now, for the currency, i understand, hell, i would even understand if they reset the project back to 0, so i had to work for it, but removing the ships entirely is just the wrong way to go about it, and it honestly is a bit shady to quite a few people. now, maybe making the older ships a side project..... i could get aboard that, gives you something else to do when you finished with the main ship grind, then you can slot the other projects in and use a different currency for each of them, say.... one you can only earn up to a certain point, which is the price of the ship. see..... now that would not be so bad, but to remove them entirely..... leaves a bad taste in Many mouths, some people do not care about the consoles, they just wanted the ships themselves for RP purposes ( why else do you think i would keep an NX in my active starship Lineup? because i want that RP feeling. ) Others do want the sets, yes, even if they are terrible, it would be something to check off their list. Others probably would use the ships as their mains, even if they are only T-5U (Even some people have their favorites and stick to them even when tier 6 ones are available, i know i still play with the Galaxy class and the Ambassador for fun, and mine are not even the refits, heck, my favorite ship is an obelisk carrier, the non-upgradable one )Many people disapprove of this for the wrong reasons, but many more have the right reasons why this is a bad, very bad, update.
Nope - sorry - this is impatience. This is sulking because of the removal of a shortcut. This is 'I don't want to wait'. This is 'I want free stuff but I want to as little as possible to get it so give me my shiny IMMEDIATELY!'.
I don't care either way as I expected this to happen since the summer event and I don't have a stash waiting to be used. What I want to point out though, is that you're completely wrong about this being a shortcut. People grided those glossy pictures, legit. That doesn't qualify as a shortcut - they have spent the time and effort to get them as everyone else in the past or future, they just didn't spent that time when Cryptic wants them to. And that right there is the problem and the source of what I see as a legitimate outrage even if I don't really care myself.
Cryptic would do good to finally understand that people play these games for a plethora of miscellaneous reasons, none of which is boosting Cryptic's metrics.
Nope - sorry - this is impatience. This is sulking because of the removal of a shortcut. This is 'I don't want to wait'. This is 'I want free stuff but I want to as little as possible to get it so give me my shiny IMMEDIATELY!'.
I don't care either way as I expected this to happen since the summer event and I don't have a stash waiting to be used. What I want to point out though, is that you're completely wrong about this being a shortcut. People grided those glossy pictures, legit. That doesn't qualify as a shortcut - they have spent the time and effort to get them as everyone else in the past or future, they just didn't spent that time when Cryptic wants them to. And that right there is the problem and the source of what I see as a legitimate outrage even if I don't really care myself.
Cryptic would do good to finally understand that people play these games for a plethora of miscellaneous reasons, none of which is boosting Cryptic's metrics.
The thing is, this is once again a no-win-situation for Cryptic. When the last year's winter event was around it's farily certain that the plans to retire currency and ships wasn't in place, that happened with the summer event. So nobody was able to tell them last year stockpiling won't work because nobody knew. It's the transition phase which they now make up for by being able to finish 2014 ships with 2014 and 2015 currency so you can finish the slotted project.
They decided the ships go because those are meant to be the rewards for playing the game now that players not playing might get "rewarded" with a free, account wide T6 and other boni, players continously around get all those events. In both cases the whining is strong and Cryptic can never win anything, but to me the rules are clear.
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
Honestly, I don't see what is wrong with stockpiling event currency, aside from the fact that it is (in theory) causing less of a turnout for the next event. But really... If someone is stockpliling this year, (IMO) they will be stockpiling for next year as well.
Having said that, though, there really is no further need to do that since event ships are now account unlocks and not per character.
But now we have a new reason to grind out event currency that we have no intention of using.
Man, this is such a boring/formal post! Why didn't Q come in to tell us why he doesn't want us to have 8x10 autographed pictures of himself? Must be boring as hell working over there.
Having read all the posts here, the only thing that I will agree with many people on is that Cryptic should make old event ships available in some shape or form on the Lobi market or Fleet stores. This maintains some aspect of the ship being a 'collectable'. I'm in agreement about them changing the currency each year though. Granted someone grinded the hell to get tokens, but I totally agree that everyone should start on even footing at each event.
A number of people still refuse to read the notes properly however. If you already have a project slotted, YOU CAN COMPLETE IT WITH THIS YEAR'S CURRENCY! It will also be the same with the Anniversary project most likely. These changes only started at the Risa Event.
