Let's Play: "The Patch Notes I'd Like to See"

tk79

In light of the recent changes to Beam Overload, let's play "breaking the gam--" I mean, "The Patch Notes I'd Like to See"!

For this edition of "The Patch Notes I'd Like to See", I am inspired by the wonderful(sic) changes made to BO and the new additions like Motivation. The mindset is: "let's break some things and have fun!" Although you might see some (or quite a few) honest suggestions here, most of them are just as indiscriminate as they can be. Like the latest changes to BO.

Now onto the changes. Have fun reading! (Or not!)

________________________________________________________



Systems:

• Shared cooldowns among different powers have been removed.
  • Shared cooldowns between two copies of the same power remain unchanged.
• Space weapons:
  • They no longer drain weapon power.
  • Items that previously provided weapon drain resistance now provide a damage strength of the same amount instead.
    • Those items include: Fleet Spire Warp Cores/Singularity Cores, Cruiser Command - Weapon System Efficiency, Assimilated 2-piece set bonus, Marion Duty Officer, etc.
• All powers that previously drained weapon power will no longer do so.
  • Weapon power "overcapping" will no longer have any practical effect.
• Damage Resistance / Diminishing Returns formula:
  • Maximum attainable resistance returned from this formula increased from 75% to 95%.
  • Applies to ground and space.
• New Spaceship Attribute: Armor Modifier.
  • It is similar to the known Shield Modifier on ships.
  • It has a similar effect on damage resistance as Combat Armor does in ground combat.
    • Example: damage resistance magnitude provided by consoles on a ship with a 1.5 Armor Modifier will be 50% better.
  • Different ships can have different modifiers.
    • Large ships will usually get higher modifiers than smaller ships.
    • It will be generally more difficult to attain higher resistance ratings with small ships, and easier on large ships.
• All ships' hit points have been changed moderately.
  • Large ships will get more hull hit points, proportionally to their size.
  • Small ships will remain more or less the same as they currently are.
• Shields (ground and space):
  • Resistance cap increased from 75% to 85%.
  • Ground: skills that harden shields now will also protect against environmental damage.
    • Psionic damage mechanics remain unchanged.
• Crouch:
  • Melee resistance debuff removed.
  • Dodge bonus provided now only applies to ranged damage.
    • It no longer applies to explosions or melee damage.
• Sprint:
  • Effects are now only applied while the character is effectively running.
  • It now provides additional 25% avoidance (for a total of 75%) while running.
  • Dodge bonus remains unchanged at 75%.
• Roll:
  • It now provides additional 50% avoidance (for a total of 100%) for the duration.
  • Dodge bonus remains unchanged at 100%.
  • Cooldown time after rolling has been doubled.
• Elite Fleet Phaser Weapons:
  • Chance to proc has been removed.
  • Upgraded effect: heals shields and armor for 10% of the amount of damage dealt with the weapon, after resists.
• Elite Fleet Disruptor Weapons Proc:
  • Vaporize effect has been removed.
  • New effect: provides a scaling damage bonus based on the target's missing health percentage.
• Elite Fleet Armor Modifier (Nanite):
  • All current effects have been removed.
  • New effect: completely negates the next damage tick received.
    • Can happen once every 15 seconds.
• Party devices:
  • Any balloon generated by a party item can now be targeted and shot down.
    • They have 1 hit point.
    • Where auto-targeting is concerned, they are considered objects.
      • They will not trigger mines or other proximity devices.
  • Balloons are no longer only generated by the client (the game application).
    • Other players will now see the same balloons as you do, in the same colors, shapes, and positions.

