It's not the worst but it could be.
In the channel elitestf, I joined a private stf. It was KASE. I already played with some guy. So then I know what is their skill and they know mine. One said I take probe on the right. Another said I take probes on the left. And the owner said I take left. All on the right. Another guy asked 10% on the gate or kill it? Nobody answered.
We started. We killed the Tac cube really quickly. And everyone went on the right. Suddenly the owner said "need on all". To be honest I didn't understand what this does mean and nobody answered. 2 probes passed out and the owner said "we lost optionnals". Someone said why? And the owner said it's because there is no one to take probe on the left. Someone went to the left to take probes. And the owner with two player got scold because we didn't understand his order. Finally because nobody answered the question. We killed the gate. And again the owner scold us.
Because it's elite stf with experienced players from elitestf channel. We did our job. Only two probes passed out and we didn't run the stf longer. I don't want imagine with pug...
had one interesting Cure space normal on this thought.
game starts like normal, everyone waits for the others to make their moves. everyone moves first, forward. hokay, I go right, as usual then. one other guy followed me. out of the three one carrier was camping (that might be forgiveable), and another cruiser was camping too, but BEHIND the carrier, and one guy was flying around. I wrote in the chat after 2 mins if they thought this through, the "one guy" lol'd and came to help. now everything seemed fine, until the first cube was down (we had good dps, so it was still in time). I go immediately to the other cube, since two is more then enough to defend even against the raptors. now the rest didnt think that, so I had to destroy 5 probes til I saw another friendly, and when we killed the rest the third guy showed up for the cube.
and with the last the rest was on the third cube with me (after I destroyed 3 nanites, since the one raptor that was left and the two neghvars were quite a challange), and we finished happily.
the funny thing is, we even got the optional. I honestly do not know how we managed that (maybe I was not the onlyone who had a ship equipped for elite, I dunno), since we averaged 2 ppl at the cubes still I had a good laugh, which was not spoiled by a bitter ending
While poorly executed sometimes these 'alternative solutions' can be somewhat entertaining.
"Everyone tend to your own cube" is actually quite doable so long as everyone is armed for speed blasting. Whomever gets their cube down first gets a flagon of Romulan Ale, I guess.
When I was in a PUG CSE with low DPS, the 'tend to your own cube' tactic tends to work. It took a royally long time to get everything demolished, but it didn't fail because someone flew in and blasted a cube prematurely.
Sometimes I host these low DPS CSEs for fleet ops to demonstrate that while everyone's cruisers can be great, they are encouraged to learn to fly destroyers/escorts too for certain scenarios. It's not as though we need to bring civilian families and thousand man crews in the back for hi risk missions anyway
STF Flight Instructor since Early 2012. Newbies are the reason why STO lives and breathes today. Do not discriminate.
Yesterday night I ran a really weird KASE.
We started wrong. Not together but one by one. And then the Tac cube shoot us one by one...
We killed it. I went on the left taking probe. A fed tac went on the right taking probes.
3 players had to kill nodes, cubes and transformers. One said something. And they realized they are from Texas. So then they went into a stupid blahblah about Texas. Texas rules, America is best. Whole of world is ****. English speakers as second language are b****. And... We totaly failed :eek: Because while they were busy to say bad words against everything is not from Texas. They forgot to play:mad:
That's hilarious LOL thanks for sharing it.
While I run a fleet of rednecks, they don't seem to make the mistake of going AMERICA F YEAH when the Borg is shooting them and expect such speeches to do any sort of DPS to the enemy.
Nations' pride is only applicable if Optional is won. Pfft. Lol!
From my post above yours the guy flaming us for saying good morning was "from certain central European nation" - so displays of national pride can backfire too!
(Disclaimer - I'm pro US and currently -not- living in the USA, just found it funny :P)
STF Flight Instructor since Early 2012. Newbies are the reason why STO lives and breathes today. Do not discriminate.
sto is full of people ready to hate for any reason and those with no life calling everyone a noob and using that as an excuse to quit. i would rather play with a friendly new player that stays in game rather than some veteran jerk calling everyone "noob" and quitting.
That's why I founded a newbie -only- fleet. You're welcome to drop by if you want to see nice veterans who like nothing better than to extend shields to newbies so they can earn a Glorious Victory (bloodwine not included)
STF Flight Instructor since Early 2012. Newbies are the reason why STO lives and breathes today. Do not discriminate.
If you're going to call "I got Kang," don't wander off to left side and pew-pew at the nanite stack by yourself (ignoring the incoming raptors the whole time).
Admittedly, the "I HAZ AWESOME [censored] AOE DPS" in team chat from the same individual gave me warning about what kind of person this was, so I quietly protected the Kang instead.
- People in skittle-boats invariably end up being the worst people on the team. Not just not knowing what to do, but have an uncanny knack for doing the completely wrong thing at the wrong time.
Skittleboats that just spam BFAW...
I'm sure if you're an addled candy-raver it looks REALLY COOL. But it's not especially effective at killing anything.
__________________________________________________
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC] "I weary of the chase. Wait for me. I shall be merciful and quick."
I puged in and saw two oddys, a klink and a kitty.
I said 'Hi' as normal, no responce.
I zipped on over to the first cube and fired a couple shots at the nodes.
I look back and all four of the other ships were setting at the Kang.
So I figured I'd conduct an experament. :rolleyes:
I flew back to the Kang and just sat there with the others.
One of the oddys was firing his technicolor rainbow beams, the Klink was doing nothing and the Kitty had some little knats buzzing around.
I sat my weapons power on minimum (Stun) and fired away every once in a while at a Borg ships closing on the Kang.
