It's difficult discussing some of this, because the discussions are almost always taking place in multiple threads - but I wanted to bring up something I mentioned in another thread as well (I find myself quoting myself more and more from one thread to another...meh):
Another thing to consider with the Plasma Shockwave (I've been so focused on the Warp Shadows discussions, I can't believe I overlooked this with my two mains being so heavily Plasma focused)...is the pseudo spamming of HE. Is the damage from this going to warrant people use their HE on themselves - meaning that this will create gaps for some Plasma-love to shine through?
Or will it just be ignored? Or even worse, will the piddly damage trigger procs that actually result in the target being harder to kill?
There have been a fair number of people clamoring for that anyways, though, saying "we don't want the -10, so just take the singularity core!" (um, that's also paying for that nifty battle cloak, so we'd have to take that too, ssssooooo....why are you playing a Romulan?) I agree about the lockbox ships being expensive, but I expect a bit of a price drop as the effects of all those 30-packs of master keys starts hitting the market.
Well, like I said in a previous post, I think there are other ways to compensate for just the battle cloak. I gave the example of the two veteran reward ships, the chimera and the... whatever the klingon one is called. They are identical in every way except the klingon one has a battle cloak and -8% shields. That would lead me to believe that the devs felt that -8% to shields was a sufficient trade off for that ship to have a battle cloak. If the D'deridex is basically a galaxy class with a different look and less turn rate, it would seem to me that.. well, for one, the lower turn rate, and some compensation in the shields or hull like -8% could compensate for a battle cloak. Plus there's the inherent disadvantages of trying to battle cloak a small moon... low turn rate, big target... yeah, seems like the battle cloak could very well compensate for itself by blowing you up every time you use it pvp. But that, of course, is just looking at "how do we stick a battle cloak on this" not the special powers.
I am not sure how I feel about the lower power levels.. they're considering -5 for now or -5 with some compromise to the boffs or consoles or whatever, but -10 might not really be such a big deal... The one thing I"m really concerned about though is that, it is my understanding, that the maximum you can set weapons to is 90, and my ships never feel like they are doing any damage unless they have weapons set to 100 with the bonus power taking it up to/near 125, so not being able to put as much power into weapons could be really bad. Of course, it's been discussed how if they would de-nerf power enhancing consoles, one could rather painlessly compensate for at least one system they felt crucial to have the +10 back... but, again, guess we'll just have to wait and see.
I noticed this while in the T'liss, I'd move into a group of frigates with a charge left over from the previous fight, pop the Plasma Shockwave, finish the first frigate and turn...just in time to see the other two collapse on themselves and blow.
Sadly, scaling means I can't do that NOW at 26, but it still takes a nice chunk out, bypassing shields.
The hull melt won't absolutely destroy an enemy, but I notice some relatively thick npc's like tac cubes and nanite transformers start dropping much faster with the burn on them. So even if it just takes a good chunk out of something, it could be super helpful.
Just tested with a Particle Gen I snagged for my Rommie, PG does NOT affect plasma weapon fire. I think the Plasma Shockwave might be intended to give science officers an edge (especially considering the Conservation of Energy trait can push its damage up by 30%), especially especially considering all that shield bypassing damage.
Well darn... I'm really going to have to consider how much I really want to buff that skill as well as finding out just how much of a buff that skill gets from particle gens at end game... really hate to invest in that skill basically just for the shockwave unless it makes it uber devastating.
Also, I often find myself tanking no matter what I fly as I normally invest in threat control. I don't mind it, no matter what I'm in, escort, science vessel, or cruiser, i seem to be able to tank just about the same. But with my romulan I'm going to have to consider if I'm going to be a battle cloaking tank that can pop out for a minute when things get too rough so that I can quickly come back in and retake agro, or if I should put those points from threat control into stealth instead. I would have to really compromise my build to have both, so stealth, which would be more for pvp, or threat control, which would be more for pve? And would I even want to tank as a romulan? Hmm... choices... choices...
Just tested with a Particle Gen I snagged for my Rommie, PG does NOT affect plasma weapon fire. I think the Plasma Shockwave might be intended to give science officers an edge (especially considering the Conservation of Energy trait can push its damage up by 30%), especially especially considering all that shield bypassing damage.
Plasma Infusers - Plasma Directed Energy & Plasma Directed Energy DoT
Ambiplasmas - Plasma Projectile Kinetic & Plasma Projeticle DoT
2pc Romulan Harness - Plasma Directed Energy & Plasma Directed Energy DoT
Embassy Consoles [Pla] - Plasma Directed Energy & Plasma Directed Energy DoT
Particle Generators - Eject Warp Plasma DoT, Plasma Shockwave, Plasma Shockwave DoT
They recently changed the Infusers and Embassy Consoles on Tribble. They used to affect Plasma Projeticle DoT and Eject Warp Plasma DoT as well.
Another thing to consider with the Plasma Shockwave (I've been so focused on the Warp Shadows discussions, I can't believe I overlooked this with my two mains being so heavily Plasma focused)...is the pseudo spamming of HE. Is the damage from this going to warrant people use their HE on themselves - meaning that this will create gaps for some Plasma-love to shine through?
Or will it just be ignored? Or even worse, will the piddly damage trigger procs that actually result in the target being harder to kill?
You raise some very valid concerns, but since there are four other powers, in pvp, it might just be best to overcharge for your damage boost if the shockwave doesn't function well in that dynamic, or use any of the other abilities to give you some other leg up that might bring you victory.
You raise some very valid concerns, but since there are four other powers, in pvp, it might just be best to overcharge for your damage boost if the shockwave doesn't function well in that dynamic, or use any of the other abilities to give you some other leg up that might bring you victory.
Each of the five should have some situational value that overall would make them equal. Otherwise, if it's being balanced around having the five of them available but there's no need for some of them...then it's not balanced.
Each of the five should have some situational value that overall would make them equal. Otherwise, if it's being balanced around having the five of them available but there's no need for some of them...then it's not balanced.
Well no, each of the singularity powers may not be balanced against the other singularity powers equally, but if you view all the singularity powers as a whole, then I don't see the need to nit pick something like... you use overcharge almost all the time because the shockwave is only really better for taking out spam, or you rarely find yourself with the need to use the shadows, or the heal isn't as valuable to you as the damage bonus. But there are a few things to consider... one is that a different player who has a different style than you or a preference for a different type of content might find the abilities you find useless to be incredibly useful.
For example, you might find the damage buff of overcharge more useful than the heal because you have built your ship to better take a beating/heal itself with the skills from your boffs, so you don't need an extra heal. But someone else might build their ship so that it's weaker in the heals in exchange for a few nasty tricks, so they need the heal. Perhaps there's a difference in tactics where you prefer overcharge against spam instead of shockwave because you find it better to alpha the source of the spam rather than try to take out the spam, "Treat the illness, not the symptoms!" you say as you hammer a carrier head on ignoring their pets. Where someone else might find that they take too much damage in that approach and need to take out the pets so they can focus on the carrier, so they like the shockwave.
So yeah... I think it's difficult to decide which abilities are truly most useful, and again, when you take them as a whole instead of 5 different abilities that need to be equal for balance sake, I think it's a different picture. You use overcharge every chance you get and don't use singularity jump all that often... but it's there for you when and if you want it. Same for the other skills... that's just how I see it.
This is a post that I also posted on the Dev Blog. This is also seen here.
There are 5 (lol) things I must say...
1: I love this, and I plan to try it on closed beta later...
