Patrols substituting for story content?

hypl · September 2014

Every other mission is a cluster of repetitive patrol missions. Most of these are just boring shooting galleries with some dialogue thrown in. I can't say I've enjoyed these.

I hope the last five levels arn't stuffed with more patrols. Seriously guys... :rolleyes:

trek21 · September 2014

Random patrols implies we're literally doing just that, with nothing else needed to be done...

Our orders in the Delta Quadrant are to get the lay of the land, and shore up a lot of very diverse messy businesses, especially in the wake of Voyager and 30+ years aftermath. It's important for intelligence-gathering, stabilization, and planning needed for operations, while an underlaying plot develops on it's own.

So if anything, they're more like world-building to the newer plot, and not unnecessary or random imo. In fact, I find it refreshing that patrols are part of the usual story-building aspect now (and that they have a purpose, rather than a self-contained incident)

jodarkrider · September 2014

Yeah, they kind of fit into the Delta Quadrant; the 'routine' work, so to speak. Although as someone who pefers & is primarily geared towards ground, I'd not mind if those 'patrols' had ground aspect to it. That's probably my issue with it, that it's really just space content there.

Also kinda not liking the fact that in the last batch of patrols, there's one done in shuttle. I discharged my shuttle ages ago, as I just can't stomach shuttle events of any kind... <,<

hypl · September 2014

jodarkrider wrote: »

That's probably my issue with it, that it's really just space content there.

Also kinda not liking the fact that in the last batch of patrols, there's one done in shuttle. I discharged my shuttle ages ago, as I just can't stomach shuttle events of any kind... <,<

I noticed this too. It's predominantly space combat. A change of pace with ground patrols would be nice.

The shuttle one is a race, isn't it? I've yet to check that out.

firestorm10491 · September 2014

I have played through most of the available content and I too have to admit I am not really impressed with the patrol/minor missions. Legacy of Romulus had far more content and options added as compared to this.

These missions are superficial and the added Hp values for Elite combat are less than impressive. The first two missions are impressive and add quality to the story. After that the missions become like the shoot 5 I haven't done in 2 years. I am fine with them as being patrols but not listed as episodes. Unfortunately its too late in the development cycle to do anything about that.

I am impressed with the races and graphic details in many areas with one notable exception. The Kobali homeworld is really VERY annoying with the constant shaking it gave me a headache just spending time there.

trelane87 · September 2014

I have to agree, at first these space patrols were tolerable but the last one was just plain boring. Each one is basically a rehash of the previous one, it's all space combat, and for some of the patrols the amount of ships you have to kill is just absurd. On elite setting if you don't have a high DPS ship expect a few minutes just to kill one ship... some enemies I was fighting last night had nearly 1 million hp. This expansion needs a lot more ground combat and more diverse enemies for ground, I have not seen any Malon, Hazari, APU, or Hierarchy ground units yet, I'm guessing there are none

hypl · September 2014

firestorm10491 wrote: »

The Kobali homeworld is really VERY annoying with the constant shaking it gave me a headache just spending time there.

Yeah, this doesn't seem to be affected by the screen shaking option either, since I have mine set to off and it still shakes. @_#

longasc · September 2014

They have IMO a higher replay value than heavily story based content.

I think and hope we will see some more story missions after Delta Rising launches. The story so far is only about to unfold, nothing is finished.

bones1970 · September 2014

longasc wrote: »

They have IMO a higher replay value than heavily story based content.

I think and hope we will see some more story missions after Delta Rising launches. The story so far is only about to unfold, nothing is finished.

Your a optimist, im not, x2 will bring, like always nothing much only buggs in the 100's.

duncanidaho11 · September 2014

firestorm10491 wrote: »

I have played through most of the available content and I too have to admit I am not really impressed with the patrol/minor missions. Legacy of Romulus had far more content and options added as compared to this..

For me they're the highlight. LOR basically told one story in the big setting of "establishing a new romulan faction" which was a wasted opportunity. These patrol missions give the quadrant the depth that the last expansion more or less lacked.

I love them and for several reasons.

1. There's a large diversity of enemy factions which allows the new additions to have a greater presence than the story allows (because its focused.)

2. The structure of the patrol missions is more varied than just about any other type of space scenario outside of PVE (ie. its fully possible to grind these like you can an STF, which isn't to recommend that you do, only to point out that they're fairly robust).

3. Just about every one establishes a good piece of setting that flushes out the DQ as a diverse region of space with many different interacting agendas. Its a better kind of STO (because it actually uses the IP to reinforce gameplay.)

4. Bridge crew dialog is nicely used to create a feel for your own ship that we've quite frankly NEVER seen before (and is one of the greater holes in the STO format. All this work spent building a ship and you're just about the only one involved with anything besides bleeting info. Not quite so here..)

5. It feels like exploration (at least the first time through, and that's exploration the concept not "exploration" the limp STO anachronism Cryptic chucked recently) which satisfies that ONE thematic requirement of an expansion pack based around Voyager.

Without these missions DR is just a story about some bad guys featuring some other dudes you know. You could substitute in the DS9 cast and make the foe a resurgent Dominion and you'd pretty much have the same thing. With them, you're traveling, you're exploring, you're up to something appropriate for the IP. Its what makes DR special.

hypl · September 2014

Yep, even more patrols. And they're taking even longer to get through. It's as if the Vaadwaur ships were tailored with Intelligence ships in mind, since they seem to have absurd damage resistance, requiring the use of intelligence exploits, consistent debuffing, or an extremely high dps ship to make them defeatable in a less time-consuming manner.

Time consumption. That is my impression of this expansion so far. Everything feels so time consuming in the worst possible way. Since nothing vital seems to happen in these missions story-wise, I think I'll just skip them.

ladymyajha · September 2014

I don't mind the patrols so much, but I agree I'd have liked to see some ground combat in there.

But then I think back and realize they seem to be clumping everything together. All the ground happens at the same time in the same place, then you go back to space for a while, then back to ground for a while. Old STO was basically a space/ground/space/ground set up. Here its Space/space/space/space/ground/ground/ground/space/space/space

ladymyajha · September 2014

longasc wrote: »

They have IMO a higher replay value than heavily story based content.

I think and hope we will see some more story missions after Delta Rising launches. The story so far is only about to unfold, nothing is finished.

LOL. We'll be lucky if we get balance and bug fixes after Delta Rising launches. We'll get another year or two of episodic content every couple of months, but otherwise I'm not expecting what we see not on Tribble to be changed all that much if at all.

jodarkrider · September 2014

ladymyajha wrote: »

I don't mind the patrols so much, but I agree I'd have liked to see some ground combat in there.

But then I think back and realize they seem to be clumping everything together. All the ground happens at the same time in the same place, then you go back to space for a while, then back to ground for a while. Old STO was basically a space/ground/space/ground set up. Here its Space/space/space/space/ground/ground/ground/space/space/space

Yeah, the prelevance of space mostly, makes me a sad warrior. I prefer ground over space myself & the fact no patrols are ground makes me really...

lystent · September 2014

Why won't you guys ever learn: This is Star Trek Online. You don't explore. You shoot things!

duncanidaho11 · September 2014

ladymyajha wrote: »

I don't mind the patrols so much, but I agree I'd have liked to see some ground combat in there.

But then I think back and realize they seem to be clumping everything together. All the ground happens at the same time in the same place, then you go back to space for a while, then back to ground for a while. Old STO was basically a space/ground/space/ground set up. Here its Space/space/space/space/ground/ground/ground/space/space/space

I personally like the more binary mode a bit more because it allows each section to go a bit further than they were allowed to in old STO. For example we used to have ground section, kill 5 squads in building, space section, kill 3 squads in space, finish and repeat next mission. Now we have ground mission, go ziplining, cutscene, kill things, cutscene, scream and run away. Then next mission we might have an elaborate multi-stage space patrol followed by a return to the battlezone for free-form ground combat. There's a lot more variation here because they're not immediately supplementing ground with space or space with ground. They're instead complimenting each other over a greater period of time.

Now if they could only have the NPC health scale properly with level we'd be set for one fine expansion!

colonelchenchuan · September 2014

duncanidaho11 wrote: »

I personally like the more binary mode a bit more because it allows each section to go a bit further than they were allowed to in old STO. For example we used to have ground section, kill 5 squads in building, space section, kill 3 squads in space, finish and repeat next mission. Now we have ground mission, go ziplining, cutscene, kill things, cutscene, scream and run away. Then next mission we might have an elaborate multi-stage space patrol followed by a return to the battlezone for free-form ground combat. There's a lot more variation here because they're not immediately supplementing ground with space or space with ground. They're instead complimenting each other over a greater period of time.

Now if they could only have the NPC health scale properly with level we'd be set for one fine expansion!

well with the development the last couple of years ground is more... walk/talk. cut scene. cut scene cut scene. shoot something. walk/talk cut scene cut scene walk/talk walk/talk talk talk cutscene cutscene cutscene

duncanidaho11 · September 2014

colonelchenchuan wrote: »

well with the development the last couple of years ground is more... walk/talk. cut scene. cut scene cut scene. shoot something. walk/talk cut scene cut scene walk/talk walk/talk talk talk cutscene cutscene cutscene

Which is far better than block of text / grind 5 widely dispersed groups of dudes / block of text / beam out.

Patrols substituting for story content?

Comments