So now do we really need a forced Respec? Just give us one free Respec and let us decide whether we need to use it because of these changes.
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Now if he could just un-nerf the science ultimate abiltiy. That GDF change really isn't needed. All it does it give escorts extra cheese since a lot of them love invincible.
The torp changes are fine, assuming it somehow doesn't TRIBBLE up "Concentrate firepower".
But all the reverted changes to subnuke, etc are most saddening.
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@crypticspartan#0627
Many people seem to be worried about science captains being useless, and tactical captains performing better with science ships than science captains in science ships. Science captains still need their Subnucleonic Beam for PvP to keep their role while they also have to have some advantages when using science abilities/ships in PvE.
Suggestion:
That would mean science captains should get some advantages when flying science ships, advantages tacticals do not have. One way of doing this would be buffing the science captain (profession specific) trait "Conservation of Energy".
This trait is up most of the time - with 3 stacks.
One stack gives 10% bonus exotic damage.
To compensate for the removal of the deflector overcharge, this trait could be buffed by increasing the damage, to maybe 15% or 20% (or even bigger bonuses to balance it vs tactical captains) per stack.
In addition, the trait should give small bonuses for other skills that affect science abilities. For instance 5% bonus drain and 5% bonus to control abilities per stack.
Since science abilities are the best in terms of control and drain (special BOff abilities aside) science captains would make a lot more use of science ships than tactical captains in a tactical ship. This would also encourage more people to run science captains and make control or drain heavy science ships.
No No No. Science Captains shouldn't get an advantage with Science Vessels specifically. In STO, every class can fly every ship and has abilities that work well for all of them. If you add incentives to fly a particular ship type based on class, you're reducing the amount of choices for players, because if you don't fly the ship your class is best with, you're automatically playing a weaker build.
Science Captains don't need help in Science Vessels. Science Captains problem is that they have one ability that is really strong in PvP, but not very strong in PvE. That is suboptimal. Deflector Overcharge was an attempt to give Science Captains something that's good in both, but it also narrowed down their role to playing science vessels, because it mostly buffed things that are strong on Science Vessels (and maybe Temporal Full Spec vessels) and not so strong on other ship classes.
So the problem is finding a way to make the science suite of powers more effective in PvE, without making it also more effective in PvP, and without narrowing down the available ship choices.
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I think science captain's having 30% cat 2 damage bonus up all the time whilst also having aoe resistance debuff sensor scan is enough. This is already synergistic with science vessels. Unfortunately all tac buffs also apply to science boff abilities too which makes science a problem when it tries to compete in its own class of ship.
Also regarding go down fighting. It would be fitting to add a lockout on continuity and invincible for the duration of go down fighting once it is activated. This would allow for the tactical captain to actually 'go down fighting', otherwise devs I think you should consider renaming the ability to 'don't go down fighting'. Please devs, today is always a good day to die!
Science Captains don't need help in Science Vessels.
What PVE advantage (with Tribble changes) is there to playing a science vessel with a SCI captain vs TAC or ENG? What advantage is there to playing any vessel with a SCI captain in PVE?
The answer is, that it's a disadvantage.
Something like
1. Reduce cooldown of Photonic Fleet
2. Eliminate Photonic Capacitor trait
3. Replace Photonic Capacitor with the Holodeck version of Control Amplification
would give SCI captains some kind of advantage in a role vs TAC and ENG, which they currently have none of on Tribble. Unless "worst at everything" is the intended role, as a means of handicapping oneself for an additional challenge.
The torp changes are fine, assuming it somehow doesn't **** up "Concentrate firepower".
But all the reverted changes to subnuke, etc are most saddening.
I can see some reasons for taking away SubNuc at the LtC/CMDR and returning it to Science, but why not let Science have their Deflector Overcharge as well?
As for the torpedo change, what is the reasoning for the lockout on TS/HY for 5 seconds? I get it that you don't want torp users to have a "double-tap", but since CF can be cleared via Tac Team, as well as other sources of debuff clears incredibly easily, this will hurt PvE and PvP performance for torps.
Then, there's still the matter of several torpedo mechanics and torpedoes themselves not working properly. Will those bugs be fixed prior to launch?
Big picture question: What is the role of torpedoes in the current and future game of STO? How does the Rail Gun and other Heavy Weapons factor into the decisions made with torpedoes in the game?
No No No. Science Captains shouldn't get an advantage with Science Vessels specifically. In STO, every class can fly every ship and has abilities that work well for all of them. If you add incentives to fly a particular ship type based on class, you're reducing the amount of choices for players, because if you don't fly the ship your class is best with, you're automatically playing a weaker build.
Science Captains don't need help in Science Vessels. Science Captains problem is that they have one ability that is really strong in PvP, but not very strong in PvE. That is suboptimal. Deflector Overcharge was an attempt to give Science Captains something that's good in both, but it also narrowed down their role to playing science vessels, because it mostly buffed things that are strong on Science Vessels (and maybe Temporal Full Spec vessels) and not so strong on other ship classes.
So the problem is finding a way to make the science suite of powers more effective in PvE, without making it also more effective in PvP, and without narrowing down the available ship choices.
Nothing else changes. All builds remain the same, but scis get more from using science ships and I see absolutely no problem with that. The problem I have is that tacticals are still better in science ships than science captains, so I don't see many reasons to go for a science captain (over a tactical) in PvE. The only reason would be ground, but that's a whole different story. Tacs are better in every other damage - focused ships. It would also encourage people to make a science captain and play a science based ship with science abilities, and not a science ship with all beams and plasma consoles (Yes I know, that will change) like it used to be. A tac can still fly a science ships, that won't change at all. But the sci will have a slight advantage over a tactical captain, just like a science captain does less damage in an escort with a 5/2 weapon layout and 2 science consoles.
No No No. Science Captains shouldn't get an advantage with Science Vessels specifically. In STO, every class can fly every ship and has abilities that work well for all of them. If you add incentives to fly a particular ship type based on class, you're reducing the amount of choices for players, because if you don't fly the ship your class is best with, you're automatically playing a weaker build.
Science Captains don't need help in Science Vessels. Science Captains problem is that they have one ability that is really strong in PvP, but not very strong in PvE. That is suboptimal. Deflector Overcharge was an attempt to give Science Captains something that's good in both, but it also narrowed down their role to playing science vessels, because it mostly buffed things that are strong on Science Vessels (and maybe Temporal Full Spec vessels) and not so strong on other ship classes.
So the problem is finding a way to make the science suite of powers more effective in PvE, without making it also more effective in PvP, and without narrowing down the available ship choices.
They also have one solid debuff a couple extra powers (photonic fleet and scattering field) which do seem to be specifically directed at compensating for science vessel shortcomings (weapons and tanking respectively). Ie. the class already feels pigeon-holed because it is difficult (in my experience) to find other builds besides science vessel and science carrier that takes specific advantage of their full range of captain powers (whereas ENG and TAC captains can more easily to take advantage of their full set across many different builds. See my previous example of turning an ENG cruiser into an exotic build, just about everything fits in.)
IMO, science captains need more help with science abilities (and powers that emulate them, ex. Aceton Beam, Attack Pattern Beta), allowing them to start making better use of them those across a wider range of ships (which would seem to be why you chose Science [ie. emphasis on special abilities] over TAC/ENG in the first place.) Their current range of captain powers seems too unfocused (and DO seemed like a step in the right direction.)
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Subnucleonic Beam is no longer a bridge officer power, and is once again a Science Captain Power.
Deflector Overcharge has been removed from the game.
...
Personally I'm glad this was rolled back. While I had no complaints about SNB being a BOff ability, removing SNB as a captain power and replacing it with something that encouraged science captains into only science ships took a lot of diversity out of game.
I do understand how some players think that SNB (as a captain power) is a 'useless' ability in PVE, I really do, but DO could also be as equally 'useless' unless you had a build to take advantage of it. With this rollback I feel I would no longer be making a *wrong* choice by flying a science/cruiser or science/escort combination.
As to removing the lockout on GDF while an immunity is active, as a Tac captain, I see no risk now in cheesing a system to go max DPS. That, to me, does not make for good game play, let alone sensible mechanics. GDF is supposed to be your last-ditch effort before you possibly die. Now, I can see a significantly reduced GDF in play with an immunity up, but the skill/risk/reward of having near zero hp and staying alive while maintaining a damage buff is now trivial.
PvP getting less interesting now. I really thought Deflector Overload and locking out GDF when invincible was slotted were good ideas; I really enjoyed them in PvP. Back to the same old boring vape people as I fly at transwarp speeds in my escort and never worry about dying because I'm invincible tactics lol. Just shoot them down to 0 in .3 milliseconds lol, fly from one side of the map to the other 10 times in 1 second lol, and then come back and shoot them down again.
I do understand how some players think that SNB (as a captain power) is a 'useless' ability in PVE, I really do, but DO could also be as equally 'useless' unless you had a build to take advantage of it. With this rollback I feel I would no longer be making a *wrong* choice by flying a science/cruiser or science/escort combination.
Not likely, DO had shield healing. And I do have to question what a science cruiser/escort is doing that wouldn't be partially improved by +drain/exotic/control. Sensor scan by itself isn't enough to make a recognizable "science escort build" or scattering field with a "science cruiser." Those have to be teamed synergistically with other traits, and abilities which tend to fall into the core sci areas (ex. Aceton Beam, Attack Pattern Beta, Ionic Turbulence). Otherwise, one should ostensibly be flying a TAC/ENG character whose abilities more directly feed into Cruiser/Escort gameplay.
If it's just a question of "well, I like sci but I want to fly anything I want regardless of how that's speced out" you could have done that too with DO (and taken advantage of the shield healing over depressing power levels without drain.) DO wouldn't have necessarily made it more difficult to fly non-sci ships with a sci character simply by being relevant (but not exclusively relevant) to sci.
Post edited by duncanidaho11 on
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I do understand how some players think that SNB (as a captain power) is a 'useless' ability in PVE, I really do, but DO could also be as equally 'useless' unless you had a build to take advantage of it. With this rollback I feel I would no longer be making a *wrong* choice by flying a science/cruiser or science/escort combination.
Not likely, DO had shield healing. And I do have to question what a science cruiser/escort is doing that wouldn't be improved by +drain/exotic/control. Sensor scan by itself isn't enough to make a recognizable "science escort build." That has to be teamed synergistically with other traits, and abilities which tend to fall into the core sci areas (ex. Aceton Beam). Otherwise, you should ostensibly be flying a TAC/ENG character which more directly feed into Cruiser/Escort gameplay.
If it's just a question of "well, I like sci but I want to fly anything I want regardless of how that's speced out" you could have done that too with DO (and taken advantage of the shield healing over depressing power levels without drain.) DO wouldn't have made it more difficult to fly non-sci ships with a sci character (it would have been easier for me.)
It is a question of proportionality.
