Personally the whole shoot first ask questions later mindset that starfleet has now is what made me not want to play starfleet. When a vulcan says it would be better to blow someone up rather than trying to disable or use diplomacy, ruins the feel of what starfleet should play like. Not to mention if Q really saw what starfleet was doing he would finish the trial and eradicate humans for going back to being a "dangerous, savage child race".
I agree. Some missions are quite disturbing when you think about them. Not even as a Starfleet standpoint, but even from a random guy point of vue.
Shooting and killing Malon that were scammed medical stuff from the Hierarchy in DR is a good example. Those poor guys were scammed, hail you hoping you'll give the stuff back, and what do you do ? You open fire and kill them. That's sick.
for love to be unconditional one must sacrific something somewhere for it to be pure, in a sense a war has to be fought and there can only be one winner. where were you going with that exactly?
T6 Miranda Hero Ship FTW. Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
Personally the whole shoot first ask questions later mindset that starfleet has now is what made me not want to play starfleet. When a vulcan says it would be better to blow someone up rather than a more logical course: trying to disable or use diplomacy, ruins the feel of what starfleet should play like. Not to mention if Q really saw what starfleet was doing he would finish the trial and eradicate humans for going back to being a "dangerous, savage child race".
I would like to see more diplomacy options. I've gone to a lot of trouble to rank up my Diplomacy commendation and would like to see it used for more than a few extra transwarp destinations.
But I think I have a vague understanding of how missions are pieced together in the game and I know that's not a simple prospect. You need things to happen in order to trigger the next objective and when there's a choice between peace or combat it takes a special set up to make that work.
It's also not conducive to levelling up your character because you're losing skill points from not killing enemy mobs. It's definitely not conducive to cross-faction missions where you might actually want your Klingon to go guns blazing and a diplomacy option would be out of character.
There's also the point that the game is supposed to reward players for time playing. A diplomacy "opt-out" could end up decreasing time played and soon everybody's opting out of combat because they can complete the mission faster.
So you end up doing things like mixing nerve tonics because you're marking time that you'd otherwise spend killing stuff. That, we don't need more of.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
I would like to see more diplomacy options. I've gone to a lot of trouble to rank up my Diplomacy commendation and would like to see it used for more than a few extra transwarp destinations.
But I think I have a vague understanding of how missions are pieced together in the game and I know that's not a simple prospect. You need things to happen in order to trigger the next objective and when there's a choice between peace or combat it takes a special set up to make that work.
It's also not conducive to levelling up your character because you're losing skill points from not killing enemy mobs. It's definitely not conducive to cross-faction missions where you might actually want your Klingon to go guns blazing and a diplomacy option would be out of character.
There's also the point that the game is supposed to reward players for time playing. A diplomacy "opt-out" could end up decreasing time played and soon everybody's opting out of combat because they can complete the mission faster.
So you end up doing things like mixing nerve tonics because you're marking time that you'd otherwise spend killing stuff. That, we don't need more of.
I understand some of it would take extra coding but here is something that might be easy. It would entail coding in dif dialogue(ie getting rid of blowing people up) and coding in that a ship hit by a fed captain doesnt go boom. Just change the model to look disabled, like the axon, smoke, and sparks instead of the explosion animations. That would fix a lot of the unsettling things that keep some players from playing federation characters. Actually I shouldnt say it would be easy as I am not a coder/developer as I don't really know if it would be easy or not.
The new ads are pure fascism, but since DS9 essentially destroyed Star Trek and made Federation fascism canon, I can't do anything but fondly recall TOS and TAS and TNG series and Voyager, and jump ship to Star Fleet Universe, as Trek's cousin franchise has not yet become cynical.
That said, Cryptic's new fascist vector art is beautiful and pure retrofuturist awesome. It's like The Rocketeer! However, historically speaking, as cool as retro comic style is, what we call retrofuturism was, in fact, pretty much the TRIBBLE-era style: big government + big science = PROGRESS, r=war! Synergy, man.
