Star Trek Online: Here We Go Again!

[Kitsune]

The excelsior and nebula classes are bought with space bucks for now, but will be cash store only in the future as they're the special versions of the T3 cruiser and science vessel.

[Sir T]

Impulse Exclusive Playable Federation Race: Pakleds
Looking for things to make you go? Try creating a Federation Pakled Officer! These Captains begin with the Dumb Luck trait (40% increase in susceptibility to placate and confuse powers, 20% percent increase in susceptibility to holds, 6% increase in Critical frequency). They may choose three additional traits.

So, since I'm downloading this from Impulse as we speak, I will have the exclusive ability to play a moron. 

[Rishathra]

Lots of different things you can put in that Lt. Commander slot.  It depends mainly on how you play.  Charged Particle Burst, Photonic Shockwave, Energy Siphon, Tyken's rift, all good choices depending on what you like to do.  If you can find a BO with Transfer Shield Strength III, that's a fantastic one.

I've been playing a lot on the F2P beta server, and while some of the economy changes are pants on head, everything else is pretty awesome.  The duty officer system is fun and adds a nice bit of depth.  The new ships are pretty nice as well.

[Ragnoros]

I like how even Cryptic form threads like to break. It's like anything they touch is doomed. 

(Both this thread and the one on CO do not redirect to the newest post properly)

[Lantyssa]

Pretty sure it's because they were merged from longer threads, and the post count doesn't get updated when that happens.

Someone should probably PM Trippy directly about it, but I need a thread on a subject I care about to break to do so.

[Sir T]

Played around a bit withthis last night. I have to say it was initially very confusing, but got better onces I figured out how to rearrange my UI. I have to say I didn't care for the ground combat at all, but the space combat was fun. But trying to learn how to maneuver with all those Borg Cubes warping all over the place gave me a headache.

How do I unlock the stuff from the deluxe edition I paid a tenner for?

[Kitsune]

You unlock it by going into the store and claiming your items in there.  The stuff that you get with your edition should be listed as free.

[Rishathra]

Ooh!  Ooh!  Someone else I can twink!

Ground combat gets a lot more interesting after a few ranks, when you and your BOs have more than one ability to use.  Another good aspect is that it is just as quick as it is at the lower levels, so even if you never take a liking to it, it goes by quickly and is never much of a grind.

[Sir T]

Well, I've been playing this quite a lot, and I have to say I'm fairly impressed. I'm on Leutenant 8 and yeah, this levels are a pain, and I'm really starting to feel the limitations of the starting shipand cant wait to get out of it. I don't know it ifs just be though but it gets very very laggy at times, to the extent that the ship just judders in place, and my guy will start running in circles. And today it disconnected me from the server.

Still its kinda fun so far.

[ghost]

I just re-subbed to this for something to do.  I just made my character with the biggest tits possible and was fairly impressed.  So far I think this game has a lot of potential to keep me interested for a month or two.

[Count Nerfedalot]

I just re-subbed to this for something to do.  I just made my character with the biggest tits possible and was fairly impressed.  So far I think this game has a lot of potential to keep me interested for a month or two.

Big tits can have that effect on some.

[Sir T]

AAAAnd the Miranda is history! 

I really like the differences they made with the ship classes I have to say. I've pretty much figured out already that the Cruisers are for people that think turning is for whimps, and need WIDE Phaser arcs as ship its obvious that real ships give the opposition a full broadside in the spirit of Nelson. I really like the science vessel especially since I'm figuring out how buffs and debufs work and I'm enjoying casting spells tossing out techological effects. I'm saving up for an escort to see what that's like to fly, but I think I'll stick with a science vessel for now

Have to say lots of fun so far. I'm finding that ground combat actually gives a nice break in the spaceship shooting so I think it was actually a good design decision. to include it, though I still prefer the space combat. I tried out crafting the other day and its a pretty nice system actually. Haven't got the skills to make anything worthwhile, but its certainly fun enough to be worth chasing anomalies for mats to get your skills up.

[Surlyboi]

Escorts are fun if you like run-and-gun sort of assaults. Swoop in, all foreword weapons firing to drop shields and a shit ton of armor and then give 'em your ass shields as you swoop by and line up another run.

[5150]

I've just hit Captain on live (as the free ship each rank will not include captiain upwards after F2P, Captain gets a discount and Admiral gets sod all) and purchased all 3 ships.

I havent flown Voyager (Science) yet but I flew the Nebula for the whole of commander.

The Galaxy (Cruiser) is a slow ass beast (The commander level cruiser may also have been, I didnt fly it) and I find changing facing to the enemy is very hard and your facing shield gets hammered alot.

The Defiant (Escort) is very fun, very nippy but very much a glass cannon. Its speed also works against it as you generally dont get enough time facing the enemy with all cannons blazing before you have to turn around for another run (but your rear shield will crumble on the way out).

Given my very nice experience with the Nebula I can see me sticking with Voyager for the most part as this seems to be a good balance between the 2 (and has the subsystem targetting to boot!)

BTW all C-Store ships will, in F2P, have their special ability coverted to a console (with another console slot added) which can be used in any ship of the same class (Escort/Science/Cruiser), which includes the commander level Nebula & Excelsior so you might want to buy them with energy credits now before you have to buy them with C-Store points

[01101010]

I've just hit Captain on live (as the free ship each rank will not include captiain upwards after F2P, Captain gets a discount and Admiral gets sod all) and purchased all 3 ships.

I havent flown Voyager (Science) yet but I flew the Nebula for the whole of commander.

The Galaxy (Cruiser) is a slow ass beast (The commander level cruiser may also have been, I didnt fly it) and I find changing facing to the enemy is very hard and your facing shield gets hammered alot.

The Defiant (Escort) is very fun, very nippy but very much a glass cannon. Its speed also works against it as you generally dont get enough time facing the enemy with all cannons blazing before you have to turn around for another run (but your rear shield will crumble on the way out).

Given my very nice experience with the Nebula I can see me sticking with Voyager for the most part as this seems to be a good balance between the 2 (and has the subsystem targetting to boot!)

BTW all C-Store ships will, in F2P, have their special ability coverted to a console (with another console slot added) which can be used in any ship of the same class (Escort/Science/Cruiser), which includes the commander level Nebula & Excelsior so you might want to buy them with energy credits now before you have to buy them with C-Store points

IMHO the Galaxy class cruisers are the worst ships in the game... horrible turnrate and horrible looks. Now in their defense, they are pretty beefy - but that was the only ship I took out did two missions with and promptly went back to the stupid looking Excelsior till I could get into the assault cruiser.

[Kitsune]

Science vessels definitely do it for me; their turn rate is good, their shields are great, and they have built in damage buffs.  Cruisers often look nicer but the damn things turn like oil tankers.  Escorts often look like crap and are too fragile, and even with their good turn speed it's a bitch to get a target inside the tiny 45° firing arc of their cannons.

[Sir T]

Yeah the cruisers definatly mandate the use of "Evasive maneuvers" to turn your ship around in anything like a reasonable time or even to bring a new shield into arc. I think that the only way to enjoy them is to use the 270 degree banks and accept you are a mobile turret with lots of phasers or fewer phasers and a torpedo, depending on where the enemy is. Escorts I couldn't really figure out when I tried one. I imagine you are basically abandoning the close range slugging for basic running in and out as the only way to get your cannons on a target is to be at longish range or charging it and hoping you can drop a shield in your pass to do some structure damage to whittle them down.

I have to admit I'm enjoying the science vessel, but i'll create another char soon to try a non science character for one of the other ship types. I imagine the special abilities of the tactical and engineering captains make the corresponding ships more flyable.

[01101010]

When I used an Escort, my MO was to get right within range 9km or so and drop speed to half and unleash hell. I would have primed the cannon and torpedo buff just before. While that was going on, I'd spam front shield. Then about 3-4km range, hit the speed buff and turn and run while spamming rear shield till 10km or so and repeat till dead. *yawn

[Surlyboi]

When I used an Escort, my MO was to get right within range 9km or so and drop speed to half and unleash hell. I would have primed the cannon and torpedo buff just before. While that was going on, I'd spam front shield. Then about 3-4km range, hit the speed buff and turn and run while spamming rear shield till 10km or so and repeat till dead. *yawn

This was pretty much my strategy too. Most targets are half dead after the first pass.

[Kitsune]

I approach at an angle to keep both fore and aft beams on a target until the shields are dropping, then fire up the torpedo burst, turn enough to get them into my front arc, and lob a pile of torpedoes into them before they can get the shields back up.  The science vessel power to target shields is super helpful for that.

[Rishathra]

When I used an Escort, my MO was to get right within range 9km or so and drop speed to half and unleash hell. I would have primed the cannon and torpedo buff just before. While that was going on, I'd spam front shield. Then about 3-4km range, hit the speed buff and turn and run while spamming rear shield till 10km or so and repeat till dead. *yawn

This "coming around for another pass" thing.  Are you talking about pvp play?  I've never had to do that in pve.  I just reinforce forward shields and shoot untill they're dead.  More specifically, I go full speed until I'm within 5km, then drop to one quarter and hit the tractor beam so they can't change faces, and just continue to unload everything until boom.

[luckton]

Oh damn, my interest level just spiked.

http://www.startrekonline.com/node/2675

TL;DR - "Yeah, you know how we went bat shit crazy with having a specific skill for every. single. fucking. thing?  And how they confused the fuck out of everyone?  One word: HOMOGENIZE!"

 

[Surlyboi]

Holy shit, that's a comprehensive overhaul.

Really though, considering how often I changed ships and never really noticed my success rate lower any, maybe I was doing it wrong.

[Stormwaltz]

Oh dear. Now they're starting to over-correct.

