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The new traits make the aux2bat build problems even worse
lucho80
Member Posts: 6,600 Bug Hunter
It was bad enough when the team abilities (ST,ET,TT) got taken out of having shared cooldowns and all of a sudden you started seeing aux2bat cruisers that were pretty much immune to debuffs, specially if they use the debuff clearing doff. Now you're going to add this trait that just make things worse.
Engineering
Activating any Engineering Bridge Officer ability gives 20% Damage Reduction for 3 seconds.
Now, if you first fixed the whole problem with ALWAYS having everything at global CD using aux2bat and technicians, I would have no problem with this one, but given the fact that I see no movement towards that, this is just completely over the top. They already proc on inspirational leader a lot because of all the boff abilities they have up all the time, now you give them extra resistance with a 20% chance on top of that? Please tell me after it procs it's locked out from another proc for some amount of time.
Engineering
Activating any Engineering Bridge Officer ability gives 20% Damage Reduction for 3 seconds.
Now, if you first fixed the whole problem with ALWAYS having everything at global CD using aux2bat and technicians, I would have no problem with this one, but given the fact that I see no movement towards that, this is just completely over the top. They already proc on inspirational leader a lot because of all the boff abilities they have up all the time, now you give them extra resistance with a 20% chance on top of that? Please tell me after it procs it's locked out from another proc for some amount of time.
Post edited by lucho80 on
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Consider: What abilities will a typical cruiser activate:
EPTX/Y every 15 seconds.
Aux2Something every 10-15 seconds. If a cruiser isn't Aux2batting, it's Aux2SIFing or Aux2Damping instead.
On top of that, it's "Damage Reduction", which means it's likely to suffer the same brutal diminshing returns of other "damage reduction" boni.
Say you've got a boat with...
X, X, X, X
X, X, X
...if you AtB that - how often are you going to be popping Eng abilities compared to if you weren't?
Sure, you might be hitting your EPtX abilities around the same time - but - you're going to be hitting those three other Eng abilities faster.
While there is the diminishing returns on damage resistance, you don't have to stack it. You pick this up - frees you up to do something else elsewhere. But you don't quite get that option if you're not running AtB.
I'm not even sure what this means. Is it
(a) shield damage reduction,
(b) damage resistance,
(c) bonus damage resistance,
(d) something similar to the damage reduction from abilities like Aceton Beam and Weapons Malfunction?
I'm also not sure how (d) works; it might work differently for ground and space too.
Un-ATB'ed, I'd again, be popping my EPTX every 15 seconds, my aux2sif or aux2damp every 10-15 seconds depending on what I'm doing with it...
So not much changes. ATB'd, I can throw an Engi team more often, but that's going to be on a 15-20s cycle and not going to add much to a 10-15s cycle, plus you probably won't be spamming Engi team mindlessly. The result is that you're not really gaining much you didn't already.
And, of course, we don't actually know what the ability does. What *IS* 20% damage resistance? A bit of hull armor, subject to Diminishing Returns mauling? Eh...such gappy, unreliable armor, isn't going to convince me to replace my existing armor to depend on this. I am not convinced that the sky is falling here.
We actually really don't like A2B, but it's a bit of a "third rail" situation. When we have the right fix to it, someday, we'll probably possibly maybe make it.
Systems Designer - Cryptic Studios
Twitter: @JeffAHamilton
"The right to fix it"
What does this mean?
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
They can't just eliminate technician doff reduction- I mean they could but it would negatively impact a lot of users and they need to keep their demographics in mind. Generally speaking a company will go for soft fixes rather than hard ones. Minor alterations that alleviate the problem without major structural changes.
Aux2Bat is problematic because it's really really strong, but it's also one of the few ways eng cruisers can really remain competitive. So they don't want to just rip that functionality out entirely. They need to find a solution that fixes the main issues with it (that it's too powerful) without eliminating it entirely, or nerfing it into a state of not being useful.
It might do to make a dedicated aux2bat//reduction thread somewhere and fork discussion over there.
It means "the right fix to it".
There used to be a picture here, but they changed signatures and I can't be bothered to replace it.
It means you flipped the words around :P
The RIGHT FIX, not the right TO FIX
It's dodge. In space.
Systems Designer - Cryptic Studios
Twitter: @JeffAHamilton
a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way.
Just seemed like an interesting choice of words regarding a mechanic
I am obviously dyslexic...my bad hawk
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
Isn't that defense?
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
There used to be a picture here, but they changed signatures and I can't be bothered to replace it.
Too big a nerf
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
No, not in STO. Defense is a miss chance. Dodge (on ground, famously on Caitians and some ground set gear) is actually damage reduction. You have your DodgeChance % chance to reduce incoming damage by your AvoidanceMagnitude %. This power is a 100% DodgeChance, 20% AvoidanceMagnitude.
