Thoughts on ship diversity in STO

[Inquizitor]

In an attempt to break us out of the closed Beta funk I had an idea.

I was pondering on my way to work how sad it will be to not see any of the Defiants or Akiras or Intrepids in teh end game stuff. Admittidly we don't know the full picture yet but we do know that the devs have said and even given rough percentages how one tier will be better than another tier.

What I was thinking about would be for a way to upgrade the lower tiers into the higher tiers. maybe limit it to two extra tiers. The drawback is you would have to laydown ALOT of prestige but the upside is you could keep a ship you really like. In practice it would be easier to just get the next tier up so this is mainly an option for people who really like some of these other ships to keep them.

In this way a Defiant can become a T4 for some relativly high Prestige cost. Lets say twice the cost of just grabbing a Promethius.

An Akira can become T3 for twice the cost of a Dfiant and then to upgrade to T4 it would cost 4 times the cost of a promethius.

A Saber becomes T2 for 2x and T3 for 4 times however it wouldnt be able to get to T4.

A Miranda would have a max of T2.


What are yalls thoughts on this?

[Canean]

I have to say its not a bad idea. I would appreciate the ability to keep flying an Akira (my favorite for some time). Though I would have to imagine they would stay some what competitive from what Cryptic has already said. Well at least between tier 4 and 5 they said there would be little difference. So I'm hoping I can keep the Akira (should be tier 4) going longer and still enjoy the higher level content.

[Arokh72]

I believe they alluded to what you are saying in the last AskCryptic:

There are five tiers of ships. At tier 5, there are two ships per category, so there are two top-end Escorts, two top-end Science Vessels and two top-end Cruisers. One is a ship from the existing intellectual property and one is created by Cryptic. We did this so there would be more variety at higher ranks. But the difference between a tier 4 and a tier 5 – the difference between a Defiant and Prometheus, for example – is more about differentiation than raw power.

It’s not a linear progression; it’s a difference of around 5 percent in terms of overall ship performance between tier 4 and 5. So the disparity between the two is very small. Effectively, a tier 5 ship is twice as good as a starting ship, and a tier 4 ship is 80 percent better than a starting ship. And that’s just the ship. Once you factor in your skills, your Bridge Officers and your items, the performance difference between the ships is very small, which means you can choose which ships you want to fly and when, rather than being forced into one ship just because it’s better than the others. It’s about letting players find the ships that accentuate their play style, rather than forcing people into one specific template.

But the bottom line is tier 5 ships are better than tier 4 ships. It’s a game of progression. You may like your flaming sword, but the level 50 sword is better than the level 40 sword. But if you do want to stay in a lower-tier ship, you won’t feel as underpowered as you normally would in other MMOs.

I interpret that as stating that even though the higher tier ships will always be better than a lower tier ship, the difference between a well specced lower tier ship and higher tier is negligible. So in saying that if you max out your Miranda with all the best mods and the best BOs it'll still be worthwhile using up at Admiral level. What I'd like to see is further "unlockable" ship to be able to use. Basically being able to repair and use a derelict ship we may see floating around in space.

[Varrangian]

Yeah I discussed this issue in my "The ship Tier problem..." (http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=27210) thread.

[Inquizitor]

You discussed the problem. I'm just proposing a solution to spark discussion if nothing else. Besides that was a month ago.

I'm personally more concerned wiht a cinimatic feel than anything else. I want to see all the different classes involved in a space battle just fo rthe look of it.

[Varrangian]

You discussed the problem. I'm just proposing a solution to spark discussion if nothing else. Besides that was a month ago.

I'm personally more concerned wiht a cinimatic feel than anything else. I want to see all the different classes involved in a space battle just fo rthe look of it.

I proposed two solutions to the problem.

I do have two ideas for a solution to this.

The first idea would involve an elaborate quest line that allows players to upgrade one tier 3 or lower ship to tier 4. Granted this does not allow for visual identification of tier, but like I said above I don't really believe that is essential to a good game. One of the benefits of this idea is that it allows players who like a tier 1 ship to keep that ship for the end game. Which I think is a huge plus to making a game everyone can enjoy and love.

The second idea is that the configurations in tier 2 and tier 3 get redistributed. So for instance let's say the Akira is a tier 2 Escort, its sister ship the Oslo would be a tier 3 escort and the Zephyr would be tier 4. For the Defiant configuration the base Defiant would be tier 3 as would the Vigilant, but the Gallant would be tier 4. Then all the Prometheus configurations would be tier 4. This would mean at tier 4 you would have at least 3 basic hull designs.

[Rev1021]

i do believe there is a problem you over looked. the higher tier ships will have more BO slots.
also the slots on the higer tier ships wil be higher rank.
so on a tier 5 ship you be the rank of adrimal and you can use all your skills and those of your BO's.

so if your an admiral and want to fly a tier 1 ship you can only use your Lt. commander skills and your BO's can only use thier Lt. skills.

by all means fly your lower tiered ships but don't complain they are not as good as tier 5 ships. and don't try to figure out a way you can modifiy them. otherwise you might as well make all the ships equal and that would be boring.

[Inquizitor]

i do believe there is a problem you over looked. the higher tier ships will have more BO slots.
also the slots on the higer tier ships wil be higher rank.
so on a tier 5 ship you be the rank of adrimal and you can use all your skills and those of your BO's.

so if your an admiral and want to fly a tier 1 ship you can only use your Lt. commander skills and your BO's can only use thier Lt. skills.

by all means fly your lower tiered ships but don't complain they are not as good as tier 5 ships. and don't try to figure out a way you can modifiy them. otherwise you might as well make all the ships equal and that would be boring.

I didn't forget it. :) I believe that adding those consoles and upgrades is what upping the Tiers is all about. Well. mostly about.

[scottage00]

I'm not too worried about ship diversity, 6 tier five classes, 3 usable tier 4 classes. With three varients each that's 27 fairly distinct classes at higher levels. My only problem is that the Akira is placed so low but hopefully we can get around that.

I understand exactly what you mean for tier diversity in end game and I really hope they can include that some way, but I hope they don't include it by having lower tier ships be upgradeable. Mostly because if I was cruising around in my brand new tier 5 klingon vessal only to have a saber or miranda warp in front of me and blow my out of the sky it would just look silly.

[Inquizitor]

Well my idea would actually prevent that. a Sabre would only be able to be T4 (using your units of measure) which is still weaker than the other ships. a Miranda would only be able to reach T3 (again using your units of measure) So they shouldnt ever be able to take you out in a strait up fight even with my idea. besides if someone can get aorund those limitations and take out a Neg'vahr with a Miranda..well might be annoying but how many times has the Enterprise been shown to do the impossible :)

[scottage00]

Oh I had a question too, would a tier 4 be able to upgrade to be a tier 5?

[Inquizitor]

Oh I had a question too, would a tier 4 be able to upgrade to be a tier 5?

I'm still using the Origonal Tier system where it goes form Tier 0 to Tier 4.

i've not gotten used to numbering it from 1-5 yet.

[Reservoir_Dog]

Nice thought, I agree with you on the part that it's pretty boring to have battles where only two or three different kinds of ships are involved.
The first idea for an solution which popped into my head was to make a "Ship-Points-System". For example each side of the battling parties would have 20.000 Ship-Points at their disposal. Now for a Tier5-Ship to participate it would cost them, let's say, 7.500 points, so they could have a max. of two Tier 5 Ships in their fleet. A Tier4-ship would cost mabye 5000 points, etc.
This would guarantee a wide diversity of ships and force the fleets to actually think about tactics (for example one big slow Tier5-Cruiser which is supported by various fast Tier2-escorts).
This way we could avoid supercharged Mirandas and stuff like that. Because, no matter how much you love your constitution-class and no matter how much guns you put on it, it will never be a match for a souvergin. Same applies for Bird of Preys and Negh'Vars.

Just my two cents,

RD

[Inquizitor]

That occured to me as well. It would make things a bit more tactical from a fleet standpoint. Do we bring alot of Tier 5's. If not do we bring 2 Science Tier 5's or two Cruiser Tier 5's etc etc.

It would be an interesting mechanic but impossible to enforce in an open PvP area such as teh neutral zone.

[Eclipse1987]

I don't like the idea. Honestly I feel the diference is to close as it stands right now, the diffrence from 0-4 is only 100% meaning two mirandas are equal to a sovereign. IMO the diffrence should be closer to ~400% between bottom and top tier

A saber under the o.p. suggestion effectively becomes 5% weaker than a prometheus, which if you think about it is kinda funny.

Thsn there is the fact that if you stuck a saber with the same armerments and shields as a prometheus it still wouldn't preform anywhere near the same level.

In short I don't see it as making sense or as a good idea.

[Norvo]

I don't like the idea. Honestly I feel the diference is to close as it stands right now, the diffrence from 0-4 is only 100% meaning two mirandas are equal to a sovereign. IMO the diffrence should be closer to ~400% between bottom and top tier

In short I don't see it as making sense or as a good idea.


