Is tier 1 a fast moving target now?
Princess_Uhura
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in The Bridge
Ive been noticing over the past year that they have really ramped up the rare that they are introducing the new “best” crew at various parts of the game. So, basically every few months the “best crew” that you worked your tail off to acquire (or spend real money to buy) is now just an after thougt.
Am i the only one seeing this? Im starting to get fatigued from the constant crew acquisition and then overwhelmed by not having enough honor to max them all, and by the time that i do, there is better crew out there.
Anyone else?
Am i the only one seeing this? Im starting to get fatigued from the constant crew acquisition and then overwhelmed by not having enough honor to max them all, and by the time that i do, there is better crew out there.
Anyone else?
1
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No matter what they do, someone complains.
I'll add that they just had a mega event with only one decent 5*.
While I understand the frustration of not being able to keep up with everything, many of us CAN do it and very much welcome this pace. It used to be incredibly boring before this golden age of top cards and FBB.
You don't even need to keep up, missed out on Arex, a few months there will be another chance. It's a very pro-active change that I prefer than competing for another Rank 250 voyager with nothing going for them other than being a favourite character.
For reference, im a low spender usually, but my vip points probably eclipse most players from a time when i spent quite a lot
And 4 great ones!
Gogo Lower Decks.
I used to be fairly high but the last six months or so I've been low, only buying the ultra campaign and nothing else.
I love Lower Decks the show, and I'm glad they were added to the game. But Ransom, Tendi and the Dog, and Shaxs do not have good stats. Corrupted Badgey is the only 5* from the mega I'm considering citing. And since the mega, Agimus is the only new Lower Decks crew worth citing.
Since Bionic Rutherford 2 months ago, we've only had 4 5* that I think are worth citing(roughly tier 2 or higher).
I don't think 1 good crew every 2 weeks is too much stat creep. Especially when its mixed between events, 6 packs, and objective events. It's much more sustainable than feeling like you need to compete in an event every week while also not feeling stale like there are no new cards worth going for over a month.
I dont have any argument with that stance.
I would like to hear from some players who dont drop tons of cash on the game though, since, im sorry to say, you dont represent the majority of the players.
I haven't found stat creep to be any different than it's always been. Some new crew are 'must have' for the masses, while others are either terrible or redundant. As a nearly 6-year, low-spend (non-spend for most of the past year) player, I still find crew slots to be a far more limiting factor than stat creep, in terms of determining what 5* I go for. With a deep enough crew, even the shiny new stat superstars barely move the needle, so I certainly don't feel like I'm missing out. Between the introduction of crew retrieval, and 10x packs & cites being more readily available thanks to objective events, desired crew are far more easy to come by (and immortalize) now than ever before.
Still, even if your former Tier 1 are not Tier 1 anymore, they are still as useful as before in game modes that are not in direct competitioni, like Voyages. If they took you to a 10 hour voyage before, they will take you to 10 hours now, even if they are dropping tiers.
For competition, you might be at a disadvantage in ship battles, or gauntlet, but I don't think those rankings drop as much as voyage ranking.
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I think the crew slots are part of what my concern is. With fbb relying so heavily on a deep roster, and with the churning out of new ultra high power crew ar a real rapid pace (compared to a year ago), i am really seeing some strain with crew slots. And slits are extremely over priced, even when “on sale”.
I mean i am happy that there are new shiny things that i want, but it really seems like the game is trying to tip people into a moderate to high spending category to keep up.
I have 330 slots right now and there is definitely a need for about 30 more with my roster/play style.
Without the slots, you dump buckets of merits to help with nodes in fbb.
If you tap your dilithium budget for slots, you cant as easily keep up with honor to cite up your new shiny crew.
If you use a slot for a new shiny crew, you have to factor in which crew gets frozen and have to juggle your options for fbb thawing to attack nodes at a cost of merits.
Im just saying that the playing field is shifting to be more heavy spender friendly, which, i understand to an extent, but the balance seems way off for me, a low spender, and im hesitant to shift up to be a moderate spender, which i know is just my situation, but i think that a lot of players are in a similar spot.
I agree that milking of the cash cow has been far more blatant since the change in ownership, but I refuse to spent dil on crew slots, given the game is a glorified collecting quest. I make that decision and realize it limits my ability to go after crew I may like for one reason or another. I can finish wherever I want to in any given event, but rarely bother to do more than clearing thresholds. I could see how that approach might lead to frustration, but it is also freeing, when it comes to the time/effort/dil/money spent chasing rank.
The only time I've ever been guilty of succumbing to mob mentality was a few years ago when FO Burnham was all the rage on the forums - I got her in a behold and cited her right away, yet rarely use her beyond CMD shuttles (with several options giving similar %). The whole idea of tier rankings are based on vacuum, without taking existing crew into consideration. I find that so many of the top crew have redundant stats, to the point that they would provide minimal incremental value AFTER citing them up to immortalize them (while taking a valuable crew slot).
As for FBB, I accept the fact that I will be basically useless for all battles below nightmare, especially when it comes to clearing nodes. In an active, well-balanced fleet, that ideally shouldn't be a big deal. Players can contribute in different ways at different levels. Those early battles are only repeated often enough to get past the early resource roadblocks, and then I am able to more substantially contribute to both nightmare battles. I choose to accept this reality as a bi-product of my personal gameplay strategies.
I'm am far from a whale. I am a super light spender. I only have 5 more crew slots than you. Crew slots are always an issue. They were an issue before FBB and they will be an issue after FBB. The OE giving a 4* cite has helped relieve some of the crew slot pressure more than anything else they've done in the past year. But you were complaining about those OE events too.
Yes you have to use merits to unfreeze crew, but between the packs and bridge rewards I am net positive merits since FBB launched.
If there is a 5* crew I like, I compete for that crew. If there isn't, I take the week easy. But I'd much rather have a reason every couple weeks to get a new crew than go months with no crew will make any difference on my roster. Sure I'll never FF all my crew, but I would have never FF'd my crew anyway. But making that choice of which crew to cite is part of the game. And it's better than not making the choice because there are no good crew to cite.
I haven't spent a dime on this game.
Today.
Otherwise, I'm the antithesis. I could safely postulate that if WRG pulled the userbase into a spreadsheet and sorted by VIP points, I'd be in the top 5 players active currently and probably top 10 all time. I'm working on crossing the 5M VIP point threshold, on pace to do so by January sometime at my current consistent rate of spend.
I have 50 more crew slots than you, that's something we have relatively in common - I don't think for my play style I need more than that. When the game launched, it was heralded as not a card collecting game, but rather a strategy based RPG. Since then, I think we've all agreed that indeed, it is a card collecting game....and if that's the name of the game, then that's what I'll do.
So having all the available crew in the game immortalized and 2/3/4 copies of most of the gold cards, I've found that I don't need 90% of the crew in the game to function. I need a fairly solid base for voyages, your daily and OE themed shuttle crew, and the occasional vanity bridge. I don't do gauntlet unless I'm forced, so I'll have 5-10 of those guys around. Before FBB, I had about 100 open crew slots at any given moment and figured that's more than enough.
FBB changed this dramatically - as you can imagine having all crew in the game makes me handy to have for node unlocks. Our fleet has an amazing group of folks running spreadsheets and unlocking nodes so the rest of the fleet doesn't have to worry with it. Even with a dedicated team, I found myself out of both crew slots AND merits a month into FBB. I am being forced to change my playstyle due to the limited game economics of crewslots and merits, or not participate in FBB where I could be used best. It's a weird gripe, sure, but still it's mine.
FBB is refreshing for an otherwise stale game, where nothing has changed in years save for the new weekly cards that I rush to collect. On the subject, even if 90% of the cards head to the vault to never be used again, it's nice to see decently powered cards released that show value for the money/time/effort to obtain them - as said better above, I like playing the game with some fresh faces every few weeks instead of the same 'tier 1' cards from 2018.
WRG seems to be in a groove of some heavy hitting powerful cards that help most play types, and I think you'd be hard pressed to find a person upset with that. The only thing that is upsetting to everyone universally is the non-stop pace at which cards are released - 'the content train don't stop'.
Take it from me, the best thing one can do is try and let go of FOMO or the desire to 'catch em all'. You can't. I mean, you can, sure. I did, as have a few others like ATravelingMan from the amazing CAB fleet. But they just keep making more and you have to keep spending more to keep up. And then it becomes this weird meta of, is it 'impressive' enough? Sulus Husband is one of a handful of players that has all crew in the game, and he's been able to maintain that off and on for quite a while, and that's dang impressive. He's done something that literally less than 100 players have done in this game - more people have won events than caught all the crew. Yet, in one of his posts where he celebrated, someone basically said "yeah but they aren't immortalized, so not that impressive." Where does it stop?
Nothing makes Sulu or Traveling or you anyone else a better player than me or the next person, nothing makes us worse either. It's a mobile game with pixels that, sadly, one day will go away and we'll have nothing to show for the money and time and effort we collectively spent. The important thing is to find something you enjoy in the game sphere itself - which is usually community. Find some folks who are like minded and strike up a bond. You'll find the most rewarding thing about this app on your phone is the people on the other side of the world that are happy to see you, just as you are happy to see them. That will last long beyond the server's final boot.
Sorry I had too much coffee...what was the question again?
Without looking back, I'm pretty sure I suggested "Sacrifice Hemmer" {"Valeo Beta V Hemmer"} as soon as I finished watching the episode. {along with some others from that episode.} And I think most people can agree that the Tuesday Pack EV Suit Hemmer this week is way better than the one in what people are starting to call "The Dishonor Hall."
Yes, found it. Posted it 30 June 2022
SPOILERS FOR EPISODE NINE OF STRANGE NEW WORLDS
Timid Sam Kirk
Defensive Chapel {with phaser rifle}
Gorn Hatchlings {The Alpha with the babies at his/her feet?}
Oriana {Newt. Only her brother calls her Rebecca Oriana}
Buckley
Catharsis La'An {with shattered Alpha Gorn}
Decisive Uhura {End of episode}
Chia 'Det {Ch-Ch-Chia}
Emotional Outbreak Spock
Lieutenant Duke
"It's YOUR party" Erica
Dishwasher Spock
I'm not one of the three, but for reference, I usually do the Uber Campaign and DYC the new 5*. I time it to also DYC the Premium 5* if I do not have them, or they are new, too. Also, do the Daily Dilithium. So, $54-$79 a month, I guess.
If the pace continues, its going to get to a point that exclusive crew are the only edge, and portal crew are devalued considerably.
This is it, for all the years we had events for crew like Hernandez, Jhamel, Suspiria. We now have lots of options. Can't get this week's great crew? Well in a few weeks there will be another one, this is a great option to get good powered crew for all players, not just for who spends and doesn't. And adds to the longevity of the game.
(But at the same time, game utility is way down my personal criteria for going after a card, it's very much about my faves. If some of them turn out to be useful, so much the better.)
On a semi-related note, I have felt as though they've recently been paying much more attention to making sure even quite new players have a leg up in events, eg the bonus traits corresponding to ones belonging to the previous mega gold, or putting Tam Elbrun into the monthly rewards before he was big bonus that time.
You do not need a deep roster. You also don’t need the latest high powered card.
What does Acting Tier One Arex do for you for example?
He’s obviously top flight Voyager with good stats and a variety of traits. He even has decent proficiencies which are requirement for doing a crap shoot for 12 hours.
But does one Voyager really help you that much? It doesn’t.
His only real value is in collections and even that’s a little limited. He provides limited ability in every other area of the game. I passed on him and I’m going to pass on the next few 5* crew.
The only solution is to just pick and choose if something appeals to you. You can always get something later.
Of the top 20 crew only 7 are event crew, 3 are pack crew. Some of those are hardly required and some are already in portal. Spork is far and away the best of them. I’m shocked that it’s not still in the top 5.
And I would add voyages is the most individually focused part of the game. A Voyager crew only affects your own voyage length. If you don't get arex, he probably won't be a bonus in too many faction events. He's not useful in gauntlet or arena. And he won't be a be required card for a FBB node until a later portal update. And when he does show up, hopefully someone else in your fleet has him.
And if you did get arex, who cares if a better card comes around in 2 months. He'll still provide the exact same voyage score for you then as he does now.
Moving forward, i doubt that the tiered ranking system that a lot of players use to talk about crew will be relevant for much longer. It might be simpler to just rate crew based on how new they are.
All I see is several people trying tell you that you are not getting power creeped, meaning your roster is not getting devalued, so there is no real issue here. You are really just whining about not getting everything you want for your play style and the money you are spending. Which many of us understand but if your solution is to rob that joy from others, again, when it does no harm to you, is just…funny?.
I have only bought the monthly dil and the campaign for almost a year now and I have all the top crew I want minus Rhys (got very unlucky). Other than that I ran voyages around the clock, adwarp everything on cooldown including expensive components (building inventory), tank shuttles, farm galaxy items in skirmishes and compete in events for multiple copies. Merits are the most important currency and they’re only spent on tanking. Always play gauntlet and maximize the number for rounds you play for maximum merits. I did a couple of difficult 4x offerwalls that yielded over 100k dil which I’ve used on 6-packs when they put top crew in them. That’s more of a splurge as they all can be sniped with CR eventually, and I will do that for Rhys. You all know how to do this but are you really doing it around the clock with an app with multiple timers to remind you of everything? That’s how some of us are playing this.
It is a lot of time and work, but a lot can be achieved without more spending. Dialing down the rate of top crew is not just penalizing whales, it’s penalizing efficiency and number obsessed trekkies like me. And again, for what?
[edit] It took less than a year for my alt to reach a point where I can afford to compete in events for multiple copies quite often. It’s a vip0 alt that runs 10h voyages on the regular. I’ve airlocked most cadets, I airlock SRs often, I wisely spend cites on top golds that offer tremendous value in multiple areas of the game and have good long term prospects. Arex is absolutely one of them. Stop using harmful community resources (citation optimizer, etc.) and pay no attention to the *big base* crowd. Hop on Discord and talk numbers with fellow theorycrafters, data munchers and math gurus, it’s a different world and perspective than what you commonly see on these forums.
Timelines Talks Discord: https://discord.gg/HmNrwakbN9
Timelines Discord: https://discord.gg/8Du7ZtJ
Always lots of analysis of the game happening there. TT Discord has discussions for 12 hour voyages, fleet boss battles and Big Book resources aswell as rational behind tiering and lots of indepth looks at the maths of the game.
The question i asked is in the thread title, “is tier 1 a fast moving target”, and the answer is yes.
I appreciate alot of your post, but i disagree with your assessment that i am “whining” about being power creeped. My concerns are larger than that, but you dont have those same concerns and thats fine.
But you dont have to resort to attacking the legitimacy of my concerns by claiming that i am doing something that i am not.