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General strategy shift of honor...
Synthetic Commander
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in Ready Room
I have been playing since right at the end of the mirror picard event, so I can't really call myself new anymore! I am considering a general shift in allocation of my legendary citations and would appreciate opinions. I have seen the post of how many people are reaching 10+ hour voyages without DIL, I obviously won't be there for a WHILE with my slow spending (or stat creep).
Now I'm almost 100% over 8 hour voyages without dil (only one that is pretty rough is sec/sci with 8.2 hours estimated by IAMPICARD, everything else is 8.5-9 hours). Even on faction weekends I can more often than not hit 8 hours.
With a job, wife and kids, committing to babysitting voyages after 8 hours is very unreliable so most often I recall right at 8 hour dilemma. This means investing more citations in voyage powerhouse crew will take a long time to pay off for me (until 10 hour voyages consistently). For this reason I am considering switching to top-end base skill shuttle crew for a little while, to help fill shuttle seats when my faction/hybrid event crew is not extensive.
My first targets would be:
Falcon O'Brien 1/5 (sec would help my weakest voyage skill too, and very common shuttle seat)
Professor Sato 1/5 (monster dip base)
Dr. Hugh Culber 1/5 (monster med base)
then:
Durango Troi 2/5 (just had a troi event, figure o'brien more likely to come up next)
And then I'm at rura penthe kirk or transition back to voyage crew
Borg Queen/Philippa Georgiou 1/5 (best base cmd I've got for now, and NONE of my primary cmd crew are past 2/5)
Caretaker 3/5
Mirror Picard 2/5
Interfaced Laforge 1/5
Mountaineer Spock 1/5
.....
Anyone else switched from voyage focus to shuttle crew focus after reaching the 8 hour voyage wall?
Thanks for your thoughts.
Now I'm almost 100% over 8 hour voyages without dil (only one that is pretty rough is sec/sci with 8.2 hours estimated by IAMPICARD, everything else is 8.5-9 hours). Even on faction weekends I can more often than not hit 8 hours.
With a job, wife and kids, committing to babysitting voyages after 8 hours is very unreliable so most often I recall right at 8 hour dilemma. This means investing more citations in voyage powerhouse crew will take a long time to pay off for me (until 10 hour voyages consistently). For this reason I am considering switching to top-end base skill shuttle crew for a little while, to help fill shuttle seats when my faction/hybrid event crew is not extensive.
My first targets would be:
Falcon O'Brien 1/5 (sec would help my weakest voyage skill too, and very common shuttle seat)
Professor Sato 1/5 (monster dip base)
Dr. Hugh Culber 1/5 (monster med base)
then:
Durango Troi 2/5 (just had a troi event, figure o'brien more likely to come up next)
And then I'm at rura penthe kirk or transition back to voyage crew
Borg Queen/Philippa Georgiou 1/5 (best base cmd I've got for now, and NONE of my primary cmd crew are past 2/5)
Caretaker 3/5
Mirror Picard 2/5
Interfaced Laforge 1/5
Mountaineer Spock 1/5
.....
Anyone else switched from voyage focus to shuttle crew focus after reaching the 8 hour voyage wall?
Thanks for your thoughts.
1
Comments
This will take time.....
My Current list is
Etana Jol - should be able to cite later on today.
Caretaker 3/5
HMS Data 3/5
After that point I may take an honor begold as there are still quite a few legendaries I want to unlock or possibly add stars if RNG is kind.
I don't run iampicard so can't tell you my optimal crew, but I do know I hit 8 hours for each voyage now (expect some voyages during faction events).
A bit more than a month ago I reviewed my crew to see where my weak points were, and I did so when looking at base stats and how many 1000+ I currently had and what percentage of top 6 were immortalised 4*s.
My weakest areas were SCI, ENG and SEC, with ENG being especially poor (nothing much after FF/FE Ru'afo).
I did the following:
- Which 1/5s addressed those areas? (i.e. boost base scores)
- Which 1/5s are good voyage crew?
- Which 1/5s would help with collections?
I came up with a shortlist of (all 1/5):
- RAF Miles O'Brien;
- Assimilated La Forge;
- Mirror Data;
- Away Team Saru/Maquis Tuvok.
Of those I chose O'Brien to start citing ... Data and Saru/Tuvok (completed the Vulcan one) don't address collections, La Forge is similar to Ru'afo.
O'Brien is currently 3/5.
I've since obtained ... The Traveller, Leonardo da Vinci, The Caretaker (just before he left gauntlet) and now Etana Jol (currently 2/5) ... ah well ... good voyage crew ... at least O'Brien has good base ENG and CMD ... when I finish with O'Brien, I'll still need to improve SCI and SEC I think.
So:
- I only invest in 3-skill 5*s (outside of mega-event crew);
- I try to address issues that help to broaden my crew (e.g. I won't be investing into DIP/CMD crew in the near future);
- I combine the base stat/voyage consideration;
- Collections help if I'm uncertain;
(- Main character helps if I'm uncertain).
