NPC Crews

[Rivo]

With all the current debate I have been thinking, ok we are getting NPC crews which we can customise, then off we go.


Missions are given to us by NPCs
Our Crew Are NPCs
Our targets in most cases will be NPCs


Who the hell are we going to talk to?

From the sounds of the current direction you could actually play this game and NEVER interact with another human ever.

With all of these customisable NPCs are we not looking at a Cross between spaces battles and The Sims?

One of the Main aspects of MMOs is the social aspect, look at WOW many people only still play it to keep in touch with friends they have made over the years.

But with STO and your army of NPCs how will this effect the socail part of this MMO?

[Cold-Fusion]

I'm still hoping they will reverse course to an extent on this design decision. I think they want to cater for solo players, and i think that's very important and needs to guide design to an extent.

But MMO's are about interacting with other players and working together to achieve goals. Star Trek was always about family in terms of the crew, the relationships between them and our ability to work together and employ our ingenuity in order to overcome the odds.

By making players captain their own ships on a permanent basis your loosing some of that.

They could either have NPC/PC swapping for every ship or large vessels, such as the Galaxy or Sovereign class requiring multiple players up to a maximum of 5.

[Dext]

With all the current debate I have been thinking, ok we are getting NPC crews which we can customise, then off we go.


Missions are given to us by NPCs
Our Crew Are NPCs
Our targets in most cases will be NPCs


Who the hell are we going to talk to?

From the sounds of the current direction you could actually play this game and NEVER interact with another human ever.

With all of these customisable NPCs are we not looking at a Cross between spaces battles and The Sims?

One of the Main aspects of MMOs is the social aspect, look at WOW many people only still play it to keep in touch with friends they have made over the years.

But with STO and your army of NPCs how will this effect the socail part of this MMO?


they told us there will be thing that we will have to have group an are fleets to do some thing in the game. AN they did say that we can beam down to planets with the owners of other ships an fight to with on the ground.

[QuanishaJenkins]

I don't know but when I 1st read about this game I was sure they had set it up where, evryone was on a big ship. Everyone had there own room/apartment on this big ship. You where given miss. and sent off to do quest with other ppl.

What happened to that? The way it's set up now why is it a mmorpg?

[On_Demand]

Who the hell are we going to talk to?



Other players in our Fleet
Other players in a group when we beam down to do missions on a planet
The thousands of other people in our faction via chat
Players on star bases
Players on non-instanced planets like Earth, Vulcan, etc.


I really don't get the argument that we won't have interaction with other players(that I've seen a million times already).

It's an MMO. Cryptic is not going to hide us away from the rest of the galaxy.

[LordDave]

I don't know but when I 1st read about this game I was sure they had set it up where, evryone was on a big ship. Everyone had there own room/apartment on this big ship. You where given miss. and sent off to do quest with other ppl.

What happened to that? The way it's set up now why is it a mmorpg?

That was Perpetual Entertainment.
As you can see, they failed to deliver anything. Not even so much as a concept of how to do Player Crews successfully.


Look, http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=6508
Read that and then tell me what you think.

[Zyrious]

With all the current debate I have been thinking, ok we are getting NPC crews which we can customise, then off we go.


Missions are given to us by NPCs
Our Crew Are NPCs
Our targets in most cases will be NPCs


Who the hell are we going to talk to?

From the sounds of the current direction you could actually play this game and NEVER interact with another human ever.

With all of these customisable NPCs are we not looking at a Cross between spaces battles and The Sims?

One of the Main aspects of MMOs is the social aspect, look at WOW many people only still play it to keep in touch with friends they have made over the years.

But with STO and your army of NPCs how will this effect the socail part of this MMO?

Actually, there's a lot of player interactions. We can group with other captains, and fight side by side with their ships, or go on planetary missions with them. There will be hubs, like the old PE design, where players can all get together. Most likely Starbases and hotspots (Starfleet command?).

We will have fleets, which will require a lot of interactions, and we will have an economy, which probably means many parts you buy will be from another player. There is also PvP and battle hotspots along the neutral zone of the Klingon Empire. Not to mention, as with every mutiplayer game, and especially if they only have 1 server like EvE, you will run into plenty of other players as you cruise around space. And if you want to hang out with others, then you will probably spend a lot of time grouped, in a fleet, and visiting hotspots, hubs, and at shops.

[davie1234]

this argument would be like in WOW

can a real player play the part of my left leg in game

its just the same as WOW , your avatar guy will be a ship most the time so you can do the same avatar group stuff like on any other MMO

[PAw]

Im looking forward to hanging out on Earth!
and also you dont have to take anyone with you on a away team so im guessing you could even do a mission with a group of captains.

[davie1234]

Im looking forward to hanging out on Earth!
and also you dont have to take anyone with you on a away team so im guessing you could even do a mission with a group of captains.

thats correct acording to the guy on web cast thingy

[Sendric]

I think that player crews are cool, but impractical as the exclusive option. They make the entry point for the game pretty steep...a first time player without a guild from another game will have a hard time figuring out how they are going to play. Also, you might have a case of insomnia and play when the rest of your crew are not.

I would hate to be stuck with a pick-up group, hope they all have voice chat and try to crew a ship cohesively all the while hoping no one goes LD because they are impatient. I think that there should be perks to forming a player crew with scaling rewards, but the game needs to be access friendly to solo situations as well.

On the balance I think that the current approach is the correct one.

[On_Demand]

this argument would be like in WOW

can a real player play the part of my left leg in game

its just the same as WOW , your avatar guy will be a ship most the time so you can do the same avatar group stuff like on any other MMO

That's actually a great analogy.:)

[Sendric]

That's actually a great analogy.:)

this argument would be like in WOW

can a real player play the part of my left leg in game

its just the same as WOW , your avatar guy will be a ship most the time so you can do the same avatar group stuff like on any other MMO

/second that...great analogy

[EnsignSkylarkThibedeau]

Sounds Similar to Earth and Beyond. Fly your ship around and do missions then land and get out at the stations. Go dance in the disco and meet people, do crafts, buy stuff etc.

[Weyouns]

i stopped reading the op soon as he said wow

[davie1234]

/second that...great analogy

thanks man

I wish I thought of it earlier on for my other thread :rolleyes:

[CircularReasoning]

That was Perpetual Entertainment.
As you can see, they failed to deliver anything. Not even so much as a concept of how to do Player Crews successfully.


Look, http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=6508
Read that and then tell me what you think.
Actually their system originally had a helm position, but this was given over to the captain, since otherwise it was a difficult situation to manage. Each post would be filled with an NPC when no player was available and each person at their station could toggle an internal and external view of the ship, it was a complex arrangement. Perpetual did achieve much more than they are given credit on this board, a working ground combat and quest system, numerous models, internal features of ships, one whole system, quite a bit.

