Don't people do this already? A plan-B is always nice.
Some do, some don't. Some don't bother with the extra BOFF slots on toons. With the current EPtX abilities on Holo, I'd be hardpressed to do it for certain guys. With the new EPtX abilities...something I'm considering doing more off. While the +power is dropping from 30s to 20s, those other buffs (outside of EPtS) are going from 5s to 20s.
cruisers warp core > escort warp cores in star trek correct? i mean we got these massive engineering decks that have warp cores the size of buildings, you mean to tell me that they squeeze all that into a escort?
so why do beams suck so much power on a cruiser? we should have the power to run them all day long not having to micro manage 3 skills plus consumables plus red matter capacitor to keep power up above 100 where they do good damage nevermind if you actually have to tank and heal your team at the same time, no i got to sit there and watch your weapons power, watch your aux power, watch your team panel, watch what the primary is watch your....
so yea cruisers are not about twitch play, but they are about watching stuff and spamming skills like mad.
reroll to the old power drain mechanics, or give cruisers a slight -to beam array drain. that would go along way to improving the damage of cruiser boats and free up some slots in our bars for team skills, tank etc. and make it less about watching stuff drop and the cd on what skills to keep your damage decent over the course of a long fight.
it also would make cruiser boats really beam boats, and leave escorts cannons as they are.
The warp cores on Cruisers are also running more systems than the warp cores on Escorts. There's more crew, more life support - Hell, more lights in all the hallways - more waste disposal - more replicators - more sonic showers - more...everything. Cruisers aren't just fat Escorts...you can't just look at the weapons.
still begs the question why we cant fire our 6 to 7 beam arrays without watching our power levels drop into the toilet the second you turn to broadside. vs an escort that can blaze away never even bother with emptw or anything and their levels stay fine and dandy.
a slight boost would make beam boats playable again.
or just let everyone mount dual heavies and be done with it look less power drain.
still begs the question why we cant fire our 6 to 7 beam arrays without watching our power levels drop into the toilet the second you turn to broadside. vs an escort that can blaze away never even bother with emptw or anything and their levels stay fine and dandy.
a slight boost would make beam boats playable again.
or just let everyone mount dual heavies and be done with it look less power drain.
its the ROF thats why, the DHC recharge slightly between shots vs beams which is a loooong constant drain.
easiest way to have an energy cap similar to Eve, where generally bigger ships can have larger amounts of energy to use.
So I grabbed my main Fed Eng and dropped him in his Mirror Assault instead of his Chel Grett. Switched some stuff around, etc, etc, etc.
So, it's sporting:
Fore - Experimental, 2x Rom Array Mk XII [Acc]x2,Plasma Array Mk XI [Acc]x2
Aft - Cutting Beam, 2x Rom Array Mk XII [Acc]x2,Plasma Array Mk XI [Acc]x2
2pc MACO, Aegis Engines
EPtW1/EPtS1
SDO(BFI), 3x DCE(EPt), MAS(EWP)
123/100 Weapon Power
So obviously it it 125 and overcapped quickly just from the EPtE1 and the MACO Shields.
What would you expect the Weapon Power to drop down to? Normal, FAW (Single Target), FAW (Multiple Targets), BO?
Escorts are powerful, more so than cruisers, even in the literature, technical manuals and program.
The original defiant I'm sure many people know was designed to face the Borg, if you research into it further you would find that on its testing faze, it nearly shook itself apart due to the amount of power it had.
By the time sisko gets his, the kinks had been ironed out, it kept the power but got strengthened to cope.
I still think beams should work on a spike damage format to make the more punchy.
But then again, there are plenty of cruiser toons using beams that can quite happily demolish ships.
Stop trying to make cruisers like escorts, the fact is they aren't. Also stop trying to make escorts like shuttles.
Escorts are powerful, more so than cruisers, even in the literature, technical manuals and program.
The original defiant I'm sure many people know was designed to face the Borg, if you research into it further you would find that on its testing faze, it nearly shook itself apart due to the amount of power it had.
By the time sisko gets his, the kinks had been ironed out, it kept the power but got strengthened to cope.
I still think beams should work on a spike damage format to make the more punchy.
But then again, there are plenty of cruiser toons using beams that can quite happily demolish ships.
Stop trying to make cruisers like escorts, the fact is they aren't. Also stop trying to make escorts like shuttles.
Hrmm, while that covers some of the lack of info - conflicting info - etc, etc, etc in regard to the Defiant... my favorite thing to point out about trying to "source" things as "canon"...is that the "canon" is still fictional.
It's not like you can take the Ford and Chevy out to the mudpit - not like you can setup the AMD machine and the nVidia machine on the workbench - not like you can have two sports teams play - etc, etc, etc.
As a "hero" ship - the Defiant would be invulnerable until such a point that the story required it to be vulnerable. That's no different than any of the "hero" ships. There might be some damage here and there, but it was never significant unless the story required it to be significant.
I mean, c'mon - look at how many ships were obliterated during the Dominion War while the Defiant puttered along fine...until it being destroyed so easily by the Breen. Of course, all those ships getting destroyed...yes...somewhat stock footage, since the same footage was used over and over again.
It wasn't the ship that made the ship special, it was who was on the ship. Sisko & Co. could have been on a Miranda and the same things would have happened. You could interchange any of the ships from any of the series with some minor rewrites and the overall stories would have been the same - wouldn't matter if it was Kirk in a Connie, Picard in a Galaxy, Janeway in an Intrepid, Sisko in a Defiant, or Archer in a NX.
Yes, there's canon...but it's still fiction. It's not...tonight on Modern Marvels, the ships of Starfleet! Yeah...no, not in the least.
So the devs are faced with the issue of trying to balance ships where every ships is a hero ship because on every ship is a hero...the player...the Kirk, Picard, Archer, Janeway, Sisko...on each player ship. While they can make those ships hero ships in PvE against the NPCs - they've got to be a little more realistic about the fantasy and the fiction involved with the ships when balancing them. They've "equated" the Galaxy, Defiant, and Intrepid...put them as the Captain vessels, etc, etc, etc.
Players may have favorites, think X > Y or whatever...point to various things from the shows...but that really doesn't mean squat. Canon? Yes. Real? Lol...no.
Funnily I think you answered the nerf question in that.
Everyone thinks their ship is the 'hero' ship, therefor it should be indestructible.
It gets massively boring when people cry for nerfs to things that simply don't need it because they get destroyed by them.
Beam cruisers are still powerful, so many people seem to think cruisers are the ultimate tool for destruction that are infallible. When ultimately they aren't either, they can be made to be pretty nasty with a combination of good player ability for tanking and the correct setup on stats and boffs.
Lets face it, DHC is designed for one roll, destruction. Beams can be setup for essentially area denial, harassing fire, shield stripping, keeping pressure on certain areas. The escort is the surgical strike, fast and focused.
All the ships are a balancing act, offensive/defensive. Yes, even the 'op' escorts, for maximum damage really you have to sacrifice survivability (but that's where a good team comes in). You want survivability? Well, you have to sacrifice a little bit of offensive.
The bug ship is actually a little bit of an enigma on that but it is available to both factions.
As for Tac toons being OP. you may want to see what a well setup sci toon can do to a good Tac toon! The tacs biggest thing is damage, being able to get it down quick but it last a limited time, 30 seconds as opposed to the SNBs 45 seconds, oh and SNB shuts all those buffs down in one foul swoop. I'm not saying sci is overpowered (although in multiples it gets very tedious very quickly) but Tac isn't OP either. Engineer is UP by a long way.
The issue with many of the things, in the eyes of some people, is that the balancing that existed for certain things no longer does or does not to the extent it did.
Say you have Object A. It has Power B which is balanced by Mechanic C. As time goes on, New X is introduced which buffs Power B. At the same time, New Y is introduced which reduces the balancing effect of Mechanic C. Given the way things go, there was also likely New Z added which works really well with Object A. Suddenly Object A no longer appears balanced. People begin to call out for nerfs to Object A.
Object A never changed. Power B was changed by New X and Mechanic C was changed by New Y (as well as New Z having been introduced that's best friends with Object A).
X, Y, & Z...should have taken into account the semblance of balance that existed with Object A with Power B and Mechanic C. X, Y, & Z are what need to be addressed...not Object A.
Thinking that X, Y, & Z apply equally to Object F and Object K doesn't cut it...because they had their own Powers and Mechanics for balancing. How X, Y, & Z interact with each Object is not going to be the same.
That is what some folks believe has been overlooked. To an extent, it's where Cryptic is now trying to make little tweaks here and there...trying to avoid too much of what would be considered nerfing because of the outcry while also trying to avoid too much mudflation which would also result in an outcry, eh? It's a WIP...there's no magic wand.
the defient is a match for an 80 year old light cruiser design refit the best they could. a ship no were near as powerful as an ambassador class, intrepid class, akira class, sovereign class, nebula class or galaxy class. the defiant is a federation bird of prey, and wile it can kill even smaller bugs pretty easily, its nothing compared to the heavy cruisers and battleships in terms of firepower and durability. wouldn't know it by playing this game though, were a shuttle and galaxy class deal the same damage with a beam array.
So I grabbed my main Fed Eng and dropped him in his Mirror Assault instead of his Chel Grett. Switched some stuff around, etc, etc, etc.
So, it's sporting:
Fore - Experimental, 2x Rom Array Mk XII [Acc]x2,Plasma Array Mk XI [Acc]x2
Aft - Cutting Beam, 2x Rom Array Mk XII [Acc]x2,Plasma Array Mk XI [Acc]x2
2pc MACO, Aegis Engines
EPtW1/EPtS1
SDO(BFI), 3x DCE(EPt), MAS(EWP)
123/100 Weapon Power
So obviously it it 125 and overcapped quickly just from the EPtE1 and the MACO Shields.
What would you expect the Weapon Power to drop down to? Normal, FAW (Single Target), FAW (Multiple Targets), BO?
I was serious in asking this. There's a lot of folks that complain about Cruisers and Beam Weapons...saying that they cause their power to bottom out. That there are issues with the drain mechanics, etc, etc, etc.
So what are people seeing their Weapon Power do that they consider it bottoming out, draining out the wahzoo, etc, etc, etc?
So what are people seeing their Weapon Power do that they consider it bottoming out, draining out the wahzoo, etc, etc, etc?
I don't have any HUGE issues with my beamboat power "bottoming out", before I overcapped and added flow regulator consoles (two mk XI purples) I was overcapping and had a power low of 90 or so, put the consoles on and that became 105 using 6 arrays but the damage was only tolerable
Would there be any major downside to reducing burst damage on cannons to allow for more variety in hybrid escort builds? Are there any other ships besides escorts that would be too negatively affected? Do any escorts believe they're *not* doing too much damage in comparison to other ship types?
Yes, there would be a downside; the way it's been going recently as far as I can tell is that the Borg get tougher and the feds get nerfed, the DHC is really the only thing that can take something apart without taking all day. How many times have you been sitting there trading beam broadsides with a Klingon ship, or any other ship, come to think of it, and thought 'I swear this AI is OP'?
We already have AI popping abilities twice as fast as players are able to (eg. Orion matrons, Borg ships) in both ground and space combat, the last thing we need is for one of the few remaining weapons worth bothering with to become any weaker than they already are.
It seems to me that almost everything AI is getting beefed up and almost everything PC is getting nerfed. Nerfing the DHC is not only pointless but also harms our ability to effectively do anything to the AI.
Simply put, it will NEVER be a good time to nerf the DHC!
You should see the hell that I give intruders just for being on my deck uninvited, get off my guns! :cool:
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
I'm not THAT difficult to please, I just have a very low tolerance threshold for stupid BS! - George Carlin.
I don't have any HUGE issues with my beamboat power "bottoming out", before I overcapped and added flow regulator consoles (two mk XI purples) I was overcapping and had a power low of 90 or so, put the consoles on and that became 105 using 6 arrays but the damage was only tolerable
See, that's what I would lean more toward - that the damage itself is off - not necessarily because of drain - but because of the timing/number of shots and how damage is modified.
Because yeah, the majority of time that guy was sitting in the 120s - sometimes in the 100s-110s - might dip into the 90s depending on things fired/what didn't trigger - the BO would drop to 60-70s but I'd be right back up at the usual 100s+.
The base DPV for Beam Arrays is 100. The base DPS for Beams is 80. They fire 4 shots over a 5s period.
The base DPV for DHCs is 174. The base DPS for DHCs is 116. They fire 2 shots over a 3s period.
In a 15s period, the base damage for Beams would be 1200.
In a 15s period, the base damage for DHCs would be 1740.
Take that out to a minute, the base damage for Beams would be 4800.
Take that out to a minute, the base damage for DHCs would be 6960.
Take that out to 15 minutes, the base damage for Beams would be 72000.
Take that out to 15 minutes, the base damage for DHCs would be 104400.
The ratios at the given interval are:
1 shot - 1:1.74
15s - 1:1.45
60s - 1:1.45
15m - 1:1.45
So as you can see, base damage is +45% for DHCs than Arrays. Course that gets into the "balance" of the 45 arc vs. 250 arc, etc, etc, etc. It likely balances out in that sense (before taking into account various changes that have made it easier to keep that 45 arc).
Okay though, we're not running with those Mk 0/TRIBBLE base weapons though - are we? Let's juice things up - equally of course - and see what we get, eh? I'll just be looking at the DPV values for each as each modifier/bonus to the damage is added. This may take a little while (TL-DR area, lol) - but then I'll get into the DPS over a certain period of time (based upon EPtW on Tribble). I'll show the DPV ratio for each step. Remember, it started with a 1:1.74 DPV ratio.
We'll take a break here, because those are our new Base DPV values. I'm going to grab a smoke (I highly recommend that you don't - it's bad for your health) and I'll be right back...
...okay then, now we'll get into abilities and Weapon Power, eh? Please note, I'm just doing some spreadsheet warrior stuff here - I'm going to premise it off of two things having been fixed that may or may not have been fixed*. I'm also going to be going with the numbers that one of my guys had, so they may not reflect what your toons show.
First we'll toss the 125 Weapon Power at those numbers:
Okay, the next modifier is a Multiplicative Modifier (like Weapon Power) rather than an Additive Modifier (like the majority of them we've seen so far) and that is Emergency Power to Weapons I (+10%):
I'm going to grab another smoke (honestly, don't smoke kids - it's bad for you - no lie) and come back to do a little analysis and explain why I listed that same ratio so many times...
...it's because that ratio never changes. It would change were you to include Critical Hits and Critical Damage, because of the DHCs +10% CrtD - but I didn't touch Crits, since I didn't feel they were necessary to this level of the discussion.
Okay then, so a little analysis. First, I'm going to round.
Beams DPV - 2734.3
DHCs DPV - 4757.7
What's the DPS?
Beams - 2187.4
DHCs - 3171.8
Which gets us back to that 1:1.45 ratio we had earlier before adding in all the juice!
Given that the EPtW1 buff lasts 20s on Tribble, I'm only going to show the damage for a 15s period rather than all the others.
It still maintains that 1:1.45 ratio we saw earlier as well.
So okay, if the DPV maintains the 1:1.74 and the DPS maintains the 1:1.45...what's the problem?
Standard Beam DPV (100) & Juiced Beam DPV (2734.3)...27.343x the Standard.
Standard DHC DPV (174) & Juiced DHC DPV (4757.7)...27.343x the Standard.
Difference between Standard Beam and Standard DHC DPV...74 damage.
Difference between Juiced Beam and Juiced DHC DPV...2023.4 damage.
Yep, the difference in damage between each shot for the Beam and DHC...while it remains at that 1:1.74 ratio - the actual number, the actual difference in damage is 27.343x that of the Standard when Juiced.
Standard Beam DPS (80) & Juiced Beam DPS (2187.4)...27.343x the Standard.
Standard DHC DPS (116) & Juiced DHC DPS (3171.8)...27.343x the Standard.
Difference between Standard Beam and Standard DHC DPS...36 DPS.
Difference between Juiced Beam and Juiced DHC DPS...984.4 DPS.
Yep, the difference in DPS for the Beam and DHC...while it remains at that 1:1.45 ratio - the actual number, the acutal difference in DPS is 27.343x that of the Standard when Juiced.
So those two ratios remain the same...but...the better the weapons you have, the more skill you have, the better consoles you have, the more power you have available, the better/more abilities you use...the greater the disparity between the two weapons grows.
For the example laid out above...
1:1.74 DPV Ratio saw the difference in DPV go from 74 to 2023.4 DPV.
1:1.45 DPS Ratio saw the difference in DPS go from 36 to 984.4 DPS.
/cough
So uh, one might say that flat ratios may not be the way the Cryptic should have gone with that, eh?
edit: And yes, that was without the Critical Hits/Critical Severity, the difference in drain mechanics, not looking at CRF/CSV vs. BO/FAW, the additional passives from rep, new gear being introduced, the effects of healing as it relates to pressure vs. spike, and all those wonderful things that just add to the disparity between the two weapons...which is supposedly balanced around the difficulty of keeping that 45 arc. /cough Yeah right... /cough
Attribution: The above would not have been possible without discussions with bareel in the following two threads...
*In the second thread listed above, I noted that there were issues with neither Tactical Fleet not Emergency Power to Weapons providing the correct bonus. I'd have to log in and run the math in game again to see if those have been resolved or not. I'm going to assume for the examples above that those have been resolved. If they have not, please join me in bugging Cryptic to fix them. If they have, please join me in thanking Cryptic for fixing them.
See, that's what I would lean more toward - that the damage itself is off - not necessarily because of drain - but because of the timing/number of shots and how damage is modified.
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yep, thats that front loaded vs gradual thing in action. beam arrays, and single cannons, should have the same fireing cycle as DHCs, so they are more able to damage for effect, like that superior damage per volley allows.
Yes, there would be a downside; the way it's been going recently as far as I can tell is that the Borg get tougher and the feds get nerfed, the DHC is really the only thing that can take something apart without taking all day. How many times have you been sitting there trading beam broadsides with a Klingon ship, or any other ship, come to think of it, and thought 'I swear this AI is OP'?
We already have AI popping abilities twice as fast as players are able to (eg. Orion matrons, Borg ships) in both ground and space combat, the last thing we need is for one of the few remaining weapons worth bothering with to become any weaker than they already are.
It seems to me that almost everything AI is getting beefed up and almost everything PC is getting nerfed. Nerfing the DHC is not only pointless but also harms our ability to effectively do anything to the AI.
Simply put, it will NEVER be a good time to nerf the DHC!
You should see the hell that I give intruders just for being on my deck uninvited, get off my guns! :cool:
in pve there actually is no DPS difference between DHCs and DC, except the difference the power level draining makes. npcs dont distribute thier shields, so you dont need frontloaded damage. DHC being so much better is mostly a pvp thing.
in pve there actually is no DPS difference between DHCs and DC, except the difference the power level draining makes. npcs dont distribute thier shields, so you dont need frontloaded damage. DHC being so much better is mostly a pvp thing.
It's kind of frightening, in a sense, how many folks have come into the various threads saying things similar, eh? Not what you said, but what the guy you were replying to said.
No doubt I've got PvP builds that are useless in PvE...but that's because PvE doesn't require the quirky stuff that those builds do. NPCs don't do X, Y, Z...so there's no need to have the build that messes with X, Y, Z. But even those guys, I can drop in a ragamuffin Escort and they're more than capable of getting it done in PvE without the best build or gear for it.
There's folks acting as if STO has an actual gear progression thing going on. As if you start regular STFs at 50, get some Mk X/XI STF gear, and then you're ready for ESTFs so you can get Mk XII STF gear. Folks are chewing through ESTFs in blue Mk X stuff FFS...I don't get it.
I understand if you want the 5min run - yeah, you want to go a certain way. But they way some of them are making it out that you need that to get it done in 10-15min? That's insane, I've been in a 5 Eng Cruiser PUG where we've gotten it done with time to spare. Admittedly, heh, we were a little surprised at the time...but yeah, we got it done with time to spare...lol.
dual heavy cannons mean nothing. everytime it seems I bite the target goes all shields and his buddy shows his face the moment I commit. completely ignore my hoh'sus to deal maximum damage to me. it's not the weapons, it's the numbers and tactics applied.
Lyndon Brewer: 20% chance to capture enemy ship for 60 seconds on successful use of boarding party.
No, this is not a troll post. Considering the upcoming tweaks to EPTX, this might be a good time to tone down cannon damage a bit.
The primary change that comes to mind is removing the inherent CrtD bonus on DHCs, but any sort of (slight) damage reduction could benefit ship type balance in both PvP and PvE. A nerf would be good for PvP because of the upcoming reduction in tanking ability (mostly for cruisers) and good for PvE because there's little reason to run anything but escort due to the prevalence of damage-based mission objectives.
Don't get me wrong, cannons are awesome and I use full cannon builds on my escort and BoP, but it's simply too easy to do both alpha strike burst damage and sustained dps while using a minimal variety of bridge officer powers and cooldown timing techniques.
Would there be any major downside to reducing burst damage on cannons to allow for more variety in hybrid escort builds? Are there any other ships besides escorts that would be too negatively affected? Do any escorts believe they're *not* doing too much damage in comparison to other ship types?
This may be a touchy issue so please keep the forum wars to a minimum if at all possible, but it doesn't hurt to give input for the sake of discussion.
As some one who has piloted every type of ship. And who loves his Bird of Prey ambush build...
I have to admit Dual Heavy Cannons for Tactical Officers are just too good right now. And will become more obvious when LoR is released. Especially when you have Warbirds de-cloaking and alpha Striking with those Same DHCs.
Granted how ever, Antonio does also make a Valid point, Spike damage will also get a boost from this change to the Emergency power to X abilities also.
Giving players a resistance vs other players is a nice Idea in theory, but with how Resistance currently works in STO, it might not be as helpful as it seems.
Dual heavy Cannons are definitely a number 1 "offender" for some crazy events I have witnessed and been the victim of in PVP. And I'm not just referring to damage numbers in a Final Score.
It may be time to decrease either their Weapon damage, or perhaps even the way they register weapon Power drain across multiple Dual heavy Cannons.
If this is the case, it's a problem with the Tactical captain class, not DHCs. If DHCs are working fine for everyone else, but are OP on Tac captains, you don't fix this by nerfing DHCs.
in maximum a year from now STO will have Pong like complexity.It will be funny when people will want the ingame minigames nerfed
Ill trade both for a TIF buff :rolleyes:
Oooh oooh, the borg cube on elite is OP. Nerf it.
Sounds like some people want to RP in PvP instead of understand how it works thoroughly and learn to counter it effectively. Wasn't discovery half the fun in this game when you guys first started playing it?
Remember the days when you sat at the bridge officer trainer, went through each skill, tested it in private with a friend and used it if it felt good in the queues?
With the advent of bootcamp, you dont have to do this no more. You are given the relevant information on a plate. What tends to happen now is that when you try to pass the hard learnt knowledge in a friendly / respectful manner, you are called an elitist.
Come on guys, do you truly want to pvp or do you just want a facebook game really where you just log in and play with minimal learning and strategy?
Comments
Don't people do this already? A plan-B is always nice.
Elite Defense Stovokor
Some do, some don't. Some don't bother with the extra BOFF slots on toons. With the current EPtX abilities on Holo, I'd be hardpressed to do it for certain guys. With the new EPtX abilities...something I'm considering doing more off. While the +power is dropping from 30s to 20s, those other buffs (outside of EPtS) are going from 5s to 20s.
so why do beams suck so much power on a cruiser? we should have the power to run them all day long not having to micro manage 3 skills plus consumables plus red matter capacitor to keep power up above 100 where they do good damage nevermind if you actually have to tank and heal your team at the same time, no i got to sit there and watch your weapons power, watch your aux power, watch your team panel, watch what the primary is watch your....
so yea cruisers are not about twitch play, but they are about watching stuff and spamming skills like mad.
reroll to the old power drain mechanics, or give cruisers a slight -to beam array drain. that would go along way to improving the damage of cruiser boats and free up some slots in our bars for team skills, tank etc. and make it less about watching stuff drop and the cd on what skills to keep your damage decent over the course of a long fight.
it also would make cruiser boats really beam boats, and leave escorts cannons as they are.
a slight boost would make beam boats playable again.
or just let everyone mount dual heavies and be done with it look less power drain.
its the ROF thats why, the DHC recharge slightly between shots vs beams which is a loooong constant drain.
easiest way to have an energy cap similar to Eve, where generally bigger ships can have larger amounts of energy to use.
So, it's sporting:
Fore - Experimental, 2x Rom Array Mk XII [Acc]x2, Plasma Array Mk XI [Acc]x2
Aft - Cutting Beam, 2x Rom Array Mk XII [Acc]x2, Plasma Array Mk XI [Acc]x2
2pc MACO, Aegis Engines
EPtW1/EPtS1
SDO(BFI), 3x DCE(EPt), MAS(EWP)
123/100 Weapon Power
So obviously it it 125 and overcapped quickly just from the EPtE1 and the MACO Shields.
What would you expect the Weapon Power to drop down to? Normal, FAW (Single Target), FAW (Multiple Targets), BO?
The original defiant I'm sure many people know was designed to face the Borg, if you research into it further you would find that on its testing faze, it nearly shook itself apart due to the amount of power it had.
By the time sisko gets his, the kinks had been ironed out, it kept the power but got strengthened to cope.
I still think beams should work on a spike damage format to make the more punchy.
But then again, there are plenty of cruiser toons using beams that can quite happily demolish ships.
Stop trying to make cruisers like escorts, the fact is they aren't. Also stop trying to make escorts like shuttles.
http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/articles/defiant-problems.htm
Hrmm, while that covers some of the lack of info - conflicting info - etc, etc, etc in regard to the Defiant... my favorite thing to point out about trying to "source" things as "canon"...is that the "canon" is still fictional.
It's not like you can take the Ford and Chevy out to the mudpit - not like you can setup the AMD machine and the nVidia machine on the workbench - not like you can have two sports teams play - etc, etc, etc.
As a "hero" ship - the Defiant would be invulnerable until such a point that the story required it to be vulnerable. That's no different than any of the "hero" ships. There might be some damage here and there, but it was never significant unless the story required it to be significant.
I mean, c'mon - look at how many ships were obliterated during the Dominion War while the Defiant puttered along fine...until it being destroyed so easily by the Breen. Of course, all those ships getting destroyed...yes...somewhat stock footage, since the same footage was used over and over again.
It wasn't the ship that made the ship special, it was who was on the ship. Sisko & Co. could have been on a Miranda and the same things would have happened. You could interchange any of the ships from any of the series with some minor rewrites and the overall stories would have been the same - wouldn't matter if it was Kirk in a Connie, Picard in a Galaxy, Janeway in an Intrepid, Sisko in a Defiant, or Archer in a NX.
Yes, there's canon...but it's still fiction. It's not...tonight on Modern Marvels, the ships of Starfleet! Yeah...no, not in the least.
So the devs are faced with the issue of trying to balance ships where every ships is a hero ship because on every ship is a hero...the player...the Kirk, Picard, Archer, Janeway, Sisko...on each player ship. While they can make those ships hero ships in PvE against the NPCs - they've got to be a little more realistic about the fantasy and the fiction involved with the ships when balancing them. They've "equated" the Galaxy, Defiant, and Intrepid...put them as the Captain vessels, etc, etc, etc.
Players may have favorites, think X > Y or whatever...point to various things from the shows...but that really doesn't mean squat. Canon? Yes. Real? Lol...no.
Everyone thinks their ship is the 'hero' ship, therefor it should be indestructible.
It gets massively boring when people cry for nerfs to things that simply don't need it because they get destroyed by them.
Beam cruisers are still powerful, so many people seem to think cruisers are the ultimate tool for destruction that are infallible. When ultimately they aren't either, they can be made to be pretty nasty with a combination of good player ability for tanking and the correct setup on stats and boffs.
Lets face it, DHC is designed for one roll, destruction. Beams can be setup for essentially area denial, harassing fire, shield stripping, keeping pressure on certain areas. The escort is the surgical strike, fast and focused.
All the ships are a balancing act, offensive/defensive. Yes, even the 'op' escorts, for maximum damage really you have to sacrifice survivability (but that's where a good team comes in). You want survivability? Well, you have to sacrifice a little bit of offensive.
The bug ship is actually a little bit of an enigma on that but it is available to both factions.
As for Tac toons being OP. you may want to see what a well setup sci toon can do to a good Tac toon! The tacs biggest thing is damage, being able to get it down quick but it last a limited time, 30 seconds as opposed to the SNBs 45 seconds, oh and SNB shuts all those buffs down in one foul swoop. I'm not saying sci is overpowered (although in multiples it gets very tedious very quickly) but Tac isn't OP either. Engineer is UP by a long way.
Say you have Object A. It has Power B which is balanced by Mechanic C. As time goes on, New X is introduced which buffs Power B. At the same time, New Y is introduced which reduces the balancing effect of Mechanic C. Given the way things go, there was also likely New Z added which works really well with Object A. Suddenly Object A no longer appears balanced. People begin to call out for nerfs to Object A.
Object A never changed. Power B was changed by New X and Mechanic C was changed by New Y (as well as New Z having been introduced that's best friends with Object A).
X, Y, & Z...should have taken into account the semblance of balance that existed with Object A with Power B and Mechanic C. X, Y, & Z are what need to be addressed...not Object A.
Thinking that X, Y, & Z apply equally to Object F and Object K doesn't cut it...because they had their own Powers and Mechanics for balancing. How X, Y, & Z interact with each Object is not going to be the same.
That is what some folks believe has been overlooked. To an extent, it's where Cryptic is now trying to make little tweaks here and there...trying to avoid too much of what would be considered nerfing because of the outcry while also trying to avoid too much mudflation which would also result in an outcry, eh? It's a WIP...there's no magic wand.
I was serious in asking this. There's a lot of folks that complain about Cruisers and Beam Weapons...saying that they cause their power to bottom out. That there are issues with the drain mechanics, etc, etc, etc.
So what are people seeing their Weapon Power do that they consider it bottoming out, draining out the wahzoo, etc, etc, etc?
I don't have any HUGE issues with my beamboat power "bottoming out", before I overcapped and added flow regulator consoles (two mk XI purples) I was overcapping and had a power low of 90 or so, put the consoles on and that became 105 using 6 arrays but the damage was only tolerable
Yes, there would be a downside; the way it's been going recently as far as I can tell is that the Borg get tougher and the feds get nerfed, the DHC is really the only thing that can take something apart without taking all day. How many times have you been sitting there trading beam broadsides with a Klingon ship, or any other ship, come to think of it, and thought 'I swear this AI is OP'?
We already have AI popping abilities twice as fast as players are able to (eg. Orion matrons, Borg ships) in both ground and space combat, the last thing we need is for one of the few remaining weapons worth bothering with to become any weaker than they already are.
It seems to me that almost everything AI is getting beefed up and almost everything PC is getting nerfed. Nerfing the DHC is not only pointless but also harms our ability to effectively do anything to the AI.
Simply put, it will NEVER be a good time to nerf the DHC!
You should see the hell that I give intruders just for being on my deck uninvited, get off my guns! :cool:
I'm not THAT difficult to please, I just have a very low tolerance threshold for stupid BS! - George Carlin.
See, that's what I would lean more toward - that the damage itself is off - not necessarily because of drain - but because of the timing/number of shots and how damage is modified.
Because yeah, the majority of time that guy was sitting in the 120s - sometimes in the 100s-110s - might dip into the 90s depending on things fired/what didn't trigger - the BO would drop to 60-70s but I'd be right back up at the usual 100s+.
The base DPV for Beam Arrays is 100. The base DPS for Beams is 80. They fire 4 shots over a 5s period.
The base DPV for DHCs is 174. The base DPS for DHCs is 116. They fire 2 shots over a 3s period.
In a 15s period, the base damage for Beams would be 1200.
In a 15s period, the base damage for DHCs would be 1740.
Take that out to a minute, the base damage for Beams would be 4800.
