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Discussion Thread: Space Metagame Changes
adjudicatorhawk
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
Hi all,
In our preparation for Delta Rising, we've been taking a hard look at Space powers and abilities that are underperforming, as well as a select few that dominate the choices players make across the board. The purpose of this thread is for the community to come together and discuss what powers they feel meet either of these two categories, and to talk frankly about any problems with the current metagame of Star Trek Online.
I'm going to largely be lurking in this thread, but may chime in from time to time. Let's see if we can civilly and rationally discuss what we think are problems, and more importantly why we think those powers are problematic. I want to see what you all care about, and see what changes we can make to address things that you care about while making the game a better game, with a more interesting decision-tree structure that defines your "best action to take at any given time" during space combat.
In our preparation for Delta Rising, we've been taking a hard look at Space powers and abilities that are underperforming, as well as a select few that dominate the choices players make across the board. The purpose of this thread is for the community to come together and discuss what powers they feel meet either of these two categories, and to talk frankly about any problems with the current metagame of Star Trek Online.
I'm going to largely be lurking in this thread, but may chime in from time to time. Let's see if we can civilly and rationally discuss what we think are problems, and more importantly why we think those powers are problematic. I want to see what you all care about, and see what changes we can make to address things that you care about while making the game a better game, with a more interesting decision-tree structure that defines your "best action to take at any given time" during space combat.
Post edited by adjudicatorhawk on
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Can we begin with aux2bat and just get that out of the way?
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=17896541 for reference
Let's start by having aux2bat being unable to gain any auxillary at all while active.
And then have all team abilities dependent on auxillary. This would be the perfect fix for a2b and would keep auxillary relevant on all builds.
Tactical could be length of time on the redistribute shield and how strong the +skill part is
Sci team would be the power of the shield heal, maybe how long of a rolling cleanse is
Eng team would be the power of the hull heal and the cleanse rolling time
I would also like cannon abilities lowered in rank. As faw crushes the TRIBBLE out to of them for dps
There is also faw overcapping shenangins, boarding party,aceton beam, Tachyon beam, but that should ( for later in the thread
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
tac captain abilities to stop buffing feed back pulse (they can return 2-3x as much damage as u give them), aux2battery is far too used and abused (seriously this is probably the most used build in the whole game and everyone who defends it, is just addicted to it) and vaping/1 shotting is out of control.....
lets not forget about romulans insane crtH and crtD.A normal non romulan in a lockbox ship is < than a romulan in the same lockbox ship.
Photonic Officer. to what? idk, but the way it's working now is confusing. It seriously takes an essay to explain it to someone.
Attack pattern delta. It works nicely but there's no need to use level 3. Since it's a "tanking" power (there's a doff that makes it grab agro) but level 3 is only for squishy ships. It would be nice if level 1 was an ensign power, level 2 was lieutenant, and level 3 was lt commander. this would let cruisers have more access to attack patterns.
Aceton Beam. I think the CD is way too long for it to be effective. It would also make sense for it to be cleared by ET rather than HE, at least in my opinion.
Aceton Beam is a skill that I feel is underpowered, though that might be because its effects are hardly noticeable. I think however that Engineering powers should be more diverse and desired in general anyway, so ships like the Galaxy-R would be more competitively viable.
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So without futher ado, here are there powers I think are in need of being looked at or dont.
First: A2B builds. Don't touch them. (1) They're not the best cruiser builds in the game. As an EPtX build is much better. However, they offer an easy access for new players to pick up cruisers and be competitive with them. They won't be the best but they'll be functional. (2) It allows for support cruiser builds (like Ambassadors with Grav Well I) to fire off more quickly and rewards those play styles. They wont do as much damage as another build, but they can use Sci powers more.
Second: Engineering Consoles. With the exception of the new RCS Crafting consoles, Engineering Consoles are just. HAHAHAHAH. Fleet Neutroniums and the RCS crafting consoles w/ Sci modifiers are the best. The rest are well.. rubbish. This has to do with the fact that Engineering powers don't actually seem to do anything. Power transfer? Fine, thats ok. But I can get that bonus from a Fleet Neutronium.
I also feel that Science's emphasis on Shield abilities should be transferred to Engineering. Shields are part of the ship's systems after all. Flow Capacitors, a Sci skill tree should also be moved here as that's also pretty engineering oriented.
I'd also like to ask that you consider making a Tactical-oriented Engineering Console. I could see the Galaxy or the Odyssey really benefiting from the option of using Neutronium that also offers +10% Weapon Specific Damage.
This issue ties into my next point.
Three: Underperforming Cruisers. The Galaxy, the Odyssey Star Cruiser. These two ships are just simply outclassed by everything else. And the reason is their heavy emphasis on Engineering abilities. 5 ENG consoles at present is useless. And anything below 3 Tac Consoles is useless. I would also say, they are the two cruisers who could benefit from a Hangar Slot. The Galaxy-class' main shuttlebay is huge. So huge, they couldn't show it in any episode. The Odyssey Star Cruiser needs something to make up for it lacking the 3-set powers of the Odyssey C-store variants. Make it a Fleet-level hull with a Hangar Bay. Its not enough to make them match the Soveriegn or the Avenger but its a step in the right direction.
Honestly, and I think this is a point that has to be drilled in: With the current meta game, all ships require at least 3 Tactical consoles to be viable in PVE. And More than 4 Engineering Consoles is a Waste.
Four: Fix the Aquarius Console. The pet is underwhelming on the C-Store Odysseys. It dies easily (I suggest giving the pet a hull to match the cruiser, its an NPC after all) and give it some meta-game based powers and really smart AI. In general this should be done through out the game's pets. Make them smarter. I know, easier said than done.
Five: Make Tanking and Healing Necessary Skills. I have no clue how to do this, but its a problem in this game. Everyone can heal themselves. So theres no point having a healer. In addition, threat is totally borked thanks to the fact people can just push out a metric ton of damage. It might do us some good to consider going back to the drawing board on space combat and reinvent the wheel as it were. I know thats alot to ask, but the system that was cobbled together to get the game out the door is starting to fall apart. This is more of a long-term goal than anything. Hey, who knows, maybe this tech could be for STO2.
Thats about all I have to say really. But I hope it helps.
TRIBBLE Hydra! Hail Janeway!
Would it be possible to either make a "Rapid Fire" power able to fire your beams OR cannons in rapid succession, or possibly add a "Beam Rapid Fire" or "Cannon Overload" type abilities?
Current:
- Beam Overload
- Beam Fire at Will
- Cannon Rapid Fire
- Cannon Scatter Volley
New list (if possible)
- Overload
- Fire at Will
- Rapid Fire
(Scatter Volley removed, due to Fire at Will working with Cannon powers)
New powers (if possible)
- Beam Rapid Fire (quick, short bursts from your energy beams for limited duration)
- Cannon Overload ("high yield" burst of cannon weapons fire, which deals 100% crit on first blast, with no additional power drain)
attack pattern omega: way too many benefits...should be split into an offensive and a defensive version
target subsystem X: completely worthless and underpowered compared to BO and FAW...either give them a separate cooldown or remove them entirely. Utterly useless on sci vessels too.
dispersal patterns: should start at ensign, similar to torp abilities
torp spread: way too many projectiles flying around for my taste, and for my CPU's. Additionaly the sound for this ability seems to be 1000% louder than anything in the game. seems that every projectile amplifies the sound volume.
most clicky universal consoles have a way too long cooldown...making them 3rd grade consoles. 1 minute cooldown seems sufficent to me, instead of 3 or more.
Boarding party takes the cake as the worst Engineering power, hands-down. It's too slow to reach the opponent, can be easily shot down or evaded, and can be effortlessly cleared with tac team. It's just not a credible enough threat to justify removing another engineering power.
I'd love to see engineering powers get a complete overhaul in general, on that note. Engineering-heavy ships are crippled by an overabundance of shared cooldowns, particularly at ensign and lieutenant levels.
Tachyon Beam is ineffective in virtually any context. A limited arc and a weak shield drain make it undesirable at any level, particularly given how powerful some other science abilities are. If it reduced shield hardness or increased the amount of damage taken by the shield, it might be worth something.
Mask Energy Signature does anybody use this?
Charged Particle Burst shares some of the same problems as tachyon beam -- shield drain resistance makes it virtually useless, aside from decloaking nearby enemies. That part can come in handy.
Edit: Okay let me clarify. Either the enemy sees you or they don't, it's pretty straightforward. Three levels of the ability are therefore redundant in that regard.
This, adjudicatorhawk. This is why Engineering consoles and BOFF powers need attention. This is why they need to be boosted to get in-line with Tac and Sci.
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The same principle could be applied to APD. This would further the use of APD and bring more diversity into the game. Teams could have dedicated tanks with APD which would further reduce enemy resistances (in combination with APB) and would bring a very much overlooked role into the meta. Though a recluse with Beta spamming pets might be the whole-in-one package ...
