Season 7 Changes – Now Live!
By PWE_BranFlakes @ November 20, 2012 at 7:00pm
Greetings!
First off, Happy Holidays from the STO Team! It has been pretty hectic around here and we can't believe it has already been a week since the launch of Season 7! Before we go into the Holiday Weekend, the team and I would like to give you a status update.
Season 7 is doing great. Lots of new players are logging in. Plenty of returning players are coming back to check out the new update. Concurrency is up across the board and generally speaking the team is very proud of the work that went into this Season and we are thrilled by all of the wonderful comments about New Romulus and the new Events. You can expect more large zones like this in future Seasons.
Not everything is sunshine and roses, though. As we mentioned in previous posts, we continue to monitor the Dilithium economy reaction to the changes in Season 7 and as previously stated, we will be making some additional adjustments which we feel will address issues that have been discussed. Some of those changes are going to happen in an update tomorrow (Wednesday Nov 21) and some of them are going to happen in the following week's update on Nov 29. If we feel more changes are necessary after that, we will certainly make them because our goal is to keep the game balanced while ensuring that players are having fun. Even though we've managed to get more Dilithium into more players hands, we agree that STF runs and Dilithium have been a challenging change that needs to be addressed and we are going to continue to do so.
First up, we expect to turn Foundry play back on with tomorrow's update. This is great news for Foundry fans and anyone looking to run the Foundry Dilithium Daily mission. We expect to have Foundry editing online in the following week after we've finalized all of our mission regression testing. So far everything looks good and we are in much better shape than we were after Season 6.
Private Queues are going to remain off for another week so that we can get the cool down timers for the missions to be in synch with the cool down timers in the public queues. Once that is confirmed, we'll turn the private queues back on.
The Reputation System, including the STFs are getting some major changes over the next two weeks. Here is a rundown of what is going to happen over the next several Holodeck updates.
- Omega Conversion Crates can be opened immediately. You will no longer need to achieve T3 in Omega Fleet to open these.
- Reputation XP Project timers are dropping from 40 hours to 20 hours across all Tiers. If you have a project in progress, it will not change, but any new projects after the update will be adjusted. We are also looking into adding the ability to drop a project.
- All XP Reputation Projects (projects that reward progress towards your next Tier) will now grant 240 Dilithium (on average) upon completion. If you complete 4 XP Rep Projects a day, you should earn about 960 Dilithium per day from it. These are in addition to the Marks to Dilithium conversion Projects. Once you've completed a Reputation System, these XP Projects will go away, but the Marks to Dilithium conversion projects will remain.
- Reputation Projects that convert Marks to Dilithium are being moved from unlocking at T5 to being available immediately. This allows you to convert Omega Marks and Romulan Marks to Dilithium similar to how you could trade STF items for Dilithium previously.
- Loot drops are getting added to STF mobs as well as to bosses.
- End of STF Loot Rolls are returning. There will once again be a chance to earn special rewards at the end of STFs or Romulan Mark events. These special rewards will be Bonus marks, Borg Neural Processors, or other items needed for Reputation rewards.
- Reputation Advancement Projects (the ones that unlock each tier) are having their timers reduced from 1 hour to 15 mins. and we are removing Dilithium inputs from these Tier Up projects.
- The amount of commodities needed for Romulan Reputation projects is being reduced due to the lack of drops on New Romulus. We will be adding more drops to New Romulus in the future either through enemy kills or daily missions.
- All Reputation Projects are being changed so that you need to claim the reward upon completion. This puts it in line with how Duty Officer assignments work so you can see the rewards you are getting from each project.
We expect all of the above changes to be live before December. A few will be live by tomorrow, with the rest live around Nov 29th. (UPDATE! As of Friday, November 30th, these updates are now live.)
Thank you for your patience. We realize that players have been asking for many of these changes since Season 7 first started appearing on Tribble. We feel much better about making these changes now that we have a week's worth of data on a full Shard (there were only a hundred or so players on Tribble) and are able to see how a full server load of players are interacting with the new Reputation system. We're confident that the above approach will still achieve our balance goals, while putting more of the fun back in the economy. Our end goal has always been to put more Dilithium into the hands of the average player. The above changes should help get us there and put more Dilithium back into STFs.
Season 7 is just getting started and we hope that you'll enjoy all the updates that will come with this Season. Tomorrow we are releasing the next Duty Officer pack which has been specifically tuned to help with Starbase and Embassy construction. Shortly after the Winter Event will begin around December 6th. Last year's Winter Wonderland has been updated to include new missions, a new track, new rewards, a new ship, and plenty of fun that will run through the new year.
We will also be running a full month of Feature Episode Replay where all the limited time rewards from all four series will be available all month long. So if you've got some new characters that need these special items, December is going to be your chance to catch up.
