Ehm FED escort fewer consoles ? Making universal consoles wouldnt help much, because they would still be limited to lt. level (like now). except for tact of course.
I think MES should be changed so it provides a avoidance/defense bonus, so its hard to lock on them with weapons, torps/beams miss etc.
I have an admiral tac in escort, and i also have admiral engineer in cruiser...and really, right now, there is no point to use that escort, because the cruiser outperforms it in every stat.
I was experimentin with escort builds and such, but without a way to respec, its kinda pointless to try now.
The raptor has it's uses. I just think of the BOP as the science vessel of the klingon fleet because of it's awesome support potential, it's just cooler than fed science vessels because it can mount cannons. BOP is not really an escort simply because it's nimble and mounts cannons.
T1-T3 there is no reason at all to use a raptor since the BOP can use the same weapons and have better officer configs.
T4-T5 the raptor can out DPS the BOP, but is overshadowed by the cruisers which have more damage potential and MUCH higher survivability. Also it's BO stations absolutely suck like a roomba powered by a fusion reactor.
Escorts are kind of irrelevant/un-needed in PVP at the moment.
Even with strategy like "extend shields" or other team work, that effort would be better served with protecting Science or Cruisers. Any number of escorts at this point just seems to make a team weaker. They have no real role to serve in later tiers because their DPS doesn't scale enough with their paperness. If that makes any sense. Defensive skills and science skills are so much more powerful than offensive/escort/tac skills that they really just aren't needed. Cruisers have more damage potential due to escorts needing to be so close, close enough to get insta-killed by VM/SNB/Tractor/Etc, they don't have an advantage of pitch so cruisers can just fly at them and get a couple degrees above their firing arc, which requires an escort to retreat and circle back around just to get the enemy back in their sights.
Escorts need love. They were gimped in Beta when people cried about cannons, but people didn't realize it'd affect more than Klingons at the time.
Escorts need love. They were gimped in Beta when people cried about cannons, but people didn't realize it'd affect more than Klingons at the time.
I'd argue that escorts were affected more adversely by cannon nerfs than the BOPs. The short range doesn't really harm the BOP who can start the fight at short range at their discretion, but decidedly impacts the escort who can't long-ball with cannons.
Oh, if only this were the case. Right now, if you fire one, all torps gain a 3 second cool-down.
Torpedoes work exactly like cannons do. You can't fire 2 cannons at once, can you? Same with torpedoes.
Photon torpedoes have a 6s single cooldown. That means you can fire more torpedoes with a second tube. Fire 1, 3s later fire 2, 3s later fire 1 again compared to fire 1, wait 6s, fire 1 again.
But other torpedoes have even longer cooldowns. Quantums are 8s, so you can fire 3 tubes before you finish the cooldown on tube 1 (although it would be 1s longer due to the global). Transphasics have a 10s cooldown, so you can have 4 torpedoes in the "water" before the first finishes the initial cooldown.
No you can't fire all your torpedoes at once, but you stagger-fire them like cannons to gain more overall.
Escorts are kind of irrelevant/un-needed in PVP at the moment.
Even with strategy like "extend shields" or other team work, that effort would be better served with protecting Science or Cruisers. Any number of escorts at this point just seems to make a team weaker.
That's what I see too.
We can theorycraft about how to make Escorts/Raptors viable and useful in a well organized team but for the other 95% of teams they're a liability.
Feds playing anything less than expert level organized premades would be better off using cruisers and science ships, but mostly cruisers, while pug Klingons would do best in 100% battlecruisers.
Feds need to learn something vitally important: Escorts aren't solo machines in pvp. When you have a single escort trying to dogfight a bop, the BoP is going to get behind you and ruin your day. Mostly because the BoP can turn faster, but more importantly, THEY HAVE A WINGMATE!!!
Stop being TRIBBLE, people, and realize that you have to be a coordinated team. If one escort is going on the attack, another escort should be right behind them, providing the finishing DPS and support for the first one. NOTHING will be able to survive that attack run.
Also, realize that the first ship attacking from cloak is probably not the most dangerous ship....
I'd argue that escorts were affected more adversely by cannon nerfs than the BOPs. The short range doesn't really harm the BOP who can start the fight at short range at their discretion, but decidedly impacts the escort who can't long-ball with cannons.
Feds need to learn something vitally important: Escorts aren't solo machines in pvp. When you have a single escort trying to dogfight a bop, the BoP is going to get behind you and ruin your day. Mostly because the BoP can turn faster, but more importantly, THEY HAVE A WINGMATE!!!
Stop being TRIBBLE, people, and realize that you have to be a coordinated team. If one escort is going on the attack, another escort should be right behind them, providing the finishing DPS and support for the first one. NOTHING will be able to survive that attack run.
Also, realize that the first ship attacking from cloak is probably not the most dangerous ship....
as an escort in t5, I can say that with proper support we don't crumble easily, akin to buffing a BOP to survive a fedball alpha strike in t2, but different. In the middle of a t5 dogfight I can easily get off 2 or 3 kills before I go down (If I go down, I've gone games without dying.)
Oddly enough I find that I'm spending my engineering team most of the time on an ally rather than myself. I know how to get away from a fight, and I know when to stay in and score a kill, which is something that most escorts don't know when to differentiate.
Now if only I didn't hit abandon ship instead of ramming speed /ramble
Edit:
for the recort I pack
Engineering team 1
Emergency power to shields 1
reverse shield polarity 1
jam sensors 1
charged particle blast 1
Never seen a bop sticking behind me. Im pretty sure i can kill most enemies 1vs1, but escorts die like flies under focused fire. But thats how its supposed to be. With the right setup, an escort can tear enemies very quickly. I dont even have RPS on my advanced escort and i live pretty long, because i run often :-)
But still im pretty sure i do even better in my cruiser...i can do same dmg (less burst tho), heal and support and survive.
Federation escorts do feel terrible, low survivability plus the low range of cannons and no way to close the distance before the entire team of battle cruisers melts you is absurd. Something needs to be done because pvp is nothing but suck for escort pilots.
Maybe if mes was fixed it wouldnt be so bad, or they reverted the disruptor changes but I doubt they will do anything.
PvP is nothing but suck for all federation players who are used to games that consist of more than just huddling into a ball and waiting to be attacked.
Here's the thing though - ships in this game are a tool, not a class.
I can guarantee that escorts are not worthless 'in general', but they might not be the best thing to bring against kdf because kdf outmatch them in that particular facet.
Against KDF in pvp, you probably want to bring mostly cruisers and some science ships. Make the fight happen on YOUR terms, not the enemy's.
Feds are playing defensively in pvp vs kdf. Prepare accordingly.
Here's the thing though - ships in this game are a tool, not a class.
I can guarantee that escorts are not worthless 'in general', but they might not be the best thing to bring against kdf because kdf outmatch them in that particular facet.
Against KDF in pvp, you probably want to bring mostly cruisers and some science ships. Make the fight happen on YOUR terms, not the enemy's.
Feds are playing defensively in pvp vs kdf. Prepare accordingly.
This shouldnt happen though, one class of ship should not be invalidated as useless. Something needs done to fix this poor design element.
You're like a guy with a hammer, looking at a box of screws and complaining.
You take destroyers to fight subs, subs to fight carriers, carriers to fight battleships, battleships to fight destroyers...
Stop complaining and start solving problems.
That wouldnt be an issue if we could spec for several ships. But since we are pretty screwed with skill points, its hard to "adapt" if you happen to play the least wanted combination in pvp...tac escort. You would be right, if we had unlimited skill points, and could just switch ships. This isnt the case.
That wouldnt be an issue if we could spec for several ships. But since we are pretty screwed with skill points, its hard to "adapt" if you happen to play the least wanted combination in pvp...tac escort. You would be right, if we had unlimited skill points, and could just switch ships. This isnt the case.
I don't spec into the specific ship, and you can EASILY spec into all of the general ships.
Its' a points vs benefits thing. For the cost of ONE t5 ship spec you could raise ALL of your lower tier subsystem power level boosters. That choice is pretty obvious to me.
If you favor escorts for pve, fly a cruiser in pvp and kit it out with turrets, which receive your cannon skill bonus and can use rapid fire. DEM+TURRETS+CRF isn't as bursty, but it'll damn sure put an ever lovin hurt on someone.
Trick up your shizzle with some RSP+ENGTEAM+DEM on your engineer slots, and sciteam + gw/cpb.
That is, if you want to win. Maybe you like losing.
I don't spec into the specific ship, and you can EASILY spec into all of the general ships.
Its' a points vs benefits thing. For the cost of ONE t5 ship spec you could raise ALL of your lower tier subsystem power level boosters. That choice is pretty obvious to me.
Yes, unless you exactly know the system, and after you spent all your points..you realize you need something else :-) If there was at least respec option. But still, something is wrong, when escorts do so poorly overall compared to cruisers.
Oh and btw, power levels are raised by T4/T5 skills, so you couldnt, if you meant that.
Don't even listen to meat machine, he's just one of those "Don't complain about broken stuff, just don't use it" people.
Escorts are useless in their current state and its not because of the ships design, but because there is absolutely no point to having a fast attack ship in a game that's all about sitting around and trying to survive an inevitable ambush. If they finally nerfed cloak a bit escorts would be fine.
Nah, meat is ok. We may not always agree, but compared to others, he can actualy tries to discuss instead flame. But as i said, if 1/3 of ships is not good enough for high tier, there must be something wrong. Even on klingons you see mostly neghvars+carriers, with occassional bop or raptor.
My Brigadier General is a tac officer and ive only flown BoP's , i find it adds a little exitement knowing that your in a tin foil tub waiting to be punctured by the first stray torpedo that comes along lol . Like anything else , though, a BoP can be made rugged and hard to kill if you use the right BO skills.
Yes, unless you exactly know the system, and after you spent all your points..you realize you need something else :-) If there was at least respec option. But still, something is wrong, when escorts do so poorly overall compared to cruisers.
Oh and btw, power levels are raised by T4/T5 skills, so you couldnt, if you meant that.
Efficiency is t3.
I completely agree with you on the spec thing. My first 3-4 characters were completely screwed up. I only know what to spend points on now because of CB.
The day you give a single piece of useful advice, someone will start listening to you.
Efficiency is t3.
I completely agree with you on the spec thing. My first 3-4 characters were completely screwed up. I only know what to spend points on now because of CB.
Efficiency just improves EPS of that system a little (subjective feeling). Power levels are raised by performance (tested).
And yeah i screwed many chars also. Currently my escort captain used 45k BO points..and my spec is pretty screwed.
Im not sure, if i want to level another tac escort captain just to correct some flaws i made. I propably never will be able to change starting traits, so my current captain will always be alittle weaker, than the "max" i could achieve.
Nah, meat is ok. We may not always agree, but compared to others, he can actualy tries to discuss instead flame.
If someone always defends the status quo based on the idea that there is something wrong with everyone who doesn't like things exactly the way they are and dismisses claims that something doesn't work in the face of overwhelming evidence they are not helping anything.
If someone always defends the status quo based on the idea that there is something wrong with everyone who doesn't like things exactly the way they are and dismisses claims that something doesn't work in the face of overwhelming evidence they are not helping anything.
I take that as an endorsement, thank you. I criticize the things I feel are imba, and defend the things which are not.
I play on both factions, and I have fun and succeed in pvp (usually).
Overwhelming baised and exculpatory testimony from the uninitiated is not evidence. I'm the guy who got past where you are now, trying to lead you there.
That wouldnt be an issue if we could spec for several ships. But since we are pretty screwed with skill points, its hard to "adapt" if you happen to play the least wanted combination in pvp...tac escort. You would be right, if we had unlimited skill points, and could just switch ships. This isnt the case.