The same could be done with BfAW, Grav-Well or Tykens-Rift. Either put a max limit of affected enemies on these abilities or make them collapse faster, the more enemies they affect. This would also make the damage of these abilities a lot more predictable. Particle Gens would still buff the damage of those abilities, but it could be dne in different ways. Part. Gens could increase the damage threshold before collape, they could increase the damage dealt as to make the ability increasingly more burst like (this might also be nice for PvE), ... ,etc.
Problems in PvP:
Also the ability to boost certain damage types to ridiculous levels (Proton Barrage), through using base value modifying consoles should be looked into (or is this really WAI?).
Underused/Staple Boff Abilities:
Tactical Team: A staple in PvP and a nice skill to have in PvE. The higher ranks are wasted slots though. The increase in bonus damage isn't enough to justify the higher boff slot and that's sadly the only thing that increases with this ability. I'd like to see an incremental increase in auto shield distibution the higher the ability is slotted, or a decrease in downtime (so lengthen its uptime with each rank by 1 second for example).
BFaW: This needs to be brought in line with other skill. The sheer amount of damage increase with multiple enemies around is to big (of course since this ability is used mainly in conjunction with beam arrays other factors play into the extreme damage potential of this ability).
Subsystem Targeting abilities: Give certain weapon energy types a bonus for this skill (in canon phaser are precision weapons, while disruptors are more violent). I find the usability of this power lacking tbh. I don't know what power levels a cube possesses and the flat 20% chance is too unpredictable (it can be nice in PvP since a flat 20% every 15 sec [min] is quite powerfull, butit's not really usable in PvE where everything dies in the blink of an eye anyways. Even against boss mobs, like the queen, i wouldn't want to waste a slot on this ability since it shares a cooldown with other beam enhancing abilities)
APD/APB: shouldn't stack as elaborated above.
Mine Dispersal Patterns: My "problems" with mines below. I don't really see a point in using anything else but DP-Beta, be it in PvE or PvP. I get the point of Alpha. You're supposed to lay them behind you when being chased, but due to the fact, that you are never chased in PvE and the activation time on mines is rather high, this thing is rather useless. Disp. Patterns are also overpriced. They could start at ensign and would still not be OP for what they provide.
Photonic Officer: My only beef with this ability is the long cooldown versus uptime. The big advantage is of course having a cooldown reduction boff power that can't be nuked. Still, the 1:2 uptime is detrimental to it's usage. I'd suggest making this a skill half as effective as dual Aux to bat. Meaning it will "only" reduce ability cooldown to half of their global value ever (even with rank 3 of the ability), but make it still available more often. 1:1 uptime would be nice, a constant uptime even better.
AuxtBat: Apart from the obvious issue with technician doffs. There is little to no increased benefit to using a higher rank version of this power. And strangely enough, there doesn't exist a rank 3 version of this ability.
AuxtDamp: There is no reason to slot anything higher than rank 1 of this ability. The only thing that increases is the kinetic damage resist and crew disable/death resist. That's just not worth it to give up a lt. cmdr. slot for. There should at least be an increase in speed and turn rate over a lower rank. Again there doesn't exist a rank 3 version of this ability.
Boarding Parties: Suffer the same fate as destructible torpedos. They nearly never reach their target. Also a mean to make this an AoE ability (albeit very limited AoE) would be nice. Another idea would be a doff that lets me transport them directly to the enemy ship.
Aceton Beam: The cooldown is too long, the duration too short and it is easily cleared in PvP. Let it only be cleared by Eng. Team. This would make it harder to be cleared, since not everybody runs Eng. Team (but everybody runs HE as a staple cleanse) and provide me with an incentive to use it.
Warp Plasma: The cooldown is actually a bit too short 1 min would make this already spammable ability more bearable.
All around:
Make engineers more usefull. Scis are the kings of PvP, Tacs of PvE and Engies just perform adequately. You could actually make them into more of a support class, without reducing their solo game value. Give them some innate team buffing (or single teammate buffing) abilties (except Engineering Fleet) that actually make them more versatile.
Class diversity. Classes/carreers are basically just defined throug their captains abilities in space. This, i feel, is not enough. Synergies between the cpatains carreer and boff abilties would be a nice idea. This would incentivise players to fly carreer specific ships (escort obviously have more tac station and therefore higher synergy potential) and still allow to place your captain into a non-carreer-specific ship without too much of a loss. (Though cooldown reducing abilties could circumvent the incentive induced by these synergies)
Some added Ensign abilities. There are alot of ships out there with a useless Ensign station. Useless in the sense of "i could use this tier 1 power at lt. commander and get a lot more out of it, since i have the room for it". Espcieally ships like the Galaxy class, the Defiant class, or other ships overstacked on specific boff slot would profit from this change. (Just for an example. I'd always ignore the ensign station in the galaxy, becausei only every need 2 stations for an EPtX ability and maybe an eng team. I'd have to downgrade 1 EPtX ability form rank 3 to 1 just to make use of all my boff slots and this would leave me with other "useless" slot higher up)
Targetable torps are too easily shot down or otherwise hindered. I don't even bother anymore to pick Torp. High Yield for any of my ships, because i can basically guarantee that 80% of those torps never see their target for more then a sec. The only targetable torp that doesn't seem to have that problem is the T'Varo's beach ball and the Bio-Neural Warhead (Btw. make this things cooldown be reducable by doffs). Imho, the higher the cooldown for a torp with a targetable high yield projectile, and the stronger the version of the torp high yield used, the more HP it should have (or defense or speed ... etc.).
Buff some underused abilities. See post by "whatinblueblazes"
Torp mechanics should be looked at. At the dawn of the enchanced biomolecular torp, those things could actually be an alternative to other spike skill. They'd perform decently in PvP and PvE (partly due to the buff of photon torp damage through the 2 sets). But as it stands now, torps are simply inferior to energy weapons. They perform a burst role in PvE, but are only pratical if you fight against low health enemies whose shield can actually be shot open long enough. Bigger enemies nearly never have an open shield facing and if they do, they are basically dead anyways.
Mines: require a very specific playstyle and a lot of moving around if used to their maximum potential. The problem lies in conflicting playstyles. Using cannons i rarely fly close enough to activate the mines. I'll just fly to an advantageous position and stay there (usually rocking back and forth for the defence bonus) and fire my weapons. Since cannon damage falloff starts at 2km there isn't really any reason to fly any closer, because that would also reduce my reaction time (usually against some high yield torp i have to run away from/target and destroy). I also never found it necessary to mine a certain region of the map to stop anything. Mines are more spammable deployables which are more based on luck then on anything else. The most usefull mine to me were the Nukara mines, tractor mines and the tethered quantum mines (these actually have some momentum and can shoot in front of you when performing a full stop).
BO is still not viable in PvE: I may have it with me as a throwaway skill which can be used with my 360° beam array in the back, but cannons usually do their job better and a lot more consistently. Though i admit, seeing big
numbers is rewarding. If only the same could be said for torps ...
Another problem is the concept of +damage and bonus damage. This need to be explained somewhere, so that the mechanic doesn't become tribal knowledge and will eventually be lost.
My notes are in red.
TRIBBLE Hydra! Hail Janeway!
Team work is op again?Is it so hard to have the escort cast TT on you and sci ship to cast Sci team on the escort?Where is team work ?
[*]Subsystem Targeting: Shouldn't share cooldown with other beam abilities. There is no reason to use a subsystem targeting over FAW or another beam ability right now.
[/QUOTE]
Make it a toggle like the cruiser commands
Because its OP w/OUT teamwork. People are spamming it to shore up their shields regardless of what the actual shield levels. Auto-redistribution benefits everyone. TT would still benefit from giving bonus damage.
TRIBBLE Hydra! Hail Janeway!
As a cruiser Captain I sometimes feel restricted in my options with attack patterns, given that my limited Tactical Bridge officer seating is limited in rank. I don't have any idea what could be done specifically but It would be nice if Attack patterns where perhaps less powerful but more accessible?
Also I would support making FAW apply to turrets, beams and cannons together, as this would make mixed beams and cannon builds more desirable to use Perhaps?
How is op without team work?You may aswell play without it on a sci ship or a ship with huge hull hp.You dont even need tt in pve .Any change to TT will only TRIBBLE up one of the best part of pvp ....thats having a role for each ship ...escorts should cast tt on healer and the healer should cast sci team or eng team on the escort.
Since healing other players isn't very good at the moment, making them work as advertised could help.
Best suggestion I've read yet.
Make the Science ship "Subsystem Targeting" abilities, have no rank, but be technologically superior to the Bridge Officer version of Rank I. Current Science ship abilities are all Rank I's. They should not share cooldown with other beam abilities. Instead (as suggested), they should be made into toggles, which buffs your energy weapons (beam or cannon/turrets), to such an extant that they have a chance to disable the chosen subsystem. As it's now a toggle, that chance should be rather low, and it's duration adjusted accordingly.
TT is vital in PVE for the following reasons:
1) Its the only ability that removes Borg Assmiliation.
