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Where is the love for Science ships?

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  • warmaker001bwarmaker001b Member Posts: 9,205 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    wildeye042 wrote: »
    I find the argument that Science gets no love because no one plays Science because Science gets no love very convincing. And disheartening as a Science Captain.

    Also, Cryptic loves Science ships so much they are giving them away!

    Science Players are there for these reasons, and in no particular order:

    * If a longtime player, esp. from STO's release, they still have their SCI toon and refuse to give up on him/her. That is my case. My 2nd ever toon for STO (original is Fed TAC Vulcan) is a KDF Klingon SCI captain.

    * Newer players that just like playing SCI, but have no idea on how much better the class and BOFF abilities used to be.

    * PVP: SCI captains have some useful captain abilities for PVP. BUFF stripping via SubNuc, massive debuff and detection via Sensor Scan, for example.


    In the end, which came in 2009 a few months after STO released, Science got no love because Tactical people complained about them. How dare Science be able to fight using only Science abilities! Only Tactical should do that with sticking to only Tactical abilities! Cryptic felt the same and nerfed in patch after patch the powerhouse Science abilities of long ago:

    Tykien's Rift, Viral Matrix, Gravity Well, all abilities that had anything to do with Drains which is a whole damn lot, Photonic Shockwave, and of course Feedback Pulse. These were all nerfed within the first 5 months of the game. Nerfed HARD. And Cryptic has refused to do anything more positive with Science in general since.

    There are a couple insulting things Cryptic has done though with SCI.

    Feeback Pulse: TACs complained tremendously hard that Feedback Pulse was nasty. They couldn't unload with impunity on a SCI ship putting everything it had into FBP. Cryptic didn't like Science doing damage, because obviously the mantra of "Only Tac can do damage, Fk the rest of you" began to ran rampant (not as much as today though). So this began, FBP + SCI Capt BUFFs DEBUFFS + High Aux Power + High Particle Gen Skill = FAIL. However, if a TAC uses FBP now, you may be very astonished with the results :mad: For experimenting, I had my KDF TAC alien using the Vo'Quv. With TAC Captain BUFFs to include TAC BOFF abilities, FBP could kill an Alpha Striking PVPer outright if he does not read the target right.

    Lastly, the new Subspace Integration Circuit comes to mind. Years after nerfing the hell out of Science, Cryptic decides to release this console which is a strong combination of a few Science abilities, and then some. It does a Grav Well like hold, it kills BOFF ability usage except ENG Team, just like SubNuc AND Viral Matrix. On top of that, it kills Perception as if you were hit by Vent Theta Radiation (a console). All this, from one console, from one click of a button, and it's actually effective and damaging, and sets up a target in a team environment. But the original SCI abilities have been nerfed hard years ago.

    In short, long ago in STO, Science could rely on itself to do combat well, in the same way Tactical could do with their abilities and weapons, just done in a whole different style. But that is no longer the case since 2009.
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  • buccaneerdtbbuccaneerdtb Member Posts: 575 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Nerf Science = Injury

    Give all Captains a console that is more powerful than the pre-nerf Science = Insult

    Then repeat the process with each new console so Escorts can do almost any Science trick with a console better than a Science Vessel with BO powers = Rediculous

    Then allow Tactical Captains to buff Science BO powers but not allow Science Captains to = Absurd

    Tactical Captains still complain about SNB = LoL
  • warmaker001bwarmaker001b Member Posts: 9,205 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Nerf Science = Injury

    Give all Captains a console that is more powerful than the pre-nerf Science = Insult

    Then repeat the process with each new console so Escorts can do almost any Science trick with a console better than a Science Vessel with BO powers = Rediculous

    To make it even better, you can have zero skills in any Science, and that console is still effective.
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  • lianthelialianthelia Member Posts: 7,880 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    maicake716 wrote: »
    my analogy with tacs was that sci are not designed to be the primary damage dealers, sci's are designed to heal/crowd control/debuff.

    sci's do that job good.

    tacs are designed to do max dps, they do that good.

    and yes, i refer to pvp when i talk about sci's.

    pve doesnt depend on player skill. you just point and click and shoot. thats it to 99% of pve.

    Umm no they don't...Sci might have a niche build that works okay but most Sci abilities...PvE or PvP just aren't effective.

    Gravity Well doesn't stop anything but the AI that doesn't use EPTE, Energy Siphon has little effect unless you take 3 and load yourself with lots of Flow Capacitors, Tachyon Beam is pointless and Charged Particle Burst is only good for decloaking in pvp, and Tyken's Rift...don't get me started.