The Klink was still doing nothing and an oddy was doing nothing. The other oddy was firing away with his technicolor rainbow beams and the Kitty had these little knats buzzing around it.
Within a few minutes the Kang was surrounded and destroyed. :eek:
About that time everybody started shouting Noobe Noobe Noobe.
LOL I'm not sure this 1 was my worst ... But it is the 1 that sticks out in my memory.... Me and a friend pugged a Kase run together we both went right leaving the rest of the team to go left ..... Well 2 min into it I noticed the other side had let a probe get thru and thought well TRIBBLE there goes the optional ... anyway my teamate who was catching probes on our side noticed more of their probes getting close so darted off to help them and noticed not 1 of the 3 ppl over on other side was even watching the probes ... So he said something about it ... And the response he got back was it doesnt matter if the probes get thru .... We dont have enough DPS to stop them so we concentrating on the bigger stuff... LMFAO... 1st off Dont play Elite STF's if you arent gonna at least try for the optional ... 2nd off if you dont have enough DPS for the probes what in the hell do you really think your doing to the bigger stuff... lol
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]Target locked Captain....Alpha loaded....5,4,3,2,1.... Target dead captain, locking on next target
- KASE: Nobody wants to do Probe Duty.
For instance, 4 people on the left, and 2 probes slip through.
Now, I admit I was on the left. I was on my spec'd tank, and was holding down aggro on the cube at the time. Maybe I should have tried to handle that too, but call me crazy for expecting one of the other 3 guys to handle it.
Also, for those who spawn a cube, and get spanked by it... please, don't spawn it if you can't tank it or kill it.
While I CAN pull it off of you, hold aggro on the other cube AND take hits from the gate (while healing your busted hull), it's not efficient. You're just making everyone's life harder. Including yours.
i love this one! i was in a KASE yesterday. i am on one side and 4 on the other. i'm in my armitage all level 12, so i know i can handle it. i'm taking out probes and then start taking fire. cubes love my armitage and i had one right above me that i failed to notice had snuck up on me.
i took out the cube and had to rush to get a couple of probes at the last second. it was close. a couple of the guys on the other side start calling me a noob and asking if i know what i'm doing. i ignore them and continue to do probes, gens and transformers.
all of a sudden probes and spheres start pouring out of the gateway. they destroyed the gateway on their side without a 10% check or warning. i'm overwhelmed and one of them says "if he is not a noob he can stop the probes". i was determined not to get destroyed just to show them. they at least worked on the gateway while i cleaned up probes and spheres.
donatra shows up and i realize between the 4 of them they might have as much dps as i do. the fight with donatra was long and miserable with 2 of them dead at any given time. at least i got some good loot.
it seems like anytime a player starts calling other players "noob" you know it is going to be bad.
LOL I'm not sure this 1 was my worst ... But it is the 1 that sticks out in my memory.... Me and a friend pugged a Kase run together we both went right leaving the rest of the team to go left ..... Well 2 min into it I noticed the other side had let a probe get thru and thought well TRIBBLE there goes the optional ... anyway my teamate who was catching probes on our side noticed more of their probes getting close so darted off to help them and noticed not 1 of the 3 ppl over on other side was even watching the probes ... So he said something about it ... And the response he got back was it doesnt matter if the probes get thru .... We dont have enough DPS to stop them so we concentrating on the bigger stuff... LMFAO... 1st off Dont play Elite STF's if you arent gonna at least try for the optional ... 2nd off if you dont have enough DPS for the probes what in the hell do you really think your doing to the bigger stuff... lol
this is about the funniest post i have ever read. sad, but funny. not able to destroy a probe is really bad.
What is it about these players? Honestly? I mean, how can these players not notice that their firepower is horribly underwhelming?!
I found a post somewhere in the forums about rainbow technicolor beams and cannons. They were claiming you only loose 10% or less of your dps with rainbows. Middle school math or lack of I guess. I figure the loss at more like 33% minimum. All they need to do is mouse over the weapons and do comparisons. There's even tools to find the dps online. But like the math, mousing over and using the tools is a lost art.
- ISE: There's always at least one person who doesn't know what the 10% rule is.
And after messing up the first one, and gets it explained to them... will mess it up again.
Also, apparently people think it's a good idea to split the teams firepower between the gate and Tac cube. Because focusing one down quickly makes too much sense. (/sarcasm)
So true.
I just got out of one with the following:
-- MVAM with 4 different energy types (it looked pretty when it shot, at least...)
-- Gal-X that couldn't even solo a sphere
-- an eng with ??? (I barely registered this player due to seeming to do nothing)
-- The above three focused on gens one at a time, completely ignoring the cubes above the transformers and my request to get off the gens
-- spawned tons of spheres and then lacked the DPS to down them
-- repeated this on both sides
The DSSV on the team was on the ball, though, trying to snare what he/she could and worked on the cubes with me while I tanked them and then we went sphere hunting.
Interestingly, despite their dying almost every 30-60 seconds, our three other teammates did NOT rack up ship injuries. And they didn't try to take on the cube and the gate at the same time, though they did pull the cube. If they know to heal it and not to split focus at the end, I really can't help myself but wonder if they were trollin' us. STO is not a difficult game, but perhaps players are still just that bad.
All in all this ISE took about four times as long as it should have.
- KASE: Nobody wants to do Probe Duty.
[...]
Also, for those who spawn a cube, and get spanked by it... please, don't spawn it if you can't tank it or kill it.
Interestingly, it's been my experience that carrier captains will often volunteer for probe duty as the initial tac cube is engaged. But if you get a bunch of escorts or tac cruisers or whatever on your team, it's likely no one will jump at the easiest (read: least amount of movement) job.