"You don't want to patrol!? You don't want to escort!? You don't want to defend the Federation's Starbases!? Then why are you flying my Starships!? If you were a Klingon you'd be killed on the spot, but lucky for you.....you WERE in Starfleet. Let's see how New Zealand Penal Colony suits you." Adm A. Necheyev.
We want to maintain the exclusivity and collectability of the event ships from the Winter Event each year
Why?
I believe we have the Admiralty system to thank for Cryptics change of heart in the past year.
Gotta make new players catch up with their wallets, 3 alts = 3 free ships if classic versions were out there
I'd ask for the Picture prizes to be account bound too, but I know that goes under "fat chance"
Did the player need to continue beyond point 2? Nope. That was a choice. They could have stopped there; they have the ship - there is no reason to continue the 'grind' beyond stockpiling.
See....there was a reason to continue grinding for some people. I, for example, tend to view the winter race and the summer 'fly through hoops' as grindy and tedious activities, not fun at all. Sure, it's cool and new the first time around, but after a while....ugh. So some people said to themselves - "Well, I already grided this multiple times and I'm feeling sick of the winter event because of the grind, but I'll slug on for a while more so I can actually enjoy the next one instead of focusing on the grind." And up until this year, this was perfectly legitimate, hence their reasons for continuing to do so.
It was not a shortcut, what you're saying is that if a government implements a prohibition law everyone that used to sell or drink liquor previous to the implementation of the law was committing a crime and still needs to be arrested.
Personally, I actually fancy the new model better because it lessens the grind due to account unlocks - so it's actually better for the players. What Cryptic could have and should have done is announce before both the events this and tell that this year will be the last year where players will be allowed to stockpile beforehand - it would have saved them a lot of flak and angry players and they would have still implemented their new policy albeit a bit later, but because of nurturing good relations with the playerbase - something that unfortunately seems so alien to Cryptic.
Having read all the posts here, the only thing that I will agree with many people on is that Cryptic should make old event ships available in some shape or form on the Lobi market or Fleet stores. This maintains some aspect of the ship being a 'collectable'. I'm in agreement about them changing the currency each year though. Granted someone grinded the hell to get tokens, but I totally agree that everyone should start on even footing at each event.
I'm strongly opposed to the idea of making the ships Lobi/fleet-only, especially if it's paid-for character unlocks. However, if there really is no other option except retiring them completely (an opinion I do not share with you or the developers), then this will have to suffice.
A number of people still refuse to read the notes properly however. If you already have a project slotted, YOU CAN COMPLETE IT WITH THIS YEAR'S CURRENCY! It will also be the same with the Anniversary project most likely. These changes only started at the Risa Event.
If you have it slotted. If.
If you canceled or had intended to slot it after getting all the pearls/pictures/Q-mendations, tough luck.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
Did the player need to continue beyond point 2? Nope. That was a choice. They could have stopped there; they have the ship - there is no reason to continue the 'grind' beyond stockpiling.
See....there was a reason to continue grinding for some people. I, for example, tend to view the winter race and the summer 'fly through hoops' as grindy and tedious activities, not fun at all. Sure, it's cool and new the first time around, but after a while....ugh. So some people said to themselves - "Well, I already grided this multiple times and I'm feeling sick of the winter event because of the grind, but I'll slug on for a while more so I can actually enjoy the next one instead of focusing on the grind." And up until this year, this was perfectly legitimate, hence their reasons for continuing to do so.
It was not a shortcut, what you're saying is that if a government implements a prohibition law everyone that used to sell or drink liquor previous to the implementation of the law was committing a crime and still needs to be arrested.
Personally, I actually fancy the new model better because it lessens the grind due to account unlocks - so it's actually better for the players. What Cryptic could have and should have done is announce before both the events this and tell that this year will be the last year where players will be allowed to stockpile beforehand - it would have saved them a lot of flak and angry players and they would have still implemented their new policy albeit a bit later, but because of nurturing good relations with the playerbase - something that unfortunately seems so alien to Cryptic.
Except the stockpiling (or prevention thereof) isn't the problem. The ships being retired is.
While I would personally be content just with some kind of 'last chance' event (like what the 2014 events turned out to be, except nobody said so until it was too late) to pick up the missing ships, the fact remains that the issue isn't going to go away. There's always going to be another group of players - most likely new arrivals who hadn't seen STO before - who will go "Oh hey, shiny! How do I get it?" when they see/hear about the old event ships (the Sarr Theln and Nandi probably more so than the T5 ships of previous years, I'll grant you that), some of which may be put off to varying degrees when they hear they can't have them anymore.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
I only dislike this move with the currency as previous year ships have not been made available in the Lobi store - this is most obviously a problem with the Samsar, which contains part of the command cruiser console set. The Breen ships may be in a similar situation.