Take that out to a minute, the base damage for DHCs would be 6960.
Take that out to 15 minutes, the base damage for Beams would be 72000.
Take that out to 15 minutes, the base damage for DHCs would be 104400.
The ratios at the given interval are:
1 shot - 1:1.74
15s - 1:1.45
60s - 1:1.45
15m - 1:1.45
So as you can see, base damage is +45% for DHCs than Arrays. Course that gets into the "balance" of the 45 arc vs. 250 arc, etc, etc, etc. It likely balances out in that sense (before taking into account various changes that have made it easier to keep that 45 arc).
Okay though, we're not running with those Mk 0/TRIBBLE base weapons though - are we? Let's juice things up - equally of course - and see what we get, eh? I'll just be looking at the DPV values for each as each modifier/bonus to the damage is added. This may take a little while (TL-DR area, lol) - but then I'll get into the DPS over a certain period of time (based upon EPtW on Tribble). I'll show the DPV ratio for each step. Remember, it started with a 1:1.74 DPV ratio.
I'll start with 9 in Weapons Training:
Beams (100) + (100 * (0.999 * 0.5)) = 149.95
DHCs (174) + (174 * (0.999 * 0.5)) = 260.913
Ratio - 1:1.74
I'll add in the 9 in Energy Weapons:
Beams (149.95) + (100 * (0.999 * 0.5)) = 199.9
DHCs (260.913) + (174 * (0.999 * 0.5)) = 347.826
Ratio - 1:1.74
I'll make each MK XII:
Beams (199.9) + (100 * 1.2) = 319.9
DHCs (347.826) + (174 * 1.2) = 556.626
Ratio - 1:1.74
I'll make them Ultra Rare, cause Ultra Rare is cool:
Beams (319.9) + (100 * (4 * 0.025)) = 329.9
DHCs (556.626) + (174 * (4 * 0.025)) = 574.026
Ratio - 1:1.74
Since they're UR, I'll give them [Dmg]x2:
Beams (329.9) + (100 * (2 * 0.05)) = 339.9
DHCs (574.026) + (174 * (2 * 0.05)) = 591.426
Ratio - 1:1.74
Let's give them 4x +30% Tac Consoles:
Beams (339.9) + (4 * (100 * 0.30)) = 459.9
DHCs (591.426) + (4 * (174 * 0.30)) = 800.226
Ratio - 1:1.74
We'll take a break here, because those are our new Base DPV values. I'm going to grab a smoke (I highly recommend that you don't - it's bad for your health) and I'll be right back...
...okay then, now we'll get into abilities and Weapon Power, eh? Please note, I'm just doing some spreadsheet warrior stuff here - I'm going to premise it off of two things having been fixed that may or may not have been fixed*. I'm also going to be going with the numbers that one of my guys had, so they may not reflect what your toons show.
First we'll toss the 125 Weapon Power at those numbers:
Beams (459.9) * (1 + ((125-50) * 0.02))) = 1149.75
DHCs (800.226) * (1 + ((125-50) * 0.02))) = 2000.565
Ratio - 1:1.74
Those numbers will be our new number for when we add in the abilities/powers.
So now I'll add in an Attack Pattern Alpha III (+47.1%):
Beams (1149.75) + (1149.75 * 0.471) = 1691.28225
DHCs (2000.565) + (2000.565 * 0.471) = 2942.831115
Ratio - 1:1.74
Then an Attack Pattern Omega I (+14.2%):
Beams (1691.28225) + (1149.75 * 0.142) = 1854.54675
DHCs (2942.831115) + (2000.565 * 0.142) = 3226.911345
Ratio - 1:1.74
We'll add in Go Down Fighting III (+24.9%):
Beams (1854.54675) + (1149.75 * 0.249) = 2140.8345
DHCs (3226.911345) + (2000.565 * 0.249) = 3725.05203
Ratio - 1:1.74
Boom-chakka-lakka and we hit Tactical Fleet II (+30%):
Beams (2140.8345) + (1149.75 * 0.3) = 2485.7595
DHCs (3725.05203) + (2000.565 * 0.3) = 4325.22153
Ratio - 1:1.74
Okay, the next modifier is a Multiplicative Modifier (like Weapon Power) rather than an Additive Modifier (like the majority of them we've seen so far) and that is Emergency Power to Weapons I (+10%):
Beams (2485.7595) * 1.1 = 2734.33545
DHCs (4325.22153) * 1.1 = 4757.743683
Ratio - 1:1.74
I'm going to grab another smoke (honestly, don't smoke kids - it's bad for you - no lie) and come back to do a little analysis and explain why I listed that same ratio so many times...
...it's because that ratio never changes. It would change were you to include Critical Hits and Critical Damage, because of the DHCs +10% CrtD - but I didn't touch Crits, since I didn't feel they were necessary to this level of the discussion.
Okay then, so a little analysis. First, I'm going to round.
Beams DPV - 2734.3
DHCs DPV - 4757.7
What's the DPS?
Beams - 2187.4
DHCs - 3171.8
Which gets us back to that 1:1.45 ratio we had earlier before adding in all the juice!
Given that the EPtW1 buff lasts 20s on Tribble, I'm only going to show the damage for a 15s period rather than all the others.
Beams (15s) Damage - 32811.6
DHCs (15s) Damage - 47577
It still maintains that 1:1.45 ratio we saw earlier as well.
So okay, if the DPV maintains the 1:1.74 and the DPS maintains the 1:1.45...what's the problem?
