"Gravity Kills" TFO is still horrible

kitsubeep · May 2020

I clicked 'Random' queue and just had my worst run of this TFO to date. Two players left basically immediately. One was afk, disconnected, came back, then left. The last player just died repeatedly and did not even start running Hawking particles until the last protomatter facility. I basically had to solo it and it took at least half an hour which means I should have just eaten the leaver penalty and save myself the headache.

A TFO on normal difficulty that makes people leave in spite of whatever penalties are levelled at them is not good in a game. People would rather stop playing your game for half an hour, rather than do that TFO.

I have some suggestions.
Firstly is the enemy respawns. They respawn too rapidly in such large numbers as to not allow players any breathing room to gather particles.

Secondly is perhaps the Tzenkethi themselves. I believe it is unbalanced and unfair for any faction to have both a high amount of damage output and an extremely sturdy tank unless facing Exotic Damage players. Their turtle tank also invalidates flanking/raider mechanics. I'm fairly certain a Tzenkethi battlegroup can defeat any other faction in an NPC straight fight. If their turtle tank is their distinguishing feature then at least reduce their damage? I have little hope for this since requests to have this faction toned down have always been ignored...

garaffe · May 2020

I agree that this TFO is painful with a disorganised team during a random queue. However, I do not think it is as bad as you do. A good strategy is to have a sci captain with strong control and defense push the station defenders away using TBR and then drop a megawell to keep them away from the station. This allows the faster captains on the team to run particles.

It is also not difficult to run particles in a larger, slower ship provided that you have full power to engines and evasive maneuvers, emergency power to engines, and attack pattern omega ready. It also helps to have all three points in impulse expertise for captain abilities (cruiser captains should have this anyways). Having a cloak also helps avoid getting trapped in red-alert.

All that said, it can be difficult if your team is full of captains that don't know what they are doing.

trillbuffet · May 2020

Remove it and set this up as a pilot ship TFO like how the shuttle tfo's work. Both Tzenkethi TFO's their major duration is just a speed race and not a dps race. Plus the lock trajectory is the most easily used skill to kill their ships Only build you need is fly from behind them which is usually easy at the hypermass because they are headed for the Jupiter. so right when you pass the front of their ship lock your trajectory and shoot at their forward facing while the ability ends you should be at the Jupiter with your particle or at the tzenkethi base to launch their bomb to destroy it. So it would be great especially if a pilot ship had commander pilot and Lt or better intel so you could use clean getaway, lock trajectory, pilot team, deploy countermeasures, evade target lock, and kinetic magnet as the basics of a speed racing build for these TFO's. So they aren't entirely bad TFO's they just need better management of how they are played and people would like them more if people are prepared for them.

garaffe · May 2020

trillbuffet wrote: »

Remove it and set this up as a pilot ship TFO like how the shuttle tfo's work. Both Tzenkethi TFO's their major duration is just a speed race and not a dps race. Plus the lock trajectory is the most easily used skill to kill their ships Only build you need is fly from behind them which is usually easy at the hypermass because they are headed for the Jupiter. so right when you pass the front of their ship lock your trajectory and shoot at their forward facing while the ability ends you should be at the Jupiter with your particle or at the tzenkethi base to launch their bomb to destroy it. So it would be great especially if a pilot ship had commander pilot and Lt or better intel so you could use clean getaway, lock trajectory, pilot team, deploy countermeasures, evade target lock, and kinetic magnet as the basics of a speed racing build for these TFO's. So they aren't entirely bad TFO's they just need better management of how they are played and people would like them more if people are prepared for them.

Please correct me if I am reading your post wrong.

Making a TFO that can only be accessed by players with pilot ships goes against the fundamentally F2P basis of STO since pilot ships cost zen. Not to mention the fact that not everyone likes/wants to fly pilot ships. TFOs should be designed so that they are playable and enjoyable by anyone with a decent build. This is not to say that a given TFO can't be more suited to a particular build, in fact this encourages players to experiment with their builds.

I like Gravity Kills the way it is because I know how to play it successfully on my characters. But I also agree that it could be "toned down" a bit when it comes to the spawn rate.

Side note: It just tickles me to use TBR to push the Tzenkethi ships into the black hole. =D

garaffe · May 2020

corinthalas wrote: »

garaffe wrote: »

Side note: It just tickles me to use TBR to push the Tzenkethi ships into the black hole. =D

I tried that one run, just to see if it would work. Pushed a battleship as far out as I would normally have to disengage and use the game's autowarp to get out again. Nope. That slow-*** battleship hummed right along back to the anchor station as if it was nothing. Hence my earlier comment about the gravity well only applying to player ships. Now, there might be a critical-threshold that has to be crossed for it to be lethal, but suffice to say, if *I* couldn't get out in a fast-moving escort with escape maneuvers going, there's no way in hell a BATTLESHIP should be able to do it unassisted. But that's exactly what happened. And there's no point in killing their ships. It'll be replaced before the explosion animation finishes.

You might need to boost your CtrlX to make TBR more effective. As a sci captain I have not problem flinging the tzenkethi ships into the black hole with TBR. There is a critical threshold though, and I thought it was the same as the point at which players get the warp out prompt, but I may be wrong. This is particularly satisfying with the dreadnought at the end of the mission.

grancommes · May 2020

I was in my slowest ship last night for this mission. I still managed to bring in more than 1/3 of the total particles.
Prevailing impulse engines help a lot here (with multiple heals).

It goes pretty fast if people focus on particles.

grancommes · May 2020

Just did this again a moment ago. I don't know what other people were doing, but I got 22 of the 30 particles in my khopesh. Cloaking device helped to some degree, though the other khopesh in the mission obviously didn't have the same success gathering particles. Or the bajoran interceptor.

We didn't finish before the mission timer (optional), but weren't that far off.
Just needed another captain to be gathering particles.

grancommes · May 2020

did it again (must be an endeavor?). this time all or most captains gathered particles and we finished with a couple minutes to spare.

I did remind everyone this time at the beginning that gathering particles helps finish the mission faster.
Or this group already knew what they were doing.

snowwolf · May 2020

I've done this a couple of times in the last two days, as part of random TFO. Had no problems at all completing them, the last time some of the players only focused on shooting things.. So yeah, but still no biggy. Had no problems with the enemy ships.

What I do have a problem with however is the Iconian Sphere mission, that's just awful. lol.

"Gravity Kills" TFO is still horrible

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