I can fairly safely assume each player brings their ship and it's basically a multiplayer story mission. Unfortunately, though, that means I have little to no desire to actually play those. Not for any reason other than it feels untrue to the IP. You rarely see any multiple ship battles in Star Trek, the whole focus was on the crew coming together, not fleets of ships battling. If they made it where your party was the crew of a single ship and the away team, I'd be interested.
The draws for the LTS for me are obviously the stipend, the reward ships, and the extra character/inventory slots. The rest of it is fairly blah.
Thats pretty much the STF, I'll be honest about them, They are fun for one or two tries, But after that they get boring, and while there is a plot to them (Borg assimilating a starbase for example) that is not enough to make them easily replay able
( And if you like your stuff to look canoical, the costumes people use might make you retch )
The stipend is probably the best part i think, Allows you to buy a lot of costumes and ships so thats probably the most useful part of it
These are the Voyages on the STO forum, the final frontier. Our continuing mission: to explore Pretentious Posts, to seek out new Overreactions and Misinformation , to boldly experience Cynicism like no man has before.......
Rats. Was really hoping to come out of here with "Okay, great, I'll buy it right now!" or "Okay, great, I'll pass!" And I'm just as solidly on the fence as when I started =P
Yeah, STFs are multiplayer missions. Space STFs are typically limited to 5 ships, Crystalline Catastrophe can have up to 10 ships. Ground missions can have up to 20 players in a handful of them.
If are not interested in the multiplayer aspect of the game and you have gotten burned out doing grind fests in other MMOs, then the end game of STO is not for you, at least until you recover from burn out. That pretty much leaves Foundry missions which are community created missions. It's possible to replay previous missions to get more powerful versions of some of the gear, but that in itself can be a grind and might not be worth your time if you are not going to play end game content. For example, when you play the Federation missions "Everything Old Is New" one of the rewards you can choose is a blue retro phaser beam array probably Mk VI or something like that; playing it with a level 50 toon will allow you to choose the Mk XI version. Each time you replay the mission you can choose it over and and over again. Assuming you want 6 blue retro phaser beam arrays MK XI, then you need to play the mission 6 times.
Try no to take a hard line with "Star Trek IP" because there are many things in STO that breaks that. Remember, in the end STO is a game designed to be fun (supposedly fun at least) so strict IP takes a backseat from time to time.
Anyway, it's best just to play the game to find out if STO is something you will actually enjoy. Don't worry, you should have another chance later this year to hand over $200 to Cryptic. I got my $200 ready, however, my tablet just died yesterday... damn it....
Try no to take a hard line with "Star Trek IP" because there are many things in STO that breaks that. Remember, in the end STO is a game designed to be fun (supposedly fun at least) so strict IP takes a backseat from time to time.
I didn't mean to give the impression I was going hardline "THIS BREAKS CANON, BLARGHFARGLERAAAARGH!!" I don't use the standard uniform, I mix and match ship parts to make the ship look as good to me as possible, so I'm fairly loose when it comes to that. It's more a case of it just feels wrong with the multi-ship battles. May change when I get there and try it, but for the moment it rubs me the wrong way.
I didn't mean to give the impression I was going hardline "THIS BREAKS CANON, BLARGHFARGLERAAAARGH!!" I don't use the standard uniform, I mix and match ship parts to make the ship look as good to me as possible, so I'm fairly loose when it comes to that. It's more a case of it just feels wrong with the multi-ship battles. May change when I get there and try it, but for the moment it rubs me the wrong way.
Yeah, just give a try. If you don't like it, then you don't like it.
The reasons why I am tried STO is because it is free, it's not a fantasy game, and because even though it is a MMO the primary focus is on single player game play when you exclude end game content. If I didn't like it then I would have deleted the game and the only thing I would have wasted was my time.
I think the question is really: "What do you want out of the game?"
For me, I want a few of the ships from the TV series that I like, and to waste a couple of hundred hours on it.
For me, then, $200-300 would be $1-1.50 per hour of gameplay. That's a lot for most games, and particularly a lot to pay up front.
The problem with the lifetime membership is that it's probably worthwhile for me to get now (at Lt.Cmdr), but less worthwhile by the time I'm Admiral already as I'll have completed a lot of the story. On the flip side, as Lt.Cmdr, I'm not 100% sure I'll stick around long enough for it to be worthwhile - the gameplay feels a bit "samey" - every fight feels roughly the same.
