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Shuttles
I would like to request that WRG look into the practice of "shuttle tanking".
This strategy is an exploit of a game mechanic, whereby users intentionally "fail" shuttle missions, in order to keep the shuttle missions on the shortest possible time duration (1 minute).
Here are some reference materials pointing to the strategy:
https://www.reddit.com/r/StarTrekTimelines/comments/aq5qzg/guide_tanked_shuttles_why_and_how/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwOuhhvwGq8
The end goal of this strategy, is to take advantage of the "faction winner" stage after a faction event, where you can send "tanked" shuttles in order to obtain a maximum amount of free chronitons and hard to farm items that are only available from shuttle missions. This is optimized by failing a certain number of these missions in order to keep all shuttle missions at the shortest possible duration, which is instantaneous in the case of "faction winner" shuttles.
This is clearly a flagrant exploit of a game mechanic that was intended to keep new players with undeveloped rosters in a "goldilocks" zone of passable shuttle missions.
I would propose balancing the reward structure of non tanked faction winner shuttles, or, simply eliminating the shuttle tanking process. It is a completely unbalanced and unfair advantage that was hardly intended by the creators of this game.
This strategy is an exploit of a game mechanic, whereby users intentionally "fail" shuttle missions, in order to keep the shuttle missions on the shortest possible time duration (1 minute).
Here are some reference materials pointing to the strategy:
https://www.reddit.com/r/StarTrekTimelines/comments/aq5qzg/guide_tanked_shuttles_why_and_how/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwOuhhvwGq8The end goal of this strategy, is to take advantage of the "faction winner" stage after a faction event, where you can send "tanked" shuttles in order to obtain a maximum amount of free chronitons and hard to farm items that are only available from shuttle missions. This is optimized by failing a certain number of these missions in order to keep all shuttle missions at the shortest possible duration, which is instantaneous in the case of "faction winner" shuttles.
This is clearly a flagrant exploit of a game mechanic that was intended to keep new players with undeveloped rosters in a "goldilocks" zone of passable shuttle missions.
I would propose balancing the reward structure of non tanked faction winner shuttles, or, simply eliminating the shuttle tanking process. It is a completely unbalanced and unfair advantage that was hardly intended by the creators of this game.
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No, there are two reasons to do this. One, you want to get some of the faction rewards that are not easily obtained when you have it good with the faction. This is particularly good for 0* holoprograms. Two, you tank a faction so that you can send out seven shuttles very quickly on days when you have a lot going on.
Full disclosure, I did the second. I have used it a few times only in the year or so I tanked a faction. Some days I just have a lot going at work. Almost all days I send out at least four waves of regular shuttles.
If the game designers have a problem and call that an exploit, I'll stop.
But there is absolutely no competitive advantage.
#1 is EXACTLY why people do it. There is just no other way to get basic holoprograms, they are not available from ANY away team or space battles and with Section 31 maxed out, they do not drop from shuttles either. The only way to get them in any useful quantity is to tank Section 31 and run them on this much lower difficulty or waste lower level cadet tickets. If this "exploit" gets fixed without a corresponding way to get acquire basic holoprograms, my assumption is it would lead to a mass exodus event. The same goes for basic orchids and ancient films for Federation. Those are the two factions I have tanked for EXACTLY that reason, and those are the two factions I recommend my fleet members tank.
Keeping those factions tanked takes a significant amount of work and resources, so again, this is not an "exploit". I go through so many more merits than your average player buying all the transmissions I need. I also need to use time reducers several times a week to get my durations back down when that annoying 14% minimum untanks my shuttles. There are costs associated with this strategy that non-tankers simply do not incur.
#2 This is not why I have my shuttles tanked, but I have had to utilize this a couple of times on days I had plans, like attending a wedding. It is handy, no doubt, but like you said I seriously doubt most tankers do this regularly, there are just too many good rewards from other factions worth running shuttles to acquire.
To the OP, if you are going to take such a massive shot at the playerbase, at least have the decency to have a name.
How are shuttles supposed to work? Passing increases difficulty and reward rarity. Failing reduces difficulty and reward rarity.
Are shuttles working as intended? Yes
No issue to address.
A- Minimum time is 30s
B- You cannot tank an event shuttle, well you can but there is no point to it. You would just lower your VP and not rank in the event. These types of shuttles have no bearing on non-event shuttles that are run daily. So no one is gaining any bonus in events from this.
