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Skill Revamp, Experimentation, and a Prediction
maerikcharon
Member Posts: 108 Arc User
`One of the stated goals of the skills revamp has been to encourage experimentation with builds.
The single most important barrier to skill experimentation has been Zen cost. Which they have pretty much stated in their FAQ is going to remain.
So, this pretty much negates any hopes that there will be more build experimentation in the game.
One of the many significant reasons why "DPS is God" on Star Trek online, stems from the fact that it takes more than two character-weeks of in game grinding at current exchange prices for a character to respec their skill points. Something like 18 days worth of dilithium conversion, even when spread across several characters, is ridiculous, to simply see what a different build does.
Something that is simply part of the game mechanics of other games, even including those with such terrible Free to Play models as Star Wars: The Old Republic, becomes comparatively a "Grind Fest" in Star Trek Online, and needlessly so.
Already players have to pay to 'uprade' ships they have already purchased. An upgrade, mind you that still places them into inferior status, with very few exceptions, to higher end ships. Or worse yet, in order to get higher end iterations of ships they have already `purchased, they have to pay not just the original price, but now a 20``% markup for the new shiny.
STO fans have been remarkably forgiving about this.
However, a note to the marketing folks. You had best be extremely careful with this skill revamp. Right now you have the chance to generate tons of player goodwill, by removing the cost of it entirely. Or making it a dilithium cost, rather than zen.
If you don't here is my prediciton.
1) You WILL release the spec tree in a bugged state, every single other release you have done thus far has been broken, some of them critically so, we as players have no reason to expect this time will be any different.
2) People will spend their skill points buying these bugged skills, and then will feel they are being gouged. "You bought bugged skills?! Why, you can just buy this here respec token to fix that... Discounted to 300 zen!" Which is the functional equivalent of poisoning someone, and then selling them the antidote.
Or
3) Nobody will actually spend their skill points. They'll wait a week for some grand-pubah DPS guy to do your bug-finding for you, then wait a week or two past that for you to 'fix it' and then he will proceed to post "The Spec" and they will mindlessly all slap points into that spec, not having any idea what any of it actually does, only that its "The Spec"
Which, is basically what we have now. People don't know anything about the skill trees, because you have put a barrier to the learning and experimenting in those trees which is unecessary, and detrimental to the game on a level you didn't realize.
You will have done this massive overhaul/revamp, and you will end up with the same stagnation you had before, except it will be little boxes picked going top to bottom, instead of little boxes picked left to right.
The single most important barrier to skill experimentation has been Zen cost. Which they have pretty much stated in their FAQ is going to remain.
So, this pretty much negates any hopes that there will be more build experimentation in the game.
One of the many significant reasons why "DPS is God" on Star Trek online, stems from the fact that it takes more than two character-weeks of in game grinding at current exchange prices for a character to respec their skill points. Something like 18 days worth of dilithium conversion, even when spread across several characters, is ridiculous, to simply see what a different build does.
Something that is simply part of the game mechanics of other games, even including those with such terrible Free to Play models as Star Wars: The Old Republic, becomes comparatively a "Grind Fest" in Star Trek Online, and needlessly so.
Already players have to pay to 'uprade' ships they have already purchased. An upgrade, mind you that still places them into inferior status, with very few exceptions, to higher end ships. Or worse yet, in order to get higher end iterations of ships they have already `purchased, they have to pay not just the original price, but now a 20``% markup for the new shiny.
STO fans have been remarkably forgiving about this.
However, a note to the marketing folks. You had best be extremely careful with this skill revamp. Right now you have the chance to generate tons of player goodwill, by removing the cost of it entirely. Or making it a dilithium cost, rather than zen.
If you don't here is my prediciton.
1) You WILL release the spec tree in a bugged state, every single other release you have done thus far has been broken, some of them critically so, we as players have no reason to expect this time will be any different.
