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Death beams, one shot kills, & other annoyances
magnumstar
Member Posts: 269 Arc User
I caught a couple posts a awhile back complaining about the one shot kills from both the Unimatrix and Crystalline Entity. And to be honest there are problems with both the Hive Onslaught and CE missions. I'm not sure if some of the changes were intentional or were errors in the redesign. Either case some things do need fixed or at least toned down some. But they need not do away with the super one shot kills, all that needs to be done is make it so they can be avoided. One shot kills aren't the problem, the problem is there isn't a viable defense against them.
Hive Onslaught - I hate being trapped next to the queen so you can possibly avoid the lance beams (Not that it works at the moment anyway). I like to move around and fire, just sitting in one place is boring. My idea for the lance beams is instead having them not fire near the queen give them a short range 5km and make it so the unimatrix gives some indicator when it will fire, pulse green for a few seconds prior to firing or something of that nature. This way you have a chance to avoid it. On elite mode you can extend the beams range out to 7.5 km and give it a quicker time between pulsing and firing.
Crystalline Entity - I tried PuGGing this a couple times since LoR and I can't seem to stay alive long enough to do any good. The beams the thing fires are way more devastating than the shockwave, at least you can avoid the shockwave but the beams never miss and do a lot of damage. My idea to fix this is give the CE a beam attack exactly like regular ships with beam weapons can perform, beam fire at will. Prior to performing the beam fire at will ability the CE would start to glow purple then pulse, as the pulse quickens it gets closer to firing. You have only seconds to get out of range (7.5) or be annihilated. It can still have regular beam attacks that do normal dmg in addition to the fire at will attack. Also on elite mode the range would be 10km and the time from pulse to fire could be either random or much quicker than normal difficulty.
Anyway that's how I'd do it. It doesn't take the one shot kills away, you'd still have that danger, but it gives you a chance to defend against them. I like the added danger of the one shot kills it makes the missions more exciting but are only fun if they can be avoided, spam respawning just stinks.
Hive Onslaught - I hate being trapped next to the queen so you can possibly avoid the lance beams (Not that it works at the moment anyway). I like to move around and fire, just sitting in one place is boring. My idea for the lance beams is instead having them not fire near the queen give them a short range 5km and make it so the unimatrix gives some indicator when it will fire, pulse green for a few seconds prior to firing or something of that nature. This way you have a chance to avoid it. On elite mode you can extend the beams range out to 7.5 km and give it a quicker time between pulsing and firing.
Crystalline Entity - I tried PuGGing this a couple times since LoR and I can't seem to stay alive long enough to do any good. The beams the thing fires are way more devastating than the shockwave, at least you can avoid the shockwave but the beams never miss and do a lot of damage. My idea to fix this is give the CE a beam attack exactly like regular ships with beam weapons can perform, beam fire at will. Prior to performing the beam fire at will ability the CE would start to glow purple then pulse, as the pulse quickens it gets closer to firing. You have only seconds to get out of range (7.5) or be annihilated. It can still have regular beam attacks that do normal dmg in addition to the fire at will attack. Also on elite mode the range would be 10km and the time from pulse to fire could be either random or much quicker than normal difficulty.
Anyway that's how I'd do it. It doesn't take the one shot kills away, you'd still have that danger, but it gives you a chance to defend against them. I like the added danger of the one shot kills it makes the missions more exciting but are only fun if they can be avoided, spam respawning just stinks.
Post edited by magnumstar on
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Because it destroys the need for other classes except damage dealers. Why? Because it doesn't matters what you are in when you get hit, you are dead. So, no point in a tank or a healer to keep the tank alive. Just use the damage dealer and go to town.
It is a symptomatic problem across the entire game. Either its one shots or no Challenger at all. And getting one shotted isn't a challenge either. It is simply annoying.
And since we are stuck with the trinity system, it either needs a rework how the game deals with damage, healing and agro to get rid of the trinity.
See in a good trinity combat system you would have the tnak that can soak up a ton of damage and generate agro, but he lacks damage output and healing. So that your healer has to keep the tankalive while the dps pounds the enemy to scrap.
And for that to work, you need damage from the npc that is surviable in the first place and not an instagib.
Otherwise the tank can't hold the agro, or the healer can't heal the tank since it is already dead when hit.
And that is why in PvE all you need is a tac. Everything else is a waste of time.
The only way a 1 shot kill is even excusable is if it comes with a warning, a countdown before it fires, and there's a way to counter it. Like "Kill these generators within 30 seconds or anything within X distance is going to die". Donatra is borderline because there's a clear indicator of where it's going to fire, but it sometimes glitches and doesn't show.
However, they hit like crazy, I played on my Wells, and I took an average of 8K/shot, non crit, unbuffed. And they are firing at everyone, which mean they will hit everyone, unlike the borg. The borg torp is crazy, but at least you can switch tank, and it's not killing everyone.
Not to mention the ridiculous reward from eCE, compared to the difficulty/number of players required.
I agree the OS/crazy damage is a stupid design idea. Elite shouldn't mean frustrating.
When I fly a battleship I don't feel like I'm in a true ship killer, look at the guns on a real battle ship, that says it all. Not that a battleship is indestructible but they are heavily armored and armed as well. Sure a fast moving light cruiser or destroyer can get in and cause a heck of a lot of dmg then get back out of range quick enough before the big ship can retaliate but it better not hesitate or its a goner.
Battleships and Dreadnaughts should be able to mount a heavy beam array that does way more damage than the normal arrays do. And to counter the bigger ships armor and fire power the smaller ships should have a defense bonus that comes with speed and maneuverability. This can be adjusted so all ships have a role from the frigate to the largest ships. This would make all the various ships playable at end game.
Frigates - fastest and most maneuverable, has hard points to mount light turrets that only attack hvy torps and shuttles/fighters. Also has hard points for 2 forward weapons and 2 rear mounted weapons. Lightly armored, depends on its speed and maneuverability to avoid dmg. Acts as a fighter screen but has enough fire power to take out the bigger ships given time.
Light Cruiser - This is the class the escorts will come from and is the destroyer type craft of the STO universe. Fast, maneuverable and hits hard. Has good armor plus speed and maneuverability. Attack ship, its role is to move in fast hit hard and get back out.
Med Cruiser - Research vessels come from this class as well as ships of war. Medium armor, speed, and maneuverability (Research vessels will have better spd and maneuv but will be less armored). 4 weps front and 4 in back (3x3 for the research ship). Acts as a screen against the lighter ships.
Heavy Cruiser - Larger version of the Med Cruiser, Exploration vessels will come from this class because its large enough to venture out and hold its own. Better armored but slower and less maneuverable that the smaller Med Cruiser. 4x4 weapon layout, can mount one heavy beam array.
Battleship - Ship killer, heavily armored but slow speed and maneuverability. 4x4 weapons layout, can equip 2 heavy beam arrays.
Dreadnaught - Larger version of the battleship, more armor and more firepower. 4x4 weapons layout and can mount 3 heavy beam arrays.
This setup every ship can battle another fairly since the smaller ships counter the weapons and armor of the larger ships with speed and maneuverability. This is a heck of a lot better system than the outdated and boring trinity way of doing things.
Back to the original posting - One shot kills aren't bad as long as they can be either A: Defended against or B: avoided. I picked avoidance since it is the easier one to implement and makes more since. I mean this is what we see in the movies when a ST ship is faced with a death beam
Sensors Officer - Captain the Unimatrix is powering up its weapons!
Captain - Helmsman evasive maneuvers and hard to port!
Heh, anyone remember the original STFs before the ground combat overhaul and PvE queue? Infected would take about two hours, Cure upwards of three or four, and Khitomer Accord.... bring a lunch. But immediately after the ground combat overhaul, and 2 hours became half an hour, oh there was an elitist UPROAR... and that's when we got the insta-kill shot, as best I can remember. I think they were intended to be visible, but got lost in the coding somewhere.