Oh, and you the players have the power to just skip all violent activities in-game, and use the CombatlogReader to compete with Heals Per Second. Make invulnerable ships with no weapons, and fill your tac console slots with peaceful universals. Be the revolution you want to see in society.
ROFL dude. The Sisko destroyed the ultimate fascism, the Dominion. Sacrificing everything in the process. His conscience, his soul, his life. (Ok maybe not all, his son is alive.) Anyway, Fed was at the verge of destruction, The Sisko's every actions were justified.
You note some of the problems that plague Diplomacy missions.
To me they always felt pointless, for example the original "first contact" mission for example. It's just a few multi-choice answers with rather obvious correct choices. You end up reading some text walls, click a few times and you're done. It's nice as a break from normal missions or as part of a normal mission. But it doesn't really stand on its own.
Exploration should be easier, but runs into the problem that randomly generated adventures aren't very interesting. They are in the end, just more of the same but worse as they can't even advance the story line.
But the whole point of "New Worlds, etc." is that it should become the story line. However it can't unless everyone explores the same stuff- which is just... more normal storyline perhaps with a different framing. Maybe that would be enough?
The bar here is a high one, and I've never seen any MMO pull it off.
This thread is getting off-topic. But instead of closing it down, I'm going to wrangle this back because I actually really like this topic of discussion.
There's a very interesting moral discussion revolving around the militarization of Starfleet which has been touched upon time and time again in Star Trek lore. If anything, we see the precarious nature of militarizing the body, compared to the KDF. There are some on the side of the fence who would argue that it helped the Federation explore and survive, while others would say that it deviates from what Starfleet primary intention.
Well first of all thanks to the two of you for jumping in here and trying to save it.
I agree with you Trendy, militarization of Starfleet is a very interesting topic and even if TNG, TOS etc. was a lot about exploration most problems to be solved did involve some firepower. No surprise their "science ships" even shot battle cruisers out of space and I don't recall seeing much of a genuine science missions that didn't run into at least one violent issue. Maybe the one where Geordi started turning into some invisible creature. In any case the militarization of Starfleet is also discussed in the series/movies itself. It's also critizised. Maybe this is something that could also be added to the game. Some critical voices. For example an Admiral that sends you on a mission to sort out things a bit differently so he can prevent everything being shot to pieces.
What I'd really like to see in STO is getting the mixture a bit better. Like in the series I like the battles if they are not all and everything. Unless you're playing KDF of course. There I'm actually annoyed that I have to walk through old Drozana putting my disruptors on stun or having to make cocktails for whimpy Cassidy instead of just killing her and taking the coil from her body. On Fed on the other hand I like a little bit more exploration background. The way the story is headed right now it's just nothing but battle however. Having it been the Voth and Dinosaurs just a year ago it now climaxes in the new super enemy: the Iconians. Will there be any researching? Any attempt to understand them? Gather intelligence? Any rescue mission? Or do we just get to shoot? I think we could use a little shooting break every now and then
I understand some of it would take extra coding but here is something that might be easy. It would entail coding in dif dialogue(ie getting rid of blowing people up) and coding in that a ship hit by a fed captain doesnt go boom. Just change the model to look disabled, like the axon, smoke, and sparks instead of the explosion animations. That would fix a lot of the unsettling things that keep some players from playing federation characters. Actually I shouldnt say it would be easy as I am not a coder/developer as I don't really know if it would be easy or not.
True, it would be more Federation-ish if we simply disabled ships instead of blowing them up.
But now you have disabled ships potentially cluttering up the map. From a game engine perspective and to save your graphics card a little overheating it's more efficient to harvest objects on the map that aren't serving any further purpose.
Blowing them up gives you a good excuse to do just that. Where the mission does allow you to disable instead of destroy, I'm pretty certain that they have it scripted to replace the hostile mob with a noncombatant object. The swap is fast enough that you normally don't notice the blip. But again, that's a special set up to make that work.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
I would like to see more diplomacy options. I've gone to a lot of trouble to rank up my Diplomacy commendation and would like to see it used for more than a few extra transwarp destinations.
