MACO
Even with these nerfs/changes, the MACO set bonuses are terrible.
1) 5% recharge reduction is cosmetic, and is also superfluous in the face of Tac Initiative and Aux to Batts + Technician builds.
2) Graviton beam is worthless, and this is the third set bonus. The only thing it's done since they nerfed the usefulness out of it is tickle the borg and then promptly go on a 3 minute cooldown.
Keep in mind the 5% reduction effects more than just Boff powers last I saw unlike tac intiative and aux2batt builds.
Functionally speaking, that's pointless.
The MACO 2-piece bonus does indeed affect other things... it reduces the recharge time of not only your Tactical BOFF powers (like Tactical Initiative) or your other BOFF powers and Captain Abilities (like Aux2Bat with Technicians) but also your Weapon Recharge times.
It's a small buff, but it's noticable if you're looking for it. In practice it's not a game-changer, but it grants a little extra utility and a little more damage over time (particularly with weapons that have a longer recharge such as DHCs and Torpedos/Mines).
That said, given the option I'd probably still opt for the Borg 2-piece set bonus than the MACO one. Klingon-side it'd be a tougher call. The Honor Guard equipment's 2-piece set bonus (+Torpedo Damage and +Aux Power) is pretty sweet.
Aegis = defense, hull resists; the deflector has ok bonuses, but can do better; engines defense boost performance is betten by omega engines
Breen = ES and Transphasic damage, gear is lackluster individually; shield give polaron resist
Jem = polaron damage boost; shield poor man's maco, deflect ok depending on what your needing to boost, engines not so good
romulan = not sure, never did the grind for it; buffer shield w/TRIBBLE regen, i think it boosted plasma torps
MACO = best shields imo, 5% recharge bonus for 2 part, grave beam for 3 part; ok engines, deflector
KHG = best cap shields ok proc; 2 part bonus torp damage, TRIBBLE 3 part AoE mes; engines slow, deflect jack of all trades
OMEGA = 2 part glider, 3 part defense and kinetic resist debuffs; best engines, deflector gives targeting boost, shields give movement boosting proc have good regen
The Jem engines aren't too bad, if anything I always thought it'd be a great set if not for the deflector being the weak link.
So, they nerved an overpowered combination or boosted the omega set on a test server and everyone here is "aaaaaaahhh my escort is useless" ... Well, take a engie/cruiser with in STF's. They can provide Heal and/or tanking for you ;-)
This only works if a ****ing cruiser pilot knows what the **** its doing.
I have been in a LOT of STF's (working my way to the 150 mark) And i can honestly tell you. 95% dont have a clue.
I pull aggro so easily despite no skill points spent in doing so it isnt even close to funny. I'm 'tanking' is more like BARELY surviving when i'm getting full fire from a cube let alone a ****ing tactical cube. Most cruiser pilots try to DPS the hell out of **** and cant even understand how important a tactic like fire at will is for getting/holding aggro.
This will effectively KILL any future pugging of an STF by me. There is no way in hell i am going to burn through that many repair kits on my fleet defiant every STF. I now have no reason in the world to NOT go full FLEET gear rather than keep my current configuration. That means fleet marks, fleet content anda hell of a lot less pugging to do so.
It's about time.
Still it doesn't go far enough, the 2-piece Borg set will still be a must have set for most, simply for the hull heals. What needs to be done is to rip out the borg hull heal proc, or make it so that it's part of the 3-piece set, with the tractor beam becoming part of the two piece.
As it is though, it's still overpowered. The set was a mistake from it's introduction and needs to be brought in line with the other sets.
So basically, it's a good start but doesn't go far enough.
As for those raging, try to see it from a balance perspective. It is overpowered, so overpowered in fact that even after the first nerf it's STILL overpowered. I use it myself and I'll be more then happy to see it get nerfed further, because that's exactly what it needs.
Hahahahaha right. Needed. You're wrecking most of the configurations for MANY players. Forcing them to grind new content or PRAY for the utmost in luck to get items to fix their soon to be broken configurations. Science vessels get further shafted. Escorts lose the only thing keeping them ALIVE in more than a few cases and Cruisers are dancing in the streets when 95% of their pilots SUCK in their primary ****ing ROLE! I'm going to be advising my fleet to go pure fleet gear from now on. I'm dropping my 3 DHC's for fleet versions and i wont be looking back.
Its a balance change that has a cascade effect and when the other items are so difficult and so ****ing random to get. (And still will be despite what season 7 claims to bring just you watch) That's a problem.
Other than the fact that, being regenerative, their base point count is low which means that alpha spikes and the massive 30k+ late game deathbolts get through easier?
That's exactly the problem, get through easier? Try not even there. The gap between maco and borg is over 2k in shielding.
UKcaptain: go TRIBBLE in someone else's cereal. Escorts not being squishy is what wins most pugs these days because cruiser pilots cant or wont play their own roles.
STOlev: Probably did what a few of us have done and specced entirely out of torpedos.
P2Wsucks: No one outruns me in borg engines. Though fleet ones i have yet to test. (No reason not to now.)
I just finished up my tactical...or so i thought. Things i still wanted were not things i needed. This changes that significantly...i'm sure my fleet is going to LOVE this.
The Jem engines aren't too bad, if anything I always thought it'd be a great set if not for the deflector being the weak link.
heh I always like the Jem deflector as a fall back iirc +24 flow caps +24 decompile etc.
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While I'd say that 3-piece Borg with the faction shield is the most common in PvP there are a number of people that run 2/2 Borg and Faction specific so I would say that we're looking at an increase in the number of tetryon gliders out there overall with this change....
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While I'd say that 3-piece Borg with the faction shield is the most common in PvP there are a number of people that run 2/2 Borg and Faction specific so I would say that we're looking at an increase in the number of tetryon gliders out there overall with this change....
kinda surprised people were ignoring it anyway
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P2Wsucks: No one outruns me in borg engines. Though fleet ones i have yet to test. (No reason not to now.)
I just finished up my tactical...or so i thought. Things i still wanted were not things i needed. This changes that significantly...i'm sure my fleet is going to LOVE this.
You can't be serious. Have you even fitted the MKXII Omega engines and seen the turnrate/max speed on that compared to any other engines in the game? It beats the Aegis which easily beats the Borg. The Borg isn't even a hyper impulse engine.
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It only works well with certain setups anyway, otherwise it's absorbed by normal shield heals without notice.
Also, after looking further at that post from the Jupiter forums, it looks like the new 3-piece (Adapted Omega set that is) will be similar to the Tholian ground 3-piece proc, so I have to wonder if we're looking at a proc'd Ablative Armor for everybody now?
As for the rest of the set, the +Weapons power proc and the general feel of it being 2 weapons and a console, I'm guessing that it would work best on non-escorts/raptors.
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It only works well with certain setups anyway, otherwise it's absorbed by normal shield heals without notice.
Also, after looking further at that post from the Jupiter forums, it looks like the new 3-piece (Adapted Omega set that is) will be similar to the Tholian ground 3-piece proc, so I have to wonder if we're looking at a proc'd Ablative Armor for everybody now?
As for the rest of the set, the +Weapons power proc and the general feel of it being 2 weapons and a console, I'm guessing that it would work best on non-escorts/raptors.
Honestly, I haven't bothered w/the Tholian ground grind, so I'll check out the what's currently the new set spec.
But, given how good the Omega individual parts are I still can't see why more engergy weapon based builds don't use it.
[Zone] Dack@****: cowards can't take a fed 1 on 1 crinckley cowards Hahahaha you smell like flowers
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"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
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It only works well with certain setups anyway, otherwise it's absorbed by normal shield heals without notice.
Also, after looking further at that post from the Jupiter forums, it looks like the new 3-piece (Adapted Omega set that is) will be similar to the Tholian ground 3-piece proc, so I have to wonder if we're looking at a proc'd Ablative Armor for everybody now?
As for the rest of the set, the +Weapons power proc and the general feel of it being 2 weapons and a console, I'm guessing that it would work best on non-escorts/raptors.
What I don't really get is why they made the new Borg set almost completely a kinetic weapons load and then made the bonus one to weap power. To be honest I'm not sure what possible ship that would go well with, a DBB/cannon Recon maybe? But then you're so low on weapon slots...
Unless there's something I'm missing it seems very misguided.
Doesn't matter. Most of the PvP community knows there are fleets with devs. Regardless of if I'm correct in my identification of a braggart, there ARE player fleets that have devs....and there shouldn't be.
The cutting beam might be a beam arry/dbb that does kenetic with high sheild peirce, so it would benefit from it. I'm hoping it is as that would give my pve sci build a way to get more kenetic and bleedthrough at the same time as letting me use target subsystem abilities.
Sorry, I was going off memory and blended a deflector I got from STF store w/the Jem. The Jem boosts flow caps, counter measures, gravitons, and damps +24.4 and has a +1 stealth detection. I've used it for flow caps or scramble builds till I found something better in the past.
[Zone] Dack@****: cowards can't take a fed 1 on 1 crinckley cowards Hahahaha you smell like flowers
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I'm not entirely grasping the point you're trying to make... Is it that the assimilated console shouldn't be changed? Or Devs shouldn't be in player fleets? Or that it's getting changed because of Dev's in player fleets? Or what???
What I don't really get is why they made the new Borg set almost completely a kinetic weapons load and then made the bonus one to weap power. To be honest I'm not sure what possible ship that would go well with, a DBB/cannon Recon maybe? But then you're so low on weapon slots...
Unless there's something I'm missing it seems very misguided.
It's hard to say, if the cutting beam really is kinetic damage (I know what it says but this is Cryptic) then I have to wonder if the 2-piece KHG set would work with it; if that is the case then I know of several platforms that this would work on from the B'rel to the Bortasqu.
However, I think that, again, this would work best on this would work best on non-tac boats like assault cruisers and the like where they need to spend more skill points to get weapon power up to 125 and get drained hard by large broadsides. All this is speculative though since we don't know the firing arcs, damage, or anything at all really.....
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I'm not entirely grasping the point you're trying to make... Is it that the assimilated console shouldn't be changed? Or Devs shouldn't be in player fleets? Or that it's getting changed because of Dev's in player fleets? Or what???
What I'm saying is that, however unlikely, the possibility is there to corrupt the development system. Devs should be above being members of player fleets and developing emotions for or against any players.
I find it funny because of all the changes to skills and sets have been because pvpers are *****ing about being overpowered....then it makes it underpowered in PvE because players want "balance" in PvP....
Surely you aren't implying that Cryptic makes balance changes based solely on PvP?
My main character is Klingon. I don't care about 3 borg + maco. The borg set, including console, is the only set that you can mix with other sets and get two bonuses. Why not leave it that way?
I find this line of replies sadly hilarious. We put a lot of work into the massive list of fixes/changes above, and ya'll are hung up on the ability to skip our content. =p
The cutting beam might be a beam arry/dbb that does kenetic with high sheild peirce, so it would benefit from it. I'm hoping it is as that would give my pve sci build a way to get more kenetic and bleedthrough at the same time as letting me use target subsystem abilities.
My guess is that it's the same thing that the Borg Tactical Cubes and Gates are using right now, and those hit you in a 'pulse' fashion that periodically damages you as it's on you though it's essentially negated by BFI or any hull heal really, it's only dangerous if you've got nothing to pop.
If that's the case then it's a major **** up by Cryptic given the bleedthrough potential that's already out there.....
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I'm not keen with them fiddling with the Borg Set, best leave things well enough alone. Especially when people been comfortabily using them for so long.
As for Devs (or former Devs) being in player fleets, I don't mind as long as there is no favoratism shown to that fleet.