Standard Beam DPV (100) & Juiced Beam DPV (2734.3)...27.343x the Standard.
Standard DHC DPV (174) & Juiced DHC DPV (4757.7)...27.343x the Standard.
Difference between Standard Beam and Standard DHC DPV...74 damage.
Difference between Juiced Beam and Juiced DHC DPV...2023.4 damage.
Yep, the difference in damage between each shot for the Beam and DHC...while it remains at that 1:1.74 ratio - the actual number, the actual difference in damage is 27.343x that of the Standard when Juiced.
Standard Beam DPS (80) & Juiced Beam DPS (2187.4)...27.343x the Standard.
Standard DHC DPS (116) & Juiced DHC DPS (3171.8)...27.343x the Standard.
Difference between Standard Beam and Standard DHC DPS...36 DPS.
Difference between Juiced Beam and Juiced DHC DPS...984.4 DPS.
Yep, the difference in DPS for the Beam and DHC...while it remains at that 1:1.45 ratio - the actual number, the acutal difference in DPS is 27.343x that of the Standard when Juiced.
So those two ratios remain the same...but...the better the weapons you have, the more skill you have, the better consoles you have, the more power you have available, the better/more abilities you use...the greater the disparity between the two weapons grows.
For the example laid out above...
1:1.74 DPV Ratio saw the difference in DPV go from 74 to 2023.4 DPV.
1:1.45 DPS Ratio saw the difference in DPS go from 36 to 984.4 DPS.
/cough
So uh, one might say that flat ratios may not be the way the Cryptic should have gone with that, eh?
edit: And yes, that was without the Critical Hits/Critical Severity, the difference in drain mechanics, not looking at CRF/CSV vs. BO/FAW, the additional passives from rep, new gear being introduced, the effects of healing as it relates to pressure vs. spike, and all those wonderful things that just add to the disparity between the two weapons...which is supposedly balanced around the difficulty of keeping that 45 arc. /cough Yeah right... /cough
Attribution: The above would not have been possible without discussions with bareel in the following two threads...
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=525111
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=604551
*In the second thread listed above, I noted that there were issues with neither Tactical Fleet not Emergency Power to Weapons providing the correct bonus. I'd have to log in and run the math in game again to see if those have been resolved or not. I'm going to assume for the examples above that those have been resolved. If they have not, please join me in bugging Cryptic to fix them. If they have, please join me in thanking Cryptic for fixing them.
yep, thats that front loaded vs gradual thing in action. beam arrays, and single cannons, should have the same fireing cycle as DHCs, so they are more able to damage for effect, like that superior damage per volley allows.
in pve there actually is no DPS difference between DHCs and DC, except the difference the power level draining makes. npcs dont distribute thier shields, so you dont need frontloaded damage. DHC being so much better is mostly a pvp thing.
It's kind of frightening, in a sense, how many folks have come into the various threads saying things similar, eh? Not what you said, but what the guy you were replying to said.
No doubt I've got PvP builds that are useless in PvE...but that's because PvE doesn't require the quirky stuff that those builds do. NPCs don't do X, Y, Z...so there's no need to have the build that messes with X, Y, Z. But even those guys, I can drop in a ragamuffin Escort and they're more than capable of getting it done in PvE without the best build or gear for it.
There's folks acting as if STO has an actual gear progression thing going on. As if you start regular STFs at 50, get some Mk X/XI STF gear, and then you're ready for ESTFs so you can get Mk XII STF gear. Folks are chewing through ESTFs in blue Mk X stuff FFS...I don't get it.
I understand if you want the 5min run - yeah, you want to go a certain way. But they way some of them are making it out that you need that to get it done in 10-15min? That's insane, I've been in a 5 Eng Cruiser PUG where we've gotten it done with time to spare. Admittedly, heh, we were a little surprised at the time...but yeah, we got it done with time to spare...lol.
cause sometimes its party time!
Do you even Science Bro?
The problem isn't as much DHCs as the secret builds to make them Op. Something that is constantly nerfed when it's anything else. Please see my post on "ALpha STriking"" here: http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=9728051#post9728051
If your post is anything like, "I have a sandwich so you can't be starving" it's time to rethink posting. ~thlaylierah
Lets just play hand bags at 10 paces shall we....
Ooooh ooooh, lets tickle each other to death....
Elite Defense Stovokor
I don't want to buy anything.
*Closes door*
CUUCUUMBEER! "-With slight partigen with it."
Proud member or DPS-800 "-We kill dem mines with our scitter turrets."
in maximum a year from now STO will have Pong like complexity.It will be funny when people will want the ingame minigames nerfed
Ill trade both for a TIF buff :rolleyes:
If this is the case, it's a problem with the Tactical captain class, not DHCs. If DHCs are working fine for everyone else, but are OP on Tac captains, you don't fix this by nerfing DHCs.
Oooh oooh, the borg cube on elite is OP. Nerf it.
Sounds like some people want to RP in PvP instead of understand how it works thoroughly and learn to counter it effectively. Wasn't discovery half the fun in this game when you guys first started playing it?
Remember the days when you sat at the bridge officer trainer, went through each skill, tested it in private with a friend and used it if it felt good in the queues?
With the advent of bootcamp, you dont have to do this no more. You are given the relevant information on a plate. What tends to happen now is that when you try to pass the hard learnt knowledge in a friendly / respectful manner, you are called an elitist.
Come on guys, do you truly want to pvp or do you just want a facebook game really where you just log in and play with minimal learning and strategy?