plasma burn effects damage over time. It could balanced out a little bit by perhaps reducing the time the DoT is active by each lens used the previous example, but now that would really be cool if the R/D system made that possible. Food for thought.
You guys are taking away Exploration which was primarily solo missions where one could gather mats to craft. Now, we get notice that 'Queued STF's' will be awarded mat boxes and the Elite STF's will have a chance at very rare the rest of the players who don't play them won't. Guess they'll have to settle for buying them on the exchange? Is this balanced or even remotely fair?
I'm confused honestly by how the new research and development system is supposed to work, given I haven't watched any videos on it, but I shouldn't have to either, period. It should be self-explanatory, or there needs to be more documentation or a walk-through on how to bring it all together, make it a mission to assemble a mk II beam or something and give the player everything he/she needs to make it happen, that'll at least get everyone started in the right direction.
In the recent P1 podcast, Geko states there will be a tutorial for crafting...
I think we might have a two birds one stone situation here:
The models for high mark ground weapons, in many people's eyes, are inferior to the earlier marks. When crafting ground weapons, could we get some way of manipulating their appearance? For instance, if you crafted a Mk XII phaser pistol, you could make it look like the standard issue phaser instead of that huge thing with holograms all over it you get as a random drop. Or make a plasma pistol look like a Romulan disruptor, for Republic players, instead of the other plasma gun style.
The style of the end game weapon models (some fleet and reputation aside) have always been disappointing to me. Letting us change them through the crafting system would be great, but I don't know if the tech's actually there to do it or not.
That's not a bad idea, sometimes the simplicity is best, though I did want the MACO Battle Rifle for looks. There's also a fleet phaser I'm interested in. Kind of a snub nosed rifle, but I don't know which one it is.
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
I took all the old crafting system Anomaly Traces and converted them on Tribble to see how much new Rare (blue) Material I received in the conversion (see attached matrix).
Of course, the conversion did net a large quantity of common and uncommon material, but the rare material is essential for the mid to high level component and gear. The amount of rare material obtained from existing anomaly traces will determine how much a player will have to grind later in the new crafting progression.
I had 427 anomaly traces and obtained 112 rare materials after conversion or 26% when comparing quantities based on only old rare types and new rare types (the uncommon and common types obtained are not considered for this experiment).
Addendum: I noticed that the anomalies identified as uncommon level for new material will always give a good quantity of uncommon (and only uncommon material); so why are trace conversions using this "random reward" system for the material given in return? Use a straightforward rare for rare even if it is a one for one and each type of trace matches with a type of new rare material... just don't rip us off on all the grinding we did for these traces and give us a fraction of the rare material that should be received in the conversion.
It's in the notes. You are getting a free spanking new version Odyssey fleet uniform, they just haven't finished designing it yet.
All you needed to say. We are the chorus.
Yesterday I was really upset so I was not clear. Sorry.
I know that we are getting a new uniform but I could not care less
But I care about the new crafting system I want to craft.
There are so many posts like:
Oh I heard that someone posted that he was listening and that we will be able to make
I would love that Cryptic enables posting to players who logged on to Tribble in last 24h.
After 21 crafting assignments and burning 1575 dil to bypass 2h building time to build MK II dual cannon I got:
0, yes zero very rare AP MK II dual canons
p.s. I will execute my rare Jamhadar who is serving under me for 1,5 years for incompetence its just a MK II dual canon, he is Energy Weapons Officer not a Doctor.
I greatly disagree with you putting "Crafting Packs" in Queued Events. First of all, not everyone wants to do Queued events. And KDF queues have been dead for months!!! So are KDF players supposed to buy off the exchange?
Second, you are going to overflow the Exchange with garbage crafted drops, while Very Rares will be sold by greedy players for far excessive amounts. Where average / casual players won't stand a chance to afford.
I greatly disagree with you putting "Crafting Packs" in Queued Events. First of all, not everyone wants to do Queued events. And KDF queues have been dead for months!!! So are KDF players supposed to buy off the exchange?
Second, you are going to overflow the Exchange with garbage crafted drops, while Very Rares will be sold by greedy players for far excessive amounts. Where average / casual players won't stand a chance to afford.
I think they meant ques like ISE and such. If you can't find an ISE team in 5 minutes, than the servers are down.
Let us wear Swimsuits on Foundry maps or bridges please! I would pay zen for that.
1. You take out exploration so we can all sit around in Drosana waiting for a queue to pop baisically taking out the boldly go and change it to stand around and wait for either your queue to pop or someone to use a dance ball. That is why I come and play a game, to stand around and do the same repeatable missions over and over again. Please tell me who thinks that is actually fun.
2. You add basically another grind to the game. Except the previous grinds you put your time in, and got a known reward for it. This time you put your time in, pay an huge price, and most likely get taken for a ride and get something that you had the same random chance to get for free by just doing missions.
3. Oh, and you do not reward players who spent the time to level up your previous systems and farm for mats, but penalize them for all the time they spent already. Nice.
So basically you set up a white board, listened to the community, wrote down all the fedback you were given, and then chose to create a system that universally contained everything that people said they dislike about your game, and leave nothing in that anyone finds even slightly enjoyable.
You know whnen you say that you are listening and taking our input under concideration, you are supposed to actually create systems that people may enjoy and find usef I l, not systems that contain everything people hate.
So Cryptic, let me get this straight...see if I understand this correctly...
1) once this officially releases, my max level crafting is getting reset and I have to start from scratch.
royal TRIBBLE up #1...why not just reset our character levels and progression while your at it? make us all start over from the beginning of the game at level 1 in our Mirandas.
2) your use of the word "regularly" when we are crafting, means we are spending obscene amounts of dilithium for a randomized quality of item (which mind you costs us players either, insane amounts of time most of don't have, or REAL MONEY)
royal TRIBBLE up #2....any % chance under 100% is unacceptable. I am not using gathered materials and dilithium...which you obviously are pushing us to spend the real money currency to obtain...on an item of random quality.
3) you've now turned the crafting process from something that takes seconds, into something that takes hours...AND requires duty officers (which mind you also requires spending of real cash to purchase more of)
royal TRIBBLE up #3 This isn't even worth commenting on. I wouldn't mind it so much if there was a way to reliably obtain those said duty officers without spending money.
4) According to people posting here, the conversion amount from old materials to new materials is so bad, it might as well not even exist, meaning...to re iterate bullet 1... I am starting from scratch...meaning there is zero"reward" as you put it for those of us who have spent a lot of time and money into the old crafting system.
royal TRIBBLE up #4, am I supposed to be pleased at the middle finger you just gave all of us players who put time and money into the old crafting system?
I think I've made my point with just these 4 points. Cryptic, until you design this new crafting system into something that's actually a player friendly, enjoyable, and USABLE alternate means of obtaining high quality end game gear...you know for those us who aren't swimming in our excess time, not to mention CASH instead of the most obviously greedy money sink I have ever seen in my life...I'm not spending so much as another cent on this game.
Mind you, bear one more thing in mind before you just assume I'm already not forking up money and take a look under my name Cryptic to see what kind of subscription my account is.
Sounds good to me. Plus, if crafting is gonna use doffs the doffs should be able to gather all mats in the system.
It's one of those things that might get tricky. Cause although they've added all sorts of new ways to get the Common/Uncommon/Rare - they've locked the Very Rare (and thus Mk XI/Mk XII) behind that chance from an Elite queued event. They've also mentioned Crafting Packs, which basically sound like Crafting Lock Boxes, eh?
Lots of folks have been focused on the Dil costs - and - I don't think they've quite looked at how difficult it is going to be to get those VR mats.
I was a bit snarky in my initial reply, and I apologize for that - I was just thinking about how easy it is to hit up CCE for a chance at VR mats...and that it sounded a little too much like a certain group of posters out there that...yeah, never mind - but that's what flooded into that.
But they're going to have to look at the overall cost/effort involved in getting to the point where the Dil costs come into play...and...if it sucks just to try to get the mats, the Dil cost won't matter cause folks will never get that far. Cryptic definitely needs to balance that angle...
Comments
the Good
-Ability to craft Antiproton at lower levels. While it may be considered Vendor trash for some, I see it as a potential asset to pass off to future toons that I will create.
-New things for people to craft that didn't exist in old crafting system: Omnidirectional beams for phasers, disruptors, tetryon, plasma and polaron, new dual heavy cannon that can fire double the arc of other dual heavy cannons, new consoles and a new ground weapon.
-accessible from anywhere.
-having to actually build the parts of whatever we want to make.
-able to craft more than one thing at a time (old system you could only do one thing at a time. New system you can do up to 5 once you unlock the slots)
Neutral
-dilithium cost is a bit high, but it's not the weapons themselves that cost the dilithium, it's crafting the component that they need that is part of the cost.