Also super fun is when someone brings out a cube and then kites it to other people so that they can go back to killing defenseless structures. This happens more than I would have assumed when I first started playing.
More importantly, though, is the huge lack of communication, especially in KASE, that I've seen. Or not seen. Hardly anyone ever asks for help on probes until after they let 1-3 through the vortex, if they even ask at all.
- People in skittle-boats invariably end up being the worst people on the team. Not just not knowing what to do, but have an uncanny knack for doing the completely wrong thing at the wrong time.
It's disconcerting how easy it is for someone in, say, DS9 zone chat to advocate skittles / rainbow builds and have people appear (I say "appear" as they could just be playing along, of course) to accept it as a good idea. All those procs gotta add up to PWNING, right?!?
I had a fun one in normal Infected Space earlier. On my level 49 toon at the time, otherwise I'd have been in elite.
So.. we kill the cube and stuff no issues there. Typically for a normal pug, one of the gens is blown early, so I run off to grav well the spheres and probes. That's when I notice half the team is on the right side of the gate with probes heading that way too...
6-8 minutes later, we finally get the transformer down..
Also had an ISN where people where ignoring the initial sphere above the trans and just shooting the gens.
To add to that, I had my own personal fail moment in KA elite. Normally, when I'm on probe duty, I can handle the left side of the right side gate, or at least get the cube and gens down if the left side team is working fast. Today, cube nailed me with torps twice..
Fortunately, there were a couple of fleeties in with me to cover my fail
Having trouble with ground STFs? Looking for help?
Did KAS normal earlier, as it's was running as an 'extra loot' calender event, and I frequently do normals if am pressed for time (which doesn't always work out well!)
The line up was:
Odyssey rainbow beam boat
Fleet Escort rainbow beam boat
Vor'cha rainbow beam boat (have to say, first time I've seen this on a klink ship!)
Sovereign with antiproton beams and Tricolbalt torps
Myself - Sao Paulo class with antiproton cannons and MkXII quantum torps (MkXI aft)
Needless to say, the only two ships doing any real damage were the Sovereign, which had impressive DPS, and myself.
Honourable mention must go to the Fleet Escort too - he tried chasing two probes down, to prevent them reaching the vortex, but his pretty beams were doing next to nothing. The player in the Sovereign shot over to assist and, thankfully, did what the Fleet Escort couldn't. The sad thing is, I made sure to take occasional glances at what the ineffective FE was doing and he did the exact same thing with the next duo of probes that appeared - chased them, shooting his useless rainbow beams, until they were almost in reach of the vortex, until I bailed him out. I remained on probe control duty after that, although almost wished I hadn't, as think that the FE player might have realised how useless his ship was if some probes had gotten through.
What is it about these players? Honestly? I mean, how can these players not notice that their firepower is horribly underwhelming?!
That. Is. Pitiful. My fed is in the free 2-year oddy, and he can do probe duty just fine. My klink in a Vo'quv can take probes and one transformer and cube (effectively half the gate defenses + probes at once). How can a player suck that badly?
When in doubt, (hehe) c4!
This sig dedicated to the many random objects the Mythbusters crew has blow to smitherines
I was doing Cure Normal. Remember that Normal part, because that's important.
Some guy in a Bortasqu' was flying around, doing pretty good, DPSing well enough, but something was off about him.
We wound up losing the optional, I believe, and then the guy in the Bortasqu' wound up getting destroyed. When he respawns, he just sits there.
I suggested he join us. He said something along the lines of "Nope, imma just sit here."
In a slightly snarky but generally inoffensive manner, I posit that we'd be doing better if he'd help. He comes back with something about crappy rainbow boats and bad DPS. He had insulted a Normal STF pug for having bad builds.
Now, here's my thing. This is a Normal STF. Normal. Not Elite. Having teh 1887 hAxx0rz build is neither required nor necessary to do a Normal STF, even for the optional. There's even less reason to go insulting people in a Normal STF because learning STFs is what Normal is for. Insulting people accomplishes nothing but making the insulter look like a tremendous *******. You have no excuse to treat anyone like that in a Normal STF, ever. As you might expect, this angered me significantly.
Having taken enough of this bull**** from this elitist douche, I politely suggested he f*** off and die.
He /tell'd me with the creatively worded response, "easy s*** and die" shortly after the game ended. I promptly ignored him. He likely did the same.
Kids, please. Remember that Normal is probably going to be full of sub-par builds and players. Save the high expectations for Elite. And even then, acting like an ******* is still uncalled for.
Just now I finished a Khitomer Ground Elite. Not a spectacular run, no optional, but still an enjoyable one. We had just killed Tosk and were mopping up the rest of the borg, and I was looking forward to checking whatever I might get from the bag in the end. Then, I suddenly found myself back at ESD and there seemed to be a message window, but it didn't say anything. I was pretty stumped since this was the third attempt at PUG ground today and was finally going to get something out of the efforts. Guess not :rolleyes:
"Rainbow" is an energy weapon phenomenon people refer to when a ship appears in STF's using more than one energy type, or even having every beam being of a different energy type. "Skittles" is referred to when the same thing happens with cannons or turrets.
10% rule is the usual method of success in infected space elite. It involves taking each nanite generator down to 10% and then bursting them down all at once, followed by quickly taking down the transformer before the nanite spheres get to heal it. It is much faster and easier than trying to fight off a horde of spheres coming towards the transformer.
"Rainbow" is an energy weapon phenomenon people refer to when a ship appears in STF's using more than one energy type, or even having every beam being of a different energy type. "Skittles" is referred to when the same thing happens with cannons or turrets.
10% rule is the usual method of success in infected space elite. It involves taking each nanite generator down to 10% and then bursting them down all at once, followed by quickly taking down the transformer before the nanite spheres get to heal it. It is much faster and easier than trying to fight off a horde of spheres coming towards the transformer.
Interestingly, it's been my experience that carrier captains will often volunteer for probe duty as the initial tac cube is engaged. But if you get a bunch of escorts or tac cruisers or whatever on your team, it's likely no one will jump at the easiest (read: least amount of movement) job.
Also super fun is when someone brings out a cube and then kites it to other people so that they can go back to killing defenseless structures. This happens more than I would have assumed when I first started playing.
More importantly, though, is the huge lack of communication, especially in KASE, that I've seen. Or not seen. Hardly anyone ever asks for help on probes until after they let 1-3 through the vortex, if they even ask at all.
The easiest way to solve lack of communication is to communicate at the start of the mission, and position ownship at a obscure but important strategic point such as R probes on KASE. Make sure the team knows about it and you have a strong basis for communication.
If there are people destroying generators and not dealing with their sphere or cube spawns call them out BY NAME so the rest of the team knows to prepare for additional hostiles. Whether the 'saboteur' in question is willing or not to learn to deal with his own TRIBBLE is a non issue, if I can redeploy 2-3 others to compensate and even relieve said saboteur of duty. Some do it to grief, so when they see competitive, competent mission control, they see that they have two choices - contribute to the mission, or leave.
Sometimes I deliberately tell demolition crews to lead the cube over to the R probe area so I can provide supplementary DPS. Kiting is even a valid tactic in my book when known inexperienced players are on a training run but strong ships are deployed in probe cover position (veterans play strategic role, assist newbies.)
Many a time STF players these days no longer have to follow recommended tactics because they've been running the same mission over and over again for months. Many a time I can ignore the minor issues with coordination and communication by simply using DPS or riot control functions as a 'universal language'.
Identifying the weak points in a map and reinforcing them to the point of guaranteeing success is a sure fire way to not just improve general player quality over time but form guilds and alliances out of the simple act of sharing competency and knowledge while contributing to team victories.
To the point of player quality being poor in STFs, I disagree. Misinformed, ill-guided, yes, but poor, no.
Many of the STF guides and teachings are due for updating as they do not take into account new methods and new alternative tactics that require much less micromanagement for success in PUGs. Different people have different learning styles.
The only fault I can see in the STF playerbase is the "prepared to fail" mentality. Cut that out, actively promote communications and identifiying weaker players (to assist them), and we'll all realize that everyone has the potential to excel in these very simplistic challenges.
It's a no brainer to send people URLs and get them to do their homework.
But I much prefer giving a rainbow pilot a little key ideas and watching his build develop into another potential Cygone or Dragon over time as he starts to communicate, develop and evolve with the right ideas of success and the right amount of positive reinforcement.
Labelling them as poor STFers or noobs as most others are prone to do, is a mistake. These noobs are the lifeblood of F2P STO, a source of excellent company, Season 6 fleet manpower, and of course, future STF experts in their own right.
Just as other initiatives posted on this forum are implying, player development, not criticism, is the way to go. If only for the fact, Starfleet exists as an organization in this franchise because people development ranks very high in its list of priorities, regardless of race, culture, or prejudices.
STF Flight Instructor since Early 2012. Newbies are the reason why STO lives and breathes today. Do not discriminate.
"Rainbow" is an energy weapon phenomenon people refer to when a ship appears in STF's using more than one energy type, or even having every beam being of a different energy type. "Skittles" is referred to when the same thing happens with cannons or turrets.
10% rule is the usual method of success in infected space elite. It involves taking each nanite generator down to 10% and then bursting them down all at once, followed by quickly taking down the transformer before the nanite spheres get to heal it. It is much faster and easier than trying to fight off a horde of spheres coming towards the transformer.
Rainbow is also there because people are deluded into thinking that a 2.5% proc chance means that they'll stack every proc on every target they ever go against.
10% should be the standard for EVERY Infected run because Normal should be a gateway to Elite, not a way to pick up stupid habits that TRIBBLE everyone else down the line.
/Last ISN run, someone ran to the right to start popping Generators AFTER one of the heroes on the left popped a Generator. I expect someone to kill the closest Generator to the Gateway in every ISN run, but it's kind of rare to see "Starfleet Tac Captain in a Cruiser" guy #02939 go right after popping a Generator on the left.
At that point, that hero sat around max range for their beam boat, slowly picking off generators as we cleared the trash around the left so as to avoid the Spheres that spawn after killing generators... so apparently, this happened enough times before for this person to KNOW how to avoid damaging their shields.
What is it about these players? Honestly? I mean, how can these players not notice that their firepower is horribly underwhelming?!
1) They've probably single-playered the whole game as far as the STFs, so no one's told them it's a dreadful idea. I think about the T3 Akira build I had when I had only been playing the game for two weeks now, and I cringe. But I had my affairs sorted by the time I went near STFs.
and
2) They haven't actually taken thirty seconds to sit down and compare the consoles and made connection that all the same colour = more damage. I bet a lot of them haven't even thought of stacking the energy consoles.
I see a Rainbow Beam Escort and I really cringe. That's as wrong as you can get weapons on a ship. They're probably all flying around on /50 power for everything too.
It wasn't my worst but almost.
It was KAGE. We started really fine. Good team. At the second floor. A guy said : "I'm going. Bye". And he left. Argh... Happiness another player come in. He was good. While we are running to the last big room. I noticed one player is really weak because he always die. Call him "weaker" (it's not his real name). We went to the last roomm. Suddenly weaker went to the room console. And he let us make clean the big place floor by floor. And while we make clean the place he always asking us which one "B3? A3?". I told him stop it and come help us to make clean the place. He went and we did it. When it's time to deal with the shield. I said now you can go to the room. He said "where?" I said the room with transportation. And did it. Transportation to his ship. So then he left. At 4 we deal with the shield. A guy died in the tunnel. He said "Thanks I got my boff". And he left. We end up at 3 without optionnal. Thiw last week end people were crazy.
It wasn't my worst but almost.
It was KAGE. We started really fine. Good team. At the second floor. A guy said : "I'm going. Bye". And he left. Argh... Happiness another player come in. He was good. While we are running to the last big room. I noticed one player is really weak because he always die. Call him "weaker" (it's not his real name). We went to the last roomm. Suddenly weaker went to the room console. And he let us make clean the big place floor by floor. And while we make clean the place he always asking us which one "B3? A3?". I told him stop it and come help us to make clean the place. He went and we did it. When it's time to deal with the shield. I said now you can go to the room. He said "where?" I said the room with transportation. And did it. Transportation to his ship. So then he left. At 4 we deal with the shield. A guy died in the tunnel. He said "Thanks I got my boff". And he left. We end up at 3 without optionnal. Thiw last week end people were crazy.
Unfortunately this is all too common. KAGE is a map that requires micromanagement or at least someone to get loud and decide for the team what kind of tactics should be used. Or at the very least make it clear an experienced player should man the room to get the shield extensions done right (assuming PUGs are half the time short on DPS or don't have a demolition engineer).
Many a time crazy people have to be told to leave the game because they insist on running into the control room and cocking it up for everyone by randomly disabling shields everywhere. In the typical worst case scenario it's when half the team quits that a PUG half-team can finally get its act together and start the actual demolition.
"Optional" and "standard" actually has different techniques in some elite STF groups. It's actually faster to start the demolition immediately from the bottom level up provided there is a good team to do the Optional, but most times it's far simpler for PUGs to do the 'clear all mobs first' routine.
On one hand ground elites are better handled by pre-teams, fleets or ESTF / proSTF channel players. On the other hand sometimes you get very good teams in PUG elites, or good new tactics to try out with experienced players.
But most of the time you get half the team comprised of people who seem to be using Mark X common weapons, can't even shoot down a normal drone and that's where most of the frustration comes from. It's apparently a good idea in some peoples' minds to skip the normal STF learning stage and go right to Elites in the hope of getting prototype gear.
In space, this is not much of a matter since one or two 'tactical players' can make all the difference on their own provided deployment or mission procedure is not cocked up. Drop rate is decent now so the "hopefuls" do get upgunned eventually.
On ground is a different matter as (using a more extreme example) CGE can be made impossible if it takes 3 PUG players (and their useless peashooters) to guard a single Borg device - that abysmal lack of preparation makes for a very tedious or even an impossible mission.
STF Flight Instructor since Early 2012. Newbies are the reason why STO lives and breathes today. Do not discriminate.
lol
My comment about communication includes instances of people who seem to be communicating at first, claiming roles and the like, and then still going silent until after they let probes through. I don't always have the want or time to be playing babysitter or checking the map.
In any case, I'd wager I have more positive stories than negative, but that's not what this thread is all about...
A Cannon armed Escort (with turrets to rear) opened fire on AOE (scatter volley)
It was firing over several bursts in Red , green , orange and Mint
the target (a Raptor) went bye bye very fast
At this point a science ship (Gorn C store ) messaged "oh fail rainboe boltboat"
And triggered a blazing row
Myself and the other cruiser present then had to hold back everything for three solid minutes while those two called each other names
I do not usually side with an escort
But he was pouring on the fire AND moving at speed also he was pulling his weight
I tend to send people spare weapons that will do the job better if they seem to be held back
I have a few spare items banked I would never personally use (polaron for example im not jem hadar so I regard them as not any use)
That's a interesting thing to do - there are certain non [borg] weapons that can potentially do impressive damage in the right hands, or allow the team to do attacks that the AI cannot react to.
Spare pulsewaves, sniper rifles and a compression pistol or two might be worthwhile to give out in case you see a team with DPS or control issues. My tactical toon somehow dishes out immense damage with her tetryon compression pistol.
Believe it or not when ill prepared players get a hard time at elite grounds some of them adopt a stubborn mentality and will just fight it out to the bitter end, while veterans just ragequit and leave. This is where I find to be the perfect time to go into instructor mode for their benefit. School of hard knocks, as they say.
STF Flight Instructor since Early 2012. Newbies are the reason why STO lives and breathes today. Do not discriminate.
On one hand ground elites are better handled by pre-teams, fleets or ESTF / proSTF channel players. On the other hand sometimes you get very good teams in PUG elites, or good new tactics to try out with experienced players.
But most of the time you get half the team comprised of people who seem to be using Mark X common weapons, can't even shoot down a normal drone and that's where most of the frustration comes from. It's apparently a good idea in some peoples' minds to skip the normal STF learning stage and go right to Elites in the hope of getting prototype gear.
.
By the way. Do you know a channel or klingon fleet there is some training for CGE? There is no training in my fleet. And I don't want to run CGN or CGE with pug. I got strong and persistent irrational fear of leaver
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In the channel elitestf, I joined a private stf. It was KASE. I already played with some guy. So then I know what is their skill and they know mine. One said I take probe on the right. Another said I take probes on the left. And the owner said I take left. All on the right. Another guy asked 10% on the gate or kill it? Nobody answered.
We started. We killed the Tac cube really quickly. And everyone went on the right. Suddenly the owner said "need on all". To be honest I didn't understand what this does mean and nobody answered. 2 probes passed out and the owner said "we lost optionnals". Someone said why? And the owner said it's because there is no one to take probe on the left. Someone went to the left to take probes. And the owner with two player got scold because we didn't understand his order. Finally because nobody answered the question. We killed the gate. And again the owner scold us.
