In all 4 fleets I’m in the contribution behavior has been the same for 5 years. While only a hand full of players are concerned with the progression of holdings and are willing to put required effort into it all the rest is just concerned with generating enough credits to progress their characters.
The way this is going those few that want to progress the new holdings simply can’t this time and all the rest won’t bother at all in light of the alternatives.
After seeing this I find it shocking by how far you guys at cryptic have lost the touch with the player base. Given how beautiful the new stuff in the Colony is I know you mean well but it won’t work out to the slightest if it goes live that way.
Post edited by peterconnorfirst on
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In all 4 fleets I’m in the contribution behavior has been the same for 5 years. While only a hand full of players are concerned with the progression of holdings and are willing to put required effort into it all the rest is just concerned with generating enough credits to progress their characters.
The way this is going those few that want to progress the new holdings simply can’t this time and all the rest won’t bother at all in light of the alternatives.
After seeing this I find it shocking by how far you guys at cryptic have lost the touch with the player base. Given how beautiful the new stuff in the Colony is I know you mean well but it won’t work out to the slightest if it goes live that way.
actually to progress the new holding you have to play the game, which is exactly what we need and i appreciate this. in case we could just buy the provisions or so, it will be just the same old thing. people with enough fmarks/fcredits dont have to do anything at all. and playing a queue at the map itself, i defnitly like that one. only the minigames might be a bit boring at all for a lot of farming but in case the queue will reward with a decent amount of provisions it will be perfect
The situation is pretty easy: A. Tone down requirements Or B. Increase a lot the rewards given by hourlies and missions Otherwise is gonna be a looooong term holding for everyone.
actually to progress the new holding you have to play the game, which is exactly what we need and i appreciate this.
I agree on this. But at least make the provisions a reward from ANY content and based on invested TIME so some content won't be preferred over another like it is now. Even make them a random drop from lockboxes.
Managed to get into a fleet and went to holding to test and noted the following:
1. On entering the colony i had no idea where to go as only NPC who wanted to talk was the guy to trigger the fleet invasion simulation.
2. Steps behind me so though lets go up but no entry up there. Why have steps if you cant go up them?
3. Ran around map to look for mini games and stumbled across the first two as no indication on map as to where to go at all.
4. Found issue with bridges as the sloped parts of the brisges have no collision detection but flat sections are fine.
5. after doing luxury sorting and ore collection mini games i wandered round trying to find the last one only to go past an unmarked npc who happened to be the quartermaster who wanted to give me the missions. Really would be useful if he had his quest giver marking before you take a mission from him.
6. The mini game for collecting batteries is the 10x10 placeholder so correct graphic still needs putting there.
The mini games themselves though I am not sure if they work correctly as when i do a mini game i am asked to collect 250 of a thing but when i do it and dont get to 250 i end up with provisions in my inventory but once i hit enough to get 250 the game doesnt award me any provisions at all. So should we end up with 250 provisions in total in our inventories, the 250 get automatically thrown into fleet stores, or other as at this point I am not sure what to expect?
Also we need a method of quick travel there.
Edit: Re mini games: they are probably not working as intended. When playing the mini games the game will reward the physical provisions only for the first run through of the mission. On the second and subsequent missions the mission count is incremented but no provisions are given to the player. Ie If I run through and score 100 points I will get 50 provisions, and no matter what I score in later missions i will receive no more even though the mission progress will move up to 250 and close.
Interesting bug by the way on the games. When playing the game you still get a dialog popping up to get you to start the game even though its open. When you press it the game jumps super erratically so you cant do anything in it and never score anything. The dialog really needs to go hen one is already open, and please take away the references to us collecting omega particles as we arent supposed to be collecting those.
2nd Edit: Just tried to leave the colony and there is nowhere except for the colony security chief dialog to exit the holding. The running about is already excessive so we need to be able to beam out from where we finish a daily or people will be put off gathering them very quickly.
Could anybody provide more data about the requirement/reward figures as they are intended please?
--- Perhaps somebody from Cryptic even, if that is not too much to ask for? ---
Form what has been presented so far, a Tier 4 XP project for Morale for example requires over 12k of the respective provisions. A 40 minutes run of the new PvE is supposed to hand out 0,6k of the respective provisions?
Since the average STO Joe won’t participate in the grind for provisions as their donations don’t reward credits enthusiasts for base progressions are now supposed to play the new map over 13-14h to get a daily filled? Yea the new map better is good because even if 5 peeps in a fleet would tend to it regularly they would still need to dedicate almost 3h a day just to get this nonsense straight. Yo, and that each day for a year probably to get to Tier 5.
I hope I’m in deep error here with the figures because otherwise this thing is not going to fly.
