I think they were referred to as some sort of "energy cells" (i.e. capacitors) that got burned out every time the Defiant's cannons were fired at maximum power (the cannon equivalent of "beam overload", sort of).
To your sig:
I'll bite, how many does it take?
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Another strong possibility would be to add expose/exploit to space.
All energy weapons become exposes.
All projectiles become exploits.
Weight the chance for expose or the chance for exploit insta-kill based on weapon speed. Fast weapons have a lower chance. Slow weapons have a higher chance.
A combo would be more powerful than either by itself unless maybe you've got a solid DHC build because of the potential for torpedo insta-kills.
But DHCs would remain desirable because of the steady, non-diceroll dependent DPS.
Slow beam/slow torpedo might be godlike in PvE then but would be more balanced in PvP and could be given some counters for NPCs and PvP opponents to use against it like abilities that clear or even reverse an "expose" debuff back to the target and/or linking aggro to using expose/exploit and making some enemies capped at the amount of damage they can take from an expose/exploit combo attack.
Possibly also expose resistance on PvP and tanking dedicated gear.
You missed the point, it does still take away from customizing options, even if you have more slots to play with.
Canon went out the door a loooong time ago
See above.
Still adds to power creep, with typically 2 more slots for weapons, under what you're proposing. Again, this game is easy enough, don't need to add even more power to players' ships. Although with shared cooldowns, most likely, the 2nd torp would be kind of a waste, anyway.
Please explain how it takes away from customization. As I see it you would have greater options with energy weapons and then options with launchers how does this take away from customizing a ship?
When there are roots to canon, it will never be "out the door" even if the door is wide open.
So you are suggesting that nothing new be added to the game because it will cause a power creep? So someone tell the Devs to take a long over due break we don't need anything new put in game cause it will affect the power standards that are set!
No, new will continue to happen and with new the power standards will change. When we as players become more powerful we can get more powerful enemies. This promotes longevity.
Adding something that should have been a part of the game at launch will not kill the game in the least!
Please explain how it takes away from customization. As I see it you would have greater options with energy weapons and then options with launchers how does this take away from customizing a ship?
When there are roots to canon, it will never be "out the door" even if the door is wide open.
So you are suggesting that nothing new be added to the game because it will cause a power creep? So someone tell the Devs to take a long over due break we don't need anything new put in game cause it will affect the power standards that are set!
No, new will continue to happen and with new the power standards will change. When we as players become more powerful we can get more powerful enemies. This promotes longevity.
Adding something that should have been a part of the game at launch will not kill the game in the least!
To your first part: I explained how it takes away customizability, twice now. Sure, you get more slots to play with. However, you can only put certain weapon types in each. For example: with one previous poster's example, he wanted 4 energy slots, 2 torp slots, on a particular ship. So that means I have to have 4 & 2. NOT 5 & 1. NOT 6 & 0. So it limits my ability to customize. I'm not sure how much clearer I can make the difference between the ability to cutomize a slot, from just having more slots, than I have.
As far as nothing new, where did I say that? However, we've gotten new stuff already, without a balance pass at older content, and thus, it's easier than ever, already, to faceplant enemies really quickly. As in, little to no effort, especially if you buy in to the dps race. Heck, I've watched someone, just 2 nights ago, tear apart a cube, by himself, in about 25 seconds. IF, even that long. If you add more weapon slots to ships, using him as an example, he'd have probably had that cube toast in under 10 seconds. I come on, how much easier, and non-challenging, do you want this game to be?
To boot, I've only had ONE reply to this, that was okay with weaponry getting less damage, to account for the increased damage potential, that adding more weapon slots to all T4 & T5 ships would bring. (No one seems to have thought out how these slots would end up working for the lower tier ships, as of yet).
As far as more powerful enemies, we wouldn't really need any, IF the devs would swing a pass through the content, to make it more of a challenge, at all levels & modes of play, whether Fleet Actions, STF's, Rom missions, and story content. Especially the AI. (Just no more stupid invisi-Gozer torps that seem to be prevalent every now & again).
So yes, I am heavily against dedicated torp slots, and in particular, ADDED weapon slots, without reducing all weapons' damage output, for space.
Honestly, the only added slots I'd like to see, is a system for all 4 arcs (Fore/Aft/Starboard/Port) added, but with a corresponding reduction in most weapons' firing arcs, as you could add weapons to cover the sides.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
If I am not mistaken, this boils down to "Give me more weapons for my ship."
However you slice it, that is what you are looking for.
Why do you need this change? What is preventing you from mounting a torpedo or two on your ship, right now? Most of my ships carry one or more torpedo launchers, why can't yours?
Are you lacking in damage output? Is that what this is about?
I also agree that we should not have a dedicated torp slot. i like having options and players should have to think about what they want. the game is pretty easy that it does not matter what you slot. if they added a dedicated torp slot, it would be taking a slot we have and changing it have rather than adding another one to make things even easier. then you get no choice.
as it stands you want a torp, by all means have one, or two, but they dont need to force us to have one, or give us more weapon slots.
To your first part: I explained how it takes away customizability, twice now. Sure, you get more slots to play with. However, you can only put certain weapon types in each. For example: with one previous poster's example, he wanted 4 energy slots, 2 torp slots, on a particular ship. So that means I have to have 4 & 2. NOT 5 & 1. NOT 6 & 0. So it limits my ability to customize. I'm not sure how much clearer I can make the difference between the ability to cutomize a slot, from just having more slots, than I have.
Right now you get 4 front, and that's it. Some ships have 5 but lets focus on the common 4.
You get 4. 4 to fit torps or energy. That's it. You can fit 3 phasers and 1 photon. 4 DHC's 4 photons, 1 phaser 1 tetryon, 1 quantum 1 tricobalt.
Lets say you put in two torp slots and the others are converted to energy.
Now you 4 energy. Can be 4 phasers, 4 tetryons, 4 plasma, 2 antiproton DHC's, 1 Plasma array and a borg cutting beam
PLUS you can now choose two torps. 2 photons, 2 quantums, 1 photon 1 transphasic. 1 quantum and 1 tricobalt.
It opens options and possibilities, not closes them.
To your first part: I explained how it takes away customizability, twice now. Sure, you get more slots to play with. However, you can only put certain weapon types in each. For example: with one previous poster's example, he wanted 4 energy slots, 2 torp slots, on a particular ship. So that means I have to have 4 & 2. NOT 5 & 1. NOT 6 & 0. So it limits my ability to customize. I'm not sure how much clearer I can make the difference between the ability to cutomize a slot, from just having more slots, than I have.
As far as nothing new, where did I say that? However, we've gotten new stuff already, without a balance pass at older content, and thus, it's easier than ever, already, to faceplant enemies really quickly. As in, little to no effort, especially if you buy in to the dps race. Heck, I've watched someone, just 2 nights ago, tear apart a cube, by himself, in about 25 seconds. IF, even that long. If you add more weapon slots to ships, using him as an example, he'd have probably had that cube toast in under 10 seconds. I come on, how much easier, and non-challenging, do you want this game to be?
To boot, I've only had ONE reply to this, that was okay with weaponry getting less damage, to account for the increased damage potential, that adding more weapon slots to all T4 & T5 ships would bring. (No one seems to have thought out how these slots would end up working for the lower tier ships, as of yet).
As far as more powerful enemies, we wouldn't really need any, IF the devs would swing a pass through the content, to make it more of a challenge, at all levels & modes of play, whether Fleet Actions, STF's, Rom missions, and story content. Especially the AI. (Just no more stupid invisi-Gozer torps that seem to be prevalent every now & again).