[davie1234]

what happened with Perpetials game

was it binned or did Cryptic take over and add their own stuff in

[Zyrious]

what happened with Perpetials game

was it binned or did Cryptic take over and add their own stuff in

Perpetuals game was trashed. Cryptic took the Conceptual art and some idea's and then applied it all to their own engine and gameplay. Which in the end was best, a whole new development team would have trouble trying to adapt to someone elses code and engine, especially if no developer notes were left with it. This happened with SWG when Raph Koster and his team were fired and replaced (Most of them are now working at Bioware Austin on the new Kotor MMO) and the new devs had no real idea how to handle the engine. It's felt that was one of the contributing factors to the creation of the NGE.

[ressikan_flute]

this argument would be like in WOW

can a real player play the part of my left leg in game

its just the same as WOW , your avatar guy will be a ship most the time so you can do the same avatar group stuff like on any other MMO

Last time I checked, my left leg didn't have it's own personality. I don't consult it for advise, it doesn't have it's own ideas, it doesn't think and solve problems, it doesn't break limits or make discoveries - it's not sentient. In other words - it's a RL pet.

Do I want my left leg as chief engineer or a Geordi LaForge?

Heh, perhaps you NPC supporters are just scared, because one 5 person bridge crew of creative, intelligent people would mop the floor with you. ;) (just kidding)

As far as a game where players cooperatively control the functions of one body - I think that could be one of the most hilarious things to watch ever.

[LordDave]

Actually their system originally had a helm position, but this was given over to the captain, since otherwise it was a difficult situation to manage. Each post would be filled with an NPC when no player was available and each person at their station could toggle an internal and external view of the ship, it was a complex arrangement. Perpetual did achieve much more than they are given credit on this board, a working ground combat and quest system, numerous models, internal features of ships, one whole system, quite a bit.

So what did each station do then?

[CdrWolfe]

Heh, perhaps you NPC supporters are just scared, because one 5 person bridge crew of creative, intelligent people would mop the floor with you. ;) (just kidding).

Or perhaps scared on contect with other people ;),

My only concern with the NPC only crowed is that all they seem to care about is having a single player game with the option of it being in a MMO so for the only reason of stroking an ego, i mean in a normal single player game you can selflessly do your own thing never having to interact with anyone else and achieve something however it can later become pointless when you have no one else to recognise this fact.

In an MMO you can begin to show yourslef off, 'PWNZORZ" other people and begin to stroke that ego :)

Heh if you want to play an MMO and do it in a way which disregards any contact with anyone else then feel free, but i see no reason why others who want to group with other people, socialise (I hard concept for some ;)) and build a team of people or play along with friends can do there thing aswell.

Regards Wolfe

[LordDave]

Or perhaps scared on contect with other people ;),

My only concern with the NPC only crowed is that all they seem to care about is having a single player game with the option of it being in a MMO so for the only reason of stroking an ego, i mean in a normal single player game you can selflessly do your own thing never having to interact with anyone else and achieve something however it can later become pointless when you have no one else to recognise this fact.

In an MMO you can begin to show yourslef off, 'PWNZORZ" other people and begin to stroke that ego :)

Heh if you want to play an MMO and do it in a way which disregards any contact with anyone else then feel free, but i see no reason why others who want to group with other people, socialise (I hard concept for some ;)) and build a team of people or play along with friends can do there thing aswell.

Regards Wolfe

I'm confused.
I thought STO had both systems (You can solo without contact or you can " group with other people, socialise and build a team of people or play along with friends can do there thing aswell.")

[Zyrious]

Last time I checked, my left leg didn't have it's own personality. I don't consult it for advise, it doesn't have it's own ideas, it doesn't think and solve problems, it doesn't break limits or make discoveries - it's not sentient. In other words - it's a RL pet.

Do I want my left leg as chief engineer or a Geordi LaForge?

Heh, perhaps you NPC supporters are just scared, because one 5 person bridge crew of creative, intelligent people would mop the floor with you. ;) (just kidding)

As far as a game where players cooperatively control the functions of one body - I think that could be one of the most hilarious things to watch ever.

That's a pretty fallacious attack on his analagous statement. He's talking in regards to MMO gameplay mechanics and you're talking about RL. In the game, when controlling the starship it is EXACTLY the same as controlling an avatar in any other MMO. So having a player crew would be like having player limbs in another MMO. You're disadvantaging yourself.

Whereas any other person can control all of the operations quickly and seamlessly themselves, you want the option to disadvantage yourself where you have to coordinate all of the basic operations between 5 people, having to work together and keep communication clean just to perform a simple attack, whereas the Single player with NPC crew does it with 1 button press. It's the equivelant of having to tell your left leg to step forward, and your right leg to stay in place, and then vice versa, whenever you decide to walk in any other MMO.

[davie1234]

this game is going to like every other MMO for teams / meeting people / groups etc

being someones helms man / tactical officer is like being someones left leg on any other MMO

[LordDave]

That's a pretty fallacious attack on his analagous statement. He's talking in regards to MMO gameplay mechanics and you're talking about RL. In the game, when controlling the starship it is EXACTLY the same as controlling an avatar in any other MMO. So having a player crew would be like having player limbs in another MMO. You're disadvantaging yourself.

Whereas any other person can control all of the operations quickly and seamlessly themselves, you want the option to disadvantage yourself where you have to coordinate all of the basic operations between 5 people, having to work together and keep communication clean just to perform a simple attack, whereas the Single player with NPC crew does it with 1 button press. It's the equivelant of having to tell your left leg to step forward, and your right leg to stay in place, and then vice versa, whenever you decide to walk in any other MMO.

All the while your attack arm will be having fun while your diplomacy (hand shaking) arm is gabbing about something else while everyone is trying to coordinate.

[davie1234]

That's a pretty fallacious attack on his analagous statement. He's talking in regards to MMO gameplay mechanics and you're talking about RL. In the game, when controlling the starship it is EXACTLY the same as controlling an avatar in any other MMO. So having a player crew would be like having player limbs in another MMO. You're disadvantaging yourself.

Whereas any other person can control all of the operations quickly and seamlessly themselves, you want the option to disadvantage yourself where you have to coordinate all of the basic operations between 5 people, having to work together and keep communication clean just to perform a simple attack, whereas the Single player with NPC crew does it with 1 button press. It's the equivelant of having to tell your left leg to step forward, and your right leg to stay in place, and then vice versa, whenever you decide to walk in any other MMO.

couldn't have said it better

[davie1234]

question

if you were a tactical officer

and your ship wasn't in a fight for ages , what do you do ? stand and watch the others play the game

money well spent there I think :rolleyes:

I could go on

[LordDave]

question

if you were a tactical officer

and your ship wasn't in a fight for ages , what do you do ? stand and watch the others play the game

money well spent there I think :rolleyes:

I could go on

The idea is that if you don't need a tactical officer, then you won't have a PC one or that tactical officer will run around the holodeck and stuff.
All great, in theory, but that means that the internal ship "instance" needs to be affected by the external environment.
Also, how often can you really shoot targets in one day? Odds are that tactical officer will leave the ship. The ship may then get into a problem and need a tactical officer, but not have one except the NPC, who is really weak because since he wasn't used, he never leveled and thus has only basic skills.

