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Titan changes - update

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Mynas Atoch
Eternity INC.
Goonswarm Federation
#301 - 2012-03-28 16:04:03 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Daniel Plain wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Daniel Plain wrote:
after reading dozens of pages, i still cannot see why you can't simply multiply the actual applied turret damage with something like max(1, sig radius / sqrt(gun resolution)).


Target painters, for the most part.


don't TPs get diminishing returns? if there is no point in putting more than 2-3 painters on a target, you can account for that by adding a constant factor to the damage nerf. i'm not an expert but a scenario where titans can damage other caps without any help, damage BS and buffer drakes drakes with TP support, and not seriously damage cruisers no matter how much they get webbed/painted seems reasonable to me.

if the diminishing returns on TPs aren't strong enough, you can still nerf TP stacking.


We don't want to balance turrets around the *assumption* of TPs, and we don't want to do a wider nerf to TPs just to solve this one case.

There is so much you don't want to do that you seem to be losing sight of the goal here. No one cares if a solo titan can or can't hit a moon from 100 metres.

The problem is Titans don't scale.

Ten titans and twenty supercarriers have fifty slots free for target painters without breaking sweat or even worrying about the hundreds of available slots in their support fleet. Assuming that these ships have EWAR support, not in the ones, but in the TENS is a valid and pragmatic assumption for eve as it is played.
Daniel Plain
Doomheim
#302 - 2012-03-28 16:10:12 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:

We don't want to balance turrets around the *assumption* of TPs, and we don't want to do a wider nerf to TPs just to solve this one case.


you aren't nerfing TPs per se, just stacking TPs on one target. i am not aware of a situation where this is a valuable strategy, except in a mission golem (which honestly is already unviable, unless you want to be a snowflake). also, how is it a bad idea to make a titan dependant on subcap support whenever it encounters subcaps?

I should buy an Ishtar.
Camios
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#303 - 2012-03-28 16:10:43 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Daniel Plain wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Daniel Plain wrote:
after reading dozens of pages, i still cannot see why you can't simply multiply the actual applied turret damage with something like max(1, sig radius / sqrt(gun resolution)).


Target painters, for the most part.


don't TPs get diminishing returns? if there is no point in putting more than 2-3 painters on a target, you can account for that by adding a constant factor to the damage nerf. i'm not an expert but a scenario where titans can damage other caps without any help, damage BS and buffer drakes drakes with TP support, and not seriously damage cruisers no matter how much they get webbed/painted seems reasonable to me.

if the diminishing returns on TPs aren't strong enough, you can still nerf TP stacking.


We don't want to balance turrets around the *assumption* of TPs, and we don't want to do a wider nerf to TPs just to solve this one case.


I think that anyway you should balance titans on the assumption that they will have the right support, since AFAIK one of the design goal is to have them fielded with support and not alone.

TBH it seems to me that there isn't anything you can do to nerf titans with the manpower/time at your disposal, except beating yourselves for having introduced titans way back in the past.

Anyway history has shown that titans are killable with dreads in big numbers achieving economical victory, so probably dreads are the way to go and people will understand it; the problem is the structure of alliances that can't reimburse them.

Retar Aveymone
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#304 - 2012-03-28 16:11:17 UTC
Daniel Plain wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

We don't want to balance turrets around the *assumption* of TPs, and we don't want to do a wider nerf to TPs just to solve this one case.


you aren't nerfing TPs per se, just stacking TPs on one target. i am not aware of a situation where this is a valuable strategy, except in a mission golem (which honestly is already unviable, unless you want to be a snowflake). also, how is it a bad idea to make a titan dependant on subcap support whenever it encounters subcaps?

You put the TPs on supercarriers, not subcaps.
Harotak
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#305 - 2012-03-28 16:13:13 UTC  |  Edited by: Harotak
Mynas Atoch wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Daniel Plain wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Daniel Plain wrote:
after reading dozens of pages, i still cannot see why you can't simply multiply the actual applied turret damage with something like max(1, sig radius / sqrt(gun resolution)).


