Lost faith?

[Archived Post]

So I have been testing the Free to play build and I'm slowly losing faith that Cryptic has the best interests of this game at heart....This is my rant and my reasons.

1. Forced to level in order.....Why? i always loved deviating in the game and wandering around. Now missions come in a certain order whose brilliant idea was this? this is not fun doing the exact same order with ever new alt.

2. Buying my new tier of ships......excuse me...the federation isn't founded on money...So why does it feel like this game is becoming less and less about trek and starting to feel more like a grinding mmo from the east. (hmmm)

3. Klingons capped until you play federation....While I do not like the klingon faction limiting them to a higher level is utterly boneheaded....what will we do for pvp which is already suffering badly.

4. Forced dailies......When you force people to do something especially dailies simply to progress....you need to fire whoever thought this was a good idea.

5. the grind....Im sorry and I don't mean to sound bad with this comment but this is Star Trek not ****....why are we copying an eastern style of MMO with grinding endlessly to get new rewards....where is the fun in this? can cryptic not find a better way to earn items.


Shattered promises....I recall It being said we would not Notice a whole lot of difference in our gameplay with the free to play conversion....yet this is beginning to feel a lot like SWG when the NGE went live....
the more I see the more im unhappy with my favorite game...I have never let my sub die since this game has come out....and thankfully never bought a lifetime Sub though for the first time....I am beginning to question Star treks future under cryptic and starting to wonder if the string of bad judgement means it's time to move on.

thanks for reading.

[Archived Post]

+1 with 100% loss of trust / faith here in Cryptic; the F2P conversion was the last straw for me.

[Archived Post]

I lost faith in Cryptic a long time ago. All they're doing now is continuing to prove I was right to do so.

[Archived Post]

Great to see that I'm not the only one.
Although MY greatest issues are with the ecomomy. Wich, of course, involves the ship-purchase issue.

[Archived Post]

yeah that was a boneheaded and utterly silly move to do.

[Archived Post]

Indeed OP. I'm trying not to, but yes, I am beginning to lose faith. Up until the release of the patch notes last night I've been feeling fairly positive about the f2p changes coming to STO, but the dilithium economy as it is now is just... wrong... but I'll get in to that in a moment. Lets take a look at your points

1. I kinda like what they've done with the levelling path here. They've made it a lot clearer for new players and it does hand hold them through the content... but yes, right now it is too restrictive. I'd like to see the Fronts broken down a little further in to specific quest chains if possible, that way if you get stuck, you can move on to a new quest chain. I'd also like to see the different Fronts unlock via level rather than by completing the previous one. I honestly don't think it'll be too confusing for new players if the Romulan front were to unlock at say... level 19, regardless of if they've completed the Klingon front or not.

2. Yeah, this is a definite problem... I can kinda see where they're going with this as they want to encourage people in to buying the +1 ships off the C-store, but honestly, for gold members, it's unacceptable in it's current form. I think what they should do is to give gold players the free ship token as they used to, and give silver players the Dilithium stipend. Gives more incentive to subscribe.

3. Agreed 100%. If I had my way I'd say delay the f2p launch until the klingon faction was fully fleshed out. The game will earn much more money, recognition and players (not to mention more equal PvP numbers) in the long term by doing this than by relaunching the Klingons a few months down the line after the F2p launch. That ship has sailed unfortunately :(

4 and 5. I don't really have a problem with dailies and grinding... too a point. The big problem right now is that there's too few options for earning dilithium right now, and too many hard caps on those options, meaning that you have to grind through multiple routes to earn any sort of amount of dilithium.

The way Dilithium is handed out currently is far too inconsistent and seriously need rethinking. What the devs should be aiming at is having Dailies giving refined Dilithium while activities that granted Marks/badges on live should grant Dilithium Ore. With a cap on refinement it means that someone can build up as much ore as they like, during whichever activity they like, but can't flood the market.

The Devs also need to take a serious look at Endgame and STF loot. Right now, on the test server it's much easier to grind STFs to equip your ship than to bother with grinding Dilithium. Dilithium as a currency pretty much becomes pointless at endgame. Hopefully they can take another look at this and find a proper balance without throwing overly restrictive measures on to STFs like long cooldowns or inflating the prices of STF loot.

[Archived Post]

I'm trying not to, I can see some good things in this new economy. I just see some really painful things as well, I'm hoping that they are truly listening to the feedback players are giving, and reconsidering refinement caps in particular.

[Archived Post]

I am going to wait until F2P is launched until then I will reserve my opinion, enuff said I have played almost all the games under PWE banner. Rating -100

[Archived Post]

My faith is litterally gone. After seeing the KDF and C-store on tribble yesterday a good half of my fleet simply filtered out to do other things because we couldn't even stand to look at the game. I still don't think I can launch it to look at it. Especially considering how utterly filthy I feel having to have had to purchase the overpriced C-store Promie just so I wouldn't have to fly around in a captain level ship at VA, cause as usual Cryptic pays no head to people who've already gotten somewhere through their broken system and doesn't grandfather a damn thing.

[Archived Post]

I'm trying not to, I can see some good things in this new economy. I just see some really painful things as well, I'm hoping that they are truly listening to the feedback players are giving, and reconsidering refinement caps in particular.

Id they would listen to the feedback someone would have opened the DOS-BOX on tribble and typed Format C: and startet the whole f2p concept new from the scratch.
Or however that works on servers. No f2p-relatet change doesnt suck.

After seeing the KDF and C-store on tribble yesterday a good half of my fleet simply filtered out to do other things because we couldn't even stand to look at the game. I still don't think I can launch it to look at it.

And those are obviously people who stayed with the game not only for a 3/4 year of content drought, like fed players, but for a whole running time without content.
There was clearly put a lot of efford even scaring that loyal players away.....

[Archived Post]

Agreed OP

I think there's way too many changes to things that were never even really mentioned by the community and not enough changes to things we actually griped about.

I agree with all your points but the one that bothers me the most is the KDF issue. It's almost like they're avoiding getting a decent KDF playerbase, which I know doesn't make any sense at all, but that's just how I feel.

[Archived Post]

I lost faith in Cryptic a year ago, it been all down hill from there.

[Archived Post]

this game is going down a path of self destruction.

i dont mind them trying to make the economy work, and dilitium is a cool way to do it. however, making us do dailys just to get ships as we level is a bit over the top... my idea is that all non plus 1 ships should be available the same way they were, and all plus ones should be dilitihium, and if youw ant it, you grind for it...
the problem with the new system is we are not given many "choices" or "freedoms" in how we level, obtain new ships, and blah blah blah...

i think the biggest problem i see here is that they are trying to rework the game for the new players, and not paying attention to the current/players who have been playing the game since the begining. cryptic and a perfect world seem to think that they are going to get this massive influx of people when they go free to play. i do not see this happening on such a grand scale.. i see some peeps who were fed up with the game coming back, and i see maybe a few thousand more coming in who have never tried it, but star trek is not for everyone, i think they either alienated, or have most of the star trek fan base out there.. someone who is not into startrek is not gonna pick the game up because it is free to play... this is why i think it is such a mistake to alienate the current clientel... i can say that i am suprised to see that almost all of the posters in the forums all speak with the same voice on this.. even the "fan boys/girls" are not fully liking the changes.. ive never seen the forums so united over one issue, which should be heard loud and clear by the devs and cryptic. however, they seem to be pushing this forward one way or the other...

i will agree that i think this f2p launch and dstahl leaving are directly related... i listened to several interviews and in each of them he said that c store prices would drop, and now not even 3 weeks later, they are all higher... almost everything he outlined for us, is being introduced the opposite of how he explained it... im not going to say that he knew this was gonna happend, but i think he knew it had the chance... ill bet cryptic put a plan on the table, and pw put their own plan on the table, and he knew what was gonna happen.

its a shame, this game was starting to look like a fully fleshed mmo, and now its starting to look more like a flop.. since star trek is a passion of mine, i hope that they get it right, but i feel less optamistic than i ever have before...

[Archived Post]

What you are just seeing now is what others have seen a while ago which is why those certain parties "left to open an exciting new chapter in their lives"...

This game is a cash-cow for other projects and has been for some time. They will generate sales from new purchases from the sheeple that will flood in, pump it into those other projects and strip this game down until you can't leave ESD without buying a permit of some sort - with points.

Watch.

[Archived Post]

For the first time in 2 years, I've totally lost faith in Cryptic. The economy is the last straw for me. Something tells me that there is a bigger story behind the reason why Dstahl left. Maybe its just me...

[Archived Post]

yes, I have completely lost faith in this company.

[Archived Post]

The best part about threads like this is that you always know who's going to be posting in them from the title alone.

[Archived Post]

I'm Afraid i lost faith when i heard that the FE was going to Tribble 1st then to the holodeck.

then i try holo and find

1. that we are rail roaded into missions

2. you can't afford to Equip your ship and after LTC you can't afford the ship ( thats right can't afford the ship your in the federation that abolised money over 400 years ago) so now the federation has become Dilithum ferengi's.

3. the Doff system. ok can't recruit doffs i have used my C store sifen on more Doff's so that i can maybe get to the 3rd tier to get teh reward.

4. there is a chance after i have worked up to 51 and done all this i'll lose the character when the wipe the system is that really worth only having fed rewards for getting the 51 and then having to go throught the klingons and suffer there leveling to get the same thing for there side. Really, your kidding right.

5.Refining Dilithium: again this makes no sense setting a limit to refining ore maybe limit refining on your ship but if your on a space station you should be able to refine as much as you want. looking at the maths on the form to get enough ore refined to outfit a VA ship and Away team will take 400 days. thats not including the time it takes to earn the ore required, which unlike the old merits you don't get each mission only throught Grinding dailies

6. STF these are now more annoying as you can't guarantee that you will get any salvage to work towards your new STF rewards. which means playing the STF's over and over and over again till you get enought salvage to turn into requisitions that can then buy one part of the kit.

7. The lack of energy credits, playing on the tribble server i have noticed that i'm lacking energy credits, on Holo i didn't have much only 2 million credits spread over 6 characters so far on tribble i've managed to pull together 12,000 EC's. it seems like missions are missing EC's and (merits)Dilithium now. so you only get XP and a item. which in most cases won't help you outfit your ship or away team.

8. The lack of Dilithium: with this being the thing that Buys BO, training, ships, Ground and Ship eqiupment, you would think there was more ways to get the stuff. i know this is linked to 1, 5 and 7 slightly

[Archived Post]

Agreed, in the past some have called me a Cryptic apologist, but no more.

[Archived Post]

Agreed, in the past some have called me a Cryptic apologist, but no more.

Same.

Spin up the slipstream drive and set course for a galaxy far, far away.

[Archived Post]

Lost Faith ? Faith ? in Cryptic ?

