Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I believe the Ishtar is in a good spot and shouldn't be nerfed anymore. If you want to think of something to be a decent counter other than Tengus maybe give torps splash damage again to pop the sentry drones. :P

A HAC shouldn't be "better" or "worse" than an ABC, they are different types of ships that fill different roles. You have to compare the ships in specific roles, not just the ships. Is a Malediction "worse" than an Oracle? That question is invalid without an intended role.

To your point, yes, I feel a HAC should be less effective than an ABC when it comes to being a mobile sniper using battleship-class weaponry. Absolutely, 100%. Why? It's simple. HACs were never intended to fill that role. The only reason CCP gave the sentry drone bonuses to the Ishtar was to avoid making it "just another drone boat". I commend that effort, but it's time for them to put it aside and fix the Ishtar.

To help put this into context, name me one other HAC where this is even a relevant discussion. No other HACs come close to matching ABCs in performance in their role, only the Ishtar.

HACs should be either good anti-support snipers, or good brawling cruisers, or good kiters, or any of several other roles. But none of them should get to be all of them at once, and I don't feel that overlapping them with ABCs is wise or intended by CCP.

If you're looking to mess about a bit, might want to address:

A) Large weapons on medium ships
B) Large mods on medium ships
C) Medium mods on small ships

Roles should make these feasible, not fitting requirements.

also, Vagabond should be a cruiser sized inty.

Drop its tank 50% and give it 50% more speed and agility plz

Actually, that's a point.

Dropping all ships tank would be a step away from "guys, we need another 300 people to kill this drake" fleet chatter.

anyways, looking forward to the tweaks as they look very conservative this time.

It isn't "all of them at once" . A shield Ishtar isn't brawling anything. Shield ishtars cannot stand to be pinned down by anything with decent firepower. If you have decent tackle, or just bubbles, a shield ishtar fleet couldn't even engage another hac fleet. Their entire strategy would be "burn away and warp out/in for repositioning. " . A single scram means no more kiting for a shield fit, and that means death. They are excellent kiting ships, but snipers often need to be.

Armor ishtars, however, are wonderful brawling ships. Amazing tank, ewar, prop and tackle. Can they get their drone control range high enough to snipe? Yeah. But it doesn't matter much because those 3 DDA fit 600+ damage wardens don't exist on an armor fit. Their damage is pitiful compared to shield fits, and plenty of armor fits prefer ewar to omnis and so their most all hitting falloff.

I get that the ishtar is versatile and strong, but it can't literally do everything at once, fits don't allow for it.

You know it wouldnt hurt to take a look at the ishtars cap too.

Might as well nert those SOE ships (stratios) as well as they have cloak and way more EHP then a sentry Ishtar and even more DPS because of blasters.

I haven't used Ishtar since I bought my stratios and why should I when it out performs my sentry Ishtar in every way aside from 120km control drone range.

Okay, Mr. Slippery Slope, how about introducing "medium" sized sentry drones for cruisers and restrict the current "heavy" sentry drones to battleships. (And introduce fighter sized sentry drones for carriers.)

Come on folks, try to open your minds a little.

Yes, obviously, *right now* sentry drones have no ship class restriction and they can be deployed by any ship with the bandwidth. Nobody is saying that's not true *right now*. But this is an F&I thread about rebalancing -- just because something currently *is*, that doesn't mean it *should be*.

Full flights of sentry (and heavy) drones deliver DPS that is comparable to large turret and missile systems, at ranges comparable to large weapons. That's why we call them "battleship class" weapons, and that's why they don't belong on cruiser class hulls. It's poor game balance, and it will always be poor game balance, no matter how much you personally enjoy being able to use oversized weapons on a small, fast and resilient platform.

But if it will put an end to this ridiculous head-in-sand "they aren't battleship weapons" argument (and I know it won't, but let's pretend people are reasonable), how about some numbers. The goal here is to make things as comparable as possible, so that means:

• All 5 skills, no implants
• For gun boats, 8 turrets with a 5%/level damage or ROF bonus, for 10 effective turrets
• For drone boats, 5 sentry drones with a 10%/level damage bonus, for 7.5 effective sentry drones
• All T2 long-range weapons with standard T1 high-DPS/short-range ammo, not considering reloads
• No damage or tracking modules (since they're now available equally for both turrets and drones)

Under those conditions, here is the damage, optimal, falloff, tracking and signature resolution of various large and medium weapons systems, conveniently labeled (L) for large turrets, (M) for medium turrets, and (S) for sentry drones:

• (L) Tachyon Beam Laser II: 455dps @ 33+25km, 0.0174rad/s, 400m res
• (L) 425mm Railgun II: 400dps @ 36+30km, 0.01263rad/s, 400m res
• (L) 1400mm Howitzer Artillery II: 336dps @ 30+44km, 0.01125rad/s, 400m res
• (S) Garde II: 421dps @ 30+18km, 0.036rad/s, 400m res
• (S) Curator II: 396dps @ 52+12km, 0.0276rad/s, 400m res
• (S) Bouncer II: 371dps @ 52+48km, 0.0192rad/s, 400m res
• (S) Warden II: 346dps @ 75+42km, 0.012rad/s, 400m res
• (M) Heavy Beam Laser II: 395dps @ 15+10km, 0.03712rad/s, 125m res
• (M) 250mm Railgun II: 406dps @ 18+15km, 0.02566rad/s, 125m res
• (M) 720mm Howitzer Artillery II: 280dps @ 15+22km, 0.02612rad/s, 125m res

Your first clue is the turret signature resolution, which is 400 on large turrets and sentry drones, and 125 on medium turrets. That right there tells you that sentry drones are, on some level, intended as "battleship class" weapons which are expected to shoot at battleship sized targets.

Your next clue is the DPS-to-range tradeoff. Yes, medium lasers and rails rival large turret DPS, but at a significant range penalty; sentry drones have DPS similar to large turrets, range generally greater than large turrets, and tracking far in excess of large turrets (approaching that of medium turrets). Remember also that sentry drones are stationary, so their host ship can speed/sig tank without hurting the sentry drones (already amazing) damage application.

Sentry drones are wack. Gardes are the worst, but they're all a little too good, and putting them on a cruiser hull is just indefensible to start with. Giving that hull additional bonuses to range and tracking that make them apply damage better than medium turrets, at ranges better than large turrets, ... I don't even have words.

Thank you for doing this, it reflects painfully what is wrong with sentries on the Ishtar. The tracking is insane, matched with being static, and range in excess of BATTLESHIP guns.

This, fitted to a ship that can enhance the range and tracking significantly while moving away from the weapons, means they work VASTLY more effectively than any other ship, even a static battleship.

Why the hell does my HAC get an average range of 15k of optimal, and tracking barely better than these longer ranged, static weapons.

The one thing to fix is how well 400m res guns hit cruisers - the signature resolution matched with the typical battleship tracking and movement is a good indicator of what is wrong. Add the range of sentries.

CCP - CANT YOU SEE ANY OF THIS? WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?

Nope, no empty quotes here.

This here CCP, is why Sentries are really the main problem, and not the Ishtar hull itself. Heavies are fine as the travel time and orbit speed make applying damage to small targets difficult, if not downright impossible, a drawback Sentries lack when the fight has moved and the small stuff is 70+ km away, easily within Warden optimal, and trivially within tracking at such ranges despite how fast that small stuff is flying.