For me personally, then, I suspect I'll just end up putting $40 or so into the game to buy a few ships... I've already put in $30, bought a Delta Flyer and a couple of crew slots, with enough left for my Defiant when I level up a bit. Once I've got a Voyager too, I'll probably finish a lot of the story with those and that'll probably do me... Cryptic will have had $50 off me, I'll have had $50 worth of gameplay, everyone's happy.
You just have to work out what you want from the game, and how long you're actually likely to play it. I play quite a few F2P games, and I put money into them all (as someone who works and does reasonably out of it, I feel I should support the games for the teenagers who can't... and on the flip side, the money makes up for the time I can't put into the game because I'm working)... but I tend to play one for 6 months then move on to something else, with a couple of favourites sticking around in the background.
If you're the same, you're probably better off just buying Zen for a couple of ships you want and to ease your way up the ranks. If you're the type of person who'll play one game for a couple of years, you probably want a LTS.
I just got the lts and I'm enjoying the benefits .
As for the posts about player levels dropping. That's happening on the whole format of
Pc . All games are suffering. That's why these and other developers are launching
These f2p on consoles .
The game is amazing and I'm loving every minute.
As the post says above, it's about what you want from the game . It's not a necessary
Component to enjoying the game.
it adds some things that you can purchase separate anyways .
I am a gold member, locked in a sale sub price a little over 2 years ago of $30 every 3 months, yes I pay more, but wasn't sure which way the game was going, especially as a mostly KDF player. If it was 6 months ago and I had the lump sum cash, I would be tempted.
As such, it will cost me less money and only patience to get to 1000 days.
If you know you are in for the long haul, go for it.
I cannot wait for those 1000 day vet ships, well the Romulan one anyways.
For me, I'll hit 1000 days after $120 and less than a year, not worth the extra $80 for immediate gratification.
If I knew I would still be playing 700 days later,probably would have gotten LTS, and that was before you got all of the benefits at once even with a LTS.
Just thought I would share my thoughts.
Thanks for the Advanced Light Cruiser, Allied Escort Bundles, Jem-Hadar Light Battlecruiser, and Mek'leth
New Content Wishlist
T6 updates for the Kamarag & Vor'Cha
Heavy Cruiser & a Movie Era Style AoY Utility Cruiser
As far as the lifetime sub, I will let each individual make their own choice, and will not say whether I have or not. I will say that Cryptic has made enough money off of me that they should have no complaints--we are well past the point where I felt I needed to make sure they made $50, as a thank you for giving me hours of enjoyment, and a way to make sure it continues. I make a salary, so I didn't mind.
As far as the lifetime of the game, the following is really for Cryptic's benefit--if STO ever goes away, it will be because they gooned it away. This is because Star Trek proper is a 40 year old franchise with a rich vein of stories, many of which have been mined, but much which hasn't. It is also a universe amenable to new things/empahses (the Iconians, for instance). On the minus side, it is largely dependent on the TNG/DS9/VOY canon, and every year is a year further away from the conclusion of those series--so a while back, regarding ST in general, I was wondering when the tales went to the "Zorro/Lone Ranger/Shadow" route, where the cultural force died out and only washed up has beens (ahem) remembered them. This does not seem to be happening (Dr. Sheldon Cooper for the win? Has Big Band Theory helped kick ST into cultural relevance for another ten years?), and the second Abrams movie did not become the TNG killer I was worried about (where twenty years from now "Star Trek" means Kirk, and Kirk alone), so what this all means is that Cryptic has two things any business would die for--a market for product already created by others, a steady renewal source of customers (i.e, high school and college kids), and a product that allows those Star Trek fans to not have to worry about Lord Layabout's Level 3zillion Troll Monster killing them on day 2. Repeatedly, at the spawn point. In a sense, then, Cryptic has only to mine, not create, a revenue stream. That means something in the business world. A lot, actually.
So while I am not an MBA, I do consider myself a *fairly* intelligent individual. If STO becomes Star Trek Offline it will be because of bad business choices. They either goon up cashflow (always a risk for any seemingly successful business), or they act like Paramount and refuse to cultivate the fan base, holding them off at arms length (unlike LucasFilm).
So, for Cryptic, because I do consider myself a *fairly* intelligent person, here are some things to consider:
1.) I don't go to cons, but those might be your number one opportunity to make yourself *the* requirement for any serous Star Trek fan: at some point in your life, you aren't a Star Trek fan unless you have played STO. This means sponsored tourneys.
1.a.) Sponsored tourneys with stock ship options. Which leads into...
