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baudl
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...for most builds it is obvious that one more vulnerability locator/exploiter is BiS.
What about limiting the use of duplicate consoles on your ship?
One of each console would be more in line with typical character itemization of similar RPGs. And there is obviously a reason to not allow stacking of the same Item. STO seems to not adhere to this rule.
Before anyone responds with "but you can put into the slot whatever you want!"...well, yes. But when the outcome is almost always worse than simply stacking that one console, instead of being forced to min-max with all the various types of other consoles, I'd say it takes away a certain amount of challenge from this "ship build" gameplay part of the game.
What about limiting the use of duplicate consoles on your ship?
One of each console would be more in line with typical character itemization of similar RPGs. And there is obviously a reason to not allow stacking of the same Item. STO seems to not adhere to this rule.
Before anyone responds with "but you can put into the slot whatever you want!"...well, yes. But when the outcome is almost always worse than simply stacking that one console, instead of being forced to min-max with all the various types of other consoles, I'd say it takes away a certain amount of challenge from this "ship build" gameplay part of the game.
Go pro or go home
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But then I decided against it, because it would be pretty much useless (as in, no additional fun obtained by) to/by do(ing) so.
So instead I added a few more tac consoles to a drain ship, and vice versa. The outcome isn't necessarily 'worse'. Having a fun, additional clicky ability can be better if it leads to a more enjoyable experience. No one's really forced to min-max anything, that's everyone's own choice and largely depends on what one considers to be worse or better in the first place.
One thing that might add more diversity and discourage endless stacking of the same powerful stuff, is removing limitations on less potent, unique clicky consoles. Think, for example, the console from the Jellyfish or those from the Akira and the T5 Vesta lines. It wouldn't really be gamebreaking to allow players to equip more than one of such consoles, but it could open up a lot of more options in ship building.
Edit: for clarification, I meant the Jellyfish from the 2009 movie, not the more recent event ship.
Or the crafted ones, normal and the special ones.
That's what I think makes STO stand out from other MMOs. The sheer freedom of customization in builds.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
Now I'm going to ask the obvious question and address the elephant in the room before someone else does. Why should I or anyone else have our ability to slot multiples of certain consoles restricted because you have an issue with it "not being as in line with other RPGs" as you said? And if I want to use 8 exploiters on a ship (now possible in some cases), why is that any of your business? As I pointed out a moment ago, if you want to build your ships in a way that doesn't use duplicate consoles to be more in line with other games, you're already free to do that. If you only want to use one Locator/Exploiter on a ship, nothing is stopping you from doing that. As I pointed out above, certain games allow you to equip multiples of certain items, and some games don't. STO is one that allows you to equip multiples of certain items. That doesn't make it bad if someone uses 8 exploiters/locators when you don't, it simply means they prefer to build differently than you do.
When developing content/items for games, you as the developer have to answer the question of why the person would ever want to do that content or interact/not interact with that item. If you as the creator of that content/item can't given them a reason, you can't expect the average player to have a reason either. So if you want to as you said "make more available consoles more useful" then you would need to answer the question of why people who haven't been using them would suddenly want to do so. If I've never used a certain item as a tank, why would I be interested in it now? What's my motivation to give it a second look that didn't exist previously? Not all content/items need to be developed with all people in mind. I play primarily as a tank, and although I have the ability to create pure DPS or sci builds, they're not my cup of tea so I usually don't. When an ultra sci something comes out, sometimes I'm able to make use of it, but most times I don't use it. That doesn't make the item bad, it simply means I wasn't the target audience for that item.
Also there are a couple of points I want to make note of. Isomag consoles are a thing and work wonders for many builds. There are going to be folks who stick to the traditional Locator/Exploiter setup for their new universal slot, and that's perfectly valid if they do. For me as a tank, another Locator/Exploiter is nice but certainly not BiS. For reputation items, see again my comments regarding items not being made with all people in mind. Are there some that could use a facelift, potentially yes imo. However again not all reputation consoles are made with all people in mind. I use the Sustained Radiant Field console on my tanks at times where as most DPS folks I know typically don't. As diverse as the build system can be in STO if people choose not to take advantage of it, that's on them. An option isn't good/bad purely because it exists, and simply because something can be done doesn't mean it should. Certain builds/combos aren't seen very often for a reason.
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"Runes of Magic" is a game I played for many years - and still do once or twice a week!
My character has fifteen item slots for various armor pieces, jewellery and weapons. Class limitations apply and so I will only have access to 13 - 14 if I have an offhand weapon/shield.
Whilst I can only equip one belt, one chestpiece, one pair of boots, one set of shoulder armor etc., I can put the same six stats and four runes on every item my character wears - all thirteen, or fourteen.
Now, Runes of Magic and Star Trek Online are not similar RPG's. One's a medieval fantasy world with monsters, dragons, corrupt politicians, and whatever else; the other is a futuristic space exploration/combat game. Both offer me the same kind of massive freedom in my character/ship build.
limiting each console to "unique" simply makes other consoles and console sets (more) viable. To be clear, they literally designed whole sets of consoles to sell with a ship bundle...which right now simply fill empty slots on unused ships.
An RPG is an RPG with items that fill slots in inventories, that give stats to your avatar...not sure why people would claim that the setting makes any difference to that basic principle. And giving players the option to stack literally the same Item or even the same stat over and over (without thinking about synergies etc.) is the definition of poorly developed game mechanics. Can still be fun, but I guess when people also like dry pasta, they too can like bland game design.
That's not how that works at all. If people aren't using certain items there is generally a reason for it. Likewise if people are using certain items, there is generally a reason for it. If my goal is to be as effective as possible, why am I going to use Console A that only gives me 2 benefits when I can use Console B that gives me 4 benefits? If I want to go back and used Console A at some point to mix things up I can but that's a personal choice each person has to make.
Next as someone who has made maps for other games, created items for other games and so on, I can tell you from experience that you can't force players to do something they don't want to do. If I want people to fight at Point A on my map instead of Point B, I need to give them reasons to go to Point A vs trying to beat them over the head and force them away from Point B. Otherwise by purely trying to force them to Point A one of a few things is going to happen. Either they're going to find somewhere else to take the fight, or they're going to just straight up quit. If I want them to fight at Point A I need to give them reasons to go there. Such as extra ammo, an extra med pack, better cover to control the boss, or so on.
If Cryptic wasn't cool with people stacking things like Locators/Exploiters they never would've allowed it from the start. The fact that you can is WAI. Coming back in and limiting that to a unique equip now isn't going to do anything but drive players away from the game in droves. Making certain items like Locators/Exploiters unique equip isn't going to suddenly improve the design of other "less viable" options. It means you're forcing an artificial limit on people to force them to use inferior options.
An RPG simply put means Role Playing Game. Some are better experiences than others but that's a different can of worms. Even then point still stands from before, Some RPG type games allow you to stack multiple copies of certain items, and some don't. For some games that allow you to stack certain stats, I'll use Balder's Gate since it's D&D based and easier for folks to understand. If I'm playing my Sorcerer, the effectiveness of my magic depends on my Intelligence skill as the main driving factor. I may be able to pick up items that have strength, agility, or so on. But if my goal is to buff my magic as high as it can go, why on earth would I ever use strength or agility items that will never buff my magic damage? That's foolish. Thus I stack intelligence based items. Again that's not bad design, that's working as intended.
Likewise in STO, if my goal is to buff my Disruptors as high as they will go, why am I going to use something that's not going to assist with that or keeping me alive or give me the best bonuses? You're entitled to the opinion that stacking certain items is bland design but it's purely that, your opinion. You're not the arbiter of what is good or bad design.
As I pointed out before, if you want to treat certain items as unique on your playthroughs of the game, or only use x amount of certain items, you already have that ability. Nothing is stopping you from doing that. What you don't get to do is come in and tell me I must also play like you do because you personally don't find the ability to stack items fun when my gameplay has zero effect on you. In games that give you choice of how you build your characters, ships, or what have you, not everyone is going to make the same choices as you. That doesn't mean they're doing something wrong, it simply means they do not think or play the same way as you.
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Min-maxxers gonna min-max, and if they're trying to climb the DPS charts they might do TFOs in premade groups with sets of interlocking buffs to max that max. If that's their fun it is not wrong.
