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Nerfing Dilithium Weekends again

Cryptic ... remember last year when you nerfed Dilithium weekends, and we all had a sit in at the starbase?

So why are you nerfing it again? ...

From today's patch notes ...
Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking? At least it was bringing people into the game. Believe it or not a 50% upgrade for playing queues is not going to do it.

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Comments

  • evilmark444evilmark444 Member Posts: 6,951 Arc User
    This is old news, was on tribble last week, several threads came up, no dev response
    Lifetime Subscriber since Beta
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  • roamerzaroamerza Member Posts: 52 Arc User
    Well, it is hardly old news if it is in today's patch notes. Most of us do not play on Tribble.
    Are we seriously hitting Cryptic's bottom line with 4-5 Dilithium Weekends a year?
  • gradiigradii Member Posts: 2,824 Arc User
    Dilithium has always been really easy to get, but as long as the refine limit stays at 8,000 this won't make much of a difference at all.

    "He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
    Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
    he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
    In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
    He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
    He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
    He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
    He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
  • roamerzaroamerza Member Posts: 52 Arc User
    Except that all of us Lifetime players get 8000 Di processed a day, even when we are not logged in.
  • baldrick8baldrick8 Member Posts: 100 Arc User
    Not always. Bugs out for me sometimes.
  • gradiigradii Member Posts: 2,824 Arc User
    edited July 2016
    roamerza wrote: »
    Except that all of us Lifetime players get 8000 Di processed a day, even when we are not logged in.

    Makes no difference. that's still 8,000 a day.

    "He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
    Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
    he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
    In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
    He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
    He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
    He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
    He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
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  • starmanjstarmanj Member Posts: 718 Arc User
    gradii wrote: »
    roamerza wrote: »
    Except that all of us Lifetime players get 8000 Di processed a day, even when we are not logged in.

    Makes no difference. that's still 8,000 a day.

    Actually it is 8,500 a day for non life time members if DIL mining is completed.
  • peterconnorfirstpeterconnorfirst Member Posts: 6,225 Arc User
    edited July 2016
    coldnapalm wrote: »
    This is aimed more at the hardcore farmers who has 20 toons who don't actually reach that cap per toon when they don’t have 3-4 dozen admiralty ship cards which are much easier to use than contraband. And it's not a bad thing.

    Agreed, I’m not concerned a bit here.
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    teamwork to reach a goal is awesome and highly appreciated
  • ltminnsltminns Member Posts: 12,572 Arc User
    I think this is more related to a pretty soon to appear Temporal Recruitment Dilithium Bonus World Event Week. That is after all the Temporal Recruits work their b*tts off for a week. :)
    'But to be logical is not to be right', and 'nothing' on God's earth could ever 'make it' right!'
    Judge Dan Haywood
    'As l speak now, the words are forming in my head.
    l don't know.
    l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
    That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
    Lt. Philip J. Minns
  • jaguarskxjaguarskx Member Posts: 5,945 Arc User
    roamerza wrote: »

    From today's patch notes ...
    Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

    It is in response to numerous threads complaining about the high exchange rate for Dil to Zen. I think prior to the release notes the exchange rate was something like 480:1 or 490:1. When it was released in the Tribble notes last week it cause a bit of a panic which led to the exchange rate dip to 383:1 (at least that what I personally saw). The market recovered from the panic and last time I checked the exchange rate was something like 425:1.

    I think someone posted that a good number of his friends decided to stop playing STO because the "price" to get Zen for free was simply too high for them to justify spending a lot of time grinding for Dil.
  • gradiigradii Member Posts: 2,824 Arc User
    starmanj wrote: »
    gradii wrote: »
    roamerza wrote: »
    Except that all of us Lifetime players get 8000 Di processed a day, even when we are not logged in.

    Makes no difference. that's still 8,000 a day.

    Actually it is 8,500 a day for non life time members if DIL mining is completed.

    9,500 for lifetime members if they use the lifer assignment.

    "He shall be my finest warrior, this generic man who was forced upon me.
    Like a badass I shall make him look, and in the furnace of war I shall forge him.
    he shall be of iron will and steely sinew.
    In great armour I shall clad him and with the mightiest weapons he shall be armed.
    He will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight him.
    He shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best him in battle.
    He is my answer to cryptic logic, he is the Defender of my Romulan Crew.
    He is Tovan Khev... and he shall know no fear."
  • echattyechatty Member Posts: 5,917 Arc User
    Yeah. But the assignment is a 48 hour one, so that's 1000 every two days.
    Now a LTS and loving it.
    Just because you spend money on this game, it does not entitle you to be a jerk if things don't go your way.
    I have come to the conclusion that I have a memory like Etch-A-Sketch. I shake my head and forget everything. :D
  • trennantrennan Member Posts: 2,839 Arc User
    And the contraband dil farmers with 20+ alt cried and wept as they could no long farm their daily dil via contraband.

