So now we'll watch the DPS squadron manage 200k DPS runs! Just what the game needed, MOAR power creep....YAY?
I'd be seriously interested in the thought process behind this, but I'm at a point where I highly doubt there is one.
It's to encourage upgrades. I'm sure many people quit upgrading. I stopped at 13 for most of my characters' weapons. I did this because the boost does not help solve the failqueues such as BDA, ANRA, VCA. I'm not sure a 100% increase would help for most pugs in these instances.
In any event I'm sure I will finish upgrading at some point.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
It's to encourage upgrades. I'm sure many people quit upgrading. I stopped at 13 for most of my characters' weapons. I did this because the boost does not help solve the failqueues such as BDA, ANRA, VCA. I'm not sure a 100% increase would help for most pugs in these instances.
In any event I'm sure I will finish upgrading at some point.
Exactly. It's the only reason they've increased the damage on MK XIII and IV space weapons. I know myself that I looked at the potential upgrade numbers and thought "nope, not worth the cost". I'm sure others have done the same, so this is an attempt to get some of us with that thought to actually use the upgrade system. I'm still a flat out 'no' though because my Dil goes to other things like the Fleet projects and I don't have money to pump into the game to upgrade items across 15 characters. If the price was half of what it is I'd be much more inclined to bother with it, until such times though I'll make do with what I have.
Join date is wrong, I've actually been around since STO Beta.
True alters don't have a "main". Account wide unlocks for all unique event rewards!!
I'd only upgrade to Mk XIV with the current upgrade costs regularly if they did one of two things:
Boost that MkXIV to 3x the damage like someone suggested. Because DPS is required anyway to break through some of the ridiculous hulls of Advanced and Elite NPCs and Cryptic still refuses to bring Advanced back down to Pre-DR Elite levels like they were supposed to be.
OR
Add a guaranteed [XPBoost] Mod (not affecting Mods gained; meaning you can still have 4xCrtD + Epic Mod) that provides 50% more XP while in ship combat. To each upgraded MkXIV weapon. And the mod stacks.
What about PvP?
This change will have a larger effect in PvP that is, you PvP foes with Mark 14 weapons will kill you faster. This is true, but should still be more in line with PvP pre-Delta Rising, assuming a ship with Mark 14 gear is fighting a T5U or T6 ship. The bonus in HP vs Damage should now go up at comparable rates.
I take issue with this statement.
It seems to me that you have little idea of the current state of PvP, most notably about the huge disparity between offense and defense. While defense is constantly handicapped by Diminishing Returns, offense goes up linearly (from base) without any reduction, and is further affected by the constant release of broken items and mechanics.
To put it into some perspective, and to show you an example of such disparity, a T5 ship, not a T5U or T6, is likely able to vape a T6 ship/tank with full defenses and upgrades.
This isn't just about HP and Damage going up at comparable rates. It's about multipliers. There are much more damage multipliers than defense. As a result, even if you upgrade HP and Damage at comparable rates, Damage will always get the benefit of multipliers and defense will have little effect due to the absurd damage rates being put out in the current state of the game.
You should have left the PvP quote out of the OP. Having stated that it will "still be more in line with PvP pre-Delta Rising", I'm sorry but you have no idea what you're talking about.
There seem to be some questions as to why we changed the damage on Mark 13 and Mark 14 space weapons. So I wanted to explain the history and talk a little math.
As we were planning Mark 13 and Mark 14 item, we wanted them to be significantly better than Mark 12. All items generally increase at a lineal pace at about +10% improvement per Mark. We wanted the difference between Mark 12 and Mark 13 items to be more than that, and the difference between Mark 13 and Mark 14 to be even greater still. In general, we wanted Mark 14 items to be about +30% better than Mark 12 items. You can see this reflected in the HP of T5U and T6 ships.
So, technically, this was implemented correctly. If you just consider the weapon alone, a Mark 12 weapon that does 222 damage will do about 282 damage as Mark 14, which is around +27% slightly under target, but within the range of what we were shooting for. However, this is only true if you have no weapon skills, and no items (like consoles) that increase you weapon damage. If you have both Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill, a Mark 12 weapon will do about 321 damage, while a Mark 14 will do about 381 damage, which is only around +19%. And if you add 4 weapon consoles, a Mark 12 weapon will do about 441 damage, while a Mark 14 will do about 501 damage, which is only around +14%. Basically, the diminishing returns system will reduce the bonus you get out of Mark 14 weapons, even though the weapons themselves are actually on target.
