Wait, now we even have shields that buff weapons?
It's one of the dumber things they've done over the years. Shields that buff weapons? That mechanic is supposed to work by diverting shield power to weapons power - you know, what we already have in game?
Massive Reboot, maybe its needed yea ? But it wont happen here in STO. We'd need a whole new game; STO 2, on a whole new engine for anything worthwhile to be done.
Not to be a buzz kill but....will....not....happen. Sorry. At a minimum, not in the foreseeable future. Defiantly be more Star Trek games, just not MMORPG style.
Retired. I'm now in search for that perfect space anomaly.
This new Shield would (or should) benefit anyone who's flying an Escort or Destroyer; ships that don't focus on survivability, but instead, on dealing damage. In their case, who even needs shields?
This new Shield would (or should) benefit anyone who's flying an Escort or Destroyer; ships that don't focus on survivability, but instead, on dealing damage. In their case, who even needs shields?
This would be about the reason I would use it. Specially once I get my Andorian Delta to level. They will be flying the "glass cannon" Kumari ship. So I need serious DPS cranking out of it.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
This new Shield would (or should) benefit anyone who's flying an Escort or Destroyer; ships that don't focus on survivability, but instead, on dealing damage. In their case, who even needs shields?
I'm sorry but as a Destroyer and Battlecruiser jockey most of the time, if you are dead you are not contributing. As much punch as you can without sacrificing survival. Covariant max cap Shields, and Boff abilities or other abilities to replenish them.
Hull is the buffer while you fix your shields, heck full Shields and damaged hull, using go down fighting, is a fun tactic.
Thanks for the Advanced Light Cruiser, Allied Escort Bundles, Jem-Hadar Light Battlecruiser, and Mek'leth
New Content Wishlist
T6 updates for the Kamarag & Vor'Cha
Heavy Cruiser & a Movie Era Style AoY Utility Cruiser
I'm sorry but as a Destroyer and Battlecruiser jockey most of the time, if you are dead you are not contributing. As much punch as you can without sacrificing survival. Covariant max cap Shields, and Boff abilities or other abilities to replenish them.
If playing cleverly, you'll be playing with (at least) one cruiser player who can take the focus off your little escort/destroyer. If the focus isn't on escorts or destroyers (or battlecruisers) then they don't need to worry (as much) about their shielding.
Furthermore, cruisers and science ships, when used correctly, can take care of escorts. Engineering Team, Hazard Emitters and Science Team are a godsend if used correctly in team-fashion. I suppose there's some difference where the battlecruiser is concerned (cause they're always going to have more hull than an escort), but if someone is flying around in a Defiant, Sabre or Kumari, they shouldn't be concerning themselves so much with shielding.
It seems okay, I've tested it on a galaxy and it parsed decently.
It is good, people mock without trying. I gave it a good test on tribble (as much as I could without a working queue) and now I'm in the process of acquiring one on Holodeck, not that there's any real rush.
Frankly it isn't hard to keep your shields up and run this at the same time, its about flying smart and not activating it when your shield heals are all on full cooldown or something just as stupid. If anything what it could encourage is a team wanting a tank to draw aggro (or other measures) in the more intense queues so that they can abuse this with impunity, but of course that won't happen because no one ever thinks these things through.
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.
And it actually has been that way since the release. The energy management in STO is unfortunately a failure IMO. There was never a time in this game where running full weapon power wasn't the best option for any non-Science Vessel.
Weapon Power just is so much more useful in comparison to any other power type.
If shield power was as useful as weapon power, a ship with 50 shields would blow up in 10 seconds and a ship with 125 shield power would last for 10 minutes.
Agreed. Power management should be flexible and come with trade-offs. If I run all power to weapons I deal massive damage but should die quickly and be slow. If I run all power to shields I should be very very resilent, but sacrifice my weapons and other powers for it. But we have so many items in-game that magically grant you power from nothing and allow to run all powers in overcap mode all the time - what's the point?
Power levels are as useful as crew at this point.
I agree, this has bugged me for years. STO never really balanced the powers in such a way there is a give and take.
For instance, the more Defensive a person is, the weaker their attacks should be. The more Offensive a player, the weaker their defense. But with STO, attacks are so off the scale that they really need no real defense. But in fact they aren't entirely defenseless, because some abilities boost resistance.