Because it's elite stf with experienced players from elitestf channel. We did our job. Only two probes passed out and we didn't run the stf longer. I don't want imagine with pug...
While poorly executed sometimes these 'alternative solutions' can be somewhat entertaining.
"Everyone tend to your own cube" is actually quite doable so long as everyone is armed for speed blasting. Whomever gets their cube down first gets a flagon of Romulan Ale, I guess.
When I was in a PUG CSE with low DPS, the 'tend to your own cube' tactic tends to work. It took a royally long time to get everything demolished, but it didn't fail because someone flew in and blasted a cube prematurely.
Sometimes I host these low DPS CSEs for fleet ops to demonstrate that while everyone's cruisers can be great, they are encouraged to learn to fly destroyers/escorts too for certain scenarios. It's not as though we need to bring civilian families and thousand man crews in the back for hi risk missions anyway
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That's hilarious LOL thanks for sharing it.
While I run a fleet of rednecks, they don't seem to make the mistake of going AMERICA F YEAH when the Borg is shooting them and expect such speeches to do any sort of DPS to the enemy.
Nations' pride is only applicable if Optional is won. Pfft. Lol!
From my post above yours the guy flaming us for saying good morning was "from certain central European nation" - so displays of national pride can backfire too!
(Disclaimer - I'm pro US and currently -not- living in the USA, just found it funny :P)
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That's why I founded a newbie -only- fleet. You're welcome to drop by if you want to see nice veterans who like nothing better than to extend shields to newbies so they can earn a Glorious Victory (bloodwine not included)
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If you're going to call "I got Kang," don't wander off to left side and pew-pew at the nanite stack by yourself (ignoring the incoming raptors the whole time).
Admittedly, the "I HAZ AWESOME [censored] AOE DPS" in team chat from the same individual gave me warning about what kind of person this was, so I quietly protected the Kang instead.
Skittleboats that just spam BFAW...
I'm sure if you're an addled candy-raver it looks REALLY COOL. But it's not especially effective at killing anything.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC] "I weary of the chase. Wait for me. I shall be merciful and quick."
Cure Normal Space.
I puged in and saw two oddys, a klink and a kitty.
I said 'Hi' as normal, no responce.
I zipped on over to the first cube and fired a couple shots at the nodes.
I look back and all four of the other ships were setting at the Kang.
So I figured I'd conduct an experament. :rolleyes:
I flew back to the Kang and just sat there with the others.
One of the oddys was firing his technicolor rainbow beams, the Klink was doing nothing and the Kitty had some little knats buzzing around.
I sat my weapons power on minimum (Stun) and fired away every once in a while at a Borg ships closing on the Kang.
The Klink was still doing nothing and an oddy was doing nothing. The other oddy was firing away with his technicolor rainbow beams and the Kitty had these little knats buzzing around it.
Within a few minutes the Kang was surrounded and destroyed. :eek:
About that time everybody started shouting Noobe Noobe Noobe.
It was hiilarious. :P
Zone into a KA already in "progress"
There are only two other ships.
One of which is some guy drifting around just occasionally shooting at random things.
With his mic open, volume at full, and apparently having quite the party in his apartment in a language I don't recognize.
I didn't stay...
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC] "I weary of the chase. Wait for me. I shall be merciful and quick."
This is the first time I've heard that. Wonder why the others left LOL.
Reminds me of the time someone thought it was a good idea to blast Imperial March on voice comms one time.
Bloody hell what was the point of VC if music was blaring through it LOL
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i love this one! i was in a KASE yesterday. i am on one side and 4 on the other. i'm in my armitage all level 12, so i know i can handle it. i'm taking out probes and then start taking fire. cubes love my armitage and i had one right above me that i failed to notice had snuck up on me.
i took out the cube and had to rush to get a couple of probes at the last second. it was close. a couple of the guys on the other side start calling me a noob and asking if i know what i'm doing. i ignore them and continue to do probes, gens and transformers.
all of a sudden probes and spheres start pouring out of the gateway. they destroyed the gateway on their side without a 10% check or warning. i'm overwhelmed and one of them says "if he is not a noob he can stop the probes". i was determined not to get destroyed just to show them. they at least worked on the gateway while i cleaned up probes and spheres.
donatra shows up and i realize between the 4 of them they might have as much dps as i do. the fight with donatra was long and miserable with 2 of them dead at any given time. at least i got some good loot.
it seems like anytime a player starts calling other players "noob" you know it is going to be bad.
this is about the funniest post i have ever read. sad, but funny. not able to destroy a probe is really bad.
I found a post somewhere in the forums about rainbow technicolor beams and cannons. They were claiming you only loose 10% or less of your dps with rainbows. Middle school math or lack of I guess. I figure the loss at more like 33% minimum. All they need to do is mouse over the weapons and do comparisons. There's even tools to find the dps online. But like the math, mousing over and using the tools is a lost art.
Let them continue. They make easy kills in pvp.
So true.
I just got out of one with the following:
-- MVAM with 4 different energy types (it looked pretty when it shot, at least...)
-- Gal-X that couldn't even solo a sphere
-- an eng with ??? (I barely registered this player due to seeming to do nothing)
-- The above three focused on gens one at a time, completely ignoring the cubes above the transformers and my request to get off the gens
-- spawned tons of spheres and then lacked the DPS to down them
-- repeated this on both sides
The DSSV on the team was on the ball, though, trying to snare what he/she could and worked on the cubes with me while I tanked them and then we went sphere hunting.
