Only real challenge in this game is overcoming human error and ignorance.
Is DPS at the crazy end of the spectrum ?. Yes it is
However I prefer my DPS at the crazy end of the spectrum so I can do my best to negate the challenge of human error and ignorance. I'm playing a match with x other people for a reward based on My/their ability to be able to play whichever PvE I'm in. Their failure penalises me, so I make dam sure I'm as strong as I can be so I get the full reward for my time.
Examples.
Khitomer Space Elite.
Numerous times I've seen 3 players attack the Transformer Portal side and ignore probes.
Again I've seen a player attack Transformer spawn Cube and Sphere and can't handle either so Probes slip through.
I've had players on the opp side to me attack the Transformer the other side. Die to the Cube/Sphere and rather than clean up the mess they spawned run to the side I'm on because I've already killed the Cubes and Spheres and starting on the 2nd Transformer/Gate because its easier.
CCA.
In a weaker team players not moving outside the blast radius causing failures. Or shooting the Tholians instead wasting timer
ISA.
Captain NU-Kirk going solo to the other side of the Gate and spawning Nanites whilst unlike Prime Kirk kicking TRIBBLE and taking numbers he gets TRIBBLE slapped like Nu-Kirk.
Or Nanities closing in on Transformer and rather than Grav Well they Grav Well the Transformer swarming it with Borg.
Dyson BattleZone.
My Favourite for Player stupidity. V-Rex fight. 1 Player finds himself at a Silo and decides to completely ignore the Medics/Engineers and tries to solo the V-Rex (Something I'm not sure is possible to do before the Omega particles are stolen) Ignoring the silo indicator under the mini map, ignoring the text warnings and ignoring the voice warnings.
So yes DPS is out of control i'll agree to that, But "war isn't much fun unless you're winning". I'd rather play in a team that can nuke the map and earn me my precious pink rocks than a team that can't even put a dent in Donatra. Yes I've been in one of those matches, watching my 4 team mates pour everything they had on her after I took her to 5% health and ended up seeing her health climb back to 11% because they just plain sucked.
DPS s a necessary evil. The NPC's in this game are nothing more than Bricks to pew pew. What this game really needs is a smarter AI for NPC's so they become a challenge.
I do not want another Delta Rising where Hull and Shields where buffed so much that was just plain boring trading fire with NPC and making little progress. It was like a evenly matched PvP fight where neither player could take down the other and it just dragged on and on.
They could always apply the same thing to Tac consoles they did to Engineering and Science consoles-a "Diminishing Returns" algorithm. say, each additional console of the same or similar type adds 30% less performance than the one previous, possibly with the decline starting with the third console. Thus, having 4 consoles of the same type would give
worked thusly:
Value X= statted bonus from a given console by itself
x
(x-30%)
((x-30%)-30%)
((x-30%)-30%)-30%
for example, where X=30 (iirc, Purple energy console at Mk XII)
30
20
13.3
4.4
added together a total stack of 64.7
vs.
the present:
30
30
30
30
which provides 120.
the difference in damages from a 3 console cruiser or battlecruiser, and a 4 console setup, isn't all that big, right? except that an Escort or Raider gets more innate bonus to weapons power. Likewise, the difference between 4 consoles and 5 isn't that big, assuming same/similar tac consoles in use. This would probably rein in a LOT of the powercreep, while still leaving 'room' for all the build-doffs and such to boost DPS, the only thing it would really do, is rein the numbers down enough that Cryptic isn't tempted to give Dreadnought stats to Borg Probes.
The built-in workaround, of course, being to vary the console types-either using the configuration-specific consoles (say, a Beam console in there with your Antiproton consoles, or a cannon console in there), or by varying weapon type consoles (3 consoles for Antiproton, one Beam console, and a torp console for your follow-on shot, or maybe a manifold console on a beam build to get around the diminishing returns.)
Kinda the way you might mix RCS with (+turn)Armor consoles to get your defense up.
sum total impact, I wager, would be a 'nerfing' of the 120K-plus leaguers down, a mild inconvenience for the mid-range 30K-50K builds, and no net change for low-end builds. Cryptic could still make money off refined dil. for upgrading costs, (30% of gold Mk XIV is still going to leave you more than 30% of Purple or Ultraviolet MK XII)
The math on how Tactical damage buff consoles work resembles diminishing returns, even the Spire ones. Depending on your build, a fifth console might add 3% to your dps. In fact the 200k+ builds are using either one or none for actual Tactical consoles or even the Lobi Store consoles. It's the Embassy Plasma consoles that are the highly sought after ones, right after Plasmonic Leech. These consoles give a pretty dramatic increase in dps.
I saw earlier in this thread that someone suggested a 50% reduction of damage for FAW, this would probably hurt lower end players more than the higher end ones. If this nerfed happened, my 200k+ build would lose between 10-20% of my total dps in my runs. The higher end players are working in multiple things that the average player doesn't fully understand: ie. haste, armor pen, damage resistance debuff, power management, cooldown reductions, damage sources, etc. Most players in the game don't know about concepts like "damage category oversaturation", where a 30% increase in damage can actually be way less than a 10% damage increase. Almost all of the game mechanics have a diminishing returns type of effect built in, it's the high end guys that are minimizing these diminishing returns using multiple mechanics. The lower end doesn't really do this, so one thing that is hit hard will affect them to a greater extent. Just a rough guess from parses I've seen, they would probably lose between 30-40% of thier dps if they use FAW.
Perhaps limiting the ability to stack those external buffs might be in order then. Certainly it would reduce the load on the servers that was noted by Borticus over six months ago. Of course, that's much more complicated process, isn't it?
since you're an expert here...
what would be the impact to your build if, say, plasma consoles didn't stack? Or if you couldn't "Overcap" your energy weapons but instead ran against a hard wall?
I mean hypothetically, what change to the system would hit the High-End DPS'ers without basically savagely gutting the low-end players?
Feel free to answer honestly, it's not like anyone on Cryptic Staff is going to be reading any of this, much less reading it for ideas and content.
Nerfing any single mechanic is just going to cause the high dpsers to redistribute powers to compensate, so one fix isn't going to do much. You would have to work on everything, which hurts everyone. In games there will always be a large group that doesn't do well. Maybe they have a disability, their priorities are on other things, they don't have the time/resources, or just flat don't care. I prefer helping the people who want to learn how to build their ships better, you would probably be surprised at how little investment it takes to get to the 50k range. People like "canon builds", 50k builds with these are super easy. I use that 50k because that range should be able to get you through ANY content in the game. Get the average player up to that point and add in some sort of "elite" content for those who are capable and I think people would be happier overall.
I just think the problem is that people have to put in an effort to get an intermediate understanding of the game mechanics and you need to know where to find that information. There are many resources available, but the places where people check first are the worst for finding anything useful, ie. official forums and the wiki. There are youtubers and streamers out there who are alright at giving information. The two top places I've foundd are the DPS-Metals league(for team buffing up one guy to high numbers) and r/stobuilds on Reddit(for building a ship that doesn't require a team to buff them up).
[...] I quickly realize, "hey, I should pass that guy the ball whenever he get's even relatively open."
That's the normal, natural reaction to realizing that I have a really good player on my team. My reaction isn't to walk off the court. [...]
Why is it that there are always people who miss the point like this?
The equivalent of STO's balance in a PvE match is not some guy being able to do a slam dunk. It is one guy being able to play completely alone against the opposing team and having no chance whatsoever to not win at least 60:0, never doing anything but 3-point baskets.
It's a very sound equivalent.
No, really it isn't, you've missed the point by a long way.
The post above is correct, it is like a guy who can play against the other team without the help of anyone else on his own team.
I have no problem with the high DPS players but it does take a lot of the fun out of the game for me when they come into normal queues or Battle Zones.
When they're in BZ's then that can cause me to lose out on rewards for taking part (though I'm not saying it is intentional). If I am out of position or a little bit too far away from a certain enemy(ies) then they take them out quickly without me being able to get a hit in to get credit, and this has nothing to do with my skill or DPS, if he kills it before I can get there (because of massive DPS), then it doesn't matter if I have 5000 or 1,000,000 DPS, I will not get credit because he is killing it so quickly, this simply wouldn't happen with 'normal' DPS types.
It happened to me just the other day in the Voth Space BZ someone was taking out all the ships in a group before I could take out one lol.
Personally I think there should be some type of cap on normal queues and BZ's
[...] I quickly realize, "hey, I should pass that guy the ball whenever he get's even relatively open."
That's the normal, natural reaction to realizing that I have a really good player on my team. My reaction isn't to walk off the court. [...]
Why is it that there are always people who miss the point like this?
The equivalent of STO's balance in a PvE match is not some guy being able to do a slam dunk. It is one guy being able to play completely alone against the opposing team and having no chance whatsoever to not win at least 60:0, never doing anything but 3-point baskets.
It's a very sound equivalent.
No, really it isn't, you've missed the point by a long way.
The post above is correct, it is like a guy who can play against the other team without the help of anyone else on his own team.
I have no problem with the high DPS players but it does take a lot of the fun out of the game for me when they come into normal queues or Battle Zones.
When they're in BZ's then that can cause me to lose out on rewards for taking part (though I'm not saying it is intentional). If I am out of position or a little bit too far away from a certain enemy(ies) then they take them out quickly without me being able to get a hit in to get credit, and this has nothing to do with my skill or DPS, if he kills it before I can get there (because of massive DPS), then it doesn't matter if I have 5000 or 1,000,000 DPS, I will not get credit because he is killing it so quickly, this simply wouldn't happen with 'normal' DPS types.
It happened to me just the other day in the Voth Space BZ someone was taking out all the ships in a group before I could take out one lol.
Personally I think there should be some type of cap on normal queues and BZ's
Sal's counter point is that you're comparing someone who's a pro basketball player with a high school freshman and expecting them to compete with each other.
The powercreep is why we lost the old Borg Elites.
Actually, we "lost" them because they were pretty poorly designed, and MMOs in general have been moving away from the "2 hour dungeons/raids" type gameplay in general, since no one wants to spend that much time on one dungeon.
Yes, because 60-second STFs and Alerts are so much better. Might as well just press a "get loot now" button
There's time gates on almost all of the PVE maps. This perception that there are 30 second runs and 60 second runs, comes from just TWO maps. The two most popular maps, but just those two.
Run Procyon V or something if you're tired of 60 second runs.
The devs will have no choice but to address the powercreep at some point.
ISA runs that last barely 50 seconds? CCA lasting all of ten seconds in some instances? Sorry, that's just NOT right.
Most MMOs address power creep by making NEW end-game content that is harder and takes longer to complete. World of Warcraft, Everquest, and many others have been progressing for years and years and years on this model.
And in that model you know what happens to their oldest content, or in STO's case the Borg maps and the Crystaline Entity encounter? They become dated and obsolete.
So actually, it IS right. It's the way of things. It's what happens to old content like ISA and CCA. We're all supposed to have moved on to the Iconian War and the Temporal stuff.
If the guy plays basketball 40 hours a week, he's either a professional being paid to do it, in which case why would he even bother being on the same court as a factory worker he's not related to or drinking buddies with, or he doesn't have a job and all he does is goof off playing basketball-either way, he's just that good because he's that devoted to it.
MOST people in your league are that devoted-for now. but, ah...if you're blowing that kind of time and money on the game, you're either going to get bored, or it's going to catch up and "Life Intervened". scaling things to your Pro Basketballer when it's a kiddie court (and STO is, just that-a Kiddie Court game. They even went so far as to remove any semblance of hard choices or questionable actions from the storyline to make it more 'kid friendly'), that's not "Wow he's good" but more "Why is he even HERE?"
full-court jungleball on a half-court playground net really isn't a measure of 'skill' without including handicapping-obstacles, point-spreads or variant rules. Those with time+Money have more chance of doing well than those without-that's merely a fact,
What is the point of any of this? My point is that players that do tons of damage aren't bad for the game. Just like players that do 5k DPS aren't bad for the game.
...but tellya what, 200,000 people spending 30 minutes to an hour and maybe 500 zen is going to be buying a hell of a lot more than 35 people who blow a grand a year and can play all day long, every day. Them's just the facts of the market.
Totally irrelevant as both skilled and unskilled players spend money. It's not an either or scenario.
Okay - but the problem with this analogy is that the opposing team consists of players who are useless. Does that make the player good or the opposing team bad?
I tend to lean toward the latter - the Borg in ISA are laughable.
If the opposing team is weak, it doesn't sound like there's a problem with the analogy then. If the issue is that guy that can dunk is playing against other humans, then use golf as the analogy. If I go out and get smoked by my friend by 20 shots, I'll ask him for some pointers along the way. I won't get angry at him and ask him why he even bothered coming if he was so much better than me.
No, really it isn't, you've missed the point by a long way.
There is no point to miss. The original "point" is a faulty one. The "point" is literally that the OP is mad that someone is better than them. It's a public queue. By joining it, you submit to the randomness that comes along with it. If you don't like it, form up with your friends and do private runs. The same is true for basketball. If you don't like getting dunked on at the public park, get some friends together and buy a basketball hoop and play at your house.
When you see "TRIBBLE" in my posts, it's because I manually typed "TRIBBLE" and censored myself.
Ok, i think it's all about Beam Array Fire at Will (BFAW). Using it in conjunction with agro increasing consoles insures taking high amounts of damage, enabling them to use Go Down Fighting which gives them another 30% damage boost and protection.
They should change the way BFAW works, that will affect everyone though. So when the DPSbeasts enter a scene they should carefully consider whether or not to use BFAW. The idea is to alter the mechanics of BFAW to something like this.
The more targets are being attacked by BFAW the lesser the effect per target. The damage will gradually increase with fewer and fewer targets available. Let's say 10 targets = low damage to individual target, 5 Targets = medium damage to individual target, 1 target = high damage to single target (usually a Boss ship). BFAW should always do more damage to an individual target than a normal broadside beam array attack but only a little when there are many targets around.
If the guy plays basketball 40 hours a week, he's either a professional being paid to do it, in which case why would he even bother being on the same court as a factory worker he's not related to or drinking buddies with, or he doesn't have a job and all he does is goof off playing basketball-either way, he's just that good because he's that devoted to it.
MOST people in your league are that devoted-for now. but, ah...if you're blowing that kind of time and money on the game, you're either going to get bored, or it's going to catch up and "Life Intervened". scaling things to your Pro Basketballer when it's a kiddie court (and STO is, just that-a Kiddie Court game. They even went so far as to remove any semblance of hard choices or questionable actions from the storyline to make it more 'kid friendly'), that's not "Wow he's good" but more "Why is he even HERE?"
full-court jungleball on a half-court playground net really isn't a measure of 'skill' without including handicapping-obstacles, point-spreads or variant rules. Those with time+Money have more chance of doing well than those without-that's merely a fact,
What is the point of any of this? My point is that players that do tons of damage aren't bad for the game. Just like players that do 5k DPS aren't bad for the game.
...but tellya what, 200,000 people spending 30 minutes to an hour and maybe 500 zen is going to be buying a hell of a lot more than 35 people who blow a grand a year and can play all day long, every day. Them's just the facts of the market.
