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Romulan Ship Progression Discussion
vitzh
Member Posts: 519
So I was curious about everyone's thoughts about the way Romulan ships progress? Talking in terms like how the ships act and perform and how you use them, factors such as turn rate and bridge officer layout?
From a New Players Perspective:
I feel like Romulan Warbirds will become quite a nasty shock especially when moving from Mogai to D'Deridex. Centurion>SubCommander the Romulan Warbirds behave and share characteristics similar to an escort/raptor. (high turn rate, cannon loadouts) But importantly, they are Tac/Sci focused and you believe you settle in, knowing what to expect out of Warbirds.
All of a sudden you are taken from this type of ship and stuck in basically an engineer focused space whale. Now if I was a new player I'd be a bit overwhelmed, confused and shocked by this sudden change.
Firstly you have to reconfigure your bridge officers, most likely respec a few. It's a sudden shift to engineer focus.
Then your skills, you may have been configuring for a more science or tac abilities, now you wish you had a respec token for yourself?
Then finally ship setup, you find yourself switching most likely from a cannon build to a beam build in a ship type you've had very little time to get familiar with.
___
So question, anyone think that's a fair assessment or am I underestimating the average new player? I'm just a tad concerned that at Romulan Commander you have what could only be described as a dramatic shift in ship type with no real alternative to change it (Unless you use a cstore ship)
From a New Players Perspective:
I feel like Romulan Warbirds will become quite a nasty shock especially when moving from Mogai to D'Deridex. Centurion>SubCommander the Romulan Warbirds behave and share characteristics similar to an escort/raptor. (high turn rate, cannon loadouts) But importantly, they are Tac/Sci focused and you believe you settle in, knowing what to expect out of Warbirds.
All of a sudden you are taken from this type of ship and stuck in basically an engineer focused space whale. Now if I was a new player I'd be a bit overwhelmed, confused and shocked by this sudden change.
Firstly you have to reconfigure your bridge officers, most likely respec a few. It's a sudden shift to engineer focus.
Then your skills, you may have been configuring for a more science or tac abilities, now you wish you had a respec token for yourself?
Then finally ship setup, you find yourself switching most likely from a cannon build to a beam build in a ship type you've had very little time to get familiar with.
___
So question, anyone think that's a fair assessment or am I underestimating the average new player? I'm just a tad concerned that at Romulan Commander you have what could only be described as a dramatic shift in ship type with no real alternative to change it (Unless you use a cstore ship)
Post edited by vitzh on
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I think they should have ship template, for example you take a mogai, and you choose between engi, sci or tac mogai, with a different BOFF loadout. Once choosen, you can't change back.
Or maybe have commander universal slot.
Of course I can play with my allies ship, for the leveling, but if I play Romulan, I want to play a Romulan ship, not being forced in KDF/fed ships. And anyway, at max lvl, I dont have a choice. D'deridex or pay for an escort.
I feel like I need to pay to play the ship I want, unlike the fed or KDF where I can find a choice of ships without having to pay for them.
Romulan space whale at lower levels? I don't like the idea of that solution but does kinda work.
What Cryptic should consider before releasing anything.
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.
For both faction there is a big choice of free or almost free ship, if you include the mirror ship that are very cheap on the exchange.
As an example, it would be like playing fed, but the only free ships available for lvling are escort, and the T5 free ship is the assault cruiser, while having to pay real money for the escort or sci ship. To be accurate, no sci ship.
At t5, the fed have 2 escort + 2 sci ship + 2 cruiser for free. The romulan 1 cruiser. No sci ship.
I don't like it. You should make one of 2 T5 romulan ship for free to. I know it won't happen, its too late, but it's stupid. When you made this game f2p, you said no content behind a paywall, and the players were not required to pay for an endgame ship, no matter which ship they used.
For the Romulan, they will.
What next ?
Anyway, it doesn't change what I said
You can't expect to have everything you want simply because you want it.
And I'm not saying all ships should be free or some nonsense. Just 1 more so people can choose between 2 ships. And I didnt even said which one, so that's not because I want it for free. In fact, I'm hoarding zen, so I will be able to "pay" for whatever ship I want.
I'm just saying it's not fair, compared to others factions. And according to cryptic, Romulan are not a minifaction. And it won't help for the health of this faction to lock ships behind a paywall.
There's just no way for Cryptic to give away that many free ship choices - especially when there aren't that many canon Rom ships types to choose from.
Probably because the idea this could happen is an insane suggestion based around a fairy tale where Cryptic magically stops working entirely on the FED side of the game for over a year.
It's not a realistic goal. Nor should it be.
Clearly there need to be more Romulan ships at some stage. I won't actually get worried unless we're sitting here a year from now still wondering where the science ship is. If that day comes, well... yeah.
"We are smart." - Grebnedlog
Member of Alliance Central Command/boq botlhra'ghom
We have both Enterprise era and TOS era "Warbirds" (actually are Bird-of-Preys but name changed to seperate them from KDF's B'rel Class Bird of Preys), D'deridex Cruiser, and the Mogai. Almost all the official "warships" that are seen are available. Only the D7, which is also a KDF ship, is "missing." (Actually it's also a Tier 3 KDF ship, as the K't'inga Battle Cruiser.)
The Narada which is a modified mining vessel, which could be as powerful as 2409's Tuffli cargo ship, A scout/Science vessel and the Scimitar, are missing. According to UGC Podcast with Capt. Gecko: Scimitar is being worked on to be playable. (It's a NPC in the game.. you'll find one in KASE, but don't get too close.)
There is also a Drone ship, which is said to be based on the 22nd (Enterprise era) Warbird class.
This page has just about every ship shown on screen: http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/schematics/romulan_ships.htm
For Star Trek: Armada, only two ships came from the series. Romulan only had two offical ships, the Scout and the D'deridex, the least of any faction in game. It's actually a bit tricky to work out which ship was what when you're playing the game.
There need art and systems guys to create a lot of new ships. I'd expect new free ships will be added, as well as any "pay" one.
http://sto.perfectworld.com/news/?p=858671
T'liss/T'varo - for those that enjoy flying Raiders.
Dhelan/Dhael - for those that enjoy flying Escorts.
Mogai/Valdore - for those that enjoy flying Destroyers.
D'Deridex/D'ridthau - for those that enjoy flying Battle Cruisers.
Ha'apax - for those that enjoy flying Cruisers
Okay, so for the Ha'apax they don't actually say that in the blog. However, based on the turn rate, etc, etc, etc - c'mon, it's most like a Fed Cruiser, eh? Less maneuverable, but still...
Which brings up an issue with the D'Deridex - cause it's way too slow for those that enjoy flying Battle Cruisers. It too is more like a Fed Cruiser. Perhaps one could make the stretch to a Bortas/Bortasqu'...but that's a stretch. It doesn't have the stats to suggest it flies anything like a Kamarag, Vor'cha, Mirror Vor'cha, Negh'Var, Tor'Kaht, etc, etc, etc.
So if they were to add the bit about the Ha'apax and make the D'Deridex actually like a Battle Cruiser...then, you know - they've got a nice little thing going for them, no?
Raider->Escort->Destroyer->Battle Cruiser->Cruiser...you get to dork around with each along the way, eh?
Cause at T5, you're going to get to pick:
T'varo Light Warbird Retrofit, Dhelan Warbird Retrofit, Mogai Heavy Warbird Retrofit, D'Deridex Warbird Battle Cruiser Retrofit, Fleet T'varo Light Warbird Retrofit, Fleet Dhelan Warbird Retrofit, Fleet Mogai Heavy Warbird Retrofit, Fleet D'Deridex Warbird Battle Cruiser Retrofit, Fleet Ha'apax Advanced Warbird, Fleet Ha'apax Advanced Warbird Refit...
...plus whatever additional ships are made available at, near, shortly after, eventually after launch.
Yes, there are those that already have or those that will likely already have a preference on the type of ship they level with. There are going to be those that enjoy the zipzipboom of leveling with an Escort to get it done as fast as possible. They can grab their ally's equivalent ships along the way, eh?
Some of the complaints are understandable, they're quality of life things. Not everybody is going to blow through it in a weekend (that's without skipping text - I mean, it just doesn't take that long to level in games these days - folks don't have the patience for it and game companies have recognized that long ago...unfortunately, imho).
It just wouldn't be very cost effective for them to offer more ships along the way...it was one thing for the Fed/KDF back before the F2P conversion - but face it, it wasn't long after the F2P conversion that they did the changes to the T1-4 ship consoles...they needed to sell the ships and generate some revenue.
As for the comments about Engineers, those have me scratching my head. Sure it would be one thing to say you want the Cruiser experience from 1-50, but uh...an Engineer is not a Cruiser.