2.) There are two games in STO now--the game where ships act like Star Trek ships, and the game where things buzz around at Warp 3000 and/or melt Borg cubes, all while seeming to have shields at 100,000 points. All I am going to say is that the more of the second, the more STO resembles any other MMORG (I've never played any other), and loses it's number one draw.
3.) Be careful with the Voth/Undine zones. There might be legitimate reasons for them, but at the end of the day Star Trek is about "stars", not atmospheres. If they are your planned end state, you might be at yours. People will get tired of them, because of the lack of tacit "ST" feel.
4.) Finally, as an insight: I enjoyed my Klingon character, as a character, more than I did my Fed guy, after a point: because a.) it made me realize being a Klingon would actually be a little ruthless in the real world (it is an *empire*, after all), and b.) I felt everybody and his brother was sending the Fed guy off on flunky tasks. I mean, he's supposed to be a Captain/Admiral, right? Send the Ensign for those things, Tuvok. I also enjoyed the Klingon only stories, so more of this, and same with the Fed. The more you get into Fed/Rom/Klingon kumbaya, the less Star Trek-like it seems. I understand the financial reasons behind this, but remember--this is really a steady source of cash-flow, for at least five more years (and more, if a new TV series ever gets established, esp. in the post-VOY universe). Don't goon it away.
5.) I want my own tac fleet, with ability to set "attack patterns" with BOFF-captained ships. This happened in the series (Picard sending Data off), so why not here?
Once again, for Cryptic's benefit: I fully understand ROI, and not as buzzword either. I fully understand the heartless nature of some financial decisions. I also understand STO may in fact already be at the "cash-cow" stage, as far as investment goes. Cryptic is a business, and presumably one hoping to be bigger next year than this, and even bigger the year thereafter, and so on. I support this (though not to the extent of severely changing STO simply because it makes a profit, but not the best of all possible ROIs. That is business stupidity in action.)
All I am going to point out is that while I am not a huge Star Wars fan, the model you want to emulate is LucasFilm, where they seemingly valued the fandom simply because it existed, and not because it was something to data mine for other reasons. MBAs may have the numbers on their side a lot of the time, that doens't mean they were able to correctly quantify the human heart. Unless I miss my guess, your player base has a higher-than-average-intelligence skew that is already predisposed to distrust what they see as purely cynical or exploitative business moves. Everything in life should be mutually beneficial to the same relevant extent--not where you get far more out of the deal than the other guy. So tread carefully in some areas, because my guy feel is that in a seemingly wise (from an MBA perspective) to tweek ROI, you could either really mess up the product (New Coke), or cause the customer base to distrust you (Facebook), which limits future growth far more than just not doing the seemingly-wise MBA move.
Well, Look at the reward packs you are getting for turning in the birds on Risa during the summer event. They do allow you to choose which marks you want, and you can bank the packs. These are, in effect, Universal marks. Tho only problem is that they do not stack.
Regarding The cost value of LTS:
Ignoring most of the benefits, if you only take into account the $15 per month and the $5 Zen stipend, you are paying for 10 (Ten) months up front. Less then a year of premium play. if you play three toons (one in each faction) you will probably get your money's worth. As a bonus you have every Veteran benefit from day 1. So.
If you are a new player it is worth the value
If you are a seasoned player, it depends on if you will be playing for a year more and/or you want the benefits.
and from what I see a 2nd major expansion is a matter of WHEN, not IF. So, this will mean another faction to play.
These threads remind me of several games people swear up and down are dying or declining,
Omg yugioh is dying
Omg magic is dying
omg pokemon is dying
omg wow is dying
omg champions is dying
omg heroclix is dying
omg D&D is dying
...........................................................
you get the idea, doomsayer trolls are doomsayer trolls...
the game will die when the game management gets to TRIBBLE poor to function or the license runs out. i think some people agree with myself that we see these ignorant style of threads too often x.x
Comments
Thats pretty much the STF, I'll be honest about them, They are fun for one or two tries, But after that they get boring, and while there is a plot to them (Borg assimilating a starbase for example) that is not enough to make them easily replay able
( And if you like your stuff to look canoical, the costumes people use might make you retch )
The stipend is probably the best part i think, Allows you to buy a lot of costumes and ships so thats probably the most useful part of it
Thanks for the help, though, great info given.
