Star Trek Online Discussion Thread (now free to play!)

[Amaris]

Isn't the Vesta only slightly smaller than the Sovereign-class? That'd probably eliminate it from being used as an escort.

Plus Cryptic will usually ignore the intended role of the vessel anyway. Hence the Nebula-class as a science ship in-game.

I don't know, I always figured the Nebula class for a science vessel, like an up-to-date Miranda class.

Anyhoo, has anyone seen the servers today?! They're packed! I was in a LONG queue before I ever got in to play, and even then I was only in 15 minutes before I got bumped. The STO forums just went down due to all of the activity, too! It's a mixed blessing, but yay, STO is busy!

The thing is the Nebula-class generally did the same type of missions that we saw the Enterprise-D do in the series. If we're going by what we saw, then why can't we have a Galaxy-class as a science vessel too.

The Galaxy class was a science vessel (among other things), built primarily for exploration. She just happened to have a kickass defense system, too.

Every diagram I've seen of the Nebula class, though, shows it to be a bit weaker in the defense department, and higher in the sciences department, when compared to the Galaxy class.

 

[syberghost]

Game is fun enough, but they really need to get their act together technically. Servers were also slammed when I logged in earlier, had queues to get in, etc. They had better put more resources online before the FEs start back up next weekend, or they are going to lose a lot of new F2P players that are turned off by this...

It's happening because they increased the population caps to keep the new players from being shut out by login queues. They're working on stability fixes and further increases. It's a balancing act; there were queues this afternoon, despite the fact the game currently has a higher player cap than it's ever had in its history.

There were also plenty of people in the office working today on those fixes. If this was easy everybody'd be doing it.

 

[intrinsical]

Game is fun enough, but they really need to get their act together technically. Servers were also slammed when I logged in earlier, had queues to get in, etc. They had better put more resources online before the FEs start back up next weekend, or they are going to lose a lot of new F2P players that are turned off by this...

It's happening because they increased the population caps to keep the new players from being shut out by login queues. They're working on stability fixes and further increases. It's a balancing act; there were queues this afternoon, despite the fact the game currently has a higher player cap than it's ever had in its history.

There were also plenty of people in the office working today on those fixes. If this was easy everybody'd be doing it.

Every single MMO I have played with has had teething issues when faced with a sudden and larger than anticipated increase in the number of players. This isn't something that can simply be solved by just adding more servers and hardware, although having more hardware does help alleviate some of the issues a little.

Syberghost, I'm assuming you either work for Cryptic or know people who do? If so please feedback to them that as a long time supporter of Cryptic (since day 1 City of Heroes), I'm happy enough with STO and am seriously considering a lifetime subscription. Job well done.

 

[Amaris]

Yep. They'll sort it out. Still...

It can get a little annoying.
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[USS Mariner]

Request to join the TBBS Armada

erika gabriel@nickmariner

Joined at the start of F2P, I think I've spent about oh, 40-50 dollars in costumes and interiors, though my best purchase was the TMP costumes and the TOS bundle. As nice as the Galaxy and Destiny Bridges are, the fact that the default interiors blow ass in comparison to the TOS interior in terms of (physically acceptable) scale and interactivity.

I practically shit my pants when I realized that you can sit in every chair, as well as the neato blast shutters, and trophy options in the lounge.

Honestly, the lack of both options and any thought in the interior system really prevents me from getting an account (plus my current lack of employment, but I gotta stand by principle ).

First, the way one switches from "tactical" view to Bridge view is the largest immersion breaking event in the game. I understand that the game's coding treats the bridge as it's own "world", which is fine, if they would replace beaming out with your character just walking into the turbolift, or if that's too much effort, just cut away from the scene before the beaming animation starts.

Also, why can't I actually enter tactical view when I'm sitting in my captain's chair? That's a no brainer. And speaking of chairs, why the hell can't I sit in other bridge or ready room seats like I can in the TOS pack? I know it's only a matter of assigning a point to each prop, so why haven't they retroactively done this to every bridge?

