I've noticed a trend recently in the composition of premade teams: The escorts are being replaced by T'varo and D'helan warbirds.
Why? Because they are capable of the highest spike damage, can kill their target in a single burst, and escape/recloak before being killed.
How?
1) Romulan bridge officers increasing the effectiveness of ambush when decloaking for massive burst damage.
2) Beam Overload 1 and Beam Overload 3 being double stacked while inside the cloak, in conjunction with the beam overload duty officers.
3) Fully offensive science and engineering bridge officer skills, including Tractor Beam and Directed Energy Modulation.
4) No need for defense: after a quick 5 second kill, they simply follow this procedure:
----a) Singularity Jump: Will move them away from danger and placate the opponent, as well as hold anyone near you.
----b) Emergency Power to Engines: Following the singularity jump, move 20km away before anyone has time to react.
----c) Battle Cloak: Safely disappear, removing self from being a target. Being so far away negates the possibility that a CPB or tractor beam will be a problem.
----d) Repeat 1-3
What good is this? On teams with 3 tanky healers, it effectively forces the opposing team to target who you want. The T'varo and the D'helan will only be visible for a brief 5 second window, hardly long enough to maneuver into the firing arc, before they're gone again. So opposing teams attempting to coordinate alpha strikes are forced to do so against the most difficult to kill targets. And when coordinated, the romulan DPS ships will kill a target before anyone has even noticed they have decloaked.
So why can't non-romulan escorts do the same thing with such great effect? They don't have Singularity Jump. This is what makes the romulan ships so effective at this type of strategy: they get a burst of distance, a hold on any potential attackers, and (the best aspect of the ability) they vanish from anyone who might be watching them. It removes the weakness that klink ships and defiants in similar builds have: EPtE will only allow you to escape if the opponent doesn't stop you from leaving. The Singularity Jump ensures that you will leave effectively nearly ever time.
More and more, Romulan ships built this way are making the case that playing any other escort is a liability. I, for one, am not ready to throw in the towel yet (as an avid Fed escort player), but do admit that I can see the writing on the walls that, I may need to abandon my favorite ships and rep-grind a romulan tac if I want to give my team the best chance to win in PvP.
There are ways to combat this, but it is difficult with teh UI set up for quicker heals. Can be done but steepens learning curve for new people.
I have repeatedly stated the Romulans are going to make a run at PvP with their battle cloak and coordination. Too many were upset with their low power, because they were wanting to fly rommies like a fed, non-cloaking ship. (most probably never played kdf before).
They can be defeated but they have elevated the required game play on other team. It does make premades exponentially more difficult to beat for pugs and amplifies the need for premade and pug queues, such as substantially higher rewards, but you have to have a team of 5 to Q for that mission.
Edit: This makes having science more important. If engies had more diverse powers than self hull heals, or the power drain limited battle cloak then they would have an increased role, as it stands now with their limited turn rate and the UI system, they will have to be Johnie on the spot healers with macros and such.
PvE Jem'Hadar motto:Participation Ribbonsare life.
I seen this coming a long time ago b4 the release of LoR while i was beta testing the Romulan faction, some people was trying to point out that the Romulan Warbird's Singularity powers is to make up for the Warbird's low power level's which i have argue at the time that any good player will go around that, as now we already seeing the result of those Frigate type Warbird's and sometimes a very good build Scimitar can kill people out of a cloak less than a few seconds if not cripple them badly just to be finished off moments later.
One of the main reasons that Romulan charaters can do alot of damage is basically their BOff's space traits which gives them a huge advantage over Fed and KDF characters which have BOff's with useless space traits that have no combat purpose, for an example my Romulan toon have 5 boff's with each having a Superior Operative trait and a Subterfuge one as well (2 space traits in 1 boff), My Rommie toon have 20% crit, 95% crit sev, can go back to cloak less than 10 sec after decloak and also my Starship Stealth rating is over 700 points even though Starship Stealth rate from Subterfuge does not suppose to stack, while on the other hand my KDF main have only 12% crit, 70% crit sec, can go back to in 17 sec after decloak... this is all having the same consoles and tech with both characters.