Fate - protects fools, small children, and ships named Enterprise Will Riker
Member Access Denied Armada!
My forum single-issue of rage: Make the Proton Experimental Weapon go for subsystem targetting!
i wish the photos were changed from bind to character to bind to account for that event. i have a few, but on a character i'm not really planning to use anymore due to poor species choice (i should've picked alien, but to do it now i'd have to delete him and re-grind everything. no thanks), so they'll be all wasted.
Now clowns, that's another story. They scare the crap out of me.
We fight them too. Entire armies spilling out of Volkswagens.
We do our best to fight them off, but they keep sending them in.
retiring the photos is okay but retiring the ships is nonsense.
If a Player only has 1 ship he'll never be able to get the full breen console set now AND he'll never be able to get the Plesh-Brek Frigates because those things require at least 2 or even all 3 Breen ships.
Why not put them in the c-store or better in the fleet ship store for fleet marks so players can still get the consoles or fly around with the original, iconic Chell-Grett destroyer.
AND why the hell are they doing that NOW? First they create a Delta recruiting event so more p(l)ayers join or create new Chars and then they take all the ships away for good? Bad decision, bad managemnet, very bad
retiring the photos is okay but retiring the ships is nonsense.
If a Player only has 1 ship he'll never be able to get the full breen console set now AND he'll never be able to get the Plesh-Brek Frigates because those things require at least 2 or even all 3 Breen ships.
Why not put them in the c-store or better in the fleet ship store for fleet marks so players can still get the consoles or fly around with the original, iconic Chell-Grett destroyer.
AND why the hell are they doing that NOW? First they create a Delta recruiting event so more p(l)ayers join or create new Chars and then they take all the ships away for good? Bad decision, bad managemnet, very bad
they only ships you could get from that were the breen ships anyways there are ships that players cant get anyways like the dyson and the obilisk why not add them in to that
retiring the photos is okay but retiring the ships is nonsense.
If a Player only has 1 ship he'll never be able to get the full breen console set now AND he'll never be able to get the Plesh-Brek Frigates because those things require at least 2 or even all 3 Breen ships.
Why not put them in the c-store or better in the fleet ship store for fleet marks so players can still get the consoles or fly around with the original, iconic Chell-Grett destroyer.
AND why the hell are they doing that NOW? First they create a Delta recruiting event so more p(l)ayers join or create new Chars and then they take all the ships away for good? Bad decision, bad managemnet, very bad
they only ships you could get from that were the breen ships anyways there are ships that players cant get anyways like the dyson and the obilisk why not add them in to that
Technically incorrect. While the Dyson destroyer and Obelisk can no longer be obtained for free, the former can be bought for 600 Lobi while the latter can be bought for 100k(?) fleet credits and 2 fleet ship modules. (Additionally, one can simply skip the regular Obelisk and get the Advanced Obelisk for 800 Lobi without any ill effect.)
Not a very pleasant (or consistently applied - the Risian ships are still completely gone) precedent, though. All of the above are character unlocks, and fairly pricey ones at that. (Well, okay, the Obelisk might not be, maybe, but... the Dyson destroyer and Advanced Obelisk certainly are.)
Indeed, the only ship that CANNOT be obtained through any means whatsoever (even if you participated in the event and got the ship) is the T5 Kamarag, and that one has a fleet equivalent.
If we also count ships that can no longer be unlocked for later use, we have the T5 Kamarag, the T5 Ambassador (seeing it as a giveaway was nice, though), the Risian ships, the Nandi, the Samsar, and all non-Rezreth Breen ships. (Counting dead promotions also contributes the Jem'Hadar Attack Ship and Voth Bulwark. Admiralty aside, the JHAS has nothing the JHSS doesn't have - but I wish I could get my hands on a Bulwark... and the money to pay for it, for that matter...)
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
The real problem isn't the glossy pictures. Its the fact they are removing the ships. Giving those people that haven't gotten them by now, less content.
I already got all the ships. But I still think its unfair to people that joined in later, doesn't have the same equal options.
They have less overall content available.
Change the way for people to earn them, but don't remove them entirely.
"Please, Captain, not in front of the Klingons." Spock to Kirk, as Kirk is about to hug him.
Star Trek V: "The Final Frontier"
The real problem isn't the glossy pictures. Its the fact they are removing the ships. Giving those people that haven't gotten them by now, less content.
