Hey guys n gals. I pretty much love support roles, one I fill out decently I think as an engi. 7 out of my 10 (i think I have ten, cant check atm) are engineering toons. My main is a toon that I invested a ton in.
Recently though I wonder what is it with the posts regarding how 'engis aren't welcome' in teams, group lessons, etc.
Have they become that bad? I did notice that their rate was self preservation was less than the dps that could be unleashed on them (just mo). I used to fly the sci oddy, then the recluse *really just dislike playing a non fed ship* So now I fly a fleet ambassador as a support healer with Scramble support (no doffs). The added boost to jam sensors on an opposing tac focused on me does well to negate their initial strike. The scramble lets me to hump and messup an opposing healer.
I havent been playing premade competively recently (slower net connection), but was curious on people's thoughts and what they recommend to bring back some engi love.
Can a sci do the same support and have the same tankiness as an engi healer now? (so a team with another snb is more beneficial than an eng without?
Problem is you don't win a match by not dying. You win a match by killing more then you die.
Sci brings more debuff (nuke and scan are so much better then eps and nadion its a joke).... and heals that in fact are group heals like Sci fleet and Damp Field... instead of self buffs that do nothing at all for a team. You can say ya it allows me to slot more heals... but that just isn't true anymore.
Tac brings more dps.
Both Tac and Sci will tank 90% as well as an engi.
Both Tac and Sci will tank 100% as well if they work together.
Makes Engi sort of redundant as far as optimal team goes.
There isn't just one thing to point at and blame... its a year or so of item and rep power creep that simply makes engi pointless.
Can a sci do the same support and have the same tankiness as an engi healer now? (so a team with another snb is more beneficial than an eng without?
The same support, yes.
As tanky, not necessarily alone but the game of premade PvP is cross-healing.
No one really survives on their own, so a self-focused mitigator isn't as useful as a Sci in that circumstance.
I'm going to go somewhat against the grain and say that they aren't "useless" technically speaking, and rather they are "not optimal".
Unfortunately premade pvp is survival of the fittest when it comes to game mechanics, and that requires choices to be optimal for them to have a place on a team.
The problem with Engi in team PvP is that nearly all of their skills are entirely selfish and contribute nothing to the team, and those that aren't are obsolete (EPS) or TRIBBLE (Eng Fleet).
On top of that, they also pose no real threat to the enemy. A Tac Captain can kill people. An Eng Captain won't.
On top of that, Engineers don't really do anything unique. They can heal...themselves. They can boost power levels...but so can a whole raft of other skills, procs, and doffs. They can reduce energy drain...as can a raft of equipment and doffs. The apparent schtick of an Engineer in space is that they are the masters of Power....but power levels are capped at 125, and an Engineer is unable to change this. Since critical systems are generally already running at those levels, an engineer provides little. The only thing an engineer can do is hard-capped, whereas there is no limit on how much damage a Tactical captain can cause or how many buffs a Science captain can remove.
So, an engineering captain contributes nothing in the PvP environment and anyone who succeeds as an engineering captain is doing so in spite of, not because of, being an engineer.
Aww well that's a little disheartening, but that does make more sense. So only possible fixes are either decreasing tankability and healing capability of other classes? changing the captain engi abilities somehow? other? I'm pretty sure there will be folks that would rage against the former suggestion (thats all it is, a suggestion), so I am all ears about how you guys would fix it (or if you have ideas for more team beneficial classes. My logic was usually, if an engi is less likely to die, than the rest of the team is less likely to die because they have heals.
I'm just tossing ideas and random things out there for people to work with. It's also the main reason I swapped to the amby build, just trying to make an engi setup that would be more acceptable/likeable/useful for some of these new team setups. Any other engies, feel free to peep in if you have the same experience or maybe some fixers for our predicament.
It seems to be that the meat of what they're lacking, is an offensive captain skill or even just an ability that isn't replicatable by boff abilities. What would you change or make as a captain skill for an engi? (I would keep the ep transfer useable for self or other person, especially if that other person needs it while being focused. the nadeon seems not as useful, I would probably change that to something else then. Any ideas?
EDIT: replace an occurances of "useless" in my posts with "not optimal" per suggestion
fleet ships in particular killed off the need for tankiness. but even before then an engineer was only good for keeping the enemy busy until they found softer targets.
if engineering fleet gave a speed boost and miracle worker could be applied to a teammate that would go a long way to making engineering more useful
fleet ships in particular killed off the need for tankiness. but even before then an engineer was only good for keeping the enemy busy until they found softer targets.
if engineering fleet gave a speed boost and miracle worker could be applied to a teammate that would go a long way to making engineering more useful
-speed boost = increase the tankiness of speed boost using classes? im 50/50 on that, I do like it, just not sure how much more that would stack on a tac ship :P.
-miracle worker on other people = pretty neat imo, and since it doesnt add any resist bonuses and just does a straight up heal, it wouldn't be too op at all. neato
Edit: another idea, Front Line = proximity draw fire (either activated or passive). depend on one's proximity to an allied ship, the engineer captain will be able to take some of the damage unto themselves. (or maybe just as a target ally, press button, redirect damage to self) idk how one would code that or how much would be involved.
Engineers are designed as self focused mitigators. (Tanks)
They do in fact do exactly that, very well.
Unfortunately that role has very little value to premade PvP teams.
The role has little use in pve also, 89 threat, top level gear, and 2 threat increasing consoles and I still have a few tacticals that can grab aggro from me.
not that I really need to grab aggro, as escort fleet ships can tank well enough for pve anyway
-speed boost = increase the tankiness of speed boost using classes? im 50/50 on that, I do like it, just not sure how much more that would stack on a tac ship :P. [/QUOTE]
true, I was thinking of something that would fit the career. Perhaps instead a flat power bonus to all subsystems? say 5-10 for the team
-speed boost = increase the tankiness of speed boost using classes? im 50/50 on that, I do like it, just not sure how much more that would stack on a tac ship :P.
true, I was thinking of something that would fit the career. Perhaps instead a flat power bonus to all subsystems? say 5-10 for the team[/QUOTE]
Haha that is kind of neat, so basically the engineer becomes a giant battery. Damn, the idea of team batteries already existing just popped into my head, it's still a neat idea though.
IMO I would make changes that would be unpopular with some of the pve crowd.
However I think its time Cryptic admits this game doesn't really have tanks in PvE either.
Lets all be honest now how many times have you Puged any of the STFs... seen 1-3 Engi cruisers and let out the sigh. Its no fun taking 3x as long to finish a 5-7min mission.
I mean Cryptic had to add +threat consoles recently to even be able to pretend tanking was possible... and lets be honest 90% of the PvE engi players all sloted -threat units instead. lol
What I would do would make changes... that would reinforce the healer role... add some debuff... and make them useful in a team... AND in PvE.
EPS Transfer.... Have EPS raise the power cap to 140 for Shields Engines and Aux. (we would leave weapons out... we don't need every team with one engi feeding the one spike scort overload juice. However a overcap for self or tossed as a super heal buffer would be nice... and the aux overcap might be a nice buff to a sci teammate)
Nadion... See ya wouldn't wanna be ya... DELETE.
Replacement for Nadion
Nanite Field
-AOE 5k
- Provide a 100 point resistance boost to all friendly units in range.
- Provide a 50 point resistance debuff to all enemy units in range.
(this would be a dual purpose skill... both providing resistance like sci damp field... as well as a dmg boost through debuff)
M Worker.
- Make it castable
- reduce the cool down 25%
- make it resist sub nukes for 10s. (not clear just resist)
(this would make engis the ultimate team healer, allowing them to protect against multiple subnukes... not sure if this might not make games last forever... but I think it could work)
Rotate Shield Freq
- Make this skill Castable ONLY
- When cast... the caster receives the current RSF effect
- The friendy target has "Phase retraction mode" engaged on them reducing all dmg by 15% for the duration of the engi RSF
So that would be my perfect Engi....
The RSF would encourage team work... and be a team buff with out giving up any self healing.
M. Worker give engi healer something unique... allowing them to stop the chain nukes.
The nadion replacement (lets be honest Cryptic has killed it off with the Omega Amp proc) would give engis more dmg... and more important that dmg boost would be a team boost just like Sensor scan.
