I don't know if this was stated upthread, but one of the issues is that in a DPS-centric game, escorts get something that with a few exceptions, only thYE get - DHCs with an inherent additional +10% critd.
Well, crusiers should get something they cant get, like heavy armor with +10 CritD resistance or somesuch...and Sci ships get a +10% buff to whatever deflector dish they get....or something...
So -
Escorts - DHC
Crusiers - Heavy Armor
Science - Mega Buff to their currently mounted deflector.
I don't understand why people keep proposing medium armor for sci ships and light armor for escorts... a science ship's survivability has always been in its shields (except for the Intrepid Retrofit when it uses its Ablative Generator), and Escorts have had hull advantages over them. Given that the Defiant at least was considered notable for its armor, I'd think it odd to make Escorts the least armored ships in the game.
Standard and Heavy armors would be enough for me, with Heavy going to (Battle)Cruisers and possibly Carriers, the rest making do with Standard armor.
If you make cruisers 'more survivable' very little will happen until stronger enemies show up. Then escorts, by virtue of not having an armor slot to play catch up with, get less tanky and are de facto 'nerfed'. Soon as there's a fair wad of STF enemies escorts can't stand up to cruisers become useful again. Overly simplistic I know but that's my guess.
And then over there is science vessels doing... something... with maybe a raybeam...
I don't know if this was stated upthread, but one of the issues is that in a DPS-centric game, escorts get something that with a few exceptions, only thYE get - DHCs with an inherent additional +10% critd.
Well, crusiers should get something they cant get, like heavy armor with +10 CritD resistance or somesuch...and Sci ships get a +10% buff to whatever deflector dish they get....or something...
So -
Escorts - DHC
Crusiers - Heavy Armor
Science - Mega Buff to their currently mounted deflector.
/just spitballin here....
I can see that happening, but also one more thing. Beam array and DBB gain a "raking" ability that adds a certain percentage critical hit chance.
Armor for all. But give armor "weight". Make it lower the turn rate, inertia and impulse modifier of ships.
Something like rcs accelerators work but inverse. The lower your base turn, the less it affects you. Ships with very low movement stats, like cruisers and carriers, would be basically inmune to being affected by armor weight.
Also maybe, heavy armor exclusive of cruisers. Escorts limited to light armor. Everything in between light and medium armor.
Different types of armor would have varying ways of modifying movement stats.
Armor for all. But give armor "weight". Make it lower the turn rate, inertia and impulse modifier of ships.
Something like rcs accelerators work but inverse. The lower your base turn, the less it affects you. Ships with very low movement stats, like cruisers and carriers, would be basically inmune to being affected by armor weight.
Also maybe, heavy armor exclusive of cruisers. Escorts limited to light armor. Everything in between light and medium armor.
Different types of armor would have varying ways of modifying movement stats.
Not a bad thought. Let people pile on armor, but they'd pay for it in terms of movement which would then affect their defense score.
The modifier shouldn't be base turn, I don't think, but a new attribute. We'll call it mass ratio (or base mass) for lack of a better term, and it should reflect the overall mass of the ship. The smallest ships would suffer bigger movement penalties for heavier armor, while the larger ships could become more nimble at the expense of lighter or no armor. RCS Accelerators and high Engine/Aux power could offset the effect of heavier armor that increases the turn rate and inertia.
This would also necessitate a balance pass to adjust turn rate and inertia for existing ships, assuming light armor comes standard on escort and sci and medium armor comes standard on cruisers and that cruisers' current turn rates are predicated on equipping heavy armor.
My 2 cents...
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Current situation (simplified) as stated by gecko:
Escorts are fine; Cruisers are not.
Option 1 is a direct fix just focussing on making cruisers fine too.
Option 2 focusses on making cruisers fine but also add changes to the escorts in a way that does not change anything to them (since they are already fine) & just everything else eng. console related just for the sake of... ?