I already got all the ships. But I still think its unfair to people that joined in later, doesn't have the same equal options.
They have less overall content available.
Change the way for people to earn them, but don't remove them entirely.
Unfortunately, that point has been restated by at least half a dozen people in half a different dozen ways. As much as I would like to believe otherwise, continuing to repeat it further is unlikely to change the outcome.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
If you want to convince anyone that they shouldn't be making this change, it doesn't exactly help to attack both them and their hard work.
What hard work? They've been steadily TRIBBLE up the game with each patch and aren't exactly making much of an effort to fix the really broken stuff. Sorry, but, I gave them the benefit of the doubt once. I'm not going to make the same mistake again. They deserve all the ire they get.
See....there was a reason to continue grinding for some people. I, for example, tend to view the winter race and the summer 'fly through hoops' as grindy and tedious activities, not fun at all. Sure, it's cool and new the first time around, but after a while....ugh. So some people said to themselves - "Well, I already grided this multiple times and I'm feeling sick of the winter event because of the grind, but I'll slug on for a while more so I can actually enjoy the next one instead of focusing on the grind." And up until this year, this was perfectly legitimate, hence their reasons for continuing to do so.
That right there. The events are NOT fun. They're tedious and grindy. By the time I got the Nandi during the summer, I was so sick of Risa, I didn't want to spend another second there. Same goes for the Winter Wonderland. I've hated it since day one because it's stupid, boring and grindy. They need to change things up instead of re-hashing the same BS year after year. Not to mention, annoyingly x-mas themed.
Risa Flyovers and Winter Wonderland Races done on 3 toons are breeze compared to current Mirror Invasion - that one i'm doing on all my toons - 16 repeats a day - now that's a Grind....
Still, i think it's worth it.... (i really, really hope it will be worth it...)
Information about the return of Q’s Winter Wonderland is just around the corner! As part of this year's holiday festivities, we will be retiring the “Autographed 8x10 Glossy Photos of Q” and changing how starships will be earned during this event. ~LaughingTrendy
I understand why you guys are retiring the old currency and will be doing different vouchers for each year's event. I know it is very annoying for people that had currency saved up, but I understand the reasoning.
What I really don't understand is the decision to prevent players from slotting event projects to earn the previous year's ships, especially since you're allowing players who already have them slotted to continue the projects and earn the ships. If nothing else, this seems like it would have been a good opportunity to get players to spend more time in the event earning rewards to complete the extra projects. As it is there is now going to be literally zero reason for players to run the event race more than the minimum needed to get this year's ship.
As a relatively new player this hits extra hard because while I was *barely* able to grind out the Breen Carrier last year, I didn't have enough time to get either of the other two ships. I wasn't terribly worried about that because it was understood that I'd be able to run the event a bunch more times next year to get them then. Now players like me will not be able to complete their console sets or even get the raider so that we can buy frigate pets for our carriers. The people I convinced to join the game during the Delta Recruiting event are even worse off because they won't be able to get any of the previous ships I'd told them about. One of them is actually interested in the command cruiser bundle, but has to deal with the fact that they'll not be able to get the Kobali ship to complete the console set.
You can say that we had warning after you changed the system for the Summer event, but it's a cold comfort at best. Just like the Summer event the "warning" came without any chance to do anything to prepare for it. Having not been a player during the Summer event last year I couldn't slot projects to get either of the Risan ships that I'd been looking forward to getting. Now we of course have "warning" that the other Breen ships will be unavailable this year but we have no ability to slot projects to get them or do anything to help the situation except feel sad that we're going to miss them.
I really wish you guys would reconsider the decision to remove the older ship projects from the game, especially ones with set bonuses or other synergy with other ships. It's bad enough that there are a ton of other items floating around that we can never earn, but it feels like you are punishing those of us with partial sets for not having been around long enough and still wanting to collect things. I know you are claiming that you want to create a sense of exclusivity for the event ships, but is that really what you want? Judging from the reactions of people who already have the older ships it doesn't sound like this exclusivity is either needed or wanted.
The reason why they are doing this is to "herd" people into playing at least enough of the current event to earn whatever currency for the current year.
It's all about their their precious metrics.
Honestly, I don't see what is wrong with stockpiling event currency, aside from the fact that it is (in theory) causing less of a turnout for the next event. But really... If someone is stockpliling this year, (IMO) they will be stockpiling for next year as well.
Having said that, though, there really is no further need to do that since event ships are now account unlocks and not per character.