The buff to your shield healing is not anywhere as valuable as a buff to your primary damage source in STO, because even with the changes, it will still be mostly a DPS race in PvE content. And so if you don't fly a Science Vessel as Science Captain, you are at a disadvantage to someone playing a Science Captain in a Science Vessel, since the Science Captain in the Science Vessel is buffing his primary damage source, and you're not.
You might be better off then you are now, but you are still not reaching your full potential. And that is what will inevitably narrow down the choices people will see as valuable. Even if you personally might think that at least you're doing better than you are now, in the large scheme of the game's balance, you're still making a suboptimal choice.
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Thanks guys, I think that the gdf change is good, the reduction in uptime is good and maybe the overall dmg% should be decreased slightly aswell. There were 1v1 matches where I was fighting my friend which is an Eng and as a tac I couldn't even proc his continuity since the buff to miracle worker, also to note the eng was running minimal heals and I still have to maintain strong heals in order to stay alive.
Can I suggest a change to the way continuity/invincible works. Make it an optional, can use either but not both, most players will have difficulty fighting other players that use both, not to mention the added survivability that placates and tac retreat give.
And since we all got a dmg nerf overall would it not make sense to do the same with heals, even by say 10% ?
Thanks
I wouldn't say minimal heals. Just less than most tacs run in pvp now a days.
My main issue to the loss of DO is that Science captains will become the least effective class when it comes to Exotic damage builds. Tacs will have GDF and APA while Engs will buff Exotics via Aux overcap. Rolling back some of the Sci skill nerfs won't fix that.
IMO while the return of SubNuc to Sci captains was a welcome change, this patch was a step backwards when it comes to class balance.
DO should be returned as a Sci-exclusive ability. It can be through a Captain trait (less effective since it would be passive, possibly replacing Photonic Capacitor) or rolled into Science Fleet (though the one-player cast at a time in PVE might hurt this).
Agreed. I had not even thought about the Eng Aux overcapping! Sci does have conservation of energy. I have not done the math to see if it compares to eng aux overcapping, though. Conservation of energy certainly does not compare to apa/gdf, though.
If they would remove the exotic buff from gdf/apa, that would solve the tac issue. Some combination of bringing DO back, or buffing Conservation of Energy, or perhaps making sensor scan AoE (e.g everyone in a 90 degree cone, for example) could counter the Eng issue.
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The buff to your shield healing is not anywhere as valuable as a buff to your primary damage source in STO, because even with the changes, it will still be mostly a DPS race in PvE content. And so if you don't fly a Science Vessel as Science Captain, you are at a disadvantage to someone playing a Science Captain in a Science Vessel, since the Science Captain in the Science Vessel is buffing his primary damage source, and you're not.
You might be better off then you are now, but you are still not reaching your full potential. And that is what will inevitably narrow down the choices people will see as valuable. Even if you personally might think that at least you're doing better than you are now, in the large scheme of the game's balance, you're still making a suboptimal choice.
Suboptimal choices exist across the game. An ENG captain in an escort isn't reaching the same healing potential as an ENG captain in a cruiser. There are also some compromises between a TAC captain a cruiser or science vessel over an escort (though these aren't particularly noticeable in current STO.) This is basic to specialization versus generalization, mixing professions and ships pulls you down from maximum potential to compromise with other areas of gameplay.
Tradeoffs have been made.
As a result, buffs to the core won't benefit the generalist as much of the specialist. This is true across all professions in terms of absolute magnitudes whether or not that magnitude is in fact necessary for gameplay (ie. you can go too far with damage resistance buffs and healing for ENG, there are diminishing returns after a point. Ditto TAC seating for TAC captains using beams.) But that's just a factor of comparing the absolute size of a percentage based increase across two different numbers (again, it's stating common principle.) The lower generalist "loses out" according to one number, but remember that they've made a strategic choice to invest in other stats (which pays off if they have disproportionate benefits in context. Ex. not exploding as frequently compensating for a lower increase in sci potential.)
Removing DO does not change these dynamics, it simply avoids talking about them by sticking to the null state (with respect to PVE) of SNB's status quo. A 0% buff has the same impact regardless.
Post edited by duncanidaho11 on
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How about a bit more civility in here, eh? All of the insults and vitriol aren't going to make your voices heard any louder on the very divisive subjects we're dealing with. If you would like to share feedback that offers helpful information that can be used to inform our future decisions, we're more than willing to listen.
We're working on putting together a more thorough explanation for why some of these changes have recently been rolled back, and would ask for a little bit of patience. We know that a lot of the passion behind these posts comes from a position of caring deeply for the experiences you have in Star Trek Online, and you have to believe we care just as deeply.
Perhaps more, considering it's how we pay rent!
When the solutions you have crafted don't end up solving the problem, or create too many unacceptable new problems, it's not a weakness to admit the mistake and start again, so long as something was learned.
Indeed insults and such get us nowhere. Do what you gotta do to improve the game and we can provide constructive feedback for you guys in spite of flame attempts.
I look forward to this explanation on the changes. If we understand more what you guys are thinking then that will help us understand a bit more and perhaps offer better feedback. From your wording I'm guessing something went bonkers when you changed the abilities around and such and I'm curious as to what you guys were seeing. Since we can't always see what you guys see then that definitely can cause some confusion and such on our part as players.
I have to admit that based off what I see so far, I'm not thrilled by allowing GDF to be used while under the effects of Invincible and Continuity again.
