Even without the CD bugs on bombs, enemy neutralization is far better than turrets. It deals a lot of dps when it's properly used, and requires no doff to get an inferior dps. But it's easy and funny to use, thus people enjoy it a lot. They can spam toys and lights and they do it. And turrets are very relaxing to use even if it's inefficient. I'd accept someone telling me he can't use bombs because he can't handle it. I may not be willing to play with him again but i could do with that.
I really think these kits are only encouraging mediocrity by providing players some of the worst kits with improved stats and a new power. The purpose is noble, as usual (giving those kits a new life) but the result will be a disaster in pve for engs and scis. It'll create more frustration on both parts (experienced players and rookies), more failed games, and thus nothing good.
Ok, I will admit I mostly use fab spec because it's highly entertaining. But anyone who runs with me will tell you that when it comes down to it, if there is a target that really needs to die (I.E Armek, Becca, the Queen (sorry, tosk don't count, he's a joke)) I switch to EN kit, because it's far more effective at making a target killable. Drastically weakening weapons and rooting, plus slows and almost straight out HP damage are invaluable.
It is said the best weapon is one that is never fired. I disagree. The best weapon is one you only have to fire... once.
Okay, I'll play devil's advocate and just come right out and say that the new Romulan xenobiologist kit is NOT useless as everyone is so quick to say here. This is coming from one who leveled his toon with it from the moment the regular version was available at Mk. VI on up. I play science as my main 90% of the time since I find engineering to be...well, meh, and tactical to be utterly boring, but that's just me (I still appreciate being on teams with great tacs and engies).
I even used a xeno kit at Mk. X to get started in STFs, including elites. On Infected ground, the gas grenade set up choke points when the team was sniping borg behind the trigger lines and reduced damage we took from those stuck in the cloud, med tricorder to handle moderate damage mostly to myself and sometimes others, biofilter for even more damage resist (I can't stress enough how important every percent of resist you can get on ground elite STFs), and yes even Stasis Field has its use from time to time when I froze an approaching heavy drone that no one was shooting at to buy a few seconds of survival in case we got overwhelmed and a teammate went down. In spite of its effectiveness (it takes lots of practice), I got flak for using the kit in spite of regularly helping teams win optional objectives, most of the time from munchkin tac and engie players who don't understand the value of its abilities. I eventually got myself a Borg Med Analyzer kit which I almost always use, PvE or PvP. I sometimes use Physicist (with the ground grav well doff) for kicks and giggles, but it's lack of heals bothers me a lot, and doesn't fit my play style.
Devil's advocate aside, I was skeptical about Cryptic recycling existing kits for the Embassy, however, including the xeno one. I was expecting, you know, actual Romulan abilities for my sci like the ones that annoy me when I fight the Tal Shiar mobs on New Romulus and The Big Dig temple such as those nasty radiation debuffs/DoTs. Cryptic needs to make these kits fit Romulan technology and their theme. Nothing was said about these being reverse-engineered kits. I expect to feel like a devious Romulan agent with them, not a regular fed sci with a kit so many despise that has a little extra non-Romulan flavor.
All they had to do was take Hyperonic Radiation out of the physicist kit, and rework it as Thalaron radiation with different effects (guess what, biofilter sweep takes care of that debuff, btw), and replace Anethezine Gas with it. I was happy to see tachyon harmonic in the new kit since that is my bread and butter with the Borg kit I use now, but the Romulans never use it, so why is it there? Why not put me, as a sci, on par with a tac and give me an Operative-like cloak ability that has an ambush-like effect that buffs damage for a few seconds when I decloak, and has a chance to either expose or exploit? The obscure Trek PC game from many moons ago, Away Team, featured the ship's Russian sci officer using a personal cloak he acquired from the Romulans and was the only one able to use it. Cloaks should have been a sci-only ability from the start in STO. Tacs already have ambush and other damage buff abilities for god's sake. Balance, Cryptic, BALANCE!!! Pretty please?
As a quick aside from sci stuff, the Romulan engineer kit should have those annoying thalaron drones that deploy thalaron mines (which should be as nasty as Tholian ground mines that are one-shot kill wonders) while retaining their new (and awesome) plasma flamethrower drones (framerate killers, but they kill mobs rather nicely with extreme prejudice), and tacs should have the AoE smoke bomb clouds Romulan subcommanders use to shroud themselves. I think it should be changed to do damage to enemies that enter the cloud similar to theta radiation in space...maybe change it to a nanite cloud since, after all, why shouldn't the Romulans have access to Borg technology? Remember Nero's Narada ship from Star Trek 2009??? The whole dang thing, space tentacles and all, was reverse-engineered Borg tech from top to bottom!
Lots of great info here, I'd just love to see some videos of your team(s) in action...
As far as PvE goes, if your team is constantly on the run, then yes FS would be worthless.
Although I'm not sure how worthwhile an EN kit is except to lay explosives (mines and C.Bomb) to impact mobs that follow you and I'm not sure it's worthwhile to stop to set them (isn't it better to just keep running?), which only leaves weapon malfunction and fuse armor to take out 2 enemies ahead?
Maybe I need to train a Tac Toon for missions like this.
However in standard missions where you have to encounter and defeat a group where you normally begin outnumbered...The Fab Spec Kit quickly evens up the odds, and if you deploy smartly the battle is usually over before you get a chance to shoot.
And I have no trouble with the Tholian Medium missions on Nukers acting as a one man army...the only time I die is when a cat jumps on my keyboard...note: I've found the dual pistols very effective against the Tholians (except Hard External)
in regards to some of the comments...
"It's range can draw aggro from mobs that a group isn't ready to handle yet"
the sweet thing is that the turrets, drones, AND MEDICAL GENERATOR all become the targets as you (and your away team) mow down the mobs. I love using the Med Gen as a target.
another comment referred to how long it takes to lay down everything...
I can usually deploy everything in less than 10 seconds including:
1-3 Phaser Turrets III .....FS kit
1-3 Quantum Mortar III.....FS kit
1 Medical Generator .....FS kit
1-3 Seeker Drones. ....FS kit
1-3 Support Drones ....Eng Ability
and with
2 Mirror soldiers ....Orb of Possibilities
1 Horta
1 Orbital Strike
= one man army
All of these are VERY effective during the Hard Tholian missions
and due to the effectiveness of turrets, I've changed out my away team from being 3 Tacs and 1 Eng and me to 2 Eng (trained with PTIII and ChrMines III), 1 Sci, 1 Tac and me, since the AI Tacs weren't very effective.
Actually the number of opportunities where fab specialist gets an edge over the bomb kit is extremely limited. I see 2 main instances:
- nukara interior hard
- mine trap, where the healing turret can save many romulan lives, and where saving lives is more important than raw dps. It's only useful during step 3 though.
In some boss rooms it might be useful, but the problem with turrets is that they get adapted, they get one shot by most mobs, even the most ridiculous ones, they have quite a low dps (no matter how much you can be impressed), they take time to pop and make you vulnerable, and can't one shot tac drones on crit like bombs.
Actually, turrets do get adapted to, but they do not remodulate themselves. However, that's not important, as I was just testing my phaser turret against a group of Borg on Otha. When the turret was adapted to, it kept shooting for full damage. No "Adapted!" icon sprung up with the damage text.
I was testing on Captain 30 with the Fab Spec MK VII kit, so maybe those don't remodulate, but I can't imagine they're much different.
All that said, I still vastly prefer Enemy Neutralisation. I have a fast, aggressive playstyle, I get up in peoples faces and hit them as hard as I can. I'm always on the move be it PvE or PvP, setting down my turrets and then chasing after my enemies does nothing for me. If we had to babysit out turrets and generators like the TF2 Engineer and they did the majority of our damage, I might consider using them.
Joined: January 2010
Fanfiction! ZOMG! Read it now!
kate-wintersbite.deviantart.com/art/0x01-Treachery-293641403
Comments
I really think these kits are only encouraging mediocrity by providing players some of the worst kits with improved stats and a new power. The purpose is noble, as usual (giving those kits a new life) but the result will be a disaster in pve for engs and scis. It'll create more frustration on both parts (experienced players and rookies), more failed games, and thus nothing good.
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
I even used a xeno kit at Mk. X to get started in STFs, including elites. On Infected ground, the gas grenade set up choke points when the team was sniping borg behind the trigger lines and reduced damage we took from those stuck in the cloud, med tricorder to handle moderate damage mostly to myself and sometimes others, biofilter for even more damage resist (I can't stress enough how important every percent of resist you can get on ground elite STFs), and yes even Stasis Field has its use from time to time when I froze an approaching heavy drone that no one was shooting at to buy a few seconds of survival in case we got overwhelmed and a teammate went down. In spite of its effectiveness (it takes lots of practice), I got flak for using the kit in spite of regularly helping teams win optional objectives, most of the time from munchkin tac and engie players who don't understand the value of its abilities. I eventually got myself a Borg Med Analyzer kit which I almost always use, PvE or PvP. I sometimes use Physicist (with the ground grav well doff) for kicks and giggles, but it's lack of heals bothers me a lot, and doesn't fit my play style.
Devil's advocate aside, I was skeptical about Cryptic recycling existing kits for the Embassy, however, including the xeno one. I was expecting, you know, actual Romulan abilities for my sci like the ones that annoy me when I fight the Tal Shiar mobs on New Romulus and The Big Dig temple such as those nasty radiation debuffs/DoTs. Cryptic needs to make these kits fit Romulan technology and their theme. Nothing was said about these being reverse-engineered kits. I expect to feel like a devious Romulan agent with them, not a regular fed sci with a kit so many despise that has a little extra non-Romulan flavor.
All they had to do was take Hyperonic Radiation out of the physicist kit, and rework it as Thalaron radiation with different effects (guess what, biofilter sweep takes care of that debuff, btw), and replace Anethezine Gas with it. I was happy to see tachyon harmonic in the new kit since that is my bread and butter with the Borg kit I use now, but the Romulans never use it, so why is it there? Why not put me, as a sci, on par with a tac and give me an Operative-like cloak ability that has an ambush-like effect that buffs damage for a few seconds when I decloak, and has a chance to either expose or exploit? The obscure Trek PC game from many moons ago, Away Team, featured the ship's Russian sci officer using a personal cloak he acquired from the Romulans and was the only one able to use it. Cloaks should have been a sci-only ability from the start in STO. Tacs already have ambush and other damage buff abilities for god's sake. Balance, Cryptic, BALANCE!!! Pretty please?
As a quick aside from sci stuff, the Romulan engineer kit should have those annoying thalaron drones that deploy thalaron mines (which should be as nasty as Tholian ground mines that are one-shot kill wonders) while retaining their new (and awesome) plasma flamethrower drones (framerate killers, but they kill mobs rather nicely with extreme prejudice), and tacs should have the AoE smoke bomb clouds Romulan subcommanders use to shroud themselves. I think it should be changed to do damage to enemies that enter the cloud similar to theta radiation in space...maybe change it to a nanite cloud since, after all, why shouldn't the Romulans have access to Borg technology? Remember Nero's Narada ship from Star Trek 2009??? The whole dang thing, space tentacles and all, was reverse-engineered Borg tech from top to bottom!
As far as PvE goes, if your team is constantly on the run, then yes FS would be worthless.
Although I'm not sure how worthwhile an EN kit is except to lay explosives (mines and C.Bomb) to impact mobs that follow you and I'm not sure it's worthwhile to stop to set them (isn't it better to just keep running?), which only leaves weapon malfunction and fuse armor to take out 2 enemies ahead?
Maybe I need to train a Tac Toon for missions like this.
However in standard missions where you have to encounter and defeat a group where you normally begin outnumbered...The Fab Spec Kit quickly evens up the odds, and if you deploy smartly the battle is usually over before you get a chance to shoot.
And I have no trouble with the Tholian Medium missions on Nukers acting as a one man army...the only time I die is when a cat jumps on my keyboard...note: I've found the dual pistols very effective against the Tholians (except Hard External)
in regards to some of the comments...
"It's range can draw aggro from mobs that a group isn't ready to handle yet"
the sweet thing is that the turrets, drones, AND MEDICAL GENERATOR all become the targets as you (and your away team) mow down the mobs. I love using the Med Gen as a target.
another comment referred to how long it takes to lay down everything...
I can usually deploy everything in less than 10 seconds including:
1-3 Phaser Turrets III .....FS kit
1-3 Quantum Mortar III.....FS kit
1 Medical Generator .....FS kit
1-3 Seeker Drones. ....FS kit
1-3 Support Drones ....Eng Ability
and with
2 Mirror soldiers ....Orb of Possibilities
1 Horta
1 Orbital Strike
= one man army
All of these are VERY effective during the Hard Tholian missions
and due to the effectiveness of turrets, I've changed out my away team from being 3 Tacs and 1 Eng and me to 2 Eng (trained with PTIII and ChrMines III), 1 Sci, 1 Tac and me, since the AI Tacs weren't very effective.
- nukara interior hard
- mine trap, where the healing turret can save many romulan lives, and where saving lives is more important than raw dps. It's only useful during step 3 though.
In some boss rooms it might be useful, but the problem with turrets is that they get adapted, they get one shot by most mobs, even the most ridiculous ones, they have quite a low dps (no matter how much you can be impressed), they take time to pop and make you vulnerable, and can't one shot tac drones on crit like bombs.
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
I was testing on Captain 30 with the Fab Spec MK VII kit, so maybe those don't remodulate, but I can't imagine they're much different.
All that said, I still vastly prefer Enemy Neutralisation. I have a fast, aggressive playstyle, I get up in peoples faces and hit them as hard as I can. I'm always on the move be it PvE or PvP, setting down my turrets and then chasing after my enemies does nothing for me. If we had to babysit out turrets and generators like the TF2 Engineer and they did the majority of our damage, I might consider using them.
Fanfiction! ZOMG! Read it now!
kate-wintersbite.deviantart.com/art/0x01-Treachery-293641403
Fixed: STO = Tactical
The Developer bias for Tactical/Escorts with space and ground is getting to ridiculous proportions now.
Help rebuild the Romulan Star Empire to glory. Click the banner to join today.