So yes, I am heavily against dedicated torp slots, and in particular, ADDED weapon slots, without reducing all weapons' damage output, for space.
Honestly, the only added slots I'd like to see, is a system for all 4 arcs (Fore/Aft/Starboard/Port) added, but with a corresponding reduction in most weapons' firing arcs, as you could add weapons to cover the sides.
Customization is an illusion when the choices are between a clearly optimal build and a suboptimal one that wastes a lot of skillpoints in a weapon type that isn't even desirable, let alone necessary, in current game mechanics.
It's a false choice. In this case, the person with the all-energy build already has the "customization" of being optimal, and projectile weapons bear the burden of being "customized" into expensive and wasteful suboptimal status.
I think a good deal of this boils down to reluctance to allow the game to change and improve for fear of losing some edge due to over-commitment in current game mechanics, presumably in PVP.
The game didn't crash and burn when warp cores were introduced, nor did it suddenly implode when reverse shield polarity got a nerf long ago, nor did it fail noticably when Romulan singularity mechanics were introduced, offering multiple new abilities to all warbirds that obviously didn't exist before Legacy of Romulus.
Resisting change simply because it's change is hardly helpful.
Right now you get 4 front, and that's it. Some ships have 5 but lets focus on the common 4.
You get 4. 4 to fit torps or energy. That's it. You can fit 3 phasers and 1 photon. 4 DHC's 4 photons, 1 phaser 1 tetryon, 1 quantum 1 tricobalt.
Lets say you put in two torp slots and the others are converted to energy.
Now you 4 energy. Can be 4 phasers, 4 tetryons, 4 plasma, 2 antiproton DHC's, 1 Plasma array and a borg cutting beam
PLUS you can now choose two torps. 2 photons, 2 quantums, 1 photon 1 transphasic. 1 quantum and 1 tricobalt.
It opens options and possibilities, not closes them.
No, it closes them. Again, I'll stick to you 4 & 2 example for 6 slots total. What if I happen to NOT want a torpedo ship? Under your system, that would mean that sure, I get my 4 energy weapons, but that's it. Whereas you'd get 6. So it CLOSES possibilities. And removes a certain amount of the possibilities that would otherwise be open to me.
Whereas, under the present system, using 4 slots as the norm. I again, don't want torps. I can slot 4 energy weapons. You, however, DO want torps. So you slot 2 energy, and 2 torps. We both run 4. The option to both do what you want (run torps), and what I want (don't run torps), doesn't leave either one of us disadvantaged, based on the number of weapons.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Projectile weapons cost skill points to invest in, and at present, there is not much reason to do so when energy does the job.
The same can not be said of projectile weapons on their own, which without something to open up shields, are not very effective.
The very basic mechanics of this game, as described by Jack Emmert in the pre-beta releases about Star Trek Online, involved "beams take out shields, then torpedoes destroy the exposed hull". Said about that plainly and that directly. It was a nice exchange, a nice chemistry between the two weapon types, and felt very Trek appropiate.
I get it that a lot of folks see the numbers, the optimization, and clearly want things to stay exactly the way they are, perhaps out of reluctance to re-optimize for any new system. Otherwise I don't understand the vendetta toward torpedo weapons and the desire to keep them obsolete (As some of you may have noticed, none of BranFlakes' team in the livestream used a single torpedo).
No, it closes them. Again, I'll stick to you 4 & 2 example for 6 slots total. What if I happen to NOT want a torpedo ship? Under your system, that would mean that sure, I get my 4 energy weapons, but that's it. Whereas you'd get 6. So it CLOSES possibilities. And removes a certain amount of the possibilities that would otherwise be open to me.
Whereas, under the present system, using 4 slots as the norm. I again, don't want torps. I can slot 4 energy weapons. You, however, DO want torps. So you slot 2 energy, and 2 torps. We both run 4. The option to both do what you want (run torps), and what I want (don't run torps), doesn't leave either one of us disadvantaged, based on the number of weapons.
This does not make sense outside of self interest. Simply saying, over and over and over again, as you have in this thread "you don't have to do it my way" totally ignores not only the MMO inevitability of nerfing when something gets overdone to the point of being the only competitively viable way of doing it, but it also ignores the fact that Star Trek's never in its space battles had a energy-dominant balance. Torpedoes were the heavy hitters, often the decisive blows that ended battles. Not so much in this game.
I'll say it again for clarity. "If you don't like X, don't do X" is a poor argument when "X" is detrimental to the game. The same argument was used constantly in gaming history, even in STO. A lot of us can remember when Reverse Shield Polarity was necessary for any build in PVP, and was one of the earliest major nerfs that came around. But before that nerf, the outcry was "if you don't like reverse shield polarity, don't use it", which TOTALLY ignores the issue and tells all people involved the false choice they have.
Being free to be a detriment to the team by even attempting to approach the make and feel of a Star Trek ship because of some misplaced and self-defined definition of "customization" hardly feels like "customization" at all.
Projectile weapons cost skill points to invest in, and at present, there is not much reason to do so when energy does the job.
The same can not be said of projectile weapons on their own, which without something to open up shields, are not very effective.
The very basic mechanics of this game, as described by Jack Emmert in the pre-beta releases about Star Trek Online, involved "beams take out shields, then torpedoes destroy the exposed hull". Said about that plainly and that directly. It was a nice exchange, a nice chemistry between the two weapon types, and felt very Trek appropiate.
I get it that a lot of folks see the numbers, the optimization, and clearly want things to stay exactly the way they are, perhaps out of reluctance to re-optimize for any new system. Otherwise I don't understand the vendetta toward torpedo weapons and the desire to keep them obsolete (As some of you may have noticed, none of BranFlakes' team in the livestream used a single torpedo).
I believe you're operating under a huge misconception. (actually 2)
A> Ok, while you have plenty of min/maxers out there, I really haven't seen anyone posting in here, that would qualify. And as far as "needing more to make torps "important" again", or needing some excessive amount of xp to level up, they don't. All adding more slots would do, is make the min/maxers chuckle in glee as they get MORE dps to play with. Simple as that.
B> To add further to mis-conception of torps being obsolete. If that's so, how come I rarely see a ship operating without them? If they're so bad off, how come tons of people, including some of the min/maxers, use them so often? Personally, a more appropriate way, to bring torps a little more in the limelight, and a little more useful, as I stated in a previous post, would be to get rid of the ridiculous shared cooldown. Makes no sense, that just because you rocked off a torp, you're other launcher has a few seconds before it can fire. They don't share ammo feed, they don't share the power tap. Nothing is in common between the two launchers, thus, there should be no cooldown. On top of that, by the reasoning of shared cooldown for torps, then when you fire off an energy weapon, all others should share a cooldown as well. And I doubt THAT would go over well, with anyone!
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
No, it closes them. Again, I'll stick to you 4 & 2 example for 6 slots total. What if I happen to NOT want a torpedo ship? Under your system, that would mean that sure, I get my 4 energy weapons, but that's it. Whereas you'd get 6. So it CLOSES possibilities. And removes a certain amount of the possibilities that would otherwise be open to me.
Whereas, under the present system, using 4 slots as the norm. I again, don't want torps. I can slot 4 energy weapons. You, however, DO want torps. So you slot 2 energy, and 2 torps. We both run 4. The option to both do what you want (run torps), and what I want (don't run torps), doesn't leave either one of us disadvantaged, based on the number of weapons.
There are too many energy boats as it is right now and I see you work with one at the moment. Would this change if say, torpedos didn't share a cooldown and an all torpedo setup had the most potential damage?
