[MachoCyclone]

Remember that Weapons have the biggest impact when upgrading in Marks.

As I recall, Weapons > Consoles > Core > Shield/Deflector/Engines, though I don't have a link to the analysis handy.

My weapons are already MK XIV Ultra Rare. While I am working on upgrading those to Epics, I suspect I won't see much of a difference. The tac consoles where in serious need of upgrading as they were Mk XII.


After flying the standard Intel Cruiser, it kinda of grew on me and went ahead and upgraded to the Fleet version. I do like the console that came with it.

[MachoCyclone]

I hope this doesn't violate any dead thread rules since I am the OP of the thread. If so, just let me know.

As a reward to my captain for saving the galaxy from the Iconians; I awarded him with a brand new ship to command. A Fleet T6 Arbiter Class Battle Cruiser. Here is the current build.

I pretty much just transferred my previous build to this one with some upgraded parts. I finished upgraded my Aegis set to Epic. This build also gives the ship the following stats:





Haven't put her through any missions or PvE yet. Will be doing that soon. And I still have upgrading to do. I am also just messing around with the build due to boredom. LOL.

[Dark]

The Arbiter doesn't need A2B, and A2B really doesn't belong on a ship that doesn't need it.

It fits a Drake build perfectly. With 2-3 DCEs and 2 Conn DOffs to bring Tac Team to minimum:

LCdr Tac: FAW1/APB1/APB2
Ens Tac: TT
LCdr iTac: OSS1/OSS2/FAW3
Cdr Eng: ET1/EPtS2/EPtW3/AtSIF3
Lt Sci: HE1/ST2

Aux is not something to give up if at all possible, considering it's the 4th [AMP], powers Nukara T4 traits, and obviously scales your heals.

[MachoCyclone]

The Arbiter doesn't need A2B, and A2B really doesn't belong on a ship that doesn't need it.

It fits a Drake build perfectly. With 2-3 DCEs and 2 Conn DOffs to bring Tac Team to minimum:

LCdr Tac: FAW1/APB1/APB2
Ens Tac: TT
LCdr iTac: OSS1/OSS2/FAW3
Cdr Eng: ET1/EPtS2/EPtW3/AtSIF3
Lt Sci: HE1/ST2

Aux is not something to give up if at all possible, considering it's the 4th [AMP], powers Nukara T4 traits, and obviously scales your heals.

I was looking at going away from the A2B build here soon. Just been messing around with different items. I figured since it was something I was used too, I would just stick with it while just poking around the ships equipment. I think people have forgotten about the Aegis shield. It does seem to be just as good as the "newer" shields, but I could be wrong. I am by no means an expert at the inner workings of the game.

[MachoCyclone]

What a difference that has made. I haven't run the parse on it yet, but there was a noticeable difference for the better. And that is with putting the Nukera Deflector and Romulan Engines back on the ship.

Another interesting side affect I am noticing (and not sure what is causing it), but when I use TT1, I also get a cool down reduction on FAW and OSS abilities. Alot of times, this will send it into the global cool down timer and I can then fire FAW3 again in 20 seconds without usng FAW1. I can reproduce this just sitting outside of ESD if I time everything right, and real easy to do in battle since I am alway hitting the keys TT, FAW, and OSS myself. The Doffs are setup as per the recommendation from Dark. I wonder if that means I can get away with a single FAW and OSS and run 2 TT1?

Alaso, Since I am an Engineer and also have the Regenerative Universal console and with the BOFF abilities, so I have plenty of hull heals, couldn't I sub At2SIF3 for RSP3? The other hull heals restore far more hull than At2SIF3 can achieve.

ET1 restores 7,829
AtSIF3 restores 6,456
HE2 restores 13,773
Miracle Worker 17,398
Regen Console 17,398

So, I could easily sub the AtSIF3 for RSP3 and not lose out on hull heals. Thoughts?

[Dark]

I don't know what's happening with your cooldowns, AHoD comes to mind but that only reduces Sci & Captain abilities. Reciprocity? That isn't reliable enough to build around unless you're at Vel'gon levels of tanking, though.

What level of Aux are you listing those values at? ET doesn't scale with anything, but AtSIF scales with Aux. ET is also every 30s while AtSIF is every 15s, so given those listed figures it would put AtSIF at almost double the healing within 30s. They're also actually used differently in my layout there - ET is purely to prevent OSS from knocking subsystems offline, as well as to recover from things like Iconian probes. AtSIF is spammed - the healing is significant but incidental to keeping the big damage resistance buff cycling (10s every 15s, like Tac Team's uptime). Both of these are used as part of the normal buff/attack rotation, not as an actual "oh my hull is busted, time to heal" type of heal.

HE1 and MW are basically the only real heals on hand, used for when hull dips and you need to buy time for AtSIF & ET to cycle and bring you back up. HE1 as opposed to ST1, because ST2 (backed up by your RSF) is your only real shield heal, and it's probably going to be the most used of your reactive heals. Shields drop first, and if you can keep your shields up the bleedthrough (Resilient shields, right?) is unlikely to overcome the AtSIF & ET cycle.

Personally, I'd do 2 DCEs, 2 Conn, and then 2 Shield Distribution DOffs. That turns Brace for Impact into a pretty good shield heal, which means ST2, RSF, BFI for shields and AtSIF3, ET1, HE1 for hull with MW as the emergency button.

I also think you're looking at the regen console backwards. You shouldn't be changing your build based on possession of that console, you should be looking at if you need that console at all based on your build. If it's unnecessary, you can ditch it for something else.

BTW, current meta is Iconian 3-piece & Fleet Core for general purposes, or Iconian 4-piece (with a minimum of UR on the core) for faster or coordinated runs where you can keep the set buff cycling.

[MachoCyclone]

I had forgotten that AtSIF was linked to Aux. So, my current power levels are now:

W- 101/70
S- 93/70
E- 55/15
A- 70/45

I also think that I was looking at the wrong rotation of the abilities. I was using the AtSIF and ET has hull heals instead of using them for their other affects. I am using the Aegis Covariant Shield currently. I am still working on the Iconian Rep and only have the Iconian Deflector available to me at the moment.

I don't have to have the Regen console, and I look at that as kind of a second MW. Also, it is just a matter learning how to fly this setup, but I am getting better with it. With what you told me about ET, I am now activating that about 2 seconds before OSS ends that way there is no subsystem that gets disabled. Just a matter of watching the timers. And, I still have that odd cool down issue with the FAW. I am pretty much able to solely use FAW3.

[Dark]

I'd recommend dropping Shields to a setting of 50 at most. IIRC, the bonus over 50 is primarily towards passive shield regen, which is... barely anything.

EPS Manifold Efficiency (with 3 ranks in Starship Batteries) with EPtS/EPtW cycling, as well as EPtS2 itself and just Rank 9 in the Starship EPS skill (which is a must, as it's key for overcapping your weapons), should let you sit at ~90 shield power when "idle" (but cycling your buffs). Any traits that boost EPS will increase that further.

Having OSS will further alleviate any potential power issues, at least for shields. You're aware of overcapping?

[MachoCyclone]

I thought that all power settings had a hard cap of 125. You can go over that? The shield setting should be 50 + whatever bonuses? Or a total of 50 with the bonuses?

[Dark]

Shields should be set at no more than 50.

Bonuses from power in a subsystem above 50 caps at 125, yes. (Aside from when OSS or similar things are active.)
However, when you fire weapons it drains Weapon Power. That power is then restored at the end of the weapon's firing cycle.

With multiple energy weapons, every weapon aside from the first will this be firing at a lower power level, dealing reduced damage compared to the first. You should notice this, especially during Fire At Will. This is what Overcapping deals with.


If you only have 125 power:

1st weapon @ 125, drains 10 power
2nd weapon @ 115, drains 10 power
3rd weapon @ 105, drains 10 power
4th weapon @ 95, drains 10 power
etc.

If you have (through whatever means, be it Plasmonic Leech, EPS Manifold Efficiency, EPtW3, etc.) more power than 125, that excess power will flow back into Weapon Power during that drain, at your Power Transfer Rate.


If you have 145 power and sufficient Power Transfer Rate:

1st weapon @ 125, (20 excess) drains 10 power
2nd weapon @ 125, (10 excess) drains 10 power
3rd weapon @ 125,(0 excess) drains 10 power
4th weapon @ 115, drains 10 power
etc.

As you can imagine, having enough excess power and a sufficient Power Transfer Rate results in a huge difference when you get to 7-8 weapons. I'm not familiar enough with the math to calculate what's a "sufficient" Power Transfer Rate off-hand, I think it's 300%? It's best to consider it as perpetually "not enough". In anycase, that's Overcapping (having Weapon Power over the 125 cap), and that's why Weapon Power is always set to 100, and why Shield Power is usually set under 50 (because EPtS gives us the freedom to divert power from Shield to Aux).

There's other ways to offset the drain, for example the Fleet cores that reduce Drain will reduce the amount of Overcapping necessary.

[MachoCyclone]

Well, that explains why I have no weapon power drop when get EPtW, Red Matter Cap, OSS, and EPS Manifold going at the same time.

Also, since I'm not really using the Regen console; I'm going to replace that an EPS Relay (I think that is the one that boosts transfer rate).


Sent from my SM-G360V using Tapatalk

[MachoCyclone]

Just ran ISA in a pug group. Not bad at all. Still learning how to fly this build, but I can say that does perform better than my Aux2Bat Excelsior.

[Dark]

You should submit that and get your invite to the 10k channel.
You might get close to 30k if your teammates are pulling 10k-30k.

[MachoCyclone]

You should submit that and get your invite to the 10k channel.
You might get close to 30k if your teammates are pulling 10k-30k.

Yep. Already part of that channel. I was hitting 12-14K (high of around 15-16K) with the Excelsior build. Main focus now is getting the Iconian Set and upgrading current equipment. I can say that I am pretty darn happy with this build.

I also made some tweaks to the skill points and now have base numbers of:

Power Transfer Rate: 296% and 490% with EPS Power Transfer 3
Hull strength is 92,502
Shield strength is 18,017
Engery Weapon Resist is 34.7%
Kinetic resist is 39.2%
Crit Chance is 18%
Bonus Acc is 12.7%
Crit Damage is 105.3%
Bonus Defense is 57.7%
Turn Rate of 21.1 degrees per second

Power Levels are

W- 114/85
S- 84/50
E- 55/15
A- 73/50

With Red Matter Cap, EPtW, Engineering Fleet 3, EPS Power Transfer 3, and OSS 2:

Everything is way above the 125 cap. Weapon power goes to about 170.

I'm beginning that Kliest is not a suitable name for such a powerful ship.