I understand some of it would take extra coding but here is something that might be easy. It would entail coding in dif dialogue(ie getting rid of blowing people up) and coding in that a ship hit by a fed captain doesnt go boom. Just change the model to look disabled, like the axon, smoke, and sparks instead of the explosion animations. That would fix a lot of the unsettling things that keep some players from playing federation characters. Actually I shouldnt say it would be easy as I am not a coder/developer as I don't really know if it would be easy or not.
Those are two things I'd love to have as options. Especially the later may be easier than the first and it would be very much in line with the Trek idea. In the series ships are usually not destroyed but disabled whenever possible. Even Janeway preferred that way if it wasn't the Borg.
True, it would be more Federation-ish if we simply disabled ships instead of blowing them up.
But now you have disabled ships potentially cluttering up the map. From a game engine perspective and to save your graphics card a little overheating it's more efficient to harvest objects on the map that aren't serving any further purpose.
Blowing them up gives you a good excuse to do just that. Where the mission does allow you to disable instead of destroy, I'm pretty certain that they have it scripted to replace the hostile mob with a noncombatant object. The swap is fast enough that you normally don't notice the blip. But again, that's a special set up to make that work.
Perhaps maybe make them warp out shortly after being disabled? Give the engineers time to fix engines(ie after 15 seconds or something). Have the ship captain dialogue bubble be like "get us out of here!" Or maybe cloak and disappear if they have the technology. Or just have them warp out when they reach 0 hp. That could possibly fix the map clutter. And when you think about it that would prolly be what would actually happen in that kind of situation. Not all races would fight til the end like the kdf. Most would run away if they are outmatched.
Personally the whole shoot first ask questions later mindset that starfleet has now is what made me not want to play starfleet. When a vulcan says it would be better to blow someone up rather than a more logical course: trying to disable or use diplomacy, ruins the feel of what starfleet should play like. Not to mention if Q really saw what starfleet was doing he would finish the trial and eradicate humans for going back to being a "dangerous, savage child race".
I'll start by pointing to Garth of Izar, and all the other starship captains of the day who ran off the reservation. There's also how easily we forget that it was only seven years between the creation of the Genesis device and the assassination of Chancellor Gorkon. Starfleet was only as immaculate as Jim Kirk's plot armor could keep it as such.
I'm also reminded of Starfleet's adventures with the Borg, where they got their hangar bays handed to them - twice, still tried the peaceful solution, found out that plan failed, and got their hangar bay handed to them again. I imagine what the follow-up to the Battle of Sector 001 would have been had they gone that route, and it makes the Dominion War look like child's play.
And, oh yeah, there is the Dominion War while we're at it.
As someone taught Picard, it's not safe out here. It's not for the timid. Starfleet's been on a long slow realization that Q was pretty gosh darn right back there and we're just now seeing them finally hitch up their big boy pants.
True, it would be more Federation-ish if we simply disabled ships instead of blowing them up.
But now you have disabled ships potentially cluttering up the map. From a game engine perspective and to save your graphics card a little overheating it's more efficient to harvest objects on the map that aren't serving any further purpose.
Blowing them up gives you a good excuse to do just that. Where the mission does allow you to disable instead of destroy, I'm pretty certain that they have it scripted to replace the hostile mob with a noncombatant object. The swap is fast enough that you normally don't notice the blip. But again, that's a special set up to make that work.
Nah, there's actually a code widget that changes their state. You can see it in the new FE. When you disable Sela's ship it's still marked as a hostile, but you can't continue to damage it.
Umm. OP hate to ruin a good how star trek isn't Disney enough thread.... But the "warmongering" letter is in universe written by a kdf captain you known the proud warrior race guys.
Also starfleet has a general order for glassing a planet since TOS era, not very peaceful if you ask me. That some evil empire stuff there.
if I stop posting it doesn't make you right it. just means I don't have enough rum to continue interacting with you.
