Science & Industry

I don't believe there is a need for B or C.

Capital strip miners which has higher yield + longer range to cover a lot of the rocks in belts is all that is necessary.
If you keep the ship moving in a direction to a destination you are warping to, you can still instant warp. Basically start from one end of the belt, move to other end and setup warp out points at either end of the belt so you can instant warp.

The danger will come from being caught while you are still warping to a belt.

it will only be caught if it starts warp from 0m/s when a neut jump in.

If you had it aligned and moving at warp speed it is an instant warp. The only time it can get caught is if it was turning around to align or if it was in warp to the belt when neuts / reds came in, both of which are short period of time and a luck of the draw thing. As long as the capital strip miner has a long range, I don't think there is a need for an immune to e-war/scram.

It does require a more active mining as you need to constantly change alignment to get out, but you can see it as a way to prevent botting....

lol.

I have thought the same thing often times. I am not suggesting that my ideas are in any way great ones, they are simply ideas and observations after many years of play. I can tell this thread that any rorqual driver short of having EW invul, will NEVER fly that thing into an ore belt.

For the seasoned rorqual drivers we live by simple rules

1: Do not fly in the belts. Do not fly in belts. DO NOT FLY IN BELTS.
2: Do not warp to cyno lights when there is a neut in system (yes I learned this the painful way).
3: Make sure when you go into siege mode you didn't bounce off one of your POS structures, (I once looked up and was 50k from the POS in siege mode chugging along).

Even if they do put something groovy on the rorqual like capital strip miners but no immunity or protection from EW, 99% of your rorqual drivers will stay in the POS. Years have taught us that anything outside the POS you are ham at a wolf dinner. If they remove the ability that rorquals can only boost in belts, most of us veterans will sell this big contraption and get us the Orca to chug around in. It almost seems like an industrial sin to lose a rorqual.

Problem: Rorquals won't go to belts 'cause indy pilots are very conservative and don't like getting killed
Solution: Make risking your Rorqual more attractive
Win #1: Rorquals will go to belts
Win #2: There will be Rorquals in belts to gank

My idea is a rehash, I'm sure, of many others before, but hopefully with a twist or two.

Capital Ore Chomper (yeah, a better name would be nice)
- Automatically targets asteroids, tractors them to the ship, then casts a special warp field around them that transfers them directly into the ore bay.
- Max of two high-slot modules
- Only fits on the Rorqual
- Siege mode NOT required and also no longer required for boosts
- Only works with asteroids of 400m in diameter or smaller
- Auto-targets asteroids
- No crystals
- Does not work on Mercoxit
- Capital Ore Crusher skill required. Adds Range, Tractor Speed and Chomp Speed per level
- Slider control for Asteroid size: Smaller or Bigger first
- Slider control for Range: Close or Far first.

Goal would be for each module to mine about as much as a max-skilled Skiff

With this ability, you could mine with a fleet, have your Hulks/Macks mine the big 'roids, vacuum up the little ones with the Rorqual, and boost at the same time. Probably exactly what the game designers had in mind when they first designed the ship eons ago.

But, this is too easy! It will encourage AFK mining. Botting! If a Hulk could do this, sure. But, for a Rorqual, I don't think so. See Win #2 above.

Some how, I doubt CCP'S answer will be making the Rorqual a botting monster. It is amusing that the idea of "how can we make the Rorqual relevant in eve" keeps turning to "how can we make Rorqual's explode". If making loss mails is the main goal then CCP can adjust the Insurance payout to 150%. Then, YAY, the Rorqual is totally fixed now. All battle Rorquals warp to zero at the belts.

The issue I see with your concept is that the more drastic the change idea the less likely it is and the more likely it turns into a bad genie wish. Your idea could be condensed down from TL/DR, to a few adjustments or reworks of role bonuses. Less is more. Take a good look at the hows/ why of the tiercide changes or the Kronus ship changes. it could be more like this;

ECM AOE GOD MODE BUBBLE!!!---> 50% RANGE BONUS TO ECM BURST, PER LEVEL ECM STRENGTH PER LEVEL.
SMARTBOMB GOD MODE---> 100% DAMAGE BONUS PER LEVEL, 100% RATE OF FIRE PER LEVEL , -50 % OPTIMAL RANGE PER LEVEL.

Well there is some truth to this and if the idea ends up contributing to what they do then it is likely that some kind of workaround like yours ends up being the case. But your simple workaround misses some key points. Like making the exhumers in your fleet immune to the smart bomb effect. Or making the smart bomb/ECM effect only usable in belts in order to prevent the ship from being exploitable by crafty players who want to use the Rorq in a variety of fleet situations, and connecting the ECM and smart bomb effect to the siege mode, meaning the siege (and other bonuses associated with it like the mining link bonuses) is only usable in belts, so the Rorq won't be very useful in a POS.

So basically, your simple set of adjustments won't exactly do the trick that I was looking for, but yeah I get your point.

However, from the way I see it, all the code they would need is pretty much already there. For instant, you can't lock anything if you're in a POS bubble so that code could be ported to the siege field I recommend. Really the only labor intensive part of setting up the field I recommended was the graphic effect I was looking for, the 'shimmering red cloud' which would really only be there to make the Rorq's siege, already just about the coolest siege in the game with it's verticalization, unfolding, and flame jets, even cooler looking. That could be scrapped. But honestly, an ECM/smartbomb field should not be hugely technically advanced.

But yeah, they might opt for implementing a bonus set that accomplishes more or less the same thing. It's just that the key to the workability of it is that the effect be tied to siege which is only usable in belts. otherwise you'd find smart bombing invulnerable Rorquals station camping people and otherwise being an overpowered combat monster used in ways that have nothing to do with deep space mining. If you're going to ask for a God mode it has to be highly restricted in the situations where it can be implemented. So actually, my idea of tieing all the effects to the siege in the form of a bundle and having it only work in belts actually gives it a greater possibility of being implemented than just giving it some huge bonuses that could potentially be exploited outside of the developers' intent. Also, in a post above I pointed out that a Rorqual god mode in the form of a POS bubble around the ship had been previously contemplated and was shot down because of the technical challenges, not simply because it was a god mode. So something like my idea could be implemented, I think. Also in another post I begged for more Dev and CSM input on their reactions to these ideas (hoping that I would get their reaction to mine). So hopefully we'll get an idea of where we should be channeling our energies. Until then, though, I don't see why my idea wouldn't be workable.

If the ship is effectively invulnerable while sieging then people will siege it in belts.

That's a lot of SP gone *poof*. Convert to another skill that gives the same bonus?