Totally irrelevant as both skilled and unskilled players spend money. It's not an either or scenario.
Okay - but the problem with this analogy is that the opposing team consists of players who are useless. Does that make the player good or the opposing team bad?
I tend to lean toward the latter - the Borg in ISA are laughable.
If the opposing team is weak, it doesn't sound like there's a problem with the analogy then. If the issue is that guy that can dunk is playing against other humans, then use golf as the analogy. If I go out and get smoked by my friend by 20 shots, I'll ask him for some pointers along the way. I won't get angry at him and ask him why he even bothered coming if he was so much better than me.
No, really it isn't, you've missed the point by a long way.
There is no point to miss. The original "point" is a faulty one. The "point" is literally that the OP is mad that someone is better than them. It's a public queue. By joining it, you submit to the randomness that comes along with it. If you don't like it, form up with your friends and do private runs. The same is true for basketball. If you don't like getting dunked on at the public park, get some friends together and buy a basketball hoop and play at your house.
no, Sal, I think you're missing the point.
See, you get a first timer in there (and you will) and he or she is in there with, say...YOU. And YOU smoke the instance-we're talking ten-second CCA here, the entity didn't even get a chance to do it's little wave-thing one time.
So this newguy, he's supposed to.what, exactly? "WOw this game is so **** great I got an AFK penalty my first run!! I'm going to stay forever and spend all sorts of cash!!"
Or...(vastly more likely)
"Dude, this game sucks. I'm out of here."
YOU are playing a single-player shooter, and YOU are playing it like you're the only dude on the map...because with that much damage (thanks to sloppy work on the developer end), you might as well be. I acknowledge, you put a lot of effort (and I suspect it's a lot of effort) to get that 'good'. I'm probably not far off the forty hours a week mark, am I? Or the bundle you spent-whether your money, or some relative's money, putting forty hours a week into a game makes it PROFESSIONAL level play, on a playing field designed for, and intended for, six to eight hour a WEEK amatuers who don't have the hours to spend doing things like flogging the exchange, studying walkthroughs, running on multiple alts until you have the perfect timing down, and not to mention the obvious maxing of reps, ship traits, etc. etc. to get those scores.
but you're on a map with four to nine other people, and in a pug, odds are better than good that they're not all twenty-to-forty hour a weekers with ten to twelve alts, all of whom have maxed rep and spec scores, best crafted gear, ideally balanced traits on ideally chosen races..and guess what?
for those new guys, that experience sucked rocks dude. They got in, started moving and the instance was over before they even got a shot in.
YOU got your jollies and your rewards, and they got to sit for an hour in the penalty box.
and you thnk they should be grateful and want to be your pal?
There is some level of narcissism involved in your position, dude, or maybe just social isolation.
You make a lot of assumptions. I'm not a 100k+ DPSer. I'm not that good. I'm simply saying that EVERYONE has the same right to join a queue. Everyone. From the 5k player up to the 150k player. If you want to tell players that they are bad guys or have social problems because they understand the game better, then frankly you have some kind of inferiority problem.
When you see "TRIBBLE" in my posts, it's because I manually typed "TRIBBLE" and censored myself.
for those new guys, that experience sucked rocks dude. They got in, started moving and the instance was over before they even got a shot in.
YOU got your jollies and your rewards, and they got to sit for an hour in the penalty box.
The penalty is two hours these days.
Had a slow map load earlier this week and got hit with a two hour penalty. Lagg and slow map loading, often when i spot someone with boosts filling out the screen, are the real fun killers.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
The whole problem is that most who have been defending the current situation are above average players. Not all of them of course, but in most cases they're members of the 30k or 50k+ channels.
Players who, further, are unable to look beyond the bow of their own starship as I've said before in these discussions.
Don't expect people on here to consider the game or its health as a whole, they'd rather defend the current ridiculous situation where one person (read: they themselves) can complete advanced instances in a mere fraction of the time these missions were supposed to last simply because it's in their own interest.
Everyone with an objective stance on the matter or at least with the capability to imagine the position of the average players (who represent the bulk of the players and who are needed to keep the game going as well but who you won't usually find that often on the Forum) understands that the current situation needs to be changed.
Simply put, you're trying to reason with people who have no need for reason as a reasonable state of the game goes against their own personal interest.
So while I admire your dedication, I think it's pointless in the end. They don't see a need for some balance, instead they'll just try to evade the whole thing and core of the issue by calling for elite difficulty. As if that's going to solve the issues in the 90% of the other game content.
I myself gave up a while ago trying to get through to them. There's no reason to be found with people who defend extreme situations (no matter what type of extreme situation) and who, as a solution, only propose more extreme measures.
Ok, i think it's all about Beam Array Fire at Will (BFAW). Using it in conjunction with agro increasing consoles insures taking high amounts of damage, enabling them to use Go Down Fighting which gives them another 30% damage boost and protection.
They should change the way BFAW works, that will affect everyone though. So when the DPSbeasts enter a scene they should carefully consider whether or not to use BFAW. The idea is to alter the mechanics of BFAW to something like this.
