Star Trek Online: The Continuing Languish Mission

[Barrister]

What is the benefit of doing things at higher difficulty?

Better rewards, both in drops and XP.

But I stick with basic difficulty.  I'm not 133t-enough.

[Syt]

I just played a foundry mission, To Helna and Back. Not great, but an hour's worth of mission; I'd give it 3.75 stars out of 5 - well crafted but not overly original. It allowed me to sample the new ground combat, though - MASSIVE improvement. Fights are now finished MUCH faster instead of moving at a glacial pace of chipping away fractions of hitpoints. Actually feels like action now.

Not sure I like the FPS mode, but in any event you can keep the traditional MMO mode as well.

Yes - great improvement.

The revamp to the Borg is a bit confusing though, as it isn't explained in-game AT ALL.

I played in "normal" mode, i.e. tabbing from target to target.

[Barrister]

Ketermuls. It's still one big server right?

Yup.  I'll add you to my friends list.

I haven't played the last couple weeks, but that's as good a reason as any to hop on tonight.

Doesn't seem to work.  Is that your account name (as opposed to your character name)?  In STO you can befriend an entire person - not just an individual character.

[chipwich]

Ketermuls. It's still one big server right?

Yup.  I'll add you to my friends list.

I haven't played the last couple weeks, but that's as good a reason as any to hop on tonight.

Doesn't seem to work.  Is that your account name (as opposed to your character name)?  In STO you can befriend an entire person - not just an individual character.

Ketermuls is my account name. Ixchel@ketermuls

[chipwich]

Wait it turns out my name is porkface.

[Barrister]

[DontSayBanana]

This kind of quality stuff is why I miss playing.

[Syt]

Seems they switched off the Foundry because it doesn't play well wiht the latest update (seems they switched off the Foundry during the test of the update).

Which sucks, because in the past months the Foundry was the only source for new, original content.

[Barrister]

New owners have announced what many have long suspected - STO will go "free to play".

No specific details released so far.

I dunno - as a LTS who still plays the game (albeit sporadically) unless they just screw me over on the LTS I suppose it doesn't make any difference, and might even improve things.

[DontSayBanana]

New owners have announced what many have long suspected - STO will go "free to play".

No specific details released so far.

I dunno - as a LTS who still plays the game (albeit sporadically) unless they just screw me over on the LTS I suppose it doesn't make any difference, and might even improve things.

This worries me.  F2P's are usually good time-wasters that you can just sink a couple minutes into here and there (World of Tanks: amazingly successful as a F2P, for example).  I suppose this could help inject some life into PvP, but there's very little one can do in the campaigns without sinking at least an hour (one reason I didn't find it so hard to stop playing).

[Barrister]

New owners have announced what many have long suspected - STO will go "free to play".

No specific details released so far.

I dunno - as a LTS who still plays the game (albeit sporadically) unless they just screw me over on the LTS I suppose it doesn't make any difference, and might even improve things.

This worries me.  F2P's are usually good time-wasters that you can just sink a couple minutes into here and there (World of Tanks: amazingly successful as a F2P, for example).  I suppose this could help inject some life into PvP, but there's very little one can do in the campaigns without sinking at least an hour (one reason I didn't find it so hard to stop playing).

First - that's not quite true with STO.  As long as you complete a stage of a mission, if you then quit and come back the next day you have the option of coming back right where you left off.  The only problem is missions where you have a very long ground map - you have to complete that entire map or else risk losing the time spent on it.

Also LOTRO isn't a 'couple of minutes time waster' and has supposedly done well F2P.

But no details announced (other than 'you can play all the way to max level without paying a cent'), so no risk worrying too much.



But in news that was unrelated until now, I did put $5 down on a SWTOR pre-order. 

[Grey Fox]

F2P are so fucking expensive

[Syt]

Champions Online seems to do pretty well as F2P. Their lifetimers also get 400 free points every month for the store.

But I've also pre-ordered the SW:TOR collector's edition, because I'm a sucker.

[Barrister]

Champions Online seems to do pretty well as F2P. Their lifetimers also get 400 free points every month for the store.

But I've also pre-ordered the SW:TOR collector's edition, because I'm a sucker.

I am getting slightly (but only slightly) smarter, as I did not get the CE.

Honestly from reading about SWTOR I think it'll be fun to play solo for awhile, but I can't imagine it holding my interest for months and years.

[chipwich]

I think most MMO makers are realizing that the monthly pay model is on it's way out except for blockbuster MMOs. And even then Guild Wars 2 will be box-to-play. An the fact that STO had a cash shop already irritated me.