Last time i checked they don't have more shields then a escort 0.9 for mogai and Dhelan,
Ah, you're looking at the Retrofits; I hadn't recorded the stats on those since they haven't been "officially" released even on Tribble (once we've had the rest of the content to level us to 50 released, I'll consider them to be at what the devs feel to be "here, try the balance on this" stage). Once they actually extend the beta phase to let us finish out the Romulan campaigns, I'll assume whatever's listed for the ship is the "final" form, until then I see it as "subject to change". Not that we can't give good feedback on what's already posted, mind you.
It's very odd, though...the T2 Dhelan and T3 Mogai are definitely tougher (if only a bit) than their escort counterparts; they define the Warbird at those levels as a bit slower but a bit tougher than escorts (and they get +10 Weapon, +5 Engine power rather than the escort's +15 Weapon power). Why would they throw that out for the T5 Retrofits, turning them into more generic escorts?
I'd like to ask though how are certain people playing with the other singularity powers yet ?
If I read correctly, if you're willing to grind up to lvl 50 outside of the episodic content, you can still get your free veteran-rewards ship from the selection of Retrofits, despite not being able to get the free D'deridex and Ha'apax (because you can't complete the promotion mission yet).
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...,
-40 power points is a challenge, but one I think can be worked around; rather than the sustained "keep all power up to all systems" model that people currently use, we'll have to work with the original escort model, to stack our skills, batteries, etc for a maximal burst of firepower/healing/whatever and then let it drop down in one or more areas while we set up the next burst. I don't have a problem with that, it's a lot more interesting and challenging than just trying to be uber all the time. Though with traits like the Engineer's battery trait being added, we might have more options for mitigating that power loss.
Giving up any of the BOff slots, though, I would argue against in the strongest terms. The effect of reduced skills would be to limit the customizability of the ships, reducing the variety seen in Warbirds and the viability of alternate builds. The loss of console slots, while less visible, would similarly constrict the variety of Warbird builds in the wild (especially considering the C-Store Warbird console's set bonuses).
What I'd really like to do is to be able to test the Warbird with the original -40 power balance at endgame with decent gear to get a feeling for how much impact the power penalty, the battle cloak, and singularity cloak make on what ends up being the vast majority of the time spent in the game, as opposed to how it feels while levelling up.
battle cloak is useful yes, but it has major disadvantages like you can't really activate while under heavy fire I did that mistake a few times.. You pop faster then a balloon meets a tack, becuase enemy torpedoes tear through your hull sundering a gaping hole in your ship. Only way's I can see to counter act this if your in high hull ship like the d'deridex stacking monotonium, or using warp shadows with the singularity core that scrambles torpedoes. But remember you can't use hull healing skills while in cloak.
The problem I see with loose of -40 is not only do you have to stack energy skills, you will never catch up to fed or kdf ship in energy not that this is problem but 40 energy gap all ways seems much, but 20 is much more livable. Then energy skills could actually make up for it mostly.
Also as said by the dev post mogai isn't escort but more of a destroyer.
battle cloak is useful yes, but it has major disadvantages like you can't really activate while under heavy fire I did that mistake a few times.. You pop faster then a balloon meets a tack, becuase enemy torpedoes tear through your hull sundering a gaping hole in your ship. Only way's I can see to counter act this if your in high hull ship like the d'deridex stacking monotonium, or using warp shadows with the singularity core that scrambles torpedoes. But remember you can't use hull healing skills while in cloak.
Singularity jump can be useful too; charge your most damaging enemy (or cluster of enemies), pop Singularity Jump, and hit the battle cloak before they get out of the effect of the accuracy debuff.
battle cloak is useful yes, but it has major disadvantages like you can't really activate while under heavy fire I did that mistake a few times.. You pop faster then a balloon meets a tack, becuase enemy torpedoes tear through your hull sundering a gaping hole in your ship. Only way's I can see to counter act this if your in high hull ship like the d'deridex stacking monotonium, or using warp shadows with the singularity core that scrambles torpedoes. But remember you can't use hull healing skills while in cloak.
Also as said by the dev post mogai isn't escort but more of a destroyer.
The viability of the ability is kinda no concern of mine. Simple cloak costs 1 console slot. With that logic, all romulan ships have extra universal console slot that is occupied with battlecloak.
"Cryptic Studio’s Jack Emmert (2010): Microtransactions are the biggest bunch of nonsense. I like paying one fee and not worrying about it – like my cellphone. The world’s biggest MMO isn’t item based, even though the black market item GDP is bigger than Russia … microtransactions make me want to die.”
The viability of the ability is kinda no concern of mine. Simple cloak costs 1 console slot. With that logic, all romulan ships have extra universal console slot that is occupied with battlecloak.
klingon ships don't loose a console slot for cloak, but if your bringing fed ships in defiant and dreadnought ships really should have a innate cloak, much like the heavy escort carrier has innate fighter bay.
Instead dread could get their console replaced by a console that buffs their lance ability, the defiant retrofit I don't know what it should have for a console tbh but I'm sure they could come up with something.
But there is no logic in not taking into account the viability of a ability, that's merely being dismissive.
Giving up any of the BOff slots, though, I would argue against in the strongest terms. The effect of reduced skills would be to limit the customizability of the ships, reducing the variety seen in Warbirds and the viability of alternate builds. The loss of console slots, while less visible, would similarly constrict the variety of Warbird builds in the wild (especially considering the C-Store Warbird console's set bonuses).
What I'd really like to do is to be able to test the Warbird with the original -40 power balance at endgame with decent gear to get a feeling for how much impact the power penalty, the battle cloak, and singularity cloak make on what ends up being the vast majority of the time spent in the game, as opposed to how it feels while levelling up.
The more I've thought about it and looked at ships I have in game and thought "okay... so what's at 58 now should be at 48 on a warbird" and going over each thing... well... it might not be too bad really.
One thing I would really like though is instead of assigning ships where their bonus power will be, let it come from the core. Instead of deciding that the mogai will have +10 to weapons and +5 to engines, let someone choose that with a core. Instead of forcing the D'Deridex into +10 shields and +5 aux, let the core give that. If a D'deridex pilot wants +10 weapons and +5 engines... or if they could make other combinations/all 15 points to one system, I think that would be great.
I think they could do something interesting with warbirds like give them a set commander for what they think the ship is bent toward, like a commander eng for the D'deridex for being large and cruiser like, and then let the rest be universal. But that might be considered "OP." Or if they were to reduce the number of boffs, they could give warbirds a carrier like boff setup, commander set to what they think the ship is bent toward, again, I'll use the D'deridex: Commander engineer, lt.com tac, lt.com sci, lt. eng. (or better yet, lt universal.) If it had the universal lt. it could be taken more toward one specialty or another based on the play style of the captain. More tactically based ships could have a commander tac, lt.com eng, lt.com sci, and a lt. tac. (again, even better a lt. universal.)
I know none of those suggestions will probably be taken... I'm just super tired of getting stuck with a, typically, very rigid boff layout for taking a ship. You might like the look of a ship, even the stats of a ship, but it has a boff layout you don't want and you either have to suffer with it or take a ship you don't really like because it has a better boff laout for you. How about we just make all boffs universal on all ships and call it a day? Yeah?
Well since wrathofachilles has already in a super tired state suggested the boff layout I had been toying with for the D'deridex I thought I might as well present all of my soon to be flamed ideas for Romulan ship boff layouts.
The Romulan command structure as I have imagined it would not be welcoming to Uhlans having any kind of real power on their bridges and therefore would not be represented by a boff power on their ships.
Although somewhat limiting, having only 4 boffs on a bridge can be quite powerful and some might see it as overpowered so I will include a boff layout that would also have only 11 powers as opposed to the normal 12.
I have limited my suggestions to the retrofit and fleet retrofit versions of the 5 ships that we do know something about.
T'varo Retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Consoles: 4 Tac, 2 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Fleet T'varo Retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 5 Tac, 2 Eng, 3 sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Alternate Consoles: 4 Tac, 2 Eng, 4 Sci
The T'varo Retrofit and Fleet T'varo Retrofit represent the Romulan raider ship class and therefore would be staying cloaked as much as possible while torpedo bombing, mine laying and science debuffing.
With the idea of trying to stay cloaked as much as possible they have less need for Engineering powers and Captains can opt to use something else for that Lt. universal on the Fleet T'varo for an extreme build.
Dhelan Retrofit:
Comm tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Sci
Consoles: 4 Tac, 3 Eng, 2 sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Sci
Fleet Dhelan retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 5 tac, 3 Eng, 2 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Uni
The Dhelan Retrofit and Fleet Dhelan Retrofit are the Romluan escort ship class and thus should bring as much firepower to the table as possible.
The idea for the lack of dedicated science boff is that a Captain may choose to put more emphasis on engineering to keep them in a fight longer if they want.
Mogai Retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Consoles: 4 Tac, 3 eng, 2 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Fleet Mogai retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 4 Tac, 3 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
The Mogai Retrofit and Fleet Mogai Retrofit are the Romulan destroyer class of ships and have very well rounded capabilities.
The Fleet Mogai Retrofit allows for the first realistic Aux to Batt build for the Romulans as well as several other interesting build possibilties.
D'deridex Retrofit:
Lt. Comm Tac
Comm Eng
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Consoles: 3 Tac, 3 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Fleet D'deridex Retrofit:
Lt. Comm Tac
Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 3 Tac, 4 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
The 12 boff power D'deridex Retrofit and Fleet D'deridex Retrofit layouts are exactly what I'd want to see for these ships.
The 11 boff power variants forced me to try the controversial "no commander" idea which I am still not fond of.
Fleet Ha'apax:
Comm Tac
Comm Eng
Lt. Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 3 Tac, 5 Eng, 2 Sci
Fleet Ha'apax Refit:
Comm Tac
Comm Sci
Lt. Eng
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 3 Tac, 2 Eng, 5 Sci
These are the fleet versions of the large battlecruiser that can split into 2 crafts so a Commander for each half was the idea here.
There is an Engineering and Science focused version for Romulan Captains to use.
There are more limitations when you only have 4 boffs to slot and lack of variety for the future may disallow this setup to be adopted for the entire Romluan fleet.
Other layouts could see a 3,3,3,3 layouts or even a 3 boff layout of all commanders,(perhaps for a carrier?).
Now do not take it personally...but the fact you want cmd tac and 4/5 tac consoles on most of your ship layouts should tell the devs what average player thinks and what is seriously wrong with the game. Dps dps dps dps dps dps dps moaaar dps.
"Cryptic Studio’s Jack Emmert (2010): Microtransactions are the biggest bunch of nonsense. I like paying one fee and not worrying about it – like my cellphone. The world’s biggest MMO isn’t item based, even though the black market item GDP is bigger than Russia … microtransactions make me want to die.”
if they arent going to change the d'deridex's carrier turn rate, they should give it a carrier style station setup. 2 LTC stations, 1 for sci and the other for tac, with a COM and LT eng. for tier 5
I think you have some very interesting ideas, especially about the Ha'apax. Though I think many people would consider them OP. But if they added boff station setups like these, I think that might justify the -10 to all power levels the devs were looking at before.