I played with one person on the PW / Cryptic Team on several occasions, and I know that person never abused their power even in the slightest. In fact, that person didn't exactly like to mix work with fun. Not sure about the others though. :P
Which pieces of the Borg set and Maco set are recommended?
if your referring to what i mentioned earlier. it WAS the Borg console + deflector + engines and the Maco Shield. because of the way the procs worked, they worked the best with higher capacity shields. if you didnt have maco usually another high cap shield usually a covariant would be substituted till you got it, or were KDF side.
Comments
The MACO 2-piece bonus does indeed affect other things... it reduces the recharge time of not only your Tactical BOFF powers (like Tactical Initiative) or your other BOFF powers and Captain Abilities (like Aux2Bat with Technicians) but also your Weapon Recharge times.
It's a small buff, but it's noticable if you're looking for it. In practice it's not a game-changer, but it grants a little extra utility and a little more damage over time (particularly with weapons that have a longer recharge such as DHCs and Torpedos/Mines).
That said, given the option I'd probably still opt for the Borg 2-piece set bonus than the MACO one. Klingon-side it'd be a tougher call. The Honor Guard equipment's 2-piece set bonus (+Torpedo Damage and +Aux Power) is pretty sweet.
The Jem engines aren't too bad, if anything I always thought it'd be a great set if not for the deflector being the weak link.
vids and guides and stuff
[9:52] [Zone #11] Neal@trapper1532: im a omega force shadow oprative and a maoc elite camander and here i am taking water samples
This only works if a ****ing cruiser pilot knows what the **** its doing.
I have been in a LOT of STF's (working my way to the 150 mark) And i can honestly tell you. 95% dont have a clue.
I pull aggro so easily despite no skill points spent in doing so it isnt even close to funny. I'm 'tanking' is more like BARELY surviving when i'm getting full fire from a cube let alone a ****ing tactical cube. Most cruiser pilots try to DPS the hell out of **** and cant even understand how important a tactic like fire at will is for getting/holding aggro.
This will effectively KILL any future pugging of an STF by me. There is no way in hell i am going to burn through that many repair kits on my fleet defiant every STF. I now have no reason in the world to NOT go full FLEET gear rather than keep my current configuration. That means fleet marks, fleet content anda hell of a lot less pugging to do so.
Hahahahaha right. Needed. You're wrecking most of the configurations for MANY players. Forcing them to grind new content or PRAY for the utmost in luck to get items to fix their soon to be broken configurations. Science vessels get further shafted. Escorts lose the only thing keeping them ALIVE in more than a few cases and Cruisers are dancing in the streets when 95% of their pilots SUCK in their primary ****ing ROLE! I'm going to be advising my fleet to go pure fleet gear from now on. I'm dropping my 3 DHC's for fleet versions and i wont be looking back.
Its a balance change that has a cascade effect and when the other items are so difficult and so ****ing random to get. (And still will be despite what season 7 claims to bring just you watch) That's a problem.
That's exactly the problem, get through easier? Try not even there. The gap between maco and borg is over 2k in shielding.
UKcaptain: go TRIBBLE in someone else's cereal. Escorts not being squishy is what wins most pugs these days because cruiser pilots cant or wont play their own roles.
STOlev: Probably did what a few of us have done and specced entirely out of torpedos.
P2Wsucks: No one outruns me in borg engines. Though fleet ones i have yet to test. (No reason not to now.)
I just finished up my tactical...or so i thought. Things i still wanted were not things i needed. This changes that significantly...i'm sure my fleet is going to LOVE this.
heh I always like the Jem deflector as a fall back iirc +24 flow caps +24 decompile etc.
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kinda surprised people were ignoring it anyway
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The Jem has decompiler?!? What!!!!!!?????
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[9:52] [Zone #11] Neal@trapper1532: im a omega force shadow oprative and a maoc elite camander and here i am taking water samples
You can't be serious. Have you even fitted the MKXII Omega engines and seen the turnrate/max speed on that compared to any other engines in the game? It beats the Aegis which easily beats the Borg. The Borg isn't even a hyper impulse engine.