That's one thing I don't understand about people. Engineers do NOT have to fly cruisers. Try an Engineer in an Escort and it becomes pretty much indestructible. In fact I'd go as far to say that Tac's do better in Cruisers than Engineers.
Think problem I poorly stated is that you have no real option to fly one class of ship from 1-50. eg you can't fly an escort/raptor like ship and can't fly a cruiser like ship and the change seems pretty much forced on you. That's my only real concern and from a new players perspective it's a bit disastrous. I bet you start seeing new players to the game using Sub Commander Mogai's all the way up to lvl 50.
What Cryptic should consider before releasing anything.
My engineer flies a science ship and does a pretty dang good job at it. I use the eng skills to cover some of the defense while I focus the BOff skills on crowd control and exotic damage. (Murderball combo ftw!)
I'm guessing the devs' mindset here is that, in the long run, the 10 levels from 30-40 is a tiny, tiny period in the long run of the character, and by doing it this way, they give the players experience with the full range of Warbirds before letting them pick their preferred playstyle at 40 (for Zen, of course, unless they like the Ha'apax). I won't ENJOY it, but I can see the reason for it, and when I've had my Romulan VA for a year, I doubt I'll be standing on the bridge of my Mogai Retrofit thinking back with rage to those few days I had to fly a D'deridex while levelling.
...I use "fly" in a very loose sense when it comes to the D'deridex and its turn rate. :P
They don't want Rom players to spend a week between 10 and 19. They expect you to get there in a few /played hours and move on. The first 40 levels are just a few hours of teaching you about the different Rom ships so you can decide what you want to use during the "real" content: end-game.
There are far more romulan ships in canon then you relise
1) D'deridex
2) Draconarious class warbird
3) Lanora class Scout ship
4) Vas'delatham class warbird (Replaced the T'liss and smaller warbirds in defensive roles better known as the defender becuase it was commonly used for starbase defense and patrol craft)
Ok gonna stop posting pics here and just name them you look up what they look like
5) D-7
6) D'Shara class (Not certin its canon but it looks nice )
7) Raptor class warbird
8) Aye Mosaram class warbird
9) D'Talla warbird
well you get the idea theres alot of romulan ships that could be added at a later date but to say there isnt that many is not factual.
well anyways theres some i dug up enjoy
I think you proved the point of the person you were replying to there. 2,3,4,6,8, and 9 are not canon. Many are in beta [non-screen] canon, but that isn't accessible to Cryptic that easily.
This is STO so canon isnt a big issue
LOL cannot argue with you there
Time to start saving my gold coin aka zen for those ships ....then again knowing me id see a new shiny and blow my stash of coin on it XD
Actually, yes it is. Cryptic's license is only for stuff that has appeared in screen-canon. They have to negotiate with other IP holders to gain access to stuff that was introduced in other video games or novels. They have done it before [see the Vesta
I don't think it will attract a lot of player to this faction, as it's released last, and you'll have to pay real money for something else than a cruiser for endgame. I don't think it will help, as less people will play Romulan regularly, and thus, even less people will buy the cstore ship they'll release. You basically need to make people want to play Romulan, and probably leave their fed/KDF full of gear for a new character that will need a lot of grinding, not make they run away once they reach 50.
I fail to see how this is "fair". And no, it's not a minifaction, it's a major faction, just ask cryptic, they never said the contrary, no matter what you feel about it.
I just said 2 ship for free, which would mean half the amount of free ship for KDF, would be fair. They would still miss a sci ship, but later they can release a carrier or a sci ship for the romulan.
And I'm not even complaining for myself, as I will buy a cstore ship with my zen (got around 6500, should be enough), not because I'll be forced to, but it was already my decision before playing the Romulan. I was just trying to make a constructive comment.
As you can see I only talked about endgame.
On a side note, about engineer in cruiser, my engineer never played a cruiser, and I fly an escort
The Rom experience is to entertain you and to give you a story to get you to 50 quickly. From then on it's a grind/buy experience. No one cares about having 5 ships at T2, because you'll only be there 4ish hours and then you need a T3 ship.
Who won't be quickly opening the C-store to buy something that turns better? :P
Ok now i know your a true trekkie thinking a a game like STO has to be 100% canonical in a sci fi based MMO even one that has themes there is always room for imaginitive thinking.
usually aslong as it goes along with the theme or title then all involved will be ok with adding non canon ships.