    Sci is so pooched and there has been nothing towards fixing it unlike Engineering.
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  • wildeye042wildeye042 Member Posts: 87 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    I actually play as Science all the time. My son is Engineer and we both find Tactical to be boring, everything is too easy as a Tactical. You should have seen Science before the ground revamp. None of our abilities did any damage, lol, even the volcano one(the radiation was 5 damage, the volcano was 24 IIRC. And we all had much more HP so 24 was less than pathetic, players got hurt worse by stubbing their toe.). And Orbital Strike did only 50 damage or so, it was called Orbital Tickle by the players.

    Although, on a side note, Science holds actually worked back then, so you could use Stasis Field, Sensor Scan, Nanites, Tachyon Harmonic, Radiation, then attack with weapons because they were held.

    That's what I've been hearing. Unfortunately, it sounds like Cryptic never rebalanced ships after the skill revamp. Assuming passive skills/consoles balance each other out, i.e., Graviton Generators v. Inertial Dampeners (an assumption I'm not sure is true), the fewer number of weapon slots for science ships is never addressed. Sensor Scan doesn't compensate for the loss in DPS as it takes too long to build up to make a difference without adequate holds/slows (and maxes out at 10%) and Subsystem Targeting is rendered effectively useless by the many ways to counter it. (Nor do the various Science abilities that use Exotic Particle damage make up for the deficit given their low damage output and limited time to employ them without adequate holds/slows.)

    I won't go into Captain abilities since this thread is ostensibly about ships except to say that Science ships seemed designed to rely more on Science Captain abilities than other types of ships so nerfing those abilities makes a bad situation even worse, especially when you hit end game.
  • adamkafeiadamkafei Member Posts: 6,539 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    In fairness to the PvPers who have posted in this thread, my pvp sci/sci build is designed with the intention of disabling the target for long enough for a team-mate to destroy it or disrupt the player long enough for me to destroy them, something I can do quite well. My PvE build is less fantastic due to the lacking CCing power of CC and the pvp build is plain useless in all pve due to the lack of AI... well intelligence, give them some skills, the AI to USE them and remove immunity to sci powers and my pvp build would feel right at home in pve as well.

    Sadly that will never happen so, devs, can we please have our CC skills actually CC? Pwease? Pretty please?
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  • jojobejojobe Member Posts: 88 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    I think they nerfed science ships because that's what they are science ships. Tech ships with low attack but high support. the cruiser to be tank class and escorts to deal out the damage. I do not think they dev want and attack class science ship. what i think your requesting may never happen. the most aggressive science ship to date is the vesta.
  • capnshadow27capnshadow27 Member Posts: 1,731 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    i just want to throw this out there.

    Take your three "hero" ships, and the fleet variety of them, so the highest stats they have.

    You have your fleet tactical escort retorfit, 33K hull, 4/3 Weapons, .9 Shield modifier.
    Your Fleet exploration cruiser retrofit, 44K hull, 4/4 Weapons, 1.1 Shield modifier
    Your Fleet long range science vesssel retrofit, 29.7K Hull, 3/3 Weapons. 1.43 Shield modifier.

    So if you exclude the powers and seating of Boffs, and the way the consoles are which in most cases nobody has a problem with the console set-ups.

    The ships are very different. In most cases my Intrepid pops long before my Escort. And thats with tossing heals left and right on the Intrepid. Also i have one of each type of toon and i fly ALL my ships on them - my ENG cause romulans dont get high end fed ships (working on a fed eng for more testing)

    All that being said Before powers even come into play science ships are at a disadvantage. Most of them are pretty big ships, or if not big at least decent sized.

    So if they hooked up SOME science ships with more weapons they could fall a little in line with the other ships.

    I mean come on, Galaxy has 4/4 but the Nebula doesn't? its basically only missing the neck. and not to bring canon to a videogame fight BUT voyager has 6 frikkin weapons on the front. I think she could at least get a 4/3.

    That is all.
    Inertia just means you can do Powerslides in you carrier!
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  • lianthelialianthelia Member Posts: 7,880 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    jojobe wrote: »
    I think they nerfed science ships because that's what they are science ships. Tech ships with low attack but high support. the cruiser to be tank class and escorts to deal out the damage. I do not think they dev want and attack class science ship. what i think your requesting may never happen. the most aggressive science ship to date is the vesta.

    They nerfed Science because Science abilities used to do a lot of damage so you had Tac officers flying in Science ships doing just insane amounts of damage and they got it nerfed.

    Problem is they went way overboard and now Science abilities do no damage and no real support. This game is based around DPS...Escorts can obviously do great DPS, with the right build Cruisers can do great DPS, Science on the other hand can't.

    I'm not asking for some Science ship that is more powerful than the Vesta if that's what you're thinking. The Vesta...is a wanna-be Escort that is the size of a Cruiser...I like the Vesta but she is pretty much trying to be almost anything but a Science ship.

    I want Science ships to get some attention and same with Science abilities, they deserve some love...and not some secondary deflector gimmick that only helps Sci ships.
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  • warmaker001bwarmaker001b Member Posts: 9,205 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    The fate of Science Ships is tied with the SCI BOFF abilities that they can use alot of.

    Nobody complains about the damage output of ships with high TAC BOFF stations.

    Nobody complains about the survivability and support capable of ships with high ENG BOFF stations.

    Ships slanted in these flavors perform in what they were obviously designed for.

    Science Ships on the other hand underperform because they're tied to the heavy Science BOFF stations that stack up on underwhelming Science abilities. Failing that, they have great 3/3 weapon slots and lower hulls on average than Escorts.
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  • the1tiggletthe1tigglet Member Posts: 1,421 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    naldoran wrote: »
    Here's a better question: where's the love for science abilities? With so many consoles granting what have traditionally been science powers' effects, borked resists making many abilities ineffective, and the lack of group content that really *needs* science ships on the team, there's precious little reason to fly those many wonderful ships you just listed. :(

    That's actually where my outrage comes from. There's a ton of new consoles each with a skill that mimics science skills and often they work tons better then the science skill they mimic! then we have skills on the singularity cores of any and all romulan ships. We've offered suggestions like for a very long time now, no indication that anyone is even concerned about science skills and it's not just the space skills either, Doffs that say they do certain things on the science ground slots do not function I myself have posted about these bugs and haven't received any indication that anyone even cares much less knows about the problems.

    My question is where is the love for the sci skills?

    Why does my repulsor beam push back ships like mad crazy when i have exactly 0 in grav but 168 in particle gen but hardly does any damage?

    Why don't TR and GW actually cut the power of engines or hold enemies in place when i have 170 or so in Grav Gen?

    Why are there Doffs that give major upgrades to both engineering and tactical space skills but almost nothing acceptable in science to help improve damage output?

    And will anything be done about these problems when a science focused captain's tale becomes the next major update, Voyager?

    Will we get equipable tricorders? Will sci ships get two slots for deflectors? Will the doff skills be expanded to include more enhancements (like causing engine power cutoff with TR or holding enemies in place with GW) or will these skills actually get fixed? Will the ground Doffs like botanists actually get fixed where they actually share their buff with everyone on both Dolv and Mez? Will the chance to beam down a nurse actually work as well and as often as the tacticals ability to summon whole armies of security escorts?

    I'd really like to know because Janeway was a scientist first and foremost, sure she had to use tactical maneuvers but science was her focus.
  • atalossataloss Member Posts: 563 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    wildeye042 wrote: »
    That's what I've been hearing. Unfortunately, it sounds like Cryptic never rebalanced ships after the skill revamp. Assuming passive skills/consoles balance each other out, i.e., Graviton Generators v. Inertial Dampeners (an assumption I'm not sure is true), the fewer number of weapon slots for science ships is never addressed. Sensor Scan doesn't compensate for the loss in DPS as it takes too long to build up to make a difference without adequate holds/slows (and maxes out at 10%) and Subsystem Targeting is rendered effectively useless by the many ways to counter it. (Nor do the various Science abilities that use Exotic Particle damage make up for the deficit given their low damage output and limited time to employ them without adequate holds/slows.)

    I won't go into Captain abilities since this thread is ostensibly about ships except to say that Science ships seemed designed to rely more on Science Captain abilities than other types of ships so nerfing those abilities makes a bad situation even worse, especially when you hit end game.

    I agree with everything (my only toon is a Vulcan Engineer). I like flying science ships (I've flown escorts and cruisers as well), my former two ships are an Atrox and a Multi-Mission Reconnaissance Explorer (Aventine Class). I got tired of depending on my pets to help me do DPS, so I tried out the cheap Mirror Universe Star Cruiser.

