Question about Decloaking Alpha combo

redsnake721

I had gotten pretty good at surviving Alphas from decloaking BOP's and killing them before they could cloak and run.
Now they are using a new trick and was wondering if someone could let me know how they are doing it.
Right before they decloak or as they decloak they are hitting with something that is knocking all systems off-line.
Its not sending my Boff abilities into cooldown, it is making all the skills go dark for about 5 seconds so there is no possible way to defend or activate any ability.
And I had this attack comming from a Tac captian in a KDF BOP so its not a subnuke.
Is it VM? my ship is not turning purple.
There is a crashing/thunder noise before it hits, then all Boff stations go dark and the icons for Boff abilities disappear.
I dont know if this is something new that came with the new Doffs or some Nukera T5 reputation ability or what.
More than a little frustrating when you can no longer defend yourself from the decloaking alpha. Before you would hear the sound of the alpha buffing up and had time to hit TT, and TSS or TT and EPTS and evasive and move out of the way. There were a number of thing to do to avoid getting one-shotted. Now you are dead in the water with no ability to do anything, Just a sitting duck. If anyone know what this ability is let me know. But I'm not sure what can be done about it to avoid it if you cant activate any ability at all, not even batteries

smokeybacon90

It sounds like the photonic shockwave combo. Followed up with a BO and a quantum salvo it is devastating.

redsnake721

I have seen that one before and it never took all systems offline before, I need to look and see if the new Doffs are adding something to Photonic shockwave perhaps.

bitemepwe

The PSW-BO3-HY BoP build is a specialized build that can be devastating in the hands of an experienced player.

saxfire

sounds like heavy graviton beam or smthing, that is the only ability that disables everything but shields at once, if your subsystems are disabled instead of your ship, it's HGB, aka maco 3 piece set, but if its just disabling everything aka STUN, it might be magnetometric overload or photonic shockwave

edit: thnder voice might mean photonic shockwave, maybe you got hit by minimax or somebody else

redsnake721

After some research it looks like if you have 6 skill levels of Subspace decompiler with Photonic shockwave 3 the Photonic shockwave can disable all systems and can increase the disable affects upto 3.8 seconds. Really doesn't seem right that there is no defence or way to clean it off. And that can disable every time. I can see a "chance to disable" but %100 success to disable is over the top.

saxfire

You can remove it with engineering team and you can become immune to it with a2d, apo, gamma patterns, you can also put 3 points in inertial dampeners to reduce the stun to 1 second

scurry5

There's been no change to it since LoR - it's just that you might have encountered this for the first time. No new doffs were introduced. It's an extremely rare build that requires very, very good timing to pull off, and requires a boff layout that renders the BoP even more ineffective than usual in a straight-up fight. Not to mention if the BoP is caught, it's even more likely to be dead than usual.

Also, the spec tradeoff - 6 points into a max level Sci skill - is quite a big one. Your counter is basically APO and Aux to Dampeners, as stated below, and having a small spec into Inertial Dampeners, which cuts the stuntime immensely.

fonz71

a2d is great and will make you somewhat immune to this attack, but... inertia dampeners is the way to go, even at a high cost. the reason i say, is that being a specialized build, it takes some degree of experience to pull off that kind of alpha. the attacker usually watches your buffs carefully and times the alpha between your resist up-times. same will be true with a2d.

spec'ing 6 there i rarely see my dash go dark, if it does it's only for less than a second. it is also helpful with other hold- repel related buffs, and i may be mistaken but i believe i read somewhere it even has an effect on the duration of viral... seemed weird that it would, but i'm sure i read it

http://sto.gamepedia.com/Skill:_Starship_Inertial_Dampeners

yup, there it is... it's on the internet so it must be true, right?.....right? hehe

good luck and have fun!!

newreman1

Please report this exploiters/abusers to the game authorities immediately.

redsnake721

fonz71 wrote: »

a2d is great and will make you somewhat immune to this attack, but... inertia dampeners is the way to go, even at a high cost. the reason i say, is that being a specialized build, it takes some degree of experience to pull off that kind of alpha. the attacker usually watches your buffs carefully and times the alpha between your resist up-times. same will be true with a2d.

spec'ing 6 there i rarely see my dash go dark, if it does it's only for less than a second. it is also helpful with other hold- repel related buffs, and i may be mistaken but i believe i read somewhere it even has an effect on the duration of viral... seemed weird that it would, but i'm sure i read it

http://sto.gamepedia.com/Skill:_Starship_Inertial_Dampeners

yup, there it is... it's on the internet so it must be true, right?.....right? hehe

good luck and have fun!!

