Greetings, Captains! You’re listening to EPISODE 198 OF PRIORITY ONE PODCAST, the premier Star Trek Online podcast! This episode was recorded on Thursday, November 13th 2014 and made available for download on Monday, November 17th 2014 at PriorityOnePodcast.com!
This week we Trek Out the final frontier and go where no man has gone before — the surface of a comet! In Star Trek Online News – another week, another patch. Changes have been made to some of the core features of Delta Rising and we’ll get into that. In our Community Spotlight segment, we help you break down those Item-Upgrade costs with MightBOB and his informative spreadsheet skills available for everyone to use. We also have an interview with Content Designer Jaddua Ross and Environment Artist Keenan Daufelt and they discuss the creation of the mission Dragon’s Deceit. Finally, before we wrap the show, we’ll open hailing frequencies for your incoming messages!
NOTE: In STONews Elijah suggests that it would require 339 Superior Tech Upgrades to upgrade his ship. However, 339 Superior Tech Upgrades would also include ONE three-piece Ground Set.
Topics Discussed
This week’s Community Question:
How much have you spent on upgrades? Did you grind for the requirement costs or did you just “buy it now” with Zen?
Let us know YOUR thoughts by commenting below!
In case you missed it, we’ve already published several video interviews on our YouTube Channel from Priority One Podcast’s on-site visit to Cryptic Studios in October 2014. BE SURE TO VISIT OUR CHANNEL AND SUBSCRIBE TO THE PREMIER STAR TREK ONLINE PODCAST!
Captains, if you haven’t already filled out our “Game Ideas” form on our website, check it out at HTTP://PRIORITYONEPODCAST.COM/GAMEIDEAS
and let us know your thoughts!
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Elio is a Northern New Jersey Cuban-American and graduate of Kean University, having earned his Bachelor of Arts in Theatre Performance in 2011. He has performed in internationally renowned performance halls such as Avery Fisher Hall with the New York Philharmonic, as a member of the Westminster Symphonic Choir, and in Beijing, China as a representative for Kean University. Since 2012, he has had the wonderful opportunity to Executive Produce Priority One – the premiere Star Trek Online podcast. Whether recruiting, managing the global team of talented volunteers, arranging interviews with special guests, editing, web-development, finding sponsors, managing crowd funding, or writing content for the podcast, Elio has a hand in it all. A long-time Trekkie, Elio has been watching the series since he was a child and sneaking in late night, back-to-back, episodes of TNG reruns. He finally embraced the Trekdom in college and spent many hours catching up on the entire multiverse…. instead of studying.
Greetings, Captains! You’re listening to EPISODE 197 OF PRIORITY ONE PODCAST, the premier Star Trek Online podcast! This episode was recorded on Thursday, November 6th 2014 and made available for […]
TobiasLTF on 2014-11-21
Keep the good content rolling in P1 team!
On the topic of the upgrade system… So far I have two ships on ONE toon upgraded past Mark 12. The Fleet Patrol Escort Refit has all gear upgraded to Mark 13, while the Galor and all ground gear to Mark 14. Throughout this process I have used a combination of finish now and waiting for the timegate to complete. All together, for this one toon, I have spent over 200+ MILLION EC on the materials to create the superior tech upgrade kits and over 700k dilithium ($45 worth of Zen) applying those kits and the few times I did use the finish now function. Mind you this is just raising the “Mark” level and not attempting to increase the rarity outside of the normal chances during the upgrade process. I cant even fathom the astronomical costs of trying to get a set of space/ground gear to go gold.
Looking back over this journey I have found two truths about the upgrade system as a whole. One is that I find that the costs, aside from time, spent have been ludicrous. Two would be that this system is absolutely NOT alt friendly, let alone toons that fly multiple ships, in a game where alts are NECCESARY to fund your primary toon(s) in the current F2P model. I feel that a reduction in the dilithium costs of applying upgrades should be drastically reduced, and the chances of a rarity upgrade bumped up a bit… Just my 2 cents.
TobiasLTF on 2019-01-30
Keep the good content rolling in P1 team!
