We’ve got the trailer for the winning viewer submitted STO mission, “Invasion of the Ship Snatchers”. Plus we’ve got some firm details on Cryptic’s secret Star Trek Online project for Season 3.

Then – We’ve got a whole new question for you in our Mail segment, as well as your surprising Free to Play feedback from last week’s question.

All that and more, and this week’s STOked!

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This Week’s Show Notes:

NEWS:

Secret Project Update:

Revamped Sector Space

1. Will include exploration overhaul -AND- beta UGC functionality.
2. Final details not yet available — internally, they’re working on a few different options and seeing which works best, before moving those features to Tribble.

New PVP Queue UI and Match making is on Tribble for testing

1. Details of the new system found HERE
2. Interestingly, many of the implemented changes were inspired by a user-created thread.

Ask Cryptic, Aug 9

1. They are shifting focus over to improving existing content and mechanics, rather than simply adding more stuff (although in some cases – KDF, e.g. – adding more stuff IS the fix.)
2. Another mention of the commissioned officer trading system, sounds like it’s more than speculation now. (“put in for a transfer”)
3. Multiple mentions of UGC, including using it to customize interiors and create fleet starbases.
4. I still find it humorous that “sitting in chairs” is this massive technological hurdle.

Found tidbit, re: Ground Combat Improvements suggestions:  

1. “I passed it on to the design team.  They’re digging into ground combat soon.” -jmattson
2. If you want your voice heard on ground combat, now is the time to do it!

StormShade “No new factions for Season 3”

1. Mostly polish and bug fixes
2. Get the feeling Cryptic is really sick of the new faction question?

NewEgg promotion:

1. Buy a core i5 processor + motherboard, get a free copy of STO.
2. Offer valid until Sept 5, 2010.

MATH:

(No math this week)

In it’s place:  EPIC CINEMATIC TRAILER OF EPICNESS AND RAD.  I hope.

MAIL:

We asked:  How do you feel about STO moving to a F2P subscription?

Special shout-out to “BlueBadger” – a since-beta DDO vet – that shared with us some lengthy insights into how that community reacted to the F2P move, and how it’s still being received by folks that’ve been on the inside of the issue since the beginning.

General feelings:

1. The game needed the influx of players, or it was going to die.
2. The subscription options allow for veteran players to not feel slighted/ignored (for the most part).
3. The store interface, and repeated encouragement for new players to purchase items from it, raises questions and community issues.  Turbine should not try to ‘bleed’ new players for money.  Let them come to the Store on their own terms.

In a Massively.com article from Feb. it was said:

"That's why it should come as no surprise to hear that since relaunching as a hybrid F2P in September, DDO has managed to amass more than 1 million new players who had never played the game before. According to Turbine, there are over twice as many paid subscribers as there were prior to the change. The revenue from DDO store transactions is now also over 500% — three times the industry standard for similar titles!"

(https://www.massively.com/2010/02/26/one-million-new-adventurers-in-dungeons-and-dragons-online/)

Also remember that LOTRO is going F2P, and EQII recently announced their F2P subscription model as well.  And technically AoC’s Trial is very similar.  This is becoming the way of the future, for games on the decline to re-initiate player interest.

Features/Restrictions proposed for FREE players:

– Minimal forum access (to keep community limited to dedicated players)

– Reduced access to the Exchange (to make it less likely these accounts will be used by ‘gold farmers’)

– Content locks, on a per-system or per-sector basis (to encourage Freepers to buy things).

– Allow Subscribers to purchase ‘Assignments’ that they can give to lower rank Freepers, for individual missions.  (to encourage subscribers to buy these with C-Store points, and to encourage Freepers to subscribe so they can do the same to introduce their friends to the game.)

Generally speaking, our audience seems to think that this would be a GOOD thing for the game, but must be done with care to not alienate existing customers, or come across as a blatant money-grab.

NEXT WEEK’S QUESTION:

We’re holding another contest!  This time, send us your character bio.

Bonus consideration given to those that meet a few requirements:

– Accuracy is important – to the timeline, and to the universe.

– No ‘chosen one’ scenarios (one of a kind, last of a dead race, a Q in human form, etc)

– Canon races will probably have an advantage simply from an “established storyline” standpoint that you can plug into.

Download: