It depends on what one considers a solution and how fast of a solution you want. If you want immediate solutions, run with private groups of like minded peoples so you don't have to worry about encountering the ultra high DPSers you're worried about. This eliminates both sides of the argument as folks can play to their hearts content with like minded people and never have to worry about high/low DPS.
If you want everyone to have equal access to the content, as in everyone can at least step through the door, then you establish a baseline floor and say "anyone meeting requirements X Y Z are good to go." This can be strictly a level requirement, or it can be coupled with other things such saying "anyone at level 65 and 10k DPS is good to go" or what have you. Then anyone above said minimum is good to go on all difficulties. This is what we have now as generally the only requirements people have to meet are level minimums. Anyone who has met the minimum requirements is good to go regardless of difficulty.
If you want special treatment for certain groups along with equality of outcome and don't care if it drives off large portions of the game, then you can institute DPS caps and force people above certain DPS thresholds to only play on higher tier difficulties matching that threshold. You can also add any other arbitrary restrictions and/or changes you wished in this area.
If you believe that not all content has to be made with all people in mind BUT also want to preserve equal chances to get into said content, then you establish basic minimum requirements that must be met to get your foot in the door for each type of content. For normal mode they must meet condition X, for advanced it's conditions X and Y, for elite they must meet conditions X Y and Z. If they don't meet all conditions, they don't get to go. For example let's say condition X is being max level, condition Y is having all equipment at mk xii very rare or above, and condition Z is a DPS requirement of 50k. Now those don't have to be the exact conditions and they can be different, but this is purely for sake of argument. At that juncture, people know what is expected of them to get into each tier of difficulty. How far up the ladder they choose to go is up to them. The difficulties would be balanced around people having met the conditions required for said difficulty while giving people ways to measure their progress.
Unless someone is deliberately trying to AFK someone and being a troll, which would require proof, I see no issue with regards to people being able to do high amounts of DPS. The only real issue I see in this mess is some people not being where they think they are as I outlined before without revisiting the whole thing. Is it ideal getting low DPS people in higher difficulty runs no. Do I think they should be there before certain conditions have been met, no I don't. Likewise is it ideal if you get someone who is doing 500k+ in a normal mode run, not really. If you want equality in terms of access to get in the door, you will have to live with high DPS coming into normal runs, and low DPS going into higher tier runs. If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but want to preserve equal access to the content, then certain conditions will have to be met to get in the door.
"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
So what are the possible solutions for the DPS issue then? There have been a few ideas offered in this thread.
There are those that may have to pick up their gameplay a bit it's not the 1960's any more
There are others that might want to back off when playing certain normal difficulty maps
Signs could be posted stating the minimum and maximum dps for a map
Game masters with parsers could be deployed to issue violation tickets to offenders doing too much or too little
Players who incur too many violations would have their starships towed to an impound yard
Players would have to attend either a basic starship operation or respectful starship operation course, as determined by the nature of their violations
So what are the possible solutions for the DPS issue then? There have been a few ideas offered in this thread.
There are those that may have to pick up their gameplay a bit it's not the 1960's any more
There are others that might want to back off when playing certain normal difficulty maps
Signs could be posted stating the minimum and maximum dps for a map
Game masters with parsers could be deployed to issue violation tickets to offenders doing too much or too little
Players who incur too many violations would have their starships towed to an impound yard
Players would have to attend either a basic starship operation or respectful starship operation course, as determined by the nature of their violations
Any related fees would help the dilex
Good grief man you just proposed the Starfleet DMV 0_o
"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
People keep bringing up advanced and elite versions of event queues, but that goes both ways - they also need to be normal and advanced versions of ELITE-ONLY queues made as well. LOOKING AT YOU, KORFEZ!
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
if you have torpedos, the first strike bundle is worth the price of admission just for the maelstrom launchers. I routinely see 220 and 300K crits. I just ran argala/wanted and only took 20K shield damage (Have the heal shields endeavor.) I'm hoping not but i see a nerf coing
Well torpedoes is a tricky thing. The torpedo itself plays a big role and how you fire it. Like High Yield Undine Photon Torpedo from the reputation system is a beast as is the Dyson Photon but careful if you are to close with that one you blow yourself up. Now for spread you got something like Neutronic who does a lot of damage on spread.
You also got others who do special stuff like the Quantum Phase Torp as spread for shield drain and you got the Delphic from the lobi store who shoots 4 torps on high yield one 5/6 on 2/3 and takes with each torpedo 10 resistance off combine that with a beta and maybe something else and you get quickly - 100+ resistance on the enemy ship.
C-Store Inc. is still looking for active members on the fed side. If you don't have a fleet feel free to contact me in game @stegi.
I think there's not enough consensus that there IS a problem, let alone the same problem. There's been lots of ideas, but nothing that strikes me as being sufficient to fix anything. Lots of sidestepping the issue, I feel.
Without some solid idea of what the problem actually IS, I think a solution will be elusive.
Not sure I would agree that in general people disagree on this. I believe it depends on what exactly are we talking about.
Is there too much DPS for Normal event content? Yes.
Is there too much DPS for Advanced level TFOs? Depends on a number of things. Impact is seen mostly on Borg TFOs, but in general, maybe.
Is there too much DPS for Elite level queues? Probably not. Some of the Elite DPS folk can answer that.
Looking at the situation like that, you get a better idea of where the adjustments need to be made. In general MMO terms, you have a lot of end game level players who are essentially forced into playing in the starter zones. This is why the problem is much more visible when running content that only comes in Normal difficulty, like Red Alerts, event TFOs, BZs etc. and why I believe any solution has to have a more broad approach.
So how to entice players who are built and playing at a higher level of difficulty out of the lower difficulty content? This is where I like a couple of the suggestions that were made.
Increasing the rewards for Elite level content.
Adding Advanced and Elite level versions of event TFO content would help. It would draw some of the players out of Normal and into those levels of difficulty who are looking for more of a challenge.
Creating a solo TFO map (using ISA map or even CSA or HSA maybe) to be used as a DPS measure to let a player know if they are up to the challenge of higher difficulty content or not. This also helps keep some of the Advanced and Elite players out of lower level content who are running it just to measure their DPS.
I also believe there should be more difficult content added into the game at some point. Everyone will have an equal opportunity to play it, but they will need to up their game in order to be successful at it.
I do not believe there is a one size fits all solution, nor do I believe you will ever be able to eliminate higher level players from queuing into lower difficulty TFOs, but I do believe the impact can be lessened.
This is what I've been talking about, though. That there is too much dps for ANY content is, I think, a problem. Having that elite level dps should make normal content easier, but not trivial. The difference between normal and elite is just too extreme. I feel (and maybe it's just me) that that disparity needs to be reduced, but I just don't know how they would do it.
But again, that's what I think is wrong. As you pointed out, there's not a consensus on just what the problem IS.
Put another way:
If I join elite content in Lord of the Rings Online, such as a raid, there will be players there who are better equipped, having done that content before and got ahold of the best gear possible. If one of them joins me on a normal quest somewhere else in the game, it's not going to be as difficult for him as it is for me, but it's not going to be trivial. The balance point is such that I can do the elite content with some difficulty, and he's not going to find normal content entirely trivial.
I think this is a better way.
You compare apples with oranges. When this game came out it was difficult because even normal content was a challenge. However the Player base was constantly complaining and whining it was to hard and step by step over years Cryptic accommodated the Player base and made the gameplay more easy and the weapons packing a bigger punch. Now we are here, it is what it is but it was the STO Player base who put us here not cryptic. Every casual play who has only an hour a day or less time wants to eat cake, well now there is cake and now there is also some way bigger mouths who do alot more dps. Should they play in normal TFO's, no but then I have people on advanced randoms all the time who have no business being there because they just leech their way to marks.
C-Store Inc. is still looking for active members on the fed side. If you don't have a fleet feel free to contact me in game @stegi.
Anyway, it's true that going up against lower LEVEL enemies is trivial, it's that higher level enemies are not. Being raid equipped would make higher level enemies easier, but not trivial... and there's nothing to stop me participating in a raid with my more basic gear. It would be more difficult, but not impossible. That's what I'm trying to get at.
Here is where I have an issue. If I want to gear myself out to the point I am trivializing the content I'm going into, why should I not be allowed to do so as long as I've done it legitimately? And by legitimately I mean just that, no exploits, glitches or things of that nature. You may not consider that to be fun, and that's a perfectly legitimate stance to take. Likewise on the opposite side of the coin, others may sometimes consider it fun to blast through things like a 1 man/ship army. Neither side's fun is wrong. If I vastly outgear content, then I would expect it to be a cakewalk.
Assuming Cryptic did want to balance the two sides out, the only way to realistically do this without nerfs and without completely obliterating investments people have made would be to use something akin to the SWTOR scaling system. Current max level over there is 80. If I wanted to group with a friend of mine who is level 20 I am free to do so. When I visit the planet he's on, it scales my character down to the max level intended for that planet, let's say 25 just to quantify it hypothetically. I still have my gear, my abilities and the like. However the game treats it as though I'm a level 25 toon with all the abilities and the like of a level 80, but my stats and otherwise behave like that level 25 toon and as though I have the highest gear a 25 can get. In STO terms it would be like having all mk vi golds on a level 30 ship, but with the full t6 toolkit. I still maintain a huge advantage, but generally can't simply one shot everything in sight.
Now, to refer to your example, your numbers would be fine, so long as 100k dps isn't trivializing the 10k dps content. At present, that's what's happening. Whatever the actual numbers are, elite dps trivializes the normal content. I'd just like to see it rebalanced so it's easier without being trivial. That way, normal players COULD participate in elite content too, though with more difficulty.
The problem is that in max level content there is no way to realistically prevent this. The only thing cryptic can do is set a basic standard for everyone across the board. Using Val's hypothetical 10k for normal mode, Cryptic would have to say anything 10k and above is good. Then if you moved into advanced it would go to 50k+, then 100k+ for elite. Again assuming max level content, there is no way to achieve what you're wanting to do without some kind of DPS cap that punishes anyone who dares exceed the minimums.
The key thing to keep in mind as well is that not all content is made for all people. If as a hypothetical we balanced advanced content around people doing 50k+ per Val's hypothetical, this means that content is not intended for people under that 50k minimum. They may be able to get their foot in the door, but they're not ready for it and that content was not intended for them. I still maintain if people can't meet the basic standards the game itself sets, they have no business that content or any right to go into it. Now the big question I have to ask is this, why would a normal mode player want to step into elite level content to start with? Also why should they be allowed to step into elite level content if they're not willing to put in elite levels of work to get there? That's like wanting to get paid for doing 40 hours of work in a week, but only putting in 10 hours of work. Why should the guy who worked only 10 hours get paid the same total amount as the guy who put in the 40 hours? Simply because a particular piece of content wasn't designed with certain people in mind doesn't make it a bad design.
I'm not a pvp person anymore and haven't been for some time. If pvp changes were to be made in STO, SWTOR or any other game I play, those changes would not be meant for someone like me. Likewise in STO I'm not that much of a sci person, meaning when sci ships get released those ships are not made with me in mind. Doesn't make them bad ships, it just means I'm not the target audience. I can use the ships if I like, but if I want to get the most out of them there are certain things I will need to do.
I do see your point though, that since it's really not possible to recalibrate things, perhaps the only real solution is to find ways to "keep" elite players out of normal content. I dislike that idea because it divides the playerbase, but I suppose it's better than nothing.
And this is where as I said the only way to preserve a measure of equal access close to the way things are now is for Cryptic to implement certain minimum requirements and then let players figure out how far above those minimums they want to climb. Per Val's example if normal modes were to be balanced around people doing 10k DPS, then if you are only doing 10k, you will only get 10k worth of results. However if you come in there doing 100k you will get 100k worth of results. You can't put in minimum effort and expect maximum results. If the minimum is at 10k and you want to stay at the 10k then you're free to do so and will always succeed, even if it takes longer and is a bit more difficult. If the minimum is 10k and you're at 100k, you will always succeed but will be easier and not take as long. 10k is simply the minimum to succeed in that equation, how far you go beyond it and how easy you want it to be is up to you. My choosing to go to 100k and trivialize it for myself is not wrong, just like your staying at the 10k isn't wrong either. Unless you're willing to segregate parts of the playerbase, as you've said you don't want to do, you will have to live with the risk of higher DPS people coming into lower DPS content and vice versa with what we have now. There is no way around this.
So in terms of solutions it comes down to this. What do you consider a solution and how quick do you want it?
-If you want everyone to be able to at least step through the door regardless of whether they pass or fail, aka equal access to the venue, then Cryptic will need to establish a baseline floor saying "anyone who meets X Y Z is good to go" and ship it off to players. If they only just meet X Y Z minimum they will get minimum results. If they blow past X Y Z they will get better results.
-If you want special treatment and don't care how many it drives off, anything is on the table.
-If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but also want to preserve equal chances to get into said content and succeed, you need to establish baselines for each level of content. for normal it's condition X, advanced is condition X and Y, elite is condition X Y and Z. Anyone who meets those standards is good to go whether they're sitting right on the minimum line, or they're lightyears past it. If folks want to partake in higher tiers of content the know what they need to do in order to get there. If they only want to stay in normals they can do that too. If they want to get to advanced having met X and Y but don't care about getting to Z, they can stay at X and Y. The only time Z becomes a concern is if they wish to partake in elite.
The only concern other than that is that as the players have experienced power creep, the enemies have too... which is a problem even in normal. Fighting the Tzenkethi is nearly impossible for me, even in normal, and as we've seen, my dps is more or less average. Allowing the dps to get out of hand makes the enemies get out of hand too.
The only time you will experience the stronger foes you speak of is if you deliberately seek them out in the higher tier content, so this is only an issue if you are seeking it out. Those higher powered foes will not appear in normal mode, and if they do then that would be a bug. Tzenkethi aren't hard on any difficulty, you just have to be smart about it.
Also if you're concerned about more difficult foes, why are you going into places where you know those foes exist?
"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
just for giggles, I ran the legendary Miranda through starbase 234 with gravimetric torp fore and the bio aft, I clocked about 19K. since 234 was on cooldown i swapped the torps to the maelstrom, ran 9th rule and clocked 20k. I know single runs don't mean much but the maelstrom torpedos seem to boost dps a bit.
When I say it would divide the playerbase, I mean there would be a segment playing in normal and a segment playing in elite, and they could never mix. If the elite damage and content were more restricted (I think of it as a soft cap... theoretically you would be able to reach absurd damage levels, but diminishing returns would make it essentially impossible), then all types of players could play together (and PvP might actually work to some extent).
First up, pvp is its own animal that will NEVER work how people are expecting it to by the sheer nature of how it functions in STO. In keeping to the core philosophy of STO it's not possible to make it into what people want.
People can already play together now with the system we currently have regardless of the level of power they're at. However this entire thread has been about certain people not liking that people over a certain DPS threshold can come into certain bits of content and ruin it for other people as they've outright said or hinted at. So if you want all types of players to be able to do content together then this already exists and there is no issue. Yet you've made the statement before you think there is too much DPS. So I have to question, if you want all people to be able to play together, then how can you justify excluding those with higher DPS from the equation? Logically when you say all people that must include them as well. If not then you aren't really wanting all people to be able to play together, only certain groups which divides the playerbase.
In arguing for a soft cap or any kind of DPS cap, you're placing an artificial ceiling that removes any motivation for people to improve their ships and builds. You must then decide how much DPS you think should be the max. Is it 1m DPS, is it 500k, 250k, or what number are we talking? Let's say you capped DPS at 200k, you're still going to have to deal with those 200k people playing on advanced and normal from time to time. You're not eliminating what you say is a problem, you're just punishing people for investing in their builds.
I also tend to agree with Val in his observations of your issues with the Tzenkethi. Enemies getting stronger as players get stronger has been the standard of MMOs since their existence. Yet for me personally it sounds like in part that you're arguing an oxymoronic and contradictory position.
On one hand you say you want all types of people to be able to play together, yet are arguing for a DPS cap and restrictions on so called elite damage. You say you don't want to divide the playerbase yet have argued before that so called high DPS players are ruining things for others and are arguing for changes. I also agree with Val on one other thing, people playing normal are going to play normal no matter what, and people playing elite will keep playing elite. People will keep playing their chosen level no matter what. That's not going to suddenly change. Also if a normal mode player wants to step into elite and succeed, then they need to put in the work to get there. Nothing is free nor should it be. I have to seriously ask at this point, if you want all people to be able to play together as you've hinted at, how can you argue for some kind of DPS cap or similar? You say you want people to play together, which they can do now, yet argue for restrictions. From where I'm sitting it sounds like you don't really know what you want and want to have your cake yet eat it too. So I must ask, what do you really want? Do you really want all people to be able to play together or do you not? Because if you do, then you have to live with the risk of certain things occurring.
"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
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,442Community Moderator
We had mentioned City of Heroes earlier and it got me to thinking. Remember the zone invasions like the Rikti Invasion, Halloween/Trick or Treat and Winter events? Enemy NPCs would not spawn at a specific level in any zone. I am not sure I remember the technical term for them, but they were all "level-less" everywhere throughout the city. So a level 50 going into Atlas Park and fighting the invading NPCs there would not instantly wipe everything out, and a level 5 character could go over to Peregrine Island and fight them as well without getting instantly annihilated. A mechanic along those lines could be adapted here for event content at least.
I think we already have it in game in a way.
Q's Winter Wonderland. The enemies there cannot be harmed by normal weapons, and it doesn't matter what level you are.
When I say it would divide the playerbase, I mean there would be a segment playing in normal and a segment playing in elite, and they could never mix. If the elite damage and content were more restricted (I think of it as a soft cap... theoretically you would be able to reach absurd damage levels, but diminishing returns would make it essentially impossible), then all types of players could play together (and PvP might actually work to some extent).
Why would they never be able to mix? I believe it safe to say no one has agreed segmenting and restricting the players into specific categories was a good idea.
We had mentioned City of Heroes earlier and it got me to thinking. Remember the zone invasions like the Rikti Invasion, Halloween/Trick or Treat and Winter events? Enemy NPCs would not spawn at a specific level in any zone. I am not sure I remember the technical term for them, but they were all "level-less" everywhere throughout the city. So a level 50 going into Atlas Park and fighting the invading NPCs there would not instantly wipe everything out, and a level 5 character could go over to Peregrine Island and fight them as well without getting instantly annihilated. A mechanic along those lines could be adapted here for event content at least.
Sounds like the system that was implemented in Fallout 76 a few years ago - instead of a defined level range of enemies in a given area, enemies generally level in keeping with your character (within certain limits - it is *not* safe to explore the Mire below about level 20, for instance). That goes away, of course, during Events - if you bring your level 15 into Scorched Earth, you'll get tons of XP if you survive, because the Scorchbeast Queen will be level 80 minimum, and you might get some random Level 100 Scorched or a Mirelurk Queen popping up as well. (There are suggested levels for Events for a reason.)
Not sure the STO codebase is compatible, though. As for "splitting the playerbase", this seems more self-selected to me - I'm just not seeing the point in tricking your ship out to crank out sufficient DPS to take on a Q, training your skills until you're faster than a Ferasan on crack, and then popping into Normal queues with the apparent purpose of merely humiliating all the peasants who haven't devoted their lives to achieving your royal magnificence.
I've been spending quite a bit of time now reading the thread. I don't know what has been fully discussed and what not but I feel like I would like to contribute my "take" to the discussion since I'm apparently a relatively rare creature (hard for me to say, birds of a feather fly together and I have quite a few really good players on my friends list that can pump numbers bigger than me).
I'm one of these "extreme" DPS players for starters. It's not so much that I'm chasing after a spot on the charts so much as I am attempting to push a concept to it's maximum potential. I love building ships in different ways. I have a total of 53 characters and over a decade of playing, spending money, playing events you name it. I'm a powerful, seasoned and experienced player and to be perfectly honest: my shipbuilding is at a point where there is no advanced content that is able to truly challenge me. With well organized groups even Elite content begins to look laughable with some group setups, but I digress.
Now I'm a bit of an "anomaly" player and I know it. I make custom made builds for specific ships where I decide the career of the captain as the final decision as opposed to being the first one. People rarely see me "levelling up" because generally I only begin playing the build in TFOs once I've assembled all the parts/traits and whatnot for it (with exception to rep gear of course). This is all fine and dandy for me, but over the years I've received a bit of pushback for "being too strong" in some cases.
Sometimes, actions by the high performers can be completely misinterpreted by the rest of the gang so to speak. Before they made the adjustment to breaking parties after TFOs completed, a common practice I had was to share my parsing results for the run with the rest of the team. I did this not to flex because the reality is, I'm going to be top DPS in 90%+ of any run I'm playing a random with. I'm not trying to lord these numbers over you; I was sharing them because there isn't a built in parser in the game that allows players to actually know where they stand in relation to the players around them.
Plus, there are players that genuinely don't know such tools exist and I've had many who would then ask me how I posted the numbers. I share knowledge and make it as available as I can, but some people would get angry and think that I was trying to show off how good I was... They don't get it. I don't care. I already know I'm going to outperform most of you; I'm generally racing against myself. I'm sharing the numbers to try and let the rest of you make decisions for your builds so that you know where you stand in relation to others as well as perhaps in relation to "God tier" if such a thing is to be aspired for. I don't have a horse in the race and don't really care what any of you do because odds are, I'm going to be able to carry the mission on my own so it makes little difference to me except how quickly we get it done overall.
But as they say, no good deed goes unpunished. I've been called all sorts of names for god knows what reason just because I happened to queue with an unpleaseant fellow some days. Luckily I'm a stubborn prick that doesn't particularly care what people think and I know in that aspect I probably contribute to the view of an "elitist DPSer". I don't back down and I tend to speak bluntly and try to keep things rooted in proveable data and facts. See I've watched, run the numbers, know builds inside and out that I can guestimate what a ship is doing based on setup alone. I've earned that ability over time, but I can't tell you how many arguments devolve into sillyness because I'm arguing with someone who only has a 20k record in ISA telling me they average figures that are multitudes well over that. If I were to make an analogy, the closest I can come up with would be something to the effect of I'm a woman being told by a guy what a delivery feels like and it starts getting laughable. You can't reason with people who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about, and therefore they will be stifled from improving as well.
I feel that the big solution would be to offer players more concrete information stemming straight from the game itself. While it's relatively easy to get a parsing program setup and going, it would be much better if the game itself provided some "official" numbers that players couldn't exactly shy away from at the end of a TFO. The most common error I've seen people make when they report "how much damage they do" is that they see a torpedo crit once for a big number and go "Oh yeah, if I can do X amount with that hit then my DPS is somewhere around Y (Y = X+Z?) and think they know what kind of numbers theyre doing.