2) People will spend their skill points buying these bugged skills, and then will feel they are being gouged. "You bought bugged skills?! Why, you can just buy this here respec token to fix that... Discounted to 300 zen!" Which is the functional equivalent of poisoning someone, and then selling them the antidote.
Or
3) Nobody will actually spend their skill points. They'll wait a week for some grand-pubah DPS guy to do your bug-finding for you, then wait a week or two past that for you to 'fix it' and then he will proceed to post "The Spec" and they will mindlessly all slap points into that spec, not having any idea what any of it actually does, only that its "The Spec"
Which, is basically what we have now. People don't know anything about the skill trees, because you have put a barrier to the learning and experimenting in those trees which is unecessary, and detrimental to the game on a level you didn't realize.
You will have done this massive overhaul/revamp, and you will end up with the same stagnation you had before, except it will be little boxes picked going top to bottom, instead of little boxes picked left to right.
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With boff powers the revamp made it easy and fun to add new boff powers to try with no risk if you decided you wanted to revert to their old skills. Well done, Cryptic!
With the skills revamp, it will apparently still cost 500 zen or 150,000 dil to make any changes. Experimentation? Play? Fun? No. Stress over getting your exact mix of skills right the first time. Even if the tree itself is much improved this one flaw keeps me from giving them another well done. Please re-consider this, Cryptic!
Indeed, if this was meant to "encourage experimentation", then an obvious mechanic would be to extend the Loadout Feature to be a full "rigging": not just ship equipment and boffs, but also doffs, specialization tree, skillstree, the lot. Then you would have two "riggings" for free, and additional riggings for a cost, and changing of those riggings for a cost.
Such a mechanism would allow for people who are quite casual to have in essence, one "free go" plus a standard rigging they use; and more serious players with riggings for each of their needs (to whatever extent and cost they want). This would have continued to generate some income, but also allowed for experimentation on anything from a small to a large scale, depending on the player's own needs.
Alas, it is not to be. I think it's telling that the Jupiter Class had way more player input than the skillstree fiddle before it was set largely in stone.
I also think this will drive a number of players away from the game completely due to the hidden nerfs in the revamp. This isn't a bad as what Star Wars Galaxy did, but it's coming close and that experience proved that even a wonderful IP can lose their player base if they jerk them around too much.
Will it be enough to finally hurt cryptic? No idea, they're gambling it won't be and I find it sad that they're willing to throw those dice. It means that they see serious problems as it is, and are willing to risk even more serious outcomes to adjust whatever metrics they are looking at.
I have already decided on option 3, once this system goes live, I'm gone for at least two weeks since I only get one free respec. Just like right now, I can't afford to not get it right the very first time.
It's an absolutely horrible system. They're changing everything about the skill system with the only exception being the part that most needs fixing.
I mean i look at the current skill tree and i know exactly what i'm building whether it be Sci/Eng or Tact. I've looked at the new skill tree and i'm ??? for Eng & Sci to keep them competitive with my Tact's.
you wrote
3) Nobody will actually spend their skill points. They'll wait a week for some grand-pubah DPS guy to do your bug-finding for you, then wait a week or two past that for you to 'fix it' and then he will proceed to post "The Spec" and they will mindlessly all slap points into that spec, not having any idea what any of it actually does, only that its "The Spec"
Personally i'd rather not have this revamp. I spent like a lot of others a huge amount of time and dil investing in my characters. Now my Epic and Ultra Weapons goodies aren't changing, but the skill tree that affects those goodies will have a knock on effect that will. So diminishing the return on my investment. What you see on Tribble is very close to the finished article the main reason its live there is to make sure there's no game breaking bugs when it hits holodeck. Most feedback about the new system that does'nt highlight a bug will be ignored.
It is changes like these that make me stop and think "idiot" why have you invested money into this product ?.
I don't expect them to be totally free, but they should have a flat Dilithium cost and that's it.
Even if the cost was the 2-5k Dilithium per respec, I would be completely fine with that. That would make it expensive enough that I wouldn't do it all the time, but cheap enough that if I wanted to experiment, I could.
