Lockbox Ships: Rarity and other BS

samt1996 · May 2015

I understand why lockboxes exist and I own many of the ships but I just felt the need to point something out. With the renewed interest in making them account bound I decided it's time to call Cryptic out on their 'it needs to be rare' policy. As most of you know they stated that Lockboxes were meant to keep certain ships rare whenever first released, here is my answer...

APU Cruiser
Kazon Raider
Malon Cruiser
And I wont even mention the soon-to-be account wide alien event ships

So now every single player can own an alien ship for literally peanuts. Cryptic your logic astounds me! :rolleyes:

I don't have an issue with Lockboxes but you don't have to hide your real reasons under a mountain of BS. And while i enjoy having interesting secondary prize ships rather than boring mirror ships, you must realize you've taken a massive dump on your own arguments.

thecosmic1 · May 2015

Rarity was not the reason given for all Lockbox ships, just certain ships - plus that reason was given over 3 years ago and things change in 3.5 years. Businesses evolve over time and what was important 7 years ago when STO was in development is very different from what is important today.

At the end of the day Cryptic needs to balance income requirements with IP license issues. STO was not designed as a charity for Trek-starved fans. It was designed to make Cryptic money - and then Atari money when they bought Cryptic, and now PW money. It is a for-profit business.

samt1996 · May 2015

thecosmic1 wrote: »

Rarity was not the reason given for all Lockbox ships, just certain ships - plus that reason was given over 3 years ago and things change in 3.5 years. Businesses evolve over time and what was important 7 years ago when STO was in development is very different from what is important today.

At the end of the day Cryptic needs to balance income requirements with IP license issues. STO was not designed as a charity for Trek-starved fans. It was designed to make Cryptic money - and then Atari money when they bought Cryptic, and now PW money. It is a for-profit business.

Clearly you missed the part where I said I don't have a problem with lockboxes I just wish Cryptic would be honest and not hide under silly excuses. I mean what reason do they have to lie I don't get it? I've spent over $1000 in just the last year, and I own probably 15 Lockbox/ Lobi ships. Clearly I don't have a problem with them.

thecosmic1 · May 2015

samt1996 wrote: »

Clearly you missed the part where I said I don't have a problem with lockboxes I just wish Cryptic would be honest and not hide under silly excuses. I mean what reason do they have to lie I don't get it? I've spent over $1000 in just the last year, and I own probably 15 Lockbox/ Lobi ships. Clearly I don't have a problem with them.

And clearly you missed the part where I said rarity was not the reason given for all the ships.

You are attempting to take a 3.5 year old statement about specific things and have it apply to everything. It does not work that way. Lockboxes are still here because they make Cryptic money. If they could make as much money another way they would. That is really all there is to it.

abaddon653 · May 2015

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This popcorns great! Anyone wanna share?

shadowwraith77 · May 2015

abaddon653 wrote: »

nomnomnomnom

This popcorns great! Anyone wanna share?

I got the butter and some beer, pass the popcorn plz.

noroblad · May 2015

You must be a fed.

Feds gotta understand: lockbox ships are pretty much required for the other 2/3 of the factions to make up for not having many decent ships. Or in some cases, ships at all. Roms *must* use a box sci ship if they want something decent. Roms must use a box carrier if they want a carrier. Kdf has no intel damage ship nor decent sci ship.

Until they decide to release some faction ships, the prize box ships are *critical* to enable players to enjoy the other factions.

And, really, you complain about the APU? I have yet to see one in an STF or being flown seriously.

zarato4218 · May 2015

samt1996 wrote: »

Clearly you missed the part where I said I don't have a problem with lockboxes I just wish Cryptic would be honest and not hide under silly excuses. I mean what reason do they have to lie I don't get it? I've spent over $1000 in just the last year, and I own probably 15 Lockbox/ Lobi ships. Clearly I don't have a problem with them.

[Insert Diety Here] Bless your innocence.

As someone who has taken business courses in college, though life experience probably has taught you the same, no corporation is ever fully honest with their customers. Sometimes they don't mean any malice by it and sometimes they do, but regardless the number one rule of business is never be honest and never admit you are wrong. If you don't believe me just consult with your friendly neigborhood ferengi. :cool:

samt1996 · May 2015

noroblad wrote: »

You must be a fed.

Feds gotta understand: lockbox ships are pretty much required for the other 2/3 of the factions to make up for not having many decent ships. Or in some cases, ships at all. Roms *must* use a box sci ship if they want something decent. Roms must use a box carrier if they want a carrier. Kdf has no intel damage ship nor decent sci ship.

Until they decide to release some faction ships, the prize box ships are *critical* to enable players to enjoy the other factions.

And, really, you complain about the APU? I have yet to see one in an STF or being flown seriously.

I think your on the wrong thread, the one about making Lockbox/ Lobi ships account bound is right above this one ^^

I support it BTW so I don't know what you have against me.

mustrumridcully0 · May 2015

Even if we assume that all lockbox and lobi ships are designed with their restrictions to be rare (which might be wrong, as cosmic1 points out):

For rarity purposes, it is not necessarily important that everyone can have them, but how convenient it is to get them and how many will actually use them.

The Kazon ship and similar "consolation" prize ships are not the top of the line, since they are only TIer 5 U and have no access to specializations. So there are good reasons to not fly them.

revanantmorituri · May 2015

noroblad wrote: »

mplain about the APU? I have yet to see one in an STF or being flown seriously.

