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Armor Slots: a Response to CaptainGeko
mandoknight89
Member Posts: 1,687 Arc User
First, the relevant three tweets from last night. For those who despise Twitter (as well as for the sake of completeness), this is what he said:
"Thinking about a ship armor slot. But it may stack too high with eng res consoles. Armor can do a lot more than consoles."
"How do you feel about gaining Armor, at the expense of converting existing eng res consoles into something else (don't know what yet)?"
"They could convert into an existing console, or something entirely new (just not direct hull damage mitigation)"
My own thoughts:
"Thinking about a ship armor slot. But it may stack too high with eng res consoles. Armor can do a lot more than consoles."
"How do you feel about gaining Armor, at the expense of converting existing eng res consoles into something else (don't know what yet)?"
"They could convert into an existing console, or something entirely new (just not direct hull damage mitigation)"
My own thoughts:
- Existing Engineering consoles, other than armor, are fairly weak. I've found myself considering Engineer console slots (other than the 2 for double Neutronium) to be the place to put Universal consoles, particularly since some (the Borg and Romulan consoles) grant similar bonuses to existing Engineering consoles, but with higher returns.
- I feel that an armor slot would be beneficial, if other universally useful Engineering consoles were created in the stead of the existing armor consoles (this would also help the Operations Odyssey, Fleet Galaxy, War Bortasqu', and Fleet Negh'var by making their 5th Engineering console slot more valuable). Existing Engineering consoles should get a look at, in order to make them more competitive, particularly for Cruisers (as high-Eng Escorts already have a significant advantage when it comes to RCS Accelerators).
- While it is possible that Cruisers could receive a second armor slot as their "unique benefit" (similar to how Escorts have a higher turn rate and speed than any other ship, as well as being able to wield Dual Heavy Cannons), I feel that the Warp Core should be the Cruiser's signature strength. Heavier armor could come with it, and could help justify the crippled turn rates compared to similarly sized Escorts and Science Vessels (the Armitage and Vesta are bigger than some Cruisers!), however.
- I think this is worth evaluating, but I think it would be best to implement it alongside the previously-posed Warp Core and Secondary Deflector slots.
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I know some people would complain, but really the only reason to complain about these changes to Armor, is because it's just different. With armor slots in order to gain hull resist, you stick on an armor plate instead of several neutronium consoles. So what? Players can adapt. As long as they change the existing armor consoles into something useful, no one will really lose out.
However I also think they should make some kind of a trinity for ship-specific gear, maybe like this:
Escorts get Dual Heavy Cannons
Cruisers get Heavy Armor
Science Ships get ??? (I'm thinking Secondary Deflectors, maybe prototype warp cores? I don't know)
The warp core is something that's the Cruiser's schtick. Most Science ships already have a secondary deflector on the model, and adding that slot for Science ships was given by Geko as a possible Science Vessel bonus in a recent interview.
Mine Trap Supporter
Unless we either got a whole bunch of new engineering consoles that are equally desirable as armour consoles, or existing engineering consoles were improved to have the same broad appeal of amour consoles, then engineering console slots will just become a dumping ground for universals.
Not that I wouldn't mind more free space for universal consoles; but devaluing engineering slots would be a pretty unbalanced way to bring that about.
To be honest I would much rather see a slot for different warp cores. You can then make some that will give +15 to all power levels, reduces energy drain from using powers, enhances shield regen ticks or engineering abilities by 5-10%. That's what I can think of in the minute I take to type this, I'm sure there is much more that can be done.
Armour, well your 3rd neutronium only gives you 5% more resist so really only 2 neutroniums are worth it with the current damage resist mechanics. A special armour slot for cruisers would mean you have to slot less armour consoles but other than universal consoles there would be nothing to put in said engineering slots.
It is through repetition that we learn our weakness.
A master with a stone is better than a novice with a sword.
Has damage got out of control?
This is the last thing I will post.
I have seen Cryptic change consoles before (such as the shield effectiveness console just before F2P) and mostly what they pick to change it to is almost worthless. This then becomes a NERF, pure and simple. There are some players who have played the Mk XII console lottery to the extent of having all or most of their consoles now at Mk XII purple. I believe you might find the forums blowing up and/or alot less dedicated players if all or some of these consoles are made worthless junk, that is bound, and the only thing you can do with them is sell them to the replicator.
I also think these ideas will only make his job harder since he's not done a great job on ship balance thus far. Giving him more variables to juggle will only magnify the problems.
Back when the game launched, there was balance. Your admiral ship went one of two directions ... an extra slot in one of the two professions/classes your ship was not classified as. (So cruisers, havin engineering slant, had one choice tactical in the assault cruiser, and one choice science in the star cruiser).
All the "extras" were just cosmetic. As in ... ship costumes.
Well here we are, three years later, with Geko having to do something because of all that mudflation he couldn't manage properly since someone at Cryptic felt they'd sell more if they gave "power" along with cosmetics.
I mean god, it was so stupid. Back then people would have lined up to purchase the SKIN of the Excelsior. Because they were fans of the ship. But nope, Cryptic had to sell power right along with it.
And now, that we've pretty much reached a glass ceiling on what can be done, but need to keep cramming more items for sale into the model ...
We have to give the guy who couldn't design the Nebula properly, the chance to expand the system he himself help break?
Yeah, go for it.
Cruiser pilots aren't upset that their ships aren't tanky enough, they're upset they're so slow and do less damage than escorts. An armor slot would only serve to make a cruiser tankier, even if there was a "light armor" option reducing defenses for extra speed and turning it wouldn't be a total solution.
It's not like he said it would be for cruisers only.
Besides, if armour consoles were out of the equation, then there's more room for RCS consoles and those plasma manifold things that boost weapon energy; so it would help cruisers a little in those respects (more so than ship types with fewer eng console slots anyway).
I too think Geko is getting to a point where all future ship will be completely outside the normal ship boundaries. The Kumari is clearly an upgrade to the defiant setup, so I wonder how longutil we see similar "upgrades" to other ships and classes? How odd this all happens when fleets start to get to T5.
Unfortunately, I think these days Cryptic wouldn't be satisfied with simply selling ship skins. At least not at what we would consider a reasonable price, it'd the EV suit all over again!
When he talked about the Regent not selling as well as expected... it really shows how metric-centric Cryptic has become. They aren't even considering what the playerbase might think or want and are focusing purely on past behavior. Its obvious to players why it didn't sell as well. Most players that would want one already had an Ody variant they preferred, or are waiting for their fleet to get to T5 or buying it off a T5 fleet. In fact the only reason to get a Regent now is for the 180 Torp! If that torp was a C-store only unlock you'd better believe almost every player that has a cruiser would get it, provided it wasn't a cash gouge like the 180 missiles in the lobi store are. But I guess that's the thing isn't it?
Perhaps cosmetic "mission pods" and "attack bits" that you could freely add to your ship's model would be a solution, but once again I'd say Cryptic would be unlikely to want to have actual "micro" transactions that weren't key sales.
But think of it like this: if cruisers were to be more naturally tanky (and not because of their abilities) then it would be far easier to build for damage without having to severely compromisetheir durability. That being said, this doesn't solve everything wrong about cruisers. If EPS actually meant a sot regarding weapon power usage or if beam arrays were decent weapons, then it would be a different question altogether.
Warp Cores, Heavy Armor, Secondary Deflectors, Computer Upgrades, etc, etc, etc.
Where based on some previous comments, the Warp Cores and Computer Upgrades would be available to all ships - Cruisers(ish) would get Heavy Armor and Science Vessels(ish) would get Secondary Deflectors. Escorts(ish) already having DHCs, would not get a specific alternate upgrade. Of course, it's not that neat since there are hybrid vessels and non-Escorts that can use DHCs.
Still though, that particular discussion aside - I'm wondering if Geko's been playing EVE, eh?
Warp Cores and Computer Upgrades? Will we be looking at powergrid and CPU?
Is it going to be some form of EVElite? One need only take a quick look at the EVE Ship Equipment in the Item Database - to get a gist of where all of this could go, no?
The STO Hurricane, eh?
8 High Slots (4 Fore/4 Aft Weapons)
6 Low/4 Med Slots (10 console slots)
Powergrid (Warp Core)
CPU (Computer Upgrade)
Upgrade Hardpoint (Heavy Armor)
Looking at redoing some of the STO consoles - all sorts of goodies to go in those Low/Med/High Slots, eh? Don't forget Crafting Rep and all those wondrous blueprints/recipes?
With it being STO and not EVE...it would have to be more Pakled than spreadsheet... but is that where things are heading, eh?
Correct me if I'm mistaken, but the Defiant onlyhas a +1 turn rate. I was looking at it more as a successor as the most glass cannon escort. But you're right, the other variants are far less glass canon.
There have been a lot of discussions on why cruisers are deficient in the balance equation, but there is remarkably little universally agreed on, with turn rate and the weakness of choice in ensign Engineering powers being about it. Other items like relative durability of the types of ships, damage output, power output, and crew mechanics are far more fractiously debated.
If the demands of some in this thread are listened to, then this change will do nothing to the relative durability of ship types. It won't even change the relative value of Engineering console slots, as the freed up slots apply to everyone and, ironically enough, Escorts get either equal or greater utility than cruisers from the remaining members of the current selection.
Which leaves ... what?
Absolutely agree. They started down that path of selling ships and each new ship needs something special so there's no real turning back.
Still back then, back when we were all far more innocent, I bought new uniforms like nobody's business. And new bridge packs. And new ship skins. So I could customize my looks. A lot of folks did that. Heh.
Yeah, they kind of seem to miss the bigger point about the Reagent. The Excelsior already existed. As did a zillion Cruisers (with the Ambassador still on the way). I wouldn't expect a small upgrade to the Assault Cruiser to sell well that long after the Excelsior already made the Assault Cruiser a middle of the road option. People who had the AC might buy it. But by that time so many people already moved past the AC. And those with an Excel wouldn't have needed it at all.
We're now firmly on this path, and Geko does have to come up with something. Armor slots? It's an idea I guess. But it doesn't really address the overall problem. Just the short term one, which is the one I guess is more important to the company (more sales).
I can also see cruiser only armor since we get DHC as Tacs and in the same vein of thought I can see a second deflector or even sci only shields.
Additionally what I would also love to see is a general universal slot that can take any console (eng, sci or tac) added to ships. It would add a another degree of customization to the game for players methinks. It would also give Cryptic more design room for ships in the future much as the universal BO slot does.
ingame: @.Spartan
Original Cryptic Forum Name: Spartan (member #124)
The Glorious, Kirk’s Protegè
For extra rocket sauce go with what I call "The Trinity", neutronum, monotanium and ablative.
As far as the specializations that are being mentioned, I am not sure whether to like this idea or not... as it stands I am pretty happy with the builds I have now and it seems changing the setups now would make everyone have to rethink their builds.
Sort of like when they forced the respec at F2P launch and made it so you HAVE to spend ground skillpoints, its kind of a bad idea.
Joined - 9/2011
"You Best Make Peace With Your Dear & Fluffy Lord" - Malcolm Reynolds
That was just based on what he said during the 4 hour interview. Escorts already having something special - DHCs, he was looking at Heavy Armor for Cruisers and a Second Deflector for Science Vessels (even pointing out that he believed the majority of SVs already had the second deflector as far as art was concerned - it just isn't being used).
But Battlecruisers, Raptors, Marauders, Siege Destroyers, and the Vesta all equip DHCs as well. That's not really special is it?
Also what would a second deflector do for science? How is that special?
(Personally I think they should start adding in AUX based weapons of all types available to science ships, that'd be a big step forward for helping science ships and it wouldn't make the vesta less special because the intrepid can't equip DHCs anyways).
That said, I think there is a difference between "category of upgrades of which some upgrades are restricted to certain ship classes" and "category of upgrades restricted to certain ship classes".
So, a DHC is a weapon; it fills a weapons slot, which all ships have. But the DHC in particular is not available to all ships. This, in my mind, is OK; it allows for variability but nobody loses out. In this sense, I would be totally OK with having an "Armor Slot" which has specific types of restricted armor.
So, for example, you could have armor from Ultra-Light to Ultra-Heavy (Ultra-Light, Light, Medium, Heavy, Ultra-Heavy) where only cruisers and science ships could mount Ultra-Heavy and only escorts and science ships could mount Ultra-Light. (This gives something to everyone: escorts and cruisers get a mutually exclusive set, and science ships get the versatility of both).
It would, however, in my opinion be a bad idea to do something like "Only cruisers get armor slots, only science ships get secondary deflectors".
