You know it's funny, how people say they are gated from the needed mats, to willfully gain advancement because of advanced missions being to hard, yet we have many people who have freshly created toons, DR's and, seemingly suffer no ill problems, myself included.
In fact, I have every single rep completed, except the most recent one [iconian] and, there is even ways to obtain every single mark + elite mark outside of doing STF advanced queues but, people still whine they cannot just be spoon fed doing pve advanced queues, with no effort involved!!!
Whine because they get an afk penalty, for omg being afk and/or, being a complete worthless asset to the rest of the team, being a complete troll to everyone.
Whine when the difficulty seems to hard, when their own cruddy playing is doing it to them!
You can get marks through advanced but Advanced and Elite materials? Hardly. You can now convert 100 marks to one Datacore, Processor etc. once a day. But still with about 15 marks you need7 games to get enough to convert them and then 2 games for the daily and some more if you want to save some for gear.
Now way back, as the missions still were fun there were reasonable optionals.
You could save all crewmembers in "Manus" but you didn't have to because the important thing was to kill Manus.
Back then you had 15 minutes to destroy the IMRs in "Khitomer in Stasis" and then more time to complete the mission.
Now someone mixed that up you only have 15 minutes no matter what. If you can't destroy them in 15 mins. mission and optional fail and if you do destroy them you win the mission and the optional. Why do we have almost 25 minutes for Khitomers optional if the mission is lost or won after 15 min? Yes you still have to kill Tosk but there is no timer for that.
There is no sense in that.
And no need for all those not important things to be mandatory.
And there are many thready about how messed up the Advanced PvEs are, the empty queues support that.
I often read or heard that Advanced was supposed to be like the old Elite. Its far from that.
And you dont have to be rude and call other players trolls. If you are soo good thats fine. Not everyone is. And maybe you could see the obvious: Most public queues are empty or almost empty. Even those that had 30-40 games running before. Good players/good fleets make private queues but
1. that s not the purpose of the PvEs, to be only for fleets/private group
and
2. what about the newbies who just don't have good gear yet and need to do those missions with mediocre gear?
I did several of the old Elites, space and Ground and had no problem whatsoever with ym Blue Mk XI gear. Now i do have problems with my UR Mk XIII/XIV gear even though i invested in Spire consoles, Rep. system gear, Romulan Embassy BOffs, Crafted UR Antiprotons. I usually don' t die (much) unless i have a bad day but there is also no fun anymore
I think that is why there is so much hullaballu over Advance now. Because people who are woefully underprepared, under skilled and/or undergeared are heading into Advanced to get the progression mats needed to upgrade.
I know that I am dreaming when I say I would really like to see more than one avenue for progression and gearing in STO.
But there is only one in the game, STF's. Because all the mats to upgrade gear is there in Advanced and Elite content only.
You both need to know the game more right? Buy stuff at exchange. A casual player can sit and play without having to farm and buy at the exchange right? Because you guys are casual players and support casual players, right? Not unless you are players pretending to be casual players.
But then again, why do you need to do advance when you get all you need in normal? Because that is what is happening now, in advance, people who actually complete it are the ones wanting challenge.
Spoiled and self entitled players like you and demanding like you want to do advance when you can get all the stuff you need at normal or at exchange.
And there are many thready about how messed up the Advanced PvEs are, the empty queues support that.
Advance queues arent empty. There a people still playing the qeues. I just played Borg stf without hassle just before this post.
PuG advance queues are depopulated compared to pre-Dr since a lot of competent players moved away from PuGs. It is a community created issue. In the view of a competent player, PuGs = 4 leeches.
Seems to me that those left and insist in playing PuGs and fail in advance PuGs are more or less the leeches and trolls.
Since those competent players who carry the team mostly left, suddenly PuGs are left with less competent players. Hence the leeches are exposed, thus more failed advance stf are exposed. You end up more likely pairing of 5 leeches together.
1. that s not the purpose of the PvEs, to be only for fleets/private group
and
2. what about the newbies who just don't have good gear yet and need to do those missions with mediocre gear?
Why do you need to get gear in advance? Gears =/ advance completion.
Heck, I even have alt who did all normals and got all the gears.
I did several of the old Elites, space and Ground and had no problem whatsoever with ym Blue Mk XI gear. Now i do have problems with my UR Mk XIII/XIV gear even though i invested in Spire consoles, Rep. system gear, Romulan Embassy BOffs, Crafted UR Antiprotons. I usually don' t die (much) unless i have a bad day but there is also no fun anymore
Nothing to do with gears. more to do with the player. If you dont improve your player skill, your team, there is no way you can do advance.
It is fun for a competent player regardless if they are a new player or not.
If you are not competent and leech most likely it will not be fun anymore. because someone used to carry the PuG advance pre DR who are most likely left PuGs for good.
These threads go around and around with the same people...they ignore the same things said in every thread that came before just like they will ignore the same things said in every thread that comes after.
You can't get X without doing or to get X you can only do...
...and in thread after thread, helpful folks point out all one can do to get X.
You need Y to do something...
...and in thread after thread, helpful folks point out how Y isn't needed in the least.
Hell, in some of the older threads that go on for a bit - they even forget that they've said stuff and people have already pointed out how wrong they are...and they post it again and again.
But it makes sense, cause they're also likely going to be the folks that say X doesn't tell you what you need to do or why something failed...where helpful folks point out that it does tell players what's needed and why it failed.
They're too busy making excuses to read...whether it's in the game or on the forums.
There also tends to be the strong tendency, laughable at times, for there to be an overwhelming amount of hypocrisy offered in their posts.
It's basically at the point where they should just be reported for trolling...
These threads go around and around with the same people...they ignore the same things said in every thread that came before just like they will ignore the same things said in every thread that comes after.
You can't get X without doing or to get X you can only do...
...and in thread after thread, helpful folks point out all one can do to get X.
You need Y to do something...
...and in thread after thread, helpful folks point out how Y isn't needed in the least.
Hell, in some of the older threads that go on for a bit - they even forget that they've said stuff and people have already pointed out how wrong they are...and they post it again and again.
But it makes sense, cause they're also likely going to be the folks that say X doesn't tell you what you need to do or why something failed...where helpful folks point out that it does tell players what's needed and why it failed.
They're too busy making excuses to read...whether it's in the game or on the forums.
It's basically at the point where they should just be reported for trolling...
No trolling, its just because different opinions on matter are around and the argumentation presented by the respective sides are simply not good enough to change anything about it.
I actually find the threads on topic more and more fun to watch. My favourites are those posts which try to point out how spoiled players should play, where they should earn they currencies and how fail criteria make people learn which difficulty setting they should stick to.
Best part about it is that none of it is going to happen. Why? Because players will play what they want and what they think they can and none of your 10.000 word postings will reach em. There have always been the wrong players in the wrong queues, players being disappointed in the pug they end up and those players thinking that they are any good when they play amongst elite premades ensuring them smooth sailing through PvE.
Perhaps its time one should get used to the fact that this is just the way it is.
Personally I will rejoice when cryptic finally takes away the fails in advanced mode because I suspect that those difficulty setting will get a massive influx of participants as result giving me back the pool of good and bad players alike I used to have before the change.
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Perhaps its time one should get used to the fact that this is just the way it is.
Thanks for reminding me of something I forgot in my previous post there...the laughable tendency toward hypocrisy offered by some of the posters.
edit: Course, some folks have definitely accepted that players are going to show up for content they're not prepared for...and...they've moved to channel/private runs of content. Which has contributed to the growing demise of the queues and started long before Delta Rising was ever hinted at. But if you want to defend those folks for contributing to the death of the queues by showing up like that...well, have fun with that.
edit2: Want to have folks get used to a good thing instead of a bad thing and thus act upon a good thing instead of a bad thing? Imagine if Cryptic gated the queues, so there was the least bit of confidence that the folks there were in someway actually ready for them? Those folks driven to private/channel runs because of the "bad" could return to the public queues because of the "good"...trippy, eh? Something that might actually bring some life back to the public queues instead of something that would just bring more life to the private/channel runs as more folks head off to those?
Spoiled and self entitled players like you and demanding like you want to do advance when you can get all the stuff you need at normal or at exchange.
Stuff like this makes me laugh so much. I guess alot of players are used to get screwed so much then only an attitudine like droping your pants and ask for some more TRIBBLE is acceptable. And its even more disturbing that they want other players to behave and think like them.:eek:
Like if a local store, that sold you some nice, juicy apples for 4-5 years, out of a sudden reprice those apples 10-11x times, and "for allmost the same price" starts to sell you some half rotten crapy little apples and told you thats what you wanted, you expect ppl not to express their disaproving with said store?? And called them entitled for that? Wow.
For real, the amount of stupidity on STO is really astonishing. I guess thats why the devs get away with so much and turned this game into TRIBBLE
Nothing to do with gears. more to do with the player. If you dont improve your player skill, your team, there is no way you can do advance.
Right...:rolleyes: In other words and in the majority of cases, player skill means succomb to the DPS BFAW idiocricy and denying other builds, wich were effective even in elites pre-DR.
There also tends to be the strong tendency, laughable at times, for there to be an overwhelming amount of hypocrisy offered in their posts.
It's basically at the point where they should just be reported for trolling...
Trus words there, but not as you may think. Its players like you that should be reported for trolling. It allmost looks like a broken record that repeat itselfs over and over. For post count or whatever...
Personally I will rejoice when cryptic finally takes away the fails in advanced mode because I suspect that those difficulty setting will get a massive influx of participants as result giving me back the pool of good and bad players alike I used to have before the change.
Same here. I am looking forward to these changes since i also think it will bring back more players into advanced queues, whatever good or bad ones. Diversity is allways good. Its soo boring and stupid in the same time what is now (boring BFAWs buidls mosty).
I've spent the past few days hitting up Normal queues with Meena, trying to get a better view on how things are going there with regard to what folks have been saying about Normal not teaching folks how to do Advanced.
It's kind of trippy, actually. Cause all the information is there for them to learn it if they want, but the general experience I had was there was absolutely no reason to learn it. Folks were just slaughtering things left, right, and center...to Hell with worrying about any kind of possible failure of an Optional...cause it's all but impossible to fail an Optional in Normal.
There were usually folks in the runs there that could have solo'd the run or 2-3 manned it depend on if the queue required the group to split up. Heh, it left me thinking again about the suggestion that the current Normal difficulty queues be tweaked and turned into solo missions for folks. Something that might require splitting up, having that removed so a single player could do it or having it in stages where they moved to the other areas or whatever.
The thing that struck me as the most odd about the situation, though, was even though folks were basically bulldozing their way through the run...the vast majority of folks appeared to know where to go for each bit. It was wham-bam-done over and over again as folks just ripped through it. Compare that to Advanced where there is the tendency for all sorts of stragglers and people chasing butterflies...it was mind-boggling.
Lol, left me wishing I had those folks that were running the Normals in Advanced instead of those few folks you run into from time to time in the actual Advanced.
