mine changes!

matteo716maikai

http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=289021 yes the thread is old, but i totally missed it when it first came out and it seems to have quite a few replies.

posted over in the general feedback section, i figured it's relavent to us pvp'rs so here it is!

borticuscryptic wrote: »

In the current state of space combat, Mine Launcher weapons are generally seen as undesirable. Yes, many of them serve specific purposes for which they can be especially effective. But on a whole, if faced with a decision between equipping a Torpedo Launcher and an associated Bridge Officer skill, or the same for mines, the choice is nearly always Torpedoes.

This is seen as a design imbalance. We want players to feel as though everything they can do in the game, and every piece of equipment they can obtain, has a purpose and utility that is on-par with other choices from those same categories.

In an effort to address this inconsistency, we are currently in the process of considering some rather major changes to the way in which Mine Launchers function. This effort includes shifts in two separate core mechanics:

1) Eliminating "Dispersal Pattern" bridge officer abilities, and rolling their functionality into existing Torpedo abilities.
2) Improving the utility of each separate type of mine, in various ways.


Eliminating Dispersal Patterns

---

As mentioned above, this comes down to an inconsistency of choice. The situational use of Mines when in comparison to Torpedo utility causes the vast majority of players to choose, almost unilaterally, to invest in Torpedo bridge officer abilities over Mine-based ones. Which is actually perfectly understandable - you simply get far more bang for your buck from a Torpedo High Yield, than you do from a Dispersal Patten Alpha, due to the larger number of situations in which Torpedoes can potentially outperform Mines.

This situation is exacerbated by the fact that Mine abilities are unlocked one rank higher than Torpedo abilities (Dispersal I is Lieutenant, while Torpedo I is Ensign).

Under this new proposal, the following changes would be seen by players:

1) Dispersal Pattern Alpha (also known as Mine Trail) would be replaced with Torpedo: High Yield on all existing Bridge Officers, and reduced in rank accordingly.
2) Dispersal Pattern Beta (also known as Mine Spread) would be replaced with Torpedo: Spread on all existing Bridge Officers, and reduced in rank accordingly.
3) Torpedo: High Yield abilities would gain the functionality of Dispersal Pattern Alpha in addition to their existing functionality.
4) Torpedo: Spread abilities would gain the functionality of Dispersal Pattern Beta in addition to their existing functionality.
5) Both Torpedo: High Yield and Torpedo: Spread would be renamed to fit their new dual-functionality.

Once this change was made, players that have both a Torpedo and a Mine equipped and activate a Torpedo bridge officer ability would see both of these weapons display their upgraded firing mode. Activating either the Torpedo or the Mine at this point would consume the firing mode, just as happens currently when multiple Torpedoes are equipped.

(Note: Recall that Mines were recently removed from the "Fire All Projectiles" functionality, so accidentally using your Torpedo Spread on a Mine launcher is not likely to occur unless you've altered your keybinds.)

We believe that this change would allow players to again consider Mine Launchers as a more viable equipment alternative for a wider number of tactical scenarios, since it eliminates some of the cost (in the form of lost utility) that comes from making that choice.


Improving Mine Explosion Effects

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The following is our first draft proposal of upgrading the effects of the six core damage types associated with Mine Launchers. These will require further testing and iteration before finalizing their effects, and I'm looking forward to hearing feedback about how each may effect gameplay.

If no mention of damage changes are made, assume that the current damage will remain constant in the new versions of these effects.

In addition to these changes, we're also considering a small increase to the amount of Threat generated by these targets, so that Mines can be used as a valid diversion tactic when facing AI enemies. It's possible that this Threat can be made to scale with the owner's Threat Control skill level, which would add an element of damage mitigation to players invested in this skill (enemies would be shooting something other than you).


PHOTON

- Wider Activation/Chase Radius
- Higher Defense / Sensor Masking

QUANTUM

- Travel Faster once in Chase mode
- Wider Explosion Radius (and explode farther from target)

PLASMA

- Guaranteed plasma DOT (stacks when hit with multiples)
- Small chance to leave behind a Plasma cloud (functions like Warp Plasma)

TRANSPHASIC

- 80% shield bleedthru (starting damage will likely be reduced some)

CHRONITON

- 80% chance to proc movement speed debuff
- Magnitude of debuff reduced from existing version, but stacks when hit with multiple mines

TRICOBALT

- High chance of causing a Spatial Rift which disables ability use within its radius (same as is currently caused by High Yield Tricobalt explosions)
- Each mine in a field has an individual chance of causing this rift, so there's a chance of multiple spawning near a single location.


All of the aforementioned changes have not yet been finalized internally, and there is therefore no timeline available on when (if ever) these changes will eventually make their way to Tribble and/or Holodeck.

