Well, I didn't use either in the 3+ months I spent playing right before closing, so it's not like I was particularly missing anything from not doing it...

--- Philip

	Philip J. Moyer Contributing Writer, Editor and Artist (and Moderator) -- Eyrie Productions, Unlimited CEO of MTS, High Poobah Of Artwork, and High Priest Of the Church Of Aerianne -- Magnetic Terrapin Studios "Insert Pithy Comment Here" Fandoms -- Fanart

True, but it was the principle of the thing. PvP in particular brought down the tone. It's like letting the Hell's Angels into the neighborhood. Even if they don't beat you up, they're lowering the property values. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

Just ask them to provide security. Nothing could go wrong with that approach!

I somehow doubt you'll miss much. Unless Cryptic pull a complete 180, the best endgame gear will still come from rep and fleet holdings. You might get get one or two decent items from crafting, but hopefully they'll wind up on the Exchange.

If you can trust the devs, crafting seems to have settled into Cryptics usual mostly acceptable pattern. There is going to be a 20 hour project that just levels you up in a crafting school, so you don't have to long on on the hour every hour to level up in a timely manner. Doing it that way would have taken 350 hours, the project is supposed to be a bit slower, so probably 18 or so days until you can make end game stuff in one school. At least as things stand now.

As for my thoughts, well, if things stay the way they are, its Cryptic's typical F2P model. I don't begrudge them trying to make a buck, I just wish they would be more honest about it. Take Star Wars, The Old Republic(TOR), for instance. The claim has been made, and its pretty true that they charge the F2P player for everything in that game. And I say, yes, but at least they are honest about it. With STO, they make a lot of noise about how you never have to spend any money of your own to get anything in the game, and again, they are correct. But what they don't say is how heavily the game is getting stacked against not just the F2P player, but every player, F2P, sub, or lifetime to do anything in a reasonable amount of time without spending money.

Life this new crafting system. To craft the good stuff, you need to get very rare materials. There are only three places where you can possibly get those materials.

1. Elite queues, and there you only get a chance to get Very rares, and even then, its only up to three, and you might not get the right ones even.
   
2. A doff mission, which costs some dilithium, and again, might not give you want you want.
   
3. Finally, the c-store box, of course, and even then, you might not get the right material that you need.
   

But its something else to mess around with while I wait for the next thing to come from Cryptic, and its the only Star Trek game in town, and fits my schedule, so why not?

I will add that if anyone wants me to craft stuff for them, I'll do it, on three conditions. I'm not going to be power leveling all the schools, for different gear, so if you have to have it now, I might not be your best bet. I will try my best, but I am not responsible for not getting the mods or level you want. Three, don't worry about the dilithium, that's chicken feed for me to build stuff, for the most part. But you want something crafted, please give me the very rare materials for it, that's where the real bottle neck in this system is.

Also, I plan to make a killing in the first few days selling off any very rare materials I find.

And on that note, clear skies all.

I'm going to just reply to the bits that leaped out at me.

>As for my thoughts, well, if things stay the way they are, its
>Cryptic's typical F2P model. I don't begrudge them trying to make a
>buck, I just wish they would be more honest about it. Take Star Wars,

Please do! I don't want it any more!

>The Old Republic(TOR), for instance. The claim has been made, and its
>pretty true that they charge the F2P player for everything in that
>game. And I say, yes, but at least they are honest about it. With

This is, I think, a little bit oversimplified and a whole lot more forgiving than I at least manage to be. Both games are up front and honest in the technical sense about the differences between F2P and P2P. You can claim that SW:TOR didn't lie about things, in that they never committed to anything in particular, as they shifted to a F2P model, but even the most ardent fanboy has to admit that they have gone much, much further towards screwing the F2P players than STO ever has.

Honest? Maybe. But Honest John down at the used car dealership is that sort of 'honest' too, and I don't like that any better. STO at least hasn't ever screwed me and made me pay (again!) for things that I'd already purchased.

>STO, they make a lot of noise about how you never have to spend any
>money of your own to get anything in the game, and again, they are
>correct. But what they don't say is how heavily the game is getting
>stacked against not just the F2P player, but every player, F2P, sub,
>or lifetime to do anything in a reasonable amount of time without
>spending money.

