You have to understand that World of ******** just lost 3 million subs in less than 4 months. I played that game for almost 10 years. If there's one thing I know about the WoW population, it's that they are the most self entitled crowd I have ever seen. They truly believe they deserve to everything handed to them for as minimal effort as possible. Because Blizzard did exactly that. Once the mass exodus happened, people had to find other games to infe... I mean play. I wouldn't worry too much though, many of them won't stick around for long when they realize they have to put in a little work for their rewards.
I dont see your problem. If they dont retire the currency and the ship, you can get it next year. Cryptic throws out 3-4 ships a year for new players (Summer, Winter, Featured Episodes). There should be one time you can play and get one.
I disagree on the assertion that it's "hostile" in any way, but Cryptic wanting the ships to have "exclusivity" is pretty much another form of saying "If you don't already have X, we are not going to allow you to earn X." ...see how flawed this reasoning is?
im going to go out on a limb here and suggest that the majority, if not all, of those saying this move isn't fair, are not new players. new players tend to understand that seasonal events and anniversary giveaways are for the current player base, not the future player base. a new player may be a little sad seeing what they have missed out on, but seeing the quality of those things, and then knowing they will be able to get all the new stuff as it comes around.. well, is that not all part of the excitement of starting a new game?
I'm sorry, but older players who didn't bother with some of the events or thought along the lines of 'i can always get it next time' need to face the simple truth, harsh as that may sound, it really is all on you! always remember that you cant complete what you haven't started, and since next time may never happen, you really need to use this time well. and please stop using 'think of the new players' as a vehicle to get what you want, it is so very obvious.
Actually no... The time available to grind for event ships was limited, but...
I joined shortly before the 2014 winter event...
You could do the 25 day grind during the limited time the event ran, to get that years ship OR one of the 2 previous years ships.
If one of your toons had one of the ships, your other toons could do 1 days grind for it, so, 3 toons all doing the 27 days grind meant all 3 ships on all 3 toons.
Thats why after doing 3 times the normal event grind, I had all 3 years ships on all 3 toons.
The same was true of the summer event, until, a couple or 3 weeks before the summer event kicks off "exclusivity" kicks in and the past years ships get mothballed, only available for the people who are old enough and had the time to grind for them last year or the year before.
The move doesn't make a lot of sense, truth be told, it will reduce the metrics for the event.
People wont run the event all 25 days on multiple toons to get all the ships, just run the grind once for the account unlock on this years ship.
Assuming I want the ferengi ship, it's reduced my Risa-Event time by 70%, less time people spend on Risa, less incentive to mess about getting swimwear, sunglasses, surf boards and retina destroying shirts.
So, this year, many people will, instead of effectively living on Risa for 27 days, will visit briefly once a day for 25.
<center><font size="+5"><b>Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day... Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
Not seeing how Wold of's player base differs from STO's player base.
I see a difference. Sure, there are those that have the same tendencies, but it's not nearly as prominent here as it is in WoW. People here have been more helpful and less toxic than anything I experienced in WoW. Not always, mind you, but definitely more frequently. My Fleet has been infinitely more helpful then any Guild I was ever in. I don't get bashed for asking questions near as often here as I did in WoW.
STO has it's fair share of trolls, for sure. Not nearly to the extent of WoW. My ignore list isn't full here though. In WoW, I constantly had to clear old ignores to bring in new ones.
I've been here since Beta, and havent earned a single Risa event ship, does that mean Cryptic hostile to me too? Of course not, I didn't earn those limited time ships, if I can get over it, other people can too.
As a coin collector, I've always coveted the Canadian 1948 silver dollar but have never been able to acquire one. The mint almost certainly still has the dies to make the coin so there's absolutely no reason why they shouldn't be punching them out for those of us who weren't around to get it first hand.
Honestly, it's outrageous. They're punishing me for not having been around when the coin was first issued. This isn't how they should be treating post 1948 citizens.
Player: rage! whine! blather about how new players "must feel" without actually asking any!
I'm not surprised anymore about how bitter and jaded some older players are, but it is sad.
The Dev's placate worked on you. You might want to boost your countermeasures a bit.
It was a move to split the outrage and do just what you are doing and turn them against each other instead of the Devs.
Retiring ships, that have been available for years, that are for this year purchasable with the to-be-retired-yearly currency, for the sake of exclusivity, is a shallow move and they should be called on it.
This is my Risian Corvette. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
As a coin collector, I've always coveted the Canadian 1948 silver dollar but have never been able to acquire one. The mint almost certainly still has the dies to make the coin so there's absolutely no reason why they shouldn't be punching them out for those of us who weren't around to get it first hand.
