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Donatra and 5km
reginamala78
Member Posts: 4,593 Arc User
So lately in KASE a lot, people have been calling for the 5km 'rule' when dealing with Donatra, saying she won't cloak if everyone stays outside of 5km. I disagree with that assessment, but I also figure debating tactics in the middle of a match would be bad timing and, with truncated text, come off as needlessly argumentative rather than trying to genuinely discuss it. So I bring it up here instead, to ask other players in a more suitable environment for such discussion. I think its silly, but if I'm mathematically wrong, lemme know why.
1 Isn't it yet another STF urban legend, like successful optionals supposedly boosting chances for tech drops and the like? She cloaks whenever she feels like cloaking, and thats just how it goes. Why bend over backwards for something that doesn't actually affect anything?
2 Pets. Between the proliferation of fighter pets and photonic fleet pets, even if you hang back, won't something else break the 5km boundary? Or do they not count? Or are pets supposed to be held back now (sucks if you're a carrier)?
3 We do more damage inside of 5km. This is true for everyone, but for me especially (being selfish here), the 2 ships I'm running lately are built around PSW3, so I need to get in close or lose my biggest hit. Even if this does ultimately trigger the cloak, isn't the extra damage worth it?
4 She's at her most vulnerable right after decloak. Evasive out of the cone of the thalaron pulse, pick your choice of shield facings, pound her with your biggest attacks. Its the best time to hit her, so why not enourage her to do it more often?
5 Recharge times. The cloaking time gives her a chance to heal a bit and recover her BOFF powers. However it also gives us that same breather. She gets 4 powers, we get 20+ times 5 players, plus much better healing. Plus one player with a subnuc can take most of her recovery away. Seems like the players come out on top of that math to me.
So I'm not trying to argue per se, but these are my thoughts on the subject. Am I overlooking something and need to jump on the bandwagon, or is this new rule a silly fad that needs to go away?
1 Isn't it yet another STF urban legend, like successful optionals supposedly boosting chances for tech drops and the like? She cloaks whenever she feels like cloaking, and thats just how it goes. Why bend over backwards for something that doesn't actually affect anything?
2 Pets. Between the proliferation of fighter pets and photonic fleet pets, even if you hang back, won't something else break the 5km boundary? Or do they not count? Or are pets supposed to be held back now (sucks if you're a carrier)?
3 We do more damage inside of 5km. This is true for everyone, but for me especially (being selfish here), the 2 ships I'm running lately are built around PSW3, so I need to get in close or lose my biggest hit. Even if this does ultimately trigger the cloak, isn't the extra damage worth it?
4 She's at her most vulnerable right after decloak. Evasive out of the cone of the thalaron pulse, pick your choice of shield facings, pound her with your biggest attacks. Its the best time to hit her, so why not enourage her to do it more often?
5 Recharge times. The cloaking time gives her a chance to heal a bit and recover her BOFF powers. However it also gives us that same breather. She gets 4 powers, we get 20+ times 5 players, plus much better healing. Plus one player with a subnuc can take most of her recovery away. Seems like the players come out on top of that math to me.
So I'm not trying to argue per se, but these are my thoughts on the subject. Am I overlooking something and need to jump on the bandwagon, or is this new rule a silly fad that needs to go away?
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As long as any playership being top aggro stays beyond 5km, she doesn't cloak.
If aggro switches to a player with less than 5km, she usually cloaks pretty quick.
Pets don't count and even keep her on target, while she is cloaked.
There are different ways to handle her, and all are okay, because you don't have to beat a timer anymore.
Advantage of a never cloaking enemy: 100% uptime.
When you have 50% downtime (which can be the case when she cloaks often), any damage increase needs to be more than double your output during uptime.
(these are the possible extremes).
She is harder to handle, because you may get low on CDs to survive her torpedo barrages as the top aggro ship (flying further away than 10km renders you useless, but you can wait for CDs blabla).
So after all it depends on groupsetup.
And yes, the 5k rule does work as stated.
I get what you are saying, by stating, that if you are close, you deal more damage, and if she cloaks she gets more vulnerable. I may even agree that this way she goes down faster. the ship I mean. the whole time spent in the game, is a lot longer.
believe me, you want her to not cloak, because it takes forever, if someone always gets in her face, and she cloaks 5-10 times, before you can kill her (especially if you have a low dps group)
10k DPS Vesta threads: 1; 2
It seemed to work.
Nice to know others' experiences.
Also, on a side note, PSW's disable effect shuts down her thalaron blast while she's charging it to fire.
(something I noticed on my Sci captain a few months back, but haven't seen anyone else utilize, heh)
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It works fine. You make up the damage difference by not flying around twiddling your thumbs while she's cloaked.
I actually thought the way you did before, but I was wrong.
I routinely tank her on my Tac in my Fl. Tor'Kaht at 6-7km and have little trouble holding aggro, and its a cannon/torp boat.
donatra is typically pretty easy to beat either way. i just go along with the others. if they want to follow the 5km rule, so will i and if they don't, it is not a big deal.
typically on KASE i run with an oddy with cannons and beams primarily so i can keep my distance from donatra and do damage.
i will do KASE with an escort that just destroys probes with ease, but i don't do as well against donatra under the 5km rule.
