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R.I.P. Sensor Analysis
talien
Member Posts: 712 Arc User
I don't even remember the last time I got any real use out of it, regular enemies generally die within a few seconds and most bosses have some kind of scramble/confuse/disable/etc. that breaks it and kills the damage boost. Am I missing something or is this yet another power creep casualty?
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I too have it.
They just get less sober.
And I find on the bigger targets like gates in KSA it can be good, or any mission where I leave the biggest boss till last whilst i mop up the spam mobs. Let SA run it's course whilst you kill of everything else and it'll make the end fight easier.
It's not really useful for short fights but in the long drawn out combat situations its a nice extra.
true, but here's the catch...it needs time to stack up, and the way the game handles aggro it really doesn't warrent to keep it on a dedicated tank. Sometimes you find such a dedicated tank, but that one doesn't actually need YOU to heal him anyway.
IMHO, the stacking mechanic sverely limits its usefulness. Or make it a passive ability that affects any ship in range of X km (also a better option for console users, one button less)
I remember situations where people would blame others for not dealing enough damage, not helping the team much and so on, when in fact they've been healing most of the teammates like maniacs, especially in critical moments, or focused on crowd control (you name it).
On topic though, SA could need some more love but on the other hand, having enemies that can counter it only adds to the immersion from my perspective.
Don't let them promote you. Don't let them transfer you. Don't let them do anything that takes you off the bridge of that ship, because while you're there... you can make a difference.
-Captain James T. Kirk
*shrug*
Maybe, but at least now you can leave it to stack up on a target until you're ready for it (e.g. a gate in ISA) assuming the enemy lives that long.
I've always found it useful but i guess some people forget it's there, and other simply can't be bothered taking the effort to target it correctly.
It's a wonder some player even find it out of spacedock with attitudes they have these days; shock horror!, you actually have to press a button to do something! Do people expect the game to run itself or something?
Well, you are supposed to be a commanding officer. That generally implies the ability to order your subordinates to do things for you. Like press the sensor analysis button.
Even Dreadnoughts seem to pop after a few seconds more often than not, so I really see no purpose to using it except for the enemies who are absolute damage sponges, or who are artificially gated without regard to incoming damage dealt.
I'll even take it one step further and say the "Gather Intel" mechanic on Intelligence ships is equally as worthless since you can't really gather intel on 95% of the stuff in PvE since it habitually dies in a few seconds of opening fire.
Both Sensor Analysis and Gather Intel are actually well thought-out game mechanics that have a worthwhile niche in Star Trek Online.
However, what makes them obsolete is Cryptic's desire to pander to bigger DPS numbers by providing additional game mechanics that do more than either ability, at a reduced effort, and without needing a specialized ship (Science or Intel) to do it, while routinely accomplishing it in an Area of Effect instead of Single-Target. See also: BFAW.
This is further exacerbated by the fact Cryptic has shifted its focus from seeing Science ships as a Support role (for which Sensor Analysis was created), and pushing the narrative that Science ships are Exotic Particle Generating Space Wizards, and trying to keep pace with the high DPS meta they created with Tactical.
Having it automatically apply to your current target was terrible, every time you switched to heal someone or check the status of a different target, bam, gone. Plus it didn't apply to friendly targets so there was no healing bonus, and if there had been it would have completely locked you out of doing anything besides healing that one person in order to build up SA stacks on them. Having it a targetable power was a good step but having it build over time is now severely holding it back.
You put it better than I did. I've long thought that the stacking mechanic should be done away with and just apply the full effect to a target but give it a longer cooldown. That way it's still useful on targets that don't live long enough to build a full stack without being spammable on everything in sight.
Gather intel is.....funny. I frequently have it happen where I've activated it on one target then had that target blow up before it finished stacking, then had the vulnerabilities ready on the next target if I switch quick enough.
I don't think anybody is arguing that Sensor Analysis by itself is not a powerful tool, however, the general consensus seems to be that it has no practical purpose because of the current state of the game in which things seem to die within a few seconds of opening fire.
Abilities that are Single Target, or generate Stacks over Time on a particular target (like Gather Intel and SA) are becoming increasingly irrelevant when things die just by sneezing on them with AoE damage abilities, including enemies we would traditionally associate with being highly resilient to incoming fire, like cruisers and dreadnoughts.
What I think would be a good idea is to make AoE powers damage scale per enemy being hit/affected by them, and as a result having a much much lower base damage than single-target abilities.
Interestingly some science powers like Gravity Well already sort of work like this, with the DPS being multiplicative of the number of enemies.
Ultimately there needs to be a good solid reason to use powers like Surgical Strikes and Beam Overload, Torpedo High Yield and Cannon Rapid Fire etc.