Yes, they got way too damn granular with the ship and damage type skills, but overall I felt like I was making some significant choices in character build. This takes a big leap in a WoW direction of removing meaningful choice.

Skills are confusing - What the heck does Astometrics do anyway?! It has been very confusing to cross reference which skills are affecting which abilities.

That was why we had that drop-down tab that allowed you to select any ability of your Captain and BOffs, and it would highlight all skills that affected it. This one, at least, seemed to have more to do with their chronic failure to document systems than any actual design failing.

Personally, I'd rather have a character skilled in the Trek-ish skill "Astrometrics" than a character skilled in the flavorless and generic "Starship Sensors."

[01101010]

IMHO... It's a good starting point for a revision. A tad bit too basic but that is because I grew accustomed to the system as it was. You got plenty of respec tokens to adjust every rank so I never really had an issue with say slotting phasers for one rank and polaron for my admiral. I do agree with the astrometrics example - that last tier of science was a bit vague. Sure, you can use the drop down and highlight the skills you would need to slot but if I was outfitting a ship and buying consoles - meh.

One thing that I really like is

Batteries - Increases duration of battery consumables.

Batteries were an indulgence which I hardly used. I would have liked to see the cool down shortened but this works just as well.

F2P is going to be interesting and this should make it much more friendly to incoming fodder.

[Sir T]

The did a litte stealth nerf in the last patch as well. You used to be able to recycle the basic equipment you got on a new ship to get some of the cost back, but now they are marked as costing 0. not a big deal but shows how they are thinking with ftp.

[Kitsune]

Just reached Captain and yes indeedy I do like the long range science ship.  I picked up the other two just to mess around with, but the cruiser's turnspeed is so utterly abysmal that I just can't see myself using it.

[Sir T]

Yeah, reading the ST wiki the Captain Cruiser has the worst turn rate of any ship in the game, and some of the higher tier cruisers turn better believe it or not.. From what I read on the wiki a lot of cruiser Captians actually swap to science vessels for that level.

[Surlyboi]

I ran almost every captain mission in a defiant or voyager. The galaxy class was interstellar ass.

[Furiously]

I'm a horrid person. I got excited to get my voyager refit when I hit admiral.

[Pennilenko]

I have done a large amount of playing from scratch on Tribble, I recommend that if you have anything you want crafted for main characters or alts that you do it before the FTP changes. Also craft a bunch of crafted top tier purples for sale for after the FTP switch.


Edit: I am amazed I had to add the word tribble to the spell checker dictionary.

[Sir T]

Per my earlier comment on the stealth nerf, I was actually mistaken. All the equipment from the free ship costs 0 for recycling, but if you buy one with space bux you can recycle it as normal.

Anyway, I just got a nebula class, and I have to say I don't like the slow turning on it. Lovely looking ship though, wish they had gone with that for the Enterprise D.

[Rishathra]

I have done a large amount of playing from scratch on Tribble, I recommend that if you have anything you want crafted for main characters or alts that you do it before the FTP changes. Also craft a bunch of crafted top tier purples for sale for after the FTP switch.

Also, it looks like it will be a good idea to cash in any emblems you have for mk xi gear as well.  The conversion rate of marks, emblems, merits, etc. to dilithium is... not particularly generous.

[Kitsune]

One thing I've learned is to always install Reman shields on every ship.  Even the fairly ugly ships look pretty slick when they're shiny black with glowing teal highlights.  On ships that are already pretty nice like my new Intrepid (Voyager to non-trek-nerds), they are all kinds of rocking with the Reman color scheme.  I'm still using Breen engines and deflector, need another promotion before I can equip the Aegis stuff.  The Nebula's pretty awful turn rate hurt it a lot in my book; even with an extra engineering console to hold a turn-boosting mod it was painfully sluggish compared to the fishbowl science ship.

Oh, and quick warning to anyone like me who was tempted to put down real cash for the alternate Captain science ship, its special torpedo ability apparently only works for photons.  So for the 90% of everyone who uses quantums, it's useless.  I don't know if that's going to be amended in a later patch or is 'working as intended'.

[01101010]

One thing I've learned is to always install Reman shields on every ship.  Even the fairly ugly ships look pretty slick when they're shiny black with glowing teal highlights.  On ships that are already pretty nice like my new Intrepid (Voyager to non-trek-nerds), they are all kinds of rocking with the Reman color scheme.  I'm still using Breen engines and deflector, need another promotion before I can equip the Aegis stuff.  The Nebula's pretty awful turn rate hurt it a lot in my book; even with an extra engineering console to hold a turn-boosting mod it was painfully sluggish compared to the fishbowl science ship.

Oh, and quick warning to anyone like me who was tempted to put down real cash for the alternate Captain science ship, its special torpedo ability apparently only works for photons.  So for the 90% of everyone who uses quantums, it's useless.  I don't know if that's going to be amended in a later patch or is 'working as intended'.

I liked the look of the Aegis set...