Adjusting rewards? Sorry folk, just take a look around. Peeps are not even playing CCa anymore…
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I don't think the numbers are out of line for provisions. Fleets should have more than five people working on projects. If you all remember when Starbases were introduced most fleets took more than a year to complete them. This is supposed to be a similar scale holding.
Will smaller fleets have issues? Of course, as has always been the case. They introduced Armadas so smaller fleets can pair up with larger ones to share resources. I understand the woes of smaller fleets as I have one thats is tier three about to be four. I started it when fleets launched. I'm also in a larger fleet too. It's a marathon and not a sprint. You can always change your fleets participation rules for those who don't pitch in.
I don't know the answer to STOs queue problems but building a colony should take time and be resource intensive.
Gold Sub since March 2010
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
I don't think the numbers are out of line for provisions. Fleets should have more than five people working on projects.
Will smaller fleets have issues? Of course, as has always been the case.
The misconception that „larger“ fleets are off the hook here comes from Fleet Marks with their transition of 1:25 into credits right along with the fact that holdings can swallow only a limited amount of those in the first place (b4 Tier 5).
This is not the case at all with the new stuff. As it stands with the provisions the transition factor is X : ZERO and countless are needed on a daily basis. Nobody but the biggest enthusiasts of base progression will tend to them at all and they will be pissed off by the requirements the same way PvEer were pissed off by S13.
In its current state the whole thing is nothing but a design flaw. It was born from good intention, yes, but is so poorly thought through that it will cripple the next part of this game if not changed.
Post edited by peterconnorfirst on
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actually to progress the new holding you have to play the game, which is exactly what we need and i appreciate this.
I agree on this. But at least make the provisions a reward from ANY content and based on invested TIME so some content won't be preferred over another like it is now. Even make them a random drop from lockboxes.
i have to disagree with this. basically if you want people to play something (like the new fleet action/queue thing on the map) you need something exclusive you could get only there (or it has to be the best way). if you give out the provisions for any content you will just have a next dead thing.
I don't think the numbers are out of line for provisions. Fleets should have more than five people working on projects.[...]
Let me enlighten you with some MATH.
To complete the colony holding you need a total of 9.839.697 provisions. That is without any fancy unlocks like tailor at all.
That is just a bit shy of 50.000 minigames played. (49.200)
To avoid any project stalling you want that amount gathered in roughly 230 days
And this translates into 214 minigames a day, every day, without exception for the next 8 months.
Now you could say that there is autocollection of provisions. Assuming it works without a hitch and actually allows you to contribute in a timely fashion (w/o having to idle projects, because we have no fraking clue how autocollect is supposed to work atm) the mind boggling 10 million provisions become a far more managable number.
With best scenario autocollect you still need 8.497.797 provisions. Thats 42.489 minigames at 185 per day.
Given how eager players are in parting with other high demand building resources (i.e. dilithium) I really don't see how even a 20 player fleet will pull that off. Remember provisions reward nothing, they simply vanish into a black hole.
And do not forget that the other resource requirements for building the holding are far from trivial either, there are still approximately 70 million of fleet credits in that holding, 'only' 10/15 million less than a full fleet starbase would generate.
And for the sake of completion let's run the scenario that you stop playing the fun minigames and let autocollect take care of it.
First you 'still' need to gather 103k provisions to even get to the point where autocollect 'should' start (remember we actually do not know how exactly it should work).
Tier 2 should be finished collecting after 91 days.
Tier 3 will be done after 266 days.
Tier 4 needs 511 days.
Tier 5 is done after 1.163 days.
Congratulations! Santa brought you a Tier 5 Fleet Colony for Christmas. In 2020.
As is, this fleet holding will hurt the game much more than help.
I get what they're trying to do, but they're several years too late. Most fleets died out with Delta Rising, and very few have recovered.
Adding in a holding with such an absurd grind is not the type of content that will keep people engaged in the game. Most of the playerbase couldn't even spend a few minutes in Sompek for the event, and that gave a noticeable reward.
If this goes live like this it will drive even more ppl out of the game
most of my fleeties are only logging in to paly the newest featued episode
new recruits mostly quit after they played the storyline and figured out that the offered end game content is nothing 4 them (no PvP)
the GRIND thats required to build this is WAY WAY too high
I already didint like the past changes to fleet provisions
you need fleetCREDITS to buy them and get nothing in return... leaving those for the fleet leaders to fill
with this beeing a bad system now you need to grind it o nthje fleetmap?
A game is supposed to be FUN!
grinding minigames is NOT FUN at ALL!
i know omega upgrades are the best (event once a year) but the grind is NOT FUN
so i mnot getting them
same with the provision farming its booooriiing!
do you want to keep ppl in the game by giving them boring tasks?
little hint here: its not going to work
ok the hardliners will do it, they will farm it all
but they woudl stay anyway what ever you do!