Hey, I fly an APU of my KDF-Rom Engineer. It makes a great bomber. But that is largely because I despise the Double-D: the way it handles, the seating, the consoles. I look on it as a baby Samsar (which I will upgrade to once they follow through on this "event ships will become account wide" promise).

noroblad · May 2015

samt1996 wrote: »

I think your on the wrong thread, the one about making Lockbox/ Lobi ships account bound is right above this one ^^

I support it BTW so I don't know what you have against me.

I have nothing against anyone. The thread was about how box ships are too easy to get / not rare enough, and my counter to that is, as I said, without faction ships we need the box ships to fill in the gaps.

I did not mention account wide unlocks. I don't care about account wide unlocks -- I have 0 interest in flying the same setup on 10 toons. It might be nice for the cell ship etc, but in general, meh.

Nothing against the APU either... but the skys are not filled with the things, was my point -- I saw one or two when it was new, and hardly any since.

dpsloss88 · May 2015

You are crying about someone being able to buy a cheap APU cruiser or Kazon Raider? LOL. I have never seen one in an advanced STF so I would say they are pretty damn rare...

snipey47a · May 2015

This post is just a bunch of words... what is it's purpose?

I was getting ready to take a seat in the audience with my popcorn when I realised that is post doesn't make any sense.

Firstly, I wasn't around 3.5 years ago when Cryptic introduced lockbox ships and I can only assume that the rarity they spoke of was due to the ~0.5% (or less even) drop-rate for these ships.

I can only assume then the OP is confused as to what is actually "rare" ship. An APU Cruiser is about as rare as a Mirror Universe Ship something I used to sell to a bartender when I couldn't sell them on the exchange. This is not what Cryptic was going on about when they were talking about rare ships. They were clearly taking about the feature ship for each lockbox and the even rarer promotional ship as we are currently seeing with the Elachi Dread.

Let's break it down this way based on percentages we know from previous lockboxes. After opening 10,000 there should approximately be:

1) Mirror Universe/APU Cruiser (lol value-T5 ship) with drop-rate of ~4% = 400

2) Lockbox Special Ship (Eg: Wells Temporal Science) with a drop-rate of ~0.4% = 40

I don't know about you. But 40 feature ships from 10,000 attempts seems pretty rare to me...

chalpen · May 2015

If you are willing to buy a fake ship with real money. Fine. It's a hobby.
If you are willing to buy a lottery to never get a fake ship with real money....my god, man. Walk away from the computer. Please.

I don't gamble but I would at least consider buying a lottery ticket with real money for real money before putting in something unreal.

Because cryptic could just as easily wave a magic wand and increase the odds, or give it out for free. It isn't real.

samt1996 · May 2015

snipey47a wrote: »

This post is just a bunch of words... what is it's purpose?

I was getting ready to take a seat in the audience with my popcorn when I realised that is post doesn't make any sense.

Firstly, I wasn't around 3.5 years ago when Cryptic introduced lockbox ships and I can only assume that the rarity they spoke of was due to the ~0.5% (or less even) drop-rate for these ships.

I can only assume then the OP is confused as to what is actually "rare" ship. An APU Cruiser is about as rare as a Mirror Universe Ship something I used to sell to a bartender when I couldn't sell them on the exchange. This is not what Cryptic was going on about when they were talking about rare ships. They were clearly taking about the feature ship for each lockbox and the even rarer promotional ship as we are currently seeing with the Elachi Dread.

Let's break it down this way based on percentages we know from previous lockboxes. After opening 10,000 there should approximately be:

1) Mirror Universe/APU Cruiser (lol value-T5 ship) with drop-rate of ~4% = 400

2) Lockbox Special Ship (Eg: Wells Temporal Science) with a drop-rate of ~0.4% = 40

I don't know about you. But 40 feature ships from 10,000 attempts seems pretty rare to me...

All the old DEV blogs have been wiped. (For good reason :rolleyes:) they knew it would come back to haunt them) so I cannot provide the exact wording but it went something like this...

"We want these alien ships in the game but in order to comply with CBS (I believe) they need to be rare."

That was basically the gist of it.

thecosmic1 · May 2015

samt1996 wrote: »

That was basically the gist of it.

And that was the basic gist of it 3.5 years ago. But keep in mind that the original Lockboxes did not have multiple ships in them. The first "Lockbox" was the Winter Package with the Jem Bug in December of 2011. The second was the Cardassian Lockbox with the Galor in March of 2012. Over time the process changed. They added more sub-ships to the Lockboxes and then added Lobi Store ships. As what the Lockbox was changed over time so to did the original reason for having them.

fruitvendor12 · May 2015

dpsloss88 wrote: »

You are crying about someone being able to buy a cheap APU cruiser or Kazon Raider? LOL. I have never seen one in an advanced STF so I would say they are pretty damn rare...

My L60+ Tac Fed flies an APU named Gamera themed on the old Japanese rubber suit monster. It's not my strongest ship, but it is fun to fly and the base ship cost me throwaway lunch money (800k) on the exchange, and fits equipment maximized for my main builds. Talk about a fun cheap date - great stuff.

As far as the topic, I feel for Cryptic. Every move they make to make life easier for the customer is immediately taken up as a club for the next round of complaining. The proper response is "thank you for account wide unlocks". Not accusing them of dishonesty.

No one "needs" lobi equipment except for PvP and those delicate hothouse builds used to impress people in the DPS-30,000 channel. That's want more than a need. I fly several lobi ships, and have lobi consoles but I've yet to fly any mission where it truly made a difference.

I agree it is another story for PvP. But people into PvP are min/maxers at heart anyway - it's all about the edge and the competition over another person so it is not surprising.

Lockbox Ships: Rarity and other BS

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