Grade 7 Starship Upgrades

[gpudh]

I have not been super impressed with the Grade 7 upgrades for star ships. Not any huge changed from my high end grade 6. I few points plus or minus here and there and 50 less missiles but with more damage (but damage of last missile set was not listed) I have not picked up the power conversion or emp pods yet. What is the difference? The emp still only lasts for 15 seconds. Is it a faster cooldown? What is the improvement on the power conversion? How much power to blasters? Does this take even more from shields or less?

 

I have tired new space missions and failed (granted I'm a sucky pilot) but it is a part of the game I like and if having all the grade 7 upgrades will help I would like to know to what extent it will help my poor skills.

[Jacen_Starsolo]

There are reports that it won't really help unless you have the skill. Which is why I'm not wasting money on it. There's also reports of skilled people doing them with grade 6 gear but only reports. No video I can find.

[Vandicus]

The new emp pods make a huge difference compared to the old one. I find it particularly useful in the mission with three frigates behind the player at the start, opening up with it there will allow you to save missiles and basically eliminate all the destroyable turrets on the frigates(it will also one shot turrets on a command ship, and the new command ship turrets pack a punch). The additional invulnerability time for the new electronic warfare pod I find is almost necessary for the minefield mission.

 

Don't really know about the power conversion module. Its superior, but I'm not sure to what degree it is.

[dpwms]

There are reports that it won't really help unless you have the skill. Which is why I'm not wasting money on it. There's also reports of skilled people doing them with grade 6 gear but only reports. No video I can find.

 

My experience is that even though I can ace the previous top tier missions with ease with the old ship upgrades, even with the tier 7 gear the new ones are too frustrating to be much fun. Not impossible--I've completed three of them--just so tedious that I probably won't repeat them.

Edited December 13, 2012 by dpwms

[gpudh]

Thanks so far. Looking for news on the strength of the Improved Power Conversion module. I have always leaned heavy on this one.

[AuckaLukaum]

My experience is that even though I can ace the previous top tier missions with ease with the old ship upgrades, even with the tier 7 gear the new ones are too frustrating to be much fun. Not impossible--I've completed three of them--just so tedious that I probably won't repeat them.

 

They're pretty tough. I've completed three as well. Not sure they'll be worth the hassle of repeating every week for the fleet/BH comms either, although I'm sure they'll become easier with time and familiarity. Remember, we've been doing the old ones (counting beta) for over a year now, so you can pretty much sleepwalk through them. I suspect that once we get the timing down of when to use each ability, etc, the new missions will not be quite as hard.

[dpwms]

I suspect that once we get the timing down of when to use each ability, etc, the new missions will not be quite as hard.

 

Agreed. I think my beef with them is not that they are hard, but that they demand such specific timing and offer little choice in when to use abilities such as EMP and ECM. At least with the old missions, I never felt like I had to use a specific ability at a specific time or lose, such as I do with the new ones (best example being the very specific sequence of ECM and EMP required to get through the two minefields and damage the frigate in that mission whose name I forget). Not only are the missions on rails now, but so is the player, to an extent. Still like space missions though and I would have upgraded my ship for "RP" reasons anyway.

[Goretzu]

My experience is that even though I can ace the previous top tier missions with ease with the old ship upgrades, even with the tier 7 gear the new ones are too frustrating to be much fun. Not impossible--I've completed three of them--just so tedious that I probably won't repeat them.

 

Yeah I've had a little play around with them, and mostly they just need to be learnt, there's lot more stuff to hit and places with only 1 non-damaging route through than prior ones.

 

They aren't particularly fun though.

[demotivator]

I have not been super impressed with the Grade 7 upgrades for star ships. Not any huge changed from my high end grade 6. I few points plus or minus here and there and 50 less missiles but with more damage (but damage of last missile set was not listed) I have not picked up the power conversion or emp pods yet. What is the difference? The emp still only lasts for 15 seconds. Is it a faster cooldown? What is the improvement on the power conversion? How much power to blasters? Does this take even more from shields or less?

 

I have tired new space missions and failed (granted I'm a sucky pilot) but it is a part of the game I like and if having all the grade 7 upgrades will help I would like to know to what extent it will help my poor skills.

 

My own experience is that upgrading to Grade 7 was the difference between surviving a mission but missing an objective because of low DPS - that means failure - and completing the same mission with some bonus.

 

So yes Grade 7 is definitely a step up.

 

The idea is that if you suck at space, Grade 7 won't help you anyway.

Edited December 13, 2012 by demotivator

[Felioats]

I was able to buy a few of the pieces on patch day, and I've only been able to complete one of the missions. I had hoped that with a full set, they would be close in difficulty to the old missions with tier 6. But yeah, these are so stupidly hard, I can't imagine a few more upgrades will help all that much.

 

I had no problem doing the old missions with full bonuses and not taking any armor damage.

[Guinnessmonkey]

I was able to buy a few of the pieces on patch day, and I've only been able to complete one of the missions. I had hoped that with a full set, they would be close in difficulty to the old missions with tier 6. But yeah, these are so stupidly hard, I can't imagine a few more upgrades will help all that much.

 

I had no problem doing the old missions with full bonuses and not taking any armor damage.

 

Yhea, totally agree. While the new upgrades make the old missions now super-easy, the new missions are all stupid-hard even with all the upgrades. I've completed a couple of them, but overall assaulting a large fleet and space station solo isn't really all that fun. Mostly, it just feels gamey and silly; each faction has hundreds of thousands (if not millions. We're talking galactic scale, here) of ships... They really can't spare a couple more to support you?

 

Sometimes you reach a point where something becomes less ****** and more stupid: "Captain Solo. We suspect that Vader's entire fleet may be hiding behind Endor's moon. Before we attack the Death Star, could you and Chewbacca take the Millennium Falcon and destroy the entire fleet single-handedly? That'd be great. Thanks."

 

Obviously I'd rather space that's not on rails (I miss Tie Fighter soooo much....), but if I do have to be on rails, can you at least try to make the experience something that at least resembles something from the movies? In Episode III you see Jedi pilots in a big battle; their job is NOT to destroy the enemy fleet itself, they go in pairs, and even then they require Clone fighters to watch their back to stay alive. Luke blows up the first Death Star, but not because they sent him and his X-Wing in solo. The best thing about some of the space missions was that they had at least some nod towards you being part of a task force or fleet. Sure, the AI guys really don't kill anything, but it sure does add to the atmosphere to have allied fighters swarming around.

 

I still haven't played all of the new missions, but so far I'd say that they're disappointing, and a missed opportunity. If their goal was to make space missions more popular, making them stupid-hard and designing them so that targets must be destroyed in a particular order or you will fail is not a great way to get more people enthused about space....

 

The early space missions were often designed around the concept of them being covert ops, as the galaxy wasn't yet at war. The new ones are lvl 50: The galaxy IS at war by that point. If anything, we should have less "one guy vs. a bunch of enemies" missions and more giant fleet battles where you're given a few specific objectives while swerving between giant capitol ships just kicking the crap out of each other.... *sigh*

[RikHar]

I've completed a couple of them, but overall assaulting a large fleet and space station solo isn't really all that fun. Mostly, it just feels gamey and silly; each faction has hundreds of thousands (if not millions. We're talking galactic scale, here) of ships... They really can't spare a couple more to support you?

 

 

 

This is BioWares logic, having one ship go against an entire fleet. But even if you had backup it wouldn't do any good as the space game is not realistic at all. Your backup ships never shoot anyone down.

 

Who even thinks of sending one ship against a full fleet?

 

/rasies hand and shouts "I know, I know!" It's BioWare!

Edited December 13, 2012 by RikHar

[aliasheroo]

I'm not sure anyone here understands the concept of development time.

 

Do you honestly expect them to make a fully fledged space combat game as well as a MMO and put them into the same game? This is just getting greedy.

[RikHar]

I'm not sure anyone here understands the concept of development time.

 

Do you honestly expect them to make a fully fledged space combat game as well as a MMO and put them into the same game? This is just getting greedy.

 

 

You're new to MMO's, aren't you?

 

Obviously.

[MarvelZombie]

I'm not sure anyone here understands the concept of development time.

 

Do you honestly expect them to make a fully fledged space combat game as well as a MMO and put them into the same game? This is just getting greedy.

 

And yet Star Wars Galaxies did it way back in 2004.

Edited December 13, 2012 by MarvelZombie

[Macheath]

I'm not sure anyone here understands the concept of development time.

 

Do you honestly expect them to make a fully fledged space combat game as well as a MMO and put them into the same game? This is just getting greedy.

 

To the tune of a few hundred million dollars? It certainly was possible. They decided to skimp on the space combat to give us more VO and dialogue scenes. That's their choice, and perhaps it was the right one. It sounds to me like the community wanted more than a bare-bones MMO with quality voice acting.

 

-Macheath.

[RikHar]

And yet Star Wars Galaxies did it way back in 2004.

 

Thank You

 

Yes they did and with a more superior ground game then this one as well as the space game many players here want implemented in this one.

[PsychKenn]

As to the OP, I do believe the grade 7 upgrades increase your effectiveness and I recommend buying them. Now for the other spin offs that this thread has produced; first, this isn't SWG (thankfully) and BW has stated they are working on a multiplayer space aspect for the game (fingers crossed) second, I for one enjoy the increased difficulty even with the grade 7 upgrades it makes them challenging and after trying a few times I get a sense of accomplishment from them. Some people don't like this in a game, esp a MMO, but I can remember older generations of games without save points that were similar. You just had to keep trying and improving your skill at it until you could beat them.

[aurellian]

Thank You

 

Yes they did and with a more superior ground game then this one as well as the space game many players here want implemented in this one.

 

Stop calling SWG's ground game superior. There is absolutely nothing superior about getting two missions, driving 3 minutes to the lair, killing the mobs and the lair and then repeating that over and over and over and over and over and over and over.

[Calsetes]

The missiles are a massive bonus over the Grade 6s, if only because the damage is something like double normal missile damage. That right there means you can fire "8" missiles where normally you'd only be able to fire off 4, and gives a ginormous boost to the ship's DPS.

 

Also, coincidentally, the missiles cost the most comms, is a schematic for cybertechs only, and cost some of the rarest components in the game - which they conveniently give out with cartel packs. Oh, and they sell the missile pod in the cash shop along with two other items.

 

I only managed to do one or two missions with the old missile requirements. Now, after upgrading to that and the grade 7 shield, I can do a crapton better on the space missions. They're hard, but they're not "if you make a single mistake, you DIE!" A bit of timing's needed in some parts - like the minefield mission needs some good timing on when to kick in your anti-target and EMP blast items regarding that first massive field of doom - but other than that, if you have grade 7 stuff, they're not that hard. The problem is, if you have that Grade 7 stuff. Without it... you might as well be flying George Jetson's hovercar-thing and waving a Laser Tag out the window.

[Gruug]

I am just so unimpressed with the "new" space missions. Basically they are just retreaded old missions but made harder. How can you vary a "tube" shooterl. You follow the roll-coaster ride and shoot things along the way. Not very origianl nor exciting. So, basically we get 6 new so-called space missions that are not that good....no matter what grade upgrades you use.

[Vlacke]

more superior ground game then this one

 

BS.

You must be one of those SWG fanboys who is very frustrated without the option to build his little house in the middle of bloody nowhere.