Very true!
Works great, I actually stay 6-10km away with my escort swinging in firing. I can generally keep the aggro on me the whole time as long as i attack. Takes a decent team 3-7 mins max to kill her
Here goes...
Nope. I've seen it definitely work, and I've seen cases where there have been "5.1 range" violations by a non-aggroed player and the cloak does not go off. Therefore, it does seem that the cloak-check is triggered by the "active target" (aka one with most aggro) being inside/outside that 5.1 km "barrier"...
This lends support to the "only the aggroed target triggers the cloak" theory, as pets rarely/never get Donatra's direct attention...
IIRC, beams don't drop off "as badly as cannons" at the range brackets. Which then beggars the question - is the PSW & better range bracket damage > lesser sustained DPS?
Because she heals most shield damage during the decloak, and her shields are snapped back into place by the time the evasive's done. Also, don't quote me on this, but Donatra doesn't decloak until her aggroed target is outside the 5.1 bubble for X period of time, so barring an effective tank, the best DPSser is the one that's playing "evasives out of thalaron cone"
It ultimately depends. Without her cloak/heals and the thalaron pulses I've only seen fired as part of a decloak, Donatra's not much worse than the assimilated carrier at the end of CSE. Also, even though the player's aren't in "their" optimal range brackets, Donatra's not quite as sturdy as the Assim. Carrier. To cite SFB/SFC - sometimes it's beneficial to take the shots from outside the "optimal" range bracket and be assured damage than it is to gamble on the "perfect" shot and wind up scoring no damage (Donatra cloaks and shield-heals)...
To rob a line: [quote: Mariemaia Kushrenada] Forum Posting is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever. However, opinions will change upon the reading of my post.[/quote]
That's total bull, typically the empty can rattles the most. The OP did exactly what he should have done, come to the forums and get the full story.
Never assume that a person, even one with accolades or shiny badges, actually know what they're doing. I've seen plenty of skittle boats blarg on and on about how everyone's a bunch of noobs and then TRIBBLE up the entire run by doing something stupid.
Anyway here's our tatic for KASE one of use will guard the probes on both sides with an escort. While the other 4 split up into two teams of two. One set of two will go to one gate and work on the generators and transformers , cubes. The other set of two will go to the other gate and do the same thing there. Both teams will start on the two transformers furtherest away from the middle vortex (gate) that the probes are trying to get to. After those transformers are down they move to the two closest to the vortex and take it out. They will then move to their respective gate and position themselves so they can first on the gate and probes at the same time. The person who was on probe duty will now help one of the two teams with their gate. Until it it down to 20% or so then he will leve that gate and and start heading to the other side and help with that gate. Both sides will take out their gate as quick as they can. Who ever kills the gate first will then go to the other side and finsih off that gate and any speres and probes are left. Then everyone will go after Donatra and we take her out as fast as we can.
Oh and 'taking orders' based on who's the loudest and has some l33tness tag? Pffft, yeah right.
Why then do people believe the 5k rule works? Well its random for 1, for 2 most the people that 'think' it works do NOT have their char/ships specced properly. How do I know this?
They have rainbow boats, which means they dont capitalize on their damage potential. Which means, Donatra doesnt need to cloak because well they suck... and their ships die.
Learn to put your ships together, learn how to fight and in the name of Zeus, Ares or any other person/deity get rid of your stupid rainbow weapons. Stick with 1 energy type cannon/beam or both is fine as long as its the same.
No, it actually works.
Only her target needs to remain outside 5km - however, she sometimes changes targets. (which is why people might think it's random).
I often put out 12k to 20k DPS during that fight.
Here is my top burst (from CSE, not KASE: 1 million+ points of damage in 17s)
NOOB with a Capital NOOB
the 5km rule seems to be true, however I agree with you... there is also
6) an escort under the fire of donatra can't tank it for a long time... the only way to avoid its fire is staying more then 10km away (and becoming useless) or flying closer to it (traying to stay near its back).
Playing STO spamming FAW is like playing chess using always the computer's suggested moves
That's the key there, if you got aggro on her and are kitting her you can just keep her in view at all time.
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That's a bit extreme. Donatra is a no fail encounter. Baring complete total incompetence of everyone in the group it's not possible to fail once you get to donatra. You can lemming yourself onto her and do a little bit of damage every attempt until she dies.
The only way you can 'fail' is if your ships are all so badly broken, and you have all the wrong abilities so you can't get past her shields. She's not as easy as the assimilated carrier or tactical cube, but these days she's certainly not hard for a pug. Dying isn't that big of a deal. Just remember to repair after you're done.
That's my observation as well. I've heard theories about how often she turns etc. etc.
The specific mechanic of *why* she cloaks is secondary to 'what strategy keeps her from cloaking'. Everyone staying at least 5km from her accomplishes that, though as you say, it seems to specifically be the person she's agro'd under some distance less than 5km *and* some other hidden condition that isn't always on, but is a lot of the time combine to trigger her cloak.
If you didn't take at least 6/9 starship targeting you deserve to fail at dps, even at <5km range.
>5km targeting 6/9 stops you from missing on all NPCs as long as you can fire at them.
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