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bop=shockwave+subnuke+bo

retrosragesretrosrages Member Posts: 235 Arc User
edited April 2013 in PvP Gameplay
this build seems to be running rife in pvp with every bop, you cant defend against it I saw a full hp/shields oddy dropped in 2 seconds against this set up.
I don't mind being alphad but at least give me the chance to defend myself there is no defence to this and iv got 114 in both sub system repair and dampers and also i hate being spamed by mines from cloaked bops that don't even show up this is the way a coward plays
Post edited by retrosrages on
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  • the1tiggletthe1tigglet Member Posts: 1,421 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    okay I'm listening, can you be more specific did they stack consoles? because I've been playing a sci ina sci ship for a long time now never had an easy time like that unless it was an escort.
  • edited March 2013
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  • virusdancervirusdancer Member Posts: 18,687 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    edit: basically a duplicate of what I'm discussing in Post#6.
  • doffingcomradedoffingcomrade Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    VM cannot disable shields.
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
  • virusdancervirusdancer Member Posts: 18,687 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    VM cannot disable shields.

    I know what the tooltip says. I know what the DOFF tooltip says. Somewhere along the line though...

    edit: I have no phasers, phased polarons, etc, etc on my BoP. Only thing I have that can disable a subsystem is VM. I don't BO - it's a non-Tac Hegh'ta. Just something to annoy folks with rather than kill them. Much more fun to be called a Sci Spammer than be just another guy that unintelligible insults are being hurled at (and you're never sure if it's you or somebody else...I mean, do you ask?)...

    edit: Dorking around, I dropped shields on maybe 2 out of 30 or so guys I was fighting. With nothing that should drop shields like that. I don't know if it is some combination of everything else going on - it's just shocks, nadeon shocks, grav well, tractor, hargh, trans, VM w/ Add+Spread. It's an annoyance BoP - not a kill BoP.

    edit: Hrmm, the Breen Energy Dis shouldn't drain enough to drop them.

    edit: There's nothing in the patch notes to suggest this has changed, and I'm not sure what is causing the effect I see from time to time. Would be easier if I was the target instead of the attacker.
  • doffingcomradedoffingcomrade Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    Well, usually, the result is that you stop moving, you stop shooting, and you get hit by a bunch of heavy plaz and die. Shields themselves stay up until that point, though.
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
  • radkipradkip Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    NPC Viral Matrix and player Viral Matrix are two different things. They used to be the same, but somewhere along the line player VM was changed to not disable shields while the NPC ability was left alone.
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  • p2wsucksp2wsucks Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    Aux2Damp gives immunity to stuns and any ship can fit if needed. Listen for audio cues to know when to activate it. Also, TBR has a longer range than PSW (5km vs 3km) this maybe helpful if they give themselves away too early. Switching to high Engine power or using an Engine batt may create the needed seperation. APO should work too, though not all ships can use this.

    Stuns don't shut everything down, you can still use teams. Iirc you should be able to adjust power settings and turn. High Aux setting w/sensors and you may see them coming. High shield settings should help absorb the BO if you want to go that route w/a buffer shield. Cpb has 5km range and (30 sec shared cooldown so it can be rolled as well). Then there's Scis rolling Sensor Scan.

    Even a Lt slotted Tykens will kill mines, as will tbr (can be rolled by allies to give away a cloaked ship's position), ewp (can be rolled by allies to create a decloaking zone), your own psw, gw, your own mines (these will often activate if a cloaked ship is nearby).
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  • maicake716maicake716 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    Completely valid as a tactic, the only issue I have is when the bop is still cloaked and all the attacks are cloaked so you can't see anything anywhere. Even with a reactive sensor scan and being in a sci ship, you still see nothing. Not even the freaking attacks or the wave from the shockwave.


    That's when I have a problem.

    And yes I am bitter that cryptic hasn't fixed it.
    mancom wrote: »
    Frankly, I think the only sound advice that one can give new players at this time is to stay away from PVP in STO.
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  • virusdancervirusdancer Member Posts: 18,687 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    maicake716 wrote: »
    Completely valid as a tactic, the only issue I have is when the bop is still cloaked and all the attacks are cloaked so you can't see anything anywhere. Even with a reactive sensor scan and being in a sci ship, you still see nothing. Not even the freaking attacks or the wave from the shockwave.


    That's when I have a problem.

    And yes I am bitter that cryptic hasn't fixed it.

    If Red goes to Holo on Thursday, it should be fixed then...no?
  • darkfader1988darkfader1988 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited March 2013
    If Red goes to Holo on Thursday, it should be fixed then...no?

