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Thoughts on the Vesta so far
tom61sto
Member Posts: 3,674 Arc User
I figured I'd give my experience so far for those that are on the fence about it and wanting more info.
Right now flying the Aventine (tac-ish one) from the three pack.
Console abilities: Very nice! Shared cooldown on the consoles is just about is as long as the given power runs, so not much reason to hold back on using them. The three piece has cooldown of about 10 seconds longer than it runs. 3 Min self cooldown on all of them. The deflector phaser is somewhat nice even though it's fire time is long, but not enough to make up for it's lack of fourth forward weapon slot, IMO at least. Fermion field is a pretty nice AoE heal for yourself and surrounding people, seems to heal slightly better than HE3 to those around you (about 5 km sphere). Multidimensional Wave-Function Analysis Module is kinda fun, reflecting all incoming torp damage back at the sender and shoving enemies way. Not used the last one on anything but Tholian mobs so far, but should be handy against Borg.
Manuverability: Feels odd. Seems sporty for the size of ship, but a bit harder to line up cannons than on an escort. Still getting a feel for it, shouldn't be too hard to get a handle on using DHCs given that I can line them up just fine on KDF cruiser with base turn of 10.
Tanking: This thing has thick shields, currently running MACO MK XII on it and it takes a fair bit to crack the shields, even with only a single shield recharge rate console mounted. Bleedthrough seems to not do much thanks to it's fairly large, for a Sci ship anyways, 750 crew. Once through the shields, though, you might as well have built the ship out of paper. Once a Borg Sphere group had drained through my forward facing I was nearly instantly down into the 45% range and had to turn away and hit Fermion to survive.
Firepower: Running 3x Aux DHCs fore and 3x Mk XII [Borg] turrets aft with basically all power to Aux with shields given what's left over. Running with the Lt. Comm. as Tac to give it more options to when using cannons. Not a full escort in firepower by any means, but pretty nice for a Sci ship. In the Infected Space Elite I ran I didn't draw much aggro (3x escorts and 1x Dread), but felt I was actually contributing to the DPS. I was running with only 3x phasers consoles, as I needed a place to shove another universal console :eek:, so not getting the maximum firepower out of it, but not likely to make this a full escort even with all 4 fitted anyways. Sensor Analysis takes so long to stack up that it's not really a huge factor except on really large enemies.
Hangar: Launches slowly... You hit the button to launch fighters, one appears on the rear deck it goes up, then a few seconds later another pops out on the deck and flys up, seems much slower than the Armitage or other carriers when launching. For some reason, even at full Aux, it takes a minute cooldown to launch another wing, even though the same char it takes 35-40 seconds between waves on an Armitage. Also, if you're running the Aventine hull the nacelles of the Runabouts and the wings of the fighters appear inside the riders along the deck... Hopefully both are bugs to be solved at some point. It can fit all Fed hangars, of course, so quite a bit of flexibility added on top of all the flexibility it has with a Uni Lt. Comm BOff.
Edit: unsure on times, will re-check things. On my Eng, Peregrines are 40 second recharge, but my Sci has a 1 min cooldown on them. Both are 1 min. on the Runabouts.
Still not used it enough to give it a rating, but it's an interesting ship, particularly for Sci.
Edit:
Tried it out on my Eng with the Borg Universal put into the Eng slot instead of down in the Tac. Grabbed a lot more aggro, and bleedthrough was much more of an issue with having 1x MK XI Blue Neutronium and 4x phaser consoles. Had to use my Eng capt abilities to stay alive, and even died in an ISE (I still had the shield bubble available but didn't realise that until it was too late).
Right now flying the Aventine (tac-ish one) from the three pack.
Console abilities: Very nice! Shared cooldown on the consoles is just about is as long as the given power runs, so not much reason to hold back on using them. The three piece has cooldown of about 10 seconds longer than it runs. 3 Min self cooldown on all of them. The deflector phaser is somewhat nice even though it's fire time is long, but not enough to make up for it's lack of fourth forward weapon slot, IMO at least. Fermion field is a pretty nice AoE heal for yourself and surrounding people, seems to heal slightly better than HE3 to those around you (about 5 km sphere). Multidimensional Wave-Function Analysis Module is kinda fun, reflecting all incoming torp damage back at the sender and shoving enemies way. Not used the last one on anything but Tholian mobs so far, but should be handy against Borg.
Manuverability: Feels odd. Seems sporty for the size of ship, but a bit harder to line up cannons than on an escort. Still getting a feel for it, shouldn't be too hard to get a handle on using DHCs given that I can line them up just fine on KDF cruiser with base turn of 10.