- Who break Exploration with every patch
- havent fixed certain bugs since game went live
- make pay 2 win ships and even admit they`re overpowered (Stoked Interview Al Rivera)
- put gamechanging stuff on the cstore while saying they wont
- double Cstore prizes (Excelsior if u take both versions) while saying theyll drop
- make u pay for being their betatesters ....twice !!!
- telling u they wont take away what u have, then reduce Aegis Set tier
- screw over Crafting... by accident (how does that happen, QA anyone ?)

cant see why u would :D



I say we shall all do as the Stahl did and run for the hills while their is still time

[Archived Post]

Happy 45th anniversary Star Trek!

[Archived Post]

Agreed, in the past some have called me a Cryptic apologist, but no more.

I'm approaching that point quickly.

I'd like to hope I never reach it, but it sure looks like I'll have to eat my hat and admit that things are going down the torpedo tubes.

[Archived Post]

Lacking credits and then on top of that to do some of the Doff missions you are required to put up 50K credits or replicate 30 items each one worth 1200 credits? Where the heck is the money to be able to do these missions? this is freaking stupid. Way to go cryptic seems to me that you really want to doom this game

[Archived Post]

I'm approaching that point quickly.

I'd like to hope I never reach it, but it sure looks like I'll have to eat my hat and admit that things are going down the torpedo tubes.

I just reached it few days ago.



I probably won't be around for long. Once awhile, I may get on just to chat with few friends unless they start charging dilithium for it. :P

[Archived Post]

Yes, I've lost faith. It's clear that PWE are taking a more direct role here and we can only expect more and more gameplay mechanics designed to force or encourage you to buy from the C-store. It wouldn't surprise me if they start making us pay C-points everytime we want to customise our character and uniform.

And as much as I love the DOFF system, when I see DOFF packs that you can buy, I can't help but think that they only designed it so they can sell you more stuff on the C-store.

[Archived Post]

I probably won't be around for long. Once awhile, I may get on just to chat with few friends unless they start charging dilithium for it. :P

I'm really afraid hat things are different for real this time.

Every time things looked a bit bad in the past I had something good I could point to.
And it usually turned out, at very least, ok.
And some people stood with me in defense of hope.

Now I'm not sure I've seen anyone who is standing in defense of the coming changes.
I certainly am not.

That should be enough of a wake-up call to the devs to put the brakes on this train and seriously reconsider.
At the very least they need to directly vocally address all of this.
ASAP.

[Archived Post]

I'm really afraid hat things are different for real this time.

Every time things looked a bit bad in the past I had something good I could point to.
And it usually turned out, at very least, ok.
And some people stood with me in defense of hope.

Now I'm not sure I've seen anyone who is standing in defense of the coming changes.
I certainly am not.

That should be enough of a wake-up call to the devs to put the brakes on this train and seriously reconsider.
At the very least they need to directly vocally address all of this.
ASAP.

i was someone that would give my oppion all the time good or bad but not i can't see that much good and a lot of bad. i'm also worndering if Cryptic are even listening to the player base at all, so i'm with you on the Dev's needing to address the player base.

[Archived Post]

I'm also getting close with this F2P, this thing is just a mess. Too much change too quickly, and nice words aren't doing the job. I'm just glad I have my max rank toons on both factions, I couldn't imagine leveling up this way. Just waiting on retrait tokens so I can adjust some of those and that'll be about it for me. We'll see how the new STFs come out and decide whether I bother with STO at all, lifetime sub or no.

Not sure we can solely lay this at sdeangelo's feet, there's simply too much here for that timespan - no, this one has dstahl written all over it.

[Archived Post]

I'm really afraid hat things are different for real this time.

Every time things looked a bit bad in the past I had something good I could point to.
And it usually turned out, at very least, ok.
And some people stood with me in defense of hope.

Now I'm not sure I've seen anyone who is standing in defense of the coming changes.
I certainly am not.




Sounds just like me.

[Archived Post]

This post has been edited to remove content which violates the Cryptic Studios Community Rules and Policies (http://forums.startrekonline.com/announcement.php?f=20&a=5). ~Stormshade

[Archived Post]

This post has been edited to remove content which violates the Cryptic Studios Community Rules and Policies (http://forums.startrekonline.com/announcement.php?f=20&a=5). ~Stormshade

[Archived Post]

Not sure we can solely lay this at sdeangelo's feet, there's simply too much here for that timespan - no, this one has dstahl written all over it.

I'm actually beginning, as terrifying as it is, to agree with the conspiracy theorists that Stahl left because he saw this coming and would not preside over it in good conscience.

I would *love* nothing more than to be proven *wrong* but the timing on this is just far too close for it to be coincidence.

[Archived Post]

economy revamp, complete fail.
Wake up cryptic, games can die, and there are other games coming out.

[Archived Post]

I lost faith in cryptic months ago, this sorry excuse for an mmo will go belly up by the end of the year!

I first welcomed the news the PWE was buying cryptic, even though we new it was happening months before they finally "anounced" it...
The sad thing is they are trying to milk us like the citizens in their own comunist country.

[Archived Post]

Wow, not a single positive post.

While I had some hope for F2P, I kind of saw this coming. No surprise. But I'm willing to wait and see what comes of this.

[Archived Post]

Lost Faith ? Faith ? in Cryptic ?
- telling u they wont take away what u have, then reduce Aegis Set tier




What's this?

[Archived Post]

Well, lots of new names, and those outside of the "usual" naysayers. Not a good sign.

I can honestly say I've been a pretty big fanboy. I've had complaints about some delays, but I let them slide, even through a major content drought due to them being sold and such.

But ever since the announcement of F2P and the slow roll-out of their new policies regarding it, its just hard to ignore the absolute change in philosophy going on there.

So many things are opposite of Dan Stahl's stated goals, I can't help but feel that this "new plan" from Perfect World drove him off.

The game is changing at its very core. Its the same engine and art assets, but the play style, the payment method, the advancement scheme, and the amount of value you get out of your money is all radically different, and radically swinging towards the asian-style grind fest. It really seems that the claims that Perfect World knows how to run a western game were false.

New, bad things:

Static, levelesss story progression; Every player with progress through the exact same story in the exact same order (unless they just mindlessly grind, I guess)

Small amounts of playtime are far less valuable - This game was extremely casual, since you could come play for an hour and get something done, earn some cool stuff. Playing that way now will basically mean you can't earn anything

Subscribers are completely devalued - They had a pretty dedicated fanbase for this game; We love Trek and we were willing to accept a lot of sub-optimal things because of that. But they are getting next to no value from their sub. Then heir gameplay is changing, with ultra-grinds and poor currency conversions and removed rewards. Its hard not to see your investment of close to 2 years as wasted due to the changes.

Klingons are hosed - Kicked while they were down. Sorry guys :(

The economy is... a mess. Grinds within grinds on top of grinds. You only get currency from repeatable missions: Grind. You can only refine so much per day (a small amount): Grind - You need 10 to 20+ days of playing for single items. A single set of unremarkable ship gear takes months. -- All of that adds up to the game being remade into virtually requiring people to supplement their "time currency" with real, actual currency.

I could go on.. but I don't think I need to.

This game needs an ambassador right now, badly. There is MUCH to answer for and explain. The slow updates and vague, non-specific blog posts are hurting you, not helping. We need direct interaction and explanation - not of specific systems but of the sweeping changes to the nature of the game.

Maybe Mr D'Angelo isn't comfortable in doing that like Dan did, and that is fine. But we have a Community Rep that is pretty darned good at his job when his hands aren't tied by trying to keep some ultra-secret plan under wraps. Get him some positive answers about some REAL changes we're asking for, and get him out here. Or let Heretic do it; that guy has been a super-star among you guys lately, he is hitting a home-run with his Doff system, and its a shame that its buried under this mess of a F2P conversion.

The clock is ticking; We need to hear back. Some claim that you're not worried about subscribers, that we're a drain on you.

Well, without some action, that drain won't be around much longer, just don't expect any customer loyalty for your company any longer.

12-20 approaches quickly. If THIS is the last impression most of us are left with, many of us aren't likely to ever come back.

[Archived Post]

Wait until a bug cripples -- I mean DESTROYS their forced story progression. And we know how they bring in bugs.

Whoever thought of the forced story progression should have a thing over his/her head that says the first bug that puts forced story progression to its knees should resign from Cryptic. No, not be fired. Resign! That way they can't then go and collect unemployment.

[Archived Post]

i lost faith in cryptic a long time ago..... But recent events have made my jaw drop with all the PR blunders and screw jobs they are doing to STO..... It almost makes me think that cryptic is purposely trying to sink the game so they can focus on other projects !!!! But that sounds way to paranoid and tinfoil hat like to be possibly true !!!! ;)

[Archived Post]

+1 with 100% loss of trust / faith here in Cryptic; the F2P conversion was the last straw for me.

Very nearly ditto'd from me here. I have an LTS, but I may go play games that actually feel rewarding when this one goes FTP. Maybe PotBS. Sure its F2P, but I don't feel gouged all the time by that dev team.

Sadly, all we have left is CapnLogan and his epicly awesome ship creation skillz/

[Archived Post]

Very nearly ditto'd from me here. I have an LTS, but I may go play games that actually feel rewarding when this one goes FTP. Maybe PotBS. Sure its F2P, but I don't feel gouged all the time by that dev team.

Sadly, all we have left is CapnLogan and his epicly awesome ship creation skillz/

CapnLogan and Heretic (The guy who made the Doff System, which I thought it was awesome) It's a shame the doff system probably came too late. v.v

[Archived Post]

I'm going to reserve judgement until F2P actually launches, and even then I may stick around if only to keep playing some of the Excellent foundry missions I see.

I seriously hope they listen to feedback by players.

[Archived Post]

Like a few others in this thread, I haven't had much faith in Cryptic for some time... That isn't to say that I don't value the contributions some of the devs have put into the game particularly that of Matt, Kestrel and even CapnLogan. They've all done awesome work and KNOW what this game is supposed to be about. I will even go so far as to say that for what it's worth Stahl was doing his absolute best to steer the broken car that is STO in the correct path.

I have a lifetime subscription (which I regret buying now) and I play STO once in a blue moon. I have two maxed out characters and to me I just feel as if there's nothing else for me to do in the game. I don't feel like waiting around to do the STFs and the PVP simply just doesn't interest me. We were promised on a few occasions (and are being promised such things once more once the game goes F2P) that we are going to get FE Series regularly. Why are they even promising such things when they didn't really deliver that the first time around? We got three really good FE Series and that was it for a very, very long time. Yes, other things had to be worked on... other systems needed to be fixed... but how much of this are we actually supposed to believe? Are they actually going to deliver on their promises or is something going to suddenly appear that causes them to work on other things?