    Yes. The fix is on Redshirt right now.


    To the OP: Shockwave is a commander science ability, 4 second stun, but since season 4 you can resist to it with dampeners in the skill tree, consoles, etc. On top of that the damage effect is so nerfed that they can just as well totally remove the damage effect all together. What else do you want to nerf on it? Nerf it to 2 second, and skill for resistance to it so you have a 1 second stun on a Commander Sci ability? Cmon.

    On top of that, Omega can basically be rotated on an escort (and other ships every 30 seconds, giving you basically a 50% resistance per minute to it). Use tactical teams in between and you are almost invulnerable to any alpha, even from the best bop players.

    Aux to Internal Dampeners skill also resists shockwave stuns, so I'd say plenty of counters and reductions of effect.

    When shocked you can still use a few abilities like Sci team or Engi team, and a few others I think.

    The problem with whiners about Shockwave is because they are all sitting ducks not having buffed a single ability when flying around, yeah. thats simply going to get you killed. Learn to prebuff, play smart with your abilities. Make it so that your rotating abilities are on your WASD/Spacebar keys etc, saves you alot of QQn.
    Its pretty staight forward that if you try to buff up AFTER you got shocked, it might already be too late.
    And never stop distributing shields whenever possible might also be a good idea ;)



    Sorry I dont ment to be mean but the crying about these abilities is just ungrounded (Except for B'rels that dont show themselves at all when using something in Enhanced cloak, which will soon be fixed)


    For the rest, unless the BoP has some very lucky crits, most alphas can easily be countered with a bit of resistance, a Tactical team, and an EPTS. If you never prebuff those in advance, or rotate them smartly with omega, yeah you are simply going to die.


    If you still have no clue what im talking about, i would friendly request you to attend to PvP bootcamp, and hopefully learn how to counter all this with greater success.
    MT - Sad Pandas
  • borgresearcherborgresearcher Member Posts: 451 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    you can still use rsp and team skills, so i dont find builds of that type a problem
    and there are too many skills with immunity to disables, science team can clear jam sensors
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  • renimaltrenimalt Member Posts: 219 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    Retrosrages, it sounds like you're having difficulty surviving the initial PSW stun. Surviving the stun and the strike that follows is all about getting the critical buffs that will keep you alive up before the stun hits, and then applying repairs/other countermeasures when you regain control. You'll need to pay attention and anticipate PSWs before they hit you, but once you do you'll easily counter most of these alpha strikes.

    There are number of hard counters to the stun effect caused by PSW, and a number of soft counters that will help you survive the followup strike. Here are a couple:
    • Attack Pattern Omega: Hard counter. Directly prevents the stun effect from PSW. Use this before you get hit by PSW and you won't be locked out of your abilities. (Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.)
    • Auxiliary to Inertial Dampeners: Hard counter. Also directly counters the stun effect from PSW.
    • Tactical Team: Soft counter, but extremely effective. Use this before the PSW hits; you'll still be stunned, but their attacks won't instantly break your shields and cripple your hull.
    • Any abilities that grant shield/hull resist: Soft counters. Use them to strengthen your shields/hull and you'll be more likely to survive until you regain control of your abilities.
    • Evasive Maneuvers: Extremely soft counter, but occasionally effective. Remember, you can still pilot your ship while stunned; pop Evasive and then spin around them to throw off their firing arcs.

    The main thing that I'd like to point out is that you have to pop these counters before you get hit by PSW. This means that you need to pay attention to what's going on around you. Here are some suggestions:
    • Turn up your audio; you can often hear the cloaked bops applying their buffs and preparing their alpha strike.
    • Watch for other debuffs being applied to you; some bops will use VM or tractor beams on you before they go through their PSW + alpha strike. When you see these debuffs, get your trigger finger ready on your counters.
    • Above all, stay alert. Even when they're starting from cloak, it usually takes a second (and produces a distinctive sound) to decloak. Use this time to apply your counters. You won't get to hit more than one or two, but any one of the above counters should be enough to save your bacon.