Now do not take it personally...but the fact you want cmd tac and 4/5 tac consoles on most of your ship layouts should tell the devs what average player thinks and what is seriously wrong with the game. Dps dps dps dps dps dps dps moaaar dps.
The devs took this game in a traditional mmo direction instead of more of a massively multiplayer simulation. This resulted in turning escorts into the only ships that really feel the most like a real star trek ship, firing off volleys and spreads of torpedoes (because torpedo launchers don't fire spreads or volleys by default, requiring a skill) while using attack patterns, the occasional emergency power to this an auxiliary power to that. -Typical star trek combat.
Cruisers have so few tactical boff stations that they can't really use a variety of attack patterns or fire spreads and volleys of torpedoes on a consistent basis, which is something they could do in the shows and fans expect to be able to do in the game. They have so few tactical skills available to them that they must typicall choose between a torpedo spread or a fire at will, they can't have both (especially since tac team is a required tac skill.) They also rely on gimmicky abilities (eject warp plasma, extend shields) and can some how magically transfer their auxiliary power to someone else's structural integrity field, things that were very rarely/never seen in any show or movie. Abilities that don't make up for their insane lack of damage potential in a game that is all about combat.
Science ships rely on 'space magic' that was practically never used in any show. Voyager did manage to open a rift into fluidic space, but summon a gravity well or a tykens rift? Yeah... no. Could voyager stop a borg cube with a tractor beam? Definitely not. Voyager did maneuver in attack patterns though and could fire volleys and spreads of torpedoes, but can she really do that in this game? no.
I think this is why people want more tac spots, they want to be able to do significant amounts of damage without having to resort to extremely convoluted builds that compromise the dev's intent for their ship, a compromise that typically makes them all around mediocre instead of just generally unnecessary/gimped. I think people are annoyed that escorts rather effortlessly do significant damage while every other ship requires so much more work to achieve less results.
So long as the devs look at this game in typical mmo terms, having "classes" that severely pigeonhole you in one direction or another, the damage dealer (escort), the tank (cruiser), and the healer/mage (science vessel), We're going to have problems, because star trek didn't work that way. And more so because the tank and healer aren't required in this game as escorts have enough healer and enough tank in them that the other three points of the trinity are essentially moot.
I really do like the current boff layouts and console layouts for most of the ships, mogai seems perfect, though I think 10 weapon 5 aux seems more resembling its layout, but 15 weapon isn't bad. The 45 starting power feels a lot better imo, and the singularity changes seem fair the power was decreasing too slow, the cloak change is especially interesting, I wonder if maxing stealth skill will help as much..
I am really wondering why there is no ship available that offers a Commander Sci slot for free (or with a Vet Token). The only ship currently listed to have a Commander Sci slot is the Haakona/Fleet Haakona, which are marked as Zen purchase/Fleet Ship Modules.
i noticed quite a few romulan ship changes, also all the placeholders are gone except the tier 2 Dhael, and theres fleet ships now too.
T'varo retrofit
its an escort, full blown escort. with something resembling the armatage station setup, turns beter then the defiant, and comes with a battle cloak. all that is pretty much fine. maybe a bit on the powerful side, but ok. what tips it over into absurd territory is the enhanced battle cloak, what the brel has, and what it pays dearly for in hitpoints. the turn rate advantage and universal stations are not a balance against this ship. its already got a desirable tactical ship station setup, and it turns as well as it could ever want already. the brel is a unique thing, and this romulan ship is completely better in every way. this ship should not have enhanced battle cloak, only the brel should. the fleet version of this ship has 5 tactical consoles, this REALLY should not be allowed to have enhanced battle cloak.
Dhealn retrofit
another escort with good 16 turn. its got a destroyer like station setup thats similar to the jem hadar heavy or vet ship. it can go pretty heavy sci or eng or tac, if i dont buy the legacy pack i think my retrofit tocken will go to this. but a very odd change happened to it, it lost a tac console and now has a 3/3/3 console setup. this isnt corrected by the fleet version ether, that has a 4th eng console. this is terribly baffling honestly. an escort without 4 tac consoles, how about a sci ship with 3 sci consoles, or a cruiser with 3 eng consoles? that doesn't exist anywhere else. the fleet versions should really have that 4th tac console back.
if the romulan vet ship has the same station setup as the other 2 vet ships, its going to have basically this ships station setup, and the t'varo already has a LTC eng. that seems a bit redundant, and steps on some toes IMO. this ship should instead be the defacto romulan sci ship at end game, but not a traditional sci ship. a sci ship built on top of an escort. this station setup
COM sci LTC tac
LTtac LTeng
ENS eng/uni
i wouldn't change anything else. still have 7 weapons, DHC use, 16 turn, 3/3/3 consoles, leave that all in place. no subsystem targeting or sensor analysis though. this is a niche thats definitely missing.
Mogai retrofit
this is a nice balanced destroyer type, below average turn, LTC sci, and still 3 eng stations. its got all the bases covered and looks good, especially with refit costume. i wouldnt change a thing, and the 4 sci consoles on the fleet version should make that LTC sci ability pretty fun to use.