In January we'll be releasing an Andorian Ship on the Federation side to be quickly followed by the STO 3 Year Anniversary Event. This special celebration will be released with a new one-off Feature Episode. If you were at the Star Trek convention in San Francisco this last weekend, Denise Crosby would have you believe that this episode is going to be all about Tasha Yar and Sela. We'll see… anything can happen.
The anniversary event will also offer a new special free ship for both Fed and Kdf players much like we gave away the Odyssey during last year's event.
Moving into February and March we expect to have some more events to talk about and we will begin to start teasing the next Season.
So there is plenty to look forward to in Season 7 and we thank you for continuing to share your feedback and comments with us. Thank you for the both the kudos and the criticism (although some of you need to learn some manners). We get better with every season and we have you to thank for that. We do listen, and while we don't always immediately react, we do deliberate and make changes based on ideas and feedback you submit. The QA team is still crunching through all of your bug reports and we expect to have major issues ironed out soon.
MMOs are wonderful because everything can change and there is almost always a way to improve things. We will continue to grow and evolve.
Keep an eye on the patch notes for when the above changes will hit Holodeck and thank you for making STO awesome.
See you online and Happy Holidays!
Daniel Stahl
Executive Producer
Star Trek Online
zeroknightdx @ Dec 4th, 2012 11:03AM
where are all of the anti-borg weapons
druif266 @ Dec 4th, 2012 8:57AM
A 'optional reward' is not a bad idea, now its just for the accolade. Got all of them.
kerrilyn1 @ Dec 2nd, 2012 11:41PM
Why are loot ROLLS being added back in? The whole game is heavily instanced -- ground/station/social zones, in-system space, sector space, STFs, deep space encounters, red alerts -- but yet loot isn't. Looting and NBG stuffs is nothing more than a benefit-less drama source. Instead, if we're going to have loot in STFs, let's have _instanced looting_! That way, everybody can have the loot that they crave, with none of the artery-hardening, calorie-laden drama that everybody hates! Plus it goes with the "everything is instanced" theme.
zeroknightdx
lol it for bonus loot every one dose get loot. just some will et more lol
tiberiusforest @ Dec 2nd, 2012 12:17PM
I keep signing in, hoping for a patch fix for the integrated graphics driver problem, but I'm losing hope quickly. STO is no fun when I get a crash immediately after loading a map. Wish I could play the new content, but until I can buy a whole new computer, that won't be happening.
captin143 @ Dec 2nd, 2012 8:20AM
The best Season yet
radiantdarkness0 @ Dec 2nd, 2012 2:36AM
Cryptic/PWE: Please change the Kinetic Cutting Beam so that we can equip more than one at a time on a ship. I've been wanting this exact kind of weapon since the game came out in 2010!
lucinde1 @ Dec 1st, 2012 8:51PM
Would like to See some new KDF ships coming out. See all these Starfleet ships but nothing new on on the KDF front. Also, Would be fun to win a romulan ship or hell make a playable romulan, or do you plan to make a third grp such as the romulan empire?
termitidae @ Dec 1st, 2012 6:09AM
I really love the new content with season 7. Great work guys! I do have one small request. I really really love hearing the computer warning sounds such as shields failing, hull integrity warnings. I was wondering if you can also add warnings such as "Minor sickbay damage detected" or "critical damage detected in section XXX" or perhalps when at <5% have it say something like "critical syems failing warp breach imminent!" that would really feel like home to me playing the game. Of course you can add features to disable warnings as well so those focusing on just the game can do that. I think this would be great for an old trekie like myself. Thanks again for the awesome game!
radaki @ Dec 1st, 2012 3:44AM
I was actually hoping that you would remove the Dilithium-sink from the doff system, spending 5 blue doffs and 5000-6000 is too steep a rise from Season 6. I liked the doff-system and di a lot of doff missions, but i'm not paying this fee with all the other stuff i have to use my Dilithium for. So this part of the Doff system is dead to me
alistairlowary11 @ Nov 30th, 2012 3:49PM
Pretty nice update over all, but where is the foundry editing? It's now a day past the date when they said they'd have it back up, and they haven't pushed back the date at all... so what's up?
agc1 @ Nov 30th, 2012 1:09PM
please fix auto fire an im good lol
radiantdarkness0
Autofire should be fixed now. It wasn't working for me at all before the patch. Then after the patch some could be set to autofire and some couldn't. I swapped the weapons around while in space and that fixed it. Try that.
renorick1138 @ Nov 30th, 2012 11:06AM
I always felt that the Tier 3 lock on the crate was an unnecessary (and quite undeserved) punch in the crotch for STF veterans (like myself), and I'm glad I'll be able to open the blasted thing a lot sooner! It's taking up space in my inventory/bank!
