The thing is, you have to either eliminate sci slots on escorts and cruisers entirely (not gonna happen) or give them either offensive or defensive abilities to put there. Because the offensive abilities have to be made strong enough to actually make up for the weaknesses of sci ships giving them to escorts and cruisers would create a major balance issue, so they have to have defensive sci abilities. (Plus, I do kind of like the theory of having sci as the mage abilities, with some light healing and a variety of unusual attacks.)
Creating more synergy on skills would certainly be nice, although I'm not entirely sure how to do it, given the limit to how many abilities any one ship can run (which means that even if you could come up with something new, it would be hard to fit it all in).
The first part and the second part kind of create the thing that's kind of missing - that level of opportunity and opportunity cost. Certain classes of ship have more opportunity and less opportunity cost - some have less opportunity and some opportunity cost...
I didn't realize science was in this game...I mean hell we launched a whole faction recently with 1 science ship that isn't even available till 40 and no fleet version available unless tier 5 shipyard....for a faction that seems very science directed....
Science to me has been the back of the bus class since launch, 90% of all the ships devs even make seem very pew oriented...scimitar should have had a true science feel to it...doesn't...its cool whatever I have illegal weapons on it as the "good guy" splinter faction....
I didn't realize science was in this game...I mean hell we launched a whole faction recently with 1 science ship that isn't even available till 40 and no fleet version available unless tier 5 shipyard....for a faction that seems very science directed....
Science to me has been the back of the bus class since launch, 90% of all the ships devs even make seem very pew oriented...scimitar should have had a true science feel to it...doesn't...its cool whatever I have illegal weapons on it as the "good guy" splinter faction....
...The Scimitar is the least sciencey vessel in the game. It was called a "Predator" by CAptain Picard, it has a bioweapon built in, in the movie it had 52 Disruptor banks and 27 torpedo launchers, HOW IS THAT SCIENCE!!!!! It is a warship through and through.
There are the same number of fleet science vessels on the fed side as Escorts and Science captains have what many considered one of the most powerful abilities in the game, Subnucleonic beam and sensor scan.
Count the number of Tac Cmdr, Eng Cmdr, and Sci Cmdr vessels available at T5 (this includes RA, MU, VA, Fleet, and Lockbox)...for Fed, KDF, and Rom.
True, I was just talking about Fed side (Which is the only side that Cryptic seems to care about more than an afterthought, though romulans might take their place soon)
True, I was just talking about Fed side (Which is the only side that Cryptic seems to care about more than an afterthought, though romulans might take their place soon)
Heh, it's damn painful looking at the Romulans without including the Feds and KDF in that count.
RA/MU Tac - 2 Eng - 2 Sci - 2
VA Tac - 6 Eng - 2 Sci - 0
Fleet Tac - 4 Eng - 2 Sci - 1
Total Tac - 12 Eng - 6 Sci - 3
Oh, nifty - I never noticed that it worked quite like that - never typed it out quite like that...
Half as many Eng as Tac and half as many Sci as Eng!
If the direction STO is not going is not clear...well...
There's the current event ship - the Risan Corvette. There was the Winter Event ship - the Chel Grett. There was the 3-pack of Andorian Escorts: Kumari, Khyzon, Charal. Can't forget the Tal Shiar Destroyer - but have to be honest about the Tal Shiar Battle Cruiser, right? There was the Jem Heavy and the Jem Dread...and...
...can't forget the Anniversary Ships! Kamarag Retro & Fleet Kam as well as the Ambassador Retro and Fleet Amby.
Hrmm, I can't help but feel like I'm missing something. If I am, I'm sure somebody will point it out. But let's do a quick tally then of the ships added in 2013 (since the Winter Event).
Tac - 20 Eng - 10 Sci - 3 Uni - 1
Damn it, I forgot the Rom Vet Ship...the Daeinos.
So it's actually...
Tac - 21 Eng - 10 Sci - 3 Uni - 1
Hrmm, that 4:1 Tac:Sci of the Romulans earlier doesn't look so bad when compared to the 7:1 Tac:Sci of 2013...
It's hard to say if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy for Cryptic or not, eh?
Content that's DPS based, Sci BOFF abilities that have been neutered out the wahzoo or pawned off to various consoles, and a 7:1 ratio of Tac to Sci...why wouldn't Tac vessels sell better than Sci vessels? Like...duh.
Heh, it's damn painful looking at the Romulans without including the Feds and KDF in that count.
RA/MU Tac - 2 Eng - 2 Sci - 2
VA Tac - 6 Eng - 2 Sci - 0
Fleet Tac - 4 Eng - 2 Sci - 1
Total Tac - 12 Eng - 6 Sci - 3
Oh, nifty - I never noticed that it worked quite like that - never typed it out quite like that...
Half as many Eng as Tac and half as many Sci as Eng!
If the direction STO is not going is not clear...well...
There's the current event ship - the Risan Corvette. There was the Winter Event ship - the Chel Grett. There was the 3-pack of Andorian Escorts: Kumari, Khyzon, Charal. Can't forget the Tal Shiar Destroyer - but have to be honest about the Tal Shiar Battle Cruiser, right? There was the Jem Heavy and the Jem Dread...and...
...can't forget the Anniversary Ships! Kamarag Retro & Fleet Kam as well as the Ambassador Retro and Fleet Amby.
Hrmm, I can't help but feel like I'm missing something. If I am, I'm sure somebody will point it out. But let's do a quick tally then of the ships added in 2013 (since the Winter Event).
Tac - 20 Eng - 10 Sci - 3 Uni - 1
Damn it, I forgot the Rom Vet Ship...the Daeinos.
So it's actually...
Tac - 21 Eng - 10 Sci - 3 Uni - 1
Hrmm, that 4:1 Tac:Sci of the Romulans earlier doesn't look so bad when compared to the 7:1 Tac:Sci of 2013...
It's hard to say if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy for Cryptic or not, eh?
Content that's DPS based, Sci BOFF abilities that have been neutered out the wahzoo or pawned off to various consoles, and a 7:1 ratio of Tac to Sci...why wouldn't Tac vessels sell better than Sci vessels? Like...duh.
Excellent work. It's hard to back up claims about development, but stuff like this really helps see what is actually going on. I just wish they'd at least be honest and quit pretending sci gets a fair shake. (contrary to cannon ST)
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC] If your post is anything like, "I have a sandwich so you can't be starving" it's time to rethink posting. ~thlaylierah
So realistically, you only need to have the exact number of doffs that you need. ~leadme2kirk
What bugs me is that the PVP whiners are allowed to dictate gameplay for the rest of us. Would be nice if PVP/PVE could somehow be separate systems. That way both sides could potentially be happy.
Think about it.
Did you realize the truth? PvP aficionados are massively competitive. And by massively I mean almost to the point of OCD.
Now, compared to the "average" gamer, who do you think will spend more money buying gear they feel they "need"?
That's right, now you're catching on.
Cryptic and primarily PWE, had this figured out long before Science nerfage was even a topic.
What role are those PvP nutjobs going to pick/play? You guessed it.
"But if you ask for a rise
It's no surprise that they're
Giving none away"
Heh, it's damn painful looking at the Romulans without including the Feds and KDF in that count.
RA/MU Tac - 2 Eng - 2 Sci - 2
VA Tac - 6 Eng - 2 Sci - 0
Fleet Tac - 4 Eng - 2 Sci - 1
Total Tac - 12 Eng - 6 Sci - 3
Oh, nifty - I never noticed that it worked quite like that - never typed it out quite like that...
Half as many Eng as Tac and half as many Sci as Eng!
If the direction STO is not going is not clear...well...
There's the current event ship - the Risan Corvette. There was the Winter Event ship - the Chel Grett. There was the 3-pack of Andorian Escorts: Kumari, Khyzon, Charal. Can't forget the Tal Shiar Destroyer - but have to be honest about the Tal Shiar Battle Cruiser, right? There was the Jem Heavy and the Jem Dread...and...
...can't forget the Anniversary Ships! Kamarag Retro & Fleet Kam as well as the Ambassador Retro and Fleet Amby.
Hrmm, I can't help but feel like I'm missing something. If I am, I'm sure somebody will point it out. But let's do a quick tally then of the ships added in 2013 (since the Winter Event).
Tac - 20 Eng - 10 Sci - 3 Uni - 1
Damn it, I forgot the Rom Vet Ship...the Daeinos.
So it's actually...
Tac - 21 Eng - 10 Sci - 3 Uni - 1
Hrmm, that 4:1 Tac:Sci of the Romulans earlier doesn't look so bad when compared to the 7:1 Tac:Sci of 2013...
It's hard to say if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy for Cryptic or not, eh?
Content that's DPS based, Sci BOFF abilities that have been neutered out the wahzoo or pawned off to various consoles, and a 7:1 ratio of Tac to Sci...why wouldn't Tac vessels sell better than Sci vessels? Like...duh.
Thank you for putting this in black and white (or red/blue/yellow). I posted in another thread about the lack of Sci vessels Rom side and was pretty much told that there are various Tac Cmder/Sci LtC hybrids out there for me to use my space magic with and that the Ha'nom covers all my needs anyway so... what was I moaning about?
It's also worth noting that of the three sci ships, not even the fleet version has a even a universal ensign slot. All the others do.
"So my fun is wrong?"
No. Your fun makes everyone else's fun wrong by default.
Its impossible to balence them joined together as anyone who plays PvE know's
Jellico....Engineer ground.....Da'val Romulan space Sci
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
Its impossible to balence them joined together as anyone who plays PvE know's
I disagree with that - with every ounce of my being. I find, often, that people that want them separated - have a certain image of how PvE should be. That PvE they want...is not balanced.
Thus, were PvP and PvE closer - rather than separated - then more balance could be achieved.
Sisko didn't hop in the Defiant and win the Dominion War by himself. He didn't grab four buds and win the war as a party of five.
PvP doesn't create an imbalance in STO - it points out the imbalance in STO. STO's a monster farm, one player taking out 20-30+ ships...
Which is one of the reasons that Sci looks different in PvP (not perfect by any means) than in PvE...and one of the reasons that it has fallen into the shape that it has because of PvE.
I can't help but think about the Elachi and the multiple - multiple - nerfs they received. Oh noes, they're working together - they're too smart - oh noes, I can't kill hundreds of them by pressing my pinkytoe on the spacebar...etc, etc, etc.
Its impossible to balence them joined together as anyone who plays PvE know's
This is partially true, some abilities are tough to balance for both PvE and PvP, but we can get a heck of a lot closer than we are now. Viral Matrix, for example, is pretty solid in PvP right now, and seriously underwhelming in PvE, because PvP is focused on quickly overwhelming targets in a few moments of weakness, while PvE is about slowly wearing down enemies over time, and Viral Matrix only lasts for a few moments. The shield drains are also tricky to balance, since the shield strengths of players and NPCs are so different, with a similar difference in how they're typically broken. That means that for PvE the shield drains would need to have much higher drain stats than would be reasonable in PvP. Maybe that could be fixed by setting up resistances properly, maybe not. But for the moment, since sci is so weak in both types of combat, these differences are less important.
One could balance the game very well actually but it will never happen, the way I would go about it is to balance around the PvP game and then rebuild PvE on that balance such that anything that gets put into the game is balanced in one section of the content and automatically balanced in the other rather than trying to strike a balance between two balances
This is partially true, some abilities are tough to balance for both PvE and PvP, but we can get a heck of a lot closer than we are now. Viral Matrix, for example, is pretty solid in PvP right now, and seriously underwhelming in PvE, because PvP is focused on quickly overwhelming targets in a few moments of weakness, while PvE is about slowly wearing down enemies over time, and Viral Matrix only lasts for a few moments. The shield drains are also tricky to balance, since the shield strengths of players and NPCs are so different, with a similar difference in how they're typically broken. That means that for PvE the shield drains would need to have much higher drain stats than would be reasonable in PvP. Maybe that could be fixed by setting up resistances properly, maybe not. But for the moment, since sci is so weak in both types of combat, these differences are less important.
I think this is the only way to balance, PvE and PvP are different games. They should have different skill trees and their should be a modifier to abilities for PvE and PvP that way balance could be tweaked for each independently. The reason for the skill tree is there are lots of fun ways to play PvE and be successful, but your options are more limited in a PvP build so I say give us skill trees for both and only make us complete the PvP skill tree if we want to, our rank and all would be based on the PvE skill tree, but you cant join a match if your PvP tree is not current.
The ground and space skill trees need to be completely separate too. Ground PvP is hurt because people max their space skills and then are not competitive with a dedicated ground team that maxes all those skills. The lack of competitiveness kills the fun.
This separation is the only way Science can be made to fit in both PvE and PvP.
PvE Jem'Hadar motto:Participation Ribbonsare life.
I disagree with that - with every ounce of my being. I find, often, that people that want them separated - have a certain image of how PvE should be. That PvE they want...is not balanced.
Thus, were PvP and PvE closer - rather than separated - then more balance could be achieved.
Sisko didn't hop in the Defiant and win the Dominion War by himself. He didn't grab four buds and win the war as a party of five.
PvP doesn't create an imbalance in STO - it points out the imbalance in STO. STO's a monster farm, one player taking out 20-30+ ships...
Which is one of the reasons that Sci looks different in PvP (not perfect by any means) than in PvE...and one of the reasons that it has fallen into the shape that it has because of PvE.
I can't help but think about the Elachi and the multiple - multiple - nerfs they received. Oh noes, they're working together - they're too smart - oh noes, I can't kill hundreds of them by pressing my pinkytoe on the spacebar...etc, etc, etc.