The more targets are being attacked by BFAW the lesser the effect per target. The damage will gradually increase with fewer and fewer targets available. Let's say 10 targets = low damage to individual target, 5 Targets = medium damage to individual target, 1 target = high damage to single target (usually a Boss ship). BFAW should always do more damage to an individual target than a normal broadside beam array attack but only a little when there are many targets around.
I don't think it's Beam FAW per se, it's more likely that most missions are FAW-supporting environments.
If we had game content that would actually punish the use of brainless spamming of a single ability, things might be a lot better. It's unlikely to happen though. Even when FAW doesn't give huge benefits over other abilities because you need to focus fire on a specific target (like in the Na'kuhl red alerts), it is, in the end almost never detrimental to use it anyway.
That's the core of the problem I think. Not that we have an omni-directional and ridiculously buff-able power that can be put on all ships without sacrificing much and which benefits from countless bonuses, it's that this power is the most easily accessible solution to the majority of the game content.
You should never have a single thing that's the answer to everything, but in this game it's pretty obvious that FAW is exactly that.
If people are doing less then 10k dps they need to take a serious look at their ship. I'm a terrible pilot and I can manage about 25k on a new character with no rep or starship traits. This game is super easy.
As for nerfing various things...I just don't see that happening. There will be a continuous flow of power creep and when it gets to a breaking point the enemies will be buffed again like they did with the release of dr.
All I can hear is "I don't know/don't want to know how to make an uber build, NERF EVERYONE!".
Someone, please call the waaaambulance.
Dumb comment is dumb. You make it sound like there's any skill involved in making an 'uber' build. Fact is, there are more and more different ways to get way more power than is needed for 90% of the game's content.
That's the problem the OP is describing: it's no longer only possible for a handful of players to be ridiculously powerful, it's possible for almost everyone.
Telling them to (or pretending they don't know how to get an) 'uber build' isn't going to help anyone in the end. What do you think will happen if everyone does over 50k DPS? I certainly hope you don't think it would make the game more playable or interesting.
So no, 'I don't know how to make an uber build' is not what people are saying here and you need to have your ears checked if that's all you can hear.
If people are doing less then 10k dps they need to take a serious look at their ship. I'm a terrible pilot and I can manage about 25k on a new character with no rep or starship traits. This game is super easy.
As for nerfing various things...I just don't see that happening. There will be a continuous flow of power creep and when it gets to a breaking point the enemies will be buffed again like they did with the release of dr.
Yeah that's part of the problem. It's becoming much easier. I created a whole new account a couple of weeks ago and I'm already nearing the 20k barrier. Of course I have the advantage of having years of player experience and knowledge, but in the end it's boiling down to this: even without a lot of expensive stuff, it's so easy to be unnecessary powerful.
Nerfing may not be liked by some, and of course it's understandable that they don't want to see their hard earned stuff being nerfed. But I think, in the end, that it is the only viable thing to do, and to stop adding more powercreep.
Cause I certainly agree, the way things are going, only a massive buff to enemies like they did with DR can solve this if we don't want to nerf anything.
But let's be honest: would this game survive a second DR? I have a feeling we're still trying to recover from it whenever I look at my friend list or fleet / armada rosters.
you're misunderstanding me, Salazaar, I'm not so much attacking you, as attacking your position-which you've shifted to a rights thing. You started off with "Don't you DARE nurf My Stuffz!"
Those two things go hand-in-hand actually. Just look at the previous posts that I'm responding to. "The problem" according to them is the players and the combination of powers that they're using to get high numbers. The stance that they're just "too good" and are exploiters that ruin everyone else's experience is a toxic one. They don't ruin my experience. I will continue to assert that everyone's limitations are their own and not anyone else's fault. And that players should focus on improving themselves instead of bringing others down to their level.
When you see "TRIBBLE" in my posts, it's because I manually typed "TRIBBLE" and censored myself.
you're misunderstanding me, Salazaar, I'm not so much attacking you, as attacking your position-which you've shifted to a rights thing. You started off with "Don't you DARE nurf My Stuffz!"
Those two things go hand-in-hand actually. Just look at the previous posts that I'm responding to. "The problem" according to them is the players and the combination of powers that they're using to get high numbers. The stance that they're just "too good" and are exploiters that ruin everyone else's experience is a toxic one. They don't ruin my experience. I will continue to assert that everyone's limitations are their own and not anyone else's fault. And that players should focus on improving themselves instead of bringing others down to their level.
The large amount of stacking powers/buffs/debuffs has been identified in one of the podcasts as the main reason for the lag/latency in the game. By using those "mega stacks" the DPS gurus are in fact ruining the game experience for everyone.
What you refer as a toxic environment is merely identifying the cause of the problem: lag, latency and the resulting penalties for players since their map could not load fast enough due to someone throwing down a "mega stack".
Easiest solution: 80+k DPS crowd should stay out of PUG and only play premade.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
All I can hear is "I don't know/don't want to know how to make an uber build, NERF EVERYONE!".
Someone, please call the waaaambulance.
Well I think the reason it's so unfocused is that the people whining don't know what to whine about, so they just whine. Personally..... I've seen plasma explosions deal 10k damage... recently. That's pretty ridiculous for a weapon proc that you can go off multiple times each time you hit an enemy with a weapon. Is that the ONLY reason? nah, but it's in the heap of balance issues somewhere.
