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Cryptic, Heres an Incentive you can give us to make new characters.
stuart1965
Member Posts: 691 Arc User
Ever remember the Muskateers moto, " All for 1 and 1 for all.
Yes thats right, scrap all bound to character items no matter what they are, and make everything bound to account.
Also make it alot easier to level up new characters faster and without any time gates on them too.
Substantial rewards on every PVE queue in the game, to bring it back to life, not just on one queue.
More single games. Missions using 4 bridge officers as an option when theres not many players online.
Yes thats right, scrap all bound to character items no matter what they are, and make everything bound to account.
Also make it alot easier to level up new characters faster and without any time gates on them too.
Substantial rewards on every PVE queue in the game, to bring it back to life, not just on one queue.
More single games. Missions using 4 bridge officers as an option when theres not many players online.
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edit#1: And why did you feel the need to post this as a separate thread when you'd posted basically the same thing in flash's new and still active thread? That's considered spamming.
edit#2: And the Musketeers thing is kind of stupid. Arthos training didn't make Porthos better. Porthos had to train. Aramis buying a sword didn't also buy a sword for d'Artagnan. d'Artagnan had to get his own sword.
Instead of being critical and picking holes all the time, you come up with some suggestions then.
Well that might help a lot.
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I don't want more characters. I would rather see all of my characters I already have valuable. As it is, only your main, and the Delta Recruit have any value to them. The other characters many of us have are just more of the same grind.
Actually, the Delta Recruit is also just the same grind as before, just now they are willing to reward more for it if you redo it all over again. I get that they want to increase their metrics, and show new characters being made. But they are using this gimmick instead of fixing content, or making content that players would want to come back to play.
Just another bad move in the wrong direction by not allowing existing players do get these benefits by replaying the same missions.
In much the same way they made reputation grinding on alts easier by allowing your alts to claim sponsorships with any reputation that you've already worked up to 5, I could see the developers, maybe, allowing some sort of training item to be built by a main who has completed a specialization path that accelerates the learning speed of alts.
I could maybe even see the developers being convinced to speed up the time it takes to level from 50 to 60, if their metrics show enough players falling off once they reach the delta quadrant.
But, how would increasing the rewards for PVE queue's incentivize new characters? Most of the people doing PVE queue's are in some state of end game. How would changing group content, again mostly available at the end game range of 50-60, incentivize people to create new characters?
Do you not have any idea how many ideas VD has had? Most of us are past the point of trying to offer suggestions or the mystical "constructive criticism" because 99.9% of it has fallen on deaf ears.
Different people want different things. What would be an incentive for one would not be an incentive for another. Things I would like them to do...wouldn't have much of a positive reception on the forums. In the end, they likely wouldn't be good for the game given the appearance the playerbase gives off. So there's little reason to offer suggestions in that sense. I don't see a Cryptic problem as much as I see a "people" problem. These forums aren't the place to suggest fixes for that.
Take a look at what's happened, eh?
Some folks felt the game was lacking endgame. Cryptic added more. Some folks complained about the increased endgame for multiple characters. Cryptic made it easier for multiple characters. Some folks again felt the game was lacking endgame. Cryptic again added more. Some folks complained again about the increased endgame for multiple characters. Cryptic again made it easier for multiple characters.
...and I can't recall just off hand how many times that cycle has repeated itself there...
Where the gist has been Cryptic has added more and more optional stuff for folks to do, which should have had little to no effect on the folks with multiple characters - but they've raised Hell left, right, and center needing to have all of their multiple characters being multiple finished characters.
Somebody has a "main" character and they have "alts"...they're "alts", they're not "mains". Somebody has a "main" they feel is finished and they decide to make one of their other "alts" in to their new "main", so they retire their old "main" to "alt" status and play the new "main"...it's simple, it's the way things have worked out pretty well for a long time in many a game. With the production cycle games tend to have, folks have the opportunity to work through several of their "alts" into that "main" status rotating through them and working on any other alternate advancement stuff along the way.
Come to STO and for some reason there's some expectation of being able to run dozens of "mains" that have nothing to do...and...that being a good thing. It's happened in other games I've played as well.