The reason I disagree with this is if you make all the abilities and power meaningful in PvP then you would dominate the AI. I just don't think programming is in a place where we can make an AI use a ship in the way that a person does.
The Elachi were not that bad, they were nerfed because the diversity of PvE builds that people make because they are more fun than efficient. The missions took too long, and I think they judge nerfs on lots of stats and I think timeframe the community is completeing missions is one of those stats.
The weakness of an MMO versus a box game is the mmo is developed in progress and any big changes that a sequel would have requires a reworking of the prior content. So I think it is more practical to expect a rebalance the skill trees for PvP and PvE than rework all the PvE content to make it more in line with PvP player's skills. That way they can nerf the skill trees individually and make PvE more challenging, allow all BO abilities to be useful in both vE and vP, and not take 7 years to achieve this balance by slowly reworking all the established vE grind missions that give the meaningful drops and rewards.
PvE Jem'Hadar motto:Participation Ribbonsare life.
they were nerfed because the diversity of PvE builds that people make because they are more fun than efficient.
Well, imho, that's not a good thing. It's not about everybody having to fly certain cookie cutter builds by any means - I certainly don't, I fly some damn flaky things - things that cause some folks to /facepalm. I'm not going to be the member of the 5 Minute Club nor the 20k+ Club. There is a wide diversity that is possible to get the job done within given time periods without having to force folks into cookie cutter builds.
With the Elachi, fought them with Eng, Tac, and Sci - Mogai, D'deridex, Ha'feh, Ha'nom, Ha'apax, and T'varo Retro/Fleet T'varo. Different builds, different gearing, etc, etc, etc. Heck, I even started the shuttle mission with a shuttle once by accident - instead of with a normal ship and then taking the shuttle to the surface. Fighting Monbosh in a shuttle was fun.
What STO is doing on the other hand, again imho, is doing something akin to the following:
Allowing folks that play a racing game to show up in flip flops and beat the NPCs driving Ferrari, Lamborghini, etc, etc, etc.
Allowing folks that play a football game (American or otherwise) to show up with a badminton racket and rock the NPC teams.
Etc, etc, etc...it's beyond silly how little effort has to be made.
PvE is not "buffed" - it is continuously "nerfed" - not only is the PvE made easier time and time again, but there is the continual introduction of more powerful gear without the inclusion of more powerful/more difficult content.
Which goes back to the game allowing folks to show up for a FPS game with cans of silly string...
It's not about separating PvE and PvP, then - it's about separating the game between your average game player (I consider myself average at best) and your...well, your extremely casual social game player that you might find playing certain games out there - I used to say your average Facebook gamer...but your average Facebook game requires more effort than STO does these days.
Until something along those lines is done, once more imho, then there's always going to be a problem with Sci...and always going to be a problem with PvP.
PvE and PvP must use separate mechanics if you want them both to become viable gameplay options.
PvE in most MMOs, including this one, revolves around the trinity of tank/healer/DPS. The only difference with STO is that all three of the trinity roles are mashed into each and every player along with the distinct lack of a resources management mechanism like mana it instead rely s upon 'cooldowns'. The lack of 'mana' is what causes all the gripes in PvE because simply put the monsters can either put out enough DPS to overwhelm someone and kill them in short order, or the damage output is so pathetic you can afk spacebar spam tank it. But I digress.
In order for PvE to work in the trinity style system monsters must have significantly more HP than players as they do not heal themselves. And when they do heal themselves we run into the same problem as the DPS it is either so little no one hardly notices or so massive the average player cannot overcome it. So we are stuck with bloated blobs of HP. Their damage output is in the same exact boat in order for it to overcome a players capability to heal themselves it must be fairly high.
So we end up with monsters that have significantly higher raw stats than players. You see this in nearly every MMO and even with Tabletop RPGs, it is a necessary evil with the trinity style.
Conversely PvP needs to be an attrition style of gameplay or no one would ever die. But it cannot be if the players get to keep the same built in self trinity that they get to have in PvE. No matter what path you take you end up with one of two situations either no one ever dies because sustain is too strong, or everyone dies in a matter of seconds because damage is too strong. This is why exotic damage is so pathetic in PvE, otherwise it would slaughter players in PvP. For a shield drain to be strong enough to tickle a tactical cube it would instantly drain a players entire shield. So then we bring in STOs typical 'stalemate' breaker called science or CC.
But there too we have a significant problem. If we allow the monsters to be subject to such strong CC they will be even more pathetic than they currently are. So they get to be immune because Cyptic says so. Or so large in number that it is pointless. Then you have the 'cheeze' or 'cheap' issue creap in as well since most players tend to become upset when they are heavily effected by CC in any game.
