Bring the Rainbow

Notes:

Korvan's focus is damage, through and through. His builds are all Kinetic builds for maximum damage. As such, his skill tree is more "Meta".

This skill tree has been modified to go for a maximal damage output as well as supporting the goal of chasing additional hull since this is also used on the Justiciar hull build. Advanced Hull Capacity is normally an odd choice, only one or two points should really go here, but this was an easy place to pick up a few percentage points of hull capacity. This build gets hull capacity often in small percentages at a time. We also needed to make sure that we picked up 10 points in Engineering to get the 3% hull capacity from the unlock, and 10 Engineering points isn't too much of a stretch. It would have been a harder sell at any higher unlock level. The Advanced Impulse Expertise really helps maneuverability, regardless of build. A single point in Hull Restoration, Warp Core Potential, EPS Flow, and Hull Plating are pretty efficient points for the skills the contribute to. Other +Power points (+5x2) don't unlock as much total power as Warp Core Potential (+3x4).

Tactical points are entirely damage focused. We skip Defensive Maneuvering, but max out everything else. Since we don't need Frenzied Reactions due to a better understanding of cooldowns in general, we can also take one point out of Tactical Readiness. This leaves us 10 points to use in Science. Control Expertise helps clear controls as well as boost our own. EPG and Long Range Targeting are both beneficial for damage output. Finally, Shield Regeneration is a pretty special skill, so I make sure to pick it up on every build. 

However, I do make sure to pick up a point in Hull/Shield Capacity/Restoration. I do have to stay alive, and one point in each adds a hefty amount to each of those skills when they come up.

Advanced Projectile Weapon Training is obvious since my main damage source is, well, projectiles. I did choose Advanced Energy Weapon Training too because I needed the points for the Tac Ultimate as well as I usually have some energy weapon on my ships for various reasons.

I don't use enough energy weapons for EPS to make a difference, so I skip that entirely. I do, however, move around quite a bit, so I feel that Impulse Expertise is needed. I could drop something for Advanced, but using the Competitive engines is plenty of speed usually.

As usual, I pick up Control Expertise and Drain Expertise for their resistances more than anything. Control amp just improves and exotic damage sources I have or that my teammates have. The Improved CtrlX is mostly for my token Gravity Well.

Accuracy is chosen to make sure I hit every time, and extra accuracy over what's needed just turns into more critical damage. Defensive maneuvering is the only "Improved" in the tactical tree simply because of point spend, and it doesn't contribute to damage output.

I picked up Hull Plating, but honestly could see using that point elsewhere in the future due to its low overall contribution to damage. Damage Control is even worse and not worth slotting ever.

Shield Regeneration is special in some way, but you should read Jayiie's work for details on that. I always pick up a point here because its so special.

Criticals are always a crowd pleaser. Since most of my damage output here is based on weapons, I took all 3 points in both skills. I would say if a point is to be skipped, 0.4% CrtH is not much return for a skill point. If I didn't need the spend for the Tactical ultimate, I'd evaluate if the point in Hull Capacity would be worth more (via Tyler's Duality) than the point here. I may drop Hull Plating at some point for that reason.

As far as power goes, I'll cover all 9 unlocks at once. Subsystem tuning (and power in general) is a tricky subject. Each ship comes with power bonuses, and I am using Emergency Power to Engines as well. I ended up choosing Warp Core Potential to add a flat 3 to each subsystem for a total of 12 (largest single +power per skill point). I don't end up needing a lot of extra power because I don't do most of my damage using abilities that rely on power.

I pick up Advanced Exotic Particle Generator (EPG) because it is damage. Anything that scales with EPG will do more damage, and damage is the goal.

Shield/Hull Pen are both max because it means more damage from my torpedoes gets through.

I use Boimler's now as a "primary" cooldown mechanic, and so don't need any readiness. However, the Tactical Readiness does help fill in the gaps in Boimler's (and fill out the Tac tree).

Shield Mastery is always terrible. Ignoring a random hit once every 20 seconds is terrible, and none of the other points help either.

Coordination is really solid for me solo, but also as part of a team. My build uses hangar pets, and has summon clickies (Delta Reinforcements, etc.). As part of a team, I can't expect anyone to send the buff my way if I don't send it theirs (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, Matthew 7:12).

Notes

My initial focus with this ship (to differentiate from the Excelsior) was to make it a Plasma-Torpedo build. Sadly, it seems that Hydra and Swarmer Matrix will never buff Hyper Plasma or Omega Plasma torpedoes, so I merely stuck with Digitizer torpedoes. If Plasma Torpedoes do get fixed someday, I plan on running 2x Digitizer, Hyper-plasma, Particle Emission plasma, and Omega Plasma torpedoes. This will be expensive as I will have to Gild and replace 5 Tactical Consoles with +PlasmaTorp instead of +Torp. For now, I picked the best 3 torpedoes +2 Digitizer Torpedoes. The fast firing Delphic, EBM, and Dark Matter trigger cooldowns on the heavy hitting Digitizers. Is it meta? Not really, but it is fun. 