A game where I might have half a dozen characters of different levels where I'd bounce around them depending on the mood I was in and have something that I was still playing toward...became a game where I had a dozen maxed characters with nothing to do and another half dozen characters that I was blazing through to be in the same position.
STO became an alt-needy game, imho. It wasn't a case of having new and interesting stuff to do, experiencing any sort of progression...it was just a factory, an assembly line of wham, bam, that alt's done let's do the next - over and over and over and over. Could spend around an hour to take 10+ toons through ISE...why? Had some internet problems for a few days and realized just what I was doing there...stepping away let me see that.
In looking back at how easy it's been for me to delete characters over and over, just go through the whole process again...it's just off. I've deleted characters with lock box ships, I've deleted characters that were T5 in all reps, I've deleted characters that had hit L15 in multiple R&D, and Hell...if Cryptic had shown a bit more toward the KDF, I would have deleted another toon that had a bunch of lock box/lobi ships, was L15 in five schools, had over 70 spec points, was T5 Rep across the board, etc, etc, etc again...because it just doesn't really matter. It's a wham, bam, meaningless game at this point because of how things have gone.
To me, it seems like a bunch of folks want STO to be little more than an ol' arcade game or like some lil' breaktime game one would download on their phone or tablet.
So yeah, my suggestions would involve STO actually being more like a MMO...so there's just really no place for any suggestions like that on these forums.
Hm I dont know. Well I agree that Cryptic added much more depth into game with DR but frankly this somehow feels more on the demanding side than on the rewarding.
If you want to reach endgame you face double demands as before DR (skill points, probably dil for upgrades). If you want to be top of the line you can invest ten times as much for skill points of all trees and pretty much the same counts for recourses to go for epic gear.
What I just miss... still... somehow is the rewarding part like new maps? New things to do?
DR gave 3 endgame PvE maps and Argala. Rest is the same old stuff we have for years now and was just recycled and made more difficult so peeps go for the demanding part while waiting for the next event rerun. Other maps have been left buged for weeks or were removed entirely.
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Or perhaps they don't want to play anything. Maybe they want to have all the stuff that exists in the game, just because it exists. They grind their Argala or whatever like its a prison sentence, counting days until they're done and can quit the game. Then they come here and complain when the devs add something new to their "sentence" and they "have to" grind for it again.
I tend to see Cryptic doing things...half-assed...to be kind of blunt.
Like the awesome job they did redoing the early levels for the KDF, imho. Awesome, that's going to get some folks to look at rolling a KDF character! But wait, er, they still have an abysmal selection of ships for endgame. So somebody might run through the content, but that's that - they didn't really give folks a reason to consider playing a KDF character instead of their Fed or Rom character. Then what they did with DR...another Fed ship, another Fed ship...and er...yeah.
I really dug the story of DR, including the patrol wrappers (since I wasn't a big VOY fan, it filled in some details and gave it flavor), up until the way they initially ended it without the mission they added (would have been great, imho, had that mission been there for the launch). But then we got into the DQ Patrols being the thing and some of those Patrols just being absolutely useless for Specialization and others with such a gap between them...that the potential content they had there was just wasted...as well as tapping into all the other content that was there.
I sometimes wonder what it would have been like if they'd had the various patrols set up where it was something like the following (very rough):
A takes X time and rewards Y.
B takes 2X time and rewards 2Y.
C takes 3X time and rewards 3Y.
Where there were a bunch of A, B, and C. Then I would have had all sorts of things to do, eh? Maybe do A(1), A(2), and A(3)...or do C(4)...maybe B(2) and A(4). If it didn't feel like I was just showing up to move bricks from one pile to the next so I could come in the next day to move them from that pile to another.
Sure, here we are how many months down the road and they're still trying to sort that out after all the sour experiences folks have had?
It just seems like a combination of that half-assed bit because of production schedules mixed in with that combination of shooting themselves in the foot before the race...
Roll another character? That stuff leaves me not wanting to play the characters I have.
A few years back, when I'd level a character...
It would be a mix of missions, hitting up patrols, doing queues along the way (yeah, there are actually queues there as we level up), and mixing in some PvP.