Tanking: This thing has thick shields, currently running MACO MK XII on it and it takes a fair bit to crack the shields, even with only a single shield recharge rate console mounted. Bleedthrough seems to not do much thanks to it's fairly large, for a Sci ship anyways, 750 crew. Once through the shields, though, you might as well have built the ship out of paper. Once a Borg Sphere group had drained through my forward facing I was nearly instantly down into the 45% range and had to turn away and hit Fermion to survive.
Firepower: Running 3x Aux DHCs fore and 3x Mk XII [Borg] turrets aft with basically all power to Aux with shields given what's left over. Running with the Lt. Comm. as Tac to give it more options to when using cannons. Not a full escort in firepower by any means, but pretty nice for a Sci ship. In the Infected Space Elite I ran I didn't draw much aggro (3x escorts and 1x Dread), but felt I was actually contributing to the DPS. I was running with only 3x phasers consoles, as I needed a place to shove another universal console :eek:, so not getting the maximum firepower out of it, but not likely to make this a full escort even with all 4 fitted anyways. Sensor Analysis takes so long to stack up that it's not really a huge factor except on really large enemies.
Hangar: Launches slowly... You hit the button to launch fighters, one appears on the rear deck it goes up, then a few seconds later another pops out on the deck and flys up, seems much slower than the Armitage or other carriers when launching. For some reason, even at full Aux, it takes a minute cooldown to launch another wing, even though the same char it takes 35-40 seconds between waves on an Armitage. Also, if you're running the Aventine hull the nacelles of the Runabouts and the wings of the fighters appear inside the riders along the deck... Hopefully both are bugs to be solved at some point. It can fit all Fed hangars, of course, so quite a bit of flexibility added on top of all the flexibility it has with a Uni Lt. Comm BOff.
Edit: unsure on times, will re-check things. On my Eng, Peregrines are 40 second recharge, but my Sci has a 1 min cooldown on them. Both are 1 min. on the Runabouts.
Still not used it enough to give it a rating, but it's an interesting ship, particularly for Sci.
Edit:
Tried it out on my Eng with the Borg Universal put into the Eng slot instead of down in the Tac. Grabbed a lot more aggro, and bleedthrough was much more of an issue with having 1x MK XI Blue Neutronium and 4x phaser consoles. Had to use my Eng capt abilities to stay alive, and even died in an ISE (I still had the shield bubble available but didn't realise that until it was too late).
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I agree, while being a good ship with a decent turn rate I find beams are better suited for it, at least if you're a science officer.
Trying it yesterday, when running the aux cannons the best performance was using a tac boff in the ltc universal slot to get the most of them, and with an RCS accelerator console to improve the turn rate. DPS is decent and gameplay is closer to that of an escort but if that is the way you really want to go, at that point is better to play a real escort imo.
Flying it in a more traditional sci style, using a sci boff in the ltc universal slot, replacing the RCS accelerator for a more useful console and returning to my traditional energy setup, using beams felt better suited for it. Even without using the cannons its performance was better than my other ships of choice (RSV and LRSVR) and at last it felt like a real science ship.
Is the hanger taking auxilliary power settings into account at all? It seems like it isn't.
I stared down Donatra, poped the Quantum Focused Shield Bubble, I loled... :cool:
The ship can support heal and DPS right on the verge of escorts. And if you go with a weird build like my double A2bat one that can gravwell + csv and pop a RSP and VM every minute you melt faces of entire groups of NPCs and can take the return hate.
I tanked the borg queen on elite with the Vesta. Was really hard but creative use of polarize hull and Hazz emitters kept her from eating my hull alive.
Dontra just got reverse tanked and slapped down hard wasn't even funny how badly this ship mauls her.
Its a different sort of sci. If you put cannons and run a damage build you will draw aggro. and you have to keep shield facings up and high resist as the hull is made of material less substantial than a business masters thesis. So some kind of armor increasing ability is a must A2S or PH. APD is pretty sweet if you really want to focus on not getting taken out with shields still up. With that and Haz emitters running as fast as you can get you should be able to take the occasional borg states of disapproval.
I may find something that works better in a few weeks but sofar this lets me do damage and stay around. Oh yea and lastly your not a cruiser even though your as big as one if you have half shields and less than 70% hull, Leave! GTFO, exit stage right. Switch to support and throw your TT and TSS on whoever is now tanking and fix your hull up before going back, EPTS should take care of your shields by the time your hulls back.
I'm mainly intrigued for the looks, because this is the first 3-pack that actually makes the ship look different between models, so buying the 3-pack effectively nets you 3 skins.
If only they would do the same for the Odyssey and Bortasq.
