Is it already the time of the week when someone complains that they can't finish advanced STFs in their skittles build with torps in the back and beam arrays and turrets up front in ship with 2 tac console slots filled with universal consoles? That no one knows how to be a good teammate to someone who doesn't get within 10km of the enemies because they. have. heals. so really it's everyone else's fault?
I was pugging KSA yesterday and someone was whining about how they fail KSA every single time because everyone splits up and the team gets overwhelmed. (Because having everyone go to the same side is such a great idea!) Anyway, I parsed and *of course* the person who complained about always failing KSA because no one else knows how to play didn't have the DPS to be doing advanced content and had the lowest DPS on the team.
Not saying the OP doesn't know what they're doing. Just saying it's likely.
(And yes those tachyon beams are overpowered, but they're not preventing anyone from getting BNPs. If this content is too hard for you, then omega rep gear isn't going to help.)
I do understand where the OP is coming from, i'm getting a little tired of having my shields stripped faster than a cheap hooker takes off her clothes,
At present biggest waste of time putting any resources into buying top of the line shields. Common mk xii give the same level of resistance against Borg as a Gold MK XIV and thats sweet F.A
i also don't like the finger pointing here saying the OP is the one to blame,
When you pug you cannot take into account how good/bad or dam right ugly the other 4 guys are going to be, that is totally outside your control, This is why i no longer PUG advanced queues, its not fun to fail within 90 secs and be locked out of the content
And thats the point the OP is trying to make you have public queues that cannot be completed due to them being flooded by people not ready or skilled enough to run in them.
Thats where the reward structure is wrong
I can take a for example 18k dps ship (which is more than enough to carry its own weight) into a pug and be paired with 4 other guys barely breaking 2k dps, Thats a instant fail. you can't carry those type of players anymore, Thats why the instant fail needs to go, and a reduced reward for failing to hit the optional is introduced instead, The people aren't learning by the instant fail, come off cool down repeat the same mistakes.
The OP maybe in the same situation taking his ship in which is capable of holding its own but then being teamed with 4 others that can't, he gets a penalized not once but 3 times,
Instant removal from map
IInability to actually play the whole STF he queued for (With reduced rewards)
lockout from repeating the content.
Is the content too hard, No ! its not, it is people that make the content hard and the rewards need to be restructured so people not ready for advanced are encouraged to stay and play on normal.
OP try to find a active STF channel to run these missions its the only and best advice anyone here can really give as PUGGING since DR is a kcik in the nuts
It is kind of amusing that the borg are now harder than many others. I guess it's a nice change for the poor old things.
As the birds here love to crow about their victory of turning this from a casual game to something else one can only hope that the Heralds are not heralding the closing credits soon to come. That would be a hollow victory indeed.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Hrmm, I kind of stopped reading on the second page. Maybe I'll go back and read the rest, maybe not, maybe not.
I disagree with the thought process of having kept Normal, Advanced, and Elite as they were and adding in another level. Elite was a joke that could have been Normal.
Take the current Normal and make it an Episode/Mission which can be played at Normal, Advanced, Elite where each has dialogue windows and gameplay which might offer the least bit of preparation for when somebody is going to hit up the actual queues.
Take Advanced and make it Normal.
Take Elite (or create Elite if necessary, since some are missing) and make it Advanced.
Create an actual Elite for those folks out there that play at that level so I don't have to feel sad about what I'm doing down at my level.
Yeah, it's along the lines of what was said - in making something for them, but it doesn't ignore the joke of what things are.
As for the Tachyon Beam stuff, it's hard for me to reply those complaints with a straight face...cause it's the Borg, you know...how they adapt, and well, players...refusing to adapt. C'mon, how can that not make you chuckle?
There are all sorts of enemies out there that Cryptic has tried to offer a variety of gameplay with...most of them get nerfed into the ground before leaving Tribble or shortly after hitting Holodeck.
The different foes should provide a diverse selection of challenges and obstacles, otherwise they might as well just be untextured blobs floating around in space that we destroy with one hand mashing the spacebar and the other hand patting us on the back for being badass.
What does a game designed for less than 1000 people look like? Ask the Heralds.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
When you pug you cannot take into account how good/bad or dam right ugly the other 4 guys are going to be, that is totally outside your control, This is why i no longer PUG advanced queues, its not fun to fail within 90 secs and be locked out of the content
And thats the point the OP is trying to make you have public queues that cannot be completed due to them being flooded by people not ready or skilled enough to run in them.
True. If you're getting 18K and you have 4 teammates getting 2k, you'll probably fail a borg STF. Heck, I'm getting 32K on my FPER and I just failed a pug run of CSA. It happens.
But if you're getting 18k, odds are you'll be winning more than half the time because you won't only be in groups with people getting 2k. On the other hand, if you're getting 2K, you'll fail more often than someone getting 18k because you already have 16k less no matter who's on your team.
That's why it seems that every time I see someone in a pug complaining about always losing, they have very low DPS. The one problem that all their pug runs have in common is themselves.
I can take a for example 18k dps ship (which is more than enough to carry its own weight) into a pug and be paired with 4 other guys barely breaking 2k dps, Thats a instant fail. you can't carry those type of players anymore, Thats why the instant fail needs to go, and a reduced reward for failing to hit the optional is introduced instead, The people aren't learning by the instant fail, come off cool down repeat the same mistakes.
I completely disagree. The fact that these last few months have seen a huge upswing of people complaining about having to care about DPS on these forums, an increase of people in DPS channels, and people talking about how others have to up their game shows that people are learning.
You know what keeps people from learning? Giving them full or almost full rewards even if they fail part of the mission. That was the pre-DR system, and every single pug would fail every single optional of the old elite STFs. Because they didn't have to care.
The fact that someone with mid-range DPS can't solo these missions anymore does *not* mean that they're too hard. They're supposed to be 5-person missions. They're supposed to be somewhat difficult. They're supposed to be things people can fail because pve content that you always win is boring.
They really need to make 50,000 dps a requirement for advanced. We really need to eliminate some of the casual scum that is still sticking to the sides of this pool.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
hey virusdancer, interesting change to your avatar
as of now, the casuals can't do advanced... so no, don't make advanced normal, lol.
the wine will be too great...
Casuals can. Scrubs cant. Get the vocabulary right
While I'd personally (depending on how long I've been reading the forums on that particular day) try to avoid using the term scrubs...yeah, casuals can definitely do Advanced.
I think too many folks look at some of the numbers some of the DPS folks are doing and think that's what's needed to do an Advanced.
Here are two groups, first Ryan's group:
CLRInfected Space[1:57] Dmg(DPS) Player A 13,940,099(120,173) Player B 7,100,130(60,685) Player C 6,945,694(59,365) Player D 3,802,028(32,496) Player E 2,407,538(26,169)
And then one I had three runs ago:
CLRInfected Space[16:06] Dmg(DPS) Player A 11,417,002(11,993) Player B 9,798,138(10,357) Player C 5,476,196(5,758) Player D 4,451,156(4,613) Player E 4,169,563(4,469)
Ryan's group had a total DPS there of...298887.899 going for them in their 117 second run.
My wee group had a total DPS there of...37190.025 going for us in our 966 second run.
Both groups completed ISA successfully and with the Optional nabbed with time to spare. Heh, yeah, Ryan's group did it with far more time to spare than my wee pug did...but both groups completed ISA with the Optional.
Folks could do lower DPS than my wee group and still complete ISA without nabbing the Optional. Cause you know, my wee group there...doing Advanced and grabbing the Optional with time to spare - we're badass, Advanced of the Advanced and all...if one would believe some folks out there. We're a bunch of random folks flying around going wheeee from a public pug queue...and we're a bunch of Elitists for doing so.
But, but, but...look at what Ryan's group did! Nah, my wee group wasn't a bunch of near-Elite folks...we were just a bunch of casuals going wheeee and having fun. Between my wee group and Ryan's, it's a bit of trek before you run into the Advanced players and then the Elite are beyond that before one gets into those Wizards...
And well, folks, some folks out there, just can't see beyond their keyboard to see where the issue is...and...well, it talks of a special childhood where everything got a gold star.
But I'd not say anything like that until later in the day...
i certainly agree that there should be single player walk-through in the missions to let the player know how its to be done.
and i agree in principle with ramping up the difficulty in the advance & implementing elite. the problem however still remains that, doing this doesnt remove the dps schism that is undermining the use of any set system that could be taught in the first place.
its building castles in the sand.
The DPS schism is a tough one, and something that I believe is a flaw of the underlying damage formula with just how much is multiplicative versus additive. There is so much stuff there regardless with the way we had a faux level cap increase that even if it were additive there would still be a DPS schism.
All of those things can quickly add up...and the more the lower moves up, the ludicrous manner that the higher will move up.
The more Cryptic has tried to provide for the folks leaning on the spacebar while flying rainbow builds running 50 weapon power and shooting from just inside 10km so they can nap on autopilot between engagements...the more some of the folks out there are able just to slaughter everything.
Say we had somebody running ~20% efficiency that was doing 5k DPS. That means somebody running at 100% efficiency with the same build would be doing 25k DPS. A difference of 20,000 DPS. So we drop out stuff to bring that 5k person up to 10k...doubling their DPS. Well, that means we also doubled that 100% guy or gal. They'll go from 25k to 50k. That 20,000 difference becomes a 40,000 difference. Throw some more stuff at them to get them from 10k to 15k, yeah? That other guy's now at 75k. The 20,000 became 40,000 became 60,000...
lol, I remember the first time those insta-shield stripper spheres came, it was like magic, my shield disappeared in a blink of a eye.
But I adapted, of course at the cost of my DPS. I changed my Nebula build so I have ET 1 and RSP 2 (ANY RSP is a must now), removed EPTW 1 because of that. Added the Regenerative Integrity Field console and the Kobali warp core from the Samsar. I still die sometimes but way less. Just need to keep some distance from those spheres.
These new change were targeted against those min-max build with minimal or no heals (Just look at the plasma doping nerf). I guess Cryptic want those guys to have a more balanced build. Sad part is that new players with average equipment also suffer the consequences.
But I adapted, of course at the cost of my DPS. I changed my Nebula build so I have ET 1 and RSP 2 (ANY RSP is a must now), removed EPTW 1 because of that.
Depends on how good you can manage resistencies. Engineers and Scientists are quite well equipped here with their captain skills.
I noted a huge boost of surivability by re-adding Nukara T4:Defense to my traits, especially on the sciships (no surprise if you think about it).
I completely disagree. The fact that these last few months have seen a huge upswing of people complaining about having to care about DPS on these forums, an increase of people in DPS channels, and people talking about how others have to up their game shows that people are learning.
I'm part of DPS 10k and 30K and actually the overall quality of DPS 10K has declined considerably in recent months, to the point where ISA isn't a sure thing and quite often is by the skin of your teeth taking a Transformer down before spheres get there,
In fact daily since Crystal Event you have people moaning about a failure because people decided to try and tank the CE's 2nd blast rather than play safe and move. Or players ignoring the Wait for pets call. Minor things i know.
DPS 10k numbers swelled due to the embassy consoles and plasma doping,Many players got in in the back of that. I've been part of the channels since intial concept when it was dps 5k.
DPS 10K although far superior to pugging has become the new PublicSTFChannel
They are talking about a channel resets for th upperchannels. Personnally i'd deal with 10k 1st and then move up.
What does a game designed for less than 1000 people look like? Ask the Heralds.
The game isn't designed for them in the least. #1000 is doing 26601.2 DPS. There's no content in the game that requires anywhere near that. One would be hard pressed to find content that required half of that. A third of that is going to be overkill for Advanced content.
You mentioned 50k earlier...there are only 171 folks at 50k+.
Now if there were only 1000 people doing over 4-5k...
I'm part of DPS 10k and 30K and actually the overall quality of DPS 10K has declined considerably in recent months, to the point where ISA isn't a sure thing and quite often is by the skin of your teeth taking a Transformer down before spheres get there,
In fact daily since Crystal Event you have people moaning about a failure because people decided to try and tank the CE's 2nd blast rather than play safe and move. Or players ignoring the Wait for pets call. Minor things i know.
DPS 10k numbers swelled due to the embassy consoles and plasma doping,Many players got in in the back of that. I've been part of the channels since intial concept when it was dps 5k.
DPS 10K although far superior to pugging has become the new PublicSTFChannel
They are talking about a channel resets for th upperchannels. Personnally i'd deal with 10k 1st and then move up.
I still think when they did the reset of the upper stuff, they should have done a complete reset and upped the minimum channel from 10k. Heh, but that's just because I'm an elitist douche nozzle trying to exclude myself from channels. Wait? What? Yeah, depending on who is asked I'm either an elitist or a noob.
It's really nice that most comments like these come from people who recieved their STF gear at pre-buff-times, when you could just faceroll the event...
Actually some of the best anti-Borg gear comes from Nukara rep. Crystal swords are KILLER in ground combat.
I've noticed that during this CCE event, PUG ISAs are more fail than usual.
Hrmm, I think I've had one fail since the Catastrophe event started. Then again, it was sometime before that where one had failed - so I guess that would be an increase.
Then again, it was sometime before that where one had failed - so I guess that would be an increase.
I could swear you posted in a thread three parses, including a failed ISA, shortly before or not long after the event started.
I failed a pair consecutively the other night. In one, I could swear one guy rushed a generator and then started pulling nanite spheres towards the transformer. The other one...well, the other four players combined barely managed to surpass by paltry 13k DPS.
You're preaching to the choir. Lock boxes are basically dead to me; my luck with them is that poor and I could never justify devoting the resources needed to open up dozens or hundreds just to pursue some low probability result.
"Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society." - Aristotle
I could swear you posted in a thread three parses, including a failed ISA, shortly before or not long after the event started.
Was it a failed or a failed optional? I had a group that missed the Optional by like 3 seconds. Er, and I guess there was one where I got in like 10 seconds before it failed which might have been around that time...one of those somebody bailed right before it would have failed and lucky me got plopped down in there.
Was it a failed or a failed optional? I had a group that missed the Optional by like 3 seconds. Er, and I guess there was one where I got in like 10 seconds before it failed which might have been around that time...one of those somebody bailed right before it would have failed and lucky me got plopped down in there.
I can't recall; you've been posting parses in several random threads recently.
It could have been a failed optional.
I can't imagine it's the latter one you describe, as you were providing a parse, which you couldn't have generated if you were only in there for a few seconds before failure.
"Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society." - Aristotle
Well just pugged Khitomer Accord Normal. Soloed one side and defended against probes. Guy defending on the left didn't have the DPS in a normal yes NORMAL run to defend the left. If that had been advanced he would have cost the team the mission, rewards and hit us with a cool down timer.
Worse still no call for help to assist him
Perfect example why i don't pug Advanced or Elite, not having my game time and personal rewards outside of my control.
I pug on and off mainly to grab quick marks and dil, sometimes trying to put a pre-made together takes longer than pugging through 3 normal stfs'
I just started playing STO a little over a week ago, and I am now mid-level 54.
I've played in a few Borg STF's, all normal, and I was in no way a benefit to those groups because the people that were playing in them completely tore through the missions faster than I could figure out what was going on.
Now I am wanting to really get into Rep grinding, but I am not really sure where to start getting into advanced STF's. My ship gear isn't all that spectacular, and I am pretty sure it could do with some changes, but being new, I have limited options available to me at this point to start min/maxing my build.
I hate the feeling of being 'carried' in anything, which is what I felt like in the normals I played in before.
I guess my point is, for a new captain on the outside looking in, the whole STF situation is very daunting, and listening to everyone have grievances with recent changes, makes them a lot intimidating.
Now I am wanting to really get into Rep grinding, but I am not really sure where to start getting into advanced STF's.
Simple. You don't. You grind marks in normals.
Find a decent fleet with tier 3 non-starbase holdings (the embassy, dilithium mine and spire). White doffs are one of the better turn-ins (300 fleet credits per doff), and you can get those by running the doff recruitment missions; for Federation, you'll find these at Starfleet Academy (Vulcan, Andorian, Tellarite, and three more from the personnel officer, just don't bother with the civilian call to duty assignment, or the R&D assignment).
Fleet gear will cover tactical consoles and a warp/singularity core. From the embassy, you'll also be able to pick up Romulan tactical officers with the Superior Romulan Operative trait; most builds run two tactical officers, and 2x SRO provides +4% critical hit chance and +10% critical hit damage.
It's also worth noting that the revamp of the fleet plasma consoles is coming soon, and by the sound of it those consoles will be worth at least a few thousand DPS per console. For a fresh build, this may be the fastest way to achieve advanced STF levels of DPS.
Rep gear will fill out the remaining non-weapon slots. At this point, all of the elite reputation marks (borg neural processors, ancient power cells, etc), can be acquired from solo content, so there's no actual need to run advanced STFs before you're ready for them. AFAIK, rep consoles only require two elite marks per console, which you're likely to pick up incidentally from the reward box granted for each rep turn in assignment. That only leaves shields/deflectors/engines requiring any significant amount of elite marks.
As for weapons, people seem to think that the patch unlocking the selection of mods on crafted items is coming. Completing the fleet and rep gears should be more than enough time for this to go live, if it is at all, at which point you should be able to easily pick up the mod configuration you want for your chosen damage type, and can start engaging in the upgrade system.
"Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society." - Aristotle
Frankly, if you're failing in these "advanced" missions.. you're failing.
Sure, the shield stripping is a bit over the top.. but it was before DR too. When fighting borg, expect to have your shields stripped repeatedly. This is no reason to fail the mission though, as aside from the occasional high yield torpedo (that can be shot down) there's little danger in these runs. They can quite literally be completed without even bothering to equip shields.
As for the health enemies possess - again, that's not Cryptic's fault.. that's yours. If you're having ANY trouble killing a probe in less than a few seconds (I tend to wipe them out in a volley or two), then you've got some serious problems with your setup. I can't tell you how many times I've seen players that are unable to dent a probe's shields.. and frankly, I don't know how anyone manages to be so bad.
Moral of the story - Don't expect the dev's to make advanced level missions achievable when you're doing everything wrong. The secondary objectives shouldn't pose any problems, your ship shouldn't ever be in any real danger (seriously, the damage enemies do can nearly be totally ignored), and you should be capable of wiping out all but a tactical cube solo without any difficulty at all (even cubes shouldn't take more than 30 seconds). If you do it right, you'll have no problems.. in fact, the missions are far too EASY if anything.
I just started playing STO a little over a week ago, and I am now mid-level 54.
I've played in a few Borg STF's, all normal, and I was in no way a benefit to those groups because the people that were playing in them completely tore through the missions faster than I could figure out what was going on.
Now I am wanting to really get into Rep grinding, but I am not really sure where to start getting into advanced STF's. My ship gear isn't all that spectacular, and I am pretty sure it could do with some changes, but being new, I have limited options available to me at this point to start min/maxing my build.
I hate the feeling of being 'carried' in anything, which is what I felt like in the normals I played in before.
I guess my point is, for a new captain on the outside looking in, the whole STF situation is very daunting, and listening to everyone have grievances with recent changes, makes them a lot intimidating.
Something that might work for the new player gets into some of the changes the Cryptic has made over the years. Things that will allow players to perhaps look at some gearing options, get some Reputation Traits, and just get more comfortable in flying about without having to step foot in a single STF (it's something even folks that are not new to the game can take advantage of if they like).
For each of the Reputations as somebody is leveling them up from Tier 1 to Tier 5, there is the Daily Project. With the advent of Daily Reward Bonus Boxes (or whatever they're called, I was looking for something in the attic earlier and although the girlfriend swears I didn't hit my head hard enough to do any brain damage - I'm all sorts of dazed and confused) which will not only provide enough of the regular Marks for the Daily Project, but will also allow for an accumulation of spare regular Marks that can later be used to toward purchasing any desired gear.
So there the player is doing their thing getting that done, learning a bit more about the game as they go along...getting some extra Marks, getting some Dil, earning some EC. No, it's not balls to the walls grinding for any of it - but it's stuff going on as folks are doing their thing getting that done.
But what about the Elite Marks, those special items required for gear for some of the Reps? While neither Nukara nor Romulan require any (don't even have them), the others do. Cryptic has added ways for folks to get those without hitting up any queues though...now, the ability to get some are a little more limited than others. But with placing it against the backdrop of also leveling up the Rep and just getting more comfortable with the game...basically, having fun instead of making it into a grind...those different Elite Marks if desired can be earned along the way, right?
Now, it's not just about that stuff...not just Rep gear. There are several mission sets that while folks might look down on them for some of the higher tiered play (not just the content, but the folks playing the content) - they are things that will allow folks to dork around with different things - there's the Breen set, Jem'Hadar set, Solanae set, Kobali set, and so forth. Just things folks can muck about with in playing around with different set bonuses and getting a feel for what they want and the options open to them. There are also going to be various mission rewards from replay where if folks want to have a go with certain things they can do that.
Heck, even during this time, maybe somebody wants to start in on doing some Research Projects to take a look at some R&D down the road, eh? While flying around there'll also be the DOFFing one can goof about with and have some fun.
Maybe in a player's travels they'll come across somebody that was cool or helpful that's in a fleet - so they hook up with them. Maybe get some Fleet gear mixed in, maybe have somebody that will show them the ropes a bit more, take them on some runs.
This game just oozes both new player and casual player friendly.
Could it do a better job perhaps in teaching folks some stuff? I think so, this game might ooze friendliness but sometimes it's going to be a case of hitting up the forums here or elsewhere, maybe checking with folks here or there to get some answers for things. And well, like anything on the internet there are going to be a mix of personalities there...so some folks might be very helpful and some folks might...not.
It's pretty nifty, overall, imho though...folks can get all sorts of stuff, learn some basics, and well yeah - just all sorts of stuff without hitting up a queue.
The laid back nature of the game is one of the reasons I've managed to hang around as long as I have...sure, there's all sorts of Hell one can make the game if they want, there's all sorts of hardcore directions one can go if they want, but it's just a pretty laid back game if one wants it to be. So, imho, it provides for all sorts of folks in that sense...though, er, I guess one could say it's kind of lacking for the PvP folks and the high DPS folks - and hopefully Cryptic can toss them a bone from time to time as well; but all in all...yeah...pretty nifty, imho.
Comments
I was pugging KSA yesterday and someone was whining about how they fail KSA every single time because everyone splits up and the team gets overwhelmed. (Because having everyone go to the same side is such a great idea!) Anyway, I parsed and *of course* the person who complained about always failing KSA because no one else knows how to play didn't have the DPS to be doing advanced content and had the lowest DPS on the team.
Not saying the OP doesn't know what they're doing. Just saying it's likely.
(And yes those tachyon beams are overpowered, but they're not preventing anyone from getting BNPs. If this content is too hard for you, then omega rep gear isn't going to help.)
At present biggest waste of time putting any resources into buying top of the line shields. Common mk xii give the same level of resistance against Borg as a Gold MK XIV and thats sweet F.A
i also don't like the finger pointing here saying the OP is the one to blame,
When you pug you cannot take into account how good/bad or dam right ugly the other 4 guys are going to be, that is totally outside your control, This is why i no longer PUG advanced queues, its not fun to fail within 90 secs and be locked out of the content
And thats the point the OP is trying to make you have public queues that cannot be completed due to them being flooded by people not ready or skilled enough to run in them.
Thats where the reward structure is wrong
I can take a for example 18k dps ship (which is more than enough to carry its own weight) into a pug and be paired with 4 other guys barely breaking 2k dps, Thats a instant fail. you can't carry those type of players anymore, Thats why the instant fail needs to go, and a reduced reward for failing to hit the optional is introduced instead, The people aren't learning by the instant fail, come off cool down repeat the same mistakes.
The OP maybe in the same situation taking his ship in which is capable of holding its own but then being teamed with 4 others that can't, he gets a penalized not once but 3 times,
Instant removal from map
IInability to actually play the whole STF he queued for (With reduced rewards)
lockout from repeating the content.
Is the content too hard, No ! its not, it is people that make the content hard and the rewards need to be restructured so people not ready for advanced are encouraged to stay and play on normal.
OP try to find a active STF channel to run these missions its the only and best advice anyone here can really give as PUGGING since DR is a kcik in the nuts
I dont have the dil required for the items, wish i could trade them :P
As the birds here love to crow about their victory of turning this from a casual game to something else one can only hope that the Heralds are not heralding the closing credits soon to come. That would be a hollow victory indeed.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
I disagree with the thought process of having kept Normal, Advanced, and Elite as they were and adding in another level. Elite was a joke that could have been Normal.
Take the current Normal and make it an Episode/Mission which can be played at Normal, Advanced, Elite where each has dialogue windows and gameplay which might offer the least bit of preparation for when somebody is going to hit up the actual queues.
Take Advanced and make it Normal.
Take Elite (or create Elite if necessary, since some are missing) and make it Advanced.
Create an actual Elite for those folks out there that play at that level so I don't have to feel sad about what I'm doing down at my level.
Yeah, it's along the lines of what was said - in making something for them, but it doesn't ignore the joke of what things are.
As for the Tachyon Beam stuff, it's hard for me to reply those complaints with a straight face...cause it's the Borg, you know...how they adapt, and well, players...refusing to adapt. C'mon, how can that not make you chuckle?
There are all sorts of enemies out there that Cryptic has tried to offer a variety of gameplay with...most of them get nerfed into the ground before leaving Tribble or shortly after hitting Holodeck.
The different foes should provide a diverse selection of challenges and obstacles, otherwise they might as well just be untextured blobs floating around in space that we destroy with one hand mashing the spacebar and the other hand patting us on the back for being badass.
as of now, the casuals can't do advanced... so no, don't make advanced normal, lol.
the wine will be too great...
Casuals can. Scrubs cant. Get the vocabulary right
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
True. If you're getting 18K and you have 4 teammates getting 2k, you'll probably fail a borg STF. Heck, I'm getting 32K on my FPER and I just failed a pug run of CSA. It happens.
But if you're getting 18k, odds are you'll be winning more than half the time because you won't only be in groups with people getting 2k. On the other hand, if you're getting 2K, you'll fail more often than someone getting 18k because you already have 16k less no matter who's on your team.
That's why it seems that every time I see someone in a pug complaining about always losing, they have very low DPS. The one problem that all their pug runs have in common is themselves.
I completely disagree. The fact that these last few months have seen a huge upswing of people complaining about having to care about DPS on these forums, an increase of people in DPS channels, and people talking about how others have to up their game shows that people are learning.
You know what keeps people from learning? Giving them full or almost full rewards even if they fail part of the mission. That was the pre-DR system, and every single pug would fail every single optional of the old elite STFs. Because they didn't have to care.
The fact that someone with mid-range DPS can't solo these missions anymore does *not* mean that they're too hard. They're supposed to be 5-person missions. They're supposed to be somewhat difficult. They're supposed to be things people can fail because pve content that you always win is boring.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
While I'd personally (depending on how long I've been reading the forums on that particular day) try to avoid using the term scrubs...yeah, casuals can definitely do Advanced.
I think too many folks look at some of the numbers some of the DPS folks are doing and think that's what's needed to do an Advanced.
Here are two groups, first Ryan's group:
CLRInfected Space[1:57] Dmg(DPS) Player A 13,940,099(120,173) Player B 7,100,130(60,685) Player C 6,945,694(59,365) Player D 3,802,028(32,496) Player E 2,407,538(26,169)
And then one I had three runs ago:
CLRInfected Space[16:06] Dmg(DPS) Player A 11,417,002(11,993) Player B 9,798,138(10,357) Player C 5,476,196(5,758) Player D 4,451,156(4,613) Player E 4,169,563(4,469)
Ryan's group had a total DPS there of...298887.899 going for them in their 117 second run.
My wee group had a total DPS there of...37190.025 going for us in our 966 second run.
Both groups completed ISA successfully and with the Optional nabbed with time to spare. Heh, yeah, Ryan's group did it with far more time to spare than my wee pug did...but both groups completed ISA with the Optional.
Folks could do lower DPS than my wee group and still complete ISA without nabbing the Optional. Cause you know, my wee group there...doing Advanced and grabbing the Optional with time to spare - we're badass, Advanced of the Advanced and all...if one would believe some folks out there. We're a bunch of random folks flying around going wheeee from a public pug queue...and we're a bunch of Elitists for doing so.
But, but, but...look at what Ryan's group did! Nah, my wee group wasn't a bunch of near-Elite folks...we were just a bunch of casuals going wheeee and having fun. Between my wee group and Ryan's, it's a bit of trek before you run into the Advanced players and then the Elite are beyond that before one gets into those Wizards...
And well, folks, some folks out there, just can't see beyond their keyboard to see where the issue is...and...well, it talks of a special childhood where everything got a gold star.
But I'd not say anything like that until later in the day...
The DPS schism is a tough one, and something that I believe is a flaw of the underlying damage formula with just how much is multiplicative versus additive. There is so much stuff there regardless with the way we had a faux level cap increase that even if it were additive there would still be a DPS schism.
Damage = Base * (1 - WeaponEnhancementBaseModifier) * (1 + WeaponPowerBoost) * (1 + WeaponEnhancementBoost) * (1 + SumAllStrengthBoost) * (1 + SumAllBonusBoost) * (1 - RangePenalty) * (1 - DamageResistance)
All of those things can quickly add up...and the more the lower moves up, the ludicrous manner that the higher will move up.
The more Cryptic has tried to provide for the folks leaning on the spacebar while flying rainbow builds running 50 weapon power and shooting from just inside 10km so they can nap on autopilot between engagements...the more some of the folks out there are able just to slaughter everything.
Say we had somebody running ~20% efficiency that was doing 5k DPS. That means somebody running at 100% efficiency with the same build would be doing 25k DPS. A difference of 20,000 DPS. So we drop out stuff to bring that 5k person up to 10k...doubling their DPS. Well, that means we also doubled that 100% guy or gal. They'll go from 25k to 50k. That 20,000 difference becomes a 40,000 difference. Throw some more stuff at them to get them from 10k to 15k, yeah? That other guy's now at 75k. The 20,000 became 40,000 became 60,000...
It's a schism breeding machine...meh.
But I adapted, of course at the cost of my DPS. I changed my Nebula build so I have ET 1 and RSP 2 (ANY RSP is a must now), removed EPTW 1 because of that. Added the Regenerative Integrity Field console and the Kobali warp core from the Samsar. I still die sometimes but way less. Just need to keep some distance from those spheres.
These new change were targeted against those min-max build with minimal or no heals (Just look at the plasma doping nerf). I guess Cryptic want those guys to have a more balanced build. Sad part is that new players with average equipment also suffer the consequences.
...that signature. It was one of those later in the day things.
Depends on how good you can manage resistencies. Engineers and Scientists are quite well equipped here with their captain skills.
I noted a huge boost of surivability by re-adding Nukara T4:Defense to my traits, especially on the sciships (no surprise if you think about it).
I'm part of DPS 10k and 30K and actually the overall quality of DPS 10K has declined considerably in recent months, to the point where ISA isn't a sure thing and quite often is by the skin of your teeth taking a Transformer down before spheres get there,
In fact daily since Crystal Event you have people moaning about a failure because people decided to try and tank the CE's 2nd blast rather than play safe and move. Or players ignoring the Wait for pets call. Minor things i know.
DPS 10k numbers swelled due to the embassy consoles and plasma doping,Many players got in in the back of that. I've been part of the channels since intial concept when it was dps 5k.
DPS 10K although far superior to pugging has become the new PublicSTFChannel
They are talking about a channel resets for th upperchannels. Personnally i'd deal with 10k 1st and then move up.
The game isn't designed for them in the least. #1000 is doing 26601.2 DPS. There's no content in the game that requires anywhere near that. One would be hard pressed to find content that required half of that. A third of that is going to be overkill for Advanced content.
You mentioned 50k earlier...there are only 171 folks at 50k+.
Now if there were only 1000 people doing over 4-5k...
I still think when they did the reset of the upper stuff, they should have done a complete reset and upped the minimum channel from 10k. Heh, but that's just because I'm an elitist douche nozzle trying to exclude myself from channels. Wait? What? Yeah, depending on who is asked I'm either an elitist or a noob.
My character Tsin'xing
So, you're an elitist noob.
Possibly the most common species on these forums.
Hrmm, I think I've had one fail since the Catastrophe event started. Then again, it was sometime before that where one had failed - so I guess that would be an increase.
I'm lucky with pugs - unlucky with lock boxes.
I failed a pair consecutively the other night. In one, I could swear one guy rushed a generator and then started pulling nanite spheres towards the transformer. The other one...well, the other four players combined barely managed to surpass by paltry 13k DPS.
You're preaching to the choir. Lock boxes are basically dead to me; my luck with them is that poor and I could never justify devoting the resources needed to open up dozens or hundreds just to pursue some low probability result.
Was it a failed or a failed optional? I had a group that missed the Optional by like 3 seconds. Er, and I guess there was one where I got in like 10 seconds before it failed which might have been around that time...one of those somebody bailed right before it would have failed and lucky me got plopped down in there.
It could have been a failed optional.
I can't imagine it's the latter one you describe, as you were providing a parse, which you couldn't have generated if you were only in there for a few seconds before failure.
Worse still no call for help to assist him
Perfect example why i don't pug Advanced or Elite, not having my game time and personal rewards outside of my control.
I pug on and off mainly to grab quick marks and dil, sometimes trying to put a pre-made together takes longer than pugging through 3 normal stfs'
I've played in a few Borg STF's, all normal, and I was in no way a benefit to those groups because the people that were playing in them completely tore through the missions faster than I could figure out what was going on.
Now I am wanting to really get into Rep grinding, but I am not really sure where to start getting into advanced STF's. My ship gear isn't all that spectacular, and I am pretty sure it could do with some changes, but being new, I have limited options available to me at this point to start min/maxing my build.
I hate the feeling of being 'carried' in anything, which is what I felt like in the normals I played in before.
I guess my point is, for a new captain on the outside looking in, the whole STF situation is very daunting, and listening to everyone have grievances with recent changes, makes them a lot intimidating.
Find a decent fleet with tier 3 non-starbase holdings (the embassy, dilithium mine and spire). White doffs are one of the better turn-ins (300 fleet credits per doff), and you can get those by running the doff recruitment missions; for Federation, you'll find these at Starfleet Academy (Vulcan, Andorian, Tellarite, and three more from the personnel officer, just don't bother with the civilian call to duty assignment, or the R&D assignment).
Fleet gear will cover tactical consoles and a warp/singularity core. From the embassy, you'll also be able to pick up Romulan tactical officers with the Superior Romulan Operative trait; most builds run two tactical officers, and 2x SRO provides +4% critical hit chance and +10% critical hit damage.
It's also worth noting that the revamp of the fleet plasma consoles is coming soon, and by the sound of it those consoles will be worth at least a few thousand DPS per console. For a fresh build, this may be the fastest way to achieve advanced STF levels of DPS.
Rep gear will fill out the remaining non-weapon slots. At this point, all of the elite reputation marks (borg neural processors, ancient power cells, etc), can be acquired from solo content, so there's no actual need to run advanced STFs before you're ready for them. AFAIK, rep consoles only require two elite marks per console, which you're likely to pick up incidentally from the reward box granted for each rep turn in assignment. That only leaves shields/deflectors/engines requiring any significant amount of elite marks.
As for weapons, people seem to think that the patch unlocking the selection of mods on crafted items is coming. Completing the fleet and rep gears should be more than enough time for this to go live, if it is at all, at which point you should be able to easily pick up the mod configuration you want for your chosen damage type, and can start engaging in the upgrade system.
Sure, the shield stripping is a bit over the top.. but it was before DR too. When fighting borg, expect to have your shields stripped repeatedly. This is no reason to fail the mission though, as aside from the occasional high yield torpedo (that can be shot down) there's little danger in these runs. They can quite literally be completed without even bothering to equip shields.
As for the health enemies possess - again, that's not Cryptic's fault.. that's yours. If you're having ANY trouble killing a probe in less than a few seconds (I tend to wipe them out in a volley or two), then you've got some serious problems with your setup. I can't tell you how many times I've seen players that are unable to dent a probe's shields.. and frankly, I don't know how anyone manages to be so bad.
Moral of the story - Don't expect the dev's to make advanced level missions achievable when you're doing everything wrong. The secondary objectives shouldn't pose any problems, your ship shouldn't ever be in any real danger (seriously, the damage enemies do can nearly be totally ignored), and you should be capable of wiping out all but a tactical cube solo without any difficulty at all (even cubes shouldn't take more than 30 seconds). If you do it right, you'll have no problems.. in fact, the missions are far too EASY if anything.
Something that might work for the new player gets into some of the changes the Cryptic has made over the years. Things that will allow players to perhaps look at some gearing options, get some Reputation Traits, and just get more comfortable in flying about without having to step foot in a single STF (it's something even folks that are not new to the game can take advantage of if they like).
For each of the Reputations as somebody is leveling them up from Tier 1 to Tier 5, there is the Daily Project. With the advent of Daily Reward Bonus Boxes (or whatever they're called, I was looking for something in the attic earlier and although the girlfriend swears I didn't hit my head hard enough to do any brain damage - I'm all sorts of dazed and confused) which will not only provide enough of the regular Marks for the Daily Project, but will also allow for an accumulation of spare regular Marks that can later be used to toward purchasing any desired gear.
So there the player is doing their thing getting that done, learning a bit more about the game as they go along...getting some extra Marks, getting some Dil, earning some EC. No, it's not balls to the walls grinding for any of it - but it's stuff going on as folks are doing their thing getting that done.
But what about the Elite Marks, those special items required for gear for some of the Reps? While neither Nukara nor Romulan require any (don't even have them), the others do. Cryptic has added ways for folks to get those without hitting up any queues though...now, the ability to get some are a little more limited than others. But with placing it against the backdrop of also leveling up the Rep and just getting more comfortable with the game...basically, having fun instead of making it into a grind...those different Elite Marks if desired can be earned along the way, right?
Now, it's not just about that stuff...not just Rep gear. There are several mission sets that while folks might look down on them for some of the higher tiered play (not just the content, but the folks playing the content) - they are things that will allow folks to dork around with different things - there's the Breen set, Jem'Hadar set, Solanae set, Kobali set, and so forth. Just things folks can muck about with in playing around with different set bonuses and getting a feel for what they want and the options open to them. There are also going to be various mission rewards from replay where if folks want to have a go with certain things they can do that.
Heck, even during this time, maybe somebody wants to start in on doing some Research Projects to take a look at some R&D down the road, eh? While flying around there'll also be the DOFFing one can goof about with and have some fun.
Maybe in a player's travels they'll come across somebody that was cool or helpful that's in a fleet - so they hook up with them. Maybe get some Fleet gear mixed in, maybe have somebody that will show them the ropes a bit more, take them on some runs.
This game just oozes both new player and casual player friendly.
Could it do a better job perhaps in teaching folks some stuff? I think so, this game might ooze friendliness but sometimes it's going to be a case of hitting up the forums here or elsewhere, maybe checking with folks here or there to get some answers for things. And well, like anything on the internet there are going to be a mix of personalities there...so some folks might be very helpful and some folks might...not.
It's pretty nifty, overall, imho though...folks can get all sorts of stuff, learn some basics, and well yeah - just all sorts of stuff without hitting up a queue.
The laid back nature of the game is one of the reasons I've managed to hang around as long as I have...sure, there's all sorts of Hell one can make the game if they want, there's all sorts of hardcore directions one can go if they want, but it's just a pretty laid back game if one wants it to be. So, imho, it provides for all sorts of folks in that sense...though, er, I guess one could say it's kind of lacking for the PvP folks and the high DPS folks - and hopefully Cryptic can toss them a bone from time to time as well; but all in all...yeah...pretty nifty, imho.