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So, according to people that are testing on Tribble FAW is now hitting two targets, but instead of dividing DPS between them is giving full damage to both. This is obviously going to turn the game into "eight beam array DPS cruiser online", let's nip this in the bud people.
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Are you saying Cannon Scatter Volley should be nipped in the bud too?
CSV has a very narrow cone and is easy to dodge. If Jorfs report is correct I would imagine we will see the return (or continuation) of the 8 beam circle and jerk cruiser. lol
So you lose single target damage if you use CSV when compared to standard CRF.
With this change to BFAW you wont loose any single target damage and instead get the same dps as standard beam broadsiding on another random target. So essentially your damage output is doubled.
On top of that you get the +% damage bonus also that comes with FAW
so if you where to run BFAW3 you would get +140% DPS output, compared to CSV 3 which is a pathetic + 25%
wow really balanced, combined with the changes to reduce spam. BFAW is going to be the NEW OP
this is looking like another epic fail by cryptic again.
Edit , oh yea and CSV is a higher slot power so it should be far better than BFAW. Looking at the upcoming BFAW changes this is not the case. Its still not even worth a higher slot compared to BFAW as it currently operates atm and now BFAW is getting another buff.
Correction sort of, 5 man team excelsiors with 8-beams or there abouts. If this makes it to live you could also see the escorts becoming beam boats again especially since they can run all the high level tac buffs.
Indeed... It this change comes in I would perfer to see FAW pushed up one tier as it should be. FAW 3 should be a commander skill.
Cannons and Turrets have wider arcs and can use CSV... but honestly the dmg is week and the cost is high (commander).
The only real damage you can do with CSV is with Dual cannons and these have the 45 degree arc that limit the max of 3 targets in most cases... they are also easy to escape as 45 degrees is very easy to duck out of.
The new Faw with single beams will have much better dmg potential then the higher arc cannon weapons... with no down side really. You can still blast away at your main target and get a ton of bonus dmg. Multiple this over 4 or 5 ships and, you have the most boring game I could possibly imagine. 5 cruisers 8 auto fire clicks each... 4 follow settings and I guess you have more time to watch tv.
True, cruisers wouldn't have huge spikes with this build because none of them would run BOv.
... Right?
And also make sure your feedback is based on facts and not claims. Just to be sure.
How many shots are fired per beam cycle modified by BFAW? What does the individual shot do?
CSV does more damage than CRF? I thought CRF fires more quickly for less damage which meant the two were about equal on their single target damage and CSV had the bonus of hitting my target's two best friends for 80% damage.
Cannon Rapid Fire deals the most damage against a single target. It increases your firing rate, the individual shots might deal less damage, but the damage/seconds still increases effectively.
Cannon Scatter Volley provides a smaller damage buff against a single target than Cannon Rapid Fire. But CSV hits multiple targets, so if you count the damage you deal overall, it can go way above the current value.
If I read snix and Salami_Inferno notes correctly:
Cannon Scatter Volley (since a long time) hits your primary target and 2 randomly determined target. You actually create more shots during that cycle. The damage per shot is also increased. That increase is lower than that of CRF, but you still hit 3 times as many targets as normal, so if you just count overall damage regardless of target, CSV generates more DPS than CRF. But usually ,you really want to deal a lot of damage against a single target to overcome its healing capabilities, and damage to non-primary targets is not that relevant. But for "soft" targets like pets, mines and unbuffed noobs with snail-like reflexes, CSV is preferrable.
Beam Fire At Will appears to work more closely to CSV now, except it only hits one random second target. What is unclear to me currently is the extra shots generated by BFAW hit the primary target as well if there is no second target to hit, and if the individual shot's damage is reduced to make up for the extra damage potential then. The "old" BFAW generated only 1 extra shot over the beam's firing cycle, and could hit the primary target again, so if you isolated the target, you had a single target buff, and if you did not, you had a spam clearance buff.
Ok, so the first target recieves damage from beams.