C- Tanked shuttles work by failing shuttles, then passing them for quick turnaround of resource gain. But it's still a process. 14% Failed shuttles can still succeed sending your timer out and generally it can be as intensive as a Galaxy event with the amount of constant tapping. Not a lot of people utilise this to the extremes that you are talking about, as it requires a ton of work. Go in for a quick few extra chrons and (more importantly) top up the 0* holoprograms, def. But that's hardly an unfair advantage
D- Tanked shuttles are also useful for Objective events, or any kind of system where you need to pass a lot of shuttle missions quickly. 250 shuttles for Resistance Burnham, easily do it over a couple of days with Dominion. Is it an advantage, does me getting Burnham 20 days earlier constitute an advantage. Not really. Even the FTM players will get and cite the freebie star so it makes no difference there. Also useful for non-bonus events where you need to top up items. I use it on S31 daily, send a few fails, then successes and get a bunch of holos. Winning.
E- How could WRG solve this? Well they are unlikely to re-write the entire shuttle system, it's a fundamental part of the game at this time and I doubt their resources are allocated to addressing such a minor part of it. They could withdraw the Faction Bonus post-event (something they've kind of already been doing with introducing single faction events and more hybrids anyway) but that would very much anger the thousands of existing players who like the extra hit of chrons once in a while. They could ban players who tank? Well...we know what happened last time they enforced an action, and that was actually an unintended exploit.
TL;DR - Doesn't effect events, tanking consume time and taps, great for objective events, faction bonus could be tweaked but that would annoy everyone.
Edit: wait till OP hears about Kickstarts and Dirty Shuttles...
Good day.
Lots of straw men arguments above, but one caught my attention, some of you claim that very few people do this. Others claim that there will be a mass exodus if WRG fixes this glitch. How can both of those be true?
Regardless, this is absolutely an exploit. 100%. Whether or not it construes as cheating is up to WRG. I think that considering how elaborate the process is, and how bountiful the rewards can be, it is quite clear that it is cheating.
To each their own.
Mass exodus would result in the loss of a faction winner bonus, tweaking a system that could have impact on people who don't tank and general reaction to previous iterations of game changes that the community did not react well too. Not the loss of tanking.
It is not instantanious and rapid fire. There is a lot of preperation. Collecting shuttles is instant yes, if running sets of 4 shuttles you will get a quick 20. But then you have to send out fail boats, wait for them to return, hope they don't succeed and wait if they do. Anyone who has done tanking knows that it's not as easy as the video makes out, but it is profitable, with enough time and patience. But it's not cheating, it's not exploiting, and it's not as game changing as the over-reaction of a statement you are making.
If you want a good example, look at the VIP0 crowd, people who don't Pay 2 Win, people who live with Warp 1 in a Galaxy and still win them. I am in awe of a community of people who can play that way, would I deny them the benefits of tanking? Absolutely not, it's a minor profit bonus for chrons and items and nothing more. There are much more serious concerns in the world than someone getting 500 chrons on a Tuesday.
Would hoarding chronitons or farming galaxy items also be considered cheating by some? These are the mechanics that the game allows for different players to adopt different strategies, different approaches. It's one of the reasons I love the game. It allows people to play it differently.
Tanking is not cheating at all.
If a shuttle is successful you get x points if it’s not you get -x points. Game is built like that. Where do you see the cheating there?
Some people has been clever enough to to see the advantages of tanking and nice enough to share it with the community.
Tanking is not an easy task, it takes months. Cheaters go the easy way, not the way that take months to accomplish.
Do a favor to yourself and think twice before calling the community cheaters, when we are a great sharing community
Too much work and chrons aren t an issue anyway.
I d be more concerned about recent 4x Offer Wall offers that gave
up to 100k dilihtium. That‘s more concerning, regarding affecting revenue
and in game balance, than some tanked shuttles.
Actually, you still get basic holo's when you max Section 31 out.
I send daily 4-5 shuttles in total for Section 31 (when it's not a faction event) and I get at least average 1 basic holo each day.
Also every mon-wed-fri you can get basic holo's with Cadet missions on elite.
Which I do 2 missions with double add. When I run low I do 4.
So far I have never ran out of basic holo's.
I have 46 atm.
The shocking part on Datacore when I imported my data was when it said I need 1200+ 0* holoprograms....chances are you'll need a lot more than 46 too
True, I actually need 1960. But the point that I wanted to make is that you don't need tanked shuttles.
I'm getting almost every day new basic holo's, I'm not running out.
Orchids I have 179 and only 420 needed.
The only problem I now started to have is with Ancient Films.
Federation Shuttles will fix that
...wait, actually we all agree.
Well, all minus one.
I forget, what are we fighting about? Ancient Films?
In this case, the amount of tanked shuttles anyone can run is strictly limited by Merits to buy Transmissions.
For three days every month, that currency conversion is a bit more efficient. But nothing is being conjured out of thin air here.