Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Unfortunately, it makes no one happy, not even the speculators.

Lots of people wish covert ops cloak for Nestor. I think it is too powerful option for battleship. It is good that covert ops cloak is limited to maximum of blockade runner size ships. We can't have total security in new eden. Null sec is wild wild west and that is what it is supposed to be. All ships should be able to produce more ISK than they cost in average before they are destroyed. This gives goal to ship survivability.

This made me think something. Black ops battleships cannot use covops cloak either but they get bonuses to normal cloaks. Could Nestor receive this kind of bonuses? I find it strange that noone has asked this before and no comment about this possibility from CCP side.

Here are blackops ships cloak bonuses:
125% bonus to ship max velocity when using Cloaking Devices
No targeting delay after Cloaking Device deactivation
Cloak reactivation delay reduced to 5 seconds

I distinctly recall a DEV (Fozzie or Rise) saying in another thread here that a Covert-ops cloak on the Nestor is never going to happen (and was never intended to happen) because...

- It would step on the toes of Black-ops (which don't and probably won't get them either)
- it would make them too powerful (because cloaking is a very powerful tool and the Nestor is more combat capable than any Black-ops battleship).

I totally agree that the Nestor needs some love, actually more like a major overhaul, but a covert cloaking would be too much. The Nestor would then become a primary PvP ship, replacing much of the functionality of the Black Ops. If you compare a Nestor to a Sin - both with a T1 cloaking device equipped - the primary difference is that the Nestor has scanning bonus (which is almost useless) and the Sin can fly faster. If you now give the Nestor a covert ops cloaking, the Sin would be reduced to a Jump Bridge.

As I suggested here, I would rather like to see some changes focussing on Exploration. You mostly need cloaking for two things: to hide and for gate camps. As the Nestor has a relatively fast align time and can equip a T1 cloaking device to hide and warp core stabs against scrambling, the main problems are:

• Extremely long lock times when just installing a cloaking device.
• Cannot warp in bubbles.

As you now have the Mobile Depots, you can refit the warp-core stabs at any time once you entered your destination system. You cannot however remove the cloaking device, since if you need it, you need it fast and not in a minute. So what needs to be fixed for the Nestor is the lock time increase when equipping one. Therefore my primary suggestion is:


The bubble issue would require either a total interdiction immunity or a module for that, but both would make the Nestor way too powerful. An alternative is a one-time escape system like a jump drive with no cyno requirement, so you can - if you are fast enough - hit that jump and be gone, at least on the first gate camp you meet. Details on how I envision this in my other post linked above.

In addition I think a +1 warp strength would greatly help on survival to prevent that one random tackler to lock you down for good. A Nestor - as most BS class ships - cannot kill a properly piloted Interceptor, so meeting one means death eventually. That won't be totally prevented by a +1, but at least greatly reduced, as the interceptor needs to be very close to use the scrambler (and actually needs to have one equipped).

I am not in favor of warping cloaked for battleship, but making the Nestor a black ops battleship, even before the pass on the other black ops, would be really nice. A logi black ops ship....

Your idea of an overhaul was a bit much there, at least too much for any one ship

My logic behind this is as follows:

1) Interdiction Immunity on a Battleship -
Interceptors, Reconfigured T3's and the like can avoid Bubbles but there is NO Reason a Battleship should be able to. Since Battleships can MJD out of harms way before scrams land tackle bubbles are just a nuisance. And if the Nestor Became a BLOPS there would be no reason for you to warp into a bubble since you can avoid camps with a few units of liquid ozone and a covert cyno. Sure a dictor could land and bubble up, but usually you see a dictor on scan the first thing you do is prime the MJD or get a mod ready to kill it since most of them are squishy. ( Granted you did say this was overpowered im just pointing it out again )

2) 100% Reduction to scan res penalty with cloaks - So this would allow the nestor to lock on faster after using a cloak yes, but battleships have abysmal scan resolution out of the box and you forgot about targeting delay after decloak so for PVP that's pretty useless unless something else has target tackled before you decloak.

3) A one use Drive that allows you to escape a camp? Like the Jump drives all black ops already have? Also no fuel or cyno requirement makes that very OP unless it just drops you at the Sun and renders you unable to move or cloak for a set time

4) adding warp core strength? Why? if your battleship is tackled by a ceptor and you cant de-aggress and dock / jump away your dead, like anything else that gets caught by one in the middle of nowhere or at a site.

5) Warp core stabs on a Nestor in general when its obviously far from a good choice as an exploration ship.