Prestige decay:
Every 24-hour period that a character is not played, its prestige would be reduced by 10% or by 0.01 points, whichever is greater. This way, it will be impossible to hoard massive amounts of prestige over an extended period of time while waiting around for Cryptic to release something new to spend it on. This makes prestige not only a measure of how many events one plays through, but also how regularly they play. Going on a long hiatus could suck a character's prestige dry. However, prestige that has already been contributed towards a goal is not subject to decay.
This part of the idea I hate with the fire of a thousand suns.
Not unexpected.
Being punished for not logging in is too far in my opinion.
Try not to think of it as a punishment. We have to remember that Cryptic HAS to be able to make money. And considering how slow they are to release ANYTHING, if players were able to fully horde up a ton of prestige and then not even bother to play the game, then they could easily just log in on day one of a new item release, plunk down full prestige and have it instantly. Now if they've been pretty dedicated with their gameplay, then only going a short period without logging in, the decay will not be too significant. It just makes it so that for all but the most dedicated players, there will be some measure of grind if they don't want to spend real money.
If they want to give daily rewards to people for logging in, that's fine.. I get it. Taking away things I have 'earned' because I am not currently active in the game would make me avoid the system entirely.
Prestige is all about rating an individual's activity level. Now there would be som onus on Cryptic to start making the events players engage in have real meaning, so there's a real purpose behind doing them, be it to work collectively towards escalating that event or else keeping it from escalating. Compelling reasons to actually get involved in events, and stay involved with them is kep. It's easy to get bored with running the same content over and over and want to take a break. But when doing even repetitive content with a meaningful purpose, it can be engaging. Make the gameplay actually compelling and people will want to be in the game as often as possible, thus organically mitigating prestige decay.
I like a lot of your idea and find it really well thought out, but this part is a huge negative for me. Players do not like feeling like they are being punished and having things removed from them definitely creates a feeling of punishment.
I do understand. Butsomething needs to happen to ensure that there is incentive to just outright buy stuff with Zen. Now keep in mind, like I said, any Prestige already committed to a goal is immune to decay. Those poonts are considered spent. And if Cryptic releases enough things with prestige contribution in mind, and they manage to do it regularly enough, then 100% of the earned prestige would be allocated towards something the player wants. Therefore none of it would be lost. The only time decay would really becomee a factor is when a player literally has nothing available for prestige that they want and they are not all that engaged with the game anyway.
That is my clarification for the reason for that concept. I will say that I am open to alternative suggestions to keep the spending of Zen incentivized. Like I said, There HAS to be profit in this. I suppose they could delay making items available for Prestige by however many days that they decide it ought to take a player to earn enough prestige to buy them with it, thus leaving an initial windo for evryone to just pay Zen to get it, even though they haveenough prestige to get it when it comes available that way.
Big ticket items might have that delay be as much as 30 days. But those willing to fork over the Zen can get it on day one.
I'm with sea on this one, i will be punished because i have to travel for work, and not been able to play for 2 or 3 weeks.. that would kill the game for me..
On Consoles the exchange rate is rarely by the 500 mark, it's usually closer to the 300s, as for Dilithium value maybe sell T6 ships for Dil, definitely nothing Disco related since it's not very popular with STO's playerbase, people want T6 ships but ones that aren't TRIBBLE, for example T6 Borg Cubes for Dilithium might sell like hot cakes, T6 Pakled Ships for Dilithium would also be very popular, there's a Damand, but I'm doubting that Cryptic would supply those demands, the vast majority of the playerbase here seems to love Ships more than anything.
I know this won't be popular because it is about something popular. But I think the fleet invites to buy fleet stuff when not in the fleet (also combined with many fleets being finished) is what ultimately killed the exchange. Fair or no, dedicated small to mid-sized fleet leaders kept the exchange afloat for years. But when you can just buy the stuff for free without spending 800,000,000 dil to upgrade stuff, it kind of takes all the wind from the exchange sails. And, no, it wasn't fair, but those guys bought a lot of dil over the years.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
They could have rolled aout a year's worth of content using the contribution and project mechanics that were open to the entire player populace, with contribution requirements reflecting the size of the player population and how much of each thing would need to be contributed within the timeframe of the next phase being ready to go live. That way, player involvement would drive the actual deployment.
I don't think players would react well to being told "hey, we have this content made, and its in the game, but you can't access it until you dump 10 trillion dilthium into these public projects!" That's typically not something people like hearing, and it doesn't lead to an enjoyable gameplay experience. One person's ability to access actual content shouldn't be locked behind someone else having to cough up some in-game currency.
Who knows. With Gearbox now calling the top-level shots, there may actually be a decision maker who actually gives a damn about the potential STO has always had but has never been able to reach for due to its size, which PWE never bothered trying to help them achieve in spite of having the funds to make it happen.
From what they have said in one the livestreams(in December I think it was), STO isn't profitable enough to hire even like 10 more people. A publisher isn't going to dump money into a game to increase its team size if the game isn't making enough money to make back the cost spent on the new devs. That's just losing money.
The root problem is that every way to spend dilithium - except using it to buy Zen - has some sort of logical limit to it,
Other than maintenance cost/upkeep for ships/facilities.
I would hate an maintenance cost/upkeep for ships (in fact i have seen several games in which the upkeep eventually bankrupts players) but it would be one of the few consistent ways to remove dilithium from the balance.