We feel most players have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill, and a lot of players have at least some item that makes their weapons better. So we wanted to make Mark 13 and 14 items have a more noticeable increase in damage that was in line with the increase in HP of critter and player ships. The new increase in damage will do the following:
If you have no skill and no energy weapon consoles: +50% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
If you have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill but no energy weapon consoles: +34% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
If you have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill and two (2) energy weapon consoles: +29% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
If you have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill and four (4) energy weapon consoles: +25% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
The last 3 scenarios average to about +30% increase in damage, which was the original target. If you have absolutely no skill or consoles, you get a much bigger boost, but this is unlikely, and you will probably need that boost anyway.
What about other items like shields, engines, etc?
Well, those items are not as aggressively effected by the same diminishing returns math that weapons are, so they really dont need to be increased? They are working as expected.
What about ground weapons?
We considered ground weapons, but ground weapons arent affect by items like consoles, and are affected by skill far less than space items. They are performing much closer to what would be expected.
What about PvP?
This change will have a larger effect in PvP that is, you PvP foes with Mark 14 weapons will kill you faster. This is true, but should still be more in line with PvP pre-Delta Rising, assuming a ship with Mark 14 gear is fighting a T5U or T6 ship. The bonus in HP vs Damage should now go up at comparable rates.
As always, no number are final. We will continue to monitor the data and feedback and tune as necessary. But hopefully, everyone will be excited that they will be blowing up bad guys a Iittle faster now.
LLAP
Let me translate this for you:
Cryptic is going to make mk13 +14 weapons more powerful.
In 2-3 weeks Cryptic will notice that the PVEs are too easy and require some balancing so the mission difficulty will be raised to match the new powerful weapons.
This of course will lead to the situation where players with MK12 weapons are not able to play these missions anymore because they have become too difficult now.
That forces these players to upgrade their weapons which will consume high amounts of dilithium and boosts the rates at which Zen is purchased by these players.
Mission accomplished!
Sometimes you just have to think like a Cryptic EP to see the long term goals.
So your "Bonus" wouldn't be the same Bonus we currently have? It would basically be a new system in its entirety?
What we have currently is actually:
A base level of damage based on what a white quality weapon of a type does.
A bonus applied based on color quality.
Bonuses/reductions applied based on Dmg mods, distances, and enemy resistances/resistance debuffing/shields/etc.
Bonuses applied based on abilities.
Bonuses applied based on crits.
I'm suggesting that these be split out into two forms of damage on every attack. These two forms could scale separately, limiting absolute scaling potential. But could be better for the basic player.
Base damage would be antiproton/phaser/disruptor/etc-type damage. And would scale based off of some things including resistances and distance and energy type consoles.
Bonus damage (Dmg mod, weapon quality improvement from white quality) would be Bonus-type and would scale off of separate considerations. Basic bonus damage would be MUCH higher than it is presently but would not scale positively or negatively off of range, resistances, and bridge officer abilities.
It is something of a new system but I'm proposing it based on what I think the intent of the current system is, particularly after reading Geko's post.
Man... I run a torpedo bomber, and I really like this change.
Most of my tac consoles are devoted to torpedo damage, but I still have a few poorly bonused energy weapons to take down shields/proc my BO shieldpen doffs. With this change, my torpedo damage has gone up noticeably... but my energy weapon damage is massively improved.
This still does nothing to address the massive power gap between fresh level 60 players and level 60 players with maxed out spec trees. In fact it kind of makes it worse. Remember back when you totally overhauled the Rep system traits because you didn't want a 'huge divide between fresh level 50 players and long standing level 50 players'... Then you did this...
Geko logic, because metrics.
I had some hope for the future of STO when they "nerfed" rep traits.
You can imagine my joy at what specializations have done.
This is my Risian Corvette. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
Let me translate this for you:
Cryptic is going to make mk13 +14 weapons more powerful.
In 2-3 weeks Cryptic will notice that the PVEs are too easy and require some balancing so the mission difficulty will be raised to match the new powerful weapons.
This of course will lead to the situation where players with MK12 weapons are not able to play these missions anymore because they have become too difficult now.
That forces these players to upgrade their weapons which will consume high amounts of dilithium and boosts the rates at which Zen is purchased by these players.
Mission accomplished!
Sometimes you just have to think like a Cryptic EP to see the long term goals.
Let me translate this for you:
Cryptic is going to make mk13 +14 weapons more powerful.
In 2-3 weeks Cryptic will notice that the PVEs are too easy and require some balancing so the mission difficulty will be raised to match the new powerful weapons.
This of course will lead to the situation where players with MK12 weapons are not able to play these missions anymore because they have become too difficult now.
That forces these players to upgrade their weapons which will consume high amounts of dilithium and boosts the rates at which Zen is purchased by these players.
Mission accomplished!
Sometimes you just have to think like a Cryptic EP to see the long term goals.
Why do I see the PVE queues, the ones who are active... getting quieter.
What about ground weapons?
We considered ground weapons, but ground weapons arent affect by items like consoles, and are affected by skill far less than space items. They are performing much closer to what would be expected.
...
You really haven't checked out full auto rifles lately, have you? :P
Let me translate this for you:
Cryptic is going to make mk13 +14 weapons more powerful.
In 2-3 weeks Cryptic will notice that the PVEs are too easy and require some balancing so the mission difficulty will be raised to match the new powerful weapons.
This of course will lead to the situation where players with MK12 weapons are not able to play these missions anymore because they have become too difficult now.
That forces these players to upgrade their weapons which will consume high amounts of dilithium and boosts the rates at which Zen is purchased by these players.
Mission accomplished!
Sometimes you just have to think like a Cryptic EP to see the long term goals.
Sadly,that's pretty much it.
The PWE/Cryptic sweatshop...not where the game is made,but where the game is played!
Take back your home,end the grind!
Volunteer moderators policing the forums is like a mall cop trying to solve a murder.
There seem to be some questions as to why we changed the damage on Mark 13 and Mark 14 space weapons. So I wanted to explain the history and talk a little math.
As we were planning Mark 13 and Mark 14 item, we wanted them to be significantly better than Mark 12. All items generally increase at a lineal pace at about +10% improvement per Mark. We wanted the difference between Mark 12 and Mark 13 items to be more than that, and the difference between Mark 13 and Mark 14 to be even greater still. In general, we wanted Mark 14 items to be about +30% better than Mark 12 items. You can see this reflected in the HP of T5U and T6 ships.
So, technically, this was implemented correctly. If you just consider the weapon alone, a Mark 12 weapon that does 222 damage will do about 282 damage as Mark 14, which is around +27% slightly under target, but within the range of what we were shooting for. However, this is only true if you have no weapon skills, and no items (like consoles) that increase you weapon damage. If you have both Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill, a Mark 12 weapon will do about 321 damage, while a Mark 14 will do about 381 damage, which is only around +19%. And if you add 4 weapon consoles, a Mark 12 weapon will do about 441 damage, while a Mark 14 will do about 501 damage, which is only around +14%. Basically, the diminishing returns system will reduce the bonus you get out of Mark 14 weapons, even though the weapons themselves are actually on target.
We feel most players have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill, and a lot of players have at least some item that makes their weapons better. So we wanted to make Mark 13 and 14 items have a more noticeable increase in damage that was in line with the increase in HP of critter and player ships. The new increase in damage will do the following:
If you have no skill and no energy weapon consoles: +50% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
If you have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill but no energy weapon consoles: +34% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
If you have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill and two (2) energy weapon consoles: +29% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
If you have Starship Weapon Training and Starship Energy Weapons skill and four (4) energy weapon consoles: +25% damage from Mark 12 to Mark 14
The last 3 scenarios average to about +30% increase in damage, which was the original target. If you have absolutely no skill or consoles, you get a much bigger boost, but this is unlikely, and you will probably need that boost anyway.
What about other items like shields, engines, etc?
Well, those items are not as aggressively effected by the same diminishing returns math that weapons are, so they really dont need to be increased? They are working as expected.
What about ground weapons?
