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Is there any real purpose to Cruisers anymore
sterlingwarbird
Member Posts: 186 Arc User
I am a Cruiser captain and I love those ships. They are far more graceful and beautiful then any BoP or psudo-escort (I call them "psudo" because not counting the Defiant, there are no other Federation escorts) could hope to be.
The problem is, in PvP, Cruisers have no real purpose except to fill up space on the team. Cruisers do not have the hull or shield strength to withstand a massive alpha strike from an opposing team which happens more often then not and sub-nuc completely gimps them.
However because Escort damage is through the roof, there needs to be a few balance changes. I would suggest doubling all cruiser hull and shield strength base stats and then effectively keeping their damage the same. This means they would not be overpowered and they could still be killed by Escorts but would provide them with a far more effective role in PvP.
This would give them the ability to support other ships without having to worry too much about constantly buffing themselves and self-healing. This would allow cruisers to fulfill their intended protector role a lot more easier and make cruisers like the Galaxy Class more viable again WITHOUT changing its damage.
If these are supposed to be large, bulky, powerful support ships then can we please make them large and powerful, not allowing them to die in one pass with an alpha strike.
The problem is, in PvP, Cruisers have no real purpose except to fill up space on the team. Cruisers do not have the hull or shield strength to withstand a massive alpha strike from an opposing team which happens more often then not and sub-nuc completely gimps them.
However because Escort damage is through the roof, there needs to be a few balance changes. I would suggest doubling all cruiser hull and shield strength base stats and then effectively keeping their damage the same. This means they would not be overpowered and they could still be killed by Escorts but would provide them with a far more effective role in PvP.
This would give them the ability to support other ships without having to worry too much about constantly buffing themselves and self-healing. This would allow cruisers to fulfill their intended protector role a lot more easier and make cruisers like the Galaxy Class more viable again WITHOUT changing its damage.
If these are supposed to be large, bulky, powerful support ships then can we please make them large and powerful, not allowing them to die in one pass with an alpha strike.
Post edited by sterlingwarbird on
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Burning ring of fire. Sure you might get one, but the AOE damage from the other four is going to tear you to shreds. Some of those cruisers do some pretty nasty dps.
That or they live long enough to tractor spam you into oblivion once APO is on cd.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Of course, I'm not disputing that which is why I do not want to change their damage, I recognize that Cruiser damage is optimal but larger cruisers with less tactical capability should have much more hull to make up for their lower tactical output. The Excelsior does not need these changes but the Galaxy desperately does.
The Fleet Galaxy should have 88,000 hull and 2.1 shield modifier to make up for its tactical shortfalls. Cryptic needs to look at ships individually and not as part of the "trinity".
Yeah ill never PvP on Dannika, whats the point, there is no place for a tank/healer in PvP. Just debuffer/healers which of course is the domain of Sci.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Exactly, Klingon cruisers need the same treatment. Cryptic needs to go back, look at ALL the ships and cater to their individual need to make them all viable. For example, the Fleet Nebula could have an additional "Torpedo Pod" reduced cooldown torpedo rate to make it have something unique over the Vesta and make it a viable Torpedo boat.
Its great that somebody agrees with my idea of looking at ships from an individual standpoint.
Honestly I think the engineer archetype as a whole is worthless in space. Might as well roll a tac cappy and throw them in a cruiser. At least then they get some damage specials with survivability. I might experiment with my KDF engineer in an escort but that just seems so dumb to me.
Tac Escort works, Sci Science works, Engineer Cruiser = lol
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
What about an engineering ability that's like one I saw in ToR, its an AoE taunt that gimps damage by 95% if they attempt to attack anything but you when its in effect. It also buffs your damage resistance by 50%, surely something like that would be useful for an engineer in a tank role in PvP? A taunt that works in PvP in some way..
You want double shields and hull for cruisers because coordination from a science and a tactical officer can kill them? Have you ever tried to kill a fleet star cruiser build for just tanking? That ship can take fire from 2 tactical officer escorts without any problem. You need a science officer to make them crack. With double shields and hull most cruisers would have 136,000 hull and 25,000 shields/facing, they would never die. Somehow I have a feeling that is what you want to happen. With the Legacy of Romulus update, it isn't too hard to make a single cannon cruiser work very well while still having a very capable tank.