...there was all sorts of stuff to do, and almost no two leveling experiences were the same.
I had fun doing my "alt" thing where I'd have different characters at different levels...even in retiring or rerolling a "main"; I had fun going through the process.
Then it became...wham, bam, done...not even half way through the episodes - not having touched a single patrol - not having hit a single queue - nor any PvP in the least. It was wham, bam, done...50...soon followed by wham, bam, done...everything...nothing to do, so do it again.
Almost every change that Cryptic has made to this game that I'd find myself grumbling about, I can trace back to some posts from folks complaining. Which is funny, because the same basically goes for so many of the complaints out there...Cryptic has given some folks what they asked for, eh? And it's kind of hard to separate them all, so it often comes across as folks just didn't think about what they were asking for while complaining and so when they got it, they're complaining even more. Sure, not everybody falls into that category. Some of the folks complaining about certain things argued against those earlier complaints...but so many folks just tend not to think their complaints out and what it would mean if Cryptic actually acted upon them - how it would change the game and if they'd actually be happy once that change was made.
I remember watching an interview from the time they were at the show last year, where they announced DR, and they even gave Garret Wang a promotion (which I thought was funny).
One of the developers said that high DPS players were at level 50 (which is where the content is setup for), but were doing DPS that was at level 60. He said that by raising the level cap, they were going to fix that.
So far, all that they did was give us 10 more levels, so that players are now at level 60, and the content is setup for level 65 type DPS, but high DPS players are doing level 75 DPS. It is the same thing as before.
So, what is next? As they keep selling power creep, and DPS, they are going to need to keep moving both of them up. The content will get ridiculously buffed again, and we may get another level cap increase with more power creep to sell. Then the cycle will start all over again.
I would rather they stop trying to play tug-a-war with DPS players, and focus on more content for the game. And by content, I don't mean the same patrols to grind. I mean episodes, and other things that we can do that are not a chase for DPS.
Also, the CapSpec system is a joke really. The passives are pretty good, but the way it was done was completely wrong.
i have said this before, and I will say it again, when they add something to the game that they want to be something you get over time by playing the game for years, and not focus on it, then they lock the ability to use gear, or train Boffs in that system for the new ships they just came out with, then it is not a long term system. It is another rep system that they just want you to take for ever to unlock.
If it had been something like a proficiency system, or something like that, it would have been better. Each time you use something, it will level up a bar for it. Then, when it goes up a level, it will add a small bonus to it.
Each type of weapon can have a proficiency cap for them, and if they ever want to increase it, they just add more levels. And the higher your proficiency goes, the more damage you can do with that weapon.
If they did this, and NOT lock anything behind it, then it didn't matter what content you played, you were progressing your character. And, it could take years to do, and would be better than locking passives, or worse, ability to use gear, or train Boffs behind it.
They want to sell power creep, and keep players in the game as long as possible. But, they don't have any good ideas on how to do it, and they just jump at an idea thinking it will make them money.
More thinking needs to be done before acting.
We'll fix it by making 60 the cap! *half-hearted huzzah*
And we'll add mk XIII and mk XIV weapons and let people get epic versions! *not sure if serious eyebrow raise*
To top it off we'll add endless specializations, each one more OP than the last! *facepalm*
Exactly, because if players were doing level 60 DPS, then there was no need to increase the DPS they do after raising their level cap. Just offer more content instead. A lot of time and energy was wasted.
Nope, lets just increase difficulty, sell the same ships back to people again, and in another 2 years be right back where we were pre-DR. durrrr
I came back to the game in January, I play an average of 1-2 hours a day. I read quests, watch the animated cut scenes, and go out of my way to collect mats (in other words I havent "speed levelled"). I've gone back and repeated missions to get equipment sets....
Without using Zen or similar, I now have a lvl 60 Klingon Science, lvl 50 Romulan Tact, and a level 32 Romulan Engineer.
The only "gates" I have found so far are the reputation system where I am Tier III and Tier IV and crafting where I started it late, and have yet to get past rank 10 on any.
These "gates" are part and parcel of any MMO out there....
So, where is this slow levelling system most seem to think is there....?
Crime is part of any city but I don't think people would see it as a good thing.
