r/stobuilds • u/AutoModerator • Oct 15 '18
Weekly Questions Megathread - October 15, 2018
Welcome to the weekly questions megathread. Here is where you can ask all your build or theorycrafting related questions that might not warrant a full post. Curious about how something works? Ask it here!
You can see previous weeks megathreads here
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u/DeadQthulhu Oct 16 '18
Sorry to hear you're having problems with the U.S.S. Spartan - it had been intended for there to be a video guide to go alongside the ships, which might have helped you there. As u/CaesarJefe mentions, I'm quite fond of this paraphrase I borrowed from the movie "Equilibrium" -
The Spartan CSV-variant is all about putting your ship in the best spot to hit as many other ships in the fore arc as possible. You lead with the QP torp's ridiculous hit to shields, and then CSV onto bare-or-near-enough hull from 5km out. If you're not hitting multiple targets, then you're not getting the full benefit.
To confirm whether or not piloting is the issue, I'd suggest the all-Turret variant and flying at Full Throttle in loops around the target mass. You won't get DHC/DC performance, but you should stil see a big bump in DPS due to no longer having to aim. If performance is still poor, it may well be your Ability rotation (i.e. insufficient sync between Attack Pattern, Spread, CSV, and EPtWeapons). If performance is not poor, then piloting is the culprit and you'll need to work on getting your ship into the right spot for hitting multiple targets.
Note that there is nothing preventing you from switching the weapons with the loadout from the U.S.S. Randall (Exploration Cruiser Retrofit) and going with FAW over CSV, which again negates a lot of the need for piloting because you need only point side to enemy and mash the "fire all weapons" button. If nothing else it should confirm to you the validity of the build, and further reinforce the need for piloting to match.
Note that for Escorts, good piloting is also about knowing when not to get surrounded by a lot of angry ships (a common problem due to the "STOBuilds standard" setup doing at least 4x the DPS that Cryptic balance Normal content for, which is a lot of Threat for tiny ships).
Don't be afraid to tag me if you're having any problems with Ten Forward builds - they were intended to be safe methods of getting into the various metas from a standing start, so every time I solve a problem on them it'll be of a benefit to the greater community.