It actually makes perfect sense from a gameplay perspective. With your idea, you spend a skill point or two on a new ship and you're instantly 100% more powerful than you were a second ago. It doesn't make any sense, and that big of a jump would make other upgrades (ship equipment and weapons, bridge officers) simply meaningless as upgrades, unless your new piece of ship equipment also makes you 75%-100% more powerful than you were without it.

There's so much inflation there it would either be completely ridiculous or make other aspects of the game almost irrelevant.

[Vorus]

I share the OP's concern. After three months of gameplay, when all the original players are Admirals, it's going to get boring it everyone's flying around in Sovereigns, Promethei, and Vo'Quvs. Personally, I'll probably stay in whichever tier 3-4 ship I like the best, and just chose to fight wisely or in packs if I have to. But I don't see a lot of other people doing that.

While the OP makes a decent suggestion, and I could certainly live with its implementation, I'd personally rather see players flying a ship because they LIKE it, not because it's powerful enough to take on a tier 5 ship.

Remember the old days of the SFC games? All the best players had one or two ship types that they flew most of the time, and you knew if "So and So" was online and in that ship of his, he was a threat, because he knew that ship like the back of his hand, and he'd use every ounce of that ship to kill you if you weren't careful.

And of course, you knew his ship nearly as well as he did, because you've faced him enough times. And you knew your ship just as well as he knew his. And each of you knew that the other had that knowledge. The battle began even before either of you went into red alert, because you were both already planning your strategies, and trying to get inside your opponent's head.

THAT'S what I'd like to see here, players flying Cheyennes that can dance around a Sovereign fanboy and make him cry when they torch him. Packs of BoPs that are well-known for being Galaxy-killers. And that sweaty palm effect when that one particular player decloaks in that ship of death that you can't ever seem to defeat . . .

[Eclipse1987]

It actually makes perfect sense from a gameplay perspective. With your idea, you spend a skill point or two on a new ship and you're instantly 100% more powerful than you were a second ago. It doesn't make any sense, and that big of a jump would make other upgrades (ship equipment and weapons, bridge officers) simply meaningless as upgrades, unless your new piece of ship equipment also makes you 75%-100% more powerful than you were without it.

There's so much inflation there it would either be completely ridiculous or make other aspects of the game almost irrelevant.

IDK any competitve game where two stock begining characters can match 1 maxed out one and usually by the time you hit the cap you are several times more powerful than when u start out.

Anyway what I was talking about wasn't an immediate 100% jump, but a gradual increase until the difference between fully upgraded tiers was ~100%
(factoring in equipment b.o., etc
.)so as not to make any upgrades or mechanics irrelivant.

Beside's I'm not advocating a game change I'm expressing my oppinion that the diffrence between a starter and a sovereign should be greater than 1:2

and I still say a 5% diffrence between a saber and prometheus dose not make sense.

[scottage00]

I think eclipse makes a great point, think about 2 mirandas taking down a Vo'Quv. That's a ship with about six times it's length, six times it's height and three times it's width. That's roughly 100 times the mass and with the current system theoreticly a pack of three mirandas could go Vo'Quv hunting, that's actually pretty viable in end game.

EDIT: I'd like to add that I don't hate the idea, I just think it would look wierd. I'm not strongly opposed to it at all.

[Inquizitor]

I would like that as well RV. I freely admit we dont have all of the information yet. However we can only go with what information we have been given so far. They are saying a Tier 5 ship is x better than Tier 4 and Y better than Tier 3. While I think a small fast manuerable ship is useful I can't help but notice thata Defiant is a fast small ship and the Promethius is likely similar.

I think we are not going to be short tactical options. I am just interested in the cinematic quality of the fights in addition to players being able to fly whatever they want, within reason, and still be competitive. Lets face it; If I like flying an Akira it's not going to be much fun getting my butt handed to me most fights. Especially when an Akira is one of the more modern ships. Then we look at the Olympic class which is more modern than an Intrepid. Something else that occurred to me is alot of the iconic ships are stuck in Tier 3. an Intrepid, Defiant, Galaxy. These are ships people will readily identify with and yet will likely be largely missing in the late game.

Whats more this kinda goes back to character customization. It was mentioned that you can't expect a level 40 flaming sword that you like the look of to compete with a Level 50 sword that you might not like the look of as much. Yet a major part of Cryptics success so far has been that you can have your character look however you want regardless of their abilities. In Star Trek half of the game our ship is going to be 'our character' That is what we will be looking at. I personally think it better for players to be able to see the ship they really like instead of being forced into a higher tier ship they don't like as much.

Obviously there is certain canon restrictions we want to work with here. we Don't want it to be easy but it shopudl be a choice for people to have. In the superhero games no one would think twice about a small girl taking on a big bruiser and winning. In Star Trek we have some precident as to which class of ship is better however we also have ingenuity in Star Trek. We also have Captains very attached to their ships and still facing down long odds to win.