    :eek: My Mirror Universe Star Cruiser does three times the damage of my Atrox & Multi-Mission Reconnaissance Explorer (Aventine Class). I was just shocked at how fast, maneuverable and invincible my cruiser is. I almost don't want to go back to a science ship, instead I'd rather focus on Engineering and Tac because the Science abilities don't do much. During STF's my science ships were used as Crowd control for the Tactical and Crusier ships.
    One day Cryptic will be free from their Perfect World overlord. Until that day comes, they will continue to pamper the whales of this game, and ignore everyone that isn't a whale.
  • tinkerstormtinkerstorm Member Posts: 853 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Where is the love for science ships? Huddled in a corner commiserating with the love for cruisers.
  • the1tiggletthe1tigglet Member Posts: 1,421 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    ataloss wrote: »
    I agree with everything (my only toon is a Vulcan Engineer). I like flying science ships (I've flown escorts and cruisers as well), my former two ships are an Atrox and a Multi-Mission Reconnaissance Explorer (Aventine Class). I got tired of depending on my pets to help me do DPS, so I tried out the cheap Mirror Universe Star Cruiser.

    :eek: My Mirror Universe Star Cruiser does three times the damage of my Atrox & Multi-Mission Reconnaissance Explorer (Aventine Class). I was just shocked at how fast, maneuverable and invincible my cruiser is. I almost don't want to go back to a science ship, instead I'd rather focus on Engineering and Tac because the Science abilities don't do much. During STF's my science ships were used as Crowd control for the Tactical and Crusier ships.

    Part of the reason for your good fortune with cruisers is you're an engineer, I noticed it on mine, apparently engineers get extra resistance than other classes on their ships despite the kind of ship so your science ship even with the trouble you're having is way better experience then science captains on their science ships because you have added resist.
  • atalossataloss Member Posts: 563 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Part of the reason for your good fortune with cruisers is you're an engineer, I noticed it on mine, apparently engineers get extra resistance than other classes on their ships despite the kind of ship so your science ship even with the trouble you're having is way better experience then science captains on their science ships because you have added resist.

    I didn't know that. But thank you for educating me. I don't think I will go back to a science ship because the Star Cruiser is so good. Even though many people have stated how crappy the mirror universe ships are, this one has handed out more snack downs than my previous 3 ships combined in a shorter amount of time.

    I'm going to do the vault mission so that I can have the 50 scorpion fighters (in my device slot). Just encase I get "in over my head" I can launch them for a little help.

    side note: I wish all cruisers had a hangar slot. Because technically they all do have roundabouts and other smaller ships on board.
    One day Cryptic will be free from their Perfect World overlord. Until that day comes, they will continue to pamper the whales of this game, and ignore everyone that isn't a whale.
  • tinkerstormtinkerstorm Member Posts: 853 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Since you enjoy the Star Cruiser, you may want to consider one of the Odyssey ships. The tactical version comes with a console that lets you launch an escort fighter pet every four minutes.
  • lianthelialianthelia Member Posts: 7,880 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Since you enjoy the Star Cruiser, you may want to consider one of the Odyssey ships. The tactical version comes with a console that lets you launch an escort fighter pet every four minutes.

    Testimony that Cruisers are in much better shape than Science ships eh? ;)
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  • tinkerstormtinkerstorm Member Posts: 853 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    lianthelia wrote: »
    Testimony that Cruisers are in much better shape than Science ships eh? ;)
    Don't read so much into it. Very slightly less sucky is far from much better.
  • lianthelialianthelia Member Posts: 7,880 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    Don't read so much into it. Very slightly less sucky is far from much better.

    Anything in the game is much better than Science! I don't see how Cruisers can complain about anything other than not having cannons which doesn't seem to matter much when you can break 10k or in some cases 20k dps with beams.

    Cruisers are in a much better place than Science is by far, even if a Sci ship had the slots to run A2B it would just kill everything Science on the ship.
    Can't have a honest conversation because of a white knight with power
  • buccaneerdtbbuccaneerdtb Member Posts: 575 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    I am beginning to love Science Vessels again! I can go AFK in STFs and nobody notices, lol.
  • arcademasterarcademaster Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    I am beginning to love Science Vessels again! I can go AFK in STFs and nobody notices, lol.

    Sad but true. I don't even trust Science ships to do probe duty in KASE. The risk is just too high.
  • tinkerstormtinkerstorm Member Posts: 853 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    lianthelia wrote: »
    in some cases 20k dps with beams.
    I can has? Would love me some of that.
  • adamkafeiadamkafei Member Posts: 6,539 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    I can has? Would love me some of that.

    Aux2Batt x2 (with 3 doffs), FAW2, APB2, EPtW3, DEM3 (With doff), Rommie plasma beams, multiple [Pla] science consoles.