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"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
It only works well with certain setups anyway, otherwise it's absorbed by normal shield heals without notice.
Also, after looking further at that post from the Jupiter forums, it looks like the new 3-piece (Adapted Omega set that is) will be similar to the Tholian ground 3-piece proc, so I have to wonder if we're looking at a proc'd Ablative Armor for everybody now?
As for the rest of the set, the +Weapons power proc and the general feel of it being 2 weapons and a console, I'm guessing that it would work best on non-escorts/raptors.
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Honestly, I haven't bothered w/the Tholian ground grind, so I'll check out the what's currently the new set spec.
But, given how good the Omega individual parts are I still can't see why more engergy weapon based builds don't use it.
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"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
What I don't really get is why they made the new Borg set almost completely a kinetic weapons load and then made the bonus one to weap power. To be honest I'm not sure what possible ship that would go well with, a DBB/cannon Recon maybe? But then you're so low on weapon slots...
Unless there's something I'm missing it seems very misguided.
vids and guides and stuff
[9:52] [Zone #11] Neal@trapper1532: im a omega force shadow oprative and a maoc elite camander and here i am taking water samples
Sorry, I was going off memory and blended a deflector I got from STF store w/the Jem. The Jem boosts flow caps, counter measures, gravitons, and damps +24.4 and has a +1 stealth detection. I've used it for flow caps or scramble builds till I found something better in the past.
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"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
It's hard to say, if the cutting beam really is kinetic damage (I know what it says but this is Cryptic) then I have to wonder if the 2-piece KHG set would work with it; if that is the case then I know of several platforms that this would work on from the B'rel to the Bortasqu.
However, I think that, again, this would work best on this would work best on non-tac boats like assault cruisers and the like where they need to spend more skill points to get weapon power up to 125 and get drained hard by large broadsides. All this is speculative though since we don't know the firing arcs, damage, or anything at all really.....
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This post has been edited to remove content which violates the Perfect World Entertainment Community Rules and Policies . ~Tobar26th
you mean like the overpowered 3 borg + 1 MACO that everyone recommends for pretty much everything?
Surely you aren't implying that Cryptic makes balance changes based solely on PvP?
Pretty much this ^
Despite the fact that PvE is so easy you could run all Mk X commons and still complete optionals.
However this looks like its going to be one of those happy accidents that happen for Cryptic now and then.
Great change.... death to the glider / heal boats.... and one less heal for people running 3 piece + maco sounds fantastic to me.
No, i was just saying that the more recent changes have been due to pvp "balance"
Are you running elite difficulty? thats when having better gear is good.
on another note, these 2 sets together seem really cool.
My guess is that it's the same thing that the Borg Tactical Cubes and Gates are using right now, and those hit you in a 'pulse' fashion that periodically damages you as it's on you though it's essentially negated by BFI or any hull heal really, it's only dangerous if you've got nothing to pop.
If that's the case then it's a major **** up by Cryptic given the bleedthrough potential that's already out there.....
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They should leave the Borg set alone as some of us did the HARD version of the STFs way back when to earn it.
Used to be Cryptic left stuff that was already in game alone to avoid the FRAUD moniker, they need to reinstate this policy.
As for devs in fleets getting stuff modified to suit their play style, I believe that would be grounds for termination.
Which pieces of the Borg set and Maco set are recommended?
I'm not keen with them fiddling with the Borg Set, best leave things well enough alone. Especially when people been comfortabily using them for so long.
As for Devs (or former Devs) being in player fleets, I don't mind as long as there is no favoratism shown to that fleet.
I played with one person on the PW / Cryptic Team on several occasions, and I know that person never abused their power even in the slightest. In fact, that person didn't exactly like to mix work with fun. Not sure about the others though. :P
if your referring to what i mentioned earlier. it WAS the Borg console + deflector + engines and the Maco Shield. because of the way the procs worked, they worked the best with higher capacity shields. if you didnt have maco usually another high cap shield usually a covariant would be substituted till you got it, or were KDF side.