Now if he could just un-nerf the science ultimate abiltiy. That GDF change really isn't needed. All it does it give escorts extra cheese since a lot of them love invincible.
That would just re-establish another point of power creep that they're trying to reign in and widen the gap between tactical and the other professions again. Sci ultimate was nerfed for a reason. Instead Deflector Overcharge should've stayed as it allows science an ability that amounts to their version of Attack Pattern Alpha. Something as potent as Deflector Overcharge contributed a great deal into closing the gap and was something that was tailored for science captains alone, which is what's needed at this point imo.
I can see some reasons for taking away SubNuc at the LtC/CMDR and returning it to Science, but why not let Science have their Deflector Overcharge as well?
As to removing the lockout on GDF while an immunity is active, as a Tac captain, I see no risk now in cheesing a system to go max DPS. That, to me, does not make for good game play, let alone sensible mechanics. GDF is supposed to be your last-ditch effort before you possibly die. Now, I can see a significantly reduced GDF in play with an immunity up, but the skill/risk/reward of having near zero hp and staying alive while maintaining a damage buff is now trivial.
These quotes here especially. Deflector Overcharge went a long way to closing the gap between tactical and science. Science can still do good damage but it's not nearly as consistent as tactical. Science at the moment is something they're either going to do great with, or it's going to kick you in the nads from my observations. I have to admit I was looking forward to using SubNuc on my non-sci toons but I can live without it on my non-sci captains. So far I remain skeptical on the Deflector Overcharge removal and feel it could've been better refined if there were issues. Something similar at least imo needs to be done for science.
For the Go Down Fighting changes, the ability should've been left decoupled from Invincible and Continuity. If the objective is to reduce power creep then this is a step in the wrong direction. As the quoted poster pointed out, GDF is meant to be a last ditch effort type of ability. In other words the "if I'm going down I'm taking you with me," type of ability. If left in its current state there is no downside to the ability and no risk to using it. You will also see folks return to using GDF with invincible to guarantee a 0% Hp GDF which is a VERY huge bit of cheese in the power creep scene. If power creep is something that you guys are wanting to address @borticuscryptic then respectfully, I don't see how you guys can justify allowing that to continue. I primarily play tactical and it's something that I've believed to be an issue for some time now. Like I said above perhaps once you guys get the reasoning post to us, then I might can see your train of thought a bit more and can offer better feedback. At the moment I have to say, I'm not a fan of the GDF and Deflector Overcharge reversions.
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Concerning the TS/HY 5 second lockout; by this logic, shouldn't other BOff weapon enhancements that can be chained (CRF, CSV, BO, FaW w/ enough haste) also be subjected to the same rules?
Ack good point. So you need to add that in when comparing to Eng overcapping. Maybe Conservation of Energy + Sensor scan > Eng Aux overcapping. If I had the formula for aux overcapping on tribble I'd do the math.
So now do we really need a forced Respec? Just give us one free Respec and let us decide whether we need to use it because of these changes.
The respec is only required for Science Captains on Tribble who had already done a respec. For any other captain on Tribble, and for all captains when this goes live, it will be optional.
Removed the Kobali Adventure Zone missions from the mission journal and replaced with three wrapper missions titled Kobali Crisis Act I, II, III, that contain the removed missions.
Delta Patrols are no longer required for mission progression but do remain in game.
Experience requirements from levels 50-60 have been significantly lowered.
Updated the window which appears when opening a Lock Box.
This is still a work in progress.
The Progress tab of the Status UI now shows players their current amount of Fleet Credits and their Lifetime Fleet Credits Earned total.
Systems:
Resolved an issue where the Multi-Spectral Particle Generator was not applying damage buffs properly.
The Multi-Spectral Particle Generator set bonus is now treated as exotic damage.
Drain Infection's damage has been increased relative to its current Tribble state.
Prototype Ablative Jevonite Hardpoints can now be used while unequipped.
The Bridge Officer Abilities Torpedo High Yield and Torpedo Spread can no longer be activated while the player has a Torpedo High Yield or Spread available to fire, or if the player has fired a torpedo as a High Yield or Spread within the last 5 seconds.
The Bridge Officer Abilities Torpedo High Yield and Torpedo Spread once again upgrade your next attack within 30 seconds.
Resolved an issue where Surgical Strikes showed an incorrect damage multipler for ranks 2 and 3.
Resolved an issue that caused the Regeneration from the Protomatter Capacitor Starship Trait to not scale with Hull Regeneration. This is a tooltip change only.
Resolved an issue that would cause shield regeneration to fluctuate while cloaked.
Go Down Fighting can once again be used while continuity or invincible are available to save you from dying
Go Down Fighting now only lasts 15 seconds once activated, but has a much shorter cooldown
Subnucleonic Beam is no longer a bridge officer power, and is once again a Science Captain Power.
Deflector Overcharge has been removed from the game.
Resolved an issue that prevented Rock and Roll from providing a damage immunity.
Known Issues:
Bridge Officers who were trained in Subnucleonic Beam can no longer train new Science Bridge Officer abilities.
Captains who previously had Deflector Overcharge will need to retrain skills to regain access to Subnucleonic Beam
Captains who are freshly copied to Tribble should not have this problem.
Thank you for returning Sub-Nuc!!! THHHAAAAAANK YOOOOOOOU!!!
Why on earth have you reduced XP req's for Lvl 50 - 60!? You can already level insanely quickly throughout the game!!!! In fact it's one of my biggest bug-bears that you can lvl to 50 with-in a week's normal play!
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Why on earth have you reduced XP req's for Lvl 50 - 60!? You can already level insanely quickly throughout the game!!!! In fact it's one of my biggest bug-bears that you can lvl to 50 with-in a week's normal play!
This has been needed for years as it brings the level 50-60 in line with the rest of the game. I don't know about you but I don't consider grinding longer than necessary to gain a level to be fun. The game shouldn't have to take a very long time to level a character. Yes they want to keep folks playing and I don't expect to be able to gain 30 levels from one mission, but on the flip side I do expect that I shouldn't have to do 50 missions just to gain half a level either. When Delta Rising came out it was a grind fest to get to 60 even if you were someone who spammed the living daylights out of patrols back when you could repeat them. I don't see why it should take obscene amounts of time to get to 60.
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So now do we really need a forced Respec? Just give us one free Respec and let us decide whether we need to use it because of these changes.
@ltminns: It is implied, but basically, science characters already on Tribble need respeccing, but characters copied over don't. It worked for me. The mandatory respec was necessary when they removed SNB, but since that is no longer happening, it's not necessary.
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The buff to your shield healing is not anywhere as valuable as a buff to your primary damage source in STO, because even with the changes, it will still be mostly a DPS race in PvE content. And so if you don't fly a Science Vessel as Science Captain, you are at a disadvantage to someone playing a Science Captain in a Science Vessel, since the Science Captain in the Science Vessel is buffing his primary damage source, and you're not.
You might be better off then you are now, but you are still not reaching your full potential. And that is what will inevitably narrow down the choices people will see as valuable. Even if you personally might think that at least you're doing better than you are now, in the large scheme of the game's balance, you're still making a suboptimal choice.
Suboptimal choices exist across the game. An ENG captain in an escort isn't reaching the same healing potential as an ENG captain in a cruiser. There are also some compromises between a TAC captain a cruiser or science vessel over an escort (though these aren't particularly noticeable in current STO.) This is basic to specialization versus generalization, mixing professions and ships pulls you down from maximum potential to compromise with other areas of gameplay.
Engineering abilities actually do very little to buff heals. Some of them are self-heals, but they don't buff other heals. Engineering Team buffs your entire team, so it doesn't have to be you who's the healer.
The build-in heals keep the Engineer alive, whether he's in an Escort, Cruiser or Science Vessel. The power buffs helps everything, the energy drain reduction mostly helps energy weapons, which all ship classes can utilize (arguably it helps science the least, but then the bonus power compensates for one of the science vessel weaknesses - needing high power levels everywhere - and the rotate shield frequency shield DR buff augments the strong science vessels strong shields well, so overall it roughly balances out between the ship classes.)
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What PVE advantage (with Tribble changes) is there to playing a science vessel with a SCI captain vs TAC or ENG? What advantage is there to playing any vessel with a SCI captain in PVE?
Sensor Scan is an AOE hull resistance debuff. That means any AoE attacks after you sensor scanned, of you and your team, are getting stronger. That works great for every ship class that has access to AoE abilities.
I remember that there was once talk about Tholian Carrier "Nanny" ships that used their pets Attack Pattern Beta to buff the damage output of the team and the Tacticals - put Science Captains in these nannies, and they can also add sensor scan as extra damage for the team's Tacticals. (and I suspect that was already part of the "nanny" team set up, but I am no expert on that matter.) Of course, the damage they added to their team mates is probably never traced back to them in the logs.
For the Science Captain's concerns - if he's using Gravity Well, Destabilizing Resonance Beam, Subspace Vortex, Beam Fire At WIll, Torpedo Spread, Cannon Scatter Volley or any other AoE skills I am not remembering right now, Sensor Scan is a big damage enhancer, possibly on the level of Attack Pattern Alpha. (Not sure if anyone ever compared the two powers directly.)
Subnucleonic Beam is basically the Science Vessel Captain's equivalent of Fire on My Mark. It's much more powerful in PvP then FOMM, but much weaker in PvE.
And now the Photonic Fleet is also a lot stronger than it used to be. I am certainly not sure that it was enough, and I would prefer to see some additional PvE related buff to SNB.
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Looking at it if we honestly want to make science (well all careers really) largely competitive with each other in content, and that many feel that deflector overload was a move in the right direction for that, than as I posted maybe looking into areas of a science captain's ability that we could add aspects of what deflector overload did could help. Some examples would be like those listed below.
Distributing aspects of defl;ector overload among other science captain abilities.
Sensor scan: You could buff the damage resistance debuff from sensor scan to give even more of a debuff to exotic, and Kenitic based damage. Though you could also roll into sensor scan that it debuff the control resistance of the target as well.
Science fleet: With this you could buff the shield restoration, or merely just apply a shield healing aspect to it as well, while buffing the draining aspect of this ability as well as adding a control buff maybe.
Subnucleonic Beam: I find this ability semi-strange as outside of areas that you need to strip buffs off targets, it is quite useless base-line, compared to the other two careers that even base-line their abilities have some use in all content. So what about either making this actually debuff the target making them more vulnerable to conteol or drain, maybe even exoptic damage for a short duration after it's use. Though their is the idea of adding a buf stealing aspect to Subnucleonic Beam in which it has a change to re-apply one of the removed buffs onto the science captain that used it.
Each of these types of buffs would be quite small in scale really, and yet combined would be quite a nice buff to science overall making them more competitive. The idea of deflector overload was not a bad idea, it was just wonky as it felt like it was going to push you into specific ship types.
