I think what we need from @borticuscryptic and the other developers are some answers as to what role(s) do they want the conventional weapons to play, especially with new weapon types like Heavy Weapons making an entrance into the game.
Actions speak louder than words, so right now the only role they're quite loudly telling us they want torpedoes and mines to go right back to is "Trap option in an Ivory Tower game system design".
The most fundamental question, question 0 to your list, would be: Why are projectiles actively kept inferior to energy weapons in every way and by every possible metric despite using up an identical number of weapon slots?
It's nice to have follow up discussions on forums to measure up changes to the nature of class balancing. For the sake of science subnucleonic beam, I think it could take some inspiration from other captain and boff science abilities in order to help keep it within the science class genre whilst closing the performance gap between other classes. My idea is a Pb-aoe subnucleonic shockwave like the Intel ability sort of, but with lesser effects than the current beam, but that also buffs some science and healing skills and exotic dmg. I like the aoe for science because that's what most of its abilities are based around. This brings the update in line with engineer Eps transfer overcap which is similar to OSS Intel skill, another example of modifying a captain skill to be like a superior version of a specialist skill.
Maybe could be some kind of subnucleonic corrosive blast Pb-aoe that erodes hull resistances too. That would significantly focus science in to the debuffing role it's intended to be.
I think there's every reason to take pre existing specialist skills and modify them to see how they sit within a science captain subnucleonic beam replacement. I say this because alot of specialist abilities are already very science focused so there's no real desperate need to completely reinvent the wheel here.
I think what we need from @borticuscryptic and the other developers are some answers as to what role(s) do they want the conventional weapons to play, especially with new weapon types like Heavy Weapons making an entrance into the game.
Actions speak louder than words, so right now the only role they're quite loudly telling us they want torpedoes and mines to go right back to is "Trap option in an Ivory Tower game system design".
The most fundamental question, question 0 to your list, would be: Why are projectiles actively kept inferior to energy weapons in every way and by every possible metric despite using up an identical number of weapon slots?
I tried mostly torpedo/exotic builds on Tribble ,so I don't really know how much non-torpedo builds were "nerfed" - but it is my understanding that the nerfs to beam fire at will, embassy consoles and plasmonic leech as well as the new weapon power rules also hit beam builds. What I do know is that NPCs still melt from my attacks.
And you may not have noticed it, because I didn't at the time: During the Agents of Yesterday build, Omega Kinetic Shearing got a more or less unintentional buff. It used to be that the DOT effect was only based on damage actually incurred to hull, but since then, it applied to the torpedoes damage before any resistances or shields come into play. That means Torpedoes basically got a real 40 % extra hull damage from the trait. The reduction to 10 % is of course signficant compared to the post AOY state, but is probably still better than what Kinetic Shearing did before.
And they rolled back the 10 second active time for torpedo buffs, they are back to 30 seconds as before.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Of course I noticed it. Everyone noticed it. You'll note they were still squarely a couple of hundred thousand DPS under the beams for the best players, and *significantly* weaker than any equivalent energy build to the average player; even *with* the 40% shearing you were still putting in twice the effort for 2/3 the output, and said output is generally measured using a certain mission where half the targets have *no shields*...
The problem's not that it's too strong now - that did need to be peeled back - but not because of the total output of torpedoes under it. And therein lies the issue. Shearing covered up the symptom. It's now being reduced to a quarter of its value but with not only a refusal to cure the underlying disease but an actual additional hobbling thrown in for good measure.
Torpedoes were subpar *WITH* it. The damage shearing is providing on holodeck is too much for a trait, yes, but it's also directly compensating for damage and capabilities that *SHOULD* be integrated to the torpedoes and yet is not.
Torpedoes do less damage than most (I think turrets do fall behind even maxed out, but they're 360' weapons that get boosted by abilities like scatter and rapidfire) energy weapons at high energy levels; and that's fine, as you're not paying energy to fire them (but they are disabled at 0 energy). But then? Then they get reduced by 62.5% (for standard bleedthrough values) against shields. Then they don't get to simultaneously fire like the energy weapons do. Then they don't get haste. Then they don't get to all benefit from bridge officer abilities the way all the energy weapons do. Then they get less access to armor/shield penetration too, and fewer set bonuses and unique item effects. Energy weapons get a singularity ability all on their own too! And projectile users? They're stuck staring at that filthy overcharge button, unable to swap or alter it or ever get any use out of the thing.
And here we are, watching them get yet another cooldown thrown in against them, because somehow, SOMEHOW, they, not the energy weapons that completely outmatch them, need to be "toned down" as well?
I appreciate the detailed, direct communication. I think I can speak for everyone in thanking the two of you for that.
I normally would never be obnoxious enough to address a Dev directly on forums, as I normally would think you all have better things to do than chat, but I have some PVP-related concerns which seem salient to the current (much appreciated) efforts you are putting in to genuinely attempting to balance the PVP experience. I'll put them after Borticus' quote here.
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.
...
Go Down Fighting
The problem we were attempting to solve here, is the Risk-vs-Reward element of this particular ability. It has always been intended that gaining a larger damage output bonus from GDF should be restricted to scenarios where the player is very likely to perish. This is actually why the original duration was so long - because it wasn't supposed to matter, since you'd almost-inevitably die long before the duration timed out. With the introduction of Damage Immunities and Death Prevention triggers, it became far too easy to gain maximum benefit from this ability without having to factor in its risk factors.
The initial change was made from the perspective of "If there are no risk factors at play (because you are Unkillable) then you should not reap any rewards."
We ended up reverting this change for a few very important reasons:
1) For Tactical Captains, it severely diminished (or, some could say eliminated) the invested value of two highly desirable and enjoyable gameplay modifying talents: Temporal Operative's "Continuity" and the "Invincible" Starship Trait.
2) It effectively removed the "Good Day To Die" Personal Trait from being a valid gameplay choice, if you chose to run either of the passives mentioned in the above point.
Ultimately, the above factors led us to realize that modifying the availability of GDF in this manner was more of a band-aid than a true solution, and caused some major issues that we hadn't intended. So, after re-examining the reasons that GDF remained a concern, we decided to try out a different change, which would not *remove* the players' ability to mitigate the risk of using the ability, but would instead *limit* how much of that risk could be removed. This led us to the changes you see in the most recent patch. Now that GDF has a shorter up-time, and will be used more frequently, players attempting to get the most out of this ability will have to be absorbing more near-death risk on a regularly-recurring basis.
It probably goes without saying (but I'll say it anyway!) that we're still watching this closely, to make sure we aren't creating any unanticipated issues this time around. And to see whether or not sufficient risk has been re-introduced to the ability's performance status, to warrant the significant benefits it still offers.
Point blank: Go Down Fighting, and the interactions it has with some traits and specializations, is pretty much THE issue in PVP.
The original design of Go Down Fighting is a really cool Tactical ability with appealing thematic flavor. However, it has become problematic to the point of gamebreaking in terms of PVP for the following interactions:
- Last Ditch Effort, a lockbox space trait that adds 100% damage resistance to Go Down Fighting.
- A Good Day to Die, a lockbox space trait that allows use of Go Down Fighting at any hull strength.
- Invincible, the lockbox ship trait that makes you unkillable for 8 seconds, as well as granting a 50% bonus to both hull and should healing.
- Continuity, the Temporal specialization ability that teleports you 8km away from danger when you're at 10% hull, which loses any downside with Adaptation II.
Combine this with Attrition Warfare from the Strategist specialization, which drastically reduces Captain and BOFF shield and hull heals while in threatening stance, it makes even the most mediocre of Tac captains all but immortal in a PVP situation. Whether we're talking about the build on Holodeck or the current build on Tribble, there is virtually no substantive risk involved with Go Down Fighting, and nothing but a gamebreaking stack of rewards given in return.
As is stands, when GDF is combined with all of the above, you've created a situation where anyone in PVP who isn't a Tactical captain with a Battle Cloak-capable ship is playing wrong. That's indefensible from a game design/gameplay perspective no matter how anyone tries to justify it.
It is logical to want to protect Tactical player investments of time and money, and it is logical that Cryptic doesn't want to hurt their bottom line by discouraging Tac captains from buying lockbox keys to get traits you've created. But quite frankly, you can't punish two out of three player career choices while doing so, that is not logical. I am extremely appreciative of the sincere efforts you're currently putting in to fixing the PVP situation, but they will all be in vain if you don't fix the total mess that is Go Down Fighting and it's host of God Mode interactions.
You guys are beyond clever enough to fix this. Please wow us with your talents and do so.
"I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of how awesome I am."
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
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.
Tribble has been updated to: ST.75.20170306c.4
Go Down Fighting:
Now scales damage much more aggressively with missing HP
Can no longer be activated while Invincible or Continuity are available to save you from death
Because it did not happen in this patch, it was not called out for this patch, because it had already happened and been called out.
My appologies, but the "give us numbers" still stand
In addition to GDF, maybe it would be good to reduce the max effect at all to maybe 75% to not let the gap between weaker and better players escalate again.
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.
@crypticspartan#0627,
Thank you for this change. I regret the tone of my post in the previous patch notes thread. Trying to turn the Resolute into an ad-hoc science vessel was frustrating and that spilled out into the forums.
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.
...True. But Deflector Overcharge is something that would have been useful in any situation, 100% of the time...
I do not agree. My cruiser has no problems with healing now. 50% bonus to healing every two minutes is just too long a gap. I have to survive the two minutes the ability is on cooldown, so it does not justify changing my BOff setup. At best, I could re-arrange consoles and possibly get rid of one survivability console, but I doubt it.
The defensive bonus from the skill increases are tiny and vastly outperformed by active powers such as the various Teams and Polarize Hull.
The changes exchanged an ability that was of little value against many enemies for an ability that was of little value on many ships. Deflector Overcharge needed to go back to the drawing board.
Probably the best solution to subnucleonic beam is to go through and give every enemy race/type some sort of buff skill that they use that makes stripping buffs a worthwhile activity in PvE. Player mechanics don't exist in a vacuum (even in deep space ). What we do is only half of the equation, with NPC behavior/content the complementary half. Create some value to cleansing in PvE and that button's desirability will rise.
