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Suggestions to increase PVE activity
darpink
Member Posts: 341 Arc User
It's no secret that the PVE Queues are fairly inactive. There are a few that remain active on a regular basis like the Borg STFs, Crystaline Entity, Starbase Fleet Alert (if you're Fed), Bug hunt etc.
But there are a some of them that never have anyone Que'd or playing, such as Mine Trap and any others that require 10-20 players, The Battle of Korfez etc.
Mine Trap: is a fun PVE and a lot of players enjoy it, so why doesn't anyone play it anymore? Because it occasionally glitches, which makes it a waste of time and effort.
Suggestion: Cut the map in half and make it a 10 player event rather than 20 and most of all fix the glitches!!
The Battle of Korfez: Make it possible to win.
Starbase Fleet Defense: Fix the glitches, reduce the number of enemies that spawn thus reducing the amount of graphics lag that most of us experience. One way to do this would be to reduce the requirement for players from 20 down to 10 players. Only spawning enemies at the locations of the two 5 man teams.
If you have any suggestions that may help increase PVE activity, please feel free to use this thread to discuss it with other players, maybe the Devs will read it too!
But there are a some of them that never have anyone Que'd or playing, such as Mine Trap and any others that require 10-20 players, The Battle of Korfez etc.
Mine Trap: is a fun PVE and a lot of players enjoy it, so why doesn't anyone play it anymore? Because it occasionally glitches, which makes it a waste of time and effort.
Suggestion: Cut the map in half and make it a 10 player event rather than 20 and most of all fix the glitches!!
The Battle of Korfez: Make it possible to win.
Starbase Fleet Defense: Fix the glitches, reduce the number of enemies that spawn thus reducing the amount of graphics lag that most of us experience. One way to do this would be to reduce the requirement for players from 20 down to 10 players. Only spawning enemies at the locations of the two 5 man teams.
If you have any suggestions that may help increase PVE activity, please feel free to use this thread to discuss it with other players, maybe the Devs will read it too!
Post edited by darpink on
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In other words, most likely players are not playing the queues not because the queues are bad, but the core systems of the game are.
The only suggestion I can see to address queues (and everything else) is that the devs rethink their design decisions. Tall order though.
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The state of the game may need to be addressed as well, but this thread was created as a suggestion thread for the PVE inactivity, not to try to fix the entire "State of the Game".
1) Pugs are have a rep (well deserved in my opinion) for being really bad to non-existent for communicating. Given that best way for achieving the mandatory additional objectives in many of the advanced/elite queues this is driving people away from them in my view as its normally a path to failure when everyone just goes in blasting away at everything.
Maybe forcing pug's into a lobby to allow hellos/coordination prior to putting everyone in mission or and extended mission prep time for communication would help this (or maybe I'm just being overly hopeful).
Also given what I've read on other threads it seems that the trolls are finding new inventive ways to contribute to the failure of the mandatory objectives and hence ruin the runs for pugs (which is clearly a lot easier to do in a pug than a pre-made and makes an unfortunate experience for the rest of us).
2) With the increase in hit points assigned to elite critters and to a lesser degree advanced critters it seems that many of the newer toons that aren't well equipped or toons that just have mediocore builds just can't do enough dps and/or don't follow the strategies required to effectively achieve mission success for the team and hence this puts off many people from pugging.
3) I suspect a fair few people have until recently been levelling and now are running the winter event which I'm certain isn't helping the state of the queues.
4) As has always been the problem with this game certain queues provide significantly better rewards for time invested than others. The general structure of the rewards system needs overhauled in my view with the rewards balanced more accurately towards time invested (without providing an exploit route though). I'll give an example, a borg STF say Infected Space takes say 15 minutes in advanced for 720 dilithium, 1 processor and 60 marks plus R&D rewards or thereabouts with the mission optional timer is set for 15 minutes so lets say that's the nominal average time for mission which an average team should be capable of achieving. The breach (which is a mission I do like as its a different challenge from the usual borg massacre) gives comparable rewards but the mission optional timer is 40 minutes so mission is essentially expected to take 2 to 3 times longer but doesn't give any better rewards (and in fact the R&D reward is the same as borg space missions). And the way this needs fixed is not by nerfing the rewards for the quick missions but by making the rewards for the longer or more challenging content at any particular level more rewarding - I know people like running CCA or ISA but making the less popular content reward proportionally more for time invested might well help make those queues more popular.
So I think what I'm trying to say is that I think the current state of the queues issue isn't a single particular issue, but a combination of many issues that need addressed. Any maybe allowing a people to queue more of the unpopular queues would help as well so that more people can sit in those queues instead of going straight to the usual suspects.
That's my thoughts anyway and I'd love to see some attention given to this as I usually hit the pug queues and the same old missions get very boring very quickly so be good to see different ones run from time to time.
mattauckett, you made some really good points and I'm glad you did, I hope the Devs take note and either do some serious PVE mission revamps or do away with the never active ones altogether.
Try to be a little more pragmatic. You are not seeing how both are connected. The "State of the Game" is the cause players are leaving the game. Less players = less activity in the queues. Difficulty changes have also contributed to less players playing the queues, again another change related to "State of the Game".
Have you been here when Mine Trap was released? It was a very popular queue back in the day, being constantly played, a good source of Romulan Marks, and quite fun to boot. It stood like that many months following its release. Of course the 20-player requirement made it hard to start, but it would take 3 minutes at most, and I can tell because I played it quite a lot.
Now go back a few paragraphs to understand why it's no longer being played. The queues may need adjustments, some of them might indeed suck, but they are not all "very bad", neither the main cause that people aren't playing them.
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I was merely making a suggestion to try to help increase activity in PVE. And I do remember when Mine Trap was popular. I also remember that it became less and less active as glitches went unfixed.
I think we have a common goal, keep arguing or countering everything I say if that's what floats your boat. But I'm not going to argue semantics.
There are few people on the queue because most of the time you know they wont finish the mission.
Most players have sucky dps, or sucky tanking capability and dont know what to do with the mission especially in Advanced missions.
They have made group missions in Advanced function or forced to have a decent group. You cant just have One excellent player with an excellent build with the rest of the group being subpar and carry the whole mission just like in Elite missions before. You can only do that in Normal queues. Nowadays you need a good group in most of the Advanced missions.
the problem is that some of the advanced elite missions the timers are so tight that all it takes is one bad player- or one run of bad luck- to make it unwinnable.
after ,multiple fails and lots of wasted time, people just don't play those anymore
I dont see that as a problem. You might consider the following before you make conclusions:
1) Not everyone has reached level 60 nor has maxed specialization. If people claim to be casual players, you shouldnt be level 60 nor have maxed specializations yet. Thus, majority shouldnt be able to finish PuGs.
2) These are Advanced/Elite PuGs. There are normal queues for quick fix.
3) You went in a PuG. Expect the worse. Either you dont go in, or craft a build that would compensate for PuG weakness. There are fleets and groups to compensate for this. Not unless you have an unorganized group or fleet.
4) Same level skill players usually group together especially in private queues. So, you end up with the less than capable players if you PuG.
They should wait for everyone to max level and specialization before they adjust stuff. Currently, the game is rewarding the right grouping rather than random grouping. What you are asking is rewarding random grouping even if you have the worst possible player in the group.
Time will only tell!
Its easy to win. You just have to warp on benthans, as they are still bugged.
For all others the solution is simple: Increase rewards.
I lifted the main points of your thread for you:
Make it easier so we can farm it.
Give us free stuff.
Just like everyother thread posted in the last month.
The devs claimed that the advanced queues would be a bit more difficult than the old elite. Fair enough. Lo and behold, somebody decides that the best way to do this is to not only add more enemies (which I would have been fine with) but also decides to jack their HP up to absurd levels. And then they also decide that the players want to do it for slashed rewards, and a chance at a 10-mark fail prize and an hour-long cooldown as if they had beaten the mission. I'm not a developer, and even I know that you don't make people put in more effort for less reward.
Here's a post I had from the PvE queue survey, and I think it gets the point across that I wanted to convey. Do these simple things, and I get the feeling queue participation would be well on its way to recovery.
