Ideas for the D-Rhienn :)

[Elim]

posted on January 24th, 2011, 1:26 pm

Last edited by Elim on January 24th, 2011, 1:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I totally agree with you Boggz, in every point. But, I think D-rhienns are completely ok in 1v1 games, the recent adjustment to thier cost made them balanced in every aspect. You can stop the rom guy from getting criticall mass of them.

The problem that they tend to completely ruin team games.    If you ask me we can keep them as they are now, just make them capped on 6.

PS: I know that you almighty devs don't like the idea of capping stuff, but I think you should consider it when balancing things, especially if you wan't to keep the micromanagment-intensive nature of the game, and not turn into a macro madness as like (yes same example always ) starcraft2.

posted on January 24th, 2011, 1:33 pm

Well, lets point out the purpose of those ships and maybe we see the balancing in a better way:

Torp-rhienn: Should be good against larger ships. Engage and kill them off. Not so good against stations, you have the Serkas for it. The Torp-Rhienn could be something like a little-D. Here my suggestion:

Make it short-ranged and mainly torpedo based, but therefore fast. Its torpedos should be something like the "good old instable plasma torp" designed to intercept battleships.

Passives: If we look on the large battlrships, we have:
- Tavara - medium ranged
Big-D - medium ranged
- V-13 - medium ranged
- Neggie - short
- Excel II - long
- Avalon - long
- souvie - medium
- cube/sphere - medium

Well, hard to tell. I'm between a passive against long and medium. The torp-rhien will have problems against cruisers, so that might be a problem, because even in later game, you will use the cruisers coming out of the yards. The dominion will use the T-15, the feds the Excel, the rommies ... everything and the klingons the vor'cha. So... hard to tell, how the torp-rhienn should perform against battleships while maintaining a good stance against cruisers, or at least not a bad.

Disruptor-rhienn:
This ship should be good against the smaller fry, like destroyers and light cruisers. So the counterpart to the disruptor-rhienn.
This is in the first view pretty good, BUt, most destroyers DON'T have short range. There atre fast tracking computers, that will perform good against B'rel and such, but most little ships are long/medium ranged. Only the S-2, the monsoon and the birds of prey are not. So... too easy to counter.

So maybe we could add this: Disruptor domination: Most small ships use pulse weapons to fight off other small ships. The D-Rhienn will counter this with hardened shield generators, that negate the effects of pulse-weapons against it.

The D-rhienn should also be short-ranged and be fast OR medium ranged. No long range. We already have so many long range-destroyers. (look at the feds)

What do you think?

posted on January 24th, 2011, 4:44 pm

yes we have long range ships in the game, but look at the Romulan line-up

Long range Romulan Ships:
Rhienn
Cehlaer

The Rhienn is the only long range ship available to the Helev avatar.  I'd be okay with a lot of other changes before I'd accept nerfing their range.

posted on January 24th, 2011, 8:37 pm

Gonna have to reverse what i said before and say these need a weakness of some kind because the female klingon avatar has no counter for them and stands no chance. Even vorcha get eaten by them.

posted on January 25th, 2011, 2:07 am

Yep, we are currently working on redoing some of the Romulan baseline units, including the Rhienn Refits

Thanks for the response, Optec!


  Good to know that the problem hasn't been overlooked

posted on January 25th, 2011, 2:54 am

Part of the problem is the overall setup of the Romulan tech tree. I get that Romulans have a one-second cloak and excellent cloak detect. I also understand there need to be drawbacks to the Romulan style of play. However, the tech setup can be absolutely crippling. Ships alone are very expensive, and the expense and rigidity of the tech tree make it relatively difficult to effectively counter an opponent.

When you have little ability to protect expansions and incredibly expensive ships, you don't really have the resources to switch Leahval -> Generix or vice versa. This means that there are many times when it becomes "Ok, I can build X research station and do the Leahval/Generix refit researches, or I can just spam my cheapest warship and upgrade it to Disruptor refit."