In all fairness, I can see both sides of the coin. What I don't like is how Cryptic is essentially taking away a player's motivation to go above and beyond what their precious metrics tell them about player participation during an event, and trying to lessen the sting of the ship removal with an exchange system for the soon to be outdated currency.
Let's face it, the good stuff you can not even claim unless that character is already level 60.
Stockpiling does hurt metrics... cause you dont need to grind for each alt.
say I have 5 toons... I grind on all 5 and get 1000 each.
Toon 1 hands in 1000 and gets ship + unlock
Toon 2 to 5 hands in 40 and gets ship and 960 left over pics...
assuming they dont keep grinding for more.
Next year, toon 2 does event once... hands in 1000 and gets ship + unlock...
See the problem.
If the choice was to grind each toon for 1000 for each ship or do an account unlock... account unlock would be the better choice for players. If you need the ship ASAP. you can always buy the photos via Lobi.
Nooo, I have only the Breen carrier. I wanted to get the Plesh Brek Heavy Raider to get the Elite Hangar pets. I was a newbie player last Xmas and I misunderstood how the system works - that you only have to complete ONE project and it unlocks ALL other projects for only 40 photos.
I wouldn't mind grinding for them all anew with new currency, I get that and agree with fairness but if the ships are removed as well...
Could it not be done that old ships remain and new are added? If a new player (or old who did not get them) wants them, the player has to grind all the way for the 1000 price and if the player wants more than one ship, he has to grind this way on more characters - better incentive to stay, be logged on and play.
Or perhaps there could be a very special event sometime during a year when ships from old festivity events (Xmas/Summer) are offered for someting, call it Temporal Anomaly, whatever. but enable those special "gift" ships to be available. Note that this would not be the case for other reward ships, such as the Kobali Samsar (5th anniversary) or Faction specific SCI Destroyer (4th anniversary), although I wouldn't mind getting these too, but I understand that the concepet of anniversary and the gift for it is for players who WERE at the time playing. The XMas gift was the same though for all the time and removing access to these ships is IMHO unfair to new players (I'll bite, it was noone's but my fault for misunderstanding, so even if I could not get them, OK, but the true new players should have the chance)
Retire the currency each year, not the rewards. Make new currency backwards compatible, capable of completing previous years' projects, but old currency cannot be used for the current year's project. That alone would resolve the stockpiling issue and prevent players from preloading for next year.
^ This is how it should be done.
I'm one of those stockpilers, I'll admit.
Between my various chars, I have enough winter and anniversary currency for the next 4-5 years. Only requiring me to run each event once for that year. That was kind of a side effect of Cryptic making them account unlocks now. It wasn't intended that way when I first started.
I did this so, you know, I can take a vacation. It is the holiday season, people have lives. If I'm planning a vacation, why can't I plan for that?
So prevent people from thinking ahead, fine. At least don't unslot the projects once we queue them, that gives us an opportunity to complete it next time.
If I miss one day's worth of autographs, and lose not only the ship that year, but the time wasted collecting the other 960, that will turn me off and make me less likely to participate next year.
-Rule of Acquisition #113: Always have sex with the boss.
-I am one of the many victims from the hijacked Caspian Division.
I will not let the childish acts of a criminal ruin this game for me.
-The actions of Cryptic, on the other hand......
Retire the currency each year, not the rewards. Make new currency backwards compatible, capable of completing previous years' projects, but old currency cannot be used for the current year's project. That alone would resolve the stockpiling issue and prevent players from preloading for next year.
^ This is how it should be done.
I'm one of those stockpilers, I'll admit.
Between my various chars, I have enough winter and anniversary currency for the next 4-5 years. Only requiring me to run each event once for that year. That was kind of a side effect of Cryptic making them account unlocks now. It wasn't intended that way when I first started.
I did this so, you know, I can take a vacation. It is the holiday season, people have lives. If I'm planning a vacation, why can't I plan for that?
So prevent people from thinking ahead, fine. At least don't unslot the projects once we queue them, that gives us an opportunity to complete it next time.
If I miss one day's worth of autographs, and lose not only the ship that year, but the time wasted collecting the other 960, that will turn me off and make me less likely to participate next year.
I keep thinking of other games who have done this sort of thing. They would offer the current year alongside, and sometimes discounted, previous year event item. Then after a few years they would still offer the old item through some sort of game currency. This sort of fits into the lobi store theory.