This idea is a way to work within both ideas. Let the players play what they want while also respecting Star Trek Canon. They already let us modify one cariant to look like anothers while retaining the stats. Look is already not being tied to function. Why not let an Olympic compete on more equal terms? I just don't see the ship as being a piece of equipment or a power. Not in the terms of a Cryptic game. IT is far more than our Mount. It is an extension of our characters as much as our ridge officers will be.

[Vorus]

In Star Trek half of the game our ship is going to be 'our character' That is what we will be looking at. I personally think it better for players to be able to see the ship they really like instead of being forced into a higher tier ship they don't like as much.
I can see your point. And honestly, I'm not sure if I agree with it. One the one hand, I can completely see your point. If I want to stick in my Cheyenne Class, it'd annoy me to be outclassed in every fight just because of the fact that there are so many more Sovereign fans than Cheyenne fans.

On the other hand, as a hard-core Trek techie, it'd annoy me to see Mirandas take down Galaxys because the Mirandas were buffed up to match any ship.

And again, I like the idea of a skilled player being able to use his ship well enough to beat clearly superior opponents and making a name for himself that way.

But then I go back to "Yeah, but not many people are going to want to work that hard, so we're still going to end up with a few hundred thousand Sovvies flying around." so I want it to be easy enough to make low-tier ships useful that people are still drawn to them.

I'm not really sure which option I'd prefer, so I guess Cryptic has tried to strike a decent middle ground.

[Inquizitor]

Let me adress the Miranda issue since it keeps popping up. I dont want to see Mriandas going toe to toe with the Galaxies either. This is what I meant about the ships being able to compete with each other within reason. Using the system I proposed the Mirandas would only be a Tier 3 max while the Galaxy could be Tier 5. However someone that would invest that many points into their little miranda would at least have a far better chance at surviving a fight than the current situation.

We are talking about players here. Their ships. They are the starrs. Tehy are supposed to be tougher than your average NPC. I fully expenct, and would be annoyed if it wasn't so, that Mirandas will be blasted out of the sky by the dozens as a matter of course in Klingon missions. The oposite is true when the federation is fighting B'rels in NPC missions. When it comes to players though. They are the stars of their own shows. These little buggers should be tougher nuts to crack.

[Vorus]

Heh, it's hard to argue with those paragraphs. Well said. :D

[Farmer42]

Seeing the tiers of ship unlock they way Cryptic is doing it makes sense to me, but in terms of gameplay and the feel of Star Trek, it might be best if they just make the ships skins. Say, you go up a tier, unlock some new ships, and every ship you have unlocked is assumed to have gotten a refit to be competitive. Further, each ship could have ship-specific special abilities, possibly unlocked by certain BO's. Now, we haven't seen how they're dealing with different ships of the same type per tier, so I'm not sure how viable this is.

[scottage00]

I'm still thinking that a 2:1 ratio of sov to miranda is pretty good. That means that it's even less for sov to saber or connie. Theoreticly ignoring player skill two sabers should be able to take down a sov every time. That's pretty good as the only ships that wouldn't be able to stant up toe to toe with a sov would be the cheyenne and the connie. For them even as a hero ship it would be streaching it.

[Eclipse1987]

Let me adress the Miranda issue since it keeps popping up. I dont want to see Mriandas going toe to toe with the Galaxies either. This is what I meant about the ships being able to compete with each other within reason. Using the system I proposed the Mirandas would only be a Tier 3 max while the Galaxy could be Tier 5. However someone that would invest that many points into their little miranda would at least have a far better chance at surviving a fight than the current situation.

We are talking about players here. Their ships. They are the starrs. Tehy are supposed to be tougher than your average NPC. I fully expenct, and would be annoyed if it wasn't so, that Mirandas will be blasted out of the sky by the dozens as a matter of course in Klingon missions. The oposite is true when the federation is fighting B'rels in NPC missions. When it comes to players though. They are the stars of their own shows. These little buggers should be tougher nuts to crack.

That is a nice statement and all and not to take away from it but at the end of the day it still dosent make sense that a saber should come within a 5% difference of a prometheus no matter how much you like it no matter how you slice it even with top of the line equipment.

Cryptic HAS made it so weaker ships can compete at the current 1:2 ratio which is way too generous imo.


how many other mmo's let two noobs equal a maxed player? none I can think of.

They actually did progression backwards in this game, normally the gap widens as you lvl,however they made it shrink, which is why imo a 400% or greater gap would make sense but to give lower tiered players a chance they made it significantly smaller.