The EPS changes would again make the engi EPS a buff that you want to have thrown on you, or used by the engi themselves to super boost either sci boff attacks or just regen shielding ect.
What would you change or make as a captain skill for an engi?
Assuming the current game model, engineer needs a damage boosting ability of significant power.
The current design seems to be that Tac wins by killing fast and loses by dying fast, while Eng wins by dying slow and loses by killing slow. The downfall with this is that tac has access to the same BOFF abilities that let eng die slowly (2x EPtS, an Engi Team, and whatever Sci skills), but the Engi does not have access to the Tact abilities that let it kill quickly (BFaW is not a significant damage booster, APB1/APD1 are marginal, and that is your available set of choices).
Engi needs access to something that is the equivalent of APA or FOMM. EPS almost does it, but its not enough to overcome the other issues. It really needs some way to improve damage output in the same way that tac can improve damage mitigation.
edit--an option would be a Commander-level Engi BOFF ability that improves the performance of beam weapons (only)
To be fair to Renim, he tends to PUG or do PUGmades a lot, and probably in many situations where there is much less cross-healing than in Premade PvP.
He can't count on the support of others, and opponent PUG teams don't require chain SNB coordinated with Alpha strikes to score kills on.
So this is actually the area where I think Eng actually has a role.
thats what i have said. an eng has a strength as a pug healer, were there is no other healers around to prop each other up. in premades there is that co healing, so the eng has no advantage in that situation
i think the current state of eng, being the best tank, is totally misguided. it shouldn't be about that at all, thats basically useless. heres what i would do to eng, make them an energy sorcerer, not a repair man. but, energy hard caps cut an eng off at the kneecaps in terms of effective energy manipulation, thus the first change.
-an always on 150 power effect cap for all 4 subsystems. maybe from a trait or something, but its always on and just for the eng captain.
-nadion becoming an AOE field skill that reduces energy drain the way it does now, and grants immunity to siphon drone drain.
-EPS transfer, with the first change, this will be much more useful as is. but, it should also have the effect of everyone of the EPt skills, at half magnitude of the version 1 of that power.
-MW being castable, but the heal cut in half, and providing a 15 second immunity to SNB. this would be helpful for protecting an escort using a highly buffed GDF, or help protect a target from chain SNBs, and do a WHOLE lot for eng usefulness on a team.
-RSF effects cut in half, but once activated activates on all your team mates at once
the 150 power effect cap would allow an eng actual synergy in everything finally, like a tac or sci already has. remember, its not exactly going to be easy to get a subsystem up to 150 power, even with all the power buffs thee are now.
for weapons, he could deal stronger pressure damage in whatever he is in, it would be a higher plateau of damage, not spiky like a tac captain, and not based on debuffs like a sci. he could have the strongest shield resistance with more shield power, at this point i hardly think thats to much of a concern. its not that hard to cap your shield res already. an eng could have the fastest engines too, thats just canon, eng officers making engines go as fast as possible lol. he could also buff aux levels highest, and have synergy with sci skills, buffing effect the highest amount. like i said, energy sorcerers, not zombie tanks.
Engies have their place in space and on ground. I have seem some are better engies than others. But play an engie in a team based map long enough you will see there usefulness.
My engie on the ground, depending on the kit can rack up more dps than what you would think. I can also out heal, (tank) depending on the kit than most scis.
IMHO anyone who thinks Engineers are useless hasn't been on a team with a good one often enough.
Does that mean the Profession can't or shouldn't be improved? Of course not.
My preferred team is still:
Tac in a nifty quick escort (i.e. Defiant/Bug/BoP)
Tac in something a little more versatile =(MVAE/Armitage/Raptor etc.)
Sci set up for Debuffs/CC
Sci set up for Damage/CC/maybe some healing
Eng in a healboat with the skill to manage helping with spam clearing
I would personally rather face a team who has a Sci as primary healer than a really good Eng. Sci healer will be easier to kill, make the damage dealers easy targets.
There was this neat system they used for tanks in WAR for pvp which actually made taunt kind of useful. You would taunt a player and unless he targeted the player who taunted him, the tank (perhaps the team as well, I don't remember its been a while) would do more damage to him, ie his resistance was lowered. It only lasted about 15 seconds or so, and it 5times to clear it or something.