-can only convert one item at a time, but since there will be a fix coming for this soon, I can remain neutral on it.
Bad
-Everytime you go back to the previous section from looking at what an item requires, it takes you back to the beginning of the list so you have to keep scrolling down each time.
-XP requirement increases sharply. Should adjust it relative to what you are able to craft so it's not as time gated.
-no ability to craft kit modules or melee weapons.
In all, I know that this is still a work in progress, but I think so far it's a step in the right direction. People not in fleets/not interested in reputation can work up to get Mark XII gear. Sure, it'll probably be subpar compared to fleet stuff, but it's something else that they can obtain on their own.
- 99% of the xp comes from crafting items (weapons, shields, etc) that I will never use and just sell.
- In order to level quickly, I just make a basic MkVI item in every category. Doing this blasts me straight to Level 2 (never saw level 1 anything). Honestly, I do not see a need for making any pieces MkV or lower - any new character will be player Level 20 before they have enough materials to make anything based on random drops of material and scans, and all I do is immediately discard them for ECs. I say just make R&D open up at Level 20 and scrap the low end R&D (MkV and below) because 1) no one will use it and 2) it just takes up space.
- The 99% of xp coming from items we will just discard is tedious. Once I get to level 2 in anything, I have to grind out MkVI items until I get to level 5!?! before I can make anything higher. With 1 hour timers on builds, this means I will be spending weeks before I can build anything that is Mk X (and therefore marginally useful) because I am prevented from making blue components. The leveling curve is pretty steep, and honestly a huge turnoff to using the system.
- The probability of rarity thing is not great, but I can deal with it. The disappointing thing is that there is no crit bonus. A MkVI purple and MkVI white award the same crafting xp - if I am building this stuff to grind out crafting xp, so why do I really care about the quality if I am not getting an xp bonus for it (the marginal bonus in EC's when I sell is not really incentive enough).
- The UI is nice looking, though I would appreciate the ability to click on components in the cost pane of an item and "drill-down" to craft that component instead. That would save me a number of clicks, as well as trying to keep track of how many of which component I need when clicking through (right now I am writing little notes on post-its to keep track of how much I need of which components).
- Reduction of material types is nice, but now it has spawned a ton of components. Between materials and components, I would hazard that there are nearly as many crafting items (the lack of schematics is nice however, so kudos on that).
- Using the Doffs is done well.
I definitely think the crafting system misses the mark on a few things:
1) In the old system and the new one, the only reason to build low level components is to gain crafting xp so you can craft things you actually want. In the old system, you could do that much faster, making this system a step back.
2) Lets say I want a Purple MKXII with the right combo of buffs. I am starring down several weeks of grinding materials and building components for low level items I will turn around and sell, before I can make purple components for MkXII's. Then I have to keep grinding those to get enough crafting xp to get a reasonable chance of a crit on a MkXII. Then I have to keep doing that until I get the combo of buffs I want. OR I could buy a MkXII purple off the market that I know has the buffs I want. True, it will cost a lot of ECs. True, the Exchange may not have the exact thing I want. But honestly, I would rather grind out the ECs and search the exchange everyday for the version I want - less time on my part, especially considering anyone who does make it to the top of the crafting trees will be flooding the market with reject MkXIII purples because they didn't hit their perfect set of buffs.
3) The lack of an ability to break down, level up, or enhance existing components seems like a big miss. It makes sense (RP-wise and mechanically) to take an existing engine and 1) break it down for parts (at a loss obviously - cannot get materials or components out 1-for-1), 2) upgrade it to have better output (i.e. level), or 3) enhance the engine to get additional buffs.
4) The Aegis set was never game breaking - why, because it had decent but not exceptional stats. The bigger benefits came through set bonuses which typically require a tradeoff with other items (individually) or set bonus opportunities. Why this was (and still is) the only craftable set I will never understand. I am not really interested in grinding for a random drop generator - I will grind for unique items, even if they are not uber powerful. The top tier items that have been inserted do seem pretty game breaking and concern me about balance.
5) In order for me to want to invest any time in this, it has to give me something that I cannot get otherwise - be it unique items, ability to upgrade items, ability to craft the exact item I want. What has been created is a grindy random drop-generator - not seeing how this brings anything to the game other than allowing me to specialize in one type of random drop.
The UI, Doff system integration, reduced materials, etc. are all good but if this system does not deliver on giving us a better way of getting the components we desire than the current random drop mechanism, I do not think this system will be successful.
I agree with the need for increasing xp gained per hour as you level up.
Here are some quick and dirty hard numbers from my time crafting with the new system..
With 600 being the standard XP received per hour, no matter what you craft (other than the AEGIS shield) it comes out to 600xp per hour.
Here is the hourly cost to level up to 8th.
1st to 2nd = 0.38
2nd to 3rd = 16.2
3rd to 4th = 33.3
4th to 5th = 30
5th to 6th = 34
6th to 7th = 42
7th to 8th = 45
8th to 9th = 48
9th to 10th = 51
The above is if you don't use dilithium to "finish now". You also need to add the hours together to get a total time for going from 1st level to 8th in just that one school (in this case 299.88 hours).
Don't sound to bad ..right? Just under 13 days and you could be level 10!
So lets look at the numbers going from level 10 to 15.
You finally made level 10 and now you can make all the components but you want better chances to get purples so you need to get to level 15 to have a decent chance.
10th to 11th = 120
11th to 12th = 135
12th to 13th = 150
13th to 14th = 165
14th to 15th = 180
So 750 hours if you don't "finish now". Well.. that's over 31 days if you keep on top of things and can manage the materials required to keep things moving.
Still with me? (13 days plus 31 days is 44 days so far..)
But then you notice something.. you want to max out the school but level 16 requires a hefty price.., what most games call a "HELL LEVEL". It cost 420 hours just to go from 15 to 16!
15th to 16th = 420
16th to 17th = 450
17th to 18th = 480
18th to 19th = 510
19th to 20th = 540
(Basically 100 days)
So 44 + 100 = 144 days or nearly 5 months just to max out one school.
So why did Al say in that podcast that he expected it to take a couple of months? Simple, once you unlock the other 4 R&D slots you can double up on jobs or use some to advance another school. That can cut the time spent to leveling in half or even more if you can get enough materials to keep things running smoothly throughout the duration.
Those are the "quick and dirty" numbers for you.
I hope this was helpful.
Squishing Bugs for a better future
Please specify/cite/quote your Cryptic/PWE source.
It's in the notes. You are getting a free spanking new version Odyssey fleet uniform, they just haven't finished designing it yet. All you needed to say. We are the chorus.
Here here. I don't like the randomization, but the idea of fuse mods fits nicely, and I like it a lot.
But being able to salvage one mod component from breaking down an item could work nicely too.
The Agreed, and I think Romulans would get a Knife or a Sword based on the Sword of the Raptor Star.
The Jem'Hadar and all Dominion forces used Phased Polarons, not Antiprotons.
Enhanced ability with the faction's natural weapons does make sense though.
Above is taken from the tribble release notes from 6/24. It's in response to someone asking about mass conversion of data samples.
Main Issues with R&D System
1 - Removal of the Exploration Clusters now removes a huge chunk of a player's ability to gather resources. How will this issue be rectified? We need maps somewhere where we can gather resources. Having them in nodes of all missions like before is fine, but a true crafter is going to just want to have the ability to gather. You have removed that option.
2 - The dilithium costs need to go completely. I am tired of having to constantly grind for dilithium for everything in game, especially when dilithium is not rewarded everywhere in game and the refining limit per day is still so low. It is still not the time-based currency as promised. Fix the issues with obtaining refined dilithium.
3 - We need a "deconstruction"/"reverse engineering" mechanic so we can break items down into raw materials. Every decent crafting system has one. If we get an item as a loot drop we should have the ability to either sell it or break it down.
4 - We need to be able to slot the Modifiers we want at the launch of the system. Waiting for it to come later leaves this system incomplete. Right now it feel more like a crafting lockbox system.
5 - Costs for DOFFs at the Academy need to be drastically reduced since this is yet another system that eats or heavily uses DOFFs. Imagine the costs of grinding for a random DOFF to fill one of those slots, let alone use them as a "catalyst"
6 - DOFFs as "catalysts" needs to be replaced with items that are found, replicated, purchased, rewarded etc...
7 - The XP curves between crafting levels are too steep compared to the XP granted from crafting an item. Those need to be brought down more in line with the XP granted.
8 - The timers to complete crafting an item are too long and need to be drastically reduced. This system has way to many grind, timer, and paywalls to be of any fun for players to use.
10 - When crafting components the system does not recognize your "best" DOFF like it does for crafting the item. I put this back up here because it seems to work "sporadically"
11 - There needs to be more diversity in DOFFs used for crafting. With so many different ones there should not really be any duplication and in reality there should be two options to choose from.
12 - The categories are very odd. Breaking weapons into three is just not logical and arbitrarily increases the grind. These need to be more streamlined.
14 - We need a way to make components in bulk, the ability to loop component crafting repeatedly rather than click click click every three seconds.
15 - The UI is not well designed and does not have a good workflow. There are too many alternate popup menus and shifting to different screens. It would be better if there was not as much wasted space with huge icons and blank areas if everything was consolidated onto one page. Take the beam crafting...we should only see one window where we select things and instead of having a separate window for all the subcomps, we should be able to craft them from the beam page etc.. Doff should be in a drop down and not from another popup. The UI just has too many windows.
16 - The timer for the subcomps is routinely going into negative time. Is there really a need for a timer on those items? Especially 5 seconds?
17 - The crafting bonus for DOFFs needs to be upped a bit. perhaps 10, 20, 40.
18 - The number of crafting nodes needs to be drastically increased or the drop stacks need to be upped quite a bit.
19 - We will desperately need "farming" areas. If you want a true crafting system you have to provide non-combat opportunities to collect resources. Will resources be included in loot drops as well? Not replacing things, but added as an additional. Active resource gathering missions or areas or do you plan it to be all passive DOFF related?
20 - The new UI for the DOFF system is not very intuitive. Having to hover over everything to see what you need and what you will be rewarded is cumbersome. Also, why were the job categories removed and it put all into one long scrolling mash? Again, there is a great deal of wasted space in the UI interface and the small picture and job bar are not the same height which adds to its awkward look.
22 - The system is far from balanced and it is clear it was not tested for leveling internally. In order for me to advance in beams to make MK VIII Beams, I need to make a Firing Sequencer, which we cannot do until level 5. So we have to slowly and ponderously inch ourselves forward at 600 XP a shot? The XP payout needs to be re-calibrated. For example in the case of the MK VI Beams, 600 should be for a white, and we should get progressively more XP for the higher the quality of an item we make. As it is we get just 600 XP for purple, blue, green, or white. This does not make any sense.
23 - Rare and Very Rare component costs need to be re-assessed as they are too large and depend on too many rare materials for which we have no real active way of harvesting.
24 - Recipes are not progressive: why do lower level beam weapons require a targeting interface but later MK ones (e.g. MK VI) do not? Yes it makes sense that weapons should have targeting arrays. The item recipes need to be progressive and logical. Thus give them a pass.
25 - Subcomponents need to come out at different qualities. Each subcomponent needs to be whit,e green, blue and purple. This should give a bonus toward the final item quality to reduce the gambling. Using all purple subcomponents should then give you a purple crafted item unless there is that rare critical failure.
26 - The dilithium prices on the new DOFF packs at SFA need to be at least cut in half. 1000 dilithium for a purely random draw is again even more gambling int he system. Same for the original packs btw. You put in the reputation system to eliminate player concern and remove the randomness for something guaranteed with progression yet a year later we are now back to another system that just has all randomness.
27 - I know you guys keep saying we can craft anything at any level and are touting that as the big thing for the system. However, all subcomponent recipes are not unlocked at the start of the system. For example in beams I cannot construct a firing sequencer until level 5 or an isolinear chip until level 10. I have to rely on someone else doing it and getting it from them. That means someone still has to level first, which logically means you cannot create anything at any level.
28 - In the recycle tab of your inventory, all the new crafting items have priority. Please give them a lower priority than you main inventory. It is tedious to have to scroll down every time to recycle junk items into EC.
29 - The R&D DOFF job at the academy needs to have its timer drastically reduced. 48hrs? Seriously? Why not just keep it like the rest of the, same timer, same cooldown. Be consistent with the existing rules. The more and different rules and exceptions you have, the further you get from your goal of making the game easier to play for newcomers.
30 - Alright the fact that the particle traces are converting to Common and Uncommon materials in the new system is very disconcerting. Rare for rare. Please re-adjust the tables. This completely renders any previous time and effort we have put into the game a lot less worthy. We have already had this happen to us with Marks...etc... Cryptic please learn from your past mistakes and do not repeat them. It is bad enough you added the Fleet project which awards people half of the fleet credits for the same amount of marks. I will say that the downfall of many MMOs is inconsistency in the rules. Be consistent.
31 - Here is another one where things do not make sense...because some subcomponents are shared among different schools...e.g. Electromagnetic Couplings, subcomponent crafting should be separate of crafting in any of the schools bu subcomponent recipes should be given out for respective levels in particular schools. I say this because let's say I am lvl 5 in Cannons and lvl 0 in Projectiles. If I try to craft an Electromagnetic Coupling for Cannons I have a +50 but in Projectiles to craft the same subcomponent it is +0??? That makes no sense whatsoever even from a design perspective.
Why Dilithium in the Crafting System is Unhealthy for it
Any dilithium cost in this system does not make it broadly appealing. With the amount of work you have to put in on the front end to start getting and making good gear, adding the dilithium grind to it just shoots it pretty much dead out of the gate. Look at how gated the system is already...
Solutions to Ease the Multiple Time Gates, Paygates, Paywalls, Microtransaction Hooks and Overly Grindy mechanics
You guys went too wild building in gates, micro-transaction hooks, and grinds to the point this system will not be fun at all. I am not trying to be mean, but if something does not give in it, then it will be all for nothing, too few people will use it and then you will not be able to justify additions to it. You want solutions here are some:
Solutions for Crafting by Fleshing out the Rewards in the DOFF Commendation Categories
Here is another solution...the reward structure in the DOFF system was never completed. We only ever got the leveling rewards for Diplomacy/Marauding. Why not add in related rewards for the other DOFF categories and tiers that are crafting/resource gathering related?...
I could go on and on and flesh out every tier for each category.
Doing that will bring the DOFF and Crafting System even closer together and provide a means a player can reduce some of the gates.
At Minimum What Needs to be Done before Launch
1 The XP/Timer/Dilithium inputs need to be readjusted to move the extremes in closer to what reality could be.
2 A way to reverse engineer loot items to obtain materials and perhaps modifier circuits (The analogue of modifier bits in many other games).
3 Subcomponents need to be able to come out at different rarities based on your crafting skill+bonuses and those rarities convey a bonus that will afford more of a guaranteed item.
4 Dilithium costs on subcomponents needs to be removed completely. There are already dilithium inputs for the system in the form of the Buy it now button, DOFF packs, and DOFF grinder for better DOFFs. These are already too many.
5 We need to be able to nearly guarantee what we want to craft (given our crafting skill). If I want to craft a Green MK VI Beam array with [ACC], I should be able to do that.
6 Recipes for items need to follow a consistent logical order, if a MK II Beam array requires W and X, a MK VI Beam Array should require W, X, Y, and Z.
7 The UI needs to be reworked to manage the crafting flow better. There are already too many screens, too many clicks, too much scrolling. It all needs to be present on ONE pane. We get a drop down for the item, we get a drop down for what rarity we want (to try for), and we get a drop down for the MODs we want on the item. Then the system gives us what subcomponents we will need, we select X DOFFs that will craft those subcomponents and the system queues them up and cycles through them adding them to our R&D inventory as they finish (no clicking to collect the items). Once finished, we then select the DOFF we want to use to craft the item, we click the craft item button, the system then places the item in our inventory (no clicking to collect the item). We do not need a window to show us empty crafting slots, that just needs to be a number. We do not need a huge scrolling window of subcomponents, that should be taken care in the main crafting UI.
Bottom line is, if crafting is going to serve the purposes of:
1 - Enhancing the economics and social interaction of the game
2 - An alternative method of obtaining base gear for leveling
3 - In essence, and end game activity
Then it,
1 - Needs to complimentary not competitive with the other gear systems.
2 - Needs to start at a lower level AND have the same progression as character leveling so there is not lag (why are there even crafting recipes for items lower than lvl 15 then?)
3 - Has to provide some unique items that are highly needed (stacks of phaser charges for example).
Noncombat Methods of Resource Gathering and more on Fleshing Out DOFF Commendation Categories
If you want to entice the type of people who do crafting in MMOs then you are going to need to add more active non-combat methods to farm materials. Herding people into the PvE queues is not going to cut it. Yes we have the DOFF missions, but the costs to crew your ship full of good DOFFs is extremely expensive in terms of Zen (for packs), ec, DOFF grinders (dilithium costs in those are way too high), fleet marks etc..
Something has to give and it is all way too random as it is.
We should just have a DOFF store where we can buy the DOFFs we want that come in game. Zen packs perhaps not but definitely for the free stuff. We should also have parallel stores for each track as we do for diplomacy. Heck, you do not even have to create new DOFFs, just allocate some of the uncommons, rares, and very rares already in the system. You should be able to flesh out all the final tier rewards easy. Have us do chain missions to unlock the stores for the Leethean, Andorian, Vulcan, etc... contacts. Divorce these from costing dilithium and make dismissing them give you "requisitions" which are then the currency for the DOFF system. We seem to be adding so many new currencies anyhow.