2: Is this just the way you are going to make all the other factions look dumb to chose and make the Rom pop go from initial 0 to 30% at launch or something? Cause lets put it this way.... (1) Romulans CAN CLOAK like the KDF (2) Have Variety AND Perks just as any other FED could have (3) Mostly has consoles like Subspace Jump, Photonic Consoles, Absorption and Heal, massive Damage upgrade, AND AoE mashed into 1 console.. NOT INCLUDING ITS A CORE and you could have other consoles!
3: How is this relevant to go side to side with the FEDERATION and KLINGONS?
4: Isn't enough that they mostly have everything since they can join a faction and get items from it so in most cases.... they are superior over all?!?!?
5: This is just to keep the peace.... maybe you can allow people in the KDF or FED to join the Republic or even the Opposite KDF or FED or stay with their own faction if they really wanted to to even the game out more.... I mean mostly ROMS get chose a faction and get over-powered to Grethor and Back with the cores.... I mean the Roms ARE allies with the KDF and FEDS...... they CAN share technology.. Why cant they share a core for goodness sake.. and do go *It wont fit the ship* thing on me. It is not relevant to overpower one faction while the others are uncompariable to the others. Sure Ilike it but make it cross-factional.
P.S. Lowering the Power of the Ship Does NOT HELP AT ALL with the Power that the cores hold!!!!!
P.S.S. You ^TOTALY^ NERFED KDF and FED Bridges! Our Cores look like cylinders that blink.. they look like nuclear bombs!!!!
P.S.S.S. OMG..... Romulans are getting the Royal Treatment.... but for us Klingons who love and strive and love KDF... this is just sad.... but I thank you for adding to KDF.. but comparing to the Romulans.... really we are slummed again.
R'tolves Will Spread Thier Peace and Will Prevail Over the Hostiles Who Dare Hurt Such A Isolationist Consitutional Monarchy!
You are diffidently over reacting play their ships before you, you conclude that the singularity abilities > 40 loss of over all power. Some are useful sure but they are very very situational.
kdf and fed get warp cores that add to max power and have better mods overall Imo. Though i have yet to see very rare of either singularity or warp cores.
Well, like I said in a previous post, I think there are other ways to compensate for just the battle cloak. I gave the example of the two veteran reward ships, the chimera and the... whatever the klingon one is called. They are identical in every way except the klingon one has a battle cloak and -8% shields. That would lead me to believe that the devs felt that -8% to shields was a sufficient trade off for that ship to have a battle cloak. If the D'deridex is basically a galaxy class with a different look and less turn rate, it would seem to me that.. well, for one, the lower turn rate, and some compensation in the shields or hull like -8% could compensate for a battle cloak. Plus there's the inherent disadvantages of trying to battle cloak a small moon... low turn rate, big target... yeah, seems like the battle cloak could very well compensate for itself by blowing you up every time you use it pvp. But that, of course, is just looking at "how do we stick a battle cloak on this" not the special powers.
I'm just primarily concerned about dropping a new, untested cost and moving to a "been there, done that" cost, especially one that pushes the ship closer to an existing type (the "squishy battle cloak" raiders); we know how the -8% cost works already, I'd like to give the power level penalties a chance to see how much challenge it actually offers.
As for "blow you up every time you use it in pvp", does the Defense stat really count for so little in PvP? (Not snarking, honest question; I have a TRIBBLE internet connection and don't enjoy being lagged to death repeatedly, so I don't do PvP). The battle cloak's defensive buff kicks in immediately on trigger, I noticed, so I was hoping that would serve as some, well, defense until you broke LOS by completing the cloaking. Against NPCs I noticed that usually over 2/3rds of incoming attacks that were still en route when I popped the cloak missed.
I am not sure how I feel about the lower power levels.. they're considering -5 for now or -5 with some compromise to the boffs or consoles or whatever, but -10 might not really be such a big deal... The one thing I"m really concerned about though is that, it is my understanding, that the maximum you can set weapons to is 90, and my ships never feel like they are doing any damage unless they have weapons set to 100 with the bonus power taking it up to/near 125, so not being able to put as much power into weapons could be really bad. Of course, it's been discussed how if they would de-nerf power enhancing consoles, one could rather painlessly compensate for at least one system they felt crucial to have the +10 back... but, again, guess we'll just have to wait and see.
For the power levels, you set them as you normally would, e.g. 100 to weapon, 50 to shield, 25 to eng and aux under the standard full weapons setting. In the ACTUAL power, though, each stat takes a factors in a -10 among its other factors, such as Warp Core Efficiency. (As a side note, efficiency looks at the amount of power you allocated, not what you actually get, so your efficiency bonus for a 25 Aux is calculated from 25, not 15. Alas.) Since the two "escort" warbirds (Dhelan and Mogai) also get a +10 to weapons and +5 to engines, you will get 100 power when you set your weapons to 100. I don't know if you can properly hit a baseline 125 weapon power, but it's within reach of achieving through temporary effects. Also, I like to point out my science vessel does a rather nice amount of DPS with only 45 weapon power. :P
Oh, and the current entry for the D'deridex lists its power bonuses as +10 in shields, +5 in aux.
Well darn... I'm really going to have to consider how much I really want to buff that skill as well as finding out just how much of a buff that skill gets from particle gens at end game... really hate to invest in that skill basically just for the shockwave unless it makes it uber devastating.
Like any AoE, its power increases the more enemies it hits (Point Defense Console doesn't count. :P). At level 26, PG at 61.5, I get an initial burst of 1103 damage, with a follow-up burn of 3309. With my Conservation of Energy exotic damage buff and the battle cloak damage buff, I can push that up to 1709 and 5128 respectively, with the latter completely bypassing shields. Hmmm...for the influence of PG, at level 25 going from 7.5 PG to 61.5, base damage jumped from 983 to 1091, and the afterburn from 2948 to 3272. If you're not planning on investing in other PG-boosted abilities, I wouldn't bother just for the sake of Plasma Shockwave. For my own (likely) build, I think I'll be getting a worthwhile benefit for it.
Also, I often find myself tanking no matter what I fly as I normally invest in threat control. I don't mind it, no matter what I'm in, escort, science vessel, or cruiser, i seem to be able to tank just about the same. But with my romulan I'm going to have to consider if I'm going to be a battle cloaking tank that can pop out for a minute when things get too rough so that I can quickly come back in and retake agro, or if I should put those points from threat control into stealth instead. I would have to really compromise my build to have both, so stealth, which would be more for pvp, or threat control, which would be more for pve? And would I even want to tank as a romulan? Hmm... choices... choices...
I haven't gotten far enough to be able to put points in stealth, so I don't know how good a return it is yet. I haven't yet been spotted by an NPC enemy, even when I've been practically scraping their hull. That might be the racial boost showing its effect.
For tanking, the Singularity's giving you a lot of options. Plasma Shockwave will likely be useful as a light AoE taunt to help pick up aggro quickly (I find shield-bypassing effects seem to generate more hate than more higher damage shield damaging effects, but that might just be my imagination), or maybe to punish enemies for cloaking too near you (Bonniekin, Bonniekin, all dressed in PLASMA!), plus there's the mysterious Singularity Overcharge. Quanum Absorption is pretty obvious in its usage, and I think you can pick up a core that gives you +20 all damage resist while it's active too (seems to be bugged, I have one of those cores and I don't see a change in my resistance numbers). When you're taking too much heat beyond what QA can do for you, use Warp Shadows if the enemy is further away, or Singularity Leap if they're nearer. The latter seems a bit more preferable if enemy proximity justifies it since it also debuffs accuracy, damage, AND perception (making it easier to slip on your cloak safely and making it less likely they can find you once you have it on).