For me, Star Trek Online has left such a horrible and sour taste in my mouth. I'm a huge Trek fan.. I've seen all the movies.. all the episodes. I love it all. STO, however, has really demoralized me... and has even made me doubt my love for a franchise I hold dear to my heart. It's like.. I want to do something Trek related.. and then STO pops in my head.. and I just feel really... really... dirty.

I am just incredibly disappointed with what we got for Star Trek Online. It just doesn't hold many ideals in the gameplay that make Star Trek so great. I would have liked to see a bigger open galaxy for us to do stuff in.. more things that are familiar to us in the Star Trek Universe, moral choices for the things we do instead of going into a system and simply obliterating ten enemies. I think overall I just would have liked things to be a little different.. for things to have a little bit more meaning.

I think in some ways I wish that it would be more evident that not some, but all the people working on this game care about what they are doing. I know that some of them do. But when you have some things that people are overly against but still get put into the game... or art things, like the signs in ESD that have different fonts for absolutely no reason. Where is the Quality Control? Things like that, amongst other things just looks really bad visually (of course that's just my opinion).

I don't want to put the blame on the current dev team.. but I think the root of the problem stems on how the game was initially designed. The company is working on three games (maybe four?). For the size of Cryptic Studios and for the quality that we as Star Trek fans are demanding they are simply spread too thinly. I just really wish that when initially designing Star Trek Online, that this would have been considered.. instead we got too much at once.. and much of it has either had to be redesigned or changed (ground combat, crafting, UI, interiors, etc)... or left to be unfinished and in limbo (Klingons).

I do wish Cryptic luck with STO, and their other properties, though. I know that I won't be recommending any of them to anyone I know. :(

[Archived Post]

I just got an email from EVE online directing me to a public apology from CCP's CEO for not listening to the players, and vowing to turn the ship around and look to their concerns. It was interesting to see some of the parallels between both games.

Where this game goes from here Is hard to say, Star Wars Galaxies had many threads quite similar to this at it's turning point.

There seems to be a sadness in this thread that moves beyond the normal anger, and that worries me.

I think we shouldn't give up hope just yet, and we also need to remember that we are part of a much larger collective, we are Star Trek fans.

In the past when Star Trek was up against a wall and threatened by interests that seemed to ignore and walk on the values it idealized the fans came together and made their voice heard. Perhaps it's time for the players of STO to look past the borders of this game and out to the general voice of Star Trek fans and ask for help in getting this on the right track.

[Archived Post]

There seems to be a sadness in this thread that moves beyond the normal anger, and that worries me.


Worse still, there is almost no-one left defending Cryptic.
This is the first time thats happened and it's a very bad sign.

Whats more worrisome still; the devs can't *possibly* be blind to this level of negativity.
Its the highest I've ever seen it, and I was here since open beta.
So either they don't care, their hands are tied, or they are having a hard time with their PR skills.

I'd like to hope its the last one.... but at this point I think its a combination of the first and second.

[Archived Post]

Anyone else notice that 100% of the new content since the Romulan FE series is delayed until F2P? Even many of the bug fixes are delayed.

There is literally nothing to do on live, and has not been for some time. If you want to enjoy STO, you're only chance is on Tribble. It's the only place anything is new or interesting.

All the paid subscribers from March(?) to F2P launch are literally only financing the transition and testing of F2P.

Naturally Cryptic probably did not intend for things to turn out this way, but it is the most logical reading of the events from the consumer's side.

Edit: I should add that this feeling is a stark contrast from the beginning of August when I was relaying to a friend at WotC how excited I was that Cryptic had the D&D license. Now I'm not so sure. At a certain point, patience wears out when your wallet is draining and time is flying by.

[Archived Post]

You know I loved this game at the start. Getting a new ship when I leveled was the best thing, in my opinion. I enjoyed having something to look forward to. Now you have to wonder if you have enouh money to buy it and who wants to grind for a ship you will have for a short while. I finally see what all the complaints are about. The only downside I saw to this game was lack of content. Well that list is increasing. When SWTOR comes out I might just uninstall this game and not look back. If that happens I will probably not buy another Cryptic game.

[Archived Post]

Worse still, there is almost no-one left defending Cryptic.
This is the first time thats happened and it's a very bad sign.

Whats more worrisome still; the devs can't *possibly* be blind to this level of negativity.
Its the highest I've ever seen it, and I was here since open beta.
So either they don't care, their hands are tied, or they are having a hard time with their PR skills.

I'd like to hope its the last one.... but at this point I think its a combination of the first and second.

And that its not the crazy "Cryptic sucks at everything, so much fail" crowd being negative, but a lot of the longtime fans who liked the game as it was, even if it wasn't perfect. If you're losing your loyalists with this much uniformity.. something is wrong.

[Archived Post]

Wow, lots of bile inhere. Im holding my breath untill it actually comes out on holodeck. Very concerned with having to BUY ships when you lvl up (even if its partially) ... i dont remember anybody calling the current lvling up tokens bad in any way, why fix something thats not broken?

Im also a bit worried that our freedom in playing STO like we want to is going to be limited by forcing people to do mission in the order that the Devs want us to do them in, and not when/how and in wich order we desire. (Another thing that doesnt need fixing realy?) And also refinement caps on dilithium that are apparently to low.

Aside from that im still in the grey area as to making up my mind about this game. Even if it doesnt realy matter since im a lifetimer (wich i still dont regret tbh)

Obviously its distressing to see them "fix" things that dont need fixing, when there still is a content drought (even if gozer (who otherwise seems to be a good man) does not agree with that statement).

One can only sigh, facepalm and blindly hope for the best. We are all (well most of us) very much into Star Trek. And to keep it alive in an MMO is just to good for words. Worth chewing trough content droughts while a dev says there is no drought, worth hoping they will learn when they do stupid things. And hoping the issues we have will get adress in the future somewhere.

Ps: Please dont screw over crafting (read about only uneven number items being able to get crafted and an aegis nerf

PsPs: Can we please get a RETRAIT in the C-store instead of the endless supply of ships wich well they do look awesome, but in essence bring barely anything new to the game? It would make me able to play my Fed ton again without frowning upon the stupid choices i made back in the day when i bought this game. (with a long cooldown as to avoid abuse)

Thx all!

[Archived Post]

And that its not the crazy "Cryptic sucks at everything, so much fail" crowd being negative, but a lot of the longtime fans who liked the game as it was, even if it wasn't perfect. If you're losing your loyalists with this much uniformity.. something is wrong.

Yep, I went from die-hard Cryptic apologist, to "I don't think I'm ever going to play again" over the course of two or three days.

My story is not unique here.

[Archived Post]

I have supported Cryptic through so many chances with this game. Sure I am a late bloomer of only having my sub since the first FE series but I have gave them a lot of slack. Supported them through this or that. Sat down and pretty much played EVERY part of the game. But 4.1 feels like I hit a brick wall with a Lamborghini Gallardo.

[Archived Post]

Its just the way it seems they are going about it. It seems like "they" believe their is a base of players locked into the game that for worse or worser wont leave. So they are concentrating on the other potentially great base that woill be coming in when F2P goes live. I am starting to loose faith here too.

[Archived Post]

And that its not the crazy "Cryptic sucks at everything, so much fail" crowd being negative, but a lot of the longtime fans who liked the game as it was, even if it wasn't perfect. If you're losing your loyalists with this much uniformity.. something is wrong.

This ^

I used to defend STO and Cryptic almost any time someone said something negative about the game.
But now... Now i have arrived at the point where i SPIT at Cryptic in complete revulsion.

[Archived Post]

..yet this is beginning to feel a lot like SWG when the NGE went live.....
I was so Happy I wasn't Subbing to SWG when that happened.

Oddly enough this isn't the first Comparison to the SOE/LA Epic Fail that was the NGE

[Archived Post]

Sorry Cryptic. But if something isn't done. I'm going to have to abandon a whole community I built[My Fleet] and pre-order and wait for Phantasy Star Online 2.

[Archived Post]

I believe the OP's analogy of an NGE is probably a good one. SOE went after a playerbase they didn't have, by CHANGING SWG throughout at the expense of the playerbase they did have. It seems history is repeating itself, now via Cryptic. This could very well be known as STO's NGE when it's all said and done.

Even Rubinfield, SWG NGE Developer, in his blog who defended the CHANGES, itself, stated that they now knew the fact that massively CHANGING a game mid-stream is what caused the problem. His solution was to kill the game and re-launch if your going to make this amount of gameplay CHANGES. People, existing customers, remember how it "used to be" and are NEVER quite satified with the specific CHANGES or the shear amount of them. Then, they move on to other games taking their playtime and money right along with them. This sets up a steamroller of sorts. The loss of playerbase hits what playerbase stayed thru the CHANGES, groups are harder to find, PVP suffers greatly, PVE becomes few and far between, and the game untimatly ends up on life support, and then finaly, "uhhh, death". SWG had 2 main developers for the last several years as that was just about all the very small playerbase could support financialy. This in turn keeps content very few and far between making the existing playerbase even smaller. (case in point, the large time gap we have seen in STO due to F2P CHANGES that took the time for additional content in this last year) It is a vicious cycle that seems not to end except for a timely rollback (see WoWs add real names to their forums CHANGE that didn't quite come to pass and was rolled back rather quickly)

With TOR's launch coming so quickly, Cryptic couldn't have chosen a worse time for this. There will be another option on Dec 20th (expecialy for the 15 a month crowd which we all are to this date) and not depending on a cash grab store nor Pay to Win to make full gameplay (PVP) even possible, even if your a monthly sub, lifetimer, or not.

This F2P is really different than Champs. Champs really did not have much of a playerbase at all before the CHANGE. Not very many lost in the transition. STO however, does have an existing playerbase and the people that are disgruntled due to these CHANGES can make life, for a CHANGED game, extreamly hard, at times. Ask SOE. Word of mouth does have an effect.

As in SWG's case, the "other" playerbase they were looking for NEVER showed up. With the launch of TOR coinciding with about the time of these STO CHANGES, I doubt very much that this playerbase Cryptic is looking for shows up either. I have seen TOR 1st hand and I was planning NOT to go to TOR when it came out and stay in STO. But due to nothing more than this version of NGE, I am now planning to move all my gameplay over there as soon as it's possible, lifetime or not, before Dec 20th as I've now preordered the 150 package. See Cryptic, people will spend money on a subscription game and with this specific person, you have now made that possible for Bioware.

I just can't believe that another gaming company would even consider such a thing as this, again. But, oh well, they will in all probability learn the exact same lesson that SOE learned as well. Was a sad day for SWG and will be yet another sad day for STO. At least SOE had the excuse of "it had never been done" to fall back on.

[Archived Post]

Yep, I went from die-hard Cryptic apologist, to "I don't think I'm ever going to play again" over the course of two or three days.

My story is not unique here.

If anything there are only three kinds of people;

*"I told you sos' maybe a bit pre-mature, but starting to look more and more correct every day.

*People like you and me who were fans but are not so much anymore.
*Two subcategories; those like me who remain optimistic (if only just a bit)
*And those who are resigned already

*People who are still being fans (but they're rarer than hens teeth)

[Archived Post]

Like was mentioned earlier in this topic - "be careful what you ask for, you just may get it..."

I'll be around to turn the lights out and take the flag down... :(

So much for the dream of a playable Romulan faction. :mad:

[Archived Post]

).

....

One can only sigh, facepalm and blindly hope for the best. We are all (well most of us) very much into Star Trek. And to keep it alive in an MMO is just to good for words. Worth chewing trough content droughts while a dev says there is no drought, worth hoping they will learn when they do stupid things. And hoping the issues we have will get adress in the future somewhere.

Ps: Please dont screw over crafting (read about only uneven number items being able to get crafted and an aegis nerf

PsPs: Can we please get a RETRAIT in the C-store instead of the endless supply of ships wich well they do look awesome, but in essence bring barely anything new to the game? It would make me able to play my Fed ton again without frowning upon the stupid choices i made back in the day when i bought this game. (with a long cooldown as to avoid abuse)

Thx all!

STO hasn't been Star Trek for a looong time. This is the Terran Empire...actually the Terrans were probably better than Cryptic. :rolleyes:

This game/company is everything Star Trek isn't....unless there are some morals / ethics hidden somewhere. :confused:

[Archived Post]

I lost faith along time ago. I lost faith on broken promises and missing features announced and never delivered.

This free to play is just the icing on the cake. The force progression on the stories is not good at all.

While the new interface looks nice forcing players to do them is not a good thing. I leveled up new alts during the new featured episodes and found it refreshing to do it in a certain order and skip ones I did not like.

Under the new system now I have to play all the boring ones and still not get access to them untill I complete the stories before them.

[Archived Post]

I agree with all the OP statements but (s)he missed the most important reason to lose faith.

On Holodeck *right now* the game is awesome, and fully functional for only $15 a month. When you rank up you get a new ship. When you get a new ship you can replay Featured Episodes and run exploration missions and gear that new ship properly.

On F2P server there is no way to have a fun, fully functional game for only $15 a month. When you rank up you get a percentage of what you need to buy to get a ship. All featured episodes are no longer availible at Lt Commander 1. You cant just spend a few hours doing Exploration and gear up given the 8000 a day refine limit.


Even with F2P bringing obvious restrictions you CANT opt out of these ridiculous restrictions even if you offer $15 a month.

They are CREATING artificial problems you can solve by buying Dilithium.

[Archived Post]

Yeah, i'd lost faith in Cryptic a long time ago, BUT.... i considered the STO team to be a seperate entity because up until F2P they weren't like the rest of Cryptic. They were doing great by the community. The game was going great, there was nwe content almost regularly. But then they started being just a part of Cryptic again.

I'm not losing faith in the game, i'm losing faith in the people making it. Lying to the fans/subs, making promises they won't keep, Telling us they're reworking the economy when they just renamed a few things and raised prices on things. I'm a huge trek fan, i like the game, but as it is, i'll probably not play until new content drops. I might even Drop my fed/klingon alts.

[Archived Post]

Like others have posted, I was a cryptic fanboy too. The only decision that ever really ticked me off was them putting the Champions Mirror Uniform on the C-Store. That seems like such a tiny issue now, compared to taking away a great game and replacing it with one giant "Insert Credit Card here" tag.

If it releases like this, my lifetime sub just became valueless, and I will have made the full transition from seeing Cryptic as visionaries to seeing them as common swindlers.

[Archived Post]

So I have been testing the Free to play build and I'm slowly losing faith that Cryptic has the best interests of this game at heart....This is my rant and my reasons.

1. Forced to level in order.....Why? i always loved deviating in the game and wandering around. Now missions come in a certain order whose brilliant idea was this? this is not fun doing the exact same order with ever new alt.

2. Buying my new tier of ships......excuse me...the federation isn't founded on money...So why does it feel like this game is becoming less and less about trek and starting to feel more like a grinding mmo from the east. (hmmm)

3. Klingons capped until you play federation....While I do not like the klingon faction limiting them to a higher level is utterly boneheaded....what will we do for pvp which is already suffering badly.

4. Forced dailies......When you force people to do something especially dailies simply to progress....you need to fire whoever thought this was a good idea.

5. the grind....Im sorry and I don't mean to sound bad with this comment but this is Star Trek not ****....why are we copying an eastern style of MMO with grinding endlessly to get new rewards....where is the fun in this? can cryptic not find a better way to earn items.


Shattered promises....I recall It being said we would not Notice a whole lot of difference in our gameplay with the free to play conversion....yet this is beginning to feel a lot like SWG when the NGE went live....
the more I see the more im unhappy with my favorite game...I have never let my sub die since this game has come out....and thankfully never bought a lifetime Sub though for the first time....I am beginning to question Star treks future under cryptic and starting to wonder if the string of bad judgement means it's time to move on.

thanks for reading.

This to the Nth degree.



On F2P server there is no way to have a fun, fully functional game for only $15 a month. When you rank up you get a percentage of what you need to buy to get a ship. All featured episodes are no longer availible at Lt Commander 1. You cant just spend a few hours doing Exploration and gear up given the 8000 a day refine limit.


Even with F2P bringing obvious restrictions you CANT opt out of these ridiculous restrictions even if you offer $15 a month.

They are CREATING artificial problems you can solve by buying Dilithium.

Also this.

[Archived Post]

Lol.. moved to the F2P feedback forum.

Out of sight, out of mind? (Like there aren't still 50 F2P threads in the main forum.. the whole game is about F2P now)

Stormie: Instead of moving this, can you actually GET SOME ANSWERS FOR US?

[Archived Post]

Yep completly lost faith. I have always had a love/hate relationship with STO. Now its pretty much just 'hate'.

The game has lost its balance with these F2P changes, and has swung way too far into the realms of Evony/Pay2Win model. I was genuinly pleased when I heard the game was going F2P, now with these changes all's that I can see is the end of STO.

Star Trek fans are (usually) intelligent people, and will not support a model that attempts to milk them dry at any given opertunity, and since this is a trek franchise (and not hello kitty for instance) once you lose your core supporters there will be no one to replace them. That is why I dont see this game suriviving unless they make some major changes.

The current trek model was never perfect, but I could live with it, the new one, I cannot.

[Archived Post]

Lol.. moved to the F2P feedback forum.

Out of sight, out of mind? (Like there aren't still 50 F2P threads in the main forum.. the whole game is about F2P now)

Stormie: Instead of moving this, can you actually GET SOME ANSWERS FOR US?

Not likely. Getting answers out of Cryptic is like tring to catch a greased up pig.

[Archived Post]

And no a single response from any dev or GM, we are just talking to the air..... :mad:

[Archived Post]

And no a single response from any dev or GM, we are just talking to the air..... :mad:

I know what the answer will be when it comes.

"Please be patient"

"Wonderfull things are happening, all will be revealed soon!"

"We are not monsters, there is no conspiricy theory!"

"Thats why we dont come to the forums, look at all this anger!"

or

"INSERT CANNED RESPONSE HERE"

Completely fed up with Cryptics lack of morals, I have given them the beneifit of the doubt for a long time now, but they have revealed themselves to be money grubbers with no regard for customer service.

[Archived Post]

And no a single response from any dev or GM, we are just talking to the air..... :mad:

If a dev or GM actually responded saying "This is the way we decided it is going to be, not going to change now." Would you happily go your merry way, satisfied that you got that answer?

[Archived Post]

Yep, I will cancel my subscription and tell them what they can do with the game other than playing it.

[Archived Post]

I'm actually beginning, as terrifying as it is, to agree with the conspiracy theorists that Stahl left because he saw this coming and would not preside over it in good conscience.

I would *love* nothing more than to be proven *wrong* but the timing on this is just far too close for it to be coincidence.

He doesn't have to be an altruist. He could have just figured "This thing's going to be a disaster and I don't want my name on it."

[Archived Post]

He doesn't have to be an altruist. He could have just figured "This thing's going to be a disaster and I don't want my name on it."

Lol altruist? he went to work for Zygna who specialise in pay2win. He cut his teeth on STO :P

[Archived Post]

:eek: Zygna??? Yuck. Now that was a downstep.

[Archived Post]

I lost mi faith in Cryptic looooooooong time ago.. is good to see that some peoples open their eyes now..

[Archived Post]

Cerritouru, then why are you still a staff in an STO fleet? You should all do what most of us have already done: Leave while it was still a bit of fun. Soon there will be no fun left. I left the game in July, by the way, with both of my LTS accounts. I keep monitoring the forum with this second one a bit.

[Archived Post]

The only reason I really still play this game is cause I have a lifteime sub and I still enjoy the space combat and the small changes every once in awhile to keep me interested. Otherwise, I can't really say I "Lost Faith" since I never really had a high opinion of this game.

However, in terms of this thread, I have a few things I'd like to say.

1) C-store: I don't see a problem with the changes here. Sure some prices changed, but otherwise the stuff in the C-store still isn't "necessary" to have fun in the game, even with the F2P setup. I haven't felt the need to use my 1200 stipend yet with my charecter.

2) There is a big issue right now with loot vs. time spent playing and levels due to the HUGE change in experience gained by completing the featured episodes, thats why everyone is short of Energy Credits on tribble.
For example, it used to take about 3-4 missions to get 1 level, now it takes just 1.5. That means the amount of loot and energy credits you get while playing has reduced by 2-3x, and the amount of time you play in each tier is 2-3x shorter!
That doesn't give you enough time to get good drops or earn enough energy credits to setup your tier of ship properly.

3) The lack of easy-to-obtain Exploration points to buy green gear hurts. You cant say spend 1 whole level just doing explorations to get some badges in order to buy some green gear for your ship, so you have to rely on Energy Credits which are as mentioned, much harder to come by, so you wind up with a poorly equipped ship throughout the early parts of the game.
The cost of the dilithium for early level items in the stores is quite high, meaning you have to spend MUCH more time grinding to get quality items early on.
This doesn't seem to be as big of an issue for the end of the game though, seeing as the sets are still available (at least I think they are, are they?) and end-game-content will be awarding Dilithium meaning you can still buy the same purple/blue items from stores that you did before in the same amount of time with the same amount of grinding.

4) The leveling "in order" is a big problem right now due to having the missions with low-level loot being higher level, meaning you don't get the kind of rewards you NEED from the missions for the level you are at. This needs fixing.
And playing the missions in order is also quite annoying as mentioned, as quite a few of them I just don't like and usually skip with the old layout. I think I'm going to start a separate thread with ideas about this though, since it appears to be a sticky point that most people don't like so far.


Overall, I'm not as upset as the rest of you apparently, I don't think the changes are as bad as they are being made out to be. I spent a crap load of time grinding in the past to get my quality setups, and I don't see any big difference with that so far.

[Archived Post]

I agree with you 100% but there is a difference of grinding when you can or you choose to do so to get a better gear and forced grinding to be able to just get a ship so you can enter the next level, that really stinks. :mad:

[Archived Post]

Agreed, in the past some have called me a Cryptic apologist, but no more.

Add me to the list - I just recently found out I was cosidered the figurehead of the "Cryptic Defense Force" (never heard of it myself.) If I had a positive view of the game's direction for the first 18 months, and had some sympathy for what Cryptic was going through in being sold etc. (AS I've been at a corporation in my career where that happened) - sue me. I always spoke my opinion, and rarely did I ever try to speak for anyone else.

That said, as Tribble F2P testing moves forward; and I see for myself what's 'coming down the pipe'; (and no, it's more than just a simple adjustment of numbers per se - EG upping the Raw Dilithium converson limit and adjusting some prices WON'T fix the overall systemic issues being buillt into the F2P bversion of STO now - the F2P system they've developed and decided to go with is flawed at it's core as far as that goes IMO.)

If anything the attitude of DStahl (regardless of th fact that he promised much, and sometimes dilivered late) of "Make STO more Star Trek like" - which in general is what I thought of the majority of his additions to the game during hiis tenure); has been superceeded by a nerw attitude of "Let's make the first Western MMO using a TRUELY EASTERN MMO F2P model"; and if anything, the particular result for STO is removing EVEN MORE of whatever 'Star Trek' feel was a part of the game prior to this paradigm shift.

EVERYTHING now either 'locks you in with no real choice' (EG the new Story Mission structure that requires you to play EVERY MISSION in the exact same order on EVERY character you make (assuming you want to experience the story content of the game); or is SO timelocked by 20 hour (1 day) timers; or even the new Daily Events that last an hour but 'fire' in roptation, so if you want to play ione you HAVE to be on at a ertain time or miss out; or capped to make teh new economy work EG Raw Dilithium conversion of 8000 per day.)

Gone is the "Hey, I have 15 minuts, I think I'll playSTO.." days; pot F2P it's "Hey I want to play STO, but hell, my next Doff assignment doesn't complete for 2 hours; I can't get good rewards for <insert name of daily here>, for 3 hours; and the daily event I like doesn't hit for 2 hours; and I'd ony get mor raw dilithium that I can't convert for another 6 hours... <--- And THIS is where F2P is taking STO.

It's devolving into what EQ became lo those many years ago; or what some people feel regarding EVE Online today - more of another JOB (with tight scheduling for success) then a game (or worse a game where stuff like it's goping to force you to do to advance; ISN'T the point of the IP it's based on.)

So, yeah, with old guard Cryptic folks like Stoemsshade coming here and doing posts in response to these concerns of:

"Hey, with F2P the future for STO is brighter than it's ever been."

Just sound like more PR spin; and an attempt to convionce us (and those at Cryptic still working on STO)) hat STO is fine.

Me? I don't think that's goping to be the case going forward; and I too have lost faith that STO game development is going to improve the state of actual gameplay. The majority of what I have experienced on Tribble indicates the opposite for me.

Will I still play? Yes. I still like the Space Combat system overall; and some of the storylines of the next FE series.

Am I tempted to make other/new characters post F2P? No, not really. I don't like being 'locked into' content progression with zero choice or having to micromanage what I do so I can be sure to be able to afford to get and gear ships for any new character. It used to be you felt rewarded for leveling; but under STO F2P - even as an LTS - I've started to dread approaching that next Major rank, as I won't have enough to function well in that Rank until I'm alsmost to the next Rank - AND I really have to chart and schedule my play in advance to get what I need to advance. <--- BASD cycle for a GAME that's supposed tio be fun and relaxing.

Do I think anything will change in this new F2P Paradigm as a result of mine, and other existing players concerns and feedback over what we see as a negative direction?

Nope - they haven't annouced it - but they are on a tight deadline and the course has been set -- with no detours; jsut some arthimetic updates.

[Archived Post]

Sadly, I remember arguing with about half of the people in this thread during some of the more egregious CStore debacles and seeing them on my side of the camp is disconcerting and more than a little sad. I would rather have been wrong than see STO turn the direction it seems to be going and the fact tha apologists and "fan boys" are now on my side of the fence greatly concerns me. Ethics and morality have never been Cryptic's strong suit but this has gone completely out of control.

Since release, Cryptic has been unethical in its behavior towards the customer base, we have been lied to and misdirected for two years and sadly, it is only getting worse since Perfect World's takeover of the company. It was bad enough dealing with Infogrames/Atari but Perfect World makes them look like saints.

This hole Cryptic is digging seems inescapable to me since there seems to be little, if any, interest in showing any respect whatever to the paying public in search of the next gold mine. I had almost begun to feel as though I were tilting at windmills in my prior anti-cstore and anti-Atari posts but I am starting to wonder if my target were wrong and it was that Cryptic lacks those same ethics as both Atari and Perfect Worlds seems to be missing.

Both my wife and I took ethics in college and we do understand both business ethics and general ethics neither of which has ever been displayed by Cryptic, I still have my textbooks and seriously considered sending them to the Cryptic main office but I think that would be a waste of my time and money, I no longer believe they have any interest in ethical behavior.

[Archived Post]

Originally I played City of Heroes. I loved City of Heroes. And was disappointed when Cryptic sold it to NCNC. But It continued to get better until they recked PVP for about 6 Months+ So I moved on. Floated around.. Migrated to Champions Online for a short stint and heard about Star Trek Online and thought "Oh that's going to be AWESOME! And I like Cryptic, they made City of Heroes! They will make it a great gaming experience!"

I look back and wonder where did they go wrong?

When the game came out, sure it had it's bugs, but it was a fun experience. Not "Trek" enough, but fun. Lately how ever, it's almost like the Ferengi have taken over. Next I'll be expecting us to have to by a copy of the Rules of Aquisition before we can even enter the game. :rolleyes:

My issues with the current Free To Play Model are:

Forced Mission Chains. - These should be level unlockable. Not forced to do each chain in the story in order to get further. It should be like the TV series. You can skip parts of it, and if you liked the later story, maybe go back and play the other series to see how things got to where they are now.

Dilithium costs are WAY to high, ESPECIALLY in high end, NON STF, Gear. - If you look at the old Emblem Gear, it's 240,000 REFINED Dilithium. Now imagine having to grind out Dailies for Refined and Unrefined, then having to use your current 8,000 cap. It could take Months to fully out fit a ship.

Klingon Empire. Even at level 17/19 The Klingon Empire does not have enough eposides. Some one will go from Federation side at level 25, take one look at just the content and probobly wonder why they should bother, and more then likely just go back to their Feds. I've been preaching for Equality between the sides of the game for a long time, but at this rate, it might be another 2 Years before that happens. Sure I have a Life time sub, but at this rate my interest in playing may wayne so far that I might give up all together..:(

PVP The biggest flaw that happened, was when the game launched. And that flaw was a Public Fed vs Fed Que in addition to the Fed Vs Klingon. They should have made Fed vs Fed a Private Que, and left the Fed Vs Klingon the Public part of the Que. Same with Klingon vs Klingon should also be a Private Que. This will still be in the F2P model, and honestly I wish it wasn't. But it's not something new so I'll leave that personal Pevee alone.

Not enough Refined Dilithium per Rank up. This bothers me. I like that at least we're getting Discounts. And I can understand that as your normal leveling you should get enough Refined Dilithium to buy your ships at each rank, but maybe it shouldn't be the same for Silver vs Gold. Maybe what we're looking at should be Silver, and Gold gets, instead of Dilithium to buy a new ship, the Free ship Tokens. Though I know Cryptic is trying to filter those out. It would at least give incentive to paying for the game, at least long enough to reach VA 1 and then later re-sub when the Level cap gets raised again.

Removal of the Borg Set. So far I don't like that the Borg Set seems to have been removed. Now I could be wrong on this point. And would be glad to be wrong. But if that set does get removed, I can only hope that those of us who worked hard to get full sets on our characters, we don't lose them.

Old Bugs are still there, and things are getting more unbalanced. The original game balance that was in the game, made the game fun. And originally if something was broken, they tried to fix it swiftly, but as the months grew longer, things have been left Stagnent, over powered, or not working perhaps as intended. Now I know they are supposed to be getting worked on, or fixed in the F2P Model. But what is the future for the game's combat balance? Maybe there should be a statement that Combat is going to be changing, where damage will be higher to comphensate for the amount of healing and resistances that are in the game now? Most of these issues are in space of course. Ground seems better, but it still isn't as perfect as I'm sure it eventually could be.

Pay to win. This is something I can understand being right for a Free to Play Model. You want the best, and coolest ships, then you have to pay for them. But why not let Gold have those ships auto unlocked, but you maybe still have to pay Dilithium for them? Where Silver would have to pay C-store points to unock them? And a gold member could also pay C-store points to unlock them incase they ever went Silver. Just a suggestion here. I mean ship costumes aside, it would be nice if this were a change in the F2P Model.

All in all, those above paragraphs are probobly only some of the issues I have with the game. I'm sure there are others that I haven't said. And I'm sure I'm repeating what others have said, but since it's all feed back, I can only hope that it gets listened to and implimented in some way in order to make the F2P And Star Trek Online experience better as a whole.

[Archived Post]

I give this game a month when f2p comes out, then it dies.
Lies will kill cryptic someday.

[Archived Post]

Anyone make a ship named Titanic with a captain named Dan Stahl then have him leave the ship for another ship called "Dodged A Bullet"?

[Archived Post]

Heres the question though. At what point do you walk away from STO? What is the final straw?

[Archived Post]

Totally agreed, forced dailies are terrible, 60k dilitium for a piece of equiptment. 8k cap per day.

Amazing.

[Archived Post]

Heres the question though. At what point do you walk away from STO? What is the final straw?

I honestly don't know, since I have a litetime sub my thought processes are going to be different to those that sub monthly. My sub has "paid for itself" but I also hate the thought of abandoning the game entirely due to the unethical choices made by the company. On the other hand, I have no wish to hang around someplace I am obviously not wanted as a customer.

I took a break over the summer to work on and drive my old cars but came back when the weather started changing. Now, I am forced to wonder what I am going to do this winter since STO seems to be going to hell in a handbasket.

[Archived Post]

I'd like to thank not only Tiberion1701, but this thread as a whole, for my new sig banner.