D'deridex retrofit
well the station setup is a major improvement, its got the ambassador station setup now, but only 2 tac consoles. im not sure why there is an obsetion to give this ship bad qualities that the galaxy class has. it can have firepower comparable to the galaxy, thats fine, but in game the galaxy should not have the WORST damage dealing of any ship. and the d'deridex is cursed to be at about the same level. then i look at what the hapax got, and my first thought is they should swap consoles and stations. this ship is supposed top be a large predator, the station setup the Ha'apax has, the regent station setup, is a perfect fit for this established ship. the ha'apax is an open book, you guys can make it whatever you want. swap the consoles and stain setup between the ha'apax and d'deridex, and your close to perfect. except for that turn rate. YOU HAVE TO RAISE THE FLOOR ABOVE 5. 5 is totally absurd and the biggest disadvantage a ship can have. its the turn rate of a carrier, and i dont see any hanger bays. it might be a big ship, but its mostly hallow. the big old KDF carrier proboly has 5 times its volume. the d'deridex is a battelcruiser, battle cruisers have turn rates no worse then 9. positioning with battle cloak is one thing, but it would take nothing to move a ship out of its fireing arc as soon as it decloaks. the subspace jump thing puts you in a random place, not facing your enemy, and the singularity thing does the same. none of these things are even half adequate replacements for actual turn rate.
Ha'apax
a new large ship design. given the fact that its not hollow, it likely has 2 or 3 times the volume the d'deridex has. a lower turn rate would thus make sense for this, like 6 to the d'deridex's 9, that it should have. this is a new ship, a clean slate, it can be whatever cryptic wants it to be. the ambassador station setup seems a better fit on such a large thing then the tactical heavy regent setup it has now, and that should go to the dederidex.
advanced Ha'apax
this is interesting reconfiguration. sorta breaks the rules though, of knowing what you will get based on what your looking at. casting at a 135 deg arc is handy, and clearly had this ship in mind, among others, but mid teen turn rates let a sci ship be effective. a sci tank in something like this would be plenty interesting, sci is as good at support and healing as eng, so this is a cool take on a sci based healer. it can separate too right? and i presume the non advanced ha'apax can use that console too, well maybe it can be a sci ship after all. this, with my proposed changes to the Dhealn, should cover the bases for the romulans nicely.
romulans will have T'varo and mogia as escorts at the opposite of the spectrum, Dhealn and adv Ha'apax as sci that are also at the opposite ends of the sci ship stat pool, and the d'deridex and Ha'apax to be cruisers, warbird style. that are gonna be hugely disappointing unless the turn rate floor that limits so many ships gets lifted up 1 to 3 more points, not just for these 2 ships but every slow turning cruiser.
I agree with pretty much everything what dontdrunkimshoot just posted. The T'Varo is just insane, it's a Fleet Defiant with enhanced battlecloak and a better turnrate. Imagine what people could do in PvP when using this ship as a torpboat. I would say this ship is even better than the bug, despite having two points less in turnrate.
The Mogai seems balanced and has a very interesting layout. LtC sci BOff, 2 eng consoles, 4 sci consoles and 4 tac consoles in the fleet version. I'm not sure yet how I will make use of the that, whether to use the sci-heavy layout for shieldtanking (TSS3 and 3-4 field generators) or an offensive ability.
The D'deridex however is a total fail. I will probably even skip this ship when leveling up my Romulan character. The lower tier Subcommander Mogai/Valdore is better than this useless piece of garbage.
I think D'Deridex is "fine". But only because I compare it to it's obvious Mirror the Galaxy. If the new D'Deridex is fail, what is Galaxy then ? Ultra-fail ? People try to push the D'Deridex to somewhere else, without moving it's mirror. The devs consantly point out that there is nothing wrong with the Galaxy, so there can't be anything wrong with the D'Deridex :P
I personally like the Mogai (would put a sci toon there), the T'varo seems a little too good. But at least it's not purple.
"Cryptic Studio’s Jack Emmert (2010): Microtransactions are the biggest bunch of nonsense. I like paying one fee and not worrying about it – like my cellphone. The world’s biggest MMO isn’t item based, even though the black market item GDP is bigger than Russia … microtransactions make me want to die.”
I don't mind a ship with a 3/3/3 console layout. It's fairly unique and makes the ship a middle of the road choice. If the fleet version only have 9 slots, though, that is an oversight that needs corrected.
I think the d'deridex is perfectly fine, though I am still not looking forward to having to fly the T4 version simply because I don't enjoy cruisers.
I will probably fly a Pach Raptor from lvl 30-50 and then directly switch to a Fleet Mogai. Both the D'deridex and the Ha'pax are not exactly what I would consider a fun ship to fly, at least not with a tac captain.
Glad to see some changes made to the D'deridex. Not a beast and still kind of cruiser-y, but I think I'm gonna fly it now. Just have to decide if I want to make a Sci or Engi character for it.
The Ha'apax though and its fleet variants look like true beasts, quite frankly. With all the battle cloaks, singularity powers, universal stations, separation console and significant hull and weapon capabilities it looks like THE dreadnought of the game... Pitty it requires a Tier 5 shipyard.
Also, is the Romulan Battle Cloak supposed to give me +13.5 bare turn rate? I've tested the Tier 4 D'deridex with battle cloak, auxiliary to inertial dampers, emergency power to engines and evasive maneuvers skills and with all that turned on I've received 96.5 turn rate o_O
True, without the battlecloak the ship can barely turn, but still, while cloaked I've been doing circles faster than most of my escorts... Not that I mind, but it makes me wonder about the balance side of things.
The fleet t'varo has basically everything: a 0.99 shield modifier (for a raider, seriously?), a better hull than most kdf bird of preys, enhanced battle cloak, 5 tac consoles... Don't you think it's a bit too much?