Personally the whole shoot first ask questions later mindset that starfleet has now is what made me not want to play starfleet. When a vulcan says it would be better to blow someone up rather than a more logical course: trying to disable or use diplomacy, ruins the feel of what starfleet should play like. Not to mention if Q really saw what starfleet was doing he would finish the trial and eradicate humans for going back to being a "dangerous, savage child race".
You mean the Starfleet of The Motion Picture and early Next Generation.
It's funny that people base their notions of what Starfleet truly is from two small slivers of the overall mythos.
Starfleet has always had a bent toward a mixture of gunboat diplomacy, showing the flag, and negotiation from strength. Starfleet commanders have always had, throughout the majority of Trek's history, an aggressive mindset that has both righted wrongs and caused problems.
As for the shoot first deal, it's because Star Trek Online IS A GAME. It's focus is on the aspect from the shows/movies that involves space battles, beating the bad guys, high adventure, and daring-do. In other words, the more exciting aspects of Star Trek.
Even in the TOS Starfleet was a military organization to begin with. There was no militarization in TWOK, it was already there!
Courtmarshals, ranks, Prime Directive, General Orders...
Come on kids, you're fooling yourself if you think Starfleet wasn't a military organization from the outset.
They simply have peaceful missions, just like -gasp- armies and navies do today! I mean they don't call HAO a peace mission.
BTW that stands for Humanitarian Assistance Operation where the military goes in, bringing in food, medical supplies and the like to help a ravaged area. Military does it all the time, just not talked about because it isn't blowing people up.
But spare me DS9 or other shows "Militarized" Star fleet. Bunch of feldercarb.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
There's a very interesting moral discussion revolving around the militarization of Starfleet which has been touched upon time and time again in Star Trek lore. If anything, we see the precarious nature of militarizing the body, compared to the KDF. There are some on the side of the fence who would argue that it helped the Federation explore and survive, while others would say that it deviates from what Starfleet primary intention.
There's nothing precarious about the nature of militarized Starfleet compared to the KDF. It is a military organization at all timesjust like the KDFwith JAG Corps and Court Martial. The difference is that Starfleet is deceitful about it (TNG: "Peak Performance"):
PICARD: Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.
There's nothing precarious about the nature of militarized Starfleet compared to the KDF. It is a military organization at all timesjust like the KDFwith JAG Corps and Court Martial. The difference is that Starfleet is deceitful about it (TNG: "Peak Performance"):
PICARD: Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.
One of the few times I thought Picard was full of it when he said that line. Biggest bunch of TRIBBLE.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
waaaaaaay back at the begining , in 1 of the books, they talked about how there was a constant tug-of-war between the science/exploration branch and the military branch, i think it was around the time of the romulan war.... i forget the name of the book tho, and don't give me that TRIBBLE about how the books don't count, if you want the actual reference read the f-ing book(s)...............
Ultimately, gameplay in the true spirit and tradition of Star Trek just does not translate well to an MMORPG and never will, not if its going to have any kind of mass appeal to be financially viable.
It works fine in singleplayer adventures like Star Trek a final unity, but even then the most succesful Star Trek games of all time have all been combat oriented. Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force, Bridge Commander, Starfleet Command, Armada, etc.
You know I've been rewatching TOS... and honestly the majority of the episodes have Kirk fighting something. It's not all space hippies and Herberts. The majority of the time Kirk is making love AND making war at the same time.
So the idea that DS9 somehow screwed up Star Trek and made it into a war loving brand is patently false. Star Trek has always been about conflict... hell the first episode of TNG has Picard fighting TRIBBLE.
Star Trek has always had conflict, fighting, aggression, hatred, and war involved in it. It's just rose colored glasses suddenly saying it was about peace, love, and exploration.
You know I've been rewatching TOS... and honestly the majority of the episodes have Kirk fighting something. It's not all space hippies and Herberts. The majority of the time Kirk is making love AND making war at the same time.
So the idea that DS9 somehow screwed up Star Trek and made it into a war loving brand is patently false. Star Trek has always been about conflict... hell the first episode of TNG has Picard fighting TRIBBLE.
Star Trek has always had conflict, fighting, aggression, hatred, and war involved in it. It's just rose colored glasses suddenly saying it was about peace, love, and exploration.
I do agree there was conflict but if ya look closely most of the time kirk and picard only retaliated cause they got shot at. They didnt actively seek out combat like the feds do in this game. This kind of thing has been talked about for quite a long time(4 or so years) which means that a lot of people have a problem with it. Not just a couple people.
I do agree there was conflict but if ya look closely most of the time kirk and picard only retaliated cause they got shot at. They didnt actively seek out combat like the feds do in this game. This kind of thing has been talked about for quite a long time(4 or so years) which means that a lot of people have a problem with it. Not just a couple people.
Trust me I'm one of those people who talk about it too... to a point...
But lets be honest here... the Feds didn't go looking for the Elachi... didn't go looking for the Vaadwaur... didn't go looking for the Voth... didn't go looking for the Undine... and most certainly didn't go looking for the Iconians (since the Feds didn't even know they were alive).
Basically put... they didn't actively seek out combat technically... it was foisted on them as it generally is in the various series.
Mind you it's kind of semantics... but really most of the bad guys showe up at the Federation door step and the Federation is kind of forced to fight them. What are we supposed to do, let the Elachi kidnap Romulans while letting the Jem Hadar keep DS9, and the Breen salt Deferia?
The idea that even in the future it's a Eutopia where no one and nothing will mess with the FEderation because it's all love and exploration is a joke.. .hence why even in Star Trek they had weapons on their ships.
The only conflict we kind of sort of went looking for is against the Klingons (and by the start of the game we're already in a war with them... so fight the war.)... and originally the Tal Shiar.
I guess the concept is now that unlike true Facist states like Naxi Germany the Federation isn't actively looking to expand their influence by violence and conquest... however they're not afraid to use violence to defend themselves... nor if they get brought into conflict either by stumbling into it or because of various alliances.... to fully commit to a war.
So no it's not facism nor has the Federation gone looking for a fight. Generally though the fight is brough to them... and the Federation isn't afraid to do whatever is necessary to defend themselves and their allies from the aggressors.
This thread is getting off-topic. But instead of closing it down, I'm going to wrangle this back because I actually really like this topic of discussion.
There's a very interesting moral discussion revolving around the militarization of Starfleet which has been touched upon time and time again in Star Trek lore. If anything, we see the precarious nature of militarizing the body, compared to the KDF. There are some on the side of the fence who would argue that it helped the Federation explore and survive, while others would say that it deviates from what Starfleet primary intention.
Since the game launched, there has been discussion about:
The idea of a civil war or Maquis-like group being added to the game, which various developers seemed to champion.
The ethics of Section 31. We've been working for Franklin Drake so much it gets forgotten but he was the first NPC who generated a REALLY strong emotional reaction from players... and he had both big fans and people who wanted him dead.
Some players, including me -- and I think even a certain Cryptic Cat and Jeremy (even moreso his STOked cohost) -- wanted or tossed around the idea of a morality system like some Star Wars games have. I always compared this to Aldor/Scryer in WoW's Burning Crusade and the Desolace centaurs (and Bloodsail/Goblins). I don't think that either/or dueling rep system has ever been done perfectly in an MMO but I think the idea of two reputations where progress on one makes enemies of the other side is a really strong and really cool mechanic.
I would really like to see something in STO that is choice heavy like that. Not irreversible necessarily but where there is a rift created among the playerbase over the tactics and ethics. Not Klingon vs. Fed but militarization vs. peace with an enemy. Not just as a simple mission flip but as something which really defines our relationship to a sector block. Like if we had the choice between the Kobali, the Breen, neutrality/non-interference, or annihilating all sides.
Really, I think a personality system would be a lot of fun, particularly if it could affect how enemy deaths are handled. Kill, capture, execute them when they're down, or stun and let the enemy potentially regroup. Or a choice between blowing up enemy ships, disabling them and leaving them be (which might lower your passive threat gen with that faction), taking POWs who you exchange with enemy command, or looting them and leaving them adrift while you run off with their cargo.
