Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Don't hold your breath.

HML's will still be pretty good. Which means Drakes will still be pretty good. HAM's are getting a decent buff with the skill changes and the Caracal is going to be a very good T1 cruiser with either RLML's, HML's or HAM's.

You're grumbling is not really necessary. All will be fine. Trust me. In six months time when we're looking at the summer expansion no one will remember all of this unecessary whining.

........and I think Drake blobs will still exist.

I would LOVE this as an option. I've got a whole lot of SP invested into broken hulls and weapons, and despite all the non-Caldari pilots (as usual) assuring us that everything is just fine, I have absolutely no faith that CCP even being interested in balance. If they are, I damn sure haven't seen it.

I don't care what "whiners" say about HAM changes. I know my Sacrilege likes them a lot (especially that PG req change ).



As soon as I can get 13M SP back from gunnery if I want.

Dear OT,

Let me tell you my sad/funny story of Lili and 2006. I see that you started in '09. In '06 the race that was indisputedly ass stink in the game was amarr. But I didn't know that. And back then your rolled race mattered. You started with a pitance of sp. And your attributes were single digits. You actually looked forward to training into higher tiers of frigates and cruisers because it took time. And there were no tech III ships or even tier 2 BCs. Anyway, I posted back then similar posts to yours, only about how amarr was the suck. But the difference was noone could even pretend amarr was not.

I quickly realized, like you suggest, that I should crosstrain if I wanted to avoid being stuck in the suck. I chose minmatar. Minmatar was no great shakes at that time either. Gallente was the best pvp race in the game. Caldari was the best pve race (and continued to be and still is btw, which is a horrible lack of balance), ******* Ravens everywhere ruling that domain. But Minmatar had some pvp options. Also, I started my first other account. I put that puppy straight into Caldari/Gallente.

Then came the tier 2 BCs. They changed everything. Initially Myrms were kickass. But incredibly fast, in response to Caldari whines (caldari being the predominant race of characters and ships in game, and always have been) it was nerfed immediately and harshly. No more 125 bandwidth Myrms ruling pvp. The Myrm receeded from view. Meanwhile lots of changes occurred. The brief Amarr revival of 2008-2009 died when the sniping Apocs lost their place with probing changes (as did all sniper BSs).

And simultaneous to this is the story of the Drake. That curious species of op'd pve tank regen Drakes, were allowing caldari characters (usually 3 charisma achuras, another story of wonderful imbalance in the game) to smugly gain entry into level 4 income making much faster than those flying other races.

And then some time in 2009-2010 due to the disappearance of the sniping BSs, some smart person said, wait a second, this drake thing is actually a BS, a cheaper and easier BS. Up until that moment bears were showing up for pvp in regen drakes as if that op'd pve regen tank was going to survive getting primaried. Poeple laughed at and derided drake pilots for this. But that smart person realized if buffer fit with extender rigs and not purgers, that resist bonused BC had essentially a BS sized buffer. And lo and behold those HMs put out much more damage at mid range combat (40-70km) than any other medium weapon, and even most short range weapon fit rr battleships at that range. Mid range was starting to be favored due to various changes in game.

Plenty of developments have occured, too complex to list them all. But suffice to say that Caldari has never been the worst pvp race. It was never good for "solo." But really who thinks solo is scrupulously honored and any way to play this game. The drakes for which you whine, regularly out dps Gallente drone boats, and even sometime Canes, in low sec scraps that I fly now on my latest account. You think missile travel is a pita. Try drone travel time. 10-30 ship engagements do not only favor close range face melt. So, drake hm spam only experiences that initial volley delay and then it lays into the target. Probably a couple volleys have already landed before medium drones have traversed the 20-40kms as the fight weaves around. And those volleys are flying faster than the dual-neut Cane racing to get within 10km of the next target.

So, OT, all this is to say, I think you lack perspective. Both over time, and accross races. Over the last year Caldari has been second to Minmatar for number of ships regularly appearing on the eve-klill top 20. And its top two have dominated the first to third spots for a couple years. Meawhile Gallente has been stuck in the suck and lucky to have any representation (this month one ship) in the top 20, but sometimes that is only through an angel ship (so really only a half ship for representation). Amarr has had a few ships. But they are ships that take more training to get into. Zealots and Abaddons. And those ships really only shine with well developed skills. And yeah, we don't know what protion of lowsec v nullsec combat eve-kill is capturing. But it is definitely not only reflecting null-sec use.

No player in this game should think he can get away with training only one race and one particular weapon system. Heretofore it's been possible to do that with Caldari medium ships and HMLs. No other path has had that luxury. That luxury will go. Please try to find the grace to deal with it as CCP's finally serious rebalancing process progresses.

Sincerely,
LiLu

Nice post. I have a "sad story" as well. This was back before the rocket fix. I was brand new to PvP. I had just finished training rockets to level 5, my very first T2 weapon, based on an old thread talking about how great rockets were. So off I went into battle. My victim didn't melt as the thread suggested. Instead, this clown started laughing at me and posting my damage numbers in local. OT Smithers Rockets hits for 30 damage...LULZ! OT Smithers Rockets hits you for 27 damage... I am there blasting away, and all of local is laughing and talking smack at the noob who trained rockets. The guy didn't even bother to kill me with his Rifter (which, now that I think about it, is pretty surprising). He just buzzed around soaking up my damage and laughing at me. I was like "WTF? the forums said this was supposed to be amazing!" So I rechecked the thread to see what I had done wrong, and discovered that it had been written like three years before. Doh!

Anyway, it's funny today.

We all have our own opinions. Like yours, mine is based on my experience and play style. I have tried to post reasonable and balanced suggestions based upon my experience in game. I am not arguing for anything that helps me in any way, I am not trying to get some advantage for myself. I don't fly Drakes very often, I fly against them. I am one of those folks flying against the so-called overpowered Drakes, and I am just not seeing it. Your experiences flying in null sec fleets are different than what I see flying (usually outnumbered) in tiny low sec pirate gangs, and I respect that your opinions are every bit as valid as my own within that framework. I can easily see how the Drake, in those environments, would be ridiculous.

I have said multiple times that an argument can be made that the HM Drake is somewhat overpowered. It OBJECTIVELY does better damage at range than other medium weapons, it's relatively fast, and it manages all this while maintaining a decent tank. It's a great ship. It's the best BC in certain situations, and one could argue (though I would disagree) that it is the best BC in the game (I think the Cane gets this honor).

None of this argues for a severe nerf. It's actually okay if the Caldari have the best BC (if you believe that the Drake earns this title). Someone has to, and there is no reason it cannot be Caldari. Particularly when we consider that BCs as a whole are pretty well balanced overall. The Harbi and Myrm could use a little love, but overall the entire class is pretty solid.

However, I do not actually have a problem with CCP nerfing the HM Drake. I've crunched the numbers myself, and interestingly enough I came up with almost the same damage reduction that CCP is suggesting. Almost, because they want to nerf it more than I though was strictly fair considering flight time.

My concerns are these:

1. The range nerf is fine. I would even dial the range back a bit more. It does not need to hit that far without rigs.
2. The damage nerf is too high once you take into account the delay and reload issues.
3. Before doing any of this, CCP needs to fix some of the other currently broken Caldari hulls.

This last is the most important. I think CCP is underestimating just how angry some Caldari pilots were even before all this was proposed. I have heard them in game and on TS over and over again. They have entire classes of ships that are selling for scrap prices in Jita, and CCP's response -- after years of waiting for a fix -- is to nerf those ships further. These folks trained for Caldari HACs and Command ships and BS's, and they want to use them in PvP. They trained for Cruise Missiles and Torpedos, they want to use those too.

Like I said, these are my opinions. And even when I disagreed with other posters I have tried to keep my comments respectful, constructive, and directed at the content of the post rather than the person making it.

@ Lili, Jorma didnt even name a combat alt, unlike me. Still you dont seem to be bothering with encouraging him to do so, funny?

And you didnt answer my question. Will you GTFO and stop posting your stuff here as soon as I posted from my PvP toon? :)

and Jorma, about this Raven - I really really hope you will bring it to PvP. Really.

Just a few things out of this ..



You seem to be the only one who is claiming Caldari dominate PvE atm. A Vargur and esp. a Machariel will wipe the floor in missions with every Caldari ship.



The Zealot numbers seem to show its mostly nullsec, but it wont matter much. CCP has made a decision, and they will see what they get :)



I sincerely doubt ANY of those guys who are by you and others called whiners here is interested in sticking with just one particular weapon system. Thats been my credo from the very start: give us variety, give us options. Heck, even nerf HML but in return for the love of god, give us WORKING HAMs, WORKING TORPs, WORKING CMs. Used in WORKING NHs, Cerbs, Ravens. And then I am sure not a single one of those who are opposing to the incoming nerf will seriously complain. I for sure wont.

But as long as projectile BS wipe the floor with missile BS I dont see why a Drake should not be able to be first of 4 in *its* domain. Change one ok, but change the others too. And not sometime later, but right now.

So yeah, backing up OT Smithers again. Is there one of you who thinks OT is wrong with what he said about the Moa in comparison to its peers, or the Caracal compared to the Bellicose (!!!!)? If so, bring facts please.

Post your combat alt. Thanks.

The relevance of your video is as big as your combat record Jorma ..

Yeah, this here has the same relevance to this topic like your awesome Raven fitting. I bet it will PWN eve-kill.net stats from now on. You wont post your combat alt, is that correct?

Well, I guess that didn't work out. 3/4 of this thread is S**t posting.