Player Features and Ideas Discussion

That is the same thing, just adding a new name. But shifting the stats as I said at least the smaller ones become somethign more than empty database entries.

I would for example push ALL plates PG requirement 50% UP and increase their EHP 50% as well.
With Extenders I would DOUBLE their PG requirement, and push their EHP up by some 75% and impose a recharge rate penalty of 33%.

The result would be, ALL Cruiser sized hulls that fit 2x 1600 plates would be forced to drop to 1. Most of that fit 1600 plates would drop to the new enhanced 800 plates. Most battlecruisers will beable to keep 1600 plates (now enhanced and more powerful) when tuning their guns and rigs. All battleships would freely keep their 1600 plates and get a nicely deserved boost to EHP.

At end that fixates the cruiser more into the mobility role and battleships in the soaking damage role, and leavign the BC with the capability of transit between the 2 (specially if you buff their base max speed by some 15% and reduce their agility on same ground to keep same effective acceleration)

Lets do an overall recap (no Kagura Nikon, that doesn't mean "lets capitalise all the things") then:

[Problem]
Combat Battlecruiser warp speed is too slow

This has been fixed with these changes in this thread.


[Problem]
OGB's allow players to fly ships with extremely enhanced capability in a primary ship with very little risk to the secondary or "boosting ship". This allows pilots to use OGB alts in the most powerful and expensive boosting ships as there is little to no risk in losing them. If gang links were required to be on grid this would encourage the use of CBC's as cheap command ships and actually enforce the role they are designed for.
[Solution]
Off Grid Boosting needs to be removed.
[Additional]
Skill requirements for gang link boosting and the need for command processors to get multiple boosts running make the use of CBC's as useful command platforms extremely limited.
[Solution]
Lower skill point requirements for gang links . Allow CBC's to fit 3 unbonused gang links and give them more high slots to do so. To prevent the high slots from being abused, create a role bonus to reduce fitting requirements of gang links or just reduce gang link fitting requirements and rebalance ship fitting stats accordingly.

[Problem]
BC's pretty much require a MJD fitted. This is for defensive use to prevent being kited to death and offensively to get on top of a target. Currently, only the armour BC's can fit a MJD and a MWD and retain effectiveness. BC targeting range is also too low to allow offensive use of the MJD (you need to have your target pre locked before the jump).
[Solution]
Buff all BC targeting range.
Re-evaluate shield BC slot layout to allow the use of MJD+MWD (dual prop) fits without completely gimping the ship. The other option of having all CBC's have a MJD fitted as standard removes too much choice from the game. It's not a good solution.

[Problem]
Modules used by Battlecruisers are also used by cruisers. eg tanking modules and weapons. This means that there is no distinction between the classes when it comes to damage projection and the fact that BC's have roughly twice the signature radius and slower speeds, completely removes their base HP advantage.
[Solution] - Tanking modules
Kagura's suggestion to re balance the plates and shield extenders is the best solution for the tanking modules.
[Solution] - Damage Projection
The issue of damage projection could be solved with a projection role bonus, however this would be problematic. A better solution would be to increase base fittings to allow larger caliber weapons to fit in order to improve projection. This solution is also very problematic as it opens many doors for other fitting opportunities that may break stuff. Weapons will also get a balance pass eventually which is supposed to remove the "tier system" of the weapons.
In the end, damage projection may be best off left until all other problems are solved and to re-evaluate whether its required or not.

[Problem]
On grid mobility. BC's are quite slow and sluggish preventing any real kiting setups making the cruiser a better option.
[Solution]
I really don't think a speed buff is required for these ships. Certainly not until all other issues have been addressed.

BUT I LIKE CAPS LOCK!!! THis whoel situation is agaisn proof that thigns cannot be balanced in the void. The other classes and how the modules are used in REALITY by the players are as much if not even more important.

Same thing is happening with the sivpul issue.. all same thing.

I know the result is completely different, that's part of the point. What you're talking about is an absolutely massive change to the game's balance with massively wide reaching consequences. You may say "good" or something like that but that's not a good thing from a balance perspective and it's unrealistic to expect CCP to go with that sort of shake up when the general state of things is pretty good, with the exception of the perception of Battleships and Battlecruisers as PvP assets.

Some problems with this approach:

• It doesn't take into account any situation besides those that use a buffer tanked fit, which is mainly fleet engagements with Logi present on the field.
• It ties the effectiveness of these ships to these modules, at least if you honestly expect this to be a reasonable fix.
• It doesn't take into account any sort of active tanked setup or meta.
• It completely ignores that the game is intentionally balanced this way and Cruisers are supposed to have the ability to fit those modules with all of the benefits and penalties they incur because of them. Fun fact, a Thorax with an AB and a 1600 plate fitted takes between 20 and 33% more damage, depending on orbit distance. A Caracal with a Large Shield Extender and an AB takes between 40 and 85% more applied DPS. (both tests done with a Maelstrom with 800mm ACs and 3 Gyros fitted and no other modules)

If BCs and BSes are the problem then we should address the stats on those ships or, in the case of Battleships, the weapons fitted for them. It's unlikely CCP are going to take an approach that would basically bulldoze the current state of the game by making sweeping modifications to core modules.

This assumes that there's literally no use-case for the smallest size of plate, which may not be the case, or that throwing a 3200mm plate into the game would have a good result to overall balance. (Also they'd have to introduce a new item or everyone would have to re-fit all of their ships and re-buy a lot of modules and would be rather pissed about that)

As for Shield ships they get active omni-hardeners and passive regen, Armor gets the option for % increases and a larger plate. Overall it works out fairly balanced most of the time, but the two types of tank have different benefits and therefore different applications.

I still don't agree that tweaking these modules actually fixes the issue with at best tangentially related ships either. If there's an issue with these hulls then it's an issue with something unique to those hulls, not the modules or weapons, and it's easiest to fix the issue by addressing it at the root instead of doing something that has a massive impact on the game as a whole.

Also I didn't test it in-game, that wouldn't be reliable, I threw together a damage graph in EFT and ran the numbers that way. It's massively impractical to run various fits, I simply threw together a match up that I felt was a fairly good representation of the effect of a Plate or Extender on a Cruiser's incoming DPS to demonstrate that there is, in-fact, a trade off to fitting that kind of buffer onto a Cruiser hull.

But then you are NOT solving some issues. For example the super over buffered T3. Other problem is that a 1600 plate of now has more base EHP than cruiser hulls by themselves on that layer. That means that the plate basically is an all or nothing scenario, the ship differences are meaningless when compared to the module.

Increasing the hull ammount WILL NOT FIX AT ALL THE issue, unless you increase MASSIVELY the ammount of base EHP and that would skew completely the balance of repair and buffer tanks. If you increase the hull base EHP by 15%, the 1600 plates are still more relevant than the cruiser itself.. and they are EVEN MORE irrelevant on battleships.

The result is that you might make the problem even worse

No it does not tie the ship to the module. On the opposite and that is where you are havign short vision. Right now the buffer plate on a cruiser is more important than the cruiser itself. You could fix that changing the hulls, but you would need to change almsot ALL hulls in game and woudl be far far more complicated to balance.


It does take other situatiosn into account. BEcause ships do not fly in a spreadsheet. When you fit and undock you need to do it relative to the capabilities of the opposition you will face. So when you change buffer ships you change the meta and change other scenarios as well. SImple example.. that change would increase substantially the EHP of several battleships .. enough that HACS fiting ASB might not resist long enough in a fight against them.

No, the game was NOT intentionaly balanced in a way that Cruisers, that were made to be MOBILE focused, can Squeeze out ALL their modules to fit an oversized tank that chalanges or even SURPASSES battleships, while battleships that were supposed to be the damage sponges can at most fit SMALL buffer modules ( because 1600 plates are at most that relative to their base hulls) and effectively are WORSE at tanking than T3s and most t2 cruisers.

I do not know form what hole you got those numbers of yours, but is not from eve. A caracal increases its signature by 20% when it fits a large shield extender. So at MOST it will increase its received damage by 20% on the apex of the curve, and on scenarios where it could already be tracked more or less easily even less change. A thorax with 1600 plate and AB of with NO plate when you add the "depending on the distance" of your sentence.. both take ZERO DAMAGE from a maelstrom in REAL EVE, not EFT!!! Hint for the uninformed, the EFT formula doe snot work EXACTLY as the in game for the extreme scenarios! It is an extrapolation of the game, and is not an 100% math at the apex of the derivative change on the correlation of tracking and signature , that happens for instance on very close combat. That is why AB cruisers at 1 km are immune to most battleships.

Please, go PLAY THE GAME, and do some real combat to know how things REALLY work out. People use always large extenders and 1600 paltes for a reason.. THEY ARE MASSIVELY advantageous. you take TINY bit ammount more damage than with the MEDIUm extender adn 800 plate for TWICE more EHP.

I think the idea is to try to address the issue of both Battlecruisers and Battleships having relatively weak tanks by introducing an "XL" module to be used on both BC's and BS's (BS's would double up).

Currently the relative tanking difference between cruisers and BC's is quite small (even though on paper it looks larger). This is because BC's have roughly twice the signature radius of cruisers and are slower to boot. This is by design so that BS's can curb stomp them. There for reducing BC sig rad is problematic as it would make them tankier vs BS's which isn't desirable.

Increasing native HP pools is an option but it doesn't take away the fact that cruisers are fitting BS sized modules that are increasing their HP by more than their native HP pool. Applying the same tanking module to a BC which only increasing it's HP pool then fractionally is out of wack.
I''l give you the numbers to make it even clearer how bonkers this all is:
a T2 1600mm plate gives you an additional 4800 armour HP
a Maller has a base armour HP pool of 2875 (1600mm plate gives + 167% to it's armour pool)
A Prophecy has a base armour HP pool of 6875 (1600mm plate gives +69% to it's armour pool)
An Abaddon has a base armour HP pool of 10625 (1600mm plate gives +45% to it's armour pool)
That is way too much of a bonus to the cruiser relatively speaking. Especially when it is really easly to get a 1600mm plate on a cruiser.

This is why plates and extenders need to change. Shift all plates one place to the left and delete the 50mm plates. They really don't get used anyways

Hafta agree on plates/extenders here. Long overdue - and T3 EHP levels have shown that.

A tiercide-type review would give clearer vision to BS and BC roles, but is ~effort~.