I assume there is a specific ruleset for such things, probably based on consoles and powers not to use.
Is there an equivilant no-holds-barred tournament.
i am curious because one of the tensions i see between PvE and PvP is how it is perceived that pressure from PvP nerfs things for PvE.
Would a cheese laden tournament style be a good test bed for anti-cheese strategies.
Ultimately leading to less pressure to nerf.
The No BS tournament was designed to allow all participants to have fun for the majority of the PvP community. Not for balance as most people assume. The 10 "perceived" worst things were banned e.g. Aux to battery powered Dkoras which could EMP every 30 secs or Danubes at that point in time that just locked you down permanently. The turn out was awesome for the first one especially considering how small the community is. 20 teams with at least 5 people in each one if memory serves correctly.
Yes there is and was a "Cheesy" tournament not so long ago. It was hosted by TRPH called The iPvP tournament. Providing you participated in it for what it was, a tournament for the community, it was fun. That too had a good turnout.
i am curious because one of the tensions i see between PvE and PvP is how it is perceived that pressure from PvP nerfs things for PvE.
Well it is a tension perhaps... however it is also a misconception. (I do understand you are saying that. )
I have reported many many bugs. I have also reported many bad mechanics. I have on occasion been asked to help test ships before they are launched. (many of the games players have been part of focus tests, its not just a few PvPers but players from every end of the pool). I guess I'm just saying that yes I am one of (not the only of courese) people that report lots of stuff that ends up getting "nerfed".
I can tell you from 4 years of experience taddeling on broken mechanics / items / skills ect...
If some thing mainly effects PvP it WILL NOT be nerfed. Cryptic has been very consistent on NOT fixing things that are broken mainly in regard to PvP.
However the second those same mechanics become a problem in PvE That is when they are fixed almost instantly... oh sorry "nerfed".
I know many people seem to think there is some small group of min maxing PvPers that report every fun item as broken or start mulitple wine threads so they will get nerfed. Its just not the case. There are a handful of high end Min Max type players in this game and they are not all strictly PvP players.
If they nerfed things for PvP... FAW would have been deleted already... romulans would have got the axe (or at least there boff stacking would have)... my point is things that are broken for PvP mainly don't get fixed... it is kind of the main problem with PvP. Lots of broken mechnaics that make people shooting at NPCs happy... and people getting shot with them not so much.
We could cry and wine for a year and things won't get fixed.
I will admit though that I have made a habit of taking the most broken things I find and making sure to let the Devs know what they can do in PvE.
Yes I think you can all thank me for having your Trico mine toys fixed... It was amazing how it got fixed with in 2 weeks after I sent a log to a dev of my little bop pulling over 1million DPS in the last min of a STF. lmao Again point is if its broken in one end of the pool its just as broken in the other. (I can't remember the exact dps on that run I think it was closer to the 1.5mil mark though... 2 rounds of 4x400k each mines will do that)
What we should be doing as a STAR TREK ONLINE community is all honestly reporting things that are obviously not working as intended. (or where the intention was obviously wrong). I don't consider the word NERF to be a bad one. Every Game should undergo corrections to mechanics all the time... imo every patch should fix something that isn't quite exactly right big or small. I like my games challenging as possible... both PvE and PvP.
I see your substantive point, and broadly I agree.
However, there has been a few little nibbles around the edge of it.
The nerf to the point defence console was brought about, pretty much, by the new PvP shuttle map.
But broken is broken.
You might be right on that one. The shuttle mode in general should have got a once over.
In general shuttle mode both PvE and PvP are more in line with the assertion that the 2 modes are not 100% equal in terms of what is needed for balance.
I get that all the PvE maps are all balanced so that having an ISO console on your shuttle isn't game breaking. Of course being able to load all the full size ship gear on the shuttles is one and perhaps the only reason the shuttle ques are empty.
It is a case where they should have found away to restrict that stuff for the PvP shuttle maps and allowed it in the PvE shuttle maps. Well we all know Cryptic has a hard time doing things right if the work involved hits a threshold they are not authorized to cross. Ok I should be quite now. lol
You might be right on that one. The shuttle mode in general should have got a once over.
In general shuttle mode both PvE and PvP are more in line with the assertion that the 2 modes are not 100% equal in terms of what is needed for balance.
I get that all the PvE maps are all balanced so that having an ISO console on your shuttle isn't game breaking. Of course being able to load all the full size ship gear on the shuttles is one and perhaps the only reason the shuttle ques are empty.
It is a case where they should have found away to restrict that stuff for the PvP shuttle maps and allowed it in the PvE shuttle maps. Well we all know Cryptic has a hard time doing things right if the work involved hits a threshold they are not authorized to cross. Ok I should be quite now. lol
I was actually looking forward to shuttle PvP pug queues.
Problem is, they are empty.
I agree that the shuttle PvP thing appears to have been done hastily.
For myself, Id have a quick pass through the game and make the shuttle-starship equipment classification a bit more stringent.
In other words, no universal consoles for shuttles unless they came from a shuttle.
Better than changing how a console works for starships.
I was actually looking forward to shuttle PvP pug queues.
Problem is, they are empty.
I agree that the shuttle PvP thing appears to have been done hastily.
For myself, Id have a quick pass through the game and make the shuttle-starship equipment classification a bit more stringent.
In other words, no universal consoles for shuttles unless they came from a shuttle.
Better than changing how a console works for starships.
I agree they should even have shuttle specific consoles. they have Shuttle shield mods -S. It wouldn't be hard to throw a basic blue one for all the basic into the vendor for a low amount of EC. Why not standardize it.
I know it is one case though where the very small numbers of people that like to do the shuttle pve que stuff might be annoyed. I do wonder why they where ever allowed to use that stuff anyway... seems odd as Cryptic was at one time trying to push things like the time shuttle deflector and yellowstone engine as P2W Shuttle stuff... seems silly if you can just load all the full size P2W you already have... why buy a yellowstone when you can just use the theta console right.
why buy a yellowstone when you can just use the theta console right.
Yup....
....and, if you think about it, shuttle PvP solves a lot of issues people have with PvP.
There isnt really a scimitar or JHAS equivilant in shuttles.
And if you couldnt use universal starship consoles on them, then a vast amount of cheese would be gone.
While there would still be a bit of hierarchy in kit (my Aeon, with he defelctor dish from that, the shields from the Ferengi shuttle and the yellowstone engines for instance...lol) there wouldnt be so much in the way of one shot kills.
Much more skill......and much more beginner friendly.
I actually looked forward to shuttle PVP quite a bit. I played it for the first few days it was out, but then just stopped from all the cheese consoles. PVP just sucks with them.
That said, I did get into some mighty fine dogfights with a few people. One in particular came right down to the wire and ended with me blowing up and the other guy at 2% hull left. Neither of us were using cheese consoles and it was grand. Wish I could do more of that.
They keep plugging pvp in a desperate attempt to improve it's numbers. PVPers are complaining about its lack of attention from other players, etc. Unfortunately, what both PVPers and Cryptic aren't taking into consideration is that the current PVPers are what is driving new players away from this aspect of the game with their elitist "do it my way or get out" attitude. Until current players of PVP change that attitude nothing anyone does will improve PVP on STO.
I've never met anyone with that attitude. I think you may be mistaking helpful advice for the "do it my way or get out" attitude.
Let's take the difference between how I would react to people in a PvE match vs. how I would react in a PvP match:
In PvE if I notice someone not distributing their shields I'll send them a tactical team or a heal if they really need it, but I never say anything because victory will come whether they do this themselves or not.
In PvP, I will do the same thing, but in the end I can't keep wasting my tac teams and heals on one person while neglecting myself and the rest of the team. In this instance, I will also tell them that they need to be distributing shields themselves and using tactical team. That is not telling them, "do it my way or get out." It's telling them, "you should do this if you want to survive longer."
In PvP, I will do the same thing, but in the end I can't keep wasting my tac teams and heals on one person while neglecting myself and the rest of the team. In this instance, I will also tell them that they need to be distributing shields themselves and using tactical team. That is not telling them, "do it my way or get out." It's telling them, "you should do this if you want to survive longer."
Maybe you should also add a link to PVP Boot camp for further assistance because its out side your scope of support to continue to save their butts in PVP?
Sorry.. Tech support humor is dry.. and painful.. :P
You think that your beta test was bad?
Think about this: American Football has been in open beta for 144 years. ~Kotaku
Seriously, folks, PvP's great fun. You'll learn how to not be totally abysmal at the game much faster than you'd think possible.
You might not ever be good, mind, just not awful.
Starfleet Dental will, as a gesture of goodwill towards the community, be offering no-cost PvP assessments, where we will grade you on our scientifically developed 10- point scale of badness, and even tell you what low-effort things you could do to stop being so bad!
