As for me? I'm perfectly happy with things now, though I did prefer having my traits stacked and I do miss a few of the old traits, but I've adjusted and adapted.
Would PvP balance passes completely change gameplay for you? Couldn't you adjust and adapt to the changes?
In case the idea didn't get across...these points go both ways. The difference is how the scope of balance changes affect PvE compared to PvP. A miniscule, barely noticeable tweak to PvE gameplay can make a game-defining difference in PvP.
Wtf are you talking about? We (the pvpers) have to stfu if something is unbalanced because you fear it could affect your OPness in PvE???
Imagine a world where PvP was totaly fine and PvE was broken to the max. Imagine we (the pvpers) would tell you to stfu cuz your cries for nerfs would change our game...
PvE is broken to the max as well.
Lil thing called Plasma doping with FLWC +Pla Embassy consoles and +beam Tactical consoles.
Only that equipped on ANY ship with 3,4,5 Sci consoles and/or 3,4,5 tac consoles nets you 30,40,50k DPS. Only from plasma burn from broken synergy of console bonuses and max subsys power.
People pay $1000+ dollars for whatnot, when in fact only thing you need is 1 Plasmonic Leech. 4 Embassy -Threat +Plasma FLWC consoles and 4-5 Spire Tac Vulnerabilty Locator tac consoles with 6-7 CrtDx3/4 beams.
Bang. You're killing left and right in ANY ship.
And you need waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay less then 1000$, but you need to know stuff right?
Now you know.
Also, Neutronic Torpedo spread 3. With it alone, nothing else. i do 30k DPS on t5/U ship, 4 DHCs i use, pets and other stuff is just a bonus on top of it.
See, complete logic is wrong.
People bought P2W, but knowledge of broken stuff always surpasses P2W and skill tenfold.
Balance what hurts PvP = balance everything else.
2(two) space PvE mission that is not filled with pure NPC DPS HP sponges are
Borg Disconnected Elite and Battle of Korfez Elite.
I was rather surprised to see something like that in STO. That is good and clean fun Co-op PvE.
Besides new and old ground missions that are fun and dynamic(DRSE, NTTE, BHE, Incursion, Self Destruction, Kobali zone) and those 2 new Space PvE missions there is no bright points even in PvE.
Someone mentioned HSE.
When it came out, Borg were shooting near or over 1mil Plasma lances over the 30km range on cloaked ships on spawn.
Borg Queen shot 800k PSW, and galactically high FBP.
And still I finished my first HSE when it came out with a DEFIANT. I used all my repair stuff, entire PUG team did, we died, respawned, but we won.
Then i finished it with Science 3k DPS Aventine. Having Disable Subsys ability on a ship was a requirement to win some stuff with blue and purple gear we had then.
I urge you. Go with PUG in somewhat nerfed and somewhat changed HSE now with $1000 stuff and t6 ships. see how far you will get.
Even very high DPS ships with all gold gear fail HSE.
Now, the point.
Some abilities are way too strong for 60-100k HP Player ships in PvP.
Same abilities are way to weak versus 800k-several mil HP NPC ships in PvE.
Abilities like FBP, TBR, Beam overload, Torpedo High Yield, Iso kinetic Cannon, ionic Turbulence etc, etc.
So it forces out Science setups out of PvE with everyone doing BFAW plasma doping and forces out anything but high speed escorts with BO and Science/intel IT, TBR/FBP ships out of PvP.
Game deteriorated because of broken BOFF skills and inflated NPC DMG/HP.
Balance is good. Fixing broken stuff is good. For everyone. Starting with Cryptic down to newest player signing up today.
Well I'm pretty sure 99% of the PvEers would cry for nerfs if NPC had FPB. Do you guys remember the PvE QQ and cries for nerfs when Borg Spheres had EPtE? That was nothing compared to the ****storms coming after applying FBP to NPCs.
Nah. NPC's already have much more FBP than you think. I vividly recall, for instance, the 'Shutdown' mission at DS9 (the one that got marked as 'exploitative', remember?). I was doing it on Elite, and those Feedback Pulses got wicked after lv 54 or so (in the sense that you could easily die from it, when they were coming from multiple vectors).
PvE might change yes, but there will always be a way to adapt - sadly that does not apply for PvP.
Physician, heal thyself! Plenty of PvP-ers already have adapted, and indeed, O irony, uses FBP to counter SS. And very effectively. Why can't you?!
To try and balance PVP will nerf PVE beyond any reasonable level.
And this here is why it should simply never happen. Might as well end the thread right here.
Seriously, prior to DR balance was maybe an option. But then, after their umptiest 'meet & greed', they decided to go full overboard with the power creep, not even pretending any more they were holding back. And I love it! The choice was theirs. And I bought into it, quite literally.
If people want true PvP... go play EvE Online! :P No, seriously. STO is, resoundingly so, a PvE game. And, on that note,
"You sound like you don't want to be an android."
"I am an android. That will never change."
Wasn't the whole 'Limit you to only 4 Rep traits' a balance pass for PvP? I seem to recall that upsetting quite a few people.