I am looking forward to the revamp going live and appreciate the greater transparency and reduction of needless complexity.
Frankly, with a real money transaction attatched to respec, there is no room for experimentation.
That stifles the game more than it liberates it.
You want to see the end of cookie cutter specs?
Then you stop gouging the people who want to break the mold.
If respec has to have a price then...
I'd pay happily in dilithium, enthusiastically in EC, apathetically with latinum and Never with zen.
It's not like I don't already pay.
Store purchases on occasion and even a subscription.
My point is, if there was a way in game to earn a respec, then it'd be a thing I'd want to experiment with and discover for myself what I like.
Because the consequence of my errors would be some game time spent fixing it.
If the consequence is measured in real money, then I'll either be avoiding making a mistake that will cost me by following the above mentioned and quite popular option 3 , or I'd end up resenting the system that rewards experimental play with a financial punishment.
I would go with your proposal if only they would implement it. But I have to admit, the response to Tribble feedback has never been inspiring. And that's putting it mildly.
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sounds about right for how I will handle the new skill system, as I have said in another thread I cant work out what makes the best skill set on the old system and I am no wiser with the new system, sure I can understand what each thing does a little better but that is a long way from understanding if (A) works well with (B) and if it does will adding (c) make it better or worse and so on.
if respecs had been free with the new system I might have been more tempted to experiment with different builds and who knows I could have even ended up learning what skills complement or void each other.
as thing stands I will not touch the skill tree until I see a good all round set up posted that I can copy even if it takes months of waiting.
it would have also been nice if they give us a few save slots for various skill sets so that once we find skill sets that work well with say Carriers we can save that to one slot and when we find what works best for Science ships we could save a set up for that and so on, when I think of it I would have been much more inclined to buy extra skill save slots then I will ever be to buy respecs.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
And me.
Most annoying of all is i just hit 30k now i will have to start from scratch again.
Spice and Wolf is the best anime ever and the viewers love it.
PS Spice and Wolf is ok not the best tho lol
What does "Maxed out in both space and ground" mean to you?
Everyone has the same maximum number of skill points he can get. You also need to spend a certain amount of minimum points at each tier on space and on ground.
If you maxed out ground, e.g. spend as much as possible of your points there, you cannot have maxed out space anymore. And vice versa.
I can tell you that the new system will not allow you to split your skill points between ground and space. You have a separate pool for both.
There are a few new skills in the system. Several skills have been combined into one, and some things have been turned into unlocks that you gain by spending enough points in one tree.
So far I haven' really seen any builds that couldn't get similar skill bonuses as before, and most have some points left over to spend on skills that didn't exist before. But: Some skills affect your powers differently than they used to, which also means that some powers will have become weaker, and some probably stronger.
But you have to waste a lot of time doing that -- any spec XP, dil, marks, EC, loot you earn while testing evaporates because you're using a copied character on the test server.
If respecs were cheap, we wouldn't lose any character gains just the cost.
XP, dil, marks, and EC are all free in tribble and it's not like it takes long to test anyways. I find tribble incredibly useful for testing and now that we get free respecs on tribble it's even better.
I somewhat agree with the OP but it's easy to experiment on tribble.
the free respecs on tribble are there for testing the new skill system, don't expect that to be a permanent fixture once the new skill system goes live.
don't be surprised if they close that potential drain on their income double quick.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Losing that is a lot better than losing 500 zen, but it's still a loss.
You don't know that. Everything else has stayed.
I probably *will* respec on the first day (but likely come to regret it, LOL). I think I have it all more-or-less figured out, but the Science stats are missing on my Tribble ship (really, Bort?!), so that's not exactly helping me to understand what's going on either.
Overall, I'd say the new system only serves to make thing more confusing. And people *will* need to respec multiple times. And people *will* not like it. And Cryptic *will* not care. That is my prediction.