[lootra]

when will people stop acting like player crews are the only way to get social with friends, ITS. FRIGGIN. NOT. ok?

theres going to be CHAT CHANNELS, NOT JUST PROXIMITY CHAT.

and theres going to be stations you can dock at, move freely and SOCIALISE WITH OTHERS

get the hint? no? gee, your like bricks when it comes to "alternatives" know what it means?

also, npc crews are NOT disregarding a game as an MMO, EVE doesnt even have captains, YOU ARE THE SHIP, but do i see people complaining about the disregard for socialisation? N.O.

[Rivo]

this argument would be like in WOW

can a real player play the part of my left leg in game

its just the same as WOW , your avatar guy will be a ship most the time so you can do the same avatar group stuff like on any other MMO

Ok then lets really look at the above

If this was to compare to WOW you would not compare co-operative play with solo, as you are doing with your left leg. Your Avantar is YOUR character left leg and all, no PRO-PC posts have suggested that if you dont have a Full PC then you couldnt function. Your analogy sugests that your Leg is independant from you and you cannot do ANYTHING without it performing a taskl. to Put this in the Pro-PC argument if this was the case and need someone to use your leg for you one of your precious NPCs could be activated for you!

If comparing STO to WOW you would surely compare it to a 5 man or a Raid. Where each class has a specific job and each person does that Job. In Wow unless your a specail case you can generally Move and press you attack/Heal/Buff buttons all by yourself. Your left leg is not going to win the day for you tbh.

Your ship will be more than your Avantar especially if PC is introduced, unlike your body avantar there are loads of things you could do inside the ship, where as a Left leg you could do only a few. You have a sick bay, Engine room, holodecks and whatever else crypt give us.

[CdrWolfe]

Feel free in giving some examples of grouping in early game missions, even though we don't know how quests etc are going to work i doubt it will be something akin to killing 20 boars in which a group of ships could go around together blasting boars orbiting amoon somewhere :).

I also doubt if it is as mentioned in the webcast, you get missions handed down from star fleet commmand that unlike WOW where you can share quests and those you group with can all work to complete it here you won't be able to as i can imagine it could get unpractical.

You can't exactly share that diplomacy mission with the Risan ambassador with you other 5 grouped ship friends. How exactly will it work, will you and each respective captain and his bridge crew all beam down to have a formal chat and enagage diplomacy?

All Six captains can't surely sleep with the ambassadors daughter surely??

:)

So you have any good ideas if grouped missions in a early game environment, prefereably ones which aren't grouped up to blow up borg sphere in sector xyz, in which 20 levels later just gets upgraded to blow up borg cube etc.

Regards Wolfe

[LordDave]

Ok then lets really look at the above

If this was to compare to WOW you would not compare co-operative play with solo, as you are doing with your left leg. Your Avantar is YOUR character left leg and all, no PRO-PC posts have suggested that if you dont have a Full PC then you couldnt function. Your analogy sugests that your Leg is independant from you and you cannot do ANYTHING without it performing a taskl. to Put this in the Pro-PC argument if this was the case and need someone to use your leg for you one of your precious NPCs could be activated for you!

If comparing STO to WOW you would surely compare it to a 5 man or a Raid. Where each class has a specific job and each person does that Job. In Wow unless your a specail case you can generally Move and press you attack/Heal/Buff buttons all by yourself. Your left leg is not going to win the day for you tbh.

Your ship will be more than your Avantar especially if PC is introduced, unlike your body avantar there are loads of things you could do inside the ship, where as a Left leg you could do only a few. You have a sick bay, Engine room, holodecks and whatever else crypt give us.

Are there loads of things you can do inside a ship?
That, I think, is the #1 issue Cryptic had with PC crews. It's not that they don't want to put it in or that it'll be horribly organized. It's that, what are the people on the ship going to do when they aren't needed? What are they going to do when they are needed? Mini-games? Press a button? Dance Dance Revolution? With WoW instances, your always doing something. (unless the group as a whole is stopped) A healer, for example, doesn't sit around and do nothing while the tank talks to the NPCs.

So we put it as 100% combat. But then you need to make it so that the ships ARE 100% combat, or that they can pick when to go into combat, stay in constant combat, then leave.
Then you have to put in non-combat stuff. Like a PC science officer with epic scanning skills for a survey mission.
Or have an engineer run around the instanced ship, find a "Damaged spot" and click their "Fix it" button. Again, you can only do this so many times before you want to do something else. And why bother anyway? If it takes a player 30 seconds to get to a damaged spot and then another 15 to fix it, that's 45 seconds for one fix. An NPC only crew doesn't even have that. The damage just get's fixed.
Or perhaps the engineer should just sit back and distribute power. All they do is move power here, more power there, ect...

Now, we know there will be crafting in the game, most likely done by the commander avatar on his ship. So that's not needed.

I suppose if you want to put this in a WoW sense, PC crews would be if you had all the powers of your whole party as solo, but when your not solo, its divided up.
A fighter can heal, DPS, and Tank at the same time just as well as a Player Crew. But when others joined your party, the powers were split between you all and each person could only see the party icons and not the game world. Except the guy leading, the guy with the attack stuff, and the guy who can move everyone.
Oh and the mages could only do"Fireball 1", "Magic Dampening" and "conjur food and drink"

[CdrWolfe]

Are there loads of things you can do inside a ship?
That, I think, is the #1 issue Cryptic had with PC crews. It's not that they don't want to put it in or that it'll be ve to put in non-combat stuff. Like a PC science officer with epic scanning skills for a survey mission.
Or have an engineer run around the instanced ship, find a "Damaged spot" and click their "Fix it" button. Again, you can only do this so many times before you want to do something else. And why bother anyway? If it takes a player 30 seconds to get to a damaged spot and then another 15 to fix it, that's 45 seconds for one fix. An NPC only crew doesn't even have that. The damage just get's fixed.
Or perhaps the engineer should just sit back and distribute power. All they do is move power here, more power there, ect...
"

You equate the need for something for each PC player to do while on a mission with naturally being a hard thing to code in or write in a mission. I agree that for each mission to be enjoyable by everyone that every position would have to have somehting to do, something meaningful.

However i don't quite see how you feel that perhaps in a PC environment having an engineer do the same 'puzzle' to fix damage etc would get broing quickly, (Yes perhaps though that is really dependent on the imagination of the developer), while simplifying this to a simple button for the captain to push 'Heal Ship' makes it even more fun?

How exactly does making your role one of being every specialist on the ship and lets be honest that is what it will be, you will just be handing out orders to NPC crews i.e pressing buttons for heal ship, move here, scan this and perhaps defend this.

Now i'am not sure how fun you find pressing one to five buttons or so every 5 minutes but i can see it getting very boring aswell :)

Regards Wolfe

[ressikan_flute]

That's a pretty fallacious attack on his analagous statement. He's talking in regards to MMO gameplay mechanics and you're talking about RL. In the game, when controlling the starship it is EXACTLY the same as controlling an avatar in any other MMO. So having a player crew would be like having player limbs in another MMO. You're disadvantaging yourself.

