@borticuscryptic
First I'll preface by saying, I don't understand why there are Tactical Unlocks in the science tree, etc. Does this mean my Science character can craft them at the proper expenditure or is that not the case and my TAC has to spend 17 points in SCIENCE skills to make BFAW3? If my Science can actually MAKE the tactical manual since I have the requisite points in the skill, then no real harm is done. IF I can't make ALL the TAC manuals with my tac without spending significant points in ALL the trees (and currently you cannot spend 22 points in each tree) then you're not following one of your own guidelines that you stated at the start. That we won't lose anything. To me, this is a loss of something I've been able to do since the beginning of the game, have my characters be able to train ALL of their career skills which by trading and training a fleeties BOff (old way) or via manuals (new way).
Now, I think I have a way for this to work that'll still require investment and make sense for people.
Move the training manual creation to the R&D system. For example move the BFAW to the Beams R&D. Rank 1 unlocks at 10, Rank 2 Unlocks at 15 Rank 3 unlocks at 20 not only is this fairly intuitive, it gives a reason for having a Rank 20 R&D skill.
Anyway -- I'm some sure people hate it, but maybe not.
Welcome to the club, like many here i too am really dissapointed by that change REALLY, and the "official" answer was anything but satisfying. To your Question the answer is NO i tried stuff out on Tribble, chars can only craft Manuals from their own Carrer, so yea we have to waste Points BUT even than we cant get all unlocked since we either have to choose the one or the other, so in the end if you have at least one character per carrer, you would need 2 more per Carrer to be able to craft all Manuals, not mention that just to be able to get those you have to Skill them in a not really efficient way.
So sorry with all respects I DONT GET IT, the System we have right now a character can unlock all the Manuals of his carrer = PERFECT
The New System you can only unlock around half of the Manuals and need 3 Characters per Carrer to craft them all = NOT PERFECT
So yea we DO Loose something, something we would like to keep, is that unreasonable?
regarding your idea with putting them into the R&D System ( ALL of Rank 3s) while i still say that it should A) only depend on Carrer and Rank or B ) another solution that allows us to stiill craft them all, your Idea is still a Million Times better than what is in the new System right now, yea it will take some time and effort BUT at atleast it can be achived unlike with the new System.......iam not happy with this, and the thread here shows me i am not the only one....we were asked to give feedback, so it would be nice if this feedback is taken seriously.
True alters don't have a "main". Account wide unlocks for all unique event and mission rewards!!
The suggestion we made turns the choices from a meaningless choice to a useful choice. (this is in reference to the energy and projectile choices).
I completely disagree, and am frankly a bit surprised that nobody else is so far seeing the opposite side of this.
If a player isn't using Projectiles, then maybe unlocking a choice between two different improvements to that mechanic might make them think about changing that external choice. Similarly, if somebody is using only Energy Weapons, then being asked to choose which aspect of that system they want to improve is exactly the sort of choice-with-consequences that generates a sense of agency and meaningfulness within that choice.
Conversely, if they were split up into two nodes of "Projectile vs. Energy" then guess which ones would be meaninglessly ignored by the majority of the playerbase.
No its forcing a choice on us. If that was your intent. Please leave the old Skill Tree as is. Id rather have the freedom of choosing whats on my ship than being forced to slap torpedoes on it because the skill tree gave me no other option.
Or they could just want the new crafted skills system to encourage making a variety of captains on your account. Maybe they'd like for people with fewer captains to feel more inclined to get involved with buying and selling skill manuals on the exchange.
Seriously, whey do they even matter? You can generate an unending stream of Boffs via Doff missions and then just cannibalize them for skill manuals.
To me this is just the weirdest thing to get worked up over.
Or they could just want the new crafted skills system to encourage making a variety of captains on your account. Maybe they'd like for people with fewer captains to feel more inclined to get involved with buying and selling skill manuals on the exchange.
Seriously, whey do they even matter? You can generate an unending stream of Boffs via Doff missions and then just cannibalize them for skill manuals.
To me this is just the weirdest thing to get worked up over.
There are skill manuals you can only train/create as a captain, that are NOT possible to get via BOffs, one of which is BFAW3, which is currently able to be made by tactical captains with 6 points in a skill (Starship Energy Weapons, I think, not in game ATM). There are others for the other careers. Now, in the build on tribble, to make that same skill manual, I have to spend 17 points in a skill track (science) I may not want. It's this seeming discrepancy that I'm (we) are "getting worked up over".
Formerly Known as Protector from June 2008 to June 20, 2012
Please enable us to buy a token with Zen to faction change a 25th Century FED to a TOS FED.
I completely disagree, and am frankly a bit surprised that nobody else is so far seeing the opposite side of this.
If a player isn't using Projectiles, then maybe unlocking a choice between two different improvements to that mechanic might make them think about changing that external choice. Similarly, if somebody is using only Energy Weapons, then being asked to choose which aspect of that system they want to improve is exactly the sort of choice-with-consequences that generates a sense of agency and meaningfulness within that choice.
Oh, I saw the opposite side. In fact it's incredibly OBVIOUS that you guys have been trying desperately to make energy/projectile hybrids relevant for a while (even if mines keep getting left out on the back step, quite forgotten):
The Weapons Synergy ship trait.
The Supercharged Weapons ship trait.
Numerous technology sets with a torpedo in them.
I think you might do better if the Torpedo and Mine boosting skills affected more than one weapon per rotation, like... I dunno... the immensely more popular directed energy weapons and their skills...? Or even combine the effects of some of the Torpedo skills with Mine skills so mixing both types on a single ship isn't massively self-defeating.
Until then I've got no issue with throwing the virtues of hybrid load-outs much more squarely in people's faces.
There are skill manuals you can only train/create as a captain, that are NOT possible to get via BOffs, one of which is BFAW3, which is currently able to be made by tactical captains with 6 points in a skill (Starship Energy Weapons, I think, not in game ATM). There are others for the other careers. Now, in the build on tribble, to make that same skill manual, I have to spend 17 points in a skill track (science) I may not want. It's this seeming discrepancy that I'm (we) are "getting worked up over".
Ok, so it's a straight up drive to encourage either a variety of captains on one account if you want to be entirely self sufficient or get more involved with the exchange.
Still WAY down the list of things I'm looking at askance, but to each their own .
that's the entire reason i made this post when @borticuscryptic asked for potential suggestions to replace the seperate energy and torpedo damage skills if he were to consider merging them
The specific specializations are gone, which is good. However I agree the torpedo and energy base abilities could do with combining as well so long as we can find a suitable replacement for the other three points.
I'm open to hearing suggestions.
Okay, well for kick off I have a few ideas to bounce around:
Stealth Detection Rating Increases.
Torpedo Flight Speed/Defence Increases.
Increased Weapon Proc Chance (think @mrtshead mentioned this as well).
Flight Speed and Turn Rate Strength.
If I think of any more I'll say
well, 2 & 3 there were the ideas i had as well, so i'll just add on the third i had
[*] Decreased arming time of Mines/Increased Stealth Rating and/or Defense/Increased homing speed (stackable with the gene sequencer Hot Pursuit, otherwise that becomes more useless than it already is)
...mines really, REALLY need love, especially since every new enemy introduced within the past several seasons now use large amounts of AoE
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The suggestion we made turns the choices from a meaningless choice to a useful choice. (this is in reference to the energy and projectile choices).
I completely disagree, and am frankly a bit surprised that nobody else is so far seeing the opposite side of this.
If a player isn't using Projectiles, then maybe unlocking a choice between two different improvements to that mechanic might make them think about changing that external choice. Similarly, if somebody is using only Energy Weapons, then being asked to choose which aspect of that system they want to improve is exactly the sort of choice-with-consequences that generates a sense of agency and meaningfulness within that choice.
Conversely, if they were split up into two nodes of "Projectile vs. Energy" then guess which ones would be meaninglessly ignored by the majority of the playerbase.
I think you may be right, but it will probably take us a while to get there. We are used to a skill tree that lets us pick the skills we want to spec into and completely ignore the ones we have no desire to use. This new system does tend to force some on us (subspace decompiler?) even if they are "free" for what we intend to select (control). Furthermore, the unlocks do require an energy bonus, even if you run all torps and a projectile bonus, even if you don't load one. It may have the result of encouraging players to try new builds and options, but the specific bonus is still being forced. I think that is hard for many players to swallow, since we are so used to fine-tuning for ourselves.
If the goal is to encourage new play styles without the skill tree being a limiting factor, then one-time unlocks may not accomplish that goal. Perhaps a better way to encourage torp-energy synergy is to provide it directly.
Instead of:
Commander
+1% Projectile crit chance
+5 projectile crit severity
Captain
+1% energy crit chance
+5 energy crit severity
How about:
Commander
+1% Projectile crit chance (bonus doubles for 10s after energy weapon activation)
+5 projectile crit severity (bonus doubles for 10s after energy weapon activation)
Captain
+1% energy crit chance (bonus doubles for 10s after projectile weapon activation)
+5 energy crit severity (bonus doubles for 10s after projectile weapon activation)
I don't know how to word it, but basically you get the +1% crtH and +5 crtD at all times, but when firing the "other" weapon type you get a single stack that has the double bonus and lasts 10s (plenty of time to complete firing cycle for 1 torp) and is refreshed each time a new weapon is fired. This keeps the same choice at each unlock, but now grants a synergy from running both weapon types.
If you have continuous cycles of energy weaps and torps, you get the choice of:
+4% crit to all weapon damage
+20 severity to all weapon damage
+2% crit for one type and +10 severity for the other
The same choice is still there, but it is being packaged as something you gain, rather than a bonus you can't have.
There are skill manuals you can only train/create as a captain, that are NOT possible to get via BOffs, one of which is BFAW3, which is currently able to be made by tactical captains with 6 points in a skill (Starship Energy Weapons, I think, not in game ATM). There are others for the other careers. Now, in the build on tribble, to make that same skill manual, I have to spend 17 points in a skill track (science) I may not want. It's this seeming discrepancy that I'm (we) are "getting worked up over".
Ok, so it's a straight up drive to encourage either a variety of captains on one account if you want to be entirely self sufficient or get more involved with the exchange.
Still WAY down the list of things I'm looking at askance, but to each their own .
look, the thing is, right now we can do what they want to take away with the new system, and if something is being taken away getting upset is the most natural reaction dont you think??? Encouraging a variety of Captains? I allready have my eng/tac and sci crafter so in order to be able to craft everything i would need 6 more JUST to do what i can do right now with my 3 crafters.....encouraging? thats more like discourageging..and getting more involved with the exchange? by paying some greedy people hundredthousands of ECs? you know some people like me have more than just a few characters and like to switch boffs here and there and train them, so this involvement could be expensive over time.......so my question here is WHY change it when its Perfect the way it is? Why take that away? My logic Processor in my Brain is working at full capacity but cant come up with a "logical" answer to this issue.....
True alters don't have a "main". Account wide unlocks for all unique event and mission rewards!!
Similarly, if somebody is using only Energy Weapons, then being asked to choose which aspect of that system they want to improve is exactly the sort of choice-with-consequences that generates a sense of agency and meaningfulness within that choice.
I don't think you're ever going to see a meaningful choice between [CrtH] and [CrtD] until you normalize the magnitude of those two benefits game-wide. +2% vs. +20% isn't a choice and the most casual stroll through the Exchange will tell you one alternative is one-to-three orders of magnitude more valued than the other. The new skill decision gate offers 1% vs 5% (a ratio that probably should be reflected out to gear despite the godawful caterwauling it would provoke. Even lowering [CrtD] to +15% would be a major step towards real parity), but lets consider a different tact:
What if the bonuses being chosen between were much larger, but only applied to non-Ability-enhanced attacks?
That would be a HUGE boon to hybrid-weapons ships that don't have back-to-back-to-back Abilities rolling for all of their weapons. It would also improve your average damage while not driving up your peak/burst damage.
I've made a post regarding the skill revamp system including a few things that I feel could be tweaked or changed to improve things. A link to the thread is below, if anybody wants to respond to me directly on anything I've said leave a comment in the new thread and I'll get back to you, otherwise feel free to discus the issues I raise here safe in the knowledge that most people don't have the time to read everything in such a busy thread. I've a small suggestion at the end of the post should the developers feel that it's worth looking into.
I am totally bamboozled by the career based progression bars on the bottom of the tree page. At which point do these skill "choices" get made? Did it come up during the tutorial? I missed it.
(The text windows are titled "Choice Selection" eventually turning into "Ultimate Selection" at the top of the scale.)
I, also, see that the BOFF training manuals are spread out inside these career based progression bars. Are higher level BOFF training manuals going to be locked away from those people who do not put enough points in one "career" or another?
I usually set my characters up with a middle of the road setting...not really going full bore in SCI or TAC or ENG. I can see that would lock me to BOFF training manuals available at the low end of that career point progression bar...only to be fed to the lions in the exchange for the ones higher up on that scale.
