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Fix for Ishtars online
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Rivr Luzade
Coreli Corporation
Pandemic Legion
#121 - 2015-02-03 11:10:32 UTC
afkalt wrote:
The "drone ball" only exists because killing drones is barely practical even with bombers. If that is actually undertaken en mass, they just enter a long orbit and scatter the drones to the winds and killing them becomes beyond a bad idea.

I know this, because it's what we do when the enemy can only muster bombers and they try and bomb the drones. Then you're down to locking up and shooting individual sentries, whilst taking return fire. That is only going to end one way because if you can soak the fire in the first place, you're shooting the ishtars.

It's a nice idea on paper, only works in limited circumstance/vs poor or inexperienced FCs.

That is why you use your turret ships. They are mostly useless against Ishtars anways. You warp in to the drones and start murdering them. That is way more effective than bombers. And if they drop another set, you prepare for warp out, while you continue killing the first set ball/streak, warp out and back in to the next ball/streak. If you are so close to the drones, they cannot hit you or at least a highly reduced number hits you for full damage while they die.

UI Improvement Collective

My ridicule, heavy criticism and general pale outlook about your or CCP's ideas is nothing but an encouragement to prove me wrong. Give it a try.
Cassius Invictus
Viziam
Amarr Empire
#122 - 2015-02-03 12:10:22 UTC
Rivr Luzade wrote:
Counter proposal: Give up on killmails. If you fight Sentry Drone Ishtars, kill their drones first and foremost and then the ship itself. It's that easy. The only thing that needs to change is the mindset of the players from "Must have killmails" to "Must win this fight". "Must have killmails" is flawed and backwards as you cling to tactics of the past and do not adapt; whereas "Must win this fight" opens up so many possibilities to counter people and Ishtars in particular: Focus on destroying their drones instead of the ship, orbit the drones and you won't get damaged, warp out to pings and back to the next drone ball/drone streak if the Ishtar drops another set and repeat step 1. Do it again and again and again. And if the Ishtar flees to a station to restock the drone bay, camp the station. If the Ishtars flee to another system, camp the gates, camp the route, intercept them -- without drones they can't hurt you. If they go to a POS, find the POS and watch it or camp it depending on its set up. If the Ishtars warp to save spots/a safe spot and you see mobile depots, scan down the depots and rf them/kill the Ishtars there. You might not get as many kills in the first place, but you win the fights. That is what should count.

There is no doubt that Ishtars could need a little nerf, which, depending on the nature of the change, is going to make them completely inviable as a fleet ship but that's another story; however, as long as it is as it is you need to adapt and change your way to play the game. You ought to stop only complaining about the Ishtar, you need to take on its weakness and use it against the ship.


Did you ever heard about abandoning drones tactic? Guess not...
Rivr Luzade
Coreli Corporation
Pandemic Legion
#123 - 2015-02-03 12:26:04 UTC
Do you read my posts, Cassius? I don't think so because otherwise you would not have asked that question.

UI Improvement Collective

My ridicule, heavy criticism and general pale outlook about your or CCP's ideas is nothing but an encouragement to prove me wrong. Give it a try.
Serendipity Lost
Repo Industries
#124 - 2015-02-03 13:28:49 UTC
Anhenka wrote:
Pravius wrote:

i think thats the point isnt it..... its a cruiser hull that brings battleship dps to the field without all the drawbacks of being a battleship...

and btw if they implement these changes it still will be able to with orgre 2 but will be forced to fight and closer ranges and carry differnt types of drones than just flights of sentry drones

Nobody uses heavies, because they are trash.

If you were to remove sentries, still, nobody would use heavies in 99% of PvP, barring very rare brawling setups like Blasterthrons, Armageddons, or Rattlesnakes. Please note that none of these are cruiser hulls.

A small, fragile, kiting ship that can only use heavies or other non sentry drones is thus, also trash. Nobody would be forced to do anything with Ishtars, because just about everything would be better than them. I would pick a T1 fit hurricane over a t2 Ogre wielding Ishtar.

Heavies are just that bad.


Heavies work great. You just have to be bold enough to tackle (that would be web and scram if you are unfamiliar with the concept) your opponent. If you only like small fragile kiting ships, the yeah sure heavies suck.

Try developing a pvp strategy that doesn't have running away in one of the first 3 steps of the plan.

Ishtar is a HAC. It's got great resists and a small sig radius. Try an AB, web, scarm and some blasters. That plