Incoming changes to Pilot Abilities

[Stromgold]

As some of you already know, I love flying sci/pilot ships, so I am glad to see some improvements for this!!

Greetings, Captains! We’ve decided to make some changes to the Pilot Bridge Officer Abilities to bring them closer in effectiveness to some of our more popular Bridge Officer Abilities. Numerically, Pilot Specialization Bridge Officer Abilities are in a weak state. Most of them try to do cool things and fall short due to lack of raw power, and a couple need more intensive care. Help is on the way.

The design intent here is simple: raise the power level of Pilot BOFF Abilities such that they’re worth using alongside other more popular BOFF Abilities. Most Abilities got raw power in whatever area made them most special. Reroute Reserves to Weapons, Clean Getaway, and Deploy Countermeasures got more thorough rebuilds because they needed clearer jobs to do – situations where it’s obvious what the Ability can do for the Captain.

A couple of the changes are more experimental, in particular Reinforcements Squadron. We’re adding stat scaling to the fighters it calls as a special mechanic of the ability (details below). Watching how this interacts with gearing decisions will teach us a lot, and chart a course that could take us to more broadly supporting minionmancer playstyles in the future. Generally speaking, we expect these changes may need to shift slightly so they can settle comfortably.

Additionally, we’re making small tweaks to two Engineer Bridge Officer Abilities. Starship Shields are a core part of Trek and we feel they’re a bit squished by the elephantine cube in the room: the Borg are very good at what they do and it’s important they stay that way. Since they’re also severely warping the play space around the Shields mechanic, we’re giving Captains the tools they need to do some adaptation of their own. Emergency Power to Shields and Reverse Shield Polarity now grant conditional and unconditional immunity to Shield Drain during their respective effects.

These changes are currently slated to go live in an update this week on PC, and then hit Console when we've had some time to see how they work on PC, and address any issues that arise from feedback or otherwise.. More details are listed below. Take a look, theorycrafters, and let us know what you think of these changes. Remember, the best place to get your feedback seen is on our official forums.



Improved Engineer Bridge Officer Abilities:
Numbers provided are preliminary and may be changed before release!



Emergency Power to Shields
Now also grants Immunity to Shield Drain when your Shields are reduced to 20/35/50% total Capacity


Reverse Shield Polarity
Now also grants Immunity to Shield Drain




Improved Pilot Specialization Bridge Officer Abilities:
Numbers provided are preliminary and may be changed before release!



Energy weapons: Reroute Reserves to Weapons
Haste improved from 20/40/60 to 75/150/225
Engine power drain normalized at 8, was 8/6/4
If Engine Power reaches 0, effect ends, the shared category cooldown is reset, and remaining duration is subtracted from other Energy Weapon Firing Mode recharge times


Clean Getaway
Duration improved from 4/6/8 to 8/10/12
After 3 sec, each sec your ship avoids damage recover 1 sec recharge of boff and cap abilities


Deploy Countermeasures
Ability now additionally deploys holo images of your starship which taunt Foes and vanish after being damaged
Number of images and duration scale with ability rank (3/4/6 images and 13/18/23 sec duration)
Chance to Confuse removed


Reinforcements Squadron
Ships Receive Bonus Damage from your Acc and Crit Sev
This is something we're going to watch and tune as we gather data about how it performs in the wild
Current tuning is that fighters receive Bonus Damage equal to (3 * extra Accuracy) + extra Crit Severity
Summoned fighters are immune to core breaches


Form Up
Bonus Damage starts at max value, no longer ramps up over duration
Teleport range now 20 km for all ranks


Subspace Boom
Explosion damage significantly increased
Roughly speaking, base damage improved by 50% and Throttle scaling damage doubled
Large debuff to Accuracy added to the explosion
-50/-65/-80 for 5 sec


Lock Trajectory
Added a buff to Critical Chance during active effect
2/3/4%


Pilot Team
Now grants a modest bonus to Defense during the effect
7.5/15/22.5
Now grants Immunity to Placate during the effect


Hold Together
Scaling from high Throttle doubled


Fly Her Apart
Damage buff improved, happens during buildup as well as after
3/3.75/4.5% per sec Fly Her Apart is active


Coolant Ignition
Damage scales with Engine Power
Currently 0.5% additional per Engine Power
Initial detonation now has a large burst of Damage
Roughly 4.5x tick damage


Attack Pattern Lambda
Confuse lasts longer, also applies Placate to Foes that are not Players, but has a long CD per target
Duration improved to 15 sec
Cooldown 60 sec per Foe
Now applies to all weapon types
Higher ranks dramatically improve Acc and Perception
35/50/65 Acc
250/500/750 Perception


Jonathan Herlache

Systems Designer

Star Trek Online

[jem_389]

Long time coming.

[Stromgold]

Energy weapons: Reroute Reserves to Weapons
Haste improved from 20/40/60 to 75/150/225
Engine power drain normalized at 8, was 8/6/4
If Engine Power reaches 0, effect ends, the shared category cooldown is reset, and remaining duration is subtracted from other Energy Weapon Firing Mode recharge times

225 firing cycle haste??

My guess is that one (or more) of the new incoming ships is a pilot ship. That change will definitely drum up some sales.

I am willing to bet that it does not stay that way very long before it gets nerfed.

[jem_389]

Well they did paraphase it with "we expect these changes may need to shift slightly so they can settle comfortably" which is Cryptic speak for "we'll nerf it after a healthy increase in sales", lol. The changes to engineering bridge officer abilities should help the shield issue., again until they nerf it. And yes you can almost guarantee one (or two) of the new ships will have Pilot seating............

[Sysil]

Time to refresh my Defiant build!

[cmdraftbrn]

emergency power to nerf bat.

delta rising was the greatest expansion ever, and the players loved it!

[Pattern]

The changes to pilot team and clean getaway have the biggest impact IMO.

[Sysil]

The changes to pilot team and clean getaway have the biggest impact IMO.

There is one placate that Pilot Team does not immunize against: the AuxtoSIF doff placate. That one's cleared by Engineering team.