Escort online is dead, long live a2b online

marcel314 · February 2014

....
after science online, escort online and a2b online, can we have shuttle online? My runabout should be able to kill scimitars by dropping a photon torpedo into it's thermal exhaust port.
....

Im bored , too much grinding lol

ijimithy · February 2014

lol yea A2B with DEM has made a come back unfortunately and it's even hit the PvP matches again. I went up against several Schimi groups last night with cruisers firing off A2B wiping out my hull in seconds even with heals and separating the FAWBall.

Take a break from the grind and youtube funny vids that always keeps me entertained xD

czertik123 · February 2014

a2b with dem ?

ijimithy · February 2014

Aux to Bat with Directed Energy Modulation ya know the ability that allows you to penetrate your enemies shields and go straight to Hull lol Combined with a Marion Doff that is lethal since you can get the Cool downs down to global.

ufpterrell · February 2014

The balance is dead, long live the balance :P.

Tbh, A2B with DEM + Marion is so OP it deserves to be nerfed. That's coming from someone who's main is also an Engineer. It shows how fail aspects of builds are when there is only one cookie cutter build to pwn everything. No variation, no interesting mixtures to throw you off.

thyrnecris · February 2014

To be honest, that's the very sign of Powercreep, and the fact why PvP in a Gear dependent game (that adds the 'Character Build' thing, too) is a Joke. Put 2 with the same 'Skill' level into a Match, and when skill is equal, the one with better gear WILL win. I'd actually claim that without the Doff System, most of the 'broken' builds these days wouldn't even exist.

johngazman · February 2014

Escorts aren't the most overpowered part of this game anymore?

Huh.

I'm trying to care. But I don't.

lianthelia · February 2014

thyrnecris wrote: »

To be honest, that's the very sign of Powercreep, and the fact why PvP in a Gear dependent game (that adds the 'Character Build' thing, too) is a Joke. Put 2 with the same 'Skill' level into a Match, and when skill is equal, the one with better gear WILL win. I'd actually claim that without the Doff System, most of the 'broken' builds these days wouldn't even exist.

Umm...that kinda makes sense...if they have equal skill the one with better equipment should win.

snoggymack22 · February 2014

ufpterrell wrote: »

The balance is dead, long live the balance :P.

Tbh, A2B with DEM + Marion is so OP it deserves to be nerfed. That's coming from someone who's main is also an Engineer. It shows how fail aspects of builds are when there is only one cookie cutter build to pwn everything. No variation, no interesting mixtures to throw you off.

Unfortunately this game's never really had much variation. Hell A2B isn't that far off from the beam boats that used to fly around in PvP circa 2010. They're using new aspects of the game (the changes in certain BOFF powers and the affects of certain DOFFs) to really just bring the game back to a previous playstyle.

So I'm not sure your complaint really fits this game.

futurepastnow · February 2014

'Escorts Online' (it was never that, but you can pretend if you wish) died over a year ago. If you think A2B + DEM is the new flavor, your knowledge of game trends is already obsolete.

warmaker001b · February 2014

johngazman wrote: »

Escorts aren't the most overpowered part of this game anymore?

Huh.

I'm trying to care. But I don't.

Yep, same thing for me.

ladyinferno2010 · February 2014

Not everyone plays to min/max, anyway.

killdozer9211 · February 2014

This thread's about six months late...

vetteguy904 · February 2014

so let me get this right...

WAAAAAA my escort isn't all powerful anymore WAAAAAAAAA

doe that sum it up?

rylanadionysis · February 2014

Hm. My escorts are just as lethal today as they were when escorts were fotm

Cruisers got more dangerous but they still pop like they always did before.

Spec a little more defensive, add another hull heal and watch a loldem cruiser fail over and over to kill you.

inb4 "well i know this one cruiser guy who eats escorts alive blah blah blah" yeh okay good for him, he is the exception to the rule.

A solid escort pilot will either stalemate or kill even a competent tac cruiser most of the time.

marcel314 · February 2014

killdozer9211 wrote: »

This thread's about six months late...

My thread is more than 6 months too late

but people still think that every non escort is up or useless.