Yep, been brought up in a few threads. Have to figure whatever they're looking at is at the early whiteboard stage...
Er...boost Science skills.
Nothing like having weapons drain Aux you wanted for your Sci abilities...
Currently there are three pieces of equipment that I deem to be necessary to the running of the ship. They are the engine, deflector and shield system. I think there should be more. I think that, aside from sci, tac and eng consoles there should be...
Engines - This governs top speed and turning.
Deflector - This can modify top warp speed and provides bonuses to some skills.
Shields - Obvious.
Hull - This would be what the ship's outer hull is made of, its armour. A heavy armour class for cruisers is a good idea.
Computer System - Affects effectiveness of computer based abilities and some would assist resisting the affects of opponent abilities.
Warp Core - Affects power levels across different systems and has some affect on power transfer rates.
To help differentiate the classes there would be some items (the best items of their class) that should be limited to certain classes. As a proposed idea...
Escorts - Access to DCs and DHCs and faster, more maneuverable engines.
Cruisers - Larger Warp cores and stronger hulls.
Science - More exotic deflectors and computers, such as the bio-neural based computer on Voyager.
This system would involve a large commitment on Cryptic's behalf but I feel such a system would benefit the game immensely.
Thoughts?
To be fair, DHCs are available to almost all ships. It'd be more appropriate to say that Fed cruisers and Fed Sci Vessels (as well as most ships copy pasted from them) are the exception in not having DHCs available.
I'm far more in favor of opening up DHCs to fed cruisers and upping their turning by +1 or +2 than further adding ways to stat customize ships. I want cosmetic customization, not more stats!
Balance what you already have in the game. Maybe if cruiser beams were not so suck tastic for the average player your regent would have sold a bit better. Or if the fleet version wasn't tier 5 SB.
I mean it really is just a mirror of the KDF Fleet cruiser (tier 2 btw) boff layout and stats minus DHCs. One ship is highly praised the other didn't sell very well.
Doesn't exactly take a rocket scientist or a doctorate in physiology to figure this one out. But no instead we get the...
Cruisers are unpopular because their beam damage is low so I know we'll make them even more tanky that'll fix it!
Bah.
(PS) Second Sci Deflector is a really good idea tho aside from the obvious double two set piece advantage I doubt they could code around or take into account with balance. Perhaps just let Sci vessels double the bonuses from the deflector would be a better idea.
Giving cruisers a slot for special armor would be awesome, giving science ships a slot for a secondary deflector or a mission module would be great as well, and while escorts do get DHC's I cannot help but feel they get left out of the upgrade party.
first, escorts feds side are the only ships capable of equiping DHC's with a few special exceptions.
while that is a unique ability the escorts do not get a special slot for them.
second, I think giving cruisers warp core slots and science ships secondary deflector slots would be awesome! but it just would not make any sense to leave those slots off other ships.
heres what I think
DHC's already in game, only equiped by escorts
create heavy armor consoles for cruisers that ONLY cruisers can equip
create some new heavy science console or weapon even, im no good at science ships so ill leave that to who ever reads this.
Add three new slots to everyship in the game:
secondary deflector / mission pod
warp core
starship thrusters ( or something more technical )
secondary deflector / mission pod - has a passive that increases effectivness on sci ships
these would have stats to support science ships only, and since escorts / cruiser do not have access to alot of science abilities/high end abilities the science ships will benefit the most from them.
warp core - has a passive that increases effectivness on cruisers
these would have stats to support cruisers only, same as above - science ships and escorts do not have access to high end engineering abilities so they would naturally help cruisers more.
starship thrusters - has a passive that increases effectivness on escorts.
these would have stats to support escorts more, same as above - cruisers and sci ships do not have high end tac abilities so they naturally supprt escorts more.
each of these items could have stats to support the tac, sci, or eng abilities of each ship. but the point is that none of them would break the ships role ( thats why I included the passive above that increases effectivness on the respective ship )
I also like this suggestion. I made my suggestion above real fast and did not read this first. but hey it looks like we are on the same page woot!
I kinda dig this idea, but I doubt they would go for it, it would possibly force another look at the skill tree, and a complete revamp of the equipment system as we know it.
Would like to see some of these ideas in game though.
Joined - 9/2011
"You Best Make Peace With Your Dear & Fluffy Lord" - Malcolm Reynolds