In all i think the KDF and Feds needs a new Gerneration of indigenous BOff's with their own combat space traits that can atleast compete with the Romulan ones, tho u can go to the Romulan Embassy for their BOff's but it will still nowhere as good as the Romulan faction ones which the Embassy BOff's have only 1 space trait each and the Superior Operative trait is only limited to Tactical BOff's.
I think the dev's should kill off the reduce 10%-15% CD time on the recloak on the Superior Operative trait on BOff's or atleast don't make it stack.
there's still alot of issues that have to be address...
I seen this coming a long time ago b4 the release of LoR while i was beta testing the Romulan faction, some people was trying to point out that the Romulan Warbird's Singularity powers is to make up for the Warbird's low power level's which i have argue at the time that any good player will go around that, as now we already seeing the result of those Frigate type Warbird's and sometimes a very good build Scimitar can kill people out of a cloak less than a few seconds if not cripple them badly just to be finished off moments later.
One of the main reasons that Romulan charaters can do alot of damage is basically their BOff's space traits which gives them a huge advantage over Fed and KDF characters which have BOff's with useless space traits that have no combat purpose, for an example my Romulan toon have 5 boff's with each having a Superior Operative trait and a Subterfuge one as well (2 space traits in 1 boff), My Rommie toon have 20% crit, 95% crit sev, can go back to cloak less than 10 sec after decloak and also my Starship Stealth rating is over 700 points even though Starship Stealth rate from Subterfuge does not suppose to stack, while on the other hand my KDF main have only 12% crit, 70% crit sec, can go back to in 17 sec after decloak... this is all having the same consoles and tech with both characters.
In all i think the KDF and Feds needs a new Gerneration of indigenous BOff's with their own combat space traits that can atleast compete with the Romulan ones, tho u can go to the Romulan Embassy for their BOff's but it will still nowhere as good as the Romulan faction ones which the Embassy BOff's have only 1 space trait each and the Superior Operative trait is only limited to Tactical BOff's.
I think the dev's should kill off the reduce 10%-15% CD time on the recloak on the Superior Operative trait on BOff's or atleast don't make it stack.
there's still alot of issues that have to be address...
Is the stack intended or is it waiting for a correction?
PvE Jem'Hadar motto:Participation Ribbonsare life.
i really hope they'll bring rommies on par with the other factions by when they milked enough out of them.
a start could be: simply remove that jump-ability from sing-bar (and give em a + in powerlevels before anyone can whine).
Take a look at the Fleet Mogai - It's basically a fleet patrol escort with the shields of a fleet excelsior/assault cruiser, a battlecloak and singularity powers. Power levels were never a problem by VA.
Also lots of free (FREE) boffs with good to excellent space traits. I've got both a science officer and engineer with the superior operative trait, something which you can't get from the embassy. And I got them for free. My Romulan, with no dilithium spent or rep powers or equipment, had a higher crit chance and severity than my fully leveled and geared up fed alt.
The imbalance is so obvious I've dropped my feds with their temporal destroyers and made the Romulan my main.
Yet people still cry the bugship is OP.
Been up against a Tvaro?
Same speed, just as powerful with weapons, slightly weaker with boffs but that doesnt matter when the damn thing can run and cloak every 9 seconds, with the rom Boffs and Doffs its near impossible to lock onto, let alone hit.
Bugship OP my a55, Tvaro is very close to being a bugship but with a battle cloak and singularity powers. That destabilised torpedo is a joke as well.
Scimitar whilst being a good ship in itself, its the pets, pooping out pets that do nothing but scramble sensors! Scramble after scramble after scramble.
Is the stack intended or is it waiting for a correction?
At this point it's up to the dev's to decide...
I just know from experience in pvp... i build my Sci toon ship with 250 Starship Sensor rating which many of that came from sci sensor probe consoles, When i tag a Romulan Warbird (with Max Stealth) with sensor scan b4 it cloaks, and while he/she cloaks with my sensor scan still on it i won't be able to detect unless i'm within 2-4 km away from their ship and that's with my Aux power level at 110... too bad there's no BOff's with a 150 Sensor skill rating, but that would be as cheap as the Romulan BOff with a Stealth rating from subterfuge from their BOff they already have.
Can't understand how one faction could be given such a huge advantage over the others.
As a KDF player I used to bemoan the disparity between the Feds and KDF.