[Archived Post]

The game seemed to be moving in the right direction a couple weeks ago when I re-subbed, but this new FTP model is destroying any hope I had for the game to improve. I had a feeling this would turn into a grind fest under the new owners but I had no idea it would be this bad.

[Archived Post]

-shrug- no faith lost on my part, though it's getting dangerous to post an opinion like that anywhere on most of the forum because it turns into flame bait

something to do with 'no changes just content' crowd spoiling for a fight...

The whole F2P thing was expected on my part and I look forward to it, the final change-over and the surge in subscribers

[Archived Post]

Wait until a bug cripples -- I mean DESTROYS their forced story progression. And we know how they bring in bugs.

Whoever thought of the forced story progression should have a thing over his/her head that says the first bug that puts forced story progression to its knees should resign from Cryptic. No, not be fired. Resign! That way they can't then go and collect unemployment.

Too late. As it stands there are a couple missions that were broken and can lock up progression now.

Heres the question though. At what point do you walk away from STO? What is the final straw?

I honestly don't know, since I have a litetime sub my thought processes are going to be different to those that sub monthly. My sub has "paid for itself" but I also hate the thought of abandoning the game entirely due to the unethical choices made by the company. On the other hand, I have no wish to hang around someplace I am obviously not wanted as a customer.

I took a break over the summer to work on and drive my old cars but came back when the weather started changing. Now, I am forced to wonder what I am going to do this winter since STO seems to be going to hell in a handbasket.

I'm in the same boat as thanatos. I'm on a life-sub, I'd've been gone already if it wasn't for that. But, yeah, the end of the line for me is when I just don't care anymore, and I've gotten there.

[Archived Post]

Too late. As it stands there are a couple missions that were broken and can lock up progression now.

Some of us got some rare bugs on Stranded in Space, and were unable to progress past the first mission.

[Archived Post]

Some of us got some rare bugs on Stranded in Space, and were unable to progress past the first mission.

Suddenly I feel so blessed, I made it all the way to Researcher Rescue before the god of scripting got confused and proceeded to gnaw off its own leg.

[Archived Post]

I'm really unhappy with the economy and storyline changes. They are absolutely terrible for the game.

Together they take every shred of freedom, option, and choice in the gameplay and toss it out the airlock. I look at Champs and love what F2P has done for that game. Then I look at STO and wish they would scrap F2P entirely if it means such absurd changes are coming. I honestly can't fathom how these design decisions were made. It feels like two completely different companies.

Yes its early in the beta and more changes are going to come as more systems are put in and adjustments made. But these big changes are absolutely horrible thus far.

Doffs are great, and the new events have potential. But the economy and progression changes are absolutely terrible.

And through all of this there is that looming thing in the background. Even if you want to continue playing this game, why should you bother paying for it? The difference between Gold and Silver accounts can be summed up in a number of free things you get while leveling. So why not just sub a month, level your character, then go back to Silver?

[Archived Post]

I'm really unhappy with the economy and storyline changes. They are absolutely terrible for the game.

Together they take every shred of freedom, option, and choice in the gameplay and toss it out the airlock. I look at Champs and love what F2P has done for that game. Then I look at STO and wish they would scrap F2P entirely if it means such absurd changes are coming. I honestly can't fathom how these design decisions were made. It feels like two completely different companies.

Yes its early in the beta and more changes are going to come as more systems are put in and adjustments made. But these big changes are absolutely horrible thus far.

Doffs are great, and the new events have potential. But the economy and progression changes are absolutely terrible.

And through all of this there is that looming thing in the background. Even if you want to continue playing this game, why should you bother paying for it? The difference between Gold and Silver accounts can be summed up in a number of free things you get while leveling. So why not just sub a month, level your character, then go back to Silver?

They are from two entirely different companies. When Atari sold to Perfect Worlds (a grevious misnomer apparently) they changed directions drastically. This is not the same company as I signed up for, even I am not that insane about Trek.

[Archived Post]

-shrug- no faith lost on my part, though it's getting dangerous to post an opinion like that anywhere on most of the forum because it turns into flame bait

something to do with 'no changes just content' crowd spoiling for a fight...

The whole F2P thing was expected on my part and I look forward to it, the final change-over and the surge in subscribers

Hey, as long as some one is willing to keep the faith, it's fine with me. Keep the faith for all of us.

[Archived Post]

After playing this game from the closed beta, I have also lost faith. That being said, I will still play it, why? because I will get paid to, 400 cp a month. I figure that my 2 years of prepaid time was up on the 2 year anniversary, so, now, they are paying me by giving me C store points. I will save them, and give them back when a nice shiny comes out. Other than, I am power levelling my alts, just so I don't have to deal with the ridiculous crap they are shoving down our throats.

-100 to Cryptic for letting their new owners force them into ruining what was once, a good community relationship they had with loyal players. They should have known there would be problems when their EP walked away "To spend time with his family" That is probably true, I would rather do that than bend over go against my principles.

Sorry if that offends someone, frankly, I don't care, I am offended by the treatment cryptic is giving the player base... the people who WOULD have tried to get their friends to play F2P... If they still faith.

When the announcement went out about F2P, I told a large group of my gamer friends to try it, today, I told not to waste their time. I bet Cryptic 1000000 Dilithium that this is going on with many others.

[Archived Post]

Fixing something that is not broken never eneded well.

Well the actual gameplay is (tribble!)-d, so I'll just stick to role-playing or using my already maxed out characters... and I'll hope someone will keep the game up, because I'll go Silver when F2P hits.


Of course, its still not too late for Cryptic to give Subscribers back their old rights and rewards.... while milking Silver players too.


As Quark said, a loyal customer is valuable.

[Archived Post]

Sorry Cryptic. But if something isn't done. I'm going to have to abandon a whole community I built[My Fleet] and pre-order and wait for Phantasy Star Online 2.

That is rather tempting, I still have a fondness of the old Fantasy Star games, and did mess with Phatnasy Star Online a bit. Then again some people will go to TOR, others will go to LoTRO, others to WoW (possibly... I know I won't). But yes there are many alternatives and if Cryptic and Perfect World Entertainment think that the Western market will put up with an Eastern style P2W economy, they are mistaken. The majority of us will leave, and some will badmouth the game. And look what happened to SWG when that happened to them...

But I won't count chickens before they are hatched. Cryptic has time to fix the mess they are making. Whether they will or not is up to them. All we can do is give feedback. If they decide to ignore feedback and plow ahead, then we will speak with our wallets and head to greener pastures elsewhere.

The biggest problem they have is the linear one track mission progression you can't get around. At least pull the Featured Episode missions out of that since with them in the track you can't do any more Featured Episode Replay Events. Plus adding new Featured Episodes would be problematic since where do yuo throw them into the chain, how to do you gate them? it would also be best if each of the Chains 'Klingon', 'Romulan', 'Cardassian', 'Borg', 'Breen', and 'Undine' are simply level gated like on Holodeck. You can start one without finishing the 'previous ones'. And for crying out loud, make the mission rewards level-appropriate via scaling like with the Featured Episodes.

Also they don't need to double gate Dilithium. Either gate it with dailies OR gate it with the ore to refined, but don't use both. Unless you add in an auto-refine for say Gold subscribers so they can earn a bunch of ore and then let it refine over dauys without even having to log in. It also makes playing alts a major hassle. The current economy on Tribble turns the game into a job. I've given up on it and am just messing around with the Doff system, which while still a bit buggy is being improved and the one good thing I've come across. They need to rework the Dilithium economy and give it a complete overhaul since this implementation is horrible.

If I wanted a game with an economy like this I'd have started playing EVE instead of STO.

I have a lifetime sub that has paid for itself so while i have tired to give feedback on things, if everyone's feedback is ignored and they shove an EVE style economy or worse into the game then they should call it Ferengi Online and not STO... we should all be Ferengi and the federation would be the 'enemies' since they don't pull this kind of stuff. I would like to know how CBS is allowing this change to go on... I mean if Cryptic and Perfect World Entertainment for example turned STO into an online dating simulator then CBS would most likely be knocking their door down with legal documents before they could upload the code to either Tribble or Redshirt. So my big question is why is CBS so silent right now? They are turning STO into what feels like a parody of EVE. So can we call STO F2P, Ferengi Online where you can be a Space Pirate and a crooked merchant.

What next the Ferengi Conquest of Vulcan to get more Vulcan Love Slaves?

Forget the pitchforks and torches... this system is going to roast itself if it continues in this direction. All I'll do is sit back and watch, and when Cryptic starts crying about the failed changeover... I know a lot of people will be able to honestly say "We told you this would happen but you wouldn't listen."

I know CBS has to vet all major changes to STO, so who at CBS vetted this stuff?

Not likely. Getting answers out of Cryptic is like tring to catch a greased up pig.

Oh that is simple, use a net not your hands.
How long before we have to trap someone in a net to get some answers. Real answers, not 'hey look a shiny is over there, ignore what we are doing over here behind the curtain.
But the real question do we need to chase down someone at Cryptic, Perfect World Entertainment, or CBS... or all three.

[Archived Post]

"Faith? I dated a girl named Faith. She cheated on me, with a girl named Chastity." - Tom Sizemore, Red Planet

[Archived Post]

Same.

Spin up the slipstream drive and set course for a galaxy far, far away.

I'm sorry I need to quote this. As that is exactly what i have done. Cryptic...So sorry...but you've allowed the star trek license to and forgive my language...get shat all over.

[Archived Post]

I'm sorry I need to quote this. As that is exactly what i have done. Cryptic...So sorry...but you've allowed the star trek license to and forgive my language...get shat all over.

Listen folks, Star Trek isn't owned by Cryptic, they lease is from CBS, Stahl said this so many times. You **** and moan about PW, but CBS/Desilue still owns Star Trek.. They aren't going to satifsy your wet-dreams about it . CBS has a lore they want to follow, why do you think the new Star Trek paid tribute to the old instead of total earaser? Because you can't erase 5 dvd sets. In fact Cryptic has lived up to license. They kept Shatner timeline instead of the Abrahms.

[Archived Post]

I'm sorry I need to quote this. As that is exactly what i have done. Cryptic...So sorry...but you've allowed the star trek license to and forgive my language...get shat all over.

The Tribble FTP server has been up for what? only a week? This system is going to take *months* to change/tweak/balance. If they had a firm release date (say October 14th), and this was pretty much the game we were getting, I'd agree with you. But, right now, they've made a lot of changes in just the past week since it's gone live, and Heretic and others ahve stated things *are* getting looked at, changed, tweaked, etc, so, to give up faith after just one week seems, I dunno. I'd say shortsighed perhaps.

I'll be more concerned if things don't get changed as the beta testing continues, but, I just can't see it after just a week.