Praise be to Dear Leader - bask in His munificence.
Seriously, folks, PvP's great fun. You'll learn how to not be totally abysmal at the game much faster than you'd think possible.
You might not ever be good, mind, just not awful.
Starfleet Dental will, as a gesture of goodwill towards the community, be offering no-cost PvP assessments, where we will grade you on our scientifically developed 10- point scale of badness, and even tell you what low-effort things you could do to stop being so bad!
Praise be to Dear Leader - bask in His munificence.
And this is a fleet that the voice of the community associates himself with. Glad to see pandas and all the goon squatters are working together to help pvp should be the final nail in its coffin.
Most people might consider me a "carebear" for the way I am vehemently against PVP in a F2P scenario, but that's primarily due to two things. The unsportsmanlike behavior of the participants is ignorable, so I won't rail on about that.
The other part is where it's unfair to noobs when they go against me, who has a $25 ship with a few choice consoles and a ship full of purple XII guns and a few reputation-system consoles and guns, or when I go against somebody who has a top-end fleet ship sporting $100 of other ship consoles and a ship full of XII fleet guns and two sets of reputation gear: what happens is a one-sided beating, and this is what I see every time I go into PVP. Either I'm handing out the one-sided beating, or I'm getting it.
A "good fight" as PVPers are so fond of saying at the end of such a beating, should consist of several minutes where neither side is sure if they're going to pull this one off. I've never seen such a thing in STO PVP, just a series of one-sided kills.
In Neverwinter, Cryptic has a gear score listed for each player, and they have limited certain dungeons to a minimum gear score. They could easily do this in STO as well, taking into account your captain's traits and skills, active duty DOFFs and BOFF skills. If the queue automatically lumped players into brackets of similar gear scores, that would be a glorious thing. If players could see their gear scores, and the projected gear score change of various items and could voluntarily compete in higher brackets (but not lower brackets), that would be good too. To be totally fair, lock a player's gear so they can't swap in a higher-ranked set after they queue, and we'd be golden.
No other change would be necessary: just make objective gear scores and gate PVP matches into brackets of similar scores. This alone would get me PVPing again ... but going into it expecting to see *yet another* one-sided beating is just so ... ugh.
Though, now that I bring it up, requiring a minimum gear score to get into elite PVE matches would be a good thing, too. Too often have I seen people accept the leaver penalty because they get killed over and over less than 30 seconds after respawning, which demoralizes the remaining players.
The stuff about a F2P account not being able to compete with a non F2P account in PvP is just a lame excuse.
There are 2 reasons for that.
1) Yes the game is more gear driven that it ever was previously. However I know I can still take a completely free ship... or a 200k EC Mirror ship... and compete in PvP with no issues. Anyone that can not do that has simply not learned enough about the game yet. Lots of people crutch on there gear... they don't need to.
2) Everything and anything you could want in this game can be 100% earned with mild grid. Rep is earned through PvE... unlocking fleet ships again earned through PvE. Buying 4 fleet mods to get a fleet ships. Easily earned by selling the vendor trash from all the PvE you had to do to complete the rep.... or by using the Dilithum you earned doing the same.
Can you grind out lockbox ships ? Well you may not consider that mild grind anymore... however the answer is still yes you can. Cstore ships again more grind but really you can let others buy it for you by converting D into Zen. Helps to role a few alts here. With 20 toons (which I know is nuts) I can easily pound out 600 zen a day by just doing the Daily 8k on half my toons.
I have played as 100% F2P since the F2P launch. I canceled my sub and have not spent one cent since that time. I have 20 toons all have at least one lockbox ship some have 3 or 4. There isn't one lockbox ship I don't own... I have almost every fleet ship... ect ect.
My point is you can grind it all out... and to be effective in PvP... If you are already playing this games PvE chances are you have all the rep done... and are capable of grabbing at least ONE fleet class ship.
For those of you who aren't sure, try it. Who knows, you might just like it.
As a off again on again PvPer I can say without much question that it is pretty solidly broken.
If you just want to see stuff go BOOM (including yourself) then it is fine. If you actually want real strategy to play a heavy role then it often falls short with gear/ship/doff making too much of a difference. The moment you hit your first premade you will understand the futility of it and if you are really well setup then you will wonder what the challenge is supposed to be as you utterly demolish those who are not.
As a off again on again PvPer I can say without much question that it is pretty solidly broken.
