Raise XP rewards to something that doesn't cause my character's pixelated arteries to harden, in spending most of it's life, grinding out for Spec XP now. And enough Argulala-whatever! My hair's turning Kazon, in seeing those ships too often. Either raise rewards of give us better places, to better utilize our bloody time. See (quote) below, for where to start.
Oh, and put back the EC rewards back where they were. The whole controlling the Exchange bit tain't working at all. Peeps will be greedy even if you put EC rewards to zilch, so save my character's pixelated arteries from more hardening, and put em back? I feel like I'm wasting half a Foundry EC grind anymore, loosen up on them too, would ya devs? (Either that, of the Foundry really is a buggier system than I thought, at least on my end. Anywho.)
(Quote) Add. More. Story. I don't remember Picard having the Ent-D grind the same nebula with scans, day in and day out, during each episode. Sheesh! Can you even imagine that? Eight seasons, the plot stalls because they had to grind out something in a nebula. Add. More. Story. (End Quote)
Your expansion is incomplete. It's incomplete game design to have tons of Federation T6 science ships while leaving Romulan and KDF science captains with no T6 science ship options. If you are going to have multiple factions in your game, you need to support them equally. If you don't it's not good for anyone and only adds to the criticisism your company gets for what is precieved as a faulty product by design by your customers.
There was a time when the KDF had no science ships at all. Intentionally. Just like Feds didn't have Raiders (and particularly non with Battle Cloak and all Universal Slots).
The KDF needs a new Bird of Prey much more than a Science Vessel IMO. Science Vessels - you can get them with the Federation. But Bird of Preys, those are Klingons. They feel Klingon.
(and with the all-universal slots, you don't need science vessel specific features anyway. Science Vessels get Sensor Analysis and Subsystem Targeting, BOPs get Battle Cloak and 4 front weapon slots with DHC capability)
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
To the OP's point: let's have less of we didn't ask for, and more of what has been requested, including bug fixes! We didn't ask for an interminable specialization grind, we didn't ask for higher dil costs for EVERYTHING; we didn't ask for the skill point balance to be completely thrown out of reason; we did ask for years-old bugs to be fixed.
New content is worthless if it is full of unplayable lag & continued bugs...
Expendables Fleet: Andrew - Bajoran Fed Engineer Ken'taura - Rom/Fed Scientist Gwyllim - Human Fed Delta Tac Savik - Vulcan Fed Temporal Sci Dahar Masters Fleet: Alphal'Fa - Alien KDF Engineer Qun'pau - Rom/KDF Engineer D'nesh - Orion KDF Scientist Ghen'khan - Liberated KDF Tac Welcome to StarBug Online - to boldly Bug where no bug has been before!
STO player since November 2013
I understand that we shouldn't max specilizations over night, but it can't take this long.
Grind
The time to hit 15 could take a bit less. But just a tad. More like a rep system would be better.
Stop needing special Doffs to build special things. If I want to craft the Aegis set and I'm at level 15, let me craft it.
Stop making everything a grind. The Q shell game for the anniversaries for instance....why? Does everything have to be wrapped in a grind?
PvE
Rebalance them and make them worth doing.
Bring Terradome back. PLEASE!
Revamp some of them so they make sense to the new story arcs.
Stop using AoE and HP as artifical difficulty.
PvP
Balance for PvP. I miss ground PvP. I wasn't any good, but still I miss it.
Cutting the Cord as a PvP map....oh that would be a great ground map!
Proper Q&A
Sometimes I feel the developers are bad Tactical officers. I want more ways to grant uber pereception other than a paper bag EV suit.
Test the stuff. Then test it again. Then a 3rd time. Listen to the players on Tribble....postpone if you have to. We'd rather wait than get incomplete broken stuff. That would stop some if the fires right there....
Make healing important again.
Look at some of the kits and ship abilities. Make sure there are counters to them.
Different NPCs
I'm starting to call the Borg the Bored. "You will be assimilated bla bla bla"
On a side not, it'd be kinda funny if every now and then they say "ho ho ho" in a Borg voice for Christmas...but I'm insane like that.
Flesh out the Iconians just a little. Let's see them, even if it's one STF or FE. Make them matter but still be a mystery.
PR
Stop. Think. Post. ......maybe we should all do that as players too, but still.
Communication on the forums. COMMUNICATION. This is the official forums of the game. Stop posting only on Tribble and Twitter.
Less snarky comments
From both sides of the fence, rebuild the relationship of Player and Dev.
A monthly statement or something from Cryptic of what's coming. You should have some short term things ironed out that you can tell us. And not be posted by certain devs.
No report button or like button in the forums. That's just ripe for abuse.
However, once upon a time I used to frequent a tech site called Slashdot. They had a system based on karma. And mod points were randomly given out. Once you used your 5 mod points, you didn't get them again for a while. If you posted in the thread your modded, the mod points were undone. On that same thought, community managers here should not post and then close a thread they posted in to end discussion. Just my $0.02, I expect change.
And Taco, this question is for you I think. Why do some of the maps have "hard points" where a toon gets stuck. For instance going up the ramp in Shanty Town, there's a lip at the top that just makes you come to a complete stop. And some hills in Nukara, etc. I'm sure there's a reason, but I was wondering why they are there.
Also, ymmv on any of these opinions. They are mine and mine alone. I do not claim to represent the community or my fleet in this post. Cheers.
1. More C-Store account-wide clothing and armor (tailor; not actual functional armor) unlocks, such as the full Tal Shiar set for Romulan/Reman/Romulan-aligned Aliens, and more KDF attire, namely belts and shoes/boots compatible with the Orion bottom.
2. More special/unique race BOffs as C-Store options, such as Tholians (who we can have as DOffs).
3. More T6 ships that are original but not necessarily Intel, like the Guardian, Aelahl, and Mat'ha.
4. More Original T6 Intel Ships that still retain the necessary core aesthetics of each faction but also keep to the design of the Specialization (so far, "stealthy" for Intel).
5. Mirror Universe Skin + Registry Packs; Fed, Rom, and KDF. Each containing the appropriate Registry Prefix and skin for ALL existing and future Faction starships. Cost increases incrementally with each new faction-ship to reflect this.
6. T6 Federation Jupiter and Typhoon classes; maybe as a 3-variant bundle like the Odysseys. Such as a Tac Jupiter with a Vaadwaur Broadside Cannon-style setup, an Eng Jupiter with a long-range BFG, and a Frigate Supercarrier Sci Jupiter (2 or 3 Hangars with Defiant "Frigates").
7. C-Store Lifetime Membership. Mainly for those willing to spend months to earn the Zen to buy; though the difference is that the C-Store option will never go on sale unlike buying from the site during special events.
8. Expanded sidestories. Once the majority of the main stories are done, add optional sidestories that will still allow players to earn free special gear and equipment as an option besides crafting/Rep, while expanding our characters' involvement with various races and incidents.
9. More hair and options for character customization. We're lacking in variety and Star Trek Barbie is an important part of the game considering it's directly affecting the character we design and use. I'd like to give some characters an eternal smile or an eternal frown, or longer hair, or unicorn/bicorn/dragon horns (Alien Customization), or a Lion Mane (Male Caitian/Feressan), or Terminator-style borg implants visible through broken skin (Borg).
10. Standardized color pallet and proper full color options (including reflective/saturation/hue settings), even the bright red and green colors (as well as the other colors) of the Winter coats for proper matching; just use a color wheel and let us choose the exact RGB/Brightness color values. It's already problematic trying to give some characters a certain look when half the colors you want to use are not available (a true Red color being especially problematic) or don't show up right (because half the uniforms/armor have different reflective/saturation/hue settings).
11. The possibility of promoting a BOff to Ship Captain and allowing them to pilot another ship in your inventory, and with additional special Intel-style sub-class upgrades, eventually allow for up to three AI ships to actively accompany you in missions. Of course, you may only command them to use their own trained skills, but they will use the skills of the BOffs you assign them as they see fit. Of course, this will require some coding to give them a "personality", even if it's as rudimentary and simple as Tac Captains auto using Tac BOff abilities most of the time, Sci BOff abilities sometimes, and Eng abilities when HP is lower than 50%.
12. Delta Tech Upgrades from the C-Store, because if I'm going to waste money upgrading, I want to waste it on something that actually is worthwhile, and those Delta Tech Upgrades are it. I still have to pay the Dil costs and boosters. Win-win for Cryptic and the player.
13. The option to actually unlock the Skins and Overlays (Aegis and Borg go over your existing skin rather than replace it) that unique shields have. Except it doesn't require collecting all 3 parts like the ground sets, just requires you unlock the shield, then pay the unlock fee (Marks + Dil). Mission-reward shields with unique skins have an "event" unlock with a Dil Cost. It would also allow for additional customization; such as Aegis over the Nukara skin, or Assimilated Borg over the Counter Command skin.
14. Unlock Elite Frigates so that they can be used by any Frigate-capable Carrier. As well, Unlock all Elite Fighters and Shuttles so that they can be used by ANY carrier (Elachi Oshu shuttles, Breen Choas fighters). We're already going to pay the Dil and Fleet Mark cost, may as well make it worthwhile.
15. The ability to buy Lobi/Lockbox/Promotional/Event Elite Hangar Pets with Zen off the C-Store after unlocking the ships they're affiliated with. An alternative but still steady income for Cryptic, and an alternate means for those without access to an established Fleet holding for one reason or another (either they don't have provision usage rights, no provisions to use, or not enough Fleet marks). Costs would be around 300 Zen for Fighters and Shuttles, and 400 Zen for Frigates, which is a bit more costly than just using Fleet Marks and Dilithium (which is almost 40k per Elite pet; divided by 160 Dil to 1 Zen = 250, or 150 Dil to 1 Zen = 266.6).
16. Tholian Tarantula Science Dreadnought with Web Cannon console and the 3rd piece set allowing it to auto-teleport the current target front-and-center of its cannon as its charging up to fire. Preferably with a Sci/Intel Reciprocity-style trait, and the ability to use 1 Hangar of Tholian Frigates (default equip is Tholian Fighters).
17. Gorn Science Dreadnought with a multi-Phalanx barrier Mastery Trait around the selected Target when using Shield-healing skills.
18. A Guardian-X Dreadnought - Console Super Lance; has two built-in firing modes: Narrow and Spread. Does NOT require Saucer Separation; instead works more like the Dual/Multi-Vector abilities (use one and the other automatically goes into Cooldown). Can either use the Odyssey's Chevron Separation or the Galaxy-X's Saucer Separation. Pets entirely optional. And 4 Nacelles. NOT 3. Either enlarge the two Pylon Nacelles or have two vertical pylons with full-sized nacelles on them come up from where those built-in Nacelles would be. 2 or 4 Nacelles. Not 3.
19. Valkyrie Fighter Pets for the Feds.
20. A Suggestions Forum, even if they'll never be read and used, for the rare event that it does get read and some suggestions get used. As well as a place to post one's ideas and suggestions and update them as needed.
1) when cryptic releases "packs" like delta rising and LOR, to have a long term type of bonus (like extra dil refinement
2) allow all frigates to go on all carriers (or make a new carrier) when unlocked
Foundry UI update making the missions easier to access for players
Fix the loadout tray issue once and for all
Bring exploration back
Implement a more powerful random content generation mechanic, maybe mix this with Foundry missions
actually, I'd like to see a shift from primarily FE driven content to more of a random content concept. The FE's are nice but with such a focus on those there leaves a gap in between FE content where the content becomes stale. Or content that doesn't make sense anymore just kind of floating around in the game. Focusing on more exploration, random content generation and injecting Foundry missions into the open space for players to access them easier provides a sense of flying through space and getting into different mostly unconnected content while leveling.
^^^ No bad guys for this new adventure zone.. just "natural" hazards.
I.E. Every 15 minutes past the hour for no reason.. "Sneaky Iconians" the city floods, if you're not above the water you'll drown. :rolleyes:
Wouldn't that just be an excuse to come up with a swim mechanic and another place to wear Risian swimsuits, and at the same time, sell more Swimsuits? Esp. given that Ferenginar canonically wouldn't be shy about such things, and as long as they can make money.
