I think what is likely to happen is that there will be some new aura for cruisers, the second deflector will be T-6 and not retro, and T-6 escorts will have a fixed aft weapon.
if T-6 goes to more than 8 weapon hardpoints then there is no way a t5 ship can be competitive, especially sci ships
The devs actually implied that Tier 6 ships might happen over 1.5 years ago with the December 2012 Ask Cryptic question about Typhoons.
"Q: (cylon74656) Will the Steamrunner Class be available for those of us who dont play through Steam? And also, when will we see the Typhoon Class playable in-game?
Dstahl: The Steamrunner Class is a Steam exclusive, so it will not be available in the C-Store. However, you do not need to play through Steam in order to purchase this item. If you have a Steam Account you can purchase the item through Steam and claim it in game without needing to play STO through the Steam client.
The Typhoon Class is a dreadnaught that will most likely not appear as a playable ship until we increase the skill point cap to full Admiral. Even then, we havent yet decided if this will be a player ship, but we can be convinced to make it so if there is enough support for it."
If the devs were going to release this ship as a Tier 5 ship, then why wait for us becoming Admirals? No Tier 6 ships is just like the standard dev response that the game won't go F2P that we heard 3 years ago.
Has anyone made a new Hitler video for the T6 rage yet? Cant wait to watch that.
Seriously though, if you arent PvPing, and hardly any of us do, then not upgrading your T5 ships isnt going to be that big a deal. I seriously doubt I'll feel compelled to upgrade my Vesta bundle ships or Fleet Sovereign/Regent. Theres nothing going on in STO that compels us to keep up with the Jones' on a weekly basis. This universe doesnt change. If me and my crew take multi month vacations on Risa, the galaxy doesnt even miss us. Maybe I'll blow up one or two more times in group PvE queue missions, but so what. Theres no way Cryptic is going to upgrade every mission so that it feels like a T1 ship in an STF. That WOULD drive 95% of the playerbase away. As long as you arent some captain who HAS to be seen in the Ferrari class starships, T6 will barely effect you. If a few T6s show up in group PvE, great, more help, and I didnt spend another dime.
Since theres no form of territory control in this game I feel compelled to be a part of on a weekly basis, then theres no REAL hook to buying T6 ships other than ship vanity. I only bought my 3 Vestas because I loved the design. So far new Fed ships are BUTT UGLY, so THAT sure wont tempt me.
STO: @AGNT009 Since Dec 2010
Capt. Will Conquest of the U.S.S. Crusader
All I know is that I already paid real money for top-tier ships, and I will not be re-buying my stable. If the top-tier ships that I already paid money for do not remain top-tier, I'm afraid that's me out. It doesn't sit well enough with me for them to be 'upgradeable' to some extent to remain somewhat viable or competitive.
I paid for top-tier, not ships that will one day be superseded, but rather ships that will always, through some contrived means, stay at the top of the food chain among an ever-expanding number of top-tier ships. T5.5 simply isn't good enough.
For a ship that costs real money, t5.5 is garbage; fleet ships and ships that cost real money are not disposable, and need a bump up to full-fledged t6. I will not be burning more money on more ships, especially not if they will once again some day be superseded by more ships I will then be expected to buy. Nothing doing.
I will be watching intently in the coming weeks to see what is to be done about the transition from tier 5 to tier 6, but I hesitate to hope for satisfaction.
I always expected my T5 ships to become outdated someday, which is why I don't spend real money on ships. Vice Admiral was never intended to be the final rank. It will be interesting to see how easy or hard it will be to upgrade T5 to T6. I'd like to keep at least a few of my ships around.
I am both excited about the LVL cap increase, but also saddened, I have flown my Excelsior for years and I don't want to lose her.
There is a huge gap between what is considered "competitive" and actually a viable endgame ship. For instance, you can use a captain lvl ship for a long time at endgame, even in STFs, but a fleet one is gonna be far better.
It is also quite irritating to have invested so much in buying T5 C-store ships & their fleet variants, for all 3 factions to now have those ships be obsolete. But I guess we roll with the punches around here.
As a matter of communication, it would have been better for Cryptic to not announce tier 6 separately from the upgrade process. Even if they announced the increase to Admiral, mentioning tier6 later would've been a surprise, with the necessary data. Even if people were speculating it would've been better than this.
I'm sure that Cryptic is aware that at the moment their rep with the forum going player base is pretty low. It's poor communication kills moments like this that causes that.
There are major questions here that need to be answered sooner rather than later. Will this be zen thing, will it be dilithium, will it be something attained through leveling?
Will the upgrade system be just for players already at level 50? How will this affect new characters. New characters that come up will they get a free level 50 ship, and need zen for level 60? Or will they have to carry a Rear Admiral Ship all the way to the top?
==================
On another subject Where will Fleet ships fit into the new paradigm? Will there actually be Fleet Tier 6 ships? Or will all Fleet Ships be considered Tier 6/5.9?
I agree with the sentiment that the Flagship 3 should receive a first class upgrade to something that is a true tier 6 as they are spanking new top of the line boats.
True, those ships are one if not THE most important factor people start playing STO.
(after a while they realize they where misguided, but that's another topic IMO)
Cryptics new Generation of shipdesign must be more than awesome to outrank (visual) the beloved canon ships. If not, people will become even more frustrated and unhappy with the game. Power Creep alone won't work forever IMO.
Agreed completely.
The issue I've had with Cryptic ship design has been their resistance to streamlining. I"m looking at the Avenger here. Starship design in this era should not be in any way blocky, especially in the Federation. The Tempest though, that was good stuff. More ships in that vein and they could have something going there. I want more in the John Eaves Andrew Probert vein. Design influences from the Dauntless, things like that.
I wonder if they're gonna give us Species 116 contact and put the Dauntless in game?
Anyway, I know they've said they're going to go with more original in house designs, which is fine, but the in house designs have got to be absolutely stellar.
They could have mentioned new ships, shown new ships, etc, etc, etc...without mentioning T6 at all. Then drop the T6 info out in the blog, like you said.
Folks know there's power creep...we can look at the T5 ships to see that not all T5 ships are created anywhere near equal. So them kicking it up a notch for new T5 ships wouldn't have drawn the ire, eh? It's been a chronic thing, the creep, so folks have developed a tolerance for it over the years.
Could have gotten through the weekend...then gotten into the blogs when more information would have been available...and dropped the T6.
As is, they dropped out the T6...an acute change rather than the chronic change...and yeah, bam - what's going on is going on. Then again, aren't all of us forum folks supposedly just whiners anyway? If we're not fanbois tossing attaboys for every little thing, we're just crybabies to be ignored...meh.
You know this raises a salient point.
Most of the argument here is against the very concept of Tier 6.
Tier 5 vessels span from my free Assault cruiser all the way up to Odysseys, Avengers, Scimitars, Dyson Science Vessels, Kumaris, and Vestas.
My Regent is technically by most people's measure completely obsolete.
I actually read someone say that the Scimitar made the Oddy and Bort obsolete. The same thoughts were spoken by a few about the Undine Bioship.
What is it about this obsoleting of ships that makes it so much worse than all the other times ships have been rendered obsolete? When I first started playing two years ago, it was all about the Jem Hadar Attack Ship. People still shell out a mint over that ship. Nowadays it's Scimitars, Avengers, and bioships oh my.
Would all of this aggravation and threats of walking be occurring if these ships, whatever their stats and configurations had come out, and still been called Tier 5?
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
They will not be a separate class. There will be 3 classes of each new vessel so that cryptic can sell more ships.
Not to mention how stuck on trinity they are, despite how irrelevant that concept has been for the last 4 years now.
Your ship determines your role in battle, based on it's BoFF stations and your personal loadouts. NOTHING ABOUT YOUR PROFESSION REALLY MATTERS, EXCEPT THAT ENG SUCKS MORE THAN THE OTHERS.
They will not be a separate class. There will be 3 classes of each new vessel so that cryptic can sell more ships.
Not to mention how stuck on trinity they are, despite how irrelevant that concept has been for the last 4 years now.
Your ship determines your role in battle, based on it's BoFF stations and your personal loadouts. NOTHING ABOUT YOUR PROFESSION REALLY MATTERS, EXCEPT THAT ENG SUCKS MORE THAN THE OTHERS.
Sorry for caps, didn't want anyone to miss that.
As I interpreted the release it is in addition to new tier 6 vessels for the three established classes, there will be an additional entirely new ship type. Thus Tier 6 Escort, Science, cruiser, and [REDACTED].
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
I'm hoping that they will unveil some information about the T6 ships sooner rather than later. They've left a lot of questions unanswered, I think it would have been better to have dropped this gem closer to release, or alongside information about the new ships.
I'm hoping that they will unveil some information about the T6 ships sooner rather than later. They've left a lot of questions unanswered, I think it would have been better to have dropped this gem closer to release, or alongside information about the new ships.
Odds are we'll still have to wait 1-2 weeks for any info on any of the ships' stats. They may be kind and give us more angles of the new ships a little earlier, but i wouldn't hold my breath. :P
Support 90 degree arc limitation on BFaW! Save our ships from looking like flying disco balls of dumb!
What is it about this obsoleting of ships that makes it so much worse than all the other times ships have been rendered obsolete? When I first started playing two years ago, it was all about the Jem Hadar Attack Ship. People still shell out a mint over that ship. Nowadays it's Scimitars, Avengers, and bioships oh my.
Would all of this aggravation and threats of walking be occurring if these ships, whatever their stats and configurations had come out, and still been called Tier 5?
Yes. Why?
Because the majority of the hate is from people who confuse the term "obsolete" with the term "suboptimal".
There is a huge proportion of people in the game who are obsessed with trying to eek out every last DPS that can be had, and aren't happy if their ship does one less point than the current champ.
This is why FotM builds exist, this is why power creep is a problem, and this is why there's a giant-sized bucket of hate on the forums whenever Cryptic changes anything about how ships, their equipment, or their powers work.
OMG YOU LOST ME 0.06% OF MY "DEEPS"!
Getting lost in the noise is the point that even with a vanilla T5 ship like a Sovvy, you can load up on purple and violet Mk XII stuff and doffs and own any of the current content in record time.
This is about PvP, plain and simple. More specifically, it's likely about "vaping" someone or at least killing them faster then before.
Nothing will be "obsolete", but it may be "suboptimal".
Everyone wants to be king of the mountain, and they get irritated when an earthquake happens and builds a higher mountain.
It sounds like these new ships will be both never before seen and previously unplayable. And I don't have to discard any of my old faves if I don't like what comes out. I just hope Rivera knows that most of the players pick ships more because we like the look rather than their performance.
I'm actually more curious about what this 5.5 upgrade is. What does it change on our existing ships? More weapons/boff/console slots? Increased hull and shield stats? Better turn rates? I'd really like to know more about this.
I hope the devs thought long and hard about how their new Mk XIII items and new ships will effect the current dps race. I'm hoping that with these new installations, they'll be increasing the challenge of All npcs, and giving them new abilities that have to be overcome with strategy and tactics, rather than boosting dps as high as possible. I'd like to see all builds put at a slight disadvantage if they focus on only a single goal for their ship. Having to go in ready for anything would greatly increase not just the challenge of the game, but also the need for more cooperative play and teamwork.
Because the majority of the hate is from people who confuse the term "obsolete" with the term "suboptimal".
There is a huge proportion of people in the game who are obsessed with trying to eek out every last DPS that can be had, and aren't happy if their ship does one less point than the current champ.
This is why FotM builds exist, this is why power creep is a problem, and this is why there's a giant-sized bucket of hate on the forums whenever Cryptic changes anything about how ships, their equipment, or their powers work.
OMG YOU LOST ME 0.06% OF MY "DEEPS"!
Getting lost in the noise is the point that even with a vanilla T5 ship like a Sovvy, you can load up on purple and violet Mk XII stuff and doffs and own any of the current content in record time.
At least one player on these forums has done DPS tests in ISE with a variety of ships and builds, slogging through with sub-20k on an RA Star Cruiser and over-40k with the leaderboard ships. Thats not a performance difference in the "suboptimal" range.
The gap is even more significant in PVP, some of the so-called end-game ships are simply incapable of competing when you have a kill-race, all they do is help the other side to win faster due to poor performance.
Major gaps in performance are a legitimiate concern. Attempts to diminish them are rooted in something other than legitimacy.
