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Intrepid class problems
colorblind90
Member Posts: 52 Arc User
Hey!
Id appreciate some help with my intrepid class ship.
Ive been playing for a while now (VA50) and I am thinking about buying a Cstore version of the Long Range Science vessel (intrepid) but the problem is... Not sure I know how to handle one!
I like to do foundy missions and PVE, lots of both, but with the Intrepid I get my TRIBBLE handed to me so fast that I cant even say Red Alert! Shields go down after I get hit by a borg phaser for two seconds and after that its sayonnara.
Sure, I try to turn around, use ENG and SCI abilities to heal but I simply cannot survive a battle for more than a few minutes if I am alone.
Having a normal sovereign class ship I can take lots of damage and my shields seem to hold better than the ones on the intrepid - not sure why.
My style varies, I like to do DPS but I know that isnt where science shines the most but right now I dont survive for long to even drain most of my opponents shields -_-
Here is my loadou for playing on Elite:
FORE: 1x Phaser beam, 1x Dual beam, 1x photon
REAR: 1x Phaser beam, 1x Turret, 1x photon
Deflector: Positron XII Purple (boost to shields)
Shields: Regen MK XII Purple (10% bleedthrough, 6.5k capacity, 10% bleedthru)
ENG Consoles: Ablative Hull Armor XII, Field Emitter XII
SCI: 3x Flow capactiros XII
Tac: 2x Phaser damage booster thingies
My Boffs are:
Tac: 2x High Yield Torp
Eng: Enginnering team 1, EPTS II
Sci: JTS I, ST II, Tyken Rift II, Gravity Well II
Other Sci: HEI, Tachyon Beam II
So please someone give me some tips on how to gain durability or find a way to become useful with this ship. I like to drain shields and then torp the enemy but I tend to vary in my playing style... As I said, right now, with this setup, I can barely stand 5 minutes in a fight with friggin borg sphere -_-
Thanks!
PS:Yeah there is a pun in the topic title :P
EDIT: Forgot to say, I am a Tac captain with skill points that are mostly on shields(99), weapon damage(99) and starship flow capacitors(99) (which is good for tachyon attacks I suppose)
Id appreciate some help with my intrepid class ship.
Ive been playing for a while now (VA50) and I am thinking about buying a Cstore version of the Long Range Science vessel (intrepid) but the problem is... Not sure I know how to handle one!
I like to do foundy missions and PVE, lots of both, but with the Intrepid I get my TRIBBLE handed to me so fast that I cant even say Red Alert! Shields go down after I get hit by a borg phaser for two seconds and after that its sayonnara.
Sure, I try to turn around, use ENG and SCI abilities to heal but I simply cannot survive a battle for more than a few minutes if I am alone.
Having a normal sovereign class ship I can take lots of damage and my shields seem to hold better than the ones on the intrepid - not sure why.
My style varies, I like to do DPS but I know that isnt where science shines the most but right now I dont survive for long to even drain most of my opponents shields -_-
Here is my loadou for playing on Elite:
FORE: 1x Phaser beam, 1x Dual beam, 1x photon
REAR: 1x Phaser beam, 1x Turret, 1x photon
Deflector: Positron XII Purple (boost to shields)
Shields: Regen MK XII Purple (10% bleedthrough, 6.5k capacity, 10% bleedthru)
ENG Consoles: Ablative Hull Armor XII, Field Emitter XII
SCI: 3x Flow capactiros XII
Tac: 2x Phaser damage booster thingies
My Boffs are:
Tac: 2x High Yield Torp
Eng: Enginnering team 1, EPTS II
Sci: JTS I, ST II, Tyken Rift II, Gravity Well II
Other Sci: HEI, Tachyon Beam II
So please someone give me some tips on how to gain durability or find a way to become useful with this ship. I like to drain shields and then torp the enemy but I tend to vary in my playing style... As I said, right now, with this setup, I can barely stand 5 minutes in a fight with friggin borg sphere -_-
Thanks!
PS:Yeah there is a pun in the topic title :P
EDIT: Forgot to say, I am a Tac captain with skill points that are mostly on shields(99), weapon damage(99) and starship flow capacitors(99) (which is good for tachyon attacks I suppose)
Post edited by colorblind90 on
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Since you just have Lt Engineering, Engineering Team will do no good and will be blocked whenever you touch your tac team.
Tac: Tactical Team I (Re-distributes your shields to facing which is under attack/need the most), HYI.
Eng: EPtSI and Auxiliary to Structural I. Keep cycling your Aux to Strut whenver it is available; it gives a small hull heal and a damage resist.
Commander Sci: Polarize Hull (disengages tractor beam, gives a damage resist again), HE II, Tyken Rift II, Gravity well III
Lt Sci: Transfer Shield Strength I, Tractor Repulsors I (Pushes all enemies away when u are surrounded)
Also I strongly disagree with above poster. I have a character in each class on both KDF and Fed. I'll agree that your work is WAY simpler as an escort; but it doesn't mean you can't survive or give kinetic dps with your science ship.
Only two characters form my 6 use escorts, the rest use cruisers. Come with me if you wanna live, cause I tank tactical cubes on stfs with my Vesta, using the Lt Cmder for Sci and only having a Lt Engineering on me, pretty much like the Intrepid.
You wanna get a Regent? I'll show you how to make it deliver decent damage even on your Engineer. Now I don't promise it to go better than escort, but you will KILL stuff while tanking it all.
I will say this though, the sci ships are not made to give out weapon damage, you can do lots of kinetic damage though with your sci abilities, required you are spec'ed in science. Which if you aren't, I'd recommend another Engineering sortish cruiser like Excelsior, Regent or Gal X (if you wanna give out your damage via weapons).
5 FED Fleets | 3 KDF Fleets - T5 Colony on both factions
The Sovereign, at T5, also has more room for consoles that will help you live longer.
So, in other words, the T5 Intrepid will vastly out-perform the T4 version, including a larger BOff seating, more console space, and a beefier hull and shield mod.
So, I will re-do my Boff abilites as a first. I will use your "blueprints" as an example, Im really liking it as Its quite a bit diffrent than mine.
I have my power settings binded to two modes:
F1: Attack 80, Shields 80, Speed 20, Aux 20
F2: Attack 45, Shields 57, Speed 20, Aux MAX
I tried this so that I can drain and attack more effectively...
I am thinking about pressing the Buy Ship button on this T5 Intrepid but damn... Im so not sure...
As far as Im guessing the Intrepid (and all the science vessels for that matter) is used for attacks kinnda like this:
- Start with a Tachyon drain on the shields
- Use Boffs to disable the enemy
- Topredo the **** out of em
Or am I wrong?
I appreciate if anyone with a science vessel can tell me if its survivable to - for example - play STF and actually survive if a sphere gets on your behind?
Forward Weapons:
Breen Cluster Bomb
Chroniton Beam Array [from Ferengi set]
Harpeng Torpedo
Aft Weapons:
Borg Cutting Beam
Mk XI Transphasic Torpedo Crit D X3
Bio Neural Warhead
Device Slots:
Red Matter Capicator
Large Shield Battery
Subspace Field Modulator
Consloe Slots:
Isometeric Charge
Theta Radiation
Ablative Armor - that comes with the ship [I use this in STF against Borg when they use Tachyon weapons when the spheres spawn and all ten of them hit me after I hit them with Gravity Well 3 and Tychen's Rift 2]
Subspace Jumper
Point Defence System
Assimilated Module from Borg set for free tractor beam [yes I run a Borg set]
Rule 62 Multi purpose combat console [Ferengi set]
Mk XII Force Field generator
[3] Mk XII Purple Transphasic Compressors [because I have a Tier 5 ship]
The idea is my tac captain is speced to do the most damage using torps. His abilities compliment the BO skills.. example Jam Sensors 1, Torp Spread 2 ...
I fire all weapons and because they are independent cool downs Harpeng fires fastest,Chroniton hits them then the Breen Cluster Bomb is on its way. Then as I pass the target in a straffing run my other Torps now fire and the Bio neural warhead goes off.
