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Don't be so Hard on cryptic over balance!
brokenmirror2012
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
/Newfound respect for game balance.
While, STO's balance has CONCIDERABLY Deteriorated, Maintaining balance is admitably difficult.
I just started working on building a video game (not even MMO)
Hardest part of the video game is Balance, You wouldn't think it either.
Balancing is hard, because your end is 980 damage (balanced On paper) but it becomes like 7399.8873 damage after skill mods. Balancing isn't just a few numbers. a Change from 100 to 99 can be a MASSIVE change ingame.
(I can say without doubt, hardest part of making my video game, is Storyline, and balancing)
So, fellow pvpers, stop being So hard on cryptic when ur yelling over balance. The numbers we give are incorrect for them, because they have to go through a bunch of hidden factors, before we even get a number. I have no idea what they are using to do balancing, so I don't really know, For all you know DEM doing 49 damage is actualy 3.77283123 in the dev tools.
So come on, be alittle easyer about balance. Now go back to being hard over content, C-Store, the AI... Adding an AI that uses Skills intelegently, IS NOT as hard as balance. Say on ground, give all NPCs Rechargable Hypos, Add line: When Health < 20% = Hypo. In Space, have NPCs Keep EPTS up, and a script to make then like, Hazzard emmiters to dispel debuffs, ONLY every 45s so they don't spam it. etc...
While, STO's balance has CONCIDERABLY Deteriorated, Maintaining balance is admitably difficult.
I just started working on building a video game (not even MMO)
Hardest part of the video game is Balance, You wouldn't think it either.
Balancing is hard, because your end is 980 damage (balanced On paper) but it becomes like 7399.8873 damage after skill mods. Balancing isn't just a few numbers. a Change from 100 to 99 can be a MASSIVE change ingame.
(I can say without doubt, hardest part of making my video game, is Storyline, and balancing)
So, fellow pvpers, stop being So hard on cryptic when ur yelling over balance. The numbers we give are incorrect for them, because they have to go through a bunch of hidden factors, before we even get a number. I have no idea what they are using to do balancing, so I don't really know, For all you know DEM doing 49 damage is actualy 3.77283123 in the dev tools.
So come on, be alittle easyer about balance. Now go back to being hard over content, C-Store, the AI... Adding an AI that uses Skills intelegently, IS NOT as hard as balance. Say on ground, give all NPCs Rechargable Hypos, Add line: When Health < 20% = Hypo. In Space, have NPCs Keep EPTS up, and a script to make then like, Hazzard emmiters to dispel debuffs, ONLY every 45s so they don't spam it. etc...
Post edited by brokenmirror2012 on
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Where I draw the line and get really annoyed, balance wise, is two places. First off releasing obviously overpowered stuff. Like the fleet shields, reputation passives, and many other things that even on paper look insane.
Secondly is PvE balance. Yes PvP has a huge human element but PvE is much more controllable. However Cryptic has yet to even do the first step required for PvE balance and that is choose a philosophy.
Equal but Different, Holy Trinity, or Good at Different Content.
Equal but different: Check out Guild Wars 2 as the most recent example
Holy Trinity: Obvious
Good at Different Content: This is best represented in bad tabletop RPGs but an example in STO would be if Science Vessels got bonus anomalies scanned, Cruisers had the highest Warp speed, things like that. It is like when you have the really good social toon in the group that is horrid at combat but great outside of it.
Which one is STO intended to use? I have no clue. And if that much is not obvious then I will complain about it. I have done tabletop RPGs as DM for years and one of the big things I focus on is ensuring everyone at the table has fun and feels as if their character is contributing to the party/session in a meaningful way. When all 4 players think their character is the best you know you have done a good job. And really the philosophy chosen is just a matter of preference as they all can work out well depending on the style of game they just require a different form of encounter design and/or system design.
The fact is, that Cryptic has dropped the ball. There is no balance in any aspect of their game. PvE is just a DPS race. PvP is so full of universal consoles, rep-based gear, DOFF buffs and fleet/embassy gear, that almost anyone can perform any role they wish. There is no need for class balance anymore. Which has made the game horribly un-fun for anyone not flying a tacscort (the only role that still has meaningful synergy between captain skill and ship ablities).
The whole game needs a balance pass, and nothing should be left out. I don't care how much money people spent to get their stuff, if it isn't balanced, it needs to be tuned. There has to be a reason to bring a sci, a tac, and an engineer on teams (PvE or PvP). Right now, there really isn't, aside from the obligitory SNB (PvP only).
edit: In my opinion, this all boils down to the fact that PvE is too easy. The AI doesn't challenge players, and so many of them (players) are so horrible that Cryptic felt the need to make it even easier with a rapid Power-Creep that totally ignores class balance. Make PvE more challenging. Make the AI challenge players. Give us a reason to bring at least 1 of every class into every mission/instance.
But other MMOs much older then STO have got balance, hell. Even some brand new ones are well known for it. And Cryptic is an MMO gamehouse, it's their "thing" so we should expect a lot more then what we have - whichis shoddy, illconceved and badly planned out.
How much would i squeal if a read a dev blog saying "We've hired these 10-15 people who are AWESOME at PVP and balance checks. We've given them a server to test in, a pot of lockbox money, a fridge full of RedBull and expect a x many PVP maps, y many gametypes, a rep system and a BALANCE PASS for 6 months time"
I'd squal until the neighbours came round and bopped me on the head.
@Aquitaine985
Lag Industries STO PvP Fleet - Executive
A Sad Panda of Industrial calibre.
2010: This is Cryptic PvP. Please hold the line, your call is very important to us...
At this point, it is pretty much impossible to balance the game, because they introduced so many variables (including the incredibly bad idea of resist skills in the skill tree) that there is no reasonable way to balance around a mean value anymore. The variance between the effectiveness and/or frequency of abilities has been increased tremendously and the first step to balancing the game again would have to include cutting down on that variance. This in turn would require a change of the skill tree (at least of the math in the background), a change in hangar pet spawn mechanics and severe limitations on special consoles. In other words: it's never going to happen. They don't want to and even if they wanted to, the devs that they have are not smart and knowledgable enough to pull it off.
At this point, it's only a question of how much time we still have before cryptic introduces a gamebreaking ability/item with widespread adoption among the players that makes pvp unbearable and which they refuse to bring in line with our memories of S1.2-S3 balance.
That statement looks better and more correct now.
Think about this:
American Football has been in open beta for 144 years. ~Kotaku
Although we have to keep in mind that some consoles were only held in check by being tied to really bad ship classes (like the original raptor) and the problem would have become bigger with the introduction of better ships in the same class even without making them universal. And AMS was a major annoyance even before the consoles became truly universal.
But I agree, keeping the consoles closely tied to certain ships would have slowed down this muddling of ship classes that has happened because of consoles, doffs and universal boff slots.
Science Boff abilities can never be balanced because of the previously mentioned skill variance. Balance it for 0 skill? Balance it for 250 skill? O wait rommie rep 350 skill....
Tactical abilities are showing the shortsightedness of how the underlying systems scale. Hmm lets let everything multiply what could go wrong? I dunno maybe there was a reason everything was additive before...
And engineering abilities are stuck somewhere in the middle of those two. Then you have ship classes which when everything revolves around boff abilities for offense, defense, and utility the ship class is pretty much unimportant beyond the boff layout and any details it has. Ten percent extra hull or shield or whatever really does mean much when getting resists to high heaven is the way to live, or not and die.
Then there are the weapons that are balanced around an energy drain system that doesn't really work well. Especially when you start introducing fifteen ways to mess with it.
It needs to pick a philosophy and fix things to revolve around it. But you need a direction first.
*cough* yo craptic: FM for PvP...coming soon? i take it....
a history of sto pvp: 2010 - 2011
a history of sto pvp: 2012 - 2013
I dont think it is to much all cryptics fault though i blame the player base to with crying about things that are not op because they dont know how to defend or crying about something that is going to get nerfed saying it is not op and it makes the game simple for them. simple game = fail yawn...
The game is one of the most stable ones i ever plaid its never crashed on me and only a few server disconnects so i give them props for that
Would love them to balance but they don't have a check and balance team...
I do blame Cryptic of course... there isn't someone else developing this game last I checked. Therefore they are the ones responsible for things that work as well as things that don't. I think we can all agree more worked then not previously. What has changed is simple. Greed.
It is not hard to blame Cryptic when we all see so many other examples in the market place of developers that do strive for balance. Don't get me wrong I have yet to play a perfectly balanced game outside of chess. lmao No MMO will ever be perfectly balanced, and change in a MMO is one of the reasons we play them, so balance issues are to be expected.