If you just want to see stuff go BOOM (including yourself) then it is fine. If you actually want real strategy to play a heavy role then it often falls short with gear/ship/doff making too much of a difference. The moment you hit your first premade you will understand the futility of it and if you are really well setup then you will wonder what the challenge is supposed to be as you utterly demolish those who are not.
We are in agreement that there isn't a ton of stradagy in the the Que. You get one great game every 20 or so imo.
Which is why many of the games vets prefer to Pew in Tyler Durden (and why naz spent most of his article talking about it)... where 75% of the matches are great and the other 25% are at least not horrible. If you do end up in one of the not so great TD matches... stick around for the rematch where we can spin the teams a little bit and make the rematch one of the 75% of the the great matches.
We have addressed imo 90% of what drives people nuts about PvE in this game by running our own fight club. We are all there to make sure we ALL have a great time PvPing. Really it works.
If you are an on again off again type. As many of us are if we are being completely honest. Jump into the TD channel and Stop by the Team Speak this weekend and try to get in on some games. You may find that it is worth dropping by every now and then to do a little fight club with us. The game CAN have all the team synergies that make PvP fun in any game. Right now the best way to make sure your matches turn out that way is to prearrange them... not for a fleet team but for a good mix of the right classes ships and skills to make for epic matchs.
Hope to run into you in TD. Trek friends getting together to nicely beat on each other... what could be better ?
The stuff about a F2P account not being able to compete with a non F2P account in PvP is just a lame excuse.
There are 2 reasons for that.
1) Yes the game is more gear driven that it ever was previously. However I know I can still take a completely free ship... or a 200k EC Mirror ship... and compete in PvP with no issues. Anyone that can not do that has simply not learned enough about the game yet. Lots of people crutch on there gear... they don't need to.
2) Everything and anything you could want in this game can be 100% earned with mild grid. Rep is earned through PvE... unlocking fleet ships again earned through PvE. Buying 4 fleet mods to get a fleet ships. Easily earned by selling the vendor trash from all the PvE you had to do to complete the rep.... or by using the Dilithum you earned doing the same.
I don't think that F2P is the issue but new players. F2P, gold or lifer doesn't matter. However since new players has become cryptics mantra of late I think this warrants some comments.
Can you honestly say that a 200K EC ship is enough for a new lvl 50 player? No aegis, or assim console in storage, no 60 doffs for doffing and a set of 10 blue or better basic doffs.
is getting the rep xp, FM and DIl, necessary to move on all fronts, not knowing where to move first a mild grind? I don't think so. It takes weeks at level 50 to accumulate enough cxp, FM, DIL, rep xp, to acquire basic versions of what you and i can take for granted when we create alts. Will these alts be great or "competitive", not really but they can be fun enough.
However, for a new player, without the backlog of stuff vets had when each minor grind was first introduced I don't think mild grind, or 200EC and you can start having fun is an accurate description. In the 12 hours of game play that leveling takes, where did you get to learn the mechanics of standard (non-set) gear? How where you supposed to accumulate any resources, god forbid you started your own fleet to build a base.
It used to be the case that getting a new player on the way was a matter of hours. one test match, change stuff then come back and try again, done, lets queue up...! Throw in some EC banked goodies form my personal stack and they had reasonably good gear to be on their merry way .
Today there are weeks or months in between first and second test match. Get doffs, get boffs, get traits, get sets, get this, get that. Yes Fleet consoles.
Not having aegis, or assim, or dmg control doffs limits your builds, especially when it comes to practicing the basics. I have no doubt that you are a formidable opponent in a mirror ship, i have a few non-repped mirror ship alts, that pew from time to time myself.
I don't think our experience translates to new players. All a new player needs is 200k EC seems neither a fair assessment towards new players, nor to cryptic in its infinite wisdom.
Yes I still call it a mild grind. Its like everyone sometimes forgets that this is a MMO. I will say its a damn boring grind most of the time... still can you honestly say you couldn't grind out a PvP capable toon in 2 weeks ? 2 weeks is all it takes to get tier 2 reps done with out a token. Doing all that PvE earns you tons of EC... which you can easily use to grab a half decent ship. (yes some of the mirror ships are good enough depending what you want to do)... can you expect a mirror ship to be top of the top dps wise... likely not. Still you can fly one for the mirror cruisers for a 100% viable healer build... and the DPS mirror ships yes they are viable as well.