    Just speaking from my experience, TT + EPtS is usually enough to keep you alive through the stun. Mini can attest to the many times I've foiled his alpha strikes -- not only on me, but also on any other target he might be trying to tackle. :P

    The PSW + BO + THY + whatever bop strike is high-risk, high-reward. It will kill you if you're not prepared, but if you pay even the slightest amount of attention to what's going on and apply your counters correctly, you will survive these alpha strikes -- at which point you should make those silly klinks rue the day they decided to target you! :D
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  • scurry5scurry5 Member Posts: 1,554 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    Sounds like you might have some lag issues, though. Might want to check your ping counts. If you have high ping, you'll have no choice but to anticipate, same way I do. I've faced Mini before, and while he is good, if I can get my buffs in the moment I hear him decloak, he's not really effective unless he gets multicrits, in which case nothing will save you.
  • travelingmastertravelingmaster Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    renimalt wrote: »
    Retrosrages, it sounds like you're having difficulty surviving the initial PSW stun. Surviving the stun and the strike that follows is all about getting the critical buffs that will keep you alive up before the stun hits, and then applying repairs/other countermeasures when you regain control. You'll need to pay attention and anticipate PSWs before they hit you, but once you do you'll easily counter most of these alpha strikes.

    There are number of hard counters to the stun effect caused by PSW, and a number of soft counters that will help you survive the followup strike. Here are a couple:
    • Attack Pattern Omega: Hard counter. Directly prevents the stun effect from PSW. Use this before you get hit by PSW and you won't be locked out of your abilities. (Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.)
    • Auxiliary to Inertial Dampeners: Hard counter. Also directly counters the stun effect from PSW.
    • Tactical Team: Soft counter, but extremely effective. Use this before the PSW hits; you'll still be stunned, but their attacks won't instantly break your shields and cripple your hull.
    • Any abilities that grant shield/hull resist: Soft counters. Use them to strengthen your shields/hull and you'll be more likely to survive until you regain control of your abilities.
    • Evasive Maneuvers: Extremely soft counter, but occasionally effective. Remember, you can still pilot your ship while stunned; pop Evasive and then spin around them to throw off their firing arcs.

    The main thing that I'd like to point out is that you have to pop these counters before you get hit by PSW. This means that you need to pay attention to what's going on around you. Here are some suggestions:
    • Turn up your audio; you can often hear the cloaked bops applying their buffs and preparing their alpha strike.
    • Watch for other debuffs being applied to you; some bops will use VM or tractor beams on you before they go through their PSW + alpha strike. When you see these debuffs, get your trigger finger ready on your counters.
    • Above all, stay alert. Even when they're starting from cloak, it usually takes a second (and produces a distinctive sound) to decloak. Use this time to apply your counters. You won't get to hit more than one or two, but any one of the above counters should be enough to save your bacon.

    Just speaking from my experience, TT + EPtS is usually enough to keep you alive through the stun. Mini can attest to the many times I've foiled his alpha strikes -- not only on me, but also on any other target he might be trying to tackle. :P

    The PSW + BO + THY + whatever bop strike is high-risk, high-reward. It will kill you if you're not prepared, but if you pay even the slightest amount of attention to what's going on and apply your counters correctly, you will survive these alpha strikes -- at which point you should make those silly klinks rue the day they decided to target you! :D

    I'd like to emphasize the point made about keeping your ears open and staying alert. I'm one of those guys who likes to fly BoPs in Ker'rat and decloak-ambush players and try killing them in a single alpha, or at least maiming them and making them burn through skills. The easiest kills are always people who are drifting around not really paying attention, or are more focused on shooting the Borg NPCs than watching their backs.

    When you pay attention, the attack buffs are actually quite audible, and most BoP pilots will activate them within 5-6 km because some don't last very long. That, and staying alert and keeping your fingers on your important first-reaction buffs is crucial. Reaction speed is everything, because an alphastrike can be over in 5 seconds and if it's a BoP they could already be on their way out by the time you react.

    It may seem sneaky or cowardly, but this is basically one out of two viable uses for a BoP. The other is as an offensive-sci harasser, throwing around gravity wells, tractor beams, VMs, and whatnot. That's effectively what the BoP has been reduced to, because it can't compete with Federation escorts straight-up unless the escort is being piloted by an incompetent.
    My PvP toon is Krov, of The House of Snoo. Beware of my Hegh'ta of doom.
  • ilhanskilhansk Member Posts: 620 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    renimalt wrote: »
    Retrosrages, it sounds like you're having difficulty surviving the initial PSW stun. Surviving the stun and the strike that follows is all about getting the critical buffs that will keep you alive up before the stun hits, and then applying repairs/other countermeasures when you regain control. You'll need to pay attention and anticipate PSWs before they hit you, but once you do you'll easily counter most of these alpha strikes.

    You know me Renim, you know that I am a somewhat capable escort player, and as weird as it may sound, the OP has a point.