However Cryptic flat out sold balance. Make no mistake about that. It started with low level ships that where clearly designed to be unbalanced to sell them. They then decided that those ships should get goodies usable come end game to help push sell through. When the numbers died down on that, instead of creating new items or content, they simply made those items ship wide universal and watched more money come in.
Then they added a grind system... a system which can be speed up, (at least in regards to item acquisition, after unlocking the ability to acquire them) by spending more money.
They also added lockboxes, an idea OTHER developers have also embraced... however have still managed to maintain balance. There is no reason lockboxes couldn't contain everything they contain now, and ship skins / uniforms / perhaps even refined dilithium reward boxes to help push sales... instead of entirely new purposely designed unbalanced ships.
Doffs, I won't even get goingon the doff system. In general I like the idea... however its clear they think nothing of balance when they introduce new doffs. By that I mean it is clear they again design them to be unbalanced. Why else would anyone spend money in an attempt to procure them.
Frankly I am still here because I love Star Trek and I crave a space combat game. Had I been smart enough to begin playing Eve 7 years ago I doubt I would have spent more then 2 weeks with STO... however as it is I do love STO. However after spending 2 years trying my best to find a suitable replacement MMO for my time... it has simply forced me to admit to myself that seemingly every single Developer in the industry has a more balanced game design then Cryptics. (they simply all make lol ground games
There are plenty of alternative PvP MMOs we can be playing, and frankly most of us do and simply check back in here from time to time. If you want balanced PvP, or at least to play a game where balance is at least the goal... there are offerings from ArenaNet, Turbine, CCP, Piranha, NCsoft, and even blizzard.
Heaven help Cryptics wallet if one of the upcoming space MMOs turns out to be a quality product.
There is a Chris Roberts game coming... and there is a rumor recently that valve has a Space MMO in the works. Your right thought nothing hitting in the next few months or anything that I know of.
Doffs are are out of whack, and nearly every single new ability released since S6 started was not ready for holodeck.
These are not natural disasters striking a company doing their best, its the result of non-existant QA, and a development philosophy that embraces power creep and P2W. Only a radical change in Cryptic's management and Systems team could even begin to address these issues.
SO how about those FM for PvP??
a history of sto pvp: 2010 - 2011
a history of sto pvp: 2012 - 2013
I don't know what goes on behind the scenes (technically or politically). I don't design games. All I know is what I see and on the surface it appears that balance was ruined by short sighted attempts to increase revenues, poor to nonexistent quality assurance (testing), and a lack of resources (perhaps even a lack of will) to make careful and timely adjustments.
Nothing worth doing is easy but it certainly doesn't have to be this hard. I think what we need are better long term planning and more reasonable responsiveness when issues arise.
It's terrible but easy, and these Borg are way cooler than the mess STO and Voyager left us.
I absolutely agree. And its been said ever since PWE took over. The problem is, the majority of the community are PVE'ers. They don't CARE the engine they just got makes then fly too fast, they don't care the kit just released makes ground buffs/pets too powerful or the newest doffs reduce cool downs on a global scale. They either don't care because it only makes killing NPCs quicker and easier, in most cases they'll happily put more money into the game in order to take advantage of said exploits or broken content. An increasing part of me thinks things like doffs, the Vesta etc are made over powered on purpose because PWE Cryptic are the greedy TRIBBLE they are.
Fixes take time to come out because not enough money has been soaked up from the broken content, and its only to keep a very small community happy.
Its sad, and i wish i was wrong. But history speaks for itself. Feel free to keep editing my posts, Bran. I can totally copy-n-paste it back after.
@Aquitaine985
Lag Industries STO PvP Fleet - Executive
A Sad Panda of Industrial calibre.
2010: This is Cryptic PvP. Please hold the line, your call is very important to us...
It doesn't just hurt PvP. I am a PvE player and I detest imbalance. When one build style is clearly the best by a large margin it hurts the game in the end.
For one ESTF a trinity setup is nice. The others it is just better to DPS zerg I'm sorry. Even my tac defiant that has the least amount of tank of any of my ships can tank a tac cube long enough for a high DPS team to burn it down. Now when you have a bunch of failboat cruiser healers that don't even know how to crossheal and your the only one dealing damage yeah the defiant will explode first. Then after 15 seconds swoop in and finish the job.
I've been programming basic games for a while, and it's not easy too!
Have you ever tried to imagine the logic and the math behind Star Trek Online? If not, you should :cool:
PS: good luck with your game, Broken!
Archimede - Leader and Founder of "Raiders of Starfleet"
...and 21 other characters!
On the Fed side anyway there are ships for each ship class that can use DHCs and/or pet spam. Why wouldn't an all Tac team w/the Doffs I mentioned have a shot? Granted you control when SNB is used as a Sci captain, but it can be triggered much more in theory w/the Doffs.
I'm not encouraging it, but to me the Eng Captains take longer to kill and are the lowest threat. Many Sci Debuffs/CC Boffs have been replaced in effectiveness by setbonuses/pets/consoles/doff augmentations, so they're on their way out too. Nothing would be more annoying to fight imo than a team of Tac Captains using placate rep proc, Tet glider, Danubes, SNB Doffs, Attack Pattern/Tech Doffs, AMS and depending on the ships they're using they could through in VM/PSW as well.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
Aside from NWS, I have never seen any PvE content in this game that requires anything other than pure DPS. STF's? DPS is enough. Fleet Actions? DPS is enough and the only way to place high. Fleet Events? Again, DPS is enough. Can you provide an example, other than NWS, where anything other than DPS is required?
To be fair the fleet mission where you buy time for freighters to get out doesn't require DPS as much as it requires remote repairs and CC. In fact more often than not I'll see a Tac waste time killing NPCs that have already killed the freighter.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
That is 1 case where 3 sci ships with TBR and GW can do the mission by themselves. However, I have also been on multiple runs where escorts spamming CSV have done just as well, with 0 healing of the freighters.
I would have a lot more sympathy for Cryptic if they'd simply playtest new content before randomly dumping it onto the server (or even worse, reverting to old, buggy patches of the game). They've had countless offers from the community, we've practically begged them to accept our help and it's been turned down. There's really no excuse on the, "We're pressed for time" front as far as I'm concerned. Does anyone here honestly believe the Rommie ground DOffs were tested even once? If so I have some timeshare in Florida to sell you.
Frankly I think starting a PvP training event for new players -- when the devs know fine well that the state of the game is terrible -- is insulting, and I can't even imagine what they're telling those players to expect to see in the queues. This is no fault of the organizers by absolutely any means, my finger-pointing here is aimed squarely at the devs who've been happy to accommodate while constantly deflecting worried questions about the game's sorry balance.
You either take PvP seriously or you just don't put it in the game. It's that simple, and from what I can tell Cryptic takes their game's PvP component(s?) about as seriously as they do a wino at a job interview so I'll gladly reciprocate in kind. My patience is just running so thin at this point.
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
I actually told Sargon, during the BootCamp makeup session last Saturday, that I was starting to feel guilty about throwing new players into the mess that is STO PvP. There is just so much broken/unbalanced stuff out there that it seems wrong, to me, to actually encourage people to play it.
I've been super on the fence about lending a hand, originally I was all gung-ho about the idea but one issue after the other has just filled me with total doubt about the game. I'm more than happy to help new players and teach them the few things I know but I haven't found an answer as to how to let them in on the cold hard truth. Many of these players don't have the luxury we do of in-house games or rules matches between clean teams, and the queues are a total Wild West really.
I can just see new players getting AoE-subnuked by a timeship or AMS -> tric bombed for the first time or having their buffs randomly disappear from SNB DOffs and they'll quit out of frustration because what I taught them didn't prepare them for it. Sure, we can give them the appropriate countermeasures, but the bottom line is that we shouldn't have to and we'd be prepping them for a game that's fundamentally not enjoyable to play.
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
Idk, at least from my limited experience of doing them on the KDF DPS won't do it alone vs Tholians, KDF, Fek (sp). At minimum HE and TT are needed until the incoming debuffs/dps are reduced.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
Hate to say it, but I am liking the balance: the game feels a little slower and when I am in a dog fight there is always a point where I either feel like I have him or I know that he has me. Contrary to how I used to feel, which was vulnerable all the time. I would not claim to be an expert, but I am liking pvp over the last 3 weeks.
It goes without saying that they can improve the pvp content, i.e. maps, objectives,etc.
If you have not been in pvp for a while you should try it out.
With a high enough DPS you could BFaW and/or Scatter Shot and draw aggro away from the freighters.
We never wasted any heals on those things, we just drew aggro away and repaired ourselves.
So yes, everything in this game IS skewed towards having DPS.
cure space elite, not for the klink ship but for the team on docks.
pvp nuff said.
engys....no need for them. sci can heal way better and has subnuke
oh and hive elite to subnuke the sheild distro off queen