...if you've been tanking all this time, I think you'd almost have to be crazy NOT to tank on a Romulan.
Well no, each of the singularity powers may not be balanced against the other singularity powers equally, but if you view all the singularity powers as a whole, then I don't see the need to nit pick something like... you use overcharge almost all the time because the shockwave is only really better for taking out spam, or you rarely find yourself with the need to use the shadows, or the heal isn't as valuable to you as the damage bonus. But there are a few things to consider... one is that a different player who has a different style than you or a preference for a different type of content might find the abilities you find useless to be incredibly useful.
For example, you might find the damage buff of overcharge more useful than the heal because you have built your ship to better take a beating/heal itself with the skills from your boffs, so you don't need an extra heal. But someone else might build their ship so that it's weaker in the heals in exchange for a few nasty tricks, so they need the heal. Perhaps there's a difference in tactics where you prefer overcharge against spam instead of shockwave because you find it better to alpha the source of the spam rather than try to take out the spam, "Treat the illness, not the symptoms!" you say as you hammer a carrier head on ignoring their pets. Where someone else might find that they take too much damage in that approach and need to take out the pets so they can focus on the carrier, so they like the shockwave.
So yeah... I think it's difficult to decide which abilities are truly most useful, and again, when you take them as a whole instead of 5 different abilities that need to be equal for balance sake, I think it's a different picture. You use overcharge every chance you get and don't use singularity jump all that often... but it's there for you when and if you want it. Same for the other skills... that's just how I see it.
Hear hear! There's always more than one solution!
Another thought on the PS vs SOC, which you use may depend on whether you need to bring down or bypass shields; SOC sounds like it boosts your weapon damage, so if you have a lot of shields to burn through to get to the candy cent....er...hull, use SOC if you want to bring down the shields, PS if you want to get the damage in without mucking with the shields (I see a lot of near-dead-but-lots-of-shields Tholians scampering around Crystalling Catastrophe, for example).
(Did I mention I love PS's shield bypass? 'coz I do.) :P
You are diffidently over reacting play their ships before you, you conclude that the singularity abilities > 40 loss of over all power. Some are useful sure but they are very very situational.
You're underestimating their potential. Also, even if they are situational, you should be constantly creating situations where they're useful.
kdf and fed get warp cores that add to max power and have better mods overall Imo. Though i have yet to see very rare of either singularity or warp cores.
And THAT, I agree, is the biggest problem I'm currently having with the power levels. It's one thing to have warbirds start with -10 to all power levels, but it's rubbing salt into the wounds to go give the Feds/KDF warp cores that could give up to 12.5 power points (if I'm reading it right; +5 base, and then 7.5% power from one stat into another, giving up to 7.5 points of extra power to a second, lower-powered score). vs the Singularity which gives up to 7.5 points...at full singularity charge. When discharged and/or on cooldown it gives nothing.
Star Cruiser/Maurader Flight Deck Boff Slots for D'Deridex Retro is horrble. Just as bad as Gal-Retro. Assault Cruiser/Vor'Cha Boff Slots is fine. Ambassador/Kamarag is fine.
And THAT, I agree, is the biggest problem I'm currently having with the power levels. It's one thing to have warbirds start with -10 to all power levels, but it's rubbing salt into the wounds to go give the Feds/KDF warp cores that could give up to 12.5 power points (if I'm reading it right; +5 base, and then 7.5% power from one stat into another, giving up to 7.5 points of extra power to a second, lower-powered score). vs the Singularity which gives up to 7.5 points...at full singularity charge. When discharged and/or on cooldown it gives nothing.
One downside i see for feds is that if they choose the weapon power enhancer with the intention of full power to weapons with it boosting some other system, if it's based off of current power and not setting, then that power bonus to that second system is gonna be jumping all over the place once you start firing, lol.
I'm just primarily concerned about dropping a new, untested cost and moving to a "been there, done that" cost, especially one that pushes the ship closer to an existing type (the "squishy battle cloak" raiders); we know how the -8% cost works already, I'd like to give the power level penalties a chance to see how much challenge it actually offers.
My thought on that is simply... why try to reinvent the wheel? I mean, sure, maybe the power levels will turn out fine or... better? than an 8% shield penalty, but... meh.
As for "blow you up every time you use it in pvp", does the Defense stat really count for so little in PvP? (Not snarking, honest question; I have a TRIBBLE internet connection and don't enjoy being lagged to death repeatedly, so I don't do PvP). The battle cloak's defensive buff kicks in immediately on trigger, I noticed, so I was hoping that would serve as some, well, defense until you broke LOS by completing the cloaking. Against NPCs I noticed that usually over 2/3rds of incoming attacks that were still en route when I popped the cloak missed.
I think pvpers tend to invest heavily into accuracy and accuracy buffing weapons, so they may land more hits than an NPC, plus 1/3 of some uber escort's damage is all that is needed to kill you without your shields, lol. Also, I'm not sure if the larger ships like the D'deridex will end up with a bonus to defense stat like bops have so... dunno if the defense will be comparable. But romulan trait is supposed to be bonus defense and bonus stealth or cloak cool time reduction (depending on which they have on them or their career as 've only seen the cloak cool on romulan tacs) so the boffs may help with not taking damage... unless there's a hard defense cap you're already at/near...
For the power levels, you set them as you normally would, e.g. 100 to weapon, 50 to shield, 25 to eng and aux under the standard full weapons setting. In the ACTUAL power, though, each stat takes a factors in a -10 among its other factors, such as Warp Core Efficiency. (As a side note, efficiency looks at the amount of power you allocated, not what you actually get, so your efficiency bonus for a 25 Aux is calculated from 25, not 15. Alas.) Since the two "escort" warbirds (Dhelan and Mogai) also get a +10 to weapons and +5 to engines, you will get 100 power when you set your weapons to 100. I don't know if you can properly hit a baseline 125 weapon power, but it's within reach of achieving through temporary effects. Also, I like to point out my science vessel does a rather nice amount of DPS with only 45 weapon power. :P
Not sure how your science vessel manages that unless it's through space magic (sci skills) but then I've never managed to get sci skills to do meaningful damage, at least not when compared to an escort. And my concern is that, since weapon power dips once you open fire... a mechanic I hate... if you want the 125 dps your tool tip says you will do, you have to pour in like 145, if you want to do 100, you gotta put in 125. So not being able to get full weapon power in particular is just one super big... yeah... I really don't know how that's gonna go.
Oh, and the current entry for the D'deridex lists its power bonuses as +10 in shields, +5 in aux.
A WARbird gets bonus to shields and aux? really? -.- So not only are they subtracting 10 across the board but as a cruiser... which that seems to be the boff layout they're giving the D'deridex, it's not getting the full equivalent of +5 to each subsystem? It's fine to put +10 to weapons and +10 to shields or whatever combination, but that seems like a double gimp to only be giving the +15 on top of a -10 to everything... unless that's taking into consideration -5 to everything instead... Meh... I dunno. But I'd definitely prefer them stick the +10 or probably all +15 into the weapons instead since that's the only power system that suffers from constant yo-yos in power from being in combat.
I haven't gotten far enough to be able to put points in stealth, so I don't know how good a return it is yet. I haven't yet been spotted by an NPC enemy, even when I've been practically scraping their hull. That might be the racial boost showing its effect.
