Given the post, I don't think we'll even have access to the old storyline pre-Hurq in the Dominion faction. I wish we had A whole separate Gamma Quadrant storyline though, but I understand that's a LOT of time.
I -really- hope that's not the case. I'd love to be able to snag the Dominion Polaron Weapons and Space Set from the 2800 story arc, as well as the duty officers from it.
That said, still kinda disappointed that it's just Jem'Hadar. Vorta would've been nice to have, and it would've been even "cooler" if the Dominion decided to bring its former Breen allies into the fight again (They haven't done -anything- since the Feature Episode arc in which they were introduced)
"[GARBLED ELECTRONIC NOISES]"
- Thot Gar - Commanding Officer of the Braaktak Kaan
Is this something a lot of you have been clamoring for? Sure I get it's new content, it's something different, some of the game mechanics stuff sound interesting. I'll play one myself for a bit just to see the new stuff. But really? A Jem'Hadar? Why? They're a slave race, I pity them more than admire them. Apart from pure gaming reasons, why does anyone want to run a Jem'Hadar?
I for one do not understand why do Cryptic not make a new arc and story line for the two? They could have their own factions as well. Jem'Hadar you're a warrior born in the Gamma Quad, or born here in the Alpha Quad. Boom new mission in those sector serving as a gamma or a Alpha. Then they shift into fighting with the alliance or fighting on the side of the true way. Same with the Cardassians this is a easy one, true way trying to take things back to the glory days. Or join the struggle trying to help piece back their empire and live in a ever changing galaxy. This can be combined with the Jemmies to make factions like that of the Feds and Klink's with fresh new ideas. Sorry for the run-on's and fragmentation but you know breaks are short...back to the grind!
I can see Vorta, if/when they are introduced, will also start at 60 (each replacement seems to have most if not all of the memories of the previous generation).
Intelligence, Command and Strategist would be their main specialties.
Just because they aren't (as far as I know) going to be included in the original line-up, doesn't mean they can't be added down the line.
Imagine if they had a special ablility to be replaced by a clone when the Vorta player is defeated as a revival 'power'. It'd be sort of like the Android Boffs, except the that the Vorta doesn't get back up again, but a 'clone' is beamed in with the original still lying on the ground.
Considering that it'll take longer to get a new replacement to replace the replacement, there'd be a cool down period to avoid exploitation. And after a while, the original is beamed out for 'recycling'.
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,596Community Moderator
I'm not sure how to feel about that. It's like I'm playing somebody else's endgame character. To me, leveling up a new toon and inventing a backstory/theme is what I like most about this game. Hopefully, the whole Ketracel mechanic will make playing a Jem'hadar character different enough to be interesting...
Honestly... its not that different than WoW's Death Knights. They get an accelerated start too.
Well, this is weird. My comment was actually deleted somehow after editing (for devs, I had a newline, followed by five dashes (-), followed by another newline, to separate topics in my post).
Anyway, as I said, before it vanished (I also commented on the BOFF, but it was answered before me anyway):
After thinking this over, I agree with what others have said. I don't like that things are preallocated for me.
I'd prefer an empty skill set and, assuming "rep progress" doesn't apply to new reps added in the future, I'd like rep tokens which I can choose to apply to any rep of my choice, including new ones. This will restrict the number of unlocked reps, while letting the user choose which reps they want to start with.
As written, this feels like "Create player -> Copy template -> Present to player."
More like a "cookie cutter" character, than something unique and built up.
This isn't even half of what the KDF originally had a launch (when they started at level 25 or so, and had half the Fed Storyline's worth of content).
I was actually looking forward to playing this new faction until today's blog post.
This is not even a micro-faction, this is just a character to unlock ships, then delete.
Completely devalues the entire thing.
LTS Since Beta (Jan 2010).
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,596Community Moderator
All Jem’Hadar will also begin with all of their Skill Points and Traits already allocated, and a free retrain to allow for you to make your Jem’Hadar your own.
STARTS as a cookie cutter, but we can actually respec for free to fit our own playstyles.
I have a question about the Vanguard. Is he a bridge officer or a class we can play as, and if so can he be tactical, science and engineer?
As I understand it, He is similar to the Joined vs Unjoined Trill. They are visually the same, but there are some stats in the Vanguard that are a little bit better then the standard Jem'hadar.
