I feel the weapon is a super powerful weapon but it is predictable to a certain extent...i watch buffs on the tac cubes and I also know with some certainlty when he fires and prepare accordingly and i seem to survive more often then naught.
my cruiser is built to tank and tankit does. I ran a purely unscientific test where I bult a ship and did not specc for damage resistance. i was getting hit for 124k or higher from the attacks.
When I used the right gear the nmbers became managable ..a pale shadow of their former viciousness. From 124k hits to 30 k hits....I can easily recover from those. The Romulan ship used by Donatra was also tried and it wiped the whole group on elite except for me.........i took 27k...
The fact of the matter is people IMO play the game like theu have unlimited lives and they will respawn shortly after...
I play differetly......i retreat regroup and survuve much more then the average players because they sit in one place and fire.......or use their engineer consoles for other items then defense..
What really bothers me is that the wepaons range is gigantic...I burst sped away got to 27 k and the weapon still hit me.....i survived ......that needs to be looked at.
I managed to complete Khitomer Accord Elite yesterday with some of my fleet buddies.
Elite difficulty is madness. It isn't even worthy of being called elite. They should call it "Khitomer Accord - Suicide VA" because you just DIE to EVERYTHING. I mean, I do feel like the Borg as they are are kind of weak against players but yes I agree with you. Dying to a single torpedo when at 100% hull is pretty bad. Not to mention just how hard it is to shoot down the heavy plasma torpedoes....ugh....
What really bothers me is that the wepaons range is gigantic...I burst sped away got to 27 k and the weapon still hit me.....i survived ......that needs to be looked at.
If it makes you feel better our weapons will do that too if it was fired before the target is out of range. It will keep following until it hits.
I feel the weapon is a super powerful weapon but it is predictable to a certain extent...i watch buffs on the tac cubes and I also know with some certainlty when he fires and prepare accordingly and i seem to survive more often then naught.
The problem isn't HY torpedoes, they're tough but manageable because they're so slow and targetable. The one shots are coming from basic torpedoes that won't appear on the buff bar, they're just auto fired by the NPC. These are the worst offenders, I can deal with the insane FaW or the Plasma DoTs that crit for over 3k per tick because they give me a chance to react and use a skill to help resist but a single torpedo that hits for 100k with no warning and isn't even rendered on screen on a regular basis isn't something that can be prepared for.
Not sure how to weigh in on this, but I just remembered that I've occasionally seen my own torpedoes fire, but not animate, and strike the target while being 'invisible'. This may or may not be a graphical bug on my side, or it may be universal. I'm not sure.
Whilst surviving a single volley is possible with decent resists and hitting buffs at the right time, its the spam that can flatten you.
You make it through the volley, possibly having as much as 40% health left if you're well buffed, then a single torp cripples you for 20k or so (90k before resists maybe?) and pop. or a 20k Cannon shot (seriously ...20k from a single cannon shot? Who decided the numbers here?)
Oh and Donatra isn't happy with just spamming the volleys now, she'll throw em out immediately after she decloaks then follow up with an instant (no warmup/warning animation) uber-thalaron pulse.
Fun...innit?
Despite this....I'm still running STFs. I don't tend to die often, save when one of these idiocies occurs. I still find it fun when you actually defeat this overpowered bullcack.
If STFs didn't have one shot kills either its misterious invisible or not they would be "TOO EASY". There are a lot of people who always complain - why everything is so easy. Who do you think develops games today? Those same people. Kids grow up and become game developers. Then they make STFs thinking that to make it "NOT TOO EASY" they need to add a one shot kills, otherwise thing won't feel challenging.
Its an obvious fact that dying in STO is a part of game mechanic. NORMAL STFs are extremely easy if you have semi pink Mark XII equipment. So to make it more challenging they've made Elite STFs "challenging" by either swarming a bunch of one shot mobs on you if you do it wrong or a boss ship that always one shot kills you. This way you won't have a chance of retaliation until you respawn and if you try to complain about "TOO EASY", devs will tell you to go and try to take 1v1 on a boss ship.
You die in one shot from a boss ship. I guess if you'd die in 2 shots it would be TOO EASY...
ZeroNavigator, not sure what part you are being sarcastic about. Not sure if any of it was sarcasm tbh. So I'm just going to respond honestly.
Elites are supposed to be hard...not a problem. I -like- a challenge, it makes the eventual success far more enjoyable.
What irks me (and I've reiterated this several times) is imbalanced gameplay.
Bosses need tools to make us scared. One-shot effects are part of that mechanic.
Assuming you have a tank, he has to be able to take that hit or evade it in some way. Using Donatra as an example (the Thalaron pulse) you really need to evade it. That means holding back 1: Evasive Maneuvers and 2: A tractor breaking tool (Pol Hull or Omega).
To hold those back you need to be in range and suffering the worst of her fire (remember, to keep her aggro you gotta keep shooting her).
