Star Trek Online Discussion Thread (now free to play!)

[Captain_Amasov]

The Sovereign was pretty much replaced by the much older Excelsior-class in-game. If there's a ship to replace older Excelsior and Galaxy-class cruisers, I'd rather it be a current 2409 vessel. Especially one that was said to be the "flagship" and "pinnacle" of starship design. However, we'll see what the final stats are after it goes to test next week.

Not really... the excelsior had a mildly different BO layout and better turnrate but weaker hull.
I prefer the slightly less powerful ensign and lt slot to the single LtC slot for versatility reasons because I need less BOs to change a single power.

I could still take one of those out with my Excelsior. These ships are powerful, but it's all about tactics, and in terms of PvE, uberweapons won't mean jack when the STF Borg tear through them.

Yes, a better player in a weaker ship is still better than a crappy player inan Übership, no contest.

But if you play the same scenario in the better ship your performance will noticably increase.


I can rebuild every cruiser layout with the Odyssey and I mean every single one from Miranda to Galor.
The only drawback is the slow turnrate, but this gets migitated by A saucer seperation which gives you a combat pet even and B the set bonus of the 3 consoles which has power management and skill benefits as well.

And it's not only cruisers that start to become obsolete... Who in their right mind would buy a Nebula class or a D'Kyr now if he values performance even a bit?

The only ships not affected much (yet) because gameplay is so different with them are escorts.
But DPS wise the tactical version of the Odyssey will give them a run for their money if commanded by a tactical captain.
And DPS is even higher for the BortaS.

BortaS must be hands down the best ship in the game now, since everything is so DPS oriented anyway.

STF Borg ripping through them? Don't think so. BortaS will rip through THEM and Odyssey will outtank everything and still do decent DPS.
I already outtank the Elite Borg in my Sovereign. With Odyssey it will be a breeze.

So from a purely PvE perspective you feel you won't use the Sovereign anymore because these ships are much better? I'm not quite sure I follow that reasoning. I fly ships like the Galaxy-class, even though there are much better alternatives, because I want to fly it.

Unless you feel forced to do so, what would the issue be with these ships? PvE is already so laughable that you can pretty much face roll the keyboard for most content. And the stuff you can't, well, like you said; you're already outtanking Elite Borg in your Sovereign, so no need to replace it, is there?

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Simply put: we had about 5 cruisers of the line until recently, 6 if you count the Galor, each with their own niche.

Now we have just 1, all the others are reduced to being barely adequate.

I already have to fight for my place in STF groups with a Sovereign. If min/maxers had their way we'd be all flying escorts for the DPS.

Now the only cruiser that will be accepted at all will be the flagship because their is no reason not to fly it if you look at the numbers.

No, I won't give up my Sovereign just yet, in fact I hope for a +1 I can upgrade to without sacrificing my space character.
I don't have anything against the business model of +1, not since FTP anyway, but killing diversity is not good for teh game in any way.

 

[Captain_Amasov]

It's a valid point, but if you're struggling to get on STF teams with the Sovereign, then how are the other tier 5 cruisers faring? How often do you see them on STF's?

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

These days i mostly see odysseys (probably due to it being teh only free VA ship for a lot of people), and it's only going to get worse.
And it's not like the PuGs can do anything about you once you are on the team, as there is no kick button, but have you seen some of the rage going on in chat and on the forums concering anything BUT DPS ships lately?

Anyway, I will test the thing on Tribble once it's up and do a side by side comparison to the best of my min/max abilities.
Goal will be to match every bit of set up I have for my Sovereign and compensate for any disadvantage the Odyssey has. This would be turn rate and no bonus to weapon power and then compare if and where the Odyssey exceeds the Sovereign in addition.

Right now I am leaning to using the tactical variant for this because that is the one that can match my Sovereign console set up.
To compensate for the turn rate I probably have to equip at least the Chavron Seperation console or all 3. That will cost me console slots, but on equipping all three i get a boost I power levels and armor resistance. So that shouldn't be a problem.

