Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Target something big meta of course is not happening due to range.

Maybe time for them to get really big fall offs

e.g.
small nos 6km optimal 10km falloff
small neut 6km optimal 2km falloff

base nos amount on the cap percentage in the target vessel irrespective of own cap.

nos drain = base drain * target cap / target max cap

You're obsessed about this nebulous "reliability" concept, but it is meaningless in itself. The important gameplay questions are:

a) What does this enable the Nos-fitted cruiser to do that it could not previously do?
b) Will these new abilities persuade people to drop neuts for Nos on their cruisers?

The answers to these are:

a) Not much. When a cruiser with low cap requirements is not neuted, the cruiser's cap will be maintained at a higher level, but since it is not under much cap pressure, this offers no significant tactical advantage. Meanwhile, cruisers that do have high cap requirements (running an AAR for example) will always prefer to fit a cap injector, because of the poor drain rate of Nos and its ineffectiveness against small ships. When neuted by a heavy neut, the cruiser will be quickly capped out (two cycles, generally) and the Nos will operate in exactly the same fashion as it does with the current mechanic. In all cases, the BS will see a greater rate of cap drain, which it will either absorb via cap buffer because of the low rate of drain of Nos, or simply cap-boost through.

b) Er, no. Nos will retain its ability to keep tackle running, but the change in mechanic offers no new abilities of note in practice.



No. Dedicated cap warfare hulls will want to maximise their cap drain rate, and will do this using the current mechanic of logi cap support. Sacrificing ~25% of your cap drain rate for a cap-stable mix of Nos and neuts (Bhaal) is a deeply unattractive proposition when you will already have logi support on grid. For organised gangs, at least, i suppose kitchen-sink fleets might like it.

Asking this question demonstrates a misunderstanding of the issue. The stream of cap that you describe is already possible under current mechanics. To rebut the point, you need to describe common situations where the change in mechanics allows a cruiser to gain a significant in-game advantage. And no, simply having 10% more cap does not count - you need to identify what this extra cap allows you to do. You must have something in mind,but you need to give specific examples.

The case of being neuted is not valid - the proposed new mechanic offers very little advantage, because neuting by a higher-level neut rapidly alphas your cap, reducing it to a level where Nos is effective regardless of the mechanism.

"Cap is life" is a gross oversimplification. It matters little if you are cap-stable at 50% or 60% - in both cases you already have enough cap to run mods. It matters more in the case of cap-unstable ships, but I am struggling to think of cruisers that match that description while wanting to operate inside tackle (med Nos) range and would also not fit an injector. You must have something in mind,but, again, you need to give specific examples.

You mis-state my argument. I did not claim that serious cap warfare requires logi, I claimed that logi are required to maximise its effectiveness. Given that people are already well used to using logi and setting up cap chains in small-gang engagements, I believe that they will continue to use this method rather downgrading their cap-draining power and range of targets. For context, I live in a C5 WH - logi are ubiquitous, cap warfare is very common and engagements frequently escalate to capitals, and I do not believe it is dissimilar among other organised entities.

I believe it is Cap Warfare 102 that states that spreading your cap-warfare mods away from a high-cap primary is a suboptimal and inefficient application of cap warfare. You need to focus on that Archon to break its triage reps, on that Moros to turn its guns off, or on that Naglfar to stop it converting cap to EHP. Spreading Nos around hostiles is only good for maintaining your own cap, and this is already effective with current mechanics.

WOW.

Okay.

1: NOS isn't your only source of cap. If nothing else NOS is augmenting your normal cap recharge rate to run your guns/tank/tackle.

2: Even when you are under their guns (not a given even at medium NOS ranges... and we are also discussing all sizes of NOS) you still likely need to survive drones and/or missile fire.

3: Now you've got me there. Cruiser hulls are almost never used for tackling.
Wait, no, that's not right. They are used commonly have have hulls dedicated to that purpose. Leaving aside that rather obvious point, this also covers small NOS as well on frigate hulls.

Frigates, yes. Cruisers and BCs, hardly. BS? lolno. This idea simply will not have the effect that you think it will, because it changes the drivers that influence highslot fitting little outside frigates, certainly far too little to force a change in fittings.



I don't know anything of the sort. Impractical? What an absurd comment. Is it impractical for ships to focus their DPS too? What are you even trying to say here?

The most important use of cap warfare involves focusing it on ships that are highly resistant to DPS, and are highly influential on the battlefield. You can't kill them quickly, so you neut them to disable modules. In WH space, this generally means capitals; in null fleet actions it can mean caps and supercaps. Given the large cap buffers and/or recharge rates of these ships, focused neuting is essential. Of course, if you're flying a, say, neut Legion and you're faced with just generic subcapitals, then you'll spread neuts - but this is not because of any nebulous concept of "impracticality", but because you are able to alpha targets' caps with fewer than your full loadout of neuts. The driver of eliminating ships' capacitors as quickly as possible still stands.



Oh come on, this is marginal stuff. You know full well that the cap drain from a Nos is dwarfed by the amount incoming from cap transfers and injectors. You cannot seriously think this is worth giving up a highslot.

And again, you do not answer the question of what this few extra percentage points of cap allows the pilot to actually do. Why do you think it is worth dropping a neut to fit a Nos that, in some rather improbable situations, lets your cap stabilise at a few percentage points higher?



Yes, I do.

I keep asking you to give plausible specific scenarios where the mechanic change leads to an advantage sufficient to make a cruiser or BC pilot switch a utility high to a Nos - as per your opinion that Nos use would increase significantly among cruiser and BC pilots. Alas, you refuse every time, and the silence is telling. And no, simply having a little more cap is not an answer, you need to state what this allows you to do that you could not otherwise achieve, and why it was worth giving up a neut to achieve this.

This is really the source of your confusion about the value of Nos in the event of this change - you seem to be thinking, "Ooh, I might have a bit more cap, isn't that useful?", failing to appreciate that cap is merely a means to an end, not an end in itself. Neglecting entirely the opportunity cost of fitting the Nos in the first place isn't exactly helping either.

Counter proposal

Key points:
-Enemy capacitor % should be taken into account to assess difficulty in draining, the less enemy cap % the harder it is to retrieve.
-Enemy size should be taken into account to determine the NOS modules ease in draining from such size capacitor, the larger the capacitor the easier it is to access it, the smaller the harder, determining size we can use signature radius.
-The capacitor of the ship draining should be irrelevant in the decision process for draining amount.
-Larger modules should not be useless against smaller targets nor fully effective, only less effective.
-NOS should not allow anyone to effectively cap out anyone else, in effect be a Neut, not for small ships nor for large ones in any situation.


Take into account signature radius and add a signature resolution to NOS like other weapon systems, then check the enemy amount of cap remaining to multiply with as well.
MaxAmountDrained = InitialModuleDrainAmount * EnemyCapPercentageRemaining * MIN(1,SignatureEnemy/SignatureNOS)

Example for a large unchanged NOS on a Frigate at 50% capacitor with 40m signature, large NOS signature resolution is 400m.
120 * 0.5 * 40/400 -> 60 * 0.1 = 6 drained. (long cycle)

Example for a small unchanged NOS on a Battleship at 50% capacitor with 320m signature, small NOS signature resolution is 40m.
9.6 * 0.5 * 320/40 -> 4.3 * 1 = 4.3 drained.(short cycle)

Solution key points:
-It will be impossible to abuse NOS as a full on neut mechanic as is possible in the current proposal.
-Smaller ships will not be able to permanently stick themselves onto large ships running off of their capacitor if that large ship runs into lower cap.
-Allows NOS always to work for everyone even if not ideal in large to small ship situations. Large NOS will cause a reduced amount of draining on smaller ships and reduced amounts than the smaller modules due to the cycle time, which is better than the alternatives of virtually no drain which this proposal I'm addressing would bring.
-You will always want to NOS a larger ship since their capacitor will usually be at higher percentages and will be affected less by your own draining than smaller ships.
-Your own capacitor amount has no part in the drain amount decision, rightly so.
-NOS application will be an active decision ongoing in a battle, as one target goes low on cap you might need to find a new target to mooch from.
-Target painting would potentially become a useful tool in cap warfare especially against smaller ships.


Final thoughts:

A 25-50% NOS drain increase could be warranted in this proposal as capacitors tend to run in the lower percentages usually.

This is a general solution to make especially NOS a useful module for every size, the variables may be altered to receive the desired result but I think it would be fine with my proposed formula and allowing TPs to affect it.

Some would argue that the signature radius isn't warranted for capacitor warfare, but I tend to disagree, I would apply it to Neuts as well as capacitor warfare is way too effective against smaller ships and especially smaller capacitor weapon platforms as it currently stands, it is an absolute mechanic and harms cap reliant ships the most without any justification to its allowed continued dominance.

To discuss Neuts, most of this would apply well to them as well, although instead of the hard break at 100% cap drain reduction at 0% enemy cap as for the NOS, a 50% maximal cap destruction reduction at 0% enemy cap would be used to adjust Neuts from the obligatory utility slot occupier to something more like a tool, useful when used in the correct situation, not always in every fight with hardly any other tool to consider in its place.

Adjusting the effectiveness of Neuts
Ex.
A ship has large NEUTs and wants to drain a same size ship fully.
The enemy cap is at 50%, thus the Neut will function at 75% efficiency.
The enemy cap is at 25%, thus the Neut will function at 62.5%.
The enemy cap is at 10%, thus the Neut will function at 55%.
The enemy cap is at 5%, thus the Neut will function at 52.5%.

On cruiser and frigate size ships this would be even less due to signatures, Neuts will still be good to use but no longer the be all end all absolute utility module and the NOS would be a contender as well to replace its place in some ships.


NOS would have its weakness in signature resolution effect on smaller ships and low efficiency on low enemy capacitor.
Neut would have its weakness in signature resolution effect on smaller ships, a slight reduction on effect based on enemy capacitor % and a high capacitor use.


Sorry if anyone already proposed something similar, I didn't read through all posts in the thread because it's quite long and I'm lazy.

TL;DR

The less capacitor the enemy has the less you drain/destroy, also based on signature resolution and affected by TPs.

i'm Sorry CCP I still don't get why you use the old mechanic or the new one at the moment.
Both look to me like a forced and unnatural solution to an old problem.

My Understanding:
the Problem with nos was:
1. It could generate cap out of thin air
2. It drained to much and u got cap back instead of loosing it. (Neut)

The clear Solution in my eyes is.
1. force shutdown nos if not enough cap is on the targeted ship for a cycle to drain.
2. balance the drain amount, that it's not effective as neut.

If You still want some Hullbased meta add something like this:


From my point of view I would think about fitting NOS on following ships:
ALL Gallente/Amarr Ships with an Utility highslot. (there are more but these are easy to point out)
Because all of them have cap problems and normaly need an injector. with NOS they might not need the Injector and so could gain a med slot and also some energy warfare.

with the current system and the new changes u only want to fit nos on figs destroyer and maybe cruiser.

That makes this module more or less useless on more than half of the ship classes ingame.
imho that's just not a good solution.

Anecdotes are not evidence, please say how the NOS saved your life and why a neut would cause your death.



This doesn't answer the question. This scenario was possible BEFORE this change, he's asking you for a scenario that is made possible WITH this change.


Because they don't exist, cap warfare ships fit neut's and receive cap via logi if they need them or use cap boosters. Nothing is opened up for them with this change that didn't exist before it (i.e. equally bad why is CCP wasting time with this change).

They will still be just as useful as the day they "balanced" them.

and a readout of your opponents cap status will also now be shown on the HUD ...... zzzzzzz sorry zzzzzz was day dreaming....