No one can tell me that a well built Mirror ship looses to any old lockbox ship player every time. Its just not true. For a new player they can blame the ship if they like. I think we all know better though. They are likely getting beat up by people with 3-4 years of experience on them. I can blow up new people in a tier 4 ships... does that mean tier 4 is better or was it me ?
Yes the way Cryptic has things setup you can't hit 50 and jump into PvP. That isn't any different then any other MMO I have ever played. Only difference is in most of those you HAVE to PvP and get beat up to earn "PvP" marks or points or what ever the game calls them to earn better PvP gear.
The way many devs do PvP is sicking for new players because they are required to get beat on to gear up.
At least in this game... you can do 1-3 weeks of mild grind. At that point you have tier 2 reps... you should be able to afford a fleet ship. (yes I know you have to have a fleet... but it is a MMO and it really isn't hard to find a friend in this game).
What is nice for a new player is INFO. Letting people know what they should be spending the EC and dilihtium they do earn on. Nothing worse then spending what ever you have in a new game on the wrong things.
I think the community has tried hard to do that for new players. We have boot camp... many of us are as helpful as we can be in the PvP section of the forums. We yes have also been doing the TD stuff... new players are welcome there regardless of what gear they have... and the people that take part are always willing to point people in the right direction. Its also really really not hard to find people in the game willing to help you out with grinding out that PvE gear. After a few TD matches a month ago or so I went and did a bunch of PvE with a new guy that needed some stuff... and I think I may have even mailed him a few million EC wroth of guns. lol
I guess this is a long winded response to a simple ... its not all that grindy when you compare it to what else is out there.
Yes grindy no doubt to get your toon to tier 5 reps in everything. (On that score I really hope Cryptic slows down with new reps new players are getting swamped). Still I think players can do just fine with tier 2 or so reps. (its far enough to grab KCB borg consoles and MK XI gear that matters). That is all that is needed. As far as Aegis its a PvE crafted set that you can buy for the cost of your vendor trash from a nights playing the games PvE.
I posted a few inexpensive builds I could think of with basic cheap mirror universe ships. I am hoping a few more people will post some good cost saving ideas and builds for our friends that are very new and want to try out PvP with builds that are as effective as possible with out requiring them blowing tons of EC or Dithium to jump in.
Comments
The No BS tournament was designed to allow all participants to have fun for the majority of the PvP community. Not for balance as most people assume. The 10 "perceived" worst things were banned e.g. Aux to battery powered Dkoras which could EMP every 30 secs or Danubes at that point in time that just locked you down permanently. The turn out was awesome for the first one especially considering how small the community is. 20 teams with at least 5 people in each one if memory serves correctly.
Yes there is and was a "Cheesy" tournament not so long ago. It was hosted by TRPH called The iPvP tournament. Providing you participated in it for what it was, a tournament for the community, it was fun. That too had a good turnout.
Well it is a tension perhaps... however it is also a misconception. (I do understand you are saying that.
I have reported many many bugs. I have also reported many bad mechanics. I have on occasion been asked to help test ships before they are launched. (many of the games players have been part of focus tests, its not just a few PvPers but players from every end of the pool). I guess I'm just saying that yes I am one of (not the only of courese) people that report lots of stuff that ends up getting "nerfed".
I can tell you from 4 years of experience taddeling on broken mechanics / items / skills ect...
If some thing mainly effects PvP it WILL NOT be nerfed. Cryptic has been very consistent on NOT fixing things that are broken mainly in regard to PvP.
However the second those same mechanics become a problem in PvE That is when they are fixed almost instantly... oh sorry "nerfed".
I know many people seem to think there is some small group of min maxing PvPers that report every fun item as broken or start mulitple wine threads so they will get nerfed. Its just not the case. There are a handful of high end Min Max type players in this game and they are not all strictly PvP players.
If they nerfed things for PvP... FAW would have been deleted already... romulans would have got the axe (or at least there boff stacking would have)... my point is things that are broken for PvP mainly don't get fixed... it is kind of the main problem with PvP. Lots of broken mechnaics that make people shooting at NPCs happy... and people getting shot with them not so much.
We could cry and wine for a year and things won't get fixed.
I will admit though that I have made a habit of taking the most broken things I find and making sure to let the Devs know what they can do in PvE.