    Then just spam everything regardless of what it is, if it auto heals spam it even more.
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  • atalossataloss Member Posts: 563 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    I am beginning to love Science Vessels again! I can go AFK in STFs and nobody notices, lol.

    lol...that was mean but funny. I used to play a lot of STF (and still do) with my science ships. All I was good for was Graviton Well. It was like soon as everyone saw that, they came rushing in to kill whatever was just about to escape the well. Then they return to fighting Borg spheres.
    One day Cryptic will be free from their Perfect World overlord. Until that day comes, they will continue to pamper the whales of this game, and ignore everyone that isn't a whale.
  • tinkerstormtinkerstorm Member Posts: 853 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    adamkafei wrote: »
    Aux2Batt x2 (with 3 doffs), FAW2, APB2, EPtW3, DEM3 (With doff), Rommie plasma beams, multiple [Pla] science consoles.

    Then just spam everything regardless of what it is, if it auto heals spam it even more.
    All that just to not suck, when you could just go to the shipyard and pick up a common, not zen store, not lockbox), ordinary, everyday escort with white gear. Still think there's someone at Cryptic not flying escorts?
  • adamkafeiadamkafei Member Posts: 6,539 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    All that just to not suck, when you could just go to the shipyard and pick up a common, not zen store, not lockbox), ordinary, everyday escort with white gear. Still think there's someone at Cryptic not flying escorts?

    IKR, I don't suck in my cruiser, at least not by my definition, I run dual aux2damp (using 1 doff) and use 2 lvl 1 EPtX powers, I even use tetryon beams, I find I'm jsut as mobile (if not more so) have more defence and still put out 6 or 7k DPS without spamming FAW and APB on things that auto regenerate.
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  • stardestroyer001stardestroyer001 Member Posts: 2,615 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    lianthelia wrote: »
    Testimony that Cruisers are in much better shape than Science ships eh? ;)

    So you decide to judge how effective Science ships are by comparing them against a cruiser with a launching gimmick?

    I really don't know what to say. So, I suppose I will reiterate for the third time.

    Science powers are not weaker than Tactical powers.
    Science ships are not "less useful" or "less effective" than escorts or any other type of vessel.

    If a player effectively combines good ship equipment, right choices of science abilities, right kind of weapons and apt skill at executing coordinated attacks, the Science ship is just as effective, if not more effective, than the escort.

    It really boils down to that. You can't examine one part of a system, isolate it and say "It sucks!", because it is part of a system. By itself it is weak, but who would fly with only science powers and no spec or weapons?
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  • cloudjumper190cloudjumper190 Member Posts: 8 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    There have been a lot more than 3 science ships since free to play launch... here's a list of T5 ships with commander-level science BOFF stations that have come out since F2P...

    Rademaker
    Vesta
    Aventine
    Fleet Nova
    Fleet Nova Retrofit
    Atrox
    Fleet Varanus
    Fleet Trident
    Fleet Luna
    Mirror Trident
    Mirror Luna
    Korath
    Wells
    Fleet Nebula
    Ha'nom
    Mirror Ha'nom
    Fleet Ha'nom
    R'mor
    Fleet Olympic
    Fleet Olympic Retrofit
    Tholian Orb Weaver
    Fleet Intrepid
    Mirror Vo'Quv
    Fleet Vo'Quv



    Commander Universal station ships:

    Fleet Norgh
    Fleet B'Rel
    Fleet Hoh'SuS
    Fleet Hoh'SuS Retrofit
    Tal Shiar Adapted Battlecruiser
    Tholian Recluse



    May have missed a couple.
    A good number of those are Fleet ships, you can exclude those for me. I may be the rare gamer that doesn't particularly like joining guilds, or fleets for that matter. Joining these things, at least in my experience forces you to play the game the way others perceive is the way you should play it.

    You are no longer free to make up your own mind, experiment, and find what works best for you, and your game. But, must grind endlessly for the promise of items that you may not even get because your leader decides you didn't do enough, and kicks you from that same fleet, or guild you burnt the midnight oil for.

    It takes the fun out of what draws characters like me to games like this in the first place. You can blame WoW for that. I'll never do it again.
  • lucho80lucho80 Member Posts: 6,600 Bug Hunter
    edited August 2013
    The variety of science ships right now is fine. The problem is most sci abilities are pure garbage. Having said that, there are some sci builds that work extremely well.
  • stardestroyer001stardestroyer001 Member Posts: 2,615 Arc User
    edited August 2013
    lucho80 wrote: »
    The variety of science ships right now is fine. The problem is most sci abilities are pure garbage. Having said that, there are some sci builds that work extremely well.

    Only when considered and used just by themselves, with no buffs or weapons to augment their damage or specific purpose.
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