Recently ventured into the world of KDF (which I now love more than my fed collection of ships) purely based on playing with a Negh'Var. Leaving the merits of other ships aside as I know someone may suggest swapping to another, I have noticed some oddities with my power drain on my ship.
- Loadout: 3x DHC and 1 DBB fore, 4 turret rear
- Weapons power is always set to 100 (50/25/25 being the other numbers)
- 9 points in Warp Core potential, 3 points EPS (think that covers it for key skills)
As a Klingon Engineer I have access to Nadion Inv/EPS transfer and currently have 1 copy of EPtW.
So, in battle I've noticed at those times all of my power boosting abilities are on cooldown, my power drain is so much my damage numbers border on pathetic. Curiously, as soon as I deactivate one rear turret, somehow my power drain becomes a lot less and damage numbers stay higher (still of course dipping due to energy being reserved for weapons firing).
I knew it would be ambitious to set a cruiser up to try and deal escort like damage, but since I have one RCS console equipped and some skill points in thrusters my turn rate is actually decent enough to attempt this but the power drain makes the build useless. So, my questions are:
1) Is there some issue with 4 turrets vs 3 with respect to power drain I am unaware of, ie does it alter the firing cycles to coincide with one another with 4 turrets but not 3?
2) Anyone else have these issues with a similar/copy of this setup?
3) Should I cycle 2 copies constantly of EPtW and just accept the downtime between abilities or is there another way to keep power up I'm not thinking of?
4) Should I just make a completely different gear setup with beams or whatever and stick this all on my currently unloved Qin Raptor? I know the huge damage potential is there I'm just not currently doing it justice.
Looking forward to some replies!
Comments
Gain extra shield penetration and reduce weapons power drain at the same time. Mix into the cycle 2xEPTW, nadion inversion and EPS and you should be able to keeps weapon power levels up fairly consistently.
For captain skills do you also have 3 or 6 points spent into 'starship weapon performance'? (don't spend 7-9 points into it, the extra 3 combined gets you 1 extra power for weapons, not worth it)
Another suggestion would be to alter that DBB to a torpedo, that way you can retain turrets and reduce drain.
Or if you want to keep all energy based weapons change DBB to the romulan experimental beam bank, which draws 0 (zero) energy.
Then there's the consoles. get the borg console for +5 weapons power. Zero point energy conduit adds power to sub systems too. Then theres the engy consoles that add power to weapons subsystems too.
KHG engine can help too with power, even more so when the subsystems power is set at low levels (as it's an efficient engine so adds more if levels are set under 75 or whatever)
The ship I'm using is a regular Negh'Var from the Mirror lockbox, and whilst I'm very well specced out on my fed toon with omega gear galore this is a new toon with no reputation whatsoever, so for the time being options like KHG and the Borg console are out.
Definitely keen to try out the DEM (I'd somewhat avoided it since I've not found it all too useful on my tac fed). Going to be cheeky and ask how you'd best mix the engineering abilities up for this boff layout. One thing I've read elsewhere is not to use higher DEM numbers but I'd have to if I were to stick to EPtX1/2 rather than 2/3.
For a cruiser, make sure to max out your Warp Core Potential skill. This gives you more power to every system. Weapon System Performance is also a no-brainer.
The single greatest piece of equipment any KDF ship can have, for power management, is the Plasmonic Leech. It comes from a Z-store ship. One of the cheaper ones fortunately. Max out your level in the very cheap skill Flow Capacitors, and your ship will enjoy +10 power to all systems during combat.
The 2-piece adapted borg set (typically the assimilated console plus the cutting beam) gives an ongoing very high chance to buff your weapon power. (The cutting beam is also a very powerful weapon in its own right)
Even without that, any non-beams ship should do just fine with EPTW1. Higher ranks are just a waste of potential.
If your power levels STILL aren't what you want them to be after all of that, consider replacing one of your cannons with a photon torpedo launcher and adding some projectile officers to your Doff lineup. Under practical conditions a photon launcher with ProjOffs can put out a very respectable amount of damage due to the increased rate of fire and fact that torpedo damage is not reduced by range at all while cannons drop off in damage quickly.
I'm confused... Mirror Negh'Var...? Doesn't exist. Maybe it's just a typo, but you've gotten me curious.
Also, apologies for the confusion! I completely brain freezed on the Mirror Negh'Var comment, I'd just bought the Vor'cha that comes in a lockbox and had a senior moment
Rrezeth, Gorn Tactical, primary alt
Nari, Orion Science, secondary alt