Its sad that I already have the feelign all these complaints will hit deaf ears
I don’t know, one of the guys in the general discussion section suggested using elite currencies we get from PvE instead of introducing yet another currency in game.
If done with realistic amounts (given how many are left who PvE), perhaps 3-12 for XP projects throughout the tiers, such a thing could work out. It’s not as if we don’t still need to insert a ton of other resources anyway.
After speaking to the top contributors of my fleets we kind of wonder if it is even worth to start the whole new thing. Even if cryptic cuts the demands in half, even if they would divide them by ten, we are not sure if it would do any good.
Expecting so much effort out of such claustrophobic content is simply wrong to begin with.
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We don't need another G*d-d*mned Dilitium sink. We have had three large ones since December - the Phoenix Prize Pack Events.
'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.'
SAVE THIS COLONY EXPANSION AFTER THE NEW FACTION COMES TO STO NOT NOW.
This is the worst time for a full T5 fleet holding creation. Queues are dead and hardly anybody playing STO. Fall is historically the worst time for player attendance an this would be a slap on the face to most fleets who hardly have anyone logging in for less than 5mins.
Don't depend on fleets to increase your metrics but Mr EP and DEVs stand on your own to create new CONTENT and really enhance player satisfaction for those who actually want to log in STO.
Either that or listen to playerbase feedback. Reduce the number tiers or reduce the amount of XP needed to complete them.
If History repeats...this would go in empty ears then why the use of having Tribble testing or "Official feedback thread" if Mr EP nor DEVs willing to listen to feedback.
...Having the option to either burn fleet credits or do the minigames is a good idea.
Not that I'm a big fan of adding even more provision types to the replicator (I'd love a single, generic provision) something like this would help small/micro fleets who generate a HUGE amount of extraneous fleet credits (I've earned over four times the cap on all but my time recruit who has only capped once) and make up for fewer members being able to run the minigames.
I was reacting to a suggestion by trekpuppy to reduce resource collection to have them be purchasable with Dilitium as a Dilitium sink.
'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.'
Then it sounds like two or three things need to happen to make building this viable:
1) The Colony Invasion and other mini-games need to reward more of the colony-specific currencies.
2) The specific currencies need to reward something significant when donated because this isn't just a Fleet Credit burn; these are more like how Fleet Marks were, where you have to do something to get them (beyond the passive granting after upgrades).
3) Possibly to go with 1 above, the Colony Invasion specifically needs to award other inputs for the projects to make them worth running over something else.
And I still say Hoverboard/Floater compatibility to make getting around the colony easier, maybe around Tier 2 or Tier 3?
I probably should feel elated about provisions now at least rewarding fleet credits yet somehow the feeling that this is some kind of big punishment still supercedes that.
Ah where should I start with this. I've tested ALOT of things in this game to find bugs and to offer constructive feedback as I said I would do when you the dev staff gave me the green tag next to my name. With that said from what I'm seeing the bad and the grind is FAR outweighing the good. I don't think any of us mind a little bit of a grind otherwise we wouldn't be playing MMOs like this game. I will start out by touching base on the good.
Good: The good thing I see is that now we will have another holding that can grant tactical consoles aside from just the Spire and grant fleet weapons, shields, deflectors etc, without having to go to the Starbase. There's alot of potential stuff that can be utilized here which is good as it gives options instead of just leaving people with only one choice for fleet gear. It also grants the possibility of another type of event for fleets to run and a ton of potential fleet credits to earn between start and tier 5 finish, not counting provisions and so on. the other resources such as dilithium fleet marks and such are about what I would expect so that's not really a bad thing. With that in mind that's where I see the good ending at the moment if it goes live right now.
Bad:
Fleet restricted invasion event: from the wording of the blog it hints that you will only be able to run the invasion simulations to earn provisions with fleet members. So that would mean that I can't run it with my Armada members and from the looks of things I can't donate any possible excess provisions to the armada fleets. This means I also couldn't queue up to earn provisions on my own like I can from a mission similar to Fleet Alerts to get the things. With the hectic schedules that my fleet mates have it can often be difficult for us to get very many on at once, and that doesn't even take time zones into account. I have heard Cryptic say many times they want people to be able to play together and so on, and as such I must ask a very important question at this point. If Cryptic really wants people to play together, then why would you restrict this new holding and event so that only that specific fleet can have anything to do with it? If you want to encourage people to play together, restricting something like this in such a manor is the exact OPPOSITE of what should be happening to encourage group play. Similarly with Armadas, they were created to encourage fleets to play together and cooperate with each other, yet not even my Armada can help with the provisions. I enjoy hanging out with my fleet and spending time with my crew from there, but with the hectic schedules that isn't always possible and may very well grind all progress in my fleet to a halt.