Not sure actually what to think about the whole Tier 6 thing as a separate class I mean sure it's a great idea because they need to balance the sheer power they gave Roms in the other two factions ships but at the same time they need to add skills to the other Tier 5.5 ships to make them unique. For instance remove the loads of items from the lobi store on some of them because they should have some of these items by default as powers anyway like the consoles for time for the temporal ships or the consoles for the saucer sep/lance for X. Some of these are just common sense, the Ablative generator for voyager should absolutely be a power not a console.
The thing I'm seeing is their old system is being stripped that's fine so long as they do a complete job of stripping away the old out of date system while producing the Tier 6 ships by also picking out the old and improving upon them.
Because the majority of the hate is from people who confuse the term "obsolete" with the term "suboptimal".
There is a huge proportion of people in the game who are obsessed with trying to eek out every last DPS that can be had, and aren't happy if their ship does one less point than the current champ.
This is why FotM builds exist, this is why power creep is a problem, and this is why there's a giant-sized bucket of hate on the forums whenever Cryptic changes anything about how ships, their equipment, or their powers work.
OMG YOU LOST ME 0.06% OF MY "DEEPS"!
Getting lost in the noise is the point that even with a vanilla T5 ship like a Sovvy, you can load up on purple and violet Mk XII stuff and doffs and own any of the current content in record time.
This is about PvP, plain and simple. More specifically, it's likely about "vaping" someone or at least killing them faster then before.
Nothing will be "obsolete", but it may be "suboptimal".
Everyone wants to be king of the mountain, and they get irritated when an earthquake happens and builds a higher mountain.
Lemme ask you this, how many times, inbetween leveling up, did you buy really expensive gear/ships? The likely answer: you didn't. And why not? Because you, like most ppl, probably waited for end-game level before getting the good stuff.
And now imagine this.... your end-level ships suddenly aren't end-level any more. THAT is what's it's all about. DPS only plays into it, insofar that it causes your ships to be suboptimal, as you call it. I daresay it's the monetary investment in lockbox/C-Store ships that most ppl are (pre-emptively) worried about losing.
There will be a (confirmed) upgrade-path. But the cost of it is still unknown. So, if it turns out to take. say, 4 ship modules per upgrade after all, many there be (including yours truly) who would consider their ships effectively obsoleted, after all.
Lemme ask you this, how many times, inbetween leveling up, did you buy really expensive gear/ships? The likely answer: you didn't. And why not? Because you, like most ppl, probably waited for end-game level before getting the good stuff.
And now imagine this.... your end-level ships suddenly aren't end-level any more. THAT is what's it's all about. DPS only plays into it, insofar that it causes your ships to be suboptimal, as you call it. I daresay it's the monetary investment in lockbox/C-Store ships that most ppl are (pre-emptively) worried about losing.
There will be a (confirmed) upgrade-path. But the cost of it is still unknown. So, if it turns out to take. say, 4 ship modules per upgrade after all, many there be (including yours truly) who would consider their ships effectively obsoleted, after all.
I understand that, fully, but it goes back to my original question.
This isn't the first time that end level ships have ceased to be THE end level.
Every other lockbox has obsoleted someone's ship or build. And the aforementioned five fore weapon ships. The Fleet T'Varo stealth super torpedo boats.
If these ships had all these new abilities and were tier 5, do you believe there be this much outcry?
And I agree, the method, cost, and extent of upgrading tier 5 ships for the new era will certainly make or break this transition.
"Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you-Ye are many they are few"
all this noise and you know in pve at most the difference is if die once or 3 times in a given mission.
in pvp the difference my be greater but I'm willing to but someone who has a clue with still do just fine in tier 5 ships.
for me in less we get a free one I'm not going to brother. and if we do get a free one I'll probably play with it see if I like it then go back to my old favorites.... except maybe on my fed I haven't found the right ship for him yet.
if I stop posting it doesn't make you right it. just means I don't have enough rum to continue interacting with you.
At least one player on these forums has done DPS tests in ISE with a variety of ships and builds, slogging through with sub-20k on an RA Star Cruiser and over-40k with the leaderboard ships. Thats not a performance difference in the "suboptimal" range.
And many of those tests in ISE are simply unrelated to any real-world performance issues in almost any other mission, end-game or other, in the game.
"Slogging" through a 20k DPS performance? What did it take...30% of the time available for the optional to complete it? That's not "obsolete", that's merely not a speed run.
