Another Borg solution?
Post ideas and suggestions on new features or improvements here.
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posted on July 8th, 2010, 1:43 pm
Last edited by Eleshar on July 8th, 2010, 2:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Even I have a little impression that the borg lack a little bit in depth concerning their assimilatory capabilities, so I came up with an idea:
Make Borg much much weaker (still powerful ships though) and let them grow while assimilating ships.
First option
Take away the adaptors, I don't like them.
Let the Borg have a pool of X for each civilisation. When they assimilate Y ships of said/sad civilisation, their pool begins to fill by one dot (or anything) and they gain some bonuses to all Borg ships and structures against the civilisation.
Second option
Take away the adaptors, I don't like them.
Let the Borg have a pool of X (a number about 20). When they assimilate a vessel, they send it to a special structure for reverse engineering. The reverse-engineered ship will be scrapped and the pool will take note, which ship was assimilated and give appropriate bonus to all Borg ships and structures againt the VESSEL TYPE up to complete invulnerability after assimilating enough of them (lets say 10, so it allows complete imunity from weapons of two ship types).
Once filled, he pool should not be frozen and should allow adding additional ship types at the cost of those already assimilated
(let's say: the Borg player assimilated 10 Descent-class ships and 10 Akira-class ships so that he is completely invulnerable against those two ships that his opponent spams continuously - now when the Federation is on its knees and the Romulan player is still in game and biting, the Borg player assimilates 5 Deridrex-class ship at the cost of 3 Descents and 2 Akiras from his pool, so he has 70 % immunity to Descent's weapons, 80 % immunity to Akira's weapons and 50 % immunity to Deridrex' weapons).
Assimilation of a starbase should bring much more substatial bonuses, for example after assimilating a shipyard, the Borg could get a bonus against ALL ships made in the shipyard - reflecting the difficulty of absorbing such a large and important structure (also it is unlikely the Borg will have the opportunity to assimilate too many shipyards as they really will be hard to get... and they are not so numerous). After assimilating a research center, the can get one technology that the center can research. After assimilating the starbase... they get... they get... well a bonus against the civilisation as a whole?
I base my idea on the episode Q-Who and TBobW - in the first episode the Enterprise made quite a few big holes into the Borg cube while in TBoBW (after assimilating some informations from the Enterprise), the cube was almost invulnerable to Enterprise weapons. So the Borg can be quite vulnerable from the beginning (let's say a Cube hardly winning in one on one with the Galaxy class), but as time and assimilation progresses, they become much stronger against the assimilated civilisations or nigh impregnable against their specific ship types.
And they will not have the ugly Adaptor ship-type.
addendum:
OK, third option
Take away the adaptors, I don't like them BUT let the Borg have a pool for each civilisation which fills after assimilating ships blah blah blah - and after assimilating enough ships of a civilisation, the Borg are allowed to give and adaptor module to ANY ship type. The adaptor module should be a little bit weaker (about 20 % immunity against the civ + some attack bonus as well) but they could get up to three modules (well... for ships that can get so many, of course).
Make Borg much much weaker (still powerful ships though) and let them grow while assimilating ships.
First option
Take away the adaptors, I don't like them.
Let the Borg have a pool of X for each civilisation. When they assimilate Y ships of said/sad civilisation, their pool begins to fill by one dot (or anything) and they gain some bonuses to all Borg ships and structures against the civilisation.
Second option
Take away the adaptors, I don't like them.
Let the Borg have a pool of X (a number about 20). When they assimilate a vessel, they send it to a special structure for reverse engineering. The reverse-engineered ship will be scrapped and the pool will take note, which ship was assimilated and give appropriate bonus to all Borg ships and structures againt the VESSEL TYPE up to complete invulnerability after assimilating enough of them (lets say 10, so it allows complete imunity from weapons of two ship types).
Once filled, he pool should not be frozen and should allow adding additional ship types at the cost of those already assimilated
(let's say: the Borg player assimilated 10 Descent-class ships and 10 Akira-class ships so that he is completely invulnerable against those two ships that his opponent spams continuously - now when the Federation is on its knees and the Romulan player is still in game and biting, the Borg player assimilates 5 Deridrex-class ship at the cost of 3 Descents and 2 Akiras from his pool, so he has 70 % immunity to Descent's weapons, 80 % immunity to Akira's weapons and 50 % immunity to Deridrex' weapons).
Assimilation of a starbase should bring much more substatial bonuses, for example after assimilating a shipyard, the Borg could get a bonus against ALL ships made in the shipyard - reflecting the difficulty of absorbing such a large and important structure (also it is unlikely the Borg will have the opportunity to assimilate too many shipyards as they really will be hard to get... and they are not so numerous). After assimilating a research center, the can get one technology that the center can research. After assimilating the starbase... they get... they get... well a bonus against the civilisation as a whole?