Must generate generate keys to run event: This one just seems a bit foolish and like overkill to me. Not only do I need to run this invasion with only fleet members, but I also have to generate a key to run it as well. Thankfully the keys are the cheapest project to run it seems and on top of that they're quick to generate. While that is a pro to the keys, even needing them at all seems like overkill to me and a bit of tedium.
Means of acquiring provisions: I'm a firm believer in the saying of, if it's not broke then why fix it. The average player also isn't going to just spam the invasions or the minigame if they view it as tedious. I would dare say most of the playerbase doesn't mind a little bit of grind or we wouldn't be playing mmos like this game. There's only so much a person will run something like the invasion or the minigame before they get burnt out or tired of it out of sheer frustration and tedium. With as many provisions as are required I find it rather annoying and frustrating beyond belief that the minigame is my only option to get the provisions if I don't want to or otherwise can't run the invasion event. I get that you guys need to put something in to keep bots from just mindlessly spamming the new provisions for the colony, so a time gate is put on the minigame. Assuming you had only one toon per person running the minigame each day and each person ran the minigame only once, you would need 46 people to run the minigame to generate enough provisions to fill just one project at tier 4, and that's not counting upgrades or what have you. Most people are not going to run that minigame more than once or twice, with three being the most the way it sits now. Even if we say each person is running 2 toons per day, that's still 23 people you would need to log on to 2 separate toons every single day, and that's just for one project on a single track.
Amount of provisions needed: The amount of these new colony provisions needs to come WAY down if you honestly expect people to participate in leveling this fleet holding. Considering the max you can get from the minigame is 250 that's a slap in the face to the fleets and is way way way too high. I would say this needs to be cut by a factor of 5 at the very least. Most smaller fleets don't have but around 10 people give or take a few. That would put the small fleets in a position to where they can at least get it done. I'm sorry but it shouldn't feel like a full time job just to get this fleet holding running and it shouldn't feel like a full time job just to get the provisions which are only one part of the project. Even after the provisions this still leaves doffs, fleet marks, EC, and dilithium as other major resources these projects will need in order to get the thing going.
I'm not sure who came up with the exact amounts this should cost, but with respect to that person they've greatly over-estimated what the average small fleet is going to be able to do. As others have pointed out this is going to grind smaller fleets to a halt and even some of the larger fleets as well. This of course doesn't take into account the vanity projects or any upgrades. Sorry but the ball was definitely dropped on that one.
map size too large to get around reasonably without beaming points or powerboard usage: As others have pointed out this map is way too large to get around reasonably without the usage of beaming points, which aren't unlocked until tier 5, or the use of a jet pack or power board. The option to beam up should always be available without having to talk to a random NPC in the middle of a map this size. I fail to see why the beaming points couldn't be broken up and spread out across the 5 tiers, with additional points unlocking as you build up more of the colony.
Final Thoughts: While I enjoy the game and would probably like some of the equipment this holding has to offer, with the requirements as they are now, I honestly don't see them as being worth the amount of time and investment required to get them. Even if they improved my ships 10 fold I still wouldn't think they're worth the investment at the moment and I'll guarantee I'm not the only one who thinks this. I get that Cryptic wants this to be a resource sink, but in order for it to be a resource sink, I have to be able to get the resources needed to put into it in a reasonable time frame. A holding this massive should not have been dropped as soon as it has been with respect to all of the events and such that have gone on lately. I don't mind new content when it's enjoyable, but a long tedious slog is not my idea of fun.
From what I've seen and others have seen I'm going to STRONGLY urge the folks at Cryptic to reconsider making some of these costs as high as they have been set. Right now all I see this doing is royally angering the playerbase and causing people to not participate or the even worse possibility of leaving the game outright. A game is supposed to be fun and shouldn't feel like a full time job, and that's what this new holding would feel like with the costs the way they sit now. For what it's worth, as a Bug Hunter and as a long time STO player, it's my opinion that this holding is NOT ready for release in its current state without some major problems and concerns being addressed first.
"Someone once told me that time was a predator that stalked us all our lives. I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment, because it will never come again." - Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek Generations
i have to disagree with this. basically if you want people to play something (like the new fleet action/queue thing on the map) you need something exclusive you could get only there (or it has to be the best way). if you give out the provisions for any content you will just have a next dead thing.
You have a good point, getting people to play content instead of just replicating things is a good idea in principle. The problem is that running around from one side of the map to the next and playing mini games isn't exactly the content people want to play. This is supposed to be a Star Trek online game, not an iPhone app. The mini games are fine for the Anniversary Event, but a requirement for fleet provisions? Ridiculous. At least offer them as a reward for Fleet Defense Queues.
