As much as I would love to see more canon and customisable ship interiors, until it's been demonstrated that they are financially viable and integral to the core gameplay, I'll pass on that.
On the other hand, the ability to buy more Bridge Officer costume slots would be nice.
Laws of thermodynamics as applied to life: 0 - You must play the game. 1 - You can't win. 2 - You can't break even. 3 - You can't quit.
Add in melee arena PvP. Give it a persistent scoreboard. Make it a KDF exclusive thing. Perhaps use the old First City map.
A huge pass over the KDF tailor options, fix bugs and add things for us to buy.
Fill a few holes in the KDF roster with cstore ships.
Specifically allow a Gorn, Orion or Nausicaan character to fly race specific ships from level 10 onwards, and give the KDF an actual klingon science ship perhaps on a raptor chassis.
A three episode, KDF only, level 50 FE series dealing with house to house shenanigans.
Give Qo'nos a spruce up along the lines of ESD.
Species specific bridges. You'll sell a lot of Orion, Gorn and Nausicaan bridges.
1.) Make a super awesome perfect game that no one can stop playing and everyone loves and does everything right; that has no bugs and no excessive mindless grinding.
2.) Collect money.
What I don't get is why people around here always fly off the handle over hypothetical discussions.
There's nothing wrong with more choice, ultimately it's up to the consumer in question how and where they choose to spend their money.
Just wanted to point out I did not fly off the handle at anything.
I have no issue with people making lists of things they want to see added like player housing and stuff...... What I find annoying is they then go on to add.... And you could price that at X amount of zen.... What sort of clown asks to be charged for things? If cryptic/PWE choose to add something then that's cool, if they then want to charge you for it then fine, it's up to you if you buy it or not but it's up to them if and how much they will charge. They don't need sycophants pricing items/services for them.
For a hypothetical example, ship bridges, if cryptic/PWE made more and they thought to them selves... Let's sell them at 500 zen, but before releasing them a thread like this pops up with a bunch of people saying.... Hey cryptic, please add more bridges, you could price them at 1000 zen and I would throw my money at you..... So they release them at 1000 zen.
So idea's are good..... Just don't stick a price tag on them.
I'd love the bug fixes but can't see them investing the time. Perhaps we could use crowd fundraising to pick the bug to be fixed and collectively pay for the developer time?
I'd go for the crew mechanic, to give cruisers a distinctive benefit.
Well, my guess is people willing and able to "spend a few hundred" aren't exactly representative of the average customer.
Really? I was under the impression that the average STO player was not the typical F2P gamer but a general ST fan and also older as well as college educated, which usually means something of a better than average job compensation wise. Of course maybe the STO players may not representative of the general ST fan base...
If you are looking for an excellent PvE fleet consider: Omega Combat Division today.
Former member of the Cryptic Family & FriendsTesting Team. Sadly, one day, it simply vanished - without a word or trace...
[..]
I suspect that the reason Cryptic isn't doing it is two-fold:
1) Because their original game engine doesn't really have this capability and They would have to design the software from the ground up to add it.
And
2) They don't have the man-power at this time, to devote to creating such a system.
:cool:
I agree with your notions. I was sort of hoping that because of the buyout by PWE that Cryptic would be given a chance to develop a pure ST engine over a couple years, by say, year seven, for STO so the game can toss off its Champ shackles.... Maybe my hope is simply crazy vaporware ideas but I cant help but think if I owned PWE and I had ST property and a new multiyear deal (coming next year - likely) with CBS I would bankroll a seriously cutting edge development program but that is just me....
If you are looking for an excellent PvE fleet consider: Omega Combat Division today.
Former member of the Cryptic Family & FriendsTesting Team. Sadly, one day, it simply vanished - without a word or trace...
the appeal to buying cryptic is that their engine is so open. the same engine does co, sto, nwn, and will be doing the new game they're currently working on.
there is a misconception in freemium games that you should put in tons of ways to charge money for things and yes this is a myth
the principle of freemium games is that if people are entertained they will pay some money that reflects what they can afford.
If the content is good and the game offers a real game and its not just a giant cash shop people will poney up money for small perks because the company is doing a good job and well keeping them entertained.