Free Tibet!
Thx for sharing your thoughts Virus.
Well for my part Im just puzzled a bit. Its not as we wouldnt have a massive queue list at our disposal each day with some really cool maps produced for us over the years. I love em and after three years im still not tired of IGA or anything. Troublesome part is just that many of em remain somewhat underused wherever I look. Pugs, DPS channels, fleets. Each of them seem to favour the ones which grand the most benefit under the least effort (perhaps risk now as well). If cryptic would take the time to identify the reason for the discrepancy in their usage and adjust rewards accordingly I think that everybody would pretty soonish find the right thing to do for himself and things would appear less monotone.
That was my agreeing part on the OP. As far as boff usage is concerned they are a cool gimmick in BZ but the heart of endgame should be team-ups 5x5 with a lot of fun stuff to do. I think we should just have a better reason to play as in well distributed rewards and then all the demands would not even feel as such.
A good NTTE takes 2 mins and grants 1 salvage. A good IGA takes 10 minutes and grants none. If salvage is what Im after I run 5 times NTTE and Im done with it with a feeling of bore out while I should have been able to have fun in 1 IGA run for the same result.
In the end the whole reason for me to do alts will be to reach and have fun in endgame while exploring different game mechanics.
Hope I make any sense here.
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anything that degrades my current characters is a Big NO
anything that gives a new character advantages over my current character is also a Big NO
However to get new players I could see giving them a huge xp increase for a new character on new accounts only so they can level up quickly , I mean real quick
X3 XP
X3 rewards
Free purple gear for there level
Free bound to character buffs that last a full mission
And then at level 50 they Q up for advanced STFs
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
+1 to that.
I hardly ever disagree with anything virusdancer says, but I do think that it would be nice if the (current state of the) game was more alt friendly.
I have 13 characters all in different ships, I like to experiment with different builds and tactics, but since DR the gap between my mains and my alts is growing, also I have fewer mains that I used to due to the high cost of upgrading and the time investment required.
The game, in its current state, favours players who concentrate all of their efforts into one main. With sufficient effort, one character can reasonably be expected to max out specialisation points in time for the release of the next specialisation, and, obviously, only requires one set of upgraded gear (though I concede that those wishing to use multiple loadouts are similarly blighted).
I dont think that all alts should have everything, that would be just dumb; but the reputation commendations seemed to me to be a good balance, with the cost/effort halved for subsequent characters. I think it would be nice if a similar boost could be applied to the specialisation points. Upgrade costs are just ridiculous, full stop; I used to think it hard just getting fleet gear on all my characters, now its a complete show stopper.
I also dont think that making the game more alt friendly hurts anyone else, those people who concentrate all their efforts on one character will always be ahead of those who spread their time over several. And no matter how many alts you have, you can only play one at a time, so more alt friendliness would hurt or disadvantage no one.
For me, with less mains and more farmers, I find I am buying less ships and ship upgrades, for example, my Sci character is no longer one of my mains so doesnt need a new ship, same for my fleet ships, I dont need upgrades for them either. I have bought a couple of T6s (for the traits) and upgraded my Scimitar, but thats it.
Lastly, I find that I am playing quite a lot less, with the poor quality of the difficulty increases, increased requirements for dps orientated builds, less diversity in effective playing styles, and the continuing rise in bugs and lagging, it just seems to be a lot less fun these days.
Fortunately I enjoy doffing, its a bit like playing solitaire, a nice way to unwind from the day before bedtime, so until they nerf that, Ill stick around.
STO is like a MMO.... with much more grinding and less reachable content. :P
A test server is supposed to be used to properly test patches before patching anything....
Three things come to mind with that...imho.
1) What I'm doing now isn't much different than what I was doing in 2012 (outside of the absence of PvP). What is different, is that I'm continuing to earn rewards or earning more rewards for doing it. That's not grind. That's rewarding play. It's a good thing.
2) ISA 2015 is a Hell of a lot easier than ISE 2012.
3) I don't really picture STO as a MMO anymore. It's more like using public transportation. Sure, there are other folks there - but the less you have to interact with them, the better the trip will be.
My character Tsin'xing