radiantdarkness0
I agree very much! Those should have been openable from day 1 of season 7. They should also remove the time requirement for these projects. If it takes 3 days to collect all the resources to complete a project, there's no good reason to make us wait another day and a half to collect the reward. Not to mention that, once again, it feels like there are so many currencies. EC, Dil, Zen, Fleet Marks, Fleet Credits, Embassy Provisions, Omega Marks, Romulan Marks, Omega Rep, Romulan Rep, and Latinum (if anyone even cares about that one).
ebrithil1 @ Nov 30th, 2012 10:57AM
Please make the Anniversary ship a Tactical. :) There's not enough being released these days. It's like you're subtly trying to push us to Sci/Eng.
admiralnat
A tactical ship would be nice. :)
druif266 @ Nov 30th, 2012 7:39AM
not everybody is happy about the chances
interfurry @ Nov 29th, 2012 5:40PM
"We expect all of the above changes to be live before December. A few will be live by tomorrow, with the rest live around Nov 29th." They say AROUND November 29th. We MIGHT expect to see these relatively simple changes, like seeing the tier requirements for the marks conversion projects, added dilithium to projects, and the 1/2 time requirement changes within the next month, perhaps by 2014?
masterjp123
2014 ?!!? you mean 2013 Right ?
captakira @ Nov 29th, 2012 11:33AM
How about an update. When is the update going to happen. People like to be kept informed especially when you give a date and it does not happen. Today is the 29th and no update. Please keep you paying customers informed. It is called Customer Service and with the economy the way it is i would think you would want to have good Customer Service to keep you paying customers.
captinjacksparow @ Nov 29th, 2012 11:03AM
It's okay to say Merry Christmas PWE! :)
radiantdarkness0 @ Nov 29th, 2012 10:59AM
Yo! Where's my frell'n patch, devs? Also, there's a bug in the patch from last week: Autofire on ship weapons has been disabled (again!).
shadowmudkipz
No. Auto Fire Works Fine For Me.
admiralnat
Autofire works for me. I've been using it since before season 7 and never noticed any differences.
sciencekeeper @ Nov 29th, 2012 9:59AM
Hmm. If there is a delay in such a big and important update. You really shod announce that...
sciencekeeper
should... damn auto correct... What does that even mean ;-)
breadandcircuses
Your auto-correct thought it was wearing shoes of some sort :)
xandersto2012 @ Nov 29th, 2012 9:40AM
pvtbelgarion - you are correct sir. Where is the update? Can someone please clear taht up? according to everything, I should see a patch up when I log in today - Correct!
pvtbelgarion @ Nov 29th, 2012 5:47AM
." Some of those changes are going to happen in an update tomorrow (Wednesday Nov 21) and some of them are going to happen in the following week's update on Nov 29." Well here it is Nov.29 and where is the update?
xandersto2012 @ Nov 29th, 2012 4:14AM
Hello everyone, It is now the 29th of the month and all the changes have not taken place for Season
atroxvincentius @ Nov 28th, 2012 11:37AM
Crash Economy and How It Can Be Saved: Honestly, I was pretty concerned by how badly the virtual economy crashed after season 7 was released, I could make a few million EC a week on the exchange, after the release, maybe 200K a week if I was lucky, it's good they're adding the drops back in there for the Omega/Romulan PUGs, as well as adjusting the tier rewards. I bet they realized too many changes too soon can certainly crash the virtual economy as surely real economies due when financial situation change to such the extent they did here. The STFs were like a job for everyone lvl 50, get your chips, process them, sell the drops at the exchange or trade them for half the value. When those fundamentals changed, the crash occurred, no one was buying at the rate they were before, money became tight. The exchange rate on the dilithium exchange between zen credits and dilithium crashed due to everyone trading in their chips and STF gear before the changeover, great for who waited to get a good rate, too bad for those who didn't. Clearly the latest attempt for the fleet duty officers Zen store package with the possibility for the 4 ship module drop and alien artifact drops are an attempt at stimulus, but just like the real world, underlying changes need to be made, and it's great they're making those changes to get the virtual economy going again, I would suggest they add higher possible drop rate for deflectors, shields, and engines being valued at or around 50k-100K each for the PUGs to bring the economy back from the dead. Oh, and for heaven's sake, change some of the romulan or reman items, such as the reinforcements and other items, to not bind on the character when received, allow more of that gear to be traded on the exchange, that would make people want to reach the highest tier possible and to do so to specifically trade that stuff on the exchange, again helping to bring the economy back to life.
kirkryder @ Nov 28th, 2012 12:39AM
Thank you, it is what is needed to balance the game out, this will solve many issues... 1 more thing however can we have the sector DOFF missions on the planet also, it would save us having to beam upto the ship to do sector missions... Again thank you and I look forward to playing the game again once the issues have been resolved. ;)
jamesknight79 @ Nov 27th, 2012 4:13PM
I would only ask that you fix the graphics driver crash problem. That and maybe have ships where every bridge officer can use the full range of space tactics available to them.
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