 

[Rocketeer]

Well, I'm an old min/maxer from AD&D days. It's a hard habit to break. However, I try not to sacrifice fun for the sake of having the best stats.

My engineer flies the Excelsior Refit first and formost because it's the tank that I'm fondest of. Before I played STO, the home ship of my Star Trek fanclub was the Excelsior Refit. I became an authority on it while serving as initially the Chief Tactical Officer, then the Chief of Operation and lastly the Chief Science Officer. After extensive study of the ship, I determined that if there is any safe place in space it would be aboard an Excelsior Refit.

Returning back to the subject. I keep some but not all of my character's previous ships. Every once in a while, I get in one and fly around. As Asimov implied, PvE don't require the latest and greatest ship to win. So have a little fun while you're going about your missions. Get in your favorite ship and show Kirk how it's done.

.

 

[Amaris]

While we're here, I've been looking at my skills tree and I'm wondering if I'm putting everything into my ship. It has decent DPS, and I'm pretty good under fire, but I want you guys to take a look at it, since you're more into the minutiae than I am. I created my build and posted it here:

http://www.stoacademy.com/tools/skillplanner/index.php?build=johnstoskills3912_0

Here's how I have it geared out:

Let me know what you think!

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Depends...

What is your primary intention? Having as much firepower as possible or becoming nearly unkillable?

 

[intrinsical]

I don't care about PvP. So for me, its only P2W when Cryptic starts coming up with new STFs that require an Odyssey or Bortas to win.

 

[Rocketeer]

If another Tac player sees you mixing energy weapon types, they will chastise you to hell.

None of my chars use Engine or Shield Batts. Engrs and Tac use Weapon Batts, Sci uses Aux Batts. If you have any of these devices, I recommend using: Red Matter Capacitor (from Collector's Ed), Enhanced Plasma Manifold (from Oberth), Subspace Field Modulator (Devidian FE).

I would not put a torp on the rear unless you were planning to do flyovers. In that case, it would probably be a tricobalt mine.

My Tac officers use turrets for aft weapons. Phasers or AP with [Acc].

I'd replace the Bio module with something else.

I don't see any cannons on your ship, so ditch the Prefire Chamber. Get a Directed Energy Distributed Manifold or if you go with a single energy type get the appropiate console.

.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

I thought a bit more about what it is exactly that bugs me about all this.
And it's Cryptic's Trademark of being Customization King among MMOs (as far as I've seen).

They went to great length at the beginning to let you choose your ships (space characters) with as many freedom in appearance as they could afford.
This policy resulted in ships like the Envoy class (shudder), but the intention was the right one.

2 Years later we still have lots of custumization, but only for stats NOT for appearance at all with the new ship.
It seems the goal is everybody flies the same new super ship with the most desirable abilities and powers and is even allowed to pick which stat version for customization.
But individuality and freedom of identiy seems completely lost in the design plan.

Cryptic has forgotten their biggest strength.

In part we are to blame for this... but only in part.
We have been complaining the whole time that we are forced to pick ships we don't like for stats we need.
Akira fans can't fly their ships if they want to be tanks, Galaxy fans are pissed because their favorite can't be a good DPS machine and Costitution fans are screwed in every way possible.

Now the solution is no alterative at all anymore. Really?

Is it really necessary to sell powers (and that is all there is to their business atm) bundled with the ships?

If I had my way ships would just be class costumes.
You pick cruiser, science or escort class and slap any matching costume you bought or unlocked on it.
Make them completely customizable.
BO layout the way it is wouldn't be directly tied to the ship, but be defined by bridge modules (like kits) you buy or unlock.
Final stage would be special power consoles like they have now divorced from any ships.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

If another Tac player sees you mixing energy weapon types, they will chastise you to hell.

None of my chars use Engine or Shield Batts. Engrs and Tac use Weapon Batts, Sci uses Aux Batts. If you have any of these devices, I recommend using: Red Matter Capacitor (from Collector's Ed), Enhanced Plasma Manifold (from Oberth), Subspace Field Modulator (Devidian FE).

I would not put a torp on the rear unless you were planning to do flyovers. In that case, it would probably be a tricobalt mine.

My Tac officers use turrets for aft weapons. Phasers or AP with [Acc].

I'd replace the Bio module with something else.

I don't see any cannons on your ship, so ditch the Prefire Chamber. Get a Directed Energy Distributed Manifold or if you go with a single energy type get the appropiate console.

.

Some other stuff you can dump into the device consoles are the Scorpion Fighters from The Vault, deployable weapon turrets from doff missions and deuterium surplus from that daily near K7 station. The deuterium is probably better then engine batteries because they don't share a cooldown with other batteries and the red matter capacitor and Enhanced Plasma Manifold to get out auf tight situations quickly.

 

[Trek]

Personally I'd like to see the ship tiers revamped like this:

Proposal:
http://www.suricatafx.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Ship_Tier_Changes.jpg

Discussed here:
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=257999

I think that would solve most (if not all) the problems you raised Timelord_Victorious.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Personally I'd like to see the ship tiers revamped like this:

Proposal:
http://www.suricatafx.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Ship_Tier_Changes.jpg

Discussed here:
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=257999

I think that would solve most (if not all) the problems you raised Timelord_Victorious.

Interesting concept.

I thought up another one, where BO layout is determined by swappable bridge modules that can go on any ship.
base stats like speed, hull and powerlevel by the ship itself and modifiers by skills and gear.
i don't have a fance HD spreadsheet, though.

 

[Captain_Amasov]

Something just occurred to me; with the set bonus from these consoles, do you think they'll do the same with the upcoming Galaxy ship pack? You have the cloaking device (Tac) from the Galaxy-X; the saucer separation (Eng) from the Galaxy; and the antimatter spread (Sci) from the Venture.

Oh, and a shot of the Bortas bridge: http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/339/bortasbridge01.jpg

Wonder if this means we can see parts of the Odyssey outside its bridge windows too.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Something just occurred to me; with the set bonus from these consoles, do you think they'll do the same with the upcoming Galaxy ship pack? You have the cloaking device (Tac) from the Galaxy-X; the saucer separation (Eng) from the Galaxy; and the antimatter spread (Sci) from the Venture.

Oh, and a shot of the Bortas bridge: http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/339/bortasbridge01.jpg

Wonder if this means we can see parts of the Odyssey outside its bridge windows too.

Would certainly give the Galaxy Class a bit of it's appeal back among players.

 

[Captain_Amasov]

They seem to be heading towards dilithium mining, what with a "mining event" listed on the calendar and doff missions revolving around it; would now be a bad time to suggest some sort of dilithium-based ship upgrade system?

 

[intrinsical]

Maybe its just me, but isn't this game set 30-40 years after Voyager? Technology has advanced and the latest greatest ships should be based around completely new ship classes.

That is why I sort of like the current way ship tiers are setup so that our favorite ships like the Constitution, Galaxy, Defiant, Intrepid are mostly Cmdr to Captain level ships. My personal opinion is that it would be best if non of our favorite ship classes, not even retrofits, are VA level ships.

 

[CorporalClegg]

I don't care about PvP. So for me, its only P2W when Cryptic starts coming up with new STFs that require an Odyssey or Bortas to win.

It will start with PvP but it's only a matter of time before it spills over into PvE. And it won't be Cryptic driving it, per say, but players.

Eventually, it will get to the point where it will become a sort of unwritten rule for pugs and pre-made pugs. That will slowly snowball into a disaster.

But even that doesn't matter because people will inevitably fall in line. People may not call themselves, min/maxers, but anyone who has ever participated in endgame content in any MMO is to some degree.

Everybody has at some point browsed the interwebz for new build ideas to help them in whatever endgame they're trying to conquer. Those ideas always begin with min/maxers.

And there's also always a key, theme element to them. Yesterday, for example, it was an MVAM. Tomorrow it will be an Odyssey. The former was not nearly as ubiquitous because the advantage it gave over other ships was no where near as obvious. With the latter, however, it eventually going to get to the point EVERY endgame build is an Odyssey. And people will eventually fall in line to the point where at least four ships in any random pug are one.

But I think the more important issue is that this shows Cryptic isn't really satisfied with the pay = vanity model, and once they get a taste, they're going to go nuts. Book it.

I can almost guarantee that it won't belong before the next gear set comes out that will be significantly better than the MACO/OMEGA, and dilithium will be required to buy it.

It will be such an obscene amount of dilithium that 8k grind a day just isn't going to cut it. People will have all the tech they need in their banks, but not the dilithium, so they'll get out their credit cards.

It's a slippery slope that I've happened to see the worst of. Cryptic just grabbed the toboggan.

Personally I'd like to see the ship tiers revamped like this:

Proposal:
http://www.suricatafx.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Ship_Tier_Changes.jpg

Discussed here:
http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=257999

I think that would solve most (if not all) the problems you raised Timelord_Victorious.

Interesting concept.

I thought up another one, where BO layout is determined by swappable bridge modules that can go on any ship.
base stats like speed, hull and powerlevel by the ship itself and modifiers by skills and gear.
i don't have a fance HD spreadsheet, though.

It's an interesting idea, but I think even more complicated than it has to be.

Simply make it so that you ship stats are determined by captain class, ship class, and rank and then make all BO slots universal in the cmdr, ltc, lt, lt, ens layout.

They could even through in the XO mechanic they've been talking about forever to add a little variety. You'd then have four variables that determine ship's "stats" with a lot of different skins flying around.

I also think they should make the special consoles class specific, but whatever.

 

[Amaris]

Depends...

What is your primary intention? Having as much firepower as possible or becoming nearly unkillable?

Defense is more important to me than offense. Some of these PvPers are amazing. I've seen ships take continuous, sustained fire from half a dozen ships and almost shrug it off like it was nothing. I remember one ship, about 3 weeks back, that I saw in Ker'rat (A KDF BOP), that just couldn't be killed. 7 ships attacked him straight on, and his shields would fluctuate for a second, and never drop. That went on for a good 30 seconds, by which he then just hauled ass out of range in about 3 seconds.

If another Tac player sees you mixing energy weapon types, they will chastise you to hell.

Really? Why is that? I've had a fair bit of luck mixing phaser and polaron beam arrays.

None of my chars use Engine or Shield Batts. Engrs and Tac use Weapon Batts, Sci uses Aux Batts. If you have any of these devices, I recommend using: Red Matter Capacitor (from Collector's Ed), Enhanced Plasma Manifold (from Oberth), Subspace Field Modulator (Devidian FE).

I would not put a torp on the rear unless you were planning to do flyovers. In that case, it would probably be a tricobalt mine.

I do a number of flyovers. I'll use Torpedo Yield III as I come in fast (not on Full Impulse, though), and as I pass overhead, I'll give them one to grow on.

My Tac officers use turrets for aft weapons. Phasers or AP with [Acc].

I'd replace the Bio module with something else.

I don't see any cannons on your ship, so ditch the Prefire Chamber. Get a Directed Energy Distributed Manifold or if you go with a single energy type get the appropiate console.

.

Will do on that. I don't know why I kept the prefire chamber anyway.

 

[Captain_Amasov]

There's also the issue of them still thinking about raising the level cap to "Fleet Admiral" and the introduction of tier 6 ships. At some point all of the current tier 5's are going to become obsolete, most likely attractive replaced with C-store ones.

Between that and what Dan said about FE's recently, there's going to be an even bigger shit storm to come.