Unfortunately science has bore the brunt of this. CC remains powerful to some extent in PvP but useless in PvE (drains, shutdowns, stuns, etc) because otherwise the monsters are too easy. Additionally there exotic damage (shield drains, kinetic, etc) barely tickles the NPCs because otherwise it would annihilate everything in PvP. After all underpowered creates far fewer complaints than overpowered.
The best solution would have been a proper implementation of resist skills, sadly that was and remains such a collisional blunder and does little to nothing to remove the binary OP/UP nature of science. A good solution would be to use values relative to the targets, such as allowing a shield drain ability to drain by a percentage of the targets maximum or to add an always useful secondary effect such as a shield resistance debuff.
Or you could get it over with, separate the two, and balance specific abilities to work effectively in both.
And until that is fixed...most MMOs are going to have a problem.
Probably the difficulty in fixing it is the history of star trek. alot of these things are common to all ships. I wonder if STO should have given every ship all the EN and LT boff abilities with boffs that do bonuses to them, and exponential bonuses at that. All the ships could do that, the difference is in how well.
PvE Jem'Hadar motto:Participation Ribbonsare life.
Probably the difficulty in fixing it is the history of star trek. alot of these things are common to all ships. I wonder if STO should have given every ship all the EN and LT boff abilities with boffs that do bonuses to them, and exponential bonuses at that. All the ships could do that, the difference is in how well.
While there are going to be hints of, forms of, etc, etc, etc - the Trinity in almost every form of adventure fiction out there...very rarely is it ever quite the way MMOs do it.
And until that is fixed...most MMOs are going to have a problem.
Don't misunderstand I would personally prefer an actual attrition based system instead of this trinity bundled in every ship we have now but that would basically require STO 2. I have a feeling the crew mechanic was originally supposed to cover that but thanks to the wonders of iterative design it was scrapped and we got what we got.
Over and over. How many "partial" mechanics/systems are in the game?
Sci is just a glaring example.
My favorite is when the completely redesign a mechanic/system for the fifth time, like ground combat or how they plan to redo reputation.
Not to mention all the under utilized tech they create and then do absolutely nothing with. Such as the new crafting recipes from the last FE, the bonus mission from dailies in EE, and so on.
Then again who am I to judge I don't actually work on an MMO design team. But from my armchair all I see is waste and massive under utilization taking place.
As for iterative design it created Diablo 3. It implies a lack of vision and passion from the designers as well.
I do wonder if STO is making that much money (bottom line, not revenue) or if it is just understaffed to increase the profit margin.
Edit: this isn't supposed to be a jab, it is just that it feels like they are constantly rushing things out and there are not enough hours in the week to fully hash out the implications of the new content or even time to tie up loose ends. It reminds me of a job I used to have where we were a 4 man shop that was downsized from 12 and we were just putting out brush fires. Lots of intense management pressure and threats, but no follow through because they couldn't lose us. I just wonder how much of our griping is just hitting devs that are not getting support to do their job but they cant tell us, that would be unprofessional.
PvE Jem'Hadar motto:Participation Ribbonsare life.
doesnt matter what "balance" people feel is needed the powers that be will only pamper to those that bring them the most money
same way eve online turned rubbish once the carebears outnumbered the sharks, the devs just did an about turn and pampered the largest paying base of players.
unfortunatly thats not going to change in any game, money and the opinions of those providing it the most will always win in the end, so those of us who like science boats either put up or shut up tbh, we have no say.
I do wonder if STO is making that much money (bottom line, not revenue) or if it is just understaffed to increase the profit margin.
I don't think it's so much that they are understaffed specifically, but that several key designers and what not have left and much of the staff is relatively new. And while fresh blood does bring fresh ideas I'm sure it takes quite a long time to train someone up to the same level of quality and capability of someone who created the original system.
I'll be right back, there's over a decade of posts from me on various forums that I have to hunt through - some will require using the Internet Wayback Machine in the hopes of finding them though.
Comments
The first part and the second part kind of create the thing that's kind of missing - that level of opportunity and opportunity cost. Certain classes of ship have more opportunity and less opportunity cost - some have less opportunity and some opportunity cost...
Science to me has been the back of the bus class since launch, 90% of all the ships devs even make seem very pew oriented...scimitar should have had a true science feel to it...doesn't...its cool whatever I have illegal weapons on it as the "good guy" splinter faction....
...The Scimitar is the least sciencey vessel in the game. It was called a "Predator" by CAptain Picard, it has a bioweapon built in, in the movie it had 52 Disruptor banks and 27 torpedo launchers, HOW IS THAT SCIENCE!!!!! It is a warship through and through.
