Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I'm not saying missiles are bad, actually, I think that they're mostly in quite a good state. If anything, light missiles and cruise missiles are almost too good in certain situations, which brings me to my point. Look at the following table, and sorry for the crappy format.

Rockets 17 cpu 4 pwg 150 exp v 20 rad 4.5 km 8 dps
Light 24 cpu 7 pwg 170 exp v 40 rad 18.8 km 7 dps
Assault 50 cpu 113 pwg 101 exp v 125 rad 9 km 16 dps
Heavy 55 cpu 105 pwg 81 exp v 140 rad 28 km 11 dps
Torp 88 cpu 1838 71 exp v 450 rad 9 km 31 dps
Cruise 66 cpu 1513 pwg 69 exp v 330 sig 65.8 km 23 dps

This table shows the power grid and cpu requirements of t2 launchers and the tracking, range and dps characteristics of a single unbonused launcher firing t1 missiles. What I see when I look at it is a progression similar, though a little different, to what you might expect out of a line of turret weapons. In exchange for tracing characteristics and a little dps, the long range weapons here gain a significant ability to project their damage. In the case of missiles, this tradeoff is very significant. For small weapons, the range advantage is almost four to one, for mediums its three to one, and for large weapons its more than 7 to one. The big outliers here are torpedoes, both in range and application.

In most cases, range is a quality exchanged for dps and application. Torpedoes are one of the biggest outliers from this system, and currently it hobnails them into only a few extremely limited roles. In pve they find occasional use on ships like the golem, which is one of the most ideal cases for their use, but except for a few missions, the extraordinary range and application advantage outweighs the dps you gain against battleships.

What I propose is that CCP enhance the range of torpedoes slightly while keeping their velocity the same and damage the same. At the same time increase their application to be slightly better than cruise missiles, which something like a sig rad of 320 and an explosive velocity of 73. Decrease the application of cruise missiles, so they better fit the profile of the other long range missiles. Adjust the bonuses of stealth bomber accordingly so they don't become too powerful. This way, players flying missile boats like the typhoon will have a choice between short range teeth, or the ability to strike out to long ranges, just like the smaller ship classes.

Before anyone gets really crazy over this think about the following comparison.
Two ships of similar role with fairly equivalent fits. A buffer tank raven vs a buffer tanked megathron, both with ideal skills, tech 2 gear and with no implants or boosters. All EFT numbers.

[Raven, Torp raven]
Damage Control II
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II

Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Adaptive Invulnerability Field II
Large Shield Extender II
Large Shield Extender II
100MN Afterburner II
Stasis Webifier II
Warp Disruptor II

Torpedo Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Torpedo
Torpedo Launcher II, Caldari Navy Mjolnir Torpedo
Heavy Unstable Power Fluctuator I

Large Core Defense Field Extender I
Large Core Defense Field Extender I
Large Core Defense Field Extender I

1005 dps before drones, sig 518, speed 318 ehp 103,577, range 30.4 km.

[Megathron, Mega Basic pvp]
Damage Control II
1600mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
1600mm Reinforced Steel Plates II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II
Magnetic Field Stabilizer II

Tracking Computer II
Stasis Webifier II
Warp Scrambler II
100MN Afterburner II

Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L
Neutron Blaster Cannon II, Caldari Navy Antimatter Charge L

Large Trimark Armor Pump I
Large Trimark Armor Pump I
Large Trimark Armor Pump I

1047 dps before drones, sig 380, speed 356, ehp 126,725, range 4.8+14

They look pretty close on paper right? A couple of tradeoffs in ehp, mobility, sig rad, some differences in drones, etc, until you start to look at the application of damage against virtually any target. The raven simply falls right on its face, it cant even muster full dps against most comparable battleship targets eve with its web. Compare this to another short range missile boat- the HAM drake. Comparatively, its missiles do more dps than the long varieties, have better application, but even with their power, the drake has plenty out there to counter it.

I think its time for ccp to look at torpedoes, and look at missile battleships as a whole. While the changes in odyssey were mostly good, especially for cruise missiles, they need to be looked at again. Ships like the raven, with its bonus to range, using long range missiles, doesn't need the bonus to range. The native range of cruise missiles is long enough for pve activity. In pvp the range of cruise missiles doesn't count for anything, because even with their incredible application, youre too far away to use webs and often cant fit target painters because of conflicting fitting requirements or range issues. Moreover, missiles have the inherent disadvantage of having to fly to their targets, which is a big liability in long range pvp, and pvp, even with the bonus the raven currently receives to missile velocity.

Thank you, I'd actually spent a couple of days thinking about this before I posted anything, and a couple of weeks prior to that play testing with torpedoes and various turrets.

There is a lot more to missiles than meets the eye, however. People should really take a look at the way their damage is calculated and think about how it is going to affect how it can be used to missile balance. In particular the damage reduction factor is something that ccp could use to make missiles stand out from guns in a good way, to really set them apart and give players a hard choice.

BTW, Cade, I see a lot of your posts on the forums here and I have much the same thoughts about you. You're posts are well thought out and you provide great references to ccp posts/activity. Thanks for the input and I hope to see more from you.

Lets also fix the problem where torps don't fly out to their stated range because they launch at a angle and have to accelerate. So the flight time needs a small adjustment to fix this.

Already liked the OP, but need to bump it so:
+1

I agree that the ability to switch between damage types is a powerful feature of missiles as a whole, and that there should be drawbacks to missiles for having that ability. In response I feel like the missile launcher system does have weaknesses outside of torpedoes specifically to warrant the power of selectable damage.

First, launchers are not available in tiers, as are turreted weapons. If you decide to fit out a HAM boat, that's what you're fitting it with. If you run into a conflict with other modules fitting requirements you can't sacrifice a little dps or range and fit a downgraded weapon, like 220mm Vulcan IIs in order to get that 1600mm plate, mwd, medium neut, or whatever it is that you want. You have to go the route of ancillary current routers, cpu upgrades etc. This is a good thing, it helps to differentiate missiles from turrets, and the contrast between different weapon systems is part of the lifeblood of this game.

Secondly, switching between damage types is viable in pve all the time, but in pvp it is only viable some of the time. If you're well prepared and you know what you're going to fight against, you can essentially double your effective dps by switching your damage type to the targets damage resist hole. You don't always know what you're up against though, or what that person has fit for modules, moreover it isn't always practical to switch to a different missile mid combat. Sure, you can do it, but sometimes that extra 10 seconds to switch to an ideal damage type might give your opponent the reprieve they need to beat you, so often it is better to stick with a non ideal type. Again this is a balance feature and I think its a good one to keep.

Thirdly, rigor rigs, catalyst rigs, and target painters are a luxury in pvp. Theyre not something you can always fit. Under most circumstances, they do bring your applied dps, when using torpedoes, to over what you would expect when using cruise missiles. However, when you compare an application fit torp ship, to a buffer fit or ASB fit cruise ship, is that the torp ship can eek out a little more dps, with much worse range, mobility, and utility. This is a game of tradeoffs and choices, no one ship should do it all, but in this case, I believe that the tradeoff is a little too steep.

If you want to think about how missile dps is applied, look at the dps formula. This is before resists.

"The base damage of the missile is multiplied by min(1, S/E, (S/E*Ve/Vt)^(ln(drf)/ln(5.5))"

This is taken straight from EVEuni. S is the signature radius of the target, E is the explosion radius of your missile, Ve is the explosion velocity of the missile, Vt is the velocity of the target, ln is the natural logarithm (base e log) and drf is the damage reduction factor. So whats happening here is that the game is choosing the minimum of three quantities. The reason the 1 is there is because small missiles would end up doing thousands of dps against larger ships. Everything else is self explanatory except the damage reduction factor. What it is, is a factor that prevents the damage of most missiles from too rapidly approaching zero as the target gets smaller and faster compared to the weapon. Each missile type has a damage reduction factor ranging from about 2.6 to 5.5 for the largest weapons.

Ill be back later to provide a more specific example of how cruise missiles can vastly outperform torpedoes in overall dps and projection sometimes tomorrow. Right now I have to go to work.

Thanks for the well though-out post. +1

Actually the Torp raven is unable to apply full dps using a web to the following ship fits, even while theyre using a mwd, as soon as theyre scrammed, a common situation in pvp you'll have to agree.

Buffer tanked Armageddon, buffer tanked abaddon, buffer tanked apocalypse, buffer tanked raven, buffer tanked typhoon, AAR hyperion, buffer megathron, buffer dominix, buffer tempest and dual asb maelstrom. These are common fits that commonly use MWDs and often ABs. The application situation often gets worse when you start to consider rep fits, high resist fits, spider tanking fits that use ABs, etc.

Further to the OP, I think something like this could work:

Torpedoes ... 88 cpu / 1838 pwg / 73 exp v (+2.0) / 300 sig (-150) / 18km (+9.0) / 31 dps
Cruise Missiles ... 66 cpu / 1513 pwg / 69 exp v / 330 sig / 48km (-17.8) / 23 dps

torps need a range buff ...having the same range as HAMs is just ******** imo
every weapon system in the game will have his range increased the biger they are but not the torps
i dont fly torp boats personaly so i dont want an unbalanced weapon system or some kind of advantage but i believe they do need that range to be on par with the other system my mega pulses dont shoot at the same range as my heavy pulses and i think it would be fair for those missiles users ...my 10 cent

Just curious, is that an EFT Screenshot?