And if STO was canonical then cruiser would be the gun platforms they were meant to be escorts wuld not be the answer to all things BOOM and we would be doing more exploring and less fighting.
So anyways when you use a canonical ship or whatever thats when you run into legal issues and what not because usually those items are trademarked already.
Thing is then, wouldn't the progression (also taking in to account the blog) be something like:
T1 Raider 20ish Turn
T2 Escort 16-17ish Turn
T3 Destroyer 13-14ish Turn
T4 Battle Cruiser 9-10ish Turn
T5(RA) Cruiser 6-7ish Turn
Instead, we've got the following (currently):
T1 T'liss 18 Turn
T2 Dhelan 16 Turn
T3 Mogai 14 Turn
T4 D'Deridex 5.5ish Turn
T5 Ha'apax 5.5?ish Turn
It's a pretty hefty jump from T3 to T4. They should have said they were like Bortas/Bortasqu' Battle Cruisers, eh? There's not the 9, 10, 10.5, nor 11 of the Battle Cruisers folks tend actually to fly in there.
Which oddly fits in with some of the complaints about the D'Deridex: that it should turn more like a Negh'Var or Vor'cha than a Bortasqu'...
Course, if they put the D'Deridex at 9ish - it would tick the Galaxy folks off even more, eh?
But this thread's not really about ship specifics, so to speak - so the D'Deridex itself doesn't really matter. There's just a gap there, could be an entirely different ship - that's mising between that 14 Turn and the 5.5 Turn... to give players the experience of flying in different ships compared to what their friends may be flying in Fed/KDF ships.
Course, with that ship not existing - it would also not exist at T5 - so they wouldn't need to experience it to help make a selection where it wasn't a selection.
Old players/current players - that have experienced the differences can look at it and go...hrmm, wtf? The new player, going from that Mogai to the D'Deridex could likely go...HRMMMMMM, WTFUXXORMAN? THIS IS.../cough, you get the picture.
Another issue that arises is there being a single type of ship available.
T'liss
X
X
X
Dhelan
X, X
X
X
X
Mogai
X, X, X
X, X
X, X
X
D'Deridex
X, X
X, X, X, X
X, X
X, X
Ha'apax
X, X
X
X, X, X, X
X, X, X
X, X
Starts off with that one of each with the T'liss. Then the player is given a higher ranked Tac and an additional Sci with the Dhelan. The Mogai allows the player to enter the world of APO while adding a higher ranked Sci as well...
...then bam! Drop that Tac down, remove a Sci, and add a Commander Eng? Like...wut? Not only has that player gone from being able to turn to being able to wait for the Universe to turn around them...they've also been introduced to the wonderful world of there's not enough Eng BOFF abilities and the raging discussion on the EPtX changes.
After that bounce into the D'Deridex, they then hit up the Ha'apax with the additional En Tac and the Lt Eng going LCdr. Course, at this point they can pick up their RA T'varo...
In the Ship Vendor, there is a Haakona Advanced Warbird listed as a Zen Ship. This ship is not listed on the dev blog about ship progression. It's an upgraded version of the Ha'apax. There are two Fleet versions available with a T5 shipyard of the Ha'apax...the second of which says that it is Science focused. So I'm not sure where the Haakona listed in the Ship Vendor fits in.
I bring that up because...it's the only ship shown in the Ship Vendor that can actually have higher than Lt Sci. It's got a LCdr Uni (no other Sci BOFF). The Mogai Retrofit has a Lt Sci and a Lt Uni you could use two have 2x Lt Sci...if you don't mind flying with a single En Eng, eh?
There are:
16 Tactical BOFF abilities
14 Engineering BOFF abilities
18 Science BOFF abilities
Outside of the WIP Haakona, no Warbird is going to have access to Gravity Well, Photonic Shockwave, nor Viral Matrix.
Getting back to that move from Mogai to D'Deridex...
Tac: going from 3 choices of 16 abilities to 2 choices of 15
Sci: going from 3 choices of 15 abilities to 2 choices of 15
Eng: going from 2 choices of 12 abilities to 6 choices of 14
So not only are they going from the being able to turn to the...maybe I'll go make a cup of tea; but they're also going from a progression of BOFF abilities to a...wut da eff just happened?
Will be interesting to see if there are any additional changes before the launch of LoR in regard to these WIPs, eh?