...bored an not enough to do in cryptic office? (doubt it)
...prevent rage from escort players because their fave got nothing? (seriously; forum-flame-prevention?)
If, on the other hand, you (cryptic) plan to revamp eng consoles anyway then yes: go Option 2; if not then don't waste time with that and take 1.
Edit/addition:
Whoever is currently convinced that this armor should make turnrate/inerta worse on cruisers should spend some serious time playing Ody/Bortasqu class ships. Just for the laugher also add a very rare MK XII RCS to it and see how it changes next to nothing.
Class ship slots (1-5 this could increase via Tier. T1 has one, t2 has two etc etc)
Universal/Engineering - there should be a boost in general engineering item (of course it could use old ship armor BUT class ship slot will have better armor)
Science same
Tactical Same
This could expand to more customized ship and expand beyond "10" console (since it will include class ship slots)
I dont see any usefull improvement of cruisers or scienceships on this changes. today, we dont need more armor oder any simple sciencebuff. These changes will not give the posibility to reach a frist place in a fleetaction like minefield against a escort. These changes doesnt make cruisers oder scienceships more efficent on the pve-content.
there are only 2 real usefull options:
1. reduce the survibility of escorts so they need to be supported by cruisers and scienceships
2. increase the outgoing damage of cruisers and scienceships to make them more efficent for actual content
Armor for all. But give armor "weight". Make it lower the turn rate, inertia and impulse modifier of ships.
Something like rcs accelerators work but inverse. The lower your base turn, the less it affects you. Ships with very low movement stats, like cruisers and carriers, would be basically inmune to being affected by armor weight.
Also maybe, heavy armor exclusive of cruisers. Escorts limited to light armor. Everything in between light and medium armor.
Different types of armor would have varying ways of modifying movement stats.
NO !
The LAST thing I want on my cruiser is more weight on a ship that powerslides for 10km. Sure it would be nice to just sit a 7km and be invincible with the heavy armour and endless supply of heals but it won't happen against an escort who MUST be within 3km to get his DHC up to their damage potential, who you want to give light armour to.
I think the best option is to leave armour alone and de-tank the scort- cut the boff hull heals about 40% across the board, that way cruisers who already have many more eng boff power slots gain their advantage back.
Gekos proposal is simply to force players into ships they don't particularly want to fly. It has nothing to do with equipment balance, it's all about getting players out of fighters and into bombers.
Option 2:
? Everyone gets an Armor slot, but Cruisers can equip Heavy Armor.
? This is dangerous b/c it potentially raises the survivability of every ship in the game. To do this, Armor consoles would have to be changed. They would have to be something that is not related to damage mitigation (so not damage resistance, or bonus HP, or defense). The consoles would have to change to something new, or existing.
? Basic Armor could have lots of options and types, but in general, the damage resistance bonus would be equivalent to about 2 to 3 engineering consoles (for white quality - higher qualities could be better). Heavy armor would be worth much more.
So bottom line, would you be willing to loose Engineering Damage Resistance consoles for an armor slot that gives you about the same resistance, but also offers you more options.
Definitely option #2, that's also what was proposed by players around a year ago. Moving the current Engineering Resistance Consoles out of the system is the logical approach when adding an Armor slot to ships to replace said functionality.
Also it doesn't necessesairly raise the survivability, when most/Top end ships already run full Neutronium Alloy Consoles.
First, let?s take Warp Cores out of the discussion. If STO gets a Warp Core, it will have little to do with armor.
Here is the bottom line we are discussing internally:
? We want to add a ship armor slot. Having more itemization is good
? Armor means Damage Resistance (to be consistent with ground Armor). Other enhancement bonuses can be available
? We don?t want to raise the survivability of every ship in the game.
? We feel Cruisers could use an increase in survivability.
? Armor could be added as a set piece.
? Armor could offer a ship material change.
So two options we are discussing:
Option 1:
? Only Cruisers Get Armor.
? No other changes needed (simple).
? We couldn't integrate armor as set piece for everyone, but it could possibly become part of a set only usable by cruisers.
Option 2:
? Everyone gets an Armor slot, but Cruisers can equip Heavy Armor.
? This is dangerous b/c it potentially raises the survivability of every ship in the game. To do this, Armor consoles would have to be changed. They would have to be something that is not related to damage mitigation (so not damage resistance, or bonus HP, or defense). The consoles would have to change to something new, or existing.
? Basic Armor could have lots of options and types, but in general, the damage resistance bonus would be equivalent to about 2 to 3 engineering consoles (for white quality - higher qualities could be better). Heavy armor would be worth much more.
So bottom line, would you be willing to loose Engineering Damage Resistance consoles for an armor slot that gives you about the same resistance, but also offers you more options.
I say opition 2 but I honestly like the idea of armor plating becoming %based hp or +structural integrity skill consoles this would decrease the effect it would have escorts and science vessels but on high hp ships it would give more effect. I know you don't want to increase all ships survivability but that's one of the reason people use engineering slots to began with, if you want normalize it by lowering the effect of the structural integrity skill... Or buffing mob kinetic damage by a small amount...
However i think each of the different armor consoles should have a effect unique to them. Like a bonus to hull repair or power insulators or thrusters or warp core potential or shield emitters or inertial dampers, maybe even counter measures,when hull is hit with ____ damage type... or just remove armor consoles from the game..Though then how would you handle refunding the people with lots of valuable armor consoles..
Becuase I think we are long over due for a console or anything really besides deflectors which help HP... Though I guess you could just make hp a mod on the armor slotted, if so make another mod crew death resistance...
Also about sets I'm not sure it would be to out of the question the possibility of adding set with armor piece that could either be heavy or normal depending on the ship its slotted in or to different armor pieces that serve the set the same function..
You could do option 1 in the short term and then go option 2.But option 2 needs heavy testing and getting alot of feedback from pve player to pvp player alike before implementing to live.... If you go this route please allow people on test server to get a hold of the mark 12 armor's easily, like set up a free store in earth space dock and Klingon home world, possible romulan new home as well.
This thread is so sad. People bending over backwards in the small hope geckos reads this AND acts on it.
To me personally its hard to determine whether gecko is just a bad game designer or simply cornered by cryptics limited understanding of how to make money off of us.
I see it's been nearly a month and no feedback from Geko since his original comment. Any chance of an update on this subject from Geko or someone else at Cryptic?
The issue with engineering consoles is three fold.
1) Armor calculations are completely ludicrious. +35 from dibirnium, only gives what +7%??? more damage resistance to just disruptor damage for me.
2) Nuetronium is simply the best, since it not only mitigates income all incoming energy fire, but gives a kinetic protection too. Since the rate of protection is so non linear, the +18 damage resistance is almost all the benefit I could ask for.
3) You geniuses painted yourself into a corner with releasing escorts with as many engineering consoles as a cruiser.
If your looking for actual fixes longterm...
1) This is no different then science, and tactical consoles you really should revamp the entire system. There are a plethora of consoles that you've completely made OMG LOL YOU USE THAT?
2)Keep the same system, give cruisers a more profound hull point advantage. These things are supposed to be massive survivable ships, these things are where sci ships should be IMHO.
I think that part of the reason that a cruiser should be capable of equipping heavy armor is that it has the size and engine power to not be weighed down by it, so Engineers should have a bonus where they can equip armor, even heavy armor without suffering a maneuverability hit.
I dont see any usefull improvement of cruisers or scienceships on this changes. today, we dont need more armor oder any simple sciencebuff. These changes will not give the posibility to reach a frist place in a fleetaction like minefield against a escort. These changes doesnt make cruisers oder scienceships more efficent on the pve-content.
there are only 2 real usefull options:
1. reduce the survibility of escorts so they need to be supported by cruisers and scienceships
2. increase the outgoing damage of cruisers and scienceships to make them more efficent for actual content
Geckos suggestions are ony smoke screens...