And rylanadionysis my scimitar (pve build without epte or any acc mods, no a2b , cannons and a single torpedo ( i try to keep a canon loadout ) ) don't care for a2b spam in pvp and is still able to kill stuff,even a2b scimitars,avengers or whatever the next a2b capable ship is. They only thing which is able to destroy me is science magic/hax.

thunderfoot · February 2014

marcel314 wrote: »

My thread is more than 6 months too late but people still think that every non escort is up or useless.

And rylanadionysis my scimitar (pve build without epte or any acc mods, no a2b , cannons and a single torpedo ( i try to keep a canon loadout ) ) don't care for a2b spam in pvp and is still able to kill stuff,even a2b scimitars,avengers or whatever the next a2b capable ship is. They only thing which is able to destroy me is science magic/hax.

You fly a Scimi yet you're apparently feeling inadequate in it against, say, an Oberth?

Do we have some performance anxiety issues going on here?

Are you concerned that, despite flying the biggest, most OP ship in the game that somehow you don't quite measure up to the Big Kids?

A good STO player can fly anything and do well with it. PvE, PvP, STF. It does not matter. P2W doesn't matter either. Give an incompetent Captain the very best of everything and he/she will still find a way to fail. Epically at that.

I tried A2B/DEM because I became interested in it since it was popular. It was fun for awhile. But since everyone else was doing it, I wasn't that special snowflake I've always dreamed of being. Tried some different things because I wasn't really wanting that "One Build to Rule Them All" thing. My Eng toon flies a Sci ship. He doesn't need A2B or Grav Well to be effective. He's best described as a Ship Medic who does a little shooting at the Bad Guys on the side.

meimeitoo · February 2014

It's not A2B which is OP. Nor DEM. Nor Marion. It's... Tact Captains. Tact Captains have abilities that can make em do up to 3x as much DPS as you. Heck, stick a Tact in a Science Vessel, and he will do better than a true Science Captain. And that is sad. And sick.

If you nerf A2B, you're really just hurting Engineers. A2B/BFAW is the only way for Engineers and cruisers to be still in this game, and not look like a complete fool. That Tact Captains adopted their style, and in doing so made it OP in their hands, well, see the above paragraph.

atlantra · February 2014

LOL... How did a miss this thread? Hmm, what if aux to battery was an Engi captain skill only? If engineers need A2B to do damage, just make it for engineer captains only.

Yeah, but then engie captains could A2B in everything.... There's a less OP solution somewhere. My research team is on it

jockey1979 · February 2014

atlantra wrote: »

LOL... How did a miss this thread? Hmm, what if aux to battery was an Engi captain skill only? If engineers need A2B to do damage, just make it for engineer captains only.

Yeah, but then engie captains could A2B in everything.... There's a less OP solution somewhere. My research team is on it

I'm going to try this A2B in a B'rel on a tac captain I think... shouldn't be OP at all should it

coupaholic · February 2014

It's all a mess really. You can't blame a player for using the best/OP/broken combination of career, skills, traits, doffs and kit. My shoehorning the traditional MMO trinity into a game it doesn't belong it was bound to break.

It would have been far better to have no career or career abilities at all. Everyone starts exactly the same and as they level up branch off into specialisms thanks to a huge and flexible skilltree. Or simply have a passive system and gain expertise in particular skills the more you use them.

meimeitoo · February 2014

atlantra wrote: »

LOL... How did a miss this thread? Hmm, what if aux to battery was an Engi captain skill only? If engineers need A2B to do damage, just make it for engineer captains only.

I've always liked the idea, in principle, of making trade specific abilities stronger in the hands of their respective Captains. So, a GW would be significantly stronger in the hands of a Science Captain; A2B be much more powerful for an Engineer, etc.

Except... it doesn't work. At least, not if it means giving Tact Captains even more Tact advantages. And that is because this game itself is unbalanced, and heavily favors DPS over anything else; thus, under almost any circumstance, Tact Captains come out the winner.

cerealplayer · February 2014

Sigh. This misconception needs to die. Kill it, kill it fire already!

It's not bloody A2B. People are hitting 30K DPS ISE runs (which I can confirm, I have heard, but cannot confirm 40K and even 50K) without A2B. On the other hand, you can bloody well fit A2B with cannons, and you won't see your DPS explode. Try it out: the JHEC is an ideal A2B cannonscort. While it's definitely a fun ship, it is not Scimitar/Avenger/etc Beamsplotion levels of dps-hax.

There is one culprit, and one culprit only for the ridiculously broken situation we have here: energy drain mechanics and how they overwhelmingly favour beams.

A2B does one thing: it cuts your BOFF cooldowns, at the expense of your aux. Now, I understand that for PvP you may want to cut both your offensive and defensive cooldowns, but for PvE, who needs defenses when everything melts? If all you want is to cut your beam CDs, you can do it without sacrificing aux power (and, by extension, your awesome Nukara rep trait), by using the VR beam CD doff. Which, BTW, drops from Gamma Quadrant doff pack; which BTW, now comes in the newest lockbox.

marcel314 · February 2014

thunderfoot006 wrote: »

You fly a Scimi yet you're apparently feeling inadequate in it against, say, an Oberth?

Do we have some performance anxiety issues going on here?

Are you concerned that, despite flying the biggest, most OP ship in the game that somehow you don't quite measure up to the Big Kids?

A good STO player can fly anything and do well with it. PvE, PvP, STF. It does not matter. P2W doesn't matter either. Give an incompetent Captain the very best of everything and he/she will still find a way to fail. Epically at that.

I tried A2B/DEM because I became interested in it since it was popular. It was fun for awhile. But since everyone else was doing it, I wasn't that special snowflake I've always dreamed of being. Tried some different things because I wasn't really wanting that "One Build to Rule Them All" thing. My Eng toon flies a Sci ship. He doesn't need A2B or Grav Well to be effective. He's best described as a Ship Medic who does a little shooting at the Bad Guys on the side.

Fly my build, there is nothing op there (it's like a tac kumari but with the baseturnrate of a cruiser) and i don't have problems with oberths but with wells and palisades throwing subnukes,lobi consoles and universal consoles at me.
I fly other ships too...maybe was the scimitar a bad example since everyone thinks every player is a min/maxer and there are no fun builds...should have taken my eng in an odyssey or tac in mirror patrol (the prometheus looks much better than the cryptic) as example....

darkwhite0 · February 2014

meimeitoo wrote: »

It's not A2B which is OP. Nor DEM. Nor Marion. It's... Tact Captains. Tact Captains have abilities that can make em do up to 3x as much DPS as you. Heck, stick a Tact in a Science Vessel, and he will do better than a true Science Captain. And that is sad. And sick.

If you nerf A2B, you're really just hurting Engineers. A2B/BFAW is the only way for Engineers and cruisers to be still in this game, and not look like a complete fool. That Tact Captains adopted their style, and in doing so made it OP in their hands, well, see the above paragraph.

agree,
because i use this configuration (a2b, dem, marion) with my science and engineering and is hard to get the same efficiency as a captain tactical

(sry English)

talonxv · February 2014

And people wonder why I don't do PvP.

erei1 · February 2014

cerealplayer wrote: »

Sigh. This misconception needs to die. Kill it, kill it fire already!

It's not bloody A2B. People are hitting 30K DPS ISE runs (which I can confirm, I have heard, but cannot confirm 40K and even 50K) without A2B. On the other hand, you can bloody well fit A2B with cannons, and you won't see your DPS explode. Try it out: the JHEC is an ideal A2B cannonscort. While it's definitely a fun ship, it is not Scimitar/Avenger/etc Beamsplotion levels of dps-hax.

There is one culprit, and one culprit only for the ridiculously broken situation we have here: energy drain mechanics and how they overwhelmingly favour beams.

And I've been doing 20K DPS on ISE with my scimitard using a2b+dem, using blue and green gear. And it was when BFAW was bugged and didn't not crit at all.
As for using it with cannons, it's quite effective. Sure, it's not like beams, where I have my DPS going from about 8-10K to 20k+, but even I still see a DPS increase, AND a survivability increase.

A2B does one thing: it cuts your BOFF cooldowns, at the expense of your aux. Now, I understand that for PvP you may want to cut both your offensive and defensive cooldowns, but for PvE, who needs defenses when everything melts? If all you want is to cut your beam CDs, you can do it without sacrificing aux power (and, by extension, your awesome Nukara rep trait), by using the VR beam CD doff. Which, BTW, drops from Gamma Quadrant doff pack; which BTW, now comes in the newest lockbox.

Except the CD reduction is so high with 2 copies of a2b and 3 purple tech, it basically double your BOFF seating. I, for one, think it's a bit powerful, don't you think ? I don't see how any CD reduction will beat that. Why have only the beam boff abilities reduced, when you can have everything ? And the aux penalty ? It's only there half the time if you use a2b everytime it's up. And if you have some knowledge of the game, you'll know that skill like HE is based on your aux when you activate it, not when the DOT is healing you.

schnirsel · February 2014

jockey1979 wrote: »

I'm going to try this A2B in a B'rel on a tac captain I think... shouldn't be OP at all should it

The B'rel would probably not be a very good choice for this. But it is possible! Being able to prebuff everything with enhanced battle cloak makes a2b really powerful. Just be careful with leech. You'll need a healthy stack of aux batteries for the times when leech expires and your aux goes offline.

I've been using a2b on my T'varo since last summer now. It's pure opness, in PVE I use csv1,ts3 and apb3 and in PVP ts1,rf1,bo3 and apo3. Having all those abilities on global allows me to dish out real damage numbers that would make any of those faw spamming cruisers cry.
That's real supression fire. Constant spike damage. It's like having tactical initiative always active.

But don't try to copy your spacebar binds from a beamboat to a cannonboat . While beams have no problems with those binds (thanks to a 4 second firing cycle) cannons tend to get hickups and may sometimes not fire properly.
So you either have to manage a2b and eptx cycling manually to avoid damage loss (like I do) or use some other key (like a mouse button or whatever) to fire of your abilities.
I found it extremly fun to fly on a T'varo.. zipping around and blowing stuff up.

stf65 · February 2014

A2B has been around over a year now. People are just figuring this out? Plus you can set up an A2B escort build too.

jon59650 · February 2014

So...escort captains are whining that they aren't the ones doing the most damage in game? whining that A2B is so OP, A2B = no skill?

alright, if A2B needs no skill then what skill is needed to run an escort, all you do is point and shoot.

can't survive in an escort? play an engineer in an escort!

rylanadionysis · February 2014

1. Tanking your auxiliary power is a bad idea

1a. It lowers your benefit from tier 4 nukara rep
1b. It loses one of your AMP mods
1c. It lowers the potency of any sci related power, including gravity wells that can do massive DPS
1d. It can make your ship uncloakable whenever it bugs you out to 0 or if you have any kind of energy drain on you. Very bad for rommies that cycle cloaks.

2. BOFF power CDs to global is already more than possible without 3 techs and 2 boff powers to manage it

2a. Zemok for attack patterns and pairing of abilities
2b. Pairing of abilities to reach global (not always advised if using higher tier powers that have say a 60 second CD and 45 second global, youre better off just running the one bigger power actually)
2c. Cannon/beam special cd redux doffs.
2d. Damage Control Engineers for EPTx cd redux chance

3. At this stage of power creep and fleet cores and the like, there is no need whatsoever to be adding even more power to engines, shields, or even weapons.
3a. Weapon overcapping stops being effective at a certain point.
3b. Shield power is abundant
3c. So is engine power
4d. Even for romulans built correctly.

4. There are better abilities you could be using in those Lt Engineering or Universal stations.
4a. RSP/DEM/EPTX2
4b. Aux2damp/aux2sif
4c. Another cannon/beam/attack pattern in the case of tactical use of a uni slot (also more crit from an SRO embassy boff if not a rom)
4d. TBR/TB2/HE2/TSS2 sci skills like in 4c but for science.

Four reasons and four supporting points for each of those reasons to not use aux to bat.

I gave it up months ago, and I have never once looked back. I am in DPS 20k, working on 30k. I am a constant PvPer and hold my own in premade matches. My characters do things many of those a2b users that think they are doing good cant even dream of accomplishing, because its how you fly vs how you smash your tray 7 spacebar crud.

Oh... i dont even use tray 7 or keybinds, I click everything.

Just saying, folks.

Escort online is dead, long live a2b online

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