Whereas any other person can control all of the operations quickly and seamlessly themselves, you want the option to disadvantage yourself where you have to coordinate all of the basic operations between 5 people, having to work together and keep communication clean just to perform a simple attack, whereas the Single player with NPC crew does it with 1 button press. It's the equivelant of having to tell your left leg to step forward, and your right leg to stay in place, and then vice versa, whenever you decide to walk in any other MMO.

I do agree that applying RL arguments to an MMO doesn't entirely work, and I sometimes fall prey to that, so I understand your objection and apologize if I was off base a bit.

As dar as this MMO argument - what about Dungeons and Dragons online? If I play a healer I'll be in ****** shape if I group with 4 other healers. So I choose to group with a fighter, theif, etc. We all have skills we contribute to the adventure.

In essence I am the group's left leg. I am performing a function within the group ('ship' or 'bridge' crew). Things need to be coordinated in order for the group to succeed ("Don't run ahead of the theif!" "John, take up the rear." "Merlin, John needs a hand.")

Following the above argument that you seem to support the game would be MUCH better if I didn't need to do all that *work* and coordinate with living people, it would be far better to dungeon with NPC's to follow my orders and do whatever I want them to do instantaneously - and the group avatar can be my group icon or emblem. Do you see where this line of argument leads if you keep going with it? - to a normal non-MMO game or a pure PvP game. Any coordination requires group work - even in the 100 billion captains scenario if you go to a planet you will need to coordinate. That dreaded human interaction! It must be avoided so that we can do whatever we want right now!

If that's what some people want, fine. I find it a much more rich experience to work with living humans - you call it a disadvantage, I call your approach shallow. Try talking to one of your NPC's about the time someone tried to raid your ship and you tricked them into causing their own warp core breach or something. They'll sit there and blink - maybe.

An avatar is just a visual symbol of a system. This system can be a group in DDO, ships in STO, and yes, if someone made the game, a human body. Just calling the ship an avatar is just moving the dial on a spectrum of grey, it's not proclaiming a hard truth. ANY system involving live players cooperating towards one goal is, as you call it, *disadvantaged* by not having that (/sarcasm) wonderful machine like automation carrying out one persons agenda. So, ultimately according to this argument, the only way to not be *disadvantaged* is to have only bots on your side.

[marscentral]

While player crews are nice in theory, I think Cryptic is right to stick with NPCs. As others have said, not every mission is going to need a science officer or engineering or even tactical. But when they *are* needed they'll be vital, so you will always need them which goes to the next problem: real life. What happens if there are no free science officers online or your just about to go into battle and your helmsman has to go and make his kids' diinner? You and the rest of your crew are suddenly stuck. In other MMOs, you can usually weather the loss of one person or even do things solo but if they were to implement player crews that would be impossible.

As for communicating and grouping, City of Heroes IMO is one of the best MMOs I've ever played for socializing and group forming, so if Cryptic stay true to form, I don't forsee a problem here.

[LordDave]

You equate the need for something for each PC player to do while on a mission with naturally being a hard thing to code in or write in a mission. I agree that for each mission to be enjoyable by everyone that every position would have to have somehting to do, something meaningful.

However i don't quite see how you feel that perhaps in a PC environment having an engineer do the same 'puzzle' to fix damage etc would get broing quickly, (Yes perhaps though that is really dependent on the imagination of the developer), while simplifying this to a simple button for the captain to push 'Heal Ship' makes it even more fun?

How exactly does making your role one of being every specialist on the ship and lets be honest that is what it will be, you will just be handing out orders to NPC crews i.e pressing buttons for heal ship, move here, scan this and perhaps defend this.

Now i'am not sure how fun you find pressing one to five buttons or so every 5 minutes but i can see it getting very boring aswell :)

Regards Wolfe

Ahh but you, as the captain, get to talk to aliens and starfleet and stuff.
As for buttons:
Every video game with the exception of a few is nothing but button pressing. The key is to have a variety of buttons to press at any given time.
Take bridge commander.
You have 5 stations. Ops/Helm, Tactical, First Officer, Science, and Engineering.
If I want to scan something, I click my science guy, select the object, and hit scan. He then tells me what I want to know. Engineering same thing. I want to boost power to something, I click him, change the slider, and I'm done.

Now instead of one guy doing all that, imagine if each person did it separately. 4 people all working the simple commands of "increase power" or "Go to red alert". (the XO is kinda useless in an MMO position)
Imagine if your whole gameplay experience while on that ship was to change a slider or to click "Repair systems".

[Trekkie]

At first I was also concerned about how players would be able to interact with each other, but the new FAQ presents a couple of ideas related to player interaction that have me more than content. I get the impression that players will still be able to interact, just through larger venues instead of player-controlled ships.

[CdrWolfe]

I would hope i had a better imagination, or in this case the developers did :D

With PC it would probably force mission designers and developers to think of a system which would be enriching for each class and generally allow them to have some involvment which is meaningful.

While with an NPC crew all the mission designers need worry about is that they don't need to bother becuase where the other style splits it up into 5 here it dones't so you can keep the captain happen by going about each station mashing keys, because we all know that in star trek the Captain secretly did everything. that wasn't Geordi la Forge in engineering it was Picards engineering Alt :P.

With regards to the problem of having a mission which has little engineering content when you just happen to have a PC engineer aboard, well one way could be that you beasically ask star fleet command for a mission along with specifying that you have both a Captain and Engineer aboard, this way the mission sent could be geared towards both sets of classes, all this could be hidden aswell.

I'am still waiting on a good way to encourage and use grouping early on for missions by the way ;)

Regards Wolfe

[ressikan_flute]

While player crews are nice in theory, I think Cryptic is right to stick with NPCs. As others have said, not every mission is going to need a science officer or engineering or even tactical. But when they *are* needed they'll be vital, so you will always need them

No problems here - if a mission doesn't need a Science Officer they can choose to leave the ship and play some solo missions; their character can be replaced by an NPC in the meantime in case and SO is needed. Or, if they want, they can choose to stay on and roleplay, train their character skills, play out subplots or mini-games. They're free to do whatver.

which goes to the next problem: real life. What happens if there are no free science officers online or your just about to go into battle and your helmsman has to go and make his kids' diinner? You and the rest of your crew are suddenly stuck. In other MMOs, you can usually weather the loss of one person or even do things solo but if they were to implement player crews that would be impossible.

No problems here - when someone needs to attend to real life an NPC steps in for them. What's wrong with that?

As for communicating and grouping, City of Heroes IMO is one of the best MMOs I've ever played for socializing and group forming, so if Cryptic stay true to form, I don't forsee a problem here.

Perhaps, and perhaps if considered in a purely MMO sense group forming will work out well with 100 billion captains. But this is not just an MMO, it's a Trek MMO, and trek only RARELY ben about ships banding together. Trek is 98% about single ships and bridge crews working together.