I run full power to engines for a +15% defensive bonus and more manouverability. My idea is they can't hit what they can't see. So stay out of the firing arcs of cannons and slow opponents ability to hurt you. NOTE* Use the subsystem targeting with the chroniton for a chance to knock out weapons or engines.
The Intrepid can be a deadly ship when in the right hands even with all the nerfing they have been doing as of late.
If you ever want to see it in action send me a note in the mail and I will schedual it for you.
Are you kidding? The intrepid is an awesome ship.
Anyway, i use this build on my mirror luna so it should perform good on Intrepid as well.
http://www.stoacademy.com/tools/skillplanner/?build=dominionintrepid_0
The build i currently have on my intrepid is based on aegis set and it has not died in over 3 months.
I do wonder how you drain shields arnthebard?
And for questerius, how do you do kinetic damage with that build?
Any tips are welcome
some ideas for you to try
one of the problems you maybe having is that one of the best shield tanking skills in the game is Tactical team and the ship only has one tac boff with two skills
but maybe you should consider giving it a try, Tac Team 1 and high Yeald or spread 2
What Tactical team allows you to do is keep your ship in the best position to do the best damage without having to move your ship around to spread the damage on your shield sides.
then again I dont fly tac captian maybe you have another skill to manage that.
that allows you to change your weapon setup so you can create more of a kill zone, more DPS (kill faster take less damage). like:
fore weapons: 2x photon torp 1x dual beam bank (or 1x torp 2x dual beam bank
aft weapons: 3x turrets
this means that in the front 90 arc all 6 weapons are on the target, and you can fire your tach beam as well
or
fore: 3x beam array
Aft: 2x beams and 1x torp
gives you broadside attack where your beam arrays cross over, start the attack from the front and fire tach beam when it's finished move to broadside then angle to face the back and fire a high yeald or spread torp when their shields are down move back to broadside to finish
also try some other skills, like transfer shield strength which you can use on yourself or team
I never liked Tyken Rift
hazard emitters is good
or use Auxiliary to Structural instead of eng team that means it wont clash with sci or tac team means swapping EPTS II to EPTS I but may be worth it not having sci,eng,tac team timers clashing
when Shield tanking I find these skills in combo are great:
Tactical team
EPTS
Transfer Shield Strength
Reverse Shield Polarity (save for emergencies)
Other Gear
3 Flow cap's seems like overkill
Field Emitter's don't do enough to be worth it, get a Neutronium Alloy or a Monotanium Alloy
what exactly is your shield module?
I recon you should get a Resilient module with either [Cap] and [Reg] or [Cap]x2
Cov shield would also be better than regenerative I think.
you dont really have any "top tier" gear like reputation set gear so you have a massive scope for improvement there
also what are your power levels set too?
I use the regular Intrepid, not the C-store versions, as an engineer.
My build is aimed at DoT and not directly kinetic damage.
See for yourself.
http://skillplanner.stoacademy.com/?build=lrsvengi_0
For byzanathos, I used to use the covariant shield but it was regening a little too slow for my taste. Might give it a try on the new T5 ship though. Currently I have a Regen MKXII Cap Pla Pol - my enemies are glad since they shoot me down like nothing.
Oh and as said, I use two preferences for my power levels:
F1: Attack 80, Shields 80, Speed 20, Aux 20
F2: Attack 45, Shields 57, Speed 20, Aux MAX
I think these are quite great, wanna hear other peoples opinion too though
arnthebard, expect a mail soon :P
One thing, can someone tell me how you Intrepid captains fare when playing solo Episode missions on Elite?? Im asking becouse in many instances the small intrepid gets overrun by enemies and its hull just doesnt seem to hold one bit...
http://skillplanner.stoacademy.com/?build=scitac1_0
you can run minimal weapon power since i use the dual beam bank to spread the AP-B debuff to the targets reducing their damage resistance. I'm using photons cause they are cheap and have a fast reload ( add a couple of projectile doffs if you like), I also normally run the cutting beam but if cost is a factor just use the Hargh'Peng. The Photon mines cooldown is only 15sec so you can spit out a nice DP-B alot. The mark X borg set is still the cheapest and the procs will clear the Borg shield neutralizer which is whats making your shields disappear (HE will also clear it)
Power settings
WPN = 25
SHD = 75
ENG = 75
AUX = 25
This is a PVE/STF build
The ship is 2500 zen or what you will pay for the T5 intrepid with more versatility and you can run dual heavy cannons on it if you really wanted to.:D
Personal Note: IMHO this is how the boff stations on the T5 Intrepid should have been just because I've loved that ship since voyager but ultimately I was much happier in this ship. Skill spec is included I use on this ship.
PS: I use ET-2 instead of Aux2SIF-1 for dealing with Tholian power system disables, which are the most annoying thing for me
Good Hunting
I honestly think you will be much better off increasing your shield amount and healing skills than focusing on regeneration, at least give it a shot.
Get a shield array with [cap]x2 and look up this module: "Field Generator" an XI rare I think will give you 17.5% bonus to shield amount.
Dont wait for natural regen to heal it, use Skills - EPTS, Transfer shield strength, Sci Team, Reverse Shield Polarity, shield batteries
Field Generator is so much better than a Shield Emitter or Field Emitter. They will cost you a bit more to get one but they are worth it (seriously good reason they cost more, they are just better)
find a good Positron Deflector Array with a high shield system bonus - I got one with 35 I think. used it before getting the MACO set. I also have another with 32 bonus sitting in my bank so they are around.
you should be able to get well over 10k shield per side - heck I'm currently flying a BoP with a .8 shield modifier that has about 10k shield per side and I can tank Elite STF spheres and cubes pretty well and even Tac Cubes for long enough I can react get out of range and survive a hit from one of those invisible uber torps they fire and that will serve you better than a high Regen rate. Regen is useless against spike damage.
Shame I wont be in game for a couple of hours or I'd spot you a couple of modules to try
for weapons i generally either go with 2x dual beam banks and a torp up front(breen transphasic cluster torp is nice) aft is usually 3 turrets with this config
if you like single beams better i suggest a 2xbeams front and torp and same in the rear so you can pivot back and forth broadsiding and tossing torpedoes again breen cluster torps not bad choice long cool down but its shield penetration makes it a potent weapon in pve
skills im thinking a setup such as this
tactical:tact team 1,Beam overload or fire at will
engineering:emergency power to shields 1,auxiliary to structural
commander sci:hazards1,hazards2,transfer shield strength3,gravity well (or commander skill of choice)
ltcommander:polarize hull,energy siphon1,energysiphon2
ensign:tractor beam
this setup works well but the problem is you will need to get 2 purple conn officer for tacticle team cool down reduction trust me while pricy they are worth it
this bubild carried me a long way
http://skillplanner.stoacademy.com/?build=pvepvphybridrev2_0
if you have further questions you can contact me in game my IGN is in my sig
Thanks for linking to my build, pretty awesome to see it does get picked up.
I've got another version http://www.stoacademy.com/tools/skillplanner/?build=fleetdominionintrepid_0 which works better imho.
Power levels: Aux: 125+, Weapons: ~80, Shields: ~50, Engines: rest.
I'm using it on a tac toon that should be able to fly any ship without a problem so I'm specced in all things and not commited to 1 thing which makes me believe a very specific specced tac captain could squeeze a couple of more DPS out of it.
To the OP: Intrepid is a good and great looking ship. Don't give up so easily. Despite devs nerving the hell out of sci skills and still is pretty viable in PvE. In PvP I hold my own against any decent escort by draining their energy to nearly nothing.
Send me an ingame PM if you'd like to do a PvP or team up for a STF.
Looking at some other science builds i found this one funny.
http://www.stoacademy.com/tools/skillplanner/?build=simpletransphasicbomber_0
Transphasic bomber.
Tried a transphasic set on my defiant, but i found it was not resilient enough. Science vessels and in particular the Intrepid retrofit with the ablative armor console should perform excellent in this role.
A regular Intrepid with Jevonite can probably pull this off as well.
But yeah, need like 90 more zen and then Im going for Intrepid.
I see rear turrets/arrays are quite common on this class and I will be definetly trying it out altho I wonder how it works like a torpedo bomber too.
Im liking the skills suggestion a lot! It seems almost every intrepid build has a tactical team I ready to go.
As byzanathos said Field Generators seem like the best option of enhancing shields, man I dont even know how I never used one -_-
Wonder though, which torpedos are commonly used to deal kinetic damage once the shields are down? I use quantums on my sovereign cruiser but I never see anyone else use them...
Appreciate all the suggestions guys!
I wish it had the Luna's boff set up though. The science ensign is not as useless as the engineering ensign on some cruisers, but I'd still rather have a copy of tac team 1 with an extra offensive tac ability.
It's a toss up between quantums and photons. Photons cycle faster, so you lob more of them in the same time than you would any other torpedo. Quantums hit harder though, and this makes them more attractive for when you take down a shield facing and lob a THY at them.
I use quantums on my cruisers and Defiant ships, but mainly for RP reasons, while the Intrepid gets photons for much the same reason. The benefit one has over the other isn't that great so it's more down to what style you want to play.
Tricobalt is also an option, but with low rate of fire and destructible High yield.
Many torpedo builds also use the harpeng because it is fast, has radiation damage and most important of all does not use the torpedo skills HY and TS so you don't have to worry about cool down.
Edit: ninja's by stofsk
If you are going to use torps in combination with beams and/or turrets I suggest photons as they fire more often then the rest. The problem I had with quantums is that enemies blew up faster then the time it took for the torpedo to reach the enemy.
Another viable option if you have the assault cruiser refit from the zen store is the wide angle quantum torp with 5 beam arrays and go broadside.
LOL...Why waste time draining shields when you can bypass them? As a Tac officer I speced my toon to do the max damage with torpedoes. Add in my captain abilities and the little known secret that transphasic pushers stack and push the Harpeng and the Breen cluster Bomb and you have a nasty combo. I did the research myself and discovered that the Mk XII purple transphasic consoles increased damage stacks with the rule 62 console for over +100% damage increase. So basically I can hit a ship with jam sensors run in for a straffing run and knock between 40-80% off of thier hull by passing thier shields entirely. Add in a nasty theta cloud and a gravity well to hold them in place and you can see the effectiveness of this ship. Then as I pass the opponent I leave a nasty bio neural warhead and a torp spread on the way out. Oh and the quickness of my recharge by my doffs brings my torps back online by the time I am ready for a second run. If you treat it as a hand in glove approach the sci ship in a Tacs hands is a very nasty suprise for someone.
I can't endorse broadsiding builds on science vessels. Broadsiding builds are extremely energy- and boff-intensive: you need that 125+ weapons power to maintain reasonable DPS while broadsiding, which means you have to shirk either auxiliary or shields power. Shirking aux means your science powers are much, much weaker than they otherwise should be, and shirking shields is a recipe for death given science vessels' low hull ratings. Broadsiding with FaW (what gives broadsiding builds their punch) is also an aggro magnet, since you can't control what you're shooting and when, which means you're left shirking auxiliary...meaning your survivability skills are going to lack anyway.
Moreover, you need at least five beams to have reasonable damage, which leaves you a sole torpedo for anything resembling burst damage. Also, DEM is extremely important to broadsiding builds, which leaves you in the end one fewer engineering slot for survivability or power when you're already strapped for them. The end result is you're going to have to use a lot of batteries to keep yourself doing much of anything, even juggling power settings between aux-heavy and weapons-heavy (which is going to leave you potentially worse off, while power transfers).
The most I'd say for a science vessel as far as energy weapons go, is to use DBB's and turrets, or cannons and turrets. Cannons are more energy-efficient than beams, and science vessels are nimble enough to keep your targets in the frontal 90-degree arc to keep DBB's firiing. Tetryon is also a viable weapon type for science vessels (especially with the upcoming Nukara reputation) since the tetryon proc improves with higher flow capacitors and auxiliary power setting, and compensates for science vessels' weaker damage.