I helped a guy short while ago and he was mulling over whether he was ready for advanced content because he was "Only doing 80k DPS". I was skeptical that he knew what he was actually talking about because I know that if I were parsing an ISA with an average of 80k that would be more than most of the people who run that mission. As I discovered after running with him, he wasn't actually AVERAGING 80k per second over the course of the run, but he was capable of PEAKING to 80k for a short period of time. There's a big difference between those two statements and it's hard for players in the current state of the game to actually understand what their "proveable number" is.
What I think would help is at the end of the match if the match itself provided a grand total of the damage done as well as the incoming threat and heal heal numbers for each player. This could actually help alleviate some elitism as you would also be showcasing the effects of a run by having a tank or a healer on a team (a concept somewhat foreign to STO, but speaking from experience these kinds of characters can make normally "challenging" runs a breeze). If you want to get fancy you can even include "How many objectives grabbed" or something to that effect for things that require placement/interaction. But the main thing is about showing everyone what the official numbers are.
It then also forces the lower end players to face certain realities. From my experience, in most of my TFO runs I'm usually doing approximately 50% of all damage throughout the run. If I have a player of my calibre on the team, we usually each share around 33% of the damage and the rest gets divvied up amongst the other 3. In most scenarios where I'm top dog though, the breakdown USUALLY looks to me damage-wise that there are two to three players that do approximately 15-20% each and one or two that ends up being negligible.
Those negligible players can see at the end of the run that while yes, one player may have been completely "owning" the run, it's not like the other players didn't contribute/vastly outperform the "slow pokes". It's easy for the slow pokes to spot the high performer and blame it all on him, but while that player may indeed be doing the majority of the run the other players on the team are still contributing to a far greater degree but the inept player is left completely unaware and thinks the problem is entirely with player A instead of looking in the mirror.
I feel as though another solution to help ease the problem might be to also institute a "high end" threshold for AFK Penalty detection. There are scenarios where some players can dominate a map with a custom build that their character is in no way shape or form configured to emulate. Anyone who ran with the FedEx Priority Express this latest Breach event will know this to be true. So what I think is that clearly there is some type of feature where the game is keeping track of the numbers up until end of run to try and determine who the "AFK Penalty" people are. If they are already logging/doing this in order to determine participation, merely go a simple step further and share the results of the data with the players.
And then, if you have a scenario where the run is completed far in advance of the normal time frame with a single player doing a majority of the damage, you disable the AFK Penalty for all other players. This would alleviate some animosity as I've HEARD (Although admittedly, never from the horses mouth) that players get AFK penalties from there being an extreme DPSer in the run. I couched this statement because I've never gotten a message saying "TRIBBLE you, I now have an AFK penalty because of you", it's usually some mid-level player getting very angry on the behalf of others. You see, THEY were good enough not to get an AFK penalty but those poor other players are getting them apparently.
I don't know what the truth is. I'm actually going to be starting a fresh toon on a new account to try and take myself off the "Ivory Tower" so to speak for a little bit and see what I can do with a genuinely fresh captain. We'll see how it goes and what I discover. I'm at a point where I have so many traits, recruitment events, starship unlocks and whatnot on my main account that I don't really have a way of relating to normal players anymore. I have so much stuff already unlocked for a brand new character that early game content has become a joke. I hope to get a better insight into the "average player experience" soon, but in the meantime it is my hope that my perspective from the "ivory tower" is of some use to the discussion.
Not sure the STO codebase is compatible, though. As for "splitting the playerbase", this seems more self-selected to me - I'm just not seeing the point in tricking your ship out to crank out sufficient DPS to take on a Q, training your skills until you're faster than a Ferasan on crack, and then popping into Normal queues with the apparent purpose of merely humiliating all the peasants who haven't devoted their lives to achieving your royal magnificence.
For some it's fun to squeeze every last one and zero from a ship. Also for the high DPS people that's NEVER been the point of kitting a ship out to the Nth degree. There's a huge difference in someone choosing to play on a lower difficulty, and someone choosing to do so for the purposes of trolling. If someone is deliberately trying to troll and AFK people, then get some evidence of it and wire it over to the GMs.
It really comes down to whether people believe all content should be made with all people in mind or not.
If people believe all content should be made with all people in mind, then everyone has to be able to walk through the door, even if they overgear that content severely. All Cryptic can do is say "if you meet condition X you're good for this content."
If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but want everyone to be able to get through the door whether they pass or fail, then again Cryptic establishes a minimum floor for each difficulty. That floor being that folks meet condition X for normal, condition X and Y for advanced, and then conditions X Y and Z for elite. They can step foot into any difficulty whether they pass or fail. However if they want to succeed they will know what's expected of them and know what they must do in order to get there.
"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
Not sure the STO codebase is compatible, though. As for "splitting the playerbase", this seems more self-selected to me - I'm just not seeing the point in tricking your ship out to crank out sufficient DPS to take on a Q, training your skills until you're faster than a Ferasan on crack, and then popping into Normal queues with the apparent purpose of merely humiliating all the peasants who haven't devoted their lives to achieving your royal magnificence.
For some it's fun to squeeze every last one and zero from a ship. Also for the high DPS people that's NEVER been the point of kitting a ship out to the Nth degree. There's a huge difference in someone choosing to play on a lower difficulty, and someone choosing to do so for the purposes of trolling. If someone is deliberately trying to troll and AFK people, then get some evidence of it and wire it over to the GMs.
It really comes down to whether people believe all content should be made with all people in mind or not.
If people believe all content should be made with all people in mind, then everyone has to be able to walk through the door, even if they overgear that content severely. All Cryptic can do is say "if you meet condition X you're good for this content."
If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but want everyone to be able to get through the door whether they pass or fail, then again Cryptic establishes a minimum floor for each difficulty. That floor being that folks meet condition X for normal, condition X and Y for advanced, and then conditions X Y and Z for elite. They can step foot into any difficulty whether they pass or fail. However if they want to succeed they will know what's expected of them and know what they must do in order to get there.
and who decides the threshold of trolling? I gave an example and you promptly defended the "l33t" that in my opinion, was trolling me. from what I am gathering from you, is I can go through the undine battlezone, vape everything in sight in seconds, TRIBBLE off every player on the map, and as long as I don't say anything in chat, I'm good to go, whereas 15 other people are thinking what a F*****g A*****e.
and who decides the threshold of trolling? I gave an example and you promptly defended the "l33t" that in my opinion, was trolling me. from what I am gathering from you, is I can go through the undine battlezone, vape everything in sight in seconds, TRIBBLE off every player on the map, and as long as I don't say anything in chat, I'm good to go, whereas 15 other people are thinking what a F*****g A*****e.
So first to answer the question in bold, the person making that decision would be Cryptic. As to my having defended someone you believe was trolling you, what post are we talking about? Are you talking something I said in here or elsewhere? To the second portion in bold, that is not now nor has that ever been what I said. What I said was that if you're going to accuse someone of trolling, you need evidence to prove it. Someone existing on the same map as you and having higher DPS doesn't constitute trolling.
If high DPSer John Doe who does 1m DPS gets grouped with little Timmy who only does 10k DPS, and John does everything by the book as the TFO demands, but little Timmy eats an AFK penalty, that's on little Timmy. John did no wrong by simply existing on the same map. Now if John was going around and using abilities to somehow prevent Timmy from ever being able to fire his weapons or was actively trying to prevent Timmy from being able to play, THAT would be trolling. If you wanted to report John for trolling Timmy you would need to prove that John was actively trolling Timmy. Otherwise if they both happened to get paired to the same group, neither of them did anything wrong and it was just bad luck of the draw for Timmy.
To conclude, if you believe someone to be trolling, get the evidence and present it to CS. Otherwise as the game is setup right now, the game grants people the ability to step foot into any TFO they wish on any difficulty whether they pass or fail. high DPS folks can enter normal mode content, and low DPS people can enter elite content. People playing outside of their usual difficulty on its own does not constitute trolling.
