Asking for your help to improve my Tactical Escort

malnificent

It?s time to make my Tactical VA better. I don?t PVP, so you might ask what?s the point ? PVE isn?t overly demanding so what I have is likely sufficient. It has been ? I?m asking for your help to make it better.
I play this game casually so I don?t know my min/max or my ?need this and need that? details. I enjoy the forums but honestly it?s like reading separate puzzle pieces and then trying with little to fair understanding, to assemble those pieces in game.

I?ll give you all the details I can. I?m open to ALL suggestions. Thanks!


Andorian Tactical Vice Admiral

Traits: Accurate, Elusive, Lucky
STO Planner build: http://www.stoacademy.com/tools/skillplanner/index.php?build=SynJaqQuey_0
(Boffs skills are reflected in build, if interested then please follow link)

Fleet Tactical Escort Retrofit

3x AP DHC Borg MK XII
1x Omega Plasma Torp

MACO MK XII pre-S7 set (Shield, Engine, Deflector)

2x AP Turrets Borg MK XII
1x Kinetic Cutting Beam

Eng cons: Universal-Isometric Charge,
2x MK XII Neutronium very rare

Sci cons: Universal-Assimilated Module,
1x MK XI Field Generator rare

Tac cons: 4x Tactical AP Mag MK XI very rare,
1x Ambiplasma Envelope MK XI very rare

Space Doffs: 2x Projective Weap Ofc very rare,
1x Conn Ofc rare,
1x Shield Distribution Ofc rare,
1x Warp Core Eng rare


I have lots of questions ? Are Advance Fleet Weapons worth the dilithium expense to replace pre-S7 Borg weaps? Is keeping the Omega Torp/KCB/Module set worth the bonuses or should I go back to Quantum Torpedo or 4 AP DHCs? Do my space doffs look properly balanced? Is upgrading from the MACO space to the Adapted MACO space worth the 102,000 dilithium? Etc ? etc ? etc?

Please feel free to completely ignore my questions altogether and just tell me what you think. What would you do? What would you change? Whys would be nice but are not absolutely necessary O.o

Thanks for your time and expertise.

darkjeff

The Advance Fleet Weapons vs the Borg weapons is essentially [Dam]x3 vs [CritH] since the [Borg] modifier has issues. As such it's better - if they're "worth the dilithium" depends on your stocks and how often you get dilithium. Regardless, it should be an upgrade.

You always want the Module anyway, so you may as well keep the KCB - consensus seems to be split as to if a KCB better or worse than a turret, so my conclusion is that it's roughly the same. The Omega Plasma Torpedo is excellent for STFs, so there's no real reason not to get the full 3-piece bonus. Especially if you drop one copy of TT1 for another HYT, and you're able to fire it every 15 seconds.

The Adapted MACO Space set is just the Honor Guard set, I have no comment about it. I personally use the Borg set because there aren't enough damage spikes in even eSTFs to worry about capacity, especially if team DPS is high enough to melt enemies. The 3-piece tractor beam also gets turned into a very high damage weapon combined with the KCB, and extra damage is always nice. (I find it deals massive damage for the 10 seconds it's active on an unshielded hull, ticking for an average of 2.5k without crits.) Even if the cooldown is long, the passive set bonuses are still good.

Your space DOffs are a little strange. Obviously you'll want to upgrade them to Very Rare, but you should drop the Warp Core Engineer for a 2nd Purple Comm DOff, which would let you constantly cycle one copy of Tac Team. Helps keep your shields up and minimizes hull exposure.

With that in mind, I would swap one Neutronium in favor of a Zero-Point Energy Conduit to up my crit chance, especially if you're packing AP weapons. If you can keep your shields up, you'd only need to worry about bleedthrough and Plasma DoTs anyway. Heck, I'd swap the Field Generator for a Tachyokinetic Converter to squeeze even more out of crits, but I don't know how easily you can keep your shields up.

I'm tempted to say you should switch the Ambiplasma for another AP Mag, but I'm not clear on the Kinetic/Plasma breakdown for Omega torps and HYTs, so I'll let somebody else weigh in on that.

jadensecura

To answer your questions in order: fleet weapons aren't enough better than [Borg] for the cost, from everything I've heard Omega torp is far superior to a quantum and the KCB is definitely better than a turret, your doffs are ok, more on that later, Adapted MACO isn't really an upgrade, it's a change to Klingon Honor Guard, which I feel is inferior to MACO.

I'm not necessarily sure that a Warp Core Engineer is a great choice for an escort. They're very nice for builds that aren't maxing out power levels, but an Escort should be running max Weapons anyway, and that's the most important one for you. Also, is that Conn officer for Evasive Maneuvers? You definitely don't want to be using one with TT cooldown reduction when you have 2 copies of TT already. To fill in the spaces you can use Shield Distribution or EM doffs, or whatever else you want. Note that you can get very rare Shield Distribution officers from the colonial chain in Rolor Nebula.

Now, boff abilities. You're overloaded on torpedo powers, you can only use 2 because of the global cooldowns. I prefer Spread to High Yield for PvE, you don't lose much damage per target and gain a lot on secondary ones. Attack Pattern Beta is always a good choice, so I would replace Spread 3 with APB2 and HY1 with Spread 1. Also, I would say that 2 copies of EPtS are generally better than one EPtS and one RSP, I know that from personal experience. The continuous resistance boost is just too good.

For skills, your tac ones are good. However, there is a lot of waste in your engineering skills. It's basically pointless to skill any of the power skills above 6, you're too far into diminishing returns at that point. (http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=155777 is very valuable for this) Take all of those skills down to 6, and probably Plating as well (you only gain 1.7% resistance from those last 3 levels). You can use the additional skill points for Starship EPS to boost your EPtS, maybe a point of Weapon Performance, ground skills to match the kits you like, and even Driver Coil to use for Tour the Universe.

Hope that's helpful.

bareel

Ok first off I'm not sure what the issue your having is, do you want more tank, more damage, etc? But I can give you some general advice.

- For weapons upgrade the front DHCs to fleet, leave the turrets as borg. The damage increase for the turrets will not be worth it and having a good proc on your lowest damage weapons is a good thing. I would dump the kinetic cutting beam though for another turret as energy drain doesn't hurt cannons that much.

- I use quantium torps the omega one did not impress me but not sure if that is good or bad idea.

- Maco set is better than adapted one, if you feel you esplode too much though get the assimilated deflector and engine it could help.

- Drop one of the torp skills for another attack pattern beta or even delta. It will increase overall DPS output.

- Romulan Rep console is awesome, get it.

- Skills are messy. Here are suggestions.
Drop Engine Performance, and Shield Performance to 6. Drop Hull Plating to 3. Drop Warp Core Potential to 6 along with Warp Core Efficiency. Taking them all to 9 is an inefficient use of skill points.

Take Electro-Plasma Systems to 3 or 6. Take Weapon and Auxiliary Performance to 3. Take Armor Reinforcements to 3. With those changes you should be able to drop your weapon power setting down to 90 and dump the rest into shields. In the end your shield power and aux power will be significantly higher than they are with current build.

bi9t

I would switch your Tac slots to either of these:

TS1, TS2, APB2, APB3
TT1, CSV1, CSV2
TT1

or

TS1, CSV1, APO1, APB3
TS1, CSV1, APO1
TT1 with 2 Purple Conn officer Tac Team reducing doffs

lasonio

Do i want to get involved in this..... eeeeer....... hmmm... no i think I'll pass...

age03

The only thing I will say is that it would better if you had the omega set as that is more for Tacs and you only need 2 DHCs.

malnificent

Thank you one and all ...

kiloace

darkjeff wrote: »

The Advance Fleet Weapons vs the Borg weapons is essentially [Dam]x3 vs [CritH] since the [Borg] modifier has issues.

Wait...what? What's wrong with the Borg modifier? Its been working for me. I thought they just stopped selling them?

zahinder

They stopped selling it because they could never make the proc work across the board -- only some Borg ships actually count as 'borg' for the purposes of weapons.

malnificent

age03 wrote: »

The only thing I will say is that it would better if you had the omega set as that is more for Tacs and you only need 2 DHCs.

Age03 ... just so I'm clear, are you saying replace the MACO Mk12 set with the Omega MK12 set? I happen to have the Omega in the bank so that's easily doable.

I'm seeing a lot of recommendations about going 2 Borg (Deflect and Eng) with MACO shield. I thought that was "ol'school" pre-S7 advise and since the changes post S7 that Borg/MACO isnt the preferred set up it once was. Maybe Borg/MACO is still the move for escorts? But you're advising full Omega?

Thanks again for your advise.

age03

malnificent wrote: »

Age03 ... just so I'm clear, are you saying replace the MACO Mk12 set with the Omega MK12 set? I happen to have the Omega in the bank so that's easily doable.

I'm seeing a lot of recommendations about going 2 Borg (Deflect and Eng) with MACO shield. I thought that was "ol'school" pre-S7 advise and since the changes post S7 that Borg/MACO isnt the preferred set up it once was. Maybe Borg/MACO is still the move for escorts? But you're advising full Omega?

Thanks again for your advise.

That is exactly what I ma saying and not i has not changed since S7 arrived.It is still the same omega for Tacs ,Maco for Geers and Sci offs.It is ok if you were to use it on a cruiser but not an escort.

darkjeff

I'm a big fan of the full Borg set's Tractor Beam with the introduction of the Kinetic Cutting Beam, especially since nothing in PvE will spike enough for the lower shield to be a concern, while regen deals better with constant pressure.

The few times I get spikes in eSTFs, better shields wouldn't have saved me from the Borg's invisible 40k hits.

Not so good if you PvP, of course.

malnificent

thank you brother!