Engagement done...folks off to the next part...off to the next part. Group needs to split up...group splits up...group gets back together...it gets back together.
I saw more folks that had a clue about the content in a few days of doing Normal than I've seen in the past few weeks of doing Advanced. It's mind-boggling...and just lends itself to the complaints about folks leeching or trolling in Advanced and why they really want the changes made.
Stuff like this makes me laugh so much. I guess alot of players are used to get screwed so much then only an attitudine like droping your pants and ask for some more TRIBBLE is acceptable. And its even more disturbing that they want other players to behave and think like them.:eek:
Like if a local store, that sold you some nice, juicy apples for 4-5 years, out of a sudden reprice those apples 10-11x times, and "for allmost the same price" starts to sell you some half rotten crapy little apples and told you thats what you wanted, you expect ppl not to express their disaproving with said store?? And called them entitled for that? Wow.
For real, the amount of stupidity on STO is really astonishing. I guess thats why the devs get away with so much and turned this game into TRIBBLE
Look in the mirror dude. Players refuse to improve themselves, players refuse to o play with better teams, players refuse to go down to normal if they refuse the first 2, now with what you said, even players refuse to buy stuff in the exchange and get stuff at normal even they refuse all the rest I said.
spoiled and self entitled written all over what you said. Might as well let them mail us the rewards rather than cater to nerf advance,
Right...:rolleyes: In other words and in the majority of cases, player skill means succomb to the DPS BFAW idiocricy and denying other builds, wich were effective even in elites pre-DR.
You dont need skill in bfaw because? Why don't I see you breezing through the content like the experts of bfaw is a no skill ability right? But then again this advance whining thread is the opposite of bfaw require no skill. If bfaw doesn't need skill shouldn't be there no more advance whining thread because you don't need skill to use bfaw and everyone should be breezing advance content.
But this thread proves that you need skill to play the game.
I've spent the past few days hitting up Normal queues with Meena, trying to get a better view on how things are going there with regard to what folks have been saying about Normal not teaching folks how to do Advanced.
It's kind of trippy, actually. Cause all the information is there for them to learn it if they want, but the general experience I had was there was absolutely no reason to learn it. Folks were just slaughtering things left, right, and center...to Hell with worrying about any kind of possible failure of an Optional...cause it's all but impossible to fail an Optional in Normal.
There were usually folks in the runs there that could have solo'd the run or 2-3 manned it depend on if the queue required the group to split up. Heh, it left me thinking again about the suggestion that the current Normal difficulty queues be tweaked and turned into solo missions for folks. Something that might require splitting up, having that removed so a single player could do it or having it in stages where they moved to the other areas or whatever.
The thing that struck me as the most odd about the situation, though, was even though folks were basically bulldozing their way through the run...the vast majority of folks appeared to know where to go for each bit. It was wham-bam-done over and over again as folks just ripped through it. Compare that to Advanced where there is the tendency for all sorts of stragglers and people chasing butterflies...it was mind-boggling.
Lol, left me wishing I had those folks that were running the Normals in Advanced instead of those few folks you run into from time to time in the actual Advanced.
Engagement done...folks off to the next part...off to the next part. Group needs to split up...group splits up...group gets back together...it gets back together.
I saw more folks that had a clue about the content in a few days of doing Normal than I've seen in the past few weeks of doing Advanced. It's mind-boggling...and just lends itself to the complaints about folks leeching or trolling in Advanced and why they really want the changes made.
Pretty much this, most people who know how to play but cant afford to upgrade go Normal, most people who can afford to upgrade go advanced.
HOWEVER, there are those inbetween which is actually quite a lot of people who just want to get the most marks they can without over doing etc only probably havent upgraded everything and still treating the queues like they were from before DR.
Generally nobody can ingnore the inheret DPS gap needed between Advanced and Normal (all queues) but after talking to a few who've done advanced because they felt they had no other choice (because it would of taken them years to get anything decent gear wise or it felt like it) those people seem kinda desperate as they seem to love the game but lack the reasources to fully enjoy the game.
The insta-fails just made things 10x worse for those who cant afford to improve their stuff. Sad truth is this entire thing extends beyond azura. what you've described virus is essentially the exact same scenario for every single queue out their with advanced difficulty.
as for whats to learn nearly all the queues are extremely straight forward. As for anyone not understanding them...well....
Thanks for reminding me of something I forgot in my previous post there...the laughable tendency toward hypocrisy offered by some of the posters.
edit: Course, some folks have definitely accepted that players are going to show up for content they're not prepared for...and...they've moved to channel/private runs of content. Which has contributed to the growing demise of the queues and started long before Delta Rising was ever hinted at. But if you want to defend those folks for contributing to the death of the queues by showing up like that...well, have fun with that.
Yep I defenetly belive that the removement of fails will attract a huge group of bad and good players back to the queues. Why? Because the likeliness of mixed team form ups will bring back some reason and fun to PvE and give an alternative to oh cool we made Nukara Transdim in 2:40 or man, somebody gave the wrong answer on the last suspect in Undine infiltration and we are done here? elite channels or pugs currently provide.
As far as your Hypocrite or Defend terms toward me are concerned, its your call and I choose not to comment. In my opinion everybody will and probably should play the way he/she sees fit and any attempts to change that will likely be wasted because they wont happen anyway.
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As far as your Hypocrite or Defend terms toward me are concerned, its your call and I choose not to comment. In my opinion everybody will and probably should play the way he/she sees fit and any attempts to change that will likely be wasted because they wont happen anyway.
It reminded me of some of the conversations that go like this...
Tom: People that aren't prepared for Advanced, should stick to Normal until they are prepared for Advanced.
Jerry: Don't tell people where they should play. You should go do Elites and leave people alone.
...where Jerry doesn't even realize what he's just said. Don't tell people where to play, but then he tells Tom where to go play.
With what struck me odd about what you said there...with how it contradicted what you said there.
People should accept things...but you can't wait for the change. Well, looking forward to a change isn't accepting things. It's wanting a change and not accepting things. So telling folks to accept things...while wanting a change...tada.
It tends to get into that world wrapped around the pinky thing, where everybody else needs to accept what you want but you don't have to accept anything they want or what already exists in the case of you're wanting a change.
Yep I defenetly belive that the removement of fails will attract a huge group of bad and good players back to the queues. Why? Because the likeliness of mixed team form ups will bring back some reason and fun to PvE and give an alternative to oh cool we made Nukara Transdim in 2:40 or man, somebody gave the wrong answer on the last suspect in Undine infiltration and we are done here? elite channels or pugs currently provide.
Why don't I see the current anra overpopulating more than ISA and cca or even the new stfs? Because if a higher playerbase was the same sentiment as those whining about advance, based on your assumption that is a huge playerbase, shouldn't point to the population metrics agree to that wherin anra outpopulate all advance STFs?
Vd, summed it up very nicely stating that he saw more competency in normal than advance. So that those havin a hard time completing advance and whining about advance in the forums are just leeches themselves trying to package themselves as victims, majorities, casuals, and/or the only playerbase.
A) Those have stayed in Normal and avoided Advanced because of a variety of reasons. Those that muddle through with Advanced.
C) Those that have taken to private/channel runs for Advanced.
How does changing the Mandatory Objective to an Optional Objective offer an incentive to players from those three groups to change what they're doing?
With Group A, if the sole reason they were avoiding Advanced was because of the Mandatory Objective - then they may head right for Advanced. What are they going to encounter there? Cause the Objective being Mandatory or Optional is not the only difference between Normal and Advanced. It can take 4-5x the DPS to complete an Advanced in the same time as one was doing a Normal. Meaning that if the DPS does not change, one would be looking at the run taking 4-5x or longer - likely longer, cause there will probably be more deaths involved in the Advanced than there was in the Normal as well. For something like ANRA where it is a fixed time, that doesn't really matter - it takes the same length of time. Others though, they can easily get into well beyond that 4-5x time to complete it. So at what point do those particular members develop other reasons to avoid Advanced as they run into a time consuming sour experience vs. doing whatever else they might be doing and having fun otherwise, eh?
With Group B, how many of those folks have stuck to doing Advanced because of the percentage of people being at least somewhat prepared for the content? If you change that percentage, if you have them facing an increased number of people that are not prepared - meaning that their runs will get hit by the double whammy of not only taking longer but also rewarding less in the end...will they finally give up on public queues and move off to private/channel runs of some sort?
With Group C, having already moved to those private/channel runs - why would they return to face the same issue that's been driving people to private/channel runs for years now?
* * * * *
Just how is it supposed to make the queues grow?
It would be one thing if it were way back in the day where one had to hit up the queues for things, but folks complained for years about that - so Cryptic's made it pretty damn easy and in some cases far more efficient to ignore the queues.
People that might have had to put up with a run that failed every optional and took 20-30 minutes aren't stuck with that...don't have to put up with that in the least.
So how is going back to that situation, without the being stuck with it part, supposed to help the public queues grow? Hell, not being stuck with that situation has played a big part in the public queues dwindling as well. Folks might put up with a lack of fun to a degree if there's a need, but if there's no need either...?
Obviously different people have fun in different ways, I like hitting up Advanced queues knowing that there is a chance of failure and it's not just going to be a case of seeing how fast one can steal candy from the baby...others enjoy a quick 'n easy run. I just have a hard time buying into folks saying they have fun with all but complete failure for an extended period of time...but hey, maybe that's what they enjoy. Different folks...
* * * * *
Imagine if they had adjusted the randomness of the spawns in ANRA instead of the changes they made, eh? So that they provided a consistent level of difficulty instead of a varied one? So that folks knew what they were getting into there at the start...rather than it might be painfully easy on one run and brutally hard on the other.
Imagine if the various queues that have trollable Objectives that could sink the run in the blink of an eye simply didn't have those and everybody making a good faith effort actually had a shot without worrying about somebody coming along for their lawlz, yeah?
Imagine if a Normal queue wasn't easier than a 5-man Normal episode and did a little bit better job preparing folks if they wanted to move on to Advanced or beyond?
There are all sorts of issues with the various queues...I just don't see how introducing old issues again is supposed to fix that...
People should accept things...but you can't wait for the change. Well, looking forward to a change isn't accepting things. It's wanting a change and not accepting things. So telling folks to accept things...while wanting a change...tada.
Lol, kk got you and that appears to be contradicting. Well obviously the game has rules, ether to our (infinite individuals playing STO) liking or our disliking. As of late those rules keep on changing here and there forcing everybody to adapt and readapted. What I tried to say is that, despite having a personal preference how I want things to be, I do have limited means to turn things into how I wish em to be. Especially when it comes to players of different skill and standing. I have learned that accepting them all and even making them part of my game experience works best and for me is even the key to set pretty much the only long term fun in STO for myself.