Honestly, it's outrageous. They're punishing me for not having been around when the coin was first issued. This isn't how they should be treating post 1948 citizens.
To borrow your analogy...
Imagine if you cannot get the old coin, but people who have a sibling who got one in 1948 can call the mint and order spares anytime they want, free, hot off the stamping mills.
<center><font size="+5"><b>Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day... Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
no if it can be reclaimed nonstop by a sub-population every new char
it's not quite "the past"
it's a half-measure to deal with the discontent
and in a pointed way, leaves out the one population that you might want to empower -> new people
This isn't about "empowerment": That's what Delta Recruitment did, but event hat was time limted - want to join now? Sorry, that event is past.
In all cases, the intention is to get players attracted. "Whoa, exclusive, time limited rewards? I shouldn't hold off playing STO any longer, I should start an account and make my character right now, and play for 25 days at least to get this exclusive reward."
And then, after 25 days, they hear something like "Double Skill Point Event two weeks after the summer event" or "Dilithium Bonus Event" and think "Oh, I should stick around for a bit longer...".
And then they stick around for a bit longer, and then there is the "Crystalline Entity Event ,wich special, unqiue rewards and lots of Dilithium and Marks", and they might think "oh, cool, another event, can't hurt to play through that, too".
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Why are there so many people who don't seem to understand the concept "limited time event" or "limited time reward"?
I mean, if I started playing WoW now, I'd be well aware that there'd be plenty of things I wouldn't be able to get, that went by in earlier events or patches.
Ditto with SWTOR, Guild Wars, Diablo 3, Sacred 2, and dozens of other games.
There is nothing new, surprising, or different about this. It's not an insult to new players, it's not meant to drive people away, or any of the other bizarre conspiracy theories that the professionally-offended can come up with.
It's normal. Deal with it.
It's not normal for all games. There are some which allow access to certain event items either through reruns or replays every time the event comes around, or via atypical means, such as through gambling the mystery skin box for event skins in LoL.
The reason it seems to be a such a shock here though is that STO used to be classed as a newbie-friendly and casual game. Ships were always available if you came back for the event, and it was only the minor things like weapons or Doffs that were not available (from Mirror events).
Imagine if you cannot get the old coin, but people who have a sibling who got one in 1948 can call the mint and order spares anytime they want, free, hot off the stamping mills.
But you can't order "spares". You can only put your old coin into a safe (we call that "dismissing the ship" or "logging out of the character") and then take it back out (we call that "using the event reputation store" or "logging into a different character").
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
And where exactly did Cryptic ever promise those ships would always remain available during all future events and never be retired?
Please post a link to that promise because I seem to have missed it.
By repeatedly offering the previous year's ship it was implied and understood. No reasonable person would expect differently based on how it has worked for the seasonal events for the past couple years. It is how they functioned. It is what we told people to expect any time they asked about one of these ships, that they could get one of their own come the summer/winter event.
Certainly they could retire them, however with that continued expectation of availability based on previous events, it would have been most reasonable to announce the retirement of a ship during the final event the ship was available, not surprise everyone a month before the next event.
Further, Cryptic has a history of not respecting "exclusivity." The cynic would imagine these discontinued event ships are going to end up in the Lobi store.
Imagine if you cannot get the old coin, but people who have a sibling who got one in 1948 can call the mint and order spares anytime they want, free, hot off the stamping mills.
Hey, it's all good now. I looked in one of my coin books and it turns out that they actually made one the next year, and the year after that. In fact, they made one every year until 1968 when they switched to nickel and then kept making them! Obviously each year was slightly different from the last, but i feel much better now knowing that other people were able to get their own version of the coin every year.
I suppose I could be bitter and upset that I can't have EVERY version the mint produced, but to be honest, it's not their fault i wasn't around to collect it.
Certainly they could retire them, however with that continued expectation of availability based on previous events, it would have been most reasonable to announce the retirement of a ship during the final event the ship was available, not surprise everyone a month before the next event.
This is my biggest issue with the way this happened.
But you can't order "spares". You can only put your old coin into a safe (we call that "dismissing the ship" or "logging out of the character") and then take it back out (we call that "using the event reputation store" or "logging into a different character").
I only borrowed his coin analogy, I made no claims it was a good analogy.
Point remains... If you have a sibling (we call that an alt) who got the 1948 coin (risian corvette) then all their younger siblings (new alts) can phone the mint and order a fresh copy off the mills (go to the event store and claim).
If coin collectors in RL heard old dies were being used to stamp new runs of 'collectible' coins for relatives of people with an original, they would go completely ballistic.