On the topic of the upgrade system… So far I have two ships on ONE toon upgraded past Mark 12. The Fleet Patrol Escort Refit has all gear upgraded to Mark 13, while the Galor and all ground gear to Mark 14. Throughout this process I have used a combination of finish now and waiting for the timegate to complete. All together, for this one toon, I have spent over 200+ MILLION EC on the materials to create the superior tech upgrade kits and over 700k dilithium ($45 worth of Zen) applying those kits and the few times I did use the finish now function. Mind you this is just raising the “Mark” level and not attempting to increase the rarity outside of the normal chances during the upgrade process. I cant even fathom the astronomical costs of trying to get a set of space/ground gear to go gold.
Looking back over this journey I have found two truths about the upgrade system as a whole. One is that I find that the costs, aside from time, spent have been ludicrous. Two would be that this system is absolutely NOT alt friendly, let alone toons that fly multiple ships, in a game where alts are NECCESARY to fund your primary toon(s) in the current F2P model. I feel that a reduction in the dilithium costs of applying upgrades should be drastically reduced, and the chances of a rarity upgrade bumped up a bit… Just my 2 cents.
michael on 2014-11-20
At the most ill buy 20 dollars in zen..but close to 90 dollars???…i dont make enough to put that much money in a game.
michael on 2019-01-30
At the most ill buy 20 dollars in zen..but close to 90 dollars???…i dont make enough to put that much money in a game.
Marcase on 2014-11-19
This is why I listen and have been listening to P1 – I really enjoy the interviews and videos with the Devs (keep ’em coming! 🙂 – but the new crafting has us the players up in arms, that’s The Big Thing going on right now, so all the extra info, titbits and background you guys provide on this is a real treat. It will provide new and old players needed info to get the most out STO.
Great show as always, more of this please! 🙂
Marcase on 2019-01-30
This is why I listen and have been listening to P1 – I really enjoy the interviews and videos with the Devs (keep ’em coming! 🙂 – but the new crafting has us the players up in arms, that’s The Big Thing going on right now, so all the extra info, titbits and background you guys provide on this is a real treat. It will provide new and old players needed info to get the most out STO.
Great show as always, more of this please! 🙂
Reveris on 2014-11-18
Wow,
So the upgrade system is, wow, ever seen the Southpark Freemium isn’t Free episode?
We have whales who are doing this, clearly or they wouldn’t be designing for this level of spending. Frankly I can’t believe people spend on virtual property like this!
Even the EC spending is blowing my mind.
Reveris on 2019-01-30
Wow,
So the upgrade system is, wow, ever seen the Southpark Freemium isn’t Free episode?
We have whales who are doing this, clearly or they wouldn’t be designing for this level of spending. Frankly I can’t believe people spend on virtual property like this!
Even the EC spending is blowing my mind.
Dan Kochheiser on 2014-11-18
Hi Priority One. I know that I have been a little late in my responce to Cookie’s question of if I was running Advanced or Normal. I run only normal right now. So doing the Delta Quadrant in my Intel Escort takes a long time for me. And this has to do more with the fragility of the ship and the fact that the ships reset themeselves to full health if you get to far from them. I move in and out trying to kill it and not die myself.
As for the community question, I haven’t upgraded anything. I can’t afford to upgrade anything because I need the resources to get the Rep up and to get the rep gear. Once I get that done, I can consider doing it for just one ship. Once that is done, I can only consider working on Alts and one ship for each. Once every Alt has it’s one ship maxed out. I will then consider maxing out a second ship.
seannewboy on 2014-11-18
1) Love the new mastery costs.
2) I have been using the freebie kits, but have not been crafting for it, waiting until my crafter reaches 15 in all disciplines.
3)Even with the crafting weekend, the price is TOO HIGH!
4)The mark upgrade system is fine, but the quality upgrade system sucks, only 1 mark kit/quality kit just royally sucks for what you get from a quality kit.
I have 16 alts to do, it will take a while.
Wonderful show everyone.
