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New Romulus can burn for all I care!
edwardianed
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
Okay, so I've read a lot of people complain that "Devil's Choice" (specifically the segment "Defense of New Romulus") is too hard. I thought that it was probably just some folks had kitted themselves out badly or weren't using decent tactics; in short I was willing to put it down to casual players not putting in the time and/or effort to succeed at the game.
I was wrong.
"Defense of New Romulus" is a nightmare! It's not so much that the enemies are particularly strong or that I'm particularly weak (Commander 35, D'Deridex, tetryon beam setup), the problem is the spam... just so much damn spam.
I'll fly up to the periphery of the battle and start chipping away at a convenient, tactically advantageous target, only to be confronted by infinite viral matrices and tractor beam mines and boarding shuttles, rendering my Warbird about as strategically threatening as an asthmatic ant carrying some heavy shopping (bonus points if you get the reference
).
Combine this with my AI reinforcements being as effective as trying to topple the Great Wall of China by throwing jelly at it, and you have a recipe for frustration and failure.
Something needs to be done, either nerf the spam or buff one's allies, because watching the Kirk and the Kang derp their way into fifty tractor beams before I explode is a poor example of having fun.
Also, I may have used too many analogies...
I was wrong.
"Defense of New Romulus" is a nightmare! It's not so much that the enemies are particularly strong or that I'm particularly weak (Commander 35, D'Deridex, tetryon beam setup), the problem is the spam... just so much damn spam.
I'll fly up to the periphery of the battle and start chipping away at a convenient, tactically advantageous target, only to be confronted by infinite viral matrices and tractor beam mines and boarding shuttles, rendering my Warbird about as strategically threatening as an asthmatic ant carrying some heavy shopping (bonus points if you get the reference
).Combine this with my AI reinforcements being as effective as trying to topple the Great Wall of China by throwing jelly at it, and you have a recipe for frustration and failure.
Something needs to be done, either nerf the spam or buff one's allies, because watching the Kirk and the Kang derp their way into fifty tractor beams before I explode is a poor example of having fun.
Also, I may have used too many analogies...
Post edited by edwardianed on
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I just kept re spawning and heading straight at the command ship with guns blazing and using ram whenever I could.
It took about 20 mins but since command ship regenerates pretty slowy I did it in the end. The trick is to ignore everyone else.
I just stayed back and took out small shipes on the edges and after like 20 or 30 minutes the mission ended.. i guess one of the AIs took out the big ship..
Before that I must have died like 20 times..
I completely smoked it with a D'deridex (3x plasma DBBs and a torp fore, 3x plasma turrets and BA rear. All of which were green/blue quality of varying MKs). Only hull damage I took was from shield bleedthrough.
I'd say the problem is with your build and/or your playstyle.
Of course, my Romulan is an Engineer. That might have helped a bit, but that just contributes to the build aspect of it.
And I doubt it's my build that's the problem, I have a very successful Gal-R on my Fed and a Kar-Fi on my Klingon; I've reached the stage where I'm very confident in my ability to build a good ship (please don't mistake that over confidence, I accept I may have a bad build, I just don't think I do).
system Lord Baal is dead
Here's a hint: Don't just fly into the middle and pewpewpew yourself to death. Cloak, flank, and think strategically.
I died a few times during it but it really wasn't that hard.
Kirk's Protege.
We're all impressed with how uber you are...really..:rolleyes:
As many have pointed out, if you want more challenge dial up to elite. Normal difficulty is not for those who want a challenge. At normal it should be easier.
In my opinion, if they remove the infinite respawns of the elachi the mission would be fine. If they gave the allies the infinite 1hp mechanic instead of repair it would be just about perfect.
Perhaps you didn't see the line:
"I'll fly up to the periphery of the battle and start chipping away at a convenient, tactically advantageous target"
Also, I didn't say it shouldn't still be a challenge, it just has to be a little easier to accomplish. When something is needlessly difficult or at the least does not present a reason for it's difficulty, it often ceases to become fun: winning at Poker is a challenge; so is repeatedly stabbing yourself in the thigh with something sharp, only one of those is a game.
I'm not claiming to be uber or better than anyone else, simply stating that it feels like people are getting lazy and forgetting what challenging content feels like given that most of the PvE content from the story missions could be done with your eyes shut mashing the "1" key and the spacebar.
Something comes up that bucks the trend and everyone screams nerf, just want to throw the opposing view that not everyone thinks the mission is too hard. I didn't struggle, and neither did most of my friends or fleetmates. A couple did but once you give them some advice they're fine.
Kirk's Protege.
Never the less I've replayed this episode 6-8 times for the singularity core it rewards, as you advance in levels so do the rewards.
Yeah its doable, and yeah its not everyone's flavor of fun.
It's not hard, it's just horribly designed and probably was never internally tested. "Die and respawn a bunch of times until you win" is not compelling gameplay. It's just annoying.
I died more on Defense of New Romulus than I did during my entire Fed toon's career.
i REALLY should have listened to that one voice over telling me to focus fire on the big ships...
because i didn't i kept shooting the small ships -> usual logic, shoot down the small ones, fast and easy, and then you aren't getting hammered when taking on the big ones.
i think after 45 minutes i noticed that small ships kept warping in after i destroyed one...
then i went for the big ones and a few respawns later i got them killed and it was done.
you know what? THIS would be super fun if it was a PvE queue event instead of a single player mission, where you actually had to take down all of it.
Also i can't shake the feeling that whoever made the mission had a player at level 50 in his head when balancing it and only later it was pushed down to lvl 30 - 40 in the mission progression.
That last wave, however? yeesh... I can stand toe-to-toe with most dreadnaughts without blinking (Heck, I went against the Orion one from the Nimbus III arc without rescuing those pirates - I cleared the syndicate fleet from around them, but didn't repair them as requested). But 6(+?)? Plus a smattering of other ship types?
"they give you allies" no. just no. all the Romulan ships were destroyed outright before we could scratch the paint on a single dread. So when the fed/klingon reinforcements came, they were alone and didn't fare much better.
Thoughts: the "repairing" that the allied ships do is enough to keep them alive throughout any beatings they may take from a non-dreadnaght wave - but is not quick enough to deal with the punishment that the mass of dreads dish out. While perhaps the old standard of them being invincible, never going below 1 hp is a bit dated, how about something like the allies around Japori from the new romulus patrols? When 'defeated' they sit there smoking for a minute or two, then repair to full health and re-enter the fray.
Within the first couple of minutes of the last wave, all of your romulan ally ships are destroyed, and I managed to do the first couple of waves without losing any of them. They are just too weak to fight that many dreadnoughts and (multi-vector...) battleships.
Add that to the infinite respawns of frigates and escorts, and the three "immortal" ally ships are too swamped to be helpful.
I died half a dozen times just trying to pull the command ship away from the other ships, without pulling too many dreadnoughts and battleships with it. Once I managed to pull it away, it only took 10-15 mins to whittle its health down to zero in a D'ridthau beam-boat.
So yeah, buffing the ally ships to be more useful as a distraction (especially the romulans) and limit the number of enemy respawns to something that isn't infinite would make this mission a lot less annoying.
This was the toughest mission I can remember doing solo in this game. I was lvl 37 in a DD and managed to complete it albeit it took forever and I died more times than I want to count.
The secret is not to go straight for the command ship. You have to take out the smaller ships first, then lure the two dreadnoughts away and kill them. You can then ignore the rest of the ships and go for the command ship. You have to battle cloak like crazy or you'll never complete it.
I'm hitting the transwarp to Sol. Well, good luck.
Frankly, I consider putting a mission like "Defense of New Romulus" into the middle of the PVE storyline to be nearly game breaking. And at least two people in one of the global channel I watch sometimes *did* consider it gamebreaking. After attempting it several times, both of them annouced they were fed up entirely, and quit. I haven't seen either of them since then.
And for the people defending it: Just because it isn't a problem TO YOU doesn't mean there isn't a problem.
Did work for me.
Got killed a few times, but not as bad as some Hive elite runs.
Once or twice I was hot dogging and wasn't watching what I was doing but it wasn't that hard. Gotta know when to use your battle cloak and singularity abilities.
Once you pull the command ship away from the main battle it's not that hard to tank it even with mediocre gear. The problem is the sheer amount of time it takes to chop away at it.
It's just plain silly, and there are enough people stating as much that Cryptic should take it as an indication they need to reevaluate the Defense of New Romulus mission.
Notwithstanding the Kamikaze/Zerg strategy, it should not take 1-2 hours to defeat just. one. ship. :rolleyes:
Command Officers of the USS Wyvern (from left to right):
Aurellia Eshkah (Tactical); Indigo Shae (Engineering); Nysiay Chysiayki (VA, Ship Captain)
Jeclia Sek (Science); Vally Mantivour (Security)
Yeah, that.
Bingo. This is the trick. Don't take on the whole fleet.
Yes you are going to die, A LOT but FINALLY there is a mission that has hell on earth written on it and not "Made for 5 years or under". Too much pampering to the "Oh it's too hard" crowd. This fight is fantastic. Don't change a thing!!!
Try to remember you;re defending a planet from an invading force who's HQ you just blew into space dust. It's not going to be one or two ships that come after you...
***Disenchanted***
Real Join Date: Monday, 17 May 2010
When experienced, veteran players call the mission hard on Normal Difficulty, tt's all but impossible for a beginning player.
I've been playing STO since closed beta. The mission is too @#$@#$ hard.