I guess, I should be more concerned I will not be able to access other "skill" choices higher up on that progression bar, either.
Are the unlocks in the career based progression bars all PASSIVE and BOFF Training Manuals?
++++++
Thing that throws me is: There seem to be more "steps" and "bars" and "choices" to make and keep track of and cross referencing between the three "career branches" and the progression of points in each "career" in order to do what we used to do with one chart before.
Post edited by where2r1 on
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“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” -- Benjamin Franklin
You know, the sad thing is, this was supposed to make choosing skills less confusing and it seems to be having an entirely opposite effect.
The people who don't get it will either mash buttons or copy off the internet. The ones who mash buttons will mostly find there are no terrible choices. The ones who copy will be better off than ever.
Better tooltips, a real tutorial, and a general polish pass to add things like a "confirm" button still need to happen, but mechanically we're already moving in a good direction.
It would be so much easier, and more Fitting for everbody...
No, that would be blatant pandering to all-beam or all-torpedo builds. Which would be exactly what they're NOT looking to further incentivize.
But it's ok to pander to all-torpedo builds by letting them get the benefit with less compromises? These changes aren't suddenly going to make me like torpedoes, and it seems a little unfair that my choice is suddenly being penalized.
"Let me guess, my theories appall you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie" - The Doctor
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" -Agatha Heterodyne
But it's ok to pander to all-torpedo builds by letting them get the benefit with less compromises? These changes aren't suddenly going to make me like torpedoes, and it seems a little unfair that my choice is suddenly being penalized.
Choosing between a bonus to CrtH or CrtD for your beams is as dead a choice for all-torpedo builds as choosing CrtH or CrtD for your torpedos on a beam boat. I see symmetry. What torpedo pandering are you talking about?
It would be so much easier, and more Fitting for everbody...
No, that would be blatant pandering to all-beam or all-torpedo builds. Which would be exactly what they're NOT looking to further incentivize.
But it's ok to pander to all-torpedo builds by letting them get the benefit with less compromises? These changes aren't suddenly going to make me like torpedoes, and it seems a little unfair that my choice is suddenly being penalized.
I am not sure I understand what benefit all-torpedo builds get as opposed to the benefit all energy would get? Both would have to pick one projectile unlock and one energy unlock.
The problem is, that nearly any torp build has at least 1 energy weapon in the mix anyways, so there's less opportunity cost involved with your suggestion, thus favoring torpedo builds more.
It basically all because of the different weapons firing arcs.
Torpedo builds are usually forward facing and pretty nimble. That enables the mto put basically any 360° energy weapon in the back and see a benefit from the skills you proposed.
Energy weapon builds (beams) usually broadside (of course not in the case of dual-weapons) so only one of the few 180° torps would actually benefit people here. One is only attainable through the Zen store, the other comes with the Bullwark which probably costs nearly 1.5 billion ec right now.
Those flying with dual beam or cannons would rather not "waste" a forward weapon slot for a torp.
But these assumption are all pretty much only relevant for min-maxers anyways. Who knows what the average player actually flies, since we rarely see anything but some kind of "optimal" build promoted anywhere.
Choosing between a bonus to CrtH or CrtD for your beams is as dead a choice for all-torpedo builds as choosing CrtH or CrtD for your torpedos on a beam boat. I see symmetry. What torpedo pandering are you talking about?
I am not sure I understand what benefit all-torpedo builds get as opposed to the benefit all energy would get? Both would have to pick one projectile unlock and one energy unlock.
The benefit is that a torpedo build can get a boost to crits with less skill points spent than beam builds. My current build on test only reaches the torpedo crit choice and in order to reach the beam crit choice I will have to pull points from somewhere else that a torpedo build doesn't have to. I see that as a penalty to beams.
"Let me guess, my theories appall you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie" - The Doctor
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" -Agatha Heterodyne
The problem is, that nearly any torp build has at least 1 energy weapon in the mix anyways, so there's less opportunity cost involved with your suggestion, thus favoring torpedo builds more.
It basically all because of the different weapons firing arcs.
Torpedo builds are usually forward facing and pretty nimble. That enables the mto put basically any 360° energy weapon in the back and see a benefit from the skills you proposed.
Energy weapon builds (beams) usually broadside (of course not in the case of dual-weapons) so only one of the few 180° torps would actually benefit people here. One is only attainable through the Zen store, the other comes with the Bullwark which probably costs nearly 1.5 billion ec right now.