Keeping at a decent pace can keep you out of her forwards arc -most- of the time, but not all [if folks have a technique that doesnt blow the evasive cooldown and works reliably let me know, more than pleased to learn it].
That means you have to suffer some big hits, constantly. That I can do, steadily using various tanking cooldowns to keep myself up. Then she pops a Salvo3. Ok....survivable, but it hurts.
But what do you do when she spams another a couple of seconds later? Or smacks you with 90k normal torps just as you're still repairing?
I run to the assumption that- If you are doing everything right, you shouldn't be dying.
So....I post here, giving my feedback on gameplay. If some gets through and they modify things slightly...good stuff.
I Have to agree with OP, they are majorly overpowered and not fun.
It would make sense canon wise if the following where also canon but this is not the case.
specs of Galaxcy Class ship @ base level should be.
Tactical Systems
Phaser: 12 banks typ-X phaser
Typ-X phaser power: 5,1 MW
Torpedoes: photon torpedoes
Torpedo launchers: 3 (maximum of 10 torpedoes to be launched at one time per launcher)
General Specifications
Crew (standard): 1012
Crew (maximum): 5000
and shields to match.. something like 500K shield as base
and about 800,000 Hull would make it canon
ZeroNavigator, not sure what part you are being sarcastic about. ...
Elites are supposed to be hard...not a problem. I -like- a challenge, it makes the eventual success far more enjoyable.
What irks me (and I've reiterated this several times) is imbalanced gameplay.
Bosses need tools to make us scared. One-shot effects are part of that mechanic.
...
These bosses have little to no "thought" behind them. All it is - juiced up fat ship with a bunch of HP and a deadly whip. You not supposed to survive against it even if you use whatever you want to use. Sarcasm here is that common captain logic like you mention above doesn't apply to STF strategies. Even if you use all your abilities appropriately and even if Science captain will heal you, it will still be a quick death.
You call this yourself as a part of mechanic that makes your success enjoyable. But on the other hand you wonder why can't you tank a boss ship even though you doing everything right.
The only logic behind STF boss fights is - die, respawn attack, die respawn attack, dia respawn attack. Aggro holding mechanic doesn't work in STF. Even if you maximize your threat generation stat you'll still be outganned by other ships and the logic I mentioned above will still be in effect during the STF boss fights.
There are OBVIOUS one shot moments you CAN escape (green net and then a one shot kill to everyone who didn't escape the net on time) but everythign else is just a whip that meant to de-shield you and then one shot you. No matter what you do there will be one shots because its considered as a must have in STF. Its much easier to make a beefy boss with 1000000 HP who occasionally one shoots you and others than create actually a scripted encounter that is enjoyable to play.
I am not saying its right. I am saying thats what it is and why.
These bosses have little to no "thought" behind them. All it is - juiced up fat ship with a bunch of HP and a deadly whip. You not supposed to survive against it even if you use whatever you want to use. Sarcasm here is that common captain logic like you mention above doesn't apply to STF strategies. Even if you use all your abilities appropriately and even if Science captain will heal you, it will still be a quick death.
You call this yourself as a part of mechanic that makes your success enjoyable. But on the other hand you wonder why can't you tank a boss ship even though you doing everything right.
The only logic behind STF boss fights is - die, respawn attack, die respawn attack, dia respawn attack. Aggro holding mechanic doesn't work in STF. Even if you maximize your threat generation stat you'll still be outganned by other ships and the logic I mentioned above will still be in effect during the STF boss fights.
There are OBVIOUS one shot moments you CAN escape (green net and then a one shot kill to everyone who didn't escape the net on time) but everythign else is just a whip that meant to de-shield you and then one shot you. No matter what you do there will be one shots because its considered as a must have in STF. Its much easier to make a beefy boss with 1000000 HP who occasionally one shoots you and others than create actually a scripted encounter that is enjoyable to play.
I am not saying its right. I am saying thats what it is and why.
You seem to be missing the point. The one shot itself is not the point, the point is that you can't see it, or even know that it is on it's way( im talking the tac cube, not Donata). That is what I and a few others do have a problem with, is the blatant "TRIBBLE you, your dead, and I cheated to do it!" thrown at us by the devs.
Not weighing in on the OP/WAI of the torps, just proposing a workaround.
Stack some drains on the tac cube. A klink carrier can do it alone, but it takes a while. Target Subsystems, Tyken's, Energy Siphon, Borg Tractor, Breen Set bonus ability, Siphon Pods (Klingon only). Zero weapons power and they're not shooting any torps, invisible or otherwise.
Ugh, I know exactly what you're talking about. I fly an Assault Cruiser maxed out on armor and shields and can survive just about anything, but the Invisible Borg Torpedo of Doom is just frustrating. I can usually get the Heavy Plasma Torpedoes as they launch.