I'm looking for added fun and asthetics. If however you're seeking an all energy setup out of asthetics I can see where you are coming from. Forcing torpedos removes an asthetic flavor.
If however you're coming from the perspective of "all energy setups do best right now" and you'd change as soon as the game does then defending all energy does you no good.
I'll say it again for clarity. "If you don't like X, don't do X" is a poor argument when "X" is detrimental to the game. The same argument was used constantly in gaming history, even in STO. A lot of us can remember when Reverse Shield Polarity was necessary for any build in PVP, and was one of the earliest major nerfs that came around. But before that nerf, the outcry was "if you don't like reverse shield polarity, don't use it", which TOTALLY ignores the issue and tells all people involved the false choice they have.
Being free to be a detriment to the team by even attempting to approach the make and feel of a Star Trek ship because of some misplaced and self-defined definition of "customization" hardly feels like "customization" at all.
Ok, point out EXACTLY where I said, "Don't like X, don't do X". Hasn't been said by me.And there IS no "false level" of customizability currently, as far as torps go. Under what you want, then I and many others, would be constrained in what we can use.
But again, you're going to miss my point, and bulldoze over it with yours. I haven't gotten you to see any form of logic, as of yet, and I'm fully realizing you never will. As you are saying, "I want what I want, I don't give a damn about anyone else's opinion, unless you agree with ME!!!'
At least Sigurdsson is discussing this in a reasonable fashion, even if I'm not agreeing with him in the slightest.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
I believe you're operating under a huge misconception. (actually 2)
A> Ok, while you have plenty of min/maxers out there, I really haven't seen anyone posting in here, that would qualify. And as far as "needing more to make torps "important" again", or needing some excessive amount of xp to level up, they don't. All adding more slots would do, is make the min/maxers chuckle in glee as they get MORE dps to play with. Simple as that.
B> To add further to mis-conception of torps being obsolete. If that's so, how come I rarely see a ship operating without them? If they're so bad off, how come tons of people, including some of the min/maxers, use them so often? Personally, a more appropriate way, to bring torps a little more in the limelight, and a little more useful, as I stated in a previous post, would be to get rid of the ridiculous shared cooldown. Makes no sense, that just because you rocked off a torp, you're other launcher has a few seconds before it can fire. They don't share ammo feed, they don't share the power tap. Nothing is in common between the two launchers, thus, there should be no cooldown. On top of that, by the reasoning of shared cooldown for torps, then when you fire off an energy weapon, all others should share a cooldown as well. And I doubt THAT would go over well, with anyone!
Anecdotal evidence has a use but it is a very limited use. Optimization threads and even entire websites abound, as does the more concrete evidence provided by Cryptic and PWE itself: no one in BranFlakes' STF team felt the need for a single torpedo, and even admitted such in a roundabout fashion when stating "if any of us had a torpedo, we would use them when the shields were down" during the feed.
Torpedoes having a shared cooldown with each other, with a minimum second ticker, is a relic of a much older model of the game that assumed overuse and abuse of torpedoes, which is not the case now. Chances are that if a greater overhaul of torpedoes wasn't going to happen, that cooldown might eventually be lifted, considering the part that you're ignoring over and over again: Projectile weapons take up more than a weapon slot. They require several different categories of skill boxes and drain quite a few skillpoints, which energy boats never have to be concerned about.
This may be of particularly personal investment here considering how often you're posting here. If it's not for the sake of contrariness, at least explain why it would be so horrible in a Star Trek game for torpedoes to be an obligatory part of most ships' construction.
There are too many energy boats as it is right now and I see you work with one at the moment. Would this change if say, torpedos didn't share a cooldown and an all torpedo setup had the most potential damage?
I'm looking for added fun and asthetics. If however you're seeking an all energy setup out of asthetics I can see where you are coming from. Forcing torpedos removes an asthetic flavor.
If however you're coming from the perspective of "all energy setups do best right now" and you'd change as soon as the game does then defending all energy does you no good.
Ok, actually, most of my ships have 1 fore, and typically one aft torp, so I'm not a full "energy boat", I especially enjoy my Omega launcher on my FedEng, and my Bio-neural on my FedTac. I don't give a fig about "what's best". I work for, "what seems to work for me", along with "how fun is it to run this ship, with this setup."
I'm willing to bet, a ton of people, especially PvPers, if they looked at my ships, and especially my FedEng skill allocation, would be drop dead horrified at how they're set up. Because I'm not some kind of min/maxer, or worse, munchkin.
As to the question, of would I run torps MORE if they didn't share a cooldown, bet your bottom dollar I would. Probably for my Excelsior, I'd open my 2nd Bio-Neural box I have sitting around, and use both it, and the Omega launcher on my Fleet Excelsior, along with the 2 remaining fore Dual Phaser Banks. (Have 4 Phaser turrets in the rear, which is another peeve of mine, I feel they should have BEAM turrets, not just cannon turrets)
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Ok, actually, most of my ships have 1 fore, and typically one aft torp, so I'm not a full "energy boat", I especially enjoy my Omega launcher on my FedEng, and my Bio-neural on my FedTac. I don't give a fig about "what's best". I work for, "what seems to work for me", along with "how fun is it to run this ship, with this setup."
I'm willing to bet, a ton of people, especially PvPers, if they looked at my ships, and especially my FedEng skill allocation, would be drop dead horrified at how they're set up. Because I'm not some kind of min/maxer, or worse, munchkin.
As to the question, of would I run torps MORE if they didn't share a cooldown, bet your bottom dollar I would. Probably for my Excelsior, I'd open my 2nd Bio-Neural box I have sitting around, and use both it, and the Omega launcher on my Fleet Excelsior, along with the 2 remaining fore Dual Phaser Banks. (Have 4 Phaser turrets in the rear, which is another peeve of mine, I feel they should have BEAM turrets, not just cannon turrets)
Beam turrets is an interesting thing.
But then again you can put those new weapons you were thinking about into a new slot couldn't you? Still have all that energy power front on your Excelsior? In fact, if they were to make particular slots for torpedos, no more than two front, I'd think they'd remove the shared cooldown since no one can put 4 torpedos going off in a row.
Ok, actually, most of my ships have 1 fore, and typically one aft torp, so I'm not a full "energy boat", I especially enjoy my Omega launcher on my FedEng, and my Bio-neural on my FedTac. I don't give a fig about "what's best". I work for, "what seems to work for me", along with "how fun is it to run this ship, with this setup."
I'm willing to bet, a ton of people, especially PvPers, if they looked at my ships, and especially my FedEng skill allocation, would be drop dead horrified at how they're set up. Because I'm not some kind of min/maxer, or worse, munchkin.
As to the question, of would I run torps MORE if they didn't share a cooldown, bet your bottom dollar I would. Probably for my Excelsior, I'd open my 2nd Bio-Neural box I have sitting around, and use both it, and the Omega launcher on my Fleet Excelsior, along with the 2 remaining fore Dual Phaser Banks. (Have 4 Phaser turrets in the rear, which is another peeve of mine, I feel they should have BEAM turrets, not just cannon turrets)
If you truly have no personal investment in this defense of energy boating by way of refusing even the idea of a seperate launcher slot, I don't see the issue here.
The vague abstract of "choice" is an illusion the moment you get into an organized STF, or especially into an organized PVP group. That's great that you use torpedoes, unfortunately, the overall situation here is where the worst possible setups in a Star Trek game include a Star Trek blend and combination of weapons. Worse, it costs more points than investing in the optimal weapon choices!
Again, like the addition of warp cores were, adding additional distinction and functionality to ships would add, not subtract, from the overall experience. Perhaps a few of the vessels may be quite energy heavy by design, but that would also add a strategic foil of a torpedo-heavy cruiser that may be able to outperform it in other ways.
When the solution to lots of beam boats in a competitive environment is more beam boats if a hint more organized, there is a problem. If the problem is atmospheric, it can still be quite an issue for those here because of the setting.
An example in Star Wars Galaxies: There was a time in SWG (I played since day two of launch) where the optimal people were dressed like Master Chief, one and all, and used disease-laced stone daggers to kill one another with, while throwing canisters of poison back and forth while hopped up on battle drugs. The only "counter" I could think of was three Graul Maulers, each the size of a small house, running in to surround and punch those guys. Was not very Star Wars. Granted the game made dumb mistakes later, and in many different ways, but that part resonated with me for how surreal it was.
Anecdotal evidence has a use but it is a very limited use. Optimization threads and even entire websites abound, as does the more concrete evidence provided by Cryptic and PWE itself: no one in BranFlakes' STF team felt the need for a single torpedo, and even admitted such in a roundabout fashion when stating "if any of us had a torpedo, we would use them when the shields were down" during the feed.
Torpedoes having a shared cooldown with each other, with a minimum second ticker, is a relic of a much older model of the game that assumed overuse and abuse of torpedoes, which is not the case now. Chances are that if a greater overhaul of torpedoes wasn't going to happen, that cooldown might eventually be lifted, considering the part that you're ignoring over and over again: Projectile weapons take up more than a weapon slot. They require several different categories of skill boxes and drain quite a few skillpoints, which energy boats never have to be concerned about.
This may be of particularly personal investment here considering how often you're posting here. If it's not for the sake of contrariness, at least explain why it would be so horrible in a Star Trek game for torpedoes to be an obligatory part of most ships' construction.
Okay, I'm going to ask you (not that you EVER answer my questions, you tend to just say "I'm not going to answer them, it's a forced thing". However:
What skills do you need for torps to be effective? And how many points does it cost you?
Now granted, I don't know the precise answer myself. But I can tell you, that just about every one of my characters has max weapon skill, max energy weapon specialization AND max torp weapon specialization. And I can tell you, over all, from what I've seen in the skill trees, takes FAR more points to get energy effective, as you also have to have decent levels in the power generation types of skills. Not so with the torps. But again, I want you to tell me (and show me, pretend I'm from Missouri), where this supposed huge imbalance in skilling for torps, vs skilling for energy, is.
On your last part, as far as "being baggage to your team". You know what? The way I feel towards others, if they're at least trying, even if they have a "sub-par" setup, they're performing. It's the one's that AFK/Leech or actively troll/grief the mission or STF that I'm irate about. Because that guy with the "bad" setup. Guess what, he may be a newbie (I refuse to apply noob, just because someone's new). They may be trying an alernate setup. They might be trying to see just what they can do, with a sub-optimal setup. And hey, guess what...they maybe committing the cardinal sin of trying to have FUN.
So if a team looks at me as sub-optimal, just because I haven't built my ship, or skilled my character the way THEY want, guess what? They can have my middle finger, and the other one as my license to fly it.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Projectile weapons cost skill points to invest in, and at present, there is not much reason to do so when energy does the job.
The same can not be said of projectile weapons on their own, which without something to open up shields, are not very effective.
The very basic mechanics of this game, as described by Jack Emmert in the pre-beta releases about Star Trek Online, involved "beams take out shields, then torpedoes destroy the exposed hull". Said about that plainly and that directly. It was a nice exchange, a nice chemistry between the two weapon types, and felt very Trek appropiate.
I get it that a lot of folks see the numbers, the optimization, and clearly want things to stay exactly the way they are, perhaps out of reluctance to re-optimize for any new system. Otherwise I don't understand the vendetta toward torpedo weapons and the desire to keep them obsolete (As some of you may have noticed, none of BranFlakes' team in the livestream used a single torpedo).
This exactly. While you'd have beams and torpedoes both do damage to shields and hull, torpedoes should be used once shields are down to inflict major damage. That's how it is supposed to be.
The only reason torpedoes are used right now is because they have a gimmick that has nothing to do with the torpedo per se (for example the gravimetric torpedo that, on a spread, creates a number of grav wells or plasma dot or slow, or...) and because another energy weapon would just drain too much.
On a side note: I'd have loved to see each faction specializing on certain weapons right from the start. So, Starfleet would excel in beam arrays (in fact they are the only ones to use real ARRAYS), Romulans excel in cannons (reference: super heavy warbird fore cannons with a piercing effect) and Klingons would excel in elite torpedoes. This would make for a different playstyle instead of uniform gameplay.
EDIT: Although I don't like the idea of dedicated torpedo slots. If so, torpedoes should have limited ammunition and then we are touching Star Trek Simulator territory. And STO is not a simulator but a very casual action MMO.
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
Okay, I'm going to ask you (not that you EVER answer my questions, you tend to just say "I'm not going to answer them, it's a forced thing". However:
What skills do you need for torps to be effective? And how many points does it cost you?
Now granted, I don't know the precise answer myself. But I can tell you, that just about every one of my characters has max weapon skill, max energy weapon specialization AND max torp weapon specialization. And I can tell you, over all, from what I've seen in the skill trees, takes FAR more points to get energy effective, as you also have to have decent levels in the power generation types of skills. Not so with the torps. But again, I want you to tell me (and show me, pretend I'm from Missouri), where this supposed huge imbalance in skilling for torps, vs skilling for energy, is.
On your last part, as far as "being baggage to your team". You know what? The way I feel towards others, if they're at least trying, even if they have a "sub-par" setup, they're performing. It's the one's that AFK/Leech or actively troll/grief the mission or STF that I'm irate about. Because that guy with the "bad" setup. Guess what, he may be a newbie (I refuse to apply noob, just because someone's new). They may be trying an alernate setup. They might be trying to see just what they can do, with a sub-optimal setup. And hey, guess what...they maybe committing the cardinal sin of trying to have FUN.
So if a team looks at me as sub-optimal, just because I haven't built my ship, or skilled my character the way THEY want, guess what? They can have my middle finger, and the other one as my license to fly it.
Projectile weapons skill. Projectile weapons specialization. The latter is a max tier skill so is quite expensive, especially considering how effective non-weapon skills that cost a lot less at lower tiers can be.
Are you going to split hairs any further about that or are you satisfied?
The skills that are needed to boost energy are beneficial in their own right outside of the basic weapon training and specialization slot (which is still generally needed by torpedo users anyway!). The burden is still on the torpedo user, and the price paid is less power and capability elsewhere.
If launchers had their own slots, ignoring the torpedo/mine skills might still be a choice, but not quite an easy one. Right now, the current "balance" is "if I want to be optimal, I can totally ignore roughly half of the weapons categories of the game!"
If you truly have no personal investment in this defense of energy boating by way of refusing even the idea of a seperate launcher slot, I don't see the issue here.
The vague abstract of "choice" is an illusion the moment you get into an organized STF, or especially into an organized PVP group. That's great that you use torpedoes, unfortunately, the overall situation here is where the worst possible setups in a Star Trek game include a Star Trek blend and combination of weapons. Worse, it costs more points than investing in the optimal weapon choices!
Again, like the addition of warp cores were, adding additional distinction and functionality to ships would add, not subtract, from the overall experience. Perhaps a few of the vessels may be quite energy heavy by design, but that would also add a strategic foil of a torpedo-heavy cruiser that may be able to outperform it in other ways.
When the solution to lots of beam boats in a competitive environment is more beam boats if a hint more organized, there is a problem. If the problem is atmospheric, it can still be quite an issue for those here because of the setting.
An example in Star Wars Galaxies: There was a time in SWG (I played since day two of launch) where the optimal people were dressed like Master Chief, one and all, and used disease-laced stone daggers to kill one another with, while throwing canisters of poison back and forth while hopped up on battle drugs. The only "counter" I could think of was three Graul Maulers, each the size of a small house, running in to surround and punch those guys. Was not very Star Wars. Granted the game made dumb mistakes later, and in many different ways, but that part resonated with me for how surreal it was.
Ok, only point, in that, that I'll agree with you, is adding weapon slots, in the form of "dedicated" weapon slots, sure, technically adds functionality. Still takes away choice.
Let me use a simple analogy.
You have an ice cream bowl, and an ice cream cone. The cone can hold two scoops. The bowl can hold 4. But your parent (assuming in this example, that you're a kid, no insults, or slights intended at all here, just bear with me), says, ok in the bowl, you can have ANY flavour you want, but it can't have anything additional, like the one's with choco chips, or nuts, etc. But the cone, you can ONLY have the flavours that DO have "additives, such as nuts."
So, in effect, while you have "more variety", you're limited in what you can choose to put in your bowl, and on your cone.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Projectile weapons skill. Projectile weapons specialization. The latter is a max tier skill so is quite expensive, especially considering how effective non-weapon skills that cost a lot less at lower tiers can be.
Are you going to split hairs any further about that or are you satisfied?
The skills that are needed to boost energy are beneficial in their own right outside of the basic weapon training and specialization slot (which is still generally needed by torpedo users anyway!). The burden is still on the torpedo user, and the price paid is less power and capability elsewhere.
If launchers had their own slots, ignoring the torpedo/mine skills might still be a choice, but not quite an easy one. Right now, the current "balance" is "if I want to be optimal, I can totally ignore roughly half of the weapons categories of the game!"
Ok, so you're going to say, these two skills are all you need for roughly max projectile weaponry effectiveness, correct?
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
This exactly. While you'd have beams and torpedoes both do damage to shields and hull, torpedoes should be used once shields are down to inflict major damage. That's how it is supposed to be.
The only reason torpedoes are used right now is because they have a gimmick that has nothing to do with the torpedo per se (for example the gravimetric torpedo that, on a spread, creates a number of grav wells or plasma dot or slow, or...) and because another energy weapon would just drain too much.
On a side note: I'd have loved to see each faction specializing on certain weapons right from the start. So, Starfleet would excel in beam arrays (in fact they are the only ones to use real ARRAYS), Romulans excel in cannons (reference: super heavy warbird fore cannons with a piercing effect) and Klingons would excel in elite torpedoes. This would make for a different playstyle instead of uniform gameplay.
EDIT: Although I don't like the idea of dedicated torpedo slots. If so, torpedoes should have limited ammunition and then we are touching Star Trek Simulator territory. And STO is not a simulator but a very casual action MMO.
I actually really like the idea of faction-specific bonuses and focuses, though it may be a balancing can of worms. I think it'd be worth the trouble, but as is obviously clear, some seem to hate the idea of MMOs changing over time because they're too comfortable with things the way they are. In an MMO sense, change is inevitable, though resisting it nonstop can lead to problems of its own.
Ok, so you're going to say, these two skills are all you need for roughly max projectile weaponry effectiveness, correct?
If you're going down some deconstructionist path with this, don't even start.
Those "two skills that are all you need" are pretty expensive when it comes to where the could be put, compared to an energy-only user that is fully free to have the points from a Tier 5 skill and a Tier 2 skill, presumably at full, put into entire different categories.
You speak of "customization" but customization is obviously reduced when the projectile user actually tries to invest in projectiles. And for what?
I'm starting to get very skeptical about your torpedo use.
Ok, only point, in that, that I'll agree with you, is adding weapon slots, in the form of "dedicated" weapon slots, sure, technically adds functionality. Still takes away choice.
Let me use a simple analogy.
You have an ice cream bowl, and an ice cream cone. The cone can hold two scoops. The bowl can hold 4. But your parent (assuming in this example, that you're a kid, no insults, or slights intended at all here, just bear with me), says, ok in the bowl, you can have ANY flavour you want, but it can't have anything additional, like the one's with choco chips, or nuts, etc. But the cone, you can ONLY have the flavours that DO have "additives, such as nuts."
So, in effect, while you have "more variety", you're limited in what you can choose to put in your bowl, and on your cone.
The thing is mom is either offering one bowl of just the four mixed scoops or the bowl and the cone. And heck it may have nuts but mom is saying "Try it, you might like it."
It's forcing one to expand the flavors they try. Yeah it's a bit forced. And therefore force of trying something seems more the issue than customization. Customization expands, however it may expand into places you don't want to go, seems to be what you are implying more than customization being diminished.
EDIT: On the thought of it. One can look at customization being "i can put anything into the bowl." Be it stuff with nuts or without. So I can see that. However that would indicate the ship as our bowl, is two entites. One here having the four, and another part way off individual of the ship being the cone where only nuts and additives go. But it's all one bowl, with at most a divider to keep your nuts from spilling onto vanilla.
I actually really like the idea of faction-specific bonuses and focuses, though it may be a balancing can of worms. I think it'd be worth the trouble, but as is obviously clear, some seem to hate the idea of MMOs changing over time because they're too comfortable with things the way they are. In an MMO sense, change is inevitable, though resisting it nonstop can lead to problems of its own.
It would basically require a completely different game, I speculated about that some time ago.
If I were to design a system like that it would be based on faction, shipsize/energy surplus, tactical focus and a lot of other things.
For example: A B'Rel Raider would get four weapon hardpoints. Two wing cannons and a fore and aft launcher. Get rid of "tiers" and all that level balancing, that's a B'Rel. On the wings you could either install ONE twin-linked weapon ("dual cannon") or TWO single ones ("cannon"), or refit them to beam emitters if you like. The launchers sit fore and aft and could get torpedoes, mines or dedicated toys like probes and such. The Klingon bonus could maybe make for rapid reload launchers, high yield launchers (enabling high yield salvoes) etc. It couldn't slot HEAVY cannons because, well, they are far too big for a B'Rel. Heavy cannons of any kind would be limited to Battlecruisers that can slot them.
With that you'd have a B'rel. A Raider or fire support craft. If you pit that against say a Ambassador heavy cruiser you'd have a hard time and need help. That Ambassador could mount more weapons, heavier weapons (arrays which cover nearly the whole saucer are it's main weapon) but would be much slower instead and if swarmed by a pack of B'Rels would have a hard time and so on.
The watered down "balance at all costs" gameplay of STO greatly limits those experiments, however.
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
It would basically require a completely different game, I speculated about that some time ago.
If I were to design a system like that it would be based on faction, shipsize/energy surplus, tactical focus and a lot of other things.
For example: A B'Rel Raider would get four weapon hardpoints. Two wing cannons and a fore and aft launcher. Get rid of "tiers" and all that level balancing, that's a B'Rel. On the wings you could either install ONE twin-linked weapon ("dual cannon") or TWO single ones ("cannon"), or refit them to beam emitters if you like. The launchers sit fore and aft and could get torpedoes, mines or dedicated toys like probes and such. The Klingon bonus could maybe make for rapid reload launchers, high yield launchers (enabling high yield salvoes) etc. It couldn't slot HEAVY cannons because, well, they are far too big for a B'Rel. Heavy cannons of any kind would be limited to Battlecruisers that can slot them.
With that you'd have a B'rel. A Raider or fire support craft. If you pit that against say a Ambassador heavy cruiser you'd have a hard time and need help. That Ambassador could mount more weapons, heavier weapons (arrays which cover nearly the whole saucer are it's main weapon) but would be much slower instead and if swarmed by a pack of B'Rels would have a hard time and so on.
The watered down "balance at all costs" gameplay of STO greatly limits those experiments, however.
I like your ideas here so much that it somewhat embitters me how unlikely it would be for them to be implemented this late after the metaphorical ship has sailed.
If you're going down some deconstructionist path with this, don't even start.
Those "two skills that are all you need" are pretty expensive when it comes to where the could be put, compared to an energy-only user that is fully free to have the points from a Tier 5 skill and a Tier 2 skill, presumably at full, put into entire different categories.
You speak of "customization" but customization is obviously reduced when the projectile user actually tries to invest in projectiles. And for what?
I'm starting to get very skeptical about your torpedo use.
Still didn't answer the question. Are the the only skills that you need to roughly max projectile weaponry use in space, or are there more?
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
The thing is mom is either offering one bowl of just the four mixed scoops or the bowl and the cone. And heck it may have nuts but mom is saying "Try it, you might like it."
It's forcing one to expand the flavors they try. Yeah it's a bit forced. And therefore force of trying something seems more the issue than customization. Customization expands, however it may expand into places you don't want to go, seems to be what you are implying more than customization being diminished.
EDIT: On the thought of it. One can look at customization being "i can put anything into the bowl." Be it stuff with nuts or without. So I can see that. However that would indicate the ship as our bowl, is two entites. One here having the four, and another part way off individual of the ship being the cone where only nuts and additives go. But it's all one bowl, with at most a divider to keep your nuts from spilling onto vanilla.
Ok, well, we're halfway there. You're seeing my point of view, and why I don't like the idea of more, but "blocked off to full choice", slots. Which is all I asked for. And this is why I seem to be able to speak to you, because at least you're open to the idea of "Other people have differing viewpoints", and that, "They may be just as valid as my own". That's why I think you're worth discussing this whole thing, with. Because we can bounce off ideas off each other, even if, in the end, we end up, "Agreeing to disagree.":D
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Comments
To your sig:
I'll bite, how many does it take?
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
All energy weapons become exposes.
All projectiles become exploits.
Weight the chance for expose or the chance for exploit insta-kill based on weapon speed. Fast weapons have a lower chance. Slow weapons have a higher chance.
A combo would be more powerful than either by itself unless maybe you've got a solid DHC build because of the potential for torpedo insta-kills.
But DHCs would remain desirable because of the steady, non-diceroll dependent DPS.
Slow beam/slow torpedo might be godlike in PvE then but would be more balanced in PvP and could be given some counters for NPCs and PvP opponents to use against it like abilities that clear or even reverse an "expose" debuff back to the target and/or linking aggro to using expose/exploit and making some enemies capped at the amount of damage they can take from an expose/exploit combo attack.
Possibly also expose resistance on PvP and tanking dedicated gear.
Please explain how it takes away from customization. As I see it you would have greater options with energy weapons and then options with launchers how does this take away from customizing a ship?
When there are roots to canon, it will never be "out the door" even if the door is wide open.
So you are suggesting that nothing new be added to the game because it will cause a power creep? So someone tell the Devs to take a long over due break we don't need anything new put in game cause it will affect the power standards that are set!
No, new will continue to happen and with new the power standards will change. When we as players become more powerful we can get more powerful enemies. This promotes longevity.
Adding something that should have been a part of the game at launch will not kill the game in the least!
To your first part: I explained how it takes away customizability, twice now. Sure, you get more slots to play with. However, you can only put certain weapon types in each. For example: with one previous poster's example, he wanted 4 energy slots, 2 torp slots, on a particular ship. So that means I have to have 4 & 2. NOT 5 & 1. NOT 6 & 0. So it limits my ability to customize. I'm not sure how much clearer I can make the difference between the ability to cutomize a slot, from just having more slots, than I have.
As far as nothing new, where did I say that? However, we've gotten new stuff already, without a balance pass at older content, and thus, it's easier than ever, already, to faceplant enemies really quickly. As in, little to no effort, especially if you buy in to the dps race. Heck, I've watched someone, just 2 nights ago, tear apart a cube, by himself, in about 25 seconds. IF, even that long. If you add more weapon slots to ships, using him as an example, he'd have probably had that cube toast in under 10 seconds. I come on, how much easier, and non-challenging, do you want this game to be?
To boot, I've only had ONE reply to this, that was okay with weaponry getting less damage, to account for the increased damage potential, that adding more weapon slots to all T4 & T5 ships would bring. (No one seems to have thought out how these slots would end up working for the lower tier ships, as of yet).
As far as more powerful enemies, we wouldn't really need any, IF the devs would swing a pass through the content, to make it more of a challenge, at all levels & modes of play, whether Fleet Actions, STF's, Rom missions, and story content. Especially the AI. (Just no more stupid invisi-Gozer torps that seem to be prevalent every now & again).
So yes, I am heavily against dedicated torp slots, and in particular, ADDED weapon slots, without reducing all weapons' damage output, for space.
Honestly, the only added slots I'd like to see, is a system for all 4 arcs (Fore/Aft/Starboard/Port) added, but with a corresponding reduction in most weapons' firing arcs, as you could add weapons to cover the sides.
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
However you slice it, that is what you are looking for.
Why do you need this change? What is preventing you from mounting a torpedo or two on your ship, right now? Most of my ships carry one or more torpedo launchers, why can't yours?
Are you lacking in damage output? Is that what this is about?
(Yes, I read all the posts)
as it stands you want a torp, by all means have one, or two, but they dont need to force us to have one, or give us more weapon slots.
Right now you get 4 front, and that's it. Some ships have 5 but lets focus on the common 4.
You get 4. 4 to fit torps or energy. That's it. You can fit 3 phasers and 1 photon. 4 DHC's 4 photons, 1 phaser 1 tetryon, 1 quantum 1 tricobalt.
Lets say you put in two torp slots and the others are converted to energy.
Now you 4 energy. Can be 4 phasers, 4 tetryons, 4 plasma, 2 antiproton DHC's, 1 Plasma array and a borg cutting beam
PLUS you can now choose two torps. 2 photons, 2 quantums, 1 photon 1 transphasic. 1 quantum and 1 tricobalt.
It opens options and possibilities, not closes them.
Customization is an illusion when the choices are between a clearly optimal build and a suboptimal one that wastes a lot of skillpoints in a weapon type that isn't even desirable, let alone necessary, in current game mechanics.
It's a false choice. In this case, the person with the all-energy build already has the "customization" of being optimal, and projectile weapons bear the burden of being "customized" into expensive and wasteful suboptimal status.
I think a good deal of this boils down to reluctance to allow the game to change and improve for fear of losing some edge due to over-commitment in current game mechanics, presumably in PVP.
The game didn't crash and burn when warp cores were introduced, nor did it suddenly implode when reverse shield polarity got a nerf long ago, nor did it fail noticably when Romulan singularity mechanics were introduced, offering multiple new abilities to all warbirds that obviously didn't exist before Legacy of Romulus.
Resisting change simply because it's change is hardly helpful.
No, it closes them. Again, I'll stick to you 4 & 2 example for 6 slots total. What if I happen to NOT want a torpedo ship? Under your system, that would mean that sure, I get my 4 energy weapons, but that's it. Whereas you'd get 6. So it CLOSES possibilities. And removes a certain amount of the possibilities that would otherwise be open to me.
Whereas, under the present system, using 4 slots as the norm. I again, don't want torps. I can slot 4 energy weapons. You, however, DO want torps. So you slot 2 energy, and 2 torps. We both run 4. The option to both do what you want (run torps), and what I want (don't run torps), doesn't leave either one of us disadvantaged, based on the number of weapons.
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
The same can not be said of projectile weapons on their own, which without something to open up shields, are not very effective.
The very basic mechanics of this game, as described by Jack Emmert in the pre-beta releases about Star Trek Online, involved "beams take out shields, then torpedoes destroy the exposed hull". Said about that plainly and that directly. It was a nice exchange, a nice chemistry between the two weapon types, and felt very Trek appropiate.
I get it that a lot of folks see the numbers, the optimization, and clearly want things to stay exactly the way they are, perhaps out of reluctance to re-optimize for any new system. Otherwise I don't understand the vendetta toward torpedo weapons and the desire to keep them obsolete (As some of you may have noticed, none of BranFlakes' team in the livestream used a single torpedo).
This does not make sense outside of self interest. Simply saying, over and over and over again, as you have in this thread "you don't have to do it my way" totally ignores not only the MMO inevitability of nerfing when something gets overdone to the point of being the only competitively viable way of doing it, but it also ignores the fact that Star Trek's never in its space battles had a energy-dominant balance. Torpedoes were the heavy hitters, often the decisive blows that ended battles. Not so much in this game.
I'll say it again for clarity. "If you don't like X, don't do X" is a poor argument when "X" is detrimental to the game. The same argument was used constantly in gaming history, even in STO. A lot of us can remember when Reverse Shield Polarity was necessary for any build in PVP, and was one of the earliest major nerfs that came around. But before that nerf, the outcry was "if you don't like reverse shield polarity, don't use it", which TOTALLY ignores the issue and tells all people involved the false choice they have.
Being free to be a detriment to the team by even attempting to approach the make and feel of a Star Trek ship because of some misplaced and self-defined definition of "customization" hardly feels like "customization" at all.
I believe you're operating under a huge misconception. (actually 2)
A> Ok, while you have plenty of min/maxers out there, I really haven't seen anyone posting in here, that would qualify. And as far as "needing more to make torps "important" again", or needing some excessive amount of xp to level up, they don't. All adding more slots would do, is make the min/maxers chuckle in glee as they get MORE dps to play with. Simple as that.
B> To add further to mis-conception of torps being obsolete. If that's so, how come I rarely see a ship operating without them? If they're so bad off, how come tons of people, including some of the min/maxers, use them so often? Personally, a more appropriate way, to bring torps a little more in the limelight, and a little more useful, as I stated in a previous post, would be to get rid of the ridiculous shared cooldown. Makes no sense, that just because you rocked off a torp, you're other launcher has a few seconds before it can fire. They don't share ammo feed, they don't share the power tap. Nothing is in common between the two launchers, thus, there should be no cooldown. On top of that, by the reasoning of shared cooldown for torps, then when you fire off an energy weapon, all others should share a cooldown as well. And I doubt THAT would go over well, with anyone!
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
There are too many energy boats as it is right now and I see you work with one at the moment. Would this change if say, torpedos didn't share a cooldown and an all torpedo setup had the most potential damage?
I'm looking for added fun and asthetics. If however you're seeking an all energy setup out of asthetics I can see where you are coming from. Forcing torpedos removes an asthetic flavor.
If however you're coming from the perspective of "all energy setups do best right now" and you'd change as soon as the game does then defending all energy does you no good.
*edit* Haha! My 47th post!
Ok, point out EXACTLY where I said, "Don't like X, don't do X". Hasn't been said by me.And there IS no "false level" of customizability currently, as far as torps go. Under what you want, then I and many others, would be constrained in what we can use.
But again, you're going to miss my point, and bulldoze over it with yours. I haven't gotten you to see any form of logic, as of yet, and I'm fully realizing you never will. As you are saying, "I want what I want, I don't give a damn about anyone else's opinion, unless you agree with ME!!!'
At least Sigurdsson is discussing this in a reasonable fashion, even if I'm not agreeing with him in the slightest.
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Anecdotal evidence has a use but it is a very limited use. Optimization threads and even entire websites abound, as does the more concrete evidence provided by Cryptic and PWE itself: no one in BranFlakes' STF team felt the need for a single torpedo, and even admitted such in a roundabout fashion when stating "if any of us had a torpedo, we would use them when the shields were down" during the feed.
Torpedoes having a shared cooldown with each other, with a minimum second ticker, is a relic of a much older model of the game that assumed overuse and abuse of torpedoes, which is not the case now. Chances are that if a greater overhaul of torpedoes wasn't going to happen, that cooldown might eventually be lifted, considering the part that you're ignoring over and over again: Projectile weapons take up more than a weapon slot. They require several different categories of skill boxes and drain quite a few skillpoints, which energy boats never have to be concerned about.
This may be of particularly personal investment here considering how often you're posting here. If it's not for the sake of contrariness, at least explain why it would be so horrible in a Star Trek game for torpedoes to be an obligatory part of most ships' construction.
Ok, actually, most of my ships have 1 fore, and typically one aft torp, so I'm not a full "energy boat", I especially enjoy my Omega launcher on my FedEng, and my Bio-neural on my FedTac. I don't give a fig about "what's best". I work for, "what seems to work for me", along with "how fun is it to run this ship, with this setup."
I'm willing to bet, a ton of people, especially PvPers, if they looked at my ships, and especially my FedEng skill allocation, would be drop dead horrified at how they're set up. Because I'm not some kind of min/maxer, or worse, munchkin.
As to the question, of would I run torps MORE if they didn't share a cooldown, bet your bottom dollar I would. Probably for my Excelsior, I'd open my 2nd Bio-Neural box I have sitting around, and use both it, and the Omega launcher on my Fleet Excelsior, along with the 2 remaining fore Dual Phaser Banks. (Have 4 Phaser turrets in the rear, which is another peeve of mine, I feel they should have BEAM turrets, not just cannon turrets)
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Beam turrets is an interesting thing.
But then again you can put those new weapons you were thinking about into a new slot couldn't you? Still have all that energy power front on your Excelsior? In fact, if they were to make particular slots for torpedos, no more than two front, I'd think they'd remove the shared cooldown since no one can put 4 torpedos going off in a row.
If you truly have no personal investment in this defense of energy boating by way of refusing even the idea of a seperate launcher slot, I don't see the issue here.
The vague abstract of "choice" is an illusion the moment you get into an organized STF, or especially into an organized PVP group. That's great that you use torpedoes, unfortunately, the overall situation here is where the worst possible setups in a Star Trek game include a Star Trek blend and combination of weapons. Worse, it costs more points than investing in the optimal weapon choices!
Again, like the addition of warp cores were, adding additional distinction and functionality to ships would add, not subtract, from the overall experience. Perhaps a few of the vessels may be quite energy heavy by design, but that would also add a strategic foil of a torpedo-heavy cruiser that may be able to outperform it in other ways.
When the solution to lots of beam boats in a competitive environment is more beam boats if a hint more organized, there is a problem. If the problem is atmospheric, it can still be quite an issue for those here because of the setting.
An example in Star Wars Galaxies: There was a time in SWG (I played since day two of launch) where the optimal people were dressed like Master Chief, one and all, and used disease-laced stone daggers to kill one another with, while throwing canisters of poison back and forth while hopped up on battle drugs. The only "counter" I could think of was three Graul Maulers, each the size of a small house, running in to surround and punch those guys. Was not very Star Wars. Granted the game made dumb mistakes later, and in many different ways, but that part resonated with me for how surreal it was.
Okay, I'm going to ask you (not that you EVER answer my questions, you tend to just say "I'm not going to answer them, it's a forced thing". However:
What skills do you need for torps to be effective? And how many points does it cost you?
Now granted, I don't know the precise answer myself. But I can tell you, that just about every one of my characters has max weapon skill, max energy weapon specialization AND max torp weapon specialization. And I can tell you, over all, from what I've seen in the skill trees, takes FAR more points to get energy effective, as you also have to have decent levels in the power generation types of skills. Not so with the torps. But again, I want you to tell me (and show me, pretend I'm from Missouri), where this supposed huge imbalance in skilling for torps, vs skilling for energy, is.
On your last part, as far as "being baggage to your team". You know what? The way I feel towards others, if they're at least trying, even if they have a "sub-par" setup, they're performing. It's the one's that AFK/Leech or actively troll/grief the mission or STF that I'm irate about. Because that guy with the "bad" setup. Guess what, he may be a newbie (I refuse to apply noob, just because someone's new). They may be trying an alernate setup. They might be trying to see just what they can do, with a sub-optimal setup. And hey, guess what...they maybe committing the cardinal sin of trying to have FUN.
So if a team looks at me as sub-optimal, just because I haven't built my ship, or skilled my character the way THEY want, guess what? They can have my middle finger, and the other one as my license to fly it.
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
This exactly. While you'd have beams and torpedoes both do damage to shields and hull, torpedoes should be used once shields are down to inflict major damage. That's how it is supposed to be.
The only reason torpedoes are used right now is because they have a gimmick that has nothing to do with the torpedo per se (for example the gravimetric torpedo that, on a spread, creates a number of grav wells or plasma dot or slow, or...) and because another energy weapon would just drain too much.
On a side note: I'd have loved to see each faction specializing on certain weapons right from the start. So, Starfleet would excel in beam arrays (in fact they are the only ones to use real ARRAYS), Romulans excel in cannons (reference: super heavy warbird fore cannons with a piercing effect) and Klingons would excel in elite torpedoes. This would make for a different playstyle instead of uniform gameplay.
EDIT: Although I don't like the idea of dedicated torpedo slots. If so, torpedoes should have limited ammunition and then we are touching Star Trek Simulator territory. And STO is not a simulator but a very casual action MMO.
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Projectile weapons skill. Projectile weapons specialization. The latter is a max tier skill so is quite expensive, especially considering how effective non-weapon skills that cost a lot less at lower tiers can be.
Are you going to split hairs any further about that or are you satisfied?
The skills that are needed to boost energy are beneficial in their own right outside of the basic weapon training and specialization slot (which is still generally needed by torpedo users anyway!). The burden is still on the torpedo user, and the price paid is less power and capability elsewhere.
If launchers had their own slots, ignoring the torpedo/mine skills might still be a choice, but not quite an easy one. Right now, the current "balance" is "if I want to be optimal, I can totally ignore roughly half of the weapons categories of the game!"
Ok, only point, in that, that I'll agree with you, is adding weapon slots, in the form of "dedicated" weapon slots, sure, technically adds functionality. Still takes away choice.
Let me use a simple analogy.
You have an ice cream bowl, and an ice cream cone. The cone can hold two scoops. The bowl can hold 4. But your parent (assuming in this example, that you're a kid, no insults, or slights intended at all here, just bear with me), says, ok in the bowl, you can have ANY flavour you want, but it can't have anything additional, like the one's with choco chips, or nuts, etc. But the cone, you can ONLY have the flavours that DO have "additives, such as nuts."
So, in effect, while you have "more variety", you're limited in what you can choose to put in your bowl, and on your cone.
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Ok, so you're going to say, these two skills are all you need for roughly max projectile weaponry effectiveness, correct?
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
I actually really like the idea of faction-specific bonuses and focuses, though it may be a balancing can of worms. I think it'd be worth the trouble, but as is obviously clear, some seem to hate the idea of MMOs changing over time because they're too comfortable with things the way they are. In an MMO sense, change is inevitable, though resisting it nonstop can lead to problems of its own.
If you're going down some deconstructionist path with this, don't even start.
Those "two skills that are all you need" are pretty expensive when it comes to where the could be put, compared to an energy-only user that is fully free to have the points from a Tier 5 skill and a Tier 2 skill, presumably at full, put into entire different categories.
You speak of "customization" but customization is obviously reduced when the projectile user actually tries to invest in projectiles. And for what?
I'm starting to get very skeptical about your torpedo use.
The thing is mom is either offering one bowl of just the four mixed scoops or the bowl and the cone. And heck it may have nuts but mom is saying "Try it, you might like it."
It's forcing one to expand the flavors they try. Yeah it's a bit forced. And therefore force of trying something seems more the issue than customization. Customization expands, however it may expand into places you don't want to go, seems to be what you are implying more than customization being diminished.
EDIT: On the thought of it. One can look at customization being "i can put anything into the bowl." Be it stuff with nuts or without. So I can see that. However that would indicate the ship as our bowl, is two entites. One here having the four, and another part way off individual of the ship being the cone where only nuts and additives go. But it's all one bowl, with at most a divider to keep your nuts from spilling onto vanilla.
It would basically require a completely different game, I speculated about that some time ago.
If I were to design a system like that it would be based on faction, shipsize/energy surplus, tactical focus and a lot of other things.
For example: A B'Rel Raider would get four weapon hardpoints. Two wing cannons and a fore and aft launcher. Get rid of "tiers" and all that level balancing, that's a B'Rel. On the wings you could either install ONE twin-linked weapon ("dual cannon") or TWO single ones ("cannon"), or refit them to beam emitters if you like. The launchers sit fore and aft and could get torpedoes, mines or dedicated toys like probes and such. The Klingon bonus could maybe make for rapid reload launchers, high yield launchers (enabling high yield salvoes) etc. It couldn't slot HEAVY cannons because, well, they are far too big for a B'Rel. Heavy cannons of any kind would be limited to Battlecruisers that can slot them.
With that you'd have a B'rel. A Raider or fire support craft. If you pit that against say a Ambassador heavy cruiser you'd have a hard time and need help. That Ambassador could mount more weapons, heavier weapons (arrays which cover nearly the whole saucer are it's main weapon) but would be much slower instead and if swarmed by a pack of B'Rels would have a hard time and so on.
The watered down "balance at all costs" gameplay of STO greatly limits those experiments, however.
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I like your ideas here so much that it somewhat embitters me how unlikely it would be for them to be implemented this late after the metaphorical ship has sailed.
Still didn't answer the question. Are the the only skills that you need to roughly max projectile weaponry use in space, or are there more?
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"
Ok, well, we're halfway there. You're seeing my point of view, and why I don't like the idea of more, but "blocked off to full choice", slots. Which is all I asked for. And this is why I seem to be able to speak to you, because at least you're open to the idea of "Other people have differing viewpoints", and that, "They may be just as valid as my own". That's why I think you're worth discussing this whole thing, with. Because we can bounce off ideas off each other, even if, in the end, we end up, "Agreeing to disagree.":D
butcher suspect, "What'd you hit me with?"
Temperance Brennan, "A building"