Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I understand the theory there but what Im talking about in practice, 425's may be easier to fit, but the typically Mini T1 Cruiser or BC is already light on the PG side to begin with, negating any fitting advantage.

While selectable damage is nice for shooting T2 hulls, I would prefer to have straight explosive guns with more favorable damage projection.

I'm only asking for about 10km in falloff here guys. I think its reasonable for a Hurricane to be able to do more than 250 DPS at 20km with AC's.


Badman

Many ships fit neuts, but which of these ship ACTUALLY NEUTS ?

I mean, yeah, Ishtars have the usual medium neut. Cynabals and Orthrus have a neut too.

Do you encounter a Zealot and go "HEEEEYYY, I'VE GOT A NEUT, There is nothing that Zealot can do to me because he'll be out of cap, heh !" ? No.

You encounter a Zealot, and shoot the hell out of him. You'll shoot the whole time, he'll shoot the whole time, and unless you have an ACTUAL neuting ship, with more than one utility neut that is there because you can't fit an additionnal weapon in that highslot, you won't really change the outcome of the fight.

You'll tell me "But that's 1v1 situations !". Yep, that is.

What would happen in a bigger fight ? Well, capacitor warfare is even less important, as there are many ships spread around rather large areas, neuts have rather low range and will easely be countered by capboosters.



Yep, you pull range and then what ? You go back home because you can't break his tank with your pityful DPS. Or you get caught because brawling HACs are pretty fast themselves and will scramble you at the slighest mistake at range control.

Lasers ? You suggest I get in close-range and brawl ?

You'll close range, taking nicely applied DPS the whole time, brawl down that single ship, then move on to another target, still taking the whole gangs' full DPS because lasers can hit well farther than 10km.

That's versus a laser-kiting gang. What would happen versus a laser-brawling gang ? It's simple !

They have a lot more tank than you, and will apply more DPS most of the time because tracking isn't really that much relevant when you have tons of hardtackle on the field. Yep, can't use that mobility anymore, you're pinned down now.


Shield Ishtar ? You suggest I try chasing a Shield Ishtar gang with AC boats ?

Not really no. Ishtars are a special thing. I'd say that most of the time, they'll tear you down with nicely applied 600 DPS sentries, doesn't matter if you poke a resist hole (that they can plug with rigs anyway). AC boats are also more fragile than most other races' ships, you'll get killed even faster. Against Ishtars, I would take RLML Caracals over "super versatile Stabbers".

Heavy on neuts ? Yep, your prop-mod turns off, and so does every active module on your ship including tackle and resistances.

True, if the enemy gang is heavy on neuts, and I mean REALLY heavy on neuts and you have absolutly no way to counter the X Bhaalgorns/Ashimmus/Neuting Legions/Curses, then alright, I suppose ACs have an advantage here. If I encounter an enemy gang that is heavy on neuts, I probably won't engage it unless I have a special trick up my sleeve too.



Oh but they do have these "On the fly" answers.

Brawlers are best at brawling, is that right ? So the point is to get within brawling range of the hostiles ? Well, against the most common fleets, you can either brawl it down because you're faster than them, trap them and force them to engage at a gate, or pull them with a well placed bubble and brawl them down. That's an "on the fly" answer. Sure, some specific fleets will be hardcounters to yours and you should just avoid them, but that's the same with every weapon system in EVE. Yes, even projectiles. Sometimes you just can't do ****.



Have you seen a fleet defending something by using autocannons ? Because in the last months, I have not. I've seen RailTengus, Ishtars, Dominixes, Apocs/NavyApocs, Sacrileges, T3 fleets, Cerberus, Harpies, Hawks, Navy Augorors sometimes, Navy Vexors, Prophecies, Deimoses, some Munnins too, Legion fleets, Megathrons, Blackops fleets, Bomberfleets, Thoraxes, Caracals, ArtyRuptures, RailRokhs, ArtyMaelstroms, PulseBaddons, Armageddons, Drakefleets...

I have not seen a single doctrine with neither small, medium or large Autocannons as the main weapon of the fleet.

Except for one doctrine, welpcanes/welppests. Used because they have 2 neuts on each ship, not because they had autocannons.

Can't use the Canes anymore because it got nerfed to one neut. I haven't seen a WelpPest fleet in a while too.

That should tell you that something is kinda off somewhere.

What that tells me is that autocannons arent for static defense, theyre for a kiting offense.

Big slow armor boats are great for sitting in one place and defending something but when is the last time you saw an abaddon gang roaming anywhere without their titan to teleport them around?

Consider using the weapon for its intended purpose instead of trying to make it do something it wasnt designed for and then complaining when it doesnt work.

Show me that brutix generating 1k dps.

Hint : 6 neutron + 6 dmg mods + 1 T2 ROF + high damage ammo is only 971.

That is also a wooping 0.00074 dps at the 18 km mark on a 10000m sig target not moving.

Don't make the Cynabal more ridicolous than it already is.

There are missile range rigs. Course this discussion has little to do with missiles, and drakes arent known for kiting. Fit HML to shoot past 20km (lol nvm, HML are ****).

SMT youve just gone straight back to saying 'when i know what im facing id much rather fly this or this blah blah and if i cant win i run away'.

good for you, but there are some ppl who go into enemy territory, cannot dock, cannot refit and have actually come with a purpose in mind that isnt padding their killboard.

You dont know whether your enemy will bring shield or armour, kitey or brawl, glass cannon or ultra logi, neuts,ecm or damps.

all you know is that hes going to see you and what youre flying first. And with that information will build a fleet comp with the purpose of making it as easy as possible to beat your fleet comp.

@ stitch

yep AC's are medium range weapons, and that is exactly what they do right now.

Dude, you can fumble around with words all you want, but it's pretty clear everything takes a dump on AC boats at pretty much every purposes.

If it wasn't the case, you'd regularly see AC-based doctrines all around nullsec and lowsec. But it doesn't happen.

It would happen more if ACs weren't bad.

You're telling us ACs are medium range weapons but everything else performs better than ACs at medium range.

HAM Cerberus, most RLML ships, most serious droneboats etc.

Unbonused AC ships have ranges comparable to brawling ships, so there is no point trying to fight anything as you'll be either outgunned at close-range, or out-ranged in every other situation.

Bonused AC ships...well there are 3 of those, and they all get **** on by their counterparts in other races except for the very very few situations where they perform just marginally better.

If you want versatility, just don't take ACs, they are simply not versatile, most fleets will dunk you any time of the day.

EDIT : Yeah ask Omega CrendRaven about "versatile ACs". The Sleipnir is probably the only AC boat worth flying now.

I have to agree-- ACs are underpowered. I haven't flown an autocannon ship since the tracking enhancer nerf because the damage you can actually apply at the edge of point range is literally pathetic. For kiting, anything is better than autocannons (including things like rail Deimoses using long-range guns) at this point. The problem is damage application at range-- basically you can cut your damage in half if you're planning on engaging at kiting ranges, even on the hulls that have T2 falloff bonuses. On un-bonused hulls you're really out of luck, since your ****-poor range necessitates fighting inside scram range, but Minmatar ships don't have the stats for brawling (they don't do much damage, and they're not very tanky).

Medium AC kiting ships had marginal performance before the TE nerf, but the mobility advantages of the ships were usually enough to offset the poor damage output. The TE nerf really ruined them IMHO-- today they simply don't do enough damage to be a viable choice. Even with HAC 5, the Vaga is outperformed by a ton of other ships in its intended role (making so many other cruiser classes so fast and agile really eroded the Vaga's niche, as other ships are now pretty much as fast but also have good damage application). The only AC cruiser I'd still consider flying is the Cynabal, and that's just because of the new warp speed bonus they picked up.

Medium Autocannons need buffed, yes.

But pretty much medium everything needs looked at, across the board. Projectile turrets aren't unique in that regard.