--->Ground Combat General Bugs Directory
Real join date: March 2012 / PvP Veteran since May 2012 (Ground and Space)
Yes, I want cruisers to be VERY hard to kill because that is what they SHOULD be doing. Cruisers should be for people who want to play at a slowly and ironically more TACTICAL pace. Smaller cruisers like the Excelsior would trade this in for additional damage, as well as the Sovereign. Tactical is not really about tactics, its about creating as big and loud a noise as you can while trying not to get hit in your speed tanking escort.
If escorts can avoid 95% of their damage, why can't cruisers have an awesome presence on the battlefield... not like we'd be hitting you much in your JHAS gimped to hell.
First off, I mainly PvP with a Fleet Science Vessel Retrofit in PvP, I don't fly a JHAS. I agree that something needs to be done to escorts to make them less tanky. The first step has already been taken with Legacy of Romulus, Escorts are fortunately back to their low innate hull regeneration. Now if only Cryptic can do something about the Emergency Power to Engines/RCS accelerator problem introduced with Legacy of Romulus.
Buffing cruisers to immortal levels won't solve anything at all. In fact, it will make PvP worse, not better. Cryptic has given cruisers the tools to make a tanky cruiser while also dealing decent damage, it's just a matter of using them. A few weeks ago I ran into a cruiser that put out 1.3 million damage and 450k healing using an aux2bat build with single cannons from an engineer character. If that's possible, you can't tell me cruisers aren't viable. That cruiser did die three times though. Imagine how deadly he would be with double hull and shields.
--->Ground Combat General Bugs Directory
Real join date: March 2012 / PvP Veteran since May 2012 (Ground and Space)
I think my point in all of this is that you shouldnt have to be speccing to do as much damage as possible. that really isnt an engineers role. its the usual mmo pvp argument regarding "tank" classes. a human wont waste time attacking the guy he cant kill fast, so the big hulking tank just gets saved for last, if bothered with at all.
In SWG they introduced a skill near the end of the game for the light side jedi, the tank spec of that game, to give them pvp viability. it was called "saber intercept" what the ability did was basically transfer the damage your ally was taking to you. For a limited time of course. 10 seconds up with I believe 30 seconds cd. So you could intercept a massive damage spike, take the damage to the tank, and slow down the insta kill of the toon youre saving.
It wasnt the best ability in the end, as SWG was all about AOE damage and very little direct target, but it was a step in solving the low dps pvp tank problem.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
It was a very, very short time.
Regardless, thanks to A2B builds most cruisers can get quite tanky and put out a good deal of DPS--less than escorts, of course, but much safer thanks to great RSP and EPtS/E uptime. The catch is it takes a lot more time and money to make a cruiser viable than it does an escort or sci vessel (or even a hybrid cruiser like the Galor). That's the main issue if you ask me.
I was in a KDF pug once - 9/10 a KDF pug will beat a Fed pug- usually due to better teamwork.
This time we came up against a 5 pre-made group of Oddys.
FAW and chain healing in a tight 5 km circle.
We were vapourized 1/15
Could not separate them - could not break them - 1 was disable the other covered.
They were each running 7 beams and 1 torp - almost full power and beam up-time - tractors and some sci powers
The FAW was blinding.
Don't tell me Fed crusiers are useless.
that just shows what a problem FAW can be with organized teams just spaming it. that skill should not exist and just be single target.
in every other situation those cruisers are dealing dull over time damage, and even the strongest of it can be held off long enough to cycle heals, and simply blunted by distribution and resistance levels. at the same time they have little ability to CC, and only a very slight advantage in healing over a sci ship. they are just a bit better at tanking, the least useful thing in pvp.
unless your cruiser can fill the role of an escort or sci ship, or you organize a 5 cruisers FAW ball of death, cruisers are simply the least useful types of ships.
From what I could tell they were all running DEM3 - so that wall of FAW - cut our Bops up like they were tinfoil.
The only time I've killed a cruiser in a single pass while it was full-hull and mostly full-shielded is when I timed the attack PERFECTLY to coincide with a gap in their defenses, or when I timed it with a subnuke + sensor scan. Or when the player flying the cruiser is so inexperienced and sluggish in their responses that I can deliver my full alphastrike (BO2 + HY3 quantums + 1-2 volleys from DHCs) before they even react.
