These forums have been archived and are now read-only.

The new forums are live and can be found at https://forums.eveonline.com/

Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
  • Topic is locked indefinitely.
 

Weapon Accuracy Score
Author
Previous Topic Next Topic
Paradigm Calibre
Horizon Foundation
#1 - 2016-04-30 01:39:37 UTC
So I went to remind myself under what angular velocities in my overview I should be trying to keep targets when I've got barrage loaded in my 220mms, aaaand instead of finding a value in rad/s, I found a "score" of 36.432 sans unit of measure. I'd read the patch notes on the day of release, been kinda keeping up with dev blogs anxiously awaiting Citadel, but immediately went back to see what I had missed. Nothing in patch notes, but a whole lotta forum posts on the topic.

I hardly ever post in the Eve forums, I never comment on changes CCP makes, but this... I have to say something.

WHAT. THE. ****.

Did CCP change it's meaning to "Brought to You by Crayola" without telling anyone? I am thoroughly embarrassed by this. Math is not something we should be teaching people to fear, but that's exactly where all this simplification is leading. Basic trigonometry is not something that needs to be removed from the game - this is a beautiful game with more based in physics and mathematics than any other game I know of equal visual beauty and social player-base.

I used to be able to speak with pride when I talked to people unfamiliar with Eve about the related rates of which a good pilot had to be mindful, the various ratios between weapon systems and targets determining chance-to-hit and all the ways those could be manipulated or countered, but now I see a future where it comes down to "if my score is bigger than yours, I win."

I know the math is still being done, I know none of the physics have changed, but too much is being taken out of the hands of the players and hidden in black boxes in (apparently) consideration of idiots.

Hypothetical: So, I have a target orbiting me at 0.15rad/s with a signature radius of 70m. I'm having trouble hitting it. I know that both slowing its relative angular velocity or increasing its signature radius will help me hit it, but I might already be in the green with one of those ratios. I now need to back calculate from my weapon's accuracy "score" to find out its tracking speed and signature resolution to see whether I need to swap my optimal range script for a tracking script in my tracking computer or pull back my combat drones for target painting drones?

CCP has tried many-a-time to fix what's not broken - but this is repulsive. CCP, have faith in your player-base, we're here because we can do math (F1 monkeys aside).
Eli Stan
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#2 - 2016-04-30 04:37:59 UTC  |  Edited by: Eli Stan
Are you aware that your post is, like, the dozenth on this subject so far? P

Anyway, what are you trying to hit with your 220 mm autocannons? They have a base tracking stat of 0.12144 rad/s, but due to their 125 m sig res, you'd need to bump up their tracking to 0.4337 rad/s to have a 50/50 chance to hit a 35 m sig radius frigate orbiting you at 0.12144 rad/s. I mention that to show how arbitrary gun tracking is on its own is, and how useful it is to have a stat that accounts for both tracking and sig. Which is what the Weapon Accuracy Score is.

In your example, by the way, since the calculation is all multiplication and division and therefore commutative, it doesn't matter if you increase your target's sig by 50%, or increase your gun's tracking by 50% - the effect on the to-hit calculation is exactly the same. Multiply any factor by 1.5 to get your bonus and you multiply the whole term by 1.5. Knowing that you're "in the green" with either tracking or sig is useless.

Paradigm Calibre wrote:
So I went to remind myself under what angular velocities in my overview I should be trying to keep targets when I've got barrage loaded in my 220mms, aaaand instead of finding a value in rad/s, I found a "score" of 36.432 sans unit of measure. I'd read the patch notes on the day of release, been kinda keeping up with dev blogs anxiously awaiting Citadel, but immediately went back to see what I had missed. Nothing in patch notes, but a whole lotta forum posts on the topic.

I hardly ever post in the Eve forums, I never comment on changes CCP makes, but this... I have to say something.

WHAT. THE. ****.

Did CCP change it's meaning to "Brought to You by Crayola" without telling anyone? I am thoroughly embarrassed by this. Math is not something we should be teaching people to fear, but that's exactly where all this simplification is leading. Basic trigonometry is not something that needs to be removed from the game - this is a beautiful game with more based in physics and mathematics than any other game I know of equal visual beauty and social player-base.

I used to be able to speak with pride when I talked to people unfamiliar with Eve about the related rates of which a good pilot had to be mindful, the various ratios between weapon systems and targets determining chance-to-hit and all the ways those could be manipulated or countered, but now I see a future where it comes down to "if my score is bigger than yours, I win."

I know the math is still being done, I know none of the physics have changed, but too much is being taken out of the hands of the players and hidden in black boxes in (apparently) consideration of idiots.

Hypothetical: So, I have a target orbiting me at 0.15rad/s with a signature radius of 70m. I'm having trouble hitting it. I know that both slowing its relative angular velocity or increasing its signature radius will help me hit it, but I might already be in the green with one of those ratios. I now need to back calculate from my weapon's accuracy "score" to find out its tracking speed and signature resolution to see whether I need to swap my optimal range script for a tracking script in my tracking computer or pull back my combat drones for target painting drones?

CCP has tried many-a-time to fix what's not broken - but this is repulsive. CCP, have faith in your player-base, we're here because we can do math (F1 monkeys aside).
Arya Regnar
Darwins Right Hand
#3 - 2016-04-30 05:32:04 UTC
Eli Stan wrote:
Are you aware that your post is, like, the dozenth on this subject so far? P

Anyway, what are you trying to hit with your 220 mm autocannons? They have a base tracking stat of 0.12144 rad/s, but due to their 125 m sig res, you'd need to bump up their tracking to 0.4337 rad/s to have a 50/50 chance to hit a 35 m sig radius frigate orbiting you at 0.12144 rad/s. I mention that to show how arbitrary gun tracking is on its own is, and how useful it is to have a stat that accounts for both tracking and sig. Which is what the Weapon Accuracy Score is.

In your example, by the way, since the calculation is all multiplication and division and therefore commutative, it doesn't matter if you increase your target's sig by 50%, or reduce your target's angular velocity by 50%, or increase your gun's tracking by 50% - the effect on the to-hit calculation is exactly the same. Multiply any factor by 1.5 to get your bonus and you multiply the whole term by 1.5. Knowing that you're "in the green" with either tracking or sig is useless.

Should I point out that you can't do math?

Sig increase of 100% equals targets angular velocity decreasing by 50% or increasing guns tracking by 100%.

Just saying, kinda irritates me how in the same way people would think that giving 33% resist to ship hull would make hull effectively 33% bigger in ehp when it increases its ehp by 49.25%.

Roll

EvE-Mail me if you need anything.
Paradigm Calibre
Horizon Foundation
#4 - 2016-04-30 06:41:56 UTC  |  Edited by: Paradigm Calibre
Eli Stan wrote:
In your example, by the way, since the calculation is all multiplication and division and therefore commutative, it doesn't matter if you increase your target's sig by 50%, or reduce your target's angular velocity by 50%, or increase your gun's tracking by 50% - the effect on the to-hit calculation is exactly the same. Multiply any factor by 1.5 to get your bonus and you multiply the whole term by 1.5. Knowing that you're "in the green" with either tracking or sig is useless.

You're right about my hypothetical and it being commutative. I forgot there's no limitation on angvel:tracking or sigres:sigrad expressions the way there is optimal:distance in the chance-to-hit equation, so there's no "in the green" to be had.

However, the progression of chance-to-hit still follows a curve that makes balancing progression of the two individual expressions more beneficial to the overall chance-to-hit than a steeper progression of only one. A 15% bonus to both turret tracking and target sigrad is more beneficial than 30% to one or the other.

As angvel varies most in any combat, knowing the tipping point of when you don't need as much tracking enhancement as you need target painting requires knowing your turret's tracking speed. Sure, we can still back-calculate it, but it was much nicer simply having it there instead of being underneath some generalizing evaluation or memorizing charts of various turret attributes. In fact, I'd like to see tracking speed in the popup when hovering in addition to range and damage. Unless more about the UI is expected to change to accommodate this change in data representation, this is a hindrance to situational evaluation.

And, yes, I know how many posts have been made on the subject, it was part of my point of how much I dislike this change. I also posted in the CSM forum.
Eli Stan
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#5 - 2016-04-30 15:08:01 UTC
Arya Regnar wrote:
Should I point out that you can't do math?

Sig increase of 100% equals targets angular velocity decreasing by 50% or increasing guns tracking by 100%.

Just saying, kinda irritates me how in the same way people would think that giving 33% resist to ship hull would make hull effectively 33% bigger in ehp when it increases its ehp by 49.25%.

Roll


Ah, you're correct - I added the "reduce your target's angular velocity by 50%" bit after writing the rest of the post without thinking about it, and it's indeed correct. It's actually a 66% reduction of angular velocity that would be equivalent to a 50% increase in tracking or signature radius. I'll correct my previous post.

Here are some comparisons of to-hit chances, assuming I'm doing the math correctly and disregarding range. Corrections welcomed!

Arbitrary baseline that I chose, a 50/50 chance to hit:
0.5^(1) = 50%

With 30% target painter:
0.5^( (1/1.3)^2 ) = 0.5^(0.59) = 66%

With 30% tacking bonus:
0.5^( (1/1.3)^2 ) = 0.5^(0.59) = 66%

With 60% web:
0.5( (0.6/1)^2 ) = 0.5^(0.36) = 78%
Eli Stan
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#6 - 2016-04-30 15:19:01 UTC
Paradigm Calibre wrote:
However, the progression of chance-to-hit still follows a curve that makes balancing progression of the two individual expressions more beneficial to the overall chance-to-hit than a steeper progression of only one. A 15% bonus to both turret tracking and target sigrad is more beneficial than 30% to one or the other.
True, since 1.15*1.15 = 1.3225, slightly more than a 30% bonus on its own.

Quote:
As angvel varies most in any combat, knowing the tipping point of when you don't need as much tracking enhancement as you need target painting requires knowing your turret's tracking speed.
I still maintain that when talking about target painters vs tracking enhancers, it doesn't matter which one you use as they have the exact same effect on the equation. Two painters do the same as two tracking enhancers, which does the same as a painter and an enhancer. (Assuming the painters and enhancers both give a 30% bonus.) It really doesn't matter what your turret's tracking is at, and what tracking bonuses are already applied.

EXCEPT for stacking penalties! Two tracking computers are subject to stacking penalties, while a tracking computer plus target painter aren't.