I hear you on that, but you have to admit that precicely that is the reason 90% of the players that have access to it don't even use it.
I mean, when I pug from time to time, I don't even have a cruiser command active although sometimes no less than 2 cruisers are in range...
what I mean is, that depth in gameplay is good, but if most of your playerbase is not going to get into that depth because they can manage without micromanaging all their abilities, the gameplay options fail to cater to the playerbase.
And I strongly believe, that STO is a game that should strongly cater the casual players due to the nature of its franchise.
On top of it, science vessels are already more difficult to play that cruisers and escorts.
Anyway, since the console players are now also in the mix of things, dumbing down the micromanagemant aspect of the controles is almost a necessity at this point...otherwise they are going to bleed players due to too complex UI controles, which would be the worst reason of them all.
This is more my experience than this:
Many players mostly think about themselves. And it's encouraged by DPS metrics or suchlike because indeed quite a few people will tell you off if you're not high enough on the scale even if it was you who did all the portal closing or debuffing and crowd control which allowed others to do that high DPS in the first place, or flying behind the U.S.S. Hot Potato, healing it so much it doesn't have to drop.
And unfortunately many players don't adapt to the situation. "I am an DPS ship, so I don't have to take care of the objectives of the mission, I'll just kill the infinitely respawning enemies" doesn't work if you only have DPS guys at Procyon 5. (I am sure that the same would work - or not work - with tanks or supporters, only that most ships are DPS, so it's the most common scenario).
And unfortunately, a lot of non-direct-DPS abilities are getting into trouble here. Either they're really not worth it in the situation, or they're too low priority to activate while having to deal with the other abilities and boff powers and whatnot circling, or even if you did remember it and want to place it - which hotkey was it again? How exactly did I get the best out of it? Sorry, don't remember, last time I used it you still had to unlock Klingons by reaching a certain level.
Also you can set a key bind to highlight your current target with it.
My character Tsin'xing
This here is the issue and the devs need to be aware of it. STO is all about swatting trash mobs, no exceptions. Any ability that's not AoE can safely be discarded for the vast majority of all game content because even the story missions actively encourage, no, require you to simply eliminate X groups of trash mobs quickly or, even worse, on a timer where your engagement is entirely optional. I just did that Iconian arc mission on new Romulus, it's just terrible. Space, ground, space again and ground again and on every map you have to shoot dozens upon dozens of trash mobs, I think I popped the "kill 1000 Iconians" accolade on that run.
Add to that that AoE abilities in STO have absolutely no downside, they're as effective against single targets as they are against groups. The whole game isn't really thought through.
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This extends to people who think Sensor Analysis is "useless," or has no place in the current game, because if that were the case, highly-skilled players wouldn't be gravitating towards ships that offer it as an option. Don't blame the tool for the shortcomings of its user.
Now, I'll admit that I'd be one of the first players who would petition Cryptic for more content that would *require* full advantage of the depth and richness of gameplay options that are available, but so many people seem to shudder or cringe at the slightest hint of difficulty, I recognize that's a fool's errand...but again, the "solution" here isn't to start taking away gameplay options from the people who *can* appreciate and take advantage of it. That's just poor game design.
TL;DR: People seem to be rushing to solve problems that don't actually exist, here. Sensor Analysis is fine (Hell, I'd sooner make the argument that it's *too good* than that it's *too bad*), and it neither deserves being looked at nor being removed from the game.
If I recall, Sensor Analysis was there to make up for the lack of firepower Science ships have in comparison to Escorts (who have more Tac Consoles and forward-arc potential with DBBs and dual cannons), as well as Cruisers (who were quite competitive with 8 weapon slots, making beam arrays lucrative for broadsiding). SA was there to help compliment the Subsystem Targeting ability, and deal more damage to a target as it was scanned, while also allowing it to be used on allies to increase healing and survivability -- thus, not really pigeonholing science ships into either offensive ships or support ships, and making them more versatile as a result.
There is always going to be an 'arms race' between ship types as time goes on, with Cryptic attempting to find more and more ways to sell power creep while also attempting to ensure no ship type dominates the field.
However, Cryptic shifted the design focus from that versatility into making them masters at space magic with continual buffs to EPG builds and new ways to improve their AoE damage potential with Exotic damage. This wasn't really a zero sum game in regards to Sensor Analysis, but it does make it something of a fifth wheel unless it's under very specific circumstances.
Which again, isn't about how bad Sensor Analysis is (it's actually a nice ability), but in practice it's largely irrelevant, unless Cryptic finds some new ways to make Sensor Analysis practical again.
Then recently they implement an AFK mechanic that doesn't take into account those Tasks only shooting at enemy ships.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'