If you have examples, I'd *really* like to see them. I'm wondering if we're playing the same game, is all -- or perhaps we just have vastly different expectations. The only part where I see it taking 'unreasonable' amounts of time is how long it takes to convert dilithum to zen in order to make big c-store purchases. However, that being said, it *still* doesn't take long. It took me about a month to generate enough zen for a Vesta bundle, for example. I got lazy and outright paid (during a bonus zen event, hah!) for the Tempest, but it would've only taken me a couple more weeks to earn it had I not decided I didn't want to wait.

Dilithium earning power is the same between F2P and P2P, and really everything is tied to dilithium earn rate. I don't know if you've run them yet but the ground battlezone is a fantastic way to earn dilithium, and the devs have actually made it easier in the latest patches. You can get 6000 - 9000 dilithium in an hour without even trying particularly hard, and it doesn't hurt that the missions to do it are actually pretty fun. That's above your refining cap (again, the same between F2P and P2P), so you're at worst talking an hour a day if you want to maximize your earning. And I stress *if*.

That's to buy things from the c-store, which I think is the thrust of your argument about how long it takes for $stuff. If I'm wrong, what are you referring to, then?

>Life this new crafting system. To craft the good stuff, you need to
>get very rare materials. There are only three places where you can
>possibly get those materials.
>
>* Elite queues, and there you only get a chance to get Very rares,
>and even then, its only up to three, and you might not get the right
>ones even.

Elite queues are hella fun and if you haven't run them, you should give them a try. You don't even need to worry about crippling your ship any more and having to pay through the nose to fix it -- Spacedock will do it for free.

As for the drop rate: I'm willing to wait and see. As things stand now, I'm routinely converting excess drops to dilithium by way of the rep system because I've got more of the damn things (neural processors, etc) than I can be bothered to do anything with. And I don't grind; our fleet gets together and runs a couple of elites maybe once a week.

>* A doff mission, which costs some dilithium, and again, might not
>give you want you want.

Fair. Not sure if I think this is a bad thing, myself, but you've got a point. I've never liked RNG-reliant systems.

>* Finally, the
>c-store
>box, of course, and even then, you might not get the right material
>that you need.
>

Bah. I haven't found anything yet that I *need* from a lockbox and this doesn't strike me as being any different. If they want to monetize it for people who don't realize that gambling is for suckers, more power to 'em. They're not making it mandatory.

--sofaspud
--

What's that? I want to have access to the full user interface I've had since Beta? That's a real money purchase?

*Quit, uninstall.*

There are lines STO never approached that Old Republic gleefully danced over the second they went F2P. It's the EA way.

Matrix Dragon, J. Random Nutter

Well, to be fair, there's a number of people I know who have paid/lifetime subs that don't have anything left they really want from the C-store, so popping open a few lockboxes is something they do with their monthly stipend from time to time. (Other uses include C-store doff packs, FSMs that go in the fleet bank, and keys to sell on the exchange.)

STO definitely has the best F2P implementation I've encountered -- even Cryptic's other F2P MMOs don't come close. Champions Online isn't too bad, but the freeform character slot thing is a real bear, and Neverwinter lacks a sub option to form a meaningful baseline and, last I've heard, has all kinds of issues with its game economy thanks to its immaturity and lack of said sub option.

In any event, tonight I'll be logging on again to make sure I've gotten both Risa ships on everyone (either in the bank or unpacked and in drydock, for the moment) and make sure nobody's actually still on Risa when the patch drops tomorrow. My play time will still, however, be pretty limited for a little while yet, thanks to RL commitments that take precedence over my hobbies.

For the rest, the reasonable amount of time stuff, well, my words fail me, but it not about what is now, its what could be coming. Now with crafting, you can skip the wait with dilithium. How long before they add that to something like queues, like other games. Sorry you can only play one STF today, unless you want to pay us some dilithium. Maybe it won't happen, but the foot is in the door now. So no, not the C-store, but all the end game stuff that takes dilithium, and all the stuff they could add which will probably take more.

About Elite STFs, have fun with them, I find they lose the fun after the Nth plus 1 time. Same with ground dyson zone. These days, I usually log on for an hour or so, get my 25,000 dilithium when I'm lazy, and maybe play a foundry mission for laughs.

Oh yeah, season 9.5 launches tomorrow. If you didn't know this, don't feel bad, the official announcement came from Twitter and was confirmed on reddit.

So you're upset about what *might* be, not what *is*. Got it.

>crafting, you can skip the wait with dilithium. How long before they
>add that to something like queues, like other games. Sorry you can
>only play one STF today, unless you want to pay us some dilithium.
>Maybe it won't happen, but the foot is in the door now. So no, not
>the C-store, but all the end game stuff that takes dilithium, and all
>the stuff they could add which will probably take more.