I base my idea on the episode Q-Who and TBobW - in the first episode the Enterprise made quite a few big holes into the Borg cube while in TBoBW (after assimilating some informations from the Enterprise), the cube was almost invulnerable to Enterprise weapons. So the Borg can be quite vulnerable from the beginning (let's say a Cube hardly winning in one on one with the Galaxy class), but as time and assimilation progresses, they become much stronger against the assimilated civilisations or nigh impregnable against their specific ship types.
And they will not have the ugly Adaptor ship-type.
addendum:
OK, third option
Take away the adaptors, I don't like them BUT let the Borg have a pool for each civilisation which fills after assimilating ships blah blah blah - and after assimilating enough ships of a civilisation, the Borg are allowed to give and adaptor module to ANY ship type. The adaptor module should be a little bit weaker (about 20 % immunity against the civ + some attack bonus as well) but they could get up to three modules (well... for ships that can get so many, of course).
posted on July 8th, 2010, 11:14 pm
i get the feeling u dont like the adaptor :p
i like the adaptor, so i vote not to remove it.
plus this idea sounds like it will make the borg kinda op as the game goes on, i mean complete invulernability to a ship class is just wrong. i would go up to 60% at most.
i like the adaptor, so i vote not to remove it.
plus this idea sounds like it will make the borg kinda op as the game goes on, i mean complete invulernability to a ship class is just wrong. i would go up to 60% at most.
posted on July 9th, 2010, 3:03 am
I'm not a fan of the adapter either. I DO like your ideas, however I have to agree with myleswolfers. It seems like the Borg will be very under-powered early game and very over-powered late game. For balancing it would need a lot of tweaking. But it is a very cool idea.
posted on July 21st, 2010, 5:53 pm
Last edited by Eleshar on July 21st, 2010, 6:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Actually, I did not care much about the balance, that I admit completely. I just wanted the Borg to be more... borgy (borgly? borgish? borglike?) instead of boring... After all they are an assimition based race, so I want more assimilation and some impacts of it. Not just gaining the ship.
And immunity against a ship type? Is it really too strong (I really don't have an eye for game balancing)? The Borg will still be fully vulnerable to any other ship (from any other race), so there is a lot of space even if it were possible to attain complete immunity against two ship types (how many of them is there actually? I think that each race except the Borg has about 15 types, does it not?).
And no, I don't like the adaptors... why should only one ship in borg fleet be capable of adaption? And most of all, it is completely off with its design... all Borg ships are geometrical and this one is... what??? it did not feel well even in original Armada 2 as a model for Assimilator.
addendum:
Separated into another post...
And immunity against a ship type? Is it really too strong (I really don't have an eye for game balancing)? The Borg will still be fully vulnerable to any other ship (from any other race), so there is a lot of space even if it were possible to attain complete immunity against two ship types (how many of them is there actually? I think that each race except the Borg has about 15 types, does it not?).
And no, I don't like the adaptors... why should only one ship in borg fleet be capable of adaption? And most of all, it is completely off with its design... all Borg ships are geometrical and this one is... what??? it did not feel well even in original Armada 2 as a model for Assimilator.
addendum:
Separated into another post...
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:05 pm
It's the ship Lore had when he led a group of Borg split from the collective. It really has no place being the only Borg ship to adapt to a race's tech. I agree more ships should have adaption, the Adaptor could maybe get even more of an anti-large ship role (it sure handled the Enterprise well until they unleashed technobabble shields and a solar flare) and be renamed. We'll just have to wait and see tho what the Devs decide to do for the race redos.
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:07 pm
balance is very very important as this game is designed for online play. if there is no balance nobody will play the game.
as for immunity, it is very strong, if your enemy has a fleet of say mostly akira and excel 2, and u gain immunity against both u can make their whole fleet pointless. they then have to switch to another class, but takes long to build.
the adaptor is canon, it featured in descent. and in scorpion as a graphic.
as for immunity, it is very strong, if your enemy has a fleet of say mostly akira and excel 2, and u gain immunity against both u can make their whole fleet pointless. they then have to switch to another class, but takes long to build.
the adaptor is canon, it featured in descent. and in scorpion as a graphic.
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:17 pm
And I might add, I like more the first proposed solutions - after assimilating a number of ships, all borg ships get a little general bonus against a civilisation (let's say - after assimilating 10 ship's, they get 10 % in attack and defense, after assimilating another 20 ships, they gain another 5-10 % or so percent, and then finally they would have to assimilate 10-20 ships for every single 1 percent they want to gain). And thery could be some more prerequisites - for example assimilating at least two (or more) batteships or something, to trigger the bonus...
