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Where was the shuttlegeddon?
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[SJ] Admiral Aki
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in The Bridge
So the event finished and I managed to finish in the top 1000. I used some rented shuttles but not all of them (I think I used a total of 7).
So it looks like the perceived “blood bath” didn’t really materialise. Sure, the VP for the winner was up and so did drop about 300 places in the last 20 mins, but the carnage that I was expecting in this event didn’t happen.
My thoughts on the shuttle rentals are thus: I like them, especially if we get more tokens dropping from various places (voyages, gauntlet other event thresholds, perhaps as a reward for sending more shuttles during the day).
I think it adds a new strategy element. “Sure you can rent an extra shuttle... but do you have the crew to stock it with”. And if we can stockpile the tokens like we can with chrons, it means that even F2P players can compete in a faction IF they pick their battles carefully.
What are everyone else’s thoughts now that the first event is over?
So it looks like the perceived “blood bath” didn’t really materialise. Sure, the VP for the winner was up and so did drop about 300 places in the last 20 mins, but the carnage that I was expecting in this event didn’t happen.
My thoughts on the shuttle rentals are thus: I like them, especially if we get more tokens dropping from various places (voyages, gauntlet other event thresholds, perhaps as a reward for sending more shuttles during the day).
I think it adds a new strategy element. “Sure you can rent an extra shuttle... but do you have the crew to stock it with”. And if we can stockpile the tokens like we can with chrons, it means that even F2P players can compete in a faction IF they pick their battles carefully.
What are everyone else’s thoughts now that the first event is over?
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When my final shuttle came in this morning, I was at #662 with 485907 VP. By time the event ended 32 minutes later, I had tumbled to #963. I'd even gained a few VP during that time thanks to being squadron leader. Had the event gone another five minutes, I would have fallen out of the top 1000 for sure.
I'm not even going to speculate how many players abstained from using their tokens altogether or how many bought as many extra sets as DB would sell them, or where I fit into that spectrum. I didn't buy any of the boost/token packages in the portal, but if this was any indication, I expect to have to strongly consider it if I want to be competitive going forward. And as I'm not committed enough to competing in this game to spend that money, this may have been my last top 1000 finish in a Faction Event for the foreseeable future.
That was the blood bath. You had to have about 490k to make top 1000
Everyone knew going in and everyone why all out to the max they were willing.
The fact that only 30k separated 450 to 1000 says how bloody this was.
I am a completely F2P player not by choice but by principle. I never "buy" my advantages I like to earn them in any game I play so if this trend continues towards P2w I'm afraid I'll be done with this game.
I have 3 shuttles, half way to getting a 4th through dil earned in game but I got 16 tokens from honoured factions. I had 80 stockpiled rare 1.30 time boosts and I work nights so I sleep very little over the weekend. I have a fairly decent crew. Immortalised Shran and the other 4* event crew was immortalised on the Thursday night. I have several immortalised dominion trait crew so filling shuttles wasn't a problem.
I decided for captain spock to have a go.
Running shuttles at 1.30 intervals with gaps for sleep using 9 hour boosts or the new 2x boosts. Consuming over 60 rare time boosts and all the new shuttle rental tokens highest I managed after the leaderboards were settled was in the 1500's. I completed the threshold with 2 hours to spare at 1800 and just gave up.
I'll only be paying lip service to faction events in this format to be honest.
I could not have performed any better as F2P it's that simple.
Sorry to be a jerk, but I'll stop you right there. If you don't have four shuttles, don't expect to top 1000. That could be said before or after shuttle rentals.
The closer you were to 1000, the more brutal it was.
I dropped from 650 to 1050 this morning, while still running shuttles every 3 hours on average. Using some 4* time boosts fixed the problem and then some, but there was certainly a lot more churn at the end than I was used to seeing in a faction event.
I'm not an F2P, but I don't see how this mechanic helps them. F2Ps have just recently gotten the advantage of being able to 2x reward on the cadet missions; this makes it easy for them to net 12 free 10x standard boosts a week. On average I see 1 3* time boost per pack. YMMV.
But over the course of a month, that will net you around 40-48 of those boosts, on top of any others you may get (i.e. threshold rewards, better luck on pulls, etc.) From past top 1k Runs, that MIGHT be enough depending on the ranked reward.
Now, the ante has been upped. While I ranked well, I had to use a lot more time boosts than I expected, as well as more alarms than I wanted. I'm guessing F2Ps may have to be more choosy, if only because they tend to be careful about not committing unless they know they can get there; otherwise it can be a huge waste of resources.
Also, F2Ps have less space for crew as a whole, and freezing/unfreezing (for extra crew for token shuttles) costs merits.
This event, I peaked at about rank 400, and I slipped out of the top 1000 several times during my 3hr runs (I had an actual success rate of 89%, so it's not that my performance was worse than usual). My last shuttles were collected with 23 min left in the event, and I was ranked 594th. I finished 726th. From my perspective, the event was considerably more volatile than usual, and I was honestly unsure if I was going to be able to stay sub-1000 during the final minutes.
The game is moving in a direction in which faction performance will have less to do with crew depth / shuttle quality and more to do with sheer volume. It won't matter if you are sending 50% shuttles if you can send 20 of them - you will crush players that prefer to send a limited number of optimized shuttles.
Also, skill boosts are being more devalued with each game iteration (Thursday ad-doubles, fewer AND seats, 3hr-2x reward boosts, rental shuttles).
Overall, I am something less than excited about this latest change.
However, this time I had to rent 8 shuttles and send 2 extra shuttles in the last 5 minutes (2 x 4* speed boosts + 200 dil) in order to maintain my spot in the top-1000 (#947).
It was a highly competitive event around that top-1000 threshold, far beyond any other faction event I've participated in over the past nearly 2 years. Without knowing exact numbers, I'd be willing to bet that the standings were very tightly packed between 500-1500 (give or take on either/both ends).
Faction events have long been my guaranteed new 5* crew event, while I often go threshold-and-out on galaxy, skirmish and hybrid events (I pick my spots to target top-1000 in non-faction events). However, if this event is any indication, faction events are going to be far more competitive than they ever were before.
In fairness, it's hard to say whether the cause for this event being a blood-bath was Captain Spock being the ranked reward, everybody having a surplus of shuttle rental tokens from them just being introduced (ie: 14 from honored faction achievements), everybody having a surplus of time boosts since we haven't had a straight faction for a few weeks, the addition of the new threshold rewards, or a combination of all of the above. I'm curious to see what the next straight faction event will be like, now that we've gotten a taste of the 'new' faction event dynamic.
They add nothing to the game. It doesn't make the "gameplay" more compelling, simply more expensive. It's not even new content, they're just another event tax.
I'm a bit baffled that some of you enjoy being charged more for the same old thing and willingly put your wallet on the table for DB to plunder it for exactly 0 extra work but to each their own.
I've finished top 1000 with only three shuttles before
I had a simar experience. I was comfortably floating between 600 and 800 Sunday until about 18 hours remaining. My sleep schedule is such that the 9 hr runs aren't advantageous, and had been running shuttles with little down time through the night. Around 10 pm EST I saw my ranks start to drop like a rock and couldn't recover. I did not use more than four rentals over the course of this weekend, I believe.
Trying to get back into 1k was a dog fight this morning, one which I gave up on on favor of my original conservation strategy.
1. Voyage.
2. Have fun. If something isn't fun, don't do it.
3. Only pursue characters I care about.
4. Contribute to the fleet.
5. No more spending beyond monthly cards.
6. Have fun.
7. Voyage.
8. Have fun!
It may have been possible, but would have been extremely unlikely for Spock, even if nothing else had changed for the event.
I accept that
About 100 3* timer boosts was what kept me in the 100-150 range.
I use to make it into the top 1000 with 3 shuttles but had to get up every 3h to send I shuttles..... I bought the 4th one because I am just too old to do that and need my sleep :P
Obviously the pack introduction did make a difference and I think unfortunately it's a bad difference as I won't be spending more money for pay to win.
I play pretty hard in a faction event, hopefully the big push us down to it being an event for Captain Spock.
The person who ranked 30th was entirely f2p.
It's simply a matter of choosing your battles.