Hate to say it but in my opinion KDF has been marginalized the worse out of all this.
It's pretty much a PvE faction now.
Whatever "edge" it "might" have had is gone.
Every justification used for why KDF ship designs were so weak, the Romulans have surpassed that benchmark and are better in every way, with no downside whatsoever.
the Romulans have surpassed that benchmark and are better in every way, with no downside whatsoever.
The Romulans have the -40 power "disadvantage" built in as the counter to their obvious advantages (Battle Cloak, Singularity abilities, etc)... except for that engineered flaw is oh, SO easily overridden thanks to things like Leech, +Power cores, etc etc
Don't forget that Romulan Escorts can also use the Valdore console.
The Romulans have the -40 power "disadvantage" built in as the counter to their obvious advantages (Battle Cloak, Singularity abilities, etc)... except for that engineered flaw is oh, SO easily overridden thanks to things like Leech, +Power cores, etc etc
Yip! You beat me to the conclusion I was about to make
Y'know, way back before LoR was released that the Romulans would suffer from 'New Faction Syndrome', and so far I've been pretty much right on the money.
I remain empathetic to the concerns of my community, but do me a favor and lay off the god damn name calling and petty remarks. It will get you nowhere.
I must admit, respect points to Trendy for laying down the law like that.
Y'know, way back before LoR was released that the Romulans would suffer from 'New Faction Syndrome', and so far I've been pretty much right on the money.
I can't tell if you are saying that people underestimated or overestimated the new ships when LoR was released. I, for one, did not see them as much of a threat when LoR came out. It is only recently that I'm starting to see better ships.
I can't tell if you are saying that people underestimated or overestimated the new ships when LoR was released. I, for one, did not see them as much of a threat when LoR came out. It is only recently that I'm starting to see better ships.
Thats probably a bummer on your side, but i think you couldve seen it coming.
I kinda saw the potential of romulan tacs, and when i found out about the massive crit difference with the romulan innate trait, the new boffs, 7.5% extra crith and 15% extra severity, the new consoles on all the new romulan ships.
Hell, we all knew all the EptX abilities got buffed and are very useful now, epts no longer a prerequisite in order to be viable.
And what do you know, the romulan ships about all of them have universal stations where you can fit a nice extra engineer lc station on.
just saying people might have been able to see it coming.
Nobody can force you to buy a legacy pack or a cstore ship, nobody can force you to grimd new rep or level a new romulan toon, but the ones that do all have to bare the massive grind and the ones that do will get rewarded for it.
Although i fly a tvaro myself i do agree with the OP, and yes normal escorts are kinda becoming more obsolete in certain aspects.
However, to the OP, flying a tvaro sucessfully the way you describe are probably no tvaros with 2x epts and rsp etc.
Its pretty hard and risky to fly the tvaro(s) you probably encountered and they are also very, very squishy doing it that way.
They seem to die as well if you cant react fast enough flying it as a speed beast, happens to all of us. Soon,as you got him hes dead.
Perhaps we should discuss the web mines as well? They seemed like a great counter to cloaking rom bops...
But i do agree that its unfair that rommies can have their crith/d much higher then fed/kdf.
To the OP: you can also decide to bring in some romulans though right? just curious.
The ships that set up this way do have no defense, and I find that I am able to kill them if given a few volleys from dual heavy cannons. The only problem is, they remain stealthed, pick the weakest target on the team (with ample time to calmly select and execute on that target in a perfect strike), and land an ambush kill 2 out of every 3 attempts. However, when I try to kill them before they escape, I might only succeed 1 out of every 3. What you get is what you'd expect: The match isn't a blowout, but loss is nearly assured.
And after seeing it a few times, I think that the romulan hit-and-run strategy hasn't even been perfected yet. I couldn't help but think that if their healers had tossed out a scramble just as the romulans were making their ambush run, it would serve to not only throw off the healing on their kill target, but allow them even more time to make their escape without trouble.
I think this Romulan DPS trend is only now starting to come into it's prime, and has yet to be fully realized.
As for balance, I agree with you, it's not like a team can't get a few romulans of their own to do the same thing. However, my question was: what does it mean for escorts (and raptors, etc) that aren't romulan ambush strikers? Balance may be preserved, but they effectively render 1/3 of the end-game ships obsolete.
I'm sure we'll see tournaments and "special rules" put in place to limit this strategy soon, but that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. There shouldn't need to be special rules.
In the meantime, I guess we'd better start the reputation grind on our romulans.
One problem that can counter this current situation of OP Romulan Boff's is to allow them to be used by Fed and KDF players so they atleast would be near par with thier Romulan counterparts, and since Romulan players can use Fed/KDF BOff's why not Fed/KDF can use Rom BOff's and just due away with the Embassy Rom Doff's or modified them to match the Romulan Republic ones.
And if Cryptic not willing to do that... like i said earlier b4, they need make new generation of indigenous FED/KDF boffs with their own unique space traits that suits their faction/race with each having 2 space traits (1 normal space trait, 1 superior space trait) same like the Romulan Boff's have now.
One problem that can counter this current situation of OP Romulan Boff's is to allow them to be used by Fed and KDF players so they atleast would be near par with thier Romulan counterparts, and since Romulan players can use Fed/KDF BOff's why not Fed/KDF using Rom BOff's and due away with the Embassy Rom Doff's or modified them to match the Romulan Republic ones.
And if Cryptic not willing to do that... like i said earlier b4, they need make new generation of indigenous FED/KDF boffs with their own unique space traits that suits their faction/race with each having 2 space traits (1 normal space trait, 1 superior space trait) same like the Romulan Boff's have now.
Fed and Klinks already can use the romulan bridge officers, thanks to the embassy holding.
Honestly, I think the problem lies with the Singularity Jump. It does too many things for no cost and a very fast cooldown when reduced. The hold may be weak when used at low charge, but the placate and jump are what really make it effective anyway.
It could be fixed by doing any one of the following:
1) Removing the placate: can see through it/remain on target.
2) Removing the jump: force them to fly through it before the placate loses target on them.
3) Increase the cooldown. Make it more of an RSP instead of an all-the-time ability that it is now.
4) Allow it only to be used with 4 or 5 singularity power charge (so that the romulan actually has to do some fighting for a short duration BEFORE it can mindlessly escape, forcing people to keep some defensive abilities on the ship, and keeping the players honest)
I see this panning out in a number of different ways as the novelty of the Romulans wears off.
- Boff traits no longer stacking. A little like the leadership trait.
- New racial traits for KDF and Fed boffs. The Nausicaan trait "Pirate" is meant to be for space, but I can't tell if it's working.
- Two console sets for KDF and Fed, similar to the Romulan ships. Combining one from the refit and one from the retrofit ship giving a set bonus.
I don't think all those things would be a good idea, it's just the way I can see things progressing.
At the moment some Romulans are stupidly overpowered due to their boffs. I think non stacking of traits might be a start. Or if they keep stacking then give the feds back their leadership and give the KDF something. Perhaps a buff to bonus defence for klingon officers.
IMO the game has never been more enjoyable. I still like playing all my different escorts and toons. They all have a different flavor and style: Steamrunner, Fleet Somraw, Fleet Scourge, Fleet Mogai. But as someone said, it's a bit strange that my Romulan can hit harder than any of my other pre-existing characters with all their gear rep passives etc.
My poor Klingon gets no love at the moment. He used to be my favourite character to pvp with. My Somraw is woefully outclassed against most high end escorts these days. Ultimately it doesn't have a battlecloak, hull, shields or turn. Still love the ship.
Inner Circle / Special Circumstances Gardiner, Suval, Thran Korvak, Raketh, Xedar, Zidow Decis, Vesok
Fed and Klinks already can use the romulan bridge officers, thanks to the embassy holding.
Honestly, I think the problem lies with the Singularity Jump. It does too many things for no cost and a very fast cooldown when reduced. The hold may be weak when used at low charge, but the placate and jump are what really make it effective anyway.
It could be fixed by doing any one of the following:
1) Removing the placate: can see through it/remain on target.
2) Removing the jump: force them to fly through it before the placate loses target on them.
3) Increase the cooldown. Make it more of an RSP instead of an all-the-time ability that it is now.