As I flew with this build more and more, we really found that the Digitizers were holding this build back. They're so slow to travel even with the little bit of travel speed bonuses, it was too late hitting to dish out large AoE damage. So for now, Plasma torpedoes as a build are tabled. I replaced the Digitizers with Neutronic torpedoes, which are typically a strong 4th torpedo and pretty simple to acquire. Since I am running with Ceaseless Momentum and Concentrate Firepower III, if I equipped a 5th torpedo, it would hardly ever fire. As such, I equipped the Wide Angle Dual Heavy Beam Bank. As this completes the 3pc set, I now am able to fire a few extra Dark Matter torpedoes that circumvent the shared firing cooldown of torpedoes. The Delphic Torpedo is strong and applies -DRR. The Enhanced Biomolecular is powerful under High Yield, and I have set it to be the first torpedo fired in the cycle. The Dark Matter fires even less, but the DoT helps trigger Kemocite, as well as contributing to the 3pc which is even more torpedoes. 

In the rear, you could slot Morpho, but the torp would never fire and the Omni isn't worth much on its own. I found I was stronger with the -DRR from Inhibiting Turret. You could also slot some extra damage from mines. I would choose Tetryon mines as they are free and have some extra Shield Pen built in. Thoron-Infused would be fine as well, though with only one set of mines and no specific buffs, the Tetryon ones will fire more often. However, since I have AoE firing modes for ETM, the Pahvan Omni is a really strong damage source, even with low weapons power.

Notes:

The Colony Deflector is great for Damage due to the criticals. Another option is the Gamma for -DRR, but that can also be relegated to a supporting teammate. 

The Tzen-tar is a pretty slow ship on its own, so I chose to use my least favorite engines: Competitive Engines. It was suggested that I use the Engineering ones to trigger off of a hull heal, but I am a literal glass cannon with no heals and have 3 firing modes. As such, I went with the tactical variant and just have to try to stagger my firing modes a bit so that the buff is always up. Bursts of speed are hard to adjust to, but if you are always going at the same speed, then it is much easier. 

The Tholian Nucleating Warp Core has a passive ability to create crystals for more damage as targets are destroyed. Since I slotted this, I no longer can go for the 2pc Imperial Rift/Revolutionary set. The Revolutionary Core and Shield both provide a little extra damage output in the form of weapon Criticals as well as some crit for my exotic powers (though they are few). There are cheaper options for either of these if you didn't run either event, and the Tilly 2pc is a solid option for survivability and damage output. I stick with just the shields since I get damage from the core. 

I originally had torpless pets slotted, but they changed Concentrate Firepower to where torpless pets are no longer required. As such, I picked up the Elite Valkyries, which are a top tier pet and have torpedoes. I got them with the Typhon, which is a solid torper on its own, but you can also get them with a Fleet Hiawatha or Fleet Norway if you don't want the C-Store purchase. 

Notes: 

Starting with Tactical Consoles, Lorca's Custom Fire Controls has a lot of Shield Pen as well as CrtH and CrtD (with the 2pc), so it is worth taking up a slot. If I was running all plasma, I could run the Fekihri Torment Engine, but I am not so it ends up with a total of 7 Torp Locators/Exploiters. Now, a mix would be a bit stronger, but it's not worth redoing the consoles that are fully upgraded.

The other 6 slots are all Universal Consoles. Ordnance Accelerator and Ferrofluid both buff my torps, with Ferrofluid cutting down the shared cooldown and OA just some extra Cat1 and mine recharge. Since I dropped the mine and have a bevy of other Universal consoles to choose from, Ordnance Accelerator isn't on the build anymore but is a great budget option. Ferrofluid can and should be replaced by the Eagle's console, but I don't have it (yet). HYDRA and Swarmer both should add buffs to my Pets and Digitizers, but further testing showed that Digitizers were not getting buffed from HYDRA or Swarmer. It's at this point the build really started to come unraveled. The HYDRA has a lot of damage potential with my pets when I click it since I easily hit the max of 8 with two hangar bays, but I am really not focused on the pet damage or phaser damage, so it's a really poor slot on this build. I stick with just Swarmer Matrix for its Projectile Weapons training. 

Hull Image Refractors is a little extra temp HP, but also 20% to all of my damage output (including those pesky Subspatial Rifts). If you don't have some of the more expensive selections on this ship, it's a great option. The Bozeman Console (Tachyon Net Drones) shows up just about everywhere due to its ability to shut off shields on demand, as well as passive Crits. Adaptive Emergency Systems is a slightly weaker Dynamic Power Redistributor Module, but with all the available Universal Console cooldowns, DPRM isn't as desired anymore due to the channel duration. I also picked up the Adamant for the Agony Redistributor for both this and other single-target builds, but it is far from required. Finally, I also have the Micro-Quantum Torpedoes Phalanx Array from the Achilles which is a really strong clicky, terrible passive. Just make sure you use this early as it has significant travel time. 

Meta-Focused Tweaks:

• Agony Redistributor could probably be replaced. If you wanted to go nuts, put a Vovin console here, or some other console to drive Universal Designs.

Budget Tweaks:

• Ordnance Accelerator, Assimilated Module, and Hull-Image Refractors are all great budget options you can use in case you are missing some of the universal consoles.

This ship is so strong because of the Miracle Worker and Command seating. I also really focused on Tactical powers for damage output, and use very minimal other seating. At some point, however, I run out of Tactical toys to slot, so more Tactical seating wouldn't help.

Commander Tactical/Miracle Worker

Mixed-Armaments Synergy III is a powerful ability since I can't run all 7 slots with torpedoes. The persistent firing of the Omni plus constant firing of my torpedoes means I get the maximum benefit every time it is up. 

Torpedo: High Yield 3 is here due to the massive 1-hits it generates, and doesn't lock out my CSV/FAW that I trigger TS1 with ETM with. I'd lose performance from ETM by slotting TS3 here. 

Attack Pattern Beta 1 is simply some debuff. If I were using mines, I could slot a Mine Pattern.  

Kemocite-Laced Weaponry is huge on a torpedo boat due to the higher proc chance and AoE -DRR and damage. Since we can fill an Ensign seat with it, this is always an expensive BOff purchase. 

Lt. Commander Science/Command (Universal)

Concentrate Firepower III is the quintessential Torpedo power, refreshing torpedo cooldowns, granting extra THY1 every couple seconds, and overall increasing output of damage significantly. You can never have too many of these on the team, especially since pets no longer steal the torp refreshes. 

Now, I could use Tactical powers here for Automated Aggression, but with Unconventional Systems, I would rather take the Unconventional Systems triggers for my clicky consoles. 

Photonic Officer is my Lt. power of choice to even out cooldowns between Boimler procs. Going without this just means you'll have cycles where everything is painfully on cooldown when Boimler inevitably misbehaves. 

Lt. Commander Science

The highest slot is really a utility slot, and I chose Gravity Well for the pull. 

Scramble Sensors is just here for Unconventional Systems.

Tractor Beam is here for both Rapid-Emitting Armaments and Unconventional Systems. You can also slot Carrier-Wave Shield Hacking to take advantage of this Tractor Beam.

Lieutenant Tactical

Both FAW1 and CSV1 are triggers for ETM to generate more Torpedo Spreads for my torps. This shows the wanton, extreme number of Tactical seats. I don't like mule powers, but we are locked to Tactical here, and it is worth more than a Sci or Eng set of seats if we jockeyed with the Universal slot. 

Ensign Engineering

My lone engineering power: Emergency Power to Engines. This is my maneuverability stick to keep Evasive Maneuvers up. 

Meta-Focused Tweaks:

• I can't think of any. This is optimized to the max.  

Budget Tweaks:

• Since this is optimized to the max, there are a lot of budget tweaks you can make. Start at the top and work your way down, items lower down the list are harder to drop

• Drop Elite Captain, drop Varuvian Explosives, it's just flat damage

• Unconventional Systems for something like Operative, Romulan Operative, etc. This is uptime on your clickies, but at a lower budget, you have fewer clickies. 

• Intel Handler, Resonating Payload Modification both cost about the same and are minor boosts.

• Intel Agent Attache and A Good Day to Die are both pretty critical, these should be near last to drop

• Boimler Effect is our cooldown mechanic, you need several changes to the overall build to compensate for not having this.

• The rest are free, or just use the standard version instead of the K-13 upgraded version

Meta-Focused Tweaks:

Automated Aggression is the only one I would look to replace, with something like Terran Goodbye, Universal Designs, or maybe even Advanced Precision Guided Munitions. However, Automated Aggression does come with this ship

Budget Tweaks:

Again, Automated Aggression would be the first to go, but it's "free" since we are using the ship it comes from. If you wanted to actually affect the budget, then you would need to change ships, and we won't touch that here. Start at the top and work your way down.

• Rapid-Emitting Armaments is a solid trait, and the first one I would drop for budget since it requires a Legendary bundle. This also frees up the T6X2 requirement. 

• Ceaseless Momentum could be replaced with something like Carrier-Wave Shield Hacking, but make sure to change out your Projectile Weapons Officers as well to make up for the cooldowns 

• If you are trying to save on C-Store ship purchases, drop Piercing Projectiles for Angle on the Bow simply because the Achilles console outperforms the Appalachia console. 

• Subspatial Warheads is a substantial amount of damage output and is really worth the splurge

• Entwined Tactical Matrices is the last thing I would drop - if you don't have it, two of your Bridge Officer seats do essentially nothing. ETM also has wide application for other builds. 

Miscellaneous