This would be a terrible idea.
The content is based on sending waves of enemies at you. To buff 6 enemies, then debuff a single one leaves you in a spot where you have to kill 5 buffed enemies, and have no damage boosting powers like Engineers or Tacticals.
I would say, leave subnuc alone. Unless you change it to have radically different performance in PvE then it does in PvP, you should probably be looking at a different Science Captain power.
Do you even watch Star Trek beyond that pew pew JJTrek ****? Starfleet practices wargames...which is pretty much what PvP is since the Federation and Empire aren't at war.
What does PvP have to do with being a Moba? Obvious PvP hater is obvious...just because you hate PvP (Or aren't good enough to compete without broken mechanics) doesn't mean everyone hates PvP.
I hate that changes geared towards PVP are affecting PVE, and as for JJ Trek, it revolts me to think about it as Star Trek, period. Now competitive PVE has some merit and is more along the lines of what I find enjoyable. I have no problems with PVP being broken or fixed, the problem is the amount of negativity PVP generates. Case in point this very argument and your remark about me not being good enough. See, pointless drama.
Except he obviously meant that the base stats of the NPC's should be lowered and the buff then brings the NPC to the level at which it is now.
But is it worth revamping all NPC's to fix one power? Why not incorporate buff stripping into sensor scan and allow some kind of new power to take SNB's place? I'm still in favor of deflector overcharge but anything that builds more synergy within captain sci powers would be welcome.
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
This is a bit of a difficult situation. We have been attempting to address a couple of what we consider to be fairly significant gameplay issues:
- Subnucleonic Beam is not a strong PvE gameplay choice, on pretty much a universal basis.
- Science Captains lack competitive performance output increases, compared to Tactical and Engineering captains.
We tried to fix two birds with one stone here, by replacing the underperforming ability with something that we hoped would narrow a performance gap. And within those specific parameters, we still consider the original solution to have been a good one that successfully met our design goals.
However, as with the GDF changes, this replacement presented a number of new issues that we didn't think were worth what was gained.
As specialized of an ability as SubNuc is, I forsee a very major rework being required for SubNuc. I absolutely agree that Deflector Overcharge was a great solution. It's going to require something pretty major at this point imo to close that gap for Science. I can still do pretty good damage with all of my sci toons but their damage can be wildly inconsistent.
1) Science Captains became too-heavily incentivized to fly only starships that could make heavy use of Exotic Damage abilities. Since this list of ships is relatively small, and since we don't like the idea of pigeon-holing a Class to a Ship Type, this was an immediate problem.
2) Making Subnucleonic Beam into a Bridge Officer Ability didn't fix the ability's problems, but only changed its associated choice space. And now all players had the opportunity to see how problematic the ability is in PvE... nothing was solved. All we did was increase the exposure of its shortcomings.
3) Changing Subnucleonic Beam to a Boff power inadvertently diminished Science Captain viability in PvP, while simultaneously increasing the relative effectiveness of non-Science builds that suddenly had the ability to add a powerful PvP tool to their arsenals.
With this change reverted, and SNB back on Science Captains as it previously was, we're back to examining the original issues once more. This is definitely not a done deal, and we are discussing additional options that we might explore, to potentially solve the original problems we were facing. Reverting the change at this point was just a matter of knowing that the consequences of this particular design decision were not acceptable, in terms of collateral damage. I'd expect to see another change to SNB before Season 13 launches (or perhaps shortly thereafter) but we're not yet prepared to discuss what form that change may take.
1: I would respectfully ask, how is it a bad thing that sci captains have an edge with sci ships or sci heavy ships? I would actually expect that the various careers have an edge in using ships that better match their career. Sci captains having an edge in sci heavy ships, Engineers with engineering heavy ships, and Tac toons with tac heavy ships. By giving a slight edge to Sci toons using sci heavy ships, I wouldn't call that pigeon-holing as much as I would reinforcing the strengths of said captains. I absolutely believe Science should have the ability to take more advantage of exotic type abilities than their Tac or Engineering counterparts as that's supposed to be the area they excel at, abilities that Tac and Engineer wouldn't normally use. Any of the careers should be able to fly any ship they like and do reasonably well, but I don't see anything wrong with giving an edge to captains that fly ships more in line with their careers. By that logic I would be a tactical captain flying cruisers, which traditionally are more tailored towards engineers. Although I would get more of an advantage by flying a tac heavier ship, I choose to fly cruisers and forgo that extra benefit because I like to fly my cruisers and work better for how I like to play.
2: I would argue that to a point this ability in its current form is actually overspecialized. The ability itself is really only useful in pvp type situations or purging a very select few and rare buffs from enemy NPCs in a pve situation. There are a few possible solutions that I will outline in a few down below. This is one ability I have to admit I was looking forward to experimenting with on my non-sci toons.
3: I would actually argue this change wasn't as a bad as it was thought to be. Folks still have access to the SubNuc Carrier Wave which is a slightly lesser version of SubNuc. The ability requires an intel seat but the point is that folks still have access to SubNuc type effects. In terms of pvp by decoupling SubNuc Beam from science it actually gave an interesting scenario of having to watch for SubNuc coming from other places. You had no way of knowing if the Engineer or the Tac coming at you was going to SubNuc you or not and it forced you play your cards differently. I would also argue that simply because the ability is there also doesn't mean it will get used. There are alot of folks who would use the ability sure, but there are also alot of folks who would choose not to use it if it was left as a boff power.
I forsee this having the potential to be a situation World of Warcraft has had to deal with for years. In a game like WoW or STO where there are pvp and pve elements, there needs to be a very clear separation between the 2 game types. The WoW devs refuse to draw this line and more often than not, nerfs made for pvp reasons have carried over to pve, or vice versa, and hurt the game as a whole. STO thankfully hasn't had this problem so far too much. You guys have been pretty good at drawing that line with certain abilities such as saying "ability lasts for x time against NPCs, but z against players." WoW has started to implement certain abilities that are only available in pvp scenarios and others available only in pve situations. Something like that perhaps to a lesser extent could be utilized here. Now I do have a few possible solutions you might could use as ideas.
1: As some others have pointed out, remove the exotic damage buffs from several tactical powers. Some of the buffs can be left in place but the ones causing the most severe gaps in performance can be removed. The buffs for weapons would remain and some of the buffs for exotic, but not to the degree they are now. This may not be the best solution but it would remove some of the ability of Tac to sling exotic damage better than Sci in alot of cases.
2: Rework Deflector Overcharge into a new version of Science Fleet. The current version of Science Fleet could be made into a more defensive type power focusing more on shield restoration and such. By making Deflector Overcharge the new Science Fleet it would inherit the 5min timer of the current sci fleet (pre-cooldown reductions of course) and be an ability that delivers a nice gap closer, but also keeps it from being spammed to high heaven and back.
3: Allow more buffs on NPC enemies to be purged with SubNuc Beam. The issue with SubNuc is there's very little that it can purge against NPC enemies. Since that's the case it just kind of sits there.
4: Rework Sensor Scan into something similar to Deflector Overcharge, but only allow it to work for sci captains. This could allow a bit of a rework on an older ability and allow Sensor Scan to "expose" certain weaknesses to the science captain, such as pointing out a vulnerability to extreme gravity from a Grav Well, or how it could be vulnerable to a type of Destabilizing beam. There's alot of ways it could be spun to make it work.
Those are just some rough ideas off the top of my head. It's apparent at this point imo that you're not going to be able to close the gap between science and tac without some type of major ability or rework. It could be a straight up ability like Deflector Overcharge, removing some of the exotic buffs from tac, or a combination of both. It's honestly never made sense to me that as a tac I can crank out more exotic damage than a sci captain in some instances. I do believe Tac and Engineers should have the ability to deliver a potent Grav Well or similar ability on the fly when needed, but Science should absolutely have the edge and be able to deliver the strongest exotic abilities. Those are some of my thoughts regarding the science stuff. Again @borticuscryptic and @crypticspartan#0627 I don't envy you guys in your job in this instance. I do look forward to see more of what you guys come up with.
"Someone once told me that time was a predator that stalked us all our lives. I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment, because it will never come again." - Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek Generations
Getting strange dps numbers and peaks from this. Is this new and working as intended? Tachyon Particle Field Collapse Damage:2,535,462 (15,273.86 /s) The dps peak was over 1.7 million
Getting strange dps numbers and peaks from this. Is this new and working as intended? Tachyon Particle Field Collapse Damage:2,535,462 (15,273.86 /s) The dps peak was over 1.7 million
The what?Im not familar with that ability or trait..
Except he obviously meant that the base stats of the NPC's should be lowered and the buff then brings the NPC to the level at which it is now.
Then, what is the point? If NPCs are the same as they were before the change, then what benefit is subnuc giving? The ability to kill one mook "really, really fast"?
Might was well go with @mustrumridcully0 idea of turning it into a mega lance beam then. It amounts to the same thing.
Science characters need something that synergizes with AoE. I don't think more single target damage is the answer.
Do you even watch Star Trek beyond that pew pew JJTrek ****? Starfleet practices wargames...which is pretty much what PvP is since the Federation and Empire aren't at war.
What does PvP have to do with being a Moba? Obvious PvP hater is obvious...just because you hate PvP (Or aren't good enough to compete without broken mechanics) doesn't mean everyone hates PvP.
I hate that changes geared towards PVP are affecting PVE, and as for JJ Trek, it revolts me to think about it as Star Trek, period. Now competitive PVE has some merit and is more along the lines of what I find enjoyable. I have no problems with PVP being broken or fixed, the problem is the amount of negativity PVP generates. Case in point this very argument and your remark about me not being good enough. See, pointless drama.
Sure...you don't like the truth so you call it pointless drama.
You're just another person asking for broken mechanics to remain broken so you can use it as a crutch, not the first time I've seen it and it wont be the last...just because you need a crutch to support you doesn't mean it shouldn't be fixed...in PvE or PvP.