We considered ground weapons, but ground weapons arent affect by items like consoles, and are affected by skill far less than space items. They are performing much closer to what would be expected.
What about PvP?
This change will have a larger effect in PvP that is, you PvP foes with Mark 14 weapons will kill you faster. This is true, but should still be more in line with PvP pre-Delta Rising, assuming a ship with Mark 14 gear is fighting a T5U or T6 ship. The bonus in HP vs Damage should now go up at comparable rates.
As always, no number are final. We will continue to monitor the data and feedback and tune as necessary. But hopefully, everyone will be excited that they will be blowing up bad guys a Iittle faster now.
LLAP
The DPS increases for MK XIII and MK XIV, but the MK XII are still not where they were a few weeks before DR came out. They were nerfed before DR, and have not been put back to where they were.
Also, with this newer Power creep, there is not a cost reduction to upgrading. I am sorry, but all of this long explanation says to me is, "We didn't get enough money from you, so will you spend it now? We give you more power, you give us more money."
Instead of adjusting the advance queues so they will be like they said they would, they are now trying to get everyone to spend money to upgrade weapons. Remember when they said that the elite queues were suppose to be for elite, but the advanced were only going to be slightly harder than the elite were.
All they had to do was lower the hit points of the NPC's hull, and shields. But it doesn't sell, so they try to sell more power creep. And now that the enemies are hitting harder too, it just makes it harder for ones that either can't afford to upgrade, or don't want to.
When I think that they can't do worse, they prove me wrong. At least we still have the underground snowmen to play with till January 15.
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The 128k TP is for taking a VR Mk XIII weapon to VR Mk XIV.
Consoles, Deflectors/Engines, etc all have different prices.
And that's TP...not Dil. Technology Points.
Taking a UR Exploiter Mk XII to Mk XIII is 23400 TP. That's around 2k Dil.
128k TP would be 10x Superior...without any crits. Without using any TP boosts, you'd be looking at 10,750 Dil for that upgrade (1075 Dil per).
Do you folks even bother looking at things before commenting? I mean, seriously...
These maths are seriously flawed and don't take unto account the dili to craft. No one is considering TP as a "cost". You're mixing apples and oranges here. A rough estimate for upgrading one weapon from XI to XIV is 100k dilith. Per weapon. Its too expensive IF we consider all the nerfs to actually getting said dilith. Every time we find a decent place to farm some, once Cryptic hears about it, it gets nerfed.
"Expensive" is ultimately subjective. For many of us, upgrading more than one set of weapons/tac consoles/engine sets is prohibitively costly so we simply aren't even making the attempt. Sometimes its nice to just play a game without having to constantly grind to play the game. Most casual players aren't space rich. I sometimes think the game is being altered around the few who are or who are willing to drop $100s per week on STO. I am not and I'm not alone. I spent a fair anount to support the game but its apparently not enough.
These maths are seriously flawed and don't take unto account the dili to craft. No one is considering TP as a "cost". You're mixing apples and oranges here. A rough estimate for upgrading one weapon from XI to XIV is 100k dilith. Per weapon. Its too expensive IF we consider all the nerfs to actually getting said dilith. Every time we find a decent place to farm some, once Cryptic hears about it, it gets nerfed.
"Expensive" is ultimately subjective. For many of us, upgrading more than one set of weapons/tac consoles/engine sets is prohibitively costly so we simply aren't even making the attempt. Sometimes its nice to just play a game without having to constantly grind to play the game.
Nah, they're pretty much dead on. Remember, making the actual Tech Upgrades doesn't cost dilithuim, just materials and EC's. It's the application of the Tech Upgrades that costs dilithium.
My own preference for reducing cost as opposed to increasing reward stems more from, as VD mentioned, the overall long-term cost of Upgrading including quality, especially when playing more than one character and more than one build... and the extra cost for Upgrading Torps and Rep Gear. Probably my fault for wanting to play multiple characters, but that's why I haven't bothered with Upgrading much. As you said, "expensive" is a subjective term... for VD the cost is reasonable, for me it's not, thus the difference in opinion. Which I'm fine with.
Besides, it's Thursday... that ship has sailed. :P
With each passing day I wonder if I stepped into an alternate reality. The Cubs win the world series. Donald Trump is President. Britain leaves the EU. STO gets a dedicated PvP season. Engineers are "out of control" in STO.