Yes I think you can all thank me for having your Trico mine toys fixed... It was amazing how it got fixed with in 2 weeks after I sent a log to a dev of my little bop pulling over 1million DPS in the last min of a STF. lmao Again point is if its broken in one end of the pool its just as broken in the other. (I can't remember the exact dps on that run I think it was closer to the 1.5mil mark though... 2 rounds of 4x400k each mines will do that)
What we should be doing as a STAR TREK ONLINE community is all honestly reporting things that are obviously not working as intended. (or where the intention was obviously wrong). I don't consider the word NERF to be a bad one. Every Game should undergo corrections to mechanics all the time... imo every patch should fix something that isn't quite exactly right big or small. I like my games challenging as possible... both PvE and PvP.
Ok sorry for the semi off topic rant... my bad.
Well, yes and no.
I see your substantive point, and broadly I agree.
However, there has been a few little nibbles around the edge of it.
The nerf to the point defence console was brought about, pretty much, by the new PvP shuttle map.
But broken is broken.
You might be right on that one. The shuttle mode in general should have got a once over.
In general shuttle mode both PvE and PvP are more in line with the assertion that the 2 modes are not 100% equal in terms of what is needed for balance.
I get that all the PvE maps are all balanced so that having an ISO console on your shuttle isn't game breaking. Of course being able to load all the full size ship gear on the shuttles is one and perhaps the only reason the shuttle ques are empty.
It is a case where they should have found away to restrict that stuff for the PvP shuttle maps and allowed it in the PvE shuttle maps. Well we all know Cryptic has a hard time doing things right if the work involved hits a threshold they are not authorized to cross. Ok I should be quite now. lol
I was actually looking forward to shuttle PvP pug queues.
Problem is, they are empty.
I agree that the shuttle PvP thing appears to have been done hastily.
For myself, Id have a quick pass through the game and make the shuttle-starship equipment classification a bit more stringent.
In other words, no universal consoles for shuttles unless they came from a shuttle.
Better than changing how a console works for starships.
I agree they should even have shuttle specific consoles. they have Shuttle shield mods -S. It wouldn't be hard to throw a basic blue one for all the basic into the vendor for a low amount of EC. Why not standardize it.
I know it is one case though where the very small numbers of people that like to do the shuttle pve que stuff might be annoyed. I do wonder why they where ever allowed to use that stuff anyway... seems odd as Cryptic was at one time trying to push things like the time shuttle deflector and yellowstone engine as P2W Shuttle stuff... seems silly if you can just load all the full size P2W you already have... why buy a yellowstone when you can just use the theta console right.
Yup....
....and, if you think about it, shuttle PvP solves a lot of issues people have with PvP.
There isnt really a scimitar or JHAS equivilant in shuttles.
And if you couldnt use universal starship consoles on them, then a vast amount of cheese would be gone.
While there would still be a bit of hierarchy in kit (my Aeon, with he defelctor dish from that, the shields from the Ferengi shuttle and the yellowstone engines for instance...lol) there wouldnt be so much in the way of one shot kills.
Much more skill......and much more beginner friendly.
That said, I did get into some mighty fine dogfights with a few people. One in particular came right down to the wire and ended with me blowing up and the other guy at 2% hull left. Neither of us were using cheese consoles and it was grand. Wish I could do more of that.
Mine Trap Supporter
Let's take the difference between how I would react to people in a PvE match vs. how I would react in a PvP match:
In PvE if I notice someone not distributing their shields I'll send them a tactical team or a heal if they really need it, but I never say anything because victory will come whether they do this themselves or not.
In PvP, I will do the same thing, but in the end I can't keep wasting my tac teams and heals on one person while neglecting myself and the rest of the team. In this instance, I will also tell them that they need to be distributing shields themselves and using tactical team. That is not telling them, "do it my way or get out." It's telling them, "you should do this if you want to survive longer."
@DevolvedOne
Maybe you should also add a link to PVP Boot camp for further assistance because its out side your scope of support to continue to save their butts in PVP?
Sorry.. Tech support humor is dry.. and painful.. :P
Think about this:
American Football has been in open beta for 144 years. ~Kotaku
original join date 2010
Member: Team Trekyards. Visit Trekyards today!
The entire game has no useful purpose - perhaps we should just rename it Star Dunseling Online?
Some people actually play for fun, you know.....
Seriously, folks, PvP's great fun. You'll learn how to not be totally abysmal at the game much faster than you'd think possible.
You might not ever be good, mind, just not awful.
Starfleet Dental will, as a gesture of goodwill towards the community, be offering no-cost PvP assessments, where we will grade you on our scientifically developed 10- point scale of badness, and even tell you what low-effort things you could do to stop being so bad!
Praise be to Dear Leader - bask in His munificence.
And this is a fleet that the voice of the community associates himself with. Glad to see pandas and all the goon squatters are working together to help pvp should be the final nail in its coffin.
Most people might consider me a "carebear" for the way I am vehemently against PVP in a F2P scenario, but that's primarily due to two things. The unsportsmanlike behavior of the participants is ignorable, so I won't rail on about that.
The other part is where it's unfair to noobs when they go against me, who has a $25 ship with a few choice consoles and a ship full of purple XII guns and a few reputation-system consoles and guns, or when I go against somebody who has a top-end fleet ship sporting $100 of other ship consoles and a ship full of XII fleet guns and two sets of reputation gear: what happens is a one-sided beating, and this is what I see every time I go into PVP. Either I'm handing out the one-sided beating, or I'm getting it.
A "good fight" as PVPers are so fond of saying at the end of such a beating, should consist of several minutes where neither side is sure if they're going to pull this one off. I've never seen such a thing in STO PVP, just a series of one-sided kills.
In Neverwinter, Cryptic has a gear score listed for each player, and they have limited certain dungeons to a minimum gear score. They could easily do this in STO as well, taking into account your captain's traits and skills, active duty DOFFs and BOFF skills. If the queue automatically lumped players into brackets of similar gear scores, that would be a glorious thing. If players could see their gear scores, and the projected gear score change of various items and could voluntarily compete in higher brackets (but not lower brackets), that would be good too. To be totally fair, lock a player's gear so they can't swap in a higher-ranked set after they queue, and we'd be golden.
No other change would be necessary: just make objective gear scores and gate PVP matches into brackets of similar scores. This alone would get me PVPing again ... but going into it expecting to see *yet another* one-sided beating is just so ... ugh.
Though, now that I bring it up, requiring a minimum gear score to get into elite PVE matches would be a good thing, too. Too often have I seen people accept the leaver penalty because they get killed over and over less than 30 seconds after respawning, which demoralizes the remaining players.
There are 2 reasons for that.
1) Yes the game is more gear driven that it ever was previously. However I know I can still take a completely free ship... or a 200k EC Mirror ship... and compete in PvP with no issues. Anyone that can not do that has simply not learned enough about the game yet. Lots of people crutch on there gear... they don't need to.
2) Everything and anything you could want in this game can be 100% earned with mild grid. Rep is earned through PvE... unlocking fleet ships again earned through PvE. Buying 4 fleet mods to get a fleet ships. Easily earned by selling the vendor trash from all the PvE you had to do to complete the rep.... or by using the Dilithum you earned doing the same.
Can you grind out lockbox ships ? Well you may not consider that mild grind anymore... however the answer is still yes you can. Cstore ships again more grind but really you can let others buy it for you by converting D into Zen. Helps to role a few alts here. With 20 toons (which I know is nuts) I can easily pound out 600 zen a day by just doing the Daily 8k on half my toons.
I have played as 100% F2P since the F2P launch. I canceled my sub and have not spent one cent since that time. I have 20 toons all have at least one lockbox ship some have 3 or 4. There isn't one lockbox ship I don't own... I have almost every fleet ship... ect ect.
My point is you can grind it all out... and to be effective in PvP... If you are already playing this games PvE chances are you have all the rep done... and are capable of grabbing at least ONE fleet class ship.
As a off again on again PvPer I can say without much question that it is pretty solidly broken.
If you just want to see stuff go BOOM (including yourself) then it is fine. If you actually want real strategy to play a heavy role then it often falls short with gear/ship/doff making too much of a difference. The moment you hit your first premade you will understand the futility of it and if you are really well setup then you will wonder what the challenge is supposed to be as you utterly demolish those who are not.
We are in agreement that there isn't a ton of stradagy in the the Que. You get one great game every 20 or so imo.
Which is why many of the games vets prefer to Pew in Tyler Durden (and why naz spent most of his article talking about it)... where 75% of the matches are great and the other 25% are at least not horrible. If you do end up in one of the not so great TD matches... stick around for the rematch where we can spin the teams a little bit and make the rematch one of the 75% of the the great matches.
We have addressed imo 90% of what drives people nuts about PvE in this game by running our own fight club. We are all there to make sure we ALL have a great time PvPing. Really it works.