Systems Designer - Cryptic Studios
Twitter: @JeffAHamilton
Could the labels be switched? Dodge to me (and most of us I'd imagine?) sounds like it's a chance to avoid damage entirely, while Defence would be the thing that reduces it.
This mockup appeared on Reddit recently: http://i.imgur.com/njHHt5W.jpg
Any chance there's a wider UI/information exposure piece in the pipeline?
Ok...i think your using nomenclature from a different game or internal lingo.
Or I'm just behind the times on what terns are being used...
But I thought we used damage resistance magnitude and damage resistance.
That damage resistance just gets slammed right on to the sloping line graph I assume? And is that shields included or strictly hull?
How do you partially dodge something anyway? :P:D
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
There's a reason I didn't call it Dodge on the trait - I called it "20% Damage Reduction" as that's what it does. Dodge in our engine stems from Champions, where it works as I described above.
Systems Designer - Cryptic Studios
Twitter: @JeffAHamilton
But there's the ghost of a braincell left that's curious about where the "damage reduction" from this trait fits in. In my peabrain, I'm already swimming with the following terms:
Damage Resistance Rating
Damage Bonus Resistance Rating
Damage Resistance
Shield Damage Reduction
The three for Hull Damage and the one for Shield Damage...
..so when I see "20% Damage Reduction" - er - I'm left to wonder where this is going to fit in. The mention of it being akin to the Champions Dodge (where a quick Google fried my brain a little more), where it's Damage Avoidance - which is somewhat akin to both our Damage Resistance (Hull) and Shield Damage Reduction (Shields)...
...well, see - I can't even type about it, lol - brain is just too fried on the discussion. Getting lost in the terms...meh. Kind of like how APO used to provide damage reduction but that was changed to a damage resistance rating...is there a DRR behind that % damage reduction?
Is it hull damage reduction/resistance? Shield damage reduction? Does it apply to the damage before the shields?
1000 outgoing damage
> target (shields)
> target (hull)
Where's the reduction applied?
Why not? And why is the other cooldown reduction power (Photonic Officer) So terribad compared to it?
Thanks for the new sig, probably possibly, I love it.
Engineering
Activating any Engineering Bridge Officer ability gives 20% Damage Reduction for 3 seconds.
one of the new possible earned crafting traits [from maxing a crafting profession] meaning you would......
have to give up one of your currently slotted 8 [9 if alien] traits to be able to slot it?
and max that crafting disciple to unlock the trait in the 1st place?
Your point?
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
Take a raider of some kind that has 5 tac slots. Deck it out with highest lvl Tac consoles. Add Heavy Cannons and other weapons that comes with a good shield penetration. Use all your weapons enhancement buffs, TT, APB, EPW, DEM, CRF, HYT, and if Tac Char, APA, and other Tac player buffs, declock or De-MES from behind that cruiser and you are going to deliver a heck of a lot of DPS that could easily kill a heavily shielded resisting engy in an A2B cruise.
And since pvp is not always 1v1, get a friend who has the same setup on his clocking/MESing raider and you go as a pair against that 1 A2B engy cruiser and it is extremely unlikely that A2B cruiser will be alive after that shock. It was already unlikely with just 1 of you. And most PvP is team based unless you specifically make a private match and only invite 1 other person to make it a 1v1.
And you still got the Dual Beams Beam overload setup to deliver that powerful spike as well...
... ... ...
And yet, ya'll are complaining about A2B cruiser being OP???
Use all of the game play mechanics first before calling Nerf.
... ... ...
And that isn't even the end of it either. You still got the CC from Science Players where you can hammer an A2B Engie in a Cruiser with Grave Wells, Tractor Beams, Yellow Stone Run Abouts, Romulan Tractor Mines, Eject Warp Plasma to deal all the CC in the world that will maintain debuffs on an A2B Cruiser, well setup for any DPS to take out from a well built Tac in a well geared Escort or raider.
I think it's due in part to the fact that it allows a lot of lower-end ships to compete - most Cruisers, for instance, are rather weak without it. That's one of the reasons Cruisers have become more popular since the build was discovered and created. I think Cryptic, while not LIKING the exploit of something that wasn't meant to work like that, recognizes that some ships need that to compete - and they only make money on older ships that compete with newer stuff in-game. The C-Store Defiant retrofit, for instance, is a solid ship even after all these years, because the Escort game hasn't much changed, so it (and its Fleet version) are relatively popular. But the C-Store Galaxy Retrofit is generally seen as an immobile brick that tickles things to death, and not many people fly it (or its Fleet version). Cryptic wants to fix A2B, but not before they find a way to give the ships that NEED it to remain viable a second option.