Yeah, I upgraded my Dyson Shield to Mark 13 and after that experience I was done with the goofy upgrade system. I do fine without it, I do the content I enjoy like the episodes, patrols, mirror invasion, Foundery Missions, Dyson Sphere battlezone stuff, even the Winter Event stuff, which I enjoy now that I know how to win the ice race. I have my Fleet Corsair T-U, and all kinds of cool weapons as stuff on it. I don't need this stuff upgraded, I don't pvp often and when I don't I don't mind blowing up. In the case of the ice race I'm almost doing it more for fun then for the ship, the only part I want is the ship trait for my fleet corsair T-U. The Breen Ships are where symetery went to die.
In my experience the key to enjoying STO is ignore pay to win and only do the content you enjoy. I don't do lockboxes, although I've bought odds and ends from them on the exchange. .
For me dear Virus, neither as I do not plan on upgrading any time soon!
My dilithium is far to valuable, to be dumping into such a TRIBBLE system, that doesn't even work 100% yet.
Yeah, same here. I don't want to waste 9 million EC and almost 20,000 refined dil for each of my 6 fleet AP beam arrays to only get a tiny bump in the stats.
Nah, they're pretty much dead on. Remember, making the actual Tech Upgrades doesn't cost dilithuim, just materials and EC's. It's the application of the Tech Upgrades that costs dilithium.
My own preference for reducing cost as opposed to increasing reward stems more from, as VD mentioned, the overall long-term cost of Upgrading including quality, especially when playing more than one character and more than one build... and the extra cost for Upgrading Torps and Rep Gear. Probably my fault for wanting to play multiple characters, but that's why I haven't bothered with Upgrading much. As you said, "expensive" is a subjective term... for VD the cost is reasonable, for me it's not, thus the difference in opinion. Which I'm fine with.
Besides, it's Thursday... that ship has sailed. :P
I should have been more accurate. I just meant they were off in the context of what is considered cost. The application of the tech is how I see the cost. The materials I see more as time to get them. (IF they can be gotten during play and not bought on the exchange).
In the end, subjective or not, it seems many people find upgrading to expensive one way or another. An old fleetmate who I work with irl asked me if he should come back to STO and I simply told him only if you don't chase the upgrade dragon and just play the older content with what gear/ships he has. Progression has become a mountain too high to climb for most of us.
Thanks for your response, though. Its unfortunate that so many of us have become discouraged by one cost or another.
The 128k TP is for taking a VR Mk XIII weapon to VR Mk XIV.
Consoles, Deflectors/Engines, etc all have different prices.
And that's TP...not Dil. Technology Points.
Taking a UR Exploiter Mk XII to Mk XIII is 23400 TP. That's around 2k Dil.
128k TP would be 10x Superior...without any crits. Without using any TP boosts, you'd be looking at 10,750 Dil for that upgrade (1075 Dil per).
Do you folks even bother looking at things before commenting? I mean, seriously...
It's the Rarity Upgrades that really hurt, of course. And Rep Shields/KCB, etc, go for 318k TP per round (as of Very Rare Mk XIV). Some of my UR weps take like 212k TP. Those really are wicked numbers, especially when you have to multiply by 6-8, for weps (and then x5 or so to strike lucky).
And a single Superior Tech costs ca. 400k EC nowadays. That adds up real fast too.
Comments
It's to encourage upgrades. I'm sure many people quit upgrading. I stopped at 13 for most of my characters' weapons. I did this because the boost does not help solve the failqueues such as BDA, ANRA, VCA. I'm not sure a 100% increase would help for most pugs in these instances.
In any event I'm sure I will finish upgrading at some point.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Exactly. It's the only reason they've increased the damage on MK XIII and IV space weapons. I know myself that I looked at the potential upgrade numbers and thought "nope, not worth the cost". I'm sure others have done the same, so this is an attempt to get some of us with that thought to actually use the upgrade system. I'm still a flat out 'no' though because my Dil goes to other things like the Fleet projects and I don't have money to pump into the game to upgrade items across 15 characters. If the price was half of what it is I'd be much more inclined to bother with it, until such times though I'll make do with what I have.
Boost that MkXIV to 3x the damage like someone suggested. Because DPS is required anyway to break through some of the ridiculous hulls of Advanced and Elite NPCs and Cryptic still refuses to bring Advanced back down to Pre-DR Elite levels like they were supposed to be.
OR
Add a guaranteed [XPBoost] Mod (not affecting Mods gained; meaning you can still have 4xCrtD + Epic Mod) that provides 50% more XP while in ship combat. To each upgraded MkXIV weapon. And the mod stacks.
I take issue with this statement.
It seems to me that you have little idea of the current state of PvP, most notably about the huge disparity between offense and defense. While defense is constantly handicapped by Diminishing Returns, offense goes up linearly (from base) without any reduction, and is further affected by the constant release of broken items and mechanics.
To put it into some perspective, and to show you an example of such disparity, a T5 ship, not a T5U or T6, is likely able to vape a T6 ship/tank with full defenses and upgrades.
This isn't just about HP and Damage going up at comparable rates. It's about multipliers. There are much more damage multipliers than defense. As a result, even if you upgrade HP and Damage at comparable rates, Damage will always get the benefit of multipliers and defense will have little effect due to the absurd damage rates being put out in the current state of the game.
You should have left the PvP quote out of the OP. Having stated that it will "still be more in line with PvP pre-Delta Rising", I'm sorry but you have no idea what you're talking about.
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Escorts get an extra weapon, or a second fore weapon boosted. Cruisers get 2 weapons boosted.
Science gets ... ?? The fallout of greater weapon power directed at them, without shields, hull, or boosted sci abilities.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n5E7feJHw0
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Not sure why you only mentioned 3 ship types...
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A) Not 200k from this alone, 160-170k from this.
I must of understood it wrong.
No skills, no gear, but Mk 14 weapons will do more then if I get gear and put points into skills?
So do I repect and take out all energy damage related points, and put universal consoles in my tac slots?
I don't get it.
1 + 1 = 2; 100% increase
2 + 1 = 3; 50% increase
3 + 1 = 4; 33% increase
Yet each was + 1...
Let me translate this for you:
Cryptic is going to make mk13 +14 weapons more powerful.
In 2-3 weeks Cryptic will notice that the PVEs are too easy and require some balancing so the mission difficulty will be raised to match the new powerful weapons.
This of course will lead to the situation where players with MK12 weapons are not able to play these missions anymore because they have become too difficult now.
That forces these players to upgrade their weapons which will consume high amounts of dilithium and boosts the rates at which Zen is purchased by these players.
Mission accomplished!
Sometimes you just have to think like a Cryptic EP to see the long term goals.
What we have currently is actually:
A base level of damage based on what a white quality weapon of a type does.
A bonus applied based on color quality.
Bonuses/reductions applied based on Dmg mods, distances, and enemy resistances/resistance debuffing/shields/etc.
Bonuses applied based on abilities.
Bonuses applied based on crits.
I'm suggesting that these be split out into two forms of damage on every attack. These two forms could scale separately, limiting absolute scaling potential. But could be better for the basic player.
Base damage would be antiproton/phaser/disruptor/etc-type damage. And would scale based off of some things including resistances and distance and energy type consoles.
Bonus damage (Dmg mod, weapon quality improvement from white quality) would be Bonus-type and would scale off of separate considerations. Basic bonus damage would be MUCH higher than it is presently but would not scale positively or negatively off of range, resistances, and bridge officer abilities.
It is something of a new system but I'm proposing it based on what I think the intent of the current system is, particularly after reading Geko's post.
Most of my tac consoles are devoted to torpedo damage, but I still have a few poorly bonused energy weapons to take down shields/proc my BO shieldpen doffs. With this change, my torpedo damage has gone up noticeably... but my energy weapon damage is massively improved.
This truly is the age of the torpedo boat.
I had some hope for the future of STO when they "nerfed" rep traits.
You can imagine my joy at what specializations have done.
That is *exactly* how things will go down!
UNLESS players "work" for Dilithium spending more time in the game and less real money trying to buy the D from other players.
Why do I see the PVE queues, the ones who are active... getting quieter.
...
You really haven't checked out full auto rifles lately, have you? :P
Sadly,that's pretty much it.
