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How to right the game in one patch
antoniosalieri
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
Ok this is a how to fix the game thread I guess.
What I did was try to identify 3 of the largest issues most people see with the game right now... and to devise a handful of changes that would be easy enough to implement with out major rewrites or additions of code.
June 3 2010... that was the last major revamp of space skills in this game.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=160696
I think the game could use a small tweak akin to that patch... This is how I would outline such a patch that would fix many of the issues people see in the game right now.
ISSUES TO ADDRESS
1) The disproportionate distribution of damage cycles by both captain type and ship class.
2) The rhythm of healing in game... mainly the nature of healing class skills and there relation to ship class design goals.
3) Power creep that has lessened the synergies of captain and ship type combinations for team play in both pvp and pve situations.
GOALS
1) To improve game by adjusting the rhythm of the games damage cycles. (spike v pressure)
2) Increase the level of overall damage applied by cruiser and science class ships.
3) Add high cycle (spike) options to the games dedicated damage class.
4) Differentiate healing roles intended to be preformed by both the Cruiser and Science class of ships.
5) Reduce the "tank" builds in game that in general revolve around using multiple copies of Tactical team.
Changes
Team Skills
- Global reduced to 10s. on All team skills
{This change will encourage the use of all 3 team skill in player builds... and at least increase the perceived value of players running more then one team skill.}
- All Team skill clears pushed to 10s... to unify all 3 team skills with one expected value.
{This change will unify the clear times of all 3 classes of debuffs.}
- Engineering Team; added 10%, 15%, and 20% hull resistance for duration of skill.
{This change will increase the value of Engineer heavy ship types in terms of healing power.}
- Engineering Team; Added Debuff Clear for Aceton beam, and Plasma DOT type effects. As well as a adding a clear for Eject Warp plasma type effects. Remove E Team clear of any sci debuffs such as Viral Matrix.
{This change will simplify the games debuff/clear mechanics by moving all clears to same system skills. E team will clear Engineering level debuffs. This will also revalue Cruiser healer game play by increasing the player appeal of high level E team cleanses.}
- Science Team; Add clear for Viral Matrix to S Team. Also add clears for Tykens rift and Energy siphon (drain mechanic).
{Intended to move Science Debuff Removal to a Science class clear skill.}
Science Skills
- Hazard Emitters; Remove clear of all plasma dot effects as well as clear on Tykens Rift and Energy siphon effects.
{This change would retain Hazard Emitters as the main sci based hull heal, however it would move the cleansing effects to either Engineering or Science teams. Reducing overall game debuff removal, and increasing the value of support role builds.}
Tactical Skills
- Torpedo Patterns; change pattern global to 5s down from 15s.
{This change would change the cycle of damage on torpedo based weaponry. A player could choose to equip 3 copies and gain one more pattern for an increase in there overall cycle of damage at the cost of a Boff slot. Or more likely they would move the release of there buffed weaponry to an earlier point in the cycle.}
- Cannon Rapid Fire; Change Name of skill to "Rapid Fire" allow the skill to operate with cannon OR beam weaponry.
{This change would benefit cruisers and science vessels directly providing a ramped damage over time skill that could be more reliably used on those classes of ships. Due to weapon timings, cannons used with the skill would still be at a higher damage cycle level. However the change would increase the level of "pressure" damage.}
- Cannon Scatter Volley; Change name of skill to "Scatter Volley" allow the skill to operate with cannon OR beam weaponry.
{This change would benefit cruisers and science vessels directly providing a ramped damage over time skill that could be used to provide aoe damage.}
- Beam Overload; Change name of skill to "Overload Shot" allow the skill to operate with beam or cannon weaponry.
{This change would open options to players to provide potential spike with the overload skill.}
- Overload shot; Increase damage of all 3 levels of the skill by 20%... increase power drain to 100 from 50.
{In keeping with the design goal of increasing the raise and fall of the damage cycle. This change will both provide a higher rise, as well as a higher fall off in damage following the skills use.}
- Target Subsystems; Allow target subsystems to operate with cannon weaponry at 75% reduction to effective values.
{This change will do little to effect the overall design goal of tweaking damage cycles. It will however mirror the application of changes to the other weapon abilities..}
- Beam Fire at will; Change name of skill to "Point Defense Burst" PDB will now operate as an AOE overload shot. Level 1 would pick up the 3 closest targets in the weapons arc. Level 2 6 targets... and Level 3 9 targets. Allow PDB to work with any equipped Energy weapon and use there regular firing arc when calculating valid targets. Damage per target would be 50% of the damage applied by Overload Shot, per target, with a system power drain of 50.
{This change would remove the overly complicated Fire at Will mechanic, it would provide an acceptable replacement to acomplish the same task}
- Point Defense Burst; move skill to its own global cool down category. Set Global cool down to 5s. Allow skill to stack with Rapid fire or Scatter volley buffs.
{This change would make the PDB an active defense that can be slotted on multiple ship types. This would be a powerful new ability with a very low global, however a dedicated support ship could use 2 copies to push a damage spike that would mainly be focused on non player entities.}
Doff Changes
- Energy Weapons Officer - Cannon weapon; Add overload shot as an effected skill.
- Energy Weapons Officer - Beam weapon; Change skill to effect Point Defense Burst cool downs.
Captain Level Skills
- Miracle Worker; Change to castabe skill. Add engi team clears.
- Rotate Shield Freq; Change to castable skill.
What I did was try to identify 3 of the largest issues most people see with the game right now... and to devise a handful of changes that would be easy enough to implement with out major rewrites or additions of code.
June 3 2010... that was the last major revamp of space skills in this game.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=160696
I think the game could use a small tweak akin to that patch... This is how I would outline such a patch that would fix many of the issues people see in the game right now.
ISSUES TO ADDRESS
1) The disproportionate distribution of damage cycles by both captain type and ship class.
2) The rhythm of healing in game... mainly the nature of healing class skills and there relation to ship class design goals.
3) Power creep that has lessened the synergies of captain and ship type combinations for team play in both pvp and pve situations.
GOALS
1) To improve game by adjusting the rhythm of the games damage cycles. (spike v pressure)
2) Increase the level of overall damage applied by cruiser and science class ships.
3) Add high cycle (spike) options to the games dedicated damage class.
4) Differentiate healing roles intended to be preformed by both the Cruiser and Science class of ships.
5) Reduce the "tank" builds in game that in general revolve around using multiple copies of Tactical team.
Changes
Team Skills
- Global reduced to 10s. on All team skills
{This change will encourage the use of all 3 team skill in player builds... and at least increase the perceived value of players running more then one team skill.}
- All Team skill clears pushed to 10s... to unify all 3 team skills with one expected value.
{This change will unify the clear times of all 3 classes of debuffs.}
- Engineering Team; added 10%, 15%, and 20% hull resistance for duration of skill.
{This change will increase the value of Engineer heavy ship types in terms of healing power.}
- Engineering Team; Added Debuff Clear for Aceton beam, and Plasma DOT type effects. As well as a adding a clear for Eject Warp plasma type effects. Remove E Team clear of any sci debuffs such as Viral Matrix.
{This change will simplify the games debuff/clear mechanics by moving all clears to same system skills. E team will clear Engineering level debuffs. This will also revalue Cruiser healer game play by increasing the player appeal of high level E team cleanses.}
- Science Team; Add clear for Viral Matrix to S Team. Also add clears for Tykens rift and Energy siphon (drain mechanic).
{Intended to move Science Debuff Removal to a Science class clear skill.}
Science Skills
- Hazard Emitters; Remove clear of all plasma dot effects as well as clear on Tykens Rift and Energy siphon effects.
{This change would retain Hazard Emitters as the main sci based hull heal, however it would move the cleansing effects to either Engineering or Science teams. Reducing overall game debuff removal, and increasing the value of support role builds.}
Tactical Skills
- Torpedo Patterns; change pattern global to 5s down from 15s.