It's not so much for npc as it is for PVP npc aren't smart, they won't try to hunt you down or scan for you or anything.
For tanking, the Singularity's giving you a lot of options. Plasma Shockwave will likely be useful as a light AoE taunt to help pick up aggro quickly (I find shield-bypassing effects seem to generate more hate than more higher damage shield damaging effects, but that might just be my imagination), or maybe to punish enemies for cloaking too near you (Bonniekin, Bonniekin, all dressed in PLASMA!), plus there's the mysterious Singularity Overcharge. Quanum Absorption is pretty obvious in its usage, and I think you can pick up a core that gives you +20 all damage resist while it's active too (seems to be bugged, I have one of those cores and I don't see a change in my resistance numbers). When you're taking too much heat beyond what QA can do for you, use Warp Shadows if the enemy is further away, or Singularity Leap if they're nearer. The latter seems a bit more preferable if enemy proximity justifies it since it also debuffs accuracy, damage, AND perception (making it easier to slip on your cloak safely and making it less likely they can find you once you have it on).
...if you've been tanking all this time, I think you'd almost have to be crazy NOT to tank on a Romulan.
Well my thought was maybe I am supposed to be/would want to be stealthy and behind the scenes and not drawing attention... Meh, I dunno. could always respec if I found not having threat control to be super lame.[/QUOTE]
And THAT, I agree, is the biggest problem I'm currently having with the power levels. It's one thing to have warbirds start with -10 to all power levels, but it's rubbing salt into the wounds to go give the Feds/KDF warp cores that could give up to 12.5 power points (if I'm reading it right; +5 base, and then 7.5% power from one stat into another, giving up to 7.5 points of extra power to a second, lower-powered score). vs the Singularity which gives up to 7.5 points...at full singularity charge. When discharged and/or on cooldown it gives nothing.
It's +5 Max...not +5. Changes the cap from 125 to 130, but it doesn't give them the additional +5 in of itself.
The +7.5% for the Warp Core, can get kind of interesting when you run an Engineer with EPS Manifold Efficiency, a Warp Core Engineer DOFF, a Maintenance Engineer DOFF, EPS Power Transfer, and Plasmonic Leech...
Star Cruiser/Maurader Flight Deck Boff Slots for D'Deridex Retro is horrble. Just as bad as Gal-Retro. Assault Cruiser/Vor'Cha Boff Slots is fine. Ambassador/Kamarag is fine.
I think giving the D'deridex the ambassador layout would be a nice tip of the hat to them having captured and undoubtedly studied the enterprise C. Plus it would be a nicely balanced build of eng, science, and tac. Give the higher sci slot to at least do some of what the npc D'deridex can do like so many people say they want. Yup yup, I 'd be very happy with an ambassador boff layout.
It's +5 Max...not +5. Changes the cap from 125 to 130, but it doesn't give them the additional +5 in of itself.
The +7.5% for the Warp Core, can get kind of interesting when you run an Engineer with EPS Manifold Efficiency, a Warp Core Engineer DOFF, a Maintenance Engineer DOFF, EPS Power Transfer, and Plasmonic Leech...
Very interesting on the raising the cap...my test characters on Tribble don't have much dilithium so I couldn't buy one to try it.
As for the +7.5%, I suspect that's going to be (like efficiency) based on how much you allocated, not what the result is. With efficiency, if you set your power level to 25, efficiency calculates its bonus at 25, even if you've managed to jack it up over that (well, pretty sure). If the core bonus works the same way, then they can guarantee the max power you'll get out of it is 7.5 points (that would also deal with yo-yo-ing power levels from W->X cores).
You're underestimating their potential. Also, even if they are situational, you should be constantly creating situations where they're useful.
And THAT, I agree, is the biggest problem I'm currently having with the power levels. It's one thing to have warbirds start with -10 to all power levels, but it's rubbing salt into the wounds to go give the Feds/KDF warp cores that could give up to 12.5 power points (if I'm reading it right; +5 base, and then 7.5% power from one stat into another, giving up to 7.5 points of extra power to a second, lower-powered score). vs the Singularity which gives up to 7.5 points...at full singularity charge. When discharged and/or on cooldown it gives nothing.
I'm not saying they are worthless but -40 overall power is very steep price, if they do remove bridge officer slots or consoles I'd be even more disappointed unless its just ensign or something...,
People need to keep up. The devs already said they are changing the -40 to -20 and seeing how it goes.
Personally I think -20 and -1 turn rate is still a bit much for a skill on a 1 min 45 sec cooldown and a battle cloak, but it is better.
You're ignoring the methods we have for reducing cooldown and charge time (which, admittedly, the T'Varo console isn't available to us yet), and the others sure to come. You're ignoring that it's not one, but a selection of five potent skills, two of which are especially useful for providing protection and cover for when you use the battle cloak. And if you'd STILL rather not play with that, there's a fine selection of ally and lockbox ships available.
Also, if you're looking at the escort-ish warbirds (Dhelan, Mogai), the -1 turn rate isn't to compensate for the cloak or singularity, it's there because of the +10% hull and x1.0 shield modifier. You're tougher than an escort, and pay a small price in maneuverability for that.
My thought on that is simply... why try to reinvent the wheel? I mean, sure, maybe the power levels will turn out fine or... better? than an 8% shield penalty, but... meh.
By the same token, though, when trying to invent something new and unique, why reach for a stock wheel? Anyway, this is what Tribble is for, inciting rag...er...letting us test things before they go live.
I think pvpers tend to invest heavily into accuracy and accuracy buffing weapons, so they may land more hits than an NPC, plus 1/3 of some uber escort's damage is all that is needed to kill you without your shields, lol. <snip> But romulan trait is supposed to be bonus defense and bonus stealth or cloak cool time reduction (depending on which they have on them or their career as 've only seen the cloak cool on romulan tacs) so the boffs may help with not taking damage... unless there's a hard defense cap you're already at/near...
I'd forgotten that surplus accuracy contributes to crit chance, so you're very probably right...although that does imply that increasing your defense so that [acc] - [def] is less than 100% also reduces part of their crit chances...but no way of knowing if that's good enough until we can put it to the test. But I can confirm the cloak cooldown trait is from the Romulan racial pool; I have it on my science officer.
Not sure how your science vessel manages that unless it's through space magic (sci skills) but then I've never managed to get sci skills to do meaningful damage, at least not when compared to an escort. And my concern is that, since weapon power dips once you open fire... a mechanic I hate... if you want the 125 dps your tool tip says you will do, you have to pour in like 145, if you want to do 100, you gotta put in 125. So not being able to get full weapon power in particular is just one super big... yeah... I really don't know how that's gonna go.
It's a combo of science skills and torpedos, and boosting weapon power in other ways. Also trying to make sure that all my damage is either gutting shields or completely bypassing them. And if it's multiple enemies who are vulnerable to Scramble Sensors, I get to borrow all their DPS for a bit too. :P
But yeah, nowhere near an escort's DPS, but I like to think I have more utility and versatility than an escort regardless of DPS. ...on the other hand, STO likes to think that unbridled DPS should have more utility than all other tactics combined.
So not only are they subtracting 10 across the board but as a cruiser... which that seems to be the boff layout they're giving the D'deridex, it's not getting the full equivalent of +5 to each subsystem? It's fine to put +10 to weapons and +10 to shields or whatever combination, but that seems like a double gimp to only be giving the +15 on top of a -10 to everything... unless that's taking into consideration -5 to everything instead... Meh... I dunno. But I'd definitely prefer them stick the +10 or probably all +15 into the weapons instead since that's the only power system that suffers from constant yo-yos in power from being in combat.