No. That was done for PvE-ers. They simply didn't want newcomers to be so put off by the idea of being sheer impossibly behind vet players, that they would decide simply not to bother with the game at all any more (and not invest, and become a loyal customer).
posted by meimetoo
No. That was done for PvE-ers. They simply didn't want newcomers to be so put off by the idea of being sheer impossibly behind vet players, that they would decide simply not to bother with the game at all any more (and not invest, and become a loyal customer).
Isn't that what the spec tree is for?
That aside I would like to see a balance pass done across PvE itself. Examine the PvE meta and it's own issues and deal with them. What works in PvP won't necessarily work in PvE so save the baby and throw out the bathwater.
It is nice to see a conciliatory thread concerning PvE and PvP but is there any legitimate pro to it's resuscitation given the commitment of resources that would be necessitated and taken away from more widely accessed content? Spinoffs potentially paying off dividends are nice but a poor substitute for direct applications. at present the most pressing concern I have involving PvP is the RNG garbage foisted on my crafting projects because of its continued existence.
The only thing wrong with PvP is surgical strikes and ionic turbulence.
And does anyone in PvE seriously use either? DPS is all about the faw faw faw.
I'd say there's far more unbalanced things in PVP than SS and Ionic Turbulence. I used to PVP all the time but quit it in S8 because I felt it was already way out of hand in balance at that time. It hasn't gotten any better with S9 and DR was merely more of the same, unbalanced game.
This game is closer to playing X-Wing Alliance than it is a Star Trek game with battles between "Tall Ships." Players in STO can go poof as easily as a TIE Fighter.
I'd say there's far more unbalanced things in PVP than SS and Ionic Turbulence. I used to PVP all the time but quit it in S8 because I felt it was already way out of hand in balance at that time. It hasn't gotten any better with S9 and DR was merely more of the same, unbalanced game.
This game is closer to playing X-Wing Alliance than it is a Star Trek game with battles between "Tall Ships." Players in STO can go poof as easily as a TIE Fighter.
lulz ....
i feel ya man, i feel ya. zippies allover, goin on full speed like others do on full impulse *zing* ...
Honestly? No. PvP feedback generally amounts to 'Everything that is even remotely good, and makes me unable to win, needs to be nerfed.' Perhaps even valid, from a PvP perspective. But I'm a PVE-er, and balance looks just fine to me: NPC loses, I win. I like it that way, I paid for it that way.
Not quite meimeitoo, there's a large difference between the complaining PvP'ers and getting the balance right for PvP.
For all classes to work properly there will always be a measure of imbalance, but that's actually needed for the game to work. If everyone is 100% equal there will be 0.1% who can win all the time due to talent and effort to learn how to. The next 10% will be the visible top end players all fighting to get to the 0.1%. Below that it'll be the people who won't get there. Just like Tennis has 4-5 main players who dominate the Grand Slam title's during any period, the same happens here, that in turn renders a lot of people in one of two camps. Either they are the competitive type who wants to improve themselves and learn, or the non-competitive type who can't work out how to change to become better. It's not fair but that's just the way competitive games work as does life.
The advantage though is that the 0.1% and the other 10% are also able to provide data they cannot get anywhere else. In PvP you can see the strengths and weaknesses of every ship and captain class in combination, as well as all the other extraneous things such as consoles, doff's, boff's etc...
Using that data they can actually make better NPC loadouts as well as work out how to balance the game for the different levels of play in the game.
These are based off the general damage seen in ISA runs. The avg run takes a good 300-400s whereas the record on the DPS tables is 66s.
Reducing the discrepancy is one thing, but the percentages will stay the same, just the DPS numbers will change.
However when comparing the abilities used in PvE to that in PvP you'll see far more abilities become relevant as the enemy's don't just sit there using 3 abilities at most and a selection of 2-3 beams/cannons. This diversity is what PvE needs as it'll make the game more than just a spacebar macro to do as much damage as possible (yes I know the top guys don't do this, but those in the 30% do).
Making the fights need a player to use both offensive and defensive skills is a priority, that alone will reduce the necessity for DPS and increase the need for a balanced build. That balance can be either a normal split build ship with defensive and offensive capabilities or with more dedicated healing/drain/CC/support built ships working with tactical oriented builds (just like you see with the top DPS players, who use Recluse support carriers to support and buff the Tactical Scimitar's).
Oddly this is something massively demanded and yet derided at the same time. The haters will claim that the Scimitar's DPS isn't real due to having a team that support's it, yet in the next breath the same people want more team oriented gameplay to make the various other Captain/Ship classes more relevant.
In turn this requires the NPC's to be much more involved in the battle. Currently they are gimped to the point of being target sponges, or in the case of the Voth Glass cannon killers due to their impenetrable shield and damage reflect shield. Giving the NPC's the same amount of hitpoints as players and using the same abilities with the NPC's using known good combo's to create problem's for the players to solve. The next part is to have the NPC's difficulty scaled between more than just 3 levels. As you can see from the DPS levels above there should be a minimum of 4 levels. In those levels there should be a level of dynamic scaling based off equipment potential too, which takes gear and build into account as well.
The exception to that rule is the top tier which is designed to give the 0.1%ers to the limit. It's not something that gives something unique (like salvaged gear), but rewards will be based off time. Spending 10 mins fighting a massive fight will give the same % per time as finishing it in 5 mins.
The lower levels will be slightly less rewards but give the players the needed mats to get ships built to attain the top tier of content.
However none of this would be really possible without a good knowledge of how PvP functions within the game and using it as a balance measure for PvE too.
Chris Robert's on SC:
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
Ha, thats a good one. Both PvP and PvE are soo imbalanced that a balance pass would be a gigantic and useless efort. Becouse, imo, PvP allready is imbalanced from the very core of itself.
Now you see, when I first started playing this game a few years ago, I noticed something very strange, that only in this game I found. The offence vs defence imbalance.
For offence, sky is the limit. I can stack piles over piles of items, skills, passives, debuffs on enemy etc. of stuff that boost the offensice capabilities.
But for defence? I get diminuishing returns on resist and I get cap on shield res. So now after a few years of powercreep, you get something like vaping someone without any chance of react...
Folks complain about SS hittng for 60k. But let me ask you this, how much damage from that is: +110% from mk XII to MK IV, + 80-100% from OSS, flanking dmg, crit chance and severity from intel office spec passives, moar crit chance and severity from various lobi consoles, dmg boost from nukara offensive+AMP, romulan boffs, shield pen and even armor pen now post-DR and so on....
And you have to consider balancing stuff for and from new players point of view. A SS on a fresh lvl 50 or even 60 player, with none of the above stuff, will behave completly different...
The skill is not the problem, is only showing the imbalance between defensive and offensive, thats all.
Its also about hypocrisy too. CrypticQuack said some wise words in the last stream. That often players say that want something but actually want/do/buy something else. He was talking about ships, but this got me thinking about PvP and it applays here aswell. Allmost everybody screams "No to powercreep" and "Yes to balance". But when some OP stuff get realesed, it sells like hot pancakes and its used by the majority. Yet if devs release something moderate (items, ships etc.), it doesnt sell becouse its not OP enuf:rolleyes:
The only problem with that argument is it's born of the current situation. With a rebalance the situation would actually be reset and in turn would make console and ship releases much easier to sell as they would end up within the balance threshold instead of outside it (Phantom/Faeht I'm looking at you!).
On release there's usually a period of adjustment. Some yell OP, others yell Underpowered. Both need to learn that they need to work out it's weaknesses and strengths. Some ships are totally underpowered (Galaxy???) but conversely there's the Scimitar which when setup right is totally OP. There are other ships that challenge it in certain circumstances, but not many when it comes to the current DPS meta. With the rebalanced system it would be more a case of playstyle and design that would facilitate interest and not just how OP it is.
Chris Robert's on SC:
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
PvP is good for this game, as PvP-ers, let's face it, are really the only ones who truly understand the game mechanics (and then have that knowledge trickle down to us mundanes). But, realistically, this remains, overwhelmingly so, a PvE game. Ideally, certain abilities behave differently in PvP than in PvE. Surgical Strikes was already supposed to do that, iirc. Then neither camp hinders each other.
Nah, plenty of people understand the game mechanics, doesn't matter what camp of players you associate yourself with, plenty of people know the mechanics.
Honestly though, I think the only realistic solution there is to PvP without impacting the rest of the game (mostly because Cryptic aren't competent enough to do much else) is to give every single item in the game separate stats for PvE and PvP, that would solve most issues right there without impacting anything outside of PvP.
Ten soldiers wisely led will beat a hundred without a head. - Euripides
I no longer do any Bug Hunting work for Cryptic. I may resume if a serious attempt to fix the game is made.
Nah. NPC's already have much more FBP than you think. I vividly recall, for instance, the 'Shutdown' mission at DS9 (the one that got marked as 'exploitative', remember?). I was doing it on Elite, and those Feedback Pulses got wicked after lv 54 or so (in the sense that you could easily die from it, when they were coming from multiple vectors).
Physician, heal thyself! Plenty of PvP-ers already have adapted, and indeed, O irony, uses FBP to counter SS. And very effectively. Why can't you?!
And this here is why it should simply never happen. Might as well end the thread right here.
Seriously, prior to DR balance was maybe an option. But then, after their umptiest 'meet & greed', they decided to go full overboard with the power creep, not even pretending any more they were holding back. And I love it! The choice was theirs. And I bought into it, quite literally.
If people want true PvP... go play EvE Online! :P No, seriously. STO is, resoundingly so, a PvE game. And, on that note,
I don't want to play EVE. I don't like it at all. I don't want to play another MMO, this is the only one. I hate MMO as a concept, STO PvP was never MMO like.
And STO is not a PvE game. In it's core mechanics STO is pure PvP.
And it seems that you don't quite understand what balance in PvP or PvE means.
i have explained it in my post on last page.
What setups have been forced out of PvE and what setups from PvP because of broken(by cryptic's admission) stuff.
(just like you see with the top DPS players, who use Recluse support carriers to support and buff the Tactical Scimitar's).
Oddly this is something massively demanded and yet derided at the same time. The haters will claim that the Scimitar's DPS isn't real due to having a team that support's it, yet in the next breath the same people want more team oriented gameplay to make the various other Captain/Ship classes more relevant.
No. That's a fallacy. Recluses in high DPS runs serve as broken APBeta3 pet spam machines.
It is not even close to what SCI CC debuffer in PvP does.
