Player Features and Ideas Discussion

We are also tweaking the warp speed rigs (Hyperspatial Velocity Optimizers) to give them a penalty to ship CPU output (same penalty as drone rigs) instead of their current penalty to armor amount, to even the playing field for different types of tanking.

It also significantly reduces the benefits of skilled play (alignment, vigilance) and severely weakens one of the planned natural counters to the new interceptors (smartbombing tactics).

Can you clarify this? Are you saying that it's an expected counter to smartbomb interceptors/interdictors during the deceleration phase? That's a rather obscure mechanic which doesn't seem like a good choice for a natural counter.

I've got a few updates to bring to you all today.

We've been making some tweaks to the numbers, moderating the changes to the far ends of the spectrum and adjusting the stats of the warp speed rigs and the warp speed T3 subsystems.

Firstly, we have done another pass on the warp speeds by class. The default advantage for T2 ships is being reduced slightly from 12.5% to 10%. We're also increasing the speeds of a few of the slower classes (freighters, titans, battlecruisers and command ships) a tad and reducing the speed advantage of the faster ships a bit as well (bringing the top end to 8au/s instead of the previous 10au/s). It's important to note that even with this extra reduction, all interceptors will see gigantic improvements to their warp speeds for virtually all warp distances after Rubicon.

Finally, we are also putting a cap on the deceleration speed that can be obtained for now. This cap is currently set to 2au/s (the declaration speed that a 6au/s warper hits by default, and twice the current hardcoded deceleration speed). This means that as ships start to travel faster than 6au/s they will start to hit diminishing returns.

This cap is being put in place for a few reasons, mainly related to the appearance of ships as they arrive. Having ships appear to blink into place as they exit warp is not ideal as it breaks immersion and prevents players on the destination grid from seeing where the new ship came from. It also significantly reduces the benefits of skilled play (alignment, vigilance) and severely weakens one of the planned natural counters to the new interceptors (smartbombing tactics). At the max deceleration ships will still appear very quickly on grid, but it will always be visible which direction they came from and there will always be one second between their arrival on grid and the completion of the warp.

The new post-Rubicon warp chart can be seen here, including the base warp speed changes and the deceleration cap.

We are also tweaking the warp speed rigs (Hyperspatial Velocity Optimizers) to give them a penalty to ship CPU output (same penalty as drone rigs) instead of their current penalty to armor amount, to even the playing field for different types of tanking.

And finally we are making a slight adjustment to the Gravitational Capacitor subsystems on the Tengu and Proteus. We are reducing their bonus to ship warp speed from 15% to 12.5%. This places a fully skilled Gravitation Capacitor T3 at 4.875au/s, or between the new warp speeds of Destroyers and Frigates. This may prove to be a bit too powerful, so we'll be watching it carefully after release and re-evaluating.

Thanks for the feedback and testing so far everyone!

And finally we are making a slight adjustment to the Gravitational Capacitor subsystems on the Tengu and Proteus. We are reducing their bonus to ship warp speed from 15% to 12.5%. This places a fully skilled Gravitation Capacitor T3 at 4.875au/s, or between the new warp speeds of Destroyers and Frigates. This may prove to be a bit too powerful, so we'll be watching it carefully after release and re-evaluating.