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
We don't want what the Feds have. We want the equivalent. We want fairer treatment. Concern, desire, greed to some extent, and passionate belief that the enough people would buy KDF items to make it worth Cryptic's while.
As a veteran player who's been here over eight years, a player who has played through all the existing story content (figuratively) a zillion times with (literally) dozens of characters, I'm happy at the idea to start a new character already at End Game with a new story branch to proceed with. The grind-save alone is so very appealing.
That being said... On one hand I'm unhappy about having to pick a Red or Blue Team to join and align KDF/Fed-side like the Romulans. By the sound of it, Jemmies will have only a handful of their own faction-unique missions before joining the same ol' content we already/will-continue to have that EVERY OTHER CHARACTER already has/will play. At least with the Roms, there are two-dozen(ish) high-quality Romulan-only missions that drive a full, rich, beautiful story.
On the other hand, I get it. For Real Life Reasons, Cryptic is unable (possibly, though I doubt, unwilling) to continue to create new content that's faction-specific. Basically, it would be like supporting a whole game for each faction. The resources just don't exist for that sort of development. I feel they could do better at making cross-faction stories more faction-specific with slightly different flavor text/tasks for Feds, KDFs, Roms, and Doms. They do a little of that, but they could do more. Anyway, likewise with opening up existing ships, etc to the Doms (and even Roms). It allows them to create revenue from existing "stock". Which, since it's really just a bunch of 1s and 0s never requires warehouse storage, shipping, gets stale or expires, etc. It's basically "Free Money" - It'd be foolish not too.
Also, it makes sense to not have much of a back story on these new characters. I understand some of the complaints about starting with a (semi)-fully developed character already L60 with jump-started reps, specs, crafting, etc. I like leveling-up too. I like creating a head-canon for each of my toons which grows as I level-up that character. But remember, this new Jem just fell off the turnip truck yesterday. Born in a vat and sent into combat within days!!! Try to imagine that. I look forward to probing how that mind would think...
How would I be if my first day awake was with baked-in abilities and ideas of how to behave? My beliefs and morals already decided. Living gods standing over me. Already addicted to a controlling substance. This is reflected in the skills and reps pre-assigned. My ability to respec and choice of faction is my own behavior from that first day, and going forward. What is the person I want to be?
That seems like something worth Exploring.
You can find/contact me in game as @PatricianVetinari. Playing STO since Feb 2010.
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,596Community Moderator
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
I would assume the same consumable that is already available in game now.
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
I would assume the same consumable that is already available in game now.
Well that's disappointing.... I have a bajillion commodities... and can never FIND the consumable. Hell, for the dominion tribble I had to buy it off the exchange. >.>
We don't want what the Feds have. We want the equivalent. We want fairer treatment. Concern, desire, greed to some extent, and passionate belief that the enough people would buy KDF items to make it worth Cryptic's while.
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
I would assume the same consumable that is already available in game now.
I can't make profit based on assumptions.
I'd like to see some confirmation from the devs, so that I can start buying all the ketracel that's in the game right now and sell it for billions of EC, thousands of Enterprise Js and millions of veteran boff tokens.
I wasn't particularly interested in creating another toon - not after having created a Delta one which followed another one that I made a couple of months back...
But these details on the head start the Jem'Hadar will get, on top of the access to many of their allies' ships, may just have convinced me to create one after all.
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
I would assume the same consumable that is already available in game now.
Well that's disappointing.... I have a bajillion commodities... and can never FIND the consumable. Hell, for the dominion tribble I had to buy it off the exchange. >.>
You can replicate the consumable White by slotting the Vorta biochemist from Facility 4028 in a ground DOff slot.
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
I would assume the same consumable that is already available in game now.
Well that's disappointing.... I have a bajillion commodities... and can never FIND the consumable. Hell, for the dominion tribble I had to buy it off the exchange. >.>
The gamma quadrant DOFFs from the 2800 (I believe), have a Vorta that, if you assign to active ground duty, will let you replicate as much ketracel white as you want in your ship's replicator. And yes, it's the consumable version, as I give it to my Jem'Hadar BOFF.
You don't even need the pack from the C-Store (is the Gamma Quadrant pack even still there?).