Finally, those were just preliminary propositions - the details would have to be worked out in discussion... I just really don't like when the Borg can get away totally without assimilating a single ship.
I agree, of course...
If you gain immunity against those ships, he would rather well know as it would be *his* ships that were assimilated - he may even calculate the exact bonuses his opponent would gain... and he would be fool to replace those assimilated ships by the same type. If the Borg adapt, you have to adapt as well...
Finally, those were just preliminary propositions - the details would have to be worked out in discussion... I just really don't like when the Borg can get away totally without assimilating a single ship.
balance is very very important as this game is designed for online play. if there is no balance nobody will play the game.
I agree, of course...
if your enemy has a fleet of say mostly akira and excel 2, and u gain immunity against both
If you gain immunity against those ships, he would rather well know as it would be *his* ships that were assimilated - he may even calculate the exact bonuses his opponent would gain... and he would be fool to replace those assimilated ships by the same type. If the Borg adapt, you have to adapt as well...
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:19 pm
Myles wrote:the adaptor is canon, it featured in descent. and in scorpion as a graphic.
Tho it is not called an Adaptor in canon, Starfleet refers to it as Type 03 and we never hear what the Borg call it. Scorpion appeared to show it as a solar system destroying mine (or possibly just the minelayer for such a device.) Nothing in canon even hints that it was for adapting.
I think it would make a nice minelaying ship really, in addition to being more of an anti-large ship role. This would certainly give the Borg more depth as it gives a reason to build adaptors even when you haven't captured a constructor or got an ally of the same race as your enemy.
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:25 pm
More over... let's look at the other borg ships:
A Cube, a Sphere, a Diamond, a Pyramid, a Paraleloid-o-something (Assimialator), a Block (the basic probe and the harvester - whatever they are called) and a Inverted-octopus-like-circle (the constructor). The adaptor is not even regular!
A Cube, a Sphere, a Diamond, a Pyramid, a Paraleloid-o-something (Assimialator), a Block (the basic probe and the harvester - whatever they are called) and a Inverted-octopus-like-circle (the constructor). The adaptor is not even regular!
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:34 pm
Unfortunately it was put in the shows. So someone completely forgot that Borg ships are big, scary, geometric shapes that lack that human touch of aesthetics.
Also, I just noticed that the model is a little off of scaling from canon. Is that intentional to allow it to be early-mid game?
Also, I just noticed that the model is a little off of scaling from canon. Is that intentional to allow it to be early-mid game?
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:40 pm
Most likely, the game would be rather difficult to play with ships dwarfing your Starbase flying around.
Borg go for function over form, the other ships having identifiable shapes is coincidence. They don't care about themes, they don't care about making the ships 'look good', they only care about efficiency. They use the Adaptor-type, so it obviously has some use for them.
What kind of mines could it have that wouldn't be a rip-off of another races?
Eleshar wrote:More over... let's look at the other borg ships:
A Cube, a Sphere, a Diamond, a Pyramid, a Paraleloid-o-something (Assimialator), a Block (the basic probe and the harvester - whatever they are called) and a Inverted-octopus-like-circle (the constructor). The adaptor is not even regular!
Borg go for function over form, the other ships having identifiable shapes is coincidence. They don't care about themes, they don't care about making the ships 'look good', they only care about efficiency. They use the Adaptor-type, so it obviously has some use for them.
Nebula_Class_Ftw wrote:I think it would make a nice minelaying ship really, in addition to being more of an anti-large ship role. This would certainly give the Borg more depth as it gives a reason to build adaptors even when you haven't captured a constructor or got an ally of the same race as your enemy.
What kind of mines could it have that wouldn't be a rip-off of another races?
posted on July 21st, 2010, 6:51 pm
Last edited by Nebula_Class_Ftw on July 21st, 2010, 7:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Borg having mines is as much a ripoff as Dominion having phasers, or Borg having phasers for that matter. IIRC mines are only found on the Generix Support and Klingon Mixed-tech Defiant, so really only normally Romulans even have access to mines (I thought Klingons had mines too, but I can't seem to recall what ship had them and haven't seen mines mentioned on their unit analysis page.) Romulan mines are cloaked, Borg mines would not be, Borg mines would also be quite a bit more powerful and probably increase in effectiveness vs. a certain race if the Adaptor that dropped the mine had adaption modules installed.
If, howerver, the Adaptor loses adaption modules like I suggested, then maybe the mine could have adaption modules installed when you select the ability to deploy it, and in the case of no adaption modules the mine wouldn't be available to deploy from the Adaptor.
EDIT: Oh hey I found the Klingon reference, it was just talking about Defiant mines and it's been a while since I've read that part of the guide. Odd that mixed-tech with Klingons gives you mines, but Klingons have no mines themselves, especially considering there was a Klingon minefield (that Sisko decided to detonate using stolen codes) in DS9.
If, howerver, the Adaptor loses adaption modules like I suggested, then maybe the mine could have adaption modules installed when you select the ability to deploy it, and in the case of no adaption modules the mine wouldn't be available to deploy from the Adaptor.
EDIT: Oh hey I found the Klingon reference, it was just talking about Defiant mines and it's been a while since I've read that part of the guide. Odd that mixed-tech with Klingons gives you mines, but Klingons have no mines themselves, especially considering there was a Klingon minefield (that Sisko decided to detonate using stolen codes) in DS9.
posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:08 pm
There are minelayers in Fleet Ops??? Minefields in space??? Oh, god...
Well, yes, the Borg go for function, but still, they clearly prefer something that Data calls (Q who I think - first meeting with the Borg) "generalised ship" - a ship with no identifiable bridge, engine-room or anything - which allows even a heavily damaged ship to operate with full functionality. I would imagine that such a ship has to be very compact, for example a regular geometrcal shape - the cube and the sphere are exemplary.
Conversely, the adaptor (as seen on the photo) has two very un-borg-like prominencies/appendages that make the ship probably quite vulnerable - the amount of firepower to sever those appendages would be much lesser than actually destroying whatever it is on their ends. And suddenly, the ship losts about 30 or 40 % of its hull. But there is nothing to sever from a cube, a sphere, a dodecahedron,... you just have to destroy them completely.
Borg go for function over form, the other ships having identifiable shapes is coincidence. They don't care about themes, they don't care about making the ships 'look good', they only care about efficiency. They use the Adaptor-type, so it obviously has some use for them.
Well, yes, the Borg go for function, but still, they clearly prefer something that Data calls (Q who I think - first meeting with the Borg) "generalised ship" - a ship with no identifiable bridge, engine-room or anything - which allows even a heavily damaged ship to operate with full functionality. I would imagine that such a ship has to be very compact, for example a regular geometrcal shape - the cube and the sphere are exemplary.
Conversely, the adaptor (as seen on the photo) has two very un-borg-like prominencies/appendages that make the ship probably quite vulnerable - the amount of firepower to sever those appendages would be much lesser than actually destroying whatever it is on their ends. And suddenly, the ship losts about 30 or 40 % of its hull. But there is nothing to sever from a cube, a sphere, a dodecahedron,... you just have to destroy them completely.
posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:10 pm
To be Honest ,I do use the Adaptor to fill out my fleets a bit. I would like it to get a mine laying ability like the Romulan Generex or the Klingon Attack Probe ability . Ide also like the developers to consider a nother ship for the Borg . The ship style I am thinking of it is from the A1 Mod (Milenium 1.9SE) is the Romulan Attack transport I forget the actuial name . I think it make a good ship for the assimlate avitar. I feel it looks Borgish since it looks like a segmented armored pyarmid with tails on each corner of the base. this ship could replace the assimulator and the adapor for the Assimulate avitarbecause it would fill the role of a assimulator however do it at a much higher rate .To offset the higher assimilation rate the movement could be very slow. and its repair rates drastically reduced . On the scaleing of the ships I feel they should be at between the size range as the Scout Cube to the Assimilator in size .
posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:16 pm
Eleshar wrote:Well, yes, the Borg go for function, but still, they clearly prefer something that Data calls (Q who I think - first meeting with the Borg) "generalised ship" - a ship with no identifiable bridge, engine-room or anything - which allows even a heavily damaged ship to operate with full functionality. I would imagine that such a ship has to be very compact, for example a regular geometrcal shape - the cube and the sphere are exemplary.
Generalised doesn't refer to the shape, it's the interior layout. The ship's large enough to fill the requirements fine, with each section including decentralized versions of the others.
Eleshar wrote:Conversely, the adaptor (as seen on the photo) has two very un-borg-like prominencies/appendages that make the ship probably quite vulnerable - the amount of firepower to sever those appendages would be much lesser than actually destroying whatever it is on their ends. And suddenly, the ship losts about 30 or 40 % of its hull. But there is nothing to sever from a cube, a sphere, a dodecahedron,... you just have to destroy them completely.
The thinner parts are no easier to cut through than the rest of the ship because of the structural Integrity. It would take more firepower than an entire task force can put out to get through them.
Eleshar wrote:There are minelayers in Fleet Ops??? Minefields in space??? Oh, god...
You missed the Klingon-MT Defiant and Generix?
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