{This change would change the cycle of damage on torpedo based weaponry. A player could choose to equip 3 copies and gain one more pattern for an increase in there overall cycle of damage at the cost of a Boff slot. Or more likely they would move the release of there buffed weaponry to an earlier point in the cycle.}
- Cannon Rapid Fire; Change Name of skill to "Rapid Fire" allow the skill to operate with cannon OR beam weaponry.
{This change would benefit cruisers and science vessels directly providing a ramped damage over time skill that could be more reliably used on those classes of ships. Due to weapon timings, cannons used with the skill would still be at a higher damage cycle level. However the change would increase the level of "pressure" damage.}
- Cannon Scatter Volley; Change name of skill to "Scatter Volley" allow the skill to operate with cannon OR beam weaponry.
{This change would benefit cruisers and science vessels directly providing a ramped damage over time skill that could be used to provide aoe damage.}
- Beam Overload; Change name of skill to "Overload Shot" allow the skill to operate with beam or cannon weaponry.
{This change would open options to players to provide potential spike with the overload skill.}
- Overload shot; Increase damage of all 3 levels of the skill by 20%... increase power drain to 100 from 50.
{In keeping with the design goal of increasing the raise and fall of the damage cycle. This change will both provide a higher rise, as well as a higher fall off in damage following the skills use.}
- Target Subsystems; Allow target subsystems to operate with cannon weaponry at 75% reduction to effective values.
{This change will do little to effect the overall design goal of tweaking damage cycles. It will however mirror the application of changes to the other weapon abilities..}
- Beam Fire at will; Change name of skill to "Point Defense Burst" PDB will now operate as an AOE overload shot. Level 1 would pick up the 3 closest targets in the weapons arc. Level 2 6 targets... and Level 3 9 targets. Allow PDB to work with any equipped Energy weapon and use there regular firing arc when calculating valid targets. Damage per target would be 50% of the damage applied by Overload Shot, per target, with a system power drain of 50.
{This change would remove the overly complicated Fire at Will mechanic, it would provide an acceptable replacement to acomplish the same task}
- Point Defense Burst; move skill to its own global cool down category. Set Global cool down to 5s. Allow skill to stack with Rapid fire or Scatter volley buffs.
{This change would make the PDB an active defense that can be slotted on multiple ship types. This would be a powerful new ability with a very low global, however a dedicated support ship could use 2 copies to push a damage spike that would mainly be focused on non player entities.}
Doff Changes
- Energy Weapons Officer - Cannon weapon; Add overload shot as an effected skill.
- Energy Weapons Officer - Beam weapon; Change skill to effect Point Defense Burst cool downs.
Captain Level Skills
- Miracle Worker; Change to castabe skill. Add engi team clears.
- Rotate Shield Freq; Change to castable skill.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Dignity and an empty sack is worth the sack.
Post edited by antoniosalieri on
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Comments
There's some really good ideas here that would definitely benefit science and cruiser captains, but this:
would make escorts even more horrifying.
If we want to bring up the damage output of cruisers without doing the same to escorts, we need to talk about raising their innate power levels.
And for science ships, we need to improve the damage done by tractor beams and gravity wells, and make those exotic damage (not kinetic) like they originally were.
Also, science already does clear energy siphon, and as far as I know, hazard emitters does not.
Otherwise, great ideas, and great presentation. :thumbsup:
...Oh, baby, you know, I've really got to leave you / Oh, I can hear it callin 'me / I said don't you hear it callin' me the way it used to do?...
- Anne Bredon
I think with my changes we would find the "tank" scort would mostly go away. At that point I don't think the extra bit of damage an escort would gain from overload a DHC instead of a DBB would be major. Yes it would be a bit more damage then the DBB in general and that cannon would be ready to be Rapid fired of course. Overall however I think it would provide what this game needs right now... which I do think is a bit more spike, coupled with a lot more pressure, and "tank" options that don't revolve around 2 powers... namely tac team and hazards.