I played sto when it was in closed beta and then when it launched etc. The game content has far improved at the time I found the game much more shallow in many ways. I preferred the klingon side but there were only a few pvp instances that you had to run over and over again to level up. Now there is a story line
I really enjoyed the newer stuff the dyson sphere stuff etc and the quests lines that go with them. So I made a decision to pay a modest fee to cryptic every month. What I as a consumer refuse to do it pay through the nose to get items to play a game. If I have to pay more then I would say to go to a movie once a month I wont be paying. So for now since I prefer the subscription idea I pay that way even though it doesn't really offer a lot its my fee for use to cryptic to tell them I am indeed entertained. Later on I may switch this and just buy zen per month a certain amount but for now this is fine.
So in short there is nothing cyptic needs to do to entire me to pay them more money other then make a good game and then I will give them a monthly fee in return that amounts to about 15 or 20 bucks.
Give the non-Intel T6 ships access to bodyparts from their most closely related ship line (Galaxy-series for the Guardian, probably the Pach for the Mat'Ha and the D'Deridex for the Aelahl). By which I mean just add them to the "list" for those classes. If a Guardian can look like a Galaxy, Venture, Celestial, Envoy, etc then Cryptic will sell more of them. It doesn't even require adding any extra content.
It's easy: stop doing things the players in general DON'T LIKE, and start doing things we DO LIKE.
It really isn't rocket science.
I pay money when I see stuff I like. When LOR brought in the scimitar & full story lines for both Rom and KDF (sort of for the Roms anyway), I bought Zen to say that I liked what they had done.
Thus far, there is NOTHING in DR that I like, so I'm probably not gonna buy Zen. *shrug*
1. Charge 1000 zen for log-in.
2. Charge 10000 zen for successfull log-in.
3. Charge 100000 zen for successfull log-in without rubberbanding lag.
3. Charge 1000000 zen for successfull log-in without rubberbanding lag and without disconnects.
Shift Reputation, Crafting, Starship Mastery, and Specialization progress and Starship Trait unlocks to the account level. Allow for each character to contribute to the account's progress as they do now to their own, but increase the investment required to do so since that progress then applies to the whole account.
Cash in on alts.
An environment that promotes creating, playing, and equipping alternate characters also promotes spending. The opposite also holds true, where limiting the number of characters (by either player choice or developer design) limits the expense necessary to create and equip that limited number of characters.
For example: Why spend money on a ship that your main isn't set up to fly anyway?
For another example: If a player can do everything they want to in one faction, why should they spend money on ships for another faction?
For yet another, more specific, example: If a player can unlock Overwhelming Force on their Federation Science captain by purchasing and leveling a Klingon in a Mat'Ha, that increases the likelihood of purchasing the Mat'Ha even if they usually only play Federation characters, doesn't it?
With each passing day I wonder if I stepped into an alternate reality. The Cubs win the world series. Donald Trump is President. Britain leaves the EU. STO gets a dedicated PvP season. Engineers are "out of control" in STO.
Give a reward for the most lockboxes opened in an event (i.e. Lockbox released and everyday for 7 days the person who opens the most lockboxes gets a prize).
Go back to a P2P model, keep the zen store and the lifers' stippend.
My real hope. I can see a $50 a month plan but I would want to see weekly development logs. I guess at least half the budget is going to development of revenue enhancement development and not game play development presently.
If you are looking for an excellent PvE fleet consider: Omega Combat Division today.
Former member of the Cryptic Family & FriendsTesting Team. Sadly, one day, it simply vanished - without a word or trace...
A wish that I have had for a long time is to be able to take the "guts" of one ship you own and use the art of another ship you own of the same class.
They could tie it to some token system or have purchasable components. There are many older ships that I love the art of. The Qin, the Bortasqu, and certain birds of prey come to mind. Of course there should be limitations. A kumari in an Odyssey would be silly. But certain ships are close enough that I have always wondered why it wasn't possible. The mogh components in a bortasqu model for example. So long as it is within class lines I would love such a system. Even if I had to purchase both ships and then buy another item, I would spend the money.
Micro purchase in the Z Store. Small things like individual costume pieces (scarves, badges, boots, individual emotes, certain consoles, vanity items, pets, etc...) that each sell for around 100 zen. A lot of us balk at spending 550 zen for a full costume, but spending lower amounts gives us more customization, while maintaining the illusion that we're not spending a lot.
1.add endgame solo content for reputation this would bring in and keep more players rather than having high turn over due to having nothing at all currently at endgame.
2.scaling fleet costs by number of unique accounts in fleet. this would allow solo, or small groups to create and actually be able to build up fleets by scaling the costs for projects by number of unique member accounts within the fleet rather than the current flat rate which penalizes anything but large fleets heavily in resource costs and time required.
3.overall more end game content (random encounter maps, survival wave maps, etc), running the same 2-4 maps per reputation tree over and over and over and over (get it?) can induce narcolepsy in individuals that have never had it. tediously boring is an understatement grinding through the rep trees, implementing this and the first on the list would bump up population by a great margin. less overall turnover as well as people won't get as bored, fall asleep and die at their keyboards after running hive for the 1000th time.
4.more skin/color choices for ships through the z-store. throw in more choices (or even custom made) for fleet or personal decals and you have a win win. while the federation and republic might prefer to be more uniform for their military ships...klingon and the lockbox types should have a high degree of customization.
5.implement rule sets that can be chosen in PvP, this change would also allow specific rulesets automatically generated for different PvP areas. things like
no unique consoles
tier limits and/or ship type limits
limited visibility/scan range
no cloak
etc, the potential list is endless.
6.PvP rankings and rewards in fleet vs fleet scenerios, these would be equivalent to modern military exercises, participation is voluntary, rewards would be sent straight to fleet coffers such as dilithium, EC, latinum. multiple sizes possible of participating members up to 30 v 30 right now PvP means next to nothing besides bragging, however, modifications to the system will garner more players who will stay longer and potentially spend more...i never bother much with PvP...but this thread is about cryptic making money, and NOT having a decent PvP system much less any real rewards and hence no real reason to PvP neuters any potential it could have had.
7.reduce dilitium costs for doffs, crafting, and whatever else you plan on adding or creating systems with high dil costs. this is one of the biggest turn offs to this game besides the utter lack of endgame content...the interminable grind for dilithium. EVERYTHING costs dil, and the costs are outrageous. throw in 5k, 5 doffs and get some random bartender? you just spent over half the dil you can convert in a day for TRIBBLE...yeah, people love that. but that's not the only thing EVERY FREAKING THING costs tons of dil. adding grind on top of grind on top of grind is no way to make a FUN game.
8.crafting system that actually can work and get newbs using it. seriously crptic...wtf were you thinking? you created this lovely new crafting system...then you totally ruin it, end game players only, totally useless to newbs...and the other problem once these newbs reach endgame and start using it MORE GRIND on top of all the dil and rep grind...i was just :eek: when i saw that. are you intentionally trying to force every new player to quit except the most retentive once they reach max?
9. more off duty outfits, yeah, your selections such as it is is horrible. fashions make money, something proven beyond a doubt...yet for some reason you treat it as if it has ebola. won't make new ones that people would want to buy. you could sell emotes as well. while you're at it, improve the animations and models for all playable characters, i know animation blending is something you never use...but try it...it really makes movement by characters look so much better. less spastic.
10.trading...no, not the doff assignments or trading between characters but actual trade routes where players can spend a little time to get goods and deliver them to different worlds making a profit. this would also require cargo space to be added to ships, each would have a specific amount they could carry (larger carrying more than smaller obviously) which would also promote cruisers and other large ships for trading purposes as opposed to smaller escorts. and hey, throw some freighters into the z-store.
11.sort of with 10 above...colonization, either fleet or solo, you have to supply your colony, defend it, and overcome whatever other obstacles or crisis might present themselves. NOT ANOTHER DOFF ASSIGNMENT. personal, you fly there, you do the work, you reap the rewards. you get transmissions when they might need something wherever you are (inbox).
12.style choices for pylons, hulls, saucers, etc. z-store. these would be variations on current types. one offs, unlockable per character not account. why cryptic never did this i just dunno, seems an obvious evolution and a great money maker for little actual effort. even current options like say the armitage style could be split up and sold separately but overall would end up costing more since it's a per character rather than an account unlock
13. review cash shop items that AREN"T selling. lower prices on those items to make them more attractive and more likely to sell. this is one of the BIGGEST mistakes mmo's make, they set one price and stick to it rather than review and adjust to something that actually gets sales rolling in. they have zero adaptability in that regard. to be blunt, the most successful businesses adapt
14. just because i didn't want to end on 13 :P
there are literally thousands of ways STO could make more money...sadly since they tend to follow pwe's practices which are woefully out of date (the gamer community moves faster than the mmo developer/publishers by about a factor of 10) i doubt anything here will ever be implemented or even read by anyone at cryptic or pwe.