Also, it makes sense to not have much of a back story on these new characters. I understand some of the complaints about starting with a (semi)-fully developed character already L60 with jump-started reps, specs, crafting, etc. I like leveling-up too. I like creating a head-canon for each of my toons which grows as I level-up that character. But remember, this new Jem just fell off the turnip truck yesterday. Born in a vat and sent into combat within days!!! Try to imagine that. I look forward to probing how that mind would think...
How would I be if my first day awake was with baked-in abilities and ideas of how to behave? My beliefs and morals already decided. Living gods standing over me. Already addicted to a controlling substance. This is reflected in the skills and reps pre-assigned. My ability to respec and choice of faction is my own behavior from that first day, and going forward. What is the person I want to be?
That seems like something worth Exploring.
Good point. I can see that from a storytelling perspective. I will certainly try it out anyway, so I'm not going to make any rash decisions at this point.
Is the Jem'hadar Vanguard and Odo's Vanguard one and the same? It would make sense for monetary purposes to have a usual Vanguard (which is part of the packs) and then add a special Vanguard for C-store only.
Is the Jem'hadar Vanguard and Odo's Vanguard one and the same? It would make sense for monetary purposes to have a usual Vanguard (which is part of the packs) and then add a special Vanguard for C-store only.
AFAIK they're the same thing. The C-Store version will be the same one in the Vanguard Pack.
It's the same procedure they've done for every other expansion pack.
Offer the massive all-in-one pack, and also offer each item in the pack (except for titles), as separate items in the C-Store (where the previously mentioned pack just unlocks all the individual items).
As a veteran player who's been here over eight years, a player who has played through all the existing story content (figuratively) a zillion times with (literally) dozens of characters, I'm happy at the idea to start a new character already at End Game with a new story branch to proceed with. The grind-save alone is so very appealing.
That being said... On one hand I'm unhappy about having to pick a Red or Blue Team to join and align KDF/Fed-side like the Romulans. By the sound of it, Jemmies will have only a handful of their own faction-unique missions before joining the same ol' content we already/will-continue to have that EVERY OTHER CHARACTER already has/will play. At least with the Roms, there are two-dozen(ish) high-quality Romulan-only missions that drive a full, rich, beautiful story.
On the other hand, I get it. For Real Life Reasons, Cryptic is unable (possibly, though I doubt, unwilling) to continue to create new content that's faction-specific. Basically, it would be like supporting a whole game for each faction. The resources just don't exist for that sort of development. I feel they could do better at making cross-faction stories more faction-specific with slightly different flavor text/tasks for Feds, KDFs, Roms, and Doms. They do a little of that, but they could do more. Anyway, likewise with opening up existing ships, etc to the Doms (and even Roms). It allows them to create revenue from existing "stock". Which, since it's really just a bunch of 1s and 0s never requires warehouse storage, shipping, gets stale or expires, etc. It's basically "Free Money" - It'd be foolish not too.
Also, it makes sense to not have much of a back story on these new characters. I understand some of the complaints about starting with a (semi)-fully developed character already L60 with jump-started reps, specs, crafting, etc. I like leveling-up too. I like creating a head-canon for each of my toons which grows as I level-up that character. But remember, this new Jem just fell off the turnip truck yesterday. Born in a vat and sent into combat within days!!! Try to imagine that. I look forward to probing how that mind would think...
How would I be if my first day awake was with baked-in abilities and ideas of how to behave? My beliefs and morals already decided. Living gods standing over me. Already addicted to a controlling substance. This is reflected in the skills and reps pre-assigned. My ability to respec and choice of faction is my own behavior from that first day, and going forward. What is the person I want to be?
That seems like something worth Exploring.
Yeah, but imagine if they made it so the KDF subverted the process and used them as a military arm? What if the Federation was able to "liberate" them and free'd them from their programming? You could play most of the game through just like everyone else and just flavor existing missions the same way they did for Romulans.
Is there will be Jem'Hadar Recruitment Event???
I hope so... And i hope rewards will be as good as Temporal Agent Recruitment (but not as lackluster Delta).
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,596Community Moderator
Is there will be Jem'Hadar Recruitment Event???
I hope so... And i hope rewards will be as good as Temporal Agent Recruitment (but not as lackluster Delta).
You don't even need the pack from the C-Store (is the Gamma Quadrant pack even still there?).
The pack will be available when ViL goes live.
There are two things I'm still curious about.
Available ships for Jem'Hadar at start (Bug ship or currently unavailable Battlecruiser)
How Jem'Hadar will be able to play older story missions in order to have access to the rewards (Such as Jem'Hadar sets all the way back to the older FEs like the Dividian arc)
Is there will be Jem'Hadar Recruitment Event???
I hope so... And i hope rewards will be as good as Temporal Agent Recruitment (but not as lackluster Delta).
I forgot how disappointing the Delta event rewards were after the Temporal one, until I made a new Delta recruit for this current event.
I'd love some recruitment event as well, though the rewards I don't expect will be that much. After all, it won't take nearly as much time to max out everything.
EDIT: Speaking of, I wonder if they'd ever do the Delta recruitment in the future. If so, they'd have to either exclude the Dominion (which will be interesting to see in the menu), or figure out how to include it.
I wonder if that's why they opted to repeat the Delta recruitment event this time, as they may never do it again.
LTS Since Beta (Jan 2010).
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,596Community Moderator
I'd love some recruitment event as well, though the rewards I don't expect will be that much. After all, it won't take nearly as much time to max out everything.
Perhaps, but they might still tie it to completing certain things. I know the DOffing was a LOOOOOONG one on the Temporal Recruit.
Do we have to do the little ritual once a day where we pledge ourselves to the founders to get the white we need to LIVE?
Yep. At log in. The new Launch Page will have the complete Terms of Service on it in 4-point scrolling letters, which you MUST read aloud and sign before playing. At each log in.
Comments
I -really- hope that's not the case. I'd love to be able to snag the Dominion Polaron Weapons and Space Set from the 2800 story arc, as well as the duty officers from it.
That said, still kinda disappointed that it's just Jem'Hadar. Vorta would've been nice to have, and it would've been even "cooler" if the Dominion decided to bring its former Breen allies into the fight again (They haven't done -anything- since the Feature Episode arc in which they were introduced)
- Thot Gar - Commanding Officer of the Braaktak Kaan
That is from the Jem'Hadar Boff that is already in the game.
Intelligence, Command and Strategist would be their main specialties.
Just because they aren't (as far as I know) going to be included in the original line-up, doesn't mean they can't be added down the line.
Imagine if they had a special ablility to be replaced by a clone when the Vorta player is defeated as a revival 'power'. It'd be sort of like the Android Boffs, except the that the Vorta doesn't get back up again, but a 'clone' is beamed in with the original still lying on the ground.
Considering that it'll take longer to get a new replacement to replace the replacement, there'd be a cool down period to avoid exploitation. And after a while, the original is beamed out for 'recycling'.
Honestly... its not that different than WoW's Death Knights. They get an accelerated start too.
Anyway, as I said, before it vanished (I also commented on the BOFF, but it was answered before me anyway):
After thinking this over, I agree with what others have said. I don't like that things are preallocated for me.
I'd prefer an empty skill set and, assuming "rep progress" doesn't apply to new reps added in the future, I'd like rep tokens which I can choose to apply to any rep of my choice, including new ones. This will restrict the number of unlocked reps, while letting the user choose which reps they want to start with.
As written, this feels like "Create player -> Copy template -> Present to player."
More like a "cookie cutter" character, than something unique and built up.
This isn't even half of what the KDF originally had a launch (when they started at level 25 or so, and had half the Fed Storyline's worth of content).
I was actually looking forward to playing this new faction until today's blog post.
This is not even a micro-faction, this is just a character to unlock ships, then delete.
Completely devalues the entire thing.
STARTS as a cookie cutter, but we can actually respec for free to fit our own playstyles.
As I understand it, He is similar to the Joined vs Unjoined Trill. They are visually the same, but there are some stats in the Vanguard that are a little bit better then the standard Jem'hadar.
Would be nice if I dev could verify it though.
These new characters..... Are their abilities going to be activated via the Ketracel White Comodity, the actual green-quality Ketracel White consumable or some brand new form of Ketracel that'll be more prevalent than the Green consumable but less so than the commodity?
That being said... On one hand I'm unhappy about having to pick a Red or Blue Team to join and align KDF/Fed-side like the Romulans. By the sound of it, Jemmies will have only a handful of their own faction-unique missions before joining the same ol' content we already/will-continue to have that EVERY OTHER CHARACTER already has/will play. At least with the Roms, there are two-dozen(ish) high-quality Romulan-only missions that drive a full, rich, beautiful story.
On the other hand, I get it. For Real Life Reasons, Cryptic is unable (possibly, though I doubt, unwilling) to continue to create new content that's faction-specific. Basically, it would be like supporting a whole game for each faction. The resources just don't exist for that sort of development. I feel they could do better at making cross-faction stories more faction-specific with slightly different flavor text/tasks for Feds, KDFs, Roms, and Doms. They do a little of that, but they could do more. Anyway, likewise with opening up existing ships, etc to the Doms (and even Roms). It allows them to create revenue from existing "stock". Which, since it's really just a bunch of 1s and 0s never requires warehouse storage, shipping, gets stale or expires, etc. It's basically "Free Money" - It'd be foolish not too.
Also, it makes sense to not have much of a back story on these new characters. I understand some of the complaints about starting with a (semi)-fully developed character already L60 with jump-started reps, specs, crafting, etc. I like leveling-up too. I like creating a head-canon for each of my toons which grows as I level-up that character. But remember, this new Jem just fell off the turnip truck yesterday. Born in a vat and sent into combat within days!!! Try to imagine that. I look forward to probing how that mind would think...
How would I be if my first day awake was with baked-in abilities and ideas of how to behave? My beliefs and morals already decided. Living gods standing over me. Already addicted to a controlling substance. This is reflected in the skills and reps pre-assigned. My ability to respec and choice of faction is my own behavior from that first day, and going forward. What is the person I want to be?
That seems like something worth Exploring.
You can find/contact me in game as @PatricianVetinari. Playing STO since Feb 2010.
I would assume the same consumable that is already available in game now.
Well that's disappointing.... I have a bajillion commodities... and can never FIND the consumable. Hell, for the dominion tribble I had to buy it off the exchange. >.>
I can't make profit based on assumptions.
I'd like to see some confirmation from the devs, so that I can start buying all the ketracel that's in the game right now and sell it for billions of EC, thousands of Enterprise Js and millions of veteran boff tokens.
But these details on the head start the Jem'Hadar will get, on top of the access to many of their allies' ships, may just have convinced me to create one after all.
You can replicate the consumable White by slotting the Vorta biochemist from Facility 4028 in a ground DOff slot.
The gamma quadrant DOFFs from the 2800 (I believe), have a Vorta that, if you assign to active ground duty, will let you replicate as much ketracel white as you want in your ship's replicator. And yes, it's the consumable version, as I give it to my Jem'Hadar BOFF.
You don't even need the pack from the C-Store (is the Gamma Quadrant pack even still there?).
Good point. I can see that from a storytelling perspective. I will certainly try it out anyway, so I'm not going to make any rash decisions at this point.
AFAIK they're the same thing. The C-Store version will be the same one in the Vanguard Pack.
It's the same procedure they've done for every other expansion pack.
Offer the massive all-in-one pack, and also offer each item in the pack (except for titles), as separate items in the C-Store (where the previously mentioned pack just unlocks all the individual items).
Yeah, but imagine if they made it so the KDF subverted the process and used them as a military arm? What if the Federation was able to "liberate" them and free'd them from their programming? You could play most of the game through just like everyone else and just flavor existing missions the same way they did for Romulans.
I hope so... And i hope rewards will be as good as Temporal Agent Recruitment (but not as lackluster Delta).
Probably.
The pack will be available when ViL goes live.
There are two things I'm still curious about.
I forgot how disappointing the Delta event rewards were after the Temporal one, until I made a new Delta recruit for this current event.
I'd love some recruitment event as well, though the rewards I don't expect will be that much. After all, it won't take nearly as much time to max out everything.
EDIT: Speaking of, I wonder if they'd ever do the Delta recruitment in the future. If so, they'd have to either exclude the Dominion (which will be interesting to see in the menu), or figure out how to include it.
I wonder if that's why they opted to repeat the Delta recruitment event this time, as they may never do it again.
Perhaps, but they might still tie it to completing certain things. I know the DOffing was a LOOOOOONG one on the Temporal Recruit.
Yep. At log in. The new Launch Page will have the complete Terms of Service on it in 4-point scrolling letters, which you MUST read aloud and sign before playing. At each log in.
The Founders are wise!