[Archived Post]

The Tribble FTP server has been up for what? only a week? This system is going to take *months* to change/tweak/balance. If they had a firm release date (say October 14th), and this was pretty much the game we were getting, I'd agree with you. But, right now, they've made a lot of changes in just the past week since it's gone live, and Heretic and others ahve stated things *are* getting looked at, changed, tweaked, etc, so, to give up faith after just one week seems, I dunno. I'd say shortsighed perhaps.

I'll be more concerned if things don't get changed as the beta testing continues, but, I just can't see it after just a week.

Keep telling yourself that. They always say "remember it's subject to change", but when have they ever really done anything more than minor tweaks?

[Archived Post]

Keep telling yourself that. they always say "remember it's subject to change", but when have they ever really done anything more than minor tweaks?

Yeah, subject to change my ***, we see how things are tested and pushed live despite any feedback, cryptics track record speaks for itself.

[Archived Post]

The Tribble FTP server has been up for what? only a week? This system is going to take *months* to change/tweak/balance. If they had a firm release date (say October 14th), and this was pretty much the game we were getting, I'd agree with you. But, right now, they've made a lot of changes in just the past week since it's gone live, and Heretic and others ahve stated things *are* getting looked at, changed, tweaked, etc, so, to give up faith after just one week seems, I dunno. I'd say shortsighed perhaps.

I'll be more concerned if things don't get changed as the beta testing continues, but, I just can't see it after just a week.

Totally agree with you. It is a "test". I don't know why people have blown their load over it, but so be it, but me being a CMD 3 after a week, I am having great time messing with Doff system and having people by my stuff on the fake "exchange" so can get "energy" to buy better weapons with a lower ship.

[Archived Post]

Yeah, subject to change my ***, we see how things are tested and pushed live despite any feedback, cryptics track record speaks for itself.

You have Star Wars as your avatar, you already appear to have mind made up. Lets see how this new Star Wars games goes. So many have failed before. I am all up in it because I love me some Star Wars, but not as much as Star Trek. but I have already heard whisperings for Gamestop folks that this Star Wars, though cool, won't be quite what they offered. Gee imagine that. A company says something that doesna't pan out.

[Archived Post]

You have Star Wars as your avatar, you already appear to have mind made up. Lets see how this new Star Wars games goes. So many have failed before. I am all up in it because I love me some Star Wars, but not as much as Star Trek. but I have already heard whisperings for Gamestop folks that this Star Wars, though cool, won't be quite what they offered. Gee imagine that. A company says something that doesna't pan out.

I'm confused, are you arguing for or against Cryptic?

Also, people are "blowing their load" and "getting they're panties in a wad" (the sexism bit is nice) because Cryptic hasn't ever been receptive to feedback. The FACT that they have had things pushed live knowing full-well that there are issues really cements the issue.

[Archived Post]

I'm confused, are you arguing for or against Cryptic?

Also, people are "blowing their load" and "getting they're panties in a wad" (the sexism bit is nice) because Cryptic hasn't ever been receptive to feedback. The FACT that they have had things pushed live knowing full-well that there are issues really cements the issue.

Glad you like my sexism, but you say Cryptic hasn't been receptive to criticsm? Why have the change the ship buying? Before they wanted you suffer though grinding. Now they will satiisfy you cry babies by giving you ship at reduced price. And I'm sorry for the confusion but Star Wars was great. VI through VIII, I through III suck. Lucas should be ashamed.

[Archived Post]

You have Star Wars as your avatar, you already appear to have mind made up. Lets see how this new Star Wars games goes. So many have failed before. I am all up in it because I love me some Star Wars, but not as much as Star Trek. but I have already heard whisperings for Gamestop folks that this Star Wars, though cool, won't be quite what they offered. Gee imagine that. A company says something that doesna't pan out.

Yeah we'll see, Im kinda Meh about Star Wars so far... I really do like Star Trek more, however my wallet no longer likes the abuse. Im not going to take much crap from Bioware either. BF3 looks ok...Im leaning that direction. The avatar is just a statement of my dissatisfaction with the direction this game has taken.

[Archived Post]

Glad you like my sexism, but you say Cryptic hasn't been receptive to criticsm? Why have the change the ship buying? Before they wanted you suffer though grinding. Now they will satiisfy you cry babies by giving you ship at reduced price. And I'm sorry for the confusion but Star Wars was great. VI through VIII, I through III suck. Lucas should be ashamed.

<Confuzzled> No, see they've done the exact opposite. Instead of having to grind for the Refits you didn't select or one of the optional Level cap ships, you now have to grind for every ship past Lt. Commander. Or you can buy the damn things off of the C-store. Which is the problem summed up, am I correct, almost everyone else who replied to the thread?

Also, you seem to have invented a Star Wars Trilogy.

Edit: For fairness/clarification; added "past Lt. Commander".

[Archived Post]

I would gladly trust Cryptic again if they do 6 things:

1. Give Foundry free for every F2P player (Deal breaker for F2P people want to stay playing PVE)
2. Make respecing skills for everyone free at all times. (Deal breaker for F2P people want to stay playing PVP)
3. Don't screw crafting make it better, so you can craft almost anything but ships.
4. Enlarge whole starmap x 10 and make daily missions / stories in them.
5. Public apology to current STO customers for using their money & time for bug testing
totally bugged new game.
6. If PW forces you to do something, let them tell us bad news, we don't want to hate
cryptic for lying, because it affects all new game projects & games.

And if cryptic can't follow this path of being healthy spirited company, i will do all in my power to
ruin their future by telling everyone what a crappy company this and PW is.

And after all, i think that mission is to get most money for this game by getting people to stay onboard STO, even in future and spending huge amount of cashiola in c-store for ships & weapons & FEs = fast progress & happy F2P people.

[Archived Post]

I lost faith the second they moved this thread off the general discussion and into free to play feedback,

this is a general discussion, and hiding this thread here isn't going to make the problems the people are talking about in it go away.

[Archived Post]

I'm not a regular poster here - infact I generally prefer to lurk.

I've been reading the forums as of late and see alot of naysayers - normally I'd take it with a pinch of salt but several of these newer threads aren't just the naysayers - and that has me somewhat concerned.

I had a feeling of trepidation when the Atari -> PW move was announced but I knew nothing about PW so figured I'd see what happens.

I've been playing on Tribble for the past several days - the only positive things I've experienced is the DOFF system and the fact I took a walk down memory lane of the early days in my T2 Escort when I first started playing.

I can't make the points any better or any more direct than anyone else here - but to say I'm concerned with what I'm seeing is an understatement.

It seems to no longer be case of "To Boldly Go Where No-One Has Gone Before" but more "To Boldly Go - As Long As Your Wallet Allows".

Maybe that's putting it too simply.
Bottom line is that I'm losing faith in STO and the company behind it, I honestly didn't think that would happen anytime soon but the way I'm seeing things go at the moment, it's making me question my earlier decision to buy a LTS (not that I can do anything about it now).

However - I'm going to sit firmly on the fence, see what happens. I have my concerns, but I also have what's come before - the really good stuff that I (and many others) have enjoyed.

I truely hope someone at Cryptic is reading these forums and taking notes - if your customers aren't happy then they'll walk.

[Archived Post]

Heres the question though. At what point do you walk away from STO? What is the final straw?

For me it was the "Diaper Sprint/IHateDaddySprint". Watching my female borg tac flail around like an infant as she ran from one side of ESD to another was it. So I walked away from the game for a while. I'm still ****ed at them for that. Getting my new female Borg Tac (in all her borg looking glory) on the F2P server and watching her flail while sprinting was pretty damn ridiculous.

As a woman as well as a player, I felt marginalized. The game waved it's butt in my face and said "THIS IS NOT FOR YOU." One of the things I very much enjoyed about the game was the fact that women didn't run in some oddly sexed up way that made them look like lizards or lacking spines.

The fact that the F2P Tribble Test feels both restrictive (Forced chain progression, timed events, forced DAILIES) and honestly like I'm being mugged for trying to see past the fact that they made all my female characters look like jokes every time they start sprinting without holding a rifle. I was looking forward to the DOFF system and it's honestly underwhelming.

When I'm starting to consider switching to TOR when it comes out as viable option for a space based MMO (which I swore I'd never do) instead of hanging out on STO, well... that's when I know I'm past the point of no return.

[Archived Post]

Heres the question though. At what point do you walk away from STO? What is the final straw?

December 20th 2011

[Archived Post]

I lost faith the second they moved this thread off the general discussion and into free to play feedback,

this is a general discussion, and hiding this thread here isn't going to make the problems the people are talking about in it go away.

No, but it does take it out of the spotlight and they do this every time they can get away with it. It's ok for the "powers that be" to put these F2P posts wherever they want but it's not ok for us to do so.

If you arnen't accustomed to the hipocracy by now, welcome to the club, this has been happening since release. We post a critical thread, and it gets shoved into a black hole, they post a thread and it can be wherever the hell they want it to be. This is the way it works here, they simply don't want to hear from us, so they attempt to silence us by killing the thread in a black hole.

[Archived Post]

In a dream, far in the future.

Science Officer: We are detecting a 0.0001 phase variance in the slipstream drive.
Captain: Ignore it, it will correct itself.
Science Officer: 0.0002, 0.0003, 0.0004. Its increasing dramatically sir!
Captain: Your scanners must be set incorrectly, recalibrate them.
Science Officer: If we continue in the slipstream, we'll fall out!
Captain: Very well Commander, I will fix the problem. Captain to Engineering. Feed more dilithium into the slipstream drive.
Science Officer: .... *Goes to a lifeboat.*
Captain: Come back here Commander, you are needed at your post.
Science Officer: I am recalibrating the scanners sir.
Captain: Oh, good. Carry on then.
Science Officer: *Prepares to eject* Sir, the scanners report the same phase variance!
Captain: That can't be right, my console says everything is fine.
Science Officer: *Ejects* I am off to join the Borg sir. Have a good flight!
Captain: Good-bye. Ensign, take his station.
Suddenly, there are no Ensigns left on the bridge, and the ship is reduced to a skeleton crew.
Lifepods eject, and then the ship falls out of slipstream, into a Borg Armada. The crew is assimilated by a Tactical Fusion Cube, and eventually, the Borg take over the entire galaxy.

Then Vice Admiral Jadaris wakes from his nightmare, and truly hopes that the world of STO will not end in such a way.Just in case, he preps the Thunderstorm for a mission that he will never return from, and never wish to return from. Borg technology and Aegis set integrated with the ship, he will go where no Joined Trill has gone before, and never return.

Eulogy for STO F2P

(I have finally lost my faith in STO as well, but still believe in a dream that ship purchasing will be the same as it was before dilithium testing.)

[Archived Post]

Not quite loosing faith yet, and I don't normally respond to high pressure threads like this. The reason I am responding, is because I'm bothered that the Devs / customer support is only really responding to threads about the duty officer system or C-Store, while seeming to have blinders on to everything else.