There IS a way to see it coming though. Keep an eye on the Cube and Gate's portrait, looking for buffs and debuffs. When you see a Beam Fire at Will, or Beam Overload, that means an insta-kill shot is about to be fired (again, based on what I can tell from personal accounts). Soon as you see this, hit it with a Subnucleonic Beam... or BE somewhere else
We've been complaining about removing this garbage for ages and it's gotten no where.
Total Effective Health VS Total Effective Heal + Regen VS Enemy Damage Output.
Simply put most ships can restore more health over a 15 second period than what the ship has out of the gate. This is thanks to the double dip effects many abilities have providing both healing, regeneration boosts, and resistance boosts all in one package. Because of that the total damage output by the enemy needs to be so stupidly high that you can explode in a single hit if you fail to have the proper defensive abilities active to increase your resistances (which just happen to drastically increase your passive regeneration and provide a heal on top like EPtS).
Much of which had to be there to counter all of the overpowered escort-flying hardcore PvPers, who constantly whine about "OP" whenever anyone is actually able to defeat them. Its the snowball effect.
People have begged and begged for changes to various things.
It's NOT going to happen.
They mine as well shut down down the dang forums.
Yeah I am angry.
Especially with TRIBBLE like I don't know, my character being bugged for the last month? But yet again, the DEV's could give two craps about that too. (AS well). I am so sick and tired of reading the forums and nothing changing.
Oh yeah submitting like 6 different tickets, oh and 5 emails.
I do agree with this statement. I no longer play a Hive (Space) because of the every 30 sec one shot lances of the Unimatrix's. Though I could see such one shots in Elite, but not in a Normal game. I wish my own Dreadnought would have the same distance and power to one shot with it's lance. . .
Apart from the Hive [Space], I am also not finding it funny or fun with these Sphere's and Borg Assimlated Raptor's zipping around with Emergency Power To Engines. I don't know who or what decided to put this in for more of challenge to these event's, but is not fun or fair to those with bigger slower turning cruisers. This is not a challenge to me, but an annoyance and a waste of time on these STF event's. It's just plain ridiculous.
I have been avioding the STf's due to the one shot kills. I don't mind a challange, but getting insta popped is the most frustrating thing possible.
Stay at max range, when it starts charging its aoe burst, back off to >10k, wait, go back in repeat. I've never been popd by the stupid snow flake.
But the Borg lances are bad. I've gotten killed several times trying to get near the queen and more often still I get lanced on the spawn point. Not to mention that's one of TWO insta killers they got so you must both stay close and soak torp spreads and fight probes and change target to gun down the plasma bolt AND sustain DPS on the unimatrix.
No wonder the only people I clear it with are equipped for elites. Thats too much to deal with in a 5-person team.
I think there's a solution already existing in-game; attack pattern delta plus security officer doffs. The only thing is, for a cruiser to use that, they need to devote all their doffs to APD, and still suffer from being able to carry only one copy on most cruisers.
That doesn't deal with the insta-gib, but if my escort can handle most of them reasonably well, I'm sure a cruiser could do much better.
This is the basis for why I would like to see them balance cruisers by greatly enhancing their active space doff seating (to 15 at VA). Besides being consistent with their larger crew compliments, it's vital to overcoming some of the deficiencies inherent to Cryptic's bungled trinity design.
EPtS or EPtW would have been more appropriate, though it could be that they're just trying to showcase an underused and, at least in their mind, under appreciated ability. I didn't find it too much of a hassle in the one ISE I've run since LoR.
Cruiser?! Everybody's supposed to be flying an escort! Didn't you know that?
BTW, it seems to me as if [nearly] EVERY enemy NPC ship now has EPtE
It is just not worth the time.
Yes, it has been nerfed to oblivion pre LOR, but now it is just ridiculous. Tune it down!