Fixed/addressed so far
9 - There are a few errors in item names, e.g. in Beams Component - Subprocessor Unit is really the Emitter Module.
13 - We need to be able to turn in old data samples in bulk, there is already entirely too much clicking in this game and clicking for no real reason.
21 - When making a MK VI beam, I see at the bottom I will get 10 beam XP and the duration takes one minute. However, in reality, I get 600 Beam XP and the duration is ONE HOUR. Is this a typo on the UI or did someone misplace a few decimal points?
The models for high mark ground weapons, in many people's eyes, are inferior to the earlier marks. When crafting ground weapons, could we get some way of manipulating their appearance? For instance, if you crafted a Mk XII phaser pistol, you could make it look like the standard issue phaser instead of that huge thing with holograms all over it you get as a random drop. Or make a plasma pistol look like a Romulan disruptor, for Republic players, instead of the other plasma gun style.
The style of the end game weapon models (some fleet and reputation aside) have always been disappointing to me. Letting us change them through the crafting system would be great, but I don't know if the tech's actually there to do it or not.
Phaser Rifle #1
Phaser Rifle #2
Phaser Rifle #3
Commanding Officer: Captain Pyotr Ramonovich Amosov
Dedication Plaque: "Nil Intentatum Reliquit"
I'm confused honestly by how the new research and development system is supposed to work, given I haven't watched any videos on it, but I shouldn't have to either, period. It should be self-explanatory, or there needs to be more documentation or a walk-through on how to bring it all together, make it a mission to assemble a mk II beam or something and give the player everything he/she needs to make it happen, that'll at least get everyone started in the right direction.
I like the numerous different lenses and whatnot that can be built, and traded on the exchange, that was a good idea there. It would be even better with the ability to build slotted weapons or armor which at first is only available through the R/D system. Additionally, instead of choosing a weapon on the outset to be a disruptor or phaser, the player simply chooses that's how the weapon appears when it fires and procs could then be added to it via special lenses or other developed items, and it would either boost the damage capacity or add a proc, but if adding a proc, then the damage capability it reduced, something like that. To add even more complication it would really be cool if for example I could choose to have an anti-proton beam chassis, add 4 plasma lenses which would produce a anti-proton beam with a slight visually plasma-green hue and plasma proc DoT effect chance which would stack to up perhaps a 10% chance and have x4 the average DoT effects (4 lenses)and and a anti-proton lens(which would boost the average overall damage of the beam), so the end result would be a beam which is relatively weak, but has a high chance of inflicting x4 plasma burn effects damage over time. It could balanced out a little bit by perhaps reducing the time the DoT is active by each lens used the previous example, but now that would really be cool if the R/D system made that possible. Food for thought.
Hrmm...
...so the sources for crafting materials will be:
Harvest Nodes (which are being added to more missions - WIP)
DOFFing
Reward Pack from Normal Queues
Reward Pack from Elite Queues
Where they're increasing the ways in which we can get them....
In the recent P1 podcast, Geko states there will be a tutorial for crafting...
Excellent point, those were beautiful.
Issues with tooltips of [Arc] weapons
Of course, the conversion did net a large quantity of common and uncommon material, but the rare material is essential for the mid to high level component and gear. The amount of rare material obtained from existing anomaly traces will determine how much a player will have to grind later in the new crafting progression.
I had 427 anomaly traces and obtained 112 rare materials after conversion or 26% when comparing quantities based on only old rare types and new rare types (the uncommon and common types obtained are not considered for this experiment).
https://www.flickr.com/photos/124844784@N05/14323351210/
Addendum: I noticed that the anomalies identified as uncommon level for new material will always give a good quantity of uncommon (and only uncommon material); so why are trace conversions using this "random reward" system for the material given in return? Use a straightforward rare for rare even if it is a one for one and each type of trace matches with a type of new rare material... just don't rip us off on all the grinding we did for these traces and give us a fraction of the rare material that should be received in the conversion.
Yesterday I was really upset so I was not clear. Sorry.
I know that we are getting a new uniform but I could not care less
But I care about the new crafting system I want to craft.
There are so many posts like:
Oh I heard that someone posted that he was listening and that we will be able to make
I would love that Cryptic enables posting to players who logged on to Tribble in last 24h.