The fleet Dhelan has a weird console layout, I don't know what's the purpose of this ship. IMO the Dhelan should get the console layout of the t'varo and the t'varo should have 3 tac consoles only, like the KDF ship with enhanced battle cloak.
So the only Romulan science ship requires a T5 starbase? That makes me sad.
Actually - An escort people can actually buy that might challenge the Bug? Yes, please.
_________________________________________________ [Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth] [Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk] [D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
Enhanced BC might be excessive, I'll grant. But losing a tac console would be too much.
And BoPs have fallen behind the curve; they only remain competitive because of universal slots.
_________________________________________________ [Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth] [Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk] [D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
I don't mind a ship with a 3/3/3 console layout. It's fairly unique and makes the ship a middle of the road choice. If the fleet version only have 9 slots, though, that is an oversight that needs corrected.
I think the d'deridex is perfectly fine, though I am still not looking forward to having to fly the T4 version simply because I don't enjoy cruisers.
Now that I've gotten a D'deridex, it's not nearly as bad as I feared. Even with the RCS bump, it is fearfully painful to have to turn, but once cloaked you become sufficiently agile. Also, I've been able to confirm a fun tactic for the D'd. Pop Evasive Maneuvers and/or EPtE and drop Warp Plasma while charging an enemy; if you tag them with the plasma, perform a Singularity Jump. They'll be stuck there, blind and getting chewed up by the warp plasma and the singularity, giving you plenty of time to get your cloak back up and prepare for the next strike. (If you don't tag them with the Warp Plasma, they can usually pull themselves away from the dropped singularity, so you'll have to be a lot quicker about getting your cloak up.)
That being said, when I hit 50, I'm probably jumping over to the Mogai.
Enhanced BC might be excessive, I'll grant. But losing a tac console would be too much.
And BoPs have fallen behind the curve; they only remain competitive because of universal slots.
This ship is too tanky for a raider and EBC is excessive. I don't mind more ships with 5 tac consoles but this ship is an escort with a free +1 turnrate, enhanced battle cloak (with the associated dps boost), +0.1 shield modifier for free (kdf "escorts" only have 0.92) and a large choice of tanking abilities (singularity). It's worse than the jem'hadar bug.
It's as resilient as a destroyer, it has the special abilities of the best raiders, with the DPS of the best escorts. It makes no sense to me.
I'm ok with the ship if they shave the hull dramatically and give it a 0.8 shield modifier.
I'm ok with the ship if they shave the hull dramatically and give it a 0.8 shield modifier.
Better yet, rather than giving us yet another Klingon Raider, they could just go back to the original reduced power levels, which I've argued all along give a different sort of balance and make for an interesting challenge.
Thank you so incredibly much for moving the dual beam bank/heavy cannon hardpoints of the T'varo from the nacelles to the wings. It's perfect now.:D
FKA K-Tar, grumpy Klingon/El-Aurian hybrid. Now assimilated by PWE.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
oh thats a thing now? awesome. i'll have to find an npc somewhere and see
You can also see them now as red dots on the model in the ship shop.
FKA K-Tar, grumpy Klingon/El-Aurian hybrid. Now assimilated by PWE.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
I'm not sure if this is the appropriate thread for this kind of ship feedback... but I have been seeing several ha'apax flying around on tribble, and it looks like a fat space bug... like a short, fat, bus with giant wings... nothing about it is sharp or aggressive or intimidating, it looks like it might ferry children on interstellar field trips. It might be too late/too much work to change the model, but it's really disappointing that the top tier romulan ship looks like an obese, truncated, dragonfly in space.
Comments
Ah, you're looking at the Retrofits; I hadn't recorded the stats on those since they haven't been "officially" released even on Tribble (once we've had the rest of the content to level us to 50 released, I'll consider them to be at what the devs feel to be "here, try the balance on this" stage). Once they actually extend the beta phase to let us finish out the Romulan campaigns, I'll assume whatever's listed for the ship is the "final" form, until then I see it as "subject to change". Not that we can't give good feedback on what's already posted, mind you.
It's very odd, though...the T2 Dhelan and T3 Mogai are definitely tougher (if only a bit) than their escort counterparts; they define the Warbird at those levels as a bit slower but a bit tougher than escorts (and they get +10 Weapon, +5 Engine power rather than the escort's +15 Weapon power). Why would they throw that out for the T5 Retrofits, turning them into more generic escorts?
If I read correctly, if you're willing to grind up to lvl 50 outside of the episodic content, you can still get your free veteran-rewards ship from the selection of Retrofits, despite not being able to get the free D'deridex and Ha'apax (because you can't complete the promotion mission yet).
-40 power points is a challenge, but one I think can be worked around; rather than the sustained "keep all power up to all systems" model that people currently use, we'll have to work with the original escort model, to stack our skills, batteries, etc for a maximal burst of firepower/healing/whatever and then let it drop down in one or more areas while we set up the next burst. I don't have a problem with that, it's a lot more interesting and challenging than just trying to be uber all the time. Though with traits like the Engineer's battery trait being added, we might have more options for mitigating that power loss.
Giving up any of the BOff slots, though, I would argue against in the strongest terms. The effect of reduced skills would be to limit the customizability of the ships, reducing the variety seen in Warbirds and the viability of alternate builds. The loss of console slots, while less visible, would similarly constrict the variety of Warbird builds in the wild (especially considering the C-Store Warbird console's set bonuses).
What I'd really like to do is to be able to test the Warbird with the original -40 power balance at endgame with decent gear to get a feeling for how much impact the power penalty, the battle cloak, and singularity cloak make on what ends up being the vast majority of the time spent in the game, as opposed to how it feels while levelling up.
The problem I see with loose of -40 is not only do you have to stack energy skills, you will never catch up to fed or kdf ship in energy not that this is problem but 40 energy gap all ways seems much, but 20 is much more livable. Then energy skills could actually make up for it mostly.
Also as said by the dev post mogai isn't escort but more of a destroyer.
Singularity jump can be useful too; charge your most damaging enemy (or cluster of enemies), pop Singularity Jump, and hit the battle cloak before they get out of the effect of the accuracy debuff.
The viability of the ability is kinda no concern of mine. Simple cloak costs 1 console slot. With that logic, all romulan ships have extra universal console slot that is occupied with battlecloak.
Instead dread could get their console replaced by a console that buffs their lance ability, the defiant retrofit I don't know what it should have for a console tbh but I'm sure they could come up with something.
But there is no logic in not taking into account the viability of a ability, that's merely being dismissive.
The more I've thought about it and looked at ships I have in game and thought "okay... so what's at 58 now should be at 48 on a warbird" and going over each thing... well... it might not be too bad really.
One thing I would really like though is instead of assigning ships where their bonus power will be, let it come from the core. Instead of deciding that the mogai will have +10 to weapons and +5 to engines, let someone choose that with a core. Instead of forcing the D'Deridex into +10 shields and +5 aux, let the core give that. If a D'deridex pilot wants +10 weapons and +5 engines... or if they could make other combinations/all 15 points to one system, I think that would be great.
I think they could do something interesting with warbirds like give them a set commander for what they think the ship is bent toward, like a commander eng for the D'deridex for being large and cruiser like, and then let the rest be universal. But that might be considered "OP." Or if they were to reduce the number of boffs, they could give warbirds a carrier like boff setup, commander set to what they think the ship is bent toward, again, I'll use the D'deridex: Commander engineer, lt.com tac, lt.com sci, lt. eng. (or better yet, lt universal.) If it had the universal lt. it could be taken more toward one specialty or another based on the play style of the captain. More tactically based ships could have a commander tac, lt.com eng, lt.com sci, and a lt. tac. (again, even better a lt. universal.)
I know none of those suggestions will probably be taken... I'm just super tired of getting stuck with a, typically, very rigid boff layout for taking a ship. You might like the look of a ship, even the stats of a ship, but it has a boff layout you don't want and you either have to suffer with it or take a ship you don't really like because it has a better boff laout for you. How about we just make all boffs universal on all ships and call it a day? Yeah?
if only...
The Romulan command structure as I have imagined it would not be welcoming to Uhlans having any kind of real power on their bridges and therefore would not be represented by a boff power on their ships.
Although somewhat limiting, having only 4 boffs on a bridge can be quite powerful and some might see it as overpowered so I will include a boff layout that would also have only 11 powers as opposed to the normal 12.
I have limited my suggestions to the retrofit and fleet retrofit versions of the 5 ships that we do know something about.
T'varo Retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Consoles: 4 Tac, 2 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Fleet T'varo Retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 5 Tac, 2 Eng, 3 sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Alternate Consoles: 4 Tac, 2 Eng, 4 Sci
The T'varo Retrofit and Fleet T'varo Retrofit represent the Romulan raider ship class and therefore would be staying cloaked as much as possible while torpedo bombing, mine laying and science debuffing.
With the idea of trying to stay cloaked as much as possible they have less need for Engineering powers and Captains can opt to use something else for that Lt. universal on the Fleet T'varo for an extreme build.
Dhelan Retrofit:
Comm tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Sci
Consoles: 4 Tac, 3 Eng, 2 sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Sci
Fleet Dhelan retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 5 tac, 3 Eng, 2 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Uni
The Dhelan Retrofit and Fleet Dhelan Retrofit are the Romluan escort ship class and thus should bring as much firepower to the table as possible.
The idea for the lack of dedicated science boff is that a Captain may choose to put more emphasis on engineering to keep them in a fight longer if they want.
Mogai Retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Consoles: 4 Tac, 3 eng, 2 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Fleet Mogai retrofit:
Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 4 Tac, 3 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Comm Tac
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
The Mogai Retrofit and Fleet Mogai Retrofit are the Romulan destroyer class of ships and have very well rounded capabilities.
The Fleet Mogai Retrofit allows for the first realistic Aux to Batt build for the Romulans as well as several other interesting build possibilties.
D'deridex Retrofit:
Lt. Comm Tac
Comm Eng
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Consoles: 3 Tac, 3 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Fleet D'deridex Retrofit:
Lt. Comm Tac
Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 3 Tac, 4 Eng, 3 Sci
Alternate Layout:
Lt. Comm Tac
Lt. Comm Eng
Lt. Comm Sci
Lt. Uni
The 12 boff power D'deridex Retrofit and Fleet D'deridex Retrofit layouts are exactly what I'd want to see for these ships.
The 11 boff power variants forced me to try the controversial "no commander" idea which I am still not fond of.
Fleet Ha'apax:
Comm Tac
Comm Eng
Lt. Sci
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 3 Tac, 5 Eng, 2 Sci
Fleet Ha'apax Refit:
Comm Tac
Comm Sci
Lt. Eng
Lt. Uni
Consoles: 3 Tac, 2 Eng, 5 Sci
These are the fleet versions of the large battlecruiser that can split into 2 crafts so a Commander for each half was the idea here.
There is an Engineering and Science focused version for Romulan Captains to use.