[CdrWolfe]

But this is not just an MMO, it's a Trek MMO, and trek only RARELY ben about ships banding together. Trek is 98% about single ships and bridge crews working together.

What??, Really?

You clearly missed the episode where both Janeway, Picard, Sisko and two other captains of a ship flew of together to negotiate a trade deal with some andoran colony. Because picard didn't trust Geordi enough as an engineer so he wanted Janeway to tag along and bring Bellana Torres, while Sisko felt Bashir being English was naturally better then that shrewd of a woman Crusher.

So your telling me you didn't watch it?

Damn it was a goodie too

:D

Regards Wolfe

[LordDave]

I would hope i had a better imagination, or in this case the developers did :D

With PC it would probably force mission designers and developers to think of a system which would be enriching for each class and generally allow them to have some involvment which is meaningful.

While with an NPC crew all the mission designers need worry about is that they don't need to bother becuase where the other style splits it up into 5 here it dones't so you can keep the captain happen by going about each station mashing keys, because we all know that in star trek the Captain secretly did everything. that wasn't Geordi la Forge in engineering it was Picards engineering Alt :P.

With regards to the problem of having a mission which has little engineering content when you just happen to have a PC engineer aboard, well one way could be that you beasically ask star fleet command for a mission along with specifying that you have both a Captain and Engineer aboard, this way the mission sent could be geared towards both sets of classes, all this could be hidden aswell.

I'am still waiting on a good way to encourage and use grouping early on for missions by the way ;)

Regards Wolfe
Well for starters, Trek was about the ship and crew, rather then each individual person. Everyone worked as a team on the ship. There is a reason why a show focused around a single crew rather then a single person. This is what Cryptic is doing: Focusing around a single ship. (ie. each player is a Trek Show in and of themselves)

And I find your "Mashing keys" Statement strange. What exactly is an individual class character going to do while on a ship based mission? Math? Record Data? Guitar Hero? We already have Team Play Away Missions. The only thing you can't do is control part of your friend's ship. Console work basically. And I'll be fairly sad if most of the missions are space only. I think half the space missions will be ferry ones, combat ones, or diplomatic. Everything else will be Away Team, which requires specialties, which is where your friends can join you and do their own special things.
But if you want special missions, that requires more creating. I'm sure they already have a few thousand missions being made. Do you really want them to think up a few extra hundred for each class combination?

No problems here - if a mission doesn't need a Science Officer they can choose to leave the ship and play some solo missions; their character can be replaced by an NPC in the meantime in case and SO is needed. Or, if they want, they can choose to stay on and roleplay, train their character skills, play out subplots or mini-games. They're free to do whatver.

Train their character skill how? Mini-games? So should Cryptic make 100+ mini-games PER Class just so they have something new to do every hour? Or should it be a grind fest with mini-games?


Perhaps, and perhaps if considered in a purely MMO sense group forming will work out well with 100 billion captains. But this is not just an MMO, it's a Trek MMO, and trek only RARELY ben about ships banding together. Trek is 98% about single ships and bridge crews working together.

Just because you don't see it, doesn't mean it happens. Remember, if the ship in the show isn't called in to join this "fleet" why would we see them?

[ressikan_flute]

Are there loads of things you can do inside a ship?
That, I think, is the #1 issue Cryptic had with PC crews. It's not that they don't want to put it in or that it'll be horribly organized. It's that, what are the people on the ship going to do when they aren't needed? What are they going to do when they are needed? Mini-games? Press a button? Dance Dance Revolution? With WoW instances, your always doing something. (unless the group as a whole is stopped) A healer, for example, doesn't sit around and do nothing while the tank talks to the NPCs.

How many times does the same point need to be addressed? If someone won't be needed for a mission they can opt out, play solo on their own ship, and be replaced by and NPC.

In missions- will everyone have something to do every single second of every single mission? No, not in DDO either - sometimes the thief in the party needs to go and check for traps. Sometimes the thief needs to hang back while the big men do the chopping. No biggie.

As far as interesting stuff to do on a ship - this boils down to laziness and a lack of imagination. There are TON of on-board TNG episodes that kick ass and have to do with technical problem solving and diplomacy, where Geordi saves everyone's ass because he thinks outside the box. Is the ship going on a combat mission? Then perhaps there's a subplot mission that goes along with it that is technical and on-board.

But here's the thing, even if there ISN'T a subplot implementation, the person who isn't really needed for a mission can change instances and fly solo and an NPC can step in. Is it really that difficult for people to imagine this? Is everyone trying to polarize so much on purpose? I can't see for what reason.

[ressikan_flute]

Train their character skill how? Mini-games? So should Cryptic make 100+ mini-games PER Class just so they have something new to do every hour? Or should it be a grind fest with mini-games?

Hey, I'm all for user generated content if you have a problem with Cryptic producing interesting fodder for individual crewmen.

Just because you don't see it, doesn't mean it happens. Remember, if the ship in the show isn't called in to join this "fleet" why would we see them?

So we should base a Star Trek MMO on what we don't see in Trek? Perhaps the Delta Quadrant is one quarter an enormous dog terd. If the Dev's add that, who are we to complain? Just because we haven't seen it in an episode, doesn't mean it doesn't exist!

Go dog terd!

[LordDave]

How many times does the same point need to be addressed? If someone won't be needed for a mission they can opt out, play solo on their own ship, and be replaced by and NPC.

In missions- will everyone have something to do every single second of every single mission? No, not in DDO either - sometimes the thief in the party needs to go and check for traps. Sometimes the thief needs to hang back while the big men do the chopping. No biggie.

As far as interesting stuff to do on a ship - this boils down to laziness and a lack of imagination. There are TON of on-board TNG episodes that kick ass and have to do with technical problem solving and diplomacy, where Geordi saves everyone's ass because he thinks outside the box. Is the ship going on a combat mission? Then perhaps there's a subplot mission that goes along with it that is technical and on-board.

But here's the thing, even if there ISN'T a subplot implementation, the person who isn't really needed for a mission can change instances and fly solo and an NPC can step in. Is it really that difficult for people to imagine this? Is everyone trying to polarize so much on purpose? I can't see for what reason.

If your going to op out that means that there is something fun for you to do alone. If it's more fun then being on the ship, even when needed, why even going on the ship in the first place?

In Missions - Sure, but if you had an automatic trap detector, would you need a thief?

Stuff on ship - Only if it's scripted. And if it is, then it's a one shot trick you'd have to repeat over and over again. How many times can the warp core begin to breech before you stop caring and let the ship blow? THEN you have to ask yourself:
If my player engineer takes 45 seconds to fix something my NPC engineer does automatically... why do I need him?
Plus you have the issue of how to implement it. You can't exactly have every engineering console useable with full interface that directly affects the ship. As cool as that would be, it's impractical, unwise, and generally processor heavy to integrate such a system. But also remember that these ships are player ships. Can you imagine knowing that your ship has quests and such that you can't get to? How would that make you feel?
And how big would it make the game? Would Cryptic even have time to put it all in before they're forced to release?

[LordDave]

Hey, I'm all for user generated content if you have a problem with Cryptic producing interesting fodder for individual crewmen.

Well good thing they want to put it in. You just have to wait until they finish the game first, THEN they can add onto it.


So we should base a Star Trek MMO on what we don't see in Trek? Perhaps the Delta Quadrant is one quarter an enormous dog terd. If the Dev's add that, who are we to complain? Just because we haven't seen it in an episode, doesn't mean it doesn't exist!

Go dog terd!
Actually you should base it on the idea that when you see something, it could also happen somewhere else, with some other group of ships that you'll never see. Hell, we didn't see the Klingon's Great Tribble hunt, but I'm sure they had several fleets worth of ships in different areas.

[CdrWolfe]

If your going to op out that means that there is something fun for you to do alone. If it's more fun then being on the ship, even when needed, why even going on the ship in the first place?

In Missions - Sure, but if you had an automatic trap detector, would you need a thief?

Stuff on ship - Only if it's scripted. And if it is, then it's a one shot trick you'd have to repeat over and over again. How many times can the warp core begin to breech before you stop caring and let the ship blow? THEN you have to ask yourself:
If my player engineer takes 45 seconds to fix something my NPC engineer does automatically... why do I need him?
Plus you have the issue of how to implement it. You can't exactly have every engineering console useable with full interface that directly affects the ship. As cool as that would be, it's impractical, unwise, and generally processor heavy to integrate such a system. But also remember that these ships are player ships. Can you imagine knowing that your ship has quests and such that you can't get to? How would that make you feel?
And how big would it make the game? Would Cryptic even have time to put it all in before they're forced to release?

How can you equate opting out with 'Why bother doing it at all' first off your getting yourself confused, one is more reliant on whether the mission requires your skills and is not dependent on enjoyment factor, not all missions will require an engineer yes, but that hardly means you should therefore scrap the engineer lol.

Come on LordDave even you should realise this.

What alot of the pro NPC crowd seem to be doing is stating as fact that no one will enjoy being a PC, that no one will enjoy having downtime. While enjoyment is subjective and also relative to the person on hand it also depends on the system which is used to simulate fun and enjoyment.

No i know it could be incredibly hard to program, but i don't think that should mean we should just throw it all in to begin with as complexity as an argument for feature content will eventually mean everything gets dumbed down ala SWG or so i'am told.

Why bother having a complex and tactical ship combat system, where we can have a simple fast paced laser blasting game with respawning ships every 3 minutes.

Regards Wolfe

[marscentral]

No problems here - if a mission doesn't need a Science Officer they can choose to leave the ship and play some solo missions; their character can be replaced by an NPC in the meantime in case and SO is needed. Or, if they want, they can choose to stay on and roleplay, train their character skills, play out subplots or mini-games. They're free to do whatver.



No problems here - when someone needs to attend to real life an NPC steps in for them. What's wrong with that?



Perhaps, and perhaps if considered in a purely MMO sense group forming will work out well with 100 billion captains. But this is not just an MMO, it's a Trek MMO, and trek only RARELY ben about ships banding together. Trek is 98% about single ships and bridge crews working together.


While I agree that alot of Star Trek is about individual crews rather than fleets, you're ignoring the fact that Player Crews are just not practical. You're even using Cryptic's solution to fill the gap. You want NPCs to fill in for absent player crew members. You also say that if a PC officer isn't needed, he could leave the ship and solo or find another, but I ask: how Star Trek is that? I must have missed the episode where La Forge went off to Deep Space 9 because he found out they were short of engineers and Picard figured he'd be alright this episode without one.

Ultimately it's Cryptic's decision and they haven't ruled out allowing people to serve on other people's ships in the future, but the current decision really does seem like the one that will give you the most to do as a player.

[LordDave]

How can you equate opting out with 'Why bother doing it at all' first off your getting yourself confused, one is more reliant on whether the mission requires your skills and is not dependent on enjoyment factor, not all missions will require an engineer yes, but that hardly means you should therefore scrap the engineer lol.

Depends on how many times you need the engineer. If you need said Engineer for say... 5 missions out of the 5,000 in the game, what does that say? Granted, you can always make more missions, but if I was a game designer and I had to choose between making 100 Engineering useful missions, Medic useful missions, and science useful missions each (though sometimes you need more then one) and making missions that anyone can do, I'd go for the "anyone can do" not because it's easier, but because it means I can put out better content in the time I have. Now once all those "anyone can do it" missions are done, I can then focus on the specific missions. This is what an Expansion pack is for.
I fully support Player Crews and their inclusion after launch rather then before because I know it's the best option.


What alot of the pro NPC crowd seem to be doing is stating as fact that no one will enjoy being a PC, that no one will enjoy having downtime. While enjoyment is subjective and also relative to the person on hand it also depends on the system which is used to simulate fun and enjoyment.

No i know it could be incredibly hard to program, but i don't think that should mean we should just throw it all in to begin with as complexity as an argument for feature content will eventually mean everything gets dumbed down ala SWG or so i'am told.

I'm confused by this part. I understand you know it's hard to program. But that's all I really understand. The rest is a bit hard to follow. It almost sounds like your saying "Don't put it all in at once, but gradually" at which point I would agree. Hence, Expansion packs.


Why bother having a complex and tactical ship combat system, where we can have a simple fast paced laser blasting game with respawning ships every 3 minutes.
Regards Wolfe
Then it would be SWG: JtL lol.
But really, the complex and tactical ship combat system is just that, the combat system. From what was said, it's basically the combat system in Bridge Commander, which was very well done in my opinion.

[ressikan_flute]

If your going to op out that means that there is something fun for you to do alone. If it's more fun then being on the ship, even when needed, why even going on the ship in the first place?

I never said "more fun" to solo, I said if they're not needed on a mission. And indeed, it will be more fun for some people to solo, and so they can. For some who want to have fun in a bridge crew, they can.

In Missions - Sure, but if you had an automatic trap detector, would you need a thief?

Of course not, but the reason there aren't auto trap detectors (or spells which anyone can learn) in DDO is because people like playing thieves. Why have mages if you can just have stronger weapons that warriors can use that do the same thing? Because people like playing mages. This and it makes for a fun group dynamic. And MMO's are about playing with people, right? Not auto trap detectors.

Stuff on ship - Only if it's scripted. And if it is, then it's a one shot trick you'd have to repeat over and over again. How many times can the warp core begin to breech before you stop caring and let the ship blow?

Well, a warp core breech every week wouldn't be interesting in a show, either. Fortunately there are many things which could happen besides. I agree that it would have to be scripted, but a warp-core breech I wouldn't call a script but an event. They will have to make scripts for space, they could also (and may be planning on it, as they say there will be on board missions) script for the ship. Script missions could be analogous to dungeons.

THEN you have to ask yourself:
If my player engineer takes 45 seconds to fix something my NPC engineer does automatically... why do I need him?

We could automate EVERYTHING in the game and not need anyone. You're focused on efficiency and I'm focused on a rich experience. I want a live engineer because he can add to the quality of the game, not it's efficiency. I don't see Geordi as a bot, do you?

Plus you have the issue of how to implement it. You can't exactly have every engineering console useable with full interface that directly affects the ship. As cool as that would be, it's impractical, unwise, and generally processor heavy to integrate such a system.

Agreed, an entire working ship would be too much. But there is a gray area in-between, it's not just black and white (which is why I haven't heard anyone pushing for an ENTIRE crew on a star ship).


But also remember that these ships are player ships. Can you imagine knowing that your ship has quests and such that you can't get to? How would that make you feel?

Could you rephrase this or give an example? I don't quite understand.

And how big would it make the game? Would Cryptic even have time to put it all in before they're forced to release?

Hey, I don't expect Cryptic to launch everything on release. I'm on these boards to make my voice known and to support others who want a PC crew option so that it eventually becomes a reality (if they care and/or listen). I'd love to see Cryptic leave an opening in the engine for these things to eventually become a reality. I think having a minor PC available role at launch to show that this is a track they're willing to go on would be great, or even a statement that they're working on it. This would silence a lot of the debate.

[LordDave]

I'm only going to respond to the last part because it'll end this.
even a statement that they're working on it.
They did.
Well... more or less. They said that they looked at it, they wanted it, but they couldn't figure out how best to do it and decided to produce a working game first, before they tried to put in something that they didn't know how to do yet. Essentially they wanted a finished game rather then risk releasing an unfinished one. They can and will add onto it later. Assuming it's at least as popular as Guild Wars.

But since you can...

Join your friends in your ship.
Join your friends in their ship.
Join your friends in Starbases.
Join your friends on Away Missions.

I feel that they're giving you a fair amount of "Player to Player" interaction choices.

[ressikan_flute]

Well good thing they want to put it in. You just have to wait until they finish the game first, THEN they can add onto it.

Again, I'm not pushing for it to come out on release. If they said they were working towards it that would be good enough for me, honestly.

Actually you should base it on the idea that when you see something, it could also happen somewhere else, with some other group of ships that you'll never see. Hell, we didn't see the Klingon's Great Tribble hunt, but I'm sure they had several fleets worth of ships in different areas.

I only partially agree. Ship banding wasn't predominant in Trek, period. Making a case for ship banding being a necessary or consistent element requires that you come up with common situations in which more than one star-ship are necessary. Can you? I can think of one: war. Was war predominant in Trek? No. It did happen, but it was never the driving force.

So unless this game is entirely about war, then I see very little reason why people would need to haul 10 ships anywhere.

[CdrWolfe]

I'm confused by this part. I understand you know it's hard to program. But that's all I really understand. The rest is a bit hard to follow. It almost sounds like your saying "Don't put it all in at once, but gradually" at which point I would agree. Hence, Expansion packs.

"we should just throw it all in to begin with "

Sorry by 'throw it all in' i mean 'throw it all away'

Also i'll admit that due to the 'possible' complexity i would naturally understand PC being sdielined for future release, though i would like an assurance if they did and not preferebly wait another two years lol.

Regards Wolfe

[ressikan_flute]

I'm only going to respond to the last part because it'll end this.

They did.
Well... more or less. They said that they looked at it, they wanted it, but they couldn't figure out how best to do it and decided to produce a working game first, before they tried to put in something that they didn't know how to do yet. Essentially they wanted a finished game rather then risk releasing an unfinished one. They can and will add onto it later. Assuming it's at least as popular as Guild Wars.

But since you can...

Join your friends in your ship.
Join your friends in their ship.
Join your friends in Starbases.
Join your friends on Away Missions.

I feel that they're giving you a fair amount of "Player to Player" interaction choices.

Yeah, I guess it's the more or less that concerns me. If you're referring to the gamespot article I saw a glimmer of hope there, but not quite as much info as you stated above.

[LordDave]

So unless this game is entirely about war, then I see very little reason why people would need to haul 10 ships anywhere.

Evacuations. Salvage. Large Scale Surveys. Patrols. When they wiped out the Orion Pirates. Making a Tachyon Net. Blockades.

Granted, the idea of many ships banding together is probably going to be mostly combat based. Away Teams, however, are another story.

[Kinjiru]

I'm only going to respond to the last part because it'll end this.

They did.
Well... more or less. They said that they looked at it, they wanted it, but they couldn't figure out how best to do it and decided to produce a working game first, before they tried to put in something that they didn't know how to do yet. Essentially they wanted a finished game rather then risk releasing an unfinished one. They can and will add onto it later. Assuming it's at least as popular as Guild Wars.

But since you can...

Join your friends in your ship.
Join your friends in their ship.
Join your friends in Starbases.
Join your friends on Away Missions.

I feel that they're giving you a fair amount of "Player to Player" interaction choices.

Well said Dave. The other side won't listen, but well said anyway.

[LordDave]

Yeah, I guess it's the more or less that concerns me. If you're referring to the gamespot article I saw a glimmer of hope there, but not quite as much info as you stated above.
My info comes from every source I have: Web cast, FAQ, the few articles, the Hailing Frequencies interviews, ect...

"we should just throw it all in to begin with "

Sorry by 'throw it all in' i mean 'throw it all away'

Also i'll admit that due to the 'possible' complexity i would naturally understand PC being sdielined for future release, though i would like an assurance if they did and not preferebly wait another two years lol.

Regards Wolfe

Strictly speaking, Cryptic can't guarantee you that it'll be done, even in future releases, because it implies:
1. The game will have any future releases (needs to be successful first)
2. They find a way to do it in a satisfactory method.

From a PR position, it's better to say "We'll look into it" rather then "We'll do it".
Broken promises hurt more then a missing feature.

[ressikan_flute]

Well said Dave. The other side won't listen, but well said anyway.

Come on now, this isn't true. After I read his post I thought in agreement that there will be more interaction than maybe I was even thinking of. But it is a different quality of interaction, so it doesn't necessarily change my mind completely. And I am buying the game anyway - perhaps playing it will convince me more than anything.

I can listen, understand, and still disagree.

[CdrWolfe]

I only partially agree. Ship banding wasn't predominant in Trek, period. Making a case for ship banding being a necessary or consistent element requires that you come up with common situations in which more than one star-ship are necessary. Can you? I can think of one: war. Was war predominant in Trek? No. It did happen, but it was never the driving force.

So unless this game is entirely about war, then I see very little reason why people would need to haul 10 ships anywhere.

Completely agree, and i believe this to be one of the major stumbling blocks of an NPC system.

Now ignoring the few insociables :) who don't care to interact in an MMO, designing 50% of the missions to revolve around mutliple ships will in my eyes by impossible or at least not very canon or realsitic.

