Agreed....I even fell victim to it myself the opening day of these boxes.

This will not happen, it runs counter to their objectives but I can tell you I've talked with numerous people
that have spend upwards of $200 in keys and received nothing of marked valued.

Which means nothing. It is the luck of the draw, as much as luck can play a part in a preprogrammed thing like this.

Since these started dropping I have had two gold boxes. I used some left over c-points to buy my first key and all I got was a cxp bonus. The second key I bought was using by dilithium to buy the c-points, and I got a galor. Those ar ethe only boxes I have opened.

Also what is of "marked value" is a personal thing. Therefore what the people you have spoken to as having no marked value may hold more value to others. For example in game pets, to me they are a bit of fluff to have if you get them but you can live without them and it not affect your game play. Yet there some out there who weigh them as valuable and will pay almost any amount of in game currency to buy them.

If they had an option to EXCLUDE promotional items from popping up during play, it would be perfect.

But no, if anything, they've added them to more drop tables (Like the featured missions etc)

And crikey, they do drop from the oddest of items (torpedoes/mines and even destructable doors?)

Seperate loot table, I have had them drop from metreon gas as well, they can drop from things that have no other loot. Oh and I think I even had them drop from an NPCs medical generator in the Deferi dailies.

Now onto your first part, if only we could. I have been in mirror events where we are effectively flying through a fleet of boxes as everyone hits pass on the "uncommon" (rather an oxymoronic name for them). The only time I have seen aneed roll on a box is when it was a gold one.

Even an option to auto pass on these things wuld be a nice thing atleast then we don;t have to interputp gameplay to hit pass.

I doubt the Original Poster needs to learn anything, I do think that Cryptic and Perfect World need to step down there techniques to make us part our money from our wallet. It might not be a scam but I would say it borders closely on being one.

A good reputation is hard to earn and easy to damage.

A bad reputation is easy to earn, and damn near impossible to shake.

There are people I know who refuse to buy ANYTHING from Sony, as a result of the Star Wars Galaxies debacle. Sony destroyed their reputation, and it still hasn't recovered, if indeed it ever will.

Cryptic has already done extraordinary damage to their reputation. They look like greedy moneygrubbers who will use any scheme, no matter how despicable, to get as much from us while giving us as little as possible. Only time will tell if the damage is irreparable, but as I said above, it is going to be very hard to shake off the reputation they're earning.

I realize they're in a business, and that their goal is to make money, but there is a point where you have crossed a line between good business and gouging. They've pole vaulted over it, as far as I'm concerned, and I'm not the only one who thinks so. I can only hope that they will realize the error of their ways, however slim the chances of that are.

Well I hope some good comes from this travesty. Namely CONTENT! I hope they use their ill gotten gains to hire more developers and more customer service reps. This is what a sane business would do, unless they are just trying to squeeze as much cash as they can from STO thinking its a lost cause.
Time will tell. Also maybe they should donate a little money to gamblers rehab charity or something.

There are no ill gotten gains here. The game is free. All purchases are completely voluntary.

I agree, ten fold.

You're thinking of "utility" which in this context is roughly "the amount of fun I get from having this item".

Value in this context means market value which is the price at which I am willing to buy and someone else is willing to sell or vice versa.

It's a similar relationship to weather (utility) and climate (value).

Last time I checked the exchange all the pets (and in fact all but a select few of the items in general) were available under 50,000 ec. which is about half the price for a single master key. On the other hand the cross faction console was going for 3,000,000 ec and the galor for 79,000,000 and change.

It's pretty obvious that the valuable items are the galor and the console. Everything else is a limited value regardless of how much utility you get out of it.

Think of it this way. If I really want say: the dilithium Horta, but I open a box with a shield box. I can probably find someone who would trade me straight up, or I can try to sell high, buy low on the exchange and have a reasonable chance of selling the shield for enough to buy the horta. However If I have any one item from the box except a Galor, no one (except possibly the exceptionally ignorant) is going to trade me straight up for a Galor, and I have no chance of selling my item for enough to buy a galor on the exchange.