Just a thought.
Another thing I have thought about but never really mentioned, but nows a good a time as any, was to change Rotate Shield Freq. To Rotate Weapon Freq. and make it give some kind of bleedthrough bonus. I hate the idea of turning ANOTHER eng power into a dumbed down boff power though, and DEM isn't very good with beams so I've never really braught it up before. I also hate making it a direct dmg boost though so I dunno.
I would think an engi healer in a recluse would work really well. Boost shields and aux, chug EPtS and EPtA as needed, etc. Sci healing only cares about AUX power, and the heal skills are same for engi heal skills, so... immortal healer
With the current list of new traits on tribble ENG will become number 1 healer again I thinks. +10 power to every subsystem all the time is pretty freaking useful. It will take time but I really do think this will come to pass.
Give Engineers a "taunt" skill in space that makes enemies lock target on them for a few seconds.
Problem solved.
:P
Despite being non-canon and unrealistic, it would be a great mechanism for Engi's now. It would make a Engi-Cruiser viable especially combined with Feedback Pulse.
As for my idea, I'd say: Why not take some ideas from Ground Play and put them in space? Engineers are masters of dropping in support through unit fabrications. Why not give them some of that power in space? I know we can deploy turrets and what not through devices, but we have the same with batteries (emergency powers), why not turrets/drones? This could even extend as much as to creating more BOff powers that support their space unit fabrications.
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Despite being non-canon and unrealistic, it would be a great mechanism for Engi's now. It would make a Engi-Cruiser viable especially combined with Feedback Pulse.
As for my idea, I'd say: Why not take some ideas from Ground Play and put them in space? Engineers are masters of dropping in support through unit fabrications. Why not give them some of that power in space? I know we can deploy turrets and what not through devices, but we have the same with batteries (emergency powers), why not turrets/drones? This could even extend as much as to creating more BOff powers that support their space unit fabrications.
Ask a sci how awesome photonic fleet is. It would just as effective really.
thats what i have said. an eng has a strength as a pug healer, were there is no other healers around to prop each other up.
I realize I'm a little late to the discussion, but Drunk and Ultimatum pretty much summed up my thoughts on the utility of Engineers. (I wrote up some of my thoughts on my healboat in Drunk's PvP help thread.)
Engineers come with one great emergency button (RSF) and two mediocre emergency heals/resists (MW, Eng Fleet). This makes the Engineer perfect for me as a pug healer: I can't rely on any heals from other people on my team, and my own heals may be on cooldown when I suddenly get focused, so the built-in heals that Engineers come with allow me to survive against most things. (They also provide great resilience against one or two SNBs; this is crucial, since I can't rely on ST or TT from my teammates.)
Against most pugs, playing as an Engineer means that my healboat simply will not die -- this allows me to concentrate more on healing my teammates.
Unfortunately, that still means that Engineer has two dud abilities, at least as far as my pug healboat is concerned: EPS Power Transfer and Nadion Inversion. I run max power in shields and aux usually, and I already have 9 ranks in Power Insulators for a more reliable power drain resist. They pretty much only get popped if I'm being hit with some energy drain build; the rest of the time, they're just taking up tray space.
in premades there is that co healing, so the eng has no advantage in that situation
Drunk's hit the point perfectly here: in most premades, cross-healing is strong enough to keep most people alive. A Sci captain's bag of dirty tricks would be more useful than the self-heals that Engineers get. (I don't think I need to mention how little use EPS Power Transfer and Engineering Fleet get in a team...)
When OPvP makes pugmades, I can usually pull my weight -- but there've been quite a few cases when an extra SNB on the team would have been more useful than the RSF I bring for myself.
People coming up with builds and strategies that only "work" on pug teams is part of the reason pug teams suck so badly. Puggers play with the the assumption that the rest of their team are incompetent, greedy nincompoops. It's a self fulfilling prophecy.
I don't pug often, but when I do I take my premade build and it works just fine.
People coming up with builds and strategies that only "work" on pug teams is part of the reason pug teams suck so badly. Puggers play with the the assumption that the rest of their team are incompetent, greedy nincompoops. It's a self fulfilling prophecy.