Simply put, give us rewards to match the effort put in, increase our skill points received in there so that leveling isn't such a pain in the rear, and then drop resistances and shield hardness so that we're not treated to the sight of a bunch of borg frigates laughing off shots that should have vaporized them in short order.
All of these are reasonable suggestions, and would go a long way to restoring the faith of the playerbase that feel like the devs are actively at war with them, as well as shooting up queue participation.
Ignorance so much.
You should remain in Normal STFs. The main rewards in advanced/elite are materials to craft Experimental upgrades, which Casual players, non focused DPS players dont need. The current issue of the complain is non-focused DPS players want to continuously finish Advanced and Elite STFs even if they dont deserve nor need the rewards.
I am totally against this demand of players of Social welfare wherein Advanced and elite difficulty will be done at ease so that subpar builds, refusal to use the social component of the game, like a dps channel or a decent fleet, is still rewarded for those who uses and maximizes everything in the game.
Pre-Delta Rising, any of my ships could throw their weight around pretty well in the elite queues, and for a reward that I felt fit the effort put in. Sometimes I got blown up, sometimes we lost the optional, but it was never anything that made me swear off the queues. Lo and behold, Delta Rising makes it so that performing a normal borg queue isn't even as rewarding as a trip through the traelus satellite repair daily. Simply put, normal isn't rewarding enough to be worth my time. What's more, I require neural processors and ancient power cells for my omega and delta rep items, things which can only be found in the advanced or higher queues. The rewards from advanced and elite aren't just the crafting boxes, but also the dilithium and the reputation items, which, as of right now, are either slashed or well out of the reach of the PuG's due to the severe mishandling of this whole mess.
I'm not saying make advanced a walk in the park. That's what normal is for. What I am saying is make it consistent, make it rewarding, and make it fun. I do indeed craft, but after the debacle of the launch, I've more or less sworn off most STFs since the likelihood of being in a team of idiots or having a griefer on hand to wreck the whole mission is hefty. I cannot form a team or a private queue, I have to PuG it. At the current state of things, they are as pug-unfriendly as they can possibly be.
You also missed another point. They claimed advanced was supposed to be just a little harder than the old elite. They were dead wrong. I'm not demanding some sort of in-game social welfare, I'm demanding that they live up to their promises.
It is not normal for someone to expect you to put in more effort for something that rewards less than what it did. It is not normal for borg probes in khitomer vortex to have as much health as a borg sphere. It is not normal for a borg bird of prey to laugh off attacks that would have killed its negh'var counterpart in short order.
At present, the state of the queues is an unhealthy bugged mess that could have been avoided if the devs had listened to the testers on tribble.
On a side note, the toon I used to try the advanced stuff was a tactical captain in a fleet T-5U patrol escort refit, decked out with neutronic torps, mk xii fleet phaser DHCs, five fleet damage consoles, an adaptive resilient shield, the delta deflector, borg engines, an elite fleet AMP core, and a plasmonic leech. The number of advanced completions he has done that had failure-prone mandatories can be counted on one hand, due to circumstances that the devs are ultimately responsible for, by seemingly forgetting that griefers and sub-par players exist. By turning optionals on normal into mandatory objectives in advanced, instead of leaving them as optionals for an additional reward like they should have, they basically made the crappy players and griefers drag down the other players that are forced to PuG.
The result? Empty or near-empty queues that used to be chock-full of people, as folks don't want to put in more effort for a lessened reward, especially if they risk being stuck with a 10-mark "failure prize" and a cooldown because of the actions of one or more bad players or someone that wanted to ruin the whole thing for giggles. I've seen this TRIBBLE happen first-hand. You either haven't witnessed it happen, or are so insulated from the problem that you don't give a hoot.
I have to disagree with you. PuGs are near empty. But private queues are healthy. Thats if you know what premades and private queues are. Private queues are usually used by thousands of players at a certain channel or thousands of players in a fleet.
However, you need to use the social component of the game, fleet or channel, with like minded players. Apparently, with your continuous whinning, you havent used the social component of the game to the full extent.
If you want to finish advanced/elite, you group with like minded players.
PuGs are left with mostly non competent builds. Gone are the days wherein competent builds populate PuGs.
Misinformed much? That's where the BNPs, Cybernetics, and other demanded rep items for reputation gear are. If they put just a single one of those in the rewards at the end of a normal, you would not have people fouling your holy Advanced/Elites with their non-focused DPS paganism because they would run normals and still get the reputation items they want.
And before you go there, the odds of getting all that a player needs from the daily rep box is bullocks.
I stopped playing/pugging any of the STFs after trying the new ones right after the release of DR. Unlike apparently so very many who play this game, I have a real life. And a real job. Both of which contain actual accomplishments which provide me with real currency and the ability to have a positive impact on the lives of others. I play games for entertainment. As a way to relax and unwind after a long day in the Real World. I am a Casual by choice. There are things in my life far more important to me than the opinion of my ship and play skills held by some neckbeard with no prospects and no future living in a basement in Podunk, USA
The reduced rewards offered by the "New! Improved!" STFs are no longer equal to the time required to successfully complete them. The fact Smirk opened a poll asking which ques are empty tells me I am not the only one with this opinion. I haven't been anywhere near any of the ques in weeks and I am quite happy still playing STO anyways. This has been my big opportunity to catch up on Foundry Missions I always wanted to play but didn't seem to have the time for. I can only hope and pray this dearth of players lining up for the ques continues to the point where they all collapse under their own lack of use and the epeen measurers will finally wander off from STO once and for all.
On a final note, I probably drop somewhere between US $100 to $200 a month on this game.
So you're quite welcome.
The Devs did understate the difficulty of Advanced by... well let's face it, the old Elite Nanite Transformers had ~600k hp, and the Gateways had ~1.2 mil HP (1.5 in ISE). The current Advanced Nanite Transformers have ~1 mil hp (a little higher methinks, but it's late and I'm tired lol, so I won't be exact), and the Gateways have ~2 mil hp in addition to ~20% more hull resists. The Cubes are about the same, but Spheres have ~20% more hp, and the NPCs in general are a smidgeon smarter (I have never had the Borg use assimilate ship timed so perfectly between my tac teams since... well, ever). Long story short, Advanced STFs are not a little harder than old ESTFs, they're quite a bit harder. But that's ok. I don't really mind.
But what does get me is that (esp for Delta Alliance rep), the top end items are almost out of reach for most players. Yeah, you can spend 40 days getting to tier V rep, and then suddenly, you want to get the regular mk XII gear... and you have no Ancient Power Cells. Ok, no big deal, I'll just do... Korfez... and Bug Hunt ELITE... and... well TRIBBLE... And this is just default mk XII stuff. I can understand that the stuff needed to get things to mk XIV would be up in elite land, but seriously? The stuff to get regular mk XII stuff (which is no longer top dog) is so much harder. Again, I am not affected by this change personally since all of my toons already had most of their mk XII rep gear before DR, and those that didn't weren't going to get it anyways.
Sufficed to say, it's not completely broken, but there is probably some major looking in required.
1. Normal is not endgame so should not be level 50. Normal before DR was 45 and the story line still shows it. Granted level 50 is not endgame anymore but the old endgame. There was no reason to raise level for normal.
2. Advance is the old endgame level 50 but scales to 60. Advance is level 50 content and unlocks at 50. So it should not scale to 60 that is just stupid.
3. Elite there is not enough of them and should be hard. Not everyone should do elte if not geared right or ready.
The devs should of made a choice on NPCs.
1. Add more NPCs to make it harder
2. Make NPCs harder to kill but not by hulls being 3x or more than they should be. I'm sorry but frigates should not have hulls 3 times higher than a cruiser. That is stupid and boring not a challenge.
But no they did both and ruined the queues by doing that. Think about it if your a kdf flying in a BOP would your BOP have 300k hull? No it would not but your suppose to fight BOPs that have 300k hulls (cure advance).:)
Queues are fine, folks are still adapting.
That is true but after month the queues are empty and not many have adapted to it. True that most STFs before DR successful but not all (elites still had fails in options). Then one ship could save the day if there was one there. But now options are not options so you don't complete it and game over. I'm sorry but queues are not fine they are empty. The events are the only thing keeping most people playing not the queues to me.
But other than that...
Queues are not too hard in general. There are a few exceptions, like the Storming The Spire boss dreadnought which has too short time limit (esp considering half the time is wasted waiting for the shuttles to spawn), or the Korfez Benthan phase where it's impossible to keep the transports alive. At least Crystalline Catastrophe is definitely too easy. Most of them are OK. Some of them require a bit more thought to strategy than before, others require a bit more DPS than before. That's a good thing.
Queues are not empty in general. Some of them are, as they have always been. Others are not. I believe the only way to populate them all would be to give every one some unique reward, that can't be found anywhere else. Otherwise people naturally gravitate toward the ones with the highest reward:effort ratio.
Aaand you missed the point again, Paxdawn. I look at your post and I'm reminded of Kevin Bacon's last words in Animal House before being crushed into a pancake by a panicking crowd: "Remain calm! All is well!" It's not all well, though I am remaining calm. The players shouldn't be forced to have to use private queues for advanced due to high failure rates. If it were the case with Elite, I would understand. That's the point of elite. But advanced should not be experiencing this. I don't use said social component because most of the folks on my fleet's global channel don't pop on anywhere near as often, and neither do several people on the friends list (many of which I met in PuG's). By killing PuGs, they've killed a social aspect of the game, and killed the motivation of many players. The skill points nerf doesn't help matters.
The other problem, as many have pointed out, is that this massive failure rate locks many people out of gaining borg processors and ancient power cells, which are absurdly hard to get from reputation boxes. By the time you finish a reputation tracker, you'll probably have less than the fingers on one hand at best, assuming you've done nothing but normal STFs.
There was a gulf between normal and the old elite, but it was a reasonable gulf that could be crossed by anybody that knew what they were doing, and the rewards were decent enough to warrant putting the effort towards it. Now, the gulf has widened to an absurd degree, and many inconsistencies remain. This, plus slashed rewards, more or less kills motivation to even bother with all this. People want processors, but aren't about to risk putting in their all, and having it rewarded with a 10-mark "prize" and a cooldown as if they had succeeded.
Yup- XP is what I need, tho loot would be nice too.
Awoken Dead
Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
Sorry but if you are a casual player you wont need reputation gears. Players who want reputation gears are anything but casual players. And if these self proclaimed casual players cannot finish elites or advanced it is because 1) they have bad builds 2) they group with bad builds.
To know what level of competency your build is at, a decent build of level 50 Eng toon using Gal-R with 2 tac consoles/boffs with VR MK XII weapons without any DR traits can do 15k DPS which is the minimum requirements of today's advanced/elite queues. That means if you go below that DPS, the players build is really aweful. More importantly, I am comparing the build to the worst possible toon and the worst possible ship in Space dps.
You also missed the point. You are focused on self proclaimed bad game bubble. Social aspect isnt dead. It is actually very much alive. Pre-DR, you got to PuG, you dont need socially to interact whatsoever to finish elites. Why? Because one good player can carry every other 4 bad players and the optionals arent required. So, interaction is not a necessity to finish PuGs.
Nowadays, you cannot do that. You need a whole group of decent players. Also, you need to use the chat or any form of communication to coordinate the mission. Or even before that you need to go a decent fleet or go a private channel. Apparently, you have not gone to private channels which populate in the thousands which finishes advanced/elite queues almost 100%. Is the social aspect dead? No it isnt. Quite the contrary. It merely changed form from PuGs into fleets and private queues.
Umm...small and med sized fleets are hurting bad because their casuals aren't bothering to log-in anymore, and yer private queues are mostly premades and friends who've been playing together for years, who generally don't spam invites to their private queues unless they need a redshirt to pop the mission. PvE activity hasn't shifted because pugging had such a high failure rate, it shifted because players left, and the only way to get enough players to get the mission to launch was to set it up in advance. PvE queues are on life support, and it's almost an exploit to allow private queues when the public queues are so dead.
Awoken Dead
Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG