Post by Kritus tr'Mennes on Jul 9, 2012 15:48:21 GMT -6
So I've gotten myself up to 50, and bought a big Odyssey Cruiser, and have been dutifully collecting decent (Blue+) Grade XI equipment, but I think I am probably loading up wrong, as it just seems like I take incredibly high amounts of damage, while dealing out relatively pathetic damage in return.
This of course leads me to believe that I'm doing something wrong. As I understand it, cruisers are supposed to be able to soak up a decent amount of damage. I don't seem to be having a lot of luck in that respect. It seems to take NPCs a frighteningly short amount of time to take down my shields, and I won't even go into how fast my shields (and subsequently my hull) tear like one ply toilet paper after a hard night of beer and wings.
I've tried retraining my bridge officers to give me more 'tanking' abilities, like Engineering Team, Science Team, Tactical Team, Polzarize Hull, and Reverse Shield Polarity, but they help for a few seconds and then are on such long cooldowns that my shields are down before I've even scratched the enemy's paint.
I've also tried running with various power settings, Full Shields seems like it would work well, but it doesn't offer a very significant improvement in lifespan, and the increase in the time it takes me to actually kill things ends up making my lifespan shorter, because the enemy DPS (in the case of NPC combat here) is able to hit me for a more drawn out period. I've also tried 75% shields with 75% weapons. It seems relatively effective, but still less so than running with 100% weapons, as it seems for fighting against NPCs, the best defense is a good offense. Again, in PvP, one single Klingon can generally destroy me before I am able to think about blinking, but when I get my BOff abilities off, it takes them 5 seconds instead of 1 (And only because of reverse shield polarity.
That brings me to my Consoles. This is probably where the majority of my problems lie, as I've just thrown whatever I've looted in here. I have a nice shiny EPS Console that makes my power levels transfer faster, which is nice, and then I have a couple shield buffing ones... one of them gives me more shield capacity, the other increases the regen... and I think the final one is +defense for hull against like 4 different damage types. Aside from the EPS Console, none of them are really good, as I don't really know a reliable way of obtaining better ones. The episode replay doesn't seem to offer any super ones (at least as far as I've gotten), and my crafting is too low to make them. I've considered spending my dilithium, but don't really know which ones to look at so am loath to make an uninformed decision and buy one that isn't all that good. I have some Damage Booster ones for my tactical slots that are pretty decent (blue and green Grade XI, both for disruptors, because like I said, it seems that for PvE the best defense is a good offense, and I've been running episode replay for the Hybrid Disruptor-Plasma Beam Arrays).
Lastly is my build. I've put points into things that SEEM like they would be good for increasing my survivability, and my damage. Some of those skills are pretty hard to understand, especially the science ones that 'Increase Deflector' and 'Increase Sensor Array' and such like that. If it said anything about Shield Systems or Emitters, or about Power Transfer, I picked it up. I don't know if I should be focusing more into specific skills, and going all the way to 3 reds in them, or not. To this end, I've MOSTLY only spent 6 points in each of the skills, aside from a few that I put all 9 into (mostly lower level ones).
If anyone can offer advice or even creative speculation of something that I may not have thought of it will be appreciated. Perhaps my problem is that I just haven't done enough gathering of the Uber Equipment(tm) from STFs, or perhaps just need to spend more time getting my crafting up to a level where I can viably make my own gear, but even with that, I am sure a little advice will help me determine which of those avenues I should persue.
Thanks in advance for the assistance.
Kritus
This of course leads me to believe that I'm doing something wrong. As I understand it, cruisers are supposed to be able to soak up a decent amount of damage. I don't seem to be having a lot of luck in that respect. It seems to take NPCs a frighteningly short amount of time to take down my shields, and I won't even go into how fast my shields (and subsequently my hull) tear like one ply toilet paper after a hard night of beer and wings.
I've tried retraining my bridge officers to give me more 'tanking' abilities, like Engineering Team, Science Team, Tactical Team, Polzarize Hull, and Reverse Shield Polarity, but they help for a few seconds and then are on such long cooldowns that my shields are down before I've even scratched the enemy's paint.
I've also tried running with various power settings, Full Shields seems like it would work well, but it doesn't offer a very significant improvement in lifespan, and the increase in the time it takes me to actually kill things ends up making my lifespan shorter, because the enemy DPS (in the case of NPC combat here) is able to hit me for a more drawn out period. I've also tried 75% shields with 75% weapons. It seems relatively effective, but still less so than running with 100% weapons, as it seems for fighting against NPCs, the best defense is a good offense. Again, in PvP, one single Klingon can generally destroy me before I am able to think about blinking, but when I get my BOff abilities off, it takes them 5 seconds instead of 1 (And only because of reverse shield polarity.
That brings me to my Consoles. This is probably where the majority of my problems lie, as I've just thrown whatever I've looted in here. I have a nice shiny EPS Console that makes my power levels transfer faster, which is nice, and then I have a couple shield buffing ones... one of them gives me more shield capacity, the other increases the regen... and I think the final one is +defense for hull against like 4 different damage types. Aside from the EPS Console, none of them are really good, as I don't really know a reliable way of obtaining better ones. The episode replay doesn't seem to offer any super ones (at least as far as I've gotten), and my crafting is too low to make them. I've considered spending my dilithium, but don't really know which ones to look at so am loath to make an uninformed decision and buy one that isn't all that good. I have some Damage Booster ones for my tactical slots that are pretty decent (blue and green Grade XI, both for disruptors, because like I said, it seems that for PvE the best defense is a good offense, and I've been running episode replay for the Hybrid Disruptor-Plasma Beam Arrays).
Lastly is my build. I've put points into things that SEEM like they would be good for increasing my survivability, and my damage. Some of those skills are pretty hard to understand, especially the science ones that 'Increase Deflector' and 'Increase Sensor Array' and such like that. If it said anything about Shield Systems or Emitters, or about Power Transfer, I picked it up. I don't know if I should be focusing more into specific skills, and going all the way to 3 reds in them, or not. To this end, I've MOSTLY only spent 6 points in each of the skills, aside from a few that I put all 9 into (mostly lower level ones).
If anyone can offer advice or even creative speculation of something that I may not have thought of it will be appreciated. Perhaps my problem is that I just haven't done enough gathering of the Uber Equipment(tm) from STFs, or perhaps just need to spend more time getting my crafting up to a level where I can viably make my own gear, but even with that, I am sure a little advice will help me determine which of those avenues I should persue.
Thanks in advance for the assistance.
Kritus