Powers:

• All Attack Patterns and all Tactical Captain damage buffs:
  • They can only buff weapon damage.
    • They still affect ship's unique weapons and some console attacks.
      • Examples include: Proton Barrage, Phaser Lance, Phaser Lotus, Isometric Charge.
    • They can no longer affect Science and Engineering skills.
      • Examples include: Gravity Well, Eject Warp Plasma, Feedback Pulse, Tractor Beam Repulsors.
    • Ramming Speed is no longer affected.
• Ramming Speed:
  • Damage is now based on speed upon impact, and ship mass difference between the colliding ships.
    • If a large ship collides with a small ship, large ship takes lesser self-damage while dealing greater damage.
    • If a small ship collides with a large ship, small ship takes greater self-damage while dealing lesser damage.
    • If the two colliding ships are about the same size, self-damage and dealt damage, before resists, will be about the same.
    • Speed upon impact affects both damage numbers equally.
  • It is no longer affected by damage buffs of any kind.
  • It now has a flat critical chance of 5% and critical severity of 50%.
  • If the ramming ship is destroyed upon hitting a target, warp core breach explosion will happen immediately.
    • Romulan ships will perform their version of singularity core breach explosion with the known repelling effects.
• Proton Barrage:
  • All "buff striping" properties have been removed.
• Cannon Spread Volley:
  • It now takes the weapon's arc into account instead of a fixed arc.
    • Turrets will hit all targets within their 360 degree arc for the duration.
    • Same applies to Single Cannons (180 degrees) and Dual (Heavy) Cannons (45 degrees).
    • Weapons with the [Arc] modifier will benefit from the enhanced arc while using this skill.
• Fuse Armor:
  • Electrical DoT base duration changed to 6 seconds base.
    • It is no longer linked to root/stun duration.
    • Duration can be enhanced by skills.
      • This affects the total damage dealt by the skill.
      • It can not be reduced by enemy's Willpower.
    • DoT can still be cleared by usual means.
• Weapons Malfunction and Polaron proc:
  • Damage reduction debuff is no longer affected by Malfunction Immunity.
    • It can now stack from the same and multiple sources.
      • This includes Polaron weapons.
  • Damage reduction debuff magnitude and duration both reduced by 30%.
• Shield Recharge:
  • Shield resistance bonuses increased:
    • Amount of resistance increased to 15%.
    • Resistance duration increased to 6 seconds.
    • Duration and magnitude can now be affected by skills.
• Combat Supply:
  • All current effects have been removed.
  • New effect: provides a maximum of +5% buff to all damage, +5 all damage resistance rating, and 5% cooldown reduction to all teammates in the area while the box is active.
    • It also affects pets and fabrications.
    • Effects can stack from multiple boxes.
      • Five Engineers on a team can stack five boxes for a grand total of +25% base damage, +25 damage resistance rating, and 25% cooldown reduction.
• Cover Shield:
  • Movement collision from friendly players has been removed.
    • Friendly players will now pass through the shield.
    • It does not change Line of Sight mechanics, or projectile collision.
      • They won't be able to attack through the shield.
    • It will also apply in social maps.
      • NPCs in social maps will still be blocked by the shield.
• Motion Accelerator:
  • Melee damage bonus has been removed.
  • Cooldown has been reduced to 60 seconds, down from 180 seconds.
• Motivation (IMPLEMENTED - Tribble Patch Notes):
  • Critical chance bonus has been removed.
  • Heal on critical has been changed to guaranteed heal based on outcoming damage.
    • Healing threshold remains unchanged.
• Lunge:
  • Shield penetration property has been removed.
• Rally Cry:
  • Critical chance bonus no longer stacks from multiple sources.

Duty Officers:

• Conn Officers:
  • (Space) Tactical Team cooldown reduction:
    • One purple officer now brings the ability to global cooldown.
• Damage Control Engineers:
  • (Space) Engineering Team cooldown reduction:
    • One purple officer now brings the ability to global cooldown.
• Development Lab Scientists:
  • (Space) Science Team cooldown reduction:
    • One purple officer now brings the ability to global cooldown.
• Energy Weapons Officer:
  • (Space) Beam/Cannon/Subsystem Targeting attacks cooldown reduction:
    • One purple officer now brings the ability to global cooldown.
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
  • (Space) Beam Overload shield penetration:
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
    • Shield penetration to next attacks reduced to 4%/8%/12%/16%.
    • Duration remains unchanged.
• Projectile Weapons Officer:
  • (Space) Torpedo/Mine recharge reduction:
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
    • Cooldown reductions remain unchanged.
• Damage Control Engineers:
  • (Space) Emergency Power cooldown reduction:
    • One purple officer now brings the ability to global cooldown.
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
• Shield Distribution Officer:
  • (Space) Ramming Speed variant:
    • Immunity to self-damage removed.
• Assault Squad Officer:
  • (Ground) Grenade cooldown reduction variant:
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
    • It now reduces cooldown on Grenades based on the following percentages: 10%/15%/20%/25%.
      • This is per officer on active duty.
• Security Officer:
  • (Ground) Melee critical variant:
    • Critical chance reduced from 8% to 3%.
    • Critical severity reduced from 75% to 25%.
  • (Ground) Ambush DoT variant:
    • Damage-over-time duration has been increased by 50% across all ranks.
    • Damage per tick has been decreased by 33% across all ranks.
• Diagnostic Engineer:
  • (Ground) Ranged Damage bonus variant:
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
    • Ranged damage bonus has been changed from fixed 50 across ranks to 10/20/30/40 points.
  • (Ground) Shield Recharge variant:
    • All current effects have been removed.
    • New effect: grants Perfect Shields for 3 seconds on usage of Shield Recharge.
      • Each officer on active duty will extend the Perfect Shields effect by 3 seconds.
      • Having three of these officers in active duty will grant 9 seconds of Perfect Shields on usage of Shield Recharge.
• System Engineer:
  • (Space) Weapon Energy Drain variant (Marion):
    • Weapon drain bonus has been replaced by a damage strength bonus of the same amount.
      • It still relies on Directed Energy Modulation to activate.
• Technician:
  • (Space) Bridge Officer cooldown reduction variant:
    • No changes.
• Warp Core Engineer:
  • (Space) Subsystem Power variant:
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
    • Bonus power levels provided have been changed to 2/4/6/8 points.
    • Duration has been increased to 15 seconds.
  • (Space) Debuff Cleanse variant:
    • Chance to proc and periodic cleansing effect have been removed.
    • It now removes two random, non-DOT debuffs upon activation of any Emergency Power ability.
• Hazard System Officer:
  • (Ground) Fuse Armor variant:
    • Chance to proc has been removed.
    • Electrical DOT damage bonus has been decreased from 100% to 75%.
• Biologist:
  • (Space) Scramble Sensors variant:
    • Recharge time debuff has been decreased from 50% to 20%.

Traits:

• Covert:
  • Bonus to Stealth has been decreased from 20% to 5%.
• Medical Vanguard:
  • All current effects have been removed.
  • New effect: provides a passive, team-wide damage buff based on the percentage of all member's available health.
    • The less health they have, the lesser the bonus will be.
    • The maximum damage bonus provided by this trait from a single Science Captain is 5%.
    • This is scaled up to the whole team.
      • A solo Science Captain will get between 5% and 0% depending on his own health.
      • A team with five members, one being defeated and the others with full health, will get a team-wide bonus of 4%.
    • It stacks with other Science Captains on the team.
      • A team of 5 Science Captains with this trait slotted and full health will benefit from a team-wide damage bonus of 25%.
• Shield Harmonic Resonance:
  • Damage type restriction has been removed.
  • The damage resistance buff provided now works against all damage.
    • This includes environmental damage.
• Stubborn:
  • Cooldown on active power has been reduced from 240 seconds to 30 seconds.
• Strike Team Specialist:
  • Chance to proc has been removed.
  • Critical chance bonus has been reduced from 2.5% to 1.5%.
• Nanomolecular Architect:
  • Damage resistance magnitude to fabrications has been increased from 10 to 40.

