Player Features and Ideas Discussion

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As we have hinted several times before, Marauders are next on the Tech2 to-do list. And guess what? It's feedback time!

Marauders were initially released during the Trinity expansion in 2007 and were aimed for PvE activities. However, as time passed and we rebalanced other classes, especially the Pirate Battleships, they lost appeal as a whole.

We also believe that designing them for a very specific activity doesn't fit the emergent nature of EVE, and as such we wish to expand their use to PvP as well. Of course, their high price, low mobility will always ensure their role remains a niche one, but we at least can make that purpose more appealing than a simple "jam me now and forever" target dummy.


As such, after much internal and CSM discussion, we have designed Marauders with two modes of operation, specialized in harassing tactics.

In regular mode, they work approximately on the same fashion as on TQ, but are capable of using Micro Jump Drive at a faster rate than usual to quickly relocate on the battlefield.

In deployed mode (we call it bastion), their hulls transform (they will have fancy visible animations like the Rorqual does when deploying) and they become fixed weapon placement with a bonus to resistances, tanking, damage projection and receiving EW immunity. However, like Dreadnoughts, they cannot be remote assisted or even move when that happens. They also cannot use Micro Jump Drives in that mode.

The combination of both results in a ship that can jump 100km away to quickly react to a shifting environment, then go into bastion mode and use its increased damage application to deal with opposition while absorbing damage. However, due to the lack of remote assistance in that mode and isolating nature of Micro Jump Drives, they will still die easily in larger fights where DPS is concentrated. Remember that the spool up nature of the Micro Jump Drives plus the time needed to align will give opponents a window of opportunity to tackle them before they can jump again.

This also provides a stepping stone between sub-capitals / capital and their various siege / triage operation. It is noteworthy to remember we don't necessarily want them to out-damage or go faster than Pirate Battleships - instead, they tank and project damage better.


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Before we look at the hulls, here are the details about the Bastion module itself:

BASTION MODULE

Increases shield and armor repair amount by 100%

Boosts all shields, armor and hull resistances by 30%

Extends all large turret falloff and optimal by 25%

Increases all large missile max velocity by 25%

Has a cycle time of 60 seconds.

When in bastion mode, Marauder is immune to EW but cannot be remote assisted in any way

When in bastion mode, Marauder speed is set to 0 m/s and cannot warp (mass is unchanged). Also receives a weapons timer that prevents station docking or gate jumping. Weapon time doesn't require the user to drop weapon safeties in high-sec

Only one may be fitted per Marauder, cannot be deactivated before cycle ends

Uses 10 CPU and 100 powergrid to fit

Uses no specific fuel or capacitor - we were discussing the use of Heavy Water as fuel. However, it doesn't really provide any gameplay (as CCP Rise mentioned, capacitor is the main limiting factor in combat with those ships). Plus it adds more consumables to a class that already commonly uses charges for weapons, cap boosters and need to keep cargo for possible salvaging.

Skill requirements: Advanced Weapon Upgrades 5 and Energy Grid Upgrades 5

Please remember all of this is subject to change - training high energy physics is at your own risk if the bastion mode skill requirements change during the iteration process.

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Giving a new deployed mode is not enough however, as some modifications need to be made on the hulls themselves. First, we wanted to encourage Marauders to use Micro Jump Drives to move around, and as such have reduced mobility next to their Tech1 counterparts (bit higher mass and lower max velocity). We are also reducing their drone bays as they are primarily meant to deliver damage through their main weapon system.

However, we realize Marauder hulls have a certain number of issues; as such we are significantly increasing their fittings so that they can fit Large Micro Jump Drives plus Heavy Capacitor Boosters with more ease (the Vargur especially needed more fitting options). We also are increasing their high slots to 8 to compensate for the slot allocation of the bastion mode. We also are increasing their maximum targeting range and scan resolution a bit to make use of the increased damage projection, while decreasing their signature radius.

As a final combo bonus, we also are changing Target Painter cycle time from 10 to 5 seconds, and reducing their cap usage to compensate - waiting for the Target Painter cycle to finish before swapping targets is quite annoying on the Golem.

Detailed changes below.


PALADIN

Role Bonus: 100% bonus to large energy weapon damage, 100% bonus to range and velocity of tractor beams, 70% reduction in Micro Jump Drive reactivation delay

Amarr Battleship Skill Bonus:

5% bonus to capacitor capacity
7.5% bonus to Large Energy Turret optimal range [i](instead of 10% bonus to the...

Wow. Mini dreads. Ok....

Not sure how well it works for PvE, but it doesn't suck next to other battleships now.

umm... wow?

I'm getting rather tired of every ship 'upgrade' having a new, or multiple, associated skills go along with it.

So far I like. Will wait for the Round 2 and for them to appear on SiSi before a full "YEEHAA!". I'm a Golem Pilot and I like this "In-between" role for the Marauders.

Nice work!

Very interesting...

On the specifics of the proposal... Can you start to spool your MJD in Bastion mode? Assuming EWar immunity includes Scrams what is to stop a small gang of these in low-sec? Just Bastion mode for 60 seconds, spool your MJD at 55 seconds, and you are gone before you can be tackled.

That said Marauders V finishes in 2 days, so I am looking very much looking forward to flying these.

Hah... I was gonna say I called it but you posted that as I was writing that very same idea in another thread. So yeah... freken cool!

Will the Skill(s) be seeded to TQ before the Winter Expansion or will it appear all at once?

Why not have the Bastion module just use Tactical Weapons Reconfiguration?