once a company thinks they're 'doin it right' or gets stuck in a rut...both of which can be applied here...it takes a major shake up before they re-evaluate their business model. if they ever do. businesses are the ultimate conservatives...they want the same old same old to work forever, it's safe, known, and they think a predictable quantity.
doesn't work on the net, in mmo's, or much of anywhere anymore. the dynamics have changed. things change faster, opinions shift faster, information is spread faster through more mediums. i could go into some other mmo, a convo gets started about other mmo's, i could give a glowing review, an honest review, or a negative review of sto...and guess what? that does effect other players views of sto for everyone that is in that chat channel reading or involved.
publishers/devs a lot of them don't understand that...how do i know? they still try to censor their forums as if that's the only place players learn things about their game.:rolleyes:
Dr. Patricia Tanis ~ "Bacon is for sycophants and products of incest."
Donate Brains, zombies in Washington DC are starving.
Purchasable Lvl 60 toons .
Purchasable Lvl 60 toons with full reputation unlock .
Token to unlock 1 school of crafting .
Token to repackage Lockbox ship for one account bound transfer .
TOS movie bridge pack (Excelsior , Enterprise)
TNG interior pack (doctors long coat , movie phaser rifle , show phased rifle, Picard style bald head )
Raid missions (the original STFs for example)
Costume slots for Boffs .
1. Ship repair after PvP should cost you dil/zen.
2. 100 dil everytime you use profanity in chatbar
3. bringing ships with low gear to high end STF costs dil/zen as penalty.
4. different skill tress for PvP and PvE. Playing with them costs dil/zen.
5. Playing something like hot coffee mode with other players cost zen. But this won't happen due to conservative Murrica.
Grinding for MkIV epic gear?
Ain't Nobody Got Time for That
This thread is a bit frustrating, seeing how many people are just saying "bug fixes lol".
The best things Cryptic can do to monetise the game in a way that's acceptable to the playerbase usually are repeatable and cosmetic/choice based.
1) Re-species tokens. These are the lowest of low-hanging fruit; they can be bought over and over and synergise with things like...
2) New species unlocks. There are a tonne of races that can be added using pieces already in the Alien Generator, just slap a unique racial trait there and a lot of people would be all over it.
3) Full ship upgrade-ability. Almost nobody buys T1-T4 ships, so let's work around that. Have it so that every ship can be upgraded from it's lowest tier through to T6. None of this T5U nonsense, just make them T6 plain and simple. We could get rid of the ridiculous "refit" and "retrofit" naming convention too...
4) R&D track unlocks. Yeah, some people don't want to engage with the system but what does that matter? Putting a 6th project slot in the C-Store is both insanely high RoI and risk-free.
5) Item upgrade track unlocks. Same as above, but for item upgrades.
6) Starbase cosmetic projects. Perhaps this one is just done through Dilithium and monetised that way, but I know a lot of fleets would pay money for things like exterior changes to their Starbases.
7) Equipment/Ship De-binding tokens. Let's say you have a lockbox ship on one character you think would work better on a different character. Are you going to buy a second ship for millions, try for a second ship in a lockbox, or are you just going give up? Most players will give up. Add an option to repackage ships into account-bound boxes and a lot of players are going to eat that up.
Comments
On the other hand, the ability to buy more Bridge Officer costume slots would be nice.
Give the KDF a .5 season of their own.
Rejig the sense of tthe unique KDF experience.
Add in melee arena PvP. Give it a persistent scoreboard. Make it a KDF exclusive thing. Perhaps use the old First City map.
A huge pass over the KDF tailor options, fix bugs and add things for us to buy.
Fill a few holes in the KDF roster with cstore ships.
Specifically allow a Gorn, Orion or Nausicaan character to fly race specific ships from level 10 onwards, and give the KDF an actual klingon science ship perhaps on a raptor chassis.
A three episode, KDF only, level 50 FE series dealing with house to house shenanigans.
Give Qo'nos a spruce up along the lines of ESD.
Species specific bridges. You'll sell a lot of Orion, Gorn and Nausicaan bridges.