I don't pug often, but when I do I take my premade build and it works just fine.
Would you say premade builds run higher damage but are squishier because of the dependence on crosshealing...while...PUG builds run lower damage while trying to be tankier, yet even though they may have oodles of self/ally buffs - it's rare that they'll get used on an ally?
Would you say premade builds run higher damage but are squishier because of the dependence on crosshealing...while...PUG builds run lower damage while trying to be tankier, yet even though they may have oodles of self/ally buffs - it's rare that they'll get used on an ally?
That's assuming someone is running an escort. Premade builds are more min/maxed and less selfish -- more team aware. Pug builds are more (often to an extreme extent) selfish and generalized. If you find yourself aiming towards the later instead of the former you're setting yourself up to fail and creating bad habits as you go.
Maybe Jorf. But obviously majority of the players does not give a damn about premades
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Maybe Jorf. But obviously majority of the players does not give a damn about premades
And that doesn't change the fact that everything else being equal, a team of selfish players with "pug builds" will always lose to a team of less selfish players who try to fit into team focused roles.
PvP builds are better for PvE than the builds that PvErs make, though most PvErs are in flat out denial about this.
Premade builds are better for pugging than the builds that puggers make, though most puggers are in flat out denial about this too.
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Problem is you don't win a match by not dying. You win a match by killing more then you die.
Sci brings more debuff (nuke and scan are so much better then eps and nadion its a joke).... and heals that in fact are group heals like Sci fleet and Damp Field... instead of self buffs that do nothing at all for a team. You can say ya it allows me to slot more heals... but that just isn't true anymore.
Tac brings more dps.
Both Tac and Sci will tank 90% as well as an engi.
Both Tac and Sci will tank 100% as well if they work together.
Makes Engi sort of redundant as far as optimal team goes.
There isn't just one thing to point at and blame... its a year or so of item and rep power creep that simply makes engi pointless.
The same support, yes.
As tanky, not necessarily alone but the game of premade PvP is cross-healing.
No one really survives on their own, so a self-focused mitigator isn't as useful as a Sci in that circumstance.
I'm going to go somewhat against the grain and say that they aren't "useless" technically speaking, and rather they are "not optimal".
Unfortunately premade pvp is survival of the fittest when it comes to game mechanics, and that requires choices to be optimal for them to have a place on a team.
It's design intent as well.
As much as all of us love PvP, this game is a PvE game first and foremost.
The developers primarily know PvE.
Engineers are designed as self focused mitigators. (Tanks)
They do in fact do exactly that, very well.
Unfortunately that role has very little value to premade PvP teams.
On top of that, they also pose no real threat to the enemy. A Tac Captain can kill people. An Eng Captain won't.
On top of that, Engineers don't really do anything unique. They can heal...themselves. They can boost power levels...but so can a whole raft of other skills, procs, and doffs. They can reduce energy drain...as can a raft of equipment and doffs. The apparent schtick of an Engineer in space is that they are the masters of Power....but power levels are capped at 125, and an Engineer is unable to change this. Since critical systems are generally already running at those levels, an engineer provides little. The only thing an engineer can do is hard-capped, whereas there is no limit on how much damage a Tactical captain can cause or how many buffs a Science captain can remove.
So, an engineering captain contributes nothing in the PvP environment and anyone who succeeds as an engineering captain is doing so in spite of, not because of, being an engineer.
I'm just tossing ideas and random things out there for people to work with. It's also the main reason I swapped to the amby build, just trying to make an engi setup that would be more acceptable/likeable/useful for some of these new team setups. Any other engies, feel free to peep in if you have the same experience or maybe some fixers for our predicament.
It seems to be that the meat of what they're lacking, is an offensive captain skill or even just an ability that isn't replicatable by boff abilities. What would you change or make as a captain skill for an engi? (I would keep the ep transfer useable for self or other person, especially if that other person needs it while being focused. the nadeon seems not as useful, I would probably change that to something else then. Any ideas?