That in mind, I'm only looking to pick up one if I can help it, and I'm wondering which one I should get. Since hitting VA I've never remotely played a ship that uses science powers beyond TSS and Hazard emitters, so I'd like some advice on how to fly a Vesta "like a science vessel". I'm open to dropping the cannons if that's what it takes.
I'm an Engi captain and I main a Chimera and an Armitage, both with conventional cannon builds. Right now I'm eyeing the Rademaker because of the looks, but I'd like to know how you lot feel about its gimmick and console layout versus the Aventine and Vesta.
So what exactly is your build, I would like to give it a try myself!
Thing is i actually hate its looks now, the ingame texture of it seems really low quality especially for this mental price tag. It is just majorly Fugly.
I also brought the Steamrunner and flew that more tbh, even though the looks of it ingame is pretty awful too, the rear end is laughable lol.
I was better off with my sci toon in an MVAE in stfs. sad but true it is WAY more durable than the any of the vesta variants:(
hopefully, vesta will get revised during an upcoming maintenance
http://www.stoacademy.com/tools/skillplanner/index.php?build=BatCountry_0
A take on the Dontdrunkimshoot double battery builds. All skills are what you can get at the trainer once I decide that thats what I would stick with I would go looking for rare skills or captain trained versions.
3 purple technicians are absolutely required for this. I even run the 2 piece maco set for its 5% cooldown boost as well. have not had enough time to see if that actually maters(though I'm thinking it doesnt).
The trick is its a little light on hull heals so you either have to watch your hull carefully or run a 2 piece borg. Maco shield is just about required due to resilient properties, I guess a fleet elite resilient would work as well if it has some awesome advantages over the maco.
Right now I use Omega engines as they give the best turnrate of what I have fleet elietes would be good to.
once I hit tier 5 Omega rep I plan on running an adapted set for the torpedo boost set bonus and HG engines and defector stats. With a torp heavy rear weapons setup to allow for a back and forth weaving style of kiting enemies.
We are Science officers. We specialize in crowd control support, and exposing a target so the "Dee Pee Ess'ers" can rip it to pieces.
This being said, I'm loving the Vesta. The Aux Cannons are a breath of fresh air for us Sci officers that BELONG in Sci ships. Tac officers just keep a full weapon power and blow everything up, while Sci Officers, have to manage power levels to be FULLY effective.
I got all three models, popped all three Aux Cannons with three phaser turrets into the weapon slots. Hit the Aux up to 125, rotate between Energy Siphon, ST, TSS at a 15 sec interval to keep shields and power levels maxed, while popping GW3, and Cannon rapid fire to keep up a steady stream of damage.
Now it wasnt the same damage that my Tact could do in a fleet escort, but it was something I cant do it in any other Sci vessel.
Now Im a bit concerned that there wasnt a Dual beam array used instead of a cannon, especially because of the Target abilities native to Sci ships. But whatever..
I can stay full 125 Aux power, keep shields and power levels up, and dish out steady damage ..adding bursts with RF.
I do not have to manage power levels - wait for full power - pop off skill - manage power level - wait for full power - pop off damage skill.. like I have to in any other Sci ship.
Thumbs up on this ship.
There is a minor issue that bothers me though. Maybe other players might confirm this:
If an enemy drains all your weapon power the Aux cannons won't fire either. I suppose it's not meant to work like that? This means that Aux weapons are twice as prone to subsystem targeting or viral matrix attacks as ordinary weapons.
Hopefully this will be corrected soon.
No way.. Really. Do u want an ''click one button kill all in 10km range'' option too? Would that be more natural too?
A ship with shielding like it has and defensive abilties and then asking for more hull.. sorry but really.. lol.
I did end up slotting the Lt. Cmd with a Tac for CRF2 for my Anti-Proton build. I'm still tweaking the setup though for better turn rate. Highest I've been able to make it is 25 degrees per second.
15k shields are nice too
The versatility of this ship makes it good for every role, but there always will be another ship that will make the job done way better.
But I was aware of that. That's partially what I wanted for my PvE Fed Engi and Sci, whom I was sick of playing cruisers, carriers and sci ships, unable to deal any significant damage.
So right now I'm flying Sci in Aventine, with lt.cmdr. tactical, and Engi in Aventine as well, with lt.cmdr. engineering. The former I intended to be more of a DPS dealer with decent support or crowd control, while the latter was more of a team support tank, which would also be able to hold its own against, let's say, CSE raptors alone.
Yet... I feel like I'm struggling. No matter what weapon setup I'll pick I still seem to have issues dealing significant amount of damage, even with abilities such as CRF, CSV, TT, APB, EPTW etc. I even threw away the dual beam bank for a torpedo and it's still not the same as some of my other ships, often having similar weapon setups with way superior actual performance...
