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Eliminating the Jenquai Explorer?


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EL 30 strictly from Navs sounds a little high. It would definitely get you into the 20's but (without an XP multi) I don't recall it being that generous.

I like your ideas about doing something to make the JE a more attractive group member, though, and I agree I'm not after nerfing any other chartypes - just improving the JE's appeal.

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JE's will still be the best miner. They can cloak, have low signatures, high scan range, can fold space or wormhole to get away or get back to base. They have the best reactors which should make a pretty big difference. the TS' only advantages when it comes to mining is their impulse speed (which is not much higher than JE really) and their cargo hold. Both classes are slow at killing so combat doesn't make much of a difference.

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JE's will still be the best miner. They can cloak, have low signatures, high scan range, can fold space or wormhole to get away or get back to base. They have the best reactors which should make a pretty big difference. the TS' only advantages when it comes to mining is their impulse speed (which is not much higher than JE really) and their cargo hold. Both classes are slow at killing so combat doesn't make much of a difference.

I can agree with that to a point....last stress, my TS could kite stuff 10 lv's higher, so there really wasn't any issue as far as being attacked while mining, or combat in general ....yes it took time, but it's also what made it more desirable to me over the JE for a second class to play. The lv 8 shields and lv 8 reactor really stunk, but learning to kite made it where it wasn't an issue. Sig wise I was down to 0.5 using lv 7 trifid PM and pleides reactor self buff, which is same and sometimes better than JE sig.

edit: On a side note. i know this discussion is on the JE, and Im not trying to say the TS is better or, go with it instead...i'm just pointing out why I would choose a TS over a JE, after playing both classes. JE lv 150, the other TS lv 143. It is easier to level a TS, and they have a much better group role....at least thats the way it seems. i enjoyed both classes and if i wanted a true challenge i would make a JE and try to solo all that i could solo on a JD or JT

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Heh, In live, I had a JE.. 150+... The low level rocks gave typically low xp... Normally, in live, I ran missions for levelling purposes andthen just mined for other purposes..

As for combat... I remember before they changed Deneb to Vrix.. I recall going there with a guild friend and also possibly on my own, hunting the wormlike behemoths that were like L40 something.. managed to solo one too.. But yeah, if L66 glanced at you, the je would count on having to tow or jumpstart themselves.

JE is just a challenging class to play.. I did enjoy it, maybe I'll enjoy it again soon..

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EL 30 strictly from Navs sounds a little high. It would definitely get you into the 20's but (without an XP multi) I don't recall it being that generous.

I like your ideas about doing something to make the JE a more attractive group member, though, and I agree I'm not after nerfing any other chartypes - just improving the JE's appeal.

If EL30 is too much, then at least EL25 would be apropraite IMO. Especially with no jobs around, and all Jenquai needing EL25 for Combat Cloak.

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If EL30 is too much, then at least EL25 would be apropraite IMO. Especially with no jobs around, and all Jenquai needing EL25 for Combat Cloak.

The is a repeatable mission in VT, but at OL 60 i can't get it yet. I am out of "safe" area's to explore and at EL 21, just from exploring on my JT. So yeah a little increase in nav xp would be nice, at least to get to EL 25 and get combat cloak

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JE, PS and TS gain that interesting ability to get continually Explore XP when everyone else may have to farm new players on tours!

The miner classes were the medics really.

With the Seeker being the Jenquai Trader class it was obvious that they would get the ability to build Reactors, this being the build that Jenquais rely on the most, the 'ammunition' for their beams!

Is it now that there is competition to building reactors from 2 other classes that is the perceived problem? Trader classes are here to supply the rest, and there is a break on the monopoly of the Terran Trader too.

JE, PS and TS move from being build classes to going to be the mining / medic classes, and still will have some of the most unique and demanding skilsl in the game. Wormhole will be always requested

I don't see how anyone could call the the Explorer's the "medic class" I mean the 2 pure healing skills in the game are shield recharge which is trader only and hull patch which of the explorer's only the TS get. Sure there is jump start but to call explorers "medics" based on jump start alone is just not right, on the other hand if TT's lost hull patch and PS's and JE's were given hull patch and all 3 were given repair equipment then sure Medic would be a fitting title.

Back to topic, it's sad, dare I say wrong, that the best way to earn explorer experience is by touring people. This need's to change, if experience for mining was dramatically increased then you might start to see mining group's, much like combat groups, form which you hardly ever see now and which was also very uncommon in live. If you could have say 3 or 4 miners in a group with the rest non miners and be earning explorer experience at an equivalent rate mining as you could with a full group doing combat then I believe you would see touring disappear become a thing of the past.

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From my experience in ST4, getting a JE to OL 32 was a bit frustrating -

Because you can fly to a mining area and it is empty and you wait who knows how long for it to re-spawn.

Because the mining exp is very low rate of return versus killing or trading, especially without resources re-spawning more reasonably.

Because of two other problems but I understand they are bugs and being worked on.

My suggestions -

Have individual resources continually re-spawn instead of waiting for them all to be mined. Decrease the time between spawns.

Improve cloak and reduce ship signature so a JE can better play cat and mouse with the mobs roaming the resource fields. And do the same dance when attempting a JS with mobs around. When you get right down to it, it is getting to the asteroid or the dead ship amongst the mobs that turns boredom into excitement. Give me good working tools to attempt those two jobs when danger is present.

Improve the turning rate of JE ship. A JE can do combat. For me it was an even better dance in Live than asteroids but can use better maneuver ability.

Add exploration missions where a JE's cloak, and perhaps fold space, come into play. If I'm an explorer then I should be out exploring and finding things - in dangerous places (but give us good working tools for it).

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The is a repeatable mission in VT, but at OL 60 i can't get it yet. I am out of "safe" area's to explore and at EL 21, just from exploring on my JT. So yeah a little increase in nav xp would be nice, at least to get to EL 25 and get combat cloak

I agree, the Job NPC, I really don't count much since you can't use her (not a good choice of words, I admit) until you're OL75. In Live the L100 Jobs from Aragoth Station required you to be at least OL85 to get, but those weren't the only jobs available. Jobbing could be done at low level, from various stations. If It were just like Live I would do the following for any toon.

1. Finish training.

2. Explore Navs in the safer areas.

3. Run Trade runs from N7 to F7, then Somerled to Prasad to around TL15 or so.

4. Do a little combat, enough to get L3 Reactor, and Engines.

5. Explore the galaxy. Equip whatver scan buffs I can get, would use mostly combat gear, and whatever reactor buffs I could get.

6. Trade Jobs until L85, wherever I could find them. (for both XP and faction)

7. Trade Jobs form Aragoth Station to DCO/ECD, and N7 to Aragoth Station, to EL and TL 50 (as well as faction with all playable classes)

8. Work on RD faction

9. Level combat, by either fighting or using spillover XP depending on which is more efficent by class.

Upgrade hulls as needed. Take any bonus missions available.

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From my experience so far, EL from mining is absolutely pitiful right now, and way lower than in live. Mining groups used to be plentiful in areas like Glenn and Arduinne Planet, and the field respawn rates used to be able to accommodate -multiple- full mining groups. So I'm glad to hear that the respawn time is a bug, but no explorer really mines for the experience now anyways, given how pathetic it is. In live, I remember taking my PE from her lowly mid-60s up past 100 just on Arduinne Planet, with a reasonably balanced combination of CL, EL, and TL.

I was excited to start up a TS for ST4 and see how it stacked up to the PE in terms of mining power, but lately I haven't done anything but just farm combat experience because of how poorly the experience matches up. It's even worse in the case of a non-combat class like a JE, since in some areas mobs are so aggressive and respawn so quickly that you can't get anything done. In some spots, by the time you kill the guy attacking you and loot the corpse, another one is up and running straight for you. Mining experience in its current state simply isn't worth the time, even if the fields were respawning faster than they are currently and were more concentrated on the types of ores that were in them. I'm pretty certain the experience is far far worse than it was in live. :/

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I agree, the Job NPC, I really don't count much since you can't use her (not a good choice of words, I admit) until you're OL75. In Live the L100 Jobs from Aragoth Station required you to be at least OL85 to get, but those weren't the only jobs available. Jobbing could be done at low level, from various stations. If It were just like Live I would do the following for any toon.

1. Finish training.

2. Explore Navs in the safer areas.

3. Run Trade runs from N7 to F7, then Somerled to Prasad to around TL15 or so.

4. Do a little combat, enough to get L3 Reactor, and Engines.

5. Explore the galaxy. Equip whatver scan buffs I can get, would use mostly combat gear, and whatever reactor buffs I could get.

6. Trade Jobs until L85, wherever I could find them. (for both XP and faction)

7. Trade Jobs form Aragoth Station to DCO/ECD, and N7 to Aragoth Station, to EL and TL 50 (as well as faction with all playable classes)

8. Work on RD faction

9. Level combat, by either fighting or using spillover XP depending on which is more efficent by class.

Upgrade hulls as needed. Take any bonus missions available.

I did that on my non-mining toon in live for the most part. times i would group with miners to get xp both El and CL (poppa-roids). But on my mining toon i primarily...mined. The xp was comparable to terminal missions, for me anyway.

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I did that on my non-mining toon in live for the most part. times i would group with miners to get xp both El and CL (poppa-roids). But on my mining toon i primarily...mined. The xp was comparable to terminal missions, for me anyway.

In Live, starting at OL85, I could take 2 jobs from Aragoth Station to ECS Dauntless, and/or Detention Center Onorom, and back to VT, which would give me a little under 10K XP between the 2 jobs when I returned to Aragoth Station, The XP would be more TL than EL, but both amounts were significant. (These were the go to Dauntless/DCO, pick up something and bring it back to Aragoth Station). At the same time I would stop off at N7 and get 2 jobs from there, that required me to go to VT and pick up something, and bring it back to N7. That gave about the same XP as going to ECD/DCO from VT. With a JE and the first 4 whs this was rather quick XP, for a JE. A bit slower for the other classes, unless they had a JE with them. This was significantly faster XP than mining. Especially since I leveled up my JE in Live before the addition of the "Asteroid Navs" which made mining more available. All those "asteroid navs" had asterids in abundance near them. Some of them were patrolled by factioned mobs that would leave you alone, (like Sharim Traders in Jupiter & Glenn) others were more dangerous. In addition there were faction rewards, all positive no negative, for doing Jobs.

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In Live, starting at OL85, I could take 2 jobs from Aragoth Station to ECS Dauntless, and/or Detention Center Onorom, and back to VT, which would give me a little under 10K XP between the 2 jobs when I returned to Aragoth Station, The XP would be more TL than EL, but both amounts were significant. (These were the go to Dauntless/DCO, pick up something and bring it back to Aragoth Station). At the same time I would stop off at N7 and get 2 jobs from there, that required me to go to VT and pick up something, and bring it back to N7. That gave about the same XP as going to ECD/DCO from VT. With a JE and the first 4 whs this was rather quick XP, for a JE. A bit slower for the other classes, unless they had a JE with them. This was significantly faster XP than mining. Especially since I leveled up my JE in Live before the addition of the "Asteroid Navs" which made mining more available. All those "asteroid navs" had asterids in abundance near them. Some of them were patrolled by factioned mobs that would leave you alone, (like Sharim Traders in Jupiter & Glenn) others were more dangerous. In addition there were faction rewards, all positive no negative, for doing Jobs.

Ah...that may be why I didn't notice much difference. My JE was my alt, I finished leveling him after they added the new "asteroid fields" all over the place, at which time they also increased mining xp due to it being too low to be comparable with combat/trade.

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Did you completely miss the part about how mining xp is appallingly low in ST4? In live there were a lot more fields spread all over, as well as continual spawn. Right now there's very few fields, only some in select sectors. Look at all the hidden asteroid navs in Jupiter alone. The majority of them are empty.

And did you see my example above? Anyone that believes it's fair for a newbie to get 12xp per piece of ore pulled as compared to the 1k xp netted from killing a single level 0 mob really hasn't tried mining for very long. You've either given up and gone on to obtain explore xp through other means (exploration, tours, missions, building, spillover) or you're a real glutton for punishment and mined your way to prospect level 2+.

The point is that JE is a class that was once balanced to be weaker in combat by being much stronger in mining/exploration, and now that is no longer true. It's not simply because the new classes are (more) fun, it's also the general lack of content for the pure explorer/miner. Since JEs currently do not have much content to make their gameplay fun while leveling, JEs are fast becoming simply a group support class. In other words, useful and needed, but not fun, at least not until end game. And that's the point of ST4 isn't it? To discover how grindy things feel pre-150.

The current anecdotal discussions I've had is that pre-150 JE is tedious at best.

/sign

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Currently the fastest way to level up my JE, or my JT was Trading with Jess Edarte. We really need more generous explore XP. (all Jenquai need that) And maybe a small improvement in combat, much of which can be done with more choices in equipment. What I could see.

1. Improve Shield Leech. Give it more range, and a little more damage. The 5 second cooldown timer is an improvement over the 40sec or so it was in Live.

2. Make tons of new PLASMA beams and new lines of plasma beams. Don't bother with energy beams for a while other than implementing the ones from Live, at least until there are a comparable number of Plasma beams available to what we have in energy. No point in adding any EMP beams, they're useless against most mobs. Or do away with energy resistance/immunity in mobs.

3. Increase XP for navs/mining. (Give miners the ability to earn Explore XP at a comparable rate to warriors earning Combat XP)

4. Put in more orefields. Orefields need to be as common as they were in Live after the addition of the "asteroid" navs.

5. Get the Job terminals working, without timers. (let the limiter on Jobs taken be cargo hold size, and no more than 6 missions at once).

6. Make sure Jobs can be used to raise faction with the playable factions, without hurting other factions. (same as Live)

7. Compulsory Contemplation in live, sucked. There's no other way to put it. There was no point to holding a mob fast, if you had to stay still as well, and your reactor drained faster than the highest level of cloak, or freewarping. Might be better if it worked, as follows, JE expends a specific amount of energy to engage it, and it holds for a set amount of time (say 40 seconds), until the mob takes damage, or passes a resistance check, whichever comes first. Allow the JE to move after using the skill without breaking the effect. Or remake the skill entirely, so that it works more like a debuff to a mob's effectiveness. Say makes his weapons slower, or his skill use less likely to hit. As it stood in Live I used it maybe once or twice, and determined it wasn't effective relative to the amount of reactor drain involved. TTs probably found Befriend more useful.

No they wouldn't, both are more capable of earning XP by fighting than we are. Scout can kite with missiles, and has 1 more weapon mount, PE can fight it out better than us. We should make our money mostly by mining, while the other explorers use combat as a second source of credits, XP.

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if roid respawn rate and mining exp were the major problems, wouldn't TS and PS have the exact same problem? Wouldn't they feel pretty useless too?

As far as mining goes, yes TS and PS would have the same problems. The big difference is that TS and PS both are more combat capability then the JE and thus have much more access to alternative leveling. Folks that roll a JE tend to have the "pure miner" mindset as well. This was true back in live, and it seems to be the case here as well.

But yes, my major complaint is that mining xp is too slow. The equipment suggestion from Terrell are quite good, and I'm sure those will come over time as more content becomes available. Those are even end-game considerations, but mid-game xp is the issue above most others.

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My je just hit 50 today. I have been doing some testing with mining mostly. A couple issues I found:

1. Yes the spawn rate is low at the moment. I believe the spawn rate in live was slightly dynamic to how many people were in the zone.

2. I don't recall CL30+ aggressive NPCs guarding level 1-2 fields. Most of the guardians scaled up with the fields but very few had such a large disparity in combat level to the level of the field.

3. I don't recall getting bonus experience from clearing a field in live.

4. The mining "rings" seem like a new concept, I don't recall those in live. They are nice if they are the same type of roids, dull, crystallized, hydrocarbon, or radioactive.

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My je just hit 50 today. I have been doing some testing with mining mostly. A couple issues I found:

1. Yes the spawn rate is low at the moment. I believe the spawn rate in live was slightly dynamic to how many people were in the zone.

2. I don't recall CL30+ aggressive NPCs guarding level 1-2 fields. Most of the guardians scaled up with the fields but very few had such a large disparity in combat level to the level of the field.

3. I don't recall getting bonus experience from clearing a field in live.

4. The mining "rings" seem like a new concept, I don't recall those in live. They are nice if they are the same type of roids, dull, crystallized, hydrocarbon, or radioactive.

spawn rate in live was based on proximity to field. if you cleared a field, you travel (oh lets just say 20k away) and waited a minute, and traveled back, and field was respawned.

Field levels proportionate to mobs guarding them is skewed. Lv 9 fields should have lv 66 guarding them, NOT lv 5-8 gas spawns (ie...ragnarock)

Bonus xp is a new thing

mining rings is also nice if they were same type, not mixed like they are now where you can't possibly clear the spawn without traveling to wherever to empty hold (place in limited vault) to get back and hope to get a clear field bonus.

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Currently the fastest way to level up my JE, or my JT was Trading with Jess Edarte. We really need more generous explore XP. (all Jenquai need that) And maybe a small improvement in combat, much of which can be done with more choices in equipment. What I could see.

1. Improve Shield Leech. Give it more range, and a little more damage. The 5 second cooldown timer is an improvement over the 40sec or so it was in Live.

2. Make tons of new PLASMA beams and new lines of plasma beams. Don't bother with energy beams for a while other than implementing the ones from Live, at least until there are a comparable number of Plasma beams available to what we have in energy. No point in adding any EMP beams, they're useless against most mobs. Or do away with energy resistance/immunity in mobs.

3. Increase XP for navs/mining. (Give miners the ability to earn Explore XP at a comparable rate to warriors earning Combat XP)

4. Put in more orefields. Orefields need to be as common as they were in Live after the addition of the "asteroid" navs.

5. Get the Job terminals working, without timers. (let the limiter on Jobs taken be cargo hold size, and no more than 6 missions at once).

6. Make sure Jobs can be used to raise faction with the playable factions, without hurting other factions. (same as Live)

7. Compulsory Contemplation in live, sucked. There's no other way to put it. There was no point to holding a mob fast, if you had to stay still as well, and your reactor drained faster than the highest level of cloak, or freewarping. Might be better if it worked, as follows, JE expends a specific amount of energy to engage it, and it holds for a set amount of time (say 40 seconds), until the mob takes damage, or passes a resistance check, whichever comes first. Allow the JE to move after using the skill without breaking the effect. Or remake the skill entirely, so that it works more like a debuff to a mob's effectiveness. Say makes his weapons slower, or his skill use less likely to hit. As it stood in Live I used it maybe once or twice, and determined it wasn't effective relative to the amount of reactor drain involved. TTs probably found Befriend more useful.

No they wouldn't, both are more capable of earning XP by fighting than we are. Scout can kite with missiles, and has 1 more weapon mount, PE can fight it out better than us. We should make our money mostly by mining, while the other explorers use combat as a second source of credits, XP.

As far as beams is concerned....Mordana dropped end game beams (other than raid stuff) and since they aren't in game...neither are their beams.

Your other suggestions are good, but I don't see them being implemented for the stress. Not saying anything negative, but lets focus on what we can do with whats available to us this stress, to make things better for JE and other miners as well.

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All what i want when i play my je is:

Good guns. There is no need to have the best guns in game, because i'm a miner.

A good reactor, i don't need the best reactor in game, i can mine forever with a good playermade reactor and my devices.

A lot of ore and gas fields, everywhere. Why? Because i'm a miner and all what i want to do is flying to the fields and be a miner.

Maybe the devs should delete the build reactor skill from the JT. I think only JE / PS should can build reactors. TS not, they have the bigger cargo hold.

Sorry for my bad english.

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As far as beams is concerned....Mordana dropped end game beams (other than raid stuff) and since they aren't in game...neither are their beams.

Your other suggestions are good, but I don't see them being implemented for the stress. Not saying anything negative, but lets focus on what we can do with whats available to us this stress, to make things better for JE and other miners as well.

Main reason I talk about beams, is because of the Mordana weapon drops, the Ghost's Edge Energy Laser is the only one that JE can use. Unfortunately, in Live, Manes couldn't be killed with a Ghost's Edge because they were immune to energy & the higher level ones, actually were healed by energy. No matter how many JE's were shooting at the Manes at once. In Live the Developers were rather stingy with L9 Plasma beams, especially for JE, but turned around and put orefield guardians that could not be killed by energy beams, even if 50,000 JE were shooting 1 CL48 at once. Even a miner has to be able to defend himself and I would like to have some options with that. A line of non-unique and manufacturable Plasma beams with average performance for their level, and a scan buff, would do nicely.

Most of the time whenever the devs in live added new beams that the JE could use, they were energy beams which didn't do anything to address the fact that you must use Plasma to kill Manes in Live, and Manes were common orefield guardian mobs. (Same with the Voltoi guarding orefields in Antares.)

I agree that some of the scaling of mobs to orefields is wrong, but I don't think that there should be CL66 orefield guardians in L9 Orefields. The L9 Orefields in BBW from Live were guarded by Energy immune Manes, from L48 to L56. Remember that miners, often go alone into orefields, and when we find that one hidden away somewhere, we're usually no inclined to broadcast it's location to other players, especially other miners.

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Main reason I talk about beams, is because of the Mordana weapon drops, the Ghost's Edge Energy Laser is the only one that JE can use. Unfortunately, in Live, Manes couldn't be killed with a Ghost's Edge because they were immune to energy & the higher level ones, actually were healed by energy. No matter how many JE's were shooting at the Manes at once. In Live the Developers were rather stingy with L9 Plasma beams, especially for JE, but turned around and put orefield guardians that could not be killed by energy beams, even if 50,000 JE were shooting 1 CL48 at once. Even a miner has to be able to defend himself and I would like to have some options with that. A line of non-unique and manufacturable Plasma beams with average performance for their level, and a scan buff, would do nicely.

Most of the time whenever the devs in live added new beams that the JE could use, they were energy beams which didn't do anything to address the fact that you must use Plasma to kill Manes in Live, and Manes were common orefield guardian mobs. (Same with the Voltoi guarding orefields in Antares.)

I agree that some of the scaling of mobs to orefields is wrong, but I don't think that there should be CL66 orefield guardians in L9 Orefields. The L9 Orefields in BBW from Live were guarded by Energy immune Manes, from L48 to L56. Remember that miners, often go alone into orefields, and when we find that one hidden away somewhere, we're usually no inclined to broadcast it's location to other players, especially other miners.

True, and now that you brought it up I do remember there not being a huge variety of plasma beams available to a JE.

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The only fix I can think of that wouldn't effect the PS or TS is to tack another stat onto the JE only mining device that gives +% explore xp or something. If you tack it onto prospect you throw things out of wack for the other two miners, same thing if you just up the xp period.

The JE needs some help here for sure. Without jobs they lose one of their best leveling abilities (WH), and they cant really handle themselves in combat to level effectively there as we all know. The PS has solid combat, the TS has solid trade, both in addition to being equal to the JE in mining.

All it boils down to is out of the 3 mining classes 2 of them have another "level" they are good at (combat or trade), the JE doesn't have that option and it needs either to be given the option (not a good idea imo) or be given a decent edge in mining since that is what it is limited to.

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