Wouldn't be surprised either if they made a hazardous obstacle course that's also affected by timed hazards; ie, a silly obstacle run suddenly turns into a swim competition once the area floods.
Unfortunately, pretty much everything people want is a ways outside the niche of Environment Art. . .
To the contrary, most of my most passionate desires for the game consists of exploring strange new worlds!
Ferenginar, Betazed, Trill, Gornar (the space part is already in the game!), Terjas Mor. I can go on and on about alien worlds we've yet to step foot on.
I really enjoyed Nimbus III and more hybrid adventure/social zones would make me happy. In addition to a facelift for DS9 of course.
I would also likely enjoy your art team's interpretation of worlds we've heard of in the franchise but never actually got to see.
Oh, and Iotia. I keep forgetting that. 1930's Chicago shouldn't be too hard to find pictures of to draw inspiration from.
You'll get no argument from me. I think though, from the get-go Cryptic should have sat down and said "right, we're going to create this game from two (or three) different perspectives, FED & KDF (and maybe ROM). From that point on, it should have been equal across the board, regardless of where the playerbase might be. I get that you're always going to get more FED players (this is Trek) but a lot of it is because Cryptic focus on the FED - and players aren't stupid, if they know where the toys are, that's where they're going to go.
Whatever other ships/factions they want to release, be that Romulan, Cardassian, Dominion (etc) they could have done in mini missions or something rather than mini factions (which, long-term, don't work).
I do agree that we are in viscous circle here.
this is trek so naturally more people start to play as federation---> federation becomes a bigger facton ---> cryptic develops more federation content,c-store items, ships, etc. (this is where it goes wrong)---> Less incentive to play romualan or klingon, even for new players. ----> federation becomes a bigger faction ---> the circle continues endlessly
if all factions were treated equally the romulan and klingon factions would be bigger. there would be enough incentive for players to have cross faction alt that they play often. in the end the fact that the C-store is the main focus that ruins it. though i think cryptic is $crewing itself over more. now only fed sells because factions are 5%/5%/90% rom/klingon/fed if factions were 30%/30%/40% rom/klingon/fed they would have more stuff to sell to more people. because I think if factions were treated equal from the get go the fed community would be just as large but the other to faction would have pulled in additional player because the game would then have been healthier....
THE NEW CRAFTING SYSTEM IS TERRA-BAD First of all it's not even a crafting system! It's just a dumb game system that's nothing more than a glorified slots machine.
second the "special items" you hope will be the saving the saving grace are messed up to.
I do agree that we are in viscous circle here.
this is trek so naturally more people start to play as federation---> federation becomes a bigger facton
Not so sure. SWTOR is star wars, but people started as sith to. It's equally divided (more or less).
If people started as fed, that's mostly because they didn't have a choice for a very long time. And now, the huge bias toward feds makes the other faction (KDF) and fraction (rom) much less attractive.
If the game was like swtor, and more or less equal for both side, and that was that way since the beginning, people would play them a lot more.
Why play KDF or rom, when fed have that much more ships and love ? Why play them when your bug fixing/QoL patch is going to take months, even years, if ever, while it's much faster for feds ? Why play them when missions and story are fed first, then if you are lucky, you have some different dialogues ? Why play them when your queues are even more empty than feds ? Why play them, when you are still lacking a t4 commendation uniform, or a fleet uniform (rom)... ?
Why play KDF or rom, when fed have that much more ships and love ? Why play them when your bug fixing/QoL patch is going to take months, even years, if ever, while it's much faster for feds ? Why play them when missions and story are fed first, then if you are lucky, you have some different dialogues ? Why play them when your queues are even more empty than feds ? Why play them, when you are still lacking a t4 commendation uniform, or a fleet uniform (rom)... ?
Why play Fed when they can't fly a Scimitar crewed by 5 SRO's? :cool:
Why play Fed when they can't fly a Scimitar crewed by 5 SRO's? :cool:
If you play STO just to do STF, and you want the very best, then yes, ignore everything else and play rom with 5 SRO and a scimi.
Otherwise, you can also see the Rom are lacking from pretty much everything else. The KDF have more, but compared to fed, not that much.
But yeah, you can always reduce an entire faction to a single space trait and a single ship. And say it's the best.
For example, I could say the fed have reciprocity and the vesta. See, that's a kinda stupid argument.
Not so sure. SWTOR is star wars, but people started as sith to. It's equally divided (more or less).
If people started as fed, that's mostly because they didn't have a choice for a very long time. And now, the huge bias toward feds makes the other faction (KDF) and fraction (rom) much less attractive.
If the game was like swtor, and more or less equal for both side, and that was that way since the beginning, people would play them a lot more.
Why play KDF or rom, when fed have that much more ships and love ? Why play them when your bug fixing/QoL patch is going to take months, even years, if ever, while it's much faster for feds ? Why play them when missions and story are fed first, then if you are lucky, you have some different dialogues ? Why play them when your queues are even more empty than feds ? Why play them, when you are still lacking a t4 commendation uniform, or a fleet uniform (rom)... ?
I disagree with this assessment.
What mistressbenihime is saying is that it's the preceding franchise that is influencing the numbers here.
In the Star Wars movies, there were pretty much as many Sith shown as there were Jedi. With similar screen time, and the Sith are often touted as the most "badass" anyway.
There have been six full Star Trek Series, plus a bunch of movies, and EVERY ONE OF THEM centered around a Federation Ship and her crew.
Edit: Note that I'm not arguing that we should not expand upon other factions. I'm simply arguing that the majority of players (new or old) will always favor Feds because that's what was primarily shown in canon.
If you play STO just to do STF, and you want the very best, then yes, ignore everything else and play rom with 5 SRO and a scimi.
Otherwise, you can also see the Rom are lacking from pretty much everything else. The KDF have more, but compared to fed, not that much.
But yeah, you can always reduce an entire faction to a single space trait and a single ship. And say it's the best.
For example, I could say the fed have reciprocity and the vesta. See, that's a kinda stupid argument.
Sarcasm-detector needs work.