2!
Increase the outgoing damage. That way all cruiser and/or sci teams aren't hobbled in STFs.
Although one is meaningful enough that it should be implemented as well, that would hobble a tactical vessel that is not supported by a cruiser or sci. There's a difference between meaningful team work and forced interdependence.
The issue with engineering consoles is three fold.
1) Armor calculations are completely ludicrious. +35 from dibirnium, only gives what +7%??? more damage resistance to just disruptor damage for me.
2) Nuetronium is simply the best, since it not only mitigates income all incoming energy fire, but gives a kinetic protection too. Since the rate of protection is so non linear, the +18 damage resistance is almost all the benefit I could ask for.
3) You geniuses painted yourself into a corner with releasing escorts with as many engineering consoles as a cruiser.
If your looking for actual fixes longterm...
1) This is no different then science, and tactical consoles you really should revamp the entire system. There are a plethora of consoles that you've completely made OMG LOL YOU USE THAT?
2)Keep the same system, give cruisers a more profound hull point advantage. These things are supposed to be massive survivable ships, these things are where sci ships should be IMHO.
On that last point I find it curious, there are enemy npc cruisers that have 60-100+k hit points, but most cruisers we can play as top out in the 60K range I guess on the Oddy and B'Q? Aren't these supposed to be ships from the superpowers in the region?
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
You must have some sort of secret advantage i know nothing of.
There's a way to access the user settings for the forum, allowing you to set Posts per Page. But it's only accessible via black magic (don't remember where, or how to find the link to it, because it's not under the User CP).
Give cruisers a bonus to their base hitpoints, for armor equipped. This has the same practical effect as making the armor more effective because it increases the amount of damage the ship can sustain. You could start at a bonus of 3000 hitpoints per plate of armor, and then increase that up to 6000 hitpoints per plate of armor based on the Armor Reinforcements skill. This is a top tier, very expensive skill so having it pay out big rewards for a specific play style seems fine. A cruiser with 4 plates of armor and maxed out Armor Reinforcements would gain a bonus of 24000 base hitpoints, which is around a 55% increase for a fleet-level cruiser.
This lets cruisers become harder without negatively affecting other ships. It also maintains the existing system that forces cost:benefit decisions between carrying more armor or more of something else, and, increases the relative value of a skill that's currently not worth much.
Considering how the current expansion in May is going to look like I would prefer to go with option one because it will lead to less work and less crushed hopes and ideals.
I never had a problem with cruisers survivability. The problem is always to KILL THE GUY ATTACKING YOU!
Assuming competent builds on both sides, cruisers always have the short end of the stick.
Sci ships get a multitude of disabling and interference powers, escorts just blast away. Both of them can tank cruiser damage easily.
Yes, both of them will also have a hard time killing the competent cruiser but the core problem is:
I kinda want the interference sci and the dps escort in my group. I do not need a cruiser.
I do not want a healer, i want higher damage or in the case of cruisers: sufficient pressure damage.
And no, plasma weapons/consoles are not the solution. Because unless you have similar consoles for all weapon types this whole arrangement stinks mightily.
And of course: engineering boff powers flat out suck and are boring.
Engie team is unusable because it removes the ability to use tactical team - an ability which you have made absolutely vital for any ship. Tac team is vital because you have failed to adjust the shield rebalancing that is in the game to the new massive dps creep that took place.
And even if engie team were off global cooldown with tac team, it still would suck since it heals what amounts to one cannon volley of damage. whoopsie doo.
Power to X powers are boring, their secondary effect is either to short or to boring.
Aceton beam does nothing right:
It does not murder crew (and even if it did: does not matter whatsoever), it does not diminish power levels and it is cleansed easily since EVERYONE runs HE. It should inflict a dot and increasing power drain - the dot does damage based on power levels on the target ship, as it drains power the dot goes down. (so it basically softens up targets while weakening them). The powerdrain should linger a bit. perhaps even make it so that if the target gets hit with another aceton while the effect of the first still lingers, the effect gets increased magnitude.
Ejcet Warp plasma dearly needs to get bumped down to ensign level as starting point.
Extend shields: yes how about extending this to 15 km to compensate for the fact that this is a worse TSS that is breakable.
Boarding party: lol yes. So i can send in guys that will attack boffs and try to interfere with system operations but are to dumb to place some bloody bombs?!
Remember that khazon guys who took a hit for the team and blew out voyagers main power? yes. Make boarding party randomly obliterate a power system for a period of time..... synergy with vm is intended....
As for armor consoles:
I use aux to sif and polarize hull as standard on just about every ship i use.
My resists are already high. I do not need more resists. i want more base hp, more useful powers, i want to be able to actually damage the crack escort in his bloody jhas.
If this is just shifting neutroniums to another slot i can only say: meh.
How about creating armor slots for the already existing 'armor' consoles (Neutronium, etc) while retaining the non-armor consoles for the engineering slot? Cruisers can have more armor and engineering slots both-allowign them to keep the high armor they already have by lettign them slot their neutroniums into armor slots (of which they will have more than what the escorts and sci have) while having extra engineering slots for stuff liek the subsystem boosting consoles (and giving people a reason to take them)
I would like to see the armor increase with more options however, if they go in a special slot you'll have to increase the defense of the Science ships to compensate because many put these consoles on our ships because they are simply too weak as it is and there's no other way of stacking resistances (there really wouldn't be for science ships if this is as he proposes!) cruisers definitely would need the slots.
When I suggested it in the forums I suggested that they add 2 slots for cruisers 1 slot for science and 0 slots for escorts for the special armor only consoles.
I've thought about this recently myself. One of the ideas that I've come back to consistently requires a mild overhaul, but I think it would benefit the game, and help to define the role of each ship. That being said... its not perfect.
1. First, add a spot in for "Armor" item types, to all ships. For the example here, let's just say that cruisers get 3 spots, science 2, escorts 1 (some variants may, or may not, offer varying numbers, like say, a Heavy Cruiser type could get a 4th spot, and a light cruiser only 2, with appropriate adjustments elsewhere)
2. Change all existing armor (engineer consoles) to Armor consoles, and restrict them TO armor consoles. This allows the ships that should be the most tanky (cruisers) to equip the most armor, and the lightest armored ships to equip the least.
This opens up the engineering slots on every ship type to other consoles, like engine power, aux power, etc, consoles, or, for that matter, to the univeersals. You could end up with a heavily armored cruiser running extra power to X subsystem, or ultra-fast, lightly armored escorts running more power to their engines or aux.
The armor could work the same way it does now (perhaps with one slot being the "primary", that is, one that applies a visual appearance to the ship?), and from there, the other engineering consoles can be adjusted as necessary.
Comments
Just want to get my 2c in. Anything that increases my ability to customize my ships and have things just that little bit different and engaging.
Well, crusiers should get something they cant get, like heavy armor with +10 CritD resistance or somesuch...and Sci ships get a +10% buff to whatever deflector dish they get....or something...
So -
Escorts - DHC
Crusiers - Heavy Armor
Science - Mega Buff to their currently mounted deflector.
/just spitballin here....
Standard and Heavy armors would be enough for me, with Heavy going to (Battle)Cruisers and possibly Carriers, the rest making do with Standard armor.
If you make cruisers 'more survivable' very little will happen until stronger enemies show up. Then escorts, by virtue of not having an armor slot to play catch up with, get less tanky and are de facto 'nerfed'. Soon as there's a fair wad of STF enemies escorts can't stand up to cruisers become useful again. Overly simplistic I know but that's my guess.