"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
and who decides the threshold of trolling? I gave an example and you promptly defended the "l33t" that in my opinion, was trolling me. from what I am gathering from you, is I can go through the undine battlezone, vape everything in sight in seconds, TRIBBLE off every player on the map, and as long as I don't say anything in chat, I'm good to go, whereas 15 other people are thinking what a F*****g A*****e.
A high DPS player being in a battlezone may be working on a daily for endeavors. Unless they were deliberately telling you they were following you around just to troll you, there is not much you can do. It is a public space and you cannot fault them for being there. As for who decides what is or is not trolling, ultimately that is up to Cryptic GMs to decide.
Yeah, Battle Zones are, per definition, a free-for-all. If a high DPS player is in the zone with you, then, also per definition, they cannot be said to be trolling you.
Also, Battle Zones are huge. If a person feels the weight of said high DPS player, then just go work on another point in the map, and try and capture that: even a high DPS player cannot be at all places at the same time.
And, last but not least, if the presence of a high DPS player really bothers you, just switch instances. Solved.
I would like to suggest random Elite TFOs. I miss having to pay attention to what I have to do. The "optionals" that used to be a requirement in advanced so that you could fail in an advanced was something I actually liked. Did I get mad when people TRIBBLE up and waste people's time? Yes. But God is it better than feeling like I'm just going through the motions to get a participation trophy.
It's not just a matter of going elsewhere. What I'm saying, what I've said all along, is that the game shouldn't allow ANYONE to get their dps to levels that trivialize the game. The balance is broken, and it causes other problems, as we've seen in this thread.
There is no practical way to really fix that as a large part of DPS doesn't come from gear or traits but piloting and player skill. Its certainty possible to tweak balance and make improvements its just I don't think you can 100% fix the problem that way.
Even if the devs did the horrible thing of forcing all players into the same single ship with the same loadout, same preconfigured skills, traits, equipment, there would still be a massive DPS difference between players. For lack of a better word "balance" is something that is impossible to truly balance.
It's not just a matter of going elsewhere. What I'm saying, what I've said all along, is that the game shouldn't allow ANYONE to get their dps to levels that trivialize the game. The balance is broken, and it causes other problems, as we've seen in this thread.
There is no practical way to really fix that as a large part of DPS doesn't come from gear or traits but piloting and player skill. Its certainty possible to tweak balance and make improvements its just I don't think you can 100% fix the problem that way.
True. And I'm living proof of that.
Even if the devs did the horrible thing of forcing all players into the same single ship with the same loadout, same preconfigured skills, traits, equipment, there would still be a massive DPS difference between players. For lack of a better word "balance" is something that is impossible to truly balance.
I agree with most; except that I return to my first post on this thread, in which I laid out the extremely detrimental effects of spacebarring, interrupting weapon cycles (whereas the game should handle/activate in an asynchroneous matter, like any system created past 1980). That would mitigate the negative effects of not being able to time your key-presses to a T. Beyond that, piloting skill differences will naturally continue to exist -- but appear less extreme.
It's not just a matter of going elsewhere. What I'm saying, what I've said all along, is that the game shouldn't allow ANYONE to get their dps to levels that trivialize the game. The balance is broken, and it causes other problems, as we've seen in this thread.
it always happens, though. they come upwith Hey let's make the Z console. which is cool, by itself doesn't break anything, but that console, in combination with the D console or the X boff power synergize and starts to break all kinds of stuff.
Also if you're concerned about more difficult foes, why are you going into places where you know those foes exist?
I don't think was addressed after you asked it, but sometimes the current event or one of the endeavors might direct a player to certain content that they don't like. Or maybe they want to challenge themselves and try to get better.
Also if you're concerned about more difficult foes, why are you going into places where you know those foes exist?
I don't think was addressed after you asked it, but sometimes the current event or one of the endeavors might direct a player to certain content that they don't like. Or maybe they want to challenge themselves and try to get better.
Well, the so-called 'hard' patrol options weren't hard at all. Which was slightly disappointing.
The Hard option for those patrols isn't about difficulty, it's about annoyance...which is just another showing of how little Cryptic knows about their own game, since they have Breen in the normal pool when they are one of the single most IRRITATING enemy groups in the game.
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
Also if you're concerned about more difficult foes, why are you going into places where you know those foes exist?
I don't think was addressed after you asked it, but sometimes the current event or one of the endeavors might direct a player to certain content that they don't like. Or maybe they want to challenge themselves and try to get better.
Well, the so-called 'hard' patrol options weren't hard at all. Which was slightly disappointing.
Its up to you. Play them on Elite and they become alot harder.
C-Store Inc. is still looking for active members on the fed side. If you don't have a fleet feel free to contact me in game @stegi.
What if... instead of making enemies harder at higher difficulty levels, they instead reduced the capabilities of OUR ships? That is, they make the game at one general difficulty level. Those that want to play on "Advanced" difficulty would have their capabilities reduced by, say, 30%. Then, they would find the "Normal" difficulty of the game in general more difficult, and they could play ANY content at Advanced difficulty. "Elite" difficulty would reduce the capabilities of the ship by, say, 70%. Again, these players could participate in the same content as everyone else with essentially higher difficulty.
Would a system like this resolve the issues?
I'm just spitballing, I've not really thought it all the way through, but I'm not seeing any immediate concerns...
Now you're just punishing people for daring to play above normal and incentivizing people to play on normal only. This system is the equivalent of putting in less effort than the so called evil DPSers people complain about, but expecting equal results to their builds. Such as system like this would cause a mass exodus as simply nerfing people is an automatic non-starter.
If we're going to look at a scaling system, then SWTOR already solved this problem with their scaling system they introduced that scales people up/down based on the content. If a level 50 is going into veteran content (veteran is the equivalent to advanced content) then they would be scaled up to level 80. Their abilities would still be the same as being level 50, but their stats would be equal to the minimum stats an 80 would have. If on the opposite side of the coin I as a level 80 go back to one of the lower level planets, I'm scaled down to the highest level that planet is intended for. Example being, if I go back to a planet with level 25 max, then I am scaled down to highest stats a level 25 can have, but with the abilities of an 80. Purely by stats there are going to be some bits I can faceroll and one shot because that's unavoidable when you have varying degrees of damage and variances in possible damage output. Then there will be those that I can't one shot.
Otherwise what level of participation do people want to have? Because as pointed out before, people are getting rewards by their own admission, so they are in fact getting to participate. They just don't like how much they got to participate. Which fair enough if they don't, they're entitled to like/dislike what they like/dislike. At the same time if they don't feel like they were able to participate enough, then I have to ask first, what are they doing on their end to ensure maximum potential to participate? If a person says they want to be able to participate more, yet are unwilling to change anything on their end in the slightest, why should I or anyone else have to change something on my end?
"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
Otherwise what level of participation do people want to have? Because as pointed out before, people are getting rewards by their own admission, so they are in fact getting to participate. They just don't like how much they got to participate. Which fair enough if they don't, they're entitled to like/dislike what they like/dislike. At the same time if they don't feel like they were able to participate enough, then I have to ask first, what are they doing on their end to ensure maximum potential to participate? If a person says they want to be able to participate more, yet are unwilling to change anything on their end in the slightest, why should I or anyone else have to change something on my end?
Pretty much this. The 'issue' is entirely on your end. The only one that can resolve it is you. The rest of us are fine.
What if... instead of making enemies harder at higher difficulty levels, they instead reduced the capabilities of OUR ships? That is, they make the game at one general difficulty level. Those that want to play on "Advanced" difficulty would have their capabilities reduced by, say, 30%. Then, they would find the "Normal" difficulty of the game in general more difficult, and they could play ANY content at Advanced difficulty. "Elite" difficulty would reduce the capabilities of the ship by, say, 70%. Again, these players could participate in the same content as everyone else with essentially higher difficulty.
