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Expeditions
Roxton
✭✭✭
in The Bridge
So the poll I started ended with a 60 40 split in favour of more expeditions.
What should we do about it?
What should we do about it?
Star Truckerz
It's only my opinion but....
It's only my opinion but....
1
Comments
I don't know man. I don't actively hate any other event type besides Expeditions, particularly with the current reward structure.
If they were one-shot deals where you didn't have to grind and grind to get rankings for a decent reward, I might actually love them. It'd be a great way to force people to pull Commons and Rares out of the locker if you made the requirements correct. But having them use the current ranked reward system makes me not even want to bother when they do come up. At least with Galaxies it is mindless tapping where I barely have to pay attention to what is on the screen.
I get some people like them, and I can see why. And I enjoy them as well - the first run through.
Ov (Overall) | Vo (Voyage) | Fa (Faction) | Ga (Gauntlet)
Sb (Ship Battle) | Bt (Boss Battle Traits) | Co (Collection) | (Cd (Cadet)
Also, I hate scrolling through 400 crew to find the one who keeps moving down. It is a bad system. Expedition events are nice for the first day, perhaps, but then they are a pain in the tush.
...with: let them die. 60% in favor means there are 40% against. A similar question for any other event type would be much closer to 95 - 5. At least I assume so, I cannot imagine you'd get too many people saying they never want to have a Galaxy, Faction, or Skirmish event ever again. Those numbers tell me that as they currently exist, Expeditions are broken to the point where nearly half the people never want to play them.
My more constructive answer however would be to perform a follow up survey, asking for specifics. There have been a fair number of replies from people saying things like, 'as they currently are they are awful but if X was fixed I'd like them a lot more,' so IMO what "should be done" is to try and figure out what exactly it is that people dislike about the format, because if some of those concerns can be identified and solutions developed, we'd have something solid to present to the company as a way to revive Expeditions so that they can live again.
Do you have some lipstick?
A logical answer and an excellent reply. +1 from me.
As for my 2¢, I'll say again what I've been saying for two(ish) years. Expeditions need a tab, in the crew selector, that houses only event crew. Maybe a tab that just has a "B" on it. Until then, expeditions are a pass for me. (With this addition, I'd like them quite a lot; I think.)
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It's only my opinion but....
This isn't voting for governor. Nearly half of players who log onto the forums that saw the poll responded that they didn't like this event. That is a very large amount. Find out why those players don't want the event type back and maybe you get a large number that would then like them.
I would like to see a four day event with one day each if faction, skirmish, galaxy, and expedition. That could make for a fascinating story. Anyone who dislikes one event type could fight harder on another. One day each means less boredom with repeated clicking. Just never have a six day event again.
One day Galaxies will be the reason for me to ragequit the game, basically due to their high frequency and boredom. If there were Expeditions every other week I could imagine the same for other people who hate them. But like 4 a year should be ok for everyone, and if one really cannot take them... just skip it?!
In this specific example, if Expeditions see a drop in participation, competitiveness, or revenue those would be big marks against them. Their novelty may see an uptick in participation, but I bet they aren't as competitive, and don't make as much money.
We've also been told directly these are the most difficult events to make, which raises the bar above the Factions, Galaxies, and Skirmishes. Not only for new expeditions or re-runs, but dev time on improving them. Ultimately, their re-runs are probably great as a rare treat, but not part of the regular rotation.
Starport
It's only my opinion but....
But if it's true that Expedition events take more time and resources to create, then that's the most important factor. Especially if people spend less for them.
That doesn't mean that it would't be possible to have them as reruns or flashbacks though, three or four times a year. I would like that option and it would also be a nice thing for the players who actually enjoy them.
I certainly don’t care for Galaxy events, it’s been a looong time since I even tried to go beyond 130-160k VP in one. I see them as a weekend off; more importantly, I understand that some people feel the same way about Galaxy events as I do about Faction events and recognize the need for balance between the two types. Plus, the fourth star on the new 4* crew from the community rewards is a wonderful thing.
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter how much any one event type is loved or hated - what matters is how expensive they are to develop and how much revenue they can generate. Faction events generate tons of revenue from dil speed-ups, sales of packs for people looking for that 4th star on the new 4* crew, and likely from token sales and boost packs. Galaxy events probably don’t have anywhere near the same pack sales but make up for it with chron sales to the legion of players who don’t constantly churn out 8-10 hour voyages. And there will still be people out there who don’t want to miss out on the 5* crew who buy packs. Skirmishes sell event packs for crew and schematics packs for ships, plus they drive a lot of engagement - more hours spent in game means more hours exposed to LTOs, the Offer Wall, and ad viewing opportunities.
Expeditions...sell packs. The top of the leaderboard is also buying extra tickets, but most people should be able to clear thresholds (certainly enough to get the third star for the new 4* crew) with just the free tickets delivered during each day of the event and those earned from thresholds. They also don’t drive much engagement - players can accumulate VP as fast (maybe even faster) than in a Skirmish but don’t have a reason to stick around to grind for more VP because there aren’t the same bonus rewards like a Skirmish has. Simply adding items, chunks of honor or chrons, or even dil to the rare reward nodes isn’t going to make up for the fact that Expeditions are far more labor-intensive to develop. They need an appropriately large bump to revenue to be worth implementing more frequently.
I imagine DB and TP/WRG have had as many ideas as the community for how to better monetize Expedition events....and so far, none have apparently been worth implementing.
+1
Roxton, I didn't say anything about what people like or dislike, I talked about the economics of Expeditions. And Dirk did a better job than I did.
It's only my opinion but....
I understand the economy of the game and the issues with coding.
BUT All the same it’s a hot topic.
It's only my opinion but....
Phase 1 – Galaxy: Aquire new crew through rewards to to assist in phase 2.
Phase 2 – Expedition: Acquire items specific to finish advancing & training the crew, and acquire ship schematics for phase 3.
Phase 3 – Skirmish: Use new schematics to build and upgrade ship to use in battles
FYI for all the "interface problems" people: this had a fix last time. Use the search function. Last time, La Forge was "Dr. w", Data was "detec", and The Professor was "Profe". Five keystrokes and minimal scrolling for each. A little tedious, to be sure. But little moreso than a galaxy or skirmish.
I will say that some in my fleet are very vocally against expeditions. And WRG_Ben did say that they monitored participation in the last one and it was low. The player in me who sees a vocal minority stumping for expeditions wants to tell devs to **tsk tsk** it up and deal with it a couple times a year. But my logical brain knows that's not always how businesses operate.
Oh, and as I said in previous posts, I hope that any future expeditions are hybrids.
Except anybody competitive finishes the crew in the galaxy part so they don't need items from the expedition part.
And unless there are enough schematics and the new ship is faster than an existing ship, they will still use their existing ship.
It's a nice idea, but would need a lot more changes in the events to make your carryover idea have any impact.
A good idea if they keep it to 4 days. 6 days was tried. Too much.
Fixed.
What about the players Stumping for the poor Devs? What about players who are just bored and leave the game??
We already proved that the vocal minority hating on Expiditions here on these forums does not match the general consensus of players. They would rather do a Rerun Galaxy than a new Expedition. This baffles me (yes I know its easier for the Devs). So the haters are winning. They get their way. Maybe someday we will get some better variety in the game before everyone leaves. Maybe Not. Certainly hope that WRG/TP/DB/FBI doesn't just take these forums as gospel when they decide what to do. Their view of what players actually want would be very skewed. As I've already stated. Minor changes to Expedition would make it much more palatable to people. Fix the crew scrolling, add a quickpass feature for mission nodes (kinda like Skirmish). It could be done. It just isn't and probably wont be. Why not just make a new event type that doesn't over tax the Devs too much? Something.. Anything...
The forum constitutes less than 0.15% of players active in the arena. It may just so happen that forum participants skew heavily toward expedition enthusiasts. The QA lead, WRG_Ben, said that expedition participation was lower than other event types. If it was more profitable, then we would see more of them. The evidence is there, if you chose to see it.
I'm not even a hater. An expedition is an easy top 1,500 for me. I'm just here to toss in my two cents and some relevant information that I have seen and heard. Ignore it if you like, but I would prefer if you would present better evidence than a poll of <0.15% of the players with unknown demographic composition.
And a major bias in who even takes the survey on the forum. I'm an expedition fan and would love to see them return. But I'm not crazy enough to think a poll on the forum represents anything other than the opinion of the subset of forum users who chose to take the poll.
It's all been said. I don't see anything getting done. Just a lot of arguing. Ball is in TP's court.
Do you work for the Devs? You seem awfully concerned about them. You mention this over and over. What does that have to to with me? I'm a player not a Dev. I pay to play this game. I'd like to see changes. You keep pushing back on this. If you work for them that would explain your behavior.
Didn't stop you from making a prediction out of the gate that ended up being completely mistaken. I'm not here to please you. I don't need to give you evidence. You aren't a judge and this isn't a court.
So poll the players in the game then... do one of those Surveys.