Dan Kochheiser on 2019-01-30
Hi Priority One. I know that I have been a little late in my responce to Cookie’s question of if I was running Advanced or Normal. I run only normal right now. So doing the Delta Quadrant in my Intel Escort takes a long time for me. And this has to do more with the fragility of the ship and the fact that the ships reset themeselves to full health if you get to far from them. I move in and out trying to kill it and not die myself.
As for the community question, I haven’t upgraded anything. I can’t afford to upgrade anything because I need the resources to get the Rep up and to get the rep gear. Once I get that done, I can consider doing it for just one ship. Once that is done, I can only consider working on Alts and one ship for each. Once every Alt has it’s one ship maxed out. I will then consider maxing out a second ship.
seannewboy on 2019-01-30
1) Love the new mastery costs.
2) I have been using the freebie kits, but have not been crafting for it, waiting until my crafter reaches 15 in all disciplines.
3)Even with the crafting weekend, the price is TOO HIGH!
4)The mark upgrade system is fine, but the quality upgrade system sucks, only 1 mark kit/quality kit just royally sucks for what you get from a quality kit.
I have 16 alts to do, it will take a while.
Wonderful show everyone.
the LootCritter on 2014-11-17
In my case, I did it both ways.
To run my share of the tests I upgraded 1 toon buy buying the upgrades necessary (yeah, ouch).
3 additional characters I’ve upgraded by crafting the necessary elements from my stash saved for over a year. I still had to buy 100 Radiogenic Particles to finish those alts.
Crafting them ODES make a huge difference, especially when you crit with a VR doff. I was averaging 1.6 for every attempt (100 particles used generated 160 superior upgrades).
My four remaining alts will get updated eventually, but slowly drip by drip.
@Mighty_BOB_cnc on 2014-11-17
Oh good I didn’t sound like a complete idiot, or overly negative. XD
What’s funny is that during recording I said ‘hmm maybe I should add some instructions to this thing’ and since I did that it offset all of the rows which makes all of the specific rows/cells we mentioned in the podcast off by 1.
I can’t agree with Lanceandragon. The dilithium costs are fixed (within a small amount of variability with lucky crits and mini-crits). They will not change if you do piecemeal upgrades one small step at a time, or wait 6 months or a year to do your upgrades, unless Cryptic intervenes with a rebalance of the Upgrade system. The EC costs to craft items yourself are also fixed (somewhere in the single-digit millions for 1 full ship to Mk XIV [not Epic]). The only aspect where Lanceandragon is correct is that the costs for the crafting materials themselves can be mitigated by Time (grinding the mats).
The infographic wasn’t the best at explaining that most of their listed EC cost was derived from direct material purchases or upgrade tech purchases but it IS generally accurate *for the time period surveyed* IF you understand what each of the displayed figures represents (as mentioned during the podcast, I asked some questions for clarity in the forum thread).
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=20633621#post20633621
RE: Community Question: I haven’t really been upgrading my gear. I’m in resource-hoarding mode for doing my upgrades later. The system was very buggy when it launched before DR, much to my surprise, with [mods] and procs disappearing, some gear unupgradable, some gear getting *worse* stats after upgrades. So I have barely touched it for fear that it might break my stuff. I spent about 16k dilithium to upgrade a ground shield and the Zeffy Shotty for myself, and another 24k dilithium + 1.8mil EC to upgrade some cannons and consoles to flip on the exchange and that’s it. It’s only now that the system is becoming stable enough for me to consider using it on Holodeck (although I would check all of my gear on Tribble first to make sure nothing breaks).
@Mighty_BOB_cnc on 2014-11-19
Oh right! And I forgot to mention that I’ve been enjoying all of the dev interviews in the last few episodes, and this one. Despite my various criticisms of different aspects of the game, hearing the devs talk about the actual process of creating really gets me excited.
DazoUK on 2014-11-17
Hello p-one team good show by the way guys I havnt been able to play that mutch on my new toon I have however played around 10 levels since last Monday im on the last Klingon war mission and im commander (24) so still 4 ranks above the story arc I have been playing on elite and doung doofs as well I must say I do enjoy the remasterd missions love replaying them like a new game I will keep ya posted also regarding the question this week I have spend 1,000 zen on dilithiam exchange to upgrade some of my consls but I havnt done mutch im getting to r&D 15 befor I can upgrade everything
the LootCritter on 2019-01-30
In my case, I did it both ways.
To run my share of the tests I upgraded 1 toon buy buying the upgrades necessary (yeah, ouch).
3 additional characters I’ve upgraded by crafting the necessary elements from my stash saved for over a year. I still had to buy 100 Radiogenic Particles to finish those alts.
Crafting them ODES make a huge difference, especially when you crit with a VR doff. I was averaging 1.6 for every attempt (100 particles used generated 160 superior upgrades).
My four remaining alts will get updated eventually, but slowly drip by drip.
@Mighty_BOB_cnc on 2019-01-30
Oh good I didn’t sound like a complete idiot, or overly negative. XD
What’s funny is that during recording I said ‘hmm maybe I should add some instructions to this thing’ and since I did that it offset all of the rows which makes all of the specific rows/cells we mentioned in the podcast off by 1.
I can’t agree with Lanceandragon. The dilithium costs are fixed (within a small amount of variability with lucky crits and mini-crits). They will not change if you do piecemeal upgrades one small step at a time, or wait 6 months or a year to do your upgrades, unless Cryptic intervenes with a rebalance of the Upgrade system. The EC costs to craft items yourself are also fixed (somewhere in the single-digit millions for 1 full ship to Mk XIV [not Epic]). The only aspect where Lanceandragon is correct is that the costs for the crafting materials themselves can be mitigated by Time (grinding the mats).
The infographic wasn’t the best at explaining that most of their listed EC cost was derived from direct material purchases or upgrade tech purchases but it IS generally accurate *for the time period surveyed* IF you understand what each of the displayed figures represents (as mentioned during the podcast, I asked some questions for clarity in the forum thread).
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=20633621#post20633621
RE: Community Question: I haven’t really been upgrading my gear. I’m in resource-hoarding mode for doing my upgrades later. The system was very buggy when it launched before DR, much to my surprise, with [mods] and procs disappearing, some gear unupgradable, some gear getting *worse* stats after upgrades. So I have barely touched it for fear that it might break my stuff. I spent about 16k dilithium to upgrade a ground shield and the Zeffy Shotty for myself, and another 24k dilithium + 1.8mil EC to upgrade some cannons and consoles to flip on the exchange and that’s it. It’s only now that the system is becoming stable enough for me to consider using it on Holodeck (although I would check all of my gear on Tribble first to make sure nothing breaks).
@Mighty_BOB_cnc on 2019-01-30
Oh right! And I forgot to mention that I’ve been enjoying all of the dev interviews in the last few episodes, and this one. Despite my various criticisms of different aspects of the game, hearing the devs talk about the actual process of creating really gets me excited.
the LootCritter on 2014-11-17
Great Podcast! Especially with info on the calculator and other community links 😉
Thanks for including our infographic 😉
We tried to simplify the information to highlight the cost. The last element – which was a general question to those who bought the Operations Pack – what would the cost be in ZEN.
Thanks again 😉
Lanceandragon on 2014-11-17
I have been grinding /crafting for my upgrades. I have been coordinating with friends to get the very rare mats. Been selling some of extra kits from criticals to fund the making of the kits.
53 days to gather all the the stuff I need for for upgrades. Sign me up. 8 weeks for get all the items I need for one spec is very relaxed. Lets compare things to the Elephant(WoW) you can go that long without seeing the last piece you need. You have all the gear you will need. Upgrading your gear is a long term project. Focus on 13 first then be smart about how you upgrade next. Don’t try and do it all at once. Pick a piece then upgrade that. Talk with friends seen what they can do. Funding the ECs can be done by the Tour the galaxy daily, making mk 2 and 4 gear and vendoring that. If you are bankrupting yourself upgrading you are doing something wrong. Small steps are way to go. 3-4 days each item is not bad. It’s a progression system yes you can bypass a lot of it by spending zen/dilithium/ec but the main currency of the system is time.