Locations:

• Qo'nos:
  • The ring in the center of the square is now a duel ring (PVP):
    • A player who enters the ring can fight another player inside.
      • Players inside the ring cannot attack players outside the ring.
      • Buffs from players outside the ring have no effect to players inside the ring.
      • Players on a team are not allowed to enter the ring until they leave their team.
    • Only two players are allowed inside the ring at a given time.
      • Any other player that forces their way in will be repelled back.
    • All ranged attacks, kit powers, and all procs from equipment are disabled.
      • Only melee attacks are allowed.
        • This includes melee attacks from ranged weapons.
      • Procs disabled include the Vaporize proc from Nanopulse weapons, knockback and AoE effects triggered from shields and armor, etc.
      • All current buffs are stripped from the player when they enter the ring.
    • Players inside the ring in Red Alert can not leave the ring.
      • They can leave the ring when not in Red Alert, allowing another player to go in.
      • Players in a fight can not be knocked back outside the ring.
        • An invisible wall will prevent them to get "ringed out".
    • Defeated players will automatically respawn right outside the ring after 10 seconds.
      • There is no Respawn button.
      • The winner will get fully healed after 5 seconds.
      • A defeated player can not enter the ring again for 10 seconds after respawning.
        • This will allow other players in line to try their chances against the winner.
      • The winner can choose to leave the ring after their opponent is defeated.
    • NPCs will fight each other while no players are in the ring.
      • NPCs will move out once a player goes in.
• Ship interiors:
  • Ships that previously had an exclusive bridge can now choose other bridges.
    • This includes bridges with interiors.
  • A Holodeck room has been added:
    • This room will feature a console where the player can start Foundry missions without having to travel to the starting points.
    • The same console will offer an extra "Target Practice" option:
      • Targets can be chosen from predefined formats: ground combat dummies or space combat dummies.
        • These dummies come in different flavors: shielded, non-shielded, no resistances, high resistances, etc.
        • Certain dummies/drones will attack back when the player enters certain fields in the map (ground or space).
          • Dummies/drones inside those fields are stationary and immune to all effects.
          • Their attacks can defeat the player.
            • These fields are intended to test the resilience of the Captain or ship.
          • Attacking will stop once the player moves out of the field.
          • These areas have a radius of 4km (space) and 15m (ground).
            • The UI will warn the player when they are about to enter one of those fields.
          • These areas come in different flavors of damage type and difficulty.
      • While in those rooms, new UI elements will show some combat statistics, like damage-per-second, damage-per-volley, healing-per-second, etc.
        • If the player is on a team, his teammates can go inside the room as well.
        • Statistics will be separated for each player on team.
      • Each room features a PVP field (ground or space).
        • Each player inside this special field can attack each other.
          • This is a true Free-For-All mode.
        • Players inside the field cannot attack players outside the field, and vice-versa.
        • There is no limit of players that can go inside this field.
        • Players can leave the field at any time, even while in Red Alert mode.
          • These fields are intended to be testing arenas.
    • Ships that have no extended interiors will have access to the Holodeck options via one of the consoles in the bridge.

General:

• Tailor:
  • Swimwear:
    • They are now allowed inside ships and during solo instanced missions.
    • Off-duty pieces have been merged into the Swimwear category.
      • Sub-categories can now be chosen for upper and lower sections allowing parts to be mixed.
      • As a side effect of this change, the Swimwear category no longer needs to be unlocked by purchasing a Swimwear costume box.
        • It will come with the full set of Off-Duty costume pieces by default.
        • Males will now have access to a Bare Chest option in the Upper sub-category.
          • Even if they haven't purchased any Swimwear costume.
      • Off-Duty will still be a category by itself.
        • Male Bare Chest options won't be available in the Off-Duty category.
          • Male Orions being the only exception.
  • Bridge Officers can now have extra costume slots.
    • The first slot is always fixed to the Uniform category.
    • The second slot will be offered for free to all current and new Captains.
    • Second and further slots can belong to any category.
      • Even Swimwear.
    • Additional Bridge Officer costume slots can be purchased from the C-Store.
    • Bridge Officer costumes can be swapped in their profile window (default key U), by targeting them and right-clicking on their portrait and choosing Change Costume, or using the "Wear" button inside the Tailor interface in the Bridge Officers tab.
      • This will affect bridge officers both on a Captain's team, as well as inside the bridge.
    • Swimwear category restrictions will still apply.
      • Bridge Officers wearing swimwear will automatically change to their first costume slot upon beaming down to New Romulus, Dyson Battlezone, or any current or future map that allows bringing Bridge Officers along that restrict usage of swimwear.

Known Issues:

• None of the above patch notes is likely be implemented.
  • The whole thing is intended to be a joke.
• I wanted to suggest something for Exothermic Radiation but I don't really know how.
  • Same about Crew.
• BBCODE is a PITA.
  • Especially nested lists.
• Strangely enough, I had fun writing this.

anazonda

Can I have a TL;DR?

a3001

General:

All dissent will now be a bannable offense.

Known Issues:

None whatsoever.

cepholapoid

Although some of these ideas are good, I see quite a few problems as well.

First off it would seem all the changes you want made for ships would benefit larger ships. Aka more hull for bigger ships, better ramming speed. Well other than the overlap thing, but that affects most ships though.

The second is the energy weapons thing and how they would no longer drain weapon power. That would negate the whole idea of an energy weapon ( I know BO doesn't but that doesn't mean all energy weapons have to go that way) and pretty much makes torpedoes useless unless you run a dedicated vaper (which would be necessary to get through all those resistance buffs you plan on implementing.)

But that's just my opinion. I like most of the. Other "patch notes" though, although I doubt the devs would actually implement most of this stuff because some of it involves the Evul math.

questerius

I like the idea of an armor modifier.

Addition:
Users of Subspace party device can be targeted and shot, full injuries.

stofsk

I know you worked hard on that OP, OP, but can you TL;dr it please

tarastheslayer

That's horribly long, and can't say I read it all, though a lot of what I did read I don't agree with I'm afraid, I mean I appreciate you probably put a lot of time into it but a lot of it is the kind of stuff that's made this game unbalanced and linear in the first place, and just like the devs it ignores powers that need buffing.

I like the ability to shoot balloons though :P

dgdolph

PvP:
- added matchmaking
- added leaderboard
- added spectator mode
- added match replayer
- added cross faction teaming
- added stats page to character overview
- added new gameplay modes
--- capture the flag (ground)
--- sector control (game wide space)
- added 1337 new arena maps
- fixed "stuck in ceiling" bug
- added custom bufflist icons (like a big red blinking one for feedback)
- added new keybinds (Select Enemy1-5)

PvE:
- new captains now start at lvl 50
- new captains now start at T5 reputation
- MK XII now drops everywhere
- episodes, foundry and pve queues have been moved to a submenu
- drastically improved AI
- drastically improved overall difficulty

Duty Officers:
- added cluster maps again
- added old UI
--- new UI is now optional

General:
- fixed all existing bugs
- removal of all carriers
- added Fleet D'Kyr
- Defiant now has battle cloak
- Romulans aren't allied to KDF/FED anymore
--- Romulans have to build up their own Fleets from now on

dabelgrave

• Added the trait 'Sucker'
  • Upon activation, the next ability you use will activate at full strength.
  • The ability cannot be avoided or debuffed. It can be buffed.
  • 1 Zen will be deducted from your account. If no Zen is available, this trait will not function.

hyefather

PVP:
Ground and Space combat will be combined. Ground characters will now control photon and phaser turrets from ESD. For the Space part, characters can now join a friendly captain (ship invite) and control a seperate ship station. Via choice of split screen or a serperate screen. Characters that choose the Space PVP. 1 characer (team captain) will Fly the ship and all others depending on class will do their part. Captain will navigate,Tacs will use weapons, Science will be incontroll of Heals and Enemy Debuffs and Engineers will be in control of Engineer powers and Device slots. While the captain flys the ship he/she will have a new UI interface alone with a Map of the ship. When the ship needs a abilitys. A red,blue or yellow light will outline the ship map letting the Team captain know what the ship needs so he can relay the message to the other players. That reminds the other players when a classes ability is needed (to give the team captain a sense of leadership during the battle). This is completely option. Space PVP can operate like it always has. Each character in his own ship. This option was made solely for people who prefer group objectives over solo content.