"Obsolete" really means to be without function. You show me a ship that simply CAN'T complete an ISE run, and I'll agree it's obsolete. Since some people do that in T4 ships for a challenge, I'd say your argument is a bit off.
The gap is even more significant in PVP, some of the so-called end-game ships are simply incapable of competing when you have a kill-race, all they do is help the other side to win faster due to poor performance.
Hence my conclusion that this is about PvP. People have figured out how to take advantage of a few carelessly unclosed loopholes that allow for far greater DPS with a few builds than Cryptic originally intended.
Unfortunately, they have for whatever reason, pressure or lack of will and time, failed to close these loopholes and restore PvP back to the rock-scissors-paper game it's supposed to be, where skill and luck are just about the only determiners of who wins.
Major gaps in performance are a legitimiate concern. Attempts to diminish them are rooted in something other than legitimacy.
Major gaps in performance when a bare fraction of that performance is even needed in PvE is not a concern, it's an indicator of power creep.
The same thing in PvP is a concern, but half of that problem was created by PvPers screaming bloody murder over every change made. I for one wouldn't be surprised if Cryptic was a bit gun-shy about making any wholesale changes for that very reason.
As I said, PvP is the main reason for most of the hate. PvE, even elite content, doesn't require every erg of performance that can be wrung out of the most elite ship available. I doubt if the T6 elite endgame content will be that much different.
This is about an obsession with the best, strongest, and shiniest. Nothing more.
Comments
if T-6 goes to more than 8 weapon hardpoints then there is no way a t5 ship can be competitive, especially sci ships
"Q: (cylon74656) Will the Steamrunner Class be available for those of us who dont play through Steam? And also, when will we see the Typhoon Class playable in-game?
Dstahl: The Steamrunner Class is a Steam exclusive, so it will not be available in the C-Store. However, you do not need to play through Steam in order to purchase this item. If you have a Steam Account you can purchase the item through Steam and claim it in game without needing to play STO through the Steam client.
The Typhoon Class is a dreadnaught that will most likely not appear as a playable ship until we increase the skill point cap to full Admiral. Even then, we havent yet decided if this will be a player ship, but we can be convinced to make it so if there is enough support for it."
If the devs were going to release this ship as a Tier 5 ship, then why wait for us becoming Admirals? No Tier 6 ships is just like the standard dev response that the game won't go F2P that we heard 3 years ago.
8-D
Damn the only thing i would throw money at would be Annorax's Temporal incursion ship....
Seriously though, if you arent PvPing, and hardly any of us do, then not upgrading your T5 ships isnt going to be that big a deal. I seriously doubt I'll feel compelled to upgrade my Vesta bundle ships or Fleet Sovereign/Regent. Theres nothing going on in STO that compels us to keep up with the Jones' on a weekly basis. This universe doesnt change. If me and my crew take multi month vacations on Risa, the galaxy doesnt even miss us. Maybe I'll blow up one or two more times in group PvE queue missions, but so what. Theres no way Cryptic is going to upgrade every mission so that it feels like a T1 ship in an STF. That WOULD drive 95% of the playerbase away. As long as you arent some captain who HAS to be seen in the Ferrari class starships, T6 will barely effect you. If a few T6s show up in group PvE, great, more help, and I didnt spend another dime.
Since theres no form of territory control in this game I feel compelled to be a part of on a weekly basis, then theres no REAL hook to buying T6 ships other than ship vanity. I only bought my 3 Vestas because I loved the design. So far new Fed ships are BUTT UGLY, so THAT sure wont tempt me.
Capt. Will Conquest of the U.S.S. Crusader
I paid for top-tier, not ships that will one day be superseded, but rather ships that will always, through some contrived means, stay at the top of the food chain among an ever-expanding number of top-tier ships. T5.5 simply isn't good enough.
For a ship that costs real money, t5.5 is garbage; fleet ships and ships that cost real money are not disposable, and need a bump up to full-fledged t6. I will not be burning more money on more ships, especially not if they will once again some day be superseded by more ships I will then be expected to buy. Nothing doing.
I will be watching intently in the coming weeks to see what is to be done about the transition from tier 5 to tier 6, but I hesitate to hope for satisfaction.
Good day gentlemen.
There is a huge gap between what is considered "competitive" and actually a viable endgame ship. For instance, you can use a captain lvl ship for a long time at endgame, even in STFs, but a fleet one is gonna be far better.
It is also quite irritating to have invested so much in buying T5 C-store ships & their fleet variants, for all 3 factions to now have those ships be obsolete. But I guess we roll with the punches around here.
I'm sure that Cryptic is aware that at the moment their rep with the forum going player base is pretty low. It's poor communication kills moments like this that causes that.
There are major questions here that need to be answered sooner rather than later. Will this be zen thing, will it be dilithium, will it be something attained through leveling?
Will the upgrade system be just for players already at level 50? How will this affect new characters. New characters that come up will they get a free level 50 ship, and need zen for level 60? Or will they have to carry a Rear Admiral Ship all the way to the top?
==================
On another subject Where will Fleet ships fit into the new paradigm? Will there actually be Fleet Tier 6 ships? Or will all Fleet Ships be considered Tier 6/5.9?
I agree with the sentiment that the Flagship 3 should receive a first class upgrade to something that is a true tier 6 as they are spanking new top of the line boats.
Agreed completely.
The issue I've had with Cryptic ship design has been their resistance to streamlining. I"m looking at the Avenger here. Starship design in this era should not be in any way blocky, especially in the Federation. The Tempest though, that was good stuff. More ships in that vein and they could have something going there. I want more in the John Eaves Andrew Probert vein. Design influences from the Dauntless, things like that.
I wonder if they're gonna give us Species 116 contact and put the Dauntless in game?
Anyway, I know they've said they're going to go with more original in house designs, which is fine, but the in house designs have got to be absolutely stellar.
You know this raises a salient point.
Most of the argument here is against the very concept of Tier 6.
Tier 5 vessels span from my free Assault cruiser all the way up to Odysseys, Avengers, Scimitars, Dyson Science Vessels, Kumaris, and Vestas.
My Regent is technically by most people's measure completely obsolete.
I actually read someone say that the Scimitar made the Oddy and Bort obsolete. The same thoughts were spoken by a few about the Undine Bioship.
What is it about this obsoleting of ships that makes it so much worse than all the other times ships have been rendered obsolete? When I first started playing two years ago, it was all about the Jem Hadar Attack Ship. People still shell out a mint over that ship. Nowadays it's Scimitars, Avengers, and bioships oh my.
Would all of this aggravation and threats of walking be occurring if these ships, whatever their stats and configurations had come out, and still been called Tier 5?
Not to mention how stuck on trinity they are, despite how irrelevant that concept has been for the last 4 years now.
Your ship determines your role in battle, based on it's BoFF stations and your personal loadouts. NOTHING ABOUT YOUR PROFESSION REALLY MATTERS, EXCEPT THAT ENG SUCKS MORE THAN THE OTHERS.
Sorry for caps, didn't want anyone to miss that.
As I interpreted the release it is in addition to new tier 6 vessels for the three established classes, there will be an additional entirely new ship type. Thus Tier 6 Escort, Science, cruiser, and [REDACTED].
STO Beta Test and Launch Veteran
Odds are we'll still have to wait 1-2 weeks for any info on any of the ships' stats. They may be kind and give us more angles of the new ships a little earlier, but i wouldn't hold my breath. :P
Support 90 degree arc limitation on BFaW! Save our ships from looking like flying disco balls of dumb!
Because the majority of the hate is from people who confuse the term "obsolete" with the term "suboptimal".
There is a huge proportion of people in the game who are obsessed with trying to eek out every last DPS that can be had, and aren't happy if their ship does one less point than the current champ.
This is why FotM builds exist, this is why power creep is a problem, and this is why there's a giant-sized bucket of hate on the forums whenever Cryptic changes anything about how ships, their equipment, or their powers work.
OMG YOU LOST ME 0.06% OF MY "DEEPS"!
Getting lost in the noise is the point that even with a vanilla T5 ship like a Sovvy, you can load up on purple and violet Mk XII stuff and doffs and own any of the current content in record time.
This is about PvP, plain and simple. More specifically, it's likely about "vaping" someone or at least killing them faster then before.
Nothing will be "obsolete", but it may be "suboptimal".
Everyone wants to be king of the mountain, and they get irritated when an earthquake happens and builds a higher mountain.
I'm actually more curious about what this 5.5 upgrade is. What does it change on our existing ships? More weapons/boff/console slots? Increased hull and shield stats? Better turn rates? I'd really like to know more about this.
I hope the devs thought long and hard about how their new Mk XIII items and new ships will effect the current dps race. I'm hoping that with these new installations, they'll be increasing the challenge of All npcs, and giving them new abilities that have to be overcome with strategy and tactics, rather than boosting dps as high as possible. I'd like to see all builds put at a slight disadvantage if they focus on only a single goal for their ship. Having to go in ready for anything would greatly increase not just the challenge of the game, but also the need for more cooperative play and teamwork.
The gap is even more significant in PVP, some of the so-called end-game ships are simply incapable of competing when you have a kill-race, all they do is help the other side to win faster due to poor performance.
Major gaps in performance are a legitimiate concern. Attempts to diminish them are rooted in something other than legitimacy.
The thing I'm seeing is their old system is being stripped that's fine so long as they do a complete job of stripping away the old out of date system while producing the Tier 6 ships by also picking out the old and improving upon them.
Lemme ask you this, how many times, inbetween leveling up, did you buy really expensive gear/ships? The likely answer: you didn't. And why not? Because you, like most ppl, probably waited for end-game level before getting the good stuff.
And now imagine this.... your end-level ships suddenly aren't end-level any more. THAT is what's it's all about. DPS only plays into it, insofar that it causes your ships to be suboptimal, as you call it. I daresay it's the monetary investment in lockbox/C-Store ships that most ppl are (pre-emptively) worried about losing.
There will be a (confirmed) upgrade-path. But the cost of it is still unknown. So, if it turns out to take. say, 4 ship modules per upgrade after all, many there be (including yours truly) who would consider their ships effectively obsoleted, after all.
I hope so. I already have an EMH (on some of my ships at least), so an ECH would be great.
I understand that, fully, but it goes back to my original question.
This isn't the first time that end level ships have ceased to be THE end level.
Every other lockbox has obsoleted someone's ship or build. And the aforementioned five fore weapon ships. The Fleet T'Varo stealth super torpedo boats.
If these ships had all these new abilities and were tier 5, do you believe there be this much outcry?
And I agree, the method, cost, and extent of upgrading tier 5 ships for the new era will certainly make or break this transition.
I won't be parking my Fleet vessels and Fleet-grade C-Store ships anytime soon.
I'll agree with you on all points except that I might buy the warbird and I'll probably buy the raptor.
Support 90 degree arc limitation on BFaW! Save our ships from looking like flying disco balls of dumb!
in pvp the difference my be greater but I'm willing to but someone who has a clue with still do just fine in tier 5 ships.
for me in less we get a free one I'm not going to brother. and if we do get a free one I'll probably play with it see if I like it then go back to my old favorites.... except maybe on my fed I haven't found the right ship for him yet.
if I stop posting it doesn't make you right it. just means I don't have enough rum to continue interacting with you.
"Slogging" through a 20k DPS performance? What did it take...30% of the time available for the optional to complete it? That's not "obsolete", that's merely not a speed run.
"Obsolete" really means to be without function. You show me a ship that simply CAN'T complete an ISE run, and I'll agree it's obsolete. Since some people do that in T4 ships for a challenge, I'd say your argument is a bit off.
Hence my conclusion that this is about PvP. People have figured out how to take advantage of a few carelessly unclosed loopholes that allow for far greater DPS with a few builds than Cryptic originally intended.
Unfortunately, they have for whatever reason, pressure or lack of will and time, failed to close these loopholes and restore PvP back to the rock-scissors-paper game it's supposed to be, where skill and luck are just about the only determiners of who wins.
Major gaps in performance when a bare fraction of that performance is even needed in PvE is not a concern, it's an indicator of power creep.
The same thing in PvP is a concern, but half of that problem was created by PvPers screaming bloody murder over every change made. I for one wouldn't be surprised if Cryptic was a bit gun-shy about making any wholesale changes for that very reason.
As I said, PvP is the main reason for most of the hate. PvE, even elite content, doesn't require every erg of performance that can be wrung out of the most elite ship available. I doubt if the T6 elite endgame content will be that much different.
This is about an obsession with the best, strongest, and shiniest. Nothing more.