I don't think the community cared if people prepared ahead of time. In fact, most of the cosmetic (in this case non-ship) items would still be available after years of a games lifespan. Those new players who really wanted to work for it would spend the extra time gaining the ones from years past.
But I've learned people get upset when you diminish their expectations. I have never heard about the delta recruit fiasco or how this already happened during the Risa event before today. I was expecting to get one ship on each of my characters. This expectation rose to getting all 4 ships account-wide when I suddenly realized I could claim the Dyson ship, which I only did once, for all my characters. Then I got very upset to hear that I wouldn't even be able to claim even 1 of the old ships, regardless if I prefer one of them over this year's non-yet-revealed ship.
I'm not a lifetimer, veteran, or gold member. I'm just a guy who wants a T6 ship on their Klingon character. I'm pretty sure I'll still get that this winter event. I just thought things would stay consistent in this game. That's all.
It'd really be nice if a dev would actually respond (and preferably give in to the peer-pressure. ) and at least acknowledge our discontent and cough up a reasonable compromise.
Comments
I don't care either way as I expected this to happen since the summer event and I don't have a stash waiting to be used. What I want to point out though, is that you're completely wrong about this being a shortcut. People grided those glossy pictures, legit. That doesn't qualify as a shortcut - they have spent the time and effort to get them as everyone else in the past or future, they just didn't spent that time when Cryptic wants them to. And that right there is the problem and the source of what I see as a legitimate outrage even if I don't really care myself.
Cryptic would do good to finally understand that people play these games for a plethora of miscellaneous reasons, none of which is boosting Cryptic's metrics.
The thing is, this is once again a no-win-situation for Cryptic. When the last year's winter event was around it's farily certain that the plans to retire currency and ships wasn't in place, that happened with the summer event. So nobody was able to tell them last year stockpiling won't work because nobody knew. It's the transition phase which they now make up for by being able to finish 2014 ships with 2014 and 2015 currency so you can finish the slotted project.
They decided the ships go because those are meant to be the rewards for playing the game now that players not playing might get "rewarded" with a free, account wide T6 and other boni, players continously around get all those events. In both cases the whining is strong and Cryptic can never win anything, but to me the rules are clear.
Get the Forums Enhancement Extension!
My character Tsin'xing
A number of people still refuse to read the notes properly however. If you already have a project slotted, YOU CAN COMPLETE IT WITH THIS YEAR'S CURRENCY! It will also be the same with the Anniversary project most likely. These changes only started at the Risa Event.
I believe we have the Admiralty system to thank for Cryptics change of heart in the past year.
Gotta make new players catch up with their wallets, 3 alts = 3 free ships if classic versions were out there
I'd ask for the Picture prizes to be account bound too, but I know that goes under "fat chance"
See....there was a reason to continue grinding for some people. I, for example, tend to view the winter race and the summer 'fly through hoops' as grindy and tedious activities, not fun at all. Sure, it's cool and new the first time around, but after a while....ugh. So some people said to themselves - "Well, I already grided this multiple times and I'm feeling sick of the winter event because of the grind, but I'll slug on for a while more so I can actually enjoy the next one instead of focusing on the grind." And up until this year, this was perfectly legitimate, hence their reasons for continuing to do so.
It was not a shortcut, what you're saying is that if a government implements a prohibition law everyone that used to sell or drink liquor previous to the implementation of the law was committing a crime and still needs to be arrested.
Personally, I actually fancy the new model better because it lessens the grind due to account unlocks - so it's actually better for the players. What Cryptic could have and should have done is announce before both the events this and tell that this year will be the last year where players will be allowed to stockpile beforehand - it would have saved them a lot of flak and angry players and they would have still implemented their new policy albeit a bit later, but because of nurturing good relations with the playerbase - something that unfortunately seems so alien to Cryptic.
I'm strongly opposed to the idea of making the ships Lobi/fleet-only, especially if it's paid-for character unlocks. However, if there really is no other option except retiring them completely (an opinion I do not share with you or the developers), then this will have to suffice.
If you have it slotted. If.
If you canceled or had intended to slot it after getting all the pearls/pictures/Q-mendations, tough luck.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
Except the stockpiling (or prevention thereof) isn't the problem. The ships being retired is.
While I would personally be content just with some kind of 'last chance' event (like what the 2014 events turned out to be, except nobody said so until it was too late) to pick up the missing ships, the fact remains that the issue isn't going to go away. There's always going to be another group of players - most likely new arrivals who hadn't seen STO before - who will go "Oh hey, shiny! How do I get it?" when they see/hear about the old event ships (the Sarr Theln and Nandi probably more so than the T5 ships of previous years, I'll grant you that), some of which may be put off to varying degrees when they hear they can't have them anymore.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
I only dislike this move with the currency as previous year ships have not been made available in the Lobi store - this is most obviously a problem with the Samsar, which contains part of the command cruiser console set. The Breen ships may be in a similar situation.