The infographic is incredible misleading and unreliable and should not be a source for the costs of upgrading. 6 months down the line when the cost stabilize and people have most of there upgrades it will be quite a bit cheaper do upgrade.
David Desjardins (@creativegeek_ca) on 2014-11-17
Tried it both ways – through purchasing completed Superior Upgrades online, and through crafting.
Still found the costs to be very high.
Working with other players, we found that the average player could not possibly hope to have enough R&D materials to upgrade an existing XII set in the same time it took refine the dil needed.
http://lootcritter.wordpress.com/2014/11/12/infographic-costs-of-upgrading-in-delta-rising/
The number express here are averages across 93 upgraded toons.
Feedback as been interesting, with a few who had significantly higher numbers than the survey.
DazoUK on 2019-01-30
Hello p-one team good show by the way guys I havnt been able to play that mutch on my new toon I have however played around 10 levels since last Monday im on the last Klingon war mission and im commander (24) so still 4 ranks above the story arc I have been playing on elite and doung doofs as well I must say I do enjoy the remasterd missions love replaying them like a new game I will keep ya posted also regarding the question this week I have spend 1,000 zen on dilithiam exchange to upgrade some of my consls but I havnt done mutch im getting to r&D 15 befor I can upgrade everything
sanokskyrat on 2014-11-17
Wow guys great ep with those numbers BUT there is a few things i would like to point out.
I am now in a classic catch 22 moment. I have enough stuff to make stuff but other people sell it cheaper. but once i am out of that stuff I have no way to get it back with the way stfs are the way they are now.
So do i upgrade and spend all that time spending time losing in elite with nothing to show, make stuff which people now are selling for crafting low prices, (eg. new crafting consoles selling for under 1 mill). OR so i just do nothing. Because thats an opinion and as a hardcore player… thats what i am doing. Doing nothing is a choice.
I have now, decided to upgrade some items but ONLY ACCOUNT BOUND. I know i get now bonuses and can lose alot of DPS. The new crafting system DOES have all tactical consoles account bound. I have to change everytime I change to one of my 30+ toons. But if i dont i just dont see how i can keep playing.
Some items without spend any money can be made better. Jem hadar set for example. But thats impossible if i do that for every toon and there boffs but i believe that normal players should know about this! Same with space set and both of the sets give the old lobi MK XII bonus now at any level.
But its feeling like punishment rather then rewarding game play.
Knix on 2014-11-17
Great show as always.
On to the topic of upgrades. I’m a casual player, and I’m still playing through the DR story content. My mix of old Mk XI and XII purple gear gets me through most of it at a slow but steady pace, which is fine by me, so I’m not in a hurry to upgrade.
In fact, I haven’t even made the gear I’m planning on upgrading yet. When I got into the new R&D-system a couple of months ago, I decided use it to make a new set of gear for myself. Not wanting to spend dilithium, I’ve been grinding my R&D-skills ever since. I have all skills up to level 13 or 14, so just a few more weeks and I’ll be at 15 and have access to all available gear so I can start building my new set of gear.
I still haven’t figured out how to get the the rare crafting materials I need though. I want to be able to earn them directly with the gear I have. That doesn’t seem to be an option unfortunately.
My options seems to be: Leech on an advanced queue and hope for the best. I’m not about to do that.
Buy it with real life money. I’m strongly opposed to that.
Buy it with ingame assets. I want to use my ingame assets for their intended purpose, not convert them for other uses.
Use the fleet or reputation system to get the gear necessary to do advanced queu’s. Seems like a waste since that gear will probably be just as powerful as the gear I’m planning to make.
If anyone know of another way, help is always welcome.
the LootCritter on 2019-01-30
Great Podcast! Especially with info on the calculator and other community links 😉
Thanks for including our infographic 😉
We tried to simplify the information to highlight the cost. The last element – which was a general question to those who bought the Operations Pack – what would the cost be in ZEN.
Thanks again 😉
Lanceandragon on 2019-01-30
I have been grinding /crafting for my upgrades. I have been coordinating with friends to get the very rare mats. Been selling some of extra kits from criticals to fund the making of the kits.
53 days to gather all the the stuff I need for for upgrades. Sign me up. 8 weeks for get all the items I need for one spec is very relaxed. Lets compare things to the Elephant(WoW) you can go that long without seeing the last piece you need. You have all the gear you will need. Upgrading your gear is a long term project. Focus on 13 first then be smart about how you upgrade next. Don’t try and do it all at once. Pick a piece then upgrade that. Talk with friends seen what they can do. Funding the ECs can be done by the Tour the galaxy daily, making mk 2 and 4 gear and vendoring that. If you are bankrupting yourself upgrading you are doing something wrong. Small steps are way to go. 3-4 days each item is not bad. It’s a progression system yes you can bypass a lot of it by spending zen/dilithium/ec but the main currency of the system is time.
The infographic is incredible misleading and unreliable and should not be a source for the costs of upgrading. 6 months down the line when the cost stabilize and people have most of there upgrades it will be quite a bit cheaper do upgrade.
David Desjardins (@creativegee on 2019-01-30
Tried it both ways – through purchasing completed Superior Upgrades online, and through crafting.
Still found the costs to be very high.
Working with other players, we found that the average player could not possibly hope to have enough R&D materials to upgrade an existing XII set in the same time it took refine the dil needed.
http://lootcritter.wordpress.com/2014/11/12/infographic-costs-of-upgrading-in-delta-rising/
The number express here are averages across 93 upgraded toons.
Feedback as been interesting, with a few who had significantly higher numbers than the survey.
sanokskyrat on 2019-01-30
Wow guys great ep with those numbers BUT there is a few things i would like to point out.
I am now in a classic catch 22 moment. I have enough stuff to make stuff but other people sell it cheaper. but once i am out of that stuff I have no way to get it back with the way stfs are the way they are now.
So do i upgrade and spend all that time spending time losing in elite with nothing to show, make stuff which people now are selling for crafting low prices, (eg. new crafting consoles selling for under 1 mill). OR so i just do nothing. Because thats an opinion and as a hardcore player… thats what i am doing. Doing nothing is a choice.
I have now, decided to upgrade some items but ONLY ACCOUNT BOUND. I know i get now bonuses and can lose alot of DPS. The new crafting system DOES have all tactical consoles account bound. I have to change everytime I change to one of my 30+ toons. But if i dont i just dont see how i can keep playing.
Some items without spend any money can be made better. Jem hadar set for example. But thats impossible if i do that for every toon and there boffs but i believe that normal players should know about this! Same with space set and both of the sets give the old lobi MK XII bonus now at any level.
But its feeling like punishment rather then rewarding game play.
Knix on 2019-01-30
Great show as always.
On to the topic of upgrades. I’m a casual player, and I’m still playing through the DR story content. My mix of old Mk XI and XII purple gear gets me through most of it at a slow but steady pace, which is fine by me, so I’m not in a hurry to upgrade.
In fact, I haven’t even made the gear I’m planning on upgrading yet. When I got into the new R&D-system a couple of months ago, I decided use it to make a new set of gear for myself. Not wanting to spend dilithium, I’ve been grinding my R&D-skills ever since. I have all skills up to level 13 or 14, so just a few more weeks and I’ll be at 15 and have access to all available gear so I can start building my new set of gear.
I still haven’t figured out how to get the the rare crafting materials I need though. I want to be able to earn them directly with the gear I have. That doesn’t seem to be an option unfortunately.
My options seems to be: Leech on an advanced queue and hope for the best. I’m not about to do that.
Buy it with real life money. I’m strongly opposed to that.
Buy it with ingame assets. I want to use my ingame assets for their intended purpose, not convert them for other uses.
Use the fleet or reputation system to get the gear necessary to do advanced queu’s. Seems like a waste since that gear will probably be just as powerful as the gear I’m planning to make.
If anyone know of another way, help is always welcome.
Comments are closed.