I don't do that, because max DPS isn't my fun. I have SCIENCE! ships with zero exploiters, theme ships with half my slots taken up by Tholian or Herald consoles, a Fek'Ihri carrier with all the fiery consoles of doom, and so on.
You're free to decide you will only use 1 of each console, or only wear canon uniforms and fly faction-appropriate ships, or play only PVP, or whatever. Your fun is not wrong for you. It's when you want to force your fun on me that it's not OK.
yeah, not really true. Each locator/exploiter adds the same amount of raw dps to your weapons, from the first to the last...same with all cat 1 dmg boosts...only diminishing return in this game is with armor, since reaching 100% dmg reduction from armor would be too easy and obviously game breaking. Easily testable in game by simply removing one console at a time and looking at the dps of a weapon. For me it is typically 102 dps per locator console.
also, "theme" builds are one thing and are gimped by the current system anyway...a Scimitar build with all the consoles might be cool to have but is seriously underpowered and can hardly pull their weight is TFOs anyway.
When I call them gimped, I don't even mean it from a min-maxing point of view but they even make your build worse than without them on, like the Thalaron beam.
Nothing wrong with having your own theme based build in this game, but having to drastically gimp your effectiveness for it is bad game design. Ships used to have build in special abilities...like the Phaser lance, or the Siege mode of the Guramba. Scimitar should have come with that build in too...as do many other ships. They opted for consoles, which are STILL restricted to that ship class only...again, really bad game design, especially knowing they had a better solution before.
to darkbladejk:
I can only say you are completely missing the point of my posts...I'm aware that Cryptic implemented the current limitations as intended, I argue that limitations increase diversity of builds by literally forcing you to look at alternative consoles to make a build work.
And yes, I'm also aware that people are not even interested to have a "working build" in the first place. If it fits their flavour it is good enough, so to speak.
And useless consoles exist, simply by the fact that you'd pass right over it in favour of another "better" one. Examples I gave: The Solanae Dyson sphere Repuation consoles with their ACC bonus. And basically all the consoles that came with a ship from Zen store. Well not all of them, but at this point 90% of them are garbage and don't even cut it for a RPG build. Some became outdated (just natural for every old game), but some are basically stillborn. Which is sad, since somebody put time and effort into making them...
There will always be BiS items, but the problem comes from having literally the same item in a number of slots. And an incentive for putting effort into gaining alternatives (grinding reputations, spending money, crafting ...) is basically non existent.
I was under the impression that Cryptic wants to sell new ships/consoles, but given the fact that in terms of tactical consoles your choice is really limited to a handful...mostly legacy consoles, which you can stack...is (quite obviously, to me at least) counter productive.
It is not the truth, that is your opinion. And a few of us have respectfully disagreed, and explained our reasoning. The way STO lets us build our ships means you can do just about whatever you want. Which means you can play as optimized or unoptimized as you want. Theme builds are a thing because they're FUN. Not because of performance. I once slapped every gas venting ability I could on a ship. (The Legendary Excelsior literally can have every gas venting ability because of Pilot seating as a cruiser) Was it the absolute best? Nope. But it surprisingly worked.
Your stance now is that its "bad game design" and must change to fit YOUR ideal setup. You are essentially telling us we are all playing the wrong way because of "bad game design". In short, OUR fun is wrong and must be corrected.
Do you see the problem here?
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
(Emphasis added)
You're not gimping yourself if the amount of fun you experience from a certain build increases by not stacking more Spire consoles, or EPG ones.
Using fun-to-use but less effective (in terms of damage dealing potential) consoles would only amount to handicapping oneself if larger DPS numbers were the only purpose of the game. Which isn't the case.
One might as well argue that only using passive stat-boosting consoles like the Spire or EPG consoles is a form of 'gimping' oneself, because doing so doesn't allow for much use of those alternative, fun-but-lower-damage-potential consoles.
It all entirely depends on a player's general approach towards the game.