There are more limitations when you only have 4 boffs to slot and lack of variety for the future may disallow this setup to be adopted for the entire Romluan fleet.
Other layouts could see a 3,3,3,3 layouts or even a 3 boff layout of all commanders,(perhaps for a carrier?).
So there are my layout ideas so far, have at it.
I think you have some very interesting ideas, especially about the Ha'apax. Though I think many people would consider them OP. But if they added boff station setups like these, I think that might justify the -10 to all power levels the devs were looking at before.
The devs took this game in a traditional mmo direction instead of more of a massively multiplayer simulation. This resulted in turning escorts into the only ships that really feel the most like a real star trek ship, firing off volleys and spreads of torpedoes (because torpedo launchers don't fire spreads or volleys by default, requiring a skill) while using attack patterns, the occasional emergency power to this an auxiliary power to that. -Typical star trek combat.
Cruisers have so few tactical boff stations that they can't really use a variety of attack patterns or fire spreads and volleys of torpedoes on a consistent basis, which is something they could do in the shows and fans expect to be able to do in the game. They have so few tactical skills available to them that they must typicall choose between a torpedo spread or a fire at will, they can't have both (especially since tac team is a required tac skill.) They also rely on gimmicky abilities (eject warp plasma, extend shields) and can some how magically transfer their auxiliary power to someone else's structural integrity field, things that were very rarely/never seen in any show or movie. Abilities that don't make up for their insane lack of damage potential in a game that is all about combat.
Science ships rely on 'space magic' that was practically never used in any show. Voyager did manage to open a rift into fluidic space, but summon a gravity well or a tykens rift? Yeah... no. Could voyager stop a borg cube with a tractor beam? Definitely not. Voyager did maneuver in attack patterns though and could fire volleys and spreads of torpedoes, but can she really do that in this game? no.
I think this is why people want more tac spots, they want to be able to do significant amounts of damage without having to resort to extremely convoluted builds that compromise the dev's intent for their ship, a compromise that typically makes them all around mediocre instead of just generally unnecessary/gimped. I think people are annoyed that escorts rather effortlessly do significant damage while every other ship requires so much more work to achieve less results.
So long as the devs look at this game in typical mmo terms, having "classes" that severely pigeonhole you in one direction or another, the damage dealer (escort), the tank (cruiser), and the healer/mage (science vessel), We're going to have problems, because star trek didn't work that way. And more so because the tank and healer aren't required in this game as escorts have enough healer and enough tank in them that the other three points of the trinity are essentially moot.
T'varo retrofit
its an escort, full blown escort. with something resembling the armatage station setup, turns beter then the defiant, and comes with a battle cloak. all that is pretty much fine. maybe a bit on the powerful side, but ok. what tips it over into absurd territory is the enhanced battle cloak, what the brel has, and what it pays dearly for in hitpoints. the turn rate advantage and universal stations are not a balance against this ship. its already got a desirable tactical ship station setup, and it turns as well as it could ever want already. the brel is a unique thing, and this romulan ship is completely better in every way. this ship should not have enhanced battle cloak, only the brel should. the fleet version of this ship has 5 tactical consoles, this REALLY should not be allowed to have enhanced battle cloak.
Dhealn retrofit
another escort with good 16 turn. its got a destroyer like station setup thats similar to the jem hadar heavy or vet ship. it can go pretty heavy sci or eng or tac, if i dont buy the legacy pack i think my retrofit tocken will go to this. but a very odd change happened to it, it lost a tac console and now has a 3/3/3 console setup. this isnt corrected by the fleet version ether, that has a 4th eng console. this is terribly baffling honestly. an escort without 4 tac consoles, how about a sci ship with 3 sci consoles, or a cruiser with 3 eng consoles? that doesn't exist anywhere else. the fleet versions should really have that 4th tac console back.
if the romulan vet ship has the same station setup as the other 2 vet ships, its going to have basically this ships station setup, and the t'varo already has a LTC eng. that seems a bit redundant, and steps on some toes IMO. this ship should instead be the defacto romulan sci ship at end game, but not a traditional sci ship. a sci ship built on top of an escort. this station setup
COM sci
LTC tac
LTtac
LTeng
ENS eng/uni
i wouldn't change anything else. still have 7 weapons, DHC use, 16 turn, 3/3/3 consoles, leave that all in place. no subsystem targeting or sensor analysis though. this is a niche thats definitely missing.
Mogai retrofit
this is a nice balanced destroyer type, below average turn, LTC sci, and still 3 eng stations. its got all the bases covered and looks good, especially with refit costume. i wouldnt change a thing, and the 4 sci consoles on the fleet version should make that LTC sci ability pretty fun to use.
D'deridex retrofit
well the station setup is a major improvement, its got the ambassador station setup now, but only 2 tac consoles. im not sure why there is an obsetion to give this ship bad qualities that the galaxy class has. it can have firepower comparable to the galaxy, thats fine, but in game the galaxy should not have the WORST damage dealing of any ship. and the d'deridex is cursed to be at about the same level. then i look at what the hapax got, and my first thought is they should swap consoles and stations. this ship is supposed top be a large predator, the station setup the Ha'apax has, the regent station setup, is a perfect fit for this established ship. the ha'apax is an open book, you guys can make it whatever you want. swap the consoles and stain setup between the ha'apax and d'deridex, and your close to perfect. except for that turn rate. YOU HAVE TO RAISE THE FLOOR ABOVE 5. 5 is totally absurd and the biggest disadvantage a ship can have. its the turn rate of a carrier, and i dont see any hanger bays. it might be a big ship, but its mostly hallow. the big old KDF carrier proboly has 5 times its volume. the d'deridex is a battelcruiser, battle cruisers have turn rates no worse then 9. positioning with battle cloak is one thing, but it would take nothing to move a ship out of its fireing arc as soon as it decloaks. the subspace jump thing puts you in a random place, not facing your enemy, and the singularity thing does the same. none of these things are even half adequate replacements for actual turn rate.
Ha'apax
a new large ship design. given the fact that its not hollow, it likely has 2 or 3 times the volume the d'deridex has. a lower turn rate would thus make sense for this, like 6 to the d'deridex's 9, that it should have. this is a new ship, a clean slate, it can be whatever cryptic wants it to be. the ambassador station setup seems a better fit on such a large thing then the tactical heavy regent setup it has now, and that should go to the dederidex.
advanced Ha'apax
this is interesting reconfiguration. sorta breaks the rules though, of knowing what you will get based on what your looking at. casting at a 135 deg arc is handy, and clearly had this ship in mind, among others, but mid teen turn rates let a sci ship be effective. a sci tank in something like this would be plenty interesting, sci is as good at support and healing as eng, so this is a cool take on a sci based healer. it can separate too right? and i presume the non advanced ha'apax can use that console too, well maybe it can be a sci ship after all. this, with my proposed changes to the Dhealn, should cover the bases for the romulans nicely.
romulans will have T'varo and mogia as escorts at the opposite of the spectrum, Dhealn and adv Ha'apax as sci that are also at the opposite ends of the sci ship stat pool, and the d'deridex and Ha'apax to be cruisers, warbird style. that are gonna be hugely disappointing unless the turn rate floor that limits so many ships gets lifted up 1 to 3 more points, not just for these 2 ships but every slow turning cruiser.
The Mogai seems balanced and has a very interesting layout. LtC sci BOff, 2 eng consoles, 4 sci consoles and 4 tac consoles in the fleet version. I'm not sure yet how I will make use of the that, whether to use the sci-heavy layout for shieldtanking (TSS3 and 3-4 field generators) or an offensive ability.
The D'deridex however is a total fail. I will probably even skip this ship when leveling up my Romulan character. The lower tier Subcommander Mogai/Valdore is better than this useless piece of garbage.
I personally like the Mogai (would put a sci toon there), the T'varo seems a little too good. But at least it's not purple.
I think the d'deridex is perfectly fine, though I am still not looking forward to having to fly the T4 version simply because I don't enjoy cruisers.
The Ha'apax though and its fleet variants look like true beasts, quite frankly. With all the battle cloaks, singularity powers, universal stations, separation console and significant hull and weapon capabilities it looks like THE dreadnought of the game... Pitty it requires a Tier 5 shipyard.
Also, is the Romulan Battle Cloak supposed to give me +13.5 bare turn rate? I've tested the Tier 4 D'deridex with battle cloak, auxiliary to inertial dampers, emergency power to engines and evasive maneuvers skills and with all that turned on I've received 96.5 turn rate o_O
True, without the battlecloak the ship can barely turn, but still, while cloaked I've been doing circles faster than most of my escorts... Not that I mind, but it makes me wonder about the balance side of things.
The fleet Dhelan has a weird console layout, I don't know what's the purpose of this ship. IMO the Dhelan should get the console layout of the t'varo and the t'varo should have 3 tac consoles only, like the KDF ship with enhanced battle cloak.
So the only Romulan science ship requires a T5 starbase? That makes me sad.
Actually - An escort people can actually buy that might challenge the Bug? Yes, please.
[Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth]
[Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk]
[D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
Another (huge) step into power creep? No thanks. The KDF raiders look really bad in comparison.
And BoPs have fallen behind the curve; they only remain competitive because of universal slots.
[Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth]
[Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk]
[D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
Now that I've gotten a D'deridex, it's not nearly as bad as I feared. Even with the RCS bump, it is fearfully painful to have to turn, but once cloaked you become sufficiently agile. Also, I've been able to confirm a fun tactic for the D'd. Pop Evasive Maneuvers and/or EPtE and drop Warp Plasma while charging an enemy; if you tag them with the plasma, perform a Singularity Jump. They'll be stuck there, blind and getting chewed up by the warp plasma and the singularity, giving you plenty of time to get your cloak back up and prepare for the next strike. (If you don't tag them with the Warp Plasma, they can usually pull themselves away from the dropped singularity, so you'll have to be a lot quicker about getting your cloak up.)
That being said, when I hit 50, I'm probably jumping over to the Mogai.
This ship is too tanky for a raider and EBC is excessive. I don't mind more ships with 5 tac consoles but this ship is an escort with a free +1 turnrate, enhanced battle cloak (with the associated dps boost), +0.1 shield modifier for free (kdf "escorts" only have 0.92) and a large choice of tanking abilities (singularity). It's worse than the jem'hadar bug.
It's as resilient as a destroyer, it has the special abilities of the best raiders, with the DPS of the best escorts. It makes no sense to me.
I'm ok with the ship if they shave the hull dramatically and give it a 0.8 shield modifier.
Better yet, rather than giving us yet another Klingon Raider, they could just go back to the original reduced power levels, which I've argued all along give a different sort of balance and make for an interesting challenge.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.
oh thats a thing now? awesome. i'll have to find an npc somewhere and see
You can also see them now as red dots on the model in the ship shop.
Sometimes, if you want to bury the hatchet with a Klingon, it has to be in his skull. - Captain K'Tar of the USS Danu about J'mpok.