Honestly, where science vessels really shine in my opinion are as torpedo boats. Well-built torpedo boats blast through shields anyway, you can ignore weapons power in favor of shields and aux, and science vessels are definitely agile enough to keep targets in the necessary frontal arc.
Spock's Brain.
I have no problems charging an opponent and using placate abilities so I can deliver point blank torpedo attacks and cover them with radiation. That being said I try to keep an eye on my teammates in case they need a heal.
If you can afford it Veteran Human Bridge Officers are the way to go. Five of them gives you +25 to ALL power levels and with a Red Matter Capicator that means running at 125 across the board. It is nice to have the fleet set that gives you a bonus of +100 to sci abilities along with the romulan rep bonus of +100 to sci abilities and the percentage chance to bypass shields at 100%. One other favorite tool of mine is Viral Matrix 3. I set up my ship to use this ability to its maximum potential. NOTE* make sure you run 2 sensor doffs that are purple with the ability to set off multiples. It drives Klingon players crazy.
This makes no sense - why would you want to deliver a torpedo at point blank? They have no damage dropoff over distance, unlike energy weapons, and enemy energy weapons will hit you harder the closer you get (assuming we're talking about PvE - getting close in PvP can make sense with destructible torpedoes).
All of that would be nice, but it's practically unobtainable for most players. You're recommending five of one of the rarest items in the game, and one item that's no longer available...
Joined January 2010.
In regard to hating Star Trek 2009:
Well, if you're flying one of the science vessels with a lower turn rate, a PBAoE boff setup (including theta radiation, as the person to whom you responded mentioned), and/or mines, if behooves you to "knife fight". I did it myself before getting my hyper-plasma torpedoes and switching to a "grav well/overlapping AE" setup, and it worked reasonably well.
Plus, if you're fighting stuff like tactical cubes or the unimatrix ships, you can catch them in their own heavy plasma/energy ball AE's and do some serious honking damage to them. Or, if you load out feedback pulse you'll be doing all the more damage to enemies whilst shield tanking (which as a science vessel you should be doing anyway).
Spock's Brain.
Fair enough - I totally failed to notice the Theta Radiation comment in the post that I quoted, which kind of makes all of the difference. Some good suggestions in your second paragraph, though, and thanks for those! Do you happen to have a link to/suggestions for an Intrepid tank build that uses your second paragraph as a guideline? Sounds interesting to me...
All of that aside, however, the second half of my post that you quoted still stands. Suggesting 5 Veteran Human BOffs for anyone, for any build, is so absurd that it's almost satire.
Joined January 2010.
In regard to hating Star Trek 2009:
you should get that if you can, extra Tac console and the 10% bonus to shield and hull
too many options
in multiple studies i've performed they both eek out about 3-5k dps depending on energy type/skill setup.
in the long run though just play to have fun in what style fits you with the minor modifications such as field gens and tact team you should be doing well enough for now to enjoy the game and experiment how you want dont feel shoehorned into my builds or anyone elses ;-)
oh and yes it does feel a waste to get an intrepid if you already have a vesta byzanathos but the fleet intrepid has a bit more health than the vesta still a hard choice though
Shield tanking is pretty well the same across any science vessel build. Stack shield strength or regeneration (shield strength is better, giving more effective shield strength, but there's a definite case to be made for regeneration provided you can push it high enough), and stack hardening via TSS, EPtS, and your other science abilities. The only noteworthy thing about the Intrepid in that regard is with only two engineering slots, you may not be able to load out RSP as an emergency button though you get ablative generators to compensate, and you'll find yourself highly reliant on HE for hull repairing.
A PBAoE build is pretty straightforward -- torps, mines, and PSW/CPB/TBR instead of GW/TR/ES. Theta radiation really shines there, especially in ESTF's where controlling spheres and probes is at a premium. This is where the Intrepid is really strong, since the PBAoE build draws a ton of aggro and from all angles, and ablative generators don't disable torps and mines.
Spock's Brain.