    Under normal circumstances, the attacked player has a time window of about 1 second to react to the incoming stun.

    Under certain circumstances (I don't wanna get into details), the time window to react is ZERO. The stun gets applied on you before the BOP decloaks and get targetable itself. I have frapsed and watched these attack runs in slow motion. In a nutshell, right now BOPS are capable of stunning while they are cloaked. Listening to audio clues will not help. "Staying alert" will not help.
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  • antoniosalieriantoniosalieri Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    ilhansk wrote: »
    You know me Renim, you know that I am a somewhat capable escort player, and as weird as it may sound, the OP has a point.

    Under normal circumstances, the attacked player has a time window of about 1 second to react to the incoming stun.

    Under certain circumstances (I don't wanna get into details), the time window to react is ZERO. The stun gets applied on you before the BOP decloaks and get targetable itself. I have frapsed and watched these attack runs in slow motion. In a nutshell, right now BOPS are capable of stunning while they are cloaked. Listening to audio clues will not help. "Staying alert" will not help.

    Should be fixed in the next patch I believe. Then we shouldn't see anymore brel weak sauce.
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
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  • ladydragonfuryladydragonfury Member Posts: 32 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    Just a quick question, are they subnuc'ing you in their strike as in, subnucleonic beam, the purple beam that then rings around your ship? Because if they are then that's an inherent Sci Captain ability that is designed to knock out your skill tray. Which would be why you're losing the ability to use it.
    I am NEVER calling my avatars 'toons'.
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  • the1tiggletthe1tigglet Member Posts: 1,421 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    ilhansk wrote: »
    You know me Renim, you know that I am a somewhat capable escort player, and as weird as it may sound, the OP has a point.

    Under normal circumstances, the attacked player has a time window of about 1 second to react to the incoming stun.

    Under certain circumstances (I don't wanna get into details), the time window to react is ZERO. The stun gets applied on you before the BOP decloaks and get targetable itself. I have frapsed and watched these attack runs in slow motion. In a nutshell, right now BOPS are capable of stunning while they are cloaked. Listening to audio clues will not help. "Staying alert" will not help.

    The same can be said for alpha happy tactical cloaked ships so really this argument is invalid unless you're trying to further imbalance this title by making science captains even more useless then they already are in most cases.
  • antoniosalieriantoniosalieri Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    The same can be said for alpha happy tactical cloaked ships so really this argument is invalid unless you're trying to further imbalance this title by making science captains even more useless then they already are in most cases.

    Well you don't have to be a sci captain to run a shockwave.

    Honestly everyone's crying for nothing....

    I don't bother with shockwave anymore the stun isn't strong enough to justify the lt commander slots. (unless you cheese enough to be running subterfuge boffs on a brel before the fix thats coming shortly)

    I find you really don't need the stun... all you really have to do is stay cloaked until you know your targets buffs are on cool down... time your run for the 5s they can't have a tac team with out help and the chances of them living are pretty low.
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  • thegrimcorsairthegrimcorsair Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    Just a quick question, are they subnuc'ing you in their strike as in, subnucleonic beam, the purple beam that then rings around your ship? Because if they are then that's an inherent Sci Captain ability that is designed to knock out your skill tray. Which would be why you're losing the ability to use it.

    Sub-Nucleonic Beam peels all the buffs off of a target and sets back any powers currently on cooldown by up to 30 seconds. The powers will say 2+ minutes, but the effect always wears off after no more than 30 seconds. There is no disable component in SNB, that comes from PSW and other assorted weapons with the same stun on them.

    Off the top of my head that includes:

    MACO 3-Piece Heavy Graviton Beam
    Tricobalts (torpedoes and mines)
    Nadeon Detonator modified torpedoes
    Magnetometric Charge
    Temporal Disruption Torpedo (?)
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  • darkfader1988darkfader1988 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    ilhansk wrote: »
    You know me Renim, you know that I am a somewhat capable escort player, and as weird as it may sound, the OP has a point.

    Under normal circumstances, the attacked player has a time window of about 1 second to react to the incoming stun.

    Under certain circumstances (I don't wanna get into details), the time window to react is ZERO. The stun gets applied on you before the BOP decloaks and get targetable itself. I have frapsed and watched these attack runs in slow motion. In a nutshell, right now BOPS are capable of stunning while they are cloaked. Listening to audio clues will not help. "Staying alert" will not help.

    Yet prebuffing your abilities in a smart way will counter ALOT of shockwaves and the dmg after that.

    Omega 50% uptime on escort, thats already quite OP.
    2 Tacteams, you know what a tac team + epts does when someone alphas you, even with the highst spike its mostly not enough to take someone down (who also has some decent hull resists on them)

    Torps, forget it with TT up

    So omega 50%, in the 15 + 15 second of not having omega up (The other 50%) you can put in a tacteam there which basically only gives any bop a very low amount of a timeframe per minute to actually do a successful strike.

    Lets be honest, if you spec up internal dampeners to 9 the shockwave stun is already brought down to 2~ perhaps even less seconds.

    The delay between decloak and firing all of your weapons, beam overloads and torps still have a latency of at least 2 to 4 seconds because of ability/weapon queing delay. Also not to mention the shockwave travel time before actual stun hit (Even then there is a delay at closer ranges)

    From the time to decloak you hear the decloak sound, you hear additional buffs being buffedu p in a short timespan, plenty of time for a quick player to react and throw in a tacteam just in case.

    You know me well in my bop by now hank, and its kinda sad to see players that simply dont want me on the opposing team anymore because its considered OP, where there is enough that can be done to counter it. In fact ive seen people i can simply not take down because they have so much resist up and have internal damps specced, those arent even high quality inner circle etc ppl.

    Knowing all this, it is definately counterable, and it only requires players which can react as fast as the BoP can do an efficient and very fast alpha, and a bit of intertial damps, and your good against 99% of the bop players.

    Only a handful will adapt.

    Soon my sci bop is rdy and I bet I dont even need shockwave to pull off a good alpha without alpha, lets open up a new thread in advance on how OP subnucs are then. Nerf every ability until nobody can kill anything, buff Faw and lets do rainbow pew and shield proc kills, you cant stop a bop.

    Get your balls together and get a grip.



    "right now BOPS are capable of stunning while they are cloaked"

    B'rel's have always had the ability to shockwave in cloak, no news there either. Only difference is PSW has been nerfed since then over and over.
    MT - Sad Pandas
  • ladydragonfuryladydragonfury Member Posts: 32 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    Sorry, I didn't realise giving an idea of where the cooldowns came from meant that I or anyone else was supporting or suggesting subnucs should be nuked. Especially since I happen to play a Science Captain as my main char in Fed and happen to pilot one of the much maligned pure Sci ships. I don't want subnuc nuked, just wondering if that might help to explain the tray cooldowns. But now I know more about that, and know it can't be the cause, so thanks thegrimcorsair.
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  • naeviusnaevius Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    Presumably if you run in under MES you have no problem firing off a PSW by surprise...of course, you lose the de-cloak buff.
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  • emoejoeemoejoe Member Posts: 229 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    maicake716 wrote: »
    Completely valid as a tactic, the only issue I have is when the bop is still cloaked and all the attacks are cloaked so you can't see anything anywhere. Even with a reactive sensor scan and being in a sci ship, you still see nothing. Not even the freaking attacks or the wave from the shockwave.


    That's when I have a problem.

    And yes I am bitter that cryptic hasn't fixed it.

    fixed on redshirt
  • snoge00fsnoge00f Member Posts: 1,812 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    I'm glad.

    I never would have bought those boffs in that state, and I sure would hate to fly alongside people abusing them.
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
  • travelingmastertravelingmaster Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited April 2013
    my ping is 28ms I run on fibre optics so my connection is ok. As they other guy said you get stunned before they even decloak these days and there seem to be a way around the 20 second cool down on the battle cloak as well, a bop should have to fully decloak before they can unleash any stun or debuff but lets see what happen after the romulan boff fix

    Well, the problem is that the decloak sequence takes 2-3 seconds to actually complete. To anyone paying attention for cloaked attackers, that's enough time to snap on Tactical Team + EPtS1 or 2, and maybe throw out a tractor beam or other immobilizer or a stun at the BoP.

    BoPs have to strike fast in order to make the tactic work. Giving the target 3 seconds of warning time via the audible decloaking sound (and the subsequent visibility) is far too much. The best PvPers can have someone locked down in 5 seconds flat with sci skills and the like. Heaven help you if you delay an attack against a good escort pilot, as well. . .they hit Omega, and your attack's wasted. Especially since they'll just circle around and strafe you with an alpha strike.

    The cloak is ultimately fine as it is (though I'd like some protection while in cloak, maybe a hull resist buff). I wish people would stop suggesting it be altered.
    My PvP toon is Krov, of The House of Snoo. Beware of my Hegh'ta of doom.
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