NPCs in ISA don't have TT to clear APB3 spam. If they would, bam! no recluses in ISA anymore.
Teamplay part is always most important, but in PvE, except very few bosses, SCI ship can't do much and TAC ship will do same task waaay, way faster.
Skills that are comparatively super weak in PvE but super strong in PvP:
People seem to forget when STO launched... it was clear the devs at that time where 100% going for a very PvP focused game.
The entire KDF / Fed war was designed to add PvP to the game... a Red / Blue faction balance like many MMOs before it.
The game didn't even have any other way for KDF to level at launch. lol
Kerrat and Ottha where both launch Open PvP zones... and at the time they promised more was to come.
The split of gear in that first year was very easy to figure out... there was PvE gear you bought with PvE earned currency and there was PvP gear you bought with PvP tokens. Neither said PvP or PvE on them but it was implied and pretty easy to figure out.
Since that they have added shuttle PvP... and a Private Que function before that. They have also removed one ground and one space game type (not maps, game modes).
As many others have mentioned the CORE game that is STO is a great PvP game. Even though we have pretty much only had Launch Quality PvP in this game for 5 years there is still people willing to get on here and talk about how good it could be. I think that should be reason enough for Cryptic to give it some attention.
The only real issue will be if they do look at it... with they treat it like every other revamp they have done in this game. In which case no one is coming back... and the few PvP fans left will leave. If they come at it and try there best to turn it into something half way between what it is and the Esport it could be... then perhaps it could be great. As I have said more then once... this game will never be anything but an average at best PvE MMO... it still has the potential to be one of the best PvP games on the market, if its handled properly.
@sharxtreme - Did I say that the Recluse was playing the Science support heal role? Nope. I said it supported the DPS of the Scimitar, which it does by using APB spam from itself and pets. Ok so it's not the holy trinity of support but it's still teamwork. There's more teamwork in PvP that's for sure, but there needs to be some more teamwork in PvE which is closer to how you go about PvP to make it interesting.
I agree on the skills needed for PvP are totally different to PvE, which is why I was saying that PvP needs to affect PvE more by allowing more skills to become useful, which in turn means making them useful in PvP in the first place. Some are OP, others are UP. They need to be normalised a bit to make better balance.
Chris Robert's on SC:
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
I don't want to play EVE. I don't like it at all. I don't want to play another MMO, this is the only one.
And you are free to play only STO. But that's maybe the problem too: instead of turning your own attention to another game, you want to turn STO into something else. And, of course STO is a PvE game, silly.
Skills that are comparatively super weak in PvE but super strong in PvP:
Surgical Strikes is extremely powerful in PvE, believe me. Anyone who can wrap his brain around realizing a +40% CrtH boon will make a sick CrtD (Exploiters) Phantom build, will concur. Just because the disable doesn't work in PvE doesn't make SS 'comparatively super weak in PvE.' Not at all. And Ionic Turbulence is an excellent PvE debuffer.
Skills that are Game breaking in PvP but little to no effect in PvE:
So, in your opinion, Surgical Strikes, BO, and CRF are all over-powered?! That is beginning to look a lot like my initial statement, where I said PvP-ers seek to nerf everything that is even remotely good. That was a bit of a hyperbole, of course; but please don't make me right.
These threads are always great for letting everyone know who the biggest pve-kirk carebears are. Still blows my mind the % of players in STO who are so terrified of having to compete against another human being, (you know, in a multiplayer game). This isn't Eve or anything, where if your ship gets destroyed you actually have to get a new ship...
If the Devs sat down and gave PvP a good overhaul by changing mechanics/abilities/balance, would you support it if it helped the PvE meta? Maybe address the ever increasing power creep? Perhaps, once a relatively stable balance has been achieved (yes yes, people will argue that you can never have true "balance"), it could encourage more people to PvP, thereby opening a whole new arena of content instead of the constant ISA/Argala/STF grind?
:rolleyes:
"A balance pass..."
Well, the Devs already did a "balance pass" and completely destroyed PvP.
Now you want them to do another one?
IMO, we were closer to functional PvP back in S6...back before the great nerfs and when we had opposing Factions. THAT'S where we have to reboot to.
NO to ARC RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
These threads are always great for letting everyone know who the biggest pve-kirk carebears are. Still blows my mind the % of players in STO who are so terrified of having to compete against another human being, (you know, in a multiplayer game). This isn't Eve or anything, where if your ship gets destroyed you actually have to get a new ship...
<- Carebear here, and fiercely proud of it.
And although this is no dicsussion on why peeps don't want to PvP, I will simply say I have no interest in entering a PvP area, and getting insta-vaped by a borderline sociopathic cloaked teenager in his mother's basement, who made preying on the unexpected his main achievement in life. Seen enough of that in EvE, thank you! (Ha! Spewing out this old sterotype again felt good)
At the same time, people want that sort of thrill, by all means, have at it: just not at the expense of PvE, is all.
And you are free to play only STO. But that's maybe the problem too: instead of turning your own attention to another game, you want to turn STO into something else. And, of course STO is a PvE game, silly.
Sorry to say this, but you know very lil about STO it seems and even less about me.
Surgical Strikes is extremely powerful in PvE, believe me. Anyone who can wrap his brain around realizing a +40% CrtH boon will make a sick CrtD (Exploiters) Phantom build, will concur. Just because the disable doesn't work in PvE doesn't make SS 'comparatively super weak in PvE.' Not at all. And Ionic Turbulence is an excellent PvE debuffer.
No. just no. completely wrong. Surgical strikes is absolutely weak in PvE. It isn't AoE, it is slow, CSV and especially FAW beat it by so much it's not even funny.
Exploiter consoles are also very illogical way to boost CRTD. 1 Lobi elachi console covers 3 of them. ACC overflow doesn't work for beams.
to make it short. You are doing it wrong.
So, in your opinion, Surgical Strikes, BO, and CRF are all over-powered?! That is beginning to look a lot like my initial statement, where I said PvP-ers seek to nerf everything that is even remotely good. That was a bit of a hyperbole, of course; but please don't make me right.
you are not reading what i am writing.
SS, BO and CRF in pvp are overpowered coupled with OSS and ACC overflow, and newly changed 100%crth on BO.
All of which have little to no effect in PvE.
and i can't make you right because you are wrong. i play both pve and pvp.
These threads are always great for letting everyone know who the biggest pve-kirk carebears are. Still blows my mind the % of players in STO who are so terrified of having to compete against another human being, (you know, in a multiplayer game). This isn't Eve or anything, where if your ship gets destroyed you actually have to get a new ship...
Depends on the person and reason.
For myself and a number of others, video games and computer games are a way to kick back and relax, to turn off the brain for awhile and just enjoy blowing stuff up.
Am I terrified of having to compete against another person? No. But do I want to actually have to put as much work and effort into playing a game as I would disarming a bomb? No. I want to have fun. And like many people, fun for me means a decent challenge but not one that's going to force me to have to work.
That's why I keep pushing for separate serves for PvP from PvE. Let the group that has fun blowing stuff up keep what they have, while giving the group that enjoys spending hours with spreadsheets and calculators to eak out .04% more damage have what they want.
Everyone is happy then. You wont have PvE-ers complaining about PvP-ers nerfing everything, and you wont have PvP-ers complain about PvE-ers in their game.
"Why all the sales"?
And a merry freaking Christmas to you too, Ebenezer.
-jonsills, 'Cryptic Why the sales..instead of Fixing XP leveling and this game?'
Comments
Play another Star Trek MMO you mean?
Would PvP balance passes completely change gameplay for you? Couldn't you adjust and adapt to the changes?
In case the idea didn't get across...these points go both ways. The difference is how the scope of balance changes affect PvE compared to PvP. A miniscule, barely noticeable tweak to PvE gameplay can make a game-defining difference in PvP.
Indeed. PvP only has one difficulty setting and it's more reliant on meta than Elite (which is insufferably easy in comparison).
Hmm that gives me an idea. A difficulty setting beyond Elite so PvPers won't fall asleep trying to PvE!
PvE is broken to the max as well.
Lil thing called Plasma doping with FLWC +Pla Embassy consoles and +beam Tactical consoles.
Only that equipped on ANY ship with 3,4,5 Sci consoles and/or 3,4,5 tac consoles nets you 30,40,50k DPS. Only from plasma burn from broken synergy of console bonuses and max subsys power.
People pay $1000+ dollars for whatnot, when in fact only thing you need is 1 Plasmonic Leech. 4 Embassy -Threat +Plasma FLWC consoles and 4-5 Spire Tac Vulnerabilty Locator tac consoles with 6-7 CrtDx3/4 beams.
Bang. You're killing left and right in ANY ship.
And you need waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay less then 1000$, but you need to know stuff right?
Now you know.
Also, Neutronic Torpedo spread 3. With it alone, nothing else. i do 30k DPS on t5/U ship, 4 DHCs i use, pets and other stuff is just a bonus on top of it.
See, complete logic is wrong.
People bought P2W, but knowledge of broken stuff always surpasses P2W and skill tenfold.
Balance what hurts PvP = balance everything else.
2(two) space PvE mission that is not filled with pure NPC DPS HP sponges are
Borg Disconnected Elite and Battle of Korfez Elite.
I was rather surprised to see something like that in STO. That is good and clean fun Co-op PvE.
Besides new and old ground missions that are fun and dynamic(DRSE, NTTE, BHE, Incursion, Self Destruction, Kobali zone) and those 2 new Space PvE missions there is no bright points even in PvE.
Someone mentioned HSE.
When it came out, Borg were shooting near or over 1mil Plasma lances over the 30km range on cloaked ships on spawn.
Borg Queen shot 800k PSW, and galactically high FBP.
And still I finished my first HSE when it came out with a DEFIANT. I used all my repair stuff, entire PUG team did, we died, respawned, but we won.
Then i finished it with Science 3k DPS Aventine. Having Disable Subsys ability on a ship was a requirement to win some stuff with blue and purple gear we had then.
I urge you. Go with PUG in somewhat nerfed and somewhat changed HSE now with $1000 stuff and t6 ships. see how far you will get.
Even very high DPS ships with all gold gear fail HSE.
Now, the point.
Some abilities are way too strong for 60-100k HP Player ships in PvP.
Same abilities are way to weak versus 800k-several mil HP NPC ships in PvE.
Abilities like FBP, TBR, Beam overload, Torpedo High Yield, Iso kinetic Cannon, ionic Turbulence etc, etc.
So it forces out Science setups out of PvE with everyone doing BFAW plasma doping and forces out anything but high speed escorts with BO and Science/intel IT, TBR/FBP ships out of PvP.
Game deteriorated because of broken BOFF skills and inflated NPC DMG/HP.
Balance is good. Fixing broken stuff is good. For everyone. Starting with Cryptic down to newest player signing up today.
Super SpecialStar Trek Online Review
SpecialTemporal PUG 100K DPS Build
We are Travelers
Nah. NPC's already have much more FBP than you think. I vividly recall, for instance, the 'Shutdown' mission at DS9 (the one that got marked as 'exploitative', remember?). I was doing it on Elite, and those Feedback Pulses got wicked after lv 54 or so (in the sense that you could easily die from it, when they were coming from multiple vectors).
Physician, heal thyself! Plenty of PvP-ers already have adapted, and indeed, O irony, uses FBP to counter SS. And very effectively. Why can't you?!
And this here is why it should simply never happen. Might as well end the thread right here.
Seriously, prior to DR balance was maybe an option. But then, after their umptiest 'meet & greed', they decided to go full overboard with the power creep, not even pretending any more they were holding back. And I love it! The choice was theirs. And I bought into it, quite literally.
If people want true PvP... go play EvE Online! :P No, seriously. STO is, resoundingly so, a PvE game. And, on that note,
"You sound like you don't want to be an android."
"I am an android. That will never change."
- Timothy and Data ('Hero Worship')
No. That was done for PvE-ers. They simply didn't want newcomers to be so put off by the idea of being sheer impossibly behind vet players, that they would decide simply not to bother with the game at all any more (and not invest, and become a loyal customer).
Isn't that what the spec tree is for?
That aside I would like to see a balance pass done across PvE itself. Examine the PvE meta and it's own issues and deal with them. What works in PvP won't necessarily work in PvE so save the baby and throw out the bathwater.
It is nice to see a conciliatory thread concerning PvE and PvP but is there any legitimate pro to it's resuscitation given the commitment of resources that would be necessitated and taken away from more widely accessed content? Spinoffs potentially paying off dividends are nice but a poor substitute for direct applications. at present the most pressing concern I have involving PvP is the RNG garbage foisted on my crafting projects because of its continued existence.
oh wait those npcs are pve players....
I seriously use both. And my DPS went up 20k with it.
I'd say there's far more unbalanced things in PVP than SS and Ionic Turbulence. I used to PVP all the time but quit it in S8 because I felt it was already way out of hand in balance at that time. It hasn't gotten any better with S9 and DR was merely more of the same, unbalanced game.
This game is closer to playing X-Wing Alliance than it is a Star Trek game with battles between "Tall Ships." Players in STO can go poof as easily as a TIE Fighter.
lulz
i feel ya man, i feel ya. zippies allover, goin on full speed like others do on full impulse *zing*
Not quite meimeitoo, there's a large difference between the complaining PvP'ers and getting the balance right for PvP.
For all classes to work properly there will always be a measure of imbalance, but that's actually needed for the game to work. If everyone is 100% equal there will be 0.1% who can win all the time due to talent and effort to learn how to. The next 10% will be the visible top end players all fighting to get to the 0.1%. Below that it'll be the people who won't get there. Just like Tennis has 4-5 main players who dominate the Grand Slam title's during any period, the same happens here, that in turn renders a lot of people in one of two camps. Either they are the competitive type who wants to improve themselves and learn, or the non-competitive type who can't work out how to change to become better. It's not fair but that's just the way competitive games work as does life.
The advantage though is that the 0.1% and the other 10% are also able to provide data they cannot get anywhere else. In PvP you can see the strengths and weaknesses of every ship and captain class in combination, as well as all the other extraneous things such as consoles, doff's, boff's etc...
Using that data they can actually make better NPC loadouts as well as work out how to balance the game for the different levels of play in the game.
On the current scale the DPS output is like this:
60% - >5000 DPS
30% - 5000 - 25000 DPS
9.9% - 25000 - 90000 DPS
0.1% - 90000 - 180000 DPS
These are based off the general damage seen in ISA runs. The avg run takes a good 300-400s whereas the record on the DPS tables is 66s.
Reducing the discrepancy is one thing, but the percentages will stay the same, just the DPS numbers will change.
However when comparing the abilities used in PvE to that in PvP you'll see far more abilities become relevant as the enemy's don't just sit there using 3 abilities at most and a selection of 2-3 beams/cannons. This diversity is what PvE needs as it'll make the game more than just a spacebar macro to do as much damage as possible (yes I know the top guys don't do this, but those in the 30% do).
Making the fights need a player to use both offensive and defensive skills is a priority, that alone will reduce the necessity for DPS and increase the need for a balanced build. That balance can be either a normal split build ship with defensive and offensive capabilities or with more dedicated healing/drain/CC/support built ships working with tactical oriented builds (just like you see with the top DPS players, who use Recluse support carriers to support and buff the Tactical Scimitar's).
