Ships & Modules

Good points, Noisrevbus.

However; the fact is that short of Drake and to some extent Hurricane (which is also a reasonably effective midrange ship, although with significantly less EHP in a ranged fit which for small scale scenarios it has other advantages over a Drake and I would consider it "reasonably well balanced"), the other two races have some difficulty in fielding a ranged BC which has more to do with the difficulty of fitting larger guns to the Harbinger/Brutix, and the split weapons of the Myrmidon, though. Hypothetically, if all races could field a ranged BC, the only thing which would make the Drake "special" is the superior EHP in a ranged fit.

That could be solved as well, but it's better to take balance piecemeal and give Amarr and Gallente reasonable ranged BC options first, then see how it goes from there.

As for tracking tanking turrets vs sigtanking missiles... both, with sufficient numbers, are non-issues. I mean, solo and stuff yes, it's somewhat relevant vs tacklers where missiles do better then medium long range turrets, but then again, it's nothing decisive.

I'm sorry Branko, when you said this the last time i thought you were being ironic, so i didn't respond to it properly.

Bonuses and Balance

The thing is, if you look at balance and potential only, nothing is stopping you from setting your Myrms and Harbs up like that. They may not be as good as the Drake at doing exactly what it's meant to excel at. They are reasonable though. If you assume that you'd want to deal 400-500 dps at 60-80km and maintain a 70-90k buffer, they are all capable of it. I don't see why you'd want to do it and they are not as good as the Drake. But there are no "special properties" involved. That the Drake will tank upward 120k instead comes mainly from it's tanking bonus. You will see the same apply comparing Rokhs and Baddons to Maels or Megas. The differences stay within the frame of racial trait and ship bonus.

The demise of scale

This is where the design direction of CCP become interesting, since if you track back a couple of years the Drake may still have been more popular, but each other ship had potential appeal in balance between different setups. Go back to the early post-nano era when Drakes began to profile in "SHAC tactics". Alot of people were flying nano Harbs then, both beam and pulse. Their demise have nothing to do with the Drake being outright better at LR combat, and everything to do with small-medium nano growing impopular. Those gangs are gone because those corporations are gone (they are now PL ), not because of Drakes but because of dwindling content (read: targets, ships in space, at their scale).


Weight and scale

The problem today is that CCP sought to revitalize that balance with new ships. So anything the Harb or Myrm could potentially do with LR is simply better done in Talos and Racle. You saw similar things in the past, though they were never issues then. If you look at the races you can generalize and say that some ships (through bonuses) take half a step into another tier. You see that logic when people claim the Drake has a "Battleship tank". You probably don't think about it when you see how certain Battleships can be fast as BC.

The Harb offer up a good example. In the past when you had it's core setup done: beams, propmod, a basic buffer. You had 5-6 slots left to fill. You could push it's tank closer to a Drake. The better option was usually to divert those slots to what the ship did better though and put them into speed, damage and utility (and run a tactic that relied more on mobility). If you wanted to mimic a Drake as Amarr, the better option was to nano a Poc. Likewise now, the obvious option is simply picking a Racle. They may not be the same tier or class if you want to stare yourself blind on that, but they were picked in the past because they were better options - not because the Harb couldn't reasonably well.


Streamlines: Hegemony

The issue with the Tier 3 BC is that they usurp both roles. The Racle, Nado and Talos offer up so much inbetween that they obscure both LR setups on Tier 2 BC and nano BS. It's for the same reason as the Harb example once more. It's usually a better tactical option to forego the tank and use your mobility. You can still lightly buffer a BS to be as fast, agile, tanky and reachy as a Drake (with more damage) - if you want to find ships that fly with or against Drakes on similar terms (beside cost-efficiency). Before someone barks at me, let me assure you that i have done that too. I have actually flown a variety of nano BS against Drakes.

It remains a good example of how Tier 3 BC obscured existing ships and existing balance with options between LR BC and nano BS.

We're back at the point where if you'd want Myrms and Harbs to be exactly as good as Drakes at being "Drakes", you'd have to give them all similar bonuses (resistance etc.) and shift all the weapon systems to function similarily (remove transversal, or apply transversal to missiles etc.). That makes for an incredly shallow and boring EVE. The other option would be to introduce buffs that put them closer to the Drake in the projection respect, but which would truely overpower them in other regards. I realize this is something beginning players who only can fly Myrms and Harbs would actually want. It's a very naive wish however. If you look at the actual balance of ships, and analyze the mechanics in place, which is what Lili have bringing up all along - all the differences are explainable. This is also why when one of you try to point to something being overpowered on the Drake, you only amount to point out the obvious, eg.,: it can tank and project. As if that alone would be the definition of overpowered. It isn't.

Tank and projection is a streamline of blobfare.

The fact remain that if you want to engage in blobfare, there are existing options for you both in the race and cross-race.

We end at the familiar point where i say that i would rather see smaller scale and alternative tactical gameplay revitalized, than seeing more ships adapted to F1 blobs. CCP screwed the pooch on that when they nerfed nano without counter-balance. Tier 3 BC was an adaption to the hegemony, but it was obvious it was going to do more against fast LR turrets than it was going to do against slower HML platforms - because they are, you know, fast LR turret platforms. Definately possible to kill Drakes in though, but then again, so were other fast LR turrets before. It's just that most people didn't pick up on that.

Regarding their cheapness... remember that because these two ships are the most popular, there are probably many more manufacturers of them with fully researched BPOs churning them out compared to other models. Because they are so popular and bought so much, manufacturers can tolerate a lower profit margin on them and still make good money.

I can't speak to their effectiveness, but they...along with the Tengu, seem to be vastly popular for a reason.

People should pay a lot more attention to what Noisrevbus is saying. Look past the :walloftext: and actually read it.

-Liang

I don't mean an ungodly boost of epic proportions giving Harbingers, Myrmidons and other BCs resist bonus and damage bonus and 500 pg extra. Something minor like 100-ish PG and some CPU would be nice, however, so you don't end up 3% PG short fitting a Brutix with 250s, MWD and LSE (after two fitting rigs).

Makes long-range fits a bit easier to fit and therefore more viable; which is not going to stop Drake blobbing, but does give more choices in fitting other BCs which is a good thing.

I still hold that the Myrmidon needs a rework, since it's bonuses, gunslots and dronebay don't make a lot of sense.

Show me a Drake that can do all that. Your fit doesn't. Your fit is actually really bad.

You have 2 slots needlessly wasted on cap mods just so you can blab about "perma-MWD." Anyone fitting CCC rigs to their drakes is flying a ****-fit. You also have an empty midslot, which I'm assuming you left empty because you couldn't find anything to put there that wouldn't remove your "perma-MWD". Also, you're almost out of fitting. Also, your "perma-MWD" comment is dependent upon all Vs. If the pilot is missing just a single level of any cap related skill, your "perma-MWD" isn't "perma" anymore.

Your fit has no tackle, no utility, uses fitting mods it doesn't need, and needlessly gimps it's tank and DPS by doing so. Oh and it has an empty slot. But hey, a pilot with every cap-related skill at V can leave the MWD on until he gets neuted once.

You CAN get a similar tank on a Harby, you said it yourself. You can also get a similar tank on a Cane or a Myrm. You have to make sacrifices on all those ships (and the Drake) to do it though. The drake sacrifices tackle and utility. The Harby sacrifices DPS, the Cane sacrifices mobility. If you want a nice tank, you pay for it in one way or another.

The drake works really well in large spam fleets because it is almost idiot proof, it is relatively quick to train for and it is fairly effective even with low skills.

- T2 Heavy missiles are much faster to train for than T2 medium guns.
- T1/faction ammo for HMs is pretty close to the effectiveness of T2 ammo. Not so much for guns.
- Range means that piloting skill is a non-issue. Take the fleet warp and shoot what the FC tells you to. Don't worry about optimals, don't worry about transversal, just target and press F1.

Having said that, a Drake will lose a 1v1 against the other BCs.

Something that I think is overlooked or underestimated in the discussion about Drake fleet popularity vs ships like the Harby, etc, is its recovery time also.
A buffer fit Drake gets such a nice passive regen that if it lives through a fight, it is ready for the next fight in a couple of minutes, tops. The buffer fit Harby's have to call in for repairs, or hit a base, and even if they barely went through their shield buffer, it takes a while for that to recover.

I don't believe there is any one thing that makes Drakes over powered (I do not factor in 1v1, as anything can be built to fight against. I am talking small / med / large groups). I think it is the combination of everything that makes the Drake so popular atm.

Great tank, Great damage projection at all ranges (up to 70,), great recovery rate, great cost (cheap), pretty easy to skill for, good speed, etc. Other BC's and ships in general can be great in one or two categories, but not many do as a whole.


How to fix this? I have no earthly clue. I am just tossing in my observation and enjoying this thread's discussion. ;)

I must say other than Artillery and Heavy missiles, all other medium sized long range weapons are rather lame.

They require more fitting, can't fit much tank on the ship.
They have less tracking.
They have long range ammo that gives abysmal tracking and damage.
They require more cap to use.
They do less dps. Beams and Pulses have the same volley damage, Beams have a slower ROF. Railguns have both a lower ROF and volley damage.

If you want range, you go fly a tier 3 BC with superior long range guns.

Artillery has a use which is high alpha.

Heavy Missiles do consistent damage up to 70km without ship range bonus.

Hurricane is a symptom of winmatar.

guns that are easiest to fit in game, use no cap, track nearly as well as blasters with more effective range, can change damage type and...the downside? takes 10 secs to reload.

Hurricane as a ship is fine, it should be fast, agile and do a good amount of dps. I see no problem with the hull itself. Drake needs to get rid of the resist bonus (tanky ones should be tier 1 domain) and will hopefully get RoF bonus. That should plant drake in with cane for dps...though its shield tank should then be similar to armor cane.

Myrmidon probably could use a better set of bonuses for the drones to bring dps up to an acceptable level, and boost its ehp, drop rep amount (that's brutix) and boost its speed and agility slightly.

Harbinger? Well its suckyness is mostly due to lasers. Lasers cap use needs to be brought in-line with blasters so we can dispense with the amarr cap use bonus that hampers so many of their ships and makes them extremely vulnerable to neuts. Also improve laser tracking slightly, otherwise the harbinger is a fine ship.

Can you elaborate on this? What would you replace the -10% laser cap usage bonus with?

How do you propose to make Amarr the cap race? They clearly are the not much cap race at the moment, at least as far as laser ships are concerned.