If are not interested in the multiplayer aspect of the game and you have gotten burned out doing grind fests in other MMOs, then the end game of STO is not for you, at least until you recover from burn out. That pretty much leaves Foundry missions which are community created missions. It's possible to replay previous missions to get more powerful versions of some of the gear, but that in itself can be a grind and might not be worth your time if you are not going to play end game content. For example, when you play the Federation missions "Everything Old Is New" one of the rewards you can choose is a blue retro phaser beam array probably Mk VI or something like that; playing it with a level 50 toon will allow you to choose the Mk XI version. Each time you replay the mission you can choose it over and and over again. Assuming you want 6 blue retro phaser beam arrays MK XI, then you need to play the mission 6 times.
Try no to take a hard line with "Star Trek IP" because there are many things in STO that breaks that. Remember, in the end STO is a game designed to be fun (supposedly fun at least) so strict IP takes a backseat from time to time.
Anyway, it's best just to play the game to find out if STO is something you will actually enjoy. Don't worry, you should have another chance later this year to hand over $200 to Cryptic. I got my $200 ready, however, my tablet just died yesterday... damn it....
I didn't mean to give the impression I was going hardline "THIS BREAKS CANON, BLARGHFARGLERAAAARGH!!" I don't use the standard uniform, I mix and match ship parts to make the ship look as good to me as possible, so I'm fairly loose when it comes to that. It's more a case of it just feels wrong with the multi-ship battles. May change when I get there and try it, but for the moment it rubs me the wrong way.
Yeah, just give a try. If you don't like it, then you don't like it.
The reasons why I am tried STO is because it is free, it's not a fantasy game, and because even though it is a MMO the primary focus is on single player game play when you exclude end game content. If I didn't like it then I would have deleted the game and the only thing I would have wasted was my time.
For me, I want a few of the ships from the TV series that I like, and to waste a couple of hundred hours on it.
For me, then, $200-300 would be $1-1.50 per hour of gameplay. That's a lot for most games, and particularly a lot to pay up front.
The problem with the lifetime membership is that it's probably worthwhile for me to get now (at Lt.Cmdr), but less worthwhile by the time I'm Admiral already as I'll have completed a lot of the story. On the flip side, as Lt.Cmdr, I'm not 100% sure I'll stick around long enough for it to be worthwhile - the gameplay feels a bit "samey" - every fight feels roughly the same.
For me personally, then, I suspect I'll just end up putting $40 or so into the game to buy a few ships... I've already put in $30, bought a Delta Flyer and a couple of crew slots, with enough left for my Defiant when I level up a bit. Once I've got a Voyager too, I'll probably finish a lot of the story with those and that'll probably do me... Cryptic will have had $50 off me, I'll have had $50 worth of gameplay, everyone's happy.
You just have to work out what you want from the game, and how long you're actually likely to play it. I play quite a few F2P games, and I put money into them all (as someone who works and does reasonably out of it, I feel I should support the games for the teenagers who can't... and on the flip side, the money makes up for the time I can't put into the game because I'm working)... but I tend to play one for 6 months then move on to something else, with a couple of favourites sticking around in the background.
If you're the same, you're probably better off just buying Zen for a couple of ships you want and to ease your way up the ranks. If you're the type of person who'll play one game for a couple of years, you probably want a LTS.
As for the posts about player levels dropping. That's happening on the whole format of
Pc . All games are suffering. That's why these and other developers are launching
These f2p on consoles .
The game is amazing and I'm loving every minute.
As the post says above, it's about what you want from the game . It's not a necessary
Component to enjoying the game.
it adds some things that you can purchase separate anyways .
As such, it will cost me less money and only patience to get to 1000 days.
If you know you are in for the long haul, go for it.
I cannot wait for those 1000 day vet ships, well the Romulan one anyways.
For me, I'll hit 1000 days after $120 and less than a year, not worth the extra $80 for immediate gratification.
If I knew I would still be playing 700 days later,probably would have gotten LTS, and that was before you got all of the benefits at once even with a LTS.
Just thought I would share my thoughts.
As far as the lifetime of the game, the following is really for Cryptic's benefit--if STO ever goes away, it will be because they gooned it away. This is because Star Trek proper is a 40 year old franchise with a rich vein of stories, many of which have been mined, but much which hasn't. It is also a universe amenable to new things/empahses (the Iconians, for instance). On the minus side, it is largely dependent on the TNG/DS9/VOY canon, and every year is a year further away from the conclusion of those series--so a while back, regarding ST in general, I was wondering when the tales went to the "Zorro/Lone Ranger/Shadow" route, where the cultural force died out and only washed up has beens (ahem) remembered them. This does not seem to be happening (Dr. Sheldon Cooper for the win? Has Big Band Theory helped kick ST into cultural relevance for another ten years?), and the second Abrams movie did not become the TNG killer I was worried about (where twenty years from now "Star Trek" means Kirk, and Kirk alone), so what this all means is that Cryptic has two things any business would die for--a market for product already created by others, a steady renewal source of customers (i.e, high school and college kids), and a product that allows those Star Trek fans to not have to worry about Lord Layabout's Level 3zillion Troll Monster killing them on day 2. Repeatedly, at the spawn point. In a sense, then, Cryptic has only to mine, not create, a revenue stream. That means something in the business world. A lot, actually.