What you refer as a toxic environment is merely identifying the cause of the problem: lag, latency and the resulting penalties for players since their map could not load fast enough due to someone throwing down a "mega stack".
No toxicity is in how players react to such things. Ranting about how DPSers are ruining the game doesn't help anything at all.
All I can hear is "I don't know/don't want to know how to make an uber build, NERF EVERYONE!".
Someone, please call the waaaambulance.
Well I think the reason it's so unfocused is that the people whining don't know what to whine about, so they just whine. Personally..... I've seen plasma explosions deal 10k damage... recently. That's pretty ridiculous for a weapon proc that you can go off multiple times each time you hit an enemy with a weapon. Is that the ONLY reason? nah, but it's in the heap of balance issues somewhere.
Come to think of it, we haven't had a kemocite topic in ages.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
you're misunderstanding me, Salazaar, I'm not so much attacking you, as attacking your position-which you've shifted to a rights thing. You started off with "Don't you DARE nurf My Stuffz!"
Those two things go hand-in-hand actually. Just look at the previous posts that I'm responding to. "The problem" according to them is the players and the combination of powers that they're using to get high numbers. The stance that they're just "too good" and are exploiters that ruin everyone else's experience is a toxic one. They don't ruin my experience. I will continue to assert that everyone's limitations are their own and not anyone else's fault. And that players should focus on improving themselves instead of bringing others down to their level.
Easiest solution: 80+k DPS crowd should stay out of PUG and only play premade.
You should just be happy that the high dpsers are carrying all the below average players through the advanced q's. Otherwise you would be failing all the optionals. If the low dps people would play in normal difficulty where they belong there would be less issues, but they join advanced hoping someone will carry them and they can get a better reward.
you're misunderstanding me, Salazaar, I'm not so much attacking you, as attacking your position-which you've shifted to a rights thing. You started off with "Don't you DARE nurf My Stuffz!"
Those two things go hand-in-hand actually. Just look at the previous posts that I'm responding to. "The problem" according to them is the players and the combination of powers that they're using to get high numbers. The stance that they're just "too good" and are exploiters that ruin everyone else's experience is a toxic one. They don't ruin my experience. I will continue to assert that everyone's limitations are their own and not anyone else's fault. And that players should focus on improving themselves instead of bringing others down to their level.
Easiest solution: 80+k DPS crowd should stay out of PUG and only play premade.
You should just be happy that the high dpsers are carrying all the below average players through the advanced q's. Otherwise you would be failing all the optionals. If the low dps people would play in normal difficulty where they belong there would be less issues, but they join advanced hoping someone will carry them and they can get a better reward.
More reason for the 80k+ crowd to only play premade.
It's the need for elite marks and the slightly higher rewards which drive low dps players (<10k DPS) into advanced queues.
Let the optionals fail because it might encourage the low dps players to pay attention. Losing optionals is preferable to the decapitating lag at this time.
A queue only needs one or two 20k players who know their stuff, anything above that only hinders the team.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
you're misunderstanding me, Salazaar, I'm not so much attacking you, as attacking your position-which you've shifted to a rights thing. You started off with "Don't you DARE nurf My Stuffz!"
Those two things go hand-in-hand actually. Just look at the previous posts that I'm responding to. "The problem" according to them is the players and the combination of powers that they're using to get high numbers. The stance that they're just "too good" and are exploiters that ruin everyone else's experience is a toxic one. They don't ruin my experience. I will continue to assert that everyone's limitations are their own and not anyone else's fault. And that players should focus on improving themselves instead of bringing others down to their level.
The large amount of stacking powers/buffs/debuffs has been identified in one of the podcasts as the main reason for the lag/latency in the game. By using those "mega stacks" the DPS gurus are in fact ruining the game experience for everyone.
Actually, Borticus found the source of all the lag that we had and it was due to the way debuffs were being calculated and the [pen] modifier not working as intended. He made a post on Reddit about this and the solution. The solution was implemented and alleviated a significant portion of lag. So this argument holds no water.
Comments
Is DPS at the crazy end of the spectrum ?. Yes it is
However I prefer my DPS at the crazy end of the spectrum so I can do my best to negate the challenge of human error and ignorance. I'm playing a match with x other people for a reward based on My/their ability to be able to play whichever PvE I'm in. Their failure penalises me, so I make dam sure I'm as strong as I can be so I get the full reward for my time.
Examples.
Khitomer Space Elite.
Numerous times I've seen 3 players attack the Transformer Portal side and ignore probes.
Again I've seen a player attack Transformer spawn Cube and Sphere and can't handle either so Probes slip through.
I've had players on the opp side to me attack the Transformer the other side. Die to the Cube/Sphere and rather than clean up the mess they spawned run to the side I'm on because I've already killed the Cubes and Spheres and starting on the 2nd Transformer/Gate because its easier.
CCA.
In a weaker team players not moving outside the blast radius causing failures. Or shooting the Tholians instead wasting timer
ISA.