They haven't done it yet, they've made no indications of doing so, and their track record demonstrates more good faith towards their playerbase than the example you cited.

I mean, sure, I could assume that they're going to start doing all sorts of things. But I'd have no evidence to support that stance.

>About Elite STFs, have fun with them, I find they lose the fun after
>the Nth plus 1 time. Same with ground dyson zone. These days, I
>usually log on for an hour or so, get my 25,000 dilithium when I'm
>lazy, and maybe play a foundry mission for laughs.
>

Well, I *do* have fun with them, so, thanks? As for the rest... I dunno. I get the impression from what you're posting here that (1) you don't like the game, but it's the only tolerable Star Trek game in town, and (2) you've reached the stage with it where you're more interested in maximising your return on investment than playing it for the play experience.

Which, y'know, cool? If that floats your boat, more power to you and all that. But I think that kind of exemplifies why your antagonism towards the devs and what they're doing completely baffles me:

We are playing two different games.

>Oh yeah, season 9.5 launches tomorrow. If you didn't know this, don't
>feel bad, the official announcement came from Twitter and was
>confirmed on reddit.

I'm... not sure why I would, or should, feel bad about not knowing that? I get the feeling you're hinting at something re: STO, but I'm drawing a blank as to what it could be.

--sofaspud
--

From the phrasing, it sounds like a poke at Cryptic/PWE for not actually announcing it in the game('s forums), relying instead on other media.

Yeah, looking at what I am saying, I have become bittervet about this, so I'll stop now.

(now replying to StClair)

And yes it is a poke at Cryptic/PWE for not releasing the final dev blogs about the season until today, same day the season launches, and also using twitter to tell people when the season will launch instead of doing it on the main game site. But again, I'm becoming bittervet about it, so I'll stop now.

Oh hey, that reminds me, I need to do some math on how much more Magic Purple Space Rock I need for the Science Destroyer bundle. Next weeks event might well get me past the line.

Matrix Dragon, J. Random Nutter

If they took away the RNG element, I would be pretty happy with crafting as well, but I don't think that's likely. Still one can hope.

The snow was cold, wet, leaking into my shoes and I'm pretty sure some of it's suspiciously yellow.

Matrix Dragon, J. Random Nutter

Or fly our ship around Spacedock. The interior, I mean.

Ah... good times. :D

--sofaspud
--

I love when that bug makes a return appearance.

Matrix Dragon, J. Random Nutter

Previously, you could slot multiple projects that lasted 20 hours and gave you a fair chunk of xp in the crafting system, and all of that meant that you could get up to level 15 in about 33 days. Apparently, that is to fast for Cryptic unless you use dilithium.

Cryptic will be patching in tomorrow morning a fix so that you can now only run one of those 20 hour projects for each school at a time. So, if you are only running those projects to level up, you will get to level 15 in 105 days starting from 0.

On the other hand, you could craft about 1050 Mark VI items in a school, which will cost you about 40950 pieces of materials, and depending on how hard core will take you anywhere between 66 days (crafting 16 items over a four hour play session) to 11 days (crafting 4 items ever hour, 24/7).

Or, you could take the option that Cryptic wants you to, and blow about 1.9 million dilithium to finish it all now. At current prices, that's about 120 bucks worth of zen, and apparently, if the exchange is to be believed, a couple people have already done that.

On the bright side, in the long run, you will be able to get four schools to level 15 in about the same amount of time as you could using mulitple projects, but after that, the old system still wins by about a month.

As for me, well, I'll be holding my shiny in about 3 months.

The old crafting system could be ground through in about half an hour of boring, repetitive clicking. I know; that's how I got my Aegis set. This is hardly rewarding for the player and also fails to meet the goal of providing a dilithium sink.

If you really really truly cannot wait for the cooldown, you can pour your dilithium down the black hole and get your shinies early. As noted upthread, I'm not sure why this is an attractive option for anyone here (I can make plenty of assumptions about the general playerbase), since PvP isn't a Thing around these parts and the shinies aren't ever going to put you at a disadvantage unless you PvP, but okay, the option is there.

If you don't want to pour your money down the hole, you can still get there in a fairly reasonable amount of time. And I strongly suspect tweaking, much like the reputation system, will occur over the next couple of months.

On the whole I think this is a good change, both the new crafting system and the patching of the loophole that seems like it should have been caught in testing.

--sofaspud
--