Those flying with dual beam or cannons would rather not "waste" a forward weapon slot for a torp.
But these assumption are all pretty much only relevant for min-maxers anyways. Who knows what the average player actually flies, since we rarely see anything but some kind of "optimal" build promoted anywhere.
Choosing between a bonus to CrtH or CrtD for your beams is as dead a choice for all-torpedo builds as choosing CrtH or CrtD for your torpedos on a beam boat. I see symmetry. What torpedo pandering are you talking about?
I am not sure I understand what benefit all-torpedo builds get as opposed to the benefit all energy would get? Both would have to pick one projectile unlock and one energy unlock.
The benefit is that a torpedo build can get a boost to crits with less skill points spent than beam builds. My current build on test only reaches the torpedo crit choice and in order to reach the beam crit choice I will have to pull points from somewhere else that a torpedo build doesn't have to. I see that as a penalty to beams.
The benefit is that a torpedo build can get a boost to crits with less skill points spent than beam builds. My current build on test only reaches the torpedo crit choice and in order to reach the beam crit choice I will have to pull points from somewhere else that a torpedo build doesn't have to. I see that as a penalty to beams.
Fair enough. So, tell me, if you had access to the combat parses of every encounter taking place in the entire game over the last month, which type of build do you think you're seeing massively outperform the other? Majority torpedo or majority/pure beam?
Yeah, BFAW is great and all, but there was always going to come a time when it had to pay the piper. So far the bill is still shockingly affordable.
The suggestion we made turns the choices from a meaningless choice to a useful choice. (this is in reference to the energy and projectile choices).
I completely disagree, and am frankly a bit surprised that nobody else is so far seeing the opposite side of this.
If a player isn't using Projectiles, then maybe unlocking a choice between two different improvements to that mechanic might make them think about changing that external choice. Similarly, if somebody is using only Energy Weapons, then being asked to choose which aspect of that system they want to improve is exactly the sort of choice-with-consequences that generates a sense of agency and meaningfulness within that choice.
Conversely, if they were split up into two nodes of "Projectile vs. Energy" then guess which ones would be meaninglessly ignored by the majority of the playerbase.
In regards to the bolded:
Thats not how players make decisions. If a player is only using energy weapons, then theyve sunk a significant amount of resources into that build. Changing to a hybrid build, even if they only add a single projectile weapon, is going to be a non-starter. They wont do it. They'll continue to use the energy only build and will completely ignore the skills that only affect projectile weapons, including the passive node on the tactical tree. It wont help them, so there will be exactly zero reasons for them to ever care about picking it. And when they get to the energy weapons node, they'll take CritH over CritD because CritH is that much better than CritD. So right now an energy only player will ignore 3 choices (the two projectile ones, and the CritD choice), by splitting the nodes, players will potentially only ignore 2 choices.
In regards to the italicized:
You seem to think that the projectile choice would be ignored by the majority of the player base. Youre correct, because energy is king. But but leaving the nodes as they are... players are still going to ignore the projectile skills. Which is no different than what you expect.
Youre defending a bad design choice behind the veil of player agency. Stop it. Players are losing more agency with the nodes as they are now because youre removing the ability to FULLY SPEC for something. That should be just as valid a choice as hybridization is.
You know, the sad thing is, this was supposed to make choosing skills less confusing and it seems to be having an entirely opposite effect.
Yup, at least with the 1st skills update it made sense, but now I have no clue what is what, and how this new system translates into my old skill set...
The only way I can even remotely make sense, is when I can use my mirrored main characters.
The suggestion we made turns the choices from a meaningless choice to a useful choice. (this is in reference to the energy and projectile choices).
I completely disagree, and am frankly a bit surprised that nobody else is so far seeing the opposite side of this.
If a player isn't using Projectiles, then maybe unlocking a choice between two different improvements to that mechanic might make them think about changing that external choice. Similarly, if somebody is using only Energy Weapons, then being asked to choose which aspect of that system they want to improve is exactly the sort of choice-with-consequences that generates a sense of agency and meaningfulness within that choice.
Conversely, if they were split up into two nodes of "Projectile vs. Energy" then guess which ones would be meaninglessly ignored by the majority of the playerbase.
