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What's wrong with tac captain in cruiser?
s1ckbeard
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
I see so many threads of people bashing this combo but I see no actual reasons... can anyone fill me in?
The only thing I see is something along the lines of people who make tactical characters automatically want ships that turn quickly and do deeps.
Does my tac captain offer any specific skills or boosts in an escort? I'm about to ding 50 and am going to go cruiser instead of escort unless there is some actual handicap..
Thanks!
The only thing I see is something along the lines of people who make tactical characters automatically want ships that turn quickly and do deeps.
Does my tac captain offer any specific skills or boosts in an escort? I'm about to ding 50 and am going to go cruiser instead of escort unless there is some actual handicap..
Thanks!
Post edited by s1ckbeard on
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So I guess my underlying question is:
Wouldn't a captain of any type do equal DPS in the same ship if they are the same level, discounting skill and experience....
In regards to ship, I've been doing Earn free zen stuff for sometime and have more than I need for a ship, though not enough for Ody pack
no not really. The thing you have to understand is that a Tactical Captain learns certain skills that operate in the same way as Bridge Officer skills that assist the Tactical Captain in doing more DPS than the other classes. These skills include but are not limited to "Attack Pattern Alpha III" which when activated gives +47.1% to All Damage, +4.7% Critical Chance, +47.1% Critical Severity, and +113.6% Flight Turn Rate, all for 30 seconds. That is in addition to any bridge officer skills, and not counting the other tactical captain abilities.
Please note that the Tactical Captain specific abilities are unique to Tactical Captains and thus are not available to Science or Engineering Captains for the most part (with the exception of a few universal Captain abilities such as Evasive Maneuvers and Abandon Ship). So it really is only the Tactical Captain who is designed for high amounts of DPS.
Now thats not to say the other two classes can't DPS. They just have a harder time of it.
This makes sense, for some reason I thought the only abilities I could use were from BOFFs
Why are people recommending admiral cruisers over vice admiral cruisers? Can a
http://www.stowiki.org/Advanced_Heavy_Cruiser_Retrofit
really keep up with an Ody?
yes, if only because of the turn rate. However that ship cannot keep up with the Fleet Excelsior due to the fact that they are essentially the same ship, except the fleet excelsior has higher hull and better consoles.
Yah fleet ships look nice but I dont want to spend the epic long time going from 0 fleet marks to like 200,000
The way I look at it for PVE you can do whatever the heck you feel like. PVE in this game is laughably easy, even at end game so do a Tac in a cruiser/science ship, do a Sci in a Cruiser/Escort, etc. Hell I've even leveled up an Eng in nothing but Escorts, which was kind of fun.
Where the real complaints are going to come are when you start running STFs and such where the roles are more strictly enforced/called for. If you are a Science captain not running a sci ship you are seriously gimping yourself on BO abilities for debuffing and healing. Same with a Tac, if you aren't in an Escort with your dual cannons you are gimping yourself in DPS and thus hurting the team. Now I know there are exceptions to this and some talented players can do some amazing things with different builds in different ships, but I would think logic applies to 95% of us and for group content you should probably be filling your role as a Tac in an escort.
I TRIBBLE around with different ships for the different careers all the time in PVE, but for STFs I always have my career specified ship so I can take advantage of my specific captain skills and the increased amount of BO powers for my bridge officer slots for doing what my role calls for.
you only need 20,000 Fleet Credits (roughly 8 Fleet Marks) to get one of the actual Fleet Ships. That is essentially the equivalent to one of the Fleet Starbase or Embassy Daily Missions which take all of 5 minutes to complete. (assuming I am doing my math right and the exchange rate actually is 1 Fleet Mark to 2,500 Fleet Credits).
The only things you need 200,000 Fleet Credits for are the Original Odyssey that came out as a gift for the 2nd Year Anniversary, the Heavy Cruiser Retrofit, the Escort Retrofit, the base Aquarius Destroyer, the Research Science Vessel Retrofit, and the Science Vessel Retrofit. All the ships with the "Fleet" Moniker only require 20,000 Fleet Credits and the equivalent of between 5 and 25 US Dollars in order to purchase the requisite Fleet Modules. Though you can buy the Fleet Modules on the Exchange.
Though it should be noted that in order to obtain a "Fleet" ship using only 1 Fleet Module, you do have to purchase the original Retrofit off of the Cash Shop. But that saves you money in the long term assuming you want to use that Fleet Ship across multiple characters.
The Galaxy Dreadnought can use Dual Cannons and Dual Heavy Cannons. As can all Klingon Battle Cruisers.
Look around the game and you'll find nearly every tac cruiser trying to be another Kirk, and doing it badly. For a cruiser to DPS on par with an escort you are going to have to give up nearly every defense, you'll be an escort with more hp that can't turn, which is generally a dead escort. If you can accept that you'll do moderately good damage with the ability to take a lot of hits you can be useful, but that doesn't go over well with the Kirk Jrs
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Career/ship alignment doesn't necessarily equate to the optimal combination to perform a specific role. As often as not, mixing things up will produce comparable or even preferable results. It really depends upon the player understanding what role they've chosen and taking the time to understand the tools they have at their disposal to fill it.
A cruiser that cannot draw aggro from high dps escorts is not a tank. Boosting it's DPS by having a tactical captain at the helm can help it do so.
An escort that cannot stay alive is not really a DPS-dealer. Lowering it's DPS some to prevent drawing aggro away from tanks and increasing overall survivability is sometimes preferable to raw damage output. You can do this by having an engineer at the helm.
You get the idea.
all RA and VA ships are Tier 5, so they really are comparable to one another, the only major difference between the ranks is that the VA ships each have a special ability console that isn't necessarily available to RA ships.
Not true. All of the ships with the moniker of "Fleet" on them are considered Vice Admiral rank vessels. But not a single one of those ships comes with a "Special Ability" console. Rather they come with an extra console slot so that they have 10 Console Slots instead of the normal 9 Console Slots that most Tier 5 ships have. Additionally to further increase their superiority over their Rear Admiral and normal Vice Admiral counterparts, the "Fleet" ships also have an additional 10% Hull Strength and usually have additional shielding on top of their normal counterparts. In a lot of ways the "Fleet" ships can be considered Tier 6 ships instead of just Tier 5. As can some of the Lock Box vessels, and Lobi Store Vessels.
Cannons aren't the be all and end all in stfs getting the optional is
For instance can a tac in an escort drop inbetween the gate and the spheres on ISE drop a trail of ewp or a grav well or both hold them there and tank them all no
However He could probablys take down the transformer fast enough not to need that but many times you need that stopper due to noobs or fools
Any captain can run any ship they want that's one part of the game the devs haven't messed up yet an sometimes if built right can be deadly
1) Why are tac captains in cruisers bashed? They are being inefficient in the eyes of many. You have access to APA3 and FOMM3, and you can use a ship with the ability to add on APO3, CRF2/CSV2, blah blah blah, and yet you choose to use a ship that uses beams? Tactical captains and DHCs are the highest possible DPS in the game, and as such are the most efficient way to go in ESTFs. That is why they are constantly attacked. As for the can tank better and last longer? Um... yeah. My tac in a fleet defiant can sit on top of a tac cube all day, and is perfectly fine without ANY stf gear, simply because I cycle EPtS1 and TSS2. Combine that with 66% uptime on TT1, and you can tank almost ANY PvE damage with impunity. So the tank better argument is null.
Added note: "everyone expects tactical captains to deal high DPS as their only job". Yes. That is true. Because tactical captains are this game's damage dealing class. So... we want our damage dealers to deal damage. What a novel concept.