Interestingly, despite their dying almost every 30-60 seconds, our three other teammates did NOT rack up ship injuries. And they didn't try to take on the cube and the gate at the same time, though they did pull the cube. If they know to heal it and not to split focus at the end, I really can't help myself but wonder if they were trollin' us. STO is not a difficult game, but perhaps players are still just that bad.
All in all this ISE took about four times as long as it should have.
Interestingly, it's been my experience that carrier captains will often volunteer for probe duty as the initial tac cube is engaged. But if you get a bunch of escorts or tac cruisers or whatever on your team, it's likely no one will jump at the easiest (read: least amount of movement) job.
Also super fun is when someone brings out a cube and then kites it to other people so that they can go back to killing defenseless structures. This happens more than I would have assumed when I first started playing.
More importantly, though, is the huge lack of communication, especially in KASE, that I've seen. Or not seen. Hardly anyone ever asks for help on probes until after they let 1-3 through the vortex, if they even ask at all.
It's disconcerting how easy it is for someone in, say, DS9 zone chat to advocate skittles / rainbow builds and have people appear (I say "appear" as they could just be playing along, of course) to accept it as a good idea. All those procs gotta add up to PWNING, right?!?
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So.. we kill the cube and stuff no issues there. Typically for a normal pug, one of the gens is blown early, so I run off to grav well the spheres and probes. That's when I notice half the team is on the right side of the gate with probes heading that way too...
6-8 minutes later, we finally get the transformer down..
Also had an ISN where people where ignoring the initial sphere above the trans and just shooting the gens.
To add to that, I had my own personal fail moment in KA elite. Normally, when I'm on probe duty, I can handle the left side of the right side gate, or at least get the cube and gens down if the left side team is working fast. Today, cube nailed me with torps twice..
Fortunately, there were a couple of fleeties in with me to cover my fail
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I was doing Cure Normal. Remember that Normal part, because that's important.
Some guy in a Bortasqu' was flying around, doing pretty good, DPSing well enough, but something was off about him.
We wound up losing the optional, I believe, and then the guy in the Bortasqu' wound up getting destroyed. When he respawns, he just sits there.
I suggested he join us. He said something along the lines of "Nope, imma just sit here."
In a slightly snarky but generally inoffensive manner, I posit that we'd be doing better if he'd help. He comes back with something about crappy rainbow boats and bad DPS. He had insulted a Normal STF pug for having bad builds.
Now, here's my thing. This is a Normal STF. Normal. Not Elite. Having teh 1887 hAxx0rz build is neither required nor necessary to do a Normal STF, even for the optional. There's even less reason to go insulting people in a Normal STF because learning STFs is what Normal is for. Insulting people accomplishes nothing but making the insulter look like a tremendous *******. You have no excuse to treat anyone like that in a Normal STF, ever. As you might expect, this angered me significantly.
Having taken enough of this bull**** from this elitist douche, I politely suggested he f*** off and die.
He /tell'd me with the creatively worded response, "easy s*** and die" shortly after the game ended. I promptly ignored him. He likely did the same.
Kids, please. Remember that Normal is probably going to be full of sub-par builds and players. Save the high expectations for Elite. And even then, acting like an ******* is still uncalled for.
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10% rule is the usual method of success in infected space elite. It involves taking each nanite generator down to 10% and then bursting them down all at once, followed by quickly taking down the transformer before the nanite spheres get to heal it. It is much faster and easier than trying to fight off a horde of spheres coming towards the transformer.
Thank you. I appreciate the response.
The easiest way to solve lack of communication is to communicate at the start of the mission, and position ownship at a obscure but important strategic point such as R probes on KASE. Make sure the team knows about it and you have a strong basis for communication.
If there are people destroying generators and not dealing with their sphere or cube spawns call them out BY NAME so the rest of the team knows to prepare for additional hostiles. Whether the 'saboteur' in question is willing or not to learn to deal with his own TRIBBLE is a non issue, if I can redeploy 2-3 others to compensate and even relieve said saboteur of duty. Some do it to grief, so when they see competitive, competent mission control, they see that they have two choices - contribute to the mission, or leave.
Sometimes I deliberately tell demolition crews to lead the cube over to the R probe area so I can provide supplementary DPS. Kiting is even a valid tactic in my book when known inexperienced players are on a training run but strong ships are deployed in probe cover position (veterans play strategic role, assist newbies.)
Many a time STF players these days no longer have to follow recommended tactics because they've been running the same mission over and over again for months. Many a time I can ignore the minor issues with coordination and communication by simply using DPS or riot control functions as a 'universal language'.
Identifying the weak points in a map and reinforcing them to the point of guaranteeing success is a sure fire way to not just improve general player quality over time but form guilds and alliances out of the simple act of sharing competency and knowledge while contributing to team victories.
To the point of player quality being poor in STFs, I disagree. Misinformed, ill-guided, yes, but poor, no.
Many of the STF guides and teachings are due for updating as they do not take into account new methods and new alternative tactics that require much less micromanagement for success in PUGs. Different people have different learning styles.
The only fault I can see in the STF playerbase is the "prepared to fail" mentality. Cut that out, actively promote communications and identifiying weaker players (to assist them), and we'll all realize that everyone has the potential to excel in these very simplistic challenges.
It's a no brainer to send people URLs and get them to do their homework.
But I much prefer giving a rainbow pilot a little key ideas and watching his build develop into another potential Cygone or Dragon over time as he starts to communicate, develop and evolve with the right ideas of success and the right amount of positive reinforcement.
Labelling them as poor STFers or noobs as most others are prone to do, is a mistake. These noobs are the lifeblood of F2P STO, a source of excellent company, Season 6 fleet manpower, and of course, future STF experts in their own right.