Oddly this is something massively demanded and yet derided at the same time. The haters will claim that the Scimitar's DPS isn't real due to having a team that support's it, yet in the next breath the same people want more team oriented gameplay to make the various other Captain/Ship classes more relevant.
In turn this requires the NPC's to be much more involved in the battle. Currently they are gimped to the point of being target sponges, or in the case of the Voth Glass cannon killers due to their impenetrable shield and damage reflect shield. Giving the NPC's the same amount of hitpoints as players and using the same abilities with the NPC's using known good combo's to create problem's for the players to solve. The next part is to have the NPC's difficulty scaled between more than just 3 levels. As you can see from the DPS levels above there should be a minimum of 4 levels. In those levels there should be a level of dynamic scaling based off equipment potential too, which takes gear and build into account as well.
The exception to that rule is the top tier which is designed to give the 0.1%ers to the limit. It's not something that gives something unique (like salvaged gear), but rewards will be based off time. Spending 10 mins fighting a massive fight will give the same % per time as finishing it in 5 mins.
The lower levels will be slightly less rewards but give the players the needed mats to get ships built to attain the top tier of content.
However none of this would be really possible without a good knowledge of how PvP functions within the game and using it as a balance measure for PvE too.
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
Now you see, when I first started playing this game a few years ago, I noticed something very strange, that only in this game I found. The offence vs defence imbalance.
For offence, sky is the limit. I can stack piles over piles of items, skills, passives, debuffs on enemy etc. of stuff that boost the offensice capabilities.
But for defence? I get diminuishing returns on resist and I get cap on shield res. So now after a few years of powercreep, you get something like vaping someone without any chance of react...
Folks complain about SS hittng for 60k. But let me ask you this, how much damage from that is: +110% from mk XII to MK IV, + 80-100% from OSS, flanking dmg, crit chance and severity from intel office spec passives, moar crit chance and severity from various lobi consoles, dmg boost from nukara offensive+AMP, romulan boffs, shield pen and even armor pen now post-DR and so on....
And you have to consider balancing stuff for and from new players point of view. A SS on a fresh lvl 50 or even 60 player, with none of the above stuff, will behave completly different...
The skill is not the problem, is only showing the imbalance between defensive and offensive, thats all.
Its also about hypocrisy too. CrypticQuack said some wise words in the last stream. That often players say that want something but actually want/do/buy something else. He was talking about ships, but this got me thinking about PvP and it applays here aswell. Allmost everybody screams "No to powercreep" and "Yes to balance". But when some OP stuff get realesed, it sells like hot pancakes and its used by the majority. Yet if devs release something moderate (items, ships etc.), it doesnt sell becouse its not OP enuf:rolleyes:
On release there's usually a period of adjustment. Some yell OP, others yell Underpowered. Both need to learn that they need to work out it's weaknesses and strengths. Some ships are totally underpowered (Galaxy???) but conversely there's the Scimitar which when setup right is totally OP. There are other ships that challenge it in certain circumstances, but not many when it comes to the current DPS meta. With the rebalanced system it would be more a case of playstyle and design that would facilitate interest and not just how OP it is.
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
Nah, plenty of people understand the game mechanics, doesn't matter what camp of players you associate yourself with, plenty of people know the mechanics.
Honestly though, I think the only realistic solution there is to PvP without impacting the rest of the game (mostly because Cryptic aren't competent enough to do much else) is to give every single item in the game separate stats for PvE and PvP, that would solve most issues right there without impacting anything outside of PvP.
I don't want to play EVE. I don't like it at all. I don't want to play another MMO, this is the only one. I hate MMO as a concept, STO PvP was never MMO like.
And STO is not a PvE game. In it's core mechanics STO is pure PvP.
And it seems that you don't quite understand what balance in PvP or PvE means.
i have explained it in my post on last page.
What setups have been forced out of PvE and what setups from PvP because of broken(by cryptic's admission) stuff.
No. That's a fallacy. Recluses in high DPS runs serve as broken APBeta3 pet spam machines.
It is not even close to what SCI CC debuffer in PvP does.
NPCs in ISA don't have TT to clear APB3 spam. If they would, bam! no recluses in ISA anymore.
Teamplay part is always most important, but in PvE, except very few bosses, SCI ship can't do much and TAC ship will do same task waaay, way faster.
Skills that are comparatively super weak in PvE but super strong in PvP:
-FBP
-TBR
-Ionic Turbulence
-Surgical Strikes
-Beam Overload
-Isokinetic Cannon
Skills that are strong in both PvE and PvP:
-Neutronic Torpedo Spread 3 (getting the nerf)
-Plasma burn ("doping") (getting the nerf)
Skills that are only strong in PvE and very weak in PvP:
- APB3 debuff stacking
- BFAW
Skills that are Game breaking in PvP but little to no effect in PvE:
- Ionic Turbulence/Viral Torpedo chain stun/hold, disable (getting fixed?)
- EMP probe
- Override Subsys Safeties +Surgical Strikes /BO/CRF
there are more but short to do list is nicer.
Super SpecialStar Trek Online Review
SpecialTemporal PUG 100K DPS Build
We are Travelers
The entire KDF / Fed war was designed to add PvP to the game... a Red / Blue faction balance like many MMOs before it.