I personally still find that having science ships having innately sub-system targeting is a bit weird too, even though with the changes to sub-system targeting making it work with cannons an function differently is nice. It stems from the fact that science ships are one of the only ship types that have a set of boff abilities innately on them. I wonder if their might be a way of creating something different that is more universally useful for all captain careers to have for science ships instead of sub-system targeting. The idea of the secondary deflector that you can slot different secondary deflectors to gain different effects for the science abilities you slot is a good example of this concept of a universally useful aspect of your ship.
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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.'
But all the reverted changes to subnuke, etc are most saddening.
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Many people seem to be worried about science captains being useless, and tactical captains performing better with science ships than science captains in science ships. Science captains still need their Subnucleonic Beam for PvP to keep their role while they also have to have some advantages when using science abilities/ships in PvE.
Suggestion:
That would mean science captains should get some advantages when flying science ships, advantages tacticals do not have. One way of doing this would be buffing the science captain (profession specific) trait "Conservation of Energy".
This trait is up most of the time - with 3 stacks.
One stack gives 10% bonus exotic damage.
To compensate for the removal of the deflector overcharge, this trait could be buffed by increasing the damage, to maybe 15% or 20% (or even bigger bonuses to balance it vs tactical captains) per stack.
In addition, the trait should give small bonuses for other skills that affect science abilities. For instance 5% bonus drain and 5% bonus to control abilities per stack.
Since science abilities are the best in terms of control and drain (special BOff abilities aside) science captains would make a lot more use of science ships than tactical captains in a tactical ship. This would also encourage more people to run science captains and make control or drain heavy science ships.
Science Captains don't need help in Science Vessels. Science Captains problem is that they have one ability that is really strong in PvP, but not very strong in PvE. That is suboptimal. Deflector Overcharge was an attempt to give Science Captains something that's good in both, but it also narrowed down their role to playing science vessels, because it mostly buffed things that are strong on Science Vessels (and maybe Temporal Full Spec vessels) and not so strong on other ship classes.
So the problem is finding a way to make the science suite of powers more effective in PvE, without making it also more effective in PvP, and without narrowing down the available ship choices.
I think science captain's having 30% cat 2 damage bonus up all the time whilst also having aoe resistance debuff sensor scan is enough. This is already synergistic with science vessels. Unfortunately all tac buffs also apply to science boff abilities too which makes science a problem when it tries to compete in its own class of ship.
Also regarding go down fighting. It would be fitting to add a lockout on continuity and invincible for the duration of go down fighting once it is activated. This would allow for the tactical captain to actually 'go down fighting', otherwise devs I think you should consider renaming the ability to 'don't go down fighting'. Please devs, today is always a good day to die!
What PVE advantage (with Tribble changes) is there to playing a science vessel with a SCI captain vs TAC or ENG? What advantage is there to playing any vessel with a SCI captain in PVE?
The answer is, that it's a disadvantage.
Something like
1. Reduce cooldown of Photonic Fleet
2. Eliminate Photonic Capacitor trait
3. Replace Photonic Capacitor with the Holodeck version of Control Amplification
would give SCI captains some kind of advantage in a role vs TAC and ENG, which they currently have none of on Tribble. Unless "worst at everything" is the intended role, as a means of handicapping oneself for an additional challenge.
I can see some reasons for taking away SubNuc at the LtC/CMDR and returning it to Science, but why not let Science have their Deflector Overcharge as well?
As for the torpedo change, what is the reasoning for the lockout on TS/HY for 5 seconds? I get it that you don't want torp users to have a "double-tap", but since CF can be cleared via Tac Team, as well as other sources of debuff clears incredibly easily, this will hurt PvE and PvP performance for torps.
Then, there's still the matter of several torpedo mechanics and torpedoes themselves not working properly. Will those bugs be fixed prior to launch?
Big picture question: What is the role of torpedoes in the current and future game of STO? How does the Rail Gun and other Heavy Weapons factor into the decisions made with torpedoes in the game?
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I knew using Kinetics would be playing the game on hard mode, but what I didn't realize was how bad the deck is stacked against Kinetics.
Nothing else changes. All builds remain the same, but scis get more from using science ships and I see absolutely no problem with that. The problem I have is that tacticals are still better in science ships than science captains, so I don't see many reasons to go for a science captain (over a tactical) in PvE. The only reason would be ground, but that's a whole different story. Tacs are better in every other damage - focused ships. It would also encourage people to make a science captain and play a science based ship with science abilities, and not a science ship with all beams and plasma consoles (Yes I know, that will change) like it used to be. A tac can still fly a science ships, that won't change at all. But the sci will have a slight advantage over a tactical captain, just like a science captain does less damage in an escort with a 5/2 weapon layout and 2 science consoles.
They also have one solid debuff a couple extra powers (photonic fleet and scattering field) which do seem to be specifically directed at compensating for science vessel shortcomings (weapons and tanking respectively). Ie. the class already feels pigeon-holed because it is difficult (in my experience) to find other builds besides science vessel and science carrier that takes specific advantage of their full range of captain powers (whereas ENG and TAC captains can more easily to take advantage of their full set across many different builds. See my previous example of turning an ENG cruiser into an exotic build, just about everything fits in.)
IMO, science captains need more help with science abilities (and powers that emulate them, ex. Aceton Beam, Attack Pattern Beta), allowing them to start making better use of them those across a wider range of ships (which would seem to be why you chose Science [ie. emphasis on special abilities] over TAC/ENG in the first place.) Their current range of captain powers seems too unfocused (and DO seemed like a step in the right direction.)
