For the OP, as a Star Trek fan, I'm with this game until they shut it down, break it so horribly that I can't stand to play, or until someone makes a better Trek game.
There are things I'd like changed, things I'd like added, and many little things I think ought to be fixed. But, being with the game from launch, things have gotten much better. I'm sure it's not perfectly the way anyone would like it to be, but there's some hope as long as there's still some money being made.
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. Except for a T5 Connie. That would be f*%#ing awesome." - Mr. Spock
To the OP: My "loyalty" to STO changes with each new update to the game. If they add something I like, and can play it without it being buggy then I'll play it and pay money. THat is when my loyalty is strongest. Unfortunately, that hasn't happened for a long time...
Here's hoping expansion 2 is epic enough to bring back my loyalty to this game.
Going off topic:
You know theres a rumour that STO is PWE and Cryptic's most profitable game. That wouldn't surprise me as it's Star trek themed (somewhat horribly) but still, if it is why don't they get more support? Occasionally they release some really good work, but most of their work looks like it is done by a small team with a limited budget...
If both of these possible issues were fixed, just imagine what STO could become.
Beta Antares Shipyards advanced Starship development project.
CLASSIFIED
Check out the Diablo 3 forums sometime and tell me what you see. There is virtually zero pvp in that game, and the devs have built the same items 3x over, and they are a billion dollar company who can't even managed to get the numbers on their items correct for pvm. Nerfs are not done purely because of Pvp, it is the overall exploitation by cheating players or the jealousy of players who believe they are owed better gear earlier. Pvp has nothing to do with it. If Pvp were removed, you would still hear people arguing that their build is not strong enough, soon enough, cheap enough, good enough, fair enough, or even expensive enough.
D3 really isn't a good example.
1) D3's community is one of the most toxic you will find on the internet. A large amount of that is people who are still whining because the real money auction hose is gone and everything useful is bind on account. That way they can't sell on third party sites. Of course they make up lots of excuses, but most are lies because saying "I want to make real money" wouldn't carry much weight.
2) Diablo 3 is being made by MMO designers who really don't know a lot about ARPGs. That's why they're doing lots of annoying things to artificially extend gameplay...because that's how you keep people subscribed and playing. It doesn't matter that there is no subscription, that's how they were trained.
3) Blizzard also think they can turn the game into some sort of e-sport, that's why they are working so hard on ladders and Seasons.
1) D3's community is one of the most toxic you will find on the internet. A large amount of that is people who are still whining because the real money auction hose is gone and everything useful is bind on account. That way they can't sell on third party sites. Of course they make up lots of excuses, but most are lies because saying "I want to make real money" wouldn't carry much weight.
2) Diablo 3 is being made by MMO designers who really don't know a lot about ARPGs. That's why they're doing lots of annoying things to artificially extend gameplay...because that's how you keep people subscribed and playing. It doesn't matter that there is no subscription, that's how they were trained.
3) Blizzard also think they can turn the game into some sort of e-sport, that's why they are working so hard on ladders and Seasons.
I couldn't disagree more about 1), as the community is toxic because of the way Diablo 3 was designed which is 2), I am one of those people whom so called made it toxic because I argued with Blizzard Devs directly, and indirectly to not stray too far from the the Diablo 1 / Diablo 2 formula, they did not listen, and they did not care. As you said, they have never really known much about ARPG's directly, but indirectly they still host, and had the ability to pull from previous data that made the game(s) great. They refused. So if a billion dollar company can fail at itemization and balance at Diablo 3, even with 2 of the most historically famous ARPG hack'n slash games that it owns the source code to, how can you not expect glitches with a company with a fraction of a fraction of the employees?
Off topic : Also, Ladders do not make the game an e-sport, Blizzard clearly, and plainly stated Diablo 3 was not built for e-sports several times, and as a ladder runner, and a person who made it to the #1 over all position of previous Diablo 2 ladders, it is quite impossible to put a correct gauge on positions, as if they are people or bots, as I know the best of the best on the west realm. It is only a matter of time before people hook up bots. So no, running for Xp will become quite impossible to legitimately score as a ladder position, and only shows the folly of the current devs. I had a team formed with friends of friends whom held top 7 positions on the ladder, and 2 weeks later for the heck of it, I went and rushed myself and followed the 7 botter / mule accounts and got bumped to 11th over all the next day. So no, it will never become an E-sport. Blizzards "Warden" is too weak, and people have been breaking their security for years, which is something I warned them about.