Houseing:
Players can now inhabit a planet of their choice (Many players can inhabit the same planet). Players start out with a small structure that has all the following starting features. Commoditys broker,Bank, ship seclect and crafting station. Players can upgrade their shelter through the Zen store and Exploration. Players can add a Exchange, Tailor, Fireing range and much more. Players also have the option (Somewhat like tribble) to try out any ship or console in the game before purchase. Players may also create their own PVP maps using the Enviroment of the planet they chose to inhabit. Players will be given the option of creating 2 PVP maps and saving it to a New Tab located in the Quee part of the PVP UI. Here players can choose to play PVP maps that you created. Extra PVP map saves can be purchased in the Zen store (subject to change, currently 5 extra maps for 1000 zen). Many Houseing Updates are planned for release. The first Major update will be with patch 10.5

New item Bacon:
For 10 minutes when used, all abilitys,Kit powers and Devices CD are reset. Can Only be used once (1) every 15 minutes. Can only be used by Federation characters.

New Item, Gorn Bacon: Same as Bacon. Can only be used by KDF characters.

New Item, Roasted Tribble: When used triggers a Emote, Taste like chicken

daqhegh

OP forgot a few things...

The Defera Invasion Zone needs a lot of bug fixes. Half the time it is impossible to team even when on "open teaming" mode. There's The City Hard that literally needs to be waited out. The Temple Hard and Power Plant a hard sometimes glitch and either refuse to start or refuse to give rewards on completion. Probe and Temple Higher Ground will auto complete for everyone when any team does them. The Assimilated Priests in Temple Preservation of Knowledge are only partially assimilated, but somehow possess the power of fully assimilated TAC drones. It goes on and on and on. Adding DIL boxes and popup windows to spent eternity clicking in didn't help.

zathri83

Pvp removed forever.

legio10

- The "air-traffic controller" at Deep Space 9 will no longer be bitchy towards KDF-aligned characters who have completed "Boldy They Rode", but rather show proper deference and adoration.

suprcheese

You forgot:

• Swimsuits:
  • Females now have access to a Bare Chest option.

jarodroto123

suprcheese wrote: »

You forgot:

• Swimsuits:
  • Females now have access to a Bare Chest option.

hehehehehehe Star Trek Online: Expansion 2: TRIBBLE module

artan42

• We fixed all the Romulan uniform stuff.

rast1qq

dgdolph wrote: »

PvP:
- added matchmaking
- added leaderboard
- added spectator mode
- added match replayer
- added cross faction teaming
- added stats page to character overview
- added new gameplay modes
--- capture the flag (ground)
--- sector control (game wide space)
- added 1337 new arena maps
- fixed "stuck in ceiling" bug
- added custom bufflist icons (like a big red blinking one for feedback)
- added new keybinds (Select Enemy1-5)

PvE:
- new captains now start at lvl 50
- new captains now start at T5 reputation
- MK XII now drops everywhere
- episodes, foundry and pve queues have been moved to a submenu
- drastically improved AI
- drastically improved overall difficulty

Duty Officers:
- added cluster maps again
- added old UI
--- new UI is now optional

General:
- fixed all existing bugs
- removal of all carriers
- added Fleet D'Kyr
- Defiant now has battle cloak
- Romulans aren't allied to KDF/FED anymore
--- Romulans have to build up their own Fleets from now on

Season 10 PLESAE :rolleyes:

tk79

TL;DR

I was once a normal guy having fun playing a game I loved. Enjoyed ground PvP and even some space PvP as well. Then the devs started implementing stuff back in previous Seasons that people started referring as "cheese". As time went by, there were more and more cheese. Yellow cheese, blue cheese, red cheese. And the bad odor of it all started getting in the way of my fun.

The devs have proven to be experts at creating cheese. But this is a game, not a farm. I guess cheese sells, eh?

In the end, they made me a rancorous man, creating topics like this, mocking their poor design choices.

Cryptic has lost me, and I don't think they will win me back without severely changing many things. I don't look forward to Expansion 2 because, honestly? It's got Cheese Expansion all written over it.

It doesn't matter how good a Expansion is if the base game is bad.