4) Allow it only to be used with 4 or 5 singularity power charge (so that the romulan actually has to do some fighting for a short duration BEFORE it can mindlessly escape, forcing people to keep some defensive abilities on the ship, and keeping the players honest)
I been already know about the Embassy Rom Boff cause i have 3 on my KDF toon, and i meant for Romulan Republic BOff to be used on Fed/KDF.
Embassy Rom Doff is clearly not good as the Romulan Republic one either in terms of space trait (1 space trait vs 2 space traits) Embassy Boff have Superior Operative trait only on certain Tactical Boff's while the Romulan Republic BOff's have it on TAC, SCI and ENG BOff's, read up more then u will know the scope and differences between Embassy and Romulan Republic BOff's in terms of space traits
i cant help but feel silly going into pvp with a non cloaking fed escort these days. its like i choose to fly something completely inferior, with my pathetic doffs and my inability to escape at will.
Fed and Klinks already can use the romulan bridge officers, thanks to the embassy holding.
Honestly, I think the problem lies with the Singularity Jump. It does too many things for no cost and a very fast cooldown when reduced. The hold may be weak when used at low charge, but the placate and jump are what really make it effective anyway.
It could be fixed by doing any one of the following:
1) Removing the placate: can see through it/remain on target.
2) Removing the jump: force them to fly through it before the placate loses target on them.
3) Increase the cooldown. Make it more of an RSP instead of an all-the-time ability that it is now.
4) Allow it only to be used with 4 or 5 singularity power charge (so that the romulan actually has to do some fighting for a short duration BEFORE it can mindlessly escape, forcing people to keep some defensive abilities on the ship, and keeping the players honest)
Even then the difference on a bug versus a romulan ship is still 7.5%S/15+%D difference,
on Fed side you can only have 2% CritH boffs on a tactical station, that leaves 3 stations out and not oncluding the romulan innate trait.
i cant help but feel silly going into pvp with a non cloaking fed escort these days. its like i choose to fly something completely inferior, with my pathetic doffs and my inability to escape at will.
I don't even think it makes me angry. I laugh a little bit when I try to fly a fed escort around against romulan counterparts.
All I can imagine is the other team asking me why I brought a knife to a gunfight.
I've been abusing Romulan "OPness" er uniqueness as much as anyone. One thing I noticed since I rolled fed aligned Rom for kicks is how much they need plasmonic leach. It fixes their power issues at the cost of a console slot. So far that appears to be their one weakness of not having enough console slots. Imagine the outrage and QQing if Roms were banned from using it. That right there could balance the factions and fractions like they were probably intended. Singularity jump is another matter. I went back to the B'rel on my KDF toon and was well a little overwhelmed at how much harder it is to get away without sing jumping out of the middle of fedball. Took a few matches before I stoped smashing the key for sing jump
The two big advantages are the BOFF traits and the singularity powers.
The first problem can be fixed by giving the other species a chance at (useful) superior space traits. There's no real argument against this, other than some low-level dev time.
Singularity balance is a lot more difficult. Its essentially like having an extra BOFF slot that is always there and cannot be traded away. Or like having 4 special consoles that cannot be traded away. Singularity Jump has the same holding power as Gravity Well (not the same damage though), and the Shockwave has the same effectiveness as Photonic Shockwave, and the Quantum Absorption provides a hull heal that is competitive with Miracle Worker. And they are always there, you cannot trade them away for anything. IMO the real problem with this is that the ships were given the "normal" BOFF seats in addition to the singularity powers, when they should all have one less BOFF. That is probably the best way to balance it. But at this point that's impossible. Only thing I can think of at this point is cut their effect in half and double the cooldown times. If they have +5 minute CD then people wont integrate them into their strategies as much.
Cloaks are another thing that needs looking at. I'm still working through a couple of things
The likelihood that any of the above will actually occur is near zero
I've been abusing Romulan "OPness" er uniqueness as much as anyone. One thing I noticed since I rolled fed aligned Rom for kicks is how much they need plasmonic leach. It fixes their power issues at the cost of a console slot. So far that appears to be their one weakness of not having enough console slots. Imagine the outrage and QQing if Roms were banned from using it.
They made it cross-faction for the purpose of feeding Romulans
Hate to point out the white elephant in the room...but it's standing there doing a /facepalm.