Would a system like this resolve the issues?
The whole purpose of playing at a higher level than you were used to, is to have it denote your own progress. When I started playing on Advanced (like 5 years ago), I did so, because I got a wee bit better. Kinda silly to punish ppl for that. If peeps don't want to improve, or are unable to -- for whatever reason -- then they should continue to play at their level, no biggie. But last thing we should do, IMHO, is disincentivize players to get better. Not force them to 'git good' either, I haste to say, but simply respect players at their own level, which includes not punishing them for being a stronger player than I am. Respecting where ppl are, up or down from you, is important.
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If you want everyone to have equal access to the content, as in everyone can at least step through the door, then you establish a baseline floor and say "anyone meeting requirements X Y Z are good to go." This can be strictly a level requirement, or it can be coupled with other things such saying "anyone at level 65 and 10k DPS is good to go" or what have you. Then anyone above said minimum is good to go on all difficulties. This is what we have now as generally the only requirements people have to meet are level minimums. Anyone who has met the minimum requirements is good to go regardless of difficulty.
If you want special treatment for certain groups along with equality of outcome and don't care if it drives off large portions of the game, then you can institute DPS caps and force people above certain DPS thresholds to only play on higher tier difficulties matching that threshold. You can also add any other arbitrary restrictions and/or changes you wished in this area.
If you believe that not all content has to be made with all people in mind BUT also want to preserve equal chances to get into said content, then you establish basic minimum requirements that must be met to get your foot in the door for each type of content. For normal mode they must meet condition X, for advanced it's conditions X and Y, for elite they must meet conditions X Y and Z. If they don't meet all conditions, they don't get to go. For example let's say condition X is being max level, condition Y is having all equipment at mk xii very rare or above, and condition Z is a DPS requirement of 50k. Now those don't have to be the exact conditions and they can be different, but this is purely for sake of argument. At that juncture, people know what is expected of them to get into each tier of difficulty. How far up the ladder they choose to go is up to them. The difficulties would be balanced around people having met the conditions required for said difficulty while giving people ways to measure their progress.
Unless someone is deliberately trying to AFK someone and being a troll, which would require proof, I see no issue with regards to people being able to do high amounts of DPS. The only real issue I see in this mess is some people not being where they think they are as I outlined before without revisiting the whole thing. Is it ideal getting low DPS people in higher difficulty runs no. Do I think they should be there before certain conditions have been met, no I don't. Likewise is it ideal if you get someone who is doing 500k+ in a normal mode run, not really. If you want equality in terms of access to get in the door, you will have to live with high DPS coming into normal runs, and low DPS going into higher tier runs. If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but want to preserve equal access to the content, then certain conditions will have to be met to get in the door.
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Good grief man you just proposed the Starfleet DMV 0_o
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#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Well torpedoes is a tricky thing. The torpedo itself plays a big role and how you fire it. Like High Yield Undine Photon Torpedo from the reputation system is a beast as is the Dyson Photon but careful if you are to close with that one you blow yourself up. Now for spread you got something like Neutronic who does a lot of damage on spread.
You also got others who do special stuff like the Quantum Phase Torp as spread for shield drain and you got the Delphic from the lobi store who shoots 4 torps on high yield one 5/6 on 2/3 and takes with each torpedo 10 resistance off combine that with a beta and maybe something else and you get quickly - 100+ resistance on the enemy ship.
You compare apples with oranges. When this game came out it was difficult because even normal content was a challenge. However the Player base was constantly complaining and whining it was to hard and step by step over years Cryptic accommodated the Player base and made the gameplay more easy and the weapons packing a bigger punch. Now we are here, it is what it is but it was the STO Player base who put us here not cryptic. Every casual play who has only an hour a day or less time wants to eat cake, well now there is cake and now there is also some way bigger mouths who do alot more dps. Should they play in normal TFO's, no but then I have people on advanced randoms all the time who have no business being there because they just leech their way to marks.
Assuming Cryptic did want to balance the two sides out, the only way to realistically do this without nerfs and without completely obliterating investments people have made would be to use something akin to the SWTOR scaling system. Current max level over there is 80. If I wanted to group with a friend of mine who is level 20 I am free to do so. When I visit the planet he's on, it scales my character down to the max level intended for that planet, let's say 25 just to quantify it hypothetically. I still have my gear, my abilities and the like. However the game treats it as though I'm a level 25 toon with all the abilities and the like of a level 80, but my stats and otherwise behave like that level 25 toon and as though I have the highest gear a 25 can get. In STO terms it would be like having all mk vi golds on a level 30 ship, but with the full t6 toolkit. I still maintain a huge advantage, but generally can't simply one shot everything in sight.
The problem is that in max level content there is no way to realistically prevent this. The only thing cryptic can do is set a basic standard for everyone across the board. Using Val's hypothetical 10k for normal mode, Cryptic would have to say anything 10k and above is good. Then if you moved into advanced it would go to 50k+, then 100k+ for elite. Again assuming max level content, there is no way to achieve what you're wanting to do without some kind of DPS cap that punishes anyone who dares exceed the minimums.
The key thing to keep in mind as well is that not all content is made for all people. If as a hypothetical we balanced advanced content around people doing 50k+ per Val's hypothetical, this means that content is not intended for people under that 50k minimum. They may be able to get their foot in the door, but they're not ready for it and that content was not intended for them. I still maintain if people can't meet the basic standards the game itself sets, they have no business that content or any right to go into it. Now the big question I have to ask is this, why would a normal mode player want to step into elite level content to start with? Also why should they be allowed to step into elite level content if they're not willing to put in elite levels of work to get there? That's like wanting to get paid for doing 40 hours of work in a week, but only putting in 10 hours of work. Why should the guy who worked only 10 hours get paid the same total amount as the guy who put in the 40 hours? Simply because a particular piece of content wasn't designed with certain people in mind doesn't make it a bad design.
I'm not a pvp person anymore and haven't been for some time. If pvp changes were to be made in STO, SWTOR or any other game I play, those changes would not be meant for someone like me. Likewise in STO I'm not that much of a sci person, meaning when sci ships get released those ships are not made with me in mind. Doesn't make them bad ships, it just means I'm not the target audience. I can use the ships if I like, but if I want to get the most out of them there are certain things I will need to do.
And this is where as I said the only way to preserve a measure of equal access close to the way things are now is for Cryptic to implement certain minimum requirements and then let players figure out how far above those minimums they want to climb. Per Val's example if normal modes were to be balanced around people doing 10k DPS, then if you are only doing 10k, you will only get 10k worth of results. However if you come in there doing 100k you will get 100k worth of results. You can't put in minimum effort and expect maximum results. If the minimum is at 10k and you want to stay at the 10k then you're free to do so and will always succeed, even if it takes longer and is a bit more difficult. If the minimum is 10k and you're at 100k, you will always succeed but will be easier and not take as long. 10k is simply the minimum to succeed in that equation, how far you go beyond it and how easy you want it to be is up to you. My choosing to go to 100k and trivialize it for myself is not wrong, just like your staying at the 10k isn't wrong either. Unless you're willing to segregate parts of the playerbase, as you've said you don't want to do, you will have to live with the risk of higher DPS people coming into lower DPS content and vice versa with what we have now. There is no way around this.
So in terms of solutions it comes down to this. What do you consider a solution and how quick do you want it?
-If you want everyone to be able to at least step through the door regardless of whether they pass or fail, aka equal access to the venue, then Cryptic will need to establish a baseline floor saying "anyone who meets X Y Z is good to go" and ship it off to players. If they only just meet X Y Z minimum they will get minimum results. If they blow past X Y Z they will get better results.
-If you want special treatment and don't care how many it drives off, anything is on the table.