2) It boosts the power of ANY attack causing DPS to rise. And is the primary reason people use it.
3) Shield redistribution from TT allows more time between healing shield powers like EPtS or ST. (Yes, a science ship can just heal faster, but trust me, they want that DPS boost from #2 first)
4) The above reasons were why people were using TT solely and not using ET or ST when they all shared a CD.
TRIBBLE Hydra! Hail Janeway!
The HY of the enhanced bio-molecular torp can't be shot down, and it hasn't broken the game. Make all the other HY slowtorps work in a similar fashion. They're completely worthless if a ship with FAW is around, NPC or player. Their slow travel time is a good enough balancing factor, they don't need to pop the moment they encounter some flak on top of that.
1.ask the escort to cast it on you....who said you have to go all sci in pve?
2.Thats a first ....use tt to buff your damage lol ...seriously do you even play this game?
3.ask the escort to cast tt ....dont go kirk your way to success in your sci team in pvp.Scis in general are already 3 times better than a tac.
4.facepalm.
1. Why have someone cast it, when you can cast it on yourself. Also does not help in single player environments.
2. Yes I do. It helps. Alot. Its why its standard issue on every PVE build.
3. Again, you assume this game's players want team work. Nobody in PVE even listens to Team chat anymore. People in STO are after themselves and only themselves. As a result, players have to watch out for themselves.
4. Its the truth.
TRIBBLE Hydra! Hail Janeway!
Beam Overload
The 100% crit is buffing other things unintentionally, like pets. I am pretty sure we can come to a reasonable compromise without having to place 100% crit on it.
Proton Barrage
Buff striping effect is way too strong. I'd remove it completely.
All Tactical Damage Buffs
They should not affect sci or engi skills.
Ramming Speed
The DOFF that adds immunity to self-damage negates the ability only drawback, and therefore is too strong. My suggestion: if you slot that DOFF, reduce the damage done by the skill. Additionally, I think the damage of the skill should take ship size (mass) into account. Small ships should do lesser damage to large ships and vice-versa.
Subnucleonic Beam
I always looked at that power as an atrocity in this game. The cooldown debuff is insanely strong.
Powers that I think are too weak:
Beam Subsystem Targeting skills / Tachyon Beam
Little reason to use them even if you pack Flow Capacitors. They're very weak. On the other hand, Borg Spheres using it wipe your shields in seconds, even if you pack drain resistance.
Problems that I see with space combat in general:
The whole vaping concept
I am glad it has been publicly stated that they want to give targets a chance to defend themselves. I think that anything that can wipe any ship in the game in a couple of seconds is broken.
Unresistable damage
Outstanding offender: Nukara web mines (physical damage in space). It cannot be resisted, and when coupled with dispersal patterns, becomes very effective with little means of defense. Not getting into the merit of avoiding mines, BUT that there is a damage type in the game that cannot be resisted.
Too much shield penetration
This is an aggravating factor to everything in my opinion. Main offenders: DOFF that adds shield bypass on usage of BO. Probably the Elachi proc too.
Large disparity between Offense and Defense
This is mostly because of Diminishing Returns affecting damage resistance, while many old and new powers and gear buff damage directly and indirectly to extreme amounts. Even if uber defensive gear were released, the final results are always crippled by the DR formula. This has an effect that Hull seems too weak: once shields are down, Hull goes down very fast. Should it really be this way?
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TSS can remove boarding parties with the transporter doff. It actually does a better job of it than TT. I run STFs witout TT on some ships all the time like my excel or galaxy-x.
1.why play in team when you can kirk it yourself solo? lol
2.Nobody who plays this game uses tt to buff his power ...especially in pvp
3.Noone cares about pugs.Get your team ...you cant balance a game for the sake of pugs.
4.Its your pve hero mindset that wants to have everything on one ship and kirk your way to success without having anyone to help you.That is not fun in pve nor pvp.
Ok, you are reading too much into my views. I am no expert on PVP. I don't pretend to be. But I do know PVE very well and that's what my feedback is on. I can't control the players so I have to assume that they're not going to back me up in PVE. Even in pre-mades.
Please see my earlier posts about making healing and tanking more PVE viable. I want teamwork to be a more vital role in this game. Please stop attacking me because you have an issue with whats wrong in the PVE area of the game.
Personally, I would rather see the shield re-distribution go to full automatic or become part of Engineering Team (which makes more sense) as TT has too many benefits and too few downfalls. ET and ST are just heals w/ some debuff removal.
TRIBBLE Hydra! Hail Janeway!