Considering in order to make the mission somehwat feasible you would probably have to focus them on ship specific quests, i.e those which Require a ship. I.E combat or evacuation etc perhaps resource shuttling though that would be a stretch.

I thiink you can severly limit yourself when you have a system focused around you are your ship. Now perhaps if they come up with something which allows multiple players to interact, say away teams but doesn't go into the farce of having 5 captains beam down to do some remote resource gathering i would be interested.

Sadly my imagination at the moment is waning though hopefully Crytpics is not :)

Regards Wolfe

[ressikan_flute]

My info comes from every source I have: Web cast, FAQ, the few articles, the Hailing Frequencies interviews, ect...



Strictly speaking, Cryptic can't guarantee you that it'll be done, even in future releases, because it implies:
1. The game will have any future releases (needs to be successful first)
2. They find a way to do it in a satisfactory method.

From a PR position, it's better to say "We'll look into it" rather then "We'll do it".
Broken promises hurt more then a missing feature.

I can understand this. I haven't come across the hailing frequencies articles, though. I'll have to check them out.

However, I'll still be on here pushing for it for a future release, I can say that much.

[CdrWolfe]

Well said Dave. The other side won't listen, but well said anyway.

Leave the conversation to the adults son ;).

Look we have had quite a few good discussions over various threads, mainly with Lord Dave, and i have taken on board some of what he said and agree with some of it and disagree with other parts.

That doesn't exactly mean we won't listen lol.

Regards Wolfe

[Kinjiru]

Leave the conversation to the adults son ;).

Look we have had quite a few good discussions over various threads, mainly with Lord Dave, and i have taken on board some of what he said and agree with some of it and disagree with other parts.

That doesn't exactly mean we won't listen lol.

Regards Wolfe

With regard to said conversations, I've been involved in many of them. I'm going to refrain from saying what I actually feel in response to your attempt at a condescending and witty answer above, seeing as it is not topical to the conversation, whereas I, on the other hand, was in fact informing him that I agree with his stance.

My statement of irony is in direct response to the multiple threads discussing these things, where we've both answered in a similar manner, multiple times.

If my resigned statement offended you, perhaps the irony was lost in the truth of the statement.

[CdrWolfe]

Nope it was pretty clear ;)

Regards Wolfe

[Kinjiru]

Nope it was pretty clear ;)

Regards Wolfe

And you don't find the dozens of clone topics to be getting annoying? Perhaps you haven't had the opportunity to repeat yourself enough... Don't worry, you'll get there.

[LordDave]

Come on now, this isn't true. After I read his post I thought in agreement that there will be more interaction than maybe I was even thinking of. But it is a different quality of interaction, so it doesn't necessarily change my mind completely. And I am buying the game anyway - perhaps playing it will convince me more than anything.

I can listen, understand, and still disagree.
Exactly. I've had many talks on other issues and even came to an agreement with some people. Some are very .... close minded, but some aren't. On both sides.

Completely agree, and i believe this to be one of the major stumbling blocks of an NPC system.

Now ignoring the few insociables :) who don't care to interact in an MMO, designing 50% of the missions to revolve around mutliple ships will in my eyes by impossible or at least not very canon or realsitic.

Considering in order to make the mission somehwat feasible you would probably have to focus them on ship specific quests, i.e those which Require a ship. I.E combat or evacuation etc perhaps resource shuttling though that would be a stretch.

I thiink you can severly limit yourself when you have a system focused around you are your ship. Now perhaps if they come up with something which allows multiple players to interact, say away teams but doesn't go into the farce of having 5 captains beam down to do some remote resource gathering i would be interested.

Sadly my imagination at the moment is waning though hopefully Crytpics is not :)

Regards Wolfe
Well since each "captain" (who isn't a captain in rank) will have other, non-command skills (Engineering, medical, science, ect...) it's easy enough to do an Away Mission that requires a science officer, an engineer, and a security officer with 3 player characters.

I can understand this. I haven't come across the hailing frequencies articles, though. I'll have to check them out.

However, I'll still be on here pushing for it for a future release, I can say that much.
Part 1:
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=5476
Part 2:
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=5870

[LordDave]

And you don't find the dozens of clone topics to be getting annoying? Perhaps you haven't had the opportunity to repeat yourself enough... Don't worry, you'll get there.

I see it as:
We're listening, we just like listening across multiple threads. lol.

[Kinjiru]

I see it as:
We're listening, we just like listening across multiple threads. lol.

Hey, fire up two monitors and we can read in stereo, lol. :D

[CdrWolfe]

And you don't find the dozens of clone topics to be getting annoying? Perhaps you haven't had the opportunity to repeat yourself enough... Don't worry, you'll get there.

Oh i've been jumping between 1-3 threads with Lord Dave for a whlie now :).

And yes i agree it would be nice if we could sticky a few so new topics aren't created which generally cover the same topic, but i don't see that happening sadly.

Regards Wolfe

[LordDave]

Oh i've been jumping between 1-3 threads with Lord Dave for a whlie now :).

And yes i agree it would be nice if we could sticky a few so new topics aren't created which generally cover the same topic, but i don't see that happening sadly.

Regards Wolfe

People don't read the FAQ so I think stickies are right out. And you can't give us the ability to make stickies. My god... we'd have 2 pages of nothing BUT stickies.

[Kinjiru]

People don't read the FAQ so I think stickies are right out. And you can't give us the ability to make stickies. My god... we'd have 2 pages of nothing BUT stickies.

Too true man.

[CdrWolfe]

It is certainly a hard to control. If you did have stickies then for everyone you have to assert or people would that the topic was in some way sanctioned by Cryptic, for example if you stickied a topic to deal with NPC vs PC crews, immediately everyone would begin to think 'OK Cryptic is going to make a decision based on this thread etc'.

I must admit i would like stickies because some topics i feel get lost to easily and i certainly would like to continue to discuss them. though no doubt others would like other topics and once again your stuck with two pages of stickies :).

Poor Razor, damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Regards Wolfe

[awhite75]

I think one way to do player crews would have to do with providing game content within the ship. For example, if I were Chief Medical Officer on my friend's ship, I would have medical stuff to do. Such as manage my NPC medical staff, cure sick and injured NPCs and Players during ship battles (like on TV people get thrown around from all of those explosions), create cures for alien diseases that the away team picks up when returning from planets where the disease gets past the transporters bio filters (like the cure creation is a puzzle / mini game), etc. These may seem goofy but I hope you get the idea.

And of course, I would go down with the away team to provide medical and scientific support if needed. The only thing I wouldn't do is fly the ship and handle attacks. But if I get tired of playing on my friends ship, give me the option to go captain my own ship. Drop me off at a Star Base and I'll hop in my science vessel, LOL.

And you can apply this to Chief Engineers, Tactical officers, Helmsman, etc. with their own respective mini games and content stuff. So your not bored standing around on a ship you have something to do that contributes to group play in space and on the ground. But for soloist, you also can go off on your own if you want to. Wouldn't this be a win-win for everyone?