----
Anyway, the Feds could have a thousand different ships and you could still only fly one at a time. It doesn't seem like a big deal to me. I certainly wouldn't choose a faction based on the length of the list of ships I'm not flying.
Only thing I really miss on Rom/KDF is more outfit customization options. But then I always miss that, even on Fed. Restrictions =
In the Star Wars movies, there were pretty much as many Sith shown as there were Jedi. With similar screen time, and the Sith are often touted as the most "badass" anyway.
Note that I'm not arguing that we should not expand upon other factions. I'm simply arguing that the majority of players (new or old) will always favor Feds because that's what was primarily shown in canon.
You make your point, and for what it's worth, you are right in what you say. This game, whether people will want to admit it or not, is always going to draw in more FED players compared to KDF or Republic (or other potential factions later down the line - I hope not by the way).
That shouldn't mean though that the KDF and Republic get a backseat. LoR was released what, almost two years ago? I wont list the number of features the green team are lacking, cause it's many, but it's almost as if they were released (to get the sales/funds) and then forgotten about. What happened to the Suliban Boffs? - (there was talk of them) What happened to fixing up the Republic doff system? What happened to fixing the Republic Boff costumes? What happened to making the most of the feature art? What happened to exploring the Reman culture?
E2 (Delta Rising) was released. FEDs got five new ships, each with (at least) two new skins - if you exclude the Dauntless. KDF and ROM got two ships each, one of which (per) didn't come with any skins at all (except the default one). Then there's the rumour that a T6 vesta is in the works - that's ANOTHER FED ship. T6 FED ships are 3-1 compared with KDF/Republic.
I don't mean to go on (so I wont), but you can see why many people have the opinion that Cryptic primarily cater to the FEDs. How long has the Negh'var revamp been in the works for?
What mistressbenihime is saying is that it's the preceding franchise that is influencing the numbers here.
In the Star Wars movies, there were pretty much as many Sith shown as there were Jedi. With similar screen time, and the Sith are often touted as the most "badass" anyway.
There have been six full Star Trek Series, plus a bunch of movies, and EVERY ONE OF THEM centered around a Federation Ship and her crew.
Edit: Note that I'm not arguing that we should not expand upon other factions. I'm simply arguing that the majority of players (new or old) will always favor Feds because that's what was primarily shown in canon.
I would believe this more if the effort was put in from the start to actually provide equal ship offerings across factions. Delta Rising only brought out two ships each for the KDF and Romulan players to use. Why play something Cryptic/PWE is unwilling to provide proper support for like they have for Federation players?
There's no excuse for having different factions in a game and not supporting them. If Blizzard did that WoW wouldn't be near as big as it has gotten. They took care of all their factions inspite of constant bickering about favoritism for one or the other. Neither side was ever left out of Tier content for specific classes. That should be the case for here in STO. No faction should be without Tier content for specific classes like Science captains in the KDF and Romulan factions when compared to the Fed Science offerings.
What mistressbenihime is saying is that it's the preceding franchise that is influencing the numbers here.
In the Star Wars movies, there were pretty much as many Sith shown as there were Jedi. With similar screen time, and the Sith are often touted as the most "badass" anyway.
There have been six full Star Trek Series, plus a bunch of movies, and EVERY ONE OF THEM centered around a Federation Ship and her crew.
Edit: Note that I'm not arguing that we should not expand upon other factions. I'm simply arguing that the majority of players (new or old) will always favor Feds because that's what was primarily shown in canon.
I tend to agree whit taco here mostly. yes I think about 90% of players does start out to experience commanding the enterprise and roll a federation char for that reason. only a few choose romulans or klingons for their first char. they have all had way less screen time than the federation. there is always an appeal in playing "the bad guy" that's why horde and sith players exist. trek just has so many different "bad guys" that none of them truly stick out when compared to the federation.
the problem comes into play when cryptic interpreted the data notices that there are more fed player and start catering to them ever more exclusively. the better approach would have been to create enough incentive to try the other factions without making the fed players feel like second class citizens. eventually that will cause people to bleed out of the federation side into the other two factions for the federation this is not much of a problem because they get a proportionally much larger share of the "new to STO players" to fill up the empty spots of those that decide that the other faction is a better fit for them.
and now it's story time:
The first MMO I started playing was WoW (My girlfriend at the time was already playing;my relation ship whit WoW lasted longer though). I stated back in vanilla just after TBC was announced. I had heard hunter was a good class for starting players leveled up to 60 raided some core but a month later i was happily exploring outland. at level 70 though i was done whit the hunter. I liked running dungeon whit it since it was my only max level character but I was trying out alts to experience other styles of play. at some point i notice one of my alts was gathering up a lot more levels that any of the others. I player my druid more and more exclusively and at about level 45 I decided that my feral-cat druid was to be my new main character I stopped running dungeons whit my hunter, looked for a good guild for my druid and dedicated all effort in leveling it to max level. after a while it was geared comparably to my hunter who i only player as an alt at that time. then WotLK cam along only my druid made max level.
player will naturally switch to the charter that has the most natural play style for them that is why it's important that:
each faction has a unique style of play
each class has a unique style of play.
if that was true the game would essentially have 9 classes. currently though the game has 1 class and 1 faction. romulans and klingons play as the federation. the difference is only cosmetic. this isn't entirely true though Romulans play different due to the singularity cores but that's space only. that is the kind of stuff that distinguishes a faction in style of play and it would be great if we saw more of it. the same is true for classes from what I've seen on tribble your specialization is going to matter more than what class you play.
i am trying to keep this constructive here. I see good stuff i just like to see more of it in places where it should matter to.
3 faction should be enough. in my mind I always divide them as:
federation -- should favor Eng/Sci -- outsmart/outmaneuver your opponents; make them their own worst enemy -- peaceful explores/researchers -- ww2allies/NATO/western nations
Klingons -- should favor Tact/Eng -- just blast your way out of trouble or today is a good day to die -- straightforward warriors -- USSR/(feudal) japan
Romulans -- should favor Tact/Sci -- Surprise, bet you din't see that coming; playing the odds -- secretive, political, calculative, wunderwaffen -- space natzi's/roman empire
in the current setup this would really work. the romulans can provide the fire power that the feds slightly lacks and the science that Klingon's (not Klingon payers) don't care about wile both factions have access to the Wuderwaffen (singulaity powers, thaloron radiation, etc.)
to this end though federation players need exclusive science (and engineering) powers that make up for the lack of weapon damage and/or have the effectiveness of existing science powers boosted. and yes romualns need science ships badly.
this doesn't mean that there cant be federation ****s that do good weapon DPS or no Klingon science ships or romulans cant have cruizers but it means that they will have only a few like a 3:1 ratio compared to the other classes of ships.
also federatio cruizers are more science focused where a klingon cruizer is more tact focused and has some more firepower. the same is tue for other classes escorst would be better able to do scince powers sompares to a BoP (Tact/Eng) and also be more rounded than a T'lis/T'varo that should be Sci/Tact focused.
EDIT: **** result of very unfortunate typo. it should have said ship
THE NEW CRAFTING SYSTEM IS TERRA-BAD First of all it's not even a crafting system! It's just a dumb game system that's nothing more than a glorified slots machine.
second the "special items" you hope will be the saving the saving grace are messed up to.
looking back on 2014 we've had a great year. Sure there both ups and downs but I still feel that the good outweighed the bad. 2014 was a year in which Cryptic made some difficult but much needed changes to STO. Many systems were overhauled or simply redone and the transition hasn't been easy sometimes even painful. Many new systems were added as well to make the overall experience much more flexible and smoother. This resulted in a lack of content added to the game and even Delta Rising was rather heavy on the systems update side of things. The redone crafting system is far from perfect and still needs work. Many player including myself have complained about this. However seeing it along side the the gear upgrade system it's overall better than expected yet still not what it at best could have been.
Overall though we been given the much requested access to the delta quadrant and most systems have been improved to provide a much smoother experience while playing. I look back at 2014 as a year in which some much needed hard work has been done by cryptic so at is fifth anniversary in 2015 a fresh start can be made.
Looking ahead to 2015 I see the opportunity for a fresh start and forget last years drama. What do we as players want to see happening in STO during 2015?
I Will try to keep this first post up to date whit the suggestions made in this thread. Please keep it civil and be as constructive in your criticism (if any) as you can be. It will increase your chances to make it into the OP.
Ill start by making my own suggestion for 2015 feel free to add below.
Fix crafting.
Allow us to predetermine the rarity we'll get even if that comes at an increased component cost.
Let us change modifiers on existing items.
Let us set modifiers when crafting new items even if it takes special component to do so.
Please remove dilithium from crafting. It's like working to make it and than still paying to buy it. plus it crept in to many systems already.
it's not just me
The new Boff system on tribble is absolutely amazing but and it feels like nitpicking here but remove the dilithum cost from crafting the pads. It's practically noting anyway just make it actually noting and spare yourselves the backlash its already creating.
New outfits
nice one. other out fits we may want to see comming?
More content and new missions by that we mean actual missions not patrol missions.
I tend to agree now that most of the updated systems are in place it's time for a new featured series.
Boffs
Factions
Klingon (and Romulan) faction(s) should be fleshed out more. mainly by adding faction specific content and ships.
lowered overall zen and dilithium costs - less grinding
Dilitium seem to have crept into literally everything lately we can only refine 8000 a day. that cap does not need increasing but some systems like crafting really don't need it. speeding up for dil ok but to pay for the components themselfs no way...
Bugg fixes
ill keep adding to this list when they come up
3 man missions
New ships
(combat) pets
Better PvP
like it not going to come up
I suggest making brackets for each ship tier and borderlands for each. In my experience communities can self organize PvP as long as they are given proper tools.
this has been true for the pokemon comunity just look here: http://www.smogon.com/
all gamers can be defined one or as a mix of 3 Psychographic profiles Timmy, Johnny and Spike
these Psychographic profiles are used by Mark Rosewater the lead designer for Magic the Gathering. this is what Mark Rosewater says about spikes:
"Spike is the competitive player. Spike plays to win. Spike enjoys winning. To accomplish this, Spike will play whatever the best deck is. Spike will copy decks off the Internet. Spike will borrow other players' decks. To Spike, the thrill of Magic is the adrenaline rush of competition. Spike enjoys the stimulation of outplaying the opponent and the glory of victory."
In MMO terms that means spike is a stereotypical PvP player that enjoys testing his skills against other players to see how they themselves match up. for a game to be successful you need to cater to these people. in some cases by nerving some powers in PvP only.
to fix PvP there is nothing to it other than Identifying the community leaders talking to them and tweak all the powers to create a balanced meta....
Foundry
Improved Ground game
Improved Fleet systems
Captain skills overhaul
Space PvE
PvE Systems and More interesting group play
we need to get some abilities that allow for people to take up Tank and healing roles. that at the very least means control over the aggro we generate. by taunts, aggro-wipes(feign death: hunter WoW), skill that allow tanks to generate increased amount of aggro, skills that let DPS and healers generate less aggro.
when aggro becomes controllable and reasonably predictable more interesting boss-fights can be scripted requiring decent group coordination. the current lack of this leads to situation that favors groups of 5 DPS guys that need to spit op properly and do their own solo part as the best that this game has to offer as coordinated group play... just look at the new Borg Disconnected mission its a perfect example.
Misc
ok this is a joke the fact that cryptic will not delete bad ideas and refund enyone for anything thay should not have rushed onto the live server as thay have dune starting with the crafting system is the reason the game is dieing all this live bata testing with the crafting update and thare after with no refund I just hope it does not get sued to death before thay realize thay have screwed the the player loyalty sinse then bata testing on live server no refund =biggest mistake game developers can make that is it
Comments
Oh, and put back the EC rewards back where they were. The whole controlling the Exchange bit tain't working at all. Peeps will be greedy even if you put EC rewards to zilch, so save my character's pixelated arteries from more hardening, and put em back? I feel like I'm wasting half a Foundry EC grind anymore, loosen up on them too, would ya devs? (Either that, of the Foundry really is a buggier system than I thought, at least on my end. Anywho.)