<center><font size="+5"><b>Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day... Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
If they never had the ships to begin with, why would they miss them?
I've always thought STO was quite generous in this department. Free ships offered via giveaways or events are quite consistent annually and the ships in question do improve to reflect the current creep so they aren't useless either. If a player sticks around for any real length of time they will have access to freebie ships eventually.
Hey, it's all good now. I looked in one of my coin books and it turns out that they actually made one the next year, and the year after that. In fact, they made one every year until 1968 when they switched to nickel and then kept making them! Obviously each year was slightly different from the last, but i feel much better now knowing that other people were able to get their own version of the coin every year.
I suppose I could be bitter and upset that I can't have EVERY version the mint produced, but to be honest, it's not their fault i wasn't around to collect it.
Until you meet another collector at a fair, who also wasn't there in 48, but who ordered all those old coins from the mint last week, fresh off the presses, because their older brother had them from the original runs...
Nice try... your analogy sort of fails, because mints don't re issue old coins to relatives of old collectors, but Cryptic DOES issue old ships to alts of old collectors now.
<center><font size="+5"><b>Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day... Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
Nah... as a new player, for whom it's the first summer even, I don't feel anybody is hostile toward me. A bit shame, sure, but I'm looking forward the event and the Ferengi ship instead (my SCI toon will be very happy flying it).
I'm too excited about this "great event everybody's been talking about for weeks" to worry about a ship I wouldn't get. There's still a pokemon pet and a "greedy" ship I CAN get.
time is future, present and past. present goes to the past which is just a shame it cant be changed, yet one cant be hostile of time moving along. its all finite including our little lives and so far as the event ships are concerned, maybe no way they will be seen again like the free jem'hadar attack ship when this whole lobi lockbox TRIBBLE started up, same with previous events and the collectors edition.
its just a basic hard fact, things come and go. as far it being a problem for new players, you cant slam the brakes on the train because a few new players want to start from step one and work their way to the trains current position, because then you will get a stream of others, non stop that all want to do it and the train wont move. the train is gone and thats it, so is the event ships until cryptic decides otherwise.
T6 Miranda Hero Ship FTW. Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
Until you meet another collector at a fair, who also wasn't there in 48, but who ordered all those old coins from the mint last week, fresh off the presses, because their older brother had them from the original runs...
Nice try... your analogy sort of fails, because mints don't re issue old coins to relatives of old collectors, but Cryptic DOES issue old ships to alts of old collectors now.
Well, my wife can pull my current silver dollars out of the coin safe at any time and enjoy them. My kids can do the same anytime they want and if it wasn't for the lack of thumbs, my dogs could probably get in there too. That's a whole mess of people on the same "account" that can enjoy those coins. No re-issue required.
Now that I think of it, any children I might have that aren't even born yet will also be able to enjoy those coins, but only because I was there to collect them.
Put a breen equipment set on it for that rusted and grey semi-decrepit hulk look...
Heh. I stuck a Borg deflector dish on it - cyclops grinning zombie skull ship.
(also used brown hull material & faded green patterning on it. Reminded me a bit of old Chaos cruisers from Battlefleet Gothic, so I named it Plaguebearer :P)
By repeatedly offering the previous year's ship it was implied and understood. No reasonable person would expect differently based on how it has worked for the seasonal events for the past couple years. It is how they functioned. It is what we told people to expect any time they asked about one of these ships, that they could get one of their own come the summer/winter event.
you say it was implied and understood, i say it was assumed and hoped for. if players chose to take the ships for granted and expected nothing to change, when the games history has clearly shown this is never the case. personally, i cant help but feel this expectation is misguided, maybe even irrational and very much bordering on naivety.
time is future, present and past. present goes to the past which is just a shame it cant be changed, yet one cant be hostile of time moving along. its all finite including our little lives and so far as the event ships are concerned, maybe no way they will be seen again like the free jem'hadar attack ship when this whole lobi lockbox TRIBBLE started up, same with previous events and the collectors edition.
its just a basic hard fact, things come and go. as far it being a problem for new players, you cant slam the brakes on the train because a few new players want to start from step one and work their way to the trains current position, because then you will get a stream of others, non stop that all want to do it and the train wont move. the train is gone and thats it, so is the event ships until cryptic decides otherwise.
sorry just checking, you did get that the player you replied too was saying.. yeah cool, i'm really excited about the event, Ferengi ship and the new pet..?
Well, my wife can pull my current silver dollars out of the coin safe at any time and enjoy them. My kids can do the same anytime they want and if it wasn't for the lack of thumbs, my dogs could probably get in there too. That's a whole mess of people on the same "account" that can enjoy those coins. No re-issue required.