    I say, good job here Crypitc. Time to start making dil harder to get.
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  • warpangelwarpangel Member Posts: 9,427 Arc User
    roamerza wrote: »
    Cryptic ... remember last year when you nerfed Dilithium weekends, and we all had a sit in at the starbase?

    So why are you nerfing it again? ...

    From today's patch notes ...
    Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

    Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking? At least it was bringing people into the game. Believe it or not a 50% upgrade for playing queues is not going to do it.
    I'd guess "pop in every 4 hours to restart the contraband assignment on your bazillion toons and then leave" isn't the kind of people the devs are interested in bringing into the game.
  • lsegnlsegn Member Posts: 594 Arc User
    They should those people drive the lockbox economy forward. Its because of their vast supply of Zen that lockbox stuff becomes available and affordable. Now the only way keys or promotion packs can be had is with real money, the supply will drop like a stone.
  • evilmark444evilmark444 Member Posts: 6,951 Arc User
    roamerza wrote: »
    Well, it is hardly old news if it is in today's patch notes. Most of us do not play on Tribble.
    Are we seriously hitting Cryptic's bottom line with 4-5 Dilithium Weekends a year?

    When the forum fires have already raged and burned themselves out, yes it's old news. I also saw many people complaining in game about it as well, so you didn't need to log in to tribble to know about this.

    I don't like the change either, but only because the dil exchange crashed when they announced this change last week.
    Lifetime Subscriber since Beta
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  • neos472neos472 Member Posts: 580 Arc User
    warpangel wrote: »
    roamerza wrote: »
    Cryptic ... remember last year when you nerfed Dilithium weekends, and we all had a sit in at the starbase?

    So why are you nerfing it again? ...

    From today's patch notes ...
    Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

    Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking? At least it was bringing people into the game. Believe it or not a 50% upgrade for playing queues is not going to do it.
    I'd guess "pop in every 4 hours to restart the contraband assignment on your bazillion toons and then leave" isn't the kind of people the devs are interested in bringing into the game.

    this
    manipulator of time and long time space traveler
  • duncanidaho11duncanidaho11 Member Posts: 7,980 Arc User
    edited July 2016
    roamerza wrote: »
    Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking?

    Two seconds ago this was the biggest problem facing the game, around here. Now it's "oh no, how dare Cryptic make an incremental change that relates to the subject people have been fretting about for a few months now!" (ie. dilithium exchange rates.)

    Personally, these kinds of macro-economic tweaks you can't really take at any kind of personal level. Good or bad? Well it depends on the population-level stats. Ie. how much goes into the general pool. You can always game the system (ie. earn more regardless of the tweaks) by compensating with another source. It's not like turning in contraband had intrinsic gameplay value that no other activity could replicate, nor is it really going away. You're just making a bit less from that, but take it in view that since doffing was added we've had new sources from episodes, all PVE's, reputation pay-outs, admiralty, events, zones and so on. A little re-scaling here and there's to be expected (though one may have expected cryptic to have done something like this a long time ago, ie. while the other stuff was being added to balance against long-term inflation.)
    Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
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  • alexvio1alexvio1 Member Posts: 389 Arc User
    Gold sellers will not loose anything - they just will create more accounts to compensate the nerf. This change was done to make the game less alt friendly.
  • drsanitydrsanity Member Posts: 76 Arc User
    warpangel wrote: »
    roamerza wrote: »
    Cryptic ... remember last year when you nerfed Dilithium weekends, and we all had a sit in at the starbase?

    So why are you nerfing it again? ...

    From today's patch notes ...
    Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

    Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking? At least it was bringing people into the game. Believe it or not a 50% upgrade for playing queues is not going to do it.
    I'd guess "pop in every 4 hours to restart the contraband assignment on your bazillion toons and then leave" isn't the kind of people the devs are interested in bringing into the game.

    QFT.

    The question everyone should be asking is not why this is being done, but why it wasn't done a very, very long time ago.

    There is an abundance of dilithium to be earned by actually actively playing the game.

    Simply identifying the best route to 'bot' the game through contraband does not qualify as playing actively or adding and generating content and experience for the other users in the world, the fundamental argument of what Free Players are there to do in terms of the business justification case.

    Also, to:
    alexvio1 wrote: »
    Gold sellers will not loose anything - they just will create more accounts to compensate the nerf. This change was done to make the game less alt friendly.

    Personally, I find it more alt friendly not to feel compelled to cycle through my various alts every 3-4 hours just to maximize returns. I'd be _much_ happier with more long DOFF missions with worthwhile payouts at the 20 hour mark so my less active alts were a simpler once a day thing.