1.) Make a super awesome perfect game that no one can stop playing and everyone loves and does everything right; that has no bugs and no excessive mindless grinding.
2.) Collect money.
Simple as that.
Just wanted to point out I did not fly off the handle at anything.
I have no issue with people making lists of things they want to see added like player housing and stuff...... What I find annoying is they then go on to add.... And you could price that at X amount of zen.... What sort of clown asks to be charged for things? If cryptic/PWE choose to add something then that's cool, if they then want to charge you for it then fine, it's up to you if you buy it or not but it's up to them if and how much they will charge. They don't need sycophants pricing items/services for them.
For a hypothetical example, ship bridges, if cryptic/PWE made more and they thought to them selves... Let's sell them at 500 zen, but before releasing them a thread like this pops up with a bunch of people saying.... Hey cryptic, please add more bridges, you could price them at 1000 zen and I would throw my money at you..... So they release them at 1000 zen.
So idea's are good..... Just don't stick a price tag on them.
my offer is 1 EC
I'd go for the crew mechanic, to give cruisers a distinctive benefit.
i'd buy new playable species.
i'd buy new boff species.
i'd buy t6 ship ugrade tokens.
i'd buy mini-faction packs, where each pack would allow us to play a different type of new class: pirate, smuggler, diplomat, and so on.
ingame: @.Spartan
Original Cryptic Forum Name: Spartan (member #124)
The Glorious, Kirk’s Protegè
I agree with your notions. I was sort of hoping that because of the buyout by PWE that Cryptic would be given a chance to develop a pure ST engine over a couple years, by say, year seven, for STO so the game can toss off its Champ shackles.... Maybe my hope is simply crazy vaporware ideas but I cant help but think if I owned PWE and I had ST property and a new multiyear deal (coming next year - likely) with CBS I would bankroll a seriously cutting edge development program but that is just me....
ingame: @.Spartan
Original Cryptic Forum Name: Spartan (member #124)
The Glorious, Kirk’s Protegè
there is a misconception in freemium games that you should put in tons of ways to charge money for things and yes this is a myth
the principle of freemium games is that if people are entertained they will pay some money that reflects what they can afford.
If the content is good and the game offers a real game and its not just a giant cash shop people will poney up money for small perks because the company is doing a good job and well keeping them entertained.
I played sto when it was in closed beta and then when it launched etc. The game content has far improved at the time I found the game much more shallow in many ways. I preferred the klingon side but there were only a few pvp instances that you had to run over and over again to level up. Now there is a story line
I really enjoyed the newer stuff the dyson sphere stuff etc and the quests lines that go with them. So I made a decision to pay a modest fee to cryptic every month. What I as a consumer refuse to do it pay through the nose to get items to play a game. If I have to pay more then I would say to go to a movie once a month I wont be paying. So for now since I prefer the subscription idea I pay that way even though it doesn't really offer a lot its my fee for use to cryptic to tell them I am indeed entertained. Later on I may switch this and just buy zen per month a certain amount but for now this is fine.
So in short there is nothing cyptic needs to do to entire me to pay them more money other then make a good game and then I will give them a monthly fee in return that amounts to about 15 or 20 bucks.
Give the non-Intel T6 ships access to bodyparts from their most closely related ship line (Galaxy-series for the Guardian, probably the Pach for the Mat'Ha and the D'Deridex for the Aelahl). By which I mean just add them to the "list" for those classes. If a Guardian can look like a Galaxy, Venture, Celestial, Envoy, etc then Cryptic will sell more of them. It doesn't even require adding any extra content.
I'd buy either of those species right away.
It really isn't rocket science.
I pay money when I see stuff I like. When LOR brought in the scimitar & full story lines for both Rom and KDF (sort of for the Roms anyway), I bought Zen to say that I liked what they had done.
Thus far, there is NOTHING in DR that I like, so I'm probably not gonna buy Zen. *shrug*
2. Charge 10000 zen for successfull log-in.
3. Charge 100000 zen for successfull log-in without rubberbanding lag.
3. Charge 1000000 zen for successfull log-in without rubberbanding lag and without disconnects.
An environment that promotes creating, playing, and equipping alternate characters also promotes spending. The opposite also holds true, where limiting the number of characters (by either player choice or developer design) limits the expense necessary to create and equip that limited number of characters.
For example: Why spend money on a ship that your main isn't set up to fly anyway?
