Romulan strenght in 310

posted on January 13th, 2010, 12:29 pm

As the title says it, I'll write a bit about romulans and there current strength in patch 310.

After testing, and feedback from players it seems the romulans are in trouble.
Some players have overstated there problems, but the problem is not undeniable.
Also I played only Helev in multiplayer, and at lest he seems a bit troubled.

Now you might remember that in 307 the Rihenn refit was a possible monster if you had more then 10 of them; on the other hand seeing that there refit is way more costly and it's moved upper in the tech tree, at least in theory things should be normalized.
Sadly they are not.

Romulans, as we all know hide in the shadows, strike from it and disappear.
There current cloaking advantage, being the fastest in the game is good feature to implement this. But this is not enough considering the new passive system.
Let me elaborate.

Playing as Helev you have the option to go with your unrefitted Rihenns, or go directly do Griffins and/or Leahval, supported with Generixes.
Now this approach should work as you would use your faster Rihenns to attack miners, hit and runs, then attacking in force with the other ships. But if you have played online, you will see that the Rihenns only forward fiering arc and not that fast speed and the costs quickly fade away the cloaking edge you had. Mildly put you will be outproduced.

I could write here all the approaches we tried, but I will not bore you with a long post, I'll skip to the point directly.

- I would like to see the Rihenns get a speed boost of 10, as weapons still can hit it for a few seconds even after it cloaks, and it has only a forward fiering arc
- There cost should be dropped a bit, let's say -50 Dilithium, considering that early game you only have access to these ships
- There refitted version should lost the + 10 speed boost for balancing reasons, and logically a wessel that uses more power should be slower, after all they don't get a new warp core
- Perhaps a passive ability ? Like other destroyers of other factions ? Of course keeping the opening stronger fire
- Maybe lower the refit price as well bye 10% ?
- An ability like that of the sabers usable only for retreat : you engage it to gain + 20/30 speed and faster shield recharge but loose all weapons (lower offence to 0), and  of course only for the unrefitted version

Not all should be implemented of course, but some, to even the odds.

Now, because I did not write all the approaches, and all counters (rock paper scissors), I would like to asks you to write about your experience in multiplayer with romulans. Please tell me also if you fought in 1 vs. 1 or 2 vs. 2, etc, and witch race/-s you where facing.

This post is not meant to be criticism, just some ideas, to improve the romulan cloak and dagger doctrine. :shuriken:

posted on January 13th, 2010, 12:42 pm

If you ask me, the romulans are fine as they are. Their small ships are not their real military anyway, as the romulans depend on their warbird yard vessels in combat. Yes, Helev gets bonuses for staryard ships and not the bonuses for warbirds, true, but that doesn't mean that his warbirds are weak. They're just slower (that's the only point I really don't like about Helev). The staryard vessels are still more of escorts, and with Helev you still have the Griffin with the sensor jammer which is still a bad-ass weapon that (if well timed) covers you from loosing ships for a fair amount of time. And the Rhienn refits make the Rhienn much harder to kill now, so it still is a very good ship if used in groups of four ships and more.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:04 pm

Most of the Romulan techtree is fine, but their early game imo is significantly weaker than other factions.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:10 pm

But that's not really a problem, it's a challenge to players who decide to do it the romulan way 
If you manage to get to more than two resource points quickly it's not even a problem to get a warbird yard and some good upgrades earlier.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:33 pm

In what games do you quickly get 2 expnsions?

I didn't manage to play online yet, but i realized that a rhienn refit that costed 439dil in 307 now cost about 700dil but it didn't get much stronger. Further the upgrades are not available in early game too, as it was moved to the upgrade-centre. At last, the ship somehow became slower. Summarizing i cannot imagine using the Rhienn to be a valid strategy at all, thus the typical Helev strategy is lost.

Can somebody tell me how to play Helev nowadays?

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:50 pm

Testig Leahval ... seems promising .. using ther specials ... will add more info later.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:53 pm

But that's not really a problem, it's a challenge to players who decide to do it the romulan way 
If you manage to get to more than two resource points quickly it's not even a problem to get a warbird yard and some good upgrades earlier.

Of course it is a problem, how do you expect to get 2 expansions without your opponent destroying them?

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:54 pm

First: Not two expansions, i wrote "more than two resource points".

Second: Get away from using the Rhienn on its own. Think of it as an escort ship. It's slower now because of the long weapon range to reduce sniping and to be more vulnerable to short range interceptors. So based on this fact, the Rhienn is very well balanced. Use it together with Griffins. Use it in bigger groups when not having other classes yet. Rely on the Griffin or Generix (depending on your chosen avatar) in the first place and use the Rhienn as their escort and you'll see what I mean.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 1:58 pm

Hmm I guess I need to do some more testing but I'm still doubtful.

Btw the Generix is never an early game ship, you need a talshiar facility for it, but I cam see how griffins would be good as well as leahvals.

So with Helev you would always go with staryard and research facility together?

posted on January 13th, 2010, 2:00 pm

This is the age of the griffin  the rhienn is outdated 

[RedEyedRaven]

posted on January 13th, 2010, 2:05 pm

Last edited by RedEyedRaven on January 13th, 2010, 2:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

So with Helev you would always go with staryard and research facility together?

I recommend that, because especially romulans are lost without at least having Griffins and/or Laehvals. It's not as if you would have much of a choice there if you're willing to give a good match to your opponent. The reason I mentioned the Generix is because I almost ever build the Tal shiar academy as early as possible. It's risky because I never have many armed ships at this point due to the resource management, but it's often worth it.

Edit:

This is the age of the griffin  the rhienn is outdated 

Not outdated. Just an escort for more battle-focused vessels.

[Anonymous]

posted on January 13th, 2010, 2:09 pm

Last edited by Anonymous on January 13th, 2010, 2:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I've forgotten the prestique for the talshiar, staryard or research fac?

EDIT: I would also like to think there is a use for rhienns at the very beginning of the game or else there is just not point using them, and then helev has no ships before the research facility, which makes different strategies a bit linear.

[RedEyedRaven]

posted on January 13th, 2010, 2:10 pm

Last edited by RedEyedRaven on January 13th, 2010, 2:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I think it's the research fac and the staryard.

Edit:

EDIT: I would also like to think there is a use for rhienns at the very beginning of the game or else there is just not point using them, and then helev has no ships before the research facility, which makes different strategies a bit linear.

Remember that romulans are no klingons who spam with B'rels in a short amount of time. Having research facilities is a must for early romulan games.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 2:14 pm

Why should i build a weak and expensive ship for escort purposes? For escorting i usually use the generix support, which has equally much offense, speed and costs, but the nice specials.

posted on January 13th, 2010, 2:21 pm

As soon as you have the upgrades for the Rhienn (at least the torp refit and the vector torp), you'll see that this ship has very important "help to weaken enemy battlegroups"-functions.
If I read what you guys write about the Rhienn, I start to get the impression that you think the Rhienn would have to become some kind counterpart to the K'Vort with just more range. Which is not the case. I never found the Rhienn to be a battleship or something, neither in 307 or 310. It was a little more powerful in 307 because of more speed combined with its range and the early upgrade ability, but so it became too strong too early ingame and that's why the upgrades were put into the upgrade facility.