After speaking to the top contributors of my fleets we kind of wonder if it is even worth to start the whole new thing. Even if cryptic cuts the demands in half, even if they would divide them by ten, we are not sure if it would do any good.
Seriously, skip it. Why even bother starting something that's impossible to ever complete? All it will do is discourage fleet members as they run around playing silly mini games all day just to watch the progress bar never move. For most fleets, the best thing they can do to preserve their fleet is just not even start this ridiculous project.
i have to disagree with this. basically if you want people to play something (like the new fleet action/queue thing on the map) you need something exclusive you could get only there (or it has to be the best way). if you give out the provisions for any content you will just have a next dead thing.
You have a good point, getting people to play content instead of just replicating things is a good idea in principle. The problem is that running around from one side of the map to the next and playing mini games isn't exactly the content people want to play. This is supposed to be a Star Trek online game, not an iPhone app. The mini games are fine for the Anniversary Event, but a requirement for fleet provisions? Ridiculous. At least offer them as a reward for Fleet Defense Queues.
they're offered for playing the invasion simulation on that map and i think that this will be the main source to generate those provisions. maybe something equal for the space map too would be great to have a choice
they're offered for playing the invasion simulation on that map and i think that this will be the main source to generate those provisions. maybe something equal for the space map too would be great to have a choice
Which is great, but the problem is that Invasion isn't just a PvE that you can queue up for. The fleet has to run a project to unlock it, so people need to play enough mini games to enable them to do something other then mini games.
If this requirement was removed and the Invasion Scenario was allowed as a standard PVE Queue, then I would be cool with that. I do also think that provisions should be an available reward from Starbase Fleet Defense, maybe it would make it actually possible to get 20 people in queue for it.
Comments
The way this is going those few that want to progress the new holdings simply can’t this time and all the rest won’t bother at all in light of the alternatives.
After seeing this I find it shocking by how far you guys at cryptic have lost the touch with the player base. Given how beautiful the new stuff in the Colony is I know you mean well but it won’t work out to the slightest if it goes live that way.
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actually to progress the new holding you have to play the game, which is exactly what we need and i appreciate this. in case we could just buy the provisions or so, it will be just the same old thing. people with enough fmarks/fcredits dont have to do anything at all. and playing a queue at the map itself, i defnitly like that one. only the minigames might be a bit boring at all for a lot of farming but in case the queue will reward with a decent amount of provisions it will be perfect
ingame: @Felisean
A. Tone down requirements
Or
B. Increase a lot the rewards given by hourlies and missions
Otherwise is gonna be a looooong term holding for everyone.
"-Grind is good!" --Gordon Geko
Accolades checklist: https://bit.ly/FLUFFYS
1. On entering the colony i had no idea where to go as only NPC who wanted to talk was the guy to trigger the fleet invasion simulation.
2. Steps behind me so though lets go up but no entry up there. Why have steps if you cant go up them?
3. Ran around map to look for mini games and stumbled across the first two as no indication on map as to where to go at all.
4. Found issue with bridges as the sloped parts of the brisges have no collision detection but flat sections are fine.
5. after doing luxury sorting and ore collection mini games i wandered round trying to find the last one only to go past an unmarked npc who happened to be the quartermaster who wanted to give me the missions. Really would be useful if he had his quest giver marking before you take a mission from him.
6. The mini game for collecting batteries is the 10x10 placeholder so correct graphic still needs putting there.
The mini games themselves though I am not sure if they work correctly as when i do a mini game i am asked to collect 250 of a thing but when i do it and dont get to 250 i end up with provisions in my inventory but once i hit enough to get 250 the game doesnt award me any provisions at all. So should we end up with 250 provisions in total in our inventories, the 250 get automatically thrown into fleet stores, or other as at this point I am not sure what to expect?
Also we need a method of quick travel there.
Edit: Re mini games: they are probably not working as intended. When playing the mini games the game will reward the physical provisions only for the first run through of the mission. On the second and subsequent missions the mission count is incremented but no provisions are given to the player. Ie If I run through and score 100 points I will get 50 provisions, and no matter what I score in later missions i will receive no more even though the mission progress will move up to 250 and close.
Interesting bug by the way on the games. When playing the game you still get a dialog popping up to get you to start the game even though its open. When you press it the game jumps super erratically so you cant do anything in it and never score anything. The dialog really needs to go hen one is already open, and please take away the references to us collecting omega particles as we arent supposed to be collecting those.
2nd Edit: Just tried to leave the colony and there is nowhere except for the colony security chief dialog to exit the holding. The running about is already excessive so we need to be able to beam out from where we finish a daily or people will be put off gathering them very quickly.
Still waiting to be able to use forum titles
--- Perhaps somebody from Cryptic even, if that is not too much to ask for? ---
Form what has been presented so far, a Tier 4 XP project for Morale for example requires over 12k of the respective provisions. A 40 minutes run of the new PvE is supposed to hand out 0,6k of the respective provisions?