Each day, each character can grind a sheer unlimited amount of unrefined dilithium and refine 8.5K so the amount of dilithium grows daily.
There are simply too few things to spend said dilithium on.
Buying mission rewards with dilithium after completing a mission would be an option, but that would remove the need to replay missions.
There are simply no easy solutions at this point.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
We need an account wide cap on dil refinement, and move some of the stuff thats stopped being bought in Mudds moved to Phoenix boxes
This makes sense.
The Phoenix store was originally created to be a place where people could buy rewards from previous events. As everything (except the tokens themselves and upgrades) obtained from it is character-bound, there was still a reason to play new events instead of waiting for the Phoenix store update.
It's been years since there was such an update though. But they did put ever more expensive stuff in Mudd's store instead. Which means that the Phoenix store has slowly become less effective as a sink, while the need for one has steadily increased with every new Mudd release.
[4:46] [Combat {self}] Your Haymaker deals 23337 (9049) Physical Damage(Critical) to Spawnmother
The root problem is that every way to spend dilithium - except using it to buy Zen - has some sort of logical limit to it,
Other than maintenance cost/upkeep for ships/facilities.
I would hate an maintenance cost/upkeep for ships (in fact i have seen several games in which the upkeep eventually bankrupts players) but it would be one of the few consistent ways to remove dilithium from the balance.
Each day, each character can grind a sheer unlimited amount of unrefined dilithium and refine 8.5K so the amount of dilithium grows daily.
There are simply too few things to spend said dilithium on.
Buying mission rewards with dilithium after completing a mission would be an option, but that would remove the need to replay missions.
There are simply no easy solutions at this point.
To lower the prices for Zen, big sellers of it need to be convinced that they need dilithium. While something like a maintenance cost might help with that, it would probably also chase big spenders away. I can imagine that the people buying huge sums of Zen when they need some in-game resources, are the people who want convenience.
Having to constantly pay for maintenance isn't convenient. They'd likely chase away the biggest spenders, the people who might have been most willing to buy Zen and offer it on the exchange to get dilithium. Not to mention that it would make the game less casual-friendly.
Of course I'm working with some big assumptions here that may not be true, but in my opinion a maintenance cost would probably be the worst thing they could come up with.
[4:46] [Combat {self}] Your Haymaker deals 23337 (9049) Physical Damage(Critical) to Spawnmother
We need an account wide cap on dil refinement, and move some of the stuff thats stopped being bought in Mudds moved to Phoenix boxes
This makes sense.
The Phoenix store was originally created to be a place where people could buy rewards from previous events. As everything (except the tokens themselves and upgrades) obtained from it is character-bound, there was still a reason to play new events instead of waiting for the Phoenix store update.
It's been years since there was such an update though. But they did put ever more expensive stuff in Mudd's store instead. Which means that the Phoenix store has slowly become less effective as a sink, while the need for one has steadily increased with every new Mudd release.
Mudd's market, for old event rewards, is pulling double duty in that regard, both decreasing the demand for dilithium and increasing the demand for zen. But honestly, they should just get rid of prize pack and move all its various prizes to direct purchase in the Dilithium store. Whatever intention they had for the 'randomness' of it, that function isn't really relevant anymore and is actively discouraging players from reliably pursuing of the bigger-ticket rewards.
If they want to keep the prize pack around, they need to add prizes that players cannot get anywhere else, by any other means, and that have long-lasting value and demand. Most importantly, the volume of 'use' for the lower tier prizes needs to keep pace with the frequency of higher-tier prizes. The phoenix upgrade tokens, which is pretty much the only thing of value at the uncommon tier now, completely lose value long before the average player will see an ultra-rare token, let alone an epic one. That undermines player spending on the prize pack -- most of what they'll get for it is essentially worthless in short order.
To be fair, I'm still purchasing many Phoenix upgrades. And even though I don't get nearly as many of them as I'd like, I have gotten a few UR and Epic tokens.
Then again, I have been creating many more toons recently and switching to phasers on some older toons, thus increasing my need for upgrades.
Perhaps that would be a good sink too, if it were combined with other ones: motivate people to create new characters. And not just through recruitment events, but also by adding new interesting species for example, each with a handful of unique episodes, some unique gear and their own starting locations. I know it's probably not something they can do right now, but in the longer term it would be a good way to add new content, new locations and assets like ships, weapon packs and so on.
And if they, besides adding stuff, also removed some restrictions on new toons, it could work even better. Right now a new toon needs to level first, then complete reputations, collect gear, collect spec points, complete R&D schools and so on. While not necessary, for completionists who like their characters to be rounded out, it is becoming ever more difficult to get new toons up to where their older ones are. And while most of those things can be sped up, it can only be done through C-store purchases. Thus further increasing demand for Zen instead of dilithium (R&D is the exception here, but I doubt many people are motivated to speed that one up at the current prices).
The bottom line:
Instead of making very expensive items for a single character, why not motivate people more to create new ones? By:
1. adding new interesting things for new characters - and I mean more than just a passive bonus, a trait or some mark packages like with the recruitment events - instead focus on actual gameplay experiences and new environments.
2. removing some of the workload of creating new characters and developing them (without doing so through C-store tokens).
Apart from the vanity shields, I'm personally not interested in the very expensive character-bound dilithium stuff like the MACO uniforms. Each of my characters instead spends much more dilithium to get a full set of space and ground gear than I ever spend on a single item.