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Personally I'm glad this was rolled back. While I had no complaints about SNB being a BOff ability, removing SNB as a captain power and replacing it with something that encouraged science captains into only science ships took a lot of diversity out of game.
I do understand how some players think that SNB (as a captain power) is a 'useless' ability in PVE, I really do, but DO could also be as equally 'useless' unless you had a build to take advantage of it. With this rollback I feel I would no longer be making a *wrong* choice by flying a science/cruiser or science/escort combination.
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I knew using Kinetics would be playing the game on hard mode, but what I didn't realize was how bad the deck is stacked against Kinetics.
Not likely, DO had shield healing. And I do have to question what a science cruiser/escort is doing that wouldn't be partially improved by +drain/exotic/control. Sensor scan by itself isn't enough to make a recognizable "science escort build" or scattering field with a "science cruiser." Those have to be teamed synergistically with other traits, and abilities which tend to fall into the core sci areas (ex. Aceton Beam, Attack Pattern Beta, Ionic Turbulence). Otherwise, one should ostensibly be flying a TAC/ENG character whose abilities more directly feed into Cruiser/Escort gameplay.
If it's just a question of "well, I like sci but I want to fly anything I want regardless of how that's speced out" you could have done that too with DO (and taken advantage of the shield healing over depressing power levels without drain.) DO wouldn't have necessarily made it more difficult to fly non-sci ships with a sci character simply by being relevant (but not exclusively relevant) to sci.
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The buff to your shield healing is not anywhere as valuable as a buff to your primary damage source in STO, because even with the changes, it will still be mostly a DPS race in PvE content. And so if you don't fly a Science Vessel as Science Captain, you are at a disadvantage to someone playing a Science Captain in a Science Vessel, since the Science Captain in the Science Vessel is buffing his primary damage source, and you're not.
You might be better off then you are now, but you are still not reaching your full potential. And that is what will inevitably narrow down the choices people will see as valuable. Even if you personally might think that at least you're doing better than you are now, in the large scheme of the game's balance, you're still making a suboptimal choice.
I wouldn't say minimal heals. Just less than most tacs run in pvp now a days.
Agreed. I had not even thought about the Eng Aux overcapping! Sci does have conservation of energy. I have not done the math to see if it compares to eng aux overcapping, though. Conservation of energy certainly does not compare to apa/gdf, though.
If they would remove the exotic buff from gdf/apa, that would solve the tac issue. Some combination of bringing DO back, or buffing Conservation of Energy, or perhaps making sensor scan AoE (e.g everyone in a 90 degree cone, for example) could counter the Eng issue.
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Suboptimal choices exist across the game. An ENG captain in an escort isn't reaching the same healing potential as an ENG captain in a cruiser. There are also some compromises between a TAC captain a cruiser or science vessel over an escort (though these aren't particularly noticeable in current STO.) This is basic to specialization versus generalization, mixing professions and ships pulls you down from maximum potential to compromise with other areas of gameplay.
Tradeoffs have been made.
As a result, buffs to the core won't benefit the generalist as much of the specialist. This is true across all professions in terms of absolute magnitudes whether or not that magnitude is in fact necessary for gameplay (ie. you can go too far with damage resistance buffs and healing for ENG, there are diminishing returns after a point. Ditto TAC seating for TAC captains using beams.) But that's just a factor of comparing the absolute size of a percentage based increase across two different numbers (again, it's stating common principle.) The lower generalist "loses out" according to one number, but remember that they've made a strategic choice to invest in other stats (which pays off if they have disproportionate benefits in context. Ex. not exploding as frequently compensating for a lower increase in sci potential.)
Removing DO does not change these dynamics, it simply avoids talking about them by sticking to the null state (with respect to PVE) of SNB's status quo. A 0% buff has the same impact regardless.
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Indeed insults and such get us nowhere. Do what you gotta do to improve the game and we can provide constructive feedback for you guys in spite of flame attempts.
I look forward to this explanation on the changes. If we understand more what you guys are thinking then that will help us understand a bit more and perhaps offer better feedback. From your wording I'm guessing something went bonkers when you changed the abilities around and such and I'm curious as to what you guys were seeing. Since we can't always see what you guys see then that definitely can cause some confusion and such on our part as players.
I have to admit that based off what I see so far, I'm not thrilled by allowing GDF to be used while under the effects of Invincible and Continuity again.
That would just re-establish another point of power creep that they're trying to reign in and widen the gap between tactical and the other professions again. Sci ultimate was nerfed for a reason. Instead Deflector Overcharge should've stayed as it allows science an ability that amounts to their version of Attack Pattern Alpha. Something as potent as Deflector Overcharge contributed a great deal into closing the gap and was something that was tailored for science captains alone, which is what's needed at this point imo.
These quotes here especially. Deflector Overcharge went a long way to closing the gap between tactical and science. Science can still do good damage but it's not nearly as consistent as tactical. Science at the moment is something they're either going to do great with, or it's going to kick you in the nads from my observations. I have to admit I was looking forward to using SubNuc on my non-sci toons but I can live without it on my non-sci captains. So far I remain skeptical on the Deflector Overcharge removal and feel it could've been better refined if there were issues. Something similar at least imo needs to be done for science.