Captain NU-Kirk going solo to the other side of the Gate and spawning Nanites whilst unlike Prime Kirk kicking TRIBBLE and taking numbers he gets TRIBBLE slapped like Nu-Kirk.
Or Nanities closing in on Transformer and rather than Grav Well they Grav Well the Transformer swarming it with Borg.
Dyson BattleZone.
My Favourite for Player stupidity. V-Rex fight. 1 Player finds himself at a Silo and decides to completely ignore the Medics/Engineers and tries to solo the V-Rex (Something I'm not sure is possible to do before the Omega particles are stolen) Ignoring the silo indicator under the mini map, ignoring the text warnings and ignoring the voice warnings.
So yes DPS is out of control i'll agree to that, But "war isn't much fun unless you're winning". I'd rather play in a team that can nuke the map and earn me my precious pink rocks than a team that can't even put a dent in Donatra. Yes I've been in one of those matches, watching my 4 team mates pour everything they had on her after I took her to 5% health and ended up seeing her health climb back to 11% because they just plain sucked.
DPS s a necessary evil. The NPC's in this game are nothing more than Bricks to pew pew. What this game really needs is a smarter AI for NPC's so they become a challenge.
I do not want another Delta Rising where Hull and Shields where buffed so much that was just plain boring trading fire with NPC and making little progress. It was like a evenly matched PvP fight where neither player could take down the other and it just dragged on and on.
Be thankful for strong players.
Nerfing any single mechanic is just going to cause the high dpsers to redistribute powers to compensate, so one fix isn't going to do much. You would have to work on everything, which hurts everyone. In games there will always be a large group that doesn't do well. Maybe they have a disability, their priorities are on other things, they don't have the time/resources, or just flat don't care. I prefer helping the people who want to learn how to build their ships better, you would probably be surprised at how little investment it takes to get to the 50k range. People like "canon builds", 50k builds with these are super easy. I use that 50k because that range should be able to get you through ANY content in the game. Get the average player up to that point and add in some sort of "elite" content for those who are capable and I think people would be happier overall.
I just think the problem is that people have to put in an effort to get an intermediate understanding of the game mechanics and you need to know where to find that information. There are many resources available, but the places where people check first are the worst for finding anything useful, ie. official forums and the wiki. There are youtubers and streamers out there who are alright at giving information. The two top places I've foundd are the DPS-Metals league(for team buffing up one guy to high numbers) and r/stobuilds on Reddit(for building a ship that doesn't require a team to buff them up).
My character Tsin'xing
Nothing's fun about a 10-30 second battle in game.
No, really it isn't, you've missed the point by a long way.
The post above is correct, it is like a guy who can play against the other team without the help of anyone else on his own team.
I have no problem with the high DPS players but it does take a lot of the fun out of the game for me when they come into normal queues or Battle Zones.
When they're in BZ's then that can cause me to lose out on rewards for taking part (though I'm not saying it is intentional). If I am out of position or a little bit too far away from a certain enemy(ies) then they take them out quickly without me being able to get a hit in to get credit, and this has nothing to do with my skill or DPS, if he kills it before I can get there (because of massive DPS), then it doesn't matter if I have 5000 or 1,000,000 DPS, I will not get credit because he is killing it so quickly, this simply wouldn't happen with 'normal' DPS types.
It happened to me just the other day in the Voth Space BZ someone was taking out all the ships in a group before I could take out one lol.
Personally I think there should be some type of cap on normal queues and BZ's
My character Tsin'xing
There's time gates on almost all of the PVE maps. This perception that there are 30 second runs and 60 second runs, comes from just TWO maps. The two most popular maps, but just those two.
Run Procyon V or something if you're tired of 60 second runs.
Most MMOs address power creep by making NEW end-game content that is harder and takes longer to complete. World of Warcraft, Everquest, and many others have been progressing for years and years and years on this model.
And in that model you know what happens to their oldest content, or in STO's case the Borg maps and the Crystaline Entity encounter? They become dated and obsolete.
So actually, it IS right. It's the way of things. It's what happens to old content like ISA and CCA. We're all supposed to have moved on to the Iconian War and the Temporal stuff.
Totally irrelevant as both skilled and unskilled players spend money. It's not an either or scenario.
If the opposing team is weak, it doesn't sound like there's a problem with the analogy then. If the issue is that guy that can dunk is playing against other humans, then use golf as the analogy. If I go out and get smoked by my friend by 20 shots, I'll ask him for some pointers along the way. I won't get angry at him and ask him why he even bothered coming if he was so much better than me.
There is no point to miss. The original "point" is a faulty one. The "point" is literally that the OP is mad that someone is better than them. It's a public queue. By joining it, you submit to the randomness that comes along with it. If you don't like it, form up with your friends and do private runs. The same is true for basketball. If you don't like getting dunked on at the public park, get some friends together and buy a basketball hoop and play at your house.
They should change the way BFAW works, that will affect everyone though. So when the DPSbeasts enter a scene they should carefully consider whether or not to use BFAW. The idea is to alter the mechanics of BFAW to something like this.
The more targets are being attacked by BFAW the lesser the effect per target. The damage will gradually increase with fewer and fewer targets available. Let's say 10 targets = low damage to individual target, 5 Targets = medium damage to individual target, 1 target = high damage to single target (usually a Boss ship). BFAW should always do more damage to an individual target than a normal broadside beam array attack but only a little when there are many targets around.
