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Cloak Unlock skill for FED
jivedutch
Member Posts: 357 Arc User
Why is the emphasis on Cloak so big in the new skill system in the unlocks path.
Are we going to see more than the 5 expensive ships with cloak for Fed than we have now ??
In the kdf/romulan part it makes more sense, since they have cloaks from the start on just about any ship they fly , but fed only have 5 ships that can actually benefit from the skill .....
It seems imbalanced to have this emphasis on cloak systems in the skill system where a big part (some say overwhelming majority) of the player base would only be hurt by having the option there to chose wrong in the first place.
Are we going to see more than the 5 expensive ships with cloak for Fed than we have now ??
In the kdf/romulan part it makes more sense, since they have cloaks from the start on just about any ship they fly , but fed only have 5 ships that can actually benefit from the skill .....
It seems imbalanced to have this emphasis on cloak systems in the skill system where a big part (some say overwhelming majority) of the player base would only be hurt by having the option there to chose wrong in the first place.
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Totally unfeasable.
So it's either a generalized skill tree or seperating cloaking skills entirely from the skill tree, but then what? Make cloaking entirely gear based? Bot possible with innate cloaks. Klingon and Romulan ships would require cloaking device slots (which admittedly could be monetized, but still not sure if the effort is worth it.
Besides, if Klingons and Romulans can get superior Mk XIV cloaks you can bet that Federation ships that can cloak would need to get them, too, instead of the cloak consoles.
How does this change the fact that the Feds have no major use for the stealth choice? Keep it for the KDF/Roms where its more widely utilized and move if further up the chain for Feds where theyre more likely to take advantage of it.
Mask Energy Signature is a low level skill, plus a Tier 2 fed zen ship has a console that could benefit from this skill as it masks the ship using it.
"Back on topic. Destinii is correct."
(Formerly Destinii until the 'Great PWE Forum Shakeup of 2012')
As I said. There is no way they will programm 2 or 3 different skill systems for the different factions. It is just not feasable because it will throw off balance with gear and other skills.
And yes, Federation ships have stealth abilities, just not as perfect as an actual cloak.
And using an essentially maxed out stealth skill will actually make that ability worth using.
It's just costing another abilty so very situational.
But this was already mentioned in the feedback thread a few times, and I think Borticus already responded positively to the critique and ideas there.
Cryptic - Lead Systems Designer
"Play smart!"
Yes, right. This is all true.
...
But gods be damned you just made me really want a system where cloaking devices have a slot the way secondary deflectors do. It could even be the same slot, the way warp cores and singularity cores go in the same place between warbirds and everything else.
Instead of a cloak console, the Galaxy-X and defiant variants could be the only Fed ships with a cloak slot. Some ships could maybe even choose between a cloak or a secondary deflector, OOH, OOH, PEGASUS!
GaaaaahIwantthistobeathingsobadnowthepossibilitiesareendless
You're missing the point.
Okay, it's not super useful at low levels.
It also doesn't cost much to attain. That's the point. And it does have uses. Stealth isn't just useful to cloakers, and hanger pets will be all over the place in the late game, so they'll still get to use it. If your complaint is that the low level characters will struggle with the intense difficulty of surviving the punshing early game with their suboptimal skill sets, I can only suggest covering your eyes, because I may accidentally eject spittle when I laugh heartily in your face.
@borticuscryptic Can we have some clarification on what is intended by the designation "low investment"?
Because while I can easily understand the terminology when used in the "current" skill system where, say, when you just earned the last 4,000 skill points, you're debating on whether 4 pips of the "lower investment" skill or 2 pips of a Commander skill are worth 1 pip of Admiral & 1 pip of Lt, or one Captain and one Lt.Cmdr pip.
However, it falls apart in a system where, whether the box is a "Lieutenant" level or "Admiral" level, it's got the exact same cost - one point.
Is "low investment" meant to mean "easily skipped and the points banked till you access a higher skill tree tier"?
2nd half of post currently unnecessary as tribble check resulted in seeing the carrier skills moved to Admiral as "sorta requested"...
To rob a line: [quote: Mariemaia Kushrenada] Forum Posting is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever. However, opinions will change upon the reading of my post.[/quote]
He isn't (and no one is, in fact) talking about the hangar skills in the skill tree here. They are all discussing the location of the pet health unlock. Many were complaining that putting it at 5 points wouldn't work because Feds at low levels don't have stealth or pets. Others noted, quite correctly, that locating it higher up would require carrier captains to invest too many points in the Tactical tree, hence high vs low investment. You can already see the predictable outcry from carrier captains about the change in this patch.
Changes in CAPS/BOLDFACE.
It allows people with carriers to get some benefit without massively investing in Tac. It allows people not in carriers to always pick something else. It makes harder choices for extra power by grouping offense and defense in pairs. It gives a harder choice between Subsystem Repair and Control Resistance. It gives people with cloaks benefits early in the leveling process. It gives players without cloaks a useful tool instead.
I like your engineering unlocks. What I've found after trying out stuff on Tribble, is that there are still quite a number of junk choices in each tree. Sometimes this is because the skills are just not efficient, but more often it's because they don't fit a particular build.
What this does is that it makes it extremely unattractive to specialize too heavily in any one tree, because you soon reach a point where you're picking up sub-optimal skills. On the current Tribble build, most of the best unlocks are achieved by 15 points, which creates a lot of inertia to go beyond a 15/15/15 +1 build. The ultimates require a massive over-investment that only certain builds can really take advantage of. I understand that this is somewhat by-design, but I think the balance is a little off.
Now, I would personally benefit if things like energy crth and shield hardness remained lower-tier unlocks, but regardless I would suggest that the really good ones should be moved to 20 points, to balance cherry-picking only the most efficient skills against greater specialization.
1. The whole "second half of post edited out" thing was because after an epic rant about the new skill point system and various skill tree methodologies used in P&P RPGs, I noticed the hangar pet skill moved to Admiral on the tribble build released around/with the unlock of character transfers. Which is what I originally thought the thrust of this thread was about.
2. Also, you aren't "forced" to buy X tactical skills to unlock access to tier Y powers. Or, for that matter, buy X points in each level of the skill tree. The system is designed that once X many points is spent, a level unlocks. Without bouncing to tribble just to check, Admiral unlocks right around 35 points of investment. Whether said 35 is entirely in the engineering and science branches, or filling in most of the Lt and Lt Cmdr levels of the skill tree, I can access and fill an admiral level power like the recently-moved carrier pet one as soon as it lights up. 3 points later, I'm a carrier specialist.
Now, a little background here: In my "deleted epic rant", I went into a gross oversimplification behind the concepts of various skill trees I've been exposed to in my time as a dedicated P&P RPG player. One "common system" where each skill option carries an identical skill cost at every purchase point but "locks" access to various skills behind any kind of "wall" (whether level, previous investment, etc.) usually is designed around "basics first, specialization unlocked as you progress".
And this is the model I'm seeing out of STO's new tree. Especially when I look at the Science path. Lt. and LtCmdr. levels are filled with nothing but "basic" shield skills "essential" to most any build, at Cmdr and Captain I see "mid-level" specialization choices of "do I go Control or drain" at Cmdr, and "Exotic DPS or more healing" at Captain. At Admiral level, a scientist gets access to hyper-powerful shield skills...
So, the move of Carrier pet skills to "Admiral" is, in this viewpoint, a reclassification of the skill from the previous "implied definition" of "extremely essential since it's a first-presented option" to "hyper specialization" that comes from requiring 3 of an extremely limited 10 points that can be spent at that level. But other than the decision "do I really want to specialize as a carrier pet captain over hyper shield manipulator / extreme power squeezer / weapons crit master / dumping the points into a lower level skill I really really love", there is no other special investment necessary to be a carrier specialist.
Hence my request to get some clarification. Does Bort really mean "investment = amount of options available when choice is available", or what?
To rob a line: [quote: Mariemaia Kushrenada] Forum Posting is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever. However, opinions will change upon the reading of my post.[/quote]
People were complaining that having pet health or stealth at level 5 point tactical unlock was useless for Feds at low levels. It has now been moved up the tree, to the point where you need to spend 20 points in tactical to get the unlock for pet health/damage.
every Basic Cloak grants 4975 points which is more than enough to sneak close enough to everyone
and just do the ONE shot and "Vaporized" everything
Cloak = 4975
Visible Range (standard ship) = 0.7 km
Visible Range (science ship) = 1.1 km
Mask Energy Signature = 4555
Visible Range (standard ship) = 9.1 km
Visible Range (science ship) = 9.5 km
+100 Stealth points grant (a player) about 1km that he can come even closer
The only way to detact Cloaked ships early enough to prepare yourself is equiment that cripples your Def and Offense
Boring Numbers :
Standard Ships with max Aux Power of 125 = 100 perception
Standard Ships with max Aux power of 135 = 108 perception
Science Ship with a max Aux Power of 125 = 300 perception
Science Ship with a max Aux Power of 135 = 324 perception
* Deflector that boost your Sensors Stat, of 50 = 80 perception (theoretical item)
* Secondary Deflector (epic )with [sen]x2 = 30 = 50 perception
* 5 Science Consoles with each 37.5 = 187.5 = 325 persection
* Total= about 770 to779 = which would result in about 3 km where you would spot a cloaked ship
Plus
Even with all that trying and you got yourself a ship that can spot cloaked ships in a 3 - 4 km radius.
without the 100 points from the skill Tree
and without a Potato Head or nausican Bridge Officer
Grants: +150 Stealth
if you want Stealth
get yourself a Battle Cloak or even the Advanced B.C.
if you ask me the "+100 stealth" could have been deleted entirely
But cryptic can not do that , the only thing they can do is shifting some things around but everything will stay the way it is at the moment,
otherwise it would take too much time and money to make any changes on what we have now.