The End of a Voyage.

It may come as no surprise to those here on /r/sto and the many fine people in RedditChat or one of the Reddit fleets that I have not been active as of late.

Before I go further, I'm going to state that opinions expressed herein are mine, and do not necessarily represent other players or groups of players.

I effectively quit the game approximately 2 months ago. Before then, my playtime was already rather sparse.

The reasoning for that was, as much as it pains me to say, Delta Rising. Many of the changes that came about with the release of Delta Rising, and the weeks immediately following.

I liken the release of Delta Rising, to Star Wars Galaxies' CU release. Too much had changed, and I was no longer interacting with the game I had fallen in love with. For years, I had spent much time (thousands of hours) partaking of the party always ongoing in STO and I never felt my time or my many hundreds of dollars spent on the game went wasted.

When Legacy of Romulus came out, I was faced with a vast array of new content, new characters who seemed to have lives, and a new faction to work with. The new content was polished, the characters had depth, and the storyline unique to the almost-vulcans was engaging.

When Delta Rising came out, I was hoping for more of the same. Yes, there was some fresh new content, and a lot of voice talent was provided. However, even this great stuff was overshadowed by the flaws of Delta Rising. Many systems changes were made, much of the game became very grind-oriented, and it feels as though the rate of progression for my characters was glacial in the case of my main, and completely not worth the investment on my several alts.

The rate of advancement for an character who was at the previous level cap was extremely frustrating, as you could not progress enough through the story to continue with the story without finding some form of grinding, to fill the gaps provided by the lackluster rewards of the new missions. being forced to repeatedly move away from the storyline in order to catch up on my level progression, just to return to the story, was a vast departure of the general design of the storylines from 1-50, where it often felt like a smooth progression from one part of a book to the next.

Furthermore, with the advent of the trees to put points in after one had reached max level there was now some hope of a.... golden age of achievement within the game, rewards to come at a reasonable pace and to be enjoyed. Unfortunately, at the same time, the rewards of almost all content was heavily struck down, making these new advancements feel that much further out. It felt like Cryptic was moving the goalposts when I got near the endzone.

The overall result was that my sense of advancement took a drastic hit. Before DR I could reasonably feel like I had achieved something in the game even if all I did was run couple few elites that night and logged off after half an hour. Post DR I was left with the feeling of having accomplished almost nothing after even 6 hours of gameplay.

Another issue I had with the game was those very same voiceovers. Hearing the voices we've loved from our time watching the shows was great, but several of the performances felt very lacking. I'm not certain as to the cause. Perhaps the writing was subpar or perhaps the actors really phoned in their performances but in several instances it did not feel like they were the real characters, like a poor imitation of the genuine article. In some places it felt so... devoid of life that I'm pretty certain that funds that were used to secure the actors talents would have been better used to implement more player-oriented changes elsewhere.

There were other factors, but these were prime among them. Even with those issues, I still remained, for one immense reason.

The community. I've always treasured this community and have been honored these last 3+ years to have a role in shaping and embracing the wonderful players and people around here. I don't regret a single moment of it, even the drama-filled times.

Over time, though, work was getting tougher on me and I had started sensing a... general disfavor directed towards me. I have no idea of this was the actual case or my imagination, and I'm fairly certain it was the latter, but the feeling persisted. Eventually it reached a point where even with with the amazing people that make this place tick, I was no longer enjoying myself in game.

So, I left. In the time since I left, I have found myself missing only the people, and not the game. I really can't think of any aspect of the game which could, at this point, entice me to return to something which I was no longer enjoying.

Sadly, recent events for me have provided me with cause to do much self-reflection and to discover what my priorities actually are, and what things I value.

One of the things I have thought on, is the fact that I can no longer view myself as having the correct attributes to continue on as a leader of the community. Since I no longer play the game, I have a very limited view of many new topics, and outside of wishing to see people treat each other with respect and in good spirits, I really can't provide an engaging argument for or against many new topics.

As such, I am hereby announcing my intent to resign from the moderation team of /r/sto so that my less active role in the community does not cause any issues moving forward. I still wish to participate in this community but I will do so only as a interested party, not as a leader.

So, by official declaration, I now hand the command codes for /r/sto to /u/FoxtrotBeta6 and step down as moderator. May he be magnanimous in his time as the eldest moderator, and a strong shield against those who would seek to harm the community.

In parting, I leave you with some wisdom the Department of Temporal Investigations would probably like me to leave unsaid. "Those who do not learn from the future are doomed to repeat it."