They were running in pairs, one would hit with the Shockwave and VM and a Gravaton pulse and AMS, then the 2nd with a TB and then his BO, HYT. Pretty frustrating.

havam

I don't have these items, so this is purely theory crafted. But maybe someone was applying the same thinking to the OP in game:

the nukara mines seem to have stun effects as well. with some fiddling around you can wait for those to hit your target (from a b'rel lets say) and then follow up with uncloak BO3 Hy3 combo.

THe stun of these mines seems to be better then the PSW stun.

fonz71

redsnake721 wrote: »

Well I was going dark for a full 4 seconds and my ET was dark also. So I couldent clean it. Even the Warp core Batt that restores off-line systems was dark. I dont slot any dampners as far as consoles go. I have some XII purple ons. I think I have 3 levls in internal damp, is that not enough to prevent a complete shutdown?

my guess is that if you were disabled that long, then the attacker was spec'ed high in decompiler... 3 is often enough for inertia dampeners, but i would go 6 personally. also there are a number of set bonus' and deflectors that give additional dampeners. including the sci consoles themselves. would be wise to keep one of two of those things handy if you know there is an enemy about using this tactic.

vegie0

Hai,

Being that I am a PSW, BO stacked B'rel I can tell you the ways to survive against a surprice Vape attack. Primarily that power distribution can often times be the difference between life and death. If you are not in combat and floating around, try to have more power in shields. This will increase your resistance.

Next try to cycle tactical team, or if such an attack is coming use anthing that mitigates large amounts of damage. Such as RSP, BFI, Pol Hull, Aux2SIF or any other ability before the attack if possible. If you have a Jump console use that... that makes me /rage. But the best defence is a good offense, so just be alert and cycle your heals outside of combat. Makes you a very unlikely target.

knocky

Engineering Team is your friend and can save your life if you move fast enough.

ET is the real miracle worker in STO.

fonz71

vegie0 wrote: »

Hai,

Being that I am a PSW, BO stacked B'rel I can tell you the ways to survive against a surprice Vape attack. Primarily that power distribution can often times be the difference between life and death. If you are not in combat and floating around, try to have more power in shields. This will increase your resistance.

Next try to cycle tactical team, or if such an attack is coming use anthing that mitigates large amounts of damage. Such as RSP, BFI, Pol Hull, Aux2SIF or any other ability before the attack if possible. If you have a Jump console use that... that makes me /rage. But the best defence is a good offense, so just be alert and cycle your heals outside of combat. Makes you a very unlikely target.

provided you know it's coming, very good advise but cycling you buffs is always a good idea

vegie0

fonz71 wrote: »

provided you know it's coming, very good advise but cycling you buffs is always a good idea

Shhh, this is what keeps it so effective. The impatient PvPer loves to Sponge Klink BO attacks.

shockwave85

vegie0 wrote: »

Shhh, this is what keeps it so effective. The impatient PvPer loves to Sponge Klink BO attacks.

Maybe a sponge is what's needed to solve the Klingons' BO problem :P

fonz71

shockwave85 wrote: »

Maybe a sponge is what's needed to solve the Klingons' BO problem :P

awww, a dirty joke :P

lol

masterkeychnk5

All i can say, Omega, TT and Dampeners to 9, High Cap High Resist High Hull High Resist. TT and Omega not even needed with some swift reflexes

Despite what alot of newer players believe, its ridiculously easy to make a build which is giving the best Alpha'ers a headache, Engi not a necessity.

marc8219

You aren't really supposed to survive attacks like that unless you are a tank. Just respawn then equip something to help track down cloakers.

iskandus

redsnake721 wrote:

Well I was going dark for a full 4 seconds and my ET was dark also. So I couldent clean it. Even the Warp core Batt that restores off-line systems was dark. I dont slot any dampners as far as consoles go. I have some XII purple ons. I think I have 3 levls in internal damp, is that not enough to prevent a complete shutdown?