As far as get used to how it is is concerned I do so a lot. I do so by means of pugging, using elite DPS channels and friendliest as well as fleet. Im trying to make the best out of it and it works. Since DR it works just a lot harder because what I seek for (most) fun (for me) are mixed team constellations of players of different skill and standing to allow me for a challenging game atmosphere. Now going into a pug or doing so with a friend or fleet mate plays a crucial role there as u may imagine. But sadly, the supply of pugs has dried up a lot and so has the element of surprise I encounter on the same handful of maps I play for 3 years making the game less interesting for me. Naturally I dont want that to happen and I think getting right of advanced fails will do me a favour there.
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Vd, summed it up very nicely stating that he saw more competency in normal than advance. So that those havin a hard time completing advance and whining about advance in the forums are just leeches themselves trying to package themselves as victims, majorities, casuals, and/or the only playerbase.
It was mind-boggling. Yeah, sure the DPS was generally much lower than one would see in Advanced for a same duration run, but for the most part everybody appeared to have an idea of what needed to be done. I just did an ISN cause I wanted to grab some numbers for my last post, but yeah - it was a trip and it represented what I generally saw with the various queues.
ISN: People waited for pets, cloaked folks had time to move into flanking positions and prepare for ambushes, and then the initial engagement began. Folks knew they were heading left, so the combat flowed toward the left. When that initial engagement completed, folks were already moving toward the left Trans. A guy remained halfway there and dropped out the GW for the Nanites. The Gens/Trans taken care of, folks knowing they were heading right, the combat flowed right, and people moved into the Nanties...combat continuing to flow right...as they made their way to the right Trans. Same as with the left, wham, bam, no communication - just folks flowing as if they'd done this before. Combat moving to the left, knowing they were heading back to the Gateway/Cube, and as the Nanites were taken care of - the flow continued into the Gateway - leaving the Cube for the wrap up.
It was like that time after time...just like the other queues demonstrated that folks had an idea of what they were doing as they split up and went where they were needed with the combat flowing toward the next area.
ISA: Somebody charges into the Cube before everybody is even completed the map transfer. People chase the Spheres to the four corners of the map. They're finally dead, but folks have burned their Evasives or don't change their Subsystem Power...so the two guys that are actually over by the left Trans decide to take out the Cube while waiting on the rest to get over there. But that doesn't quite happen. Cause two of them will engage the Sphere closer to the warp-in than the Trans. The third guy's still making his way over and as soon as he's in range - he unloads everything into that first Gen. Okay then, the three can quickly pop the other Gens and get stuck into the Trans while the other two deal with the Nanites, right? Nope...not at all. You're left with two guys getting the Gens down and firing on the Transformer. Cause when that first Gen popped...Spheres spawned at the Trans. Obviously they have to be dealt with! So those three players chase those Spheres around the map plinking at them, ignoring the Transformer, and ignoring the Nanites coming. Queue fails.
And it's just downright twisted how often that will happen. So it becomes a case of upgrading/changing the build one has - to do 2-4x the actual DPS required for the run for an individual, while also needing to carry the crowd control, and tossing out heals for folks that might never leave the spawn again if they die.
It's just mind-boggling. Could give the guys from ISN 2-5k more DPS and they'd slaughter ISA...those guys in ISA couldn't slaughter ISA with 2-5x more DPS while they're off lollygagging, chasing butterflies, and getting lost in Exploration Clusters. Cause ISA rarely fails from my experience because of a lack of DPS, but rather it fails from how that DPS is applied.
edit: I'd say I jinxed myself...but I'm used to it happening these days...but yeah, the ISA I just ran went pretty much like that.
Why don't I see the current anra overpopulating more than ISA and cca or even the new stfs? Because if a higher playerbase was the same sentiment as those whining about advance, based on your assumption that is a huge playerbase, shouldn't point to the population metrics agree to that wherin anra outpopulate all advance STFs?
Vd, summed it up very nicely stating that he saw more competency in normal than advance. So that those havin a hard time completing advance and whining about advance in the forums are just leeches themselves trying to package themselves as victims, majorities, casuals, and/or the only playerbase.
You bring up anar? Its a bad example because the rng reward generator on that map works worse than rng pug generator for drse. Uhm for good and players that is.
As far as your and Viruss estimates for repopulating queues with removing fails is concerned I think speculation over it can be concluded best by the outcome we will witness when the changes are made. My feeling is that it will, however your augmentations also holds some merit.
Cryptic seems to be committed to the change and its not as if anybody around here could do a great deal about it anyway aside from representing it through ones game play the past 6 months.
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As far as get used to how it is is concerned I do so a lot. I do so by means of pugging, using elite DPS channels and friendliest as well as fleet. Im trying to make the best out of it and it works. Since DR it works just a lot harder because what I seek for (most) fun (for me) are mixed team constellations of players of different skill and standing to allow me for a challenging game atmosphere. Now going into a pug or doing so with a friend or fleet mate plays a crucial role there as u may imagine. But sadly, the supply of pugs has dried up a lot and so has the element of surprise I encounter on the same handful of maps I play for 3 years making the game less interesting for me. Naturally I dont want that to happen and I think getting right of advanced fails will do me a favour there.
Pugging old Elites and current Advanced, public pugging - not channel pugs/trade pugs/etc...is something that I've done cause I'm more interested in the challenge of "if" as opposed to the challenge of "how fast"...and I go back and forth depending on the thread (and my mood) as to whether I'll make the comment about stealing candy from a baby or offering props for the accomplishment of doing what they do. It's just not my thing. I want that group that has a shot at something, an actual chance, where the outcome is in question - not the group that there's no question other than how fast it will be done.
In other games over the years, hitting up pug queues has generally involved folks that understand everybody has to contribute for a chance to get it done. It's only with older/outdated content that it gets more into the realm of folks being overgeared and somebody not having to pull their weight in it. Folks that can do more move on to do more - whether harder levels of that dungeon or heading off to raid.
STO on the other hand...just doesn't have that. We just had S10 drop...and...it might as well be queues that were added back during S5. Hell, the queues back during S5 were harder than they are now. The sheer amount of powercreep since S6 through now...where most folks are being dumped in the same queues...has led to all sorts of folks knowing that they don't have to bother much at all. There's a pretty good chance that they can get carried...and...they really only run into problems if there are more folks like them in that particular run, because then there's not enough folks actually prepared and trying.
STO doesn't have any form of gating to try to make sure the folks are anywhere near prepared and are going to try...outside of the Mandatory Objectives. Course, I hate how are some are trollable and think that needs to be addressed. Otherwise though, they're that litmus test for the group. Cause a group can successfully complete the Mandatory and still fail the remaining Optionals. It's just a test of whether the group is potentially ready for the rest to come or not...and then it goes from there.
Remove that...and...well, then the odds of ever finding that "if" challenge disappear. Odds will shift more to folks that just don't care about doing anything just so they can get the end reward.
And then for me...there's just no reason to bother any more.
And with that...is why I've basically changed my stance on making things available outside of queues. I used to argue they would kill the queues (and I believe that's played a heavy role in it). But since I'm not a "how fast" guy and the "if" is being taken away...then Hell yeah, I want pretty shinies on my builds...let me get them without having to go anywhere near a queue.
Course, I'm muddling through with this Delta Recruit with a No-Fleet B'rel...for a group of folks that have talked about trying to take BoPs into Advanced/Elite queues...and I'm kidding myself to think that I'd likely ever actually queue up with folks to do it; but it's giving me a reason to play in a game that at this point I just don't have any other reason to play.
PvP (an "if" challenge) is pretty much dead. Advanced Queues (an "if" challenge) are pretty much going to be dead. So I'm kind of left clinging to the "if" of what a group of BoPs may or may not be able to do...I'm trying to picture 5x BoPs in a HSE...better load up on components, lol.
Pugging old Elites and current Advanced, public pugging - not channel pugs/trade pugs/etc...is something that I've done cause I'm more interested in the challenge of "if" as opposed to the challenge of "how fast"...and I go back and forth depending on the thread (and my mood) as to whether I'll make the comment about stealing candy from a baby or offering props for the accomplishment of doing what they do. It's just not my thing. I want that group that has a shot at something, an actual chance, where the outcome is in question - not the group that there's no question other than how fast it will be done.
In other games over the years, hitting up pug queues has generally involved folks that understand everybody has to contribute for a chance to get it done. It's only with older/outdated content that it gets more into the realm of folks being overgeared and somebody not having to pull their weight in it. Folks that can do more move on to do more - whether harder levels of that dungeon or heading off to raid.
STO on the other hand...just doesn't have that. We just had S10 drop...and...it might as well be queues that were added back during S5. Hell, the queues back during S5 were harder than they are now. The sheer amount of powercreep since S6 through now...where most folks are being dumped in the same queues...has led to all sorts of folks knowing that they don't have to bother much at all. There's a pretty good chance that they can get carried...and...they really only run into problems if there are more folks like them in that particular run, because then there's not enough folks actually prepared and trying.
STO doesn't have any form of gating to try to make sure the folks are anywhere near prepared and are going to try...outside of the Mandatory Objectives. Course, I hate how are some are trollable and think that needs to be addressed. Otherwise though, they're that litmus test for the group. Cause a group can successfully complete the Mandatory and still fail the remaining Optionals. It's just a test of whether the group is potentially ready for the rest to come or not...and then it goes from there.
Remove that...and...well, then the odds of ever finding that "if" challenge disappear. Odds will shift more to folks that just don't care about doing anything just so they can get the end reward.
And then for me...there's just no reason to bother any more.
And with that...is why I've basically changed my stance on making things available outside of queues. I used to argue they would kill the queues (and I believe that's played a heavy role in it). But since I'm not a "how fast" guy and the "if" is being taken away...then Hell yeah, I want pretty shinies on my builds...let me get them without having to go anywhere near a queue.
Course, I'm muddling through with this Delta Recruit with a No-Fleet B'rel...for a group of folks that have talked about trying to take BoPs into Advanced/Elite queues...and I'm kidding myself to think that I'd likely ever actually queue up with folks to do it; but it's giving me a reason to play in a game that at this point I just don't have any other reason to play.
PvP (an "if" challenge) is pretty much dead. Advanced Queues (an "if" challenge) are pretty much going to be dead. So I'm kind of left clinging to the "if" of what a group of BoPs may or may not be able to do...I'm trying to picture 5x BoPs in a HSE...better load up on components, lol.
Think I feel you through there, especially the last part.
Perhaps the troublesome part for many about the if component is the way some are implemented. You know back in S5 we had some, few ok, ifs but they at least were around.
I remember 3 years ago that getting past the reformer chain in CGE was an if for some teams to handle. Or we will make IGE if we can get straight with Becca. Now those at least were some real team interacting thingies were clear role distributions and attention to details were the key to success. Nowadays most of these ifs just feel poorly implemented where you try to beat some background timer or where single mistakes of an individual often cannot be compensated by the rest of the group. I belive that to be the reason what turns a lot of peeps off.
