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[Rubicon] [Updated] Interdictor Rebalance

First post First post
Author
Alain Badiou
Combine Honnete 0ber Advancer Mercantiles
#321 - 2013-10-19 07:34:23 UTC  |  Edited by: Alain Badiou
see below.
Alain Badiou
Combine Honnete 0ber Advancer Mercantiles
#322 - 2013-10-19 07:36:22 UTC  |  Edited by: Alain Badiou
already discussed.
Alain Badiou
Combine Honnete 0ber Advancer Mercantiles
#323 - 2013-10-19 08:01:59 UTC
Ganthrithor wrote:
Dehval wrote:
Just a somewhat related question.

Is there any particular reason these ships do not have proper T2 resists applied to their hulls? Wouldn't that help alleviate some of the problems?


The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.


^^This needs to be seen by CCP more than once. Thanks for the excellent write up.
Randy Wray
Warcrows
THE OLD SCHOOL
#324 - 2013-10-19 08:18:55 UTC
Ganthrithor wrote:

The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.

You got it all right, although I'd rather see interdictors be immune just to their own bubbles rather than full bubble immunity.

Solo Pvper in all areas of space including wormhole space. Check out my youtube channel @ http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd6M3xV43Af-3E1ds0tTyew/feed for mostly small scale pvp in lowsec/nullsec

twitch.tv/randywray

ElQuirko
University of Caille
Gallente Federation
#325 - 2013-10-19 11:36:47 UTC  |  Edited by: ElQuirko
Looking at this Eris: Since when were split weapons systems not a terrible idea?

(Clue: Never.)

EDIT:

Ganthrithor wrote:

The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.


Hear, hear.

Dodixie > Hek

Mind Rape
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#326 - 2013-10-19 12:06:14 UTC
CCP, making all ships the same, one class at a time.
~sandbox~
Zyella Stormborn
Green Seekers
#327 - 2013-10-19 12:30:45 UTC
Capt ****** wrote:
And yet another ...

Buff everything, nerf Minmatar.

Holy crap - its like the end of days for minmatar.

Missile boats ahoy - with no range.

Autocannon nerformama - TEs down the pan.

Worst Caps by a staggering margin.

Command ship loveliness perforated with shotgun.

Lowest DPS marauder FTL (for the loss).





QFT

There is a special Hell for people like that, Right next to child molestors, and people that talk in the theater. ~Firefly

FistyMcBumBardier
State War Academy
Caldari State
#328 - 2013-10-19 14:27:40 UTC
Hi Fozzie,

The idea with tech II ships is that they are supposed to be more specialized, but the only thing that is special about these ships is their ability to drop bubbles and warp speeds. I know that the warp speed changes are going to have a large effect on the ability of these ships to catch prey, but I fail to see how these changes are going to help with their survivability. Do you want to keep them as flying coffins where the only viable fleet fits are double/triple bubble cloak that are completely gimped in every other way?

Don't get me wrong, balancing all interdictors is a great idea and it is about time that eris becomes semi-viable. But there is so much more that could be done with this class of ships. Why not buff interdiction launchers speed or fitting but then limit them to 1 per ship? Why not give them a MWD sig decrease to increase survivability? What about bubbles to prevent MJD's? Why not a focused point similar to Hictors so that supers can be more readily tackled in lowsec? Bubbles that limit ewar effects? I am not saying all of these ideas would work, but so far not much has changed with this ship

Why not give the Eris enough CPU to fit a 400mm plate, interdiction launcher, and fill the highs and lows with damage/tank mods? If you are going to force the thing to armor tank and be split weapons, pldon't be stingy with the CPU.

Thanks for your time, and I look forward to the second draft of these changes.
-Fisty

Alvin Exe
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#329 - 2013-10-19 14:38:14 UTC
Gallente: Missile. Meh.

And this:

Ganthrithor wrote:

The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.
]
GeeShizzle MacCloud
#330 - 2013-10-19 15:00:07 UTC
Ganthrithor wrote:
Dehval wrote:
Just a somewhat related question.

Is there any particular reason these ships do not have proper T2 resists applied to their hulls? Wouldn't that help alleviate some of the problems?


The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.



QFT (quoted for truth - for the uninitiated)
Veshta Yoshida
PIE Inc.
Khimi Harar
#331 - 2013-10-19 15:30:50 UTC
For Goddess sake, do you all absolutely have to quote the entire wall when adding only a single line or character? Yes it is a good read, but contains nothing that has not already been stated numerous times throughout the thread and years .. kudos to Ganthrithor for gathering most of it up in a rational and legible post though.

Lets get down to it and go through the motions in proper fashion, I'll start with two of the biggest points:
1. What is the purpose of Interdictors and where do/should they fit into current and possible future meta?
My take - Mobile bubbling where statics have yet to go up or not wanted/needed. Act as hard counters to everything sub-cruiser. AoE battle field controllers.
2. What hindrances do they face in performing above mentioned duties?
My take - Too slow. Too big. Too weak (tank and dps both) and flat out uninspired bordering on obsolete.

Ideas for "solutions" (rather random, sorry Cry):
- Add +50% (or similarly insane amount) unstacked resists for 30s immediately after dropping a probe.
- More speed. Lower signature. Better damage+application and more consistent tanking.
- Add Void (continuous drain) and Lockbreaker (as if inside POS bubble) effect probes to be used by Interdictors. Design them around fitting twin launchers to facilitate the use of available probes.
- Let them get double link bonuses (for when they come on-grid).
- Give them a BO'esque cloaked movement bonus albeit even larger.

Bottom line: It is insanity to consider each ship on its own, doubly so with regard to ships meant to collaborate with others. 'Dictors are fleet/gang tools so primary concern should be to make them as indispensable and powerful in that theatre as logistics/eWar.
Meyr
Di-Tron Heavy Industries
OnlyFleets.
#332 - 2013-10-19 15:35:19 UTC
Just because this needs to be repeated often enough that someone takes notice of it...

Ganthrithor wrote:
Dehval wrote:
Just a somewhat related question.

Is there any particular reason these ships do not have proper T2 resists applied to their hulls? Wouldn't that help alleviate some of the problems?


The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.

LakeEnd
Brutor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#333 - 2013-10-20 15:03:03 UTC
Ganthrithor wrote:
Dehval wrote:
Just a somewhat related question.

Is there any particular reason these ships do not have proper T2 resists applied to their hulls? Wouldn't that help alleviate some of the problems?


The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.


Pains me to admit this, but this is guy is spot on ^
CCP balance devs, please read it and take heed.
Kadassh
Perkone
Caldari State
#334 - 2013-10-20 17:18:21 UTC
These ships don't have T2 resists. Can we please get T2 resists on these ships? That would really make these ships more survivable.

Also, MORE CPU. Eris cant even fit a double bubble cloak setup with any sort of tank. Its awful.
Mr Floydy
Questionable Ethics.
Ministry of Inappropriate Footwork
#335 - 2013-10-20 22:38:06 UTC
T2 resists, much smaller sig, significantly more hitpoints.
I'd take any and all of them. More fitting too, I don't see why making them tougher is a bad thing? Even if they had double the ehp they'd still be properly delicate and easy to kill quickly when you need to.
S1euth
The Graduates
The Initiative.
#336 - 2013-10-21 03:34:58 UTC  |  Edited by: S1euth
This balance pass doesn't appear to change anything. The Sabre is still an amazing Dictor because of it's agility and speed enabling it to decloak on gates and tackle. It is also able to fit a double bubble "fleet fitting" and 5 guns.

The Flycatcher got new damage bonuses and cant use any of them with a "double bubble" fleet fit because of the lack of fitting room. It needs another low slot to fit a Co-Processor or +63 CPU in order to be capable of 60% of the comparable DPS of the Sabre.

This rebalance, doesn't seem to rebalance. I can't think of any fleet PVP situation where I'd choose a Flycatcher instead of a Sabre with this current design.
Volstruis
Mise en Abyme
The Ancients.
#337 - 2013-10-21 09:31:10 UTC  |  Edited by: Volstruis
Fozzie did you do this balance pass one random morning on the toilet because you had nothing better to do?

Doesn't look or feel to me like any real thought or testing has gone into this iteration. Did you even consider things like, adapting fittings based on restricting the ships to only 1 bubble launcher, or, why do they seem to be so fragile and prone to exploding?

CCP, more effort testing and thought required please. On this class and several others.

Your assertion that diction nullification on these would be wtfbbqop. My response is how do you know? I don't actually believe you've tested this on a dev server at all.
xttz
GSF Logistics and Posting Reserves
Goonswarm Federation
#338 - 2013-10-21 11:00:03 UTC
Ganthrithor wrote:
Dehval wrote:
Just a somewhat related question.

Is there any particular reason these ships do not have proper T2 resists applied to their hulls? Wouldn't that help alleviate some of the problems?


The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.


Indeedy
gascanu
Bearing Srl.
#339 - 2013-10-21 11:52:45 UTC
Ganthrithor wrote:


The problem isn't primarily one of tank size or resists: it's dictors' horrible combination of a cruiser-sized sig and cruiser-sized top speeds with frigate tanks. It's really the speed and sigs that need tweaking more than EHP (although a decent-sized EHP increase to keep pace with the tank-creep that's been pervasive among small ships since the tiericide started would also be welcome).

What they'd do if they actually wanted to make dictors into viable combat hulls rather than bubble-and-run mobiles would be to increase EHP by ~20-25% (via raw HP or resists-- I don't think it would matter that much, although at least with resists you could theoretically keep dictors up using remote reps for small gang fights), increase the top speeds across the board such that nano-fit dictors can manage 3-3.5km/s while MWDing, and shrink their base sig radii down to 45-50 instead of the absurd ~75 they're sitting at right now.

Essentially, dictors should really resemble frigates more than they do cruisers: small tanks, high mobility (which helps them mitigate damage AND do their job of grabbing initial tackles / decloaks better) and small sigs.

On a somewhat-related note, I find it hilarious that interceptors-- ships that aren't forced to find themselves inside bubbles constantly and which are the best-equipped ships in the game in terms of their ability to rapidly burn out of bubbles they do find themselves in-- are getting bubble immunity, while dictors-- relatively slow, tankless ships that are forced to drop themselves in the middle of a 20km bubble just to do their jobs-- are stuck in their own bubbles. If anything it should be dictors that are bubble immune (allowing them to not kill themselves by tackling and allowing them to bypass "defensive" bubbles and use their own bubbles on hostile fleets to, you know, do their jobs. But what do I know, I've just been doing small-gang PvP in nullsec since 2007.

Basically these changes do next to nothing to address the fact that the combat abilities of interdictors have become absolutely farcical. Between the speed nerf that destroyed their ability to speed tank damage and the Tiericide-induced power creep that has significantly buffed what seems like every other ship class in the game, the only things that an interdictor can actually fight these days are stealth bombers (assuming they don't have a buddy in another bomber waiting to decloak and bomb you, that is), some scanning frigates (beware ye battle-Helios, however), and some industrial ships. Yeah: some industrial ships: some of those mining barges with 40k ehp and the ability to field drones will probably wreck you. Combat frigates, T1 destroyers, cruisers, some interceptors, all assault frigs, cruisers, battlecruisers, and battleships will all completely wreck you if you hang around decloaked long enough to get locked. Our game-designer buddies are acting like they're doing us some kind of big favor by "bringing all other dictors up to the level of the Sabre." Great, except that there's almost nothing that the existing inferior dictors can't fight that a Sabre can. The Sabre is mostly a bubble-and-run machine too, unless you really like losing Sabres...

I'm honestly incredibly disappointed by these changes: while I haven't been enthusiastic about most of the changes of the Tiericide Age, most of them have been things I could work with or around. With interdictors CCP are passing up their best (probably only) opportunity to fix a class that has been seriously underwhelming for years now, and that has only been further emasculated by the tiericide buffs to other small ships. Instead of doing anything to actually make dictors viable and fun ships, CCP are playing it safe by calling the Sabre "good enough" and balancing all the other dictors against it. This is really, obviously not going to do anything to improve the state of dictor-piloting, since anyone with a clue who uses their dictor outside intentionally-suicidal fleet tackling runs has already trained for a Sabre anyway. The only reason people continue to fly Sabres is that dictors are functionally indispensable, and the Sabre is the least-bad of the bunch. That doesn't mean the Sabre (or your new lineup of dictors balanced around it) will be in a good place when your changes go through, and you know it. Shame on you, CCP. I expected more from a team of designers who allegedly spent years playing this game.

^^
Morniee
Barbs Hammer
Xenta.
#340 - 2013-10-21 16:08:08 UTC
Here is my 2 cents

1 Give dictors Cov ops cloak
2 Or give dictors no penalty moving while cloaked.