There are the same number of fleet science vessels on the fed side as Escorts and Science captains have what many considered one of the most powerful abilities in the game, Subnucleonic beam and sensor scan.
True, I was just talking about Fed side (Which is the only side that Cryptic seems to care about more than an afterthought, though romulans might take their place soon)
Heh, it's damn painful looking at the Romulans without including the Feds and KDF in that count.
RA/MU
Tac - 2
Eng - 2
Sci - 2
VA
Tac - 6
Eng - 2
Sci - 0
Fleet
Tac - 4
Eng - 2
Sci - 1
Total
Tac - 12
Eng - 6
Sci - 3
Oh, nifty - I never noticed that it worked quite like that - never typed it out quite like that...
Half as many Eng as Tac and half as many Sci as Eng!
If the direction STO is not going is not clear...well...
There's the current event ship - the Risan Corvette. There was the Winter Event ship - the Chel Grett. There was the 3-pack of Andorian Escorts: Kumari, Khyzon, Charal. Can't forget the Tal Shiar Destroyer - but have to be honest about the Tal Shiar Battle Cruiser, right? There was the Jem Heavy and the Jem Dread...and...
...can't forget the Anniversary Ships! Kamarag Retro & Fleet Kam as well as the Ambassador Retro and Fleet Amby.
Hrmm, I can't help but feel like I'm missing something. If I am, I'm sure somebody will point it out. But let's do a quick tally then of the ships added in 2013 (since the Winter Event).
Tac - 20
Eng - 10
Sci - 3
Uni - 1
Damn it, I forgot the Rom Vet Ship...the Daeinos.
So it's actually...
Tac - 21
Eng - 10
Sci - 3
Uni - 1
Hrmm, that 4:1 Tac:Sci of the Romulans earlier doesn't look so bad when compared to the 7:1 Tac:Sci of 2013...
It's hard to say if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy for Cryptic or not, eh?
Content that's DPS based, Sci BOFF abilities that have been neutered out the wahzoo or pawned off to various consoles, and a 7:1 ratio of Tac to Sci...why wouldn't Tac vessels sell better than Sci vessels? Like...duh.
Excellent work. It's hard to back up claims about development, but stuff like this really helps see what is actually going on. I just wish they'd at least be honest and quit pretending sci gets a fair shake. (contrary to cannon ST)
If your post is anything like, "I have a sandwich so you can't be starving" it's time to rethink posting. ~thlaylierah
Think about it.
Did you realize the truth? PvP aficionados are massively competitive. And by massively I mean almost to the point of OCD.
Now, compared to the "average" gamer, who do you think will spend more money buying gear they feel they "need"?
That's right, now you're catching on.
Cryptic and primarily PWE, had this figured out long before Science nerfage was even a topic.
What role are those PvP nutjobs going to pick/play? You guessed it.
"But if you ask for a rise
It's no surprise that they're
Giving none away"
-Pink Floyd
Thank you for putting this in black and white (or red/blue/yellow). I posted in another thread about the lack of Sci vessels Rom side and was pretty much told that there are various Tac Cmder/Sci LtC hybrids out there for me to use my space magic with and that the Ha'nom covers all my needs anyway so... what was I moaning about?
It's also worth noting that of the three sci ships, not even the fleet version has a even a universal ensign slot. All the others do.
No. Your fun makes everyone else's fun wrong by default.
PvP and PvE are seperated into differnt games
Its impossible to balence them joined together as anyone who plays PvE know's
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
I disagree with that - with every ounce of my being. I find, often, that people that want them separated - have a certain image of how PvE should be. That PvE they want...is not balanced.
Thus, were PvP and PvE closer - rather than separated - then more balance could be achieved.
Sisko didn't hop in the Defiant and win the Dominion War by himself. He didn't grab four buds and win the war as a party of five.
PvP doesn't create an imbalance in STO - it points out the imbalance in STO. STO's a monster farm, one player taking out 20-30+ ships...
Which is one of the reasons that Sci looks different in PvP (not perfect by any means) than in PvE...and one of the reasons that it has fallen into the shape that it has because of PvE.
I can't help but think about the Elachi and the multiple - multiple - nerfs they received. Oh noes, they're working together - they're too smart - oh noes, I can't kill hundreds of them by pressing my pinkytoe on the spacebar...etc, etc, etc.