Well despite of that I remain optimistic. On some of the recent occasions cryptic brought in some interesting aspects where fails provided some good ifs. Bug hunt seems to be favoured. Clearing the alert bugs can be done by individuals and the brain bug at the end can also post a challenge where a team has to beat an if(meh but there again u also get a timer).
The 3 new PvEs? I love em all. We have a DPS feast, a non DPS map and probably the best new ground setting around since IGE. Saving the Orion a wonderfull if.
What Im trying to say is that ifs will still be around in elite mode for us to handle. My hope is that a lot players who do not bother much or just want to grab fast currencies for their gear will sit happily in advanced by then (which also includes me on occasion) while only those who care to beat an if will head into elite (which also includes me on occasion). Post DR normal mode just feels too annoyingly easy (an rarely includes me on occasion).
But who am I to fool myself heh?
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I've spent the past few days hitting up Normal queues with Meena, trying to get a better view on how things are going there with regard to what folks have been saying about Normal not teaching folks how to do Advanced.
It's kind of trippy, actually. Cause all the information is there for them to learn it if they want, but the general experience I had was there was absolutely no reason to learn it. Folks were just slaughtering things left, right, and center...to Hell with worrying about any kind of possible failure of an Optional...cause it's all but impossible to fail an Optional in Normal.
There were usually folks in the runs there that could have solo'd the run or 2-3 manned it depend on if the queue required the group to split up. Heh, it left me thinking again about the suggestion that the current Normal difficulty queues be tweaked and turned into solo missions for folks. Something that might require splitting up, having that removed so a single player could do it or having it in stages where they moved to the other areas or whatever.
The thing that struck me as the most odd about the situation, though, was even though folks were basically bulldozing their way through the run...the vast majority of folks appeared to know where to go for each bit. It was wham-bam-done over and over again as folks just ripped through it. Compare that to Advanced where there is the tendency for all sorts of stragglers and people chasing butterflies...it was mind-boggling.
Lol, left me wishing I had those folks that were running the Normals in Advanced instead of those few folks you run into from time to time in the actual Advanced.
Engagement done...folks off to the next part...off to the next part. Group needs to split up...group splits up...group gets back together...it gets back together.
I saw more folks that had a clue about the content in a few days of doing Normal than I've seen in the past few weeks of doing Advanced. It's mind-boggling...and just lends itself to the complaints about folks leeching or trolling in Advanced and why they really want the changes made.
So why aren't these knowledgeable people doing advanced? If they are so knowledgeable about the queue and can handle normal easily, why not take the next step to advanced and get a bit more for it? Isn't that the logical step? What is holding them back?
If that team does so well in normal, does that actually make them in any way capable for advanced? Or do they not want to waste their time on the chance of a failure, and have given up trying advanced at all?
I don't know if it has been done, but I'm curious how a team parses in normal versus how they parse in advanced. Doing the same thing in the same group with the same ships in a group that doesn't overpower the content significantly, how big of a gap is there?
I don't believe they would parse the same at all, and end up doing less DPS in advanced than normal. If that is true, that is just part of the problem, you can think you're ready for advanced with normal, but you aren't actually, because normal doesn't actually prepare you for advanced's requirements.
Pretty much this, most people who know how to play but cant afford to upgrade go Normal, most people who can afford to upgrade go advanced.
HOWEVER, there are those inbetween which is actually quite a lot of people who just want to get the most marks they can without over doing etc only probably havent upgraded everything and still treating the queues like they were from before DR.
Generally nobody can ingnore the inheret DPS gap needed between Advanced and Normal (all queues) but after talking to a few who've done advanced because they felt they had no other choice (because it would of taken them years to get anything decent gear wise or it felt like it) those people seem kinda desperate as they seem to love the game but lack the reasources to fully enjoy the game.
The insta-fails just made things 10x worse for those who cant afford to improve their stuff. Sad truth is this entire thing extends beyond azura. what you've described virus is essentially the exact same scenario for every single queue out their with advanced difficulty.
as for whats to learn nearly all the queues are extremely straight forward. As for anyone not understanding them...well....
I think this is a very big issue as well. Upgrades are exceedingly expensive. But generally the cheapest way to get parts for them is by doing advanced queues. It has been said and is generally true, upgrades aren't required to do advanced, yet if most people underperform as it is, they kinda do need them.
You can get marks through advanced but Advanced and Elite materials? Hardly. You can now convert 100 marks to one Datacore, Processor etc. once a day. But still with about 15 marks you need7 games to get enough to convert them and then 2 games for the daily and some more if you want to save some for gear.
15 marks is only handed from a few normal, otherwise you can obtain generous amounts from quite a few normal and, other locations that offer daily marks + elite marks so, there is no actual excuses on their part for this at all! None!
Now way back, as the missions still were fun there were reasonable optionals.
Fun, reasonable optionals, back in the day was a joke, a complete joke challenge wise, now it is made you know, actually challenging and, shows just how bad players are and, which ones aren't bad.
You could save all crewmembers in "Manus" but you didn't have to because the important thing was to kill Manus.
Back then you had 15 minutes to destroy the IMRs in "Khitomer in Stasis" and then more time to complete the mission.
Now someone mixed that up you only have 15 minutes no matter what. If you can't destroy them in 15 mins. mission and optional fail and if you do destroy them you win the mission and the optional. Why do we have almost 25 minutes for Khitomers optional if the mission is lost or won after 15 min? Yes you still have to kill Tosk but there is no timer for that.
There is no sense in that.
And no need for all those not important things to be mandatory.
And there are many thready about how messed up the Advanced PvEs are, the empty queues support that.
I often read or heard that Advanced was supposed to be like the old Elite. Its far from that.
There's the nail on the head I see all too often, you all want it easy street, like the easy street of old, the complete joke called elites, well as of right now, get over it because they are designed to be a challenge, not the walk in the park you all want it to be.
And you dont have to be rude and call other players trolls. If you are soo good thats fine. Not everyone is. And maybe you could see the obvious: Most public queues are empty or almost empty. Even those that had 30-40 games running before. Good players/good fleets make private queues but
1. that s not the purpose of the PvEs, to be only for fleets/private group
and 2. what about the newbies who just don't have good gear yet and need to do those missions with mediocre gear?
I did several of the old Elites, space and Ground and had no problem whatsoever with ym Blue Mk XI gear. Now i do have problems with my UR Mk XIII/XIV gear even though i invested in Spire consoles, Rep. system gear, Romulan Embassy BOffs, Crafted UR Antiprotons. I usually don' t die (much) unless i have a bad day but there is also no fun anymore
Only excuse here, is they and you are not adequate enough of a player, I get the same things done with mkxi gear, using my own builds, not needing none of that upgraded stuff and, shows just how wrong minded people think when they say they have to have it and, than find it doesn't actually improve their chances for success, as it is them that doesn't succeed.
Stuff like this makes me laugh so much. I guess alot of players are used to get screwed so much then only an attitudine like droping your pants and ask for some more TRIBBLE is acceptable. And its even more disturbing that they want other players to behave and think like them.:eek:
Like if a local store, that sold you some nice, juicy apples for 4-5 years, out of a sudden reprice those apples 10-11x times, and "for allmost the same price" starts to sell you some half rotten crapy little apples and told you thats what you wanted, you expect ppl not to express their disaproving with said store?? And called them entitled for that? Wow.
For real, the amount of stupidity on STO is really astonishing. I guess thats why the devs get away with so much and turned this game into TRIBBLE
No, the spoiled entitled ones, want bigger apples at half the cost of what they used to get, that is the issue as of late.
Right...:rolleyes: In other words and in the majority of cases, player skill means succomb to the DPS BFAW idiocricy and denying other builds, wich were effective even in elites pre-DR.
What was as you say effective in pre-dr elites, are now shown to be a complete joke, just like the old elites were, the people who have adapted to this change, have moved on, those still flabbergasted/stubborn/dumbfounded, have not.
Trus words there, but not as you may think. Its players like you that should be reported for trolling. It allmost looks like a broken record that repeat itselfs over and over. For post count or whatever...
Same here. I am looking forward to these changes since i also think it will bring back more players into advanced queues, whatever good or bad ones. Diversity is allways good. Its soo boring and stupid in the same time what is now (boring BFAWs buidls mosty).
So like others, you don't mind leeching off of you, you don't mind team members not helping, just so long as it is a complete walk in the park for you?
Pretty much this, most people who know how to play but cant afford to upgrade go Normal, most people who can afford to upgrade go advanced.
Can't afford is their excuse way to often and, sorry but it isn't a good enough one, I have outfitted new alts with just random loot and succeed just fine, able to easily afford exchange lockbox loot just fine and, they could to.
It's their refusal to do so, not that they cannot afford it, it is their own doing!
HOWEVER, there are those inbetween which is actually quite a lot of people who just want to get the most marks they can without over doing etc only probably havent upgraded everything and still treating the queues like they were from before DR.
Generally nobody can ingnore the inheret DPS gap needed between Advanced and Normal (all queues) but after talking to a few who've done advanced because they felt they had no other choice (because it would of taken them years to get anything decent gear wise or it felt like it) those people seem kinda desperate as they seem to love the game but lack the reasources to fully enjoy the game.
The insta-fails just made things 10x worse for those who cant afford to improve their stuff. Sad truth is this entire thing extends beyond azura. what you've described virus is essentially the exact same scenario for every single queue out their with advanced difficulty.
as for whats to learn nearly all the queues are extremely straight forward. As for anyone not understanding them...well....
All to often, the ones wanting the changes, boils down to being!
1: I am a leecher
2: I am to lazy
3: I shouldn't have to change
4: I shouldn't have to try
5: I shouldn't have to improve
6: I want it all handed to me
7: I like trolling others
Those wanting it changed because these above listed ruin the missions for them, should be discouraging the changes and, vouching for a way to have the above segregated in some fashion.
Otherwise, they are fine with people listed above and, are in turn encouraging this behavior.
I've spent the past few days hitting up Normal queues with Meena, trying to get a better view on how things are going there with regard to what folks have been saying about Normal not teaching folks how to do Advanced.
It's kind of trippy, actually. Cause all the information is there for them to learn it if they want, but the general experience I had was there was absolutely no reason to learn it. Folks were just slaughtering things left, right, and center...to Hell with worrying about any kind of possible failure of an Optional...cause it's all but impossible to fail an Optional in Normal.
There were usually folks in the runs there that could have solo'd the run or 2-3 manned it depend on if the queue required the group to split up. Heh, it left me thinking again about the suggestion that the current Normal difficulty queues be tweaked and turned into solo missions for folks. Something that might require splitting up, having that removed so a single player could do it or having it in stages where they moved to the other areas or whatever.
The thing that struck me as the most odd about the situation, though, was even though folks were basically bulldozing their way through the run...the vast majority of folks appeared to know where to go for each bit. It was wham-bam-done over and over again as folks just ripped through it. Compare that to Advanced where there is the tendency for all sorts of stragglers and people chasing butterflies...it was mind-boggling.