EDIT: replace an occurances of "useless" in my posts with "not optimal" per suggestion
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That's a great line.
fleet ships in particular killed off the need for tankiness. but even before then an engineer was only good for keeping the enemy busy until they found softer targets.
if engineering fleet gave a speed boost and miracle worker could be applied to a teammate that would go a long way to making engineering more useful
-speed boost = increase the tankiness of speed boost using classes? im 50/50 on that, I do like it, just not sure how much more that would stack on a tac ship :P.
-miracle worker on other people = pretty neat imo, and since it doesnt add any resist bonuses and just does a straight up heal, it wouldn't be too op at all. neato
Edit: another idea, Front Line = proximity draw fire (either activated or passive). depend on one's proximity to an allied ship, the engineer captain will be able to take some of the damage unto themselves. (or maybe just as a target ally, press button, redirect damage to self) idk how one would code that or how much would be involved.
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The role has little use in pve also, 89 threat, top level gear, and 2 threat increasing consoles and I still have a few tacticals that can grab aggro from me.
not that I really need to grab aggro, as escort fleet ships can tank well enough for pve anyway
[/QUOTE]
true, I was thinking of something that would fit the career. Perhaps instead a flat power bonus to all subsystems? say 5-10 for the team
true, I was thinking of something that would fit the career. Perhaps instead a flat power bonus to all subsystems? say 5-10 for the team[/QUOTE]
Haha that is kind of neat, so basically the engineer becomes a giant battery. Damn, the idea of team batteries already existing just popped into my head, it's still a neat idea though.
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However I think its time Cryptic admits this game doesn't really have tanks in PvE either.
Lets all be honest now how many times have you Puged any of the STFs... seen 1-3 Engi cruisers and let out the sigh. Its no fun taking 3x as long to finish a 5-7min mission.
I mean Cryptic had to add +threat consoles recently to even be able to pretend tanking was possible... and lets be honest 90% of the PvE engi players all sloted -threat units instead. lol
What I would do would make changes... that would reinforce the healer role... add some debuff... and make them useful in a team... AND in PvE.
EPS Transfer.... Have EPS raise the power cap to 140 for Shields Engines and Aux. (we would leave weapons out... we don't need every team with one engi feeding the one spike scort overload juice. However a overcap for self or tossed as a super heal buffer would be nice... and the aux overcap might be a nice buff to a sci teammate)
Nadion... See ya wouldn't wanna be ya... DELETE.
Replacement for Nadion
Nanite Field
-AOE 5k
- Provide a 100 point resistance boost to all friendly units in range.
- Provide a 50 point resistance debuff to all enemy units in range.
(this would be a dual purpose skill... both providing resistance like sci damp field... as well as a dmg boost through debuff)
M Worker.
- Make it castable
- reduce the cool down 25%
- make it resist sub nukes for 10s. (not clear just resist)
(this would make engis the ultimate team healer, allowing them to protect against multiple subnukes... not sure if this might not make games last forever... but I think it could work)
Rotate Shield Freq
- Make this skill Castable ONLY
- When cast... the caster receives the current RSF effect
- The friendy target has "Phase retraction mode" engaged on them reducing all dmg by 15% for the duration of the engi RSF
So that would be my perfect Engi....
The RSF would encourage team work... and be a team buff with out giving up any self healing.
M. Worker give engi healer something unique... allowing them to stop the chain nukes.
The nadion replacement (lets be honest Cryptic has killed it off with the Omega Amp proc) would give engis more dmg... and more important that dmg boost would be a team boost just like Sensor scan.
The EPS changes would again make the engi EPS a buff that you want to have thrown on you, or used by the engi themselves to super boost either sci boff attacks or just regen shielding ect.
The current design seems to be that Tac wins by killing fast and loses by dying fast, while Eng wins by dying slow and loses by killing slow. The downfall with this is that tac has access to the same BOFF abilities that let eng die slowly (2x EPtS, an Engi Team, and whatever Sci skills), but the Engi does not have access to the Tact abilities that let it kill quickly (BFaW is not a significant damage booster, APB1/APD1 are marginal, and that is your available set of choices).
Engi needs access to something that is the equivalent of APA or FOMM. EPS almost does it, but its not enough to overcome the other issues. It really needs some way to improve damage output in the same way that tac can improve damage mitigation.
edit--an option would be a Commander-level Engi BOFF ability that improves the performance of beam weapons (only)
To be fair to Renim, he tends to PUG or do PUGmades a lot, and probably in many situations where there is much less cross-healing than in Premade PvP.