Announcements are vague, and there is really no behind the scenes direction as to what exactly is "test", and what is on final shakedown before going production. They only really got involved with Dilithium threads after they became somewhat heated, and still leave a lot of questions. The Blog post is only really a PR move, and doesn't explain why we are limited on refining, and why ships & good equipment cost so much more than before (when you consider time investment involved to earn it). TBH, I wouldn't be amazed to see purple weapons packs show up on C-Store in the next few weeks, for 1200+ C-Store points. Clearly earning them in game is now a Time Vampire.

The selective hearing / understanding is what bothers me. We are all trek fans, and most importantly (you would think to them), customers.

[Archived Post]

Well granted that this is by far the largest thread that is now moved into the F2P forums I would hope that someone in management would have the gusto to attempt to stop the fire before it starts.

That being said I would really like an answer for why it was decided that all of the missions needed to be linearized to such an extreme degree....seriously.

There is no longer even the illusion of choice on if I want to go continue to bash romulans, or take a break and go assist the deferi or investigate the devidian menace.

You are just begging for a random bug to pop up in a complex mission like the Saturday's Child chain and bring an abrupt HALT to all the low level progression.

Then imagine all the fast labor reallocation, QA cycles (if there is any QA left at this point) and patch work and damage control that you would have to do for that?

Not pretty.

Also when will you finally stop beating around the KDF bushes and actually give the community what we've been asking for, for upwards of a year now, more actual KDF content?

[Archived Post]

Forcing people to log in everyday for dailies is stupid.

[Archived Post]

i accept changes pretty well. I bought my LTS a long time ago because this is Star Trek. I love every series, episode, and movie. This game was and still is the holy grail for me because I can live in my Star Trek universe. BUT, there are people making decisions that are mucking that all up. I have been playing
F2P Tribble and have built my Fed up to Commander 9 and my Klingon is Lt Commander 9. My experience with both is now negative based on THIS

Streamlined Story Arcs - Where is the logic in making to where you can't jump back and forth between different story arcs? Just open this option up, and keep the next current mission deal letting you know what would be next based on the last mission you played.

Dilithium importance - Why oh why since we are in Starleet are we forced to buy ships upon being promoted when they are our duty stations? When I was in the Army I didn't have to rent my barracks room or buy freaking Fort Drum! Make no sense to me. Not Logical to the PLAYER.

Daily Missions - I have always disliked doing the star clusters because after a while it gets REALLY repetitive. I am so tired of seeing that same bluish greensin lab for the two different factions located on opposite sides of the "map". Also, since we have to buy our new ship upon being promoted we are FORCED to play these dailies to earn Dilithium. Now I HATE the star clusters. I would rather take out the trash or wash dishes. I would rather sit here and type all this out that sit on STO and try to earn Dlithium in Star Clusters so I can buy my Commander ship after I have been promoted to Captain. Its CRAZY. I have seen no fans of this and actually people who usually take Cryptics side are now saying WAIT, this is dumb. I am in that group.

Klingons - Do I really need to explain? I will a little. When I created my new Klingon I was given equipment, weapons, experience. Everyting I would get if I was to play for a few days. This to me is about the dumbest thing ever. For me it takes away from the experience. Maybe because I am spoiled. I thought it was right to work and earn achievements. Instead, because of lack of content, or something else that I can't say on here, we start out deeper in to level progression. I hate this and from this day forward I will never create another KDF toon. Maybe with the weekly episodes that is supposed to start back someday just focus on the KDF faction at first. There is plenty of FED things, Cryptic and Foundry side. Alternate with every series. That makes more sense that doing what has been done to Klingons on Tribble.

Well that about sums up my gripes. Im sure there will be more. basically, everyone, I will just stop playing, delete the STO icon my desktop and forget this game exists if these things dont somehow change. Maybe I could learn to get used to it but I doubt it. Time will tell for me.

[Archived Post]

I have to say, the dilithium system is not that bad when you factor in events. I made 4000 refined dilithium just for repeating the Fed mirror event. Which by the way rocks.

[Archived Post]

I have to say, the dilithium system is not that bad when you factor in events. I made 4000 refined dilithium just for repeating the Fed mirror event. Which by the way rocks.



I guess my point is that you are forced to do one or the other. Or some other type daily that gives Dilithium. Which sucks if you don't like doing either. OR if you dont have the time to farm the big D.

[Archived Post]

Any mmo that forces you to grind inorder to advance is bad. The Dilithium system in it's current state is grinding. This is a game not a second job.

[Archived Post]

Lost my faith in Cryptic a long time ago.
PW just ordred them to make as much fast cash with the game as possible after they bought it up.

The game is going Star Cash Online

[Archived Post]

Any mmo that forces you to grind inorder to advance is bad. The Dilithium system in it's current state is grinding. This is a game not a second job.

Have you seen the new borg salvage system then? how you need not just borg salvage but a $#!T ton of it to get what you want and how little you get from grinding? it's insane what they're trying to do with the new economy here. Each paid subscription after F2P goes live should come with a pair of STO socks with hand prints that show you exactly where to grab your ankles.....

[Archived Post]

Oh Boy you are more naive than I though. Did you really believe for a minute that the new Cryptic administration under Chinesse control gave a crap about your Lifers or monthly subscribers? Sadly mistaken folks, they dont give a hoot in a howler for us.

[Archived Post]

While I'm sure many of you know me as a dissenter, I have had my reasons for being so against this game's direction over the last several months. (and really have been against it, since I've been pvping.... which makes it well over a year actually :( )

I think I will take my time now, to elaborate on the why now.

Since I started playing this game, my initial impression, and reaction to the game was actually quite positive. I could see a very rough product that needed to be refined, and sculpted into a master piece, the form and potential, was nothing short of utterly brilliant.

What I saw when I first subbed to this game, and the initial few months was that. Rough, and needing a masterful job to fully realize the concepts and gameplay potential.

As the seasons rolled by, I wondered when they were going to update pvp content, various promises were always made, and never delivered upon always "we need to do X first.. but soon". (this sound familiar to you PvE guys yet? We'd been enduring that line much longer)

Gameplay changes were made that no one asked for, while core underlying problems were ignored time and time again. (Case in point... Tricobalt and Plasma Nerf, while Voldemort is still running rampant) Balance changes, which were heavy handed, and indeed quite often Counter to what the pvp community asked for were slapped in as an after thought time and time again. (RSP's change among so many others. There were so many good solutions proposed instead of the one cryptic put on tribble at the time, but they did what they wanted to do anyway. And that's just one example, Torp Spread is another ) We were promised that pve rewards would never negatively impact the gameplay, however with every Featured Episode, the rewards constantly affected pvp very negatively. From the initial ghost buster gun one shotting enemy teams, to Scorpion fighters clogging up the UI so badly, and going friendly immediately after their deployer left the combat zone. To the cloaking tractor mines, which could be spammed to not just clog the UI, but perma disable enemy teams. (making them able to constantly shoot and harass you, and you unable to shoot them... meaning perpetual red alert. I don't think I have to explain why this is bad on huge pvp maps) time and time again cryptic slapped the pvp community in the face.

Overall, the game had been taking a steadily increasing series of steps in the negative direction. WOW, was a very distant memory for me, and I resubbed to it recently just post cataclysm. It was nothing short of shocking as to just how low my standards had fallen for this game in what I was willing to consider acceptable for the money I shelled out for this game. (not just in subs, but Respecs.... god only knows just how many respecs I've bought, plus a few ship skins, bridge packs, and the Excels, Karfi, and MVAM I bought) I have since cancelled my sub to wow again after playing it for 3 months. I was introduced to RIFT, and haven't looked back at either STO or WOW. My sub runs out November 1st. It would have ended last month, but I felt I had to take care of some administrative duties within my fleet, so it could easily continue without me as the game moves towards the ground.

When the Rhode Island came, they denied that it was more powerful than the other ships, despite it being blatantly better in almost every measurable way. Later they retracted that statement and embraced it's power. The AMS console, on that stupid T4 failaxy, has now been plaguing T5 pvp, that it's sucked any little bit of enjoyment out of it for most of us.

Testing on the free to pay server. I've realized this game is going to crash hard. I almost regret even subbing this last month for my guys, because this game isn't going to attract thousands of new players. It's an Azn MMO, those fail hard over here for a reason. Westerners have Standards for gaming. Grindfests aren't in those Standards. And this game isn't going to succeed in the East either, because those Free to Play games, do not gouge their players nearly as hard as this one. This game charges you 20 dollars for a ship. That is 5 more dollars than a sub, and realistically unless you like putting your face on the keyboard and rolling it around for week upon week upon week on end to grind up to the next tier of ship which you should get for Free, you'll be shelling out alot more than 20 USDs a month, as each tier goes by extremely quickly. So this is left with what... who's going to join this game?

Certainly not many Westerners... and only fairly well off Easteners.... talk about a niche market that's even smaller than the very tiny fraction of one they have now. (oh, and this game has no where near 100k subs according to mmo data, and what I've personally seen in various zones... and I play during Prime Time for mmos)

F2P is also coming out at a very bad time. This should have gone down a year ago... because lets face it 2010 was a fairly spartan year for good pc games. There's a bloody swath of them coming this year that promises to break the wallets of gamers the world over. And that's not counting the perennial console titles coming either.

So what kept me here all of this time? The community. And now that the community is by and large departing, (certainly opvp seems to be) I have no reason to stay. The community for this game, was one of the best, most helpful and cooperative out there. No other community I played with would willingly tie arms behind their backs in order for everyone to have fun in pvp. And that's just one example, to say nothing of various events the pvp community has hosted, and the myriad of friendships made. Now that, is ending there's nothing to look forward to. I'm going to miss my cohorts and partners in crime, but I suspect I'll be seeing most of them again come 12-20-2011 if not sooner in various other games.

[Archived Post]

Yeah. A lot of bad decisions being made here. Im seeing a train wreck a few months down the road. Like, around Dec/Jan...

Hopefully they continue to read the forums, and continue to see what we are saying. I still have hope... But...

As a side note: Bashing them does nothing. Bashing those who disagree with the decisions does nothing. Lets try to act as mature as this community can be in this time of un-certainty.

[Archived Post]

Yeah. A lot of bad decisions being made here. Im seeing a train wreck a few months down the road. Like, around Dec/Jan...

Hopefully they continue to read the forums, and continue to see what we are saying. I still have hope... But...

As a side note: Bashing them does nothing. Bashing those who disagree with the decisions does nothing. Lets try to act as mature as this community can be in this time of un-certainty.

I agree, presenting the facts does come across as more constructive.

It is unfortunate that many of us (myself included) have for so long had an emotional investment in Star Trek and consequently the MMo Cryptic made.