Outside of these situations, you almost always have to work with 1-2 other decloak-alphastrikers to bring down the target quickly. That's why BoPs really like to fight in packs, especially in Ker'rat. . .we can't exactly slug it out as well as an escort.
DEM3 is brutal against BoPs. The low hull really shows in that kind of situation, when our shields can't fully stop the attack. BoPs in general are vulnerable to bleedthrough, again due to the lower hull.
What the question is, and what someone cannot do, is make a cruiser (or an engineer toon) NEEDED.
You can make an engy and/or a cruiser useful, you can't make it needed.
So the real question is, are cruisers or engies needed in PvP?
That's exactly it. If you spend enough time, money and effort you can make a cruiser into a weaker, slower escort or weaker, slower sci vessel. They don't have their own niche, they can only really mimic other ship types' niches unless they're in a coordinated disco ball team.
I strongly dislike the idea that an engineering captain is railroaded into trying to become a DPS based spec when you get into the nuts and bolts. The self sustainable archetype just has no purpose in this game, in either pve or pvp. Hence why my KDF engineer is now on semi-permanent mothball (since it flies a neghvar)
About all i could do is set it up with all beams and dem like everyone else and so on. But why should an intended healer class be rammed into a quasi-dps role just because the game mechanics pretty much say MOAR DPS NAO PLOX
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Remember, that only actually works for cruisers that have decent tactical powers and not ones like the Galaxy or Star Cruiser that suffer from lack of tactical abilities and having a "high" hull makes up for nothing when an Escort can just alpha through it.
Sorry but that other guy is tactical bull, it is really really easy to make a cruiser bleed in a BoP, especially if you are using stuns along with alpha strike because the only ability that is rather useful at repelling it is RSP. You take RSP out of the occasion and a cruisers shields are next to nothing against the overpowered DPS of a tactical.
Sub-nuc is also a problem when tactical officers can just shrug it off, Engineers suffer from it heavily because of natural regeneration of abilities. The cruisers in this game don't feel like cruisers at all... yeah they feel fat but not really that powerful, not large and certainly not tanky.
Sci/science ships exist on a triangle of possible abilities based on the three extreems of heal self, heal others, and disable enemy. All of which is useful.
Eng/cruisers on the other hand, basically exist on a line, the two ends of which are heal self, and heal others. Again, both are useful, but Sci are more useful because they can also affect the enemy. Cruisers can do the off the wall build of A2B builds and do some serious damage, but again, Tacs do it better. So, basically Eng/cruisers don't have anything to call their own, and anything they do, someone else can usually do better or in a way that benifits the team more.
Ironically, cruiser pilots who want to do everything are called Kirks on these forums, but that's actually what cruisers do best, everything. One could probably build a cruiser that could beat one on one a tac/escort or a sci/science ship, I'd even bet on it. It might not be as damaging as the escort or as disabiling as the science ship, but it could probably outlast both of them. Like was shown earlier in this thread, a team of cruisers working together could probably lay waste to any other team or at least force a draw with another team of similar skill in escorts and science ships. But a cruiser doesn't have a place on a team with escorts and science ships because a cruiser IS the team, so it is redundent when you actually have a team.
Al the above is my opinion of course, but I think I might have something.
Nouveau riche LTS member
I haven't read through the thread yet. I fly mainly cruisers, and I know where you're coming from. I use to feel that way. But cruisers are awesome, and you just don't understand how tanky they are until you fly an escort yourself and try to kill one. A properly specced cruiser is a tough nut to crack.
Although not optimal compared to an Odyssey, I'm flying a tanking Galaxy right now. If you get the fleet version, that's 5 armor consoles you can slot. I go with 2x Neutronium, 1x Ablative, 1x Tetraburnium(?). If I had the fleet version I'd but in a third Neutronium.
That's almost 45-50% resistance to all energy damage right there. Add in the double hull value compared to escorts/science, you've got yourself a tank.
If the BoP was half the OP that many think it is, the KDF would rule the premades.
Its a one-shot wonder that takes skill to use correctly. Otherwise one is wasting an Alpha and trying to survive the targets retaliation.
R.I.P
Sadly true. There is a serious lack of non dps-based objectives in both PvE and PvP.
More like 2 years. For awhile, 90% of PvP matches involved 5-cruiser teams. One of the major problems now is that cruisers no longer have their niche, as there are plenty of other ships that can fill a cruiser's role. Escort tanks and sci ship healers are prime examples.
What do you mean?
(i was actually a good boy, flying sci ship)
TSI -- Star Trek Online PvP Vidoes (Youtube)
/channel_join OrganizedPVP If you are interested in learning PVP, looking for a team, or a private match.
Well, I like to give folks SOME chance of resisting. Just to make it fair, y'know? I could run a build that stocks more disables/stuns if I wanted to :P
Sure, this is great fun for people like Thissler, and don't get me wrong, I am in awe of and commend her ability, and other people who can pull off kills like this. But y'know what? It's no fun at all for the person who's suddenly dead for no apparent reason...oh, BoP cheese, that's what happened. Ready, Set, Dead is not a fun PvP experience. I'm not saying only winning is fun, but being at full strength one second and dead the next is not fun because it wasn't a fight, it wasn't engaging, it wasn't a "fun battle." They just killed you.
For people like me, who WANT to PvP, but are a bit intimidated to dip our toe in the pool, this is a huge reason of why we queue up for a few matches, but eventually lose heart and interest and just quit altogether because being on the receiving end of that just isn't fun. Yeah, I know you PvP vets throw out the same tripe in different words. The jackasses will say "lrn2play carebear" and the helpful people will provide tips and strategies for how to defend against such alpha strikes. However, such insta-kills just should never happen, in ANY game, because they're not fun to deal with. Especially when the hulking monstrosities that are cruisers (lol I know, but that's what they're SUPPOSED to be) are seen as laughably free kills by the smallest, most fragile ships in the game (Birds of Prey).
Which brings me to another point of Thissler's videos (again, I commend her skill, she's amazing). Several times, she decloaks and instagibs somebody, and that somebody's team is near instantaneous in their reaction, switching to focus-fire her little BoP, trying to lock her down with tractor beams. Literally barely a second passes between her decloak and when she starts getting shot at, and yet because of ridiculous things like APO, she's able to lolololololol away and get away scott-free, having taken virtually no damage (seriously, her shields didn't even drop). In one video, she even has the gall to say in zone chat "bit touchy aren't we?", taunting them. With things like this going on, and the following taunts that rub that invulnerability in people's faces, is it any wonder PvP is dead to all but the most dedicated and hardcore PvPers?
Now, I'm not posting this with any sort of agenda. I'm not screaming to nerf this, buff that, or any such thing. I'm merely stating the observations that *I* have made over the years of this game's development and growth. Yes, I'm aware that people like Thissler are amazingly skilled, kudos to them, really. Yes, I'm aware that these people have min/maxed their builds to the iota of ideal performance. Yes, I'm aware that some of these people have hundreds of dollars worth of gaming keyboards and mice and have keybinds setup out the wahzoo. Yes, I'm aware that these people have the absolute best gear in the game. So that leaves the question...what are new PvPers supposed to do? Telling us to just keep playing, keep getting our asses handed to us, and learn isn't very helpful because, and this may come as a shock to you pros...getting our asses handed to us for days and even weeks on end, every single time, with absolutely zero chance of even a remotely fair fight? That's not fun. It's frustrating, and most people aren't going to stick with it. Why? Because outside of bragging rights and e-peen stroking, there's no REASON to stick with PvP in this game. So if it's not fun and doesn't get me anywhere...why do it at all?
That won't be necessary. Now that Romulans have better cloaks than Klinks thanks to each Romulan boff having up to 2 space traits, including the stacking subterfuge, the Klink BoP can no longer alpha a well spec Fed-Rom ship. Put it simply, you can't alpha something that you can't see. On the other hand, I just re-spec my Rom to have +115 in Starship Sensors + EptA + Sensor Scan 3. Will be doing some testing with fleetmates later to test how effective this set up in catching those cloaked BoP cheaters but I suspect I won't need to add Tachyon Detection Field. The nice thing about EptA is that it can be activiated while under cloak. BoP won't even have the chance to raise shields before they become star dust...