But is this shield worth it? Only a matter of time will tell, but I think players will still gravitate towards the Reputation Sets or the Fleet Elite Shields. Though it makes me conerned why Cryptic keeps making new items that seems to trivalize the old (why make regular Cap^3 shields if you just go right to the Cap^4). So makes me wonder the Devs might be running out of ideas.
The Hyper-Capacitor Shield Array [Cap]x4 is useless if you ask me and here is why.
Pros:
1. Very high capacity but that's basically it.
Cons:
1. The shield drain is per attack and not per attack cycle. It drains too fast and FAW will drain it in 5 seconds basically.
2. Because of the abovementioned inherent drain the DMG % increase is decreased exponentially during use.
3. It has a 2 minute cooldown between each activation.
4. It has a 30 second duration.
I would have preferred if the shield instead locked out capacity upon toggle on. Let's say you gain a fixed 40% energy weapon DMG increase but perhaps lock out 50% of the shield's capacity in return. Of course no drain would occur. A shield with 12000 capcity would instead have 6000 when the ability is toggled on (and it stays on). Naturally it would have the same regen as it does now... lower than that of a normal capacity shield.
You would trade attack for defense and have an epic shield with significantly lower regen and even lower capacity than an epic Assimiliated Borg shield or Dyson shield which have the highest regeneration and still slightly higher capacity.
2. Because of the abovementioned inherent drain the DMG % increase is decreased exponentially during use.
This was my problem with it (I didn't craft one, just from reading the description.)
The bonus to damage is based on your shield level which is draining with each attack. This means that the ability gets less and less powerful with every shot. It seems like this would rapidly leave you in a position where you had a very slight damage boost (if any at all) in exchange for basically having no shields at all.
A 40% damage boost sounds nice.. and it would be.. but you would basically get that 40% on your initial attack only, maybe the first 2 and then it's going to drain rapidly. It just doesn't seem like a good trade off to boost 1-2 shots.
Hey Borg! Jokes on you, I drain my own shields now. Hahahahaha!
Seriously though. My first thought about this was it would be useless against Borg and other enemies that drain your ship's shields at a rapid pace. Even with 99+ in starship power insulators*, it seems to not help at all and a Tachyon beam can completely drain my shields in about 2 seconds. Borg shield neutralizer drains them even faster (it can be removed with hazard emitters but they have a tendency to spam it, especially when HM is on cooldown).
So yeah, my opinion is this shield array is completely useless against certain enemy ships.
*Starship power insulators seems to not be working and hasn't for a rather long time. Shield drains on my ships seem to be the same whether I have no points into it or have it maxed out in my skill tree at 9 ranks.
Weapon power also loses effectiveness based on the range to target. Even an array will lose 20% of it's power at 5 km. And you need to take into account the fact that Engine Power increases the passive evasion of a ship, increasing the general survivability and effectiveness of shields to boot.
First, you need to take into account that 20% power loss is taken into account regardless of power set up.
Second, you also need to take into account if something dies quicker, there is no need of improved defences at all. Also, last I checked last I checked, the values are minimal in difference in comparison to weapon power for both engines and shields.
Weapon power is the trump card of all powers expect perhaps for Aux in special circumstances. The game is heavily in favour of DPS in, well, pretty much in all factors of the game with very special and few circumstances. And it's one of the easiest things to obtain. Now apparently even easier...
I'm also going to add this:
I respecced recently and suddenly noticed my offensive build was dying all of the time.
Then I noticed that my traits (starship and regular) got unslotted in the respec. Reslotting those made it so that I almost never die.
About 5-6 traits make a huge survivability difference.
The Hyper-Capacitor Shield Array [Cap]x4 is useless if you ask me and here is why.
Pros:
1. Very high capacity but that's basically it.
Cons:
1. The shield drain is per attack and not per attack cycle. It drains too fast and FAW will drain it in 5 seconds basically.
2. Because of the abovementioned inherent drain the DMG % increase is decreased exponentially during use.
3. It has a 2 minute cooldown between each activation.
4. It has a 30 second duration.
I would have preferred if the shield instead locked out capacity upon toggle on. Let's say you gain a fixed 40% energy weapon DMG increase but perhaps lock out 50% of the shield's capacity in return. Of course no drain would occur. A shield with 12000 capcity would instead have 6000 when the ability is toggled on (and it stays on). Naturally it would have the same regen as it does now... lower than that of a normal capacity shield.
You would trade attack for defense and have an epic shield with significantly lower regen and even lower capacity than an epic Assimiliated Borg shield or Dyson shield which have the highest regeneration and still slightly higher capacity.
2. Because of the abovementioned inherent drain the DMG % increase is decreased exponentially during use.
This was my problem with it (I didn't craft one, just from reading the description.)
The bonus to damage is based on your shield level which is draining with each attack. This means that the ability gets less and less powerful with every shot. It seems like this would rapidly leave you in a position where you had a very slight damage boost (if any at all) in exchange for basically having no shields at all.
A 40% damage boost sounds nice.. and it would be.. but you would basically get that 40% on your initial attack only, maybe the first 2 and then it's going to drain rapidly. It just doesn't seem like a good trade off to boost 1-2 shots.
In a heavy battle scenario, would RSP actually counter this effect though?
As in, loads of ships pounding on your shields to recharge them?
Ships are great but you can't expect to keep this game running FOREVER on nothing but ship sales and thats exactly what its doing right now.
The fact is, some MMORPGs are running on nothing BUT sales and maintenance to keep the game going for years and years. But that's not what STO is doing. It has a massive amount of development invested into it, especially for the size of the dev team. It's incomprehensible to me why you'd say that's all STO is doing in comparison to other MMORPGs.
If all the ship sales and ways to get ships was taken away how do you think the game could support itself? I mean of course without making up new ways to make money. How would they survive? Honest question.
this actually seems like it would be better used by those with high shield capacity (like 20K+) and high shield power levels, so sci rather than escorts. piggy backing on @shadowwraith77 with RSP you would regenerate shields as quickly as you lose them, IF you are getting shot at while attacking.
EDIT: perhaps not, "while active, cannot be affected by shield heals"
this actually seems like it would be better used by those with high shield capacity (like 20K+) and high shield power levels, so sci rather than escorts. piggy backing on @shadowwraith77 with RSP you would regenerate shields as quickly as you lose them, IF you are getting shot at while attacking.
EDIT: perhaps not, "while active, cannot be affected by shield heals"
I still think we should have aesthetic slots on our ships for deflectors, shields, warp cores, and impulse engines. There's more than enough room to put in a second slot for each, just so you can fit an item with a cosmetic effect you like.
Or just put all the cosmetic effects on ship equipment you own in the ship customization screen.
I don't care which way they do it, but I think this should be a priority. I would rather have this than the next episode or season or whatever.
+1 about allowing us to use the shield visuals once we unlocked them by purchasing those shields that have them.
As far as these shields go, I'm not using the dmg feature at all. Bought 6 (diffrent energy res types) for a fair price at xii ur, upgraded to xiv and made 6 load out on my Annorax. Those shields with that 1.45 modifier. . O_o
Answers
It's one of the dumber things they've done over the years. Shields that buff weapons? That mechanic is supposed to work by diverting shield power to weapons power - you know, what we already have in game?
Not to be a buzz kill but....will....not....happen. Sorry. At a minimum, not in the foreseeable future. Defiantly be more Star Trek games, just not MMORPG style.
This would be about the reason I would use it. Specially once I get my Andorian Delta to level. They will be flying the "glass cannon" Kumari ship. So I need serious DPS cranking out of it.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
I'm sorry but as a Destroyer and Battlecruiser jockey most of the time, if you are dead you are not contributing. As much punch as you can without sacrificing survival. Covariant max cap Shields, and Boff abilities or other abilities to replenish them.
Hull is the buffer while you fix your shields, heck full Shields and damaged hull, using go down fighting, is a fun tactic.
Good point. It's important to the devs to make torpedoes less useful by comparison, every chance they get.
Furthermore, cruisers and science ships, when used correctly, can take care of escorts. Engineering Team, Hazard Emitters and Science Team are a godsend if used correctly in team-fashion. I suppose there's some difference where the battlecruiser is concerned (cause they're always going to have more hull than an escort), but if someone is flying around in a Defiant, Sabre or Kumari, they shouldn't be concerning themselves so much with shielding.
My character Tsin'xing
It is good, people mock without trying. I gave it a good test on tribble (as much as I could without a working queue) and now I'm in the process of acquiring one on Holodeck, not that there's any real rush.
Frankly it isn't hard to keep your shields up and run this at the same time, its about flying smart and not activating it when your shield heals are all on full cooldown or something just as stupid. If anything what it could encourage is a team wanting a tank to draw aggro (or other measures) in the more intense queues so that they can abuse this with impunity, but of course that won't happen because no one ever thinks these things through.
I agree, this has bugged me for years. STO never really balanced the powers in such a way there is a give and take.
For instance, the more Defensive a person is, the weaker their attacks should be. The more Offensive a player, the weaker their defense. But with STO, attacks are so off the scale that they really need no real defense. But in fact they aren't entirely defenseless, because some abilities boost resistance.
But is this shield worth it? Only a matter of time will tell, but I think players will still gravitate towards the Reputation Sets or the Fleet Elite Shields. Though it makes me conerned why Cryptic keeps making new items that seems to trivalize the old (why make regular Cap^3 shields if you just go right to the Cap^4). So makes me wonder the Devs might be running out of ideas.
Pros:
1. Very high capacity but that's basically it.
Cons:
1. The shield drain is per attack and not per attack cycle. It drains too fast and FAW will drain it in 5 seconds basically.
2. Because of the abovementioned inherent drain the DMG % increase is decreased exponentially during use.
3. It has a 2 minute cooldown between each activation.
4. It has a 30 second duration.
I would have preferred if the shield instead locked out capacity upon toggle on. Let's say you gain a fixed 40% energy weapon DMG increase but perhaps lock out 50% of the shield's capacity in return. Of course no drain would occur. A shield with 12000 capcity would instead have 6000 when the ability is toggled on (and it stays on). Naturally it would have the same regen as it does now... lower than that of a normal capacity shield.
You would trade attack for defense and have an epic shield with significantly lower regen and even lower capacity than an epic Assimiliated Borg shield or Dyson shield which have the highest regeneration and still slightly higher capacity.
This was my problem with it (I didn't craft one, just from reading the description.)
The bonus to damage is based on your shield level which is draining with each attack. This means that the ability gets less and less powerful with every shot. It seems like this would rapidly leave you in a position where you had a very slight damage boost (if any at all) in exchange for basically having no shields at all.
A 40% damage boost sounds nice.. and it would be.. but you would basically get that 40% on your initial attack only, maybe the first 2 and then it's going to drain rapidly. It just doesn't seem like a good trade off to boost 1-2 shots.
Seriously though. My first thought about this was it would be useless against Borg and other enemies that drain your ship's shields at a rapid pace. Even with 99+ in starship power insulators*, it seems to not help at all and a Tachyon beam can completely drain my shields in about 2 seconds. Borg shield neutralizer drains them even faster (it can be removed with hazard emitters but they have a tendency to spam it, especially when HM is on cooldown).
So yeah, my opinion is this shield array is completely useless against certain enemy ships.
*Starship power insulators seems to not be working and hasn't for a rather long time. Shield drains on my ships seem to be the same whether I have no points into it or have it maxed out in my skill tree at 9 ranks.
I'm also going to add this:
I respecced recently and suddenly noticed my offensive build was dying all of the time.
Then I noticed that my traits (starship and regular) got unslotted in the respec. Reslotting those made it so that I almost never die.
About 5-6 traits make a huge survivability difference.
In a heavy battle scenario, would RSP actually counter this effect though?
As in, loads of ships pounding on your shields to recharge them?
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
If all the ship sales and ways to get ships was taken away how do you think the game could support itself? I mean of course without making up new ways to make money. How would they survive? Honest question.
EDIT: perhaps not, "while active, cannot be affected by shield heals"
Day 2: Some DPS person finds a way to increase DPS with it and posts a video.
Day 3: Everyone loves it.
Hmm, this is good to know, TY!
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
We've had one of those forever, it's called the MACO shield
You really shouldn't use the word cult. It's a rather nasty word, don't you think?
Activating the gimmick caused all shields to drain rapidly to the point of incurring hull damage.
Switched back to my Borg set bonus shield.
Possibly a useful shield if you never trigger the gimmick as it's the current highest rating.
This could be fun as I'm not too serious about my setups and DPS. It's a game and I been doing 20-25k DPS on my current setup.
Original Join Date May 2009 - Real 1000 Day Veteran
I still think we should have aesthetic slots on our ships for deflectors, shields, warp cores, and impulse engines. There's more than enough room to put in a second slot for each, just so you can fit an item with a cosmetic effect you like.
Or just put all the cosmetic effects on ship equipment you own in the ship customization screen.
I don't care which way they do it, but I think this should be a priority. I would rather have this than the next episode or season or whatever.
As far as these shields go, I'm not using the dmg feature at all. Bought 6 (diffrent energy res types) for a fair price at xii ur, upgraded to xiv and made 6 load out on my Annorax. Those shields with that 1.45 modifier. . O_o