He can't count on the support of others, and opponent PUG teams don't require chain SNB coordinated with Alpha strikes to score kills on.
So this is actually the area where I think Eng actually has a role.
thats what i have said. an eng has a strength as a pug healer, were there is no other healers around to prop each other up. in premades there is that co healing, so the eng has no advantage in that situation
i think the current state of eng, being the best tank, is totally misguided. it shouldn't be about that at all, thats basically useless. heres what i would do to eng, make them an energy sorcerer, not a repair man. but, energy hard caps cut an eng off at the kneecaps in terms of effective energy manipulation, thus the first change.
-an always on 150 power effect cap for all 4 subsystems. maybe from a trait or something, but its always on and just for the eng captain.
-nadion becoming an AOE field skill that reduces energy drain the way it does now, and grants immunity to siphon drone drain.
-EPS transfer, with the first change, this will be much more useful as is. but, it should also have the effect of everyone of the EPt skills, at half magnitude of the version 1 of that power.
-MW being castable, but the heal cut in half, and providing a 15 second immunity to SNB. this would be helpful for protecting an escort using a highly buffed GDF, or help protect a target from chain SNBs, and do a WHOLE lot for eng usefulness on a team.
-RSF effects cut in half, but once activated activates on all your team mates at once
the 150 power effect cap would allow an eng actual synergy in everything finally, like a tac or sci already has. remember, its not exactly going to be easy to get a subsystem up to 150 power, even with all the power buffs thee are now.
for weapons, he could deal stronger pressure damage in whatever he is in, it would be a higher plateau of damage, not spiky like a tac captain, and not based on debuffs like a sci. he could have the strongest shield resistance with more shield power, at this point i hardly think thats to much of a concern. its not that hard to cap your shield res already. an eng could have the fastest engines too, thats just canon, eng officers making engines go as fast as possible lol. he could also buff aux levels highest, and have synergy with sci skills, buffing effect the highest amount. like i said, energy sorcerers, not zombie tanks.
My engie on the ground, depending on the kit can rack up more dps than what you would think. I can also out heal, (tank) depending on the kit than most scis.
Again, its all on how you play.
Does that mean the Profession can't or shouldn't be improved? Of course not.
My preferred team is still:
Tac in a nifty quick escort (i.e. Defiant/Bug/BoP)
Tac in something a little more versatile =(MVAE/Armitage/Raptor etc.)
Sci set up for Debuffs/CC
Sci set up for Damage/CC/maybe some healing
Eng in a healboat with the skill to manage helping with spam clearing
I would personally rather face a team who has a Sci as primary healer than a really good Eng. Sci healer will be easier to kill, make the damage dealers easy targets.
Problem solved.
:P
STO Screenshot Archive
Just a thought.
Another thing I have thought about but never really mentioned, but nows a good a time as any, was to change Rotate Shield Freq. To Rotate Weapon Freq. and make it give some kind of bleedthrough bonus. I hate the idea of turning ANOTHER eng power into a dumbed down boff power though, and DEM isn't very good with beams so I've never really braught it up before. I also hate making it a direct dmg boost though so I dunno.
Despite being non-canon and unrealistic, it would be a great mechanism for Engi's now. It would make a Engi-Cruiser viable especially combined with Feedback Pulse.
As for my idea, I'd say: Why not take some ideas from Ground Play and put them in space? Engineers are masters of dropping in support through unit fabrications. Why not give them some of that power in space? I know we can deploy turrets and what not through devices, but we have the same with batteries (emergency powers), why not turrets/drones? This could even extend as much as to creating more BOff powers that support their space unit fabrications.
All hands! Prepare the popcorn and tinfoil hats!
Ask a sci how awesome photonic fleet is. It would just as effective really.