So a couple of things here. That's not how that works with tactical consoles. First off you need to be in space when measuring your space stats as being on ground will give you a distorted view of them. Let's assume you're looking at a phaser beam array just to have a point of reference. When you look at the numbers and it says x phaser damage and y DPS, those are not the final values of the weapons at all. Those are the approximate values you will get per shot (x) and DPS per cycle (y) dry firing the weapons without any kind of firing patterns and/or buffs backing them up at all. Basically turning your weapons on autofire and letting them blast at something. Eventually you will hit a point where the cat1 benefits are miniscule at best and you would benefit more from cat2 bonuses. Overall the DPS numbers on the beams themselves mean nothing in the grand scheme of things when measuring their effectiveness. I can't even begin to describe to you how many times I've seen a beam have a lower "DPS" on it go on to outdo beams with a higher base DPS number on the parse overall.
Again gimped according to who? Is it going to pull the most DPS in the run, probably not. Is it a viable option, absolutely. So long as the ship is doing the minimum amount of damage required by the TFO itself or above the minimum and the content is being cleared, what's the problem? Besides it taking 3 minutes to clear something instead of 2 that is. As a tank I use the secondary shield console from time to time, and also the flagship computer. A particular console being tied to a certain ship and not useable by all others does NOT equate automatically make something a bad design. It simply means that particular item can't be used by others for one reason or another, such as lore reasons and/or balance purposes.
You know, I find it quite ironic you argue that build limitations increase diversity, yet you complained about the Scimitar themed consoles being exclusive to Scimitars and people choosing to use consoles exclusive to certain ships being bad game design. So I have to ask, are limitations good or bad? Because those positions are mutually exclusive in how you used them and can't both be true at the same time. I've already explained to you why simply limiting things isn't going to magically force people to use something, but will in fact force them out of the game completely. While I'm not a AAA studio dev, I'm speaking from experience in developing my own content for other games. You can't force people to do something they don't want to do in a game as they'll find a way around it or simply quit. If you want someone to do something or play a certain way you need to give them valid reasons to play that way other than simply "do it this way because I said so."
I'm not even sure where the whole working build thing comes into the discussion or how it's relevant because I never said anything about that. The closest thing I said to that was asking why someone would use something with only 2 benefits when they can use something that gives them 4.
With regards to consoles and gear, there are always going to be items that perform better than others in terms of pure raw power and benefits they give. It's been that way since the dawn of gaming. Certain items are going to be more valuable than others. That's not a flaw, that's the point. You say that 90% of cstore consoles and reputation consoles are garbage, well again I have to ask, garbage according to who? Simply because a console doesn't cater to one's particular playstyle doesn't make it a bad console. Not all consoles cater to every build type and there's noting wrong with that. Would I like to see certain items used more often, certainly, but forcing people to use it by holding a phaser to their head and saying "use this or else" isn't going to work.
I'm glad to see you cited a specific example of the Acc bonuses as that gives us something to work with. Accuracy when overflowed can give a little bit of chance and severity. However it's nowhere near as effective as just slapping a console on that gives actual chance and severity. Outside of PVP and a few instances with cannons, there's not really that much of a need to go for the Acc stat, which is why those items aren't utilized as much. See my previous comments about things with 2 benefits vs 4. Why would I use an Acc item which is akin to giving 2 benefits when I can use a Locator/Exploiter and have the same benefits plus 2 more? It's like 2 companies trying to hire for the same exact job but one pays $10 an hour and the other one pays $15. Why would I go with the one only paying $10 an hour when I can land the one that does $15? Nothing is stopping someone from taking the $10 per hour vs the $15 if they wanted to, but why would I use inferior when I can have better?
Cryptic isn't going to magically stop selling items purely because they don't implement your suggestion. New items continue to sell all the time, and even some of the old ones still sell well. Naturally again certain items are going to sell better than others will. If one item is drastically outperforming another, there's generally a reason for that.
Overall as I said prior, nothing is stopping you from diversifying your consoles more if that's what you want to do. If you want to limit yourself to only one of certain items then do it. None of us in here are going to stop you. Your fun of using only one of each console type is not wrong. Likewise those of us who prefer to stack certain consoles aren't wrong either. Again none in here are going to stop you from limiting yourself to one of certain items. What people DO have an issue with is suggesting that they should be limited as well purely because you personally don't like it. Not everyone is going to make the same choices as you in a game. That doesn't mean they're doing it wrong, especially when it has no effect on you. What it does mean is that not everyone wants to play the same way as you, and some people prefer different things.