A full faction event is 96 hours long - shuttles are 3hrs long. There are exactly 32 eligible periods to send a 3hr shuttle in during that span. Sure, it's not humanly possible to send exactly 32, because you have to staff ships and hit buttons and such, so really it's 31 - but for easy math - 32.
A player, with 4 shuttles who starts at 4k and never ever fails a shuttle will end the 96 hour event with 512,000 VP.
BUT! What if this player had been hoarding for, oh lets say a few months - and had, I dunno, 250 odd 3* time reduction boosts...why, that's exactly the amount for mathematical ease that you would need to double everything and run TWO sets of 4k shuttles in that 3hr span instead of the original 1. Well, that alone doubles your score to a million.
Sure, again, failures and human element come into play that muddy up the 'perfect' numbers. But that's why you should be a squad leader and get 50, 60, 90k VP of shared points from your teammates.
So, yes, it's very doable for not just F2P but ANYONE to score over a million VP in a shuttle event with even no rental tokens.
You just need 250 3* boosts. And all the insane luck in the world.
As for the competition, I'm mostly F2P (occasional packs when I see someone who interests me but not often) and can usually rank in the top 1000 or nearby. This event I used my free shuttle tokens and managed to finish just inside the top 5000. That is a considerable drop from my usual performance.
Instead of getting the 5 star crew I was hoping for, I barely managed all the stars for the new 3* Weyoun.
I just want to re-iterate... I did not buy any extra rental packs, and did not even use up all of the free ones I received from my honoured shuttle factions.
Exactly. And with the restructuring of Threshold Rewards, Merits are now harder to get. This puts VIP0's & other players with limited crew space (no, I'm not talking about myself) at an even bigger disadvantage than they were at before. One of "features" we'll see soon, I'm sure, are Merit Packs, buy 500 Merits for 9.99.
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Merits are pretty easily obtainable through gauntlet. Sure, some whales might want to buy them, but some whales also frequently buy chrons which are also obtainable through other means.
Your math is on point Frank. I won’t go full bore in a faction unless I have 250 3* time boosts. I started this one with 260 and have 78 left but I also had many 4 and 5* ones as well
But if they did, the minimum ratio for me to buy with money would have to be at least 10,000 / 12,000 for $4 and is have to be really really low on then to consider it.
I have all the Event and Bonus crew 4*'s FFFE. My only 5* was a 1/5 Shukar. I didn't thaw out Thot Gor and Weyoun 4 till Friday though. I did have a little a trouble getting Penk immortalized. That didn't happen till Friday night. I spend 18K honour to finish him off.
This event took more work than most shuttle events I've participated in. I figure between Spock and many people having 16 shuttle rentals available it would take more work to finish but I wanted to see if I could do well without Weyoun 6 and using no rentals. I'll be saving tokens for a future event where I want a high result.
I used a lot of 3* time boosts, but not full bore. I did use most of the "free" (threshold+achievement) shuttle tokens towards the end to guard my position, but from watching the numbers they wouldn't have made any difference to staying very very comfortably in the top 300.
What I did have was very disciplined timing, smart mission focus, a healthy 4* event bench, and my squad leader sharing a very useful card. My legendary bench isn't yet anything to write home about, and I didn't have Shukar, but having Ushaan Shran at 4* definitely helped (not regretting the $10 Shran offer!).
I'm neither f2p nor a whale, but I have invested towards ample crew slots and been very very intentional about who I accept into service, and when I train them up.
Bench strength matters. One only has to look at how quickly success %s drop off after the best mission or two (unless you're swimming in FF 5's) to see what impact a few key holes will have. One 'bad' seat can nullify a great event crew's benefit in the average score scheme, and then those % diffs get multiplied by 32 or 64 x however many weak missions you have.
So, while respecting the reported fearsome competition around 500-1000, I don't think it's necessarily become P2W *during the event itself*. But there's no question, fewer shuttle slots, or a shallower deep freeze bench because limited crew slots forced you to turn good crew away, will be a challenge.
At the high end, the ramp-up in points from 37th to 25th was frightening (but maybe it always is, I've never been close enough to pay attention before); top 25 looks currently out of my reach without a healthier stable of fused legendaries (or paying for shuttles). I'd have to defer in those in the <30 tier on how much the new options affected their play and how much they had to pay, if they did.