Lol, left me wishing I had those folks that were running the Normals in Advanced instead of those few folks you run into from time to time in the actual Advanced.
Engagement done...folks off to the next part...off to the next part. Group needs to split up...group splits up...group gets back together...it gets back together.
I saw more folks that had a clue about the content in a few days of doing Normal than I've seen in the past few weeks of doing Advanced. It's mind-boggling...and just lends itself to the complaints about folks leeching or trolling in Advanced and why they really want the changes made.
Here's the thing though Virus, in many case, actually getting the optional in a normal, grants them 50% - 100% more marks, than just completing it alone so, those complaining of getting a small amount of marks, simply have no excuses other than they cause it upon themselves.
Plain and simple!!!
The ones complaining of not getting elite materials, because only advanced has them to offer, is simply looking for an easy handout, if they aren't willing to put the effort into getting them.
That is the only major difference between normal and advanced, because elite marks can be obtained via other means, thru mark trade-ins, thru different mission dailies outside of queues so, there excuses fall flat here.
Elite crafting materials are cheap on the exchange so, even they could afford them but, they simply refuse to buy them and/or, make the full effort in obtaining them thru actual effort!
Here's the thing though Virus, in many case, actually getting the optional in a normal, grants them 50% - 100% more marks, than just completing it alone so, those complaining of getting a small amount of marks, simply have no excuses other than they cause it upon themselves.
Plain and simple!!!
The ones complaining of not getting elite materials, because only advanced has them to offer, is simply looking for an easy handout, if they aren't willing to put the effort into getting them.
That is the only major difference between normal and advanced, because elite marks can be obtained via other means, thru mark trade-ins, thru different mission dailies outside of queues so, there excuses fall flat here.
Elite crafting materials are cheap on the exchange so, even they could afford them but, they simply refuse to buy them and/or, make the full effort in obtaining them thru actual effort!
I want the elite crafting materials. I can do Advanced well enough when I have a reasonable group of people to the STF's with. I am not good enough to carry others, so I expect others to make that effort. Fails happen because others don't do well enough for me.
And the only reason I do the Advanced queues is to get the Elite Mats. If there was another method to get the Elite mats, I would do it and leave the headache of the unreliable Advanced queues.
As for Buying in th Exchange, I hate playing the economic games. I don't like the part of the game where money making is the point. (I also don't play ferengi's lol) So saying that buying things off the exchange is cheap assumes that people are makeing EC's. I don't have that much in EC's. Last O looked I had around 500k. And I keep using it on DOff missions and leveling my Iconian rep on the one Fed that is my primary crafter.
So I work for the Elite Mats by suffering through Advanced queue failures just so that I can get 1 mat of a specific type that I don't have. All of this is not complaints on my part. I am not saying to give me the mats. Just to make it possible that one person can keep me from getting the mats. Or create a way that Solo player can acquire those mats by.
And I do realize that the game has upped the HP bags on the NPC's. The fun I had running through Delta Rising with my mixed bag of Tier X/XI/XII gear in elite mode, before I figured out that the last mandatory Patrol mission I was not going to be able to complete because it could out heal my damage was a heartache. And funny, since I didn't realize I was on Elite mode for the missions till then. Switching to Normal at that point, and that's when I could understand why people were able to complete the content so easily. I had made it unecessarily hard on me. It was fun playing at that level, but until that last patrol. That last patrol was not too frustrating fo rme to be happy about the game for a time.
I want the elite crafting materials. I can do Advanced well enough when I have a reasonable group of people to the STF's with. I am not good enough to carry others, so I expect others to make that effort. Fails happen because others don't do well enough for me.
And the only reason I do the Advanced queues is to get the Elite Mats. If there was another method to get the Elite mats, I would do it and leave the headache of the unreliable Advanced queues.
There you go, you realize you cannot carry the PuGs. The team is the problem. Find a better team to finish.
As for Buying in th Exchange, I hate playing the economic games. I don't like the part of the game where money making is the point. (I also don't play ferengi's lol) So saying that buying things off the exchange is cheap assumes that people are makeing EC's. I don't have that much in EC's. Last O looked I had around 500k. And I keep using it on DOff missions and leveling my Iconian rep on the one Fed that is my primary crafter.
So I work for the Elite Mats by suffering through Advanced queue failures just so that I can get 1 mat of a specific type that I don't have. All of this is not complaints on my part. I am not saying to give me the mats. Just to make it possible that one person can keep me from getting the mats. Or create a way that Solo player can acquire those mats by.
If you dont have the time to grind the EC buy the Ec thru Zen. EC is all about time or real money. No need to play economics if you are a casual player. You are a casual player right?
Like your previous posts in this thread, Dont make lousy excuses that you dont have time but dont have money , still want all these rewards and claim to be casual.
And I do realize that the game has upped the HP bags on the NPC's. The fun I had running through Delta Rising with my mixed bag of Tier X/XI/XII gear in elite mode, before I figured out that the last mandatory Patrol mission I was not going to be able to complete because it could out heal my damage was a heartache. And funny, since I didn't realize I was on Elite mode for the missions till then. Switching to Normal at that point, and that's when I could understand why people were able to complete the content so easily. I had made it unecessarily hard on me. It was fun playing at that level, but until that last patrol. That last patrol was not too frustrating fo rme to be happy about the game for a time.
You do realize you just contradicted yourself. You say NPCs are just HP bags. Then you say they healed beyond what you can deal DPS because they are elite. What are they to you just HP bags or mobs that can self heal?
I want the elite crafting materials. I can do Advanced well enough when I have a reasonable group of people to the STF's with. I am not good enough to carry others, so I expect others to make that effort. Fails happen because others don't do well enough for me.
And the only reason I do the Advanced queues is to get the Elite Mats. If there was another method to get the Elite mats, I would do it and leave the headache of the unreliable Advanced queues.
As for Buying in th Exchange, I hate playing the economic games. I don't like the part of the game where money making is the point. (I also don't play ferengi's lol) So saying that buying things off the exchange is cheap assumes that people are makeing EC's. I don't have that much in EC's. Last O looked I had around 500k. And I keep using it on DOff missions and leveling my Iconian rep on the one Fed that is my primary crafter.
So I work for the Elite Mats by suffering through Advanced queue failures just so that I can get 1 mat of a specific type that I don't have. All of this is not complaints on my part. I am not saying to give me the mats. Just to make it possible that one person can keep me from getting the mats. Or create a way that Solo player can acquire those mats by.
And I do realize that the game has upped the HP bags on the NPC's. The fun I had running through Delta Rising with my mixed bag of Tier X/XI/XII gear in elite mode, before I figured out that the last mandatory Patrol mission I was not going to be able to complete because it could out heal my damage was a heartache. And funny, since I didn't realize I was on Elite mode for the missions till then. Switching to Normal at that point, and that's when I could understand why people were able to complete the content so easily. I had made it unecessarily hard on me. It was fun playing at that level, but until that last patrol. That last patrol was not too frustrating fo rme to be happy about the game for a time.
Everything said here, you can blame on the player's for being trolls/greedy/incompetent/unskilled/new.
As for the EC's bit, you can run the tour and, make more than you have listed per day depending on speed and # of toons! EASILY
I have to say I'm genuinely surprised to see the patch notes for tomorrow removing the fail from all 3 Iconian advanced. Tip O' tha hat to you Cryptic for following through with the comments made just before the Azure Nebula changes.
These changes would have mattered if done December last, however I always reward a good-hearted gesture so I'll not cry for the 12 hour missions demise and if I can ever get 50,000 more fleet credits (for the 5th console) I'll grab that snazzy new pilot ship.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
You both need to know the game more right? Buy stuff at exchange. A casual player can sit and play without having to farm and buy at the exchange right? Because you guys are casual players and support casual players, right? Not unless you are players pretending to be casual players.
But then again, why do you need to do advance when you get all you need in normal? Because that is what is happening now, in advance, people who actually complete it are the ones wanting challenge.
Spoiled and self entitled players like you and demanding like you want to do advance when you can get all the stuff you need at normal or at exchange.
Ignorant assumptions coupled with personal attacks.
Just because I support the causal players point of view by no means indicates I'm casual myself. I prefer Advanced / Elite modes myself. I disagree I'm only entitled to the rewards from them. The entitlement is yours not the casuals.
Did you even bother to read my idea above? It returns the difficulty to those of us that want the challenge in Advance and Elite, gives a proportional reward increase, while eliminating gating.
No more underpowered pugs queuing up either.
As you said, they aren't empty. And that won't change eliminating the gating.
I have to say I'm genuinely surprised to see the patch notes for tomorrow removing the fail from all 3 Iconian advanced. Tip O' tha hat to you Cryptic for following through with the comments made just before the Azure Nebula changes.
These changes would have mattered if done December last, however I always reward a good-hearted gesture so I'll not cry for the 12 hour missions demise and if I can ever get 50,000 more fleet credits (for the 5th console) I'll grab that snazzy new pilot ship.
They are not removing fails in all 3 Iconian STFS.
People shouldnt base this statement since later on whine again because they thought all failures were removed in all 3 Iconian STFs.
Ignorant assumptions coupled with personal attacks.
Just because I support the causal players point of view by no means indicates I'm casual myself. I prefer Advanced / Elite modes myself. I disagree I'm entitled to the rewards from them. The entitlement is yours not the casuals.
Did you even bother to read my idea above? It returns the difficulty to those of us that want the challenge in Advance and Elite, gives a proportional reward increase, while eliminating gating.
As you said, they aren't empty. And that won't change eliminating the gating.
Ok, then I am casual, but I can finish elite and play 30 mins per day, all pvers are casual, all pvpers are casuals. All of us are casuals.
Then what is the difference between those who cannot do advance and those who can since we are all casuals?
Lets define one what it is. Those who can finish advance and those who cannot. Because players who insists to nerf stuff make excuse they cannot finish advance because missions are insanely difficult and unavoidable rather themsevles solving that problem with the current mechanics which makes the difficult solvable/avoidable.
Rewards are already almost proportional. People in normal doing all the objectives will get them almost the same number of marks as the one doing Elite. Assuming that people in normal and advance actual will do the optionals.
Like I keep saying on other thread, if rewards are proportional based on difficulty, I dont mind getting 1000 salvage tech in finishing elite while those who complete normal and advance get none.
Because players who insists to nerf stuff make excuse they cannot finish advance because missions are insanely difficult and unavoidable rather themsevles solving that problem with the current mechanics which makes the difficult solvable/avoidable.
Which isn't anything I proposed. You clearly didn't read my suggestion.
And still don't address your ignorant assumption I can't complete them in you accusation. I can. I prefer to run advanced, and have no problem with our organized group that does Elites. You ignorant assumption is that because i can I must feel elitist and want to exclude anyone who can't. Sorry, no dice. I can run them and see their points equally.
Rewards are already almost proportional.
They aren't proportional, they are exclusive. Again you didn't read what I suggested. Only eliminating the exclusive progression rewards. Do you always have to build strawman arguments like this to defeat rather than trying to counter what people actually say?
People in normal doing all the objectives will get them almost the same number of marks as the one doing Elite.
That you think it is about marks is ridiculous. No one has argued that mark rewards are the problem. /facepalm
Read proportional rewards eliminating exclusive items would solve the problem. People who can't do advanced won't, because they don't have to anymore. Those of use who like the challenge can do them for increased rewards and not worry about under powered captains queuing up and having to be carried or causing failure, and the difficulty can be kept high.
To me it doesn't sound like it is the challenge at all that you like, but just the exclusive rewards. If it was the challenge, you wouldn't care if they got 1 salvaged tech a week, or got a daily Neural node for example.
if rewards are proportional based on difficulty, I dont mind getting 1000 salvage tech in finishing elite while those who complete normal and advance get none.
Proportion of 0 is well zero. Again the only ones showing entitlement are those like yourself.
Again the only ones showing entitlement are those like yourself.
So, er, I'm a little curious here...
paxdawn's showing entitlement by suggesting that those that have put in some form of effort to do more difficult content should be rewarded for doing so...
...but the opposite of that, rewarding for no effort...
...isn't showing entitlement?
Guess I'm more confused than curious with that.
I don't think the word means what you think it does.
Comments
You can get marks through advanced but Advanced and Elite materials? Hardly. You can now convert 100 marks to one Datacore, Processor etc. once a day. But still with about 15 marks you need7 games to get enough to convert them and then 2 games for the daily and some more if you want to save some for gear.
Now way back, as the missions still were fun there were reasonable optionals.
You could save all crewmembers in "Manus" but you didn't have to because the important thing was to kill Manus.
Back then you had 15 minutes to destroy the IMRs in "Khitomer in Stasis" and then more time to complete the mission.
Now someone mixed that up you only have 15 minutes no matter what. If you can't destroy them in 15 mins. mission and optional fail and if you do destroy them you win the mission and the optional. Why do we have almost 25 minutes for Khitomers optional if the mission is lost or won after 15 min? Yes you still have to kill Tosk but there is no timer for that.
There is no sense in that.
And no need for all those not important things to be mandatory.
And there are many thready about how messed up the Advanced PvEs are, the empty queues support that.
I often read or heard that Advanced was supposed to be like the old Elite. Its far from that.
And you dont have to be rude and call other players trolls. If you are soo good thats fine. Not everyone is. And maybe you could see the obvious: Most public queues are empty or almost empty. Even those that had 30-40 games running before. Good players/good fleets make private queues but
1. that s not the purpose of the PvEs, to be only for fleets/private group
and
2. what about the newbies who just don't have good gear yet and need to do those missions with mediocre gear?
I did several of the old Elites, space and Ground and had no problem whatsoever with ym Blue Mk XI gear. Now i do have problems with my UR Mk XIII/XIV gear even though i invested in Spire consoles, Rep. system gear, Romulan Embassy BOffs, Crafted UR Antiprotons. I usually don' t die (much) unless i have a bad day but there is also no fun anymore
You both need to know the game more right? Buy stuff at exchange. A casual player can sit and play without having to farm and buy at the exchange right? Because you guys are casual players and support casual players, right? Not unless you are players pretending to be casual players.
But then again, why do you need to do advance when you get all you need in normal? Because that is what is happening now, in advance, people who actually complete it are the ones wanting challenge.
Spoiled and self entitled players like you and demanding like you want to do advance when you can get all the stuff you need at normal or at exchange.
Advance queues arent empty. There a people still playing the qeues. I just played Borg stf without hassle just before this post.
PuG advance queues are depopulated compared to pre-Dr since a lot of competent players moved away from PuGs. It is a community created issue. In the view of a competent player, PuGs = 4 leeches.
Seems to me that those left and insist in playing PuGs and fail in advance PuGs are more or less the leeches and trolls.
Since those competent players who carry the team mostly left, suddenly PuGs are left with less competent players. Hence the leeches are exposed, thus more failed advance stf are exposed. You end up more likely pairing of 5 leeches together.
Why do you need to get gear in advance? Gears =/ advance completion.
Heck, I even have alt who did all normals and got all the gears.
Nothing to do with gears. more to do with the player. If you dont improve your player skill, your team, there is no way you can do advance.
It is fun for a competent player regardless if they are a new player or not.
If you are not competent and leech most likely it will not be fun anymore. because someone used to carry the PuG advance pre DR who are most likely left PuGs for good.
You can't get X without doing or to get X you can only do...
...and in thread after thread, helpful folks point out all one can do to get X.
You need Y to do something...
...and in thread after thread, helpful folks point out how Y isn't needed in the least.
Hell, in some of the older threads that go on for a bit - they even forget that they've said stuff and people have already pointed out how wrong they are...and they post it again and again.
But it makes sense, cause they're also likely going to be the folks that say X doesn't tell you what you need to do or why something failed...where helpful folks point out that it does tell players what's needed and why it failed.
They're too busy making excuses to read...whether it's in the game or on the forums.
There also tends to be the strong tendency, laughable at times, for there to be an overwhelming amount of hypocrisy offered in their posts.
It's basically at the point where they should just be reported for trolling...
No trolling, its just because different opinions on matter are around and the argumentation presented by the respective sides are simply not good enough to change anything about it.
I actually find the threads on topic more and more fun to watch. My favourites are those posts which try to point out how spoiled players should play, where they should earn they currencies and how fail criteria make people learn which difficulty setting they should stick to.
Best part about it is that none of it is going to happen. Why? Because players will play what they want and what they think they can and none of your 10.000 word postings will reach em. There have always been the wrong players in the wrong queues, players being disappointed in the pug they end up and those players thinking that they are any good when they play amongst elite premades ensuring them smooth sailing through PvE.
Perhaps its time one should get used to the fact that this is just the way it is.
Personally I will rejoice when cryptic finally takes away the fails in advanced mode because I suspect that those difficulty setting will get a massive influx of participants as result giving me back the pool of good and bad players alike I used to have before the change.
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Thanks for reminding me of something I forgot in my previous post there...the laughable tendency toward hypocrisy offered by some of the posters.
edit: Course, some folks have definitely accepted that players are going to show up for content they're not prepared for...and...they've moved to channel/private runs of content. Which has contributed to the growing demise of the queues and started long before Delta Rising was ever hinted at. But if you want to defend those folks for contributing to the death of the queues by showing up like that...well, have fun with that.
edit2: Want to have folks get used to a good thing instead of a bad thing and thus act upon a good thing instead of a bad thing? Imagine if Cryptic gated the queues, so there was the least bit of confidence that the folks there were in someway actually ready for them? Those folks driven to private/channel runs because of the "bad" could return to the public queues because of the "good"...trippy, eh? Something that might actually bring some life back to the public queues instead of something that would just bring more life to the private/channel runs as more folks head off to those?
Stuff like this makes me laugh so much. I guess alot of players are used to get screwed so much then only an attitudine like droping your pants and ask for some more TRIBBLE is acceptable. And its even more disturbing that they want other players to behave and think like them.:eek:
Like if a local store, that sold you some nice, juicy apples for 4-5 years, out of a sudden reprice those apples 10-11x times, and "for allmost the same price" starts to sell you some half rotten crapy little apples and told you thats what you wanted, you expect ppl not to express their disaproving with said store??
For real, the amount of stupidity on STO is really astonishing. I guess thats why the devs get away with so much and turned this game into TRIBBLE
Right...:rolleyes: In other words and in the majority of cases, player skill means succomb to the DPS BFAW idiocricy and denying other builds, wich were effective even in elites pre-DR.
Trus words there, but not as you may think. Its players like you that should be reported for trolling. It allmost looks like a broken record that repeat itselfs over and over. For post count or whatever...
Same here. I am looking forward to these changes since i also think it will bring back more players into advanced queues, whatever good or bad ones. Diversity is allways good. Its soo boring and stupid in the same time what is now (boring BFAWs buidls mosty).
It's kind of trippy, actually. Cause all the information is there for them to learn it if they want, but the general experience I had was there was absolutely no reason to learn it. Folks were just slaughtering things left, right, and center...to Hell with worrying about any kind of possible failure of an Optional...cause it's all but impossible to fail an Optional in Normal.
There were usually folks in the runs there that could have solo'd the run or 2-3 manned it depend on if the queue required the group to split up. Heh, it left me thinking again about the suggestion that the current Normal difficulty queues be tweaked and turned into solo missions for folks. Something that might require splitting up, having that removed so a single player could do it or having it in stages where they moved to the other areas or whatever.
The thing that struck me as the most odd about the situation, though, was even though folks were basically bulldozing their way through the run...the vast majority of folks appeared to know where to go for each bit. It was wham-bam-done over and over again as folks just ripped through it. Compare that to Advanced where there is the tendency for all sorts of stragglers and people chasing butterflies...it was mind-boggling.
Lol, left me wishing I had those folks that were running the Normals in Advanced instead of those few folks you run into from time to time in the actual Advanced.
Engagement done...folks off to the next part...off to the next part. Group needs to split up...group splits up...group gets back together...it gets back together.
I saw more folks that had a clue about the content in a few days of doing Normal than I've seen in the past few weeks of doing Advanced. It's mind-boggling...and just lends itself to the complaints about folks leeching or trolling in Advanced and why they really want the changes made.
Look in the mirror dude. Players refuse to improve themselves, players refuse to o play with better teams, players refuse to go down to normal if they refuse the first 2, now with what you said, even players refuse to buy stuff in the exchange and get stuff at normal even they refuse all the rest I said.
spoiled and self entitled written all over what you said. Might as well let them mail us the rewards rather than cater to nerf advance,
You dont need skill in bfaw because? Why don't I see you breezing through the content like the experts of bfaw is a no skill ability right? But then again this advance whining thread is the opposite of bfaw require no skill. If bfaw doesn't need skill shouldn't be there no more advance whining thread because you don't need skill to use bfaw and everyone should be breezing advance content.
But this thread proves that you need skill to play the game.
Pretty much this, most people who know how to play but cant afford to upgrade go Normal, most people who can afford to upgrade go advanced.
HOWEVER, there are those inbetween which is actually quite a lot of people who just want to get the most marks they can without over doing etc only probably havent upgraded everything and still treating the queues like they were from before DR.
Generally nobody can ingnore the inheret DPS gap needed between Advanced and Normal (all queues) but after talking to a few who've done advanced because they felt they had no other choice (because it would of taken them years to get anything decent gear wise or it felt like it) those people seem kinda desperate as they seem to love the game but lack the reasources to fully enjoy the game.
The insta-fails just made things 10x worse for those who cant afford to improve their stuff. Sad truth is this entire thing extends beyond azura. what you've described virus is essentially the exact same scenario for every single queue out their with advanced difficulty.
as for whats to learn nearly all the queues are extremely straight forward. As for anyone not understanding them...well....