0, yes zero very rare AP MK II dual canons
p.s. I will execute my rare Jamhadar who is serving under me for 1,5 years for incompetence its just a MK II dual canon, he is Energy Weapons Officer not a Doctor.
I greatly disagree with you putting "Crafting Packs" in Queued Events. First of all, not everyone wants to do Queued events. And KDF queues have been dead for months!!! So are KDF players supposed to buy off the exchange?
Second, you are going to overflow the Exchange with garbage crafted drops, while Very Rares will be sold by greedy players for far excessive amounts. Where average / casual players won't stand a chance to afford.
I think they meant ques like ISE and such. If you can't find an ISE team in 5 minutes, than the servers are down.
1. You take out exploration so we can all sit around in Drosana waiting for a queue to pop baisically taking out the boldly go and change it to stand around and wait for either your queue to pop or someone to use a dance ball. That is why I come and play a game, to stand around and do the same repeatable missions over and over again. Please tell me who thinks that is actually fun.
2. You add basically another grind to the game. Except the previous grinds you put your time in, and got a known reward for it. This time you put your time in, pay an huge price, and most likely get taken for a ride and get something that you had the same random chance to get for free by just doing missions.
3. Oh, and you do not reward players who spent the time to level up your previous systems and farm for mats, but penalize them for all the time they spent already. Nice.
So basically you set up a white board, listened to the community, wrote down all the fedback you were given, and then chose to create a system that universally contained everything that people said they dislike about your game, and leave nothing in that anyone finds even slightly enjoyable.
You know whnen you say that you are listening and taking our input under concideration, you are supposed to actually create systems that people may enjoy and find usef I l, not systems that contain everything people hate.
People that don't do something aren't going to be rewarded for not doing it...and the problem is what?
They are the only end game STO has alongside the two battlezones.
Perhaps a DOFF Chain that unlocked a repeatable with the chance at them?
1) once this officially releases, my max level crafting is getting reset and I have to start from scratch.
royal TRIBBLE up #1...why not just reset our character levels and progression while your at it? make us all start over from the beginning of the game at level 1 in our Mirandas.
2) your use of the word "regularly" when we are crafting, means we are spending obscene amounts of dilithium for a randomized quality of item (which mind you costs us players either, insane amounts of time most of don't have, or REAL MONEY)
royal TRIBBLE up #2....any % chance under 100% is unacceptable. I am not using gathered materials and dilithium...which you obviously are pushing us to spend the real money currency to obtain...on an item of random quality.
3) you've now turned the crafting process from something that takes seconds, into something that takes hours...AND requires duty officers (which mind you also requires spending of real cash to purchase more of)
royal TRIBBLE up #3 This isn't even worth commenting on. I wouldn't mind it so much if there was a way to reliably obtain those said duty officers without spending money.
4) According to people posting here, the conversion amount from old materials to new materials is so bad, it might as well not even exist, meaning...to re iterate bullet 1... I am starting from scratch...meaning there is zero"reward" as you put it for those of us who have spent a lot of time and money into the old crafting system.
royal TRIBBLE up #4, am I supposed to be pleased at the middle finger you just gave all of us players who put time and money into the old crafting system?
I think I've made my point with just these 4 points. Cryptic, until you design this new crafting system into something that's actually a player friendly, enjoyable, and USABLE alternate means of obtaining high quality end game gear...you know for those us who aren't swimming in our excess time, not to mention CASH instead of the most obviously greedy money sink I have ever seen in my life...I'm not spending so much as another cent on this game.
Mind you, bear one more thing in mind before you just assume I'm already not forking up money and take a look under my name Cryptic to see what kind of subscription my account is.
It's one of those things that might get tricky. Cause although they've added all sorts of new ways to get the Common/Uncommon/Rare - they've locked the Very Rare (and thus Mk XI/Mk XII) behind that chance from an Elite queued event. They've also mentioned Crafting Packs, which basically sound like Crafting Lock Boxes, eh?
Lots of folks have been focused on the Dil costs - and - I don't think they've quite looked at how difficult it is going to be to get those VR mats.
I was a bit snarky in my initial reply, and I apologize for that - I was just thinking about how easy it is to hit up CCE for a chance at VR mats...and that it sounded a little too much like a certain group of posters out there that...yeah, never mind - but that's what flooded into that.
But they're going to have to look at the overall cost/effort involved in getting to the point where the Dil costs come into play...and...if it sucks just to try to get the mats, the Dil cost won't matter cause folks will never get that far. Cryptic definitely needs to balance that angle...