Target painters, for the most part.


don't TPs get diminishing returns? if there is no point in putting more than 2-3 painters on a target, you can account for that by adding a constant factor to the damage nerf. i'm not an expert but a scenario where titans can damage other caps without any help, damage BS and buffer drakes drakes with TP support, and not seriously damage cruisers no matter how much they get webbed/painted seems reasonable to me.

if the diminishing returns on TPs aren't strong enough, you can still nerf TP stacking.


We don't want to balance turrets around the *assumption* of TPs, and we don't want to do a wider nerf to TPs just to solve this one case.

There is so much you don't want to do that you seem to be losing sight of the goal here. No one cares if a solo titan can or can't hit a moon from 100 metres.

The problem is Titans don't scale.

Ten titans and twenty supercarriers have fifty slots free for target painters without breaking sweat or even worrying about the hundreds of available slots in their support fleet. Assuming that these ships have EWAR support, not in the ones, but in the TENS is a valid and pragmatic assumption for eve as it is played.


And the best solution to this problem IMO is to change all EWAR so that individual modules are slightly more powerful but you can't stack more than one of each effect on any given target. This improves small gang and fleet combat gameplay equally IMO.

EWAR stacking like it does now does harm to the game across all levels of combat, not just the fringe case of titan tracking, and only adds another massive disadvantage for the solo pvp'er.

This should even extend to ECM so that each person being targeted by ECM only has to roll the random number once every 20 seconds and any further ECM applied to that target simply compares the jam strength to the existing random number and doesn't roll a new one.
Daniel Plain
Doomheim
#306 - 2012-03-28 16:23:21 UTC
Harotak wrote:


And the best solution to this problem IMO is to change all EWAR so that individual modules are slightly more powerful but you can't stack more than one of each effect on any given target. This improves small gang and fleet combat gameplay equally IMO.

This should even extend to ECM so that each person being targeted by ECM only has to roll the random number once every 20 seconds and any further ECM applied to that target simply compares the jam strength to the existing random number and doesn't roll a new one.


we're looking for a low impact, fast to implement solution.

I should buy an Ishtar.
CynoNet Two
GSF Logistics and Posting Reserves
Goonswarm Federation
#307 - 2012-03-28 16:24:37 UTC  |  Edited by: CynoNet Two
Camios wrote:
I think that anyway you should balance titans on the assumption that they will have the right support, since AFAIK one of the design goal is to have them fielded with support and not alone.

Oh really?
hint: flying them alongside nothing but (super)carriers should not be considered 'support'

Camios wrote:

Anyway history has shown that titans are killable with dreads in big numbers achieving economical victory, so probably dreads are the way to go and people will understand it; the problem is the structure of alliances that can't reimburse them.


This titan in question died because it was fit without a tank so that it could perma-smartbomb a gate without a support fleet. It crashed when attempting to refit on a nearby carrier. The reinforcement fleet landed on grid moments after it exploded. If the titan had not crashed, or had been fitted with even a slightly better tank, it would have survived.

This is a terrible example of titan balance, and more an example of a titan being flown by a moron. An admittedly unlucky moron.

Also for those of you still rehasing the titan role / cost effectiveness thing:

CCP Greyscale wrote:

Dreads are mainly antistructure, with a bit of anti-cap. Carriers still do pretty decent damage against subcaps AFAIK. Supers can switch between anti-cap and anti-subcap depending on their choice of fighter drone. Titans are pure anti-cap.

With regard to the cost and effort of getting into a super, the general design intent of EVE is that you get diminishing returns for progressively higher investments. If you look at module progression, from T1 up to high officer, you'll see that how it generally pans out is that you get a roughly linear increase in power for a roughly exponential increase in cost. Similarly with ships, a T1 cruiser is not equivalent to ten T1 frigates, and a T1 battleship is not equivalent to twenty T1 cruisers. This makes stepping into a larger more powerful ship an interesting cost-benefit decision rather than an obvious no-brainer. Supercaps should continue this trend.
Shandir
EVE University
Ivy League
#308 - 2012-03-28 16:30:58 UTC  |  Edited by: Shandir
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Daniel Plain wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Daniel Plain wrote:
after reading dozens of pages, i still cannot see why you can't simply multiply the actual applied turret damage with something like max(1, sig radius / sqrt(gun resolution)).


Target painters, for the most part.


don't TPs get diminishing returns? if there is no point in putting more than 2-3 painters on a target, you can account for that by adding a constant factor to the damage nerf. i'm not an expert but a scenario where titans can damage other caps without any help, damage BS and buffer drakes drakes with TP support, and not seriously damage cruisers no matter how much they get webbed/painted seems reasonable to me.

if the diminishing returns on TPs aren't strong enough, you can still nerf TP stacking.


We don't want to balance turrets around the *assumption* of TPs, and we don't want to do a wider nerf to TPs just to solve this one case.


If you base the damage modifier on the actual sig radius rather than the modified one, then you remove both problems. You won't have supersized drakes (shield extender/MWD sigradius bloom ignored), you won't have TP issues(TP sigradius bloom ignored). It could easily be applied universally.

It also makes sense, electronic things like shields are making the ship easier to target/track, but the ship is still not as big as a capship, and can only be hit so effectively.
Nova Fox
Novafox Shipyards
#309 - 2012-03-28 16:31:42 UTC
The next question is why would you deploy a titan after these changes? What threats do capital ships provide on a mordern warfare scale that requires brining in a titan to deal with it?

Regular Capitals in general a bigger boost in terms of damage and tanking against sub caps and be effective against sub capitals to warrent brining in super capitals to kill them off as using conventional forces would be too costly to dispose a carrier or dreadnaught.

Dust 514's CPM 1 Iron Wolf Saber Eve mail me about Dust 514 issues.
Daniel Plain
Doomheim
#310 - 2012-03-28 16:37:05 UTC
Nova Fox wrote:

Regular Capitals in general a bigger boost in terms of damage and tanking against sub caps and be effective against sub capitals to warrent brining in super capitals to kill them off as using conventional forces would be too costly to dispose a carrier or dreadnaught.


Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like

I should buy an Ishtar.
Wyatt 3arp
SPTC-IC
#311 - 2012-03-28 16:37:46 UTC
CynoNet Two wrote:


This is a terrible example of titan balance, and more an example of a titan being flown by a moron. An admittedly unlucky moron.



I'm sorry, but the whole supercarrier/titan nerf was done bcause of people flying like morons dying to titans. So it is a good example as any.
Gypsio III
Questionable Ethics.
Ministry of Inappropriate Footwork
#312 - 2012-03-28 16:43:15 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Harotak wrote:
I personally like the idea of completely removing supercap ewar immunity.


This is actually something we're evaluating at the moment, alongside a large built-in WCS bonus. The big issue is that it also makes it possible to use assistance modules on them (tracking links etc) which potentially undoes all the benefits.


I don't think you have anything to worry about here, assuming that EFT is applying tracking effects in the right order.

SS/FN tracking link on a Oneiros/Scimitar: +52.5% tracking
Tracking Disrupter II on an Arbitrator: -62.81% tracking
Tracking Disrupter II on a rigged Arbitrator with Proteus support: -83.86% tracking (lol)

The remote tracking boosting is always less powerful than the tracking disruption.

Avatar Pulse base tracking: 0.00506
With 4 tracking-scripted Cormack's TCs and with 4 Scimitar's FN Tracking Links (they're on the same stack so this is silly really): 0.01781. This is 3.5x the base.

Add 1x Arbitrator TD II (no rigs, no gang bonuses): 0.00662 (1.3x the base)
Add 2x Arbitrator TD II (no rigs, no gang bonuses): 0.00301 (0.59x the base tracking)

So there you go, two bog-standard T2 tracking disruptors on a T1 cruiser will cut the tracking of a pimped Titan down to under 60% of its base, pre-pimp tracking. Add further TDs, rigs and a link Proteus for the ultimate solution.

You could even argue that this is too much tracking disruption, and that a single Crucifier would render a Titan useless. To that, I suggest you use your subcapitals to shoot the Crucifier. I hear that T1 frigates don't tank very well. P
Lucas Quaan
DEMONS OF THE HIDDEN MIST
TRUTH. HONOUR. LIGHT.
#313 - 2012-03-28 16:44:05 UTC
Mynas Atoch wrote:
The problem is Titans don't scale.

Nothing scales in this game, that's the whole reason we huddle up to the warmth of the pilot next to us.
Daniel Plain
Doomheim
#314 - 2012-03-28 16:49:02 UTC
Gypsio III wrote:

You could even argue that this is too much tracking disruption, and that a single Crucifier would render a Titan useless. To that, I suggest you use your subcapitals to shoot the Crucifier. I hear that T1 frigates don't tank very well. P


this would make almost every blob battle be about who manages to kill or jam the opponents ewar first. not that i object, just stating the fact.

I should buy an Ishtar.
Shin Dari
Covert Brigade
#315 - 2012-03-28 16:55:56 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:
In practice, anything that extends its immediate influence beyond just titans is out of scope for this change, because it massively increases the amount of work needed to ensure that we've not fundamentally broken something.

Then I have to repeat this, reduce Titan weaponry to only Doomsday weapons with shorter cycle times. It achieves all of the objectives and its influence is completely contained to just Titans. If there are any problems with this idea please say so that we can discuss them.
Ayeson
Hard Knocks Inc.
Hard Knocks Citizens
#316 - 2012-03-28 17:11:42 UTC  |  Edited by: Ayeson
pmchem wrote:
Greyscale,

Please consider special-casing XL turrets and implementing a signature radius based solution. If you modify chancetohit (from http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Turret_damage ) by adding a sigrad based falloff function, but restrict the implementation just to XL turrets, it could be done very quickly. In time for the April escalation release, if not earlier. Plus, special-casing XL would mean subcap v subcap gameplay is not affected and nobody would really care if XL turrets were "special" with respect to sigrad effects. I think if you locked yourself, Masterplan, and Soundwave in a room this could be done in a matter of hours.


I DON'T HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH TITANS BUT PLEASE THIS, also i only read the first like...three posts of this thread

I ♥ the orthrus
Gabriel Karade
Coreli Corporation
Pandemic Legion
#317 - 2012-03-28 17:15:01 UTC
Christopher Crusman wrote:
I'm Down wrote:
The issue is this. If I pull out my gun and try to hit a pumpkin from 2 feet away, I'm probably going to hit it because it's very large in my view. But if that same pumpkin is 100 yards away, it should appear a hell of a lot smaller. This does not happen in eve. The sig size always stays consistent. So there is no penalty for sig according to range, and tracking gets progressively better at range...

The solution is to inflate weapon signiture over range for all ships. You should not decrease damage directly like falloff... that's a horrible solution. If you just inflate the signiture according to range for the weapons, this means that smaller targets get progressively harder to hit.


In other words:

Would it make sense, or be remotely feasible, for the signature resolution of a gun to be changed to an *angular* resolution, and then apply this as a scaling factor directly onto the hit-chance formula rather than as a modifier to tracking?

So, instead of a gun having a signature resolution of "40m", it might have one of "5 minutes of arc"/"0.0015 radians" (numbers pulled firmly from my rear end); it would start to miss a 40m-sig target at a distance where that 40m constitutes no more than 5 minutes of arc from the gun's POV, i.e. at about 26.7km. (I should really be using diameter for this, but I'm using radius instead since sig's an arbitrary construct anyway, ~dealwithit~)

A 400m-sig gun would have a resolution of 50 minutes of arc/0.015 radians, and would start to miss a 400m-sig target at a distance where that 400m constitutes no more than 50 minutes of arc from the gun's POV - again, at about 26.7km.

However, the small gun wouldn't start to see sig-based misses against a 400m target until past max lock range, whereas the large gun would start to see sig-based misses against the 40m target at 2.7km - at which point, the small target should probably have enough transversal tracking would take over.


I'm not sure if this would cause issues by having two separate limiting factors on range (raw range limit, i.e. projectile just petering out/laser diffusing, plus sig-res based misses), but seems to solve the zero-transversal problem while not causing the "hit a mosquito with a sledgehammer and it survived, wtf" problem. Would probably require substantial balancing to see how it impacts subcap play (in particular, it seems like it would be a blaster buff, since at blaster ranges everything would be such a "big" target as to render the extra miss chance irrelevant).

tl;dr Changing gun sig res to "angular" resolution rather than a flat radius decouples sigres from tracking without causing "hit that rifter in the face with 4000mm artillery and he survived, wtf" issues, and also makes physical sense.

EDIT: Would also have the comedy result that a titan can blap a frigate, but only if that frigate is holding still and literally touching the muzzle of the cannon - which I find perfectly acceptable :P
Exactly.

It would need a re-think of 'turret tracking speeds' i.e. how fast does the gun actually spin around in the mount (High tracking speed = poor angular resolution, vs. low tracking speed = higher angular resolution), but in a nutshell it would mean:

1) You would have a much better defined optimal range ‘window’
a.k.a something to better describe ‘racial weaponry’ differences or “Woohoo! Diversity!”

2) ‘long range’ beyond that window where accuracy comes into play vs. smaller targets (even if stationary)
a.k.a just because you’ve got 100km/200km ‘optimal’ currently doesn’t mean you can guarantee ‘blapping’ of small targets or “Yay! mixed fleets”

3) A really ‘short range’ where the old "broad side of a barn" factor would come into play.
a.k.a a proper balancing tool/role for short range guns rather than “Woohoo! EFT DPS!”

Noting of course, CCP Greyscale's comment on work required, but tbh the benefits of getting it right would be game-changing

War Machine: http://www.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=386293
Veranius
Pareto Improvements
#318 - 2012-03-28 17:15:33 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:
A bunch of stuff about scan res, turret tracking and horrible leviathan white knighting
-Greyscale


Since you seem resistant to changing XL turret tracking how about these 3 suggestions

1. Keep the scan res changes you previously suggested and increase the sig radius of SCs, dreads and carriers so that they don't take forever to lock
2. Reduce the scan res nerf so that titans can lock other capitals within a reasonable amount of time while balancing it so that it also takes a reasonably long amount of time to lock sub caps.
3. Allow tracking disruptor modules to be used on titans or introduce a Capital Tracking Disruptor mod that can tracking disrupt a titan but can only be used by other capitals (this could be a dread only module , which would give dreads an awesome, anti-titan role).


Pyro Tsu
Sarum Industries
#319 - 2012-03-28 17:18:33 UTC
First of all:

  1. Automate your balancing-tests. An average programmer should be able to write a framework for that within a month or less given how many excellent tools the community has already created and even licensed as free open-source.
  2. Specify (internally, for game-dev use only) what exaclty should be able to kill a titan. 40 average BS? 50? At what loss to the BS subcap fleet?
  3. Write tests for that. Heck, even feed battles from killboards to your new framework and see whether balancing lead to the status quo and/or your expectations.
  4. Having such framework and tests you can experiment with other formulas and balancing more aggresively and with a far more lowered psychological barrier.
  5. Instead of guessing what the outcome might be and instead of being afraid that you "fat-finger" something change's effects will be revealed to your sooner.
  6. You can process input from the community profound and faster as well as respond to feedback by the community in a way that shows your appreciation for it and that it has been considered without bias.


I get the impression that you, as CCP, limit yourself to being against this-and-that and have not thought about the entire theatre and its parameters from top to bottom.

A target's effective signature radius should always decrease with its distance - if that ship is smaller than the projectile.
One exception being missiles, because they're guided and because we already have explosion velocity and -radius. In the end it will help bringing missile- to gun-based titans closer.

Maybe that's even a viable idea for smaller gun.based vessels?

Discolsure: I am no game-designer but an engineer.

http://tsu.sarumindustries.de/
Reilly Duvolle
Hydra Squadron
#320 - 2012-03-28 17:43:35 UTC
Stop torturing both yourself and the community. Remove all gun- and missileslots from titans, boost doomsday dps to compensate and be done with it. Its where this thing is headed anyway.