-If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but also want to preserve equal chances to get into said content and succeed, you need to establish baselines for each level of content. for normal it's condition X, advanced is condition X and Y, elite is condition X Y and Z. Anyone who meets those standards is good to go whether they're sitting right on the minimum line, or they're lightyears past it. If folks want to partake in higher tiers of content the know what they need to do in order to get there. If they only want to stay in normals they can do that too. If they want to get to advanced having met X and Y but don't care about getting to Z, they can stay at X and Y. The only time Z becomes a concern is if they wish to partake in elite.
The only time you will experience the stronger foes you speak of is if you deliberately seek them out in the higher tier content, so this is only an issue if you are seeking it out. Those higher powered foes will not appear in normal mode, and if they do then that would be a bug. Tzenkethi aren't hard on any difficulty, you just have to be smart about it.
Also if you're concerned about more difficult foes, why are you going into places where you know those foes exist?
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People can already play together now with the system we currently have regardless of the level of power they're at. However this entire thread has been about certain people not liking that people over a certain DPS threshold can come into certain bits of content and ruin it for other people as they've outright said or hinted at. So if you want all types of players to be able to do content together then this already exists and there is no issue. Yet you've made the statement before you think there is too much DPS. So I have to question, if you want all people to be able to play together, then how can you justify excluding those with higher DPS from the equation? Logically when you say all people that must include them as well. If not then you aren't really wanting all people to be able to play together, only certain groups which divides the playerbase.
In arguing for a soft cap or any kind of DPS cap, you're placing an artificial ceiling that removes any motivation for people to improve their ships and builds. You must then decide how much DPS you think should be the max. Is it 1m DPS, is it 500k, 250k, or what number are we talking? Let's say you capped DPS at 200k, you're still going to have to deal with those 200k people playing on advanced and normal from time to time. You're not eliminating what you say is a problem, you're just punishing people for investing in their builds.
I also tend to agree with Val in his observations of your issues with the Tzenkethi. Enemies getting stronger as players get stronger has been the standard of MMOs since their existence. Yet for me personally it sounds like in part that you're arguing an oxymoronic and contradictory position.
On one hand you say you want all types of people to be able to play together, yet are arguing for a DPS cap and restrictions on so called elite damage. You say you don't want to divide the playerbase yet have argued before that so called high DPS players are ruining things for others and are arguing for changes. I also agree with Val on one other thing, people playing normal are going to play normal no matter what, and people playing elite will keep playing elite. People will keep playing their chosen level no matter what. That's not going to suddenly change. Also if a normal mode player wants to step into elite and succeed, then they need to put in the work to get there. Nothing is free nor should it be. I have to seriously ask at this point, if you want all people to be able to play together as you've hinted at, how can you argue for some kind of DPS cap or similar? You say you want people to play together, which they can do now, yet argue for restrictions. From where I'm sitting it sounds like you don't really know what you want and want to have your cake yet eat it too. So I must ask, what do you really want? Do you really want all people to be able to play together or do you not? Because if you do, then you have to live with the risk of certain things occurring.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
I think we already have it in game in a way.
Q's Winter Wonderland. The enemies there cannot be harmed by normal weapons, and it doesn't matter what level you are.
Not sure the STO codebase is compatible, though. As for "splitting the playerbase", this seems more self-selected to me - I'm just not seeing the point in tricking your ship out to crank out sufficient DPS to take on a Q, training your skills until you're faster than a Ferasan on crack, and then popping into Normal queues with the apparent purpose of merely humiliating all the peasants who haven't devoted their lives to achieving your royal magnificence.
I'm one of these "extreme" DPS players for starters. It's not so much that I'm chasing after a spot on the charts so much as I am attempting to push a concept to it's maximum potential. I love building ships in different ways. I have a total of 53 characters and over a decade of playing, spending money, playing events you name it. I'm a powerful, seasoned and experienced player and to be perfectly honest: my shipbuilding is at a point where there is no advanced content that is able to truly challenge me. With well organized groups even Elite content begins to look laughable with some group setups, but I digress.
Now I'm a bit of an "anomaly" player and I know it. I make custom made builds for specific ships where I decide the career of the captain as the final decision as opposed to being the first one. People rarely see me "levelling up" because generally I only begin playing the build in TFOs once I've assembled all the parts/traits and whatnot for it (with exception to rep gear of course). This is all fine and dandy for me, but over the years I've received a bit of pushback for "being too strong" in some cases.
Sometimes, actions by the high performers can be completely misinterpreted by the rest of the gang so to speak. Before they made the adjustment to breaking parties after TFOs completed, a common practice I had was to share my parsing results for the run with the rest of the team. I did this not to flex because the reality is, I'm going to be top DPS in 90%+ of any run I'm playing a random with. I'm not trying to lord these numbers over you; I was sharing them because there isn't a built in parser in the game that allows players to actually know where they stand in relation to the players around them.
Plus, there are players that genuinely don't know such tools exist and I've had many who would then ask me how I posted the numbers. I share knowledge and make it as available as I can, but some people would get angry and think that I was trying to show off how good I was... They don't get it. I don't care. I already know I'm going to outperform most of you; I'm generally racing against myself. I'm sharing the numbers to try and let the rest of you make decisions for your builds so that you know where you stand in relation to others as well as perhaps in relation to "God tier" if such a thing is to be aspired for. I don't have a horse in the race and don't really care what any of you do because odds are, I'm going to be able to carry the mission on my own so it makes little difference to me except how quickly we get it done overall.
But as they say, no good deed goes unpunished. I've been called all sorts of names for god knows what reason just because I happened to queue with an unpleaseant fellow some days. Luckily I'm a stubborn prick that doesn't particularly care what people think and I know in that aspect I probably contribute to the view of an "elitist DPSer". I don't back down and I tend to speak bluntly and try to keep things rooted in proveable data and facts. See I've watched, run the numbers, know builds inside and out that I can guestimate what a ship is doing based on setup alone. I've earned that ability over time, but I can't tell you how many arguments devolve into sillyness because I'm arguing with someone who only has a 20k record in ISA telling me they average figures that are multitudes well over that. If I were to make an analogy, the closest I can come up with would be something to the effect of I'm a woman being told by a guy what a delivery feels like and it starts getting laughable. You can't reason with people who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about, and therefore they will be stifled from improving as well.
I feel that the big solution would be to offer players more concrete information stemming straight from the game itself. While it's relatively easy to get a parsing program setup and going, it would be much better if the game itself provided some "official" numbers that players couldn't exactly shy away from at the end of a TFO. The most common error I've seen people make when they report "how much damage they do" is that they see a torpedo crit once for a big number and go "Oh yeah, if I can do X amount with that hit then my DPS is somewhere around Y (Y = X+Z?) and think they know what kind of numbers theyre doing.
I helped a guy short while ago and he was mulling over whether he was ready for advanced content because he was "Only doing 80k DPS". I was skeptical that he knew what he was actually talking about because I know that if I were parsing an ISA with an average of 80k that would be more than most of the people who run that mission. As I discovered after running with him, he wasn't actually AVERAGING 80k per second over the course of the run, but he was capable of PEAKING to 80k for a short period of time. There's a big difference between those two statements and it's hard for players in the current state of the game to actually understand what their "proveable number" is.
What I think would help is at the end of the match if the match itself provided a grand total of the damage done as well as the incoming threat and heal heal numbers for each player. This could actually help alleviate some elitism as you would also be showcasing the effects of a run by having a tank or a healer on a team (a concept somewhat foreign to STO, but speaking from experience these kinds of characters can make normally "challenging" runs a breeze). If you want to get fancy you can even include "How many objectives grabbed" or something to that effect for things that require placement/interaction. But the main thing is about showing everyone what the official numbers are.