Can't have a honest conversation because of a white knight with power
I would absolutely say so. They want to support PvP. First thing to achieve that is make it more accessible, that REQUIRES that the two game modes become less dissimilar. When you start to PvP, you basically have to learn a completely new game*. And you only figure this out in the most humiliating way possible: By exploding within seconds. That cannot be good.
PVE has evolved with the needs and preferences of the PVE community. It would be a tremendous disservice to them to rebalance their core gameplay (ie. NPC abilities, emphasis on buffs, utility of stripping them) simply to say that SNB isn't a wasted space. That does nothing for PVP by the way, while requiring a titanic adjustment on the other side of the community which must, at a certain level, say that their preferred PVE gameplay style is wrong (without objective criteria, it's simply about finding a use for one power.)
Apologies for the forceful pushback, but I have never seen a successful outcome from trying to take viable PVE and trying to reshape it into PVP. I have to say "no" emphatically.
Post edited by duncanidaho11 on
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
make them follow the same rules players have to follow and give them more than just a few faction-appropriate/lockbox-preview powers; i care not one bit if the AI only spams them instead of using them intelligently - do it anyway
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
To be fair, traits that grant immunity and invincibility for whatever period of time should have a heavy penalty in PvP only. It should have over a minute lockout because it negates the lack or existence of skill for player or opponent. It should also count as a double kill for the opponent of the person equipped with those traits as abilities.
Allowing a hugely powerful ability like GDF to work with such abilities without even being below 50% is quite frankly absurd.
Any and all abilities or traits must have counters or grant penalties if they grant the player a significant advantage over players of other factions and especially those of the same class because it stops any measure of skill and competition. Even abilities like SNB, one of the most powerful of not most powerful captain abilities, has a hard counter. Science Team 1.
Also it be possible to make torpedoes faster too? Compared to ships now they are so slow. Another option would be to slow ships at high end down a bit to stop them outrunning torps. It's a bit difficult to time a torpedo hit with the fraction of a second that shields are down for now. Used to be we'd get 2-3 seconds at most of a shield facing being down, which made alphastrikes tricky and skillfull whereas now they're either never down or the torpedo is being easily outrun... or invincibility is up... or some other stupid gimmick that makes it impossible to bring a player down despite it being a 4v1 against said gimmick wielding, skill-less, hamfisted, spacebar mashing 14 year old min-maxer living in his mother's basement...
To be fair, traits that grant immunity and invincibility for whatever period of time should have a heavy penalty in PvP only. It should have over a minute lockout because it negates the lack or existence of skill for player or opponent. It should also count as a double kill for the opponent of the person equipped with those traits as abilities.
Allowing a hugely powerful ability like GDF to work with such abilities without even being below 50% is quite frankly absurd.
Any and all abilities or traits must have counters or grant penalties if they grant the player a significant advantage over players of other factions and especially those of the same class because it stops any measure of skill and competition. Even abilities like SNB, one of the most powerful of not most powerful captain abilities, has a hard counter. Science Team 1.
Also it be possible to make torpedoes faster too? Compared to ships now they are so slow. Another option would be to slow ships at high end down a bit to stop them outrunning torps. It's a bit difficult to time a torpedo hit with the fraction of a second that shields are down for now. Used to be we'd get 2-3 seconds at most of a shield facing being down, which made alphastrikes tricky and skillfull whereas now they're either never down or the torpedo is being easily outrun... or invincibility is up... or some other stupid gimmick that makes it impossible to bring a player down despite it being a 4v1 against said gimmick wielding, skill-less, hamfisted, spacebar mashing 14 year old min-maxer living in his mother's basement...
I think this fellow has really hit the nail on the head in terms of what is the only proper solution, as unpopular amongst the exploiters as it will be.
A Good Day to Die, Invincible, and Continuity should just be straight-up disabled in PVP. Whether you have them equipped or not, be it entering a Queue PVP match or entering a war zone like Ker'rat, the system just nullifies their effect.
PVP is competitive play. As such, digital doping should have no place there.
You bought the stuff via Buying/selling keys, winning a lockbox prize, or saving energy credits? Cool, you still have it. It still works in PVE. But PVP is a different scenario, different rules.
I paid to get Invincible, I have access to (but never use) Continuity, and I'd GLADLY have the ability to use them be taken away in PVP so it's actually a competitive game of skill rather than a game of who bought the most cheats.
I'm fine with Cryptic making money on selling power creep. But Invincible and Good Day to Die isn't Pay to Win, it's far worse: it's Pay to Never Lose.
"I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of how awesome I am."
Comments
The most fundamental question, question 0 to your list, would be: Why are projectiles actively kept inferior to energy weapons in every way and by every possible metric despite using up an identical number of weapon slots?
It's nice to have follow up discussions on forums to measure up changes to the nature of class balancing. For the sake of science subnucleonic beam, I think it could take some inspiration from other captain and boff science abilities in order to help keep it within the science class genre whilst closing the performance gap between other classes. My idea is a Pb-aoe subnucleonic shockwave like the Intel ability sort of, but with lesser effects than the current beam, but that also buffs some science and healing skills and exotic dmg. I like the aoe for science because that's what most of its abilities are based around. This brings the update in line with engineer Eps transfer overcap which is similar to OSS Intel skill, another example of modifying a captain skill to be like a superior version of a specialist skill.
Maybe could be some kind of subnucleonic corrosive blast Pb-aoe that erodes hull resistances too. That would significantly focus science in to the debuffing role it's intended to be.
I think there's every reason to take pre existing specialist skills and modify them to see how they sit within a science captain subnucleonic beam replacement. I say this because alot of specialist abilities are already very science focused so there's no real desperate need to completely reinvent the wheel here.
Hope this helps.
I tried mostly torpedo/exotic builds on Tribble ,so I don't really know how much non-torpedo builds were "nerfed" - but it is my understanding that the nerfs to beam fire at will, embassy consoles and plasmonic leech as well as the new weapon power rules also hit beam builds. What I do know is that NPCs still melt from my attacks.
And you may not have noticed it, because I didn't at the time: During the Agents of Yesterday build, Omega Kinetic Shearing got a more or less unintentional buff. It used to be that the DOT effect was only based on damage actually incurred to hull, but since then, it applied to the torpedoes damage before any resistances or shields come into play. That means Torpedoes basically got a real 40 % extra hull damage from the trait. The reduction to 10 % is of course signficant compared to the post AOY state, but is probably still better than what Kinetic Shearing did before.
And they rolled back the 10 second active time for torpedo buffs, they are back to 30 seconds as before.
The problem's not that it's too strong now - that did need to be peeled back - but not because of the total output of torpedoes under it. And therein lies the issue. Shearing covered up the symptom. It's now being reduced to a quarter of its value but with not only a refusal to cure the underlying disease but an actual additional hobbling thrown in for good measure.
Torpedoes were subpar *WITH* it. The damage shearing is providing on holodeck is too much for a trait, yes, but it's also directly compensating for damage and capabilities that *SHOULD* be integrated to the torpedoes and yet is not.
Torpedoes do less damage than most (I think turrets do fall behind even maxed out, but they're 360' weapons that get boosted by abilities like scatter and rapidfire) energy weapons at high energy levels; and that's fine, as you're not paying energy to fire them (but they are disabled at 0 energy). But then? Then they get reduced by 62.5% (for standard bleedthrough values) against shields. Then they don't get to simultaneously fire like the energy weapons do. Then they don't get haste. Then they don't get to all benefit from bridge officer abilities the way all the energy weapons do. Then they get less access to armor/shield penetration too, and fewer set bonuses and unique item effects. Energy weapons get a singularity ability all on their own too! And projectile users? They're stuck staring at that filthy overcharge button, unable to swap or alter it or ever get any use out of the thing.
And here we are, watching them get yet another cooldown thrown in against them, because somehow, SOMEHOW, they, not the energy weapons that completely outmatch them, need to be "toned down" as well?
It's senseless.
@borticuscryptic @crypticspartan#0627
I appreciate the detailed, direct communication. I think I can speak for everyone in thanking the two of you for that.
I normally would never be obnoxious enough to address a Dev directly on forums, as I normally would think you all have better things to do than chat, but I have some PVP-related concerns which seem salient to the current (much appreciated) efforts you are putting in to genuinely attempting to balance the PVP experience. I'll put them after Borticus' quote here.
Point blank: Go Down Fighting, and the interactions it has with some traits and specializations, is pretty much THE issue in PVP.
The original design of Go Down Fighting is a really cool Tactical ability with appealing thematic flavor. However, it has become problematic to the point of gamebreaking in terms of PVP for the following interactions:
- Last Ditch Effort, a lockbox space trait that adds 100% damage resistance to Go Down Fighting.
- A Good Day to Die, a lockbox space trait that allows use of Go Down Fighting at any hull strength.
- Invincible, the lockbox ship trait that makes you unkillable for 8 seconds, as well as granting a 50% bonus to both hull and should healing.
- Continuity, the Temporal specialization ability that teleports you 8km away from danger when you're at 10% hull, which loses any downside with Adaptation II.
Combine this with Attrition Warfare from the Strategist specialization, which drastically reduces Captain and BOFF shield and hull heals while in threatening stance, it makes even the most mediocre of Tac captains all but immortal in a PVP situation. Whether we're talking about the build on Holodeck or the current build on Tribble, there is virtually no substantive risk involved with Go Down Fighting, and nothing but a gamebreaking stack of rewards given in return.
As is stands, when GDF is combined with all of the above, you've created a situation where anyone in PVP who isn't a Tactical captain with a Battle Cloak-capable ship is playing wrong. That's indefensible from a game design/gameplay perspective no matter how anyone tries to justify it.
It is logical to want to protect Tactical player investments of time and money, and it is logical that Cryptic doesn't want to hurt their bottom line by discouraging Tac captains from buying lockbox keys to get traits you've created. But quite frankly, you can't punish two out of three player career choices while doing so, that is not logical. I am extremely appreciative of the sincere efforts you're currently putting in to fixing the PVP situation, but they will all be in vain if you don't fix the total mess that is Go Down Fighting and it's host of God Mode interactions.
You guys are beyond clever enough to fix this. Please wow us with your talents and do so.
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Yup.
Every Tac player has access to this.
I admit my mistake, but that trait being "free" only strengthens my point really, since no money or extra effort was required to acquire it.
My appologies, but the "give us numbers" still stand
In addition to GDF, maybe it would be good to reduce the max effect at all to maybe 75% to not let the gap between weaker and better players escalate again.
ingame: @Felisean
Thank you for this change. I regret the tone of my post in the previous patch notes thread. Trying to turn the Resolute into an ad-hoc science vessel was frustrating and that spilled out into the forums. Which, it seems, I no longer have to do.
The defensive bonus from the skill increases are tiny and vastly outperformed by active powers such as the various Teams and Polarize Hull.
The changes exchanged an ability that was of little value against many enemies for an ability that was of little value on many ships. Deflector Overcharge needed to go back to the drawing board. This would be a terrible idea.
The content is based on sending waves of enemies at you. To buff 6 enemies, then debuff a single one leaves you in a spot where you have to kill 5 buffed enemies, and have no damage boosting powers like Engineers or Tacticals.
I would say, leave subnuc alone. Unless you change it to have radically different performance in PvE then it does in PvP, you should probably be looking at a different Science Captain power.
I hate that changes geared towards PVP are affecting PVE, and as for JJ Trek, it revolts me to think about it as Star Trek, period. Now competitive PVE has some merit and is more along the lines of what I find enjoyable. I have no problems with PVP being broken or fixed, the problem is the amount of negativity PVP generates. Case in point this very argument and your remark about me not being good enough. See, pointless drama.
But is it worth revamping all NPC's to fix one power? Why not incorporate buff stripping into sensor scan and allow some kind of new power to take SNB's place? I'm still in favor of deflector overcharge but anything that builds more synergy within captain sci powers would be welcome.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
As specialized of an ability as SubNuc is, I forsee a very major rework being required for SubNuc. I absolutely agree that Deflector Overcharge was a great solution. It's going to require something pretty major at this point imo to close that gap for Science. I can still do pretty good damage with all of my sci toons but their damage can be wildly inconsistent.
1: I would respectfully ask, how is it a bad thing that sci captains have an edge with sci ships or sci heavy ships? I would actually expect that the various careers have an edge in using ships that better match their career. Sci captains having an edge in sci heavy ships, Engineers with engineering heavy ships, and Tac toons with tac heavy ships. By giving a slight edge to Sci toons using sci heavy ships, I wouldn't call that pigeon-holing as much as I would reinforcing the strengths of said captains. I absolutely believe Science should have the ability to take more advantage of exotic type abilities than their Tac or Engineering counterparts as that's supposed to be the area they excel at, abilities that Tac and Engineer wouldn't normally use. Any of the careers should be able to fly any ship they like and do reasonably well, but I don't see anything wrong with giving an edge to captains that fly ships more in line with their careers. By that logic I would be a tactical captain flying cruisers, which traditionally are more tailored towards engineers. Although I would get more of an advantage by flying a tac heavier ship, I choose to fly cruisers and forgo that extra benefit because I like to fly my cruisers and work better for how I like to play.
2: I would argue that to a point this ability in its current form is actually overspecialized. The ability itself is really only useful in pvp type situations or purging a very select few and rare buffs from enemy NPCs in a pve situation. There are a few possible solutions that I will outline in a few down below. This is one ability I have to admit I was looking forward to experimenting with on my non-sci toons.
3: I would actually argue this change wasn't as a bad as it was thought to be. Folks still have access to the SubNuc Carrier Wave which is a slightly lesser version of SubNuc. The ability requires an intel seat but the point is that folks still have access to SubNuc type effects. In terms of pvp by decoupling SubNuc Beam from science it actually gave an interesting scenario of having to watch for SubNuc coming from other places. You had no way of knowing if the Engineer or the Tac coming at you was going to SubNuc you or not and it forced you play your cards differently. I would also argue that simply because the ability is there also doesn't mean it will get used. There are alot of folks who would use the ability sure, but there are also alot of folks who would choose not to use it if it was left as a boff power.
I forsee this having the potential to be a situation World of Warcraft has had to deal with for years. In a game like WoW or STO where there are pvp and pve elements, there needs to be a very clear separation between the 2 game types. The WoW devs refuse to draw this line and more often than not, nerfs made for pvp reasons have carried over to pve, or vice versa, and hurt the game as a whole. STO thankfully hasn't had this problem so far too much. You guys have been pretty good at drawing that line with certain abilities such as saying "ability lasts for x time against NPCs, but z against players." WoW has started to implement certain abilities that are only available in pvp scenarios and others available only in pve situations. Something like that perhaps to a lesser extent could be utilized here. Now I do have a few possible solutions you might could use as ideas.
1: As some others have pointed out, remove the exotic damage buffs from several tactical powers. Some of the buffs can be left in place but the ones causing the most severe gaps in performance can be removed. The buffs for weapons would remain and some of the buffs for exotic, but not to the degree they are now. This may not be the best solution but it would remove some of the ability of Tac to sling exotic damage better than Sci in alot of cases.
2: Rework Deflector Overcharge into a new version of Science Fleet. The current version of Science Fleet could be made into a more defensive type power focusing more on shield restoration and such. By making Deflector Overcharge the new Science Fleet it would inherit the 5min timer of the current sci fleet (pre-cooldown reductions of course) and be an ability that delivers a nice gap closer, but also keeps it from being spammed to high heaven and back.
3: Allow more buffs on NPC enemies to be purged with SubNuc Beam. The issue with SubNuc is there's very little that it can purge against NPC enemies. Since that's the case it just kind of sits there.
4: Rework Sensor Scan into something similar to Deflector Overcharge, but only allow it to work for sci captains. This could allow a bit of a rework on an older ability and allow Sensor Scan to "expose" certain weaknesses to the science captain, such as pointing out a vulnerability to extreme gravity from a Grav Well, or how it could be vulnerable to a type of Destabilizing beam. There's alot of ways it could be spun to make it work.
Those are just some rough ideas off the top of my head. It's apparent at this point imo that you're not going to be able to close the gap between science and tac without some type of major ability or rework. It could be a straight up ability like Deflector Overcharge, removing some of the exotic buffs from tac, or a combination of both. It's honestly never made sense to me that as a tac I can crank out more exotic damage than a sci captain in some instances. I do believe Tac and Engineers should have the ability to deliver a potent Grav Well or similar ability on the fly when needed, but Science should absolutely have the edge and be able to deliver the strongest exotic abilities. Those are some of my thoughts regarding the science stuff. Again @borticuscryptic and @crypticspartan#0627 I don't envy you guys in your job in this instance. I do look forward to see more of what you guys come up with.
Star Trek Online volunteer Community Moderator
The what?Im not familar with that ability or trait..
Rouge Sto Wiki Editor.
It should just be a shield debuff/shield drain thingy..Like that Omni-Directional Tachyon Wave..Not really a damage console..
Rouge Sto Wiki Editor.
It does and I fully agree.
Made the same argument on Reddit.
Might was well go with @mustrumridcully0 idea of turning it into a mega lance beam then. It amounts to the same thing.
Science characters need something that synergizes with AoE. I don't think more single target damage is the answer.
Sure...you don't like the truth so you call it pointless drama.
You're just another person asking for broken mechanics to remain broken so you can use it as a crutch, not the first time I've seen it and it wont be the last...just because you need a crutch to support you doesn't mean it shouldn't be fixed...in PvE or PvP.
PVE has evolved with the needs and preferences of the PVE community. It would be a tremendous disservice to them to rebalance their core gameplay (ie. NPC abilities, emphasis on buffs, utility of stripping them) simply to say that SNB isn't a wasted space. That does nothing for PVP by the way, while requiring a titanic adjustment on the other side of the community which must, at a certain level, say that their preferred PVE gameplay style is wrong (without objective criteria, it's simply about finding a use for one power.)
Apologies for the forceful pushback, but I have never seen a successful outcome from trying to take viable PVE and trying to reshape it into PVP. I have to say "no" emphatically.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
make them follow the same rules players have to follow and give them more than just a few faction-appropriate/lockbox-preview powers; i care not one bit if the AI only spams them instead of using them intelligently - do it anyway
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Allowing a hugely powerful ability like GDF to work with such abilities without even being below 50% is quite frankly absurd.
Any and all abilities or traits must have counters or grant penalties if they grant the player a significant advantage over players of other factions and especially those of the same class because it stops any measure of skill and competition. Even abilities like SNB, one of the most powerful of not most powerful captain abilities, has a hard counter. Science Team 1.
Also it be possible to make torpedoes faster too? Compared to ships now they are so slow. Another option would be to slow ships at high end down a bit to stop them outrunning torps. It's a bit difficult to time a torpedo hit with the fraction of a second that shields are down for now. Used to be we'd get 2-3 seconds at most of a shield facing being down, which made alphastrikes tricky and skillfull whereas now they're either never down or the torpedo is being easily outrun... or invincibility is up... or some other stupid gimmick that makes it impossible to bring a player down despite it being a 4v1 against said gimmick wielding, skill-less, hamfisted, spacebar mashing 14 year old min-maxer living in his mother's basement...
See what I did there??
@borticuscryptic @crypticspartan#0627
I think this fellow has really hit the nail on the head in terms of what is the only proper solution, as unpopular amongst the exploiters as it will be.
A Good Day to Die, Invincible, and Continuity should just be straight-up disabled in PVP. Whether you have them equipped or not, be it entering a Queue PVP match or entering a war zone like Ker'rat, the system just nullifies their effect.
PVP is competitive play. As such, digital doping should have no place there.
You bought the stuff via Buying/selling keys, winning a lockbox prize, or saving energy credits? Cool, you still have it. It still works in PVE. But PVP is a different scenario, different rules.
I paid to get Invincible, I have access to (but never use) Continuity, and I'd GLADLY have the ability to use them be taken away in PVP so it's actually a competitive game of skill rather than a game of who bought the most cheats.
I'm fine with Cryptic making money on selling power creep. But Invincible and Good Day to Die isn't Pay to Win, it's far worse: it's Pay to Never Lose.