Your point is taken however... and if it was possible. (and if Cryptic even desires to tweak the game at all)... perhaps a 75% effect when used on cannons could be implemented. There by evening out the damage numbers of beam vs cannon overload shots.
"Beam arrays aren't efficient because while they do drain 10 power, which is fine to me, they drain it after the first hit, which means the rest of the hits are greatly weakened, causing their overall damage to really plummet. A broadside is meant to be pretty devastating and lay a hurt on something, instead it generally ends up being a good first hit and then 3 low damage hits from all BAs.
If BAs instead drained over time, with each pulse, they would be loads better than they are now. Example:
6 BAs at 100 weapon power, let's pretend that they each did 1000 damage to start on the first hit. So first pulse: 6000 damage. This would be followed up by weapon power decreasing by 2.5 per beam array. On the second pulse, say each beam did...850 damage and again there would be a 2.5 weapon decrease per beam. Repeat for the third pulse at about 700 damage or so, and then the fourth for 550 damage.
In short, it'd look like this:
Start: 100 weapon power
1st pulse: 1000 damage per beam, weapon power drops to 85
2nd pulse: 850 damage per beam, weapon power drops to 70
3rd pulse: 700 damage per beam, weapon power drops to 55
4th pulse: 550 damage per beam, weapon power drops to 40, and then is restored back for the next go around.
What this would cause to happen is beam arrays would be delivering a very good amount of sustained fire, without buffing their damage at all. Yes they would be low at the end of a volley, but their effectiveness would increase tremendously because broadsiding wouldn't be such a massive drain on weapon power and just do tickle-level damage."
So while I'd enjoy seeing some of those changes done to BOFF powers and such, beam arrays themselves need to get adjusted first. I feel once that happens, then we can look at altering other things. I had an idea for a BOFF power, a new one for BAs, but thought about holding off on it.
True beam arrays are ineffecient. But we also lack some sort of slow shooting "heavy beam" for higher spike. Not only is the current state visualy not pleasing, the cyclles are also borked.
Without some minor exceptions i like the general idea antoniosalieri presented.
One thing I would do instead of removing Beam: Fire at will..
Change Beam: Fire at will, to Fire at will. This power would affect Torpedoes, Cannons, and Beams. Causing all weapons equipped on the ship to fire randomly with in their standard firing arcs but with increased fire rates and multiple shots, similar to the original Beam: Fire at will. (Let's face it.. when we think of Star Trek, one of the most used phrases is "All weapons, Fire at will!" not "Fire only the beams at will!" ) Also, the weapons would fire whether you have a target or not, ignoring the Auto fire rule. So if anyone flew into the 10km area you were creating with your weapons, or was caught in it, they would be affected by it.
As far as Clears go.. I'd do the following:
Change all team Clears and effects to 2s, 5s, 10s based on Rank (I, II, III respectively) This would make the Lower tier powers still effective, but would put more emphasis on the higher tier skills having a use. It would also make Tac Team III more effective as a shield distribute effect, and a defensive skill best suited for Tactical based ships. Also, increase the Bonus from Tactical Team's I, II, and III by perhaps 25% more. (Don't know their EXACT bonus numbers to give a good rating) This would also have little impact on Science Team and Engineering Team, since most of their abilities are focused on their Heals, but at the same time making Engineering Team 3 and Science team 3 more valuable for their longer duration clear. Add in the change to their Global cool downs and you'd have a golden ticket.
I'd leave Hazard Emitters as the DoT clear, but I'd change it as follows:
Reduce Hazard Emitters I and II Plasma DoT Clears to 2s, and 4s respectively. This would then make Hazard emitters I and II still useful in their current roles, but make Hazard III the best way to eliminate Plasma Dots. It would also help Plasma Weaponry because while it can clear a Dot for 2 full seconds of the duration of Hazard Emitters, it won't keep more Dots from being applied after that 2 seconds runs out. Leaving a long enough Gap for Plasma Dots to be applied, Stacked, and become more effective (Except in Hazard III's case of course)
For Polarized Hull:
Reduce the benefit of Polarized Hull I and II. Not the Duration of the Resist mind you, but the ability to make you immune to Tractor beams, say 5s for I, 10s for II, leaving the full 15s for III also giving Omega superiority in terms of being able to avoid movement debuffs, but rightfully so since it requires a LTC or CMD slot either way. Where as PH can be used as low as Ens.