This is partially true, some abilities are tough to balance for both PvE and PvP, but we can get a heck of a lot closer than we are now. Viral Matrix, for example, is pretty solid in PvP right now, and seriously underwhelming in PvE, because PvP is focused on quickly overwhelming targets in a few moments of weakness, while PvE is about slowly wearing down enemies over time, and Viral Matrix only lasts for a few moments. The shield drains are also tricky to balance, since the shield strengths of players and NPCs are so different, with a similar difference in how they're typically broken. That means that for PvE the shield drains would need to have much higher drain stats than would be reasonable in PvP. Maybe that could be fixed by setting up resistances properly, maybe not. But for the moment, since sci is so weak in both types of combat, these differences are less important.
I think this is the only way to balance, PvE and PvP are different games. They should have different skill trees and their should be a modifier to abilities for PvE and PvP that way balance could be tweaked for each independently. The reason for the skill tree is there are lots of fun ways to play PvE and be successful, but your options are more limited in a PvP build so I say give us skill trees for both and only make us complete the PvP skill tree if we want to, our rank and all would be based on the PvE skill tree, but you cant join a match if your PvP tree is not current.
The ground and space skill trees need to be completely separate too. Ground PvP is hurt because people max their space skills and then are not competitive with a dedicated ground team that maxes all those skills. The lack of competitiveness kills the fun.
This separation is the only way Science can be made to fit in both PvE and PvP.
The reason I disagree with this is if you make all the abilities and power meaningful in PvP then you would dominate the AI. I just don't think programming is in a place where we can make an AI use a ship in the way that a person does.
The Elachi were not that bad, they were nerfed because the diversity of PvE builds that people make because they are more fun than efficient. The missions took too long, and I think they judge nerfs on lots of stats and I think timeframe the community is completeing missions is one of those stats.
The weakness of an MMO versus a box game is the mmo is developed in progress and any big changes that a sequel would have requires a reworking of the prior content. So I think it is more practical to expect a rebalance the skill trees for PvP and PvE than rework all the PvE content to make it more in line with PvP player's skills. That way they can nerf the skill trees individually and make PvE more challenging, allow all BO abilities to be useful in both vE and vP, and not take 7 years to achieve this balance by slowly reworking all the established vE grind missions that give the meaningful drops and rewards.
Well, imho, that's not a good thing. It's not about everybody having to fly certain cookie cutter builds by any means - I certainly don't, I fly some damn flaky things - things that cause some folks to /facepalm. I'm not going to be the member of the 5 Minute Club nor the 20k+ Club. There is a wide diversity that is possible to get the job done within given time periods without having to force folks into cookie cutter builds.
With the Elachi, fought them with Eng, Tac, and Sci - Mogai, D'deridex, Ha'feh, Ha'nom, Ha'apax, and T'varo Retro/Fleet T'varo. Different builds, different gearing, etc, etc, etc. Heck, I even started the shuttle mission with a shuttle once by accident - instead of with a normal ship and then taking the shuttle to the surface. Fighting Monbosh in a shuttle was fun.
What STO is doing on the other hand, again imho, is doing something akin to the following:
Allowing folks that play a racing game to show up in flip flops and beat the NPCs driving Ferrari, Lamborghini, etc, etc, etc.
Allowing folks that play a football game (American or otherwise) to show up with a badminton racket and rock the NPC teams.
Etc, etc, etc...it's beyond silly how little effort has to be made.
PvE is not "buffed" - it is continuously "nerfed" - not only is the PvE made easier time and time again, but there is the continual introduction of more powerful gear without the inclusion of more powerful/more difficult content.
Which goes back to the game allowing folks to show up for a FPS game with cans of silly string...
It's not about separating PvE and PvP, then - it's about separating the game between your average game player (I consider myself average at best) and your...well, your extremely casual social game player that you might find playing certain games out there - I used to say your average Facebook gamer...but your average Facebook game requires more effort than STO does these days.
Until something along those lines is done, once more imho, then there's always going to be a problem with Sci...and always going to be a problem with PvP.
PvE in most MMOs, including this one, revolves around the trinity of tank/healer/DPS. The only difference with STO is that all three of the trinity roles are mashed into each and every player along with the distinct lack of a resources management mechanism like mana it instead rely s upon 'cooldowns'. The lack of 'mana' is what causes all the gripes in PvE because simply put the monsters can either put out enough DPS to overwhelm someone and kill them in short order, or the damage output is so pathetic you can afk spacebar spam tank it. But I digress.
In order for PvE to work in the trinity style system monsters must have significantly more HP than players as they do not heal themselves. And when they do heal themselves we run into the same problem as the DPS it is either so little no one hardly notices or so massive the average player cannot overcome it. So we are stuck with bloated blobs of HP. Their damage output is in the same exact boat in order for it to overcome a players capability to heal themselves it must be fairly high.
