Let me start out with a negative and try try to see if it can be built into a positive.
History: I have played STO on and off for a few years. Sometimes more off than on to the point where I had to relearn the game. My biggest issue is wither STO lack of balance or my lack of skill.
For example in other games I can see an enemy, boss, mob, champion, and assess the situation and battle. Usually though skillful play I can win or know why I died. In some games I only die because I made a stupid mistake. But on the end it was a challenging fight that I beat with skill.
I do not get that feeling in STO. Either I win with ease (little skill) or am swarmed and die without any chance for a victory. It seems that some times I win simply by a war or attrition (die, come back, die, come back, etc).
I have seen many you tube videos where the host seems to have the same war of attrition style, which bothers me.
So to my question. Is there a real lack of balance that forces the war of attrition style of play? Or do I need to really spend more time to become a master to get the feeling that I have with other games and able to win most battles with out dying? I want a challenging PVE that I can win without dying.
Set weapon power to maximum, use Beam Fire at Will, win.
That's literally all the skill you need in this game.
Now, now. You do need to turn on autofire and hit the spacebar once too.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
So to my question. Is there a real lack of balance that forces the war of attrition style of play? Or do I need to really spend more time to become a master to get the feeling that I have with other games and able to win most battles with out dying? I want a challenging PVE that I can win without dying.
In all fairness, without seeing how you play, what gear you are using, etc, it is impossible to answer this question. I am using a T5U Sovereign with mostly Mk XII Rep/Fleet gear and not having any issues with any of the spawns.
In most places the game follows a simple pattern: 3 small ships versus you, 1 medium ship versus you, or 1 boss ship versus you. Unless you are in an STF - designed for 5 people - or aggro multiple groups you seldom find yourself outside of that grouping type, and every ship is designed to fight those grouping types.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
Let me start out with a negative and try try to see if it can be built into a positive.
History: I have played STO on and off for a few years. Sometimes more off than on to the point where I had to relearn the game. My biggest issue is wither STO lack of balance or my lack of skill.
For example in other games I can see an enemy, boss, mob, champion, and assess the situation and battle. Usually though skillful play I can win or know why I died. In some games I only die because I made a stupid mistake. But on the end it was a challenging fight that I beat with skill.
I do not get that feeling in STO. Either I win with ease (little skill) or am swarmed and die without any chance for a victory. It seems that some times I win simply by a war or attrition (die, come back, die, come back, etc).
I have seen many you tube videos where the host seems to have the same war of attrition style, which bothers me.
So to my question. Is there a real lack of balance that forces the war of attrition style of play? Or do I need to really spend more time to become a master to get the feeling that I have with other games and able to win most battles with out dying? I want a challenging PVE that I can win without dying.
Thanks
To be honest, if you want an actual PvE challenge and play a game that's balanced within some form of reasoning, look elsewhere. I gave up playing lemming trying to be the hypothetical "best of the best" in this game because at the rate the game has gone things may very well get worse. Only reason I stick around is I play with a few remaining friends (others left this game) and we just goof off more than half the time. We can't take this game in any form of seriousness anymore
It pains me to say that because I do llike STO, I enjoy Star Trek stuff as well, but the game itself is just absurd. When actual skill and what not comes into play, you're better playing other games. That's why you get that weird feeling. It isn't you, it's just STO and what it's become.
On a side note though, there's always Foundry stuff. Can always create more entertaining situations rather than the same old predictable, boring, repetitive, obnoxious, PvE missions and stuff. (Though I'm not trying to hate on the devs and their hard work for all the badness in the game. I blame it on upper management side of things)
STO forum term definitions for newbies:Piloting Skill: That thing you do where you fly around and avoid big scary green plasma balls of death. Pressing F and spacebar may also relate to skill.Taco: A very sacred thing. Do not speak I'll of the Taco or things will happen. Terrible things! Humor: Something not found here. Don't bring it. This forum is serious business.Fun: Something illegal. Don't have it and don't bring it
@fatman592, thecosmic1, & guilli88 So the game really does not invoke skill?
@kerfo - A fair answer. I am only playing because a friend plays. But the game seems to lack the feeling of accoishment of winning a great battle or simply getting slaughtered to re-spawn to win.
I am a very good player on other games but agian in STO find that i win very easily or there is no change to win fights with out re-spawn. Sto can be fun but I find I am just pushing buttons and watching pretty colors.
Outside of PvP player skill has very little bearing on the game.
STO is about my Liberated Borg Federation Captain with his Breen 1st Officer, Jem'Hadar Tactical Officer, Liberated Borg Engineering Officer, Android Ops Officer, Photonic Science Officer, Gorn Science Officer, and Reman Medical Officer jumping into their Jem'Hadar Carrier and flying off to do missions for the new Romulan Empire. But for some players allowing a T5 Connie to be used breaks the canon in the game.
Actually STO is a collecting game and very casual shooter. It does that pretty good. I wish they would also make the game some of us wanted, an MMO with action, PvP, and strategic battles.
This game is pretty tame in terms of difficulty so long as you put in the time and effort to learn how the mechanics work. Beating the harder solo fights is a combination of 3 things -- officer skills, gear, and game mechanics knowledge. Of those, gear is actually the least important.
Officer skills directly relate to staying alive and producing damage output. If you have the wrong skills, you will not succeed. The right skills depend on your build concept, but the idea is that your skills should heal you or hurt your enemy, a lot. Healing includes clearing nasty debuffs on your own ship. Damage includes applying nasty debuffs to the enemy.
Gear. It matters, not so much the actual quality (you do not have to have highest rank top gear to do solo content on normal mode). The most important thing is making it work together, which includes basic ideas like same energy type (plasma, disruptor, etc), same family (beams, cannons) matching your tactical consoles, instead of a failed build like trying to use a plasma cannon and a disruptor beam and a antiproton turret while using tertyon tactical consoles... it helps if some of your gear is high quality. You will do just fine with up to date weapons, a good shield, and whatever else -- low ranked weapons makes it hard to kill some of the tougher fights, so if you only upgrade one thing to max rank make it your guns.
game mechanics. touched on in the other two, but the idea here is that your skills, your ship, and your gear and everything must all work together to make a build that is effective. Slapping a random selection of the best gear in the game onto a top notch ship will still fail if the gear does not work together to keep you alive and produce good damage output, while a set of green gear looted off enemy kills can beat any soloable fight in the game if the gear forms a good strong build that works.
It is a casual game in that all gear is available to anyone within some minor limitations (some items are not available outside special events, and some of it requires many hours of farming OR cash, some of it requires joining a fleet for access, but none of it really requires you to defeat elite hardcore boss fights). Anyone can beat the solo content and follow the main story without having to get groups and beat big fights to proceed. That is: the bulk of the game is soloable and you can have a top notch build even as a free player with a bit of work and patience. But casual does not mean a 4 year old can randomly gear out a ship and solo a borg cube boss. You are expected to spend the time to learn the game after level 40 or 45 it is no longer going to work to just flap around in random gear shooting at stuff without any effort applied. (Forgive me if you have put in some effort, but if you have, post your build and ask questions about it. Because it is not working, so you need to adjust something somewhere to fit your needs... we can help you!). If you are having to use grave-yard 'tactics' to beat solo content, your build needs work, this should NEVER be needed for success on normal difficulty solo content. It should also never be needed, period, but once in a while a weak group will use this as a last resort to complete something they were unable to do any other way... getting their reward while understanding that they effectively failed the mission.
@fatman592, thecosmic1, & guilli88 So the game really does not invoke skill?
@kerfo - A fair answer. I am only playing because a friend plays. But the game seems to lack the feeling of accoishment of winning a great battle or simply getting slaughtered to re-spawn to win.
I am a very good player on other games but agian in STO find that i win very easily or there is no change to win fights with out re-spawn. Sto can be fun but I find I am just pushing buttons and watching pretty colors.
I am trying to really like STO!
The group of folks I've played with we've played MMOs, shooters, RTS games and all kinds of things for many years (even role-play!). We're quite good at what we do, but when we look at STO we just LOL. Really, this game has terrible balance of mechanics. It's so out of control. I do both PvE and PvP games and I feel bad for the PvPers in this game. Any friends I brought to the game though I had to tell them to forget any form of proper gaming skill and logic they acquired in other games. STO likes to play by its own terrible rules. lol.
I feel the same with accomplishment satisfactory though. It just isn't there. That time in Payday 2 where a cloaker lunged at me, I crouched, dodged him, turned around and shot him in the face with a shotgun revolver before he Sam Fishered me felt like an accomplishment. BFAWing, Grav-welling, torp-spamming my way to victory, not so much. I might as well be playing Planetside 1 and throwing grenades down the stairwells of towers again and claim I'm a deity at killing with an epic K/D ratio.
I hate to discourage this game though as I often have to find reasons myself to keep finding enjoyment in it (I have a hard time giving up hope.) Hopefully, if you get in the groove I hope you can find some way to enjoy your time and not find it a waste.
Though to add with what the other guy said, the game is quite doable without dying. Unfortunately, once you get to that point combat becomes rather pointless and you'll really, really start to feel the ultimate dread of that non-accomplishment feeling.
STO forum term definitions for newbies:Piloting Skill: That thing you do where you fly around and avoid big scary green plasma balls of death. Pressing F and spacebar may also relate to skill.Taco: A very sacred thing. Do not speak I'll of the Taco or things will happen. Terrible things! Humor: Something not found here. Don't bring it. This forum is serious business.Fun: Something illegal. Don't have it and don't bring it
I am a very good player on other games but agian in STO find that i win very easily or there is no change to win fights with out re-spawn.
There is a very low skill floor to be able to do all the PvE content. If you're constantly respawning, you're not there yet. There's probably some fundamental thing you're missing that you'll facepalm over when you discover what it is.
In conclusion, while I only play STO on occasion with a friend and really find the game a little boring...
I REALLY LOVE the Summer Event more any seasonal event of my other games. Summer just rocks! With very nice outfits and fun events. Winter is very nice too.
I wish they would do more with the club! Maybe make some event there too.
That said I wish my other skill games took a lesson from STO on seasonal events.
Comments
That's literally all the skill you need in this game.
Can play stfs while eating with ease!
sig
http://img825.imageshack.us/img825/5451/om71.jpg
It is a peculiar phenomenon that we can imagine events that defy the laws of the universe.
In most places the game follows a simple pattern: 3 small ships versus you, 1 medium ship versus you, or 1 boss ship versus you. Unless you are in an STF - designed for 5 people - or aggro multiple groups you seldom find yourself outside of that grouping type, and every ship is designed to fight those grouping types.
To be honest, if you want an actual PvE challenge and play a game that's balanced within some form of reasoning, look elsewhere. I gave up playing lemming trying to be the hypothetical "best of the best" in this game because at the rate the game has gone things may very well get worse. Only reason I stick around is I play with a few remaining friends (others left this game) and we just goof off more than half the time. We can't take this game in any form of seriousness anymore
It pains me to say that because I do llike STO, I enjoy Star Trek stuff as well, but the game itself is just absurd. When actual skill and what not comes into play, you're better playing other games. That's why you get that weird feeling. It isn't you, it's just STO and what it's become.
On a side note though, there's always Foundry stuff. Can always create more entertaining situations rather than the same old predictable, boring, repetitive, obnoxious, PvE missions and stuff. (Though I'm not trying to hate on the devs and their hard work for all the badness in the game. I blame it on upper management side of things)
@kerfo - A fair answer. I am only playing because a friend plays. But the game seems to lack the feeling of accoishment of winning a great battle or simply getting slaughtered to re-spawn to win.
I am a very good player on other games but agian in STO find that i win very easily or there is no change to win fights with out re-spawn. Sto can be fun but I find I am just pushing buttons and watching pretty colors.
I am trying to really like STO!
Hmm, a good signature idea.
Trying to like STO since Beta!
Actually STO is a collecting game and very casual shooter. It does that pretty good. I wish they would also make the game some of us wanted, an MMO with action, PvP, and strategic battles.
Officer skills directly relate to staying alive and producing damage output. If you have the wrong skills, you will not succeed. The right skills depend on your build concept, but the idea is that your skills should heal you or hurt your enemy, a lot. Healing includes clearing nasty debuffs on your own ship. Damage includes applying nasty debuffs to the enemy.
Gear. It matters, not so much the actual quality (you do not have to have highest rank top gear to do solo content on normal mode). The most important thing is making it work together, which includes basic ideas like same energy type (plasma, disruptor, etc), same family (beams, cannons) matching your tactical consoles, instead of a failed build like trying to use a plasma cannon and a disruptor beam and a antiproton turret while using tertyon tactical consoles... it helps if some of your gear is high quality. You will do just fine with up to date weapons, a good shield, and whatever else -- low ranked weapons makes it hard to kill some of the tougher fights, so if you only upgrade one thing to max rank make it your guns.
game mechanics. touched on in the other two, but the idea here is that your skills, your ship, and your gear and everything must all work together to make a build that is effective. Slapping a random selection of the best gear in the game onto a top notch ship will still fail if the gear does not work together to keep you alive and produce good damage output, while a set of green gear looted off enemy kills can beat any soloable fight in the game if the gear forms a good strong build that works.
It is a casual game in that all gear is available to anyone within some minor limitations (some items are not available outside special events, and some of it requires many hours of farming OR cash, some of it requires joining a fleet for access, but none of it really requires you to defeat elite hardcore boss fights). Anyone can beat the solo content and follow the main story without having to get groups and beat big fights to proceed. That is: the bulk of the game is soloable and you can have a top notch build even as a free player with a bit of work and patience. But casual does not mean a 4 year old can randomly gear out a ship and solo a borg cube boss. You are expected to spend the time to learn the game after level 40 or 45 it is no longer going to work to just flap around in random gear shooting at stuff without any effort applied. (Forgive me if you have put in some effort, but if you have, post your build and ask questions about it. Because it is not working, so you need to adjust something somewhere to fit your needs... we can help you!). If you are having to use grave-yard 'tactics' to beat solo content, your build needs work, this should NEVER be needed for success on normal difficulty solo content. It should also never be needed, period, but once in a while a weak group will use this as a last resort to complete something they were unable to do any other way... getting their reward while understanding that they effectively failed the mission.
The group of folks I've played with we've played MMOs, shooters, RTS games and all kinds of things for many years (even role-play!). We're quite good at what we do, but when we look at STO we just LOL. Really, this game has terrible balance of mechanics. It's so out of control. I do both PvE and PvP games and I feel bad for the PvPers in this game. Any friends I brought to the game though I had to tell them to forget any form of proper gaming skill and logic they acquired in other games. STO likes to play by its own terrible rules. lol.
I feel the same with accomplishment satisfactory though. It just isn't there. That time in Payday 2 where a cloaker lunged at me, I crouched, dodged him, turned around and shot him in the face with a shotgun revolver before he Sam Fishered me felt like an accomplishment. BFAWing, Grav-welling, torp-spamming my way to victory, not so much. I might as well be playing Planetside 1 and throwing grenades down the stairwells of towers again and claim I'm a deity at killing with an epic K/D ratio.
I hate to discourage this game though as I often have to find reasons myself to keep finding enjoyment in it (I have a hard time giving up hope.) Hopefully, if you get in the groove I hope you can find some way to enjoy your time and not find it a waste.
Though to add with what the other guy said, the game is quite doable without dying. Unfortunately, once you get to that point combat becomes rather pointless and you'll really, really start to feel the ultimate dread of that non-accomplishment feeling.
There is a very low skill floor to be able to do all the PvE content. If you're constantly respawning, you're not there yet. There's probably some fundamental thing you're missing that you'll facepalm over when you discover what it is.
I REALLY LOVE the Summer Event more any seasonal event of my other games. Summer just rocks! With very nice outfits and fun events. Winter is very nice too.
I wish they would do more with the club! Maybe make some event there too.
That said I wish my other skill games took a lesson from STO on seasonal events.
Thanks all for posting.