[4:46] [Combat {self}] Your Haymaker deals 23337 (9049) Physical Damage(Critical) to Spawnmother
I know this won't be popular because it is about something popular. But I think the fleet invites to buy fleet stuff when not in the fleet (also combined with many fleets being finished) is what ultimately killed the exchange. Fair or no, dedicated small to mid-sized fleet leaders kept the exchange afloat for years. But when you can just buy the stuff for free without spending 800,000,000 dil to upgrade stuff, it kind of takes all the wind from the exchange sails. And, no, it wasn't fair, but those guys bought a lot of dil over the years.
Players have been running space communism channels in game as long as fleet leveling has been a thing. This has nothing to do with the dil ex... if anything it has bettered the situation. As new players are helped with which multiple big fleet purchases they should be focusing on. The little fleets continue to get bumped up... people are constantly swapping armadas to feed projects needing filled into the system.
The only thing that has changed regarding fleets is the end of development of fleets. We haven't had a new holding since the colony... and Cryptic hasn't added anything new to old holdings. Its lack of development that has stagnated the fleet dil sinks. Nothing new for old players to buy... nothing new for old fleet builders to build. New players are not going to replace the dedicated from launch players that built the first Tier 5 fleets. The people that did that are done leveling their own fleets.
IF what you suggest was to happen.... all that would happen would be fleet consolidation. (OR people would simply go one step further and give people looking for access fleet invites) As a PvPer I remember well when fleet holdings entered the game... and how it basically destroyed the game Cryptic had at the time. We had a game with 100 different small PvP fleets where most of us where friendly but we had rivalries a few enemy fleets ect... it was fun. Then the holding TRIBBLE came in and people realized having 10 man fleets wasn't really an option anymore. 100s of fleets became a handful, and it was really the end of the larger STO PvP community. If Cryptic made it so people couldn't be space communists... people wouldn't change they would just abandon half the games fleets and form a few super fleets.
Seeing as you guys are now talking about solutions... you are all missing the OBVIOUS glaring fix.
Development.
If Cryptic wants the Dil ex to move all they have to do is actually develop their game. NO not release new things to BUY every two weeks. But actually develop the game.
Bump NPCs 20-40% its time anyway with all the power creep... and then bump gear up one more mark. (we are at a in between mark number right now anyway)
Add actual new gear to the system better then the old gear. (That DOESN"T come with one of those ships being sold) Add Mission gear again that is worth upgrading. Add a couple new interesting beams. Perhaps Gasp even a new ship set... as they haven't added one of those in ages. Add a few new torps a few new mines. Add some more items to the reputation store... double hit of spending to acquire and upgrade. If they really want to sink Dil... give people reasons to take the gold gear they have had on their builds for years now and put it in the bank. What I would do that would fix things in a few days would be to spin the reputation ship sets. When they last expanded the rep system they added Space set pieces with different flavors (adding phaser disruptor plasma Ap ect options to the reputation sets) it would be logical for them to do the same with ship sets next. Why not add Gamma core stats to a Iconian set core... or Comp engine stats to a Discovery rep engine... or a Undine deflector stat to a romulan set... ect ect. They could add 2 new set options for every piece in every rep... and it would be one of those simple easy copy and paste solutions they are always looking for.
The bottom line is Cryptic has clearly not cared about the dil ex grounding out. The fix is so obvious... and its exactly what they haven't wanted to do. Actually develop the game. We don't need new systems, or massive changes to anything or even Refinement caps. We just need them to give EVERYONE reasons to spend Dill again. The fact that most of us are playing a MMO where our gear on our main toons hasn't really changed in years is THE ONLY issue.
Seeing as you guys are now talking about solutions... you are all missing the OBVIOUS glaring fix.
Development.
If Cryptic wants the Dil ex to move all they have to do is actually develop their game. NO not release new things to BUY every two weeks. But actually develop the game.
Bump NPCs 20-40% its time anyway with all the power creep... and then bump gear up one more mark. (we are at a in between mark number right now anyway)
Add actual new gear to the system better then the old gear. (That DOESN"T come with one of those ships being sold) Add Mission gear again that is worth upgrading. Add a couple new interesting beams. Perhaps Gasp even a new ship set... as they haven't added one of those in ages. Add a few new torps a few new mines. Add some more items to the reputation store... double hit of spending to acquire and upgrade. If they really want to sink Dil... give people reasons to take the gold gear they have had on their builds for years now and put it in the bank. What I would do that would fix things in a few days would be to spin the reputation ship sets. When they last expanded the rep system they added Space set pieces with different flavors (adding phaser disruptor plasma Ap ect options to the reputation sets) it would be logical for them to do the same with ship sets next. Why not add Gamma core stats to a Iconian set core... or Comp engine stats to a Discovery rep engine... or a Undine deflector stat to a romulan set... ect ect. They could add 2 new set options for every piece in every rep... and it would be one of those simple easy copy and paste solutions they are always looking for.
The bottom line is Cryptic has clearly not cared about the dil ex grounding out. The fix is so obvious... and its exactly what they haven't wanted to do. Actually develop the game. We don't need new systems, or massive changes to anything or even Refinement caps. We just need them to give EVERYONE reasons to spend Dill again. The fact that most of us are playing a MMO where our gear on our main toons hasn't really changed in years is THE ONLY issue.
I could definitely do without all the TFOs, Patrols, Endeavors and the Admiralty System, they all seem like a waste of time.
Other than maintenance cost/upkeep for ships/facilities.