This is not possible. Both ET and ST are designed in a way that even if your ship is disabled or held, it can be activated. I have seen people caught in web mines restoring their hull using ET. Thers is only a couple of explanations left. 1) You recall incorrectly 2) The said person is hacking

redsnake721

My issue was all Boff powers going dark so I couldent hit omega, or TT, or ET. Now a few times I could hear him powering up and got of a TT before my ship went offline, then when systems came back a FAW would catch and kill him before he could cloak and run. If I survived the 1st alpha his buddy would get me with the 2nd one, back 2 back sucks. I am staying out of F vs K arena for a while I think.

iskandus

In any event, assuming you were hit by PSW, the most likely culpit, the best defense against it is APO because it prevents you from being disabled. Having lots of points into Inertial Dampeners also helps but that is secondary and primarily used to passively reduce the effects of Viral Matrix. Some of the BoP can execute PSW-Tractor-BO-HYT in less than 2 seconds so lots of points into Inertial Dampeners is only helpful if their execution was less than perfect, which happens. It's tough for their execution to be near perfect.

If you are in Kerrat and you know there are some Klignons with this combo attack, you need to watch for your skill CD carefully because that's what they will try to time. Some will go as far as timing the moment when you start to cloak as the moment to initiate their attack. These TRIBBLE can be very patient. So patient in fact, they don't actually take part of what's going in Kerrat at all but sharply focusing on one target alone.

Another recommendation is to bring anti-matter spread. This thing has an effective range of 5KM sphere to all enemies within range. Virtually all BoP use a tractor beam prior to their actual alpha, whether PSW was previously used or not. Minimax himself has moved away from using PSW but some other nasty BoPers like Julius or Illusion still do and they do it with devastating results. In any event, Tractor beam is their common denominator and only useable within 5 KM of the target - inside the range of anti-matter spread. One of the difficulty for the target to escape alpha is that your camera angle is usually stuck on whatever you have a lock on at the moment. Given how rapidly they execute their combo, you will have no time to switch view, hence the anti-matter spread will act as a 360 degree life saver by not only disabling the tractor, it also blind your attackers completely, causing them to lose lock and cannot continue their attack. At this stage, you turned the table on them. These BoP are fragile and when they are blinded by anti-matter spread, you can easily shatter them into pieces.

If you are Romulan, bring Molecular Phaser Inverter with you, this will be your 2nd life saver in Kerrat. If you have both the anti-matter spread and the Molecular Phase Inverter, you can alt between the two as one goes into CD. These two items are extremely useful.

But most important of all, keep your eyes open. They will most likely attack you while you are already engaged. Always assume you can be amush at anytime in Kerrat so it's important to keep changing your speed, flight path, run EptE even if you are not fighting. Nowadays, I will activate Evasive and EptE prior to initiate cloaking even if I am not in battle. Once they see you hit Evasive, they generally do not attempt to attack because they can't tractor you and you are moving so fast hat PSW will never hit. They may try to VM though to disable cloak, hence have ET ready for that.

timezarg

The PSW + BO + HY3 combo is certainly devastating in the right hands. The issue with the combo is precise timing. . .you have to be right on top of the person to use PSW. I think the range is 2.5 km. Not everyone is precise enough to pull something like that off regularly. It's often the most experienced BoP pilots who maneuver their ships like they're an extension of their own thoughts that use tactics like that.

I've been trying my hand at a somewhat downgraded version of it, and it's really hard to stay in range to use PSW, especially with escorts. One unexpected turn can put them out of range.

playhard88

looks like a minimax attack ^^