Bottom line the ship IS half gear and half mount in STO, the player is the captain not the ship.

[Farmer42]

That is a nice statement and all and not to take away from it but at the end of the day it still dosent make sense that a saber should come within a 5% difference of a prometheus no matter how much you like it no matter how you slice it even with top of the line equipment.

Cryptic HAS made it so weaker ships can compete at the current 1:2 ratio which is way too generous imo.


how many other mmo's let two noobs equal a maxed player? none I can think of.

They actually did progression backwards in this game, normally the gap widens as you lvl,however they made it shrink, which is why imo a 400% or greater gap would make sense but to give lower tiered players a chance they made it significantly smaller.

Bottom line the ship IS half gear and half mount in STO, the player is the captain not the ship.

It isn't two n00bs. It's two admirals in a starter ship. Until we know specifics, we have to assume the the Devs were referring to all other things being equal. Meaning the same captain on different ships.

[Eclipse1987]

It isn't two n00bs. It's two admirals in a starter ship. Until we know specifics, we have to assume the the Devs were referring to all other things being equal. Meaning the same captain on different ships.

No it's not an admiral in a starter is the same as a maxed lieutenant in the same ship. that is partialy why higher tiered ships are better,you get more ablities to accsess as do your b.o.'s.

So two maxed lieutenants in mirandas are equal to one maxed admiral in a sovereign.

[Inquizitor]

not to mention, since we are talking about Admirals, Why take two mirandas when you can take two prometheus? You are never going to ahve these 2 to one odds in an equal fight. 4 vs 4. I also strongly disagree with the assertion that the ships are just Gear. They are MUCH more. in the shows the Enterprise was just as much a character in the show as the Main cast. In this game we fit out the ships with gear. Personally I think having more variety would be a good thing. IT would mean you would identify ships wiht their captains in battle. You would know that that Akira isn;t just run of the mill Akira 529. It is the USS photon Torpedo captained by Killingyouguy and he is extremely good. What the ship itself is would cease being as important as who is commanding the ship and how powerful he is.

Only the last 3 tiers am I even talking about putting on an even playing field and that is only if a particular captain pays alot of prestige to keep a design he likes. Frankly when it comes to a Sabre or Nova I wonder how far behind they would even be. The connie is a very old design but a Excalibur is not. a Sabre is actually a very GOOD ship despite it being a Tier 1 ship on the list. Its a modern ship specifically designed for combat. Fast and maneuverable. Even so I'm not even suggesting making these ships equal to a Prometheus. and the Miranda even less so.

All it boils down to is adding choice to the players. Adding customization options. IT frankly wouldn't ruin my immersion one bit to see an Akira or a Cheyenne take out a Vo'quv or for a K'vort to run down a Luna class. It would all add to diversity on the battlefield and give an entire battle more of a cinematic quality.

[Inquizitor]

No it's not an admiral in a starter is the same as a maxed lieutenant in the same ship. that is partialy why higher tiered ships are better,you get more ablities to accsess as do your b.o.'s.

So two maxed lieutenants in mirandas are equal to one maxed admiral in a sovereign.

I'm not talking about two Lieutenants in Mirandas. I'm talking about higher level characters that had to spend alot of prestige points to stay in their ship. A Lt couldn't even fly a Rank 2 ship. Why would you think a Rank 3 Miranda is being piloted by noobs?

[Eclipse1987]

I'm not talking about two Lieutenants in Mirandas. I'm talking about higher level characters that had to spend alot of prestige points to stay in their ship. A Lt couldn't even fly a Rank 2 ship. Why would you think a Rank 3 Miranda is being piloted by noobs?

the miranda is one of the starter ships so yea lieutenants will be flying them, where did you get tier 3?


and as it stands now it dosen't matter if you are a captain or commander or maxed lieutenant flying a miranda, you'd have acsess to the same lvl of avaliable skills for that ship.

[Inquizitor]

the miranda is one of the starter ships so yea lieutenants will be flying them, where did you get tier 3?


and as it stands now it dosen't matter if you are a captain or commander or maxed lieutenant flying a miranda, you'd have acsess to the same lvl of avaliable skills for that ship.

What do you mean where did I get Tier 3. Have you even read anything we've talked about in this thread?

[scottage00]

I understand what you mean about the cinematic quality and I think they'll handle this in a few ways. One with smaller tier 4 ships that are ALSO fan favorites, so they'll be used quite a bit. And the other with possible smaller ships as pets/backup on hard huge battles. If you ever watched DS9 there were actually a ton of mirandas and birds of prey, they just never, ever did well at all. The Defiant flies with them many times and somehow they all manage to get taken out with one shot.

[Tanktreads]

I like the idea of ship diversity. If people have a favorite ship I believe that even if it isn't cannon that they should be able to make that ship useful even in endgame content. Like for a raid maybe we could take a certain number of points into a raid as opposed to having a set number of players cap us out, so we can have t1 kicking ass and taking names right along side the tier 5 ships, or maybe rework ships so that you can just gut them and upgrade them for an unholy number of points.... personally i'd sort of like to have an Olympic class science ship,http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Olympic_class , don't ask me why but I like the basic look of it and its a medical ship and I like the idea of that.

So do I want ships sorted by tiers? yes
do I want them sorted by restrictions to how I can make them look? no

[Norvo]

it still dosent make sense that a saber should come within a 5% difference of a prometheus

I don't think anyone has said that. IIRC they said the Defiant would be 5% less than the Prometheus. The sabre class is all the way back at the Lt. Commander level, one step higher than the miranda.

And that seems fine to me. Besides, the Prometheus was more about Star Trek: Voyager dumping all over DS9. That and its a gimmicky ship.

As to the Miranda situation, I think its possible that 2-3 Mirandas could take down a sovereign or whatever on the show. They have shields and photons just like everyone else.

In game, the way these things usually work out is that the Sovereign will be able to destroy one of the miranda's before the sovereign is half-destroyed. Then, The mirandas are only at half firepower and the sovereign still has its weapons. It'll be able to mop the other one up.

[Eclipse1987]

What do you mean where did I get Tier 3. Have you even read anything we've talked about in this thread?

I'm talking about (as my post said) the way it is currently.

B.O.T

I still say your proposal dosen't make sense from a gameplay, realistic or i.p. p.o.v.

And besides hearing 'I like ship X and want to be competitive with it.' & the want to make battles 'cinematic' I haven't heard a good reason to change the system, if it's diversity your after t4 to my understanding is 18 ships, if thats not enough new ships could be added as well.

[Norvo]

and as it stands now it dosen't matter if you are a captain or commander or maxed lieutenant flying a miranda, you'd have acsess to the same lvl of avaliable skills for that ship.

This is a little inaccurate. In addition to the bridge officers and equipment, you also have skills from your character, and thus have more skill points invested in better weapons, shields, power or whatever.

[Eclipse1987]

I don't think anyone has said that. IIRC they said the Defiant would be 5% less than the Prometheus. The sabre class is all the way back at the Lt. Commander level, one step higher than the miranda.

And that seems fine to me. Besides, the Prometheus was more about Star Trek: Voyager dumping all over DS9. That and its a gimmicky ship.

As to the Miranda situation, I think its possible that 2-3 Mirandas could take down a sovereign or whatever on the show. They have shields and photons just like everyone else.

In game, the way these things usually work out is that the Sovereign will be able to destroy one of the miranda's before the sovereign is half-destroyed. Then, The mirandas are only at half firepower and the sovereign still has its weapons. It'll be able to mop the other one up.

My friend we agree on this, I was using the saber as an example of what I feel the fallacy of the propossed system of the o.p. is.

[Inquizitor]

I'm talking about (as my post said) the way it is currently.

B.O.T

I still say your proposal dosen't make sense from a gameplay, realistic or i.p. p.o.v.

And besides hearing 'I like ship X and want to be competitive with it.' & the want to make battles 'cinematic' I haven't heard a good reason to change the system, if it's diversity your after t4 to my understanding is 18 ships, if thats not enough new ships could be added as well.

Alot of this comes back to customization and the look of your Avatar. Cryptic is big on this. In the IP the stars of the show, Which the devs have said is what the players are, Their ship does things well beyond what a normal ship would be capable of. What's more we start to get into the bizarre places they put the ships inside the tiers. a Sabre is nearly the Equal of a Defiant. The Defiant just had the extra awesome of being the Plot ship. An Olympic class vessel was designed and built after Intrepids and yet Starfleet decided to just make a worse ship apparently. The Akira outguns a Sovereign and certainly isn't maneuverable. The Prometheus was a one trick pony prototype whose sucked unless it was in MVA mode. Guess what it won't be able to do in STO and yet it's now a T5.

My point with this idea wasn't to get into the semantics of which IP ship had the biggest ****. Alot can be explained especially in the Tiers 3, 4, and 5. When you get to the Novas, and Constitutions you are getting into either really old tech or just really small poorly armed ships. The Sabre is just small, not underpowered. a Miranda has been a workhorse for the federation for over 200 years. The designs is small and yet if they underwent massive refits and tech upgrades, such as ones a Plot ship would get (Players are the stars of the show) I'm sure they could hold out.

From a Gameplay perspective it is irrelevant either way. They could have us flying Rocks at T5 and proclaim them better than everything else and the gameplay would be no different. When it comes to the actual ship skin we use the is irrelevant form a gameplay standpoint. It's the number of bridge officers, The number of mod slots, The hitpoints/speed/hardpoints that define its gameplay value. Not the outer shell.

This isn't even a matter of someone having to earn a T5 ships. You are HANDED a T5 ship upon promotion. All this idea says is, Hey I am capable of flying these T5 ships but I much prefer the look of my T4 ship. Id be willing to pour alot of "money" into the game to upgrade this ships Tier instead of using this FREE T5 I don't really like as well. No one is suggesting someone who couldn't otherwise have a higher tier ship be able to upgrade their smaller ships beyond what they are capable of flying. It's about players choice. It's about customizing their avatar. and it's about adding variety to any fleet action that would otherwise be discouraged.

[mayamyth]

Thinking about it... there is precidence for this kind of thing from series canon itself.

The Lakota, an Excelsior class ship, was upgraded to the point where it was capable of going toe-to-toe with the Defiant.

Yes, it lost, but only by a relatively narrow margin. AND largely because Captain Benteen refused to employ the Lakota's Quantum Torperdoes against the Defiant.

[Inquizitor]

Which episode was that? I remember the Lakota but only because it was a special ship in teh Star Trek CCG.

[Caltern]

Another canon example is Admiral Riker's Galaxy-class Dreadnought from TNG's All Good Things. This would in fact a way to have your cake and eat it too within the context of the discussion: Riker's upgraded Enterprise had a third nacelle, a huge phaser cannon mounted on the underside of the saucer section, and several other visually distinct modifications that clearly spoke to how much more power it had than its base model.

This is what I would like to see with Inquizitor's suggestion. Use those prestige points to buy powerful equipment that adds significantly to the profile of the upgraded tier vessel. For example, perhaps you could use your admiral's prestige to influence Starfleet to uparmor a Defiant, and give it a spoiler/tailfin outfitted with several photon/quantum torp launchers and even bulkier-seeming ablative armor. Take a Galaxy, give it a large Nebula-style superstructure and a dramatically resculpted secondary hull that clearly accommodates a much larger crew compliment, and gives it more room to add additional phaser strips. An Intrepid class whose hull is partially covered in Borg technology, with large emitters installed along the length of the entire vessel. The difference from the "No bloody A, B, C, OR D" Enterprise and the Enterprise A. This sort of thing.

The idea is that the player's refitted ship should, at a glance, state to the observer that there is absolutely no chance that this ship is comparable to its base model. This idea also addresses the statistical differences necessary to transform a lower tier ship to a comparable Tier 5, allowing justifications for how you're going to stuff more crew into a Defiant-class (Akira/NX-01 split hull flanking the bridge maybe?) or justify the additional warp capability and firepower of a refit Galaxy dreadnought.

Basically, an addition to the game of this scope needs to address visual distinction, the player's desire to fly the ship they want, the ability to reconcile that want with the reality of the IP, and the marriage of all that with the necessary statistics to have the new ship on par with, but not greater than, the Tier 5 vessels. (Remember that part of this problem comes from the fact that there is a statistical disparity between Sov/Luna/Prom and the other tiers.)

[Eclipse1987]

Another canon example is Admiral Riker's Galaxy-class Dreadnought from TNG's All Good Things. This would in fact a way to have your cake and eat it too within the context of the discussion: Riker's upgraded Enterprise had a third nacelle, a huge phaser cannon mounted on the underside of the saucer section, and several other visually distinct modifications that clearly spoke to how much more power it had than its base model.

This is what I would like to see with Inquizitor's suggestion. Use those prestige points to buy powerful equipment that adds significantly to the profile of the upgraded tier vessel. For example, perhaps you could use your admiral's prestige to influence Starfleet to uparmor a Defiant, and give it a spoiler/tailfin outfitted with several photon/quantum torp launchers and even bulkier-seeming ablative armor. Take a Galaxy, give it a large Nebula-style superstructure and a dramatically resculpted secondary hull that clearly accommodates a much larger crew compliment

Yeah, the thing is... that reality with the 'Galaxy X' was a Q trick that didn't exist so nothing that happened there counts either in cannon, no 'Galaxy X' or any of that other stuff either, and currently we cant go adding extra nacelles and parts willy nilly a galaxy will always look like a galaxy.

[Eclipse1987]

Which episode was that? I remember the Lakota but only because it was a special ship in teh Star Trek CCG.

I wanna say paradise lost, but I could be wrong. Its been awhile since I've watched ds9

[baykinz]

You're right, it's Paradise Lost.

[Caltern]

Yeah, the thing is... that reality with the 'Galaxy X' was a Q trick that didn't exist so nothing that happened there counts either in cannon, no 'Galaxy X' or any of that other stuff either, and currently we cant go adding extra nacelles and parts willy nilly a galaxy will always look like a galaxy.

The point I drive at that I wish to claim as canon is the precedent the ship and RIker's explanation of it represents. While yes, it is a future that doesn't exist, it is one that Picard wholly accepts at face value. He doesn't bat a lash at Riker being given Admiral's prerogative in picking and refitting the Enterprise as his personal flagship. And while everything else in that episode was part of Q's trick, Picard experienced the whole thing and retains those memories, even recounted them to his bridge crew.

EDIT: Point I'm trying to make with the above paragraph: Picard doesn't find it odd that Riker would be given the Enterprise, nor the large amount of resources necessary to refit the ship. This means that an admiral flexing their prestige like that is not unheard of, nor even a major curiosity. It is entirely within the realm of possibility. - If you don't like Galaxy Deadnought / X, think of the 1701 and the Enterprise-A. Dramatic visual changes, easily speaking of a marked increase in power, yet both are the same class.

As for adding extra parts and nacelles willy-nilly, that's in fact exactly what Star Trek Online promises we can do to our ships. Ship customization is already there, and very robust. All that needs to be done to satisfy the criteria in that regard (and I emphasized those three words) is to set some parts to be purchasable by Admirals with the right amount of prestige.

[UlfricDraka]

I'd like to be able to upgrade the bridge stations on a ship, but not the hull/weapons/power beyond the original specs. Seems to me that it'd be quite fitting to have a Miranda with an elite crew that makes up with skill what it lacks in raw power.

Of course, that same crew would do even better manning a Sovereign, but sometimes for whatever reason a captain chooses to (or has to) stay with an older ship - Kirk didn't upgrade to the Excelsior, even though he probably could have had it for the asking.

[Eclipse1987]

The point I drive at that I wish to claim as canon is the precedent the ship and RIker's explanation of it represents. While yes, it is a future that doesn't exist, it is one that Picard wholly accepts at face value. He doesn't bat a lash at Riker being given Admiral's prerogative in picking and refitting the Enterprise as his personal flagship. And while everything else in that episode was part of Q's trick, Picard experienced the whole thing and retains those memories, even recounted them to his bridge crew.

EDIT: Point I'm trying to make with the above paragraph: Picard doesn't find it odd that Riker would be given the Enterprise, nor the large amount of resources necessary to refit the ship. This means that an admiral flexing their prestige like that is not unheard of, nor even a major curiosity. It is entirely within the realm of possibility. - If you don't like Galaxy Deadnought / X, think of the 1701 and the Enterprise-A.

I don't wanna de-rail this thread but this is last I heard of ship customization:

http://www.startrekonline.com/node/176

In there they talk about the limits on customization and specifically talk about not being able to add extra nacelles. Ships will be recognizable ie; a galaxy will always be recognizable as a galaxy.

B.O.T

there is a big diffrence between retrofitting a ship (like the enterprise's a & e, but in all honesty they were the top dogs at the time of their retrofitting) and making it on equal standards with another ship.

For example you could outfit a miranda with Sovereign level tech and the same armerments sheilds etc. and it still could not match the sovereign.

[Kaldrath]

I'd like to be able to upgrade the bridge stations on a ship, but not the hull/weapons/power beyond the original specs. Seems to me that it'd be quite fitting to have a Miranda with an elite crew that makes up with skill what it lacks in raw power.

Of course, that same crew would do even better manning a Sovereign, but sometimes for whatever reason a captain chooses to (or has to) stay with an older ship - Kirk didn't upgrade to the Excelsior, even though he probably could have had it for the asking.

Actually I prefer this. The Enterprise wasn't the top dog in the TOS movies, the Excelsior was, but due to the skill of the crew we all pretty much knew the Enterprise could take the Excelsior in a fight...even if it was going to be hard.

Having a ship just sort of...max out at a certain level, regardless of how good your crew is seems kinda odd. THere are of course physical limitations to what can be installed, but the capabilities of their bridge stations relegating your bride crew to substandard skills just doesn't swing right with me. I'd rather be able to upgrade some parts and bridge stations to let my bridge officers do their thing the best they can than make a lower tier ship physically as powerful as a higher tier ship.

Maybe make certain skills not as effective when performed due to 'the navigational deflector dish is not as large so our tachyon pulse is 25% less effective, Captain." Or lock off only certain skills, but I don't see why a Commander learns skills only applicable to larger 'newer' ships when they've never served on one.