its funny, I've heard something like this before......but what was it.....oh yeah!
"LIMIT TRAITS! ITS UNFIAR LIMIT HOW MANY TRAITS YOU CAN HAVE! IT WILL FIX EVERYTHING!"
Now its limit stacking, no more stacking, consoles too limit those, oh limit STF elites, limit how many you can do, make a credit cap so its easier for us to buy everything we need, limit weapons, only one weapon can fire at a time, remove all the skills only one skill can be used on a ship, limit what people can equip in pvp's, no cloaking for players only NPC's, remove romulans entirely, make klinks more peaceful, limit game time for people on more than me,limit limit limit limit limit........This is unfair, that's unfair, I spend all my time on the forums complaining instead of playing cause its all so unfair. *throws temper tantrum*
Even if you just removed stacking, you wouldn't have balanced things. You'd still have to balance the individual DOFFs.
This. Many of the doffs are balanced around stacking 3 of them, yes their are outliers like the technician DoFF's but for the most part many Doff's that stack do so because they're only worth using when stacked. If you limit them to a max of 1 of any type your going to have no choice but to treble up the magnitude of most Doff's which just brings us back to square one except now you can have 6 different Doff effects instead of 2 or 3.
Thing is, there are things that are supposedly on the same level - yet - they're nowhere near the same level.
Somebody complaining about AtB DOFFs which are free - isn't exactly complaining about something that's difficult to get or to do. That's just a balance complaint...
exactly most doffs are easy to get a2b s the most easyiest build to fin hince why so many run it..... the complaint over stacking issue seem to me allot of lazy players not trying to obtian the tools they need to play.... hey they want every one else to be as weak as they are cuz we play and do the doff missions we deserve a nerf
i say nerf this guy lmao nerf stacking really
why nerf a player thats spent years obatining there doffs for some one thats to lazy to get a free one
Thing is, there are things that are supposedly on the same level - yet - they're nowhere near the same level.
Somebody complaining about AtB DOFFs which are free - isn't exactly complaining about something that's difficult to get or to do. That's just a balance complaint...
I hear ya man, its just no one is ever going to be happy here, but PWE gave to pressure once, why not again right?
Did it fix anything? no, pissed a bunch of people off, they either rage quit or stopped spending money, and it never fixed power creep.
I can't see a complete redesign ffixing this, only going to TRIBBLE more people off. its a game, either enjoy it, or don't. To the people banging this "it must be our way drum" get over it, again its just a game, enjoy it or don't.
Let the devs do what they need to, let them chart a course, or bang your drum and see how crazy you can drive them till you get what you want or don't.
I hear ya man, its just no one is ever going to be happy here, but PWE gave to pressure once, why not again right?
Did it fix anything? no, pissed a bunch of people off, they either rage quit or stopped spending money, and it never fixed power creep.
I can't see a complete redesign ffixing this, only going to TRIBBLE more people off. its a game, either enjoy it, or don't. To the people banging this "it must be our way drum" get over it, again its just a game, enjoy it or don't.
Let the devs do what they need to, let them chart a course, or bang your drum and see how crazy you can drive them till you get what you want or don't.
edit: Meh, I'm getting old and forgetful - but I'm pretty sure I remember who the OP is...and I wouldn't lump them in with the doesn't end there crowd..
edit: Meh, I'm getting old and forgetful - but I'm pretty sure I remember who the OP is...and I wouldn't lump them in with the doesn't end there crowd..
Virus - that's cute. But seriously - are you saying that there is no problem with the current doff and trait stacking? If you can say honestly that there is no problem with it I will let it go.
exactly most doffs are easy to get a2b s the most easyiest build to fin hince why so many run it..... the complaint over stacking issue seem to me allot of lazy players not trying to obtian the tools they need to play.... hey they want every one else to be as weak as they are cuz we play and do the doff missions we deserve a nerf
i say nerf this guy lmao nerf stacking really
why nerf a player thats spent years obatining there doffs for some one thats to lazy to get a free one
Well, that was all a bit rude.
I'm not lazy, far from it, and I'd prefer if you refrained from throwing ignorant and witless accusations around.
Doff stacking, or more properly, doff trait stacking is something that contributes strongly to the cookie cutter dynamic ingame.
Because not all doffs stack, so a select few doffs become the prized ones and, voila, A2B as far as the eye can see.
Essentially, doff trait stacking is a restrictive force on builds.
If it was taken away, as another poster rightly pointed out, we'd be looking at 5-6 different doff buffs as opposed to the 2-3 we see now.
Think about that for a second.
5 or 6 doff buffs promotes a wider range of possible configurations than 2 or 3.
It means that we would have to adapt to a far greater range of buffs derived from the source, albeit at a somewhat lower intensity.
It would mean less time spent on autopilot and far more time spent on fine tuning a build.
It would mean a huge hit to the cookie cutter culture in ship building......and i do apologise, but i think thats a consummation devoutly to be wished.
Ok, so... here is the example of stacking that OP talks about, it may not be perfect but it will serve the purpose.
Romulan character, all romulan boffs, fleet crtH and crtD consoles, universal consoles w/ crtH and crtD mods. What we have so far? Toon that have, dunno, say ~30% crtH and ~130% crtD.
Now, we should be generous and give this poor romnie JHAS, becasue he dont have nuff yet.
Lets take 3 purple conn (evasives) doffs + helmsman trait, +1 purple eptX CD reduction doff. Lets see what we have so far: 3 conn doffs + trait = 20sec CD on evasives, and ~ 35sec CD (average) on eptE.
But then I won't be able to deal so much damage with a single punch! (I kid)
There are good things and bad things about the power creep:
a)it makes content too easy - bad thing
b)it makes completing a bad pug mission possible - good thing
c)it makes players lazy in their builds - generally a bad thing
d)it makes grinding go faster - generally good thing.
e)it allows almost unchecked pay-to win - or pay to win faster - good and bad.
The thing I don't like most is that there are some classes of doffs and traits that are OP and there are some that could use a buff by multi-stacking. There is just little consistency across the board.
It would be better to have no stacking and a balance pass of abilities.
Because so many people are invested in A2B, they can't realistically nerf it without risking a disastrous consumer response that would make the trait situation look tame in comparison. A2B also has fair uses like on ships like the Gal-X.
What they need to do is just create additional, equally powerful options, whilst at the same time making the ESTFs more difficult.
The issue with this is that most players don't actually want the game to be more difficult unfortunately. Look how few people play the harder content. This might be because the rewards aren't scaled appropriately.
Perhaps they can create a difficult set of instances that also reward something actually worth the pain of potentially wasted effort?
And that there is the real problem, no actual content that any of this matters in, linked with no actual content that provides sufficient incentive to need to be OP other than vanity.
The only area of the game where balance actually matters is in PvP, and they patently don't give a rats about that anyway, probably for the justifiable reason that it would take an insane amount of effort to actually keep it all balanced for very little benefit to Cryptic.
tl;dr There are more fundamental problems with the game than doff balancing
The doff system where some systems stacki and others do not is fine.
This was done so they could balance specific things. You will also notice that doffs that are quite powerful are often in a cat that does not allow stacking. This is a balance thing. It is done to offer CHEAP (opportunity cost) ways to boost skills they find lacking. (Think Gravity Well and the Grav doff that gives a chance to proc secondaries... this ups the effective nature of the skill at a low doff cost... allowing sci ships to stack this and have 20,000 gravity wells is not a good idea balance wise, they also use that mechanic so that super sci ships aren't an option with boosted GW TYKENS CPB ect... as those skills are mostly boosted by doffs from one catagory that does not stack).
There has been some terrible changes since the launch of the doff system of course.... like the global change of A2B. Tech doffs where great before the change. They where a powerful option that made an overlooked skill (a2b) viable. The choice was to run A2B instead of a second EPTx (which is why most people never used it before) however the lure of having 30% knocked off all your cool downs made it an interesting option. (double a2b was overkill and would require you to forge EPTx completely) This is how it was balanced when heretic attached -10% to each tech doff and allowed there stacking.
Changing that cool down was likely the worst balance choice Cryptic has made, ever. Of all the bad changes that one stands out as the most game breaking no doubt. At the very least they should have reduced the effect of the doffs by 50%... (that would have in fact still been a major buff... allowing the use of 2 EPTx along with A2B as now... but NOT dropping every skill to global... in fact the reduction with 2 a2bs would have been the same reduction people where getting before just with the added dual eptx)
Anyway I wasn't trying to go on and on about Tech doffs. I am saying I like that some things like Warp Core doffs and such can NOT stack... its good for balance. It allows them to provide either or options for skills... where running one doff for instance to boost GW means not being able to run the doff that boosts Tykens as well... it becomes a choice and that is good.
What the doff system really needs to be frank... is a DEV that doesn't give a Rats Patutty about player QQ. Who will go through all the doffs and adjust numbers on a handful of doffs that need it. Warp core cleans doffs / Tech Doffs could use the hardest slap down... and there is a handful more that could use tweaking... and in some cases even a bit of a buff.
Well everyone already has multiples of those boffs and doffs, so preventing stacking would be unacceptable, as many players would lose hundreds of millions of EC worth of work. The fairest thing to do is add more space traits to Fed and KDF boffs, and make superior versions of these traits available.
The doff system where some systems stacki and others do not is fine.
This was done so they could balance specific things. You will also notice that doffs that are quite powerful are often in a cat that does not allow stacking. This is a balance thing. It is done to offer CHEAP (opportunity cost) ways to boost skills they find lacking. (Think Gravity Well and the Grav doff that gives a chance to proc secondaries... this ups the effective nature of the skill at a low doff cost... allowing sci ships to stack this and have 20,000 gravity wells is not a good idea balance wise, they also use that mechanic so that super sci ships aren't an option with boosted GW TYKENS CPB ect... as those skills are mostly boosted by doffs from one catagory that does not stack).
There has been some terrible changes since the launch of the doff system of course.... like the global change of A2B. Tech doffs where great before the change. They where a powerful option that made an overlooked skill (a2b) viable. The choice was to run A2B instead of a second EPTx (which is why most people never used it before) however the lure of having 30% knocked off all your cool downs made it an interesting option. (double a2b was overkill and would require you to forge EPTx completely) This is how it was balanced when heretic attached -10% to each tech doff and allowed there stacking.
Changing that cool down was likely the worst balance choice Cryptic has made, ever. Of all the bad changes that one stands out as the most game breaking no doubt. At the very least they should have reduced the effect of the doffs by 50%... (that would have in fact still been a major buff... allowing the use of 2 EPTx along with A2B as now... but NOT dropping every skill to global... in fact the reduction with 2 a2bs would have been the same reduction people where getting before just with the added dual eptx)
Anyway I wasn't trying to go on and on about Tech doffs. I am saying I like that some things like Warp Core doffs and such can NOT stack... its good for balance. It allows them to provide either or options for skills... where running one doff for instance to boost GW means not being able to run the doff that boosts Tykens as well... it becomes a choice and that is good.
What the doff system really needs to be frank... is a DEV that doesn't give a Rats Patutty about player QQ. Who will go through all the doffs and adjust numbers on a handful of doffs that need it. Warp core cleans doffs / Tech Doffs could use the hardest slap down... and there is a handful more that could use tweaking... and in some cases even a bit of a buff.
Well we are mostly on the same page then.
I talked about the problem caused by removing AtB off shared cooldown with EPtX - this made 3 techs OP(hello - I think this was Borticus)
But it got worse - you add in the warp core -doff and some damage control doffs and you can pretty much get max power to all subsystems FULL TIME!! That is insane!
You can also get most of your Boff abilities all down to Global cooldown - that is Insane. Sure there are other OP doffs like the WCE w/clease that basically removes the need to carry clears - but all together it has gotten out of hand.
I always wished Al Rivera would step in - there was a few times that I thought he had enough spine to just do what needed to be done balance wise and say flip you to the QQing from the players.
I talked about the problem caused by removing AtB off shared cooldown with EPtX - this made 3 techs OP(hello - I think this was Borticus)
But it got worse - you add in the warp core -doff and some damage control doffs and you can pretty much get max power to all subsystems FULL TIME!! That is insane!
You can also get most of your Boff abilities all down to Global cooldown - that is Insane. Sure there are other OP doffs like the WCE w/clease that basically removes the need to carry clears - but all together it has gotten out of hand.
I always wished Al Rivera would step in - there was a few times that I thought he had enough spine to just do what needed to be done balance wise and say flip you to the QQing from the players.
But I now have my doubts.:(
I agree. There was a very short time there where it seemed they where about to put the big boy pants on and come and FIX a bunch of stuff... knowing that the QQ would die down after a week and life would go back to normal with a more balanced game.
Now your right seems like they took 5 or 6 steps back... released a few new A2B friendly ships and took another step or two back. lol
It really would be nice if Cryptic appointed ONE dev to spend a couple week (not actual work time... just time frame wise) to fix existing doff issues. They could easily make an event of it as well... have a Tribble Doff weekend. Place a vendor on Drozona or somewhere on Tribble that would vend a purple version of a ton of doffs they are looking at tweaking... and then every day update tribble with new doff numbers and get people testing them. Add a nice dev blog asking for everyones help on tribble and concise feedback on what worked and what didn't. Then a week after the tribble event... patch the game and change a bunch of doffs. (including some changes that may not be super popular like some type of fix for the worst offending doffs). Idea being to balance out the doffs.... by asking for feedback and buffing little used doffs they could soften the blow of people loosing super tech doff mode.
The doff system where some systems stacki and others do not is fine.
This was done so they could balance specific things. You will also notice that doffs that are quite powerful are often in a cat that does not allow stacking. This is a balance thing. It is done to offer CHEAP (opportunity cost) ways to boost skills they find lacking. (Think Gravity Well and the Grav doff that gives a chance to proc secondaries... this ups the effective nature of the skill at a low doff cost... allowing sci ships to stack this and have 20,000 gravity wells is not a good idea balance wise, they also use that mechanic so that super sci ships aren't an option with boosted GW TYKENS CPB ect... as those skills are mostly boosted by doffs from one catagory that does not stack).
There has been some terrible changes since the launch of the doff system of course.... like the global change of A2B. Tech doffs where great before the change. They where a powerful option that made an overlooked skill (a2b) viable. The choice was to run A2B instead of a second EPTx (which is why most people never used it before) however the lure of having 30% knocked off all your cool downs made it an interesting option. (double a2b was overkill and would require you to forge EPTx completely) This is how it was balanced when heretic attached -10% to each tech doff and allowed there stacking.
Changing that cool down was likely the worst balance choice Cryptic has made, ever. Of all the bad changes that one stands out as the most game breaking no doubt. At the very least they should have reduced the effect of the doffs by 50%... (that would have in fact still been a major buff... allowing the use of 2 EPTx along with A2B as now... but NOT dropping every skill to global... in fact the reduction with 2 a2bs would have been the same reduction people where getting before just with the added dual eptx)
Anyway I wasn't trying to go on and on about Tech doffs. I am saying I like that some things like Warp Core doffs and such can NOT stack... its good for balance. It allows them to provide either or options for skills... where running one doff for instance to boost GW means not being able to run the doff that boosts Tykens as well... it becomes a choice and that is good.
What the doff system really needs to be frank... is a DEV that doesn't give a Rats Patutty about player QQ. Who will go through all the doffs and adjust numbers on a handful of doffs that need it. Warp core cleans doffs / Tech Doffs could use the hardest slap down... and there is a handful more that could use tweaking... and in some cases even a bit of a buff.
The thing about these sort of systems is simplicity.
It's a bit like law. Law is fine where there aren't too many wrinkles and loopholes.
Too many exceptions though, and the base principles of the system start to break down.
Which is why my usual default in these things is one rule to bind them all.
Let them all stack or let none of them stack.
Let's get some diversity back into the doff portion of ship building.
And use the required balance pass to have another go at power creep.
1. Power creep is important. The point is to keep you playing, and it is totally appropriate that you have to constantly invest time to stay at the top of your game.
2. Cryptic make money when they can sell a product for $$ that allows people to pay to catch up. The trait system was nerfed because it was not possible to buy your way to the top of it. As far as cryptic is concerned there is no problem with the doff system because good doffs cost more zen to buy through selling keys on the exchange.
I'd support it going either way; just standardize it.
Why is Aux2Bat acceptable, but not stacking Gravimetric Doffs to multi-Well/Rift every cast? Likewise, I'd love to be able to doff my Tractor Repulsors to pull, drain shields and reduce turn rate all at the same time.
Coversely, I think Aux2Bat is a 'bad' build that promotes bad gameplay. Aux is an important power system(especially on cruisers). It powers every ship-heal in the game. Also, as an avid torpedo-boat user, I would be fine being limited to a single Projectile Duty Officer - if it meant you were limited to a single active duty officer for every specialization.
I'd support it going either way; just standardize it.
Coversely, I think Aux2Bat is a 'bad' build that promotes bad gameplay. Aux is an important power system(especially on cruisers). It powers every ship-heal in the game. Also, as an avid torpedo-boat user, I would be fine being limited to a single Projectile Duty Officer - if it meant you were limited to a single active duty officer for every specialization.
Aux power is NOT needed for every heal ability ingame, examples include: ET, ST, you can also use A2D, and HE easily between a2b triggers.
I`m not against a2b build, I do have avenger n galor both w/ a2b, BUT, i find those builds extremly boring to fly over time. I ahve to agree with other posters that nerfing some of the doffs and such would be giant slap2face from cryptic to players who invested their time and/or RL money in those builds, and devs never gonna do that.
That bein said, they should really carefully consider what kind of doffs/traits they will launch in 9.5 w/ crafting system. Hope we wont get more OP s***t.
I haven't read the thread, but basically OP is unhappy he can't afford doffs to make aux2bat build?
:eek:
Oh gosh - you have found me out!! LOL
This is just the account bank and one toon grabbed on Risa to show it's not tribble(can't be bothered moving stuff around/plus there is a $1 billion EC cap per toon:( ) - as you can see I am in desperate need of EC - please send donations now!!
Comments
"LIMIT TRAITS! ITS UNFIAR LIMIT HOW MANY TRAITS YOU CAN HAVE! IT WILL FIX EVERYTHING!"
Now its limit stacking, no more stacking, consoles too limit those, oh limit STF elites, limit how many you can do, make a credit cap so its easier for us to buy everything we need, limit weapons, only one weapon can fire at a time, remove all the skills only one skill can be used on a ship, limit what people can equip in pvp's, no cloaking for players only NPC's, remove romulans entirely, make klinks more peaceful, limit game time for people on more than me,limit limit limit limit limit........This is unfair, that's unfair, I spend all my time on the forums complaining instead of playing cause its all so unfair. *throws temper tantrum*
Wow whats happened here?
This. Many of the doffs are balanced around stacking 3 of them, yes their are outliers like the technician DoFF's but for the most part many Doff's that stack do so because they're only worth using when stacked. If you limit them to a max of 1 of any type your going to have no choice but to treble up the magnitude of most Doff's which just brings us back to square one except now you can have 6 different Doff effects instead of 2 or 3.
Thing is, there are things that are supposedly on the same level - yet - they're nowhere near the same level.
Somebody complaining about AtB DOFFs which are free - isn't exactly complaining about something that's difficult to get or to do. That's just a balance complaint...
i say nerf this guy lmao nerf stacking really
why nerf a player thats spent years obatining there doffs for some one thats to lazy to get a free one
I hear ya man, its just no one is ever going to be happy here, but PWE gave to pressure once, why not again right?
Did it fix anything? no, pissed a bunch of people off, they either rage quit or stopped spending money, and it never fixed power creep.
I can't see a complete redesign ffixing this, only going to TRIBBLE more people off. its a game, either enjoy it, or don't. To the people banging this "it must be our way drum" get over it, again its just a game, enjoy it or don't.
Let the devs do what they need to, let them chart a course, or bang your drum and see how crazy you can drive them till you get what you want or don't.
Heh, it's kind of funny how this song comes to mind: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mf2N08-THQA
edit: Meh, I'm getting old and forgetful - but I'm pretty sure I remember who the OP is...and I wouldn't lump them in with the doesn't end there crowd..
Virus - that's cute. But seriously - are you saying that there is no problem with the current doff and trait stacking? If you can say honestly that there is no problem with it I will let it go.
Well, that was all a bit rude.
I'm not lazy, far from it, and I'd prefer if you refrained from throwing ignorant and witless accusations around.
Doff stacking, or more properly, doff trait stacking is something that contributes strongly to the cookie cutter dynamic ingame.
Because not all doffs stack, so a select few doffs become the prized ones and, voila, A2B as far as the eye can see.
Essentially, doff trait stacking is a restrictive force on builds.
If it was taken away, as another poster rightly pointed out, we'd be looking at 5-6 different doff buffs as opposed to the 2-3 we see now.
Think about that for a second.
5 or 6 doff buffs promotes a wider range of possible configurations than 2 or 3.
It means that we would have to adapt to a far greater range of buffs derived from the source, albeit at a somewhat lower intensity.
It would mean less time spent on autopilot and far more time spent on fine tuning a build.
It would mean a huge hit to the cookie cutter culture in ship building......and i do apologise, but i think thats a consummation devoutly to be wished.
Romulan character, all romulan boffs, fleet crtH and crtD consoles, universal consoles w/ crtH and crtD mods. What we have so far? Toon that have, dunno, say ~30% crtH and ~130% crtD.
Now, we should be generous and give this poor romnie JHAS, becasue he dont have nuff yet.
Lets take 3 purple conn (evasives) doffs + helmsman trait, +1 purple eptX CD reduction doff. Lets see what we have so far: 3 conn doffs + trait = 20sec CD on evasives, and ~ 35sec CD (average) on eptE.
What we will get?? Well, we will get THIS
There are good things and bad things about the power creep:
a)it makes content too easy - bad thing
b)it makes completing a bad pug mission possible - good thing
c)it makes players lazy in their builds - generally a bad thing
d)it makes grinding go faster - generally good thing.
e)it allows almost unchecked pay-to win - or pay to win faster - good and bad.
The thing I don't like most is that there are some classes of doffs and traits that are OP and there are some that could use a buff by multi-stacking. There is just little consistency across the board.
It would be better to have no stacking and a balance pass of abilities.
But that would be only a dream I guess.
+1 on this. No Active Doff powers should stack, imo. Leads to unforeseen Op-ness.
1. Should things be taken out of the game or limited? no
2. Should content be added that gives balance? yes
3. Should current stacking include things that can't be stacked? Sure, why not
4. Will they add content to do this? No, probably not because they don't want to deal with something already in place.
That's the problem here, change something to even it out, sure. Create content to balance, too much work.
All this guy does is ask for nerfs. SBO needs to LTP!
Stop trying to bring us all down to your level. Please.
What they need to do is just create additional, equally powerful options, whilst at the same time making the ESTFs more difficult.
The issue with this is that most players don't actually want the game to be more difficult unfortunately. Look how few people play the harder content. This might be because the rewards aren't scaled appropriately.
Perhaps they can create a difficult set of instances that also reward something actually worth the pain of potentially wasted effort?
And that there is the real problem, no actual content that any of this matters in, linked with no actual content that provides sufficient incentive to need to be OP other than vanity.
The only area of the game where balance actually matters is in PvP, and they patently don't give a rats about that anyway, probably for the justifiable reason that it would take an insane amount of effort to actually keep it all balanced for very little benefit to Cryptic.
tl;dr There are more fundamental problems with the game than doff balancing
This is more of a balance request.
Fairly simple - all doffs/traits should stack to 3 or none should. And if they all do - perhaps add in a diminishing return to balance things out.
You know the game used to have balance(somewhat) and diminishing returns on most things?
Maybe with some changes most players would "learn to Play" rather than relying on doff and trait crutches so they can smash the spacebar!
PS -I can and have built a 30K dps Scimitar - it's not too hard with enough funds - from there it's all about the dance.
There are some doffing changes coming with S9.5 - I doubt they will include a balance pass - sadly:(
This was done so they could balance specific things. You will also notice that doffs that are quite powerful are often in a cat that does not allow stacking. This is a balance thing. It is done to offer CHEAP (opportunity cost) ways to boost skills they find lacking. (Think Gravity Well and the Grav doff that gives a chance to proc secondaries... this ups the effective nature of the skill at a low doff cost... allowing sci ships to stack this and have 20,000 gravity wells is not a good idea balance wise, they also use that mechanic so that super sci ships aren't an option with boosted GW TYKENS CPB ect... as those skills are mostly boosted by doffs from one catagory that does not stack).
There has been some terrible changes since the launch of the doff system of course.... like the global change of A2B. Tech doffs where great before the change. They where a powerful option that made an overlooked skill (a2b) viable. The choice was to run A2B instead of a second EPTx (which is why most people never used it before) however the lure of having 30% knocked off all your cool downs made it an interesting option. (double a2b was overkill and would require you to forge EPTx completely) This is how it was balanced when heretic attached -10% to each tech doff and allowed there stacking.
Changing that cool down was likely the worst balance choice Cryptic has made, ever. Of all the bad changes that one stands out as the most game breaking no doubt. At the very least they should have reduced the effect of the doffs by 50%... (that would have in fact still been a major buff... allowing the use of 2 EPTx along with A2B as now... but NOT dropping every skill to global... in fact the reduction with 2 a2bs would have been the same reduction people where getting before just with the added dual eptx)
Anyway I wasn't trying to go on and on about Tech doffs. I am saying I like that some things like Warp Core doffs and such can NOT stack... its good for balance. It allows them to provide either or options for skills... where running one doff for instance to boost GW means not being able to run the doff that boosts Tykens as well... it becomes a choice and that is good.
What the doff system really needs to be frank... is a DEV that doesn't give a Rats Patutty about player QQ. Who will go through all the doffs and adjust numbers on a handful of doffs that need it. Warp core cleans doffs / Tech Doffs could use the hardest slap down... and there is a handful more that could use tweaking... and in some cases even a bit of a buff.
Well we are mostly on the same page then.
I talked about the problem caused by removing AtB off shared cooldown with EPtX - this made 3 techs OP(hello - I think this was Borticus)
But it got worse - you add in the warp core -doff and some damage control doffs and you can pretty much get max power to all subsystems FULL TIME!! That is insane!
You can also get most of your Boff abilities all down to Global cooldown - that is Insane. Sure there are other OP doffs like the WCE w/clease that basically removes the need to carry clears - but all together it has gotten out of hand.
I always wished Al Rivera would step in - there was a few times that I thought he had enough spine to just do what needed to be done balance wise and say flip you to the QQing from the players.
But I now have my doubts.:(
I agree. There was a very short time there where it seemed they where about to put the big boy pants on and come and FIX a bunch of stuff... knowing that the QQ would die down after a week and life would go back to normal with a more balanced game.
Now your right seems like they took 5 or 6 steps back... released a few new A2B friendly ships and took another step or two back. lol
It really would be nice if Cryptic appointed ONE dev to spend a couple week (not actual work time... just time frame wise) to fix existing doff issues. They could easily make an event of it as well... have a Tribble Doff weekend. Place a vendor on Drozona or somewhere on Tribble that would vend a purple version of a ton of doffs they are looking at tweaking... and then every day update tribble with new doff numbers and get people testing them. Add a nice dev blog asking for everyones help on tribble and concise feedback on what worked and what didn't. Then a week after the tribble event... patch the game and change a bunch of doffs. (including some changes that may not be super popular like some type of fix for the worst offending doffs). Idea being to balance out the doffs.... by asking for feedback and buffing little used doffs they could soften the blow of people loosing super tech doff mode.
The thing about these sort of systems is simplicity.
It's a bit like law. Law is fine where there aren't too many wrinkles and loopholes.
Too many exceptions though, and the base principles of the system start to break down.
Which is why my usual default in these things is one rule to bind them all.
Let them all stack or let none of them stack.
Let's get some diversity back into the doff portion of ship building.
And use the required balance pass to have another go at power creep.
2. Cryptic make money when they can sell a product for $$ that allows people to pay to catch up. The trait system was nerfed because it was not possible to buy your way to the top of it. As far as cryptic is concerned there is no problem with the doff system because good doffs cost more zen to buy through selling keys on the exchange.
It's all working as intended.
Why is Aux2Bat acceptable, but not stacking Gravimetric Doffs to multi-Well/Rift every cast? Likewise, I'd love to be able to doff my Tractor Repulsors to pull, drain shields and reduce turn rate all at the same time.
Coversely, I think Aux2Bat is a 'bad' build that promotes bad gameplay. Aux is an important power system(especially on cruisers). It powers every ship-heal in the game. Also, as an avid torpedo-boat user, I would be fine being limited to a single Projectile Duty Officer - if it meant you were limited to a single active duty officer for every specialization.
:eek:
Yeah uh...no, he's not upset that he can't afford free DOFFs...
...he might be upset that the free DOFFs are better than the DOFFs that cost a lot though.
Aux power is NOT needed for every heal ability ingame, examples include: ET, ST, you can also use A2D, and HE easily between a2b triggers.
I`m not against a2b build, I do have avenger n galor both w/ a2b, BUT, i find those builds extremly boring to fly over time. I ahve to agree with other posters that nerfing some of the doffs and such would be giant slap2face from cryptic to players who invested their time and/or RL money in those builds, and devs never gonna do that.
That bein said, they should really carefully consider what kind of doffs/traits they will launch in 9.5 w/ crafting system. Hope we wont get more OP s***t.
Oh gosh - you have found me out!! LOL
This is just the account bank and one toon grabbed on Risa to show it's not tribble(can't be bothered moving stuff around/plus there is a $1 billion EC cap per toon:( ) - as you can see I am in desperate need of EC - please send donations now!!
http://i.imgur.com/N4eLEof.png?1