I would hate an maintenance cost/upkeep for ships (in fact i have seen several games in which the upkeep eventually bankrupts players) but it would be one of the few consistent ways to remove dilithium from the balance.
Each day, each character can grind a sheer unlimited amount of unrefined dilithium and refine 8.5K so the amount of dilithium grows daily.
There are simply too few things to spend said dilithium on.
Buying mission rewards with dilithium after completing a mission would be an option, but that would remove the need to replay missions.
There are simply no easy solutions at this point.
I have to agree with quest here. Everyone who is ranting is expecting Cryptic to come up with some oneshot, magic bullet solution to fix the economy, and when they don't they start crying fowl with accusations of malice, incompetence, or some other jab. The truth is right in quest's last line. THERE ARE NO EASY SOLUTIONS.
This is a complex problem with a player driven economy. And the biggest problem is lack of demand for Dilithium. That is one of the major pieces of this puzzle. Its not the only piece, but its one of the biggest. And because of this... there is no magic bullet fix. Its not like fixing a bug in the game, you can't just flip a switch and make everything better... fixing an economy, especially a player driven one that is always in flux based on players reacting to things, takes time and experimentation. We've seen one thing make a dent already. But its only one part of a solution. We need sustainability. Not just spikes.
And I also have to agree with my fellow forumites who disagree with ANYTHING like maintenance fees. That essentially penalizes players who are not active. STO is an extremely casual game, which is one of its appeals. You can get on anytime, you can take time off anytime, and you can come right back to where you were anytime. Imposing a maintenance fee on things would feel like a gut punch to a lot of players most likely. "Play x amount of time to earn x amount of y otherwise you can't do z". No. Just no.
Seeing as you guys are now talking about solutions... you are all missing the OBVIOUS glaring fix.
Development.
If Cryptic wants the Dil ex to move all they have to do is actually develop their game. NO not release new things to BUY every two weeks. But actually develop the game.
Bump NPCs 20-40% its time anyway with all the power creep... and then bump gear up one more mark. (we are at a in between mark number right now anyway)
Add actual new gear to the system better then the old gear. (That DOESN"T come with one of those ships being sold) Add Mission gear again that is worth upgrading. Add a couple new interesting beams. Perhaps Gasp even a new ship set... as they haven't added one of those in ages. Add a few new torps a few new mines. Add some more items to the reputation store... double hit of spending to acquire and upgrade. If they really want to sink Dil... give people reasons to take the gold gear they have had on their builds for years now and put it in the bank. What I would do that would fix things in a few days would be to spin the reputation ship sets. When they last expanded the rep system they added Space set pieces with different flavors (adding phaser disruptor plasma Ap ect options to the reputation sets) it would be logical for them to do the same with ship sets next. Why not add Gamma core stats to a Iconian set core... or Comp engine stats to a Discovery rep engine... or a Undine deflector stat to a romulan set... ect ect. They could add 2 new set options for every piece in every rep... and it would be one of those simple easy copy and paste solutions they are always looking for.
The bottom line is Cryptic has clearly not cared about the dil ex grounding out. The fix is so obvious... and its exactly what they haven't wanted to do. Actually develop the game. We don't need new systems, or massive changes to anything or even Refinement caps. We just need them to give EVERYONE reasons to spend Dill again. The fact that most of us are playing a MMO where our gear on our main toons hasn't really changed in years is THE ONLY issue.
Most of that doesn't sound like development at all.
Just bumping up HP numbers and then giving players more options to deal with it isn't interesting at all. It's just repeating of the nerf-boost cycle that we've already had too many of.
Inviting new stuff is fine, but not if it's done only to make existing stuff obsolete. That shouldn't be the goal.
And it's not necessary either, because there are plenty of ways to motivate people to get new stuff without making anything better or less effective - just make things different.
Add new models for new stuff like Andorian ground weapons, Vulcan phasers, new hangar pets, allow players to get different weapon colours for all types, create new ones like proton weapons. Give players a reason to get new gear - for example, by giving them an incentive to create new toons as I described above - without punishing them.
I totally agree that we need more development. But when I hear 'development', I'm thinking of more species, more missions and starting locations with unique environments, cities, assets and more options for players. That's actual development.
Not just creating new sets with some tweaks to stats so that we can play the same old missions again with some slightly different gear - tweaks the average player won't notice anyway because it's just a different number in an item description. They've actually done too much of that in the past and every time it has done a lot of damage.
Many people still say that Legacy of New Romulus was one of, if not the best expansion ever. Simply because entirely new worlds were added to explore, an almost full faction with tons of missions and patrols was added and tons of new clothing, weapon and ship options became available.
Delta Rising had a lot of that too, but it also made - almost instantly - the game much more difficult for the average player. Causing many people to leave, lots of anger and months of work due to further tweaking for the Devs to repair some of the damage.
What we need is another LNR-style expansion. Not another DR-like one. Then you'd have plenty of ways to get people to spend again (on new toons), without chasing them away by forcing them to replace things on their existing characters. That last thing is totally unnecessary.
Of course, a serious problem here is the disastrous choices made by PWE's management and the resulting lack of manpower for STO - and the lack of willingness from the IP holder (CBS) to actually create opportunies instead of just waiting for money to come their way.
[4:46] [Combat {self}] Your Haymaker deals 23337 (9049) Physical Damage(Critical) to Spawnmother
Yes, this is complicated. And yes, there is no "magic fix".