You seem to be missing the point. The one shot itself is not the point, the point is that you can't see it, or even know that it is on it's way( im talking the tac cube, not Donata). That is what I and a few others do have a problem with, is the blatant "TRIBBLE you, your dead, and I cheated to do it!" thrown at us by the devs.
No, he got it right. This is why we're seeing one shot Borg bosses. They are not well thought out.
Prime example is the giant plasma shot from a Unimatrix carrier on your level or above. Those things fly at a decent click and combined with a severe dodge bonus, it takes an uncanny amount of shots to get one a few to land on it and dissipate the shot before it reaches anyone. Then pile on the Regenerative Probes that appear practically every 20 seconds. Unless you're all escorts with Cannon Scatter Volley, its not happening.
Another example is Armek of Borg which required its own thread of fail.
I've been playing the Season 5 STFs for only about a week, and I too have encountered the Elite Mystery "OneShot" Death. I keep forgetting to check the combat logs (mostly because at that moment of ka-boom I'm healing my Injury(ies) and preparing to respawn to get back in battle).
I do not necessarily think the Borg are OP, but the fact that I go from nigh full shields and hull to Instant Death, from an invisible force is annoying to say the least. Especially since whatever it is that kills me can do so even when I'm out of 10k range.
I've got a tough ship. I have rare Field Generator Mk XI (+35% Shield Cap), two Electroceramic Hull Plating Mk XI (+35 Plas/Tet DR), one Neutronium Alloy Armor Mk XI (+18 Kin/Energy DR), and I've maxed the defensive skills that improve Hull, Resistances, and Defense stats. Shield power is at or above 100 (thanks to chaining EPtS), so my shield damage reduction is high. My Retro-Borg Shields have 8,662 points per facing. My hull is 53,405.
Anything that does 60k+ damange like that, really should be visible. I should have the opportunity to manually fly away from it, shoot it down, or scram any number of protective powers that I carry for just such an event (Aux2SIF, HazEms, APOmega, Brace for Impact, Subspace Field Modulator, Evasive Maneuvers).
What's worse is that whatever the Borg are firing, they can spam it with little cool down. I've seen myself and 2-3 members of my team get wiped one right after the other, only to respawn seconds later and get one shotted again.
Borg should be powerful. I'm ok with that. I'm am unpleased with gameplay that involves dying multiple times in a row from some phantom force.
I know exactly how you feel, I have encountered this several times in the Elite STF missions. It drives me crazy when I get blown up and I dont see what it is that killed me. Again because of needing to get back in the action I keep forgetting to check the logs. But this is something that I feel really needs to be fixed. I dont mind working for my loot and to complete the missions, but I dont see the sense in endless re-spawning to get the job done either. What good are our buffs to protect us from this kind of damage if they dont protect you in the first place? Anyway, make it tough but this one shot killing is for the birds.
The only logic behind STF boss fights is - die, respawn attack, die respawn attack, dia respawn attack. Aggro holding mechanic doesn't work in STF. Even if you maximize your threat generation stat you'll still be outganned by other ships and the logic I mentioned above will still be in effect during the STF boss fights.
.
I couldnt have said this any better. This is exactly how I feel. There is no logic behind this kind of absurd damage the Borg Bosses do to us. Tanking is an afterthought and survivability is next to none. I realy hate the endless re-spawning to win STFs. Crazy!!!
BTW, Im a lifetime member and im supposed to get the title below my name, how the heck do you turn that on? Ive looked and dont see it anywhere.
I appreciate the fact that the Borg are supposed to be insanely powerful.
However, an invisible torpedo that bypasses shields and does enough damage to blow up an Odyssey is just wrong.
It's only the Cubes that launch them. I almost want to say that it only happens in Cure, because if I go down in KA or Infected it's the old fashioned way.
Khitomer Accord boss has 150K one shots. Either its visible or INvisible, I dont really care because no matter what you do you won't survive this kind of a blast - either you see it coming or not - you'll die anyway and even if you see it it comes faster than any darn plasma torpedo. What annoys me is the fact that its just there. You are not required to use any kind of strategy, because strategy of DYING is the only one that Elite STF space bosses are about. You are required to die, respawn, die respawn.
Baically most bosses are just very stupid floating picture with a bunch of HP and one shot kills and whoever does most DPS will be one-shotted first. And if you fly around the sucker and she can't reach you - she'll just disappear and then reappear with a green one-shotter ready, you get out of the blast area and then she'll try to shoot you again if you stay in blind spot she will disappear again and so on and so forth. These damn bosses are MEANT to one shoot you and then one shoot next player and so on and so forth.
All I can say - very poorly scripted bosses. No thinking behind them at all. One game makes you tank and spank a boss for 2 hours (WoW), in STO you just get one shot no matter what you do. Visible, invisible, who cares? You'll die anyway, even if you see it, its a part of the boss fight - to die. And not to die because you failed to implement a proper strategy, you die because there is NO strategy and the only way they can make the fight challenging is to have you killed in one shot.
/sarcasm I guess if you were killed in 2 shots or 2 invisible shots that would be damn too easy elite boss. /sarcasm
Khitomer Accord boss has 150K one shots. Either its visible or INvisible, I dont really care because no matter what you do you won't survive this kind of a blast - either you see it coming or not - you'll die anyway and even if you see it it comes faster than any darn plasma torpedo. What annoys me is the fact that its just there. You are not required to use any kind of strategy, because strategy of DYING is the only one that Elite STF space bosses are about. You are required to die, respawn, die respawn.
Baically most bosses are just very stupid floating picture with a bunch of HP and one shot kills and whoever does most DPS will be one-shotted first. And if you fly around the sucker and she can't reach you - she'll just disappear and then reappear with a green one-shotter ready, you get out of the blast area and then she'll try to shoot you again if you stay in blind spot she will disappear again and so on and so forth. These damn bosses are MEANT to one shoot you and then one shoot next player and so on and so forth.
All I can say - very poorly scripted bosses. No thinking behind them at all. One game makes you tank and spank a boss for 2 hours (WoW), in STO you just get one shot no matter what you do. Visible, invisible, who cares? You'll die anyway, even if you see it, its a part of the boss fight - to die. And not to die because you failed to implement a proper strategy, you die because there is NO strategy and the only way they can make the fight challenging is to have you killed in one shot.
/sarcasm I guess if you were killed in 2 shots or 2 invisible shots that would be damn too easy elite boss. /sarcasm
+1
The elite STF's bosses are nothing more than poor and lazy designs by devs who lack the skill to make the fight hard, interesting and fun. SOE devs over a decade ago in EQ1 were able to do better endgame content with fights that required tactics and so has every MMO dev team since then except Cryptic who go with the most basic massive HP and damage on the bosses.
The only tactic in any of the STFs is the Scimitar green net attack where players can avoid the blast if they are paying attention. That's how boss fight in MMO's are ment to work with players having to react to what the mob is doing and not just getting 1 shot killed, respawning and zerging the mob to death.
It does sometimes have it's benefits though having these one shots. We were just running an Elite Infected space when all of a sudden the Tac Cube just exploded from 50% hull. The Combat Log revealed this;
Bottom line of the log reveals it one shot itself with a 900k hit.
I think the underlying problem with these kinds of things is that it makes the challenge feel artificially increased. The borg aren't playing by the same rules as everyone else. Their abilities and weapons are jacked up to an insane rate, as are their health. Cryptic has shown that their level designers can make interesting boss fights such as the one with Menton in Stronghold, in Champions Online, so why do they get so lazy in Star Trek Online?
Personally, I'd enjoy some sort of drawn out tactical fight a.la. Wrath of Khan, where its a single ship perhaps just with the regeneration, with an intelligent AI and abilities no different from the PCs. I suppose the flaw with this desire is the STO AI ate a lot of lead-based paint as a child.
I think the main problem of space fights is almost free and instant respawn, and insane damage to compensate it.
IMO respawn in combat should be restricted, or after respawn player should be unable to join the fight.
It will increase difficulty a lot, and all damage will have to be reduced to compensate. And it will make survival abilities useful. You will have to stay alive during all fight, instead of silly "MAX DPS - die - respawn" cycle...
I think the main problem of space fights is almost free and instant respawn, and insane damage to compensate it.
IMO respawn in combat should be restricted, or after respawn player should be unable to join the fight.
It will increase difficulty a lot, and all damage will have to be reduced to compensate. And it will make survival abilities useful. You will have to stay alive during all fight, instead of silly "MAX DPS - die - respawn" cycle...
Indeed, it was the first thing in this game that made me go... 'huh?'
When you die, you should stay dead until the encounter concludes either way or you are battle ressed, it may be samy with other MMOs, but it would make the endgame so much better. People would be forced to play better, and the abilities of the borg could be toned down to reasonable levels. Getting hit by a shootable plasma torpedo (for example) is akin to standing in the fire in any other MMO, i.e. it's an epic fail. This would raise the skill cap in this game so much, give 'Elite' some meaning, and require proper support vessels (tanks and healers).
I think the underlying problem with these kinds of things is that it makes the challenge feel artificially increased. The borg aren't playing by the same rules as everyone else. Their abilities and weapons are jacked up to an insane rate, as are their health. Cryptic has shown that their level designers can make interesting boss fights such as the one with Menton in Stronghold, in Champions Online, so why do they get so lazy in Star Trek Online?
Personally, I'd enjoy some sort of drawn out tactical fight a.la. Wrath of Khan, where its a single ship perhaps just with the regeneration, with an intelligent AI and abilities no different from the PCs. I suppose the flaw with this desire is the STO AI ate a lot of lead-based paint as a child.
Usually when you see a very poorly scripted boss without no thinking behind it's strategy and only huge HP and one shot attacks it means either of:
1. Company doesn't have enough budget to pay a developer for developing a more involving script which requires much more time.
2. They have hired a dev who has little to no imagination.
3. Lack of tools to create something better
4. Lack of time and everybody is being bossed around in the company
Considering what Cryptic was going through with ownership change I'd say they've just did what they could. Created STFs very quick without putting much thought into it to stall high level players. You can see this in every MMO when devs panic or have little time and/or money they create some dumb high-level content for high-level players to grind in.
In other words its cheaper and requires much less time to create a dumb STF than develop something really interesting. There could be other factors. Like for example CEO says - I want my STF on the table in a week, or you are all fired. Then devs being forced by lack of time create something like current STF and add a stupid drop rate for elite parts to stall players.
In the end I'd say blame the management. They either were unable to follow through, dont care to understand what players want or lack of planning and push developers and force them to create dumb content with minial drop rates to simply stall players without actually offering them anything decent. Game development is quite complex process and if its not organized well - then everything goes to heck. I guess it could be worse, we might have not had any STFs at all. But does that mean we should be happy now?
I did a few elite STFs yesterday, and while I found them a lot easier than they used to be the "LOL no" borg torpedoes were still around. We had one poor soul in our team who would preform the following:
*die*
*spawn*
*die right after spawning*
*spawn*
*die right after spawning*
Most simply because the Borg Tac Cube at the end of infected apparently has 360 degree automatic torpedo spread turrets that sometimes launch invisible torpedoes. But it's not just infected, Ran cure space on normal and just randomly exploded with nothing within range of me. Full hull, full shields, just banked a turn and *pop* there wasn't even a number showing damage I just randomly exploded for no apparent reason.
Getting hit by a shootable plasma torpedo (for example) is akin to standing in the fire in any other MMO, i.e. it's an epic fail
I'd agree if the problem was the destructible torpedoes but for the most part it's not. They can be dealt with and TBH I can't even recall the last time I was hit by one but I was one shot yesterday 6 times by the same Tac Cube by basic torpedoes. How does that help me improve my game? I already spam hull and shield resistance buffs but can't maintain them indefinitely and because I can't always see the torpedo coming (because they aren't even rendered on screen due to all the objects around and usually hit several seconds after they should have anyway) clickable hull resists aren't always helpful so, realistically, it matters very little how skilled a player is as they're going to be hit so hard that they can't negate all that damage on a regular basis anyway.
I find the instant respawn fine but a way to improve the skill level (and make a tank viable for those that really just want to sit there being shot at) would be to decrease the NPCs kinetic damage (and consequently the one shots) and increase the energy weapon damage so that instead of being hit by unmanageable amounts of kinetic damage you're constantly being hit by energy weapon damage that wears down your defences.
For those that take the time to run skills that give effective hull and shield resistances this wouldn't make the NPCs any different in terms of difficulty but those that don't would still die quickly, they'd just have a few seconds to spam abilities and see what works. As it stands current;y you can't improve because there's no way to deal with the amount of damage being dealt on a regular basis so it's easy for those that aren't yet sure of the game to write it off as something that happens. However if they can see others regularly taking those hits and surviving (and I can think of only two Cruisers that regularly tank those Tac Cubes in elite STFs, despite the numerous Cruisers out there) then they'll hopefully realise it's something wrong on there end.
Either way, forcing people to sit there whilst the rest of the team gets progressively weaker due to incapacitated team members won't in and of itself force improvement but would likely increase the hostility to the less skilled (you can see that already in the numerous threads about inexperienced players in Elite STFs) as the more experienced get to carry even more of the load whilst the inexperienced sit back and watch due to no respawn option. Although I'd prefer STO space combat in Elite STFs didn't amount to zerg and respawn I don't agree that taking away the instant respawn option will help there, even if the damage is toned down.
I can also see that their Toolset Kit even the one that developers use is quite limited. Foundry gets a toolset with a heck limited out of it, but I don't see that developers have anything that much better. They probably have some scripting module where they can script object behavior, but their scripting lefts to desire better. So maybe taking back my words about blaming management or whatever.
I think that STO game development tool is just not good enough to give us anything better. They worked on it lately it seems comparing to other old missions that are what we do now in Foundry, but improving the game dev tool seems to be taking them a lot of time and effort. So I guess that for a while we will be getting quite similar missions.
I wish foundry users had more freedom in what they can do, so Cryptic could maybe borrow the Ideas, or if they could add some foundry missions into existing pool of Episodes, but thats not as easy i guess and needs a lot of review and approvals.
Comments
Also, this is starting to sound like a Borg torpedo version of the Lance Phaser, but since it's a torpedo it's a lot more annoying.
my cruiser is built to tank and tankit does. I ran a purely unscientific test where I bult a ship and did not specc for damage resistance. i was getting hit for 124k or higher from the attacks.
When I used the right gear the nmbers became managable ..a pale shadow of their former viciousness. From 124k hits to 30 k hits....I can easily recover from those. The Romulan ship used by Donatra was also tried and it wiped the whole group on elite except for me.........i took 27k...
The fact of the matter is people IMO play the game like theu have unlimited lives and they will respawn shortly after...
I play differetly......i retreat regroup and survuve much more then the average players because they sit in one place and fire.......or use their engineer consoles for other items then defense..
What really bothers me is that the wepaons range is gigantic...I burst sped away got to 27 k and the weapon still hit me.....i survived ......that needs to be looked at.
Elite difficulty is madness. It isn't even worthy of being called elite. They should call it "Khitomer Accord - Suicide VA" because you just DIE to EVERYTHING. I mean, I do feel like the Borg as they are are kind of weak against players but yes I agree with you. Dying to a single torpedo when at 100% hull is pretty bad. Not to mention just how hard it is to shoot down the heavy plasma torpedoes....ugh....
If it makes you feel better our weapons will do that too if it was fired before the target is out of range. It will keep following until it hits.
The problem isn't HY torpedoes, they're tough but manageable because they're so slow and targetable. The one shots are coming from basic torpedoes that won't appear on the buff bar, they're just auto fired by the NPC. These are the worst offenders, I can deal with the insane FaW or the Plasma DoTs that crit for over 3k per tick because they give me a chance to react and use a skill to help resist but a single torpedo that hits for 100k with no warning and isn't even rendered on screen on a regular basis isn't something that can be prepared for.
Maybe that's what's going on here?
You make it through the volley, possibly having as much as 40% health left if you're well buffed, then a single torp cripples you for 20k or so (90k before resists maybe?) and pop. or a 20k Cannon shot (seriously ...20k from a single cannon shot? Who decided the numbers here?)
Oh and Donatra isn't happy with just spamming the volleys now, she'll throw em out immediately after she decloaks then follow up with an instant (no warmup/warning animation) uber-thalaron pulse.
Fun...innit?
Despite this....I'm still running STFs. I don't tend to die often, save when one of these idiocies occurs. I still find it fun when you actually defeat this overpowered bullcack.
But my sense of fairplay takes a hit every time.
Its an obvious fact that dying in STO is a part of game mechanic. NORMAL STFs are extremely easy if you have semi pink Mark XII equipment. So to make it more challenging they've made Elite STFs "challenging" by either swarming a bunch of one shot mobs on you if you do it wrong or a boss ship that always one shot kills you. This way you won't have a chance of retaliation until you respawn and if you try to complain about "TOO EASY", devs will tell you to go and try to take 1v1 on a boss ship.
You die in one shot from a boss ship. I guess if you'd die in 2 shots it would be TOO EASY...
I am being sarcastic here so, whatever.
Elites are supposed to be hard...not a problem. I -like- a challenge, it makes the eventual success far more enjoyable.
What irks me (and I've reiterated this several times) is imbalanced gameplay.
Bosses need tools to make us scared. One-shot effects are part of that mechanic.
Assuming you have a tank, he has to be able to take that hit or evade it in some way. Using Donatra as an example (the Thalaron pulse) you really need to evade it. That means holding back 1: Evasive Maneuvers and 2: A tractor breaking tool (Pol Hull or Omega).
To hold those back you need to be in range and suffering the worst of her fire (remember, to keep her aggro you gotta keep shooting her).
Keeping at a decent pace can keep you out of her forwards arc -most- of the time, but not all [if folks have a technique that doesnt blow the evasive cooldown and works reliably let me know, more than pleased to learn it].
That means you have to suffer some big hits, constantly. That I can do, steadily using various tanking cooldowns to keep myself up. Then she pops a Salvo3. Ok....survivable, but it hurts.
But what do you do when she spams another a couple of seconds later? Or smacks you with 90k normal torps just as you're still repairing?
I run to the assumption that- If you are doing everything right, you shouldn't be dying.
So....I post here, giving my feedback on gameplay. If some gets through and they modify things slightly...good stuff.
If not....well, at least I tried.
It would make sense canon wise if the following where also canon but this is not the case.
specs of Galaxcy Class ship @ base level should be.
Tactical Systems
Phaser: 12 banks typ-X phaser
Typ-X phaser power: 5,1 MW
Torpedoes: photon torpedoes
Torpedo launchers: 3 (maximum of 10 torpedoes to be launched at one time per launcher)
General Specifications
Crew (standard): 1012
Crew (maximum): 5000
and shields to match.. something like 500K shield as base
and about 800,000 Hull would make it canon
These bosses have little to no "thought" behind them. All it is - juiced up fat ship with a bunch of HP and a deadly whip. You not supposed to survive against it even if you use whatever you want to use. Sarcasm here is that common captain logic like you mention above doesn't apply to STF strategies. Even if you use all your abilities appropriately and even if Science captain will heal you, it will still be a quick death.
