Someone correct me if I'm wrong on this. I can clearly see the bug and it should get fixed along with the fast countdown one. My question is on how aux2bat really works.
1) If Aux power were = 0, would the ship be able to use aux2bat again? Example, my drain build piling on tgt aux subsystems 3+Siphon2+Tyken's 3+Voth Aceton. I know this is overkill, but I've had my ship draining aux2bat builds like crazy, and they still manage to use aux2bat constantly.
2) If it gets fixed and the power is always left down at 5, and lets use this video as example. The engine power was 63. Would it just get boosted to 68 on the second use of aux2bat?
Note:
I just saw this on the wiki Modified by:
Skills
Starship Electro-Plasma System - Increase weapon, shield, and engine power bonus.
Subsystems power level
Auxiliary -- Power bonus depends on current auxiliary power level.
I know Aux2bat builds run very high EPS. Having said that, if the Aux power is zero, Aux2bat should give a bonus of zero power or be disabled since there is nothing for it to run on.
Note that HE and TSS's effectiveness depends on Aux power level. If these ships actually ran Aux at 5 all the time, the heals off using them should be junk.
No, you cannot activate aux2batt if aux is at 0 (by 0, I mean offline). You also cannot activate any other aux based abilities (HE, aux2struc, TSS, etc). This is the drawback for using it. From personal experience, its actually possible to overuse it, and knock it offline yourself. Yes, you can restore it with eptaux, but then that costs you the ability to use other ep abilities, like shields and weapons. If your weapons or shields are knocked offline, aux2batt doesn't restore these.
Sadly I have to agree in the most part. Double AtB slowly starts to destroy your skills. It gets all too automatic,
I'm sorry ... "destroy your skills" ? "too automatic" ??
This ... coming from the keybind paradise that made STO "spacebar online" ?
As to A2B ... -- players were crying for ever to make beam boats more powerful .
Then we got A2B .
Now that's a "problem" , because not only beam boats can make use of it ?
Am I missing something ?
'Cuz if I'm not then you'll end up either asking for a nerf to beam boats , or doffs specific to careers , or some other crazy thing .
A2B is not what is wrong with PVP .
A list as long as my arm is what is wrong with PVP , and it seems that everyone has one list or another in this sense , but the funny thing is that not all lists are the same .
i believe it would fix atb and some extreme builds. i.e. vapers can't stack those tt and\or battery doffs. who knows what healers are stacking these days 0o
my 2 credits
Don't know why it says i'm an ARC user. i will never use that TRIBBLE Cryptic!
putting AtB on the AtD/AtS system cooldown was in its day the best rebalanced the game ever got. it made the tac cruiser a valid option and addressed its weaknesses that caused it to be so underpowered. i was the tac cruiser diehard from like the release of the excelsior on, i KNOW how underpowered they were compared to how they are today.
COM tac ships that can also use it may be problematic, but the highest turn rate AtB escort out there is the hunter, with 17. in the escort game its positioning, speed and timing that gets kills, and all 3 depend on turn rate and impulse mod a hell of a lot more then they do cycling. that's why the bug is still used so much, still nothing has a collection of stats that are so high in the areas of performance that REALLY mater. they got the uptime on tac skills with their 2 copies of everything they need from the COM and LTC tac, and the healing disadvantage it has to AtB escorts is covered totally by cross healing.
AtB real only is a quality of puging life enhancer more then anything. you can keep the tac up time, but also cover a ton of healing on your own, especially after the team skill system cooldowns were removed. what team is going to win though, the one with a bunch of self sufficient to a point AtB ships, or the one with a real healer backing up bugs that fly circles around all other escorts? we have all pvped enough to know its the latter.
ships like the patrol refit are really powerful and AtB ready, but its still only got a 16 base turn, and only room for 3 turn consoles. it and all the other AtB escorts all have a hard time getting time on target vs well flown bugs, so its vastly better time on target, vs higher healing skill uptime when these 2 things find them selves locked in a duel.
if these escorts didnt have AtB, they would be completely uncompetitive. look at the andorian escort, with its 5 forward weapons. why isnt it the escort king instead of the bug? turn rate and a pedestrian impulse mod near as i can tell, and these ships would be in the boat, and only have 4 forward weapons.
this AtB hater camp apparently cant perceive what so ever whats really causing them to die. AtB is super easy to blame though, it completely changes how you set up your ship, it must be the problem!
if these escorts didnt have AtB, they would be completely uncompetitive. look at the andorian escort, with its 5 forward weapons. why isnt it the escort king instead of the bug? turn rate and a pedestrian impulse mod near as i can tell, and these ships would be in the boat, and only have 4 forward weapons.
i gotta disagree. they can be competitive, even the kumari. only scort i not could get much use off nowadays has been the mvae. i though know that people who are out for speed-tanking can get a lot of use out of it (i'm really not one of em ).
are there better scorts? of course. are all scorts which has been let behind uncompetitive? imo they're not (it always depends on) .
@all:
plz remember the purpose of this thread and keep it constructive (if it matters in the end or not). any of u is free to start threads like "stop a2b witch-hunting", "the great a2b discussion thread", etc...
whatever ones prob is with a2b, what matters in the end is that the devs seem to be not satisfied with the state of a2b. will something happen on it cause of that? most probably not. if something will happen, will it be what most of us wanted? most probably not.
but indeed that doesn't matter at all in this thread. it's about possible changes people can see, derivating from what they think about a2b themselves. no matter if lover or hater.
in conclusion one could say that for people who are fine allover with a2b in it's current state this is the wrong thread.
this AtB hater camp apparently cant perceive what so ever whats really causing them to die. AtB is super easy to blame though, it completely changes how you set up your ship, it must be the problem!
From someone who puts his gateway links in the signature, it's pretty easy to figure out why you don't want A2B to be changed. You apparently don't bother much with builds that don't use it anymore.
Having all those varieties of builds, but all using at least one copy of A2B? What does that really tell us?
i started only one other thread after it just has been enough to me and in which i almost-quick edited my entry-rage-post.
i then invited anyone to drop opinions and people did. i got my opinion on the topic u got urs. that's totally fine. and if i'm blind, well what gives? i'm just human as any other poster in here, with everything attached to it, even the right to blindness. in the end u can't be sure to not be the blind as well i guess ...
i have no prob with u or the fact u have no prob with a2b.
of course there are a lot of other probs ingame and of course everyone got his own ranking of things to fix/alter/buf/nerf/whatever...
the title regards directly to what a dev posted. that has been the only relation i got in mind when naming it (and did that in manner of a wanted poster, as i felt that it fit the dev-comment). of course i got my own opinion, but that hasn't been the root of the name (like to read in the op).
and btw:
right before geek closed that other thead cause of certain people derailing it and hating on others in there, i did reflect my opinion on a2b again. and right before i wanted to post that i gonna oversleep my opinion it got closed (believe it or not).
however i came to the same conclusion for myself and then read the dev-comment. again: this thread hasn't been intended for a2b-hating or liking, it's intended to raise ideas and to provide a thread under the flag that dev raised (note: he didn't say it's broken). if it hasn't been me it would have been someone else.
i also got a opinion (i already stated somewhere) on attack-cruisers without a2b btw, but i won't drop it in here. it just not belongs here ...
i would please u to now get civil on those pixels and on me. as i said, feel free to open a discussion thread. i already did and u know what happened to that and why.
edit:
i won't reply any further to off-topics in here, plz understand. if you're not for starting a pure discussion-thread, feel free to "forum-mail-bomb" me
I'm sorry ... "destroy your skills" ? "too automatic" ??
This ... coming from the keybind paradise that made STO "spacebar online" ?
As to A2B ... -- players were crying for ever to make beam boats more powerful .
Then we got A2B .
Now that's a "problem" , because not only beam boats can make use of it ?
Am I missing something ?
'Cuz if I'm not then you'll end up either asking for a nerf to beam boats , or doffs specific to careers , or some other crazy thing .
A2B is not what is wrong with PVP .
A list as long as my arm is what is wrong with PVP , and it seems that everyone has one list or another in this sense , but the funny thing is that not all lists are the same .
how would it nerf beam boats? Your FAW isn't on global all the times? Poor boy...
Note how I said "double AtB", not "any form of AtB usage". But probably you don't know any other Auxiliary to X power.
There are no skills behind DOUBLE AtB. Perfect 10 seconds uptime/shared, no need of timing it. If they'd do anything to AtB to me it should be to restrict it to ships with a Commander Engineering, only one copy allowed.
how would it nerf beam boats? Your FAW isn't on global all the times? Poor boy...
Note how I said "double AtB", not "any form of AtB usage". But probably you don't know any other Auxiliary to X power.
There are no skills behind DOUBLE AtB. Perfect 10 seconds uptime/shared, no need of timing it. If they'd do anything to AtB to me it should be to restrict it to ships with a Commander Engineering, only one copy allowed.
No skill eh?
I'll give it to you the skills that are on the rotation are no skills but there's still the ones that are not...plus pilot skills, plus timing skills, plus situational awareness.
Pvp isn't just about activating abilities...and I know you know that
From someone who puts his gateway links in the signature, it's pretty easy to figure out why you don't want A2B to be changed. You apparently don't bother much with builds that don't use it anymore.
Having all those varieties of builds, but all using at least one copy of A2B? What does that really tell us?
whatever you do, dont look at my pvp help thread thats still stickied :rolleyes: what you see should tell you that for the moment my characters are using ships that AtB builds work well on. and i mostly pug, and like i said AtB builds are pug friendly because they can be so self sufficient. im not into using sci ships and have no sci captains, not into playing heal cruisers, and i don't have any bug ships, so ya my ships use AtB on various levles.
i was literally the first person to run and talk about 2 AtB builds the day the vet ship and the AtB change went live, ive got more hand on experience with it then anyone, i know what im talking about.
as for my integrity you so casually attack, im not going to lie and claim something is OP when it isn't, i have ALWAYS called out things that were, even when i use them, and defend things that are underpowered, even if i don't use them, because someone is using them, and it effects us all.
how would it nerf beam boats? Your FAW isn't on global all the times? Poor boy...
Note how I said "double AtB", not "any form of AtB usage". But probably you don't know any other Auxiliary to X power.
There are no skills behind DOUBLE AtB. Perfect 10 seconds uptime/shared, no need of timing it. If they'd do anything to AtB to me it should be to restrict it to ships with a Commander Engineering, only one copy allowed.
with this logic, everyone that uses 2 copies of CRF or APO on non AtB ships is just as bad. get more creative drivel please.
No you didn't quite get it. All I wanted to say is that Escorts, aka ships with Commander Tactical, should not have access to such huge amounts engineering abilties and pay no price for that because some can run AtB like cruisers do.
Let's say, we have an Avenger and a Patrol, with LtComm uni for engi.
Avenger might do:
ET1/ATB1/EPTS3/DEM3
EPTE1/ATD1
what 95% of patrol's captains would do:
ET1/ATB1/EPTS3
EPTE1/ATD1/DEM2
retains a Commander tactical.
You just got fast turning Avenger. I seldom envy bug pilots. Despite their turn rate, they still go for the classic escort layout.
There is two things I would do to fix the A2B. First since sensors work off aux power levels I would decrease targeting by 20% and while running at a power level of five make all enemies and friends disappear off the screen beyond 10km. I think this is a fair trade off. The Devs are never going to take away the Boff cool down because how long it has been in the game. But what they can do is build in mechanics for running low aux power levels.
We need to think about what aux power should power and take that stuff away for running power levels below 25 points.
Take resistance if you based it off of aux power it would penalize the players running it.
Transporters should run off aux levels, take the immunity and clearing of transporters and the clearing of boarding party away from TT.
While I support keeping the current system there is no penalty for running it. I support -20% to targeting and base damage resistance of abilities and consoles off aux power levels.
I like the idea about capping aux power to 5 while a2b is active. I would also like to see the duration increased to the global so if one uses 2 copies they will keep their aux power at 5. It's not like it's hard to heal with no aux now that team powers are decoupled and there has to be some drawback for using such a powerful power.
@people obviously trying to get this thread locked...seriously, grow up...there's nothing wrong with discussing a power.
what you see should tell you that for the moment my characters are using ships that AtB builds work well on.
So A2B is better than any other option for those builds? You don't want to use another option because? You picked those ships so they could use A2B? My point is right now, in the midst of this A2B madness, all your ships are running at least one copy. So it's no wonder why you don't want it messed with, you're currently using it.
im not into using sci ships and have no sci captains, not into playing heal cruisers, and i don't have any bug ships, so ya my ships use AtB on various levles.
So everything outside of healers, gankers, and bugships needs A2B "on some level" now? Are you serious?
i was literally the first person to run and talk about 2 AtB builds the day the vet ship and the AtB change went live, ive got more hand on experience with it then anyone, i know what im talking about.
A round of applause please, the 'first' ever user of A2B has entered the room. A few years, an expansion, and more nerfs/buffs/new gear than we can count in one night later...A2B is now everywhere being used in ways he who unhinged it from EPtX skills never probably thought of, it's becoming THE build for every ship that can fit two Lt Eng abilities, and boosting anything with a Lt Eng apparently. You're right though, when a vast majority of the player base is using something without question, it's never because it dwarfs so many other builds in the Kirk-pilot paradise.
as for my integrity you so casually attack, im not going to lie and claim something is OP when it isn't, i have ALWAYS called out things that were, even when i use them, and defend things that are underpowered, even if i don't use them, because someone is using them, and it effects us all.
Why were you so upset when they FIXED the Undine Rep torp and brought it back down the number of torps it was supposed to fire in the first place? Once again because you were using it and loved the extra damage? Somehow forgot how to use other viable torpedo options while claiming it was the only one worth using?
Normally I don't link to previous posts, but your insistence on what you've done in the past justifying your comments on current game issues brought me to do so.
As someone who's flies w/Sci Captain(s) and uses/used BC/EC ships w/aux2batt (including mirror Hanom) for years, I can say aux2batt does help non-Cruiser builds. I've always favored single aux2batt builds even when using KDF Vet ship and BattleCruisers w/Tac. I've never understood the over emphasis on dual aux2batt builds as if they're the only options and only things that benefited from the Tech Doff effects.
It's empirically a fact that Tech Doffs (even many single build options) offers near N-1 Boff uptime allowing for a broader set of Boff abilitiess w/much more effectiveness then not. Even before the decoupling of Aux2batt and EPtX single Aux2batt builds were effective and used/abused. Around this time Raiders were a major liability in the queues w/the Broken Pet TBs and massive Phasor Proc Spam. More and more KDF migrated to Cruisers/Carriers.
That said, I also know Aux2batt wasn't needed to buff Fleet BCs nor Vet ships when they came out. When those came out most players were around T2 of the Rep system which jacked up their CritH rates for CVS builds. Cannon cruisers ruled the day for a reason and it wasn't Aux2batt. All Aux2batt builds did was shorten the cooldowns but that didn't matter so much when the team was wiped and respawning. BCs/even Karfi had enough tank that Tac boosted CVS w/2 or 3 others would wipe the other side (in particular in PuG matches).
The reality is Tech Doffs have been out of balance for a long time. But, they're not the only Doffs that have this problem (this # is continuing to grow) and it's not going to be addressed. My personal opinion is Heretic and our "PvP Dev saw the writing on the wall (or more likely were flat out told) what was coming and they left.
[Zone] Dack@****: cowards can't take a fed 1 on 1 crinckley cowards Hahahaha you smell like flowers
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
Congrats, you still have threads with good advice and tips stickied. Thank you for that great piece of work, but that's not what is in question.
my point was most of it is also AtB builds, for mostly cruisers
So A2B is better than any other option for those builds? You don't want to use another option because? You picked those ships so they could use A2B? My point is right now, in the midst of this A2B madness, all your ships are running at least one copy. So it's no wonder why you don't want it messed with, you're currently using it.
So A2B is the Kirk-pilot's answer, I don't think that was even up for debate.
So everything outside of healers, gankers, and bugships needs A2B "on some level" now? Are you serious?
this is the AtB double stranded. why does everyone use CRF with cannons? why does everyone use FAW with beam arrays? because its simply the best fit. AtB for tac cruisers and several COM tac ships now, is the best fit for them too. and yes im serious, without it the only escort worth using again would be the bug, the best tac cruisers would be the team's glass jaw, and in that vacuum uber healers and sci ships would run the game even more then they do now.
A round of applause please, the 'first' ever user of A2B has entered the room. A few years, an expansion, and more nerfs/buffs/new gear than we can count in one night later...A2B is now everywhere being used in ways he who unhinged it from EPtX skills never probably thought of, it's becoming THE build for every ship that can fit two Lt Eng abilities, and boosting anything with a Lt Eng apparently. You're right though, when a vast majority of the player base is using something without question, it's never because it dwarfs so many other builds in the Kirk-pilot paradise.
everyone uses EPtS! EPtE! APO! CRF! RSP! its all op! its become THE build for every ship! nerf! nerf! nerf! nerf everything until we are as complex as NPCs!
Why were you so upset when they FIXED the Undine Rep torp and brought it back down the number of torps it was supposed to fire in the first place? Once again because you were using it and loved the extra damage? Somehow forgot how to use other viable torpedo options while claiming it was the only one worth using?
Normally I don't link to previous posts, but your insistence on what you've done in the past justifying your comments on current game issues brought me to do so.
what a lovely example. the bio torp and AtB have a lot in common, both were the perfect solution to 2 underpowered problems. the bio torp with spread was the first torp powerful enough that a combined energy torp build wasn't rainbow tier bad. it was such anomaly, surrounded by its underpowered peers, that it must be nerfed! sound familiar? the nerfing of the bio torp remains a tragedy, and praying to the RNG gods for HY crit was no replacement for its spread performance. your much beter off not waiting a weapon slot for it, and 2 more for the proton weapon and grav torp, and putting a DBB and turrets back on. all energy, all the time! such an improvement, status quo fo life. :rolleyes:
No you didn't quite get it. All I wanted to say is that Escorts, aka ships with Commander Tactical, should not have access to such huge amounts engineering abilties and pay no price for that because some can run AtB like cruisers do.
Let's say, we have an Avenger and a Patrol, with LtComm uni for engi.
Avenger might do:
ET1/ATB1/EPTS3/DEM3
EPTE1/ATD1
what 95% of patrol's captains would do:
ET1/ATB1/EPTS3
EPTE1/ATD1/DEM2
retains a Commander tactical.
You just got fast turning Avenger. I seldom envy bug pilots. Despite their turn rate, they still go for the classic escort layout.
avenger has 5/3 weapons. that's its edge. put 5 DHCs on it some time, it can be shockingly effective
this is the AtB double stranded. why does everyone use CRF with cannons? why does everyone use FAW with beam arrays? because its simply the best fit. AtB for tac cruisers and several COM tac ships now, is the best fit for them too. and yes im serious, without it the only escort worth using again would be the bug, the best tac cruisers would be the team's glass jaw, and in that vacuum uber healers and sci ships would run the game even more then they do now.
It being the absolute best fit is the problem. Where are the contending builds other people can choose from? Oh that's right, it takes skill and competence to run (ask Sarcasmdetector). A cruiser build that rivals or is better than one with A2B can't just be copied and pasted from the skill planner and ran with little to no explanation. Heaven forbid.
everyone uses EPtS! EPtE! APO! CRF! RSP! its all op! its become THE build for every ship! nerf! nerf! nerf! nerf everything until we are as complex as NPCs!
Yep, because those listed there put max power in 3/4 subsystems and can reduce all other cooldowns to global. Great comparison. All those listed require their own individual doffs to reduce cooldown (obviously EPtS and EPtE are the same DCE) and even then some are just a chance. If you want all those to be at global you would need at least 7 doffs, and even then it can't be done for all (RSP), and the EPtX and CRF are only a chance not a guarantee.
what a lovely example. the bio torp and AtB have a lot in common, both were the perfect solution to 2 underpowered problems. the bio torp with spread was the first torp powerful enough that a combined energy torp build wasn't rainbow tier bad. it was such anomaly, surrounded by its underpowered peers, that it must be nerfed! sound familiar? the nerfing of the bio torp remains a tragedy, and praying to the RNG gods for HY crit was no replacement for its spread performance. your much beter off not waiting a weapon slot for it, and 2 more for the proton weapon and grav torp, and putting a DBB and turrets back on. all energy, all the time! such an improvement, status quo fo life. :rolleyes:
Again the Bio Torp was a fix, not a nerf, as it was never intended to fire EXTRA torpedoes with TS2 and TS3. Also I don't see a problem with needing a crit on HY. Why should firing a HY3 guarantee a massive crit hit? Isn't that why we have crit chance/severity in the first place? Build for it and roll the dice like every other weapon/buff combo. There are still plenty of other torpedo options that do work, such as Quantum Mk XI CrtDx3. I used those on my vaper for the longest time with great success, didn't even pay for the Mk XII. The undine torp with HY3 is still awesome, especially when it crits. There have been so many boosts to Photon Torpedoes lately how you can you find something that works? So sorry you don't get guaranteed massive unintended extra damage on a TS3 that for some reason never misses.
jjdez, you cant see the forest for the trees. you think that the 'free' uptime AtB provides in any situation is an imbalance effect, when in fact there was more imbalance before it, then after it.
before it, only escorts could effectively deal damage, and thanks to imbalanced things like the borg set back when the console was a part, combined with their speed and defense score, they stopped being nearly the glass cannons they should have been. by comparison, the excelsior had lower end tac skills, bad uptime on any tac skill it could slot until doffs were first added, and none of the speed that's such a big part of escort survival. when the change happened that allowed you to run 2 different EPTX skills and AtB, a tac cruiser could pretty much have the tac skill uptime an escort had, but at inferior ability levels, and with uptime improved on healing and defense, sort of break even with the benefits of escort speed.
what AtB does on paper, and what all the armchair pros that hate it fail to realize, is not as important as what it does in the context of ship class balance. it brought parity between the escort and tac cruiser. didn't make 1 replace the other, nether can deal damage in the same style better then the other, they are different but some what equal. it is not a problem that every tac cruiser is better off with AtB builds, just like it is not a problem that every ships that uses cannons should be slotting CRF or CSV. it really isn't, doffs have been a part of the game long enough that everyone should have stopped treating them like some outsider piece of gear that shouldn't exist, and that everything was so much better before they existed.
even on AtB tac COM ships, they all still need to compete with the bug, with its superior turn rate, shield mod, hull hitpoints, and impulse modifier. AtB is never going to improve these factors on your ship, and these are the most important. its not like the bug cant cycle tac skills just as well, infact better then AtB ships, with its COM and LTC tac, it can run every tac skill it needs at full uptime too. not 2 AtB 'full up time', that is always going to be a second or 2 off, or have phantom seconds added to skill cooldonws for some mysterious reason after their cool down reaches 0. or the up time you get with 1 AtB, which is always at LEAST 5 seconds more then global on short cooldown skills, and only full uptime on 45 second or more cooldown skills. also, running AtB with AtD will gut AtD potential to improve your movement and turn rate, further distancing you from non AtB escort mobility potential. the bug needs at least 7 doffs to break even with AtB? lets say it got all those doffs, it would be back at the top were it was, with that old, huge gap it had between the second best choice. the fact that the gap is so much smaller, means its all closer to balanced, a good thing. more armchair pro, on paper thinking, instead of practical, in reality thinking.
then there's the scimitar, or sure, you can AtB it too, but its not like its not an OP ship if you do that or not. the more dangerous ones ive encountered dont run it at all. being a warbird that with the right boffs can cloak every 10-12 seconds, what need is there for global uptime on any skill really? you will get a lot more out of that ambush damage bonus if you use it as often as possible.
oh hail the original! back then there was a real trinity, balance was truly possible! don't kid yourself, if you thought there was a stanch trinity back in the day, you were fooled. station powers of healing, attack buff, resistance debuff and control are scattered haphazardly across all 3 ability types, and assigned names that make you think they are right were they belong, regardless of what they do.
healing didn't all end up in eng, offense didn't all end up in tac, and debuff and control didn't all end up in sci. its why station setups like the galaxy R have DON'T WORK, everyone that sais the galaxy R is some super tank, is one of those people i mentioned that has been fooled.
you got APB and target subsystem debuffs in tac, DEM and EPtW damage buffs in eng, TSS, HE, ST, AND PH heals and resists in sci, FBP and TBR damage dealing in sci, BP and AB debuffs in eng, and APD and TT defensive skills in tac.
trinity, ha. there are 3 ship types, and 3 station types, so it was assumed it was built on the old, outdated trinity concept, this is not the case. this means cruisers aren't supposed to only be a tank, escorts not only be dps, and sci not only control. you actually have the best heals in sci, marginalizing cruiser impotence when you factor in their turn rate and movement speed. it was only much later when there were cruiser and COM eng carriers that could slot as much sci as eng that there were good cruiser healers. in the mean time, if you tried to make cruisers deal damage, the haphazard allotment of abilities in the 3 station types and the mobility disadvantages built into the cruiser chassis left you with a woeful underpowered platform.
when AtB got put on the ATD/AtS cooldown system, and completely unintentionally, totally by accident, it improved balance across the board considerably. there were things like the ody and recluse on 1 hand, and tac heavy cruiser that could put out DPS and didnt have the glass jaw anymore. and since then, a slew of escorts with inferior mobility and raw stats to the bug that can use it too.
a fix is not needed, just like it was not needed on the bio torp, the one torp that was buffed, intentionally or not, to be balanced with energy weapon spike options. to do away with tech doffs would be a balance disaster, and the biggest nerf to the most things, ever. you would be a fool to fly anything but the following ships (not counting warbird, that have never needed uptime thanks to their battlecloak)
everything else would effectively be a tier lower in effectiveness in their various roles, and crushed in pvp. note that there are no tac cruiser, at all. only LTC/ENS tac cruisers could still put up most of the DPS they used to have, but they would have half their survivability.
If you want to center on damage, fly an escort or be okay with being outgunned by a class of ships that are DESIGNED to do the most damage. Escorts are also DESIGNED to be faster than cruisers, so an average cruiser should not be able to keep up with the speed of an average escort with one skill. Glossing over that so casually is alarming, especially when a ship with 125 shield power is also now speed tanking like the faster escorts around all the while FAWing away with max weapon power as well.
It makes perfect sense that a cruiser (even these tac-oriented cruisers), can't have the same amount of tac power uptime. A bugship should always have better access to tac abilities over any cruiser, no matter what you call it. They are after all, ESCORTS, not 'tac CRUISERS'.
This is amounting to "I want to be able to fly whatever ship I want in whatever role I want and have it be just as good as the specialized ships in their specialized roles." Is this the balance you're after that A2B has provided?
As for those skills listed previously, you mentioned them as being used a lot and therefore jokingly needing some sort of nerf nerf nerf. I explained how those skills are nowhere near the cornerstone of builds that A2B has become. After all, ever heard of the "EPtE Defiant?" Of course not, but what you have heard a million times is the "A2B <insert cruiser and now escort name here>."
Finally, aren't we all armchair pros? You know, this being a computer game and all.
Ok, you keep harping on the DPS aspect, ignoring the fact that escorts are approaching, and in some cases surpassing, cruiser toughness.
So what you are saying is that it's OK for tacscorts to have incredible survivability, rivaling cruisers, but it's not OK for cruisers to approach escort DPS?
You are, as DDIS said, applying a double standard.
DDIS has said it perfectly (metaphorically, in the literal sense his grammar is... less than perfect ). If you can't see what a2b has accomplished, namely once again providing a real use for tac cruisers for less than completely 1337 players after reading his epic wall'o'text, there isn't a point to any further debate.
My guess is "hope" keeps people not playing but posting on the forums. For others, its a path of sad realization and closure. Grieving takes time. The worst "haters" here love the game, or did at some point.
Ship class balance has been better than it has been for a long time. People scream about A2B...but all the top-performing ships don't use it. Nobody says "Escorts Online" anymore.
perhaps i didn't go into it enough that escort speed and mobility, basicly running the same number and levels of heals tac cruisers have, plus the mountain of proc heal creep have made escorts match and often surpass even modern AtB tac cruiser survivability, even if they dont run AtB themselves. only sci debuffs can really put an end to them. the tankiest tactical focus ship right now? most certainly the patrol refit, second place hunter. nether are tac cruisers.
even the fastest cruisers cant outrun escorts, they have an inferior impulse mod, its just math. they don't have the option of choosing when not to get shot, like an escort does. this is why pre AtB cruisers were so underpowered, a fraction of the firepower, basically the same number of heals, with none of the speed.
post AtB, cruisers have superior DPS, but its less effective then escort spike, and their ability to out heal damage somewhat makes up for their lack of ability to chose not to be shot, cause they are still damn slow even with EPtE.
Ok, you keep harping on the DPS aspect, ignoring the fact that escorts are approaching, and in some cases surpassing, cruiser toughness.
The topic DDIS raised more than once was damage, and how escorts were the only ships that could provide top of the line damage, (as they should...being escorts and all). That is why I discussed it several times. As for escort survivability, yeah it can get really good with speed tanking and such, but once you get slowed or worse stopped, game over. Now if you're pugging, you had better hope there is someone throwing team heals around because if you get concentrated and can't get out, again, game over. Even the best escort pilots in the game can't tank everything on their own, and team heals are often overlooked or confused with that one single person just being somehow invincible in his OP bugship.
So what you are saying is that it's OK for tacscorts to have incredible survivability, rivaling cruisers, but it's not OK for cruisers to approach escort DPS?
You are, as DDIS said, applying a double standard.
Not at all, I agree there should be better engineering options for boffs, but having one skill that can solve all the problems? If the devs ever do something about A2B, I really hope they actually add other eng boff skills to put more options out there. One skill solving all the problems isn't right, so somehow splitting it up could be a route to explore, but who knows. By the way, cruiser DPS has already 'approached' escort DPS and passed it. In PvP most of it ends up being worthless because people don't know how to use FAW, but some do, and then it creates huge issues and goes well beyond what escorts could ever do. As for PvE, how many people x-ing up in 30k for STFs are running cannon escorts...<cricket>. FAW ftw, and normally on these tac cruisers that have already graduated BEYOND A2B.
Hell, just recently there was a build posted for a SCIENCE ODYSSEY with NO A2B that could out DPS escorts AND survive, but here we are arguing if tac cruisers could be viable without A2B. It is viable and being done, but it's not cookie cutter and easily copy+paste, so we don't consider it.
DDIS has said it perfectly (metaphorically, in the literal sense his grammar is... less than perfect ). If you can't see what a2b has accomplished, namely once again providing a real use for tac cruisers for less than completely 1337 players after reading his epic wall'o'text, there isn't a point to any further debate.
I have seen what it's done, it's created the perfect Kirk's Paradise ship that takes cruisers into areas they shouldn't have been so dominant. This tac cruiser invention was meant to be a bridge between escorts and cruisers, not put cruisers on par or above escorts, (as far as speed and damage).
oh god, thats hilarious, the joke builds those pve'ers come up with are adorable, id love to see him try to pvp in that. if you think thats ligit you have a lot to learn about the meta and how things actually work in pvp before you keep trying to argue
oh and if you want to kill things fastest in pve? you get ether a sci destroyer, dhlean, or elachi escort, 2 AtB it, equip GW, CSV and TS3 and watch every npc on your screen die in about 3 to 10 seconds. LOL FAW, LOL DEEPS
I have seen what it's done, it's created the perfect Kirk's Paradise ship that takes cruisers into areas they shouldn't have been so dominant. This tac cruiser invention was meant to be a bridge between escorts and cruisers, not put cruisers on par or above escorts, (as far as speed and damage).
the only thing cruiser do better then escorts, even with all the AtB, is tank an elachi DBB proc BO3 crit. super leet cruiser DPS is not the magic i win button in pvp that it is in pve, HPS and resist levels are so much stronger then any slow and even DPS cruisers can make. you have to deal your damage in a window to short to react too, cruisers cant touch that kind of damage like escorts and warbirds can. that is why AtB really CANT be op, ever
Comments
No, you cannot activate aux2batt if aux is at 0 (by 0, I mean offline). You also cannot activate any other aux based abilities (HE, aux2struc, TSS, etc). This is the drawback for using it. From personal experience, its actually possible to overuse it, and knock it offline yourself. Yes, you can restore it with eptaux, but then that costs you the ability to use other ep abilities, like shields and weapons. If your weapons or shields are knocked offline, aux2batt doesn't restore these.
I'm sorry ... "destroy your skills" ? "too automatic" ??
This ... coming from the keybind paradise that made STO "spacebar online" ?
As to A2B ... -- players were crying for ever to make beam boats more powerful .
Then we got A2B .
Now that's a "problem" , because not only beam boats can make use of it ?
Am I missing something ?
'Cuz if I'm not then you'll end up either asking for a nerf to beam boats , or doffs specific to careers , or some other crazy thing .
A2B is not what is wrong with PVP .
A list as long as my arm is what is wrong with PVP , and it seems that everyone has one list or another in this sense , but the funny thing is that not all lists are the same .
i believe it would fix atb and some extreme builds. i.e. vapers can't stack those tt and\or battery doffs. who knows what healers are stacking these days 0o
my 2 credits
COM tac ships that can also use it may be problematic, but the highest turn rate AtB escort out there is the hunter, with 17. in the escort game its positioning, speed and timing that gets kills, and all 3 depend on turn rate and impulse mod a hell of a lot more then they do cycling. that's why the bug is still used so much, still nothing has a collection of stats that are so high in the areas of performance that REALLY mater. they got the uptime on tac skills with their 2 copies of everything they need from the COM and LTC tac, and the healing disadvantage it has to AtB escorts is covered totally by cross healing.
AtB real only is a quality of puging life enhancer more then anything. you can keep the tac up time, but also cover a ton of healing on your own, especially after the team skill system cooldowns were removed. what team is going to win though, the one with a bunch of self sufficient to a point AtB ships, or the one with a real healer backing up bugs that fly circles around all other escorts? we have all pvped enough to know its the latter.
ships like the patrol refit are really powerful and AtB ready, but its still only got a 16 base turn, and only room for 3 turn consoles. it and all the other AtB escorts all have a hard time getting time on target vs well flown bugs, so its vastly better time on target, vs higher healing skill uptime when these 2 things find them selves locked in a duel.
if these escorts didnt have AtB, they would be completely uncompetitive. look at the andorian escort, with its 5 forward weapons. why isnt it the escort king instead of the bug? turn rate and a pedestrian impulse mod near as i can tell, and these ships would be in the boat, and only have 4 forward weapons.
this AtB hater camp apparently cant perceive what so ever whats really causing them to die. AtB is super easy to blame though, it completely changes how you set up your ship, it must be the problem!
i gotta disagree. they can be competitive, even the kumari. only scort i not could get much use off nowadays has been the mvae. i though know that people who are out for speed-tanking can get a lot of use out of it (i'm really not one of em
are there better scorts? of course. are all scorts which has been let behind uncompetitive? imo they're not (it always depends on)
@all:
plz remember the purpose of this thread and keep it constructive (if it matters in the end or not). any of u is free to start threads like "stop a2b witch-hunting", "the great a2b discussion thread", etc...
whatever ones prob is with a2b, what matters in the end is that the devs seem to be not satisfied with the state of a2b. will something happen on it cause of that? most probably not. if something will happen, will it be what most of us wanted? most probably not.
but indeed that doesn't matter at all in this thread. it's about possible changes people can see, derivating from what they think about a2b themselves. no matter if lover or hater.
in conclusion one could say that for people who are fine allover with a2b in it's current state this is the wrong thread.
thx for understanding
no:)
From someone who puts his gateway links in the signature, it's pretty easy to figure out why you don't want A2B to be changed. You apparently don't bother much with builds that don't use it anymore.
Having all those varieties of builds, but all using at least one copy of A2B? What does that really tell us?
i lol'd...
...dear mate(s):
i started only one other thread after it just has been enough to me and in which i almost-quick edited my entry-rage-post.
i then invited anyone to drop opinions and people did. i got my opinion on the topic u got urs. that's totally fine. and if i'm blind, well what gives? i'm just human as any other poster in here, with everything attached to it, even the right to blindness. in the end u can't be sure to not be the blind as well i guess
i have no prob with u or the fact u have no prob with a2b.
of course there are a lot of other probs ingame and of course everyone got his own ranking of things to fix/alter/buf/nerf/whatever...
the title regards directly to what a dev posted. that has been the only relation i got in mind when naming it (and did that in manner of a wanted poster, as i felt that it fit the dev-comment). of course i got my own opinion, but that hasn't been the root of the name (like to read in the op).
and btw:
right before geek closed that other thead cause of certain people derailing it and hating on others in there, i did reflect my opinion on a2b again. and right before i wanted to post that i gonna oversleep my opinion it got closed (believe it or not).
however i came to the same conclusion for myself and then read the dev-comment. again: this thread hasn't been intended for a2b-hating or liking, it's intended to raise ideas and to provide a thread under the flag that dev raised (note: he didn't say it's broken). if it hasn't been me it would have been someone else.
i also got a opinion (i already stated somewhere) on attack-cruisers without a2b btw, but i won't drop it in here. it just not belongs here
i would please u to now get civil on those pixels and on me. as i said, feel free to open a discussion thread. i already did and u know what happened to that and why.
edit:
i won't reply any further to off-topics in here, plz understand. if you're not for starting a pure discussion-thread, feel free to "forum-mail-bomb" me
how would it nerf beam boats? Your FAW isn't on global all the times? Poor boy...
Note how I said "double AtB", not "any form of AtB usage". But probably you don't know any other Auxiliary to X power.
There are no skills behind DOUBLE AtB. Perfect 10 seconds uptime/shared, no need of timing it. If they'd do anything to AtB to me it should be to restrict it to ships with a Commander Engineering, only one copy allowed.
No skill eh?
I'll give it to you the skills that are on the rotation are no skills but there's still the ones that are not...plus pilot skills, plus timing skills, plus situational awareness.
Pvp isn't just about activating abilities...and I know you know that
My PvE/PvP hybrid skill tree
whatever you do, dont look at my pvp help thread thats still stickied :rolleyes: what you see should tell you that for the moment my characters are using ships that AtB builds work well on. and i mostly pug, and like i said AtB builds are pug friendly because they can be so self sufficient. im not into using sci ships and have no sci captains, not into playing heal cruisers, and i don't have any bug ships, so ya my ships use AtB on various levles.
i was literally the first person to run and talk about 2 AtB builds the day the vet ship and the AtB change went live, ive got more hand on experience with it then anyone, i know what im talking about.
as for my integrity you so casually attack, im not going to lie and claim something is OP when it isn't, i have ALWAYS called out things that were, even when i use them, and defend things that are underpowered, even if i don't use them, because someone is using them, and it effects us all.
with this logic, everyone that uses 2 copies of CRF or APO on non AtB ships is just as bad. get more creative drivel please.
Let's say, we have an Avenger and a Patrol, with LtComm uni for engi.
Avenger might do:
ET1/ATB1/EPTS3/DEM3
EPTE1/ATD1
what 95% of patrol's captains would do:
ET1/ATB1/EPTS3
EPTE1/ATD1/DEM2
retains a Commander tactical.
You just got fast turning Avenger. I seldom envy bug pilots. Despite their turn rate, they still go for the classic escort layout.
We need to think about what aux power should power and take that stuff away for running power levels below 25 points.
Take resistance if you based it off of aux power it would penalize the players running it.
Transporters should run off aux levels, take the immunity and clearing of transporters and the clearing of boarding party away from TT.
While I support keeping the current system there is no penalty for running it. I support -20% to targeting and base damage resistance of abilities and consoles off aux power levels.
@people obviously trying to get this thread locked...seriously, grow up...there's nothing wrong with discussing a power.
Congrats, you still have threads with good advice and tips stickied. Thank you for that great piece of work, but that's not what is in question.
So A2B is better than any other option for those builds? You don't want to use another option because? You picked those ships so they could use A2B? My point is right now, in the midst of this A2B madness, all your ships are running at least one copy. So it's no wonder why you don't want it messed with, you're currently using it.
So A2B is the Kirk-pilot's answer, I don't think that was even up for debate.
So everything outside of healers, gankers, and bugships needs A2B "on some level" now? Are you serious?
A round of applause please, the 'first' ever user of A2B has entered the room. A few years, an expansion, and more nerfs/buffs/new gear than we can count in one night later...A2B is now everywhere being used in ways he who unhinged it from EPtX skills never probably thought of, it's becoming THE build for every ship that can fit two Lt Eng abilities, and boosting anything with a Lt Eng apparently. You're right though, when a vast majority of the player base is using something without question, it's never because it dwarfs so many other builds in the Kirk-pilot paradise.
Why were you so upset when they FIXED the Undine Rep torp and brought it back down the number of torps it was supposed to fire in the first place? Once again because you were using it and loved the extra damage? Somehow forgot how to use other viable torpedo options while claiming it was the only one worth using?
Let's look back here
Maintenance Notes Comment
Other Comments
Normally I don't link to previous posts, but your insistence on what you've done in the past justifying your comments on current game issues brought me to do so.
It's empirically a fact that Tech Doffs (even many single build options) offers near N-1 Boff uptime allowing for a broader set of Boff abilitiess w/much more effectiveness then not. Even before the decoupling of Aux2batt and EPtX single Aux2batt builds were effective and used/abused. Around this time Raiders were a major liability in the queues w/the Broken Pet TBs and massive Phasor Proc Spam. More and more KDF migrated to Cruisers/Carriers.
That said, I also know Aux2batt wasn't needed to buff Fleet BCs nor Vet ships when they came out. When those came out most players were around T2 of the Rep system which jacked up their CritH rates for CVS builds. Cannon cruisers ruled the day for a reason and it wasn't Aux2batt. All Aux2batt builds did was shorten the cooldowns but that didn't matter so much when the team was wiped and respawning. BCs/even Karfi had enough tank that Tac boosted CVS w/2 or 3 others would wipe the other side (in particular in PuG matches).
The reality is Tech Doffs have been out of balance for a long time. But, they're not the only Doffs that have this problem (this # is continuing to grow) and it's not going to be addressed. My personal opinion is Heretic and our "PvP Dev saw the writing on the wall (or more likely were flat out told) what was coming and they left.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
this is the AtB double stranded. why does everyone use CRF with cannons? why does everyone use FAW with beam arrays? because its simply the best fit. AtB for tac cruisers and several COM tac ships now, is the best fit for them too. and yes im serious, without it the only escort worth using again would be the bug, the best tac cruisers would be the team's glass jaw, and in that vacuum uber healers and sci ships would run the game even more then they do now.
everyone uses EPtS! EPtE! APO! CRF! RSP! its all op! its become THE build for every ship! nerf! nerf! nerf! nerf everything until we are as complex as NPCs!
what a lovely example. the bio torp and AtB have a lot in common, both were the perfect solution to 2 underpowered problems. the bio torp with spread was the first torp powerful enough that a combined energy torp build wasn't rainbow tier bad. it was such anomaly, surrounded by its underpowered peers, that it must be nerfed! sound familiar? the nerfing of the bio torp remains a tragedy, and praying to the RNG gods for HY crit was no replacement for its spread performance. your much beter off not waiting a weapon slot for it, and 2 more for the proton weapon and grav torp, and putting a DBB and turrets back on. all energy, all the time! such an improvement, status quo fo life. :rolleyes:
avenger has 5/3 weapons. that's its edge. put 5 DHCs on it some time, it can be shockingly effective
I do that already.
However, it still has 4 tactical consoles instead of the Tempest.
It being the absolute best fit is the problem. Where are the contending builds other people can choose from? Oh that's right, it takes skill and competence to run (ask Sarcasmdetector). A cruiser build that rivals or is better than one with A2B can't just be copied and pasted from the skill planner and ran with little to no explanation. Heaven forbid.
Yep, because those listed there put max power in 3/4 subsystems and can reduce all other cooldowns to global. Great comparison. All those listed require their own individual doffs to reduce cooldown (obviously EPtS and EPtE are the same DCE) and even then some are just a chance. If you want all those to be at global you would need at least 7 doffs, and even then it can't be done for all (RSP), and the EPtX and CRF are only a chance not a guarantee.
Again the Bio Torp was a fix, not a nerf, as it was never intended to fire EXTRA torpedoes with TS2 and TS3. Also I don't see a problem with needing a crit on HY. Why should firing a HY3 guarantee a massive crit hit? Isn't that why we have crit chance/severity in the first place? Build for it and roll the dice like every other weapon/buff combo. There are still plenty of other torpedo options that do work, such as Quantum Mk XI CrtDx3. I used those on my vaper for the longest time with great success, didn't even pay for the Mk XII. The undine torp with HY3 is still awesome, especially when it crits. There have been so many boosts to Photon Torpedoes lately how you can you find something that works? So sorry you don't get guaranteed massive unintended extra damage on a TS3 that for some reason never misses.
before it, only escorts could effectively deal damage, and thanks to imbalanced things like the borg set back when the console was a part, combined with their speed and defense score, they stopped being nearly the glass cannons they should have been. by comparison, the excelsior had lower end tac skills, bad uptime on any tac skill it could slot until doffs were first added, and none of the speed that's such a big part of escort survival. when the change happened that allowed you to run 2 different EPTX skills and AtB, a tac cruiser could pretty much have the tac skill uptime an escort had, but at inferior ability levels, and with uptime improved on healing and defense, sort of break even with the benefits of escort speed.
what AtB does on paper, and what all the armchair pros that hate it fail to realize, is not as important as what it does in the context of ship class balance. it brought parity between the escort and tac cruiser. didn't make 1 replace the other, nether can deal damage in the same style better then the other, they are different but some what equal. it is not a problem that every tac cruiser is better off with AtB builds, just like it is not a problem that every ships that uses cannons should be slotting CRF or CSV. it really isn't, doffs have been a part of the game long enough that everyone should have stopped treating them like some outsider piece of gear that shouldn't exist, and that everything was so much better before they existed.
even on AtB tac COM ships, they all still need to compete with the bug, with its superior turn rate, shield mod, hull hitpoints, and impulse modifier. AtB is never going to improve these factors on your ship, and these are the most important. its not like the bug cant cycle tac skills just as well, infact better then AtB ships, with its COM and LTC tac, it can run every tac skill it needs at full uptime too. not 2 AtB 'full up time', that is always going to be a second or 2 off, or have phantom seconds added to skill cooldonws for some mysterious reason after their cool down reaches 0. or the up time you get with 1 AtB, which is always at LEAST 5 seconds more then global on short cooldown skills, and only full uptime on 45 second or more cooldown skills. also, running AtB with AtD will gut AtD potential to improve your movement and turn rate, further distancing you from non AtB escort mobility potential. the bug needs at least 7 doffs to break even with AtB? lets say it got all those doffs, it would be back at the top were it was, with that old, huge gap it had between the second best choice. the fact that the gap is so much smaller, means its all closer to balanced, a good thing. more armchair pro, on paper thinking, instead of practical, in reality thinking.
then there's the scimitar, or sure, you can AtB it too, but its not like its not an OP ship if you do that or not. the more dangerous ones ive encountered dont run it at all. being a warbird that with the right boffs can cloak every 10-12 seconds, what need is there for global uptime on any skill really? you will get a lot more out of that ambush damage bonus if you use it as often as possible.
oh hail the original! back then there was a real trinity, balance was truly possible! don't kid yourself, if you thought there was a stanch trinity back in the day, you were fooled. station powers of healing, attack buff, resistance debuff and control are scattered haphazardly across all 3 ability types, and assigned names that make you think they are right were they belong, regardless of what they do.
healing didn't all end up in eng, offense didn't all end up in tac, and debuff and control didn't all end up in sci. its why station setups like the galaxy R have DON'T WORK, everyone that sais the galaxy R is some super tank, is one of those people i mentioned that has been fooled.
you got APB and target subsystem debuffs in tac, DEM and EPtW damage buffs in eng, TSS, HE, ST, AND PH heals and resists in sci, FBP and TBR damage dealing in sci, BP and AB debuffs in eng, and APD and TT defensive skills in tac.
trinity, ha. there are 3 ship types, and 3 station types, so it was assumed it was built on the old, outdated trinity concept, this is not the case. this means cruisers aren't supposed to only be a tank, escorts not only be dps, and sci not only control. you actually have the best heals in sci, marginalizing cruiser impotence when you factor in their turn rate and movement speed. it was only much later when there were cruiser and COM eng carriers that could slot as much sci as eng that there were good cruiser healers. in the mean time, if you tried to make cruisers deal damage, the haphazard allotment of abilities in the 3 station types and the mobility disadvantages built into the cruiser chassis left you with a woeful underpowered platform.
when AtB got put on the ATD/AtS cooldown system, and completely unintentionally, totally by accident, it improved balance across the board considerably. there were things like the ody and recluse on 1 hand, and tac heavy cruiser that could put out DPS and didnt have the glass jaw anymore. and since then, a slew of escorts with inferior mobility and raw stats to the bug that can use it too.
a fix is not needed, just like it was not needed on the bio torp, the one torp that was buffed, intentionally or not, to be balanced with energy weapon spike options. to do away with tech doffs would be a balance disaster, and the biggest nerf to the most things, ever. you would be a fool to fly anything but the following ships (not counting warbird, that have never needed uptime thanks to their battlecloak)
-bug
-maybe hunter
-odyssey/bulwark
-maybe bastion
-adapted cruiser
-recluse
-wells
-vesta
-palisade
everything else would effectively be a tier lower in effectiveness in their various roles, and crushed in pvp. note that there are no tac cruiser, at all. only LTC/ENS tac cruisers could still put up most of the DPS they used to have, but they would have half their survivability.
If you want to center on damage, fly an escort or be okay with being outgunned by a class of ships that are DESIGNED to do the most damage. Escorts are also DESIGNED to be faster than cruisers, so an average cruiser should not be able to keep up with the speed of an average escort with one skill. Glossing over that so casually is alarming, especially when a ship with 125 shield power is also now speed tanking like the faster escorts around all the while FAWing away with max weapon power as well.
It makes perfect sense that a cruiser (even these tac-oriented cruisers), can't have the same amount of tac power uptime. A bugship should always have better access to tac abilities over any cruiser, no matter what you call it. They are after all, ESCORTS, not 'tac CRUISERS'.
This is amounting to "I want to be able to fly whatever ship I want in whatever role I want and have it be just as good as the specialized ships in their specialized roles." Is this the balance you're after that A2B has provided?
As for those skills listed previously, you mentioned them as being used a lot and therefore jokingly needing some sort of nerf nerf nerf. I explained how those skills are nowhere near the cornerstone of builds that A2B has become. After all, ever heard of the "EPtE Defiant?" Of course not, but what you have heard a million times is the "A2B <insert cruiser and now escort name here>."
Finally, aren't we all armchair pros? You know, this being a computer game and all.
Ok, you keep harping on the DPS aspect, ignoring the fact that escorts are approaching, and in some cases surpassing, cruiser toughness.
So what you are saying is that it's OK for tacscorts to have incredible survivability, rivaling cruisers, but it's not OK for cruisers to approach escort DPS?
You are, as DDIS said, applying a double standard.
DDIS has said it perfectly (metaphorically, in the literal sense his grammar is... less than perfect
Cheers.
Now...about those Science Ships.
even the fastest cruisers cant outrun escorts, they have an inferior impulse mod, its just math. they don't have the option of choosing when not to get shot, like an escort does. this is why pre AtB cruisers were so underpowered, a fraction of the firepower, basically the same number of heals, with none of the speed.
post AtB, cruisers have superior DPS, but its less effective then escort spike, and their ability to out heal damage somewhat makes up for their lack of ability to chose not to be shot, cause they are still damn slow even with EPtE.
The topic DDIS raised more than once was damage, and how escorts were the only ships that could provide top of the line damage, (as they should...being escorts and all). That is why I discussed it several times. As for escort survivability, yeah it can get really good with speed tanking and such, but once you get slowed or worse stopped, game over. Now if you're pugging, you had better hope there is someone throwing team heals around because if you get concentrated and can't get out, again, game over. Even the best escort pilots in the game can't tank everything on their own, and team heals are often overlooked or confused with that one single person just being somehow invincible in his OP bugship.
Not at all, I agree there should be better engineering options for boffs, but having one skill that can solve all the problems? If the devs ever do something about A2B, I really hope they actually add other eng boff skills to put more options out there. One skill solving all the problems isn't right, so somehow splitting it up could be a route to explore, but who knows. By the way, cruiser DPS has already 'approached' escort DPS and passed it. In PvP most of it ends up being worthless because people don't know how to use FAW, but some do, and then it creates huge issues and goes well beyond what escorts could ever do. As for PvE, how many people x-ing up in 30k for STFs are running cannon escorts...<cricket>. FAW ftw, and normally on these tac cruisers that have already graduated BEYOND A2B.
Hell, just recently there was a build posted for a SCIENCE ODYSSEY with NO A2B that could out DPS escorts AND survive, but here we are arguing if tac cruisers could be viable without A2B. It is viable and being done, but it's not cookie cutter and easily copy+paste, so we don't consider it.
OMG IT DOESN'T HAVE A2B
I have seen what it's done, it's created the perfect Kirk's Paradise ship that takes cruisers into areas they shouldn't have been so dominant. This tac cruiser invention was meant to be a bridge between escorts and cruisers, not put cruisers on par or above escorts, (as far as speed and damage).
oh god, thats hilarious, the joke builds those pve'ers come up with are adorable, id love to see him try to pvp in that. if you think thats ligit you have a lot to learn about the meta and how things actually work in pvp before you keep trying to argue
oh and if you want to kill things fastest in pve? you get ether a sci destroyer, dhlean, or elachi escort, 2 AtB it, equip GW, CSV and TS3 and watch every npc on your screen die in about 3 to 10 seconds. LOL FAW, LOL DEEPS
the only thing cruiser do better then escorts, even with all the AtB, is tank an elachi DBB proc BO3 crit. super leet cruiser DPS is not the magic i win button in pvp that it is in pve, HPS and resist levels are so much stronger then any slow and even DPS cruisers can make. you have to deal your damage in a window to short to react too, cruisers cant touch that kind of damage like escorts and warbirds can. that is why AtB really CANT be op, ever