And then over there is science vessels doing... something... with maybe a raybeam...
I don't know, whatever, this is not my job.
I can see that happening, but also one more thing. Beam array and DBB gain a "raking" ability that adds a certain percentage critical hit chance.
Something like rcs accelerators work but inverse. The lower your base turn, the less it affects you. Ships with very low movement stats, like cruisers and carriers, would be basically inmune to being affected by armor weight.
Also maybe, heavy armor exclusive of cruisers. Escorts limited to light armor. Everything in between light and medium armor.
Different types of armor would have varying ways of modifying movement stats.
Not a bad thought. Let people pile on armor, but they'd pay for it in terms of movement which would then affect their defense score.
The modifier shouldn't be base turn, I don't think, but a new attribute. We'll call it mass ratio (or base mass) for lack of a better term, and it should reflect the overall mass of the ship. The smallest ships would suffer bigger movement penalties for heavier armor, while the larger ships could become more nimble at the expense of lighter or no armor. RCS Accelerators and high Engine/Aux power could offset the effect of heavier armor that increases the turn rate and inertia.
This would also necessitate a balance pass to adjust turn rate and inertia for existing ships, assuming light armor comes standard on escort and sci and medium armor comes standard on cruisers and that cruisers' current turn rates are predicated on equipping heavy armor.
My 2 cents...
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Escorts are fine; Cruisers are not.
Option 1 is a direct fix just focussing on making cruisers fine too.
Option 2 focusses on making cruisers fine but also add changes to the escorts in a way that does not change anything to them (since they are already fine) & just everything else eng. console related just for the sake of... ?
...bored an not enough to do in cryptic office? (doubt it)
...prevent rage from escort players because their fave got nothing? (seriously; forum-flame-prevention?)
If, on the other hand, you (cryptic) plan to revamp eng consoles anyway then yes: go Option 2; if not then don't waste time with that and take 1.
Edit/addition:
Whoever is currently convinced that this armor should make turnrate/inerta worse on cruisers should spend some serious time playing Ody/Bortasqu class ships. Just for the laugher also add a very rare MK XII RCS to it and see how it changes next to nothing.
I think there should be something like this
Class ship slots (1-5 this could increase via Tier. T1 has one, t2 has two etc etc)
Universal/Engineering - there should be a boost in general engineering item (of course it could use old ship armor BUT class ship slot will have better armor)
Science same
Tactical Same
This could expand to more customized ship and expand beyond "10" console (since it will include class ship slots)
Please review my campaign and I'll return the favor.
there are only 2 real usefull options:
1. reduce the survibility of escorts so they need to be supported by cruisers and scienceships
2. increase the outgoing damage of cruisers and scienceships to make them more efficent for actual content
Geckos suggestions are ony smoke screens...
NO !
The LAST thing I want on my cruiser is more weight on a ship that powerslides for 10km. Sure it would be nice to just sit a 7km and be invincible with the heavy armour and endless supply of heals but it won't happen against an escort who MUST be within 3km to get his DHC up to their damage potential, who you want to give light armour to.
I think the best option is to leave armour alone and de-tank the scort- cut the boff hull heals about 40% across the board, that way cruisers who already have many more eng boff power slots gain their advantage back.
Gekos proposal is simply to force players into ships they don't particularly want to fly. It has nothing to do with equipment balance, it's all about getting players out of fighters and into bombers.
Awoken Dead
Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
Definitely option #2, that's also what was proposed by players around a year ago. Moving the current Engineering Resistance Consoles out of the system is the logical approach when adding an Armor slot to ships to replace said functionality.
Also it doesn't necessesairly raise the survivability, when most/Top end ships already run full Neutronium Alloy Consoles.
I say opition 2 but I honestly like the idea of armor plating becoming %based hp or +structural integrity skill consoles this would decrease the effect it would have escorts and science vessels but on high hp ships it would give more effect. I know you don't want to increase all ships survivability but that's one of the reason people use engineering slots to began with, if you want normalize it by lowering the effect of the structural integrity skill... Or buffing mob kinetic damage by a small amount...
However i think each of the different armor consoles should have a effect unique to them. Like a bonus to hull repair or power insulators or thrusters or warp core potential or shield emitters or inertial dampers, maybe even counter measures,when hull is hit with ____ damage type... or just remove armor consoles from the game..Though then how would you handle refunding the people with lots of valuable armor consoles..
Becuase I think we are long over due for a console or anything really besides deflectors which help HP... Though I guess you could just make hp a mod on the armor slotted, if so make another mod crew death resistance...
Also about sets I'm not sure it would be to out of the question the possibility of adding set with armor piece that could either be heavy or normal depending on the ship its slotted in or to different armor pieces that serve the set the same function..
You could do option 1 in the short term and then go option 2.But option 2 needs heavy testing and getting alot of feedback from pve player to pvp player alike before implementing to live.... If you go this route please allow people on test server to get a hold of the mark 12 armor's easily, like set up a free store in earth space dock and Klingon home world, possible romulan new home as well.
BULLSEYE! That's just the way it is.
The issue with engineering consoles is three fold.
1) Armor calculations are completely ludicrious. +35 from dibirnium, only gives what +7%??? more damage resistance to just disruptor damage for me.
2) Nuetronium is simply the best, since it not only mitigates income all incoming energy fire, but gives a kinetic protection too. Since the rate of protection is so non linear, the +18 damage resistance is almost all the benefit I could ask for.
3) You geniuses painted yourself into a corner with releasing escorts with as many engineering consoles as a cruiser.
If your looking for actual fixes longterm...
1) This is no different then science, and tactical consoles you really should revamp the entire system. There are a plethora of consoles that you've completely made OMG LOL YOU USE THAT?
2)Keep the same system, give cruisers a more profound hull point advantage. These things are supposed to be massive survivable ships, these things are where sci ships should be IMHO.
And on the subject of weight and heavy armor.
I think that part of the reason that a cruiser should be capable of equipping heavy armor is that it has the size and engine power to not be weighed down by it, so Engineers should have a bonus where they can equip armor, even heavy armor without suffering a maneuverability hit.
2!
Increase the outgoing damage. That way all cruiser and/or sci teams aren't hobbled in STFs.
Although one is meaningful enough that it should be implemented as well, that would hobble a tactical vessel that is not supported by a cruiser or sci. There's a difference between meaningful team work and forced interdependence.
On that last point I find it curious, there are enemy npc cruisers that have 60-100+k hit points, but most cruisers we can play as top out in the 60K range I guess on the Oddy and B'Q? Aren't these supposed to be ships from the superpowers in the region?
It's only 7 pages long for me.
Page 26 of 26
You must have some sort of secret advantage i know nothing of.
@CaptainD3
Yes, which is why a hull strength boost is probably the most logical, it would upset the system the least while addressing it the most directly.
Your browser must come with noob-tronium armour too.
Awoken Dead
Now shaddup about the queues, it's a BUG
There's a way to access the user settings for the forum, allowing you to set Posts per Page. But it's only accessible via black magic (don't remember where, or how to find the link to it, because it's not under the User CP).
Through my mastery of Googlefu, I have discovered that the proper link for this flavor of forum software is:
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/profile.php?do=editoptions
The setting you want is in the third block, as "Number of posts to show per page".
You're welcome.
Give cruisers a bonus to their base hitpoints, for armor equipped. This has the same practical effect as making the armor more effective because it increases the amount of damage the ship can sustain. You could start at a bonus of 3000 hitpoints per plate of armor, and then increase that up to 6000 hitpoints per plate of armor based on the Armor Reinforcements skill. This is a top tier, very expensive skill so having it pay out big rewards for a specific play style seems fine. A cruiser with 4 plates of armor and maxed out Armor Reinforcements would gain a bonus of 24000 base hitpoints, which is around a 55% increase for a fleet-level cruiser.
This lets cruisers become harder without negatively affecting other ships. It also maintains the existing system that forces cost:benefit decisions between carrying more armor or more of something else, and, increases the relative value of a skill that's currently not worth much.
I never had a problem with cruisers survivability. The problem is always to KILL THE GUY ATTACKING YOU!
Assuming competent builds on both sides, cruisers always have the short end of the stick.
Sci ships get a multitude of disabling and interference powers, escorts just blast away. Both of them can tank cruiser damage easily.
Yes, both of them will also have a hard time killing the competent cruiser but the core problem is:
I kinda want the interference sci and the dps escort in my group. I do not need a cruiser.
I do not want a healer, i want higher damage or in the case of cruisers: sufficient pressure damage.
And no, plasma weapons/consoles are not the solution. Because unless you have similar consoles for all weapon types this whole arrangement stinks mightily.
And of course: engineering boff powers flat out suck and are boring.
Engie team is unusable because it removes the ability to use tactical team - an ability which you have made absolutely vital for any ship. Tac team is vital because you have failed to adjust the shield rebalancing that is in the game to the new massive dps creep that took place.
And even if engie team were off global cooldown with tac team, it still would suck since it heals what amounts to one cannon volley of damage. whoopsie doo.
Power to X powers are boring, their secondary effect is either to short or to boring.
Aceton beam does nothing right:
It does not murder crew (and even if it did: does not matter whatsoever), it does not diminish power levels and it is cleansed easily since EVERYONE runs HE. It should inflict a dot and increasing power drain - the dot does damage based on power levels on the target ship, as it drains power the dot goes down. (so it basically softens up targets while weakening them). The powerdrain should linger a bit. perhaps even make it so that if the target gets hit with another aceton while the effect of the first still lingers, the effect gets increased magnitude.
Ejcet Warp plasma dearly needs to get bumped down to ensign level as starting point.
Extend shields: yes how about extending this to 15 km to compensate for the fact that this is a worse TSS that is breakable.
Boarding party: lol yes. So i can send in guys that will attack boffs and try to interfere with system operations but are to dumb to place some bloody bombs?!
Remember that khazon guys who took a hit for the team and blew out voyagers main power? yes. Make boarding party randomly obliterate a power system for a period of time..... synergy with vm is intended....
As for armor consoles:
I use aux to sif and polarize hull as standard on just about every ship i use.
My resists are already high. I do not need more resists. i want more base hp, more useful powers, i want to be able to actually damage the crack escort in his bloody jhas.
If this is just shifting neutroniums to another slot i can only say: meh.
When I suggested it in the forums I suggested that they add 2 slots for cruisers 1 slot for science and 0 slots for escorts for the special armor only consoles.
1. First, add a spot in for "Armor" item types, to all ships. For the example here, let's just say that cruisers get 3 spots, science 2, escorts 1 (some variants may, or may not, offer varying numbers, like say, a Heavy Cruiser type could get a 4th spot, and a light cruiser only 2, with appropriate adjustments elsewhere)
2. Change all existing armor (engineer consoles) to Armor consoles, and restrict them TO armor consoles. This allows the ships that should be the most tanky (cruisers) to equip the most armor, and the lightest armored ships to equip the least.
This opens up the engineering slots on every ship type to other consoles, like engine power, aux power, etc, consoles, or, for that matter, to the univeersals. You could end up with a heavily armored cruiser running extra power to X subsystem, or ultra-fast, lightly armored escorts running more power to their engines or aux.
The armor could work the same way it does now (perhaps with one slot being the "primary", that is, one that applies a visual appearance to the ship?), and from there, the other engineering consoles can be adjusted as necessary.