A Few Distinct Changes

[Boggz]

posted on March 2nd, 2010, 5:27 am

Last edited by Boggz on March 2nd, 2010, 5:46 am, edited 1 time in total.

Hello, all!

   
   This thread is intended to tell the Devs what I believe are the remaining ships that require an adjustment to become more balanced.  These are not the "Spammers" necessarily as I think we've beat that to death, but instead just a few thoughts on ships that either work too well or too poorly.

Note:  If I say "NEVER used. it's because that unit RARELY shows up in online gameplay and when it does it is merely a distraction, not a viable unit to use.

Dominion:

B-5 Battlecruiser:  [tt]Needs one of two things: 
1) Either needs to be slowed down and made long range 
    OR   
2) Needs to stay fast and short / medium range but lose the fighters. [/tt]
Reason:  Being fast, heavily shielded/armed, and having the fighters means that they are EXTREMELY difficult to destroy and easy to field.  If you manage to chase them you cannot target anything but the fighters.  The Fighters themselves can withstand a hit from a Prime Sphere before dieing. 

A-20 Attack Destroyer "Bug":
[tt]Needs a new passive.  Fast Tracking Computers sounds right to me.[/tt]
  Reason:  Dominion have NO decent ship to fight large groups of short ranged vessels.  Bugs are fragile as it is, and with passives being "softened" to around 20% I think this would be appropriate.

A-26 Bomber:
[tt]Needs a different passive.  Autonomous Defence AI seems appropriate.[/tt]
  Reason:  Mal helpfully pointed out that Bombers are really for dealing with Battleships and a passive vs. Medium range would be very helpful.  They wouldn't do more damage with AD-AI but would take less from almost all bships (Big D, Sovvie, Norexan, Sphere, Cube, Vorcha, Galaxy).

B-8 War Frigate: NEVER used.
[tt]Needs a new purpose.
1)  Lose the Troopship and become a "Ship-of-the-Line" (Medium range and all around even abilities)
OR
2)  Become an anti-Interceptor (Become Medium ranged, stay Pulse-armed, gain Ablative Armor or Fast-Tracking Computers).
OR
3)  Lose the Troopship, stay long ranged, but become the new Fighter Carrier with 2-3 Fighters per ship (Only if the B-5 loses it's Fighters to become a true Battlecruiser). [/tt]
  Reason:  A medium-sized, long ranged, pulse-armed ship, with 3 fighters out at a time and a build limit of 8 would be much more useful for the early-game Dominion on both Avatars.  It would provide some support cover and long ranged pulse damage (so as not to take the Bomber's role) without allowing an early "Fighter Spam" that we are seeing with the B-5's.  Having only a few fighters per ship (i.e. a LIGHT Carrier) would help the Dominion fill a number of their inadequacies they have early game right now.


Federation:

Canaveral:
[tt]Needs a defensive ability or a slightly higher defense value.  An Evasive Maneuvers ability or a shield strengthening ability would do well for a short period of time.  Even the "Tiny ECM Suite" that the Saber has would give it a little more stability vs. B'rels and such.[/tt]
Reason:  They are currently throw-away units.  Blackout has such a tiny range that you KNOW it's dead once it uses it's special.  Would be nice not to ALWAYS have to make that choice .

Excelsior I:
[tt]Perhaps re-think the amount of extra torpedoes it can fire with special energy[/tt]
Reason:  There is a reason why Excel I's always end up vetting up first.  They are a PERFECT example of what I think a long range vessel should be (strong firepower, slow speed).  I think everything else about it is perfect, just maybe a tweak on the bursts of torpedoes.

Defiant:
[tt]Adjust the burst rate for the pulses so that more damage comes out faster, but that the reload rate per burst is longer.[/tt]
Reason:  The Defiant has two distinct functions: powerful harasser and Capital-Ship disabler.  The Burst fire will allow more damage in the first volley and a quicker retreat.  DPS will be the same, but a ship that does damage this way will be finished faster than a ship doing a steady amount of damage.


Klingon:

Vupta: NEVER used.
[tt]Needs to be useful.   [/tt]
Reason:  One of the last ships in the tech tree and yet suited only for killing early game units.  Troop transports are also just not practical in the fast-paced nature of FleetOps .

Cho'naq NEVER used.
[tt]Needs to be re-thought.[/tt]
Reason:  Too expensive, too far it the tech-tree (when you COULD be building the righteous Negh'var), with low damage output and poor defense.  Simply a waste of time and resources.