2) Fleet marks are only 50 creds per mark. So you need 400 FMs to get 20k fleet creds.
thats still not that much in the grand scheme of things. That was 8 runs of the Foundry Missions before they nerfed that. And it is probably around the same amount of runs of the PvE Queues that offer Fleet Marks.
As for Tactical Captains in Cruisers being inefficient... that is simply a matter of subjective opinion. And it is something that you aren't likely to get a universal consensus on anytime soon.
People know your full of bs when you come on and you opening statement is my defiant can take on a tactical cube with uncommon shields all day
Plus cycling those too wouldn't get you far TSS should be used as and when needed not cycled
It's exactly those utility's you have apa fomm tac fleet why your beams do more damage let people play how they want its a game not real life we play for FUN remember...
First of all you have to take into account that tac captains are specialized towards DPS. The simple fact of the matter is that with +15 weapon power and dual cannon/dual heavy cannon abilities, the escort has the most raw DPS per any generalized ship type, in general, although there may be some hyper-specialist builds with other ship types that can give it a run for its money (and the Vesta's pretty up there, too).
Second, there's a general mentality towards minmaxing for a lot of people. This is somewhat unfortunate, but understandable - why have balance when you can be super-explosive and melt away the competition with raw firepower? Given the contention that DPS is #1 most important in this game it's pretty understandable.
Third, one Tac ability - Go Down Fighting. This is one that actually makes the flimsiness of the escort into an advantage. If you're torn to bits but not down yet this can give you enough firepower to possibly win - and if you die anyway you at least take a good chunk out of the enemy with you. This is usable on a cruiser, but for various reasons it just isn't nearly as helpful.
Unfortunately I have found the arrogant attitude of 'tacs should ONLY be in escorts' to be utterly repugnant, and I usually try to avoid associating with those people, at least if they carry themselves as though anyone who disagrees with them is a fool (and some of them do, very loudly). This has likely hurt the 'debate,' as it makes people sound like proselytizers - which is unfortunate because at least a few of them advocate the position that it shouldn't be that way and use it as an example of how the game is broken. Perhaps they're right, and things need to be adjusted.
However, part of the attitude ignores one thing - it's a different playstyle.
An escort is more like a fighter; a cruiser is more like a battleship. The cruiser does bring durability to the table at an expense of DPS, but it's the difference between flying a fighter as opposed to commanding a battleship, in a lot of ways. IMO, the experience is generally more fulfilling in a cruiser and as such I vye strongly towards cruisers for most alts - in fact, tac/cruiser seems to be by a considerable margin the most popular combination in the game. Which isn't surprising - for all the people who attempt to be derogatory with trying to "Kirk" through missions, most people who come to STO likely want to pretend to be Captain Kirk for a little while. In some ways it's the entire point of STO's existence. I do, at least to some extent, and it's why I bother to come here instead of heading over to DC Online or some other game. And the Hero ships in most cases were what are classed as cruisers.
Myself, I just paid a fortune to get access to a T5 shipyard to get myself a Fleet Assault Cruiser last night on one of my tacs, and I'm loving it.
And of course some people just make a religion out of their position and like superiority, which I suspect is behind many cases, as well as the perception that if you aren't using their personal One True Build then your very presence dooms any and all STFs you may grace with your presence and invalidates any participation of theirs.
Long story short - a combination of different playstyle, some unfortunate mathematical truths about the game, and arrogance/religious devotion, as well as minmaxing.
If you want a tac in a cruiser, by all means, but if you can afford it I strongly suggest you get one of the cruisers optimized for battling - namely the AC-R, the Excelsior-R, or the Odyssey Tactical (preferably with saucer sep). It is not the be-all, end-all of your success as a captain but it will most definitely help you out. And if you can't afford that, go with an Assault Cruiser; if you don't know what you're doing it will likely be frustrating to try a Star Cruiser/tac combo. If you love the Star Cruiser visuals pick up a Mirror Assault Cruiser on the Exchange - they're pretty cheap. In fact, you might want to do that /anyway/ because the mirror ship is slightly superior to the stock Assault Cruiser (identical stats plus 200 extra crew, for what little good it does).