Yep I defenetly belive that the removement of fails will attract a huge group of bad and good players back to the queues. Why? Because the likeliness of mixed team form ups will bring back some reason and fun to PvE and give an alternative to oh cool we made Nukara Transdim in 2:40 or man, somebody gave the wrong answer on the last suspect in Undine infiltration and we are done here? elite channels or pugs currently provide.
As far as your Hypocrite or Defend terms toward me are concerned, its your call and I choose not to comment. In my opinion everybody will and probably should play the way he/she sees fit and any attempts to change that will likely be wasted because they wont happen anyway.
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It reminded me of some of the conversations that go like this...
Tom: People that aren't prepared for Advanced, should stick to Normal until they are prepared for Advanced.
Jerry: Don't tell people where they should play. You should go do Elites and leave people alone.
...where Jerry doesn't even realize what he's just said. Don't tell people where to play, but then he tells Tom where to go play.
With what struck me odd about what you said there...with how it contradicted what you said there.
People should accept things...but you can't wait for the change. Well, looking forward to a change isn't accepting things. It's wanting a change and not accepting things. So telling folks to accept things...while wanting a change...tada.
It tends to get into that world wrapped around the pinky thing, where everybody else needs to accept what you want but you don't have to accept anything they want or what already exists in the case of you're wanting a change.
Why don't I see the current anra overpopulating more than ISA and cca or even the new stfs? Because if a higher playerbase was the same sentiment as those whining about advance, based on your assumption that is a huge playerbase, shouldn't point to the population metrics agree to that wherin anra outpopulate all advance STFs?
Vd, summed it up very nicely stating that he saw more competency in normal than advance. So that those havin a hard time completing advance and whining about advance in the forums are just leeches themselves trying to package themselves as victims, majorities, casuals, and/or the only playerbase.
A) Those have stayed in Normal and avoided Advanced because of a variety of reasons.
C) Those that have taken to private/channel runs for Advanced.
How does changing the Mandatory Objective to an Optional Objective offer an incentive to players from those three groups to change what they're doing?
With Group A, if the sole reason they were avoiding Advanced was because of the Mandatory Objective - then they may head right for Advanced. What are they going to encounter there? Cause the Objective being Mandatory or Optional is not the only difference between Normal and Advanced. It can take 4-5x the DPS to complete an Advanced in the same time as one was doing a Normal. Meaning that if the DPS does not change, one would be looking at the run taking 4-5x or longer - likely longer, cause there will probably be more deaths involved in the Advanced than there was in the Normal as well. For something like ANRA where it is a fixed time, that doesn't really matter - it takes the same length of time. Others though, they can easily get into well beyond that 4-5x time to complete it. So at what point do those particular members develop other reasons to avoid Advanced as they run into a time consuming sour experience vs. doing whatever else they might be doing and having fun otherwise, eh?
With Group B, how many of those folks have stuck to doing Advanced because of the percentage of people being at least somewhat prepared for the content? If you change that percentage, if you have them facing an increased number of people that are not prepared - meaning that their runs will get hit by the double whammy of not only taking longer but also rewarding less in the end...will they finally give up on public queues and move off to private/channel runs of some sort?
With Group C, having already moved to those private/channel runs - why would they return to face the same issue that's been driving people to private/channel runs for years now?
* * * * *
Just how is it supposed to make the queues grow?
It would be one thing if it were way back in the day where one had to hit up the queues for things, but folks complained for years about that - so Cryptic's made it pretty damn easy and in some cases far more efficient to ignore the queues.
People that might have had to put up with a run that failed every optional and took 20-30 minutes aren't stuck with that...don't have to put up with that in the least.
So how is going back to that situation, without the being stuck with it part, supposed to help the public queues grow? Hell, not being stuck with that situation has played a big part in the public queues dwindling as well. Folks might put up with a lack of fun to a degree if there's a need, but if there's no need either...?
Obviously different people have fun in different ways, I like hitting up Advanced queues knowing that there is a chance of failure and it's not just going to be a case of seeing how fast one can steal candy from the baby...others enjoy a quick 'n easy run. I just have a hard time buying into folks saying they have fun with all but complete failure for an extended period of time...but hey, maybe that's what they enjoy. Different folks...
* * * * *
Imagine if they had adjusted the randomness of the spawns in ANRA instead of the changes they made, eh? So that they provided a consistent level of difficulty instead of a varied one? So that folks knew what they were getting into there at the start...rather than it might be painfully easy on one run and brutally hard on the other.
Imagine if the various queues that have trollable Objectives that could sink the run in the blink of an eye simply didn't have those and everybody making a good faith effort actually had a shot without worrying about somebody coming along for their lawlz, yeah?
Imagine if a Normal queue wasn't easier than a 5-man Normal episode and did a little bit better job preparing folks if they wanted to move on to Advanced or beyond?
There are all sorts of issues with the various queues...I just don't see how introducing old issues again is supposed to fix that...
Lol, kk got you and that appears to be contradicting. Well obviously the game has rules, ether to our (infinite individuals playing STO) liking or our disliking. As of late those rules keep on changing here and there forcing everybody to adapt and readapted. What I tried to say is that, despite having a personal preference how I want things to be, I do have limited means to turn things into how I wish em to be. Especially when it comes to players of different skill and standing. I have learned that accepting them all and even making them part of my game experience works best and for me is even the key to set pretty much the only long term fun in STO for myself.
As far as get used to how it is is concerned I do so a lot. I do so by means of pugging, using elite DPS channels and friendliest as well as fleet. Im trying to make the best out of it and it works. Since DR it works just a lot harder because what I seek for (most) fun (for me) are mixed team constellations of players of different skill and standing to allow me for a challenging game atmosphere. Now going into a pug or doing so with a friend or fleet mate plays a crucial role there as u may imagine. But sadly, the supply of pugs has dried up a lot and so has the element of surprise I encounter on the same handful of maps I play for 3 years making the game less interesting for me. Naturally I dont want that to happen and I think getting right of advanced fails will do me a favour there.
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It was mind-boggling. Yeah, sure the DPS was generally much lower than one would see in Advanced for a same duration run, but for the most part everybody appeared to have an idea of what needed to be done. I just did an ISN cause I wanted to grab some numbers for my last post, but yeah - it was a trip and it represented what I generally saw with the various queues.
ISN: People waited for pets, cloaked folks had time to move into flanking positions and prepare for ambushes, and then the initial engagement began. Folks knew they were heading left, so the combat flowed toward the left. When that initial engagement completed, folks were already moving toward the left Trans. A guy remained halfway there and dropped out the GW for the Nanites. The Gens/Trans taken care of, folks knowing they were heading right, the combat flowed right, and people moved into the Nanties...combat continuing to flow right...as they made their way to the right Trans. Same as with the left, wham, bam, no communication - just folks flowing as if they'd done this before. Combat moving to the left, knowing they were heading back to the Gateway/Cube, and as the Nanites were taken care of - the flow continued into the Gateway - leaving the Cube for the wrap up.
It was like that time after time...just like the other queues demonstrated that folks had an idea of what they were doing as they split up and went where they were needed with the combat flowing toward the next area.
ISA: Somebody charges into the Cube before everybody is even completed the map transfer. People chase the Spheres to the four corners of the map. They're finally dead, but folks have burned their Evasives or don't change their Subsystem Power...so the two guys that are actually over by the left Trans decide to take out the Cube while waiting on the rest to get over there. But that doesn't quite happen. Cause two of them will engage the Sphere closer to the warp-in than the Trans. The third guy's still making his way over and as soon as he's in range - he unloads everything into that first Gen. Okay then, the three can quickly pop the other Gens and get stuck into the Trans while the other two deal with the Nanites, right? Nope...not at all. You're left with two guys getting the Gens down and firing on the Transformer. Cause when that first Gen popped...Spheres spawned at the Trans. Obviously they have to be dealt with! So those three players chase those Spheres around the map plinking at them, ignoring the Transformer, and ignoring the Nanites coming. Queue fails.
And it's just downright twisted how often that will happen. So it becomes a case of upgrading/changing the build one has - to do 2-4x the actual DPS required for the run for an individual, while also needing to carry the crowd control, and tossing out heals for folks that might never leave the spawn again if they die.
It's just mind-boggling. Could give the guys from ISN 2-5k more DPS and they'd slaughter ISA...those guys in ISA couldn't slaughter ISA with 2-5x more DPS while they're off lollygagging, chasing butterflies, and getting lost in Exploration Clusters. Cause ISA rarely fails from my experience because of a lack of DPS, but rather it fails from how that DPS is applied.
edit: I'd say I jinxed myself...but I'm used to it happening these days...but yeah, the ISA I just ran went pretty much like that.
You bring up anar? Its a bad example because the rng reward generator on that map works worse than rng pug generator for drse. Uhm for good and players that is.
As far as your and Viruss estimates for repopulating queues with removing fails is concerned I think speculation over it can be concluded best by the outcome we will witness when the changes are made. My feeling is that it will, however your augmentations also holds some merit.
Cryptic seems to be committed to the change and its not as if anybody around here could do a great deal about it anyway aside from representing it through ones game play the past 6 months.
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Pugging old Elites and current Advanced, public pugging - not channel pugs/trade pugs/etc...is something that I've done cause I'm more interested in the challenge of "if" as opposed to the challenge of "how fast"...and I go back and forth depending on the thread (and my mood) as to whether I'll make the comment about stealing candy from a baby or offering props for the accomplishment of doing what they do. It's just not my thing. I want that group that has a shot at something, an actual chance, where the outcome is in question - not the group that there's no question other than how fast it will be done.
In other games over the years, hitting up pug queues has generally involved folks that understand everybody has to contribute for a chance to get it done. It's only with older/outdated content that it gets more into the realm of folks being overgeared and somebody not having to pull their weight in it. Folks that can do more move on to do more - whether harder levels of that dungeon or heading off to raid.
STO on the other hand...just doesn't have that. We just had S10 drop...and...it might as well be queues that were added back during S5. Hell, the queues back during S5 were harder than they are now. The sheer amount of powercreep since S6 through now...where most folks are being dumped in the same queues...has led to all sorts of folks knowing that they don't have to bother much at all. There's a pretty good chance that they can get carried...and...they really only run into problems if there are more folks like them in that particular run, because then there's not enough folks actually prepared and trying.
STO doesn't have any form of gating to try to make sure the folks are anywhere near prepared and are going to try...outside of the Mandatory Objectives. Course, I hate how are some are trollable and think that needs to be addressed. Otherwise though, they're that litmus test for the group. Cause a group can successfully complete the Mandatory and still fail the remaining Optionals. It's just a test of whether the group is potentially ready for the rest to come or not...and then it goes from there.
Remove that...and...well, then the odds of ever finding that "if" challenge disappear. Odds will shift more to folks that just don't care about doing anything just so they can get the end reward.
And then for me...there's just no reason to bother any more.