It then also forces the lower end players to face certain realities. From my experience, in most of my TFO runs I'm usually doing approximately 50% of all damage throughout the run. If I have a player of my calibre on the team, we usually each share around 33% of the damage and the rest gets divvied up amongst the other 3. In most scenarios where I'm top dog though, the breakdown USUALLY looks to me damage-wise that there are two to three players that do approximately 15-20% each and one or two that ends up being negligible.
Those negligible players can see at the end of the run that while yes, one player may have been completely "owning" the run, it's not like the other players didn't contribute/vastly outperform the "slow pokes". It's easy for the slow pokes to spot the high performer and blame it all on him, but while that player may indeed be doing the majority of the run the other players on the team are still contributing to a far greater degree but the inept player is left completely unaware and thinks the problem is entirely with player A instead of looking in the mirror.
I feel as though another solution to help ease the problem might be to also institute a "high end" threshold for AFK Penalty detection. There are scenarios where some players can dominate a map with a custom build that their character is in no way shape or form configured to emulate. Anyone who ran with the FedEx Priority Express this latest Breach event will know this to be true. So what I think is that clearly there is some type of feature where the game is keeping track of the numbers up until end of run to try and determine who the "AFK Penalty" people are. If they are already logging/doing this in order to determine participation, merely go a simple step further and share the results of the data with the players.
And then, if you have a scenario where the run is completed far in advance of the normal time frame with a single player doing a majority of the damage, you disable the AFK Penalty for all other players. This would alleviate some animosity as I've HEARD (Although admittedly, never from the horses mouth) that players get AFK penalties from there being an extreme DPSer in the run. I couched this statement because I've never gotten a message saying "TRIBBLE you, I now have an AFK penalty because of you", it's usually some mid-level player getting very angry on the behalf of others. You see, THEY were good enough not to get an AFK penalty but those poor other players are getting them apparently.
I don't know what the truth is. I'm actually going to be starting a fresh toon on a new account to try and take myself off the "Ivory Tower" so to speak for a little bit and see what I can do with a genuinely fresh captain. We'll see how it goes and what I discover. I'm at a point where I have so many traits, recruitment events, starship unlocks and whatnot on my main account that I don't really have a way of relating to normal players anymore. I have so much stuff already unlocked for a brand new character that early game content has become a joke. I hope to get a better insight into the "average player experience" soon, but in the meantime it is my hope that my perspective from the "ivory tower" is of some use to the discussion.
For some it's fun to squeeze every last one and zero from a ship. Also for the high DPS people that's NEVER been the point of kitting a ship out to the Nth degree. There's a huge difference in someone choosing to play on a lower difficulty, and someone choosing to do so for the purposes of trolling. If someone is deliberately trying to troll and AFK people, then get some evidence of it and wire it over to the GMs.
It really comes down to whether people believe all content should be made with all people in mind or not.
If people believe all content should be made with all people in mind, then everyone has to be able to walk through the door, even if they overgear that content severely. All Cryptic can do is say "if you meet condition X you're good for this content."
If you believe not all content has to be made with all people in mind but want everyone to be able to get through the door whether they pass or fail, then again Cryptic establishes a minimum floor for each difficulty. That floor being that folks meet condition X for normal, condition X and Y for advanced, and then conditions X Y and Z for elite. They can step foot into any difficulty whether they pass or fail. However if they want to succeed they will know what's expected of them and know what they must do in order to get there.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
and who decides the threshold of trolling? I gave an example and you promptly defended the "l33t" that in my opinion, was trolling me. from what I am gathering from you, is I can go through the undine battlezone, vape everything in sight in seconds, TRIBBLE off every player on the map, and as long as I don't say anything in chat, I'm good to go, whereas 15 other people are thinking what a F*****g A*****e.
If high DPSer John Doe who does 1m DPS gets grouped with little Timmy who only does 10k DPS, and John does everything by the book as the TFO demands, but little Timmy eats an AFK penalty, that's on little Timmy. John did no wrong by simply existing on the same map. Now if John was going around and using abilities to somehow prevent Timmy from ever being able to fire his weapons or was actively trying to prevent Timmy from being able to play, THAT would be trolling. If you wanted to report John for trolling Timmy you would need to prove that John was actively trolling Timmy. Otherwise if they both happened to get paired to the same group, neither of them did anything wrong and it was just bad luck of the draw for Timmy.
To conclude, if you believe someone to be trolling, get the evidence and present it to CS. Otherwise as the game is setup right now, the game grants people the ability to step foot into any TFO they wish on any difficulty whether they pass or fail. high DPS folks can enter normal mode content, and low DPS people can enter elite content. People playing outside of their usual difficulty on its own does not constitute trolling.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
Yeah, Battle Zones are, per definition, a free-for-all. If a high DPS player is in the zone with you, then, also per definition, they cannot be said to be trolling you.
Also, Battle Zones are huge. If a person feels the weight of said high DPS player, then just go work on another point in the map, and try and capture that: even a high DPS player cannot be at all places at the same time.
And, last but not least, if the presence of a high DPS player really bothers you, just switch instances. Solved.
Even if the devs did the horrible thing of forcing all players into the same single ship with the same loadout, same preconfigured skills, traits, equipment, there would still be a massive DPS difference between players. For lack of a better word "balance" is something that is impossible to truly balance.
True. And I'm living proof of that.
I agree with most; except that I return to my first post on this thread, in which I laid out the extremely detrimental effects of spacebarring, interrupting weapon cycles (whereas the game should handle/activate in an asynchroneous matter, like any system created past 1980). That would mitigate the negative effects of not being able to time your key-presses to a T. Beyond that, piloting skill differences will naturally continue to exist -- but appear less extreme.
it always happens, though. they come upwith Hey let's make the Z console. which is cool, by itself doesn't break anything, but that console, in combination with the D console or the X boff power synergize and starts to break all kinds of stuff.
I don't think was addressed after you asked it, but sometimes the current event or one of the endeavors might direct a player to certain content that they don't like. Or maybe they want to challenge themselves and try to get better.
Well, the so-called 'hard' patrol options weren't hard at all. Which was slightly disappointing.
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Its up to you. Play them on Elite and they become alot harder.
Now you're just punishing people for daring to play above normal and incentivizing people to play on normal only. This system is the equivalent of putting in less effort than the so called evil DPSers people complain about, but expecting equal results to their builds. Such as system like this would cause a mass exodus as simply nerfing people is an automatic non-starter.
If we're going to look at a scaling system, then SWTOR already solved this problem with their scaling system they introduced that scales people up/down based on the content. If a level 50 is going into veteran content (veteran is the equivalent to advanced content) then they would be scaled up to level 80. Their abilities would still be the same as being level 50, but their stats would be equal to the minimum stats an 80 would have. If on the opposite side of the coin I as a level 80 go back to one of the lower level planets, I'm scaled down to the highest level that planet is intended for. Example being, if I go back to a planet with level 25 max, then I am scaled down to highest stats a level 25 can have, but with the abilities of an 80. Purely by stats there are going to be some bits I can faceroll and one shot because that's unavoidable when you have varying degrees of damage and variances in possible damage output. Then there will be those that I can't one shot.
Otherwise what level of participation do people want to have? Because as pointed out before, people are getting rewards by their own admission, so they are in fact getting to participate. They just don't like how much they got to participate. Which fair enough if they don't, they're entitled to like/dislike what they like/dislike. At the same time if they don't feel like they were able to participate enough, then I have to ask first, what are they doing on their end to ensure maximum potential to participate? If a person says they want to be able to participate more, yet are unwilling to change anything on their end in the slightest, why should I or anyone else have to change something on my end?
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
No, because there is no issue to resolve.
Pretty much this. The 'issue' is entirely on your end. The only one that can resolve it is you. The rest of us are fine.
The whole purpose of playing at a higher level than you were used to, is to have it denote your own progress. When I started playing on Advanced (like 5 years ago), I did so, because I got a wee bit better. Kinda silly to punish ppl for that.