You call this yourself as a part of mechanic that makes your success enjoyable. But on the other hand you wonder why can't you tank a boss ship even though you doing everything right.
The only logic behind STF boss fights is - die, respawn attack, die respawn attack, dia respawn attack. Aggro holding mechanic doesn't work in STF. Even if you maximize your threat generation stat you'll still be outganned by other ships and the logic I mentioned above will still be in effect during the STF boss fights.
There are OBVIOUS one shot moments you CAN escape (green net and then a one shot kill to everyone who didn't escape the net on time) but everythign else is just a whip that meant to de-shield you and then one shot you. No matter what you do there will be one shots because its considered as a must have in STF. Its much easier to make a beefy boss with 1000000 HP who occasionally one shoots you and others than create actually a scripted encounter that is enjoyable to play.
I am not saying its right. I am saying thats what it is and why.
You seem to be missing the point. The one shot itself is not the point, the point is that you can't see it, or even know that it is on it's way( im talking the tac cube, not Donata). That is what I and a few others do have a problem with, is the blatant "TRIBBLE you, your dead, and I cheated to do it!" thrown at us by the devs.
Stack some drains on the tac cube. A klink carrier can do it alone, but it takes a while. Target Subsystems, Tyken's, Energy Siphon, Borg Tractor, Breen Set bonus ability, Siphon Pods (Klingon only). Zero weapons power and they're not shooting any torps, invisible or otherwise.
No, he got it right. This is why we're seeing one shot Borg bosses. They are not well thought out.
Prime example is the giant plasma shot from a Unimatrix carrier on your level or above. Those things fly at a decent click and combined with a severe dodge bonus, it takes an uncanny amount of shots to get one a few to land on it and dissipate the shot before it reaches anyone. Then pile on the Regenerative Probes that appear practically every 20 seconds. Unless you're all escorts with Cannon Scatter Volley, its not happening.
Another example is Armek of Borg which required its own thread of fail.
I know exactly how you feel, I have encountered this several times in the Elite STF missions. It drives me crazy when I get blown up and I dont see what it is that killed me. Again because of needing to get back in the action I keep forgetting to check the logs. But this is something that I feel really needs to be fixed. I dont mind working for my loot and to complete the missions, but I dont see the sense in endless re-spawning to get the job done either. What good are our buffs to protect us from this kind of damage if they dont protect you in the first place? Anyway, make it tough but this one shot killing is for the birds.
I couldnt have said this any better. This is exactly how I feel. There is no logic behind this kind of absurd damage the Borg Bosses do to us. Tanking is an afterthought and survivability is next to none. I realy hate the endless re-spawning to win STFs. Crazy!!!
BTW, Im a lifetime member and im supposed to get the title below my name, how the heck do you turn that on? Ive looked and dont see it anywhere.
However, an invisible torpedo that bypasses shields and does enough damage to blow up an Odyssey is just wrong.
It's only the Cubes that launch them. I almost want to say that it only happens in Cure, because if I go down in KA or Infected it's the old fashioned way.
Baically most bosses are just very stupid floating picture with a bunch of HP and one shot kills and whoever does most DPS will be one-shotted first. And if you fly around the sucker and she can't reach you - she'll just disappear and then reappear with a green one-shotter ready, you get out of the blast area and then she'll try to shoot you again if you stay in blind spot she will disappear again and so on and so forth. These damn bosses are MEANT to one shoot you and then one shoot next player and so on and so forth.
All I can say - very poorly scripted bosses. No thinking behind them at all. One game makes you tank and spank a boss for 2 hours (WoW), in STO you just get one shot no matter what you do. Visible, invisible, who cares? You'll die anyway, even if you see it, its a part of the boss fight - to die. And not to die because you failed to implement a proper strategy, you die because there is NO strategy and the only way they can make the fight challenging is to have you killed in one shot.
/sarcasm I guess if you were killed in 2 shots or 2 invisible shots that would be damn too easy elite boss. /sarcasm
+1
The elite STF's bosses are nothing more than poor and lazy designs by devs who lack the skill to make the fight hard, interesting and fun. SOE devs over a decade ago in EQ1 were able to do better endgame content with fights that required tactics and so has every MMO dev team since then except Cryptic who go with the most basic massive HP and damage on the bosses.
The only tactic in any of the STFs is the Scimitar green net attack where players can avoid the blast if they are paying attention. That's how boss fight in MMO's are ment to work with players having to react to what the mob is doing and not just getting 1 shot killed, respawning and zerging the mob to death.
boost shield power with consoles
Bottom line of the log reveals it one shot itself with a 900k hit.
Personally, I'd enjoy some sort of drawn out tactical fight a.la. Wrath of Khan, where its a single ship perhaps just with the regeneration, with an intelligent AI and abilities no different from the PCs. I suppose the flaw with this desire is the STO AI ate a lot of lead-based paint as a child.