Cryptic, you've really stepped up the game in terms of giving nitpicky fans what they want (the inclusion of TMP department-colored badges is big evidence, even if it's broken for females), and you know we're willing to pay for the extra polish...

So get to waxing.

 

[Jim Gamma]

Most of the answer lies with Atari not being willing to throw more money at a game they thought was "complete" when they bought it - they didn't really understand the concept of MMOs (which are in heavy development all the time to keep people immersed). Most of Atari's games are one- or two-year hits at most, then they fade into memory as new games replace them.

So yeah, they didn't have the money to work on the things that would REALLY make this game immersive.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Yep. They'll sort it out. Still...

It can get a little annoying.
(screenshot taken 5 minutes ago)

Wow I never get out of the single digits, I guess priority login is more useful then people on the STO forums thought.

 

[Amaris]

It usually is, but you know how it is with forums. Everyone has to complain about something being wholly unfair.

 

[Ayelbourne]

I understand that the game's coding treats the bridge as it's own "world", which is fine, if they would replace beaming out with your character just walking into the turbolift, or if that's too much effort, just cut away from the scene before the beaming animation starts.

They actually had this implemented at some point during the first year. I have no idea why they changed it back.

 

[Johnnymuffintop]

Or even just change the beam-out to walking to, say, your captains chair?
Another thing that urks me is that I can't sit in EVERY chair on my bridge of I want to. Takes away from the RP elements a bit when I have my entire group of friends on my bridge but can't have them take stations.

Oh, and something simple that's big bugging me. Those damn pop ups asking me if I want to warp to a different sector and making me do a COMPLETE stop EVEN THOUGH I already told it to set a course to a different sector block. Is is that hard to add some scripting saying "if course to location X is plotted, only launch pop-up prompt for location X unless a directional key is pressed."?

 

[intrinsical]

Most of the answer lies with Atari not being willing to throw more money at a game they thought was "complete" when they bought it - they didn't really understand the concept of MMOs (which are in heavy development all the time to keep people immersed). Most of Atari's games are one- or two-year hits at most, then they fade into memory as new games replace them.

So yeah, they didn't have the money to work on the things that would REALLY make this game immersive.

I agree with this. I have played with all three Cryptic MMOs so far and in general I have been happy with what they have come up with. STO did stun me a little in terms of the number of issues and obvious bugs I have encountered as well as the lack of polish. The most blaring of which are non-functional bridges (this is a near-game breaker for me) and a bug that cause me my Klingon character to fall under the world and prevents him from completing the mission that have apparently gone unfixed for a very long time.

These seem to be issues stemming from Atari pushing STO to go live way too early and pushing Cryptic to focus on content creation rather than fixing what I consider as important bugs and issues. I have no experience with PWE as a publisher, but I hope they do a better job of managing this game.

 

[CorporalClegg]

Gravity Well III is kind of OP against heavy cruisers.

The first time I used it, I burned one down in less than ten seconds. I actually though something was wrong with the game.

 

[Amaris]

Most of the answer lies with Atari not being willing to throw more money at a game they thought was "complete" when they bought it - they didn't really understand the concept of MMOs (which are in heavy development all the time to keep people immersed). Most of Atari's games are one- or two-year hits at most, then they fade into memory as new games replace them.

So yeah, they didn't have the money to work on the things that would REALLY make this game immersive.

I agree with this. I have played with all three Cryptic MMOs so far and in general I have been happy with what they have come up with. STO did stun me a little in terms of the number of issues and obvious bugs I have encountered as well as the lack of polish. The most blaring of which are non-functional bridges (this is a near-game breaker for me) and a bug that cause me my Klingon character to fall under the world and prevents him from completing the mission that have apparently gone unfixed for a very long time.

These seem to be issues stemming from Atari pushing STO to go live way too early and pushing Cryptic to focus on content creation rather than fixing what I consider as important bugs and issues. I have no experience with PWE as a publisher, but I hope they do a better job of managing this game.