Romulans I will not do because I feel that their gameplay is so stretched right now that minor adjustments are of no importance.  The Rhienn Refits are a really cool idea, just impractical given their initial cost vs. power ratio and how expensive refitting them becomes.  Just use Leahvals and Generix instead.  I will say though that:

Serkas:
[tt]Needs a slight defensive boost[/tt].
Reason:  They are SO expensive and SO fragile, while their shots are very easily dodgeable.  Right now they are only useful to lure an enemy towards them while waiting to pounce with other cloaked units.  Their actual purpose is little except to siege a turret and hope your opponent runs out to attack.  Other artillery ranged units excel further because the Veq has guided torpedoes and a good special, the Steamrunner has an IMMENSELY powerful barrage of guided torps, while the Serkas has unguided torpedoes with an explosion that no one ever stays in.  They just end up damage each other or being mauled by interceptors.


Borg seem to have a good use for every vessel at the moment.  Adaptors and Assimilators are still rarely used as a combo of Scubes and Probes until you can spam Spheres is a better strategy.

posted on March 2nd, 2010, 5:56 am

I definitely agree about the B-5.  It will help that fighters will be last on the target list and that fast ships won't be uncatchable.  One thing I'm curious about is how the fighters are factored into the cost of the ship.  It doesn't seem to cost that much more for carriers than it did before, but now fighters are "free" (don't cost anything to field).  All 5 of them together amounts to an extra 25-30 in offensive value, that just doesn't seem to be reflected in the cost of the B-5 itself.  I know we players were complaining on how useless the the carriers were, but now that they're powerful we're  again!  But that's because they're a little too cost effective.   The Avalon is better balanced because it's really slow and most everyone has plentiful access to TWS.

As much as I hate to say this being such an adamant support of the Dominion, we're seeing a lot of people using their unique tech tree as a way to jump up to early battleships, or ships that are basically battlehips, like the B-5.  So at a side note, could it be possible to tweak the research and build times of the V-13 and B-5.  Maybe make them a bit longer?  The B-5's is especially short (only 71 seconds).  Perhaps this could be longer?  Like 90 seconds?  That would help considerably I think.  (*Crosses fingers* )

I think I understand the logic behind the bug and bomber now.  Took me a long time to realize it.  But I won't stand in the way of progress.

The B-8 for sure isn't used.  That's mainly because troopships are so expensive, but at least the Vupta can opt to not use the expensive upgrade.  I might see their cost as a little more reasonable if they took over ships and stations faster, and used combat transporters like Tyler had in his one mod, where it kept the shields up.  Optec said he liked it.  I like it too.

Hey!  The Chonaq's beam looks really cool!  Who cares if it does damage or not, I like the pretty beam!

Anyway, nice post, Boggz!

[Optec]

posted on March 2nd, 2010, 8:50 am

Last edited by Optec on March 2nd, 2010, 8:55 am, edited 1 time in total.

almost all of your requested changes are already taken into account for 3.1.2 we made similar observations

The Romulans will get larger changes, as they had some balancing formulas included taking features into account that are not yet implemented. its always difficult to work on many spots at once  They will be more cost effective

Troopships will be changed in general, as well as many Support Ships will see more or less adjustments. We also took a look at units that die to fast and made changes where desired.

The Dominion will also receive a fist full of changes, giving them a good anti-short-range weapon

we are working hard on 3.1.2 and hope to release it as soon as possible, all thsoe adjustments just need a bit more time to be validated and some features are still in development

[Zebh]

posted on March 2nd, 2010, 10:26 am

Last edited by Zebh on March 2nd, 2010, 11:10 am, edited 1 time in total.

Very good points.

I really like the idea in Cho'naq to have a long-range fire support vessel with steady beam beam. But it doesn't really do damage and has weak defense as Boggz stated. I also think that the slow speed is also very big issue. The special ability of it got a hunch to right direction to be a good fire support vessel, but it doesn't really work in game. And I really haven't figured out the special energy usage.

I got an idea some time ago (in fact, something similar have been posted before too) that could work for Cho'naq. The ship could have 2 operation modes, but much different to each other than it haves now. The other mode would be slow (speed 60), long to artillery range, slow rate heavy beam (the klingon way. preferably), that really does the damage, increased offensive values and lowered movement speed (energy transferred from engines to main weapon array). The other mode would be relatively fast (not too fast, 100 or 110), but lowered offensive and weapons would be switched to secondary, short to medium range, pulse weapons, which would result greatly weaker offensive capabilities. The key for this would be that the switch between modes would take time (20 sec perhaps), and the ship would have low offensive (the same pulses, but lower output) and not able to move so fast (faster than the fire-support mode, slower than the escort mode) while the mode is switched. That would be one idea to get cool and useful fire support vessel for klingons. (Note: I don't think the current model of Cho'naq would look appropriate for this, perhaps if Vutpa-model would be longer it could nicely and the models could be switched?)

About troop ships I think in same way as Boggz, they don't fit too well in the way FO is played. The targets usually get destroyed before they can be boarded. The same transporter rate for all size of ships is part of the problem too in my opinion.

I don't think Serkas is so useless as you described. It is true that it is slow, fragile, difficult to use, and the attack isn't so powerful, but I have found that it could be very nice fire support vessel too, as it can stay relatively away from the center of battlefield and can do area damage. The problems (costs, speed or weakness) are however so big that players can't usually afford it.

posted on March 2nd, 2010, 5:15 pm

almost all of your requested changes are already taken into account for 3.1.2 we made similar observations

The Romulans will get larger changes, as they had some balancing formulas included taking features into account that are not yet implemented. its always difficult to work on many spots at once  They will be more cost effective

Troopships will be changed in general, as well as many Support Ships will see more or less adjustments. We also took a look at units that die to fast and made changes where desired.

The Dominion will also receive a fist full of changes, giving them a good anti-short-range weapon

we are working hard on 3.1.2 and hope to release it as soon as possible, all thsoe adjustments just need a bit more time to be validated and some features are still in development

  I could not have asked for a better explanation!  Thanks, Optec!

  Glad to hear that you guys saw the same issues and thanks for taking the time to alleviate the concerns.

  Can't wait! 

posted on March 4th, 2010, 5:20 pm

Good points Boggz. Though about B5, now that fighters have lower targeting priority, I think that should take care of it. Its not THAT good a ship if you take the passive fighter shield from it, that it now has.
Really Im afraid of the overnerf tbh :S <---I know this will happen, yet the fed warpin will be unchanged...

posted on March 4th, 2010, 5:28 pm

Hahaha ... I'm more worried about the K'vort, the Leahval, and the Intrepid not getting a passive vulnerability to be honest.  The increased cost, decreased durability, increased supply and such seems like a good idea but on most maps we play resources are plentiful without being saturated.  Thus a small cost increase is rather moot and on small maps it will be crippling.

  If the suckers are still out they will still be unstoppable!  Right now they have no good counter and unless their passive is changed to include a passive vulnerability to certain weapons they are going to remain broken.

  The passives against Medium Range on the Intrepid, Kvort, Breen, Leahval, and such are good passives, but they should not be on ships that are easily spammable.  Those passives should be on ships that are not worth spamming like support ships or ships with distinctly non-frontline combat roles.  A ship like the Chargh is not worth spamming and would use a passive like Single-stage more appropriately.

  The B-5 is less of an issue because the fighters are the main problem.  I think the Puretech avatar should rethink having it's range be Medium but overall the fighters absorbing firepower was the real prob.

  The major fix that I have seen since 3.1.0 came out is the medium range passives that have no tangible vulnerability.  I.E: K'vorts, Leahvals, Intrepids, Breen Ships.  They've still got no counter and will not unless their passives are given a damage-receiving increase.

posted on March 4th, 2010, 5:40 pm

Maybe im wrong about this but i think that the excel 1s should have their ranged reduced to med, and be given an appropriate speed increase.

posted on March 4th, 2010, 5:47 pm

Put Single Stage Energy Conduits and Autonomous AI on battleships and heavy cruisers that are at the end of the tech tree!

Maybe the vupta or Cho'naq could get the K'vorts passive.

posted on March 4th, 2010, 5:55 pm

Maybe im wrong about this but i think that the excel 1s should have their ranged reduced to med, and be given an appropriate speed increase.

  Nah I just think that their special "The extra torpedoes" is not properly calculated (or calculated at all) with their offensive value.  They do much larger amounts of damage to large targets than we may think.

posted on March 4th, 2010, 5:58 pm

Maybe im wrong about this but i think that the excel 1s should have their ranged reduced to med, and be given an appropriate speed increase.

So make them weak, fragile and useless at what they are meant for? What's next; remove them?

posted on March 4th, 2010, 6:00 pm

Maybe i just liked them better when they were fast

posted on March 4th, 2010, 6:03 pm

So make them weak, fragile and useless at what they are meant for? What's next; remove them?

well they are kinda old, they should be weak even refitted. never remove them, they are great. just they shouldnt be the stalwart of the fleet any more, this is years after the dominion war. akiras should rightly be taking up that role.

posted on March 4th, 2010, 6:14 pm

I know how old they are, their role was all that all that make them useful ingame. I did make emphasis on adding useless to the end.

The removing bit was sarcastic, which, unfortunatly, still doesn't work over the net...

posted on March 4th, 2010, 6:32 pm

I have just noticed that the Excel I's rank up consistently before anything else.  It's completely due to the fact that they do so much damage at the beginning of combat while they have special energy. 


  A very easy fix for that would be to just reduce the amount of special energy they begin with and maybe increase it as they rank up or become vets.    That way they retain the powerful bombardment destroyer role that long range units have now while not being such DPS beasts.