Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I agree with making certain rats vulnerable to certain damage types but when an entire race's ammo is primarily one type with no option to switch ammo like projectiles or missiles then I think there's a problem unless it's compensated for with something else which I don't think it is for energy weapons. Amarr's best ammo is almost entirely EM and to a lesser extent Gallente have the same problem but with a mix of thermal/kinetic. I don't think it would be game breaking to give T2/faction energy crystals more thermal options.

Allowign options with more thermal is OK. trying to squeeze kinetic and explosive predominant damage is absurd.


Amarr can change regions. They are very effective agaisnt serpentis as well ( I know, I lived in fountain quite some time and ratted with amarr boats).

And things are not plain simple as some think. Check each angel battleship resistance profile. MSOt are explosive weak. But there are a few that are HIGHLY resilient to anything but EM. That measn the tradeoff amarr ahve is that at least their rats are 100% predictable.

CCP may be able to clarify, but a benefit I understand lasers are intended to enjoy is no ammo requirements. So what is 'no ammo' supposed to do for Amarr?

1. No direct cost per shot. Yet crystals don't seem cheaper than ammo once you discount for larger up front costs, ship life span, and volatility. Anyone know the comparable true costs per shot?

2. Rapid range-switching. In practice this is typically near to far (multifreq to infrared say). It is fast but not instant. Does anyone know the exact times? In any event, ships are typically setup to fight at a specific range: making this a conditional benefit.

3. Sustained DPS - long-term. One might argue that the cargo hold size sets a limit on the total amount of ammo a ship can carry. In practice this is a very, very minor advantage to lasers. Especially once booster charges come into the equation.

4. Sustained DPS - short-term. The idea here is that lasers don't have that 10 second reload time. Or do they?!

This last is what I want to discuss. Pilots across several threads converge on a 2-300 second continuous firing duration for large lasers. After which they cap out the ship and need pulsing. To make my argument clear I am going to call this cap reload. Other kinds of guns have diverse rates of fire, ammo sizes, and capacities, but let's look at missiles as a comparison. You might fit 30-80 missiles in a launcher with a firing rate of 8-12 seconds say. So a launcher runs out of ammo in anything from say 250-750 seconds.

So coming back to 'no ammo' as a benefit of lasers. Cap reload time is every 300 seconds. Which is about the same as a weapon (HML2 say) that is supposed to be disadvantaged by having to reload. In the Amarr battleship thread I argue that cap reload pushes lasers toward needing some other benefit - foreseeably higher DPS while firing, i.e. higher alpha.

Yet the direction I believe lasers are intended to take is sustained fire at a lower DPS. Take the beams/rails/artie comparison. Beams fall between rails and artie on both of damage and range: i.e. they don't have best range OR best damage. One would expect then that they either have some other benefits (yet they don't) or can sustain their DPS (yet they can't).

The conclusion I want to put forward is that arguments frequently neglect an important point. Lasers should be able to fire more continuously than any other weapon. That allows them to be balanced where the player base expects them to be balanced. Cap reload is the wrong disadvantage to give lasers. Because it effectively means they have all the disadvantages of ammo-using guns plus several other disadvantages besides.

The conversation I suggest should start with how long lasers should be able to continuously fire?!

You left out another considerable advantage of lasers - because they have high optimals and decent tracking they have very wide engagement envelopes where they can apply full DPS compared to other turret weapons (and missiles have issues of their own). This makes holding one's range perfectly less of an issue with lasers than with other weapons.

THere are some weird problems with lasers, mainly they are better in a relativly narrow range, which is fine if you have angel speed, but Amarr are not the swiftest, Scorch is great, but it is almost all EM, and is a full cap charge crystal. The massive power drain of the lasers also make them very vulnerable to being nueted out and also make it dificult to sustain another high drain module (repper, RR, Nuet). In some cases lasers on ships without the cap reduction bonuses can actually become decreasingly effective, becsue the fight went on to long (by running low on cap charges). IT is not that lasers are bad, it is there advantages can be so easily negated.

Now, lasers are getting a buff, similar if smaller to the hybrid buff that has reserrected that system. Projectiles are alos recieving a mild nerf to its falloff, by the TE nerf. So maybe the balance will change will make the laser window big enough to be useful.

This change combined with the TE nerf (hits Autos the hardest imo) combined with where blasters are currently at does a relatively good job of evening the playing field. Blasters are still hard to use but hardest hitting, autos are flexible in damage type and range, and pulse lasers get fantastic range and DPS, as usual, but with a needed cap reduction.

The resist nerf also helps even the playing field more between the Abaddon/Rokh and Hyperion/Maelstrom (not quite perfect but not complaining, I'd rather CCP focus on active tanking bonuses instead of nerfing Rokh/Abaddon further). CCP just needs to fix armor tanking (more specifically the AAR) and we're good. ASB is fine as is imo.

Then why does no one put lasers on unbonused ships anymore? ACs/Missiles go on 99% of the unbonused hulls, even the Amarr ones.

The Amarr balances that with their crazy Explosive armor resists in their T2 lineups. Gallente and Caldari get shafted with the whole "decent amount of thermic/kinetic" resists. At least in my opinion. I have to say that, Dominix aside, I'm really pleased with how the Battleships were balanced. Well, I am a bit "eh" on the Tempest but I have never wanted to fly one and never would even if it was a bit more than "eh" anyway so I'm not too concerned there.

My biggest problem with the Dominix is the Armageddon and also drones need overhauled. I just want the Domi to get some incentive for versatile fittings again (I don't want the hybrid bonus back)

Either way they made the Hyperion awesome so wooooooooooo

Probably the best point made in the entire thread.

I don't want to get into a Gallente argument on this thread but personally I think both ships received substantial buffs. You may not personally like the changes, but at least CCP Rise went back and rehashed them after the initial feedback. It's been 150+ pages of Amarr feedback with zero substantive changes to or logic behind the hull changes besides "well I like the changes and they're going into Odyssey this way".



So? Both of those get plenty of use in both solo and fleet doctrines and aren't under discussion here. It was said in response to lasers are the best dps at certain ranges and projectiles are mediocre.