Since the average STO Joe won’t participate in the grind for provisions as their donations don’t reward credits enthusiasts for base progressions are now supposed to play the new map over 13-14h to get a daily filled? Yea the new map better is good because even if 5 peeps in a fleet would tend to it regularly they would still need to dedicate almost 3h a day just to get this nonsense straight. Yo, and that each day for a year probably to get to Tier 5.
I hope I’m in deep error here with the figures because otherwise this thing is not going to fly.
Adjusting rewards? Sorry folk, just take a look around. Peeps are not even playing CCa anymore…
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Will smaller fleets have issues? Of course, as has always been the case. They introduced Armadas so smaller fleets can pair up with larger ones to share resources. I understand the woes of smaller fleets as I have one thats is tier three about to be four. I started it when fleets launched. I'm also in a larger fleet too. It's a marathon and not a sprint. You can always change your fleets participation rules for those who don't pitch in.
I don't know the answer to STOs queue problems but building a colony should take time and be resource intensive.
Lifetime Sub since June 2010
The misconception that „larger“ fleets are off the hook here comes from Fleet Marks with their transition of 1:25 into credits right along with the fact that holdings can swallow only a limited amount of those in the first place (b4 Tier 5).
This is not the case at all with the new stuff. As it stands with the provisions the transition factor is X : ZERO and countless are needed on a daily basis. Nobody but the biggest enthusiasts of base progression will tend to them at all and they will be pissed off by the requirements the same way PvEer were pissed off by S13.
In its current state the whole thing is nothing but a design flaw. It was born from good intention, yes, but is so poorly thought through that it will cripple the next part of this game if not changed.
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i have to disagree with this. basically if you want people to play something (like the new fleet action/queue thing on the map) you need something exclusive you could get only there (or it has to be the best way). if you give out the provisions for any content you will just have a next dead thing.
ingame: @Felisean
Let me enlighten you with some MATH.
To complete the colony holding you need a total of 9.839.697 provisions. That is without any fancy unlocks like tailor at all.
That is just a bit shy of 50.000 minigames played. (49.200)
To avoid any project stalling you want that amount gathered in roughly 230 days
And this translates into 214 minigames a day, every day, without exception for the next 8 months.
Now you could say that there is autocollection of provisions. Assuming it works without a hitch and actually allows you to contribute in a timely fashion (w/o having to idle projects, because we have no fraking clue how autocollect is supposed to work atm) the mind boggling 10 million provisions become a far more managable number.
With best scenario autocollect you still need 8.497.797 provisions. Thats 42.489 minigames at 185 per day.
Given how eager players are in parting with other high demand building resources (i.e. dilithium) I really don't see how even a 20 player fleet will pull that off. Remember provisions reward nothing, they simply vanish into a black hole.
And do not forget that the other resource requirements for building the holding are far from trivial either, there are still approximately 70 million of fleet credits in that holding, 'only' 10/15 million less than a full fleet starbase would generate.
And for the sake of completion let's run the scenario that you stop playing the fun minigames and let autocollect take care of it.
First you 'still' need to gather 103k provisions to even get to the point where autocollect 'should' start (remember we actually do not know how exactly it should work).
Tier 2 should be finished collecting after 91 days.
Tier 3 will be done after 266 days.
Tier 4 needs 511 days.
Tier 5 is done after 1.163 days.
Congratulations! Santa brought you a Tier 5 Fleet Colony for Christmas. In 2020.
As is, this fleet holding will hurt the game much more than help.
I get what they're trying to do, but they're several years too late. Most fleets died out with Delta Rising, and very few have recovered.
Adding in a holding with such an absurd grind is not the type of content that will keep people engaged in the game. Most of the playerbase couldn't even spend a few minutes in Sompek for the event, and that gave a noticeable reward.
most of my fleeties are only logging in to paly the newest featued episode
new recruits mostly quit after they played the storyline and figured out that the offered end game content is nothing 4 them (no PvP)
the GRIND thats required to build this is WAY WAY too high
I already didint like the past changes to fleet provisions
you need fleetCREDITS to buy them and get nothing in return... leaving those for the fleet leaders to fill
with this beeing a bad system now you need to grind it o nthje fleetmap?
A game is supposed to be FUN!
grinding minigames is NOT FUN at ALL!
i know omega upgrades are the best (event once a year) but the grind is NOT FUN
so i mnot getting them
same with the provision farming its booooriiing!
do you want to keep ppl in the game by giving them boring tasks?
little hint here: its not going to work
ok the hardliners will do it, they will farm it all
but they woudl stay anyway what ever you do!
Its sad that I already have the feelign all these complaints will hit deaf ears
If done with realistic amounts (given how many are left who PvE), perhaps 3-12 for XP projects throughout the tiers, such a thing could work out. It’s not as if we don’t still need to insert a ton of other resources anyway.
After speaking to the top contributors of my fleets we kind of wonder if it is even worth to start the whole new thing. Even if cryptic cuts the demands in half, even if they would divide them by ten, we are not sure if it would do any good.
Expecting so much effort out of such claustrophobic content is simply wrong to begin with.
Looking for a fun PvE fleet? Join us at Omega Combat Division today.
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.'
im sure its not ment as a DIL sink and i doubt u really took a look at it
cuz what ppl bug is not rly the amounts of DIL....
"-Grind is good!" --Gordon Geko
Accolades checklist: https://bit.ly/FLUFFYS
SAVE THIS COLONY EXPANSION AFTER THE NEW FACTION COMES TO STO NOT NOW.
This is the worst time for a full T5 fleet holding creation. Queues are dead and hardly anybody playing STO. Fall is historically the worst time for player attendance an this would be a slap on the face to most fleets who hardly have anyone logging in for less than 5mins.
Don't depend on fleets to increase your metrics but Mr EP and DEVs stand on your own to create new CONTENT and really enhance player satisfaction for those who actually want to log in STO.
Either that or listen to playerbase feedback. Reduce the number tiers or reduce the amount of XP needed to complete them.
If History repeats...this would go in empty ears then why the use of having Tribble testing or "Official feedback thread" if Mr EP nor DEVs willing to listen to feedback.
Not that I'm a big fan of adding even more provision types to the replicator (I'd love a single, generic provision) something like this would help small/micro fleets who generate a HUGE amount of extraneous fleet credits (I've earned over four times the cap on all but my time recruit who has only capped once) and make up for fewer members being able to run the minigames.
I was reacting to a suggestion by trekpuppy to reduce resource collection to have them be purchasable with Dilitium as a Dilitium sink.
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.'
1) The Colony Invasion and other mini-games need to reward more of the colony-specific currencies.
2) The specific currencies need to reward something significant when donated because this isn't just a Fleet Credit burn; these are more like how Fleet Marks were, where you have to do something to get them (beyond the passive granting after upgrades).
3) Possibly to go with 1 above, the Colony Invasion specifically needs to award other inputs for the projects to make them worth running over something else.
And I still say Hoverboard/Floater compatibility to make getting around the colony easier, maybe around Tier 2 or Tier 3?
next time maybe use @handle
Good: The good thing I see is that now we will have another holding that can grant tactical consoles aside from just the Spire and grant fleet weapons, shields, deflectors etc, without having to go to the Starbase. There's alot of potential stuff that can be utilized here which is good as it gives options instead of just leaving people with only one choice for fleet gear. It also grants the possibility of another type of event for fleets to run and a ton of potential fleet credits to earn between start and tier 5 finish, not counting provisions and so on. the other resources such as dilithium fleet marks and such are about what I would expect so that's not really a bad thing. With that in mind that's where I see the good ending at the moment if it goes live right now.
Bad:
Fleet restricted invasion event: from the wording of the blog it hints that you will only be able to run the invasion simulations to earn provisions with fleet members. So that would mean that I can't run it with my Armada members and from the looks of things I can't donate any possible excess provisions to the armada fleets. This means I also couldn't queue up to earn provisions on my own like I can from a mission similar to Fleet Alerts to get the things. With the hectic schedules that my fleet mates have it can often be difficult for us to get very many on at once, and that doesn't even take time zones into account. I have heard Cryptic say many times they want people to be able to play together and so on, and as such I must ask a very important question at this point. If Cryptic really wants people to play together, then why would you restrict this new holding and event so that only that specific fleet can have anything to do with it? If you want to encourage people to play together, restricting something like this in such a manor is the exact OPPOSITE of what should be happening to encourage group play. Similarly with Armadas, they were created to encourage fleets to play together and cooperate with each other, yet not even my Armada can help with the provisions. I enjoy hanging out with my fleet and spending time with my crew from there, but with the hectic schedules that isn't always possible and may very well grind all progress in my fleet to a halt.
Must generate generate keys to run event: This one just seems a bit foolish and like overkill to me. Not only do I need to run this invasion with only fleet members, but I also have to generate a key to run it as well. Thankfully the keys are the cheapest project to run it seems and on top of that they're quick to generate. While that is a pro to the keys, even needing them at all seems like overkill to me and a bit of tedium.
Means of acquiring provisions: I'm a firm believer in the saying of, if it's not broke then why fix it. The average player also isn't going to just spam the invasions or the minigame if they view it as tedious. I would dare say most of the playerbase doesn't mind a little bit of grind or we wouldn't be playing mmos like this game. There's only so much a person will run something like the invasion or the minigame before they get burnt out or tired of it out of sheer frustration and tedium. With as many provisions as are required I find it rather annoying and frustrating beyond belief that the minigame is my only option to get the provisions if I don't want to or otherwise can't run the invasion event. I get that you guys need to put something in to keep bots from just mindlessly spamming the new provisions for the colony, so a time gate is put on the minigame. Assuming you had only one toon per person running the minigame each day and each person ran the minigame only once, you would need 46 people to run the minigame to generate enough provisions to fill just one project at tier 4, and that's not counting upgrades or what have you. Most people are not going to run that minigame more than once or twice, with three being the most the way it sits now. Even if we say each person is running 2 toons per day, that's still 23 people you would need to log on to 2 separate toons every single day, and that's just for one project on a single track.
Amount of provisions needed: The amount of these new colony provisions needs to come WAY down if you honestly expect people to participate in leveling this fleet holding. Considering the max you can get from the minigame is 250 that's a slap in the face to the fleets and is way way way too high. I would say this needs to be cut by a factor of 5 at the very least. Most smaller fleets don't have but around 10 people give or take a few. That would put the small fleets in a position to where they can at least get it done. I'm sorry but it shouldn't feel like a full time job just to get this fleet holding running and it shouldn't feel like a full time job just to get the provisions which are only one part of the project. Even after the provisions this still leaves doffs, fleet marks, EC, and dilithium as other major resources these projects will need in order to get the thing going.
I'm not sure who came up with the exact amounts this should cost, but with respect to that person they've greatly over-estimated what the average small fleet is going to be able to do. As others have pointed out this is going to grind smaller fleets to a halt and even some of the larger fleets as well. This of course doesn't take into account the vanity projects or any upgrades. Sorry but the ball was definitely dropped on that one.
map size too large to get around reasonably without beaming points or powerboard usage: As others have pointed out this map is way too large to get around reasonably without the usage of beaming points, which aren't unlocked until tier 5, or the use of a jet pack or power board. The option to beam up should always be available without having to talk to a random NPC in the middle of a map this size. I fail to see why the beaming points couldn't be broken up and spread out across the 5 tiers, with additional points unlocking as you build up more of the colony.
Final Thoughts: While I enjoy the game and would probably like some of the equipment this holding has to offer, with the requirements as they are now, I honestly don't see them as being worth the amount of time and investment required to get them. Even if they improved my ships 10 fold I still wouldn't think they're worth the investment at the moment and I'll guarantee I'm not the only one who thinks this. I get that Cryptic wants this to be a resource sink, but in order for it to be a resource sink, I have to be able to get the resources needed to put into it in a reasonable time frame. A holding this massive should not have been dropped as soon as it has been with respect to all of the events and such that have gone on lately. I don't mind new content when it's enjoyable, but a long tedious slog is not my idea of fun.
From what I've seen and others have seen I'm going to STRONGLY urge the folks at Cryptic to reconsider making some of these costs as high as they have been set. Right now all I see this doing is royally angering the playerbase and causing people to not participate or the even worse possibility of leaving the game outright. A game is supposed to be fun and shouldn't feel like a full time job, and that's what this new holding would feel like with the costs the way they sit now. For what it's worth, as a Bug Hunter and as a long time STO player, it's my opinion that this holding is NOT ready for release in its current state without some major problems and concerns being addressed first.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
You have a good point, getting people to play content instead of just replicating things is a good idea in principle. The problem is that running around from one side of the map to the next and playing mini games isn't exactly the content people want to play. This is supposed to be a Star Trek online game, not an iPhone app. The mini games are fine for the Anniversary Event, but a requirement for fleet provisions? Ridiculous. At least offer them as a reward for Fleet Defense Queues.
It absolutely will. Following up the disaster that was S13 with this system is just asking people 'please stop playing our game.'
Seriously, skip it. Why even bother starting something that's impossible to ever complete? All it will do is discourage fleet members as they run around playing silly mini games all day just to watch the progress bar never move. For most fleets, the best thing they can do to preserve their fleet is just not even start this ridiculous project.
Yeah, I don't know why they even request feedback, they're not going to use it anyway.
they're offered for playing the invasion simulation on that map and i think that this will be the main source to generate those provisions. maybe something equal for the space map too would be great to have a choice
ingame: @Felisean
Which is great, but the problem is that Invasion isn't just a PvE that you can queue up for. The fleet has to run a project to unlock it, so people need to play enough mini games to enable them to do something other then mini games.
If this requirement was removed and the Invasion Scenario was allowed as a standard PVE Queue, then I would be cool with that. I do also think that provisions should be an available reward from Starbase Fleet Defense, maybe it would make it actually possible to get 20 people in queue for it.