One response we've already anticipated is that increasing the viability of Mine Launchers will in turn increase the already existing concerns over excessive entity spam on space maps. This is something we're already taking into consideration. One possible solution that has been considered is reducing the number of mines launched from a single use, while tuning the effects of that mine's utility accordingly. We're not certain at this point that such action will be the correct course to take, nor even whether or not any action will be necessary. These changes may not, in fact, manage to increase the popularity of Mine weapons, which would eliminate the call for additional concern.

All of these proposed changes are largely conceptual at this point, and therefore very subject to change. This also means that it's a perfect time to make your thoughts heard on the subject!

marctraiderz

Awesome, now lets just hope that before they introduce this build they actually FIX and REALLY implement the Chroniton Resistance fix where abilities like Omega make you immune to it, and Internal Dampeners actually gives movement resistance.

As far as I know, the patch still isnt in although it was supposedly added with Season 6, in the patch notes even.

I have a feeling it never actually got patched and they just bluntly forgot about the whole thing.

hurleybird

I'll repost my response here:

borticuscryptic wrote: »

Eliminating Dispersal Patterns

---

As mentioned above, this comes down to an inconsistency of choice. The situational use of Mines when in comparison to Torpedo utility causes the vast majority of players to choose, almost unilaterally, to invest in Torpedo bridge officer abilities over Mine-based ones. Which is actually perfectly understandable - you simply get far more bang for your buck from a Torpedo High Yield, than you do from a Dispersal Patten Alpha, due to the larger number of situations in which Torpedoes can potentially outperform Mines.

If you do end up buffing dispersal patterns to the point where they can be situationally more useful than torpedo abilities you've

This situation is exacerbated by the fact that Mine abilities are unlocked one rank higher than Torpedo abilities (Dispersal I is Lieutenant, while Torpedo I is Ensign).

Under this new proposal, the following changes would be seen by players:

1) Dispersal Pattern Alpha (also known as Mine Trail) would be replaced with Torpedo: High Yield on all existing Bridge Officers, and reduced in rank accordingly.
2) Dispersal Pattern Beta (also known as Mine Spread) would be replaced with Torpedo: Spread on all existing Bridge Officers, and reduced in rank accordingly.
3) Torpedo: High Yield abilities would gain the functionality of Dispersal Pattern Alpha in addition to their existing functionality.
4) Torpedo: Spread abilities would gain the functionality of Dispersal Pattern Beta in addition to their existing functionality.
5) Both Torpedo: High Yield and Torpedo: Spread would be renamed to fit their new dual-functionality.

Once this change was made, players that have both a Torpedo and a Mine equipped and activate a Torpedo bridge officer ability would see both of these weapons display their upgraded firing mode. Activating either the Torpedo or the Mine at this point would consume the firing mode, just as happens currently when multiple Torpedoes are equipped.

This is not a good change.

All this is going to do is make weapons more difficult to manage. If you have both torpedo and mine weapons on a ship you are *always* going to want to use the torpedo high yield or torp spread functionality, and you are *never* going to want to use the dispersal pattern functionality. Buffing the torpedo is just so much more powerful and useful. As such, your mine weapons will just get in the way and cause a headache.

For the sake of argument let's say you change dispersal patterns to be sometimes more useful than torpedo abilities... doesn't that kind of ruin the justification for combining them in the first place?

So either there's no point in combining them because people won't want to use the mine abilities and they'll just get in the way, or you change the dispersal patterns so that they actually become useful -- but if they were useful in the first place you wouldn't need to combine them!

borticuscryptic wrote: »

(Note: Recall that Mines were recently removed from the "Fire All Projectiles" functionality, so accidentally using your Torpedo Spread on a Mine launcher is not likely to occur unless you've altered your keybinds.)

That doesn't make it any better though.

Under this new system if you want to fire a high yield instead of a dispersal pattern you then need to stop firing your energy weapons because the same key fires your mines (ugh) or set up separate firing keys for mines, torpedoes, and energy weapons (double ugh), and even if you had separate keys and could use them perfectly, you wouldn't be able to preload a high yield any more unless you stopped firing your mine weapons for the duration.

My suggestions:

1. If you still decide to combine them (which you shouldn't) then at least change the dispersal patterns so that there is a reason someone who runs both mines and torps might want to activate a dispersal pattern instead of a torp ability. Otherwise, what's the point?
2. Don't combine torp and mine effects unless you can make the new boff ability use two seperate buttons on your tray for each weapon type. Having to time your weapons to either activate on a mine or torpedo as well taking away the ability to launch mines while a torpedo ability is preloaded will only result in headaches and frustration.
3. Lastly, if you do buff dispersal patterns to the point where people might actually want to use them, please don't do it in a way that encourage yet more spam. Instead of laying more mines, perhaps you could lay stronger mines.

playhard88

that information is old, atm this are the changes to mines:

http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=336581
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=338891