(Quote) Add. More. Story. I don't remember Picard having the Ent-D grind the same nebula with scans, day in and day out, during each episode. Sheesh! Can you even imagine that? Eight seasons, the plot stalls because they had to grind out something in a nebula. Add. More. Story. (End Quote)
There was a time when the KDF had no science ships at all. Intentionally. Just like Feds didn't have Raiders (and particularly non with Battle Cloak and all Universal Slots).
The KDF needs a new Bird of Prey much more than a Science Vessel IMO. Science Vessels - you can get them with the Federation. But Bird of Preys, those are Klingons. They feel Klingon.
(and with the all-universal slots, you don't need science vessel specific features anyway. Science Vessels get Sensor Analysis and Subsystem Targeting, BOPs get Battle Cloak and 4 front weapon slots with DHC capability)
I'd love to get to Ferenginar at some point. We'd have to add some new sectors though, it's north of Deferi space by a bit.
New content is worthless if it is full of unplayable lag & continued bugs...
Savik - Vulcan Fed Temporal Sci
Dahar Masters Fleet: Alphal'Fa - Alien KDF Engineer Qun'pau - Rom/KDF Engineer D'nesh - Orion KDF Scientist Ghen'khan - Liberated KDF Tac
Welcome to StarBug Online - to boldly Bug where no bug has been before!
STO player since November 2013
XP rebalancing.
Grind
PvE
PvP
Proper Q&A
Different NPCs
PR
And Taco, this question is for you I think. Why do some of the maps have "hard points" where a toon gets stuck. For instance going up the ramp in Shanty Town, there's a lip at the top that just makes you come to a complete stop. And some hills in Nukara, etc. I'm sure there's a reason, but I was wondering why they are there.
Also, ymmv on any of these opinions. They are mine and mine alone. I do not claim to represent the community or my fleet in this post. Cheers.
Lion Heart of Hammer Squadron
The females do wear clothes there now right? Otherwise it might be a lot more of a pain to create than just the environment.
2. More special/unique race BOffs as C-Store options, such as Tholians (who we can have as DOffs).
3. More T6 ships that are original but not necessarily Intel, like the Guardian, Aelahl, and Mat'ha.
4. More Original T6 Intel Ships that still retain the necessary core aesthetics of each faction but also keep to the design of the Specialization (so far, "stealthy" for Intel).
5. Mirror Universe Skin + Registry Packs; Fed, Rom, and KDF. Each containing the appropriate Registry Prefix and skin for ALL existing and future Faction starships. Cost increases incrementally with each new faction-ship to reflect this.
6. T6 Federation Jupiter and Typhoon classes; maybe as a 3-variant bundle like the Odysseys. Such as a Tac Jupiter with a Vaadwaur Broadside Cannon-style setup, an Eng Jupiter with a long-range BFG, and a Frigate Supercarrier Sci Jupiter (2 or 3 Hangars with Defiant "Frigates").
7. C-Store Lifetime Membership. Mainly for those willing to spend months to earn the Zen to buy; though the difference is that the C-Store option will never go on sale unlike buying from the site during special events.
8. Expanded sidestories. Once the majority of the main stories are done, add optional sidestories that will still allow players to earn free special gear and equipment as an option besides crafting/Rep, while expanding our characters' involvement with various races and incidents.
9. More hair and options for character customization. We're lacking in variety and Star Trek Barbie is an important part of the game considering it's directly affecting the character we design and use. I'd like to give some characters an eternal smile or an eternal frown, or longer hair, or unicorn/bicorn/dragon horns (Alien Customization), or a Lion Mane (Male Caitian/Feressan), or Terminator-style borg implants visible through broken skin (Borg).
10. Standardized color pallet and proper full color options (including reflective/saturation/hue settings), even the bright red and green colors (as well as the other colors) of the Winter coats for proper matching; just use a color wheel and let us choose the exact RGB/Brightness color values. It's already problematic trying to give some characters a certain look when half the colors you want to use are not available (a true Red color being especially problematic) or don't show up right (because half the uniforms/armor have different reflective/saturation/hue settings).
11. The possibility of promoting a BOff to Ship Captain and allowing them to pilot another ship in your inventory, and with additional special Intel-style sub-class upgrades, eventually allow for up to three AI ships to actively accompany you in missions. Of course, you may only command them to use their own trained skills, but they will use the skills of the BOffs you assign them as they see fit. Of course, this will require some coding to give them a "personality", even if it's as rudimentary and simple as Tac Captains auto using Tac BOff abilities most of the time, Sci BOff abilities sometimes, and Eng abilities when HP is lower than 50%.
12. Delta Tech Upgrades from the C-Store, because if I'm going to waste money upgrading, I want to waste it on something that actually is worthwhile, and those Delta Tech Upgrades are it. I still have to pay the Dil costs and boosters. Win-win for Cryptic and the player.
13. The option to actually unlock the Skins and Overlays (Aegis and Borg go over your existing skin rather than replace it) that unique shields have. Except it doesn't require collecting all 3 parts like the ground sets, just requires you unlock the shield, then pay the unlock fee (Marks + Dil). Mission-reward shields with unique skins have an "event" unlock with a Dil Cost. It would also allow for additional customization; such as Aegis over the Nukara skin, or Assimilated Borg over the Counter Command skin.
14. Unlock Elite Frigates so that they can be used by any Frigate-capable Carrier. As well, Unlock all Elite Fighters and Shuttles so that they can be used by ANY carrier (Elachi Oshu shuttles, Breen Choas fighters). We're already going to pay the Dil and Fleet Mark cost, may as well make it worthwhile.
15. The ability to buy Lobi/Lockbox/Promotional/Event Elite Hangar Pets with Zen off the C-Store after unlocking the ships they're affiliated with. An alternative but still steady income for Cryptic, and an alternate means for those without access to an established Fleet holding for one reason or another (either they don't have provision usage rights, no provisions to use, or not enough Fleet marks). Costs would be around 300 Zen for Fighters and Shuttles, and 400 Zen for Frigates, which is a bit more costly than just using Fleet Marks and Dilithium (which is almost 40k per Elite pet; divided by 160 Dil to 1 Zen = 250, or 150 Dil to 1 Zen = 266.6).
16. Tholian Tarantula Science Dreadnought with Web Cannon console and the 3rd piece set allowing it to auto-teleport the current target front-and-center of its cannon as its charging up to fire. Preferably with a Sci/Intel Reciprocity-style trait, and the ability to use 1 Hangar of Tholian Frigates (default equip is Tholian Fighters).
17. Gorn Science Dreadnought with a multi-Phalanx barrier Mastery Trait around the selected Target when using Shield-healing skills.
18. A Guardian-X Dreadnought - Console Super Lance; has two built-in firing modes: Narrow and Spread. Does NOT require Saucer Separation; instead works more like the Dual/Multi-Vector abilities (use one and the other automatically goes into Cooldown). Can either use the Odyssey's Chevron Separation or the Galaxy-X's Saucer Separation. Pets entirely optional. And 4 Nacelles. NOT 3. Either enlarge the two Pylon Nacelles or have two vertical pylons with full-sized nacelles on them come up from where those built-in Nacelles would be. 2 or 4 Nacelles. Not 3.
19. Valkyrie Fighter Pets for the Feds.
20. A Suggestions Forum, even if they'll never be read and used, for the rare event that it does get read and some suggestions get used. As well as a place to post one's ideas and suggestions and update them as needed.
2) allow all frigates to go on all carriers (or make a new carrier) when unlocked
Or at least design a duty officer with 20% chance to beam down a voth battlesuit instead of a security escort or standard reinforcements.
My Foundry missions | My STO Wiki page | My Twitter home page
Fix the loadout tray issue once and for all
Bring exploration back
Implement a more powerful random content generation mechanic, maybe mix this with Foundry missions
actually, I'd like to see a shift from primarily FE driven content to more of a random content concept. The FE's are nice but with such a focus on those there leaves a gap in between FE content where the content becomes stale. Or content that doesn't make sense anymore just kind of floating around in the game. Focusing on more exploration, random content generation and injecting Foundry missions into the open space for players to access them easier provides a sense of flying through space and getting into different mostly unconnected content while leveling.
^^^ No bad guys for this new adventure zone.. just "natural" hazards.
I.E. Every 15 minutes past the hour for no reason.. "Sneaky Iconians" the city floods, if you're not above the water you'll drown. :rolleyes:
Wouldn't that just be an excuse to come up with a swim mechanic and another place to wear Risian swimsuits, and at the same time, sell more Swimsuits? Esp. given that Ferenginar canonically wouldn't be shy about such things, and as long as they can make money.
Wouldn't be surprised either if they made a hazardous obstacle course that's also affected by timed hazards; ie, a silly obstacle run suddenly turns into a swim competition once the area floods.
Norway Class
I want to see something Ferasan designed.
New locations:
Trill
Hanon IV
The Water world from Voyager
"New" races:
Talarians
Sheliak
Whale Probe
First Federation
Krenim
To the contrary, most of my most passionate desires for the game consists of exploring strange new worlds!
Ferenginar, Betazed, Trill, Gornar (the space part is already in the game!), Terjas Mor. I can go on and on about alien worlds we've yet to step foot on.
I really enjoyed Nimbus III and more hybrid adventure/social zones would make me happy. In addition to a facelift for DS9 of course.
I would also likely enjoy your art team's interpretation of worlds we've heard of in the franchise but never actually got to see.
Oh, and Iotia. I keep forgetting that. 1930's Chicago shouldn't be too hard to find pictures of to draw inspiration from.
Now I want a gangster outfit and a Tommy gun, to kill borgs of course.
I do agree that we are in viscous circle here.
this is trek so naturally more people start to play as federation---> federation becomes a bigger facton ---> cryptic develops more federation content,c-store items, ships, etc. (this is where it goes wrong)---> Less incentive to play romualan or klingon, even for new players. ----> federation becomes a bigger faction ---> the circle continues endlessly
if all factions were treated equally the romulan and klingon factions would be bigger. there would be enough incentive for players to have cross faction alt that they play often. in the end the fact that the C-store is the main focus that ruins it. though i think cryptic is $crewing itself over more. now only fed sells because factions are 5%/5%/90% rom/klingon/fed if factions were 30%/30%/40% rom/klingon/fed they would have more stuff to sell to more people. because I think if factions were treated equal from the get go the fed community would be just as large but the other to faction would have pulled in additional player because the game would then have been healthier....
First of all it's not even a crafting system! It's just a dumb game system that's nothing more than a glorified slots machine.
second the "special items" you hope will be the saving the saving grace are messed up to.
If people started as fed, that's mostly because they didn't have a choice for a very long time. And now, the huge bias toward feds makes the other faction (KDF) and fraction (rom) much less attractive.
If the game was like swtor, and more or less equal for both side, and that was that way since the beginning, people would play them a lot more.
Why play KDF or rom, when fed have that much more ships and love ? Why play them when your bug fixing/QoL patch is going to take months, even years, if ever, while it's much faster for feds ? Why play them when missions and story are fed first, then if you are lucky, you have some different dialogues ? Why play them when your queues are even more empty than feds ? Why play them, when you are still lacking a t4 commendation uniform, or a fleet uniform (rom)... ?
Otherwise, you can also see the Rom are lacking from pretty much everything else. The KDF have more, but compared to fed, not that much.
But yeah, you can always reduce an entire faction to a single space trait and a single ship. And say it's the best.
For example, I could say the fed have reciprocity and the vesta. See, that's a kinda stupid argument.
I disagree with this assessment.
What mistressbenihime is saying is that it's the preceding franchise that is influencing the numbers here.
In the Star Wars movies, there were pretty much as many Sith shown as there were Jedi. With similar screen time, and the Sith are often touted as the most "badass" anyway.
There have been six full Star Trek Series, plus a bunch of movies, and EVERY ONE OF THEM centered around a Federation Ship and her crew.
Edit: Note that I'm not arguing that we should not expand upon other factions. I'm simply arguing that the majority of players (new or old) will always favor Feds because that's what was primarily shown in canon.