I couldn't disagree more about 1), as the community is toxic because of the way Diablo 3 was designed which is 2), I am one of those people whom so called made it toxic because I argued with Blizzard Devs directly, and indirectly to not stray too far from the the Diablo 1 / Diablo 2 formula, they did not listen, and they did not care. As you said, they have never really known much about ARPG's directly, but indirectly they still host, and had the ability to pull from previous data that made the game(s) great. They refused. So if a billion dollar company can fail at itemization and balance at Diablo 3, even with 2 of the most historically famous ARPG hack'n slash games that it owns the source code to, how can you not expect glitches with a company with a fraction of a fraction of the employees?
Off topic : Also, Ladders do not make the game an e-sport, Blizzard clearly, and plainly stated Diablo 3 was not built for e-sports several times, and as a ladder runner, and a person who made it to the #1 over all position of previous Diablo 2 ladders, it is quite impossible to put a correct gauge on positions, as if they are people or bots, as I know the best of the best on the west realm. It is only a matter of time before people hook up bots. So no, running for Xp will become quite impossible to legitimately score as a ladder position, and only shows the folly of the current devs. I had a team formed with friends of friends whom held top 7 positions on the ladder, and 2 weeks later for the heck of it, I went and rushed myself and followed the 7 botter / mule accounts and got bumped to 11th over all the next day. So no, it will never become an E-sport. Blizzards "Warden" is too weak, and people have been breaking their security for years, which is something I warned them about.
Well I'm one of those who thinks the root of all evil is the RMAH.
I think they had a good game coming along as noted by the early footage. Then someone like Darth Kotick directed them to add the RMAH and force people to use it.
If you step back and look at D3...everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING was designed to push you towards the RMAH.
Well I'm one of those who thinks the root of all evil is the RMAH.
I think they had a good game coming along as noted by the early footage. Then someone like Darth Kotick directed them to add the RMAH and force people to use it.
If you step back and look at D3...everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING was designed to push you towards the RMAH.
I am of the opinion it is several reasons, RMAH also happens to be one of them, now the problem is BOUND gear. Blizzard Irvine is taking both extremes instead of just allowing people to have their gear in any way they like without having to turn a profit on it. Gone are the days where there are mules attached to accounts or screen sized website spams, and if they really wanted to tighten security they should lock out demo accounts of global chat, and prevent them from sending messages.
As far as RMAH's design, it had nothing to do with the ARPG aspect, it was flawed from the beginning, they did have a tiered rune skill system, scrapped, they had talisman and charms, scrapped, they had pvp arenas, scrapped, and on and on and on. It was a long term gigantic failure, and the only reason they turned a profit was playing the Tristram theme during Blizzcons (which doesn't exist in D3), using the name Diablo, and marketing towards WOW players, in addition to Free D3 with a year sub to WOW. If it was good, they would have not made it free.
But as I said, the problems above are the reasons why I am satisfied with Cryptic. I have not heard the staggering constant pyramid sized amount of lies from Cryptic as I have heard from Blizzard. I have written pages that subject. When people target small companies like Cryptic, and slander them vs the amount of suckering companies like Blizzard does, it's unconscionable. People whom actually, willfully pay hundreds of dollars so they can get a pet like you could get in STO for free, and a band that no one cares about anymore that plays 2 or 3 songs, and then the rest is a scripted commercial. It's all really sad. Compare a Q&A with Blizzard Vs Cryptic. Compare how often actual devs visit the forum, or meet online, or on podcast, or in person with people in real life. Cryptic takes the cake every time. Up until recently did the Executive Producer speak on the forums pretty often, which was far more then any Exec on the Blizzard team.
I am of the opinion it is several reasons, RMAH also happens to be one of them, now the problem is BOUND gear. Blizzard Irvine is taking both extremes instead of just allowing people to have their gear in any way they like without having to turn a profit on it. Gone are the days where there are mules attached to accounts or screen sized website spams, and if they really wanted to tighten security they should lock out demo accounts of global chat, and prevent them from sending messages.
As far as RMAH's design, it had nothing to do with the ARPG aspect, it was flawed from the beginning, they did have a tiered rune skill system, scrapped, they had talisman and charms, scrapped, they had pvp arenas, scrapped, and on and on and on. It was a long term gigantic failure, and the only reason they turned a profit was playing the Tristram theme during Blizzcons (which doesn't exist in D3), using the name Diablo, and marketing towards WOW players, in addition to Free D3 with a year sub to WOW. If it was good, they would have not made it free.
Well if you drop BOA, you may as well bring back the RMAH, because people will just use third party sites to sell items, I like that you have to find your own stuff. They just need to fix the stuff so that it's not mostly trash.
Unfortunately after many years of gaming I've become quite the cynic / misanthrope, I believe players can generally be counted on to be greedy, exploiting, cheating, self serving scumbags and couldn't tell the truth if their lives depended on it. It's why I don't believe all the faux outrage over the removal of the star clusters, I think these people are using them in a way not intended and that's going away and they don't like it.
Well if you drop BOA, you may as well bring back the RMAH, because people will just use third party sites to sell items, I like that you have to find your own stuff. They just need to fix the stuff so that it's not mostly trash.
Unfortunately after many years of gaming I've become quite the cynic / misanthrope, I believe players can generally be counted on to be greedy, exploiting, cheating, self serving scumbags and couldn't tell the truth if their lives depended on it. It's why I don't believe all the faux outrage over the removal of the star clusters, I think these people are using them in a way not intended and that's going away and they don't like it.
The RMAH promoted black marketeering, and bad behavior, trading in itself does not. I played D2 for years, and years, I never needed to hit the black market to find what I needed, and I am one of the richest players on D2. People would always ask me who am I on JSP, and I said I don't use it. I do have an account from 04, but I have never received forum gold in it.
My opinion is if you want to stop a behavior, you change it, you don't take away peoples freedoms as punishments for something they have not done.
In my opinion, Diablo 3 is a shockingly bad game, given the level of quality that Blizzard had been able to produce in the past.
there, fixed that for you!
Removing star clusters is one thing, it would be another if they explained why they did it.
obviously somebody didn't get the memo. You should know, that they don't base their decisions on intuition, but on massive amount of data about player habbits.
If you agree with this or not is another business, but atleast except the fact that they don't do anything based on contempt for the player base. If you read this between the lines, you may have a certain preposition to assume people are tricking you. Think about that before you go around acusing people of things that happen in your fantasy.
on topic: STO isn't a very involving game...takes little to get anything you could ever desire in the game. Combined with f2p, it is a solid recepy for me to always return to the game, but never really engage into more than just casual gaming or keeping up with the newest implementations. It does a solid job in attrackting the average trekker, which i think is a casual gamer anyway.
You tell me that they 'base their decisions on a massive amount of data about player habits."
Even if this were true, how is it an objection to anything in my post?
i did highlight the sentence of your comment i responded to, let me do it again.
Removing star clusters is one thing, it would be another if they explained why they did it.
and now from the dev blog:
recent efforts to explore more distant parts of the galaxy, Exploration Clusters have become something were reluctant to steer new players towards because they are not up to our current standards. But one of the main reasons theyve stayed in the game as long as they have, is that Exploration Clusters remain a major source of crafting materials.
first part means, they put actual sector blocks where some of the clusters are right now
second part means, they don't want new people to see that ****tyold content
third reason is, that crafting mats where mainly obtained in the clusters...with them gone, the culsters cease to fulfill that purpose. Which was the only purpose they ever actually had.
another statement from that blog:
...nothing close to what we originally planned
that alone should be reason enough...after all a game developement is to some extend a piece of art, and if the artist doesn't like his work, he throws it away or reshapes it. No reasons or explanations needed.
