Archived Post
02-15-2011, 11:28 AM
With all the QQ about science being OP and the continuing of sci powers being nerfed to uselessness I have an idea to help possibly. Add a new stat, lets call it Science Resist for now.
Consider some things first. If you need defense against damage you can buff your damage resistance to help some. On the flip side if you can't kill someone you can up your damage to help some. However if you are getting beat down by CC and debuff powers there is little you can do. There are some counters to some of these powers yes. But what this has created is a few "Must Have" powers, like sci team. And once you use it you are S.O.L. till it is off cooldown. "Must Have" powers are never a good thing when balance is concerned. You may disagree but for the sake of this post lets assume that that is true.
Enter Sci Resistance. This resist would offer a chance that a sci power, like Scramble Sensors or SNB would not work on you a % of the time. Of course this number would have to be subject to diminishing returns and have a cap. It shouldn't be allowed to get so high that you would become immune to sci powers. Even a 10% chance would add a new dynamic that could give you a lucky chance and at winning verses an all sci team, just as damage resistance gives you a chance against an escort. It probably shouldn't reach more than 30%, but that is something that would have to be tested and balanced.
The next thing to come up with is where does this stat come from. It could come for gear, skills or perhaps a power level, like aux. It would have to have a trade off so that you would have to sacrifice either some damage resistance or damage for it. Gear would fill this roll some but might lead to having a "Must have" console. The lower sci skills like emitters, deflectors and sensors could offer resist to thier respective counterpart abilities. These are low enough that most could spec into them. Sci already does, and escorts typically have the skill points to spare. Cruisers would have a more difficult time but this would be a sacrifice for them typically having high damage resist. The last option would be aux power. This would give sci ships the highest sci resist, which kind of makes sense in a way. A sci ship should be more resistant to its own powers. An escort typicaly runs the lowest aux making them have the least amount of sci resist. This kind of follows with the glass cannon idea though. But anyone could pop an aux battery for a few seconds to save them in a jam. Aux would balance the idea that you would have to trade something to get higher levels though. These are just some ideas, feel free to discuss them maturely.
I think this would nerf sci ships some, a kind of across the board nerf to sci powers without hurting their value as much. Also it wouldn't hurt them as much in PvE when a power gets nerfed because of PvP.
This might be something that is very hard to implement from the devs point of view but something to consider.
PS: this is not coming from a person who is always beat down by sci ships, I fly one too :)
Consider some things first. If you need defense against damage you can buff your damage resistance to help some. On the flip side if you can't kill someone you can up your damage to help some. However if you are getting beat down by CC and debuff powers there is little you can do. There are some counters to some of these powers yes. But what this has created is a few "Must Have" powers, like sci team. And once you use it you are S.O.L. till it is off cooldown. "Must Have" powers are never a good thing when balance is concerned. You may disagree but for the sake of this post lets assume that that is true.
Enter Sci Resistance. This resist would offer a chance that a sci power, like Scramble Sensors or SNB would not work on you a % of the time. Of course this number would have to be subject to diminishing returns and have a cap. It shouldn't be allowed to get so high that you would become immune to sci powers. Even a 10% chance would add a new dynamic that could give you a lucky chance and at winning verses an all sci team, just as damage resistance gives you a chance against an escort. It probably shouldn't reach more than 30%, but that is something that would have to be tested and balanced.
The next thing to come up with is where does this stat come from. It could come for gear, skills or perhaps a power level, like aux. It would have to have a trade off so that you would have to sacrifice either some damage resistance or damage for it. Gear would fill this roll some but might lead to having a "Must have" console. The lower sci skills like emitters, deflectors and sensors could offer resist to thier respective counterpart abilities. These are low enough that most could spec into them. Sci already does, and escorts typically have the skill points to spare. Cruisers would have a more difficult time but this would be a sacrifice for them typically having high damage resist. The last option would be aux power. This would give sci ships the highest sci resist, which kind of makes sense in a way. A sci ship should be more resistant to its own powers. An escort typicaly runs the lowest aux making them have the least amount of sci resist. This kind of follows with the glass cannon idea though. But anyone could pop an aux battery for a few seconds to save them in a jam. Aux would balance the idea that you would have to trade something to get higher levels though. These are just some ideas, feel free to discuss them maturely.
I think this would nerf sci ships some, a kind of across the board nerf to sci powers without hurting their value as much. Also it wouldn't hurt them as much in PvE when a power gets nerfed because of PvP.
This might be something that is very hard to implement from the devs point of view but something to consider.
PS: this is not coming from a person who is always beat down by sci ships, I fly one too :)