For the Go Down Fighting changes, the ability should've been left decoupled from Invincible and Continuity. If the objective is to reduce power creep then this is a step in the wrong direction. As the quoted poster pointed out, GDF is meant to be a last ditch effort type of ability. In other words the "if I'm going down I'm taking you with me," type of ability. If left in its current state there is no downside to the ability and no risk to using it. You will also see folks return to using GDF with invincible to guarantee a 0% Hp GDF which is a VERY huge bit of cheese in the power creep scene. If power creep is something that you guys are wanting to address @borticuscryptic then respectfully, I don't see how you guys can justify allowing that to continue. I primarily play tactical and it's something that I've believed to be an issue for some time now. Like I said above perhaps once you guys get the reasoning post to us, then I might can see your train of thought a bit more and can offer better feedback. At the moment I have to say, I'm not a fan of the GDF and Deflector Overcharge reversions.
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"A good weapon and a great strategy will win you many battles." - Marshall
I knew using Kinetics would be playing the game on hard mode, but what I didn't realize was how bad the deck is stacked against Kinetics.
Ack good point. So you need to add that in when comparing to Eng overcapping. Maybe Conservation of Energy + Sensor scan > Eng Aux overcapping. If I had the formula for aux overcapping on tribble I'd do the math.
The respec is only required for Science Captains on Tribble who had already done a respec. For any other captain on Tribble, and for all captains when this goes live, it will be optional.
The damage change you are referring to happened in the March 15th Tribble patch; the one that started this set of changes:
Thank you for returning Sub-Nuc!!! THHHAAAAAANK YOOOOOOOU!!!
Why on earth have you reduced XP req's for Lvl 50 - 60!? You can already level insanely quickly throughout the game!!!! In fact it's one of my biggest bug-bears that you can lvl to 50 with-in a week's normal play!
This has been needed for years as it brings the level 50-60 in line with the rest of the game. I don't know about you but I don't consider grinding longer than necessary to gain a level to be fun. The game shouldn't have to take a very long time to level a character. Yes they want to keep folks playing and I don't expect to be able to gain 30 levels from one mission, but on the flip side I do expect that I shouldn't have to do 50 missions just to gain half a level either. When Delta Rising came out it was a grind fest to get to 60 even if you were someone who spammed the living daylights out of patrols back when you could repeat them. I don't see why it should take obscene amounts of time to get to 60.
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@ltminns: It is implied, but basically, science characters already on Tribble need respeccing, but characters copied over don't. It worked for me. The mandatory respec was necessary when they removed SNB, but since that is no longer happening, it's not necessary.
The build-in heals keep the Engineer alive, whether he's in an Escort, Cruiser or Science Vessel. The power buffs helps everything, the energy drain reduction mostly helps energy weapons, which all ship classes can utilize (arguably it helps science the least, but then the bonus power compensates for one of the science vessel weaknesses - needing high power levels everywhere - and the rotate shield frequency shield DR buff augments the strong science vessels strong shields well, so overall it roughly balances out between the ship classes.)
Maybe add a special exotic damage resistance debuff to subnuc, so that when you subnuc someone you deal more exotic damage to them.
I remember that there was once talk about Tholian Carrier "Nanny" ships that used their pets Attack Pattern Beta to buff the damage output of the team and the Tacticals - put Science Captains in these nannies, and they can also add sensor scan as extra damage for the team's Tacticals. (and I suspect that was already part of the "nanny" team set up, but I am no expert on that matter.) Of course, the damage they added to their team mates is probably never traced back to them in the logs.
For the Science Captain's concerns - if he's using Gravity Well, Destabilizing Resonance Beam, Subspace Vortex, Beam Fire At WIll, Torpedo Spread, Cannon Scatter Volley or any other AoE skills I am not remembering right now, Sensor Scan is a big damage enhancer, possibly on the level of Attack Pattern Alpha. (Not sure if anyone ever compared the two powers directly.)
Subnucleonic Beam is basically the Science Vessel Captain's equivalent of Fire on My Mark. It's much more powerful in PvP then FOMM, but much weaker in PvE.
And now the Photonic Fleet is also a lot stronger than it used to be. I am certainly not sure that it was enough, and I would prefer to see some additional PvE related buff to SNB.
Distributing aspects of defl;ector overload among other science captain abilities.- Sensor scan: You could buff the damage resistance debuff from sensor scan to give even more of a debuff to exotic, and Kenitic based damage. Though you could also roll into sensor scan that it debuff the control resistance of the target as well.
- Science fleet: With this you could buff the shield restoration, or merely just apply a shield healing aspect to it as well, while buffing the draining aspect of this ability as well as adding a control buff maybe.
- Subnucleonic Beam: I find this ability semi-strange as outside of areas that you need to strip buffs off targets, it is quite useless base-line, compared to the other two careers that even base-line their abilities have some use in all content. So what about either making this actually debuff the target making them more vulnerable to conteol or drain, maybe even exoptic damage for a short duration after it's use. Though their is the idea of adding a buf stealing aspect to Subnucleonic Beam in which it has a change to re-apply one of the removed buffs onto the science captain that used it.
Each of these types of buffs would be quite small in scale really, and yet combined would be quite a nice buff to science overall making them more competitive. The idea of deflector overload was not a bad idea, it was just wonky as it felt like it was going to push you into specific ship types.
I personally still find that having science ships having innately sub-system targeting is a bit weird too, even though with the changes to sub-system targeting making it work with cannons an function differently is nice. It stems from the fact that science ships are one of the only ship types that have a set of boff abilities innately on them. I wonder if their might be a way of creating something different that is more universally useful for all captain careers to have for science ships instead of sub-system targeting. The idea of the secondary deflector that you can slot different secondary deflectors to gain different effects for the science abilities you slot is a good example of this concept of a universally useful aspect of your ship.