For another example: If a player can do everything they want to in one faction, why should they spend money on ships for another faction?
For yet another, more specific, example: If a player can unlock Overwhelming Force on their Federation Science captain by purchasing and leveling a Klingon in a Mat'Ha, that increases the likelihood of purchasing the Mat'Ha even if they usually only play Federation characters, doesn't it?
This will net them a small fortune.
ingame: @.Spartan
Original Cryptic Forum Name: Spartan (member #124)
The Glorious, Kirk’s Protegè
They could tie it to some token system or have purchasable components. There are many older ships that I love the art of. The Qin, the Bortasqu, and certain birds of prey come to mind. Of course there should be limitations. A kumari in an Odyssey would be silly. But certain ships are close enough that I have always wondered why it wasn't possible. The mogh components in a bortasqu model for example. So long as it is within class lines I would love such a system. Even if I had to purchase both ships and then buy another item, I would spend the money.
Nickel and dime.
this would bring in and keep more players rather than having high turn over due to having nothing at all currently at endgame.
2.scaling fleet costs by number of unique accounts in fleet.
this would allow solo, or small groups to create and actually be able to build up fleets by scaling the costs for projects by number of unique member accounts within the fleet rather than the current flat rate which penalizes anything but large fleets heavily in resource costs and time required.
3.overall more end game content (random encounter maps, survival wave maps, etc), running the same 2-4 maps per reputation tree over and over and over and over (get it?) can induce narcolepsy in individuals that have never had it.
tediously boring is an understatement grinding through the rep trees, implementing this and the first on the list would bump up population by a great margin. less overall turnover as well as people won't get as bored, fall asleep and die at their keyboards after running hive for the 1000th time.
4.more skin/color choices for ships through the z-store. throw in more choices (or even custom made) for fleet or personal decals and you have a win win. while the federation and republic might prefer to be more uniform for their military ships...klingon and the lockbox types should have a high degree of customization.
5.implement rule sets that can be chosen in PvP, this change would also allow specific rulesets automatically generated for different PvP areas.
things like
no unique consoles
tier limits and/or ship type limits
limited visibility/scan range
no cloak
etc, the potential list is endless.
6.PvP rankings and rewards in fleet vs fleet scenerios, these would be equivalent to modern military exercises, participation is voluntary, rewards would be sent straight to fleet coffers such as dilithium, EC, latinum. multiple sizes possible of participating members up to 30 v 30
right now PvP means next to nothing besides bragging, however, modifications to the system will garner more players who will stay longer and potentially spend more...i never bother much with PvP...but this thread is about cryptic making money, and NOT having a decent PvP system much less any real rewards and hence no real reason to PvP neuters any potential it could have had.
7.reduce dilitium costs for doffs, crafting, and whatever else you plan on adding or creating systems with high dil costs.
this is one of the biggest turn offs to this game besides the utter lack of endgame content...the interminable grind for dilithium. EVERYTHING costs dil, and the costs are outrageous. throw in 5k, 5 doffs and get some random bartender? you just spent over half the dil you can convert in a day for TRIBBLE...yeah, people love that. but that's not the only thing EVERY FREAKING THING costs tons of dil. adding grind on top of grind on top of grind is no way to make a FUN game.
8.crafting system that actually can work and get newbs using it.
seriously crptic...wtf were you thinking? you created this lovely new crafting system...then you totally ruin it, end game players only, totally useless to newbs...and the other problem once these newbs reach endgame and start using it MORE GRIND on top of all the dil and rep grind...i was just :eek: when i saw that. are you intentionally trying to force every new player to quit except the most retentive once they reach max?
9. more off duty outfits, yeah, your selections such as it is is horrible. fashions make money, something proven beyond a doubt...yet for some reason you treat it as if it has ebola. won't make new ones that people would want to buy. you could sell emotes as well.
while you're at it, improve the animations and models for all playable characters, i know animation blending is something you never use...but try it...it really makes movement by characters look so much better. less spastic.
10.trading...no, not the doff assignments or trading between characters but actual trade routes where players can spend a little time to get goods and deliver them to different worlds making a profit.
this would also require cargo space to be added to ships, each would have a specific amount they could carry (larger carrying more than smaller obviously) which would also promote cruisers and other large ships for trading purposes as opposed to smaller escorts. and hey, throw some freighters into the z-store.
