And that's your problem right there. That's the root of all the complaints about cloakers in this game, imho. People want to detect cloaked ships without bothering to invest anything in stealth detection in any possible way.
It's a behavior that is deteriorating the quality of the game - why adapt, learn or sacrifice sth. when they could just come to the forum and say "X is OP, plz nerf!". (not addressing this at you personally questerius, just a general impression I've been getting from this forum lately)
I agree that there is too much complaining and too little learning, but i believe that is not the whole story when it comes to cloak and cloak detect.
The advantage has been so heavily in favor of the cloakers that people stopped investing in cloak detect since it would be wasting resources. Better to invest in speed and/or firepower to sweep the BoP in their few vulnerable seconds after they vaped someone (hopefully not you).
In addition the game does not reward specialization in anything other than alpha strike vaper.
Why be a healer or why a dedicated cloak detector when you cannot kill the cloaked vessels once you DO see them.
So while people do need to learn before they open their gap and start complaining, the imbalance between cloak and cloak detection needs to be addressed and this has become even more urgent with the boost for the alpha strike BoP.
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
That buff to raiders will be small and symbolic, the whine over the Aquarius is a big lol. Even if it's buffed someday it's still nothing special . There are lots of other great escorts out here to buy with better looks and status.
The Aquarius is potentially the most crapped-on ship in the game. It has all the weaknesses of a Raider and none of the strengths. Why does it even exist? It is outclassed in every single aspect by something else.
Totally agree, no one has any need to get the Aquarius, it's outclassed at every turn, I'm guessing the 'it doesn't have a cloak' explanation is why the Scourge Destroyer wasn't on that list as well, considering it too is essentially a raider without a cloak, just a bit better better than the Aq-why-rius.
"If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe." - Carl Sagan
Ignorance of the game mechanics is a big problem but it is not entirely the fault of the players.
One big part of the problem is the lack of a way to find info on various aspects of the game. Where does a new player go to find info on if the Human Leadership trait stacks or has diminishing returns? Cryptic doesn't provide any sort of tutorial on how to use the skill tree (I wrote one for my fleet), so if you're new to the game it can be very confusing to get used to it. Providing better explanations to how these and other items affect game play would be helpful to a lot of folks.
Agreed. It is something that has been repeatedly said many many times on this forum. Crpytic fails to provide any relevant info in ship building, setups the effects of various skills etc. That kinda' sucks, but it is what it is.
However that's what this forum is for. The way I see it - if a person can be bothered to join the forum in the first place and start a thread in the lines of "X is OP, plz nerf!", then he(or she) could have tried to seek help and advice on this same forum instead of instantly crying foul and demanding nerfs/buffs.
Another big one is the community itself. I can't tell you how many times I've seen STO vets just rip someone apart because they dare to ask a "noob" question in Zone Chat, it seems as though asking for help is a STO mortal sin. Try observing Wheaton's Law "Don't Be a ****", if you don't want to help then say nothing or point newer players to sources of help (STOwiki, the skill planner, forums, etc.). We were all new to MMO's and Star Trek Online at some point and needed help, some of got help while others did not. Being a jerk will only chase people away from playing this game.
Also agreed. Getting help in zone chat is like looking for a needle in a haystack, and ESD zone is just......I'm not going to even go there, just will say that there isn't even a needle or a haystack.
I've been saying for years that Cryptic/PWE needs to do sth. about the zone chat in this game, however the fact remains that the zone chat is not the best place to seek advice.
Oddly enough, I found out that for ex. Qo'noS zone chat can be really helpfull at times and usually questions are being honestly answered, advice is given and inexperienced players are being helped.
The same situation is present in the Klingon Gameplay & Klingon Fleetyards section of this forum, you can usually get good advice and ask any question there.
Probably has sth. to do with the smaller playerbase of the KDF, so people there tend to know eachother and be a tightly knit and helpfull bunch.
But still, my previous point - if one's come to the decision to join the STO forum to complain and demand nerfs and buffs, then one can spend the same time, effort and energy into learning new things, getting advice and broadening their gameplay knowledge instead of crying foul.
The next piece is, as you say, the player himself. After you've been given the ability to figure the game out it up to you to make it work for yourself. You can be given the best ship, gear, and weapons but if you don't take the time to learn how to use those weapons and practice with them then you won't find success.