In regards to the bolded:
Thats not how players make decisions. If a player is only using energy weapons, then theyve sunk a significant amount of resources into that build. Changing to a hybrid build, even if they only add a single projectile weapon, is going to be a non-starter. They wont do it. They'll continue to use the energy only build and will completely ignore the skills that only affect projectile weapons, including the passive node on the tactical tree. It wont help them, so there will be exactly zero reasons for them to ever care about picking it. And when they get to the energy weapons node, they'll take CritH over CritD because CritH is that much better than CritD. So right now an energy only player will ignore 3 choices (the two projectile ones, and the CritD choice), by splitting the nodes, players will potentially only ignore 2 choices.
In regards to the italicized:
You seem to think that the projectile choice would be ignored by the majority of the player base. Youre correct, because energy is king. But but leaving the nodes as they are... players are still going to ignore the projectile skills. Which is no different than what you expect.
Youre defending a bad design choice behind the veil of player agency. Stop it. Players are losing more agency with the nodes as they are now because youre removing the ability to FULLY SPEC for something. That should be just as valid a choice as hybridization is.
I just want to say the for me, the reason energy is king, is because I suck using torpedoes. I found them finicky and difficult to use and I fully admit that those who can get them to work are way better players than I am.
There is NOTHING they could put in the skill tree that could make me equip a torpedo launcher.
"Let me guess, my theories appall you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie" - The Doctor
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" -Agatha Heterodyne
@borticuscryptic obviously you have a lot on your plate here, however I share the concern with Lucho and some others about why Tach Beam, Energy Siphon, and Hazard Emitters take such a hit (I don't think that's been answered unless I missed it)? The goal is to get more people to try new things right? Nerfing some of the only good things we get as Sci Captains is not going to convince a lot of people to switch from Red to Blue. Is this a bug? Or WAI?
You offer that choice above, people will figure out which one of the two is the most beneficial and go for it always so it stops being a choice.
Ideally it's a choice that would change based on builds. I mean, I already admitted that proposal didn't really have much thought put into it.
What I don't want to see is a choice between Energy/Projectiles. That's definitely going to push someone to one or the other. I think the idea of merging the weapon types in the Crit Chance/Damage skills was the right call, and I'd like to see it apply here, too.
Comments
Welcome to the club, like many here i too am really dissapointed by that change REALLY, and the "official" answer was anything but satisfying. To your Question the answer is NO i tried stuff out on Tribble, chars can only craft Manuals from their own Carrer, so yea we have to waste Points BUT even than we cant get all unlocked since we either have to choose the one or the other, so in the end if you have at least one character per carrer, you would need 2 more per Carrer to be able to craft all Manuals, not mention that just to be able to get those you have to Skill them in a not really efficient way.
So sorry with all respects I DONT GET IT, the System we have right now a character can unlock all the Manuals of his carrer = PERFECT
The New System you can only unlock around half of the Manuals and need 3 Characters per Carrer to craft them all = NOT PERFECT
So yea we DO Loose something, something we would like to keep, is that unreasonable?
regarding your idea with putting them into the R&D System ( ALL of Rank 3s) while i still say that it should A) only depend on Carrer and Rank or B ) another solution that allows us to stiill craft them all, your Idea is still a Million Times better than what is in the new System right now, yea it will take some time and effort BUT at atleast it can be achived unlike with the new System.......iam not happy with this, and the thread here shows me i am not the only one....we were asked to give feedback, so it would be nice if this feedback is taken seriously.
No its forcing a choice on us. If that was your intent. Please leave the old Skill Tree as is. Id rather have the freedom of choosing whats on my ship than being forced to slap torpedoes on it because the skill tree gave me no other option.
Seriously, whey do they even matter? You can generate an unending stream of Boffs via Doff missions and then just cannibalize them for skill manuals.
To me this is just the weirdest thing to get worked up over.
There are skill manuals you can only train/create as a captain, that are NOT possible to get via BOffs, one of which is BFAW3, which is currently able to be made by tactical captains with 6 points in a skill (Starship Energy Weapons, I think, not in game ATM). There are others for the other careers. Now, in the build on tribble, to make that same skill manual, I have to spend 17 points in a skill track (science) I may not want. It's this seeming discrepancy that I'm (we) are "getting worked up over".
Please enable us to buy a token with Zen to faction change a 25th Century FED to a TOS FED.
Oh, I saw the opposite side. In fact it's incredibly OBVIOUS that you guys have been trying desperately to make energy/projectile hybrids relevant for a while (even if mines keep getting left out on the back step, quite forgotten):
The Weapons Synergy ship trait.
The Supercharged Weapons ship trait.
Numerous technology sets with a torpedo in them.
I think you might do better if the Torpedo and Mine boosting skills affected more than one weapon per rotation, like... I dunno... the immensely more popular directed energy weapons and their skills...? Or even combine the effects of some of the Torpedo skills with Mine skills so mixing both types on a single ship isn't massively self-defeating.
Until then I've got no issue with throwing the virtues of hybrid load-outs much more squarely in people's faces.
...As long as mines get some love in the process.
Ok, so it's a straight up drive to encourage either a variety of captains on one account if you want to be entirely self sufficient or get more involved with the exchange.
Still WAY down the list of things I'm looking at askance, but to each their own
that's the entire reason i made this post when @borticuscryptic asked for potential suggestions to replace the seperate energy and torpedo damage skills if he were to consider merging them
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
I think you may be right, but it will probably take us a while to get there. We are used to a skill tree that lets us pick the skills we want to spec into and completely ignore the ones we have no desire to use. This new system does tend to force some on us (subspace decompiler?) even if they are "free" for what we intend to select (control). Furthermore, the unlocks do require an energy bonus, even if you run all torps and a projectile bonus, even if you don't load one. It may have the result of encouraging players to try new builds and options, but the specific bonus is still being forced. I think that is hard for many players to swallow, since we are so used to fine-tuning for ourselves.
If the goal is to encourage new play styles without the skill tree being a limiting factor, then one-time unlocks may not accomplish that goal. Perhaps a better way to encourage torp-energy synergy is to provide it directly.
Instead of:
How about:
I don't know how to word it, but basically you get the +1% crtH and +5 crtD at all times, but when firing the "other" weapon type you get a single stack that has the double bonus and lasts 10s (plenty of time to complete firing cycle for 1 torp) and is refreshed each time a new weapon is fired. This keeps the same choice at each unlock, but now grants a synergy from running both weapon types.
If you have continuous cycles of energy weaps and torps, you get the choice of:
- +4% crit to all weapon damage
- +20 severity to all weapon damage
- +2% crit for one type and +10 severity for the other
The same choice is still there, but it is being packaged as something you gain, rather than a bonus you can't have.look, the thing is, right now we can do what they want to take away with the new system, and if something is being taken away getting upset is the most natural reaction dont you think??? Encouraging a variety of Captains? I allready have my eng/tac and sci crafter so in order to be able to craft everything i would need 6 more JUST to do what i can do right now with my 3 crafters.....encouraging? thats more like discourageging..and getting more involved with the exchange? by paying some greedy people hundredthousands of ECs? you know some people like me have more than just a few characters and like to switch boffs here and there and train them, so this involvement could be expensive over time.......so my question here is WHY change it when its Perfect the way it is? Why take that away? My logic Processor in my Brain is working at full capacity but cant come up with a "logical" answer to this issue.....
I don't think you're ever going to see a meaningful choice between [CrtH] and [CrtD] until you normalize the magnitude of those two benefits game-wide. +2% vs. +20% isn't a choice and the most casual stroll through the Exchange will tell you one alternative is one-to-three orders of magnitude more valued than the other. The new skill decision gate offers 1% vs 5% (a ratio that probably should be reflected out to gear despite the godawful caterwauling it would provoke. Even lowering [CrtD] to +15% would be a major step towards real parity), but lets consider a different tact:
What if the bonuses being chosen between were much larger, but only applied to non-Ability-enhanced attacks?
That would be a HUGE boon to hybrid-weapons ships that don't have back-to-back-to-back Abilities rolling for all of their weapons. It would also improve your average damage while not driving up your peak/burst damage.
It would be so much easier, and more Fitting for everbody
That may be true, but if one of the goals is to keep players from being locked into one weapon type or the other, that won't accomplish it.
No, that would be blatant pandering to all-beam or all-torpedo builds. Which would be exactly what they're NOT looking to further incentivize.
http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/startrekonline/#/discussion/1212276/skill-system-revamp-thoughts-tweaks-and-adjustments
(The text windows are titled "Choice Selection" eventually turning into "Ultimate Selection" at the top of the scale.)
I, also, see that the BOFF training manuals are spread out inside these career based progression bars. Are higher level BOFF training manuals going to be locked away from those people who do not put enough points in one "career" or another?
I usually set my characters up with a middle of the road setting...not really going full bore in SCI or TAC or ENG. I can see that would lock me to BOFF training manuals available at the low end of that career point progression bar...only to be fed to the lions in the exchange for the ones higher up on that scale.
I guess, I should be more concerned I will not be able to access other "skill" choices higher up on that progression bar, either.
Are the unlocks in the career based progression bars all PASSIVE and BOFF Training Manuals?
++++++
Thing that throws me is: There seem to be more "steps" and "bars" and "choices" to make and keep track of and cross referencing between the three "career branches" and the progression of points in each "career" in order to do what we used to do with one chart before.
“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” -- Benjamin Franklin
The people who don't get it will either mash buttons or copy off the internet. The ones who mash buttons will mostly find there are no terrible choices. The ones who copy will be better off than ever.
Better tooltips, a real tutorial, and a general polish pass to add things like a "confirm" button still need to happen, but mechanically we're already moving in a good direction.
But it's ok to pander to all-torpedo builds by letting them get the benefit with less compromises? These changes aren't suddenly going to make me like torpedoes, and it seems a little unfair that my choice is suddenly being penalized.
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" - Agatha Heterodyne
Choosing between a bonus to CrtH or CrtD for your beams is as dead a choice for all-torpedo builds as choosing CrtH or CrtD for your torpedos on a beam boat. I see symmetry. What torpedo pandering are you talking about?
I am not sure I understand what benefit all-torpedo builds get as opposed to the benefit all energy would get? Both would have to pick one projectile unlock and one energy unlock.
The problem is, that nearly any torp build has at least 1 energy weapon in the mix anyways, so there's less opportunity cost involved with your suggestion, thus favoring torpedo builds more.
It basically all because of the different weapons firing arcs.
Torpedo builds are usually forward facing and pretty nimble. That enables the mto put basically any 360° energy weapon in the back and see a benefit from the skills you proposed.
Energy weapon builds (beams) usually broadside (of course not in the case of dual-weapons) so only one of the few 180° torps would actually benefit people here. One is only attainable through the Zen store, the other comes with the Bullwark which probably costs nearly 1.5 billion ec right now.
Those flying with dual beam or cannons would rather not "waste" a forward weapon slot for a torp.
But these assumption are all pretty much only relevant for min-maxers anyways. Who knows what the average player actually flies, since we rarely see anything but some kind of "optimal" build promoted anywhere.
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" - Agatha Heterodyne
Fair points.
Fair enough. So, tell me, if you had access to the combat parses of every encounter taking place in the entire game over the last month, which type of build do you think you're seeing massively outperform the other? Majority torpedo or majority/pure beam?
Yeah, BFAW is great and all, but there was always going to come a time when it had to pay the piper. So far the bill is still shockingly affordable.
In regards to the bolded:
Thats not how players make decisions. If a player is only using energy weapons, then theyve sunk a significant amount of resources into that build. Changing to a hybrid build, even if they only add a single projectile weapon, is going to be a non-starter. They wont do it. They'll continue to use the energy only build and will completely ignore the skills that only affect projectile weapons, including the passive node on the tactical tree. It wont help them, so there will be exactly zero reasons for them to ever care about picking it. And when they get to the energy weapons node, they'll take CritH over CritD because CritH is that much better than CritD. So right now an energy only player will ignore 3 choices (the two projectile ones, and the CritD choice), by splitting the nodes, players will potentially only ignore 2 choices.
In regards to the italicized:
You seem to think that the projectile choice would be ignored by the majority of the player base. Youre correct, because energy is king. But but leaving the nodes as they are... players are still going to ignore the projectile skills. Which is no different than what you expect.
Youre defending a bad design choice behind the veil of player agency. Stop it. Players are losing more agency with the nodes as they are now because youre removing the ability to FULLY SPEC for something. That should be just as valid a choice as hybridization is.
Yup, at least with the 1st skills update it made sense, but now I have no clue what is what, and how this new system translates into my old skill set...
The only way I can even remotely make sense, is when I can use my mirrored main characters.
There is NOTHING they could put in the skill tree that could make me equip a torpedo launcher.
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" - Agatha Heterodyne
Ideally it's a choice that would change based on builds. I mean, I already admitted that proposal didn't really have much thought put into it.
What I don't want to see is a choice between Energy/Projectiles. That's definitely going to push someone to one or the other. I think the idea of merging the weapon types in the Crit Chance/Damage skills was the right call, and I'd like to see it apply here, too.