While this is true ... CMD, SEC and DIP do come up a lot ... I usually use the 4*s associated with events to fill in there ...
e.g. Xindi Prisoner Archer will have 960*2; Celebratory Ash 928*2; Mutated Paris 935*2 DIP etc. ... for SEC and CMD the list is similar ... there aren't too many (non-bonus) FF 5*s that can compete with those numbers.
If you hit those with a proper 3* skill boost, then you do quite well.
On top of that I usually have a number of 1/5s that also get a bonus ... now I could have cited those, but that requires knowledge of the event schedule.
So, this is my reason for going wide in each skill first and then tall ... I did the same when I had boatloads of 4*s that needed levelling ... first got a good base in each skill and then focussed more on key skills.
I'd follow your suggestion once I got a good base ... but with only 1 crew 1000+ in both SCI (Surak) and ENG (Ra'afo) at the moment (CMD has 6, DIP has 7, SEC has 4, MED has 2) ...
Generally speaking, if you want to improve your worst voyage combo and your shuttle performance, identify any base-heavy SEC and/or SCI crew and hold off on proficiency-heavy crew until the others are finished. ENG/SCI was a tough voyage combo for me six months ago or so - Surak, Yarnek, Grand Nagus Rom, and RAF O’Brien served well for shuttles and certain voyages but the combination of these two skills still wasn’t a good one. So I chose to cite Mirror Cochrane...and ended up getting Ru’afo and an immortal Spider Barclay as well over the next few months. Windfall aside, the crew I chose to focus on helped both shuttles and voyages because they were base-heavy rather than proficient-heavy.
My honor strategy generally has three parts:
1. For any three-skill repeating mega event legendary, add a citation as soon as you win them. This maximizes their value for the 4-week stretch and ensures you'll have an immortal legendary by the end. (Note that this means it's not worthwhile to cite T'Kuvma or Minuet.)
2. For remaining honor, focus on immortalizing a couple legendries in each skill area. Look at skill combos, too. Again, make sure they have three skills.
3. When possible, focus on main cast crew with high base skill who also have strong voyages value. Even better if you've already been lucky enough to get at least two stars on that crew without using a citation.
How this has translated for me:
My immortalized legendaries are:
- Borg Queen
- Mirror Picard
- Surak
- Prisoner Katrina Cornwell
- Bell Riots Bashir
- Ru'afo
- Assimilated Janeway
- Assimilated La Forge (finished him just before Ru'afo appeared on the scene)
- Professor Sato
- Falcon O'Brien
I've also already added a citation to Etana Jol, so she will soon be immortalized as well.The ones I'm planning to cite next (in priority order, assuming someone better doesn't pop up in the meantime):
I also really need another outstanding medical crew, but the best option currently in my crew is Mirror Crusher whose base stats are decent, but not great. Her second best skill is also Dip, just like my only two immortalized Med legendaries -- Cornwell and Bashir. So I'm hoping for a better option there.
Captain Level: 95
VIP Level: 12
Unique Crew Immortalized: 525
Collections Completed: Vulcan, Ferengi, Borg, Romulan, Cardassian, Uncommon, Rare, Veteran, Common, Engineered, Physician, Innovator, Inspiring, Diplomat, Jury Rigger, Gauntlet Legends
It sounds like I am at a very similar point in the game to Rara Racing, and believe I'll combine some advice and adjust my approach a bit. I like the approach to build broad first then up, and also need to ensure I have 2+ strong crew in each skill.
Falcon O'Brien (base + voyage improvement in one, no brainer) - Temporal Chako makes 2 x 5/5 sec crew
Professor Sato (base monster and decent voyage, some events) - highest 5/5 DIP base is Cornwell
Assimilated Janeway 2/5 (base sci + voyage and EVENTUALLY we'll have another janeway event) - Surak makes 2 x 5/5 sci crew
Mirror Picard (I know his base isn't great, but event count and overall crew help) - highest 5/5 CMD base is currently Reverend Phlox!
Rara Racing, you made a good point that there are often a high number of cmd/dip/sec 4* event crew, so other high base skills in legendary citations may be more likely to fill a non-event crew slot. Something to think about.
Then move onto:
Honey Bare Dax 2/5 (base sci better than I realized, strong voyage, insane event count)
Borg Queen 1/5 (base + voyage, though low event chance)
I'll probably continue saving up at least 100k honor before spending each time, especially right before mega events. If we have a Discovery mega I want to dump citations on Culber quickly.
1) base monsters are less common commodities than solid voyagers. The few real base monsters can add up to ~33% base skill (ANDs) over “commoners”, while the voyage monsters add maybe ~10% skill over commoners.
2) base monsters are playable in faction event seats even if unbonused
3) my base monsters are typically in daily use effectively, 100% of the time in shuttles, whereas voyage monsters have to wait for the right skill match. My strongest voyagers are only in use 50% of the time, and most others ~20-30% of the time. So better duty cycle use for the base monsters.
4) daily shuttles provide hard to get, unique or expensive items. Yes, voyages drop SRs, but there are lots of other ways to get enough voyage points to get to the 8 or 10+ hour mark and get them. Over time, begold fuses will pump up overall voyage stats, but the chance of begolding base monsters is lower because there are so few.
5) failed shuttle missions of any flavor are a downer.
I appreciate your thoughts, especially pointing out how uncommon base monsters are that is certainly a factor. Daily shuttles however just adjust as your crew gets stronger to average out to around 60%ish win rate, regardless of how weak/strong they are, so at least there it does not matter at all how strong they are.
That being said, you give a very excellent point at how much of a difference they make in event shuttle success. Especially with more OR shuttle seats and single stat seats lately.
Hmmm, for the daily shuttles, I'm able to pull in 80-90% success rates (unboosted) with a few key monsters FF (First Officer Burnham, Professor Sato, Durango Troi, Ahdar). (That includes my fleet/crew skill bonuses of ~13-15%) The formula in the wiki says dailies have a maximum difficulty of 2500, but iampicard lists it as 1568, so in principle you should be able to get to well over 60%. I haven't seen that difficulty rating change as my crew changes though...
For faction events ... yes, they definitely can help in a pinch. I've been logging my crew use since early November and, e.g., First Officer Burnham and Professor Sato have been in faction event seat use 14% of all days, even though not being event bonus crew. (I think that's at least 1 in 4 faction events each ... didn't need them for this week's Sisko/Riker/Pilot extravaganza, but in the harder faction events they really came in handy). Eventually I may have enough crew that I don't need them to fill holes, but for now it has helped salvage some attractive faction missions (because of another good seat in the mission) that I otherwise would have passed on. It's their AND pairs that make them competitive, so the DIP/CMD/SEC monsters have an edge there since those seats are much more common.
Here are some stats on some of the monsters I mentioned, relative to my crew, for usage ... the %'s correspond to "chance of being in use at any given point in a day". The shuttle %'s max out at ~65% duty cycle because of, y'know, sleep and such :-) I start the day with daily shuttles, then voyages have to make do with whoever is left unassigned. The overall use estimate is the "or" probability of the three listed [ P = (a + b - a*b) + c - ((a + b - a*b)*c) ]
Professor Sato 5/5 (DIP) (overall use ~74%)
Shuttle use: 68%
Voyage use: 4%
Event use: 14% (25% if only counting event days)
Durango Troi 5/5 (SEC) (overall use ~70%)
Shuttle use: 65%
Voyage use: 4%
Event use: 11%
Ahdar Ru'Afo 5/5 (ENG) (overall use ~69%)
Shuttle use: 58%
Voyage use: 10%
Event use: 18%
First Officer Burnham 5/5 (CMD) (overall use ~67%)
Shuttle use: 57%
Voyage use: 10%
Event use: 14%
And for two who are strong base but not monsters per se:
Emperor Philippa 5/5 (CMD) (overall use ~62%)
Shuttle use: 49%
Voyage use: 24%
Event use: 0%
Interfaced LaForge 5/5 (DIP) (overall use ~62%)
Shuttle use: 41%
Voyage use: 29%
Event use: 11%
Update: just noticed in your original post that both Falcon and Durango were on your candidate list. FWIW, I don't think you'd regret going 2-deep in SEC-CMD since it comes up so often. E.g., after Durango I have a 5/5 Joachim from my earliest gold days, not a great card by any means, but he has been a mainstay for me and his use has been a very respectable:
Joachim 5/5 (SEC) (overall use ~52%)
Shuttle use: 36%
Voyage use: 6%
Event use: 21%
Of course if you're playing for High Roller Sisko this weekend you'd have a choice between Falcon and Durango as your #2. I think Durango would give you much better event play ...
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1.Top 15-20 voyage crew (the unicorns)
Thanks for clearing that up! I had assumed that the game endlessly climbed shuttle difficulty since I have no monster base crew citationed up yet, so I've always seen that behavior. I am happy to stand corrected! Thanks for all the detailed stats, always appreciate those who take the time to do all that work and share it with us.
Looks like my next priority will now be High Roller Sisko after all. Both base monster AND voyage sec I was short on!
you can use the "stt crew lvl 100 stats" google sheet from this forum's sticky post with helpful tools, add your crew to see your ranks then select the option to show ALL ranks to see the top voyage crew available in the game (or base crew for shuttles, or top gauntlet crew).
https://forum.disruptorbeam.com/stt/discussion/4834/assistance-for-players-spreadsheets-help-sites-lists#latest
Here you can find a list of all crew sortet by voyage score
https://forum.disruptorbeam.com/stt/discussion/43/stt-level-100-spreadsheet/p1
In this spreedsheet go to the voyage tab