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I'm not trying to force anything onto other players, but the gist of the comments I get is that fun is subjective, which is true of course, but you can objectively say that being able to stack the identical item is lazy (bad) game design...
Why? Because you can completely ignore the majority of consoles that exist or that you bought, unless you want a "theme" build, and that will always be a compromise. Why does it have to be a compromise when you can have good game design incorporating that "theme" you want to go for AND have a powerful build.
This is true for other games too, not just STO obviously...although most games I play avoid letting players get multiple identical items.
So these rules literally increase diversity, rather than limit it.
I really think Cryptic missed out on an opportunity when they implemented the Universal Console slot...should have been a slot dedicated to ship class specific consoles, like Saucer Separation for all Galaxy class ship types. If you have the T5 version that comes with that console, you now have a dedicated slot for that console.
Frankly, these things should come with the ship regardless, and not in form of a console. Like Guramba and Galaxy X.
In short, everybody can fly their space barbie theme builds as much as they want and keep dying in normal TFOs or simply contribute as much as a shuttle, but the fact that these space barbie builds have to be so underwhelming is what I call bad, lazy game design. I completely recognize that this can be fun to many people, but it would be fun also if their theme build would be able to pull their own weight in team gameplay.
And yes, ship tiers that add various "slots"...weapons, consoles etc. is lazy design. It works for Cryptic because they can sell you the same ship 3-4 times. To me that is OK actually, because it keeps the lights on...but frankly, they could have come up with a better system to augment your power as you progress. While low level ship fights with only 3 weapon slots look and feel more like Trek from the shows and films. Once you have 8 weapons fire simultaneously that look and feel is completely gone.
And when your game only looks and feels like the intellectual property you want to emulate, you probably failed at game design.
#effectsoverload
You did give a reason in support of your subjective opinion, but it remains a subjective opinion.
1. assume I = "ignoring the majority of consoles that exist" implies B = bad design
2. stacking allows I
3. therefore B
I implies B; I = true; therefore B
The problem is that (1.) is an opinion not a fact, You'd need to prove I implies B before you can claim B. "It's obvious!" or "everyone knows this" is not proof.
Stacking consoles being the best be all end all solution implies there's 1 specific "objectively best" way of playing STO, stacking locators doesn't help my AoY toon that much as she's exotic damage focused and IIRC there's no locator for exotic damage. Sure you get crit hit but in the end it doesn't help EPG build as much as the EPG stat does.
Tactical consoles really help for one thing so much they're auto-include and that's weapon damage, for any other build there's better options and thus locators are not BiS for a universal slot.
I appreciate your clear response.
look at energy weapon meta builds... You will see a lot of locator/exploiter stacking going on, that would make "1." a fact not an opinion. I should have made clear though that "ignoring the majority of consoles that exist" should actually read "ignoring the majority of TACTICAL consoles that exist".
Sure in place of 3-4 duplicate consoles, you'd chose 3-4 specific tactical consoles instead, but since these 3-4 other tactical consoles are definitely weaker to locators and exploiters, they might open up the possibility of other less used (universal or ship specific) consoles since these wouldn't need to be compared to locators/exploiters, but to the weaker substitute tactical consoles.
the precise reason I wrote this post is that almost always, it is the best option for your build to stack locators/exploiters.
Of course you can ignore that, or you simply don't have a build around energy weapons. The fact remains that most clicky consoles (while having cool effects), add vastly less power to your build than simply another fleet (locator) console.
And even if you find one that is worthy to put in a universal slot, you probably are better off taking a console out of an engi or sci slot and put that nice clicky console there, and the locator tac console into the universal slot anyway.
sure, I assume there are also lvl 20 captains out there having great fun and haven't even heard of the things we are discussing here. Doesn't mean talking about that problem isn't worth it.
In fact, making certain consoles less fundamental (by not being stackable) would precisely have the effect you mentioned.
"I suspect that all sorts of things are going into that extra slot" exactly, out of necessity, because they lack access...I propose limiting this advantages access to locators/exploiters.