Appart from that, data is collected, they even give a glimpse into it from time to time, when they release how many accounts there are, how many STFs have been completed, and many other stuff. So they can extrapolate very precise data on what is played and what is ignored.
It is hard to imagine that you actually believe that cryptic has some malevolent scheme up their sleves...if anything they do not care if you agree or not with their decissions, it is rather a show of good will from them to give any statement at all. When you interprete it as "insulting" that is your soup entirely. Everybody has a right to be offended, but that doesn't mean you are right.
Star Trek is really important to me (think of what Fry said in Where No Fan Has Gone Before and that's pretty much me), so I'm somewhere between a ONE and a TWO on this. I'm less free with spending money on the game, but I in no way endorse or support the staggering levels of negativity I see daily in-game and on the forums. Yes, people have legitimate complaints and they should be heard, but when I see dozens of "CRAPTIC SUX!!1!1! comments, I can't help thinking: "Why not find something else to do with your time if this is making you so unhappy?"
I'll be here until the game dies, or you have to spend 5,000 dilithium to start a mission.
As to the exploration clusters, they are not very good. Like they have said, you get a handful of kind of crappy missions to play through to get your dailies done. Dilithium and DOFF missions are the only reasons I may - may - swing by a cluster. Crafting is not worth the resources right now so data samples are only useful for certain fleet projects.
While I didn't quite like the tone of the explanation - basically throwing it on to the players to make fun missions via the Foundry - I'm okay with exploration clusters departing. I think they ought to find a new daily as another source of dilithium and consider some new and improved exploration system - exploration is kind of core to Star Trek after all.
"After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. Except for a T5 Connie. That would be f*%#ing awesome." - Mr. Spock
invested enough that it would take quite a bit for me to just quit. Depends on what loyal even means... I will be playing other games too, but I won't be quitting to go play the latest and newest esp if that means starting a new series of payments for another game...
I guess I'd say I'm in between 2 and 3. I'll never actually STOP playing, but I will take a few months off from time to time if I get bored and let cryptic do its thing and update it, then come back and see all the shiney new things and dive right in. I'm by no means a 1. I'm usually the first to see cryptics TRIBBLE ups and jump on them.
I guess I'd say I'm in between 2 and 3. I'll never actually STOP playing, but I will take a few months off from time to time if I get bored and let cryptic do its thing and update it, then come back and see all the shiney new things and dive right in. I'm by no means a 1. I'm usually the first to see cryptics TRIBBLE ups and jump on them.
FYI... you got sucked into posting in a necro thread. Since the conversation has continued for several pages, I'm going to leave it open for now.
However, I am noticing some forum rule violations and if they continue the thread will close.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
If the link doesn't work than look it up yourself. As cryptic has been talking about changes to the game for some time. Now they finally are getting around to it and people are complaining?
Make up your minds. Do you want them to work on things in game or not?
Mind you not everyone is going to be pleased with what they turn out. If you pay to play or are playing for free, doesn't change the fact that Cryptic is going to continue moving forward whether we like it or not.
The question the OP asked is "How loyal are you to the game?"
If you're like me and don't give a damn because it is just a game than I'm sure you're going to stick around and give yourself ample breathing room when you feel the game is trying to put you in a coma. For others, that isn't the case and those people chose to leave altogether.
That is your choice, always. I for one like the game, love anything Trek, love my fleet and the antics of the people on chat.
I'm not going anywhere. That answers how loyal I am.
In regards to the Dev notes or blogs, someone stated, that they were wondering "why haven't the devs released anything regarding the changes and if they were hiding anything they didn't want us to know."
Must be another thread but the dev notes and blogs are all the blue prints to what they're thinking. I do glance those every now and then to see what they might be working on next.
Comments
There are things I'd like changed, things I'd like added, and many little things I think ought to be fixed. But, being with the game from launch, things have gotten much better. I'm sure it's not perfectly the way anyone would like it to be, but there's some hope as long as there's still some money being made.
Here's hoping expansion 2 is epic enough to bring back my loyalty to this game.
Going off topic:
You know theres a rumour that STO is PWE and Cryptic's most profitable game. That wouldn't surprise me as it's Star trek themed (somewhat horribly) but still, if it is why don't they get more support? Occasionally they release some really good work, but most of their work looks like it is done by a small team with a limited budget...
If both of these possible issues were fixed, just imagine what STO could become.
CLASSIFIED
[/SIGPIC]
D3 really isn't a good example.
1) D3's community is one of the most toxic you will find on the internet. A large amount of that is people who are still whining because the real money auction hose is gone and everything useful is bind on account. That way they can't sell on third party sites. Of course they make up lots of excuses, but most are lies because saying "I want to make real money" wouldn't carry much weight.
2) Diablo 3 is being made by MMO designers who really don't know a lot about ARPGs. That's why they're doing lots of annoying things to artificially extend gameplay...because that's how you keep people subscribed and playing. It doesn't matter that there is no subscription, that's how they were trained.
3) Blizzard also think they can turn the game into some sort of e-sport, that's why they are working so hard on ladders and Seasons.
I couldn't disagree more about 1), as the community is toxic because of the way Diablo 3 was designed which is 2), I am one of those people whom so called made it toxic because I argued with Blizzard Devs directly, and indirectly to not stray too far from the the Diablo 1 / Diablo 2 formula, they did not listen, and they did not care. As you said, they have never really known much about ARPG's directly, but indirectly they still host, and had the ability to pull from previous data that made the game(s) great. They refused. So if a billion dollar company can fail at itemization and balance at Diablo 3, even with 2 of the most historically famous ARPG hack'n slash games that it owns the source code to, how can you not expect glitches with a company with a fraction of a fraction of the employees?
Off topic : Also, Ladders do not make the game an e-sport, Blizzard clearly, and plainly stated Diablo 3 was not built for e-sports several times, and as a ladder runner, and a person who made it to the #1 over all position of previous Diablo 2 ladders, it is quite impossible to put a correct gauge on positions, as if they are people or bots, as I know the best of the best on the west realm. It is only a matter of time before people hook up bots. So no, running for Xp will become quite impossible to legitimately score as a ladder position, and only shows the folly of the current devs. I had a team formed with friends of friends whom held top 7 positions on the ladder, and 2 weeks later for the heck of it, I went and rushed myself and followed the 7 botter / mule accounts and got bumped to 11th over all the next day. So no, it will never become an E-sport. Blizzards "Warden" is too weak, and people have been breaking their security for years, which is something I warned them about.
Well I'm one of those who thinks the root of all evil is the RMAH.
I think they had a good game coming along as noted by the early footage. Then someone like Darth Kotick directed them to add the RMAH and force people to use it.
If you step back and look at D3...everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING was designed to push you towards the RMAH.
I am of the opinion it is several reasons, RMAH also happens to be one of them, now the problem is BOUND gear. Blizzard Irvine is taking both extremes instead of just allowing people to have their gear in any way they like without having to turn a profit on it. Gone are the days where there are mules attached to accounts or screen sized website spams, and if they really wanted to tighten security they should lock out demo accounts of global chat, and prevent them from sending messages.
As far as RMAH's design, it had nothing to do with the ARPG aspect, it was flawed from the beginning, they did have a tiered rune skill system, scrapped, they had talisman and charms, scrapped, they had pvp arenas, scrapped, and on and on and on. It was a long term gigantic failure, and the only reason they turned a profit was playing the Tristram theme during Blizzcons (which doesn't exist in D3), using the name Diablo, and marketing towards WOW players, in addition to Free D3 with a year sub to WOW. If it was good, they would have not made it free.
But as I said, the problems above are the reasons why I am satisfied with Cryptic. I have not heard the staggering constant pyramid sized amount of lies from Cryptic as I have heard from Blizzard. I have written pages that subject. When people target small companies like Cryptic, and slander them vs the amount of suckering companies like Blizzard does, it's unconscionable. People whom actually, willfully pay hundreds of dollars so they can get a pet like you could get in STO for free, and a band that no one cares about anymore that plays 2 or 3 songs, and then the rest is a scripted commercial. It's all really sad. Compare a Q&A with Blizzard Vs Cryptic. Compare how often actual devs visit the forum, or meet online, or on podcast, or in person with people in real life. Cryptic takes the cake every time. Up until recently did the Executive Producer speak on the forums pretty often, which was far more then any Exec on the Blizzard team.
Well if you drop BOA, you may as well bring back the RMAH, because people will just use third party sites to sell items, I like that you have to find your own stuff. They just need to fix the stuff so that it's not mostly trash.
Unfortunately after many years of gaming I've become quite the cynic / misanthrope, I believe players can generally be counted on to be greedy, exploiting, cheating, self serving scumbags and couldn't tell the truth if their lives depended on it. It's why I don't believe all the faux outrage over the removal of the star clusters, I think these people are using them in a way not intended and that's going away and they don't like it.
The RMAH promoted black marketeering, and bad behavior, trading in itself does not. I played D2 for years, and years, I never needed to hit the black market to find what I needed, and I am one of the richest players on D2. People would always ask me who am I on JSP, and I said I don't use it. I do have an account from 04, but I have never received forum gold in it.
My opinion is if you want to stop a behavior, you change it, you don't take away peoples freedoms as punishments for something they have not done.
there, fixed that for you!
obviously somebody didn't get the memo. You should know, that they don't base their decisions on intuition, but on massive amount of data about player habbits.
If you agree with this or not is another business, but atleast except the fact that they don't do anything based on contempt for the player base. If you read this between the lines, you may have a certain preposition to assume people are tricking you. Think about that before you go around acusing people of things that happen in your fantasy.
on topic: STO isn't a very involving game...takes little to get anything you could ever desire in the game. Combined with f2p, it is a solid recepy for me to always return to the game, but never really engage into more than just casual gaming or keeping up with the newest implementations. It does a solid job in attrackting the average trekker, which i think is a casual gamer anyway.
i did highlight the sentence of your comment i responded to, let me do it again.
and now from the dev blog:
first part means, they put actual sector blocks where some of the clusters are right now
second part means, they don't want new people to see that ****tyold content
third reason is, that crafting mats where mainly obtained in the clusters...with them gone, the culsters cease to fulfill that purpose. Which was the only purpose they ever actually had.
another statement from that blog: that alone should be reason enough...after all a game developement is to some extend a piece of art, and if the artist doesn't like his work, he throws it away or reshapes it. No reasons or explanations needed.
Appart from that, data is collected, they even give a glimpse into it from time to time, when they release how many accounts there are, how many STFs have been completed, and many other stuff. So they can extrapolate very precise data on what is played and what is ignored.
It is hard to imagine that you actually believe that cryptic has some malevolent scheme up their sleves...if anything they do not care if you agree or not with their decissions, it is rather a show of good will from them to give any statement at all. When you interprete it as "insulting" that is your soup entirely. Everybody has a right to be offended, but that doesn't mean you are right.
I'll be here until the game dies, or you have to spend 5,000 dilithium to start a mission.
While I didn't quite like the tone of the explanation - basically throwing it on to the players to make fun missions via the Foundry - I'm okay with exploration clusters departing. I think they ought to find a new daily as another source of dilithium and consider some new and improved exploration system - exploration is kind of core to Star Trek after all.
Congrats on your post count you devil you.
FYI... you got sucked into posting in a necro thread. Since the conversation has continued for several pages, I'm going to leave it open for now.
However, I am noticing some forum rule violations and if they continue the thread will close.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Make up your minds. Do you want them to work on things in game or not?
Mind you not everyone is going to be pleased with what they turn out. If you pay to play or are playing for free, doesn't change the fact that Cryptic is going to continue moving forward whether we like it or not.
The question the OP asked is "How loyal are you to the game?"
If you're like me and don't give a damn because it is just a game than I'm sure you're going to stick around and give yourself ample breathing room when you feel the game is trying to put you in a coma. For others, that isn't the case and those people chose to leave altogether.
That is your choice, always. I for one like the game, love anything Trek, love my fleet and the antics of the people on chat.
I'm not going anywhere. That answers how loyal I am.
Must be another thread but the dev notes and blogs are all the blue prints to what they're thinking. I do glance those every now and then to see what they might be working on next.