And with that...is why I've basically changed my stance on making things available outside of queues. I used to argue they would kill the queues (and I believe that's played a heavy role in it). But since I'm not a "how fast" guy and the "if" is being taken away...then Hell yeah, I want pretty shinies on my builds...let me get them without having to go anywhere near a queue.
Course, I'm muddling through with this Delta Recruit with a No-Fleet B'rel...for a group of folks that have talked about trying to take BoPs into Advanced/Elite queues...and I'm kidding myself to think that I'd likely ever actually queue up with folks to do it; but it's giving me a reason to play in a game that at this point I just don't have any other reason to play.
PvP (an "if" challenge) is pretty much dead. Advanced Queues (an "if" challenge) are pretty much going to be dead. So I'm kind of left clinging to the "if" of what a group of BoPs may or may not be able to do...I'm trying to picture 5x BoPs in a HSE...better load up on components, lol.
Think I feel you through there, especially the last part.
Perhaps the troublesome part for many about the if component is the way some are implemented. You know back in S5 we had some, few ok, ifs but they at least were around.
I remember 3 years ago that getting past the reformer chain in CGE was an if for some teams to handle. Or we will make IGE if we can get straight with Becca. Now those at least were some real team interacting thingies were clear role distributions and attention to details were the key to success. Nowadays most of these ifs just feel poorly implemented where you try to beat some background timer or where single mistakes of an individual often cannot be compensated by the rest of the group. I belive that to be the reason what turns a lot of peeps off.
Well despite of that I remain optimistic. On some of the recent occasions cryptic brought in some interesting aspects where fails provided some good ifs. Bug hunt seems to be favoured. Clearing the alert bugs can be done by individuals and the brain bug at the end can also post a challenge where a team has to beat an if(meh but there again u also get a timer).
The 3 new PvEs? I love em all. We have a DPS feast, a non DPS map and probably the best new ground setting around since IGE. Saving the Orion a wonderfull if.
What Im trying to say is that ifs will still be around in elite mode for us to handle. My hope is that a lot players who do not bother much or just want to grab fast currencies for their gear will sit happily in advanced by then (which also includes me on occasion) while only those who care to beat an if will head into elite (which also includes me on occasion). Post DR normal mode just feels too annoyingly easy (an rarely includes me on occasion).
But who am I to fool myself heh?
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So why aren't these knowledgeable people doing advanced? If they are so knowledgeable about the queue and can handle normal easily, why not take the next step to advanced and get a bit more for it? Isn't that the logical step? What is holding them back?
If that team does so well in normal, does that actually make them in any way capable for advanced? Or do they not want to waste their time on the chance of a failure, and have given up trying advanced at all?
I don't know if it has been done, but I'm curious how a team parses in normal versus how they parse in advanced. Doing the same thing in the same group with the same ships in a group that doesn't overpower the content significantly, how big of a gap is there?
I don't believe they would parse the same at all, and end up doing less DPS in advanced than normal. If that is true, that is just part of the problem, you can think you're ready for advanced with normal, but you aren't actually, because normal doesn't actually prepare you for advanced's requirements.
I think this is a very big issue as well. Upgrades are exceedingly expensive. But generally the cheapest way to get parts for them is by doing advanced queues. It has been said and is generally true, upgrades aren't required to do advanced, yet if most people underperform as it is, they kinda do need them.
Only excuse here, is they and you are not adequate enough of a player, I get the same things done with mkxi gear, using my own builds, not needing none of that upgraded stuff and, shows just how wrong minded people think when they say they have to have it and, than find it doesn't actually improve their chances for success, as it is them that doesn't succeed.
So like others, you don't mind leeching off of you, you don't mind team members not helping, just so long as it is a complete walk in the park for you?
All to often, the ones wanting the changes, boils down to being!
1: I am a leecher
2: I am to lazy
3: I shouldn't have to change
4: I shouldn't have to try
5: I shouldn't have to improve
6: I want it all handed to me
7: I like trolling others
Those wanting it changed because these above listed ruin the missions for them, should be discouraging the changes and, vouching for a way to have the above segregated in some fashion.
Otherwise, they are fine with people listed above and, are in turn encouraging this behavior.
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
Here's the thing though Virus, in many case, actually getting the optional in a normal, grants them 50% - 100% more marks, than just completing it alone so, those complaining of getting a small amount of marks, simply have no excuses other than they cause it upon themselves.
Plain and simple!!!
The ones complaining of not getting elite materials, because only advanced has them to offer, is simply looking for an easy handout, if they aren't willing to put the effort into getting them.
That is the only major difference between normal and advanced, because elite marks can be obtained via other means, thru mark trade-ins, thru different mission dailies outside of queues so, there excuses fall flat here.
Elite crafting materials are cheap on the exchange so, even they could afford them but, they simply refuse to buy them and/or, make the full effort in obtaining them thru actual effort!
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
/delete
I want the elite crafting materials. I can do Advanced well enough when I have a reasonable group of people to the STF's with. I am not good enough to carry others, so I expect others to make that effort. Fails happen because others don't do well enough for me.
And the only reason I do the Advanced queues is to get the Elite Mats. If there was another method to get the Elite mats, I would do it and leave the headache of the unreliable Advanced queues.
As for Buying in th Exchange, I hate playing the economic games. I don't like the part of the game where money making is the point. (I also don't play ferengi's lol) So saying that buying things off the exchange is cheap assumes that people are makeing EC's. I don't have that much in EC's. Last O looked I had around 500k. And I keep using it on DOff missions and leveling my Iconian rep on the one Fed that is my primary crafter.
So I work for the Elite Mats by suffering through Advanced queue failures just so that I can get 1 mat of a specific type that I don't have. All of this is not complaints on my part. I am not saying to give me the mats. Just to make it possible that one person can keep me from getting the mats. Or create a way that Solo player can acquire those mats by.
And I do realize that the game has upped the HP bags on the NPC's. The fun I had running through Delta Rising with my mixed bag of Tier X/XI/XII gear in elite mode, before I figured out that the last mandatory Patrol mission I was not going to be able to complete because it could out heal my damage was a heartache. And funny, since I didn't realize I was on Elite mode for the missions till then. Switching to Normal at that point, and that's when I could understand why people were able to complete the content so easily. I had made it unecessarily hard on me. It was fun playing at that level, but until that last patrol. That last patrol was not too frustrating fo rme to be happy about the game for a time.
KDF: Dahar Master Kan (Borg Klingon Tactical)::Dahar Master Torc (Alien Science)::Dahar Master Sisteric (Gorn Engineer)
RR-Fed: Citizen Sirroc (Romulan Science)::Fleet Admiral Grell (Alien Engineer)
RR-KDF: Fleet Admiral Zemo (Reman Tactical)::Fleet Admiral Xinatek (Reman Science)::Fleet Admiral Bel (Alien Engineer)
TOS-Fed: Fleet Admiral Katem (Andorian Tactical)::Lieutenant Commander Straad (Vulcan Engineer)
Dom-Fed: Dan'Tar (Jem'Hadar Science)
Dom-KDF: Kamtana'Solan (Jem'Hadar Science)
CoHost of Tribbles in Ecstasy (Zombee)
There you go, you realize you cannot carry the PuGs. The team is the problem. Find a better team to finish.
If you dont have the time to grind the EC buy the Ec thru Zen. EC is all about time or real money. No need to play economics if you are a casual player. You are a casual player right?
Like your previous posts in this thread, Dont make lousy excuses that you dont have time but dont have money , still want all these rewards and claim to be casual.
You do realize you just contradicted yourself. You say NPCs are just HP bags. Then you say they healed beyond what you can deal DPS because they are elite. What are they to you just HP bags or mobs that can self heal?
Everything said here, you can blame on the player's for being trolls/greedy/incompetent/unskilled/new.
As for the EC's bit, you can run the tour and, make more than you have listed per day depending on speed and # of toons! EASILY
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
These changes would have mattered if done December last, however I always reward a good-hearted gesture so I'll not cry for the 12 hour missions demise and if I can ever get 50,000 more fleet credits (for the 5th console) I'll grab that snazzy new pilot ship.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Ignorant assumptions coupled with personal attacks.
Just because I support the causal players point of view by no means indicates I'm casual myself. I prefer Advanced / Elite modes myself. I disagree I'm only entitled to the rewards from them. The entitlement is yours not the casuals.
Did you even bother to read my idea above? It returns the difficulty to those of us that want the challenge in Advance and Elite, gives a proportional reward increase, while eliminating gating.
No more underpowered pugs queuing up either.
As you said, they aren't empty. And that won't change eliminating the gating.
They are not removing fails in all 3 Iconian STFS.
People shouldnt base this statement since later on whine again because they thought all failures were removed in all 3 Iconian STFs.
Ok, then I am casual, but I can finish elite and play 30 mins per day, all pvers are casual, all pvpers are casuals. All of us are casuals.
Then what is the difference between those who cannot do advance and those who can since we are all casuals?
Lets define one what it is. Those who can finish advance and those who cannot. Because players who insists to nerf stuff make excuse they cannot finish advance because missions are insanely difficult and unavoidable rather themsevles solving that problem with the current mechanics which makes the difficult solvable/avoidable.
Rewards are already almost proportional. People in normal doing all the objectives will get them almost the same number of marks as the one doing Elite. Assuming that people in normal and advance actual will do the optionals.
Like I keep saying on other thread, if rewards are proportional based on difficulty, I dont mind getting 1000 salvage tech in finishing elite while those who complete normal and advance get none.
Which isn't anything I proposed. You clearly didn't read my suggestion.
And still don't address your ignorant assumption I can't complete them in you accusation. I can. I prefer to run advanced, and have no problem with our organized group that does Elites. You ignorant assumption is that because i can I must feel elitist and want to exclude anyone who can't. Sorry, no dice. I can run them and see their points equally.
They aren't proportional, they are exclusive. Again you didn't read what I suggested. Only eliminating the exclusive progression rewards. Do you always have to build strawman arguments like this to defeat rather than trying to counter what people actually say?
That you think it is about marks is ridiculous. No one has argued that mark rewards are the problem. /facepalm
Read proportional rewards eliminating exclusive items would solve the problem. People who can't do advanced won't, because they don't have to anymore. Those of use who like the challenge can do them for increased rewards and not worry about under powered captains queuing up and having to be carried or causing failure, and the difficulty can be kept high.
To me it doesn't sound like it is the challenge at all that you like, but just the exclusive rewards. If it was the challenge, you wouldn't care if they got 1 salvaged tech a week, or got a daily Neural node for example.
Proportion of 0 is well zero. Again the only ones showing entitlement are those like yourself.
So, er, I'm a little curious here...
paxdawn's showing entitlement by suggesting that those that have put in some form of effort to do more difficult content should be rewarded for doing so...
...but the opposite of that, rewarding for no effort...
...isn't showing entitlement?
Guess I'm more confused than curious with that.
I don't think the word means what you think it does.