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A Feeling of Impotence?
opo98
Member Posts: 435 Arc User
I know that I have been an avid and perhaps ragey poster on the way Cryptic has handled the recent "difficulty" spike of the game, but I quit playing the game and now I have some new insight.
When I look back on the new expansion, I noticed that even though I bought some new shinies to support the devs, I still felt like the enemies simply did not give a care in the world what I threw at them.
It almost seemed like the purchase of my ship and my hard work to get upgraded gear was completely wasted because I felt much less powerful relative to the enemies than before the patch.
They also did the difficulty in the worst way possible. Instead of making the NPCs do more damage, or have more abilities, they just scaled up their HP. Difficulty in my opinion, is only good if you feel a sense of danger or impending doom. I'm a bit of an adrenaline junkie, and I can't see where the fun is in grinding down 10x more HP; it's simply not hard to do, just boring.
PvP in this game is probably the most exciting PvP I've ever played since your life dangles on very fine threads. The difference between alive and screwed in STO PvP are thin.
If more difficult NPCs were done the same way as PvP player's ship (I.E. low HP/Shields but very dangerous weapons/abilities), it would capture the true fun of "difficulty" for me, and perhaps capture that excitement for PvE players that do not want to deal with real people in PvP.
Also, doing NPCs like this opens up whole new avenues of gameplay instead of DPS/CC or GTFO.
A player could choose to do anything with his build; for instance:
- Choose to forgo damage potential to be a beefy tank/healer for the team, thus helping the team.
- Choose to be a Debuffer that could make the dangerous enemy ships weaker, thus helping the team.
- Choose to be a fast attack vessel to spike down significant threats and run, thus helping the team.
- Choose to be a trap-layer to keep enemies away from critical points.
Or really, any number of things. Shoehorning the playerbase into a Mary Sue DPS boat all the time because the content requires it is simply just flat out boring.
When I look back on the new expansion, I noticed that even though I bought some new shinies to support the devs, I still felt like the enemies simply did not give a care in the world what I threw at them.
It almost seemed like the purchase of my ship and my hard work to get upgraded gear was completely wasted because I felt much less powerful relative to the enemies than before the patch.
They also did the difficulty in the worst way possible. Instead of making the NPCs do more damage, or have more abilities, they just scaled up their HP. Difficulty in my opinion, is only good if you feel a sense of danger or impending doom. I'm a bit of an adrenaline junkie, and I can't see where the fun is in grinding down 10x more HP; it's simply not hard to do, just boring.
PvP in this game is probably the most exciting PvP I've ever played since your life dangles on very fine threads. The difference between alive and screwed in STO PvP are thin.
If more difficult NPCs were done the same way as PvP player's ship (I.E. low HP/Shields but very dangerous weapons/abilities), it would capture the true fun of "difficulty" for me, and perhaps capture that excitement for PvE players that do not want to deal with real people in PvP.
Also, doing NPCs like this opens up whole new avenues of gameplay instead of DPS/CC or GTFO.
A player could choose to do anything with his build; for instance:
- Choose to forgo damage potential to be a beefy tank/healer for the team, thus helping the team.
- Choose to be a Debuffer that could make the dangerous enemy ships weaker, thus helping the team.
- Choose to be a fast attack vessel to spike down significant threats and run, thus helping the team.
- Choose to be a trap-layer to keep enemies away from critical points.
Or really, any number of things. Shoehorning the playerbase into a Mary Sue DPS boat all the time because the content requires it is simply just flat out boring.
Post edited by opo98 on
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Its not like this was a new development, Cryptic have mentioned before that they knew that player powercreep was a huge issue. They tried to reign some of it in when they remade the Rep powers, and now that that's solved they decided to buff enemy HP and resistances so that they lasted long enough to be able to pull off their tricks.
That's right, the real problem is that we're too powerful. They can't scale back our power, because the forums will be flooded with even more rage than when they remade the Rep Traits. The only alternative left is to scale up enemy HP and resistances. The enemies already have pretty powerful weapons and abilities, if they lasted long enough to use them.
And it cannot be balanced that way very well, because the gap between the DPS of the average player and the ace is astronomical. I'd rather have the days back of when spheres had 30 second EPTE rather than the insane amount of HP they got now, at least if they scatter they are more prone to survive longer. The main problem is NPC's are just too lumbering and clumsy. Combat should be faster paced and it would give also science crowd control yet more meaning to help out versus just DPS. But no, they whined big time about the engine boost of the spheres calling it unintelligent, when in fact it was! It was making things tougher for the spacebar mashers but rewarding other roles!
I've fought and parsed the "new" and "old" enemies, and they were never dangerous.
That's the problem. They had plently of HP, but they did not have the tools to force Mary Sue DPS boats to consider other options.
Scaling up HP and resistance doesn't solve the Mary Sue DPS problem. It is literally the definition of making it worse.
The problem with a lot of those builds unfortunately is that they depend on a coordinated team to play and take advantage of them, which only works if you HAVE a coordinated team. Given that most of the time you're flying alone, or pugging where god only knows what you'll end up teamed with, or even with fleetmates (if you have those) flying who knows what, you HAVE to be able to take care of yourself. Personally an old-school tank is my happy place, but I can only think of I think 3 missions that genuinely can use such a build, AND my team needs to understand that I'm doing so and adjust their own tactics accordingly. In the end, the only reliable solo/pug ship is a DPS one, lame as that is.
I agree totally. I took my Vesta into Delta Rising and despite it having a fairly low hull (56k or something), even on Elite it was still doable (excepting multi-mines). What I did notice however was that the Vesta's DPS was so low that each group of five was taking way too long. In other words, there's no point doing anything but going for maximum DPS.
It inspired me to look at my build, and I found ways where I could improve my efficiency while still keeping to my Exotic Damage/Shield Tank play-style.
I dislike curbstomp battles. Its why, prior to DR, I was constantly running Hive Onslaught Advanced (as its called now). It was the only STF that offered me any form of challenge. Post DR, all Advanced STFs and even story missions now offer me that challenge. So I find myself loving the changes.
The problem is, it's not more difficult, it just takes longer. And in the case of Elite, a lot longer, for worse rewards.
Let me give a (maybe achievable, maybe not) example of what would make things more difficult:
NPC ships given a range of "Attack Patterns" along with a faction-specific Pattern, so that e.g. a Reman T'Varo NPC could fire a Plasma Torp at your rear end while it remained cloaked. Your only option? To target and hit the T'Varo during these moments to try to knock its cloak ability offline (with a bonus to doing so if you have a good Subsystem Targeting setup).
PvE missions given a range of "Optional Approaches" where your team needs to work together (forgetting time barriers.. they're lame and only encourage DPS pew pew at the expense of strategy) so that e.g. you need to decide whether the team attacks that big nasty Borg Tactical Cube using that Sci player's Viral Matrix, that Eng player's Boarding Party, or that Tactical Player's Alpha Strike to bring down the shield facing on that node, because if you get it wrong, you're really in for a rough day.
More Hull Points on Dumb NPCs isn't difficult, it just takes longer.
wish everyone would get this
system Lord Baal is dead
Your example of coding special A.I. for specific enemies, while a nice idea, is economically unfeasible. It would require too much man-power to regularly code brand new A.I. to be used for single enemy types like that outside of important boss mobs. Hell, I was pleasantly surprised that we got new A.I. for the Vaadwaur ships that's currently not used anywhere else.
I do agree that time-critical failure states are annoying though. Its why I'm now shying away from Hive Onslaught Advanced. BUUUT, Infected: The Conduit and Khitomer Vortex are now challenging enough to give me that sense of struggle, so I've simply moved over.
Do they need to adjust the numbers a bit? Probably, but I still see the increased difficulty as a positive in general.
It was an issue even before they added vulnerability locators, elite carrier pets, ultra rare mk xiv equipment, romulan operative traits, etc. But of course they feel like they have to keep adding more toys to buy or people stop spending money. And they are probably right.
I think I'm still effective. Sure it takes a little longer to get through the new advanced stfs, and no time at all to burn through the normal, but I'm having fun in that regard and that's all that matters to me.
They did try to make the NPC's smarter, and in some ways they still are smarter (sometimes). I think that adding more npc's to the borg stfs was a nice touch too. The first time I ran through a new Infected and all the sphere's showed up around the first transformer, I honestly had a feeling of "oh s***." That was a welcome feeling because even though it was basically the same thing as always, it had a new feeling to it.
Oh, and I hope you don't mind OP but one of my Fleet Dhelan's just got a new name: IRW Mary Jane Dps
Even with mk xiii phaser beam arrays [acc]x3 x 4, mk xii q torp [dmg]x3 x 1 and mk xii q mine [dmg]x3 x 1, throwing everything I have (including grav wells, torp high yield and tyken rifts) at npc frigates does ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to them at least three quarters of the time due solely to the fact that they've had a massive hp hike to account for my lvl (on normal mode).
Now, I don't mind a bit of a protracted scrap with the occasional cruiser or particularly nimble Jemmy assault ship, it makes it feel less samey, gives the illusion that some npcs have a little uniquity but having every npc just shrug off a massive barrage of abilities, beams, torps and mines? Map after map after map? For every patrol? For bugger all xp? With no real way to get to the next level except repeating old missions? Really?
It was annoying enough to have every patrol arbitrarily shoe-horn in another three waves of ships just to artificially extend the encounter but now it's made even more annoying by the fact that even a frigate takes far too damned long to kill and cruisers take an ice age, so "You've completed the patrol, well done, now, here's another nine frigates to fight for no good reason." is... just... GAH! -.-
So yes, feelings of impotence, nail head, hammer, bang, good shot.
I'm not THAT difficult to please, I just have a very low tolerance threshold for stupid BS! - George Carlin.
And what you've got to look forward to, as you reach lvl 55 is that in the patrols etc where the enemies scale with your level, it'll take even longer to kill them than it does now. And still longer at lvl 56. And so on.
It'll be even more fun for you! Great incentive to keep up with the levelling slog eh?
New And Improved!TM STO: Like sawing a tree down with a rusty butter knife.
Ladies and gentlemen, the quote of the day.
Forgive me if I'm finding it highly unusual that you're doing as little damage as you claim on NORMAL mode, because I can shred down a Frigate to roughly half armour with one Tyken's Rift and sustained fire (assuming I can keep him in the Tyken's Rift) on Elite. He usually gets out though, so I have to get him on the next Tyken's Rift. I should note that I'm using Tyken's Rift 3.
Also I should note that Grav Well and Tyken's Rift have a 15 second global CD when casting one or the other, so I highly doubt you could be using both of them at the same time.
What kind of consoles are you running? Is your primary source of damage your Phasers, Exotic, or Kinetic damage? Is your Flow Caps high enough to reduce the mobs power levels enough to reduce his Shield's resistances so that your Torps deal more damage? Do you have any other sources of energy drain or resistance debuffs BESIDES Tyken's Rift and Sensor Scan?
Is it at all possible that your feeling of impotence is the result of an inefficient build?
I'm fine with having my gear become obsolete/needing to be upgraded. As many have said, that's the way it works in most mmos. What upsets me is, based on my experience on tribble, once I've upgraded all my gear to epic, upgraded my ship to t5u/t6, and filled out a large chunk of the specialization tree, I still can't kill things as fast as I could before Delta Rising.
Maybe getting a 'gold ship' will increase your parsing numbers, but I doubt the average casual player uses their parsing scores to judge how effective they are. They probably are looking at things like, "how often is my hull dropping into yellow?" or "how fast am I killing enemies?"
Right now a player at level 50 with mk xii gear fighting level 50 npcs is more powerful than one at level 60 with mk xiv gear fighting level 60 npcs. Players are going to start asking themselves why they are bothering to grind for (or buy) upgrades when the result still leaves them feeling less powerful then they were before.
It's all a mater of perception. It doesn't mater if they nerf your numbers or buff enemy numbers; you'll still feel less powerful. Maybe it is a correction for power creep, and maybe it's good for balance, but it's a blow to the incentive for players desire to pursue (or buy) power and, since the upgrade system is entirely centered around that, it seems pretty counter intuitive.
Those of us in non-escort ships and those who don't care to use cut and paste DPS builds were left to die.
WHEEE!
I'd say before rage quitting do join a good fleet and find experienced players who can help you refine your build. The sad part is everybody and their grandmother uses the DHC build style and that doesn't really cut it anymore (unless your in the 30-40k range of dps). My ship build has near invulnerability unless I get zerged or get the amazing bypass your shields invisitorp while decimating everything around me. Best part is my ship has 0 reliance on weapons and I keep my weapon power at 25. 1M hp ship? About 2 minutes to kill.
The problem is the imbalance of a casual endgame PvE towards average teams. You know like in:
Player 1: Veteran with 20k+DPS build (20k)
Player 2: Veteran with some build focussing on something else than dmg dealing (10k)
Player 3: Veteran on a new and totally underpowered build who can only contribute the basic rules. (5k)
Player 4: Casual player with a fun build who is in a long term learning process and gathering his stuff but who listens and plays by the basic rules (4k)
Player 5: Total noob blowing any mission objective at first chance with his (2k) build
Now those kind of teams I found myself mostly on the past 2,5 years. Old elite STF where no issue there but advanced are now and thats the problem.
I also play in good teams and for those the advanced mode isnt an issue. If I look at the mission timers the advanced conditions arent even that noticeable especially on ground.
Whatever cryptic decided to accomplish with the advanced mode they most certainly dont make easy dil runs via PvE harder for the right group, they just hurt the average team and dont make em really enjoyable. The consequences will be fatal cuz 9 out of 10 teams are average in STO. A look at end game PvE lists is highly recommended.
Looking for a fun PvE fleet? Join us at Omega Combat Division today.
Borg Disconnected is a perfect example. Even one person not pulling their full weight and the mission is a total disaster. I feel that no matter how much I want to help the person, even if it's a friend, that it's become a chore to do so that probably will end in failure anyway.
Then add on the fact that a lot of all of this was mentioned long before DR went live, and we were totally ignored by Cryptic and the impotence intensifies. It makes me feel that no matter what I do or say, it won't get any better because Cryptic doesn't care about me.
They only care about the top 10% of players in dps and those that they concider their friends and fan club. They keep trying to buff up their friends while curb stomping the Mary Sues and the average person is getting caught in the middle, and Cryptic couldn't care less.
So yes, I feel impotent. I feel that nothing I do will make a difference, and that a lot of my friends are being left behind while I'm simply growing more powerful, and that no one cares.