Even at T4 Extend Shields II is usually enough to keep someone alive anyway.

Last night, I was in a group with Venom (Pregg, Thrall, and a few others including Lillith). We did several Cracked Planet, both FvK and KvK, and managed to come out on top in most of the battles...the major exception was a sci/cruiser group with no escorts...we just couldn't get any damage done, nor could we get them to separate. This was a tactical issue, not a "zomg! They are too OP and we are nerfed". They were coordinated and had a better tactics.

Is it balanced? Who cares if it's balanced? You play a game and someone is always going to be at an advantage and others will have added challenges to overcome....a good player will adapt and overcome.

I absolutely suck at ground pvp - I freely admit it. In space, I feel that I am competent. My Fed is a TAC?Escort Captain 3(?), and my Klingon is a TAC/BoP LtC 6.

Balance is for the weak.

^^^^ this!


Exactly

Unfortunately, extra voice chat programs aren't really an answer to my needs. My favorite and most frustrating map isn't Cracked Planet, but Salvage Operation. With it being a 7 on 7 or even a 10 on 10, it is pretty much guaranteed that half the team is a PuG, and in fact, even if you enter as a pre-made, your pre-made is going to be about half of the team even when you do get in. So I don't see anybody with a communication advantage on this map, on either side. But really, if an extra voice chat program is required to do well on Cracked Planet, that's going to eventually force me into being a career ground pounder.

In all honestly, I have a R/L schedule that rotates between sleeping days and sleeping nights, so I just can't commit to a specific time of day to play. Therefore, unless it's a very large, international guild, it's PuG or nothing for me.

Now here is the rub. A balanced game allows the good player to adapt and overcome. How can I adapt to overcome 7 to 10 Federation players when the rest of the Klingons have quit out of frustration? I know how the others Klingons have answered that just from some of the other forum posts. Just queue for Arena and don't play Territory.

That I can believe.

In fact, I love getting into a House Battle Salvage Operation map, because I can spank the other Klingons silly with with they don't know. In fact, I have quite literally won these single-handedly. Unfortunately, I can say this because that particular map somehow spawned with me being the only one on my team against one enemy who wouldn't come out of cloak except to attack me. I won simply because I never went into cloak. (Yes, the queue is that dead.)

But that leaves me with a rather daunting task. How can we un-confuse the Klingon Defense Force so that other captains are both willing and able to actually hold territory or queue for anything other than that Cracked-Planet boredom contest. It is good news that Cryptic has announced that they are planning a T2 Klingon Cruiser. But that comes a bit late for me.

Is it something Cryptic has to address further, perhaps by adding a mechanic to reduce the award of Cracked Planet Arena and increase the reward for Territory or Assault battles. (Come to think of it, I have never actually seen the inside of an Assault map, since it's at the very end of the list and nobody queues it.) Or is there some way for us to educate other Klingons into how to win and have fun doing it?

Konru, even in the Slavage Operation a pre-made team of 5 with voice comms will turn the tide by calling out the enemies, location to which the enemy is speeding towards and many other advanatges. Getting 5 players into single spot on the map will allow you to destory a bigger group of PuG and uncoordnated opponents. Hell, the 5 premade can even shutdown the enemy spawn point in the 7v7 map.

In T3, I have experienced a roughly 1 in 4 win for the Federation. Does this means Klingon ships in T3 are overpowered? No, however a Klingon team that works together has the advantage due to 3 specific points:

1. Due to cloak they can pick their targets far more easily, and communicate on a non-hypothetical attack plan effectively.

2. Due to their high forward dps they can snipe targets very effectively. I've literally seen escorts, science vessels and occasionally even lower level cruisers get blown up in a few seconds before I was even able to target them and press the "Extend shields" hotkey.

3. Defensive abilities scale better on Klingon ships. When a Federation cruiser pops Reverse Shield Polarity he becomes invulnerable for 20 seconds. During that time he can do say 10.000 damage. (just a random number) A Klingon ship also become invulnerable for 20 seconds when it pops Reverse Shield Polarity. However during that time they can do far more damage, say 17.000 damage. Even their cruisers as they have alot higher forward dps than their Federation counterparts. Same with teamsupport abilities like Extend Shields.

Get to T5. The PvP there is horribly unbalanced in the Klinks favor.