Comments
Shooting and killing Malon that were scammed medical stuff from the Hierarchy in DR is a good example. Those poor guys were scammed, hail you hoping you'll give the stuff back, and what do you do ? You open fire and kill them. That's sick.
for love to be unconditional one must sacrific something somewhere for it to be pure, in a sense a war has to be fought and there can only be one winner. where were you going with that exactly?
Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
I would like to see more diplomacy options. I've gone to a lot of trouble to rank up my Diplomacy commendation and would like to see it used for more than a few extra transwarp destinations.
But I think I have a vague understanding of how missions are pieced together in the game and I know that's not a simple prospect. You need things to happen in order to trigger the next objective and when there's a choice between peace or combat it takes a special set up to make that work.
It's also not conducive to levelling up your character because you're losing skill points from not killing enemy mobs. It's definitely not conducive to cross-faction missions where you might actually want your Klingon to go guns blazing and a diplomacy option would be out of character.
There's also the point that the game is supposed to reward players for time playing. A diplomacy "opt-out" could end up decreasing time played and soon everybody's opting out of combat because they can complete the mission faster.
So you end up doing things like mixing nerve tonics because you're marking time that you'd otherwise spend killing stuff. That, we don't need more of.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
I understand some of it would take extra coding but here is something that might be easy. It would entail coding in dif dialogue(ie getting rid of blowing people up) and coding in that a ship hit by a fed captain doesnt go boom. Just change the model to look disabled, like the axon, smoke, and sparks instead of the explosion animations. That would fix a lot of the unsettling things that keep some players from playing federation characters. Actually I shouldnt say it would be easy as I am not a coder/developer as I don't really know if it would be easy or not.
ROFL dude. The Sisko destroyed the ultimate fascism, the Dominion. Sacrificing everything in the process. His conscience, his soul, his life. (Ok maybe not all, his son is alive.) Anyway, Fed was at the verge of destruction, The Sisko's every actions were justified.
You note some of the problems that plague Diplomacy missions.
To me they always felt pointless, for example the original "first contact" mission for example. It's just a few multi-choice answers with rather obvious correct choices. You end up reading some text walls, click a few times and you're done. It's nice as a break from normal missions or as part of a normal mission. But it doesn't really stand on its own.
Exploration should be easier, but runs into the problem that randomly generated adventures aren't very interesting. They are in the end, just more of the same but worse as they can't even advance the story line.
But the whole point of "New Worlds, etc." is that it should become the story line. However it can't unless everyone explores the same stuff- which is just... more normal storyline perhaps with a different framing. Maybe that would be enough?
The bar here is a high one, and I've never seen any MMO pull it off.
Well first of all thanks to the two of you for jumping in here and trying to save it.
I agree with you Trendy, militarization of Starfleet is a very interesting topic and even if TNG, TOS etc. was a lot about exploration most problems to be solved did involve some firepower. No surprise their "science ships" even shot battle cruisers out of space and I don't recall seeing much of a genuine science missions that didn't run into at least one violent issue. Maybe the one where Geordi started turning into some invisible creature. In any case the militarization of Starfleet is also discussed in the series/movies itself. It's also critizised. Maybe this is something that could also be added to the game. Some critical voices. For example an Admiral that sends you on a mission to sort out things a bit differently so he can prevent everything being shot to pieces.
What I'd really like to see in STO is getting the mixture a bit better. Like in the series I like the battles if they are not all and everything. Unless you're playing KDF of course. There I'm actually annoyed that I have to walk through old Drozana putting my disruptors on stun or having to make cocktails for whimpy Cassidy instead of just killing her and taking the coil from her body. On Fed on the other hand I like a little bit more exploration background. The way the story is headed right now it's just nothing but battle however. Having it been the Voth and Dinosaurs just a year ago it now climaxes in the new super enemy: the Iconians. Will there be any researching? Any attempt to understand them? Gather intelligence? Any rescue mission? Or do we just get to shoot? I think we could use a little shooting break every now and then
True, it would be more Federation-ish if we simply disabled ships instead of blowing them up.