If you are an on again off again type. As many of us are if we are being completely honest. Jump into the TD channel and Stop by the Team Speak this weekend and try to get in on some games. You may find that it is worth dropping by every now and then to do a little fight club with us. The game CAN have all the team synergies that make PvP fun in any game. Right now the best way to make sure your matches turn out that way is to prearrange them... not for a fleet team but for a good mix of the right classes ships and skills to make for epic matchs.
Hope to run into you in TD. Trek friends getting together to nicely beat on each other... what could be better ?
I don't think that F2P is the issue but new players. F2P, gold or lifer doesn't matter. However since new players has become cryptics mantra of late I think this warrants some comments.
Can you honestly say that a 200K EC ship is enough for a new lvl 50 player? No aegis, or assim console in storage, no 60 doffs for doffing and a set of 10 blue or better basic doffs.
is getting the rep xp, FM and DIl, necessary to move on all fronts, not knowing where to move first a mild grind? I don't think so. It takes weeks at level 50 to accumulate enough cxp, FM, DIL, rep xp, to acquire basic versions of what you and i can take for granted when we create alts. Will these alts be great or "competitive", not really but they can be fun enough.
However, for a new player, without the backlog of stuff vets had when each minor grind was first introduced I don't think mild grind, or 200EC and you can start having fun is an accurate description. In the 12 hours of game play that leveling takes, where did you get to learn the mechanics of standard (non-set) gear? How where you supposed to accumulate any resources, god forbid you started your own fleet to build a base.
It used to be the case that getting a new player on the way was a matter of hours. one test match, change stuff then come back and try again, done, lets queue up...! Throw in some EC banked goodies form my personal stack and they had reasonably good gear to be on their merry way .
Today there are weeks or months in between first and second test match. Get doffs, get boffs, get traits, get sets, get this, get that. Yes Fleet consoles.
Not having aegis, or assim, or dmg control doffs limits your builds, especially when it comes to practicing the basics. I have no doubt that you are a formidable opponent in a mirror ship, i have a few non-repped mirror ship alts, that pew from time to time myself.
I don't think our experience translates to new players. All a new player needs is 200k EC seems neither a fair assessment towards new players, nor to cryptic in its infinite wisdom.
a history of sto pvp: 2010 - 2011
a history of sto pvp: 2012 - 2013
No one can tell me that a well built Mirror ship looses to any old lockbox ship player every time. Its just not true. For a new player they can blame the ship if they like. I think we all know better though. They are likely getting beat up by people with 3-4 years of experience on them. I can blow up new people in a tier 4 ships... does that mean tier 4 is better or was it me ?
Yes the way Cryptic has things setup you can't hit 50 and jump into PvP. That isn't any different then any other MMO I have ever played. Only difference is in most of those you HAVE to PvP and get beat up to earn "PvP" marks or points or what ever the game calls them to earn better PvP gear.
The way many devs do PvP is sicking for new players because they are required to get beat on to gear up.
At least in this game... you can do 1-3 weeks of mild grind. At that point you have tier 2 reps... you should be able to afford a fleet ship. (yes I know you have to have a fleet... but it is a MMO and it really isn't hard to find a friend in this game).
What is nice for a new player is INFO. Letting people know what they should be spending the EC and dilihtium they do earn on. Nothing worse then spending what ever you have in a new game on the wrong things.
I think the community has tried hard to do that for new players. We have boot camp... many of us are as helpful as we can be in the PvP section of the forums. We yes have also been doing the TD stuff... new players are welcome there regardless of what gear they have... and the people that take part are always willing to point people in the right direction. Its also really really not hard to find people in the game willing to help you out with grinding out that PvE gear. After a few TD matches a month ago or so I went and did a bunch of PvE with a new guy that needed some stuff... and I think I may have even mailed him a few million EC wroth of guns. lol
I guess this is a long winded response to a simple ... its not all that grindy when you compare it to what else is out there.
Yes grindy no doubt to get your toon to tier 5 reps in everything. (On that score I really hope Cryptic slows down with new reps new players are getting swamped). Still I think players can do just fine with tier 2 or so reps. (its far enough to grab KCB borg consoles and MK XI gear that matters). That is all that is needed. As far as Aegis its a PvE crafted set that you can buy for the cost of your vendor trash from a nights playing the games PvE.
I started this thread http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1036951
in the PvP section.
I posted a few inexpensive builds I could think of with basic cheap mirror universe ships. I am hoping a few more people will post some good cost saving ideas and builds for our friends that are very new and want to try out PvP with builds that are as effective as possible with out requiring them blowing tons of EC or Dithium to jump in.