11.sort of with 10 above...colonization, either fleet or solo, you have to supply your colony, defend it, and overcome whatever other obstacles or crisis might present themselves. NOT ANOTHER DOFF ASSIGNMENT. personal, you fly there, you do the work, you reap the rewards. you get transmissions when they might need something wherever you are (inbox).
12.style choices for pylons, hulls, saucers, etc. z-store. these would be variations on current types. one offs, unlockable per character not account.
why cryptic never did this i just dunno, seems an obvious evolution and a great money maker for little actual effort. even current options like say the armitage style could be split up and sold separately but overall would end up costing more since it's a per character rather than an account unlock
13. review cash shop items that AREN"T selling. lower prices on those items to make them more attractive and more likely to sell.
this is one of the BIGGEST mistakes mmo's make, they set one price and stick to it rather than review and adjust to something that actually gets sales rolling in. they have zero adaptability in that regard. to be blunt, the most successful businesses adapt
14. just because i didn't want to end on 13 :P
there are literally thousands of ways STO could make more money...sadly since they tend to follow pwe's practices which are woefully out of date (the gamer community moves faster than the mmo developer/publishers by about a factor of 10) i doubt anything here will ever be implemented or even read by anyone at cryptic or pwe.
once a company thinks they're 'doin it right' or gets stuck in a rut...both of which can be applied here...it takes a major shake up before they re-evaluate their business model. if they ever do. businesses are the ultimate conservatives...they want the same old same old to work forever, it's safe, known, and they think a predictable quantity.
doesn't work on the net, in mmo's, or much of anywhere anymore. the dynamics have changed. things change faster, opinions shift faster, information is spread faster through more mediums. i could go into some other mmo, a convo gets started about other mmo's, i could give a glowing review, an honest review, or a negative review of sto...and guess what? that does effect other players views of sto for everyone that is in that chat channel reading or involved.
publishers/devs a lot of them don't understand that...how do i know? they still try to censor their forums as if that's the only place players learn things about their game.:rolleyes:
Donate Brains, zombies in Washington DC are starving.
^^ this . Also :
Purchasable Lvl 60 toons .
Purchasable Lvl 60 toons with full reputation unlock .
Token to unlock 1 school of crafting .
Token to repackage Lockbox ship for one account bound transfer .
TOS movie bridge pack (Excelsior , Enterprise)
TNG interior pack (doctors long coat , movie phaser rifle , show phased rifle, Picard style bald head )
Raid missions (the original STFs for example)
Costume slots for Boffs .
2. 100 dil everytime you use profanity in chatbar
3. bringing ships with low gear to high end STF costs dil/zen as penalty.
4. different skill tress for PvP and PvE. Playing with them costs dil/zen.
5. Playing something like hot coffee mode with other players cost zen. But this won't happen due to conservative Murrica.
Ain't Nobody Got Time for That
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Whoa there, friend, you might need to slow down. This is Star Trek, not an intercourse simulator. Please let us keep it that way.
The best things Cryptic can do to monetise the game in a way that's acceptable to the playerbase usually are repeatable and cosmetic/choice based.
1) Re-species tokens. These are the lowest of low-hanging fruit; they can be bought over and over and synergise with things like...
2) New species unlocks. There are a tonne of races that can be added using pieces already in the Alien Generator, just slap a unique racial trait there and a lot of people would be all over it.
3) Full ship upgrade-ability. Almost nobody buys T1-T4 ships, so let's work around that. Have it so that every ship can be upgraded from it's lowest tier through to T6. None of this T5U nonsense, just make them T6 plain and simple. We could get rid of the ridiculous "refit" and "retrofit" naming convention too...
4) R&D track unlocks. Yeah, some people don't want to engage with the system but what does that matter? Putting a 6th project slot in the C-Store is both insanely high RoI and risk-free.
5) Item upgrade track unlocks. Same as above, but for item upgrades.
6) Starbase cosmetic projects. Perhaps this one is just done through Dilithium and monetised that way, but I know a lot of fleets would pay money for things like exterior changes to their Starbases.
7) Equipment/Ship De-binding tokens. Let's say you have a lockbox ship on one character you think would work better on a different character. Are you going to buy a second ship for millions, try for a second ship in a lockbox, or are you just going give up? Most players will give up. Add an option to repackage ships into account-bound boxes and a lot of players are going to eat that up.