For Tachyon Beam/Charged Particle burst
IF it's not already apart of Tachyon Beam and Charged Particle Burst, add a -10%,20%,30% shield Resist debuff to those powers based on their Rank (I,II,III respectively)
Tetryon Fleet Weaponry
Remove the Shield resist penalty from Disruptor Fleet weaponry to be given instead to Tetryon Weaponry of the Fleet Varity but increase the hull resist penality of Fleet Disruptors by 10%.
Aceton Beam changes:
Increase either the Damage Debuff or the Dot Damage of Aceton Beam I, II, III to bring it up to par with other Bridge officer Powers. Currently Aceton beam has been the Joke of STO. But if Aceton Beam Did a better Job of Debuffing, or had greater plasma DoT damage, it might actually become a greater weapon to use in both PVE and PVP. A good change might be -20%, -40%, -60% respectfully for the debuff. Also, separate Aceton's Debuff from it's Plasma Dot, so that a simple wash of Hazard emitters wouldn't clear it completely, but would at least remove the Radiation.
Eject Warp Plasma changes:
Reduce Eject Warp Plasma I and II Movement Penality so that with out the Doff, it can't actually immobilize some thing stuck in it. Perhaps 20% unresisted 10% Resisted for I and 30% Unresisted 15% Resisted for II leaving 3 as is.
Think about this:
American Football has been in open beta for 144 years. ~Kotaku
That's why I suggested moving its clear to engi team. Granted everyone could carry an engi team instead... however we all know that won't happen. Those engi slots are just to important for other things on most builds.... so it would force teams to consider having an Engi and ideally a cruiser, so they could both clear team Acetons, and perhaps even throw some much harder to counter aceton out.
I think if hazards didn't clear it... Aceton 1 would become very popular.
On the plasma dots... ya I wasn't sure weather to suggest leaving it on hz or moving it to engi... in the end I thought engi team mainly as a simplicity of design. Engi debuffs... engi counters... and I really think plasma fires are more an engi thing then a sci.
I think the real advantage of having engi team clear plasma fires... is again forcing the need for Engi Cruisers in the game... Escorts and sci ships can slot engi teams for sure... but it will be at the cost of shield resistance in the end which I think is good overall for the game. It would really depend if people would start switching to heavy plasma based builds to take advantage of people not running enough Engi Teams. (it would be also a very good reason for an escort for instance to only load one tac team... and an engi team... thus reducing the tac team tank concern... on the tac team tanking score as well the 10s global on teams would mean that 2 tac team ships... will have a larger gap in the cycle. Having 20s solid up in a trade for 10s solid down time, I think that accomplishes the goal of raising the peeks and valleys of dmg and heals to sync up into something more fun to play)
Hard to say... on that change I know it could go either way... and I think overall the design would work both ways. I do like the team change though... that way all clears are preformed by teams... and are subject to the team cool downs (which I suggested get changed to 10s global to allow healers to run all 3 teams with no penalty to up time).
If you were getting chewed by that you'd totally be yelling "Get it off me!" But, that's Cmdr level on a ship pumping the relevant consoles. Lower levels are still likely healed away even of not cleansed.
IDK about the offense debuff. Does it even work? Also it's radiation damage so IDK if "all energy" resists it or not, anybody know?
In general I can agree with most of the OP, and what I don't fully agree with I'm just unsure of, I wouldn't go so far as to say I think it's wrong.
The one thing I want to scream from the rooftops is making MW and RSF castable. Dooo eeeet. Everybody wants it.
CommanderDonatra@Capt.Sisko: ahhh is it supposed to do that?
Norvo Tigan@dontdrunkimshoot: hell ya, maybe
I use a DBB with BO 3, and 3 DHCs, when im running alpha/omega/TT/BO the quick damage from the first burst is insane!! I couldnt even imagine how much more insane it would be if DHCs could do that.
Then again on the flip side whats the point in having all this DPS when people have ultimate tank builds mixed with mass cross healing? The healing/cross healing/tanking i believe has gotten out of control,,sci and eng should tank more than scorts yes, but damn even some scorts now are almost impossible to kill with all the shields/speed tanking/cross healing, and even worse so for sci/eng ships.
Seriously what is the point in my whole character being designed around maximum firepower when half the time it does no good?
I put in another thread a friend of mine and myself took on a wells yesterday,,,both of us are flying ships with 5 tac consoles and good weps/setups,,,we could not get that ship lower than 80% hull,,,,that is completely rediculous.
I think for PvP the issue for us is that the Developers are unlikely to change ANYTHING that will effect what they have setup in PvE.
They are NOT ever going to reduce healing... there is no point in even asking for it. They would either suffer the wrath of the PvE crowd which is much larger then the PvP community or they would have to put in a ton of work reworking every mission and npc in the game.
So what I have tried to detail is a way to INCREASE spike dmg with out increasing overall DPS, on escorts... and at the same time increasing what we call pressure damage from the other ship classes.
Yes I am suggesting to take all beam and cannon abilities and just make them weapon abilities. Yes it means you could drop the DBB and just run another DHC...
Notice I however increased the DMG fall off from using Overload at all... Increasing the drain to 100 from 50.
The idea is to increase the amount of spike you can put out slightly so you can "If you time it well" stop the supper tanks, when they are in a low point of there heal rotation. Still with the added drain you will likely still have to time things properly to really drop targets like the wells you mention playing against. On the flip side that wells would now be able to slot Rapid fire and use that together with beams, to pressure you to get the job done before there pressure damage forces you to withdraw or respawn.
I knew people would focus on the overload for cannons bit... really I don't see it increases damage by a high margin. As most escorts that are going to run an overload really don't suffer much from just slotting a Dual Beam. I think the real damage up would come from Cruisers and Sci ships slotting rapid fires on there beams.
ok i "think" i see what your saying i was just arguing to keep it balanced for both sides,,,tac/escorts complain too much tanking/shield healing/cross healing,,,,,sci/eng claim escorts too much speed tanking and massive damage ect ect.....
If you mean a BO for DHCs that works similar to the BO for DBB where as DBB shoots 4 times but only the first shot has the overload and it has to be timed right to "dust" you opponent, if that were the same with DHCs then ok i could see implementing that,,,so that its basicallly a 1 shot deal that has to be timed perfect to implement the mass damage. Otherwise you would have people running around turning everything they shoot at to dust in 3 secs flat,,,but on the flipside even with DHCs having an overload would that even do the trick? Take a sci/eng with elite fleet shields running mass heals for shields/hull , then getting cross healing on top of that, and it practically takes 4-5 teamates to take down one ship,,,thats where i think things are getting silly,,,especially when its a bug/or other escort (and i fly a bug) can do the same thing,,,i can tank decent in my bug,,but when focus fired on by 3 or more opponents i melt,,,yet ive gone against other bugs with 2 other escorts backing me up and we could not even get it to 50% hull,,,the healing is just getting insane in this game to the point where some ships it takes all 5 teamates to slam it for at least 30 or more secs to kill it.
also maybe the healing issue could be resolved as such?
Transfer shield strength made your shields weaker to heal that of your ally
and extend shields would just pull some of the damage do another target rather than resisting it?
as for hull heals yea not sure what could help there
these are probably bad ideas but hey i completely support the above
I agree with you completely. Right now healing is so high that really the ships that used to soften targets for the escorts... just don't do enough dmg.
If you and another escort couldn't even scratch the shields on a wells player... imagine how well you would do if your friend was in a cruiser instead.
I think they need to do something to increase the amount of damage the cruisers and sci ships are in fact doing in the game. Right now a well played sci ship and even cruiser can survive even the highest damage producing builds piloted by skilled players with really very little effort. It doesn't take much skill to select the right passives and gear and click EPTS and Tac team.
I think though if we got to a point where 2 escorts on a team would have no problem ending people that mess up because they are under constant pressure from the other 3 team members things might be a bit better. Right now in most cases half the teams DPS just really doesn't mean anything because at best all it does is match the new regen passives healing numbers.
My overall chaangs would accomplish that in few ways...
1 - it would boost the pressure damage on beams.
2 - it would force people to run less tactical team.. and more Team heal skills to counter debuffs. Reducing the passive tank builds a little bit.
3 - it would increase the tactical use of debuffs in general. Right now the majority of debuffs are simply cleared so easily that almost no thought needs to be put into the counter game. (I admit this could create more of a gap between skill and unskilled teams... however I don't think a game that takes more skill to do well at is a bad thing at least imo anyway)
I think if they did make my changes... it would be a boon for the tactical end of the game... and if we could keep engaging new players with things like boot camp we could really get some energized pvp going here.
Sci BOff powers are in need of their drain powers interaction with PI being carefully tweaked. They are in need of Leadership BOff's having a reduced effect on Subsystem Repair (not stacking would probably be sufficient). They are in need of Scramble Sensors being redesigned into a not absurdly designed Sci Team sponge.
I think my system would do a good job of changing but not overpowering sci. Just removing the clear potential from hazards would force most sci ships to consider having an engi team around... which would hurt there shield tank on most ships. Only a few sci ships would be able to slot a rapid fire 2 for a beam pressure build.
I think overall sci ships aren't in a bad place right now... of course if they where to make changes like the ones I suggested it would effect them. I think team wise it would force most teams to run at least one healing cruiser... which could perhaps have some of those sci ships think more about CC builds instead of healing CC hybrids.
The PI issues with sci... myself I honestly don't see it.
I know lots of sci captains belly ache that PI has neutered there drains and strips. Truth is I think all of those skills are still super strong.
On the Drain end Bort has already killed a few global cool downs to allow a ton of Drain stacking that wasn't possible before. (and my changes I think address the real issue with those builds... and that is that hazards clears both siphen and tykens) You simply need to go all in to have an effective drain build which I think is ok.
For the shield stripping... again I think the resistance is over played. I have played shield strip builds and they are still fairly effective. You simply can't load a team of strip and expect to roll anymore... nor can you expect to be able to burst people in a sci ship by stripping off all there shields and landing a HY torp or tric to the face.
I think of more concern right now is likely the Human boff fixes and the effect of people now specking subsystem repair and the effect that has on the VM. I have seen people that have VM3 last a couple seconds now. Still for the most part I find people in general have a hard time specing all the reissts at once.
Escorts do not need a damage increase.
- The PVP community is playing the "Squeaky Wheel" scenario to become uber and dictate who can and cannot join in PVP. Which is not right. The mere fact that they say that Engineers are not viable in ground PVP is ludicrous. But everyone has their own opinion.
Engineer Captains flying Cruisers are NOT healers. They are engineers. I have never seen anyone in any Star Trek Movie or TV show ask an engineer for a heal. I do agree that pressure damage can be raised.
Science ships are meant for Crowd Control.
Everyone should be doing their assigned task depending on what ship they are flying.
And, as I said before: Everyone has their own opinion about this. Just because mine differs from yours doesn't mean it is wrong.
But you insist on science ship play their role?
We can not allow our defeats in pvp to let us beleive the game is flawed. The mentality of the players are flawed. When a player looses it can't possibly be their own fault, so they rage on the forums with game breaking and self searving opinions and suggestions. We use big words in an attempt to have people take our opinions with more heft, but in the end the spirit of the message is easy to see.
Don't get mad because your tac can't tank. Don't get mad because your cruiser can't dps. This is the way of mmo gaming. I have 4 max level charecters. They are all built to do different jobs. I suggest you do the same.
But, it might not hurt to move the healing skills further up the tree to keep them out of the wrong hands.
I'm mad because my tac/escort is better tank than my tac/cruiser, and is also faster ship, turns better and does dmg that actually kills something outside of PVE.
Also my tac/escort does dmg, compared to my tac/cruiser that adds zero pressure dmg to enemy, and only helps it by procing heals.
I'm mad because I have no reason to actually fly a cruiser except to be a heal-bot (oh the joy).
Cryptic should be mad, because I have no reason to buy any of his offensive cruisers. But I guess selling escorts is profitable enough.
Why not ? Before the passives and stupid fleet shields you could easily fly a tac cruiser to create nice pressure dmg and toss a heal or extended when needed. Now it is not possible. Whats the point of selling tactically focused cruisers if you are not meant to fly them ?
Beside, my engineer is even worse in cruiser than my tac. Oh except for the Zombie part.
You are meant to fly them. I use a Galaxy X for my primary cruiser, but I use my engineer. Why don't you? You can't make apples out of oranges. By your logic, everyone in the whole game would play a tac and fill all 3 space rolls while the other 2 classes rotted.
The issues with the game right now have nothing to do with people not flying there roles.
That is the heart of the issue and what I was talking about fixing in my op.
Yes tac is > all else in an escort.
However as far as cruisers go... mostly no engi isn't the best option. There is no reason to put an engi in anything to be honest... it is outshinned by either other Captain type in the same ship. That's one issue.
Second issue is there is no tactical use of anything in PvP anymore... we have to many low level cleanses with no real trade in using them. Cryptic awhile back took the best all around low level heal (hazards) and simply made it clear 75% of the nasty debuffs in the game. This has broken any balance in terms of the Debuff / Counter that CRYPTIC designed and was in the game previous to those changes. Also many of the clears are simply not clear. Viral Matrix is cleared by Engi team we all know that as PvP players... but as a new PvP player WHY does it do that ? would Sci team not be the logical clear for a science debuff skill ? How about aceton field Why is a science heal clearing it and not an engi clear ? By simply moving the clears to there logical sources we remove confusion to new players... AND make people fly there roles. If your opponent team has a Cruiser Debuff ship throwing Acetons your team best have a cruiser to counter. Same for Science... if a team is using VMs the best way to clear is to have a properly setup sci ship with science teams.
I don't know think about how the changes I detailed would effect game play for a few seconds. If anything my changes would promote people playing there own classes more... and supporting people playing the other classes more. If for sure wouldn't allow any one person to do everyhing. lol
PS... I have been here since launch and have 17 toons... every Captain type, on both factions. This isn't about buffing my escort or cruiser or anything else... its about improving the overall game so I can pvp on everyone of my toons and have a useful role to fill.
Yup pretty much agreed, i would have no problem with them allowing beams to be a bit stronger cause as it stands the only help on offense an escort reallly has is a sci spamming people with sub nuke and viral and getting cross heals, eng /sci rarely help to weaken a target with weapons. But they still need to do something about the insane amount of tanking. As it is now when i hit the arena usually it takes couple mins to pick out the 1-2 weak links on the team that are actually killable. The other 3-4 its almost impossible to kill no matter how much DPS you are packing. If they could lower the insane healing a bit and make beams just a bit more stronger i would have no problem with that.
I dont really think anybody is raging on here,,,its just getting silly how people can tank in the arena,,,,in star trek (other than borg) where did you see 3-4 ships pounding on one and 2 mins later its still near full health?
My story of the wells earlier is perfect example,,,while he didnt scratch us either its still insane that he could sit there and take the DPS from the two of us like we were just flies bothering him.
Instead of nerfing the op tanking in pvp,,,why not make it so (only in pvp) that each time you use a healing buff the CD takes longer? Or if not a longer CD, then each time you use eng team/sci team/Ep2s/TSS ect ect....each time you use it,,it gets a little weaker during the match?