How about the secondary beam? Does ALL Arrays/DBBs select the same target? Even if there is more than 2 targets present? And do they stay on secondary target or does this jump randomly? The way I read the notes, each array will choose one secondary target, not necessarily the same. If each array is selecting it's own seconday target, FAW will remain just as useless as before.
Even if the damage is simply split between 2 targets, this is still not much better than CSV, if at all. Let's compare FAW3 to CSV2:
arc: DBB=90, DHC=45
damage increase: FAW3=40%, CSV2=20%
number of targets: FAW=2, CSV=3
base damage modifier from weapon type: DBB=1, DHC=1.25, Turrets=0.56
Up-time: FAW=3/4, CSV=2/3
Let's set up an example. I'll give the DBB base DPS at 100, DHC at 125, and turrets at 56. (http://theenginescannaetakeit.wordpress.com/articles-3/starship-weapons-overview/)
DBB= 100
FAW3= 40 (*3/4=30 for reduced uptime)
DHC= 125
CSV2= 25 (*2/3=17 for reduced uptime)
Turret=56
CSV2 turret= 11 (*2/3=7 for reduced uptime)
already you can see the cannons are putting out more DPS than the Beams. (150 over 140) Now if we set it up on an escort with 4 weapons front and 3 turrets aft we get:
4xDBB+3xTurret= 744
4xDHC+3xTurret= 824
so the damage given to the primary target is 10% higher for the Cannon build. Slight advantage Cannons.
the real difference is that CSV deals the same damage to TWO other targets, while FAW deals this only to ONE. Total DPS output from cannons will land at 824*3=2472, while the beam-escort will land at 1488. This means that the CSV build will give 66% more damage output than the FAW!
(provided you can keep target in arc.)
Conclusion:
FAW advantages: Higher damage to primary target above 5km+ range, easier to get target in arc.
CSV advantages: 10% higher damage to primary target, higher damage to targets at less than 5km range, 3 targets, difficult to counter, 66% higher total damage output.
FAW disadvantages: Easily countered, does not stop damaging friendlies when scrambled, harder to avoid unvanted targets in arc. Does not help aft weapons. Lower damage to primary target at ranges less than 5km.
CSV disadvantages: Harder to get target in arc.
From what I can see from these numbers, FAW3 even with the proposed changes, will still be a worthless ability, and by far inferior to CSV2, both for pet-sweeping and single target damage.
(I'm completely discounting the beam boat with FAW, I doubt it can do much good beyond mine/pet cleaning, and is a horrible liability if scrambled. If secondary target is selected same for all arrays, AND if it sticks to that target for the duration of the FAW cycle, I guess it it can be somewhat randomly useful. But keeping 2 targets broadside at the same time is very hard, and at a new firing cycle the secondary target will be chosen from fresh.)
EDIT IN RED: FAW DPS output slightly reduces based on reply from Bigredjedi concerning uptime.
On Holodeck I counted 40 FAW2 shots. On Tribble I counted 32, but the target moved behind a small asteroid which prevented firing for a few shots in the middle, so would have been 40 shots as well.
As you can see from the shots, both Holodeck and Tribble have the shots doing approximately the same damage with each shot. However, it appears that most of the shots on Holodeck were slightly higher damage than on Tribble.
Holodeck
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 162 (861) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 753 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 722 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 836 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 800 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 834 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 684 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 80 (797) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 75 (748) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 80 (801) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 92 (916) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 97 (969) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 80 (800) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 85 (855) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 95 (949) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 93 (930) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 84 (844) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 76 (763) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 75 (749) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 79 (786) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 84 (840) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 82 (824) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 95 (952) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 95 (945) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 93 (872) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 887 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 876 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 804 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 966 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 83 (832) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 531 (935) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 90 (896) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 96 (958) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 86 (864) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 98 (980) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 86 (855) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 99 (988) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 89 (894) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 196 (897) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 199 (948) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 957 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 254 (969) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 1040 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 993 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 829 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Tribble
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 68 (681) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 61 (613) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 56 (562) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 58 (575) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 60 (600) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 59 (591) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 55 (547) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 70 (704) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 70 (700) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 622 (641) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 60 (603) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 483 (639) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 579 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 555 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 605 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 506 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 795 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 748 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 780 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 677 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 703 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 740 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 1124 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 671 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 64 (641) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 465 (587) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 527 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 525 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 541 Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 68 (685) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 83 (831) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 80 (797) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 72 (720) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 74 (742) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Beam Banks - Fire at Will II deals 83 (825) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Your Dual Phaser Banks deals 74 (739) Phaser Damage to Typhoon Class Battleship.
Or alternatively (I think that worked best for Nagorak and BigRedJedi in their respective DPS and shield resistance tests) find a second player and shoot each other in Ker'rat or private challenges.
lol- Right. In theory at least.
Me, I plan to wait and see if this means a new loadout for a Vov.
Ok lets compare two setups shall we
Setup 1
3x forward DBB 125 weapon power using BFAW3
vs
Setup 2
3x forward DHC 125 weapon power using CSV2
For single target damage
Setup 1 is a clear winner. It does more damage all the time at ranges 3km and higher, and it has a greater arc and even bigger damage boost >3km and has a longer uptime. So against a single target this is far superior than CSV. So for single target DPS, CRF > BFAW > CSV.
The above is according to current holodeck setting without the proposed changes. Even though it was better for single target damage is wasn't that bad because the target selection was random, so it was more of a spam cleaning role.
Now according to so called proposed changes you have no more random selection and gain + 1 free shot at another target with BFAW, with no loss in single target damage, so essentially against two targets you would have 100% damage increase because you get a free shot off at that second target.
Now factor into that everything written in yellow and you can see just how overpowered this is going to be. BFAW will be superior in all almost every way except for when the player is able to keep 3 targets in forward arc all the time using CSV (lol never). That is the only situation when CSV will be better or as effective as this proposed change to BFAW.
Ok yea i haven't been bothered to go out and do actual in game testing against multiple targets with the new changes, but from what it looks like on paper, you would have to be an utter fool to even bother taking CSV over BFAW for both single target and multiple target DPS.
This is not entirely accurate...
Beam: Fire at Will has:
Thus, BFAW, in a 60-second cycle, can be activated 3 times (assuming 2 copies of the power), e.g. [45 / 60] Seconds of up-time, a [3 / 4] Ratio.
Cannon: Scatter Volley is accurately described:
Thus, CSV, in a 60-second cycle, can be activated 4 times (assuming 2 copies of the power), e.g. [40 / 60] Seconds of up-time, a [2 / 3] Ratio.
All that said, on paper, it does sound like a powerful twist on the ability, although the concerns over its utility seem unfounded, as, on paper, it now seems that it does precisely what it did previously, only now, you gain an additional attack per beam weapon pulse (total of +3 pulses) instead of gaining +1 pulse per cycle... Additionally, it sounds as though you are guaranteed (assuming that you have a target selected) that the first of those two attacks per pulse, will strike your selected target, while the second attack of each pulse will use the current, randomized targeting protocols (which may, perhaps, also hit your current target). Planning to test on Tribble at the earliest opportunity...
Just something to keep in mind...
-Big Red
Best way to test, by far... As it allows you to control ALL aspects of testing (assuming your fellow player is willing to take the necessary time)...
Things like:
-Big Red
If work and weird hours didn't prevent me from spending as much time in-game as I would like... I'd offer to set this up, but it's hard to pin down definite times that I can be available...
I don't really have a problem with CSV the way it is currently but rather that it "costs" too much. Drop CSV 1,2,and 3 to Ensign, Lieutenant, and Lt. Commander respectively and I would be happy. It would probably make it a bit more common of a skill which would be nice in that it might lead to less spam on the battlefield.
So you say that 3 DBB FAW3 will do more dmg than 3 DHC rapid fire 3 to a single target? And FAW3 will do more dmg than CSV3 to multiple targets?
And 3 DBB FAW3+APB3/APO3 will do more dmg than 3 DHC CRF3/CSV3+APB2/APO2?
IMO cruisers dont need boost to damage as they can use like DEM3+EMPTW3 *****, and still have enough heals and dmg resistance stacks. A new type of FAW will turn this again really "cruiser online" sh*t
And making CRF1 and CSV1 to ensing will favor cruisers/sci ships. I would say lets make FAW3 a cmdr tact ability. But its just my opinion.
Hope you guys can test it in pvp too. Cant wait the results
You can't Run CRF3 and APO2/3....only APO1 for the record. Outside of that you lost me with what exactly you are asking. I do agree with what you said about the cruisers. And lastly, I wasnt saying to move CRF down a notch on the BoFF position only suggested lowering CSV....or raising BFaW I guess would work too.
Actually, unbuffed cannons out-DPS DBBs up to 7km. Given a 40% buff to DBBs and a 20% to DHCs, Cannons will give more damage up to about 4.9km. http://theenginescannaetakeit.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/dps-range-comparison-graph.jpg
As my calculations in previous post shows, if you manage to stay within 5km range you will get higher single target damage from DHCs. You will have a harder job keeping target in arc, but you will also get twice as much AoE damage with CSV.
In almost all situations Cannons will deal more damage to your primary target, and the AoE attack is potentially 100% more effective than that of FAW... (With the amount of spam in PvP lately, I'd say it is very hard indeed to not have 3 or more objects in arc
Appreciate the input! Figures updated in my previous post.
If you do a simple Circle, or keep all your targets on a broadside arc, your doing the same damage to EVERY target with each beam that fires and hits the Non targeted targets. Single Beam Arrays are definitely the way to go for this tactic. As you get more weapons fireing if you get a broadside. And if you have an Engineer, or are an Engineer, and can keep your weapon power HIGH during the FAW fireing sequence, it can simply destroy not just 1 target, but MULTIPLE targets in your Weapon Arcs. You become a sphere of death with FAW 3 while keeping on target.
I can see how this would definitely be a problem if EVERYONE has Faw. 1 Target is called, and EVERYONE turns on FAW. This might very well be the death of Balling up stratagies.
I'd check out STO Starship Calculator....at 5KM an unbuffed DHC with 125 weapon Power is showing a damage at 132.972 compared to a DBB at 137.457 as you move further out the numbers become more disproportionate up to 10KM with the DHC at 61.541 vs the DBB at 105.806
A CRF3 at 10KM bumps that DHC up to 92.311 which is still lower than a completely unbuffed DBB running no skills. A CSV3 at that same range is doing 76.926 which is terrible.....You have to be under 7km running CSV3 to have damage output vs a single target outperform an unbuffed DBB with no skills running.
Running CSV for single target damage is probably a bad idea in my opinion. Having a CSV1 to help clear out spam is fine but I wouldn't count on using it as my primary source of damage.
This alone invalidates everything else you said, because you're comparing a Level 3 FAW to a Level 2 CSV. This ls like comparing a MK 5 DHC to a MK7 DHC, of course the MK7 is going to do more, it's a more powerful version. It does not matter if these two versions you're comparing take the same officer rank slot., just at a maxed out Tetryon weapons skill and Maxed out Polaron weapons skill both boost their respective weapons types by the same amount, but the first requires you be a Captain to even training it while the 2nd requires you be an admiral/general to train it. Now if you took one captain with maxed Tetryons and a copy of the same captain but could only raise Polarons by 7 points instead of the full 9 then ran a with both, you could say the Tetryons are better because they did more damage than the Polarons. While this is true, for the number of skill points spent on each, it's still comparing one maxed out weapon to one that's not maxed out.
In other words, you're comparing an grapefruit to an orange. Sure they're both citrus fruits, but the grapefruit is larger.
Now, if you want to test BFAW2 to CSV2 because you can't get CSV3 or don't have the space to slot it, that's fine, it would be a valid test because you're comparing like levels of the two skills.
The point is that BFAW provides better damage at a lower cost. You need to compare according to rank (i.e. Lt. Commander skills) to get a more accurate idea of how things stack up.