Take back your home,end the grind!
Volunteer moderators policing the forums is like a mall cop trying to solve a murder.
The DPS increases for MK XIII and MK XIV, but the MK XII are still not where they were a few weeks before DR came out. They were nerfed before DR, and have not been put back to where they were.
Also, with this newer Power creep, there is not a cost reduction to upgrading. I am sorry, but all of this long explanation says to me is, "We didn't get enough money from you, so will you spend it now? We give you more power, you give us more money."
Instead of adjusting the advance queues so they will be like they said they would, they are now trying to get everyone to spend money to upgrade weapons. Remember when they said that the elite queues were suppose to be for elite, but the advanced were only going to be slightly harder than the elite were.
All they had to do was lower the hit points of the NPC's hull, and shields. But it doesn't sell, so they try to sell more power creep. And now that the enemies are hitting harder too, it just makes it harder for ones that either can't afford to upgrade, or don't want to.
When I think that they can't do worse, they prove me wrong. At least we still have the underground snowmen to play with till January 15.
These maths are seriously flawed and don't take unto account the dili to craft. No one is considering TP as a "cost". You're mixing apples and oranges here. A rough estimate for upgrading one weapon from XI to XIV is 100k dilith. Per weapon. Its too expensive IF we consider all the nerfs to actually getting said dilith. Every time we find a decent place to farm some, once Cryptic hears about it, it gets nerfed.
"Expensive" is ultimately subjective. For many of us, upgrading more than one set of weapons/tac consoles/engine sets is prohibitively costly so we simply aren't even making the attempt. Sometimes its nice to just play a game without having to constantly grind to play the game. Most casual players aren't space rich. I sometimes think the game is being altered around the few who are or who are willing to drop $100s per week on STO. I am not and I'm not alone. I spent a fair anount to support the game but its apparently not enough.
Nah, they're pretty much dead on. Remember, making the actual Tech Upgrades doesn't cost dilithuim, just materials and EC's. It's the application of the Tech Upgrades that costs dilithium.
My own preference for reducing cost as opposed to increasing reward stems more from, as VD mentioned, the overall long-term cost of Upgrading including quality, especially when playing more than one character and more than one build... and the extra cost for Upgrading Torps and Rep Gear. Probably my fault for wanting to play multiple characters, but that's why I haven't bothered with Upgrading much. As you said, "expensive" is a subjective term... for VD the cost is reasonable, for me it's not, thus the difference in opinion. Which I'm fine with.
Besides, it's Thursday... that ship has sailed. :P
In my experience the key to enjoying STO is ignore pay to win and only do the content you enjoy. I don't do lockboxes, although I've bought odds and ends from them on the exchange. .
For me dear Virus, neither as I do not plan on upgrading any time soon!
My dilithium is far to valuable, to be dumping into such a TRIBBLE system, that doesn't even work 100% yet.
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
Yeah, same here. I don't want to waste 9 million EC and almost 20,000 refined dil for each of my 6 fleet AP beam arrays to only get a tiny bump in the stats.
Free Tibet!
I should have been more accurate. I just meant they were off in the context of what is considered cost. The application of the tech is how I see the cost. The materials I see more as time to get them. (IF they can be gotten during play and not bought on the exchange).
In the end, subjective or not, it seems many people find upgrading to expensive one way or another. An old fleetmate who I work with irl asked me if he should come back to STO and I simply told him only if you don't chase the upgrade dragon and just play the older content with what gear/ships he has. Progression has become a mountain too high to climb for most of us.
Thanks for your response, though. Its unfortunate that so many of us have become discouraged by one cost or another.
It's the Rarity Upgrades that really hurt, of course. And Rep Shields/KCB, etc, go for 318k TP per round (as of Very Rare Mk XIV). Some of my UR weps take like 212k TP. Those really are wicked numbers, especially when you have to multiply by 6-8, for weps (and then x5 or so to strike lucky).
And a single Superior Tech costs ca. 400k EC nowadays. That adds up real fast too.
why make 13 n14 stronger?
ah right to post buff pve content to make it unplayable to mk12 EQ to firce ppl to upgrade
makes sense
This is Geko's top secret plan! How did you work it out?
Free Tibet!