Engineering Fleet(Team): +Hull Damage Resistance, +Hull Repair Skill, +Warp Core Potential Skill
EPS Power Transfer(Self/Ally): +Power, +Power Transfer Rate
Miracle Worker(Self): +Hull Heal, +Single Shield Regeneration, +Repair Disabled Subsystems
Nadion Inversion(Self): +Subsystem Drain Resistance
Rotate Shield Frequency(Self): +Shield Regeneration, +Shield Damage Reduction
The Tactical
Attack Pattern Alpha(Self): +Damage, +Critical Hit, +Critical Severity, +Turn
Fire On My Mark(Target): -Hull Damage Resistance, -Stealth
Go Down Fighting(Self): +Scaling(/Hull Health) Damage
Tactical Fleet(Team): +Damage, +Maneuvers Skill, +Targeting Skill
Tactical Initiative(Self/Ally): -Tactical BOFF Ability Recharge Time
The Science
Photonic Fleet(N/A): +Holographic Pets
Scattering Field(PBAoE): +Hull Energy Damage Resistance, +Teleport Immunity
Science Fleet(Team): +Shield Emitters Skill, +Power Insulators Skill, +Shield Damage Reduction
Sensor Scan(AoE/TAoE): -Hull Damage Resistance, -Stealth, +Perception(self)
Subnucleonic Beam(Target): -All Buffs, -Power Recharge Speed
The Engineer 2.0
Engineering Fleet(Team): +Hull Damage Resistance, +Hull Repair Skill, +Subsystem Repair Skill
EPS Power Cascade(PBChain): (Chains to up to 2 ally players, each step in the chain reducing the buff (Eng gets the most, 2nd player less, 3rd player least)) +Power, +Power Transfer Rate
Miracle Worker(Self): +Hull Heal, +Single Shield Regeneration, +Repair Disabled Subsystems
Nadion Inversion Field(PBAoE): +Subsystem Drain Resistance
Rotate Shield Frequency(Self): +Shield Regeneration, +Shield Damage Reduction
edit: typo
I realize I'm a little late to the discussion, but Drunk and Ultimatum pretty much summed up my thoughts on the utility of Engineers. (I wrote up some of my thoughts on my healboat in Drunk's PvP help thread.)
Engineers come with one great emergency button (RSF) and two mediocre emergency heals/resists (MW, Eng Fleet). This makes the Engineer perfect for me as a pug healer: I can't rely on any heals from other people on my team, and my own heals may be on cooldown when I suddenly get focused, so the built-in heals that Engineers come with allow me to survive against most things. (They also provide great resilience against one or two SNBs; this is crucial, since I can't rely on ST or TT from my teammates.)
Against most pugs, playing as an Engineer means that my healboat simply will not die -- this allows me to concentrate more on healing my teammates.
Unfortunately, that still means that Engineer has two dud abilities, at least as far as my pug healboat is concerned: EPS Power Transfer and Nadion Inversion. I run max power in shields and aux usually, and I already have 9 ranks in Power Insulators for a more reliable power drain resist. They pretty much only get popped if I'm being hit with some energy drain build; the rest of the time, they're just taking up tray space.
Drunk's hit the point perfectly here: in most premades, cross-healing is strong enough to keep most people alive. A Sci captain's bag of dirty tricks would be more useful than the self-heals that Engineers get. (I don't think I need to mention how little use EPS Power Transfer and Engineering Fleet get in a team...)
When OPvP makes pugmades, I can usually pull my weight -- but there've been quite a few cases when an extra SNB on the team would have been more useful than the RSF I bring for myself.
PS: Tal, love you too.
I don't pug often, but when I do I take my premade build and it works just fine.
Would you say premade builds run higher damage but are squishier because of the dependence on crosshealing...while...PUG builds run lower damage while trying to be tankier, yet even though they may have oodles of self/ally buffs - it's rare that they'll get used on an ally?
That's assuming someone is running an escort. Premade builds are more min/maxed and less selfish -- more team aware. Pug builds are more (often to an extreme extent) selfish and generalized. If you find yourself aiming towards the later instead of the former you're setting yourself up to fail and creating bad habits as you go.
And that doesn't change the fact that everything else being equal, a team of selfish players with "pug builds" will always lose to a team of less selfish players who try to fit into team focused roles.
PvP builds are better for PvE than the builds that PvErs make, though most PvErs are in flat out denial about this.
Premade builds are better for pugging than the builds that puggers make, though most puggers are in flat out denial about this too.