Member Access Denied Armada!
My forum single-issue of rage: Make the Proton Experimental Weapon go for subsystem targetting!
We fight them too. Entire armies spilling out of Volkswagens.
We do our best to fight them off, but they keep sending them in.
If a Player only has 1 ship he'll never be able to get the full breen console set now AND he'll never be able to get the Plesh-Brek Frigates because those things require at least 2 or even all 3 Breen ships.
Why not put them in the c-store or better in the fleet ship store for fleet marks so players can still get the consoles or fly around with the original, iconic Chell-Grett destroyer.
AND why the hell are they doing that NOW? First they create a Delta recruiting event so more p(l)ayers join or create new Chars and then they take all the ships away for good? Bad decision, bad managemnet, very bad
they only ships you could get from that were the breen ships anyways there are ships that players cant get anyways like the dyson and the obilisk why not add them in to that
Technically incorrect. While the Dyson destroyer and Obelisk can no longer be obtained for free, the former can be bought for 600 Lobi while the latter can be bought for 100k(?) fleet credits and 2 fleet ship modules. (Additionally, one can simply skip the regular Obelisk and get the Advanced Obelisk for 800 Lobi without any ill effect.)
Not a very pleasant (or consistently applied - the Risian ships are still completely gone) precedent, though. All of the above are character unlocks, and fairly pricey ones at that. (Well, okay, the Obelisk might not be, maybe, but... the Dyson destroyer and Advanced Obelisk certainly are.)
Indeed, the only ship that CANNOT be obtained through any means whatsoever (even if you participated in the event and got the ship) is the T5 Kamarag, and that one has a fleet equivalent.
If we also count ships that can no longer be unlocked for later use, we have the T5 Kamarag, the T5 Ambassador (seeing it as a giveaway was nice, though), the Risian ships, the Nandi, the Samsar, and all non-Rezreth Breen ships. (Counting dead promotions also contributes the Jem'Hadar Attack Ship and Voth Bulwark. Admiralty aside, the JHAS has nothing the JHSS doesn't have - but I wish I could get my hands on a Bulwark... and the money to pay for it, for that matter...)
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
I already got all the ships. But I still think its unfair to people that joined in later, doesn't have the same equal options.
They have less overall content available.
Change the way for people to earn them, but don't remove them entirely.
Spock to Kirk, as Kirk is about to hug him.
Star Trek V: "The Final Frontier"
Unfortunately, that point has been restated by at least half a dozen people in half a different dozen ways. As much as I would like to believe otherwise, continuing to repeat it further is unlikely to change the outcome.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
What hard work? They've been steadily TRIBBLE up the game with each patch and aren't exactly making much of an effort to fix the really broken stuff. Sorry, but, I gave them the benefit of the doubt once. I'm not going to make the same mistake again. They deserve all the ire they get.
That right there. The events are NOT fun. They're tedious and grindy. By the time I got the Nandi during the summer, I was so sick of Risa, I didn't want to spend another second there. Same goes for the Winter Wonderland. I've hated it since day one because it's stupid, boring and grindy. They need to change things up instead of re-hashing the same BS year after year. Not to mention, annoyingly x-mas themed.
Still, i think it's worth it.... (i really, really hope it will be worth it...)
I understand why you guys are retiring the old currency and will be doing different vouchers for each year's event. I know it is very annoying for people that had currency saved up, but I understand the reasoning.
What I really don't understand is the decision to prevent players from slotting event projects to earn the previous year's ships, especially since you're allowing players who already have them slotted to continue the projects and earn the ships. If nothing else, this seems like it would have been a good opportunity to get players to spend more time in the event earning rewards to complete the extra projects. As it is there is now going to be literally zero reason for players to run the event race more than the minimum needed to get this year's ship.
As a relatively new player this hits extra hard because while I was *barely* able to grind out the Breen Carrier last year, I didn't have enough time to get either of the other two ships. I wasn't terribly worried about that because it was understood that I'd be able to run the event a bunch more times next year to get them then. Now players like me will not be able to complete their console sets or even get the raider so that we can buy frigate pets for our carriers. The people I convinced to join the game during the Delta Recruiting event are even worse off because they won't be able to get any of the previous ships I'd told them about. One of them is actually interested in the command cruiser bundle, but has to deal with the fact that they'll not be able to get the Kobali ship to complete the console set.
