Player Features and Ideas Discussion

ccp doesn't even have balanced all T2 weapons not to mention ships or drones. Give it time. There is so much wrong with faction weapons... just look at the LP shops and the tag requirements.

Just make Faction Weapons allowed to use T2 Ammo with current stats.
But only if you have trained to T2 ammo.

That rewards people who specialise even more, since they can advance beyond T2 guns.

T2 ammo should be limited to T2 weapons. If you want them to use special ammo then suggest that they use specialized faction ammo as well as the generic upgraded faction ammo that T1 weapons can also use. Here's an example.

Snowshoe torpedoes: Guristas torpedoes that do normal damage for torpedoes but receive an extra 25% missile velocity bonus and when within 5km of the target receive an additional 50% on top of that. This still makes them effectively useless at extreme range combat, but when they get close enough target to warrant firing off their "booster packs" they can move faster than T2 javelin torpedoes.

Angora torpedoes: All torpedoes do 50% less damage than T1 counterparts and have a -25% velocity penalty, but they also pack a 1.5 point multispectral ECM charge.

Foxbat crystals: Developed for specialized Blood Raider ships these laser crystals convert 50% of the laser projector's EM damage to thermal damage. The remaining damage is oscillated to such a different wavelength that it disrupts most ships' capacitors. Crystals function with similar base stats to MF crystals except that they do additional thermal damage equal to 25% of the EM damage and function as a neutralizer damaging the target ship's capacitor amount by 25% of the EM damage. For large "Foxbat" crystals this would mean 27 thermal damage and -7 target ship capacitor. That is, of course, under optimal conditions and the neutralizer effect should be modified by all factors applicable to normal damage.

Glub rounds: Eschewing the high tech approach they normally apply towards their advanced ship designs, leading Angel scientists have decided to get down and dirty with some of their more creative efforts. Literally. Glub rounds are constructed from a mishmash of chemical and industrial waste products and as such do a bit of all types of damage, but Angel scientists made them more annoying by adding a special blend of binding polymers allowing most of the material that isn't vaporized to remain attached to the target. What this means is that each large "Glub" round will do 10 damage of each type and slow down the target ship by 2% (max) per round with a 30 second duration. For balance purposes this should probably be either stacking penalized or capped at a maximum 20% velocity reduction.

Penetrator rounds: After years of shooting through Federation ships' shields with ease only to have to pound through the armor and then continue pounding to get through the over-strength hulls of most Federation Navy vessels Serpentis arms manufacturers have come up with a new twist on an old munition. They have modified iridium rounds by incorporating osmium into the forging process allowing for even more penetrative power. As a result these rounds are not only capable of punching through still active shields but, when not interdicted by shields, can also punch through weak spots in the ship's armor. Effectively these rounds would have a chance equal to ((100 - % of current shield/armor) / 2) to punch through and do an additional 25% damage to the next defensive barrier down. At 100% shield there's no chance of them punching through into armor, but at 50% shield they would have a 25% chance of hitting armor and a shot doing 16/12 damage would then do another 4/3 (kinetic/thermal) to the target's armor.

I mean really, let's have some fun here. Pirates are supposed to be somewhat creative and taking existing stuff in non-traditional ways that the navies really wouldn't expect or want to go.

What's game-breaking in a slower, less damaging missile that also has a chance to jam that's lower than T1 multispectral jammers and gets nothing from ship or skill bonuses to jamming? What's game-breaking with ammo that has a smaller total boosted range than javelins and only really shines when a target comes within 5km of it? Where is the game breakage in ammo that slows down the target ship but does so in an amount lower than what drones do, less than half tops of what T1 webbers do in my suggestion, that also can't really take advantage of enemy resistance holes? How is the game broken by ammo that does an extra 25% damage over what an already low'ish damage long-range ammo type does and then only when everything works perfectly which means it'll never actually hit that performance mark? What breaks the game in an ammo that does only thermal damage, probably one of the most tanked damage types in the game, and has less neutralizing power per shot than a small T1 neutralizer?

On the flip side what's not game-breaking about weapons doing more damage than T2 guns, using less capacitor than T2 guns, making use of T2 specializations, all while using T2 ammo?

Let's take a 425mm Railgun as an example.

The T1 meta 0 version:

• 21GJ activtion
• 48km optimal
• 24km falloff
• 0.0101 tracking
• 9.56s per volley
• 3.03 damage modifier
• 67Tf CPU
• 2200MW PG

The Caldari Navy variant:

• 16.8GJ activation
• 62.6km optimal
• 24km falloff
• 0.0101 tracking
• 9.56s per volley
• 3.63 damage modifier
• 74Tf CPU
• 1980MW PG

So the faction variant already does 20% more DPS, has 25% greater optimal range, and uses 10% less PG (though it also uses 10% more CPU). The Gallente faction rail gun uses less CPU but the same PG as the meta 0. It doesn't get the same range boost as the Caldari variant though.

The T2 variant:

• 21GJ activation
• 57.6km optimal
• 24km falloff
• 0.0101 tracking
• 9.56s per volley
• 3.63 damage modifier
• 74Tf CPU
• 2310MW PG

Thus the faction weapon has similar base stats to the T2 variant, but uses far less PG, less cap and gets a better optimal range.

Why do faction weapons need to use T2 ammo as well?

No they shouldn't fire t2 ammo, silly idea really.

If there is any need for faction wapons to be more widespread they should just increase their drop rate, it is their rarity that makes the price high. You need 4-8 of a weapon to make a fit so the drop rate should be 4-8 times that of mods you only generally fit one or two of (all other mods really). It isn't so faction weapons are more expensive than they should be. They could do with a slight stat buff (i don't really see a problem with them having better tracking or range than t2, given t2 can use the t2 ammo and get the skill bonus to rof) but definately shouldn't fire t2 ammo.

Make faction/DEAD/officer weapons use T2 ammo without getting the specialization skill bonus (but having the requirement of training it to use them).

People will actually use them then in some applications. Right now they are just market/carebear baubles.


.-

Doddy's point is good here - a good case of supply/demand vs. price. So, dropping the idea of T2 ammo for faction weapons:

- Faction weapons receive a statistics buff in their respective department, pushing them into the faction's specialty. Gallente damage multiplier is increased (offering in specific cases(!) more damage than T2 using the same ammunition and fitting)
- Faction weapons drop from rats in sets of 4-8.
- Prices of faction weapons are decreased in LP stores.

As an example, a Republic Fleet 425 would deal more upfront damage, while Domination 425 would have longer falloff. Bonuses would be good enough to justify paying increased price.

Possibly:

- Officer weapons use T2 ammo if skill requirements are met, while offering the bonus. Their drop rate remains unchanged.

If we go for the 'buff, no T2 ammo', It's worth noting that a raw damage increase is not everything that's important. For instance, a RF autocannon would out-damage a T2 using same T1 ammunition, but would suffer more in the optimal range/falloff department. (Without access to barrage ammo to make up for it.)

I do agree that RoF bonus should affect all weapons not just Tech 2.

The best example of T2 are ships - it's a specialized branch that requires skills and offers significant performance improvement in a single area. A good example would be Bellicose/Rapier - one being an ewar support cruiser, second being a recon ship. It gains the ability to use covert cloaks and covert cynos, as well as a webbing bonus.

There's a point in T2 weapons being slightly out of the norm, since they offer more versatility (ammo choices) at the cost of increased fitting/operation costs. Other T2 modules tend to just perform better at a similar cost - and while T2 ships are often a choice of the pilot, many will put training Tech 2 autocannons/artillery as a must for anyone flying Minmatar ships.