The penalty is two hours these days.
Had a slow map load earlier this week and got hit with a two hour penalty. Lagg and slow map loading, often when i spot someone with boosts filling out the screen, are the real fun killers.
The whole problem is that most who have been defending the current situation are above average players. Not all of them of course, but in most cases they're members of the 30k or 50k+ channels.
Players who, further, are unable to look beyond the bow of their own starship as I've said before in these discussions.
Don't expect people on here to consider the game or its health as a whole, they'd rather defend the current ridiculous situation where one person (read: they themselves) can complete advanced instances in a mere fraction of the time these missions were supposed to last simply because it's in their own interest.
Everyone with an objective stance on the matter or at least with the capability to imagine the position of the average players (who represent the bulk of the players and who are needed to keep the game going as well but who you won't usually find that often on the Forum) understands that the current situation needs to be changed.
Simply put, you're trying to reason with people who have no need for reason as a reasonable state of the game goes against their own personal interest.
So while I admire your dedication, I think it's pointless in the end. They don't see a need for some balance, instead they'll just try to evade the whole thing and core of the issue by calling for elite difficulty. As if that's going to solve the issues in the 90% of the other game content.
I myself gave up a while ago trying to get through to them. There's no reason to be found with people who defend extreme situations (no matter what type of extreme situation) and who, as a solution, only propose more extreme measures.
I don't think it's Beam FAW per se, it's more likely that most missions are FAW-supporting environments.
If we had game content that would actually punish the use of brainless spamming of a single ability, things might be a lot better. It's unlikely to happen though. Even when FAW doesn't give huge benefits over other abilities because you need to focus fire on a specific target (like in the Na'kuhl red alerts), it is, in the end almost never detrimental to use it anyway.
That's the core of the problem I think. Not that we have an omni-directional and ridiculously buff-able power that can be put on all ships without sacrificing much and which benefits from countless bonuses, it's that this power is the most easily accessible solution to the majority of the game content.
You should never have a single thing that's the answer to everything, but in this game it's pretty obvious that FAW is exactly that.
Edit: spelling
Someone, please call the waaaambulance.
As for nerfing various things...I just don't see that happening. There will be a continuous flow of power creep and when it gets to a breaking point the enemies will be buffed again like they did with the release of dr.
Dumb comment is dumb. You make it sound like there's any skill involved in making an 'uber' build. Fact is, there are more and more different ways to get way more power than is needed for 90% of the game's content.
That's the problem the OP is describing: it's no longer only possible for a handful of players to be ridiculously powerful, it's possible for almost everyone.
Telling them to (or pretending they don't know how to get an) 'uber build' isn't going to help anyone in the end. What do you think will happen if everyone does over 50k DPS? I certainly hope you don't think it would make the game more playable or interesting.
So no, 'I don't know how to make an uber build' is not what people are saying here and you need to have your ears checked if that's all you can hear.
Yeah that's part of the problem. It's becoming much easier. I created a whole new account a couple of weeks ago and I'm already nearing the 20k barrier. Of course I have the advantage of having years of player experience and knowledge, but in the end it's boiling down to this: even without a lot of expensive stuff, it's so easy to be unnecessary powerful.
Nerfing may not be liked by some, and of course it's understandable that they don't want to see their hard earned stuff being nerfed. But I think, in the end, that it is the only viable thing to do, and to stop adding more powercreep.
Cause I certainly agree, the way things are going, only a massive buff to enemies like they did with DR can solve this if we don't want to nerf anything.
But let's be honest: would this game survive a second DR? I have a feeling we're still trying to recover from it whenever I look at my friend list or fleet / armada rosters.
The large amount of stacking powers/buffs/debuffs has been identified in one of the podcasts as the main reason for the lag/latency in the game. By using those "mega stacks" the DPS gurus are in fact ruining the game experience for everyone.
What you refer as a toxic environment is merely identifying the cause of the problem: lag, latency and the resulting penalties for players since their map could not load fast enough due to someone throwing down a "mega stack".
Easiest solution: 80+k DPS crowd should stay out of PUG and only play premade.
My character Tsin'xing
Come to think of it, we haven't had a kemocite topic in ages.
You should just be happy that the high dpsers are carrying all the below average players through the advanced q's. Otherwise you would be failing all the optionals. If the low dps people would play in normal difficulty where they belong there would be less issues, but they join advanced hoping someone will carry them and they can get a better reward.
More reason for the 80k+ crowd to only play premade.
It's the need for elite marks and the slightly higher rewards which drive low dps players (<10k DPS) into advanced queues.
Let the optionals fail because it might encourage the low dps players to pay attention. Losing optionals is preferable to the decapitating lag at this time.
A queue only needs one or two 20k players who know their stuff, anything above that only hinders the team.
Actually, Borticus found the source of all the lag that we had and it was due to the way debuffs were being calculated and the [pen] modifier not working as intended. He made a post on Reddit about this and the solution. The solution was implemented and alleviated a significant portion of lag. So this argument holds no water.