You can say that we had warning after you changed the system for the Summer event, but it's a cold comfort at best. Just like the Summer event the "warning" came without any chance to do anything to prepare for it. Having not been a player during the Summer event last year I couldn't slot projects to get either of the Risan ships that I'd been looking forward to getting. Now we of course have "warning" that the other Breen ships will be unavailable this year but we have no ability to slot projects to get them or do anything to help the situation except feel sad that we're going to miss them.
I really wish you guys would reconsider the decision to remove the older ship projects from the game, especially ones with set bonuses or other synergy with other ships. It's bad enough that there are a ton of other items floating around that we can never earn, but it feels like you are punishing those of us with partial sets for not having been around long enough and still wanting to collect things. I know you are claiming that you want to create a sense of exclusivity for the event ships, but is that really what you want? Judging from the reactions of people who already have the older ships it doesn't sound like this exclusivity is either needed or wanted.
Stockpiling does hurt metrics... cause you dont need to grind for each alt.
say I have 5 toons... I grind on all 5 and get 1000 each.
Toon 1 hands in 1000 and gets ship + unlock
Toon 2 to 5 hands in 40 and gets ship and 960 left over pics...
assuming they dont keep grinding for more.
Next year, toon 2 does event once... hands in 1000 and gets ship + unlock...
See the problem.
If the choice was to grind each toon for 1000 for each ship or do an account unlock... account unlock would be the better choice for players. If you need the ship ASAP. you can always buy the photos via Lobi.
I wouldn't mind grinding for them all anew with new currency, I get that and agree with fairness but if the ships are removed as well...
Could it not be done that old ships remain and new are added? If a new player (or old who did not get them) wants them, the player has to grind all the way for the 1000 price and if the player wants more than one ship, he has to grind this way on more characters - better incentive to stay, be logged on and play.
Or perhaps there could be a very special event sometime during a year when ships from old festivity events (Xmas/Summer) are offered for someting, call it Temporal Anomaly, whatever. but enable those special "gift" ships to be available. Note that this would not be the case for other reward ships, such as the Kobali Samsar (5th anniversary) or Faction specific SCI Destroyer (4th anniversary), although I wouldn't mind getting these too, but I understand that the concepet of anniversary and the gift for it is for players who WERE at the time playing. The XMas gift was the same though for all the time and removing access to these ships is IMHO unfair to new players (I'll bite, it was noone's but my fault for misunderstanding, so even if I could not get them, OK, but the true new players should have the chance)
^ This is how it should be done.
I'm one of those stockpilers, I'll admit.
Between my various chars, I have enough winter and anniversary currency for the next 4-5 years. Only requiring me to run each event once for that year. That was kind of a side effect of Cryptic making them account unlocks now. It wasn't intended that way when I first started.
I did this so, you know, I can take a vacation. It is the holiday season, people have lives. If I'm planning a vacation, why can't I plan for that?
So prevent people from thinking ahead, fine. At least don't unslot the projects once we queue them, that gives us an opportunity to complete it next time.
If I miss one day's worth of autographs, and lose not only the ship that year, but the time wasted collecting the other 960, that will turn me off and make me less likely to participate next year.
-Rule of Acquisition #113: Always have sex with the boss.
-I am one of the many victims from the hijacked Caspian Division.
I will not let the childish acts of a criminal ruin this game for me.
-The actions of Cryptic, on the other hand......
yup, so much this ^^^^^^^^
My character Tsin'xing
I don't think the community cared if people prepared ahead of time. In fact, most of the cosmetic (in this case non-ship) items would still be available after years of a games lifespan. Those new players who really wanted to work for it would spend the extra time gaining the ones from years past.
But I've learned people get upset when you diminish their expectations. I have never heard about the delta recruit fiasco or how this already happened during the Risa event before today. I was expecting to get one ship on each of my characters. This expectation rose to getting all 4 ships account-wide when I suddenly realized I could claim the Dyson ship, which I only did once, for all my characters. Then I got very upset to hear that I wouldn't even be able to claim even 1 of the old ships, regardless if I prefer one of them over this year's non-yet-revealed ship.
I'm not a lifetimer, veteran, or gold member. I'm just a guy who wants a T6 ship on their Klingon character. I'm pretty sure I'll still get that this winter event. I just thought things would stay consistent in this game. That's all.