The game didn't even have any other way for KDF to level at launch. lol
Kerrat and Ottha where both launch Open PvP zones... and at the time they promised more was to come.
The split of gear in that first year was very easy to figure out... there was PvE gear you bought with PvE earned currency and there was PvP gear you bought with PvP tokens. Neither said PvP or PvE on them but it was implied and pretty easy to figure out.
Since that they have added shuttle PvP... and a Private Que function before that. They have also removed one ground and one space game type (not maps, game modes).
As many others have mentioned the CORE game that is STO is a great PvP game. Even though we have pretty much only had Launch Quality PvP in this game for 5 years there is still people willing to get on here and talk about how good it could be. I think that should be reason enough for Cryptic to give it some attention.
The only real issue will be if they do look at it... with they treat it like every other revamp they have done in this game. In which case no one is coming back... and the few PvP fans left will leave. If they come at it and try there best to turn it into something half way between what it is and the Esport it could be... then perhaps it could be great. As I have said more then once... this game will never be anything but an average at best PvE MMO... it still has the potential to be one of the best PvP games on the market, if its handled properly.
I agree on the skills needed for PvP are totally different to PvE, which is why I was saying that PvP needs to affect PvE more by allowing more skills to become useful, which in turn means making them useful in PvP in the first place. Some are OP, others are UP. They need to be normalised a bit to make better balance.
"You don't have to do something again and again and again repetitive that doesn't have much challange, that's just a general good gameplay thing."
IT will always suck until PVP gets it own skill tree and instance rules.
PVP should be completely separated when it comes to mechanics.
The other major problem is PVP needs beginner modes like Basic and ADV.
Basic is you fly prebuilt ships with no doffs and no uni consoles.
ADV is the same as basic but you fly your own ship.
Elite mode everything goes
Back in the first years of the game we had what's now called classic PVP.
It wa so much fun duking it out with energy weapons and shields.
The worst thing that was to you is someone threw jam sensors of you.
If you want people to play PVP there has to versions where they don't get stomp buy pay to win players.
The PVP community right now is its worst enemy as they refused to challenge Cryptic for basic version of PVP.
Why they like knocking down the newbie in PVP.
And you are free to play only STO. But that's maybe the problem too: instead of turning your own attention to another game, you want to turn STO into something else. And, of course STO is a PvE game, silly.
Surgical Strikes is extremely powerful in PvE, believe me. Anyone who can wrap his brain around realizing a +40% CrtH boon will make a sick CrtD (Exploiters) Phantom build, will concur. Just because the disable doesn't work in PvE doesn't make SS 'comparatively super weak in PvE.' Not at all. And Ionic Turbulence is an excellent PvE debuffer.
So, in your opinion, Surgical Strikes, BO, and CRF are all over-powered?! That is beginning to look a lot like my initial statement, where I said PvP-ers seek to nerf everything that is even remotely good. That was a bit of a hyperbole, of course; but please don't make me right.
:rolleyes:
"A balance pass..."
Well, the Devs already did a "balance pass" and completely destroyed PvP.
Now you want them to do another one?
IMO, we were closer to functional PvP back in S6...back before the great nerfs and when we had opposing Factions.
THAT'S where we have to reboot to.
RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
<- Carebear here, and fiercely proud of it.
And although this is no dicsussion on why peeps don't want to PvP, I will simply say I have no interest in entering a PvP area, and getting insta-vaped by a borderline sociopathic cloaked teenager in his mother's basement, who made preying on the unexpected his main achievement in life. Seen enough of that in EvE, thank you!
At the same time, people want that sort of thrill, by all means, have at it: just not at the expense of PvE, is all.
No. just no. completely wrong. Surgical strikes is absolutely weak in PvE. It isn't AoE, it is slow, CSV and especially FAW beat it by so much it's not even funny.
Exploiter consoles are also very illogical way to boost CRTD. 1 Lobi elachi console covers 3 of them. ACC overflow doesn't work for beams.
to make it short. You are doing it wrong.
you are not reading what i am writing.
SS, BO and CRF in pvp are overpowered coupled with OSS and ACC overflow, and newly changed 100%crth on BO.
All of which have little to no effect in PvE.
and i can't make you right because you are wrong. i play both pve and pvp.
Super SpecialStar Trek Online Review
SpecialTemporal PUG 100K DPS Build
We are Travelers
Depends on the person and reason.
For myself and a number of others, video games and computer games are a way to kick back and relax, to turn off the brain for awhile and just enjoy blowing stuff up.
Am I terrified of having to compete against another person? No. But do I want to actually have to put as much work and effort into playing a game as I would disarming a bomb? No. I want to have fun. And like many people, fun for me means a decent challenge but not one that's going to force me to have to work.
That's why I keep pushing for separate serves for PvP from PvE. Let the group that has fun blowing stuff up keep what they have, while giving the group that enjoys spending hours with spreadsheets and calculators to eak out .04% more damage have what they want.
Everyone is happy then. You wont have PvE-ers complaining about PvP-ers nerfing everything, and you wont have PvP-ers complain about PvE-ers in their game.
And a merry freaking Christmas to you too, Ebenezer.
-jonsills, 'Cryptic Why the sales..instead of Fixing XP leveling and this game?'