But setting those 2 obvious statements aside, consider this simple qustion:
Why did the dilex work for years, and what changed?
Answer: for many years, Cryptic regularly added fleet holdings and dil sinks. What changed? They stopped.
This isn't rocket science here. It used to work, and now it doesn't. It stopped working because they stopped doing the things they used to do.
The accelerated sales have rubbed salt in the wound, but didn't cause the wound.
Cryptic just stopped supporting fleet stuff, which was the major dil sink of the game.
And yes, I lay that choice 100% at the feet of the devs. They choose to stop doing the thing that kept the dilex working, so they are 100% to blame for it collapsing.
As mentioned: I would hate anything like an upkeep/maintenance cost and other than it obviously being highly unpopular there are numerous other arguments which can be made against it.
That said, it would be a way to remove dilithium from the ever growing stockpile.
A structural solution is necessary, not some random temporary sinks.
Just put unique mission rewards in the dilithium store after playing a mission once.
That cuts down on mission grinding for gear and should be a constant drain of dilithium from the system.
More weapons in the dilithium store (e.g. Cardassian pistols/rifles)
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
Seeing as you guys are now talking about solutions... you are all missing the OBVIOUS glaring fix.
Development.
If Cryptic wants the Dil ex to move all they have to do is actually develop their game. NO not release new things to BUY every two weeks. But actually develop the game.
Bump NPCs 20-40% its time anyway with all the power creep... and then bump gear up one more mark. (we are at a in between mark number right now anyway)
Add actual new gear to the system better then the old gear. (That DOESN"T come with one of those ships being sold) Add Mission gear again that is worth upgrading. Add a couple new interesting beams. Perhaps Gasp even a new ship set... as they haven't added one of those in ages. Add a few new torps a few new mines. Add some more items to the reputation store... double hit of spending to acquire and upgrade. If they really want to sink Dil... give people reasons to take the gold gear they have had on their builds for years now and put it in the bank. What I would do that would fix things in a few days would be to spin the reputation ship sets. When they last expanded the rep system they added Space set pieces with different flavors (adding phaser disruptor plasma Ap ect options to the reputation sets) it would be logical for them to do the same with ship sets next. Why not add Gamma core stats to a Iconian set core... or Comp engine stats to a Discovery rep engine... or a Undine deflector stat to a romulan set... ect ect. They could add 2 new set options for every piece in every rep... and it would be one of those simple easy copy and paste solutions they are always looking for.
The bottom line is Cryptic has clearly not cared about the dil ex grounding out. The fix is so obvious... and its exactly what they haven't wanted to do. Actually develop the game. We don't need new systems, or massive changes to anything or even Refinement caps. We just need them to give EVERYONE reasons to spend Dill again. The fact that most of us are playing a MMO where our gear on our main toons hasn't really changed in years is THE ONLY issue.
Most of that doesn't sound like development at all.
Just bumping up HP numbers and then giving players more options to deal with it isn't interesting at all. It's just repeating of the nerf-boost cycle that we've already had too many of.
Inviting new stuff is fine, but not if it's done only to make existing stuff obsolete. That shouldn't be the goal.
And it's not necessary either, because there are plenty of ways to motivate people to get new stuff without making anything better or less effective - just make things different.
Add new models for new stuff like Andorian ground weapons, Vulcan phasers, new hangar pets, allow players to get different weapon colours for all types, create new ones like proton weapons. Give players a reason to get new gear - for example, by giving them an incentive to create new toons as I described above - without punishing them.
I totally agree that we need more development. But when I hear 'development', I'm thinking of more species, more missions and starting locations with unique environments, cities, assets and more options for players. That's actual development.
Not just creating new sets with some tweaks to stats so that we can play the same old missions again with some slightly different gear - tweaks the average player won't notice anyway because it's just a different number in an item description. They've actually done too much of that in the past and every time it has done a lot of damage.
Many people still say that Legacy of New Romulus was one of, if not the best expansion ever. Simply because entirely new worlds were added to explore, an almost full faction with tons of missions and patrols was added and tons of new clothing, weapon and ship options became available.
Delta Rising had a lot of that too, but it also made - almost instantly - the game much more difficult for the average player. Causing many people to leave, lots of anger and months of work due to further tweaking for the Devs to repair some of the damage.
What we need is another LNR-style expansion. Not another DR-like one. Then you'd have plenty of ways to get people to spend again (on new toons), without chasing them away by forcing them to replace things on their existing characters. That last thing is totally unnecessary.
Of course, a serious problem here is the disastrous choices made by PWE's management and the resulting lack of manpower for STO - and the lack of willingness from the IP holder (CBS) to actually create opportunies instead of just waiting for money to come their way.
I wish you where right I really do.
However I think it has been proven many times now cosmetic stuff doesn't sell at the rate of gear. Like it or not this is a game and people don't want to just Barbie. (I mean that with all respect I have some cosmetic stuff like everyone else)
The on fix they have actually tried lately has been Dill for hard to get lockbox Cosmetic shields. It barely caused a ripple in the exchange backlog.
People will pay for colour changes on weapons. (but the devs have said that is out of the question in the past) However it will never be a real sink. It will cause a ripple for a few days at best.
Like it or not this is a MMO... which means constant power creep and deprecation of old gear. I have never played a MMO where the gear I ground for played multiple dungeons for or ground like a mad man to aquire was the last piece I would ever need. IT all gets deprecated by the next cool thing. In most games that means new gear tailored to the latest expansion, or new enemy types ect. If you take away the grind for gear I mean what is the point any more. That is exactly what most people play MMOs for no matter what they say.