So we end up with monsters that have significantly higher raw stats than players. You see this in nearly every MMO and even with Tabletop RPGs, it is a necessary evil with the trinity style.
Conversely PvP needs to be an attrition style of gameplay or no one would ever die. But it cannot be if the players get to keep the same built in self trinity that they get to have in PvE. No matter what path you take you end up with one of two situations either no one ever dies because sustain is too strong, or everyone dies in a matter of seconds because damage is too strong. This is why exotic damage is so pathetic in PvE, otherwise it would slaughter players in PvP. For a shield drain to be strong enough to tickle a tactical cube it would instantly drain a players entire shield. So then we bring in STOs typical 'stalemate' breaker called science or CC.
But there too we have a significant problem. If we allow the monsters to be subject to such strong CC they will be even more pathetic than they currently are. So they get to be immune because Cyptic says so. Or so large in number that it is pointless. Then you have the 'cheeze' or 'cheap' issue creap in as well since most players tend to become upset when they are heavily effected by CC in any game.
Unfortunately science has bore the brunt of this. CC remains powerful to some extent in PvP but useless in PvE (drains, shutdowns, stuns, etc) because otherwise the monsters are too easy. Additionally there exotic damage (shield drains, kinetic, etc) barely tickles the NPCs because otherwise it would annihilate everything in PvP. After all underpowered creates far fewer complaints than overpowered.
The best solution would have been a proper implementation of resist skills, sadly that was and remains such a collisional blunder and does little to nothing to remove the binary OP/UP nature of science. A good solution would be to use values relative to the targets, such as allowing a shield drain ability to drain by a percentage of the targets maximum or to add an always useful secondary effect such as a shield resistance debuff.
Or you could get it over with, separate the two, and balance specific abilities to work effectively in both.
And until that is fixed...most MMOs are going to have a problem.
Probably the difficulty in fixing it is the history of star trek. alot of these things are common to all ships. I wonder if STO should have given every ship all the EN and LT boff abilities with boffs that do bonuses to them, and exponential bonuses at that. All the ships could do that, the difference is in how well.
While there are going to be hints of, forms of, etc, etc, etc - the Trinity in almost every form of adventure fiction out there...very rarely is it ever quite the way MMOs do it.
Don't misunderstand I would personally prefer an actual attrition based system instead of this trinity bundled in every ship we have now but that would basically require STO 2. I have a feeling the crew mechanic was originally supposed to cover that but thanks to the wonders of iterative design it was scrapped and we got what we got.
Would have to say that is likely the biggest issue, imvho...with STO as a whole.
Let's do...
...nope, let's do...
...nope, let's do...
...nope, let's do...
...nope, let's do...
...nope, let's do...
...nope, let's do...
...nope, let's do.
Over and over. How many "partial" mechanics/systems are in the game?
Sci is just a glaring example.
My favorite is when the completely redesign a mechanic/system for the fifth time, like ground combat or how they plan to redo reputation.
Not to mention all the under utilized tech they create and then do absolutely nothing with. Such as the new crafting recipes from the last FE, the bonus mission from dailies in EE, and so on.
Then again who am I to judge I don't actually work on an MMO design team. But from my armchair all I see is waste and massive under utilization taking place.
As for iterative design it created Diablo 3. It implies a lack of vision and passion from the designers as well.
Edit: this isn't supposed to be a jab, it is just that it feels like they are constantly rushing things out and there are not enough hours in the week to fully hash out the implications of the new content or even time to tie up loose ends. It reminds me of a job I used to have where we were a 4 man shop that was downsized from 12 and we were just putting out brush fires. Lots of intense management pressure and threats, but no follow through because they couldn't lose us. I just wonder how much of our griping is just hitting devs that are not getting support to do their job but they cant tell us, that would be unprofessional.
doesnt matter what "balance" people feel is needed the powers that be will only pamper to those that bring them the most money
same way eve online turned rubbish once the carebears outnumbered the sharks, the devs just did an about turn and pampered the largest paying base of players.
unfortunatly thats not going to change in any game, money and the opinions of those providing it the most will always win in the end, so those of us who like science boats either put up or shut up tbh, we have no say.
And how would you go about fixing this?
I don't think it's so much that they are understaffed specifically, but that several key designers and what not have left and much of the staff is relatively new. And while fresh blood does bring fresh ideas I'm sure it takes quite a long time to train someone up to the same level of quality and capability of someone who created the original system.
I'll be right back, there's over a decade of posts from me on various forums that I have to hunt through - some will require using the Internet Wayback Machine in the hopes of finding them though.