Just as other initiatives posted on this forum are implying, player development, not criticism, is the way to go. If only for the fact, Starfleet exists as an organization in this franchise because people development ranks very high in its list of priorities, regardless of race, culture, or prejudices.
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Rainbow is also there because people are deluded into thinking that a 2.5% proc chance means that they'll stack every proc on every target they ever go against.
10% should be the standard for EVERY Infected run because Normal should be a gateway to Elite, not a way to pick up stupid habits that TRIBBLE everyone else down the line.
/Last ISN run, someone ran to the right to start popping Generators AFTER one of the heroes on the left popped a Generator. I expect someone to kill the closest Generator to the Gateway in every ISN run, but it's kind of rare to see "Starfleet Tac Captain in a Cruiser" guy #02939 go right after popping a Generator on the left.
At that point, that hero sat around max range for their beam boat, slowly picking off generators as we cleared the trash around the left so as to avoid the Spheres that spawn after killing generators... so apparently, this happened enough times before for this person to KNOW how to avoid damaging their shields.
Still managed to get the optional, though.
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1) They've probably single-playered the whole game as far as the STFs, so no one's told them it's a dreadful idea. I think about the T3 Akira build I had when I had only been playing the game for two weeks now, and I cringe. But I had my affairs sorted by the time I went near STFs.
and
2) They haven't actually taken thirty seconds to sit down and compare the consoles and made connection that all the same colour = more damage. I bet a lot of them haven't even thought of stacking the energy consoles.
I see a Rainbow Beam Escort and I really cringe. That's as wrong as you can get weapons on a ship. They're probably all flying around on /50 power for everything too.
It was KAGE. We started really fine. Good team. At the second floor. A guy said : "I'm going. Bye". And he left. Argh... Happiness another player come in. He was good. While we are running to the last big room. I noticed one player is really weak because he always die. Call him "weaker" (it's not his real name). We went to the last roomm. Suddenly weaker went to the room console. And he let us make clean the big place floor by floor. And while we make clean the place he always asking us which one "B3? A3?". I told him stop it and come help us to make clean the place. He went and we did it. When it's time to deal with the shield. I said now you can go to the room. He said "where?" I said the room with transportation. And did it. Transportation to his ship. So then he left. At 4 we deal with the shield. A guy died in the tunnel. He said "Thanks I got my boff". And he left. We end up at 3 without optionnal. Thiw last week end people were crazy.
Unfortunately this is all too common. KAGE is a map that requires micromanagement or at least someone to get loud and decide for the team what kind of tactics should be used. Or at the very least make it clear an experienced player should man the room to get the shield extensions done right (assuming PUGs are half the time short on DPS or don't have a demolition engineer).
Many a time crazy people have to be told to leave the game because they insist on running into the control room and cocking it up for everyone by randomly disabling shields everywhere. In the typical worst case scenario it's when half the team quits that a PUG half-team can finally get its act together and start the actual demolition.
"Optional" and "standard" actually has different techniques in some elite STF groups. It's actually faster to start the demolition immediately from the bottom level up provided there is a good team to do the Optional, but most times it's far simpler for PUGs to do the 'clear all mobs first' routine.
On one hand ground elites are better handled by pre-teams, fleets or ESTF / proSTF channel players. On the other hand sometimes you get very good teams in PUG elites, or good new tactics to try out with experienced players.
But most of the time you get half the team comprised of people who seem to be using Mark X common weapons, can't even shoot down a normal drone and that's where most of the frustration comes from. It's apparently a good idea in some peoples' minds to skip the normal STF learning stage and go right to Elites in the hope of getting prototype gear.
In space, this is not much of a matter since one or two 'tactical players' can make all the difference on their own provided deployment or mission procedure is not cocked up. Drop rate is decent now so the "hopefuls" do get upgunned eventually.
On ground is a different matter as (using a more extreme example) CGE can be made impossible if it takes 3 PUG players (and their useless peashooters) to guard a single Borg device - that abysmal lack of preparation makes for a very tedious or even an impossible mission.
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lol
My comment about communication includes instances of people who seem to be communicating at first, claiming roles and the like, and then still going silent until after they let probes through. I don't always have the want or time to be playing babysitter or checking the map.
In any case, I'd wager I have more positive stories than negative, but that's not what this thread is all about...
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A Cannon armed Escort (with turrets to rear) opened fire on AOE (scatter volley)
It was firing over several bursts in Red , green , orange and Mint
the target (a Raptor) went bye bye very fast
At this point a science ship (Gorn C store ) messaged "oh fail rainboe boltboat"
And triggered a blazing row
Myself and the other cruiser present then had to hold back everything for three solid minutes while those two called each other names
I do not usually side with an escort
But he was pouring on the fire AND moving at speed also he was pulling his weight
the gorn sci ship WASN'T
I have a few spare items banked I would never personally use (polaron for example im not jem hadar so I regard them as not any use)
That's a interesting thing to do - there are certain non [borg] weapons that can potentially do impressive damage in the right hands, or allow the team to do attacks that the AI cannot react to.
Spare pulsewaves, sniper rifles and a compression pistol or two might be worthwhile to give out in case you see a team with DPS or control issues. My tactical toon somehow dishes out immense damage with her tetryon compression pistol.
Believe it or not when ill prepared players get a hard time at elite grounds some of them adopt a stubborn mentality and will just fight it out to the bitter end, while veterans just ragequit and leave. This is where I find to be the perfect time to go into instructor mode for their benefit. School of hard knocks, as they say.
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By the way. Do you know a channel or klingon fleet there is some training for CGE? There is no training in my fleet. And I don't want to run CGN or CGE with pug. I got strong and persistent irrational fear of leaver