As mentioned: I would hate anything like an upkeep/maintenance cost and other than it obviously being highly unpopular there are numerous other arguments which can be made against it.
That said, it would be a way to remove dilithium from the ever growing stockpile.
A structural solution is necessary, not some random temporary sinks.
Just put unique mission rewards in the dilithium store after playing a mission once.
That cuts down on mission grinding for gear and should be a constant drain of dilithium from the system.
More weapons in the dilithium store (e.g. Cardassian pistols/rifles)
But then what would they put in the mudd store ? /s
Its sad Cryptic was on the right track with Phoenix. Every time they added something new the Dil Ex dipped for a fairly extended period. They prioritized short term profit over the games long term stability. Phoenix was all we ever needed... Mudds could have still been a thing as a way to make lockbox/promo ship bundles. Its adding all the event ships/consoles/items to mudds that has cause ALL the games economic issues.
It might be unpopular for some people to say it... but there should never have been away to go back 2 years later and buy an account unlock for a event ship/console you missed. You should have always had to burn Dill trying to pull them per toon from Phoenix. THAT was a proper long term sink. Instead Cryptic is trying to sell the freebie event things and its painfully greedy.
Other than maintenance cost/upkeep for ships/facilities.
I would hate an maintenance cost/upkeep for ships (in fact i have seen several games in which the upkeep eventually bankrupts players) but it would be one of the few consistent ways to remove dilithium from the balance.
Each day, each character can grind a sheer unlimited amount of unrefined dilithium and refine 8.5K so the amount of dilithium grows daily.
There are simply too few things to spend said dilithium on.
Buying mission rewards with dilithium after completing a mission would be an option, but that would remove the need to replay missions.
There are simply no easy solutions at this point.
I have to agree with quest here. Everyone who is ranting is expecting Cryptic to come up with some oneshot, magic bullet solution to fix the economy, and when they don't they start crying fowl with accusations of malice, incompetence, or some other jab. The truth is right in quest's last line. THERE ARE NO EASY SOLUTIONS.
This is a complex problem with a player driven economy. And the biggest problem is lack of demand for Dilithium. That is one of the major pieces of this puzzle. Its not the only piece, but its one of the biggest. And because of this... there is no magic bullet fix. Its not like fixing a bug in the game, you can't just flip a switch and make everything better... fixing an economy, especially a player driven one that is always in flux based on players reacting to things, takes time and experimentation. We've seen one thing make a dent already. But its only one part of a solution. We need sustainability. Not just spikes.
And I also have to agree with my fellow forumites who disagree with ANYTHING like maintenance fees. That essentially penalizes players who are not active. STO is an extremely casual game, which is one of its appeals. You can get on anytime, you can take time off anytime, and you can come right back to where you were anytime. Imposing a maintenance fee on things would feel like a gut punch to a lot of players most likely. "Play x amount of time to earn x amount of y otherwise you can't do z". No. Just no.
I agree with Rattler2 on all points and I still think selling T6 ships for Dil would at least add value to Dilithium, which in turn would get a Player Driven Economy slowly going again, it might be even better if we go even farther by adding T7 ships to the Dil store.
Comments
I'm with sea on this one, i will be punished because i have to travel for work, and not been able to play for 2 or 3 weeks.. that would kill the game for me..
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
From what they have said in one the livestreams(in December I think it was), STO isn't profitable enough to hire even like 10 more people. A publisher isn't going to dump money into a game to increase its team size if the game isn't making enough money to make back the cost spent on the new devs. That's just losing money.
Other than maintenance cost/upkeep for ships/facilities.
I would hate an maintenance cost/upkeep for ships (in fact i have seen several games in which the upkeep eventually bankrupts players) but it would be one of the few consistent ways to remove dilithium from the balance.
Each day, each character can grind a sheer unlimited amount of unrefined dilithium and refine 8.5K so the amount of dilithium grows daily.
There are simply too few things to spend said dilithium on.
Buying mission rewards with dilithium after completing a mission would be an option, but that would remove the need to replay missions.
There are simply no easy solutions at this point.
This makes sense.
The Phoenix store was originally created to be a place where people could buy rewards from previous events. As everything (except the tokens themselves and upgrades) obtained from it is character-bound, there was still a reason to play new events instead of waiting for the Phoenix store update.
It's been years since there was such an update though. But they did put ever more expensive stuff in Mudd's store instead. Which means that the Phoenix store has slowly become less effective as a sink, while the need for one has steadily increased with every new Mudd release.
[3/25 10:41][Combat (Self)]Your Haymaker deals 26187 (10692) Physical Damage(Critical) to Orinoco.
To lower the prices for Zen, big sellers of it need to be convinced that they need dilithium. While something like a maintenance cost might help with that, it would probably also chase big spenders away. I can imagine that the people buying huge sums of Zen when they need some in-game resources, are the people who want convenience.
Having to constantly pay for maintenance isn't convenient. They'd likely chase away the biggest spenders, the people who might have been most willing to buy Zen and offer it on the exchange to get dilithium. Not to mention that it would make the game less casual-friendly.
Of course I'm working with some big assumptions here that may not be true, but in my opinion a maintenance cost would probably be the worst thing they could come up with.
[3/25 10:41][Combat (Self)]Your Haymaker deals 26187 (10692) Physical Damage(Critical) to Orinoco.
To be fair, I'm still purchasing many Phoenix upgrades. And even though I don't get nearly as many of them as I'd like, I have gotten a few UR and Epic tokens.
Then again, I have been creating many more toons recently and switching to phasers on some older toons, thus increasing my need for upgrades.
Perhaps that would be a good sink too, if it were combined with other ones: motivate people to create new characters. And not just through recruitment events, but also by adding new interesting species for example, each with a handful of unique episodes, some unique gear and their own starting locations. I know it's probably not something they can do right now, but in the longer term it would be a good way to add new content, new locations and assets like ships, weapon packs and so on.
And if they, besides adding stuff, also removed some restrictions on new toons, it could work even better. Right now a new toon needs to level first, then complete reputations, collect gear, collect spec points, complete R&D schools and so on. While not necessary, for completionists who like their characters to be rounded out, it is becoming ever more difficult to get new toons up to where their older ones are. And while most of those things can be sped up, it can only be done through C-store purchases. Thus further increasing demand for Zen instead of dilithium (R&D is the exception here, but I doubt many people are motivated to speed that one up at the current prices).
The bottom line:
Instead of making very expensive items for a single character, why not motivate people more to create new ones? By:
1. adding new interesting things for new characters - and I mean more than just a passive bonus, a trait or some mark packages like with the recruitment events - instead focus on actual gameplay experiences and new environments.
2. removing some of the workload of creating new characters and developing them (without doing so through C-store tokens).
Apart from the vanity shields, I'm personally not interested in the very expensive character-bound dilithium stuff like the MACO uniforms. Each of my characters instead spends much more dilithium to get a full set of space and ground gear than I ever spend on a single item.
[3/25 10:41][Combat (Self)]Your Haymaker deals 26187 (10692) Physical Damage(Critical) to Orinoco.
Players have been running space communism channels in game as long as fleet leveling has been a thing. This has nothing to do with the dil ex... if anything it has bettered the situation. As new players are helped with which multiple big fleet purchases they should be focusing on. The little fleets continue to get bumped up... people are constantly swapping armadas to feed projects needing filled into the system.
The only thing that has changed regarding fleets is the end of development of fleets. We haven't had a new holding since the colony... and Cryptic hasn't added anything new to old holdings. Its lack of development that has stagnated the fleet dil sinks. Nothing new for old players to buy... nothing new for old fleet builders to build. New players are not going to replace the dedicated from launch players that built the first Tier 5 fleets. The people that did that are done leveling their own fleets.
IF what you suggest was to happen.... all that would happen would be fleet consolidation. (OR people would simply go one step further and give people looking for access fleet invites) As a PvPer I remember well when fleet holdings entered the game... and how it basically destroyed the game Cryptic had at the time. We had a game with 100 different small PvP fleets where most of us where friendly but we had rivalries a few enemy fleets ect... it was fun. Then the holding TRIBBLE came in and people realized having 10 man fleets wasn't really an option anymore. 100s of fleets became a handful, and it was really the end of the larger STO PvP community. If Cryptic made it so people couldn't be space communists... people wouldn't change they would just abandon half the games fleets and form a few super fleets.
Development.
If Cryptic wants the Dil ex to move all they have to do is actually develop their game. NO not release new things to BUY every two weeks. But actually develop the game.
Bump NPCs 20-40% its time anyway with all the power creep... and then bump gear up one more mark. (we are at a in between mark number right now anyway)
Add actual new gear to the system better then the old gear. (That DOESN"T come with one of those ships being sold) Add Mission gear again that is worth upgrading. Add a couple new interesting beams. Perhaps Gasp even a new ship set... as they haven't added one of those in ages. Add a few new torps a few new mines. Add some more items to the reputation store... double hit of spending to acquire and upgrade. If they really want to sink Dil... give people reasons to take the gold gear they have had on their builds for years now and put it in the bank. What I would do that would fix things in a few days would be to spin the reputation ship sets. When they last expanded the rep system they added Space set pieces with different flavors (adding phaser disruptor plasma Ap ect options to the reputation sets) it would be logical for them to do the same with ship sets next. Why not add Gamma core stats to a Iconian set core... or Comp engine stats to a Discovery rep engine... or a Undine deflector stat to a romulan set... ect ect. They could add 2 new set options for every piece in every rep... and it would be one of those simple easy copy and paste solutions they are always looking for.
The bottom line is Cryptic has clearly not cared about the dil ex grounding out. The fix is so obvious... and its exactly what they haven't wanted to do. Actually develop the game. We don't need new systems, or massive changes to anything or even Refinement caps. We just need them to give EVERYONE reasons to spend Dill again. The fact that most of us are playing a MMO where our gear on our main toons hasn't really changed in years is THE ONLY issue.
I could definitely do without all the TFOs, Patrols, Endeavors and the Admiralty System, they all seem like a waste of time.
I have to agree with quest here. Everyone who is ranting is expecting Cryptic to come up with some oneshot, magic bullet solution to fix the economy, and when they don't they start crying fowl with accusations of malice, incompetence, or some other jab. The truth is right in quest's last line. THERE ARE NO EASY SOLUTIONS.
This is a complex problem with a player driven economy. And the biggest problem is lack of demand for Dilithium. That is one of the major pieces of this puzzle. Its not the only piece, but its one of the biggest. And because of this... there is no magic bullet fix. Its not like fixing a bug in the game, you can't just flip a switch and make everything better... fixing an economy, especially a player driven one that is always in flux based on players reacting to things, takes time and experimentation. We've seen one thing make a dent already. But its only one part of a solution. We need sustainability. Not just spikes.
And I also have to agree with my fellow forumites who disagree with ANYTHING like maintenance fees. That essentially penalizes players who are not active. STO is an extremely casual game, which is one of its appeals. You can get on anytime, you can take time off anytime, and you can come right back to where you were anytime. Imposing a maintenance fee on things would feel like a gut punch to a lot of players most likely. "Play x amount of time to earn x amount of y otherwise you can't do z". No. Just no.
Most of that doesn't sound like development at all.
Just bumping up HP numbers and then giving players more options to deal with it isn't interesting at all. It's just repeating of the nerf-boost cycle that we've already had too many of.
Inviting new stuff is fine, but not if it's done only to make existing stuff obsolete. That shouldn't be the goal.
And it's not necessary either, because there are plenty of ways to motivate people to get new stuff without making anything better or less effective - just make things different.
Add new models for new stuff like Andorian ground weapons, Vulcan phasers, new hangar pets, allow players to get different weapon colours for all types, create new ones like proton weapons. Give players a reason to get new gear - for example, by giving them an incentive to create new toons as I described above - without punishing them.
I totally agree that we need more development. But when I hear 'development', I'm thinking of more species, more missions and starting locations with unique environments, cities, assets and more options for players. That's actual development.
Not just creating new sets with some tweaks to stats so that we can play the same old missions again with some slightly different gear - tweaks the average player won't notice anyway because it's just a different number in an item description. They've actually done too much of that in the past and every time it has done a lot of damage.
Many people still say that Legacy of New Romulus was one of, if not the best expansion ever. Simply because entirely new worlds were added to explore, an almost full faction with tons of missions and patrols was added and tons of new clothing, weapon and ship options became available.
Delta Rising had a lot of that too, but it also made - almost instantly - the game much more difficult for the average player. Causing many people to leave, lots of anger and months of work due to further tweaking for the Devs to repair some of the damage.
What we need is another LNR-style expansion. Not another DR-like one. Then you'd have plenty of ways to get people to spend again (on new toons), without chasing them away by forcing them to replace things on their existing characters. That last thing is totally unnecessary.
Of course, a serious problem here is the disastrous choices made by PWE's management and the resulting lack of manpower for STO - and the lack of willingness from the IP holder (CBS) to actually create opportunies instead of just waiting for money to come their way.
[3/25 10:41][Combat (Self)]Your Haymaker deals 26187 (10692) Physical Damage(Critical) to Orinoco.
But setting those 2 obvious statements aside, consider this simple qustion:
Why did the dilex work for years, and what changed?
Answer: for many years, Cryptic regularly added fleet holdings and dil sinks. What changed? They stopped.
This isn't rocket science here. It used to work, and now it doesn't. It stopped working because they stopped doing the things they used to do.
The accelerated sales have rubbed salt in the wound, but didn't cause the wound.
Cryptic just stopped supporting fleet stuff, which was the major dil sink of the game.
And yes, I lay that choice 100% at the feet of the devs. They choose to stop doing the thing that kept the dilex working, so they are 100% to blame for it collapsing.
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
That said, it would be a way to remove dilithium from the ever growing stockpile.
A structural solution is necessary, not some random temporary sinks.
Just put unique mission rewards in the dilithium store after playing a mission once.
That cuts down on mission grinding for gear and should be a constant drain of dilithium from the system.
More weapons in the dilithium store (e.g. Cardassian pistols/rifles)
I wish you where right I really do.
However I think it has been proven many times now cosmetic stuff doesn't sell at the rate of gear. Like it or not this is a game and people don't want to just Barbie. (I mean that with all respect I have some cosmetic stuff like everyone else)
The on fix they have actually tried lately has been Dill for hard to get lockbox Cosmetic shields. It barely caused a ripple in the exchange backlog.
People will pay for colour changes on weapons. (but the devs have said that is out of the question in the past) However it will never be a real sink. It will cause a ripple for a few days at best.
Like it or not this is a MMO... which means constant power creep and deprecation of old gear. I have never played a MMO where the gear I ground for played multiple dungeons for or ground like a mad man to aquire was the last piece I would ever need. IT all gets deprecated by the next cool thing. In most games that means new gear tailored to the latest expansion, or new enemy types ect. If you take away the grind for gear I mean what is the point any more. That is exactly what most people play MMOs for no matter what they say.
But then what would they put in the mudd store ? /s
Its sad Cryptic was on the right track with Phoenix. Every time they added something new the Dil Ex dipped for a fairly extended period. They prioritized short term profit over the games long term stability. Phoenix was all we ever needed... Mudds could have still been a thing as a way to make lockbox/promo ship bundles. Its adding all the event ships/consoles/items to mudds that has cause ALL the games economic issues.
It might be unpopular for some people to say it... but there should never have been away to go back 2 years later and buy an account unlock for a event ship/console you missed. You should have always had to burn Dill trying to pull them per toon from Phoenix. THAT was a proper long term sink. Instead Cryptic is trying to sell the freebie event things and its painfully greedy.
I agree with Rattler2 on all points and I still think selling T6 ships for Dil would at least add value to Dilithium, which in turn would get a Player Driven Economy slowly going again, it might be even better if we go even farther by adding T7 ships to the Dil store.