I feel bad for Cryptic. They're obviously pushing all of their resources into doing their best, but with all the upper level stuff going on, they can't keep on top of everything.

 

[Rocketeer]

The Nebula cruiser is technically the same as the Galaxy but with a shorter frame and additional sensors giving it more of a scientific mission. Although I can't stand the Galaxy class, the Nebula is one of my favorites. It's Doc Lee's current ship, the "USS Dragon Turtle".


Sorry but I'm almost afraid to ask - what's up with the blue horse? I came home from work and my daughter was watching something like that on Youtube. I made her get off and do her homework. I don't mind her skipping her schoolwork for Star Trek, but blue horses are out of the question... :-P
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[Rocketeer]

Request to join the TBBS Armada

erika gabriel@nickmariner

Joined at the start of F2P, I think I've spent about oh, 40-50 dollars in costumes and interiors, though my best purchase was the TMP costumes and the TOS bundle. As nice as the Galaxy and Destiny Bridges are, the fact that the default interiors blow ass in comparison to the TOS interior in terms of (physically acceptable) scale and interactivity.

I love the TOS bundle. It's fun to put on the TOS uniforms, invite your firends and climb through the jefferies tubes.

One thing that I wish the game had (but would be difficult to implement), it the ability of players to work together on a single ship. Imagine inviting others to occupy the bridge positions on your ship. Using voice chat, you direct your engineers, tactical and science officers on what you need done. I used to play an old paper base game that had this option. You would just hand out a different console sheet to each player. The captain just coordinated the action and gave orders. Wishful thinking...

.

 

[Rocketeer]

Gravity Well III is kind of OP against heavy cruisers.

The first time I used it, I burned one down in less than ten seconds. I actually though something was wrong with the game.

See if you can find a purple Gravimetric Scientist DOFF. They create aftershock gravity wells. You'll be unstoppable.

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[Captain_Amasov]

Well there's a proper Defiant interior coming along with the new FE series, and CaptainGeko has said in an interview recently that there's plans for a Galaxy and Intrepid-class ship interior too.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Well there's a proper Defiant interior coming along with the new FE series, and CaptainGeko has said in an interview recently that there's plans for a Galaxy and Intrepid-class ship interior too.

Didn't also say something about a Soverign interior also being in the works, or am I wrong about that.

 

[Amaris]

The Nebula cruiser is technically the same as the Galaxy but with a shorter frame and additional sensors giving it more of a scientific mission. Although I can't stand the Galaxy class, the Nebula is one of my favorites. It's Doc Lee's current ship, the "USS Dragon Turtle".

I love the Galaxy class, myself, but I also like the Nebula class. I have one outfitted more for gathering than I do fighting, and it's called the "Richard Dawkins". It's a nice balanced ship, IMO.

Sorry but I'm almost afraid to ask - what's up with the blue horse? I came home from work and my daughter was watching something like that on Youtube. I made her get off and do her homework. I don't mind her skipping her schoolwork for Star Trek, but blue horses are out of the question... :-P
.

That would be Rainbow Dash, from "My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic". The scene itself is from the episode "Read It And Weep". If it helps any, in the Season 2 premiere episode "The Return of Harmony", the voice of the villain "Discord", was voiced by John de Lancie, and behaved like Q from TNG. It turns out the people behind Studio B, the animators for the MLP show, are nerds.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

The Nebula cruiser is technically the same as the Galaxy but with a shorter frame and additional sensors giving it more of a scientific mission. Although I can't stand the Galaxy class, the Nebula is one of my favorites. It's Doc Lee's current ship, the "USS Dragon Turtle".

I love the Galaxy class, myself, but I also like the Nebula class. I have one outfitted more for gathering than I do fighting, and it's called the "Richard Dawkins". It's a nice balanced ship, IMO.

You know the best thing about being able to make more than one character is that you never have to choose between your favorite ships as you can use them all on differnet characters.