IMO respawn in combat should be restricted, or after respawn player should be unable to join the fight.
It will increase difficulty a lot, and all damage will have to be reduced to compensate. And it will make survival abilities useful. You will have to stay alive during all fight, instead of silly "MAX DPS - die - respawn" cycle...
Indeed, it was the first thing in this game that made me go... 'huh?'
When you die, you should stay dead until the encounter concludes either way or you are battle ressed, it may be samy with other MMOs, but it would make the endgame so much better. People would be forced to play better, and the abilities of the borg could be toned down to reasonable levels. Getting hit by a shootable plasma torpedo (for example) is akin to standing in the fire in any other MMO, i.e. it's an epic fail. This would raise the skill cap in this game so much, give 'Elite' some meaning, and require proper support vessels (tanks and healers).
Usually when you see a very poorly scripted boss without no thinking behind it's strategy and only huge HP and one shot attacks it means either of:
1. Company doesn't have enough budget to pay a developer for developing a more involving script which requires much more time.
2. They have hired a dev who has little to no imagination.
3. Lack of tools to create something better
4. Lack of time and everybody is being bossed around in the company
Considering what Cryptic was going through with ownership change I'd say they've just did what they could. Created STFs very quick without putting much thought into it to stall high level players. You can see this in every MMO when devs panic or have little time and/or money they create some dumb high-level content for high-level players to grind in.
In other words its cheaper and requires much less time to create a dumb STF than develop something really interesting. There could be other factors. Like for example CEO says - I want my STF on the table in a week, or you are all fired. Then devs being forced by lack of time create something like current STF and add a stupid drop rate for elite parts to stall players.
In the end I'd say blame the management. They either were unable to follow through, dont care to understand what players want or lack of planning and push developers and force them to create dumb content with minial drop rates to simply stall players without actually offering them anything decent. Game development is quite complex process and if its not organized well - then everything goes to heck. I guess it could be worse, we might have not had any STFs at all. But does that mean we should be happy now?
*die*
*spawn*
*die right after spawning*
*spawn*
*die right after spawning*
Most simply because the Borg Tac Cube at the end of infected apparently has 360 degree automatic torpedo spread turrets that sometimes launch invisible torpedoes. But it's not just infected, Ran cure space on normal and just randomly exploded with nothing within range of me. Full hull, full shields, just banked a turn and *pop* there wasn't even a number showing damage I just randomly exploded for no apparent reason.
I'd agree if the problem was the destructible torpedoes but for the most part it's not. They can be dealt with and TBH I can't even recall the last time I was hit by one but I was one shot yesterday 6 times by the same Tac Cube by basic torpedoes. How does that help me improve my game? I already spam hull and shield resistance buffs but can't maintain them indefinitely and because I can't always see the torpedo coming (because they aren't even rendered on screen due to all the objects around and usually hit several seconds after they should have anyway) clickable hull resists aren't always helpful so, realistically, it matters very little how skilled a player is as they're going to be hit so hard that they can't negate all that damage on a regular basis anyway.
I find the instant respawn fine but a way to improve the skill level (and make a tank viable for those that really just want to sit there being shot at) would be to decrease the NPCs kinetic damage (and consequently the one shots) and increase the energy weapon damage so that instead of being hit by unmanageable amounts of kinetic damage you're constantly being hit by energy weapon damage that wears down your defences.
For those that take the time to run skills that give effective hull and shield resistances this wouldn't make the NPCs any different in terms of difficulty but those that don't would still die quickly, they'd just have a few seconds to spam abilities and see what works. As it stands current;y you can't improve because there's no way to deal with the amount of damage being dealt on a regular basis so it's easy for those that aren't yet sure of the game to write it off as something that happens. However if they can see others regularly taking those hits and surviving (and I can think of only two Cruisers that regularly tank those Tac Cubes in elite STFs, despite the numerous Cruisers out there) then they'll hopefully realise it's something wrong on there end.
Either way, forcing people to sit there whilst the rest of the team gets progressively weaker due to incapacitated team members won't in and of itself force improvement but would likely increase the hostility to the less skilled (you can see that already in the numerous threads about inexperienced players in Elite STFs) as the more experienced get to carry even more of the load whilst the inexperienced sit back and watch due to no respawn option. Although I'd prefer STO space combat in Elite STFs didn't amount to zerg and respawn I don't agree that taking away the instant respawn option will help there, even if the damage is toned down.
I think that STO game development tool is just not good enough to give us anything better. They worked on it lately it seems comparing to other old missions that are what we do now in Foundry, but improving the game dev tool seems to be taking them a lot of time and effort. So I guess that for a while we will be getting quite similar missions.
I wish foundry users had more freedom in what they can do, so Cryptic could maybe borrow the Ideas, or if they could add some foundry missions into existing pool of Episodes, but thats not as easy i guess and needs a lot of review and approvals.