So while I am not an MBA, I do consider myself a *fairly* intelligent individual. If STO becomes Star Trek Offline it will be because of bad business choices. They either goon up cashflow (always a risk for any seemingly successful business), or they act like Paramount and refuse to cultivate the fan base, holding them off at arms length (unlike LucasFilm).
So, for Cryptic, because I do consider myself a *fairly* intelligent person, here are some things to consider:
1.) I don't go to cons, but those might be your number one opportunity to make yourself *the* requirement for any serous Star Trek fan: at some point in your life, you aren't a Star Trek fan unless you have played STO. This means sponsored tourneys.
1.a.) Sponsored tourneys with stock ship options. Which leads into...
2.) There are two games in STO now--the game where ships act like Star Trek ships, and the game where things buzz around at Warp 3000 and/or melt Borg cubes, all while seeming to have shields at 100,000 points. All I am going to say is that the more of the second, the more STO resembles any other MMORG (I've never played any other), and loses it's number one draw.
3.) Be careful with the Voth/Undine zones. There might be legitimate reasons for them, but at the end of the day Star Trek is about "stars", not atmospheres. If they are your planned end state, you might be at yours. People will get tired of them, because of the lack of tacit "ST" feel.
4.) Finally, as an insight: I enjoyed my Klingon character, as a character, more than I did my Fed guy, after a point: because a.) it made me realize being a Klingon would actually be a little ruthless in the real world (it is an *empire*, after all), and b.) I felt everybody and his brother was sending the Fed guy off on flunky tasks. I mean, he's supposed to be a Captain/Admiral, right? Send the Ensign for those things, Tuvok. I also enjoyed the Klingon only stories, so more of this, and same with the Fed. The more you get into Fed/Rom/Klingon kumbaya, the less Star Trek-like it seems. I understand the financial reasons behind this, but remember--this is really a steady source of cash-flow, for at least five more years (and more, if a new TV series ever gets established, esp. in the post-VOY universe). Don't goon it away.
5.) I want my own tac fleet, with ability to set "attack patterns" with BOFF-captained ships. This happened in the series (Picard sending Data off), so why not here?
All I am going to point out is that while I am not a huge Star Wars fan, the model you want to emulate is LucasFilm, where they seemingly valued the fandom simply because it existed, and not because it was something to data mine for other reasons. MBAs may have the numbers on their side a lot of the time, that doens't mean they were able to correctly quantify the human heart. Unless I miss my guess, your player base has a higher-than-average-intelligence skew that is already predisposed to distrust what they see as purely cynical or exploitative business moves. Everything in life should be mutually beneficial to the same relevant extent--not where you get far more out of the deal than the other guy. So tread carefully in some areas, because my guy feel is that in a seemingly wise (from an MBA perspective) to tweek ROI, you could either really mess up the product (New Coke), or cause the customer base to distrust you (Facebook), which limits future growth far more than just not doing the seemingly-wise MBA move.
Well, Look at the reward packs you are getting for turning in the birds on Risa during the summer event. They do allow you to choose which marks you want, and you can bank the packs. These are, in effect, Universal marks. Tho only problem is that they do not stack.
Regarding The cost value of LTS:
Ignoring most of the benefits, if you only take into account the $15 per month and the $5 Zen stipend, you are paying for 10 (Ten) months up front. Less then a year of premium play. if you play three toons (one in each faction) you will probably get your money's worth. As a bonus you have every Veteran benefit from day 1. So.
If you are a new player it is worth the value
If you are a seasoned player, it depends on if you will be playing for a year more and/or you want the benefits.
and from what I see a 2nd major expansion is a matter of WHEN, not IF. So, this will mean another faction to play.
Omg yugioh is dying
Omg magic is dying
omg pokemon is dying
omg wow is dying
omg champions is dying
omg heroclix is dying
omg D&D is dying
...........................................................
you get the idea, doomsayer trolls are doomsayer trolls...
the game will die when the game management gets to TRIBBLE poor to function or the license runs out. i think some people agree with myself that we see these ignorant style of threads too often x.x