    To me, that is more alt friendly as it is less drudgery (again, not actively playing, just clicking buttons that my idiot first officer cannot automate on his own, apparently. ;) )

    You are allowed of course to see it differently.
    "The only thing mankind learns from the study of history is that mankind does not learn from the study of history." ~G. Santayana
  • gaevsprivsmangaevsprivsman Member Posts: 314 Arc User
    I play 2 hours a day, and still hit the cap.. and dont even use contraband.. not a big deal for casuals..
  • antiquesroadshowantiquesroadshow Member Posts: 227 Arc User
    Dilithium is really really easy to get. But heck, you can only refine 8000 a day. That's the problem you should be complaining about.
  • davefenestratordavefenestrator Member Posts: 10,664 Arc User
    roamerza wrote: »
    Well, it is hardly old news if it is in today's patch notes. Most of us do not play on Tribble.
    Are we seriously hitting Cryptic's bottom line with 4-5 Dilithium Weekends a year?

    Already discussed in 2+ threads in this forum in the last couple of days, but it is aimed at the grinders and farmers with large numbers of KDF alts. Slowing them down means other peoples' dil has a higher value.

  • roamerzaroamerza Member Posts: 52 Arc User
    edited July 2016
    warpangel wrote: »
    roamerza wrote: »
    Cryptic ... remember last year when you nerfed Dilithium weekends, and we all had a sit in at the starbase?

    So why are you nerfing it again? ...

    From today's patch notes ...
    Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

    Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking? At least it was bringing people into the game. Believe it or not a 50% upgrade for playing queues is not going to do it.
    I'd guess "pop in every 4 hours to restart the contraband assignment on your bazillion toons and then leave" isn't the kind of people the devs are interested in bringing into the game.

    What a grandiose assumption!

    Dilitihium weekends are run a handful of times a year. It was not going to make the change the economy, or change the makeup of the game in any great shape or form.

    I think myself and the other members who collected Contraband by playing this game regularly are the type of people Cryptic would want to be rewarded on Dilithium weekends, but it is becoming another "special event" weekend really not worth the time.

    If this was to give gold miners a hard time, seems a bit like hitting a nail with a sledgehammer.
  • trejgontrejgon Member Posts: 323 Arc User
    roamerza wrote: »
    warpangel wrote: »
    roamerza wrote: »
    Cryptic ... remember last year when you nerfed Dilithium weekends, and we all had a sit in at the starbase?

    So why are you nerfing it again? ...

    From today's patch notes ...
    Increased assignment cooldown on "Turn In Contraband" assignments from 4 hours to 20 hours.

    Were we making too much Dilithium again for your liking? At least it was bringing people into the game. Believe it or not a 50% upgrade for playing queues is not going to do it.
    I'd guess "pop in every 4 hours to restart the contraband assignment on your bazillion toons and then leave" isn't the kind of people the devs are interested in bringing into the game.

    What a grandiose assumption!

    Dilitihium weekends are run a handful of times a year. It was not going to make the change the economy, or change the makeup of the game in any great shape or form.

    I think myself and the other members who collected Contraband by playing this game regularly are the type of people Cryptic would want to be rewarded on Dilithium weekends, but it is becoming another "special event" weekend really not worth the time.

    If this was to give gold miners a hard time, seems a bit like hitting a nail with a sledgehammer.

    contraband assigment cooldown nerf has nothing to do with bonus dilithium weekend >.>

    it is a thing about ppl who use crapload of alts generate with different ways enough contraband to get all those alts feed the contraband to security officer every time it gets of cd and gets the refinement limit hit on crapload of toon by basically 3 click per toon every 4 hours be it during bonus dilithium event or not

    this change was aimed to not be able to hit dilitium refining cap by mere contraband and by thus either force those farm accounts to start actually playing those toons or outright diminish their efficiency whne they are just too big for human being being able to achieve that

    the only "innocents" that could be hit with it are weekend-only players whom was relying on contraband to get the refinement limits hit during weekdays when they are unable to play anything more than those 5 minutes due to real life duties.

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  • jaguarskxjaguarskx Member Posts: 5,945 Arc User
    Dilithium is really really easy to get. But heck, you can only refine 8000 a day. That's the problem you should be complaining about.

    Depends on your perspective...

    If you need Dil for things like upgrades and fleet projects, then yes raising the refinement cap will help solve the problem.

    On the other hand, if you want to use the Dil to get Zen, then that would just cause the exchange rate to jump. That's because it will devalue the refined Dil already in the market.

    It could push the Dil / Zen market to the point where people who put Zen on the Dil Exchange will no longer bother doing so if they believe that Zen is more valuable to them than 500 Dil; the max exchange rate is 500:1. If the Zen sellers (a.k.a. Dil buyers) determine for themselves that it is simply better for them to grind and refine their own Dil, then they will not bother putting any more Zen on the Dil Exchange.

    That in turn will theoretically increase the exchange rate beyond 500:1 because there would be less Zen on the in the Dil Exchange. Basically that means there is more Dil chasing less Zen. It can get to the point where no one bothers to put up Zen for sale.

    If that should ever happen, then I suppose the number of STO playing Arc Quests would skyrocket since that would be the only source of free Zen. Though I am not sure how long it takes to get Zen since I never bothered with Arc Quests,
  • whamhammer1whamhammer1 Member Posts: 2,290 Arc User
    There was a sit-in last year?
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