But now you have disabled ships potentially cluttering up the map. From a game engine perspective and to save your graphics card a little overheating it's more efficient to harvest objects on the map that aren't serving any further purpose.
Blowing them up gives you a good excuse to do just that. Where the mission does allow you to disable instead of destroy, I'm pretty certain that they have it scripted to replace the hostile mob with a noncombatant object. The swap is fast enough that you normally don't notice the blip. But again, that's a special set up to make that work.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Those are two things I'd love to have as options. Especially the later may be easier than the first and it would be very much in line with the Trek idea. In the series ships are usually not destroyed but disabled whenever possible. Even Janeway preferred that way if it wasn't the Borg.
Perhaps maybe make them warp out shortly after being disabled? Give the engineers time to fix engines(ie after 15 seconds or something). Have the ship captain dialogue bubble be like "get us out of here!" Or maybe cloak and disappear if they have the technology. Or just have them warp out when they reach 0 hp. That could possibly fix the map clutter. And when you think about it that would prolly be what would actually happen in that kind of situation. Not all races would fight til the end like the kdf. Most would run away if they are outmatched.
I'll start by pointing to Garth of Izar, and all the other starship captains of the day who ran off the reservation. There's also how easily we forget that it was only seven years between the creation of the Genesis device and the assassination of Chancellor Gorkon. Starfleet was only as immaculate as Jim Kirk's plot armor could keep it as such.
I'm also reminded of Starfleet's adventures with the Borg, where they got their hangar bays handed to them - twice, still tried the peaceful solution, found out that plan failed, and got their hangar bay handed to them again. I imagine what the follow-up to the Battle of Sector 001 would have been had they gone that route, and it makes the Dominion War look like child's play.
And, oh yeah, there is the Dominion War while we're at it.
As someone taught Picard, it's not safe out here. It's not for the timid. Starfleet's been on a long slow realization that Q was pretty gosh darn right back there and we're just now seeing them finally hitch up their big boy pants.
My character Tsin'xing
Sooooo, who's the first volunteer I can make love with?
Also starfleet has a general order for glassing a planet since TOS era, not very peaceful if you ask me. That some evil empire stuff there.
if I stop posting it doesn't make you right it. just means I don't have enough rum to continue interacting with you.
You mean the Starfleet of The Motion Picture and early Next Generation.
It's funny that people base their notions of what Starfleet truly is from two small slivers of the overall mythos.
Starfleet has always had a bent toward a mixture of gunboat diplomacy, showing the flag, and negotiation from strength. Starfleet commanders have always had, throughout the majority of Trek's history, an aggressive mindset that has both righted wrongs and caused problems.
As for the shoot first deal, it's because Star Trek Online IS A GAME. It's focus is on the aspect from the shows/movies that involves space battles, beating the bad guys, high adventure, and daring-do. In other words, the more exciting aspects of Star Trek.
Even in the TOS Starfleet was a military organization to begin with. There was no militarization in TWOK, it was already there!
Courtmarshals, ranks, Prime Directive, General Orders...
Come on kids, you're fooling yourself if you think Starfleet wasn't a military organization from the outset.
They simply have peaceful missions, just like -gasp- armies and navies do today! I mean they don't call HAO a peace mission.
BTW that stands for Humanitarian Assistance Operation where the military goes in, bringing in food, medical supplies and the like to help a ravaged area. Military does it all the time, just not talked about because it isn't blowing people up.
But spare me DS9 or other shows "Militarized" Star fleet. Bunch of feldercarb.
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There's nothing precarious about the nature of militarized Starfleet compared to the KDF. It is a military organization at all timesjust like the KDFwith JAG Corps and Court Martial. The difference is that Starfleet is deceitful about it (TNG: "Peak Performance"):
One of the few times I thought Picard was full of it when he said that line. Biggest bunch of TRIBBLE.
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*TRIBBLE*..................
It works fine in singleplayer adventures like Star Trek a final unity, but even then the most succesful Star Trek games of all time have all been combat oriented. Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force, Bridge Commander, Starfleet Command, Armada, etc.
But ultimately a singleplayer experience.
What we learned with Delta Rising, the fanatics, the whales will play and buy no matter what..
So it just comes down to what is the most budget coding possible you can get away with, without putting in any work.
The upgrading system for example, zero models, no animations and no work put into it. Just copy-paste text in notepad.
Ultimately the game is now a case story of what happens when you have no standards and put up with everything and anything.
So the idea that DS9 somehow screwed up Star Trek and made it into a war loving brand is patently false. Star Trek has always been about conflict... hell the first episode of TNG has Picard fighting TRIBBLE.
Star Trek has always had conflict, fighting, aggression, hatred, and war involved in it. It's just rose colored glasses suddenly saying it was about peace, love, and exploration.
I do agree there was conflict but if ya look closely most of the time kirk and picard only retaliated cause they got shot at. They didnt actively seek out combat like the feds do in this game. This kind of thing has been talked about for quite a long time(4 or so years) which means that a lot of people have a problem with it. Not just a couple people.
Trust me I'm one of those people who talk about it too... to a point...
But lets be honest here... the Feds didn't go looking for the Elachi... didn't go looking for the Vaadwaur... didn't go looking for the Voth... didn't go looking for the Undine... and most certainly didn't go looking for the Iconians (since the Feds didn't even know they were alive).
Basically put... they didn't actively seek out combat technically... it was foisted on them as it generally is in the various series.
Mind you it's kind of semantics... but really most of the bad guys showe up at the Federation door step and the Federation is kind of forced to fight them. What are we supposed to do, let the Elachi kidnap Romulans while letting the Jem Hadar keep DS9, and the Breen salt Deferia?
The idea that even in the future it's a Eutopia where no one and nothing will mess with the FEderation because it's all love and exploration is a joke.. .hence why even in Star Trek they had weapons on their ships.
The only conflict we kind of sort of went looking for is against the Klingons (and by the start of the game we're already in a war with them... so fight the war.)... and originally the Tal Shiar.
I guess the concept is now that unlike true Facist states like Naxi Germany the Federation isn't actively looking to expand their influence by violence and conquest... however they're not afraid to use violence to defend themselves... nor if they get brought into conflict either by stumbling into it or because of various alliances.... to fully commit to a war.
So no it's not facism nor has the Federation gone looking for a fight. Generally though the fight is brough to them... and the Federation isn't afraid to do whatever is necessary to defend themselves and their allies from the aggressors.
Since the game launched, there has been discussion about:
The idea of a civil war or Maquis-like group being added to the game, which various developers seemed to champion.
The ethics of Section 31. We've been working for Franklin Drake so much it gets forgotten but he was the first NPC who generated a REALLY strong emotional reaction from players... and he had both big fans and people who wanted him dead.
Some players, including me -- and I think even a certain Cryptic Cat and Jeremy (even moreso his STOked cohost) -- wanted or tossed around the idea of a morality system like some Star Wars games have. I always compared this to Aldor/Scryer in WoW's Burning Crusade and the Desolace centaurs (and Bloodsail/Goblins). I don't think that either/or dueling rep system has ever been done perfectly in an MMO but I think the idea of two reputations where progress on one makes enemies of the other side is a really strong and really cool mechanic.
I would really like to see something in STO that is choice heavy like that. Not irreversible necessarily but where there is a rift created among the playerbase over the tactics and ethics. Not Klingon vs. Fed but militarization vs. peace with an enemy. Not just as a simple mission flip but as something which really defines our relationship to a sector block. Like if we had the choice between the Kobali, the Breen, neutrality/non-interference, or annihilating all sides.
Really, I think a personality system would be a lot of fun, particularly if it could affect how enemy deaths are handled. Kill, capture, execute them when they're down, or stun and let the enemy potentially regroup. Or a choice between blowing up enemy ships, disabling them and leaving them be (which might lower your passive threat gen with that faction), taking POWs who you exchange with enemy command, or looting them and leaving them adrift while you run off with their cargo.