How is this any different than any of the various complaints by other players regarding every other step on the powercreep thing that has taken place?
X is better. Player A complains. Player B tells Player A that they can get X too. If Player A says they don't want to get X, because they like Y better - Player B will say tough dookie.
So yeah, maybe it's just Karma.
Course, there are going to be the folks that are telling folks just to reroll Rom like others were told to reroll this or that or to gear a certain way, etc, etc, etc...
...and it's going to be epic when Cryptic drops out the Cardassians - it will happen again. Then it will be amazingly epic when they drop out the Borg...
Comments
I have repeatedly stated the Romulans are going to make a run at PvP with their battle cloak and coordination. Too many were upset with their low power, because they were wanting to fly rommies like a fed, non-cloaking ship. (most probably never played kdf before).
They can be defeated but they have elevated the required game play on other team. It does make premades exponentially more difficult to beat for pugs and amplifies the need for premade and pug queues, such as substantially higher rewards, but you have to have a team of 5 to Q for that mission.
Edit: This makes having science more important. If engies had more diverse powers than self hull heals, or the power drain limited battle cloak then they would have an increased role, as it stands now with their limited turn rate and the UI system, they will have to be Johnie on the spot healers with macros and such.
One of the main reasons that Romulan charaters can do alot of damage is basically their BOff's space traits which gives them a huge advantage over Fed and KDF characters which have BOff's with useless space traits that have no combat purpose, for an example my Romulan toon have 5 boff's with each having a Superior Operative trait and a Subterfuge one as well (2 space traits in 1 boff), My Rommie toon have 20% crit, 95% crit sev, can go back to cloak less than 10 sec after decloak and also my Starship Stealth rating is over 700 points even though Starship Stealth rate from Subterfuge does not suppose to stack, while on the other hand my KDF main have only 12% crit, 70% crit sec, can go back to in 17 sec after decloak... this is all having the same consoles and tech with both characters.
In all i think the KDF and Feds needs a new Gerneration of indigenous BOff's with their own combat space traits that can atleast compete with the Romulan ones, tho u can go to the Romulan Embassy for their BOff's but it will still nowhere as good as the Romulan faction ones which the Embassy BOff's have only 1 space trait each and the Superior Operative trait is only limited to Tactical BOff's.
I think the dev's should kill off the reduce 10%-15% CD time on the recloak on the Superior Operative trait on BOff's or atleast don't make it stack.
there's still alot of issues that have to be address...
Is the stack intended or is it waiting for a correction?
a start could be: simply remove that jump-ability from sing-bar (and give em a + in powerlevels before anyone can whine).
Also lots of free (FREE) boffs with good to excellent space traits. I've got both a science officer and engineer with the superior operative trait, something which you can't get from the embassy. And I got them for free. My Romulan, with no dilithium spent or rep powers or equipment, had a higher crit chance and severity than my fully leveled and geared up fed alt.
The imbalance is so obvious I've dropped my feds with their temporal destroyers and made the Romulan my main.
Daizen - Lvl 60 Tactical - Eclipse
Selia - Lvl 60 Tactical - Eclipse
Been up against a Tvaro?
Same speed, just as powerful with weapons, slightly weaker with boffs but that doesnt matter when the damn thing can run and cloak every 9 seconds, with the rom Boffs and Doffs its near impossible to lock onto, let alone hit.
Bugship OP my a55, Tvaro is very close to being a bugship but with a battle cloak and singularity powers. That destabilised torpedo is a joke as well.
Scimitar whilst being a good ship in itself, its the pets, pooping out pets that do nothing but scramble sensors! Scramble after scramble after scramble.
At this point it's up to the dev's to decide...
I just know from experience in pvp... i build my Sci toon ship with 250 Starship Sensor rating which many of that came from sci sensor probe consoles, When i tag a Romulan Warbird (with Max Stealth) with sensor scan b4 it cloaks, and while he/she cloaks with my sensor scan still on it i won't be able to detect unless i'm within 2-4 km away from their ship and that's with my Aux power level at 110... too bad there's no BOff's with a 150 Sensor skill rating, but that would be as cheap as the Romulan BOff with a Stealth rating from subterfuge from their BOff they already have.
Can't understand how one faction could be given such a huge advantage over the others.
As a KDF player I used to bemoan the disparity between the Feds and KDF.
Hate to say it but in my opinion KDF has been marginalized the worse out of all this.
It's pretty much a PvE faction now.
Whatever "edge" it "might" have had is gone.
Every justification used for why KDF ship designs were so weak, the Romulans have surpassed that benchmark and are better in every way, with no downside whatsoever.
The Romulans have the -40 power "disadvantage" built in as the counter to their obvious advantages (Battle Cloak, Singularity abilities, etc)... except for that engineered flaw is oh, SO easily overridden thanks to things like Leech, +Power cores, etc etc
Yip! You beat me to the conclusion I was about to make
However, to the OP, flying a tvaro sucessfully the way you describe are probably no tvaros with 2x epts and rsp etc.
Its pretty hard and risky to fly the tvaro(s) you probably encountered and they are also very, very squishy doing it that way.
They seem to die as well if you cant react fast enough flying it as a speed beast, happens to all of us. Soon,as you got him hes dead.
Perhaps we should discuss the web mines as well? They seemed like a great counter to cloaking rom bops...
But i do agree that its unfair that rommies can have their crith/d much higher then fed/kdf.
To the OP: you can also decide to bring in some romulans though right? just curious.
I can't tell if you are saying that people underestimated or overestimated the new ships when LoR was released. I, for one, did not see them as much of a threat when LoR came out. It is only recently that I'm starting to see better ships.
Lag Industries STO/TOR Guild
Thats probably a bummer on your side, but i think you couldve seen it coming.
I kinda saw the potential of romulan tacs, and when i found out about the massive crit difference with the romulan innate trait, the new boffs, 7.5% extra crith and 15% extra severity, the new consoles on all the new romulan ships.
Hell, we all knew all the EptX abilities got buffed and are very useful now, epts no longer a prerequisite in order to be viable.
And what do you know, the romulan ships about all of them have universal stations where you can fit a nice extra engineer lc station on.
just saying people might have been able to see it coming.
Nobody can force you to buy a legacy pack or a cstore ship, nobody can force you to grimd new rep or level a new romulan toon, but the ones that do all have to bare the massive grind and the ones that do will get rewarded for it.
I still say ditch the rep!
The ships that set up this way do have no defense, and I find that I am able to kill them if given a few volleys from dual heavy cannons. The only problem is, they remain stealthed, pick the weakest target on the team (with ample time to calmly select and execute on that target in a perfect strike), and land an ambush kill 2 out of every 3 attempts. However, when I try to kill them before they escape, I might only succeed 1 out of every 3. What you get is what you'd expect: The match isn't a blowout, but loss is nearly assured.
And after seeing it a few times, I think that the romulan hit-and-run strategy hasn't even been perfected yet. I couldn't help but think that if their healers had tossed out a scramble just as the romulans were making their ambush run, it would serve to not only throw off the healing on their kill target, but allow them even more time to make their escape without trouble.
I think this Romulan DPS trend is only now starting to come into it's prime, and has yet to be fully realized.
As for balance, I agree with you, it's not like a team can't get a few romulans of their own to do the same thing. However, my question was: what does it mean for escorts (and raptors, etc) that aren't romulan ambush strikers? Balance may be preserved, but they effectively render 1/3 of the end-game ships obsolete.
I'm sure we'll see tournaments and "special rules" put in place to limit this strategy soon, but that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. There shouldn't need to be special rules.
In the meantime, I guess we'd better start the reputation grind on our romulans.
Lag Industries STO/TOR Guild
And if Cryptic not willing to do that... like i said earlier b4, they need make new generation of indigenous FED/KDF boffs with their own unique space traits that suits their faction/race with each having 2 space traits (1 normal space trait, 1 superior space trait) same like the Romulan Boff's have now.
Fed and Klinks already can use the romulan bridge officers, thanks to the embassy holding.
Honestly, I think the problem lies with the Singularity Jump. It does too many things for no cost and a very fast cooldown when reduced. The hold may be weak when used at low charge, but the placate and jump are what really make it effective anyway.
It could be fixed by doing any one of the following:
1) Removing the placate: can see through it/remain on target.