And this, IMHO, is the root of the problem. It's a decline in player quality that has been pretty evident (at least to me) during the past year.
I partially blame the company for this, as they often release content with the lowest possible denominator in mind and they ofren indulge the people who whine on the forum because they can't be bothered to use their brain.
I'm more and more getting the impression that more and more people just can't be bothered to extract a single thought into their build, just copy paste cookie-cutter stuff posted by others on the forum and then come back and whine because their "uber build of doom for max. possible DPS" doesn't tank well or doesn't notice cloaked ships that well.
Lastly, you can only spec or gear for a limited amount of skills, if you put points into Starship Sensors or buy consoles to boost the skill, then you're losing out in other skills or filling valuable slots. It's easy to say to put together a stealth detection build but it's really not is it? You have to really plan to make a decent build, then gather gear, finish or change rep systems, wait for fleet provisions, buy respec tokens, and then have to make changes after a new patch.
I might be weird here, but to me this is one of the most fun parts of STO. Creating my own builds, my own setups. Playing around with what I can do and what the results will be. I can tell you right now that I don't usually build too specialized ships, I prefer well rounded ones. If I plan to do PvP or even just Ker'rat with a certain build, I invest in stealth detection as a Fed. I have 5 Fed. ships that have no issues detecting stealth oponents, 2 are sicence ships, 2 are cruisers and 1 is an escort.
And yet you don't see me crying foul on the forum because I had to cut from one side to invest in stealth detection on the other.
Ummm ... question ... where is the rear end of a Borg Cube, Probe or Sphere? *whistles*
Feed it ample amounts of beans, wait and the answer will reveal itself in due time.
Easier though is watching the shield facing when you or your team fires on the vessel. From that you can determine which facing is the "rear".
This program, though reasonably normal at times, seems to have a strong affinity to classes belonging to the Cat 2.0 program. Questerius 2.7 will break down on occasion, resulting in garbage and nonsense messages whenever it occurs. Usually a hard reboot or pulling the plug solves the problem when that happens.
At this point I would be happy if the called her an escort, gave her back her rear weapon slot, and let me build a mine layer out of her.
She would still suck, but then at least she would be "balanced but crappy" instead of "What are you talking about, this ship is missing parts"
Edit: I supported and proved that a Galax-R was balanced with the other ships clear up until the new Fleet Dread obsolesced it with its hangar bay, uni ens, cloak, and freebie lance. I can make just about any ship do just about any thing. I obsess over "No it isn't broken, you just don't understand it" mechanics. I love underdogs.
If *I'M* saying a ship sucks and needs to be buffed... well... yeah... I don't tend to say that lightly.
I once again match my character. Behold the power of PINK!
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
Feed it ample amounts of beans, wait and the answer will reveal itself in due time.
Easier though is watching the shield facing when you or your team fires on the vessel. From that you can determine which facing is the "rear".
Or if you can fit in a subspace jumper then you can check the cube or what ever's temp anytime of day. If thats your sorta thing.:eek: free auto align. :cool:
Raider is a functional type, not even tip-of-the-spear assault (although it can be used for that in fleet formation), but a simple hit-and-run craft for raiding a single target. Aquarius is not that ship at all, it doesnt have any of the stats for it, and Starfleet probably doesnt do those operations (publicly). Its a shallow-water frigate, a patrol boat for starbase security, a glorified shuttle for outings with more than 5 men. So on this point I agree with them.
Its also not a destroyer.
And for the record (again) I do not think BOPs needed a flanking bonus, or a decloaking bonus, all they needed was a little buff to hull and impulse speed.
^^^ This.
I have an Aquarius in my regular ship rotation running primary & secondary Nukara sets and store beams (intentionally...it humors me) and even I agree with this summation. Sure, I'm partial to it and would like it to have a buff to impulse speed and maybe a 10% hull increase and nacelle animations(!) at the very least. But I mean, as great as I think it looks and is, it's a support ship with escort leanings.
the only other ships in the game with 6 weapon slots... are science ships...
Give the Aquarius one of Sensor Analysis or Target Sub Systems, and that too would do it.
Or her rear weapon slot. If she is an Escort stop penalizing her for being a raider when she isn't.
I don't understand this "Yeah it sucks, we don't care" attitude when you could fix it in 30 seconds by giving her back her turret and calling it a day...
I once again match my character. Behold the power of PINK!
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
I'm confused here. Is the Breen raider left off the list because it is losing the bonus. Or will it retain the bonus?
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
At this point I would be happy if the called her an escort, gave her back her rear weapon slot, and let me build a mine layer out of her.
She would still suck, but then at least she would be "balanced but crappy" instead of "What are you talking about, this ship is missing parts"
But once you make that ship even slightly competent there is even less of a reason why you would want to use it over any other escort. Between the defiant, akira, prometheus, and patrol escorts there isn't a significant niche within which you can slot the little brick that couldn't without drawing an unfavorable comparison to some other ship.
Barring any major revision to the ship's role, stats, and function (which is probably the way they should go, completely revamp the thing), I think the best thing is to let the AD suck as much as possible just so it can be triumphantly used as a self-imposed handicap.
"That's right, I just solo'ed a cube in this."
Any improvements would just make it less satisfying.
Bipedal mammal and senior Foundry author.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Aquarius is not that ship at all, it doesnt have any of the stats for it, and Starfleet probably doesnt do those operations (publicly). Its a shallow-water frigate, a patrol boat for starbase security, a glorified shuttle for outings with more than 5 men. So on this point I agree with them.
Its also not a destroyer.
So... its a Defiant minus the the Mary-Sue-hero-ship image...
Congrats Cryptic. You just turned Publc Warzones into hell for Federation captains. Now watch those zones get deserted due to these new raider upgrades. As if the B'Rel wasn't already buffed enough.
The Wildcards Fleet =/\=
Admiral T'Vanto of the I.R.W. Dreaded Balerion (Scimitar Dreadnought Warbird) "Burn them All!"
AdmiralAtraxis of the U.S.S. Daskalogiannis (Avenger class Cruiser) "I am Iron Cat!"
Congrats Cryptic. You just turned Publc Warzones into hell for Federation captains. Now watch those zones get deserted due to these new raider upgrades. As if the B'Rel wasn't already buffed enough.
Duuuuuuuuuuuuude.
The complete ignorance of Romulans and Superior Romulan Operative here is just plain hilarious.
I go into Ker'rat on my KDF toon, and I am ALWAYS outnumbered by Federation escorts and cruisers. Fed science vessels outperform KDF sci ships in every way; heck, the Varanaus turns like a freaking cruiser. These raider buffs will make solo sniping a viable tactic for the KDF in Ker'rat again. As it is, the only way to succeed is to get some buddies together and form a wolfpack, and even then you're going to lose a man on every strike against any decent Odyssey pilot.
And don't even mention Scimitars. I love them, but they are hilariously OP.
Cryptic need to make only one adjustment for the Aquarius. Change its class to shuttle. It is a scout ship,vso let us use it in vault missions and be done with it.
Glad to see the KDF get some love for a change.
And still we have the Galaxy fanboys whining. Face it, the Galaxy is accurate to the IP. It sucked on the show, always getting damaged or overpowered by every ship it met. The Dominion took one out in their first encounter with a few escorts. The galaxy is aproduct of 80s thinking. Underpo e ered and overdesigned. Want a canon battlecruiser, get a Sovereign!
Nothing breaks the tension better than a tankard of warnog - except maybe a good brawl...
The Aquarius is not a Raider. I think we can all agree on that point. Would it be nice to have the flanking ability of Raiders? Sure, but Cryptic is never going to do that. As Raiding seems to not be a Federation thing in their mind.
However, the Aquarius is also not a Destroyer. Not with the current way Cryptic has Destroyers. Destroyers are able to switch from one means to the next and the Aquarius doesn't do that either. There's no modifications to it.
This leaves us with it being an Escort and be like the Defiant (Tactical Retrofit Escort). Yet, it has less weapons, inertia, turn rate, shields and hull. Its less than that. This wouldn't be a problem if it had something to compensate, but it doesn't.
So that leaves it being a ship without much of a purpose. Which means Cryptic probably never should've brought it out, even if a lot of people were wanting one. At least not until its purpose was thought out.
Why not give it the ability to engage Full Impulse much faster, or in combat (with a cooldown)?
It's small--tiny, in fact, That smallness could be actioned (lol, I hate that word!) into actual flight performance--faster acceleration, faster turning, and faster movement debuff recovery. That way, its Defense would be higher, and it would make sense to run it with full Engine power.
Make it a zippy little b*astard that's a pain to target, hit, or keep pinned down--it won't kill faster, but it'll be a lot harder to kill (short a Sci-heavy team). And it wouldn't need the Flanking bonus... But it should still get it anyway.
It needs SOMETHING to make it special, as its stats are simply atrocious.
I just hope they put some more emphasis on which is the rear facing when it comes to ships like borg cubes where its difficult to see which is the actual rear facing. Although would be nice if they had the red flash animation on b'rel like in the movie it had.
I really like that idea. Make the rear shield arc a different color. Currently the only way to knowingly attack a Borg cube or other symmetrical ship/object is to use the Jump Console, which is not something many people have. This should NOT be a requirement to properly use flanking.
Which types ships ultimately are classified as isn't determined by their attributes. It's in fact determined by whatever Cryptic wants them to be. Any element of fiction is determined by its author/creator, that's fiction 101. It is unfortunate that the poor Aquarius isn't getting any boosts, but claiming that it fits into a category that it doesn't really does not help the case.
Sorry, doesn't fly. There still needs to be internal consistency otherwise the suspension of disbelief is destroyed. So "cause the author says so" doesn't work, when the author doesn't follow his own rules. A work of fiction cannot survive without an audience that accepts and appreciates it.
Take all that into account--and sometimes the author is wrong.
The Breen raider will remain exactly as it is now.
Excellent, thanks!
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
The Aquarius could be that except it would not make much sense as the Odyssey is clearly more that capable of handling itself, after all the Defiant was sent to DS9 to buff up its defenses against a possible Dominion attack and its first assignment was to send it into the Gamma Quadrant.
What the Aquarius should be is relative open to debate but its not the Defiant nor it should be locked into being the "Odyssey BoP".
I think you can get an idea for the Aquarius role by looking at it in relation to the Odyssey, just as you can get an idea for the Hoh'Sus role by looking at it in relation to the Bortasqu.
Hoh'Sus is essentially a strike craft that supports the Bortasqu in combat, and able to perform raiding operations on its own (without carrying the Bortasqu around with it).
Aquarius is also a strike craft that supports the Odyssey in combat, and able to perform certain types of escort operations on its own, and also be used for away missions, courier missions, stuff like that. Not a warship. Historically, a corvette was generally known as a fast escort/scout for merchant ships, and this seems like a good combat role for this as well, light combat support operations, scouting operations, etc. What would probably suit it best would be some kind of science focus, like disables or stuns or holds, that let it support the Odyssey (when used as a pet), and also let it be used for fast support ship by itself (when flown as a ship).
So that's what I see for Aquarius: a science-oriented corvette, with 6 hard-points, able to use DHCs, with sensor analysis and debuffs, running EPtE. It could keep the weak hull with all that going for it.
A: Many players feel that the Aquarius is a Raider. It does share some similarities between one: some universal seating, 4/2 weapons and reduced hull. It however lacks Cloaking and was never designed to be a Raider.
What about the Breen Raider? It doesn't have cloaking either, yet somehow it was designed to be one...
I find it laughable that a good portion of the feds whining and crying about PvP being about to die are usually the same ones that have made it a deathtrap for escorts: Grav well/Theta rad/web mine/tractor pet/subspace console spammers who cut and run at the first sign of damage.
"Wah wah stop killing muh PvP" Oh, the irony :rolleyes:
Comments
I agree that there is too much complaining and too little learning, but i believe that is not the whole story when it comes to cloak and cloak detect.
The advantage has been so heavily in favor of the cloakers that people stopped investing in cloak detect since it would be wasting resources. Better to invest in speed and/or firepower to sweep the BoP in their few vulnerable seconds after they vaped someone (hopefully not you).
In addition the game does not reward specialization in anything other than alpha strike vaper.
Why be a healer or why a dedicated cloak detector when you cannot kill the cloaked vessels once you DO see them.
So while people do need to learn before they open their gap and start complaining, the imbalance between cloak and cloak detection needs to be addressed and this has become even more urgent with the boost for the alpha strike BoP.
Really? No buff to the Aquarius?
What are you guys on over there?
I'm usually supportive, but, no. Bad move. The Aquarius really sucks.
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
Totally agree, no one has any need to get the Aquarius, it's outclassed at every turn, I'm guessing the 'it doesn't have a cloak' explanation is why the Scourge Destroyer wasn't on that list as well, considering it too is essentially a raider without a cloak, just a bit better better than the Aq-why-rius.
"If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe." - Carl Sagan
Agreed. It is something that has been repeatedly said many many times on this forum. Crpytic fails to provide any relevant info in ship building, setups the effects of various skills etc. That kinda' sucks, but it is what it is.
However that's what this forum is for. The way I see it - if a person can be bothered to join the forum in the first place and start a thread in the lines of "X is OP, plz nerf!", then he(or she) could have tried to seek help and advice on this same forum instead of instantly crying foul and demanding nerfs/buffs.
Also agreed. Getting help in zone chat is like looking for a needle in a haystack, and ESD zone is just......I'm not going to even go there, just will say that there isn't even a needle or a haystack.
I've been saying for years that Cryptic/PWE needs to do sth. about the zone chat in this game, however the fact remains that the zone chat is not the best place to seek advice.
Oddly enough, I found out that for ex. Qo'noS zone chat can be really helpfull at times and usually questions are being honestly answered, advice is given and inexperienced players are being helped.
The same situation is present in the Klingon Gameplay & Klingon Fleetyards section of this forum, you can usually get good advice and ask any question there.
Probably has sth. to do with the smaller playerbase of the KDF, so people there tend to know eachother and be a tightly knit and helpfull bunch.
But still, my previous point - if one's come to the decision to join the STO forum to complain and demand nerfs and buffs, then one can spend the same time, effort and energy into learning new things, getting advice and broadening their gameplay knowledge instead of crying foul.
And this, IMHO, is the root of the problem. It's a decline in player quality that has been pretty evident (at least to me) during the past year.
I partially blame the company for this, as they often release content with the lowest possible denominator in mind and they ofren indulge the people who whine on the forum because they can't be bothered to use their brain.
I'm more and more getting the impression that more and more people just can't be bothered to extract a single thought into their build, just copy paste cookie-cutter stuff posted by others on the forum and then come back and whine because their "uber build of doom for max. possible DPS" doesn't tank well or doesn't notice cloaked ships that well.
I might be weird here, but to me this is one of the most fun parts of STO. Creating my own builds, my own setups. Playing around with what I can do and what the results will be. I can tell you right now that I don't usually build too specialized ships, I prefer well rounded ones. If I plan to do PvP or even just Ker'rat with a certain build, I invest in stealth detection as a Fed. I have 5 Fed. ships that have no issues detecting stealth oponents, 2 are sicence ships, 2 are cruisers and 1 is an escort.
And yet you don't see me crying foul on the forum because I had to cut from one side to invest in stealth detection on the other.
Original Join Date: January 30th, 2010
Feed it ample amounts of beans, wait and the answer will reveal itself in due time.
Easier though is watching the shield facing when you or your team fires on the vessel. From that you can determine which facing is the "rear".
It would have been nice if fleet norgh had 1 more console.... otherwise, looking really sweet.
She would still suck, but then at least she would be "balanced but crappy" instead of "What are you talking about, this ship is missing parts"
Edit: I supported and proved that a Galax-R was balanced with the other ships clear up until the new Fleet Dread obsolesced it with its hangar bay, uni ens, cloak, and freebie lance. I can make just about any ship do just about any thing. I obsess over "No it isn't broken, you just don't understand it" mechanics. I love underdogs.
If *I'M* saying a ship sucks and needs to be buffed... well... yeah... I don't tend to say that lightly.
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
Or if you can fit in a subspace jumper then you can check the cube or what ever's temp anytime of day. If thats your sorta thing.:eek: free auto align. :cool:
Wherever our subspace jumper points to
There should be a little white arrow pointing to the segment that represents the side of the mob you are currently shooting.
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
^^^ This.
I have an Aquarius in my regular ship rotation running primary & secondary Nukara sets and store beams (intentionally...it humors me) and even I agree with this summation. Sure, I'm partial to it and would like it to have a buff to impulse speed and maybe a 10% hull increase and nacelle animations(!) at the very least. But I mean, as great as I think it looks and is, it's a support ship with escort leanings.
the only other ships in the game with 6 weapon slots... are science ships...
Give the Aquarius one of Sensor Analysis or Target Sub Systems, and that too would do it.
Or her rear weapon slot. If she is an Escort stop penalizing her for being a raider when she isn't.
I don't understand this "Yeah it sucks, we don't care" attitude when you could fix it in 30 seconds by giving her back her turret and calling it a day...
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
But once you make that ship even slightly competent there is even less of a reason why you would want to use it over any other escort. Between the defiant, akira, prometheus, and patrol escorts there isn't a significant niche within which you can slot the little brick that couldn't without drawing an unfavorable comparison to some other ship.
Barring any major revision to the ship's role, stats, and function (which is probably the way they should go, completely revamp the thing), I think the best thing is to let the AD suck as much as possible just so it can be triumphantly used as a self-imposed handicap.
"That's right, I just solo'ed a cube in this."
Any improvements would just make it less satisfying.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
Well, it's behind - duh!
The Breen raider will remain exactly as it is now.
So... its a Defiant minus the the Mary-Sue-hero-ship image...
Well game mechanically the have.
Its only hard to find.... unless you have subspace jump to port right there^^
Admiral T'Vanto of the I.R.W. Dreaded Balerion (Scimitar Dreadnought Warbird) "Burn them All!"
Admiral Atraxis of the U.S.S. Daskalogiannis (Avenger class Cruiser) "I am Iron Cat!"
Duuuuuuuuuuuuude.
The complete ignorance of Romulans and Superior Romulan Operative here is just plain hilarious.
I go into Ker'rat on my KDF toon, and I am ALWAYS outnumbered by Federation escorts and cruisers. Fed science vessels outperform KDF sci ships in every way; heck, the Varanaus turns like a freaking cruiser. These raider buffs will make solo sniping a viable tactic for the KDF in Ker'rat again. As it is, the only way to succeed is to get some buddies together and form a wolfpack, and even then you're going to lose a man on every strike against any decent Odyssey pilot.
And don't even mention Scimitars. I love them, but they are hilariously OP.
Glad to see the KDF get some love for a change.
And still we have the Galaxy fanboys whining. Face it, the Galaxy is accurate to the IP. It sucked on the show, always getting damaged or overpowered by every ship it met. The Dominion took one out in their first encounter with a few escorts. The galaxy is aproduct of 80s thinking. Underpo e ered and overdesigned. Want a canon battlecruiser, get a Sovereign!
Why not give it the ability to engage Full Impulse much faster, or in combat (with a cooldown)?
It's small--tiny, in fact, That smallness could be actioned (lol, I hate that word!) into actual flight performance--faster acceleration, faster turning, and faster movement debuff recovery. That way, its Defense would be higher, and it would make sense to run it with full Engine power.
Make it a zippy little b*astard that's a pain to target, hit, or keep pinned down--it won't kill faster, but it'll be a lot harder to kill (short a Sci-heavy team). And it wouldn't need the Flanking bonus... But it should still get it anyway.
It needs SOMETHING to make it special, as its stats are simply atrocious. I really like that idea. Make the rear shield arc a different color. Currently the only way to knowingly attack a Borg cube or other symmetrical ship/object is to use the Jump Console, which is not something many people have. This should NOT be a requirement to properly use flanking. Sorry, doesn't fly. There still needs to be internal consistency otherwise the suspension of disbelief is destroyed. So "cause the author says so" doesn't work, when the author doesn't follow his own rules. A work of fiction cannot survive without an audience that accepts and appreciates it.
Take all that into account--and sometimes the author is wrong.
Excellent, thanks!
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
Hoh'Sus is essentially a strike craft that supports the Bortasqu in combat, and able to perform raiding operations on its own (without carrying the Bortasqu around with it).
Aquarius is also a strike craft that supports the Odyssey in combat, and able to perform certain types of escort operations on its own, and also be used for away missions, courier missions, stuff like that. Not a warship. Historically, a corvette was generally known as a fast escort/scout for merchant ships, and this seems like a good combat role for this as well, light combat support operations, scouting operations, etc. What would probably suit it best would be some kind of science focus, like disables or stuns or holds, that let it support the Odyssey (when used as a pet), and also let it be used for fast support ship by itself (when flown as a ship).
So that's what I see for Aquarius: a science-oriented corvette, with 6 hard-points, able to use DHCs, with sensor analysis and debuffs, running EPtE. It could keep the weak hull with all that going for it.
What about the Breen Raider? It doesn't have cloaking either, yet somehow it was designed to be one...
"Wah wah stop killing muh PvP" Oh, the irony :rolleyes: