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Blasters, 8 months later

Author
Gibbo3771
AQUILA INC
#21 - 2012-07-18 16:37:04 UTC
There was never a problem with small blasters (I am looking at you Taranis) but the Med's were a nightmare, struggling to fit a rack of electrons and MAR II's on a brutix without near prefect fitting skills, now you can fit a rack of ions with some mixed electrons with ease.

The null buff was definitely the best thing they have done.

They were "fine" before but now they are more inline, however it is still a bit broke in some places.

A cyclone can achieve 450dps tank, 680dps, can fit a rack of highest tier of AC, the 425 and a set of 3 hams. Where the brutix has to fit a lower tier of guns, to get the same active tank, has no where near the same range, cap stability and damage selection.

But then you can go ahead and bring this back even further and have a look at the atrocity of the prophecy, sure it can fit a massive tank but does very little DPS, cant fit a web to help with zero tracking bonus due to the need of a cap booster, or you fit AC's/blasters and do **** poor DPS anyways.

So are blasters in line now?

Yep but too bad the ships are not and never will be.
Cpt Branko
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#22 - 2012-07-18 17:32:58 UTC
Fon Revedhort wrote:
Cpt Branko wrote:

Various blasterboats do need fixes to be better then now, and to make rail configurations make sense, but what it certainly does not need is a tracking buff. People which cannot fly their ships deserve no buffs.

What exactly would you want from rails? Bear in mind that rails already perform as fine as beams - or equally bad, which is essentially the same in this case.


For medium rails to be as awesome as medium artillery / HMLs, and not crappy like beams? Big smile

Nah, it's just that some ships (mostly various T1 ships) could use a little more fitting, that's all, would help both blaster and rail fits. Plus an actually sensible bonus for the Brutix would be nice. Etc. Nothing major.
Hrett
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#23 - 2012-07-18 20:11:40 UTC
Cpt Branko wrote:
Cpt Branko wrote:

This is the hallmark of complete piloting failure.


Hrett wrote:

Yeah. That is the point. You don't do 'full' (or close to theoretical - it was like 65% when I ran the numbers witha thorax with electrons orbiting a shield Naga) DPS inside optimal when orbiting


I rest my case.

Hrett wrote:

Tracking still needs a slight buff.


No, it does not.

Various blasterboats do need fixes to be better then now, and to make rail configurations make sense, but what it certainly does not need is a tracking buff. People which cannot fly their ships deserve no buffs.


So, I am not saying you are wrong - its entirely possible that I have unrealistic expectations - but are you saying that medium electron blasters should have poor tracking against a BC inside their tiny optimal range when orbiting a larger, shield tanked ship? Stated another way - you are saying they are designed to fight in falloff when orbiting? Again - I admit my expectations might be unreasonable so I am trying to learn here. What orbit should I set for a thorax against a BC so I can get the most efficiency out of my guns? Just under optimal (which is what I do)? In falloff? If i am supposed to be fighting in falloff when orbiting, please tell me. Instead of calling me a complete piloting failure, I would love some education here. There is always room to learn, and I would particularly like the opinion of an expert in minmatar ships and weapons because you will have a different perspective.

I'm not trolling here. Please educate me (or if anyone else wants to give me some advice, I'd take that too). Just figure to fight in falloff when orbiting with blasters?

spaceship, Spaceship, SPACESHIP!

Cpt Branko
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#24 - 2012-07-18 21:22:43 UTC  |  Edited by: Cpt Branko
Very simple. Unless you have a pressing need to try to mitigate damage by increasing transversal, don't orbit.

I mean hypothetically if you orbit someone who is using worse-tracking guns you will suffer less DPS reduction then he will, but in case you have dps/ehp superiority in webrange, don't orbit. Two options exist, either flying manually to minimize transversal and keep at desired range or using the keep at range button if you feel lazy to click around which is still much better then orbit.

I mean, as long as no big speed differences exist, that is, as long as you have web and scram and can slow him down, or neither of you have, you should not be missing your target bar extreme situations like shooting frigates with BS guns or such. Only when a big speed difference does exist, like in the case of an ab frig tackling you and you having a normal MWD fit, then tracking can become a serious problem.
Suleiman Shouaa
The Tuskers
The Tuskers Co.
#25 - 2012-07-18 21:28:14 UTC
If you really want want to use orbit against a Tier3 BC, just orbit at 2km or so and should have no issues tracking.

Then again as Cpt says, you should only orbit if you need to mitigate incoming DPS and even then it's situational - if you're active tanked and the enemy is buffer tanked, then orbit is your friend. On the other hand, if you're in a buffer ship and fighting an active tanked ship, you want to use keep at range to apply full damage and break them faster, as you have a limited time to kill them before your buffer runs out.

Blasters have no issue tracking ships of the same ship class and if people orbitting frigates could hit frigates with Medium Blasters, then people who actually know how to pilot their ships would smash frigates left, right and center with little difficulty.

Tl;dr: Blasters are in a much better place than they were pre-buff, now they are a completely viable option on the Dominix (Mediums so no damage bonus) and the Myrmidon (no turretdamage bonus).
Hrett
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#26 - 2012-07-19 00:21:33 UTC  |  Edited by: Hrett
Well, thanks for both of your replies. They are helpful. But I am talking about fighting a BC with a cruiser, so there is a need to mitigate DPS. ;). Though clearly both of you have far more solo experience than me. I might just be missing something basic.

Im not saying a cruiser should win such a battle against a BC often, im just saying medium electrons should be able to track larger (shield tanked) targets inside their optimal better than they do now. I dont have EFT here, but I think an orbit of 2k puts you into falloff with AM (and it might even with null). Reducing your poor tracking reduced DPS even further, and increasing the dps on you.

I fly almost exclusively armor Gallente, so I rarely have a speed advantage. I note that Branko flies exclusively minimatar, and the times I have run into Suleiman he flys lots of stuff (I fly your arty Cane fit, btw, when haters won't let me bring Gallente to a fleet). I guess the point I am trying to make is that Minmatar ships can mitigate damage by fighting in falloff with their range advantage - it reduces the projectile DPS, but it will still be better than other weapon systems at that range so it reduces incoming dps. Gallante ships have to mitigate damage by orbiting close inside our tiny optimal - otherwise fighting in our falloff not only nerfs our dps, but it puts us in optimal range of other weapon systems at a range they can track us better and it increases their dps. I just think we should track better inside our optimal against a larger target (especially if it's shield tanked), or it's not really 'optimal.'

Again, perhaps my expectations are unrealistic. There is always the old 'approach, overheat and pray' I guess. ;)

spaceship, Spaceship, SPACESHIP!

Cpt Branko
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#27 - 2012-07-19 00:43:47 UTC  |  Edited by: Cpt Branko
Well, yes. Although I fly Minmatar almost exclusively, I often flew it blaster-style* with plate, using 425s + Hail M, which as you may imagine leads to having horrible tracking for something which fights at 1km. Tracking isn't a huge problem and can be solved fairly easily as long as you have web+scram and can actually kill your target up close.

The thing is, if you don't have in webrange superiority and just have to orbit, then yes you have some problems with tracking.

Still, if you are fighting vs something with BS guns like the mentioned Naga in a Thorax and it does not have a web and you do, you orbit, or manually pilot to increase transversal, at 1.5km or so which is still in your optimal and he won't be able to hit you well enough, while you will be able to hit him just fine. You have an order of magnitude or more better tracking then something with BS guns has, so you don't need a lot of angular velocity to make him unable to hit effectively.

If you are fighting a regular BC then you are toast, of course. That isn't anything new.

*While you can kite Gallente, you more or less have to either fight Amarr either up close or outside of point range. Same actually applies vs Caldari ships very often. So this is not as crazy as it sounds, at least for Minmatar T1 hulls.
Jerick Ludhowe
Internet Tuff Guys
#28 - 2012-07-19 13:53:33 UTC
Blasters are working well on non broken hulls atm however the truth is that almost all t1 combat ships are going to be reworked in the next 6+ months so looking at what we have atm is not a realistic outlook as to how blasters will be working in the near future. What we can do is look at the new Incursus and Atron and speculate how the balance team intends to adjust the rest of the blaster lineup.

I'd speculate more grid for the rax enabling 1600 med blaster fits w/o acr or rcu. I'd also speculate at least 1 more slot (low) going to the Brutix as well as minor increase to base hp values and fitting.
Katalci
Kismesis
#29 - 2012-07-20 01:19:48 UTC
Hrett wrote:
Instead of calling me a complete piloting failure, I would love some education here.

Orbit if you have better relative tracking to your opponent; hit approach or keep at range if you don't.
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