It's actually rather easy. Resilient Shield Array mk XII [Pla] [Cap] [Reg]. Has plasma reduction so the cube hits with less force, has added capacity in case I get hit by a torp, has added regen because it's useful overall, and it's a resilient, so far less bleedthrough damage.
Also you keep on moving, and with 7 points in maneuvers, you are dodging TRIBBLE left and right. Add on the Positron Deflector Array mk XII [SIF] [Stl], I can tank whatever it hits me with. Oh... and one more thing... you SHOOT DOWN THE HEAVY PLASMAS.
And in the event I lose a shield facing, I either 1) Divert more power to shields, or 2) hit TSS. Cycling was probably the wrong word, since I do use it only when needed, but I had 2 mk XI blue emitter arrays, so my TSS was quite... powerful. Now I just pump power to aux, hit TSS, then back to weapons.
Rule #1 with tanking a tac cube: never do it solo unless you have a full build designed to do it. Or if you're an engi in a FPE.
Rule #2 with tanking a tac cube: MOVE YOUR POWER AROUND.
The NPCs aren't smart enough to focus you down properly, nor do they do enough damage anymore to make them really dangerous. They don't time their HYs or even their regular torp shots. A plasma torp comes out of a tac cube every 5 seconds almost on the dot, a HY every 15 seconds. They shoot a beam at you once every 2 seconds almost on the dot. They tractor you for 10 seconds every 20 seconds, and they use a cutting beam on you for 5 seconds every 20 seconds. You just time your defenses to compensate. Even their movement patterns are practically scripted.
So yes, I will come in here and say that my fleet defiant (fleet mind you, that extra console hull and shields matter) can tank a tac cube with ease, because it's true. Try it with a properly built one, and you will see it's TRIBBLE easy.
(Hint: Monotanium and Electroceramic are your friends)
But again that's my opinion and I personally like nothing more than flying a fed cruiser because for me that's why I log on everyday and the best way to do that is with a tac
Just as deadly yes. Just as effective? Probably. Just as efficient? Never. But as long as you don't mind taking twice as long to get the job done, it's all g. And tbh, I fly an Engi cruiser. Takes me 3x as long. But I don't mind.
Was just answering the post, didn't mean it was how I felt.
Out of curiosity, which cruiser were you looking at?
If you are PvPing as one and trying to do decent DPS, expect to pop like an overripe zit.
Daizen - Lvl 60 Tactical - Eclipse
Selia - Lvl 60 Tactical - Eclipse
Edited for accuracy.
However you will find it harder to tank as the captain abilities for engineering and science captains bolster shields and repairs. I would recommend not heavily investing in threat control as if a gateway or tactical cube (KASE or ISE) hits you hard you will pop easier than the other captains would have.
I also think some of the stick is due to how most people in general are unable to build cruisers that can keep up in an elite STF. I for one hate seeing a cruiser in an elite not because they don't have a function but because 98% of the time they either have rainbows, barely break 2000 dps (averaged over the whole STF), don't help heal anyone taking damage and/or can't slow or stop probes/BoPs/nanite spheres.
I have an engineer in a tactical ody and have seen it out DPS escorts. Is it because it can be better than a similarily specced escort? No. Is it because my engineer makes it last longer? Partly. The main reason is because bad players are just bad and they are far too common in higher difficulties.
If you want to know if your build is OK for the end game higher difficulty settings you can use a combat parser like ACT or STOIC. I also tend to say as a rule of thumb on KASE if you can't kill 4 probes before they get to the portal on your own then you need to up your damage. Which I and most people on the forums would be happy to help with
It is through repetition that we learn our weakness.
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Has damage got out of control?
This is the last thing I will post.