WHAAA!!!! ZOMG!!! I KANT MAEK MY SHIP WERK LIKE KLINKONGS B_CUZ I ARE TRIBBLE!!!!! WHAAA!!! NERF THEM!!!
Seriously, Bud, you are whining about not being uber at everything. You do realize that, right? I am a TAC/ESCORT Captain (T-4) and I do quite well in combat. It has to do with understanding the limitations of your ship and playing towards it's strengths. If you are taking too much damage and vaporizing with the first salvo, then you need to respec your BO's or look at your team and ask them why they aren't supporting you.
and arguing with Meat is just silly, since he has even more pvp experience than me
WHAAA!!!! ZOMG!!! I KANT MAEK MY SHIP WERK LIKE KLINKONGS B_CUZ I ARE TRIBBLE!!!!! WHAAA!!! NERF THEM!!!
Seriously, Bud, you are whining about not being uber at everything. You do realize that, right? I am a TAC/ESCORT Captain (T-4) and I do quite well in combat. It has to do with understanding the limitations of your ship and playing towards it's strengths. If you are taking too much damage and vaporizing with the first salvo, then you need to respec your BO's or look at your team and ask them why they aren't supporting you.
and arguing with Meat is just silly, since he has even more pvp experience than me
Eh ? i guess you missing the point. Im not whining about anything. I have both escort tac admiral, and eng cruiser admiral, and i can objectively compare what brings more into team in T5 pvp. It has nothing to do with quick death (i usualy have least death of my team anyway). So shooo, you picked one of my post, and made a ****** comment. Go play to T5 and then come back, and we can speak :-)
But perhaps you should change your forum name to lunatic, would be more suitable.
Here's the thing though - ships in this game are a tool, not a class.
I can guarantee that escorts are not worthless 'in general', but they might not be the best thing to bring against kdf because kdf outmatch them in that particular facet.
Yes, this is part of my argument as well: that escorts (including Raptors and BOPs) are largely a tool without a job. They are fast strike hit-and-run ships in a game that doesn't really have any fast strike hit-and-run situations - at least not in PvP.
If this game had truly open PvP, Escorts would own. You'd hunt down solo players, waste them and be away before anyone else could show up, whereas cruisers would have to spend more time slogging it out and possibly have enemy reinforcements arrive before they could finish the job. Without that element, though, Escorts are a square peg in a universe of round holes. (Even in the Salvage PvP missions, the map is so small that reinforcements are never more than a few seconds away. Even Escorts can't DPS down a target and get away before the enemy fleet shows up in most cases.)
One thing I do think would help though:
* Make escorts benefit more from engine power. An escort with 100 engine power should be FAST.
* Make ship speed give greater defensive bonuses.
Escorts should basically be "speed tanks". Put your engines to 50 power with +engine power consoles and maybe Emergency Power to Engines as you make your pass and you should be difficult to hit (until someone puts you in a tractor beam). That would be loyal to Star Trek canon and might actually be a good way to balance them out. Escorts would rely on speed for defense and the counter to them would be things that hurt their engines.
Comments
I think MES should be changed so it provides a avoidance/defense bonus, so its hard to lock on them with weapons, torps/beams miss etc.
I have an admiral tac in escort, and i also have admiral engineer in cruiser...and really, right now, there is no point to use that escort, because the cruiser outperforms it in every stat.
I was experimentin with escort builds and such, but without a way to respec, its kinda pointless to try now.
T1-T3 there is no reason at all to use a raptor since the BOP can use the same weapons and have better officer configs.
T4-T5 the raptor can out DPS the BOP, but is overshadowed by the cruisers which have more damage potential and MUCH higher survivability. Also it's BO stations absolutely suck like a roomba powered by a fusion reactor.
Poor raptors
Even with strategy like "extend shields" or other team work, that effort would be better served with protecting Science or Cruisers. Any number of escorts at this point just seems to make a team weaker. They have no real role to serve in later tiers because their DPS doesn't scale enough with their paperness. If that makes any sense. Defensive skills and science skills are so much more powerful than offensive/escort/tac skills that they really just aren't needed. Cruisers have more damage potential due to escorts needing to be so close, close enough to get insta-killed by VM/SNB/Tractor/Etc, they don't have an advantage of pitch so cruisers can just fly at them and get a couple degrees above their firing arc, which requires an escort to retreat and circle back around just to get the enemy back in their sights.
Escorts need love. They were gimped in Beta when people cried about cannons, but people didn't realize it'd affect more than Klingons at the time.
I'd argue that escorts were affected more adversely by cannon nerfs than the BOPs. The short range doesn't really harm the BOP who can start the fight at short range at their discretion, but decidedly impacts the escort who can't long-ball with cannons.
Torpedoes work exactly like cannons do. You can't fire 2 cannons at once, can you? Same with torpedoes.
Photon torpedoes have a 6s single cooldown. That means you can fire more torpedoes with a second tube. Fire 1, 3s later fire 2, 3s later fire 1 again compared to fire 1, wait 6s, fire 1 again.
But other torpedoes have even longer cooldowns. Quantums are 8s, so you can fire 3 tubes before you finish the cooldown on tube 1 (although it would be 1s longer due to the global). Transphasics have a 10s cooldown, so you can have 4 torpedoes in the "water" before the first finishes the initial cooldown.
No you can't fire all your torpedoes at once, but you stagger-fire them like cannons to gain more overall.
We can theorycraft about how to make Escorts/Raptors viable and useful in a well organized team but for the other 95% of teams they're a liability.
Feds playing anything less than expert level organized premades would be better off using cruisers and science ships, but mostly cruisers, while pug Klingons would do best in 100% battlecruisers.
Stop being TRIBBLE, people, and realize that you have to be a coordinated team. If one escort is going on the attack, another escort should be right behind them, providing the finishing DPS and support for the first one. NOTHING will be able to survive that attack run.
Also, realize that the first ship attacking from cloak is probably not the most dangerous ship....
a very true observation
as an escort in t5, I can say that with proper support we don't crumble easily, akin to buffing a BOP to survive a fedball alpha strike in t2, but different. In the middle of a t5 dogfight I can easily get off 2 or 3 kills before I go down (If I go down, I've gone games without dying.)
Oddly enough I find that I'm spending my engineering team most of the time on an ally rather than myself. I know how to get away from a fight, and I know when to stay in and score a kill, which is something that most escorts don't know when to differentiate.
Now if only I didn't hit abandon ship instead of ramming speed /ramble
Edit:
for the recort I pack
Engineering team 1
Emergency power to shields 1
reverse shield polarity 1
jam sensors 1
charged particle blast 1
But still im pretty sure i do even better in my cruiser...i can do same dmg (less burst tho), heal and support and survive.
Maybe if mes was fixed it wouldnt be so bad, or they reverted the disruptor changes but I doubt they will do anything.
I can guarantee that escorts are not worthless 'in general', but they might not be the best thing to bring against kdf because kdf outmatch them in that particular facet.
Against KDF in pvp, you probably want to bring mostly cruisers and some science ships. Make the fight happen on YOUR terms, not the enemy's.
Feds are playing defensively in pvp vs kdf. Prepare accordingly.
This shouldnt happen though, one class of ship should not be invalidated as useless. Something needs done to fix this poor design element.
Its because in current setup, defence/support is more powerful than dmg/debuff, wich gives less place for escorts.
You're like a guy with a hammer, looking at a box of screws and complaining.
You take destroyers to fight subs, subs to fight carriers, carriers to fight battleships, battleships to fight destroyers...
Stop complaining and start solving problems.
That wouldnt be an issue if we could spec for several ships. But since we are pretty screwed with skill points, its hard to "adapt" if you happen to play the least wanted combination in pvp...tac escort. You would be right, if we had unlimited skill points, and could just switch ships. This isnt the case.
I don't spec into the specific ship, and you can EASILY spec into all of the general ships.
Its' a points vs benefits thing. For the cost of ONE t5 ship spec you could raise ALL of your lower tier subsystem power level boosters. That choice is pretty obvious to me.
If you favor escorts for pve, fly a cruiser in pvp and kit it out with turrets, which receive your cannon skill bonus and can use rapid fire. DEM+TURRETS+CRF isn't as bursty, but it'll damn sure put an ever lovin hurt on someone.
Trick up your shizzle with some RSP+ENGTEAM+DEM on your engineer slots, and sciteam + gw/cpb.
That is, if you want to win. Maybe you like losing.
Yes, unless you exactly know the system, and after you spent all your points..you realize you need something else :-) If there was at least respec option. But still, something is wrong, when escorts do so poorly overall compared to cruisers.
Oh and btw, power levels are raised by T4/T5 skills, so you couldnt, if you meant that.
Escorts are useless in their current state and its not because of the ships design, but because there is absolutely no point to having a fast attack ship in a game that's all about sitting around and trying to survive an inevitable ambush. If they finally nerfed cloak a bit escorts would be fine.
The day you give a single piece of useful advice, someone will start listening to you.
Efficiency is t3.
I completely agree with you on the spec thing. My first 3-4 characters were completely screwed up. I only know what to spend points on now because of CB.
Efficiency just improves EPS of that system a little (subjective feeling). Power levels are raised by performance (tested).
And yeah i screwed many chars also. Currently my escort captain used 45k BO points..and my spec is pretty screwed.
Im not sure, if i want to level another tac escort captain just to correct some flaws i made. I propably never will be able to change starting traits, so my current captain will always be alittle weaker, than the "max" i could achieve.
If someone always defends the status quo based on the idea that there is something wrong with everyone who doesn't like things exactly the way they are and dismisses claims that something doesn't work in the face of overwhelming evidence they are not helping anything.
I take that as an endorsement, thank you. I criticize the things I feel are imba, and defend the things which are not.
I play on both factions, and I have fun and succeed in pvp (usually).
Overwhelming baised and exculpatory testimony from the uninitiated is not evidence. I'm the guy who got past where you are now, trying to lead you there.
WHAAA!!!! ZOMG!!! I KANT MAEK MY SHIP WERK LIKE KLINKONGS B_CUZ I ARE TRIBBLE!!!!! WHAAA!!! NERF THEM!!!
Seriously, Bud, you are whining about not being uber at everything. You do realize that, right? I am a TAC/ESCORT Captain (T-4) and I do quite well in combat. It has to do with understanding the limitations of your ship and playing towards it's strengths. If you are taking too much damage and vaporizing with the first salvo, then you need to respec your BO's or look at your team and ask them why they aren't supporting you.
and arguing with Meat is just silly, since he has even more pvp experience than me
Eh ? i guess you missing the point. Im not whining about anything. I have both escort tac admiral, and eng cruiser admiral, and i can objectively compare what brings more into team in T5 pvp. It has nothing to do with quick death (i usualy have least death of my team anyway). So shooo, you picked one of my post, and made a ****** comment. Go play to T5 and then come back, and we can speak :-)
But perhaps you should change your forum name to lunatic, would be more suitable.
If this game had truly open PvP, Escorts would own. You'd hunt down solo players, waste them and be away before anyone else could show up, whereas cruisers would have to spend more time slogging it out and possibly have enemy reinforcements arrive before they could finish the job. Without that element, though, Escorts are a square peg in a universe of round holes. (Even in the Salvage PvP missions, the map is so small that reinforcements are never more than a few seconds away. Even Escorts can't DPS down a target and get away before the enemy fleet shows up in most cases.)
One thing I do think would help though:
* Make escorts benefit more from engine power. An escort with 100 engine power should be FAST.
* Make ship speed give greater defensive bonuses.
Escorts should basically be "speed tanks". Put your engines to 50 power with +engine power consoles and maybe Emergency Power to Engines as you make your pass and you should be difficult to hit (until someone puts you in a tractor beam). That would be loyal to Star Trek canon and might actually be a good way to balance them out. Escorts would rely on speed for defense and the counter to them would be things that hurt their engines.