I agree that the D-Rhienn is unbalanced, but I think the larger problem is that the absolute lack of flexibility in the tech tree makes it such an appealing option. Any time it comes down to bankrupting myself in an effort to gain access (building not included) to a ship, as opposed to bankrupting myself spamming D-Rhienns, I'm going to spam D-Rhienns until I want to rage-quit, never mind my opponents.

posted on January 25th, 2011, 3:43 am

Heh, I dunno .. I feel that the Rommie tech tree is ok, personally.  I've found it to be much more flexible than I previously thought ASSUMING that you use your early ships correctly and don't waste them .

[Kestrel]

posted on January 25th, 2011, 3:43 pm

Last edited by Kestrel on January 25th, 2011, 7:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Part of the problem is the overall setup of the Romulan tech tree. I get that Romulans have a one-second cloak and excellent cloak detect. I also understand there need to be drawbacks to the Romulan style of play. However, the tech setup can be absolutely crippling. Ships alone are very expensive, and the expense and rigidity of the tech tree make it relatively difficult to effectively counter an opponent.

When you have little ability to protect expansions and incredibly expensive ships, you don't really have the resources to switch Leahval -> Generix or vice versa. This means that there are many times when it becomes "Ok, I can build X research station and do the Leahval/Generix refit researches, or I can just spam my cheapest warship and upgrade it to Disruptor refit."

I agree that the D-Rhienn is unbalanced, but I think the larger problem is that the absolute lack of flexibility in the tech tree makes it such an appealing option. Any time it comes down to bankrupting myself in an effort to gain access (building not included) to a ship, as opposed to bankrupting myself spamming D-Rhienns, I'm going to spam D-Rhienns until I want to rage-quit, never mind my opponents.

I agree with you 100%, you cant risk building the more expensive ships like the griffin/deridex because you need to get out as many ships as possible in order to defend expansions and attack which means all you can is choose a ship and spam it, which really limits gameplay. A worthy turrent can fix that.

posted on January 25th, 2011, 3:55 pm

I must say I really like the Romulan tech tree, the only thing I have problems with is that the warbird yard needs the research institute. That way you can't change easily from a Generix strat to a warbird strat, you need that damn(and probably useless) building.
Generix' are fine ships and I wouldn't say that a Generix strat is weaker than a Leahval or DisRhienn strat, it depends on the situation. The only problem about it is mid game, when you got ressources but have to invest them in a building you don't need if you wanted to build Norexans for example.

On topic: I totally agree. Some people around here know that I'm playing Klingons quite often and I've found ways to counter many things, but a fleet of DisRhienns :fish:... Long range is still a problem to Klingons, but usually long range doesn't hit you hard(sabres) or can't run away from your B'rels(Bomber, Cehler, Sang, Excels...). Dis Rhienn can do both and just won't die.

posted on January 25th, 2011, 10:23 pm

I think another part of the problem is this: a sizable fleet of D-Rhienns allows Romulans to play like other factions. They retain the Romulan high-cost and cloaking traits, but their ability to do massive damage to almost any type of fleet (Borg not included) along with their ability to soak up a decent amount of damage make them a perfect generalist unit. Again, Borg notwithstanding, there are very very few roles that can not be be filled by D-Rhienns in a highly effective manner. That said, I think this goes back to my post above.

And Kestrel, the turret isn't the issue. The turrets are relatively useless unless you're Mijural (which I feel is only useful as an avatar if you're Warbirding, which in anything smaller than a 3v3, good luck with that, folks) which is fine. I'd rather park a cloaked Rhienn or two at my exp and elt them do some damage before I have to cloak them out. Retreatable turrets are awesome. What becomes a problem is that the ships are SO damned expensive and difficult to change tech. Mijural gives nice turrets so you can concentrate ships on attack, but the main early game boon of Mijural is the Shrike. If your opponent counters your shrikes, you can go Generix or Leahval or- oh wait, you're going to be out of supply faster than a Klingon spamming B'rel against T-15s.

My basic issue is this: The Romulans are a powerful offensive race, and to beat them you need to put them on the defensive, but the game mechanics and balance seem to do a good part of this for you.

Also, Boggz, why not replace the multi-disruptor with phase plates! D-Rhienn refit with phase plates would be sweet! 

posted on January 25th, 2011, 10:39 pm

Also, Boggz, why not replace the multi-disruptor with phase plates! D-Rhienn refit with phase plates would be sweet! 

  Hey, yeah!  That way not even Monsoons can counter the D-Rhienns! 


  I love your sarcasm, Prim

posted on January 25th, 2011, 11:14 pm

I think another part of the problem is this: a sizable fleet of D-Rhienns allows Romulans to play like other factions. They retain the Romulan high-cost and cloaking traits, but their ability to do massive damage to almost any type of fleet (Borg not included) along with their ability to soak up a decent amount of damage make them a perfect generalist unit. Again, Borg notwithstanding, there are very very few roles that can not be be filled by D-Rhienns in a highly effective manner. That said, I think this goes back to my post above.

And Kestrel, the turret isn't the issue. The turrets are relatively useless unless you're Mijural (which I feel is only useful as an avatar if you're Warbirding, which in anything smaller than a 3v3, good luck with that, folks) which is fine. I'd rather park a cloaked Rhienn or two at my exp and elt them do some damage before I have to cloak them out. Retreatable turrets are awesome. What becomes a problem is that the ships are SO damned expensive and difficult to change tech. Mijural gives nice turrets so you can concentrate ships on attack, but the main early game boon of Mijural is the Shrike. If your opponent counters your shrikes, you can go Generix or Leahval or- oh wait, you're going to be out of supply faster than a Klingon spamming B'rel against T-15s.

My basic issue is this: The Romulans are a powerful offensive race, and to beat them you need to put them on the defensive, but the game mechanics and balance seem to do a good part of this for you.

Also, Boggz, why not replace the multi-disruptor with phase plates! D-Rhienn refit with phase plates would be sweet! 

That wasnt my point, my point is that if romulans had a turrent worth building they wouldnt need to spam a single ship type like dis rhiens in order to survive, switching to battlehsips is expensive and leave you vulnarable due to lack of ships for attack and defense, a worthy turrent could solve this issue in romulan gameplay.

posted on January 25th, 2011, 11:51 pm

This problem will also occur if you are fed (one turret, no ships), klingon (one turret, no ships), dominion (prototype), and borg (early sphere --> must be a larger map)

The rommies lack the harass-thing you can do with other fractions. Pull out some bugs and try to kill something off. Fast and effective.
Pull out some K'vorts and harass.
Pull out some sabers/monsoons/intrepids and harass

The rommies cant do that so easily. They, and here is the point, are lucky, if they can push back the harass without getting the chance to do it by themselves. So... If we take this on, they are weak on early game. I could live with that IF they would perform better later on. But we know... warbirding is expensive and against a V-13 spam, you are going down. Against the borg even more... fedroll is also a problem and klingons... well, maybe you can do something against klingons. But only maybe.

I find it VERY hard to play rommies. The only thing I managed is to warbirding... this is effective in some way. At the time, where I get my two tavaras, I can defend and attack.

In my view, the weakest races are klingons and then the rommies. Rommies even weaker than klingons.

posted on January 26th, 2011, 12:13 am

I think you should read more passives and you will find that you never really need to go warbird yard because of how powerful staryard vessels are, specters are great against borg because of the huge crew and resistance to torpedoes. The feds can be countered by leahvals, frigates, dis rhienns, torp rhienns if they go eraudi yard, lots of stuff, and against klingons i would say try really any of the above except maybe specters 

posted on January 26th, 2011, 2:59 am

i think the roms already have enough ships that are easy to hit with torps (birds never dodge)

so i think kaleh manoeuvre should be an officer ability.

id start with a 10 speed reduction and see if that is good enough.

I agree on all three here, especially the first one.
Roms only have Shrike, Rhienn, and the Rhienn refits for small sizes, and Shrikes are avatar-specific. Removing the small size on D-Rhienns would make Spectres a near necessity if facing a torp ship spam.

As for the tech-up not halting production, maybe certain refits could require going into the yard to refit, and to do so would delay production.
If this refit method does get implemented, I think they should stay at 120 speed, since Roms already have mostly slow ships and it really better fits their sneak attacking if they don't spend too long getting to the yard and back.