Now that I think of it, any children I might have that aren't even born yet will also be able to enjoy those coins, but only because I was there to collect them.
See, this is where analogies fail so often by not being very good in the first place and by the user flogging their rotting corpses until they explode...
Your post would have been a closer analogy if you'd said
"Well my wife, kids, and dog can get their own identical sets free of charge because I have mine in the safe"
Still, I admire your attempt to justify your position with a lame inaccurate analogy, so I'll give you a very generous 4/10 for effort.
This is a one time 'bound to character on pickup' limited offer that will not be available again to your alts, either in an event store or via the lobi consortium...
<center><font size="+5"><b>Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day... Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
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I'm sorry, but older players who didn't bother with some of the events or thought along the lines of 'i can always get it next time' need to face the simple truth, harsh as that may sound, it really is all on you! always remember that you cant complete what you haven't started, and since next time may never happen, you really need to use this time well. and please stop using 'think of the new players' as a vehicle to get what you want, it is so very obvious.
In that you only had a limited time period each year in which to earn the currency to unlock it.
How many years was the Corvette available?
The Breen ships?
Actually no... The time available to grind for event ships was limited, but...
I joined shortly before the 2014 winter event...
You could do the 25 day grind during the limited time the event ran, to get that years ship OR one of the 2 previous years ships.
If one of your toons had one of the ships, your other toons could do 1 days grind for it, so, 3 toons all doing the 27 days grind meant all 3 ships on all 3 toons.
Thats why after doing 3 times the normal event grind, I had all 3 years ships on all 3 toons.
The same was true of the summer event, until, a couple or 3 weeks before the summer event kicks off "exclusivity" kicks in and the past years ships get mothballed, only available for the people who are old enough and had the time to grind for them last year or the year before.
The move doesn't make a lot of sense, truth be told, it will reduce the metrics for the event.
People wont run the event all 25 days on multiple toons to get all the ships, just run the grind once for the account unlock on this years ship.
Assuming I want the ferengi ship, it's reduced my Risa-Event time by 70%, less time people spend on Risa, less incentive to mess about getting swimwear, sunglasses, surf boards and retina destroying shirts.
So, this year, many people will, instead of effectively living on Risa for 27 days, will visit briefly once a day for 25.
Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
I see a difference. Sure, there are those that have the same tendencies, but it's not nearly as prominent here as it is in WoW. People here have been more helpful and less toxic than anything I experienced in WoW. Not always, mind you, but definitely more frequently. My Fleet has been infinitely more helpful then any Guild I was ever in. I don't get bashed for asking questions near as often here as I did in WoW.
STO has it's fair share of trolls, for sure. Not nearly to the extent of WoW. My ignore list isn't full here though. In WoW, I constantly had to clear old ignores to bring in new ones.
Cryptic: ( gives all of our alts event ships )
Player: rage! whine! blather about how new players "must feel" without actually asking any!
I'm not surprised anymore about how bitter and jaded some older players are, but it is sad.
As a coin collector, I've always coveted the Canadian 1948 silver dollar but have never been able to acquire one. The mint almost certainly still has the dies to make the coin so there's absolutely no reason why they shouldn't be punching them out for those of us who weren't around to get it first hand.
Honestly, it's outrageous. They're punishing me for not having been around when the coin was first issued. This isn't how they should be treating post 1948 citizens.
The Dev's placate worked on you. You might want to boost your countermeasures a bit.
It was a move to split the outrage and do just what you are doing and turn them against each other instead of the Devs.
Retiring ships, that have been available for years, that are for this year purchasable with the to-be-retired-yearly currency, for the sake of exclusivity, is a shallow move and they should be called on it.
To borrow your analogy...
Imagine if you cannot get the old coin, but people who have a sibling who got one in 1948 can call the mint and order spares anytime they want, free, hot off the stamping mills.
Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
This isn't about "empowerment": That's what Delta Recruitment did, but event hat was time limted - want to join now? Sorry, that event is past.
In all cases, the intention is to get players attracted. "Whoa, exclusive, time limited rewards? I shouldn't hold off playing STO any longer, I should start an account and make my character right now, and play for 25 days at least to get this exclusive reward."
And then, after 25 days, they hear something like "Double Skill Point Event two weeks after the summer event" or "Dilithium Bonus Event" and think "Oh, I should stick around for a bit longer...".
And then they stick around for a bit longer, and then there is the "Crystalline Entity Event ,wich special, unqiue rewards and lots of Dilithium and Marks", and they might think "oh, cool, another event, can't hurt to play through that, too".
That's very true.
I think I've derailed this thread enough, though. Sorry folks.
The reason it seems to be a such a shock here though is that STO used to be classed as a newbie-friendly and casual game. Ships were always available if you came back for the event, and it was only the minor things like weapons or Doffs that were not available (from Mirror events).
But you can't order "spares". You can only put your old coin into a safe (we call that "dismissing the ship" or "logging out of the character") and then take it back out (we call that "using the event reputation store" or "logging into a different character").
By repeatedly offering the previous year's ship it was implied and understood. No reasonable person would expect differently based on how it has worked for the seasonal events for the past couple years. It is how they functioned. It is what we told people to expect any time they asked about one of these ships, that they could get one of their own come the summer/winter event.
Certainly they could retire them, however with that continued expectation of availability based on previous events, it would have been most reasonable to announce the retirement of a ship during the final event the ship was available, not surprise everyone a month before the next event.
Further, Cryptic has a history of not respecting "exclusivity." The cynic would imagine these discontinued event ships are going to end up in the Lobi store.
Hey, it's all good now. I looked in one of my coin books and it turns out that they actually made one the next year, and the year after that. In fact, they made one every year until 1968 when they switched to nickel and then kept making them! Obviously each year was slightly different from the last, but i feel much better now knowing that other people were able to get their own version of the coin every year.
I suppose I could be bitter and upset that I can't have EVERY version the mint produced, but to be honest, it's not their fault i wasn't around to collect it.
This is my biggest issue with the way this happened.
I only borrowed his coin analogy, I made no claims it was a good analogy.
Point remains... If you have a sibling (we call that an alt) who got the 1948 coin (risian corvette) then all their younger siblings (new alts) can phone the mint and order a fresh copy off the mills (go to the event store and claim).
If coin collectors in RL heard old dies were being used to stamp new runs of 'collectible' coins for relatives of people with an original, they would go completely ballistic.
Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
I've always thought STO was quite generous in this department. Free ships offered via giveaways or events are quite consistent annually and the ships in question do improve to reflect the current creep so they aren't useless either. If a player sticks around for any real length of time they will have access to freebie ships eventually.
It didn't give anyone a reason to trust them in the future, that's for sure.
Until you meet another collector at a fair, who also wasn't there in 48, but who ordered all those old coins from the mint last week, fresh off the presses, because their older brother had them from the original runs...
Nice try... your analogy sort of fails, because mints don't re issue old coins to relatives of old collectors, but Cryptic DOES issue old ships to alts of old collectors now.
Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>
time is future, present and past. present goes to the past which is just a shame it cant be changed, yet one cant be hostile of time moving along. its all finite including our little lives and so far as the event ships are concerned, maybe no way they will be seen again like the free jem'hadar attack ship when this whole lobi lockbox TRIBBLE started up, same with previous events and the collectors edition.
its just a basic hard fact, things come and go. as far it being a problem for new players, you cant slam the brakes on the train because a few new players want to start from step one and work their way to the trains current position, because then you will get a stream of others, non stop that all want to do it and the train wont move. the train is gone and thats it, so is the event ships until cryptic decides otherwise.
Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
Well, my wife can pull my current silver dollars out of the coin safe at any time and enjoy them. My kids can do the same anytime they want and if it wasn't for the lack of thumbs, my dogs could probably get in there too. That's a whole mess of people on the same "account" that can enjoy those coins. No re-issue required.
Now that I think of it, any children I might have that aren't even born yet will also be able to enjoy those coins, but only because I was there to collect them.
Heh. I stuck a Borg deflector dish on it - cyclops grinning zombie skull ship.
(also used brown hull material & faded green patterning on it. Reminded me a bit of old Chaos cruisers from Battlefleet Gothic, so I named it Plaguebearer :P)
you say it was implied and understood, i say it was assumed and hoped for. if players chose to take the ships for granted and expected nothing to change, when the games history has clearly shown this is never the case. personally, i cant help but feel this expectation is misguided, maybe even irrational and very much bordering on naivety.
sorry just checking, you did get that the player you replied too was saying.. yeah cool, i'm really excited about the event, Ferengi ship and the new pet..?
See, this is where analogies fail so often by not being very good in the first place and by the user flogging their rotting corpses until they explode...
Your post would have been a closer analogy if you'd said
"Well my wife, kids, and dog can get their own identical sets free of charge because I have mine in the safe"
Still, I admire your attempt to justify your position with a lame inaccurate analogy, so I'll give you a very generous 4/10 for effort.
This is a one time 'bound to character on pickup' limited offer that will not be available again to your alts, either in an event store or via the lobi consortium...
Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life...</b></size></center>