Since they haven't released the D'd to us yet, they may still change it before it's even released to Tribble. Also, the shipyard does have some incorrect information, and that's what I was relying on (for example, the Dhelan description lists a +15 weapons power boost, but it actually gets the same +10W, +5E boost that the Mogai gets).
Given all the complaints about -40% shield regen and reduced shield resists, eliminating the shield penalty for the cruiser-ish ship would be appropriate. As for the weapon power...yeah, we're just going to need to see how Singularity Overcharge works. Then again, I've never been able to make a cruiser build that's had meaningful DPS, and having to put up with the turn rate to boot...ugh.
It's not so much for npc as it is for PVP npc aren't smart, they won't try to hunt you down or scan for you or anything.
Hmmm...my only stealth experience pre-LoR was occasionally using Mask Energy Signature to sneak past groups I didn't feel like fighting during a mission, and they would DEFINITELY aggro when they spotted me. But obviously MES is significantly weaker than a cloak (you do get to keep your shields, though, which is nice).
Well my thought was maybe I am supposed to be/would want to be stealthy and behind the scenes and not drawing attention... Meh, I dunno. could always respec if I found not having threat control to be super lame.
Oooh...you want to try NOT tanking! Gotcha. (In a D'deridex?) Let's see...I can see a few possible sets of tactics for incorporating the cloak and singularity here. The key would be the transitions in and out of cloak, since they'd be what are "new" to your playstyle.
Coming out of cloak is easy. Pick a vulnerable facing prep as many skills as you can "pre-load" while cloaked, then drop it and hammer them. EPtW and Tac Team are your friends here. You're going to want to front-load as much DPS into one burst as possible. Even if you're going with a cannon build, it might be worth it to load up one beam array (Experimental Romulan Plasma array, so it's not biting into your weapon power) among your cannons so you can use Target Shield Subsystem (if the final BOff layout gives you enough tac skills to afford the slot, that is). Once your assault is over, you should have the endurance to fight it out until your singularity's up again.
Then you switch to your "exit strategy"; how to do the most damage while ending up safely cloaked and ready to do it all again. Pop either Evasive Maneuvers, Aux to Inertial Dampeners or EPtE and charge your target (or the center of a group of targets) while laying down Warp Plasma, and when you get to the center, execute Singularity Jump. It's supposed to pull enemies in, so they can enjoy basking in your plasma trail, decloaks any enemies who might be trying to out-sneaksy you, and they get accuracy, damage, and perception nerfed so they miss your shields dropping as you cloak. I'd consider having one of three minelayers in an aft slot: tricobalt for AoE damage to the group, cloaked tractor mines to keep the enemies in the Singularity as long as possible, or the Breen transphasic cluster torp. If you have tricobalt or the tractor mines, drop them right before you do the jump, if you have the cluster torp, pop it right afterwards. All three are good for punishing fast ships that have the audacity to get behind you, too. Depending on timing, cooldowns and your current condition, you may be able to use EPtE or EM to get your nose around so you can drop your cloak again after three seconds and get another "coming out of cloak" damage bonus while they're still helpless (depends on how long SJ's black hole lasts, which might depend on charge level). Even if you remain cloaked, your allies have a nice cluster of badly impaired enemies to hose down with Torp Spreads (whose splash damage will hit everyone else in the cluster) or Cannon Spray. Bonus points if your allies can drop a Gravity Well well or two on the site of your singularity.
People need to keep up. The devs already said they are changing the -40 to -20 and seeing how it goes.
Personally I think -20 and -1 turn rate is still a bit much for a skill on a 1 min 45 sec cooldown and a battle cloak, but it is better.
they said they were going to test that but It didn't sound to me at all like it was necessarily the solution they were looking for and that they might go back at anytime.
Also that build which they changed it is not on the test server at all.
1. Singularity power drain. I like the idea of power draining over time once combat has stopped but I have two ideas. 1, slow or stall when power starts draining from a completed pip, if I have 2.5 pips filled once it drains to 2 it should wait a good 10 seconds before draining from that so I can move to the next group of enemies and have a singularity ready. 2, when Singularity hits 5, make it a 30 second drain delay that way powers like singularity overload can be used as a full power alpha strike when entering the next combat group.
2. Warp Shadows, I feel this ability could use some adjusting so here we go:
When you activate warp shadow, instead of you jumping and then creating shadows how about this; Upon activation the ability creates warp shadows equal to your level, including one right where you were when you activated the ability. The shadows generate hate/agro for dealing with NPC enemies.
When the shadows appear, you do a random jump, but maintain looking at your initial target, if you had one. You then immediately gain a 'perfect cloak' for 5 seconds, with each Singularity level adding 2 seconds on to it for a total of 10 seconds.
3. Singularity jump, either increase the range of the gravity pull effect or allow levels 3 and 5 to generate additional singularities. NPCs are pulling out of these things, and I mean cruisers, without the use of any engine abilities.
4 Singularity Overload: While active Singularity overload should negate weapon power drain and keep weapon power systems from going offline, or at least have a resist to it.
3. Singularity jump, either increase the range of the gravity pull effect or allow levels 3 and 5 to generate additional singularities. NPCs are pulling out of these things, and I mean cruisers, without the use of any engine abilities.
Frankly I can't believe, considering the dev in charge claims it helps make up for the ships poor turn rate, that using Singularity Jump doesn't turn your ship 180 degrees after using it so that you face the newly formed singularity.
Overall, I'm really enjoying the LoR closed beta. I absolutely hated the new UI, at first, but it has come a long way. I really have a hard time going back to Holodeck at this point. My main concern is the BOff layouts on the Rommie ships. Currently there are NO ships that are even workable for an ENG or SCI at Tier 5. Everything seems skewed to the TAC path. Please tell me this will change. I need to be able to use Grav Well 3 as a Romulan SCI. Thanks!
At least the D'deridex went fom a terrible Boff layout to a boring one. Maybe I?m spoiled a bit, but I find ships unappealing that have no Lt.Com station "out-of-specialty" or at least universal options.
We only really have 5 Romulan ships so far. Regardless of refits, retrofits and whatsnot, it's only five.
At least the D'deridex went fom a terrible Boff layout to a boring one. Maybe I?m spoiled a bit, but I find ships unappealing that have no Lt.Com station "out-of-specialty" or at least universal options.
We only really have 5 Romulan ships so far. Regardless of refits, retrofits and whatsnot, it's only five.
I rather like the trend the first few tiers set: top end tac but the science boffs have the same number of abilites spread between them, just not as high ranked, and think they need to continue that all the way up to tier 5 then add a second lineup that does that with engineering and science.
Such a lineup at tier 5 could give us a ship possibly with Cmd Tac, ens Tac, Lt Eng, LtC Sci, Lt Sci, as well as a ship with: Lt Tac, Cmd Eng, Ens Eng, LtC Sci, Lt Sci. (tier 4 would give us Cmd Tac, Lt Eng lt Sci, Lt Sci, and a Lt Tac, Cmd eng, lt sci, lt sci)
Being high science would fit in with the tricky, subversive nature of Romulans just as being tac heavy on KDF ships fits the Klingon's agressive nature. Those are also fairly unique layouts, starting with the d'deridex and into tier 5, the layouts all seem to be fairly mundane: we've seen them all before.
Comments
Well, like I said in a previous post, I think there are other ways to compensate for just the battle cloak. I gave the example of the two veteran reward ships, the chimera and the... whatever the klingon one is called. They are identical in every way except the klingon one has a battle cloak and -8% shields. That would lead me to believe that the devs felt that -8% to shields was a sufficient trade off for that ship to have a battle cloak. If the D'deridex is basically a galaxy class with a different look and less turn rate, it would seem to me that.. well, for one, the lower turn rate, and some compensation in the shields or hull like -8% could compensate for a battle cloak. Plus there's the inherent disadvantages of trying to battle cloak a small moon... low turn rate, big target... yeah, seems like the battle cloak could very well compensate for itself by blowing you up every time you use it pvp. But that, of course, is just looking at "how do we stick a battle cloak on this" not the special powers.
I am not sure how I feel about the lower power levels.. they're considering -5 for now or -5 with some compromise to the boffs or consoles or whatever, but -10 might not really be such a big deal... The one thing I"m really concerned about though is that, it is my understanding, that the maximum you can set weapons to is 90, and my ships never feel like they are doing any damage unless they have weapons set to 100 with the bonus power taking it up to/near 125, so not being able to put as much power into weapons could be really bad. Of course, it's been discussed how if they would de-nerf power enhancing consoles, one could rather painlessly compensate for at least one system they felt crucial to have the +10 back... but, again, guess we'll just have to wait and see.
The hull melt won't absolutely destroy an enemy, but I notice some relatively thick npc's like tac cubes and nanite transformers start dropping much faster with the burn on them. So even if it just takes a good chunk out of something, it could be super helpful.
Well darn... I'm really going to have to consider how much I really want to buff that skill as well as finding out just how much of a buff that skill gets from particle gens at end game... really hate to invest in that skill basically just for the shockwave unless it makes it uber devastating.
Also, I often find myself tanking no matter what I fly as I normally invest in threat control. I don't mind it, no matter what I'm in, escort, science vessel, or cruiser, i seem to be able to tank just about the same. But with my romulan I'm going to have to consider if I'm going to be a battle cloaking tank that can pop out for a minute when things get too rough so that I can quickly come back in and retake agro, or if I should put those points from threat control into stealth instead. I would have to really compromise my build to have both, so stealth, which would be more for pvp, or threat control, which would be more for pve? And would I even want to tank as a romulan? Hmm... choices... choices...
Plasma Infusers - Plasma Directed Energy & Plasma Directed Energy DoT
Ambiplasmas - Plasma Projectile Kinetic & Plasma Projeticle DoT
2pc Romulan Harness - Plasma Directed Energy & Plasma Directed Energy DoT
Embassy Consoles [Pla] - Plasma Directed Energy & Plasma Directed Energy DoT
Particle Generators - Eject Warp Plasma DoT, Plasma Shockwave, Plasma Shockwave DoT
They recently changed the Infusers and Embassy Consoles on Tribble. They used to affect Plasma Projeticle DoT and Eject Warp Plasma DoT as well.
You raise some very valid concerns, but since there are four other powers, in pvp, it might just be best to overcharge for your damage boost if the shockwave doesn't function well in that dynamic, or use any of the other abilities to give you some other leg up that might bring you victory.
Each of the five should have some situational value that overall would make them equal. Otherwise, if it's being balanced around having the five of them available but there's no need for some of them...then it's not balanced.
Well I assume those changes are going to go live, and in that case, my plasma build is probably about to take a biiiiiig hit... *sad face*
Well no, each of the singularity powers may not be balanced against the other singularity powers equally, but if you view all the singularity powers as a whole, then I don't see the need to nit pick something like... you use overcharge almost all the time because the shockwave is only really better for taking out spam, or you rarely find yourself with the need to use the shadows, or the heal isn't as valuable to you as the damage bonus. But there are a few things to consider... one is that a different player who has a different style than you or a preference for a different type of content might find the abilities you find useless to be incredibly useful.
For example, you might find the damage buff of overcharge more useful than the heal because you have built your ship to better take a beating/heal itself with the skills from your boffs, so you don't need an extra heal. But someone else might build their ship so that it's weaker in the heals in exchange for a few nasty tricks, so they need the heal. Perhaps there's a difference in tactics where you prefer overcharge against spam instead of shockwave because you find it better to alpha the source of the spam rather than try to take out the spam, "Treat the illness, not the symptoms!" you say as you hammer a carrier head on ignoring their pets. Where someone else might find that they take too much damage in that approach and need to take out the pets so they can focus on the carrier, so they like the shockwave.
So yeah... I think it's difficult to decide which abilities are truly most useful, and again, when you take them as a whole instead of 5 different abilities that need to be equal for balance sake, I think it's a different picture. You use overcharge every chance you get and don't use singularity jump all that often... but it's there for you when and if you want it. Same for the other skills... that's just how I see it.
1: I love this, and I plan to try it on closed beta later...
2: Is this just the way you are going to make all the other factions look dumb to chose and make the Rom pop go from initial 0 to 30% at launch or something? Cause lets put it this way.... (1) Romulans CAN CLOAK like the KDF (2) Have Variety AND Perks just as any other FED could have (3) Mostly has consoles like Subspace Jump, Photonic Consoles, Absorption and Heal, massive Damage upgrade, AND AoE mashed into 1 console.. NOT INCLUDING ITS A CORE and you could have other consoles!
3: How is this relevant to go side to side with the FEDERATION and KLINGONS?
4: Isn't enough that they mostly have everything since they can join a faction and get items from it so in most cases.... they are superior over all?!?!?
5: This is just to keep the peace.... maybe you can allow people in the KDF or FED to join the Republic or even the Opposite KDF or FED or stay with their own faction if they really wanted to to even the game out more.... I mean mostly ROMS get chose a faction and get over-powered to Grethor and Back with the cores.... I mean the Roms ARE allies with the KDF and FEDS...... they CAN share technology.. Why cant they share a core for goodness sake.. and do go *It wont fit the ship* thing on me. It is not relevant to overpower one faction while the others are uncompariable to the others. Sure Ilike it but make it cross-factional.
P.S. Lowering the Power of the Ship Does NOT HELP AT ALL with the Power that the cores hold!!!!!
P.S.S. You ^TOTALY^ NERFED KDF and FED Bridges! Our Cores look like cylinders that blink.. they look like nuclear bombs!!!!
P.S.S.S. OMG..... Romulans are getting the Royal Treatment.... but for us Klingons who love and strive and love KDF... this is just sad.... but I thank you for adding to KDF.. but comparing to the Romulans.... really we are slummed again.
kdf and fed get warp cores that add to max power and have better mods overall Imo. Though i have yet to see very rare of either singularity or warp cores.
I'm just primarily concerned about dropping a new, untested cost and moving to a "been there, done that" cost, especially one that pushes the ship closer to an existing type (the "squishy battle cloak" raiders); we know how the -8% cost works already, I'd like to give the power level penalties a chance to see how much challenge it actually offers.
As for "blow you up every time you use it in pvp", does the Defense stat really count for so little in PvP? (Not snarking, honest question; I have a TRIBBLE internet connection and don't enjoy being lagged to death repeatedly, so I don't do PvP). The battle cloak's defensive buff kicks in immediately on trigger, I noticed, so I was hoping that would serve as some, well, defense until you broke LOS by completing the cloaking. Against NPCs I noticed that usually over 2/3rds of incoming attacks that were still en route when I popped the cloak missed.