With 3x turrets aft, I've tried 1xDBB + 2x dual/quad cannons, 1xQuantum + 2x dual/quads, 1DBB + Quantum + Quad and I still barely manage to stop CSE raptors, which were for a long time my point of reference when it comes to dmg performance. I am able to take out everything in a manner of seconds in a Kar'Fi, with a lot of time to spare to damage the nanites, yet similar setup on Vesta is having issues for some reason. I mean, I do manage to deal with them alone, but it takes way more time than I would like.
Last thing to test is 3xD(H)C, although I'm afraid of significant power level drops, which I've noticed already even with EPTW and running 124/100 Weapon Power as default.
But outside of that I find the ship very enjoyable and versatile in other PvE content. If only the hangar pets could launch a little bit faster, like they do on other ships... They're pretty much useless at the moment - Peregrines die from enemy explosions instantly, while Runabouts have been nerfed so hard they're basically just there... I've seen them use their tractor beams maybe once or twice.
My only question is why are you using quad cannons...
Normal Energy Weapons are dependent on weapon power level for their damage and drain it when fired.
Quad Cannons are dependent on weapon power level for damage and drain both it and engine power when fired.
Auxillary Dual Heavy cannons are influenced solely by your Auxillary Power level and drain it when fired.
Suaveks, try using 3 Auxillary dual heavy cannons up front and a pair of tricobalt mines in back with the following tactical abilities: 2 Tac Team, Cannon Scatter Volley 1, Cannon Scatter Volley 2, and Dispersal Pattern: Beta 1. Use a tractor beam to immobilize the raptor then punch a hole in its shields while deploying the mines. Grav Well multiple raptors and them mine the middle of them. You should have little trouble crushing the tenacious buggers, even if you aren't specced heavily into Projectile weapons.
I've thrown two turrets and a chron mine (you could really just go all mines but they have CD issues) in the back and it's spiffy.
vids and guides and stuff
[9:52] [Zone #11] Neal@trapper1532: im a omega force shadow oprative and a maoc elite camander and here i am taking water samples
Is the rurn rate and dmg output worthwhile to jusitfy the use of 3 aux cannons? Wouldnt it be better to use lets say 2 aux cannons and 1 torp?
PaxOttomana: gawd mirror event is like fighting a tsi premade, they keep comin and comin!
And I don't like paying another 10,000 dilithium for a Fleet weapon.
Which I did anyway... as during my tests I decided to throw the Quads away. I'll stick with them on my Defiant for now.
As for Aux Cannons - I don't see their appeal honestly, outside of the fact that they use Aux. I'm not running pure sci and I'd like more flexibility than just accx2 and dmg mods.
Mines I never really liked outside of very specific situations, but I may be tempted to check how they work in this case. Lots of room for experimentation, which I like. First though I'll try a full 3x dual cannon and 3x turret run, without any torps or beams. I'm using something similar on a Kar'Fi (the 4th weapon there is Bio-Neural torp, but it's 1min cd) and it's a monster, but at the same time Kar'Fi is OP like hell. ;p
Well at two cannons you're going to struggle to bring down a facing to let said torp off into. I could be a little biased here (because I flew the Excel for so long in my earlier days) but the Besta's turn is actually kinda sick, and you have to remember that in the end, you're in a Sci boat: your raison d'etre is crippling people at the knees so they can't move. If you can't turn fast enough, make it so other people turn a hell of a lot slower.
I would say you could definitely make an all-torp Besta work, though. That's the thing: like someone else just said, the ship is ridiculously adaptable because of just how much TRIBBLE was packed onto it.
Also an interesting note for anyone using the Tac variant's toy console: it weirdly scales completely off of aux power and Particle Gen, even though it seems like just a phaser lance. This applies even if you're not using any aux cannons.
vids and guides and stuff
[9:52] [Zone #11] Neal@trapper1532: im a omega force shadow oprative and a maoc elite camander and here i am taking water samples
Thought you needed a beam array to fire of that phaser lance or will cannons do?
PaxOttomana: gawd mirror event is like fighting a tsi premade, they keep comin and comin!
I thought at first it was going to be some kind of weapon (like quads or a bio-neural) or maybe even an innate, but basically it's just a console and if you have it slotted, you get the lance ability. I should also probably note that it's a DoT and that an opponent can break it off if they move out of its arc.
It doesn't seem to have any additional requirements from what I can tell.
vids and guides and stuff
[9:52] [Zone #11] Neal@trapper1532: im a omega force shadow oprative and a maoc elite camander and here i am taking water samples