----
Anyway, the Feds could have a thousand different ships and you could still only fly one at a time. It doesn't seem like a big deal to me. I certainly wouldn't choose a faction based on the length of the list of ships I'm not flying.
Only thing I really miss on Rom/KDF is more outfit customization options. But then I always miss that, even on Fed. Restrictions =
* Darth Sidious (Palpatine)
* Darth Maul
* Darth Tyranus (Count Dooku)
* Darth Vader (Anakin Skywalker)
In the 2nd film (of the prequel trilogy) there was a scene with some 30+ Jedi fighting droids. Just sayin'
Whilst true, this doesn't mean that STO needs to do the same. :P
Sorry to be pedantic. Couldn't resist.
You make your point, and for what it's worth, you are right in what you say. This game, whether people will want to admit it or not, is always going to draw in more FED players compared to KDF or Republic (or other potential factions later down the line - I hope not by the way).
That shouldn't mean though that the KDF and Republic get a backseat. LoR was released what, almost two years ago? I wont list the number of features the green team are lacking, cause it's many, but it's almost as if they were released (to get the sales/funds) and then forgotten about. What happened to the Suliban Boffs? - (there was talk of them) What happened to fixing up the Republic doff system? What happened to fixing the Republic Boff costumes? What happened to making the most of the feature art? What happened to exploring the Reman culture?
E2 (Delta Rising) was released. FEDs got five new ships, each with (at least) two new skins - if you exclude the Dauntless. KDF and ROM got two ships each, one of which (per) didn't come with any skins at all (except the default one). Then there's the rumour that a T6 vesta is in the works - that's ANOTHER FED ship. T6 FED ships are 3-1 compared with KDF/Republic.
I don't mean to go on (so I wont), but you can see why many people have the opinion that Cryptic primarily cater to the FEDs. How long has the Negh'var revamp been in the works for?
I would believe this more if the effort was put in from the start to actually provide equal ship offerings across factions. Delta Rising only brought out two ships each for the KDF and Romulan players to use. Why play something Cryptic/PWE is unwilling to provide proper support for like they have for Federation players?
There's no excuse for having different factions in a game and not supporting them. If Blizzard did that WoW wouldn't be near as big as it has gotten. They took care of all their factions inspite of constant bickering about favoritism for one or the other. Neither side was ever left out of Tier content for specific classes. That should be the case for here in STO. No faction should be without Tier content for specific classes like Science captains in the KDF and Romulan factions when compared to the Fed Science offerings.
I tend to agree whit taco here mostly. yes I think about 90% of players does start out to experience commanding the enterprise and roll a federation char for that reason. only a few choose romulans or klingons for their first char. they have all had way less screen time than the federation. there is always an appeal in playing "the bad guy" that's why horde and sith players exist. trek just has so many different "bad guys" that none of them truly stick out when compared to the federation.
the problem comes into play when cryptic interpreted the data notices that there are more fed player and start catering to them ever more exclusively. the better approach would have been to create enough incentive to try the other factions without making the fed players feel like second class citizens. eventually that will cause people to bleed out of the federation side into the other two factions for the federation this is not much of a problem because they get a proportionally much larger share of the "new to STO players" to fill up the empty spots of those that decide that the other faction is a better fit for them.
and now it's story time:
The first MMO I started playing was WoW (My girlfriend at the time was already playing;my relation ship whit WoW lasted longer though). I stated back in vanilla just after TBC was announced. I had heard hunter was a good class for starting players leveled up to 60 raided some core but a month later i was happily exploring outland. at level 70 though i was done whit the hunter. I liked running dungeon whit it since it was my only max level character but I was trying out alts to experience other styles of play. at some point i notice one of my alts was gathering up a lot more levels that any of the others. I player my druid more and more exclusively and at about level 45 I decided that my feral-cat druid was to be my new main character I stopped running dungeons whit my hunter, looked for a good guild for my druid and dedicated all effort in leveling it to max level. after a while it was geared comparably to my hunter who i only player as an alt at that time. then WotLK cam along only my druid made max level.
player will naturally switch to the charter that has the most natural play style for them that is why it's important that:
- each faction has a unique style of play
- each class has a unique style of play.
if that was true the game would essentially have 9 classes. currently though the game has 1 class and 1 faction. romulans and klingons play as the federation. the difference is only cosmetic. this isn't entirely true though Romulans play different due to the singularity cores but that's space only. that is the kind of stuff that distinguishes a faction in style of play and it would be great if we saw more of it. the same is true for classes from what I've seen on tribble your specialization is going to matter more than what class you play.i am trying to keep this constructive here. I see good stuff i just like to see more of it in places where it should matter to.
3 faction should be enough. in my mind I always divide them as:
in the current setup this would really work. the romulans can provide the fire power that the feds slightly lacks and the science that Klingon's (not Klingon payers) don't care about wile both factions have access to the Wuderwaffen (singulaity powers, thaloron radiation, etc.)
to this end though federation players need exclusive science (and engineering) powers that make up for the lack of weapon damage and/or have the effectiveness of existing science powers boosted. and yes romualns need science ships badly.
this doesn't mean that there cant be federation ****s that do good weapon DPS or no Klingon science ships or romulans cant have cruizers but it means that they will have only a few like a 3:1 ratio compared to the other classes of ships.
also federatio cruizers are more science focused where a klingon cruizer is more tact focused and has some more firepower. the same is tue for other classes escorst would be better able to do scince powers sompares to a BoP (Tact/Eng) and also be more rounded than a T'lis/T'varo that should be Sci/Tact focused.
EDIT: **** result of very unfortunate typo. it should have said ship
First of all it's not even a crafting system! It's just a dumb game system that's nothing more than a glorified slots machine.
second the "special items" you hope will be the saving the saving grace are messed up to.
ok this is a joke the fact that cryptic will not delete bad ideas and refund enyone for anything thay should not have rushed onto the live server as thay have dune starting with the crafting system is the reason the game is dieing all this live bata testing with the crafting update and thare after with no refund I just hope it does not get sued to death before thay realize thay have screwed the the player loyalty sinse then bata testing on live server no refund =biggest mistake game developers can make that is it