For the power levels, you set them as you normally would, e.g. 100 to weapon, 50 to shield, 25 to eng and aux under the standard full weapons setting. In the ACTUAL power, though, each stat takes a factors in a -10 among its other factors, such as Warp Core Efficiency. (As a side note, efficiency looks at the amount of power you allocated, not what you actually get, so your efficiency bonus for a 25 Aux is calculated from 25, not 15. Alas.) Since the two "escort" warbirds (Dhelan and Mogai) also get a +10 to weapons and +5 to engines, you will get 100 power when you set your weapons to 100. I don't know if you can properly hit a baseline 125 weapon power, but it's within reach of achieving through temporary effects. Also, I like to point out my science vessel does a rather nice amount of DPS with only 45 weapon power. :P
Oh, and the current entry for the D'deridex lists its power bonuses as +10 in shields, +5 in aux.
Like any AoE, its power increases the more enemies it hits (Point Defense Console doesn't count. :P). At level 26, PG at 61.5, I get an initial burst of 1103 damage, with a follow-up burn of 3309. With my Conservation of Energy exotic damage buff and the battle cloak damage buff, I can push that up to 1709 and 5128 respectively, with the latter completely bypassing shields. Hmmm...for the influence of PG, at level 25 going from 7.5 PG to 61.5, base damage jumped from 983 to 1091, and the afterburn from 2948 to 3272. If you're not planning on investing in other PG-boosted abilities, I wouldn't bother just for the sake of Plasma Shockwave. For my own (likely) build, I think I'll be getting a worthwhile benefit for it.
I haven't gotten far enough to be able to put points in stealth, so I don't know how good a return it is yet. I haven't yet been spotted by an NPC enemy, even when I've been practically scraping their hull. That might be the racial boost showing its effect.
For tanking, the Singularity's giving you a lot of options. Plasma Shockwave will likely be useful as a light AoE taunt to help pick up aggro quickly (I find shield-bypassing effects seem to generate more hate than more higher damage shield damaging effects, but that might just be my imagination), or maybe to punish enemies for cloaking too near you (Bonniekin, Bonniekin, all dressed in PLASMA!), plus there's the mysterious Singularity Overcharge. Quanum Absorption is pretty obvious in its usage, and I think you can pick up a core that gives you +20 all damage resist while it's active too (seems to be bugged, I have one of those cores and I don't see a change in my resistance numbers). When you're taking too much heat beyond what QA can do for you, use Warp Shadows if the enemy is further away, or Singularity Leap if they're nearer. The latter seems a bit more preferable if enemy proximity justifies it since it also debuffs accuracy, damage, AND perception (making it easier to slip on your cloak safely and making it less likely they can find you once you have it on).
...if you've been tanking all this time, I think you'd almost have to be crazy NOT to tank on a Romulan.
Hear hear! There's always more than one solution!
Another thought on the PS vs SOC, which you use may depend on whether you need to bring down or bypass shields; SOC sounds like it boosts your weapon damage, so if you have a lot of shields to burn through to get to the candy cent....er...hull, use SOC if you want to bring down the shields, PS if you want to get the damage in without mucking with the shields (I see a lot of near-dead-but-lots-of-shields Tholians scampering around Crystalling Catastrophe, for example).
(Did I mention I love PS's shield bypass? 'coz I do.) :P
You're underestimating their potential. Also, even if they are situational, you should be constantly creating situations where they're useful.
And THAT, I agree, is the biggest problem I'm currently having with the power levels. It's one thing to have warbirds start with -10 to all power levels, but it's rubbing salt into the wounds to go give the Feds/KDF warp cores that could give up to 12.5 power points (if I'm reading it right; +5 base, and then 7.5% power from one stat into another, giving up to 7.5 points of extra power to a second, lower-powered score). vs the Singularity which gives up to 7.5 points...at full singularity charge. When discharged and/or on cooldown it gives nothing.
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One downside i see for feds is that if they choose the weapon power enhancer with the intention of full power to weapons with it boosting some other system, if it's based off of current power and not setting, then that power bonus to that second system is gonna be jumping all over the place once you start firing, lol.
My thought on that is simply... why try to reinvent the wheel? I mean, sure, maybe the power levels will turn out fine or... better? than an 8% shield penalty, but... meh.
I think pvpers tend to invest heavily into accuracy and accuracy buffing weapons, so they may land more hits than an NPC, plus 1/3 of some uber escort's damage is all that is needed to kill you without your shields, lol. Also, I'm not sure if the larger ships like the D'deridex will end up with a bonus to defense stat like bops have so... dunno if the defense will be comparable. But romulan trait is supposed to be bonus defense and bonus stealth or cloak cool time reduction (depending on which they have on them or their career as 've only seen the cloak cool on romulan tacs) so the boffs may help with not taking damage... unless there's a hard defense cap you're already at/near...
Not sure how your science vessel manages that unless it's through space magic (sci skills) but then I've never managed to get sci skills to do meaningful damage, at least not when compared to an escort. And my concern is that, since weapon power dips once you open fire... a mechanic I hate... if you want the 125 dps your tool tip says you will do, you have to pour in like 145, if you want to do 100, you gotta put in 125. So not being able to get full weapon power in particular is just one super big... yeah... I really don't know how that's gonna go.
A WARbird gets bonus to shields and aux? really? -.- So not only are they subtracting 10 across the board but as a cruiser... which that seems to be the boff layout they're giving the D'deridex, it's not getting the full equivalent of +5 to each subsystem? It's fine to put +10 to weapons and +10 to shields or whatever combination, but that seems like a double gimp to only be giving the +15 on top of a -10 to everything... unless that's taking into consideration -5 to everything instead... Meh... I dunno. But I'd definitely prefer them stick the +10 or probably all +15 into the weapons instead since that's the only power system that suffers from constant yo-yos in power from being in combat.
It's not so much for npc as it is for PVP npc aren't smart, they won't try to hunt you down or scan for you or anything.
Well my thought was maybe I am supposed to be/would want to be stealthy and behind the scenes and not drawing attention... Meh, I dunno. could always respec if I found not having threat control to be super lame.[/QUOTE]
It's +5 Max...not +5. Changes the cap from 125 to 130, but it doesn't give them the additional +5 in of itself.
The +7.5% for the Warp Core, can get kind of interesting when you run an Engineer with EPS Manifold Efficiency, a Warp Core Engineer DOFF, a Maintenance Engineer DOFF, EPS Power Transfer, and Plasmonic Leech...
I think giving the D'deridex the ambassador layout would be a nice tip of the hat to them having captured and undoubtedly studied the enterprise C. Plus it would be a nicely balanced build of eng, science, and tac. Give the higher sci slot to at least do some of what the npc D'deridex can do like so many people say they want. Yup yup, I 'd be very happy with an ambassador boff layout.
Very interesting on the raising the cap...my test characters on Tribble don't have much dilithium so I couldn't buy one to try it.
As for the +7.5%, I suspect that's going to be (like efficiency) based on how much you allocated, not what the result is. With efficiency, if you set your power level to 25, efficiency calculates its bonus at 25, even if you've managed to jack it up over that (well, pretty sure). If the core bonus works the same way, then they can guarantee the max power you'll get out of it is 7.5 points (that would also deal with yo-yo-ing power levels from W->X cores).
o_O Just for that reason, I'll agree with this. You have my vote.
I'm not saying they are worthless but -40 overall power is very steep price, if they do remove bridge officer slots or consoles I'd be even more disappointed unless its just ensign or something...,
Personally I think -20 and -1 turn rate is still a bit much for a skill on a 1 min 45 sec cooldown and a battle cloak, but it is better.
You're ignoring the methods we have for reducing cooldown and charge time (which, admittedly, the T'Varo console isn't available to us yet), and the others sure to come. You're ignoring that it's not one, but a selection of five potent skills, two of which are especially useful for providing protection and cover for when you use the battle cloak. And if you'd STILL rather not play with that, there's a fine selection of ally and lockbox ships available.
Also, if you're looking at the escort-ish warbirds (Dhelan, Mogai), the -1 turn rate isn't to compensate for the cloak or singularity, it's there because of the +10% hull and x1.0 shield modifier. You're tougher than an escort, and pay a small price in maneuverability for that.
By the same token, though, when trying to invent something new and unique, why reach for a stock wheel? Anyway, this is what Tribble is for, inciting rag...er...letting us test things before they go live.
I'd forgotten that surplus accuracy contributes to crit chance, so you're very probably right...although that does imply that increasing your defense so that [acc] - [def] is less than 100% also reduces part of their crit chances...but no way of knowing if that's good enough until we can put it to the test. But I can confirm the cloak cooldown trait is from the Romulan racial pool; I have it on my science officer.
It's a combo of science skills and torpedos, and boosting weapon power in other ways. Also trying to make sure that all my damage is either gutting shields or completely bypassing them. And if it's multiple enemies who are vulnerable to Scramble Sensors, I get to borrow all their DPS for a bit too. :P
But yeah, nowhere near an escort's DPS, but I like to think I have more utility and versatility than an escort regardless of DPS. ...on the other hand, STO likes to think that unbridled DPS should have more utility than all other tactics combined.
...um...phalanxes were highly effective in WAR in their day and were defined by their shield usage. Just sayin'. :P
Since they haven't released the D'd to us yet, they may still change it before it's even released to Tribble. Also, the shipyard does have some incorrect information, and that's what I was relying on (for example, the Dhelan description lists a +15 weapons power boost, but it actually gets the same +10W, +5E boost that the Mogai gets).
Given all the complaints about -40% shield regen and reduced shield resists, eliminating the shield penalty for the cruiser-ish ship would be appropriate. As for the weapon power...yeah, we're just going to need to see how Singularity Overcharge works. Then again, I've never been able to make a cruiser build that's had meaningful DPS, and having to put up with the turn rate to boot...ugh.
Hmmm...my only stealth experience pre-LoR was occasionally using Mask Energy Signature to sneak past groups I didn't feel like fighting during a mission, and they would DEFINITELY aggro when they spotted me. But obviously MES is significantly weaker than a cloak (you do get to keep your shields, though, which is nice).
Oooh...you want to try NOT tanking! Gotcha. (In a D'deridex?) Let's see...I can see a few possible sets of tactics for incorporating the cloak and singularity here. The key would be the transitions in and out of cloak, since they'd be what are "new" to your playstyle.
Coming out of cloak is easy. Pick a vulnerable facing prep as many skills as you can "pre-load" while cloaked, then drop it and hammer them. EPtW and Tac Team are your friends here. You're going to want to front-load as much DPS into one burst as possible. Even if you're going with a cannon build, it might be worth it to load up one beam array (Experimental Romulan Plasma array, so it's not biting into your weapon power) among your cannons so you can use Target Shield Subsystem (if the final BOff layout gives you enough tac skills to afford the slot, that is). Once your assault is over, you should have the endurance to fight it out until your singularity's up again.
Then you switch to your "exit strategy"; how to do the most damage while ending up safely cloaked and ready to do it all again. Pop either Evasive Maneuvers, Aux to Inertial Dampeners or EPtE and charge your target (or the center of a group of targets) while laying down Warp Plasma, and when you get to the center, execute Singularity Jump. It's supposed to pull enemies in, so they can enjoy basking in your plasma trail, decloaks any enemies who might be trying to out-sneaksy you, and they get accuracy, damage, and perception nerfed so they miss your shields dropping as you cloak. I'd consider having one of three minelayers in an aft slot: tricobalt for AoE damage to the group, cloaked tractor mines to keep the enemies in the Singularity as long as possible, or the Breen transphasic cluster torp. If you have tricobalt or the tractor mines, drop them right before you do the jump, if you have the cluster torp, pop it right afterwards. All three are good for punishing fast ships that have the audacity to get behind you, too. Depending on timing, cooldowns and your current condition, you may be able to use EPtE or EM to get your nose around so you can drop your cloak again after three seconds and get another "coming out of cloak" damage bonus while they're still helpless (depends on how long SJ's black hole lasts, which might depend on charge level). Even if you remain cloaked, your allies have a nice cluster of badly impaired enemies to hose down with Torp Spreads (whose splash damage will hit everyone else in the cluster) or Cannon Spray. Bonus points if your allies can drop a Gravity Well well or two on the site of your singularity.
Thoughts?
Also that build which they changed it is not on the test server at all.
1. Singularity power drain. I like the idea of power draining over time once combat has stopped but I have two ideas. 1, slow or stall when power starts draining from a completed pip, if I have 2.5 pips filled once it drains to 2 it should wait a good 10 seconds before draining from that so I can move to the next group of enemies and have a singularity ready. 2, when Singularity hits 5, make it a 30 second drain delay that way powers like singularity overload can be used as a full power alpha strike when entering the next combat group.
2. Warp Shadows, I feel this ability could use some adjusting so here we go:
When you activate warp shadow, instead of you jumping and then creating shadows how about this; Upon activation the ability creates warp shadows equal to your level, including one right where you were when you activated the ability. The shadows generate hate/agro for dealing with NPC enemies.
When the shadows appear, you do a random jump, but maintain looking at your initial target, if you had one. You then immediately gain a 'perfect cloak' for 5 seconds, with each Singularity level adding 2 seconds on to it for a total of 10 seconds.
3. Singularity jump, either increase the range of the gravity pull effect or allow levels 3 and 5 to generate additional singularities. NPCs are pulling out of these things, and I mean cruisers, without the use of any engine abilities.
4 Singularity Overload: While active Singularity overload should negate weapon power drain and keep weapon power systems from going offline, or at least have a resist to it.
Frankly I can't believe, considering the dev in charge claims it helps make up for the ships poor turn rate, that using Singularity Jump doesn't turn your ship 180 degrees after using it so that you face the newly formed singularity.
As it is it does not help at all.
We only really have 5 Romulan ships so far. Regardless of refits, retrofits and whatsnot, it's only five.
I rather like the trend the first few tiers set: top end tac but the science boffs have the same number of abilites spread between them, just not as high ranked, and think they need to continue that all the way up to tier 5 then add a second lineup that does that with engineering and science.
Such a lineup at tier 5 could give us a ship possibly with Cmd Tac, ens Tac, Lt Eng, LtC Sci, Lt Sci, as well as a ship with: Lt Tac, Cmd Eng, Ens Eng, LtC Sci, Lt Sci. (tier 4 would give us Cmd Tac, Lt Eng lt Sci, Lt Sci, and a Lt Tac, Cmd eng, lt sci, lt sci)
Being high science would fit in with the tricky, subversive nature of Romulans just as being tac heavy on KDF ships fits the Klingon's agressive nature. Those are also fairly unique layouts, starting with the d'deridex and into tier 5, the layouts all seem to be fairly mundane: we've seen them all before.