2) Removing the jump: force them to fly through it before the placate loses target on them.
3) Increase the cooldown. Make it more of an RSP instead of an all-the-time ability that it is now.
4) Allow it only to be used with 4 or 5 singularity power charge (so that the romulan actually has to do some fighting for a short duration BEFORE it can mindlessly escape, forcing people to keep some defensive abilities on the ship, and keeping the players honest)
Lag Industries STO/TOR Guild
- Boff traits no longer stacking. A little like the leadership trait.
- New racial traits for KDF and Fed boffs. The Nausicaan trait "Pirate" is meant to be for space, but I can't tell if it's working.
- Two console sets for KDF and Fed, similar to the Romulan ships. Combining one from the refit and one from the retrofit ship giving a set bonus.
I don't think all those things would be a good idea, it's just the way I can see things progressing.
At the moment some Romulans are stupidly overpowered due to their boffs. I think non stacking of traits might be a start. Or if they keep stacking then give the feds back their leadership and give the KDF something. Perhaps a buff to bonus defence for klingon officers.
IMO the game has never been more enjoyable. I still like playing all my different escorts and toons. They all have a different flavor and style: Steamrunner, Fleet Somraw, Fleet Scourge, Fleet Mogai. But as someone said, it's a bit strange that my Romulan can hit harder than any of my other pre-existing characters with all their gear rep passives etc.
My poor Klingon gets no love at the moment. He used to be my favourite character to pvp with. My Somraw is woefully outclassed against most high end escorts these days. Ultimately it doesn't have a battlecloak, hull, shields or turn. Still love the ship.
Gardiner, Suval, Thran
Korvak, Raketh, Xedar, Zidow
Decis, Vesok
I been already know about the Embassy Rom Boff cause i have 3 on my KDF toon, and i meant for Romulan Republic BOff to be used on Fed/KDF.
Embassy Rom Doff is clearly not good as the Romulan Republic one either in terms of space trait (1 space trait vs 2 space traits) Embassy Boff have Superior Operative trait only on certain Tactical Boff's while the Romulan Republic BOff's have it on TAC, SCI and ENG BOff's, read up more then u will know the scope and differences between Embassy and Romulan Republic BOff's in terms of space traits
Even then the difference on a bug versus a romulan ship is still 7.5%S/15+%D difference,
on Fed side you can only have 2% CritH boffs on a tactical station, that leaves 3 stations out and not oncluding the romulan innate trait.
I don't even think it makes me angry. I laugh a little bit when I try to fly a fed escort around against romulan counterparts.
All I can imagine is the other team asking me why I brought a knife to a gunfight.
Lag Industries STO/TOR Guild
The first problem can be fixed by giving the other species a chance at (useful) superior space traits. There's no real argument against this, other than some low-level dev time.
Singularity balance is a lot more difficult. Its essentially like having an extra BOFF slot that is always there and cannot be traded away. Or like having 4 special consoles that cannot be traded away. Singularity Jump has the same holding power as Gravity Well (not the same damage though), and the Shockwave has the same effectiveness as Photonic Shockwave, and the Quantum Absorption provides a hull heal that is competitive with Miracle Worker. And they are always there, you cannot trade them away for anything. IMO the real problem with this is that the ships were given the "normal" BOFF seats in addition to the singularity powers, when they should all have one less BOFF. That is probably the best way to balance it. But at this point that's impossible. Only thing I can think of at this point is cut their effect in half and double the cooldown times. If they have +5 minute CD then people wont integrate them into their strategies as much.
Cloaks are another thing that needs looking at. I'm still working through a couple of things
The likelihood that any of the above will actually occur is near zero
Lockbox prize = cash for Cryptic
How is this any different than any of the various complaints by other players regarding every other step on the powercreep thing that has taken place?
X is better. Player A complains. Player B tells Player A that they can get X too. If Player A says they don't want to get X, because they like Y better - Player B will say tough dookie.
So yeah, maybe it's just Karma.
Course, there are going to be the folks that are telling folks just to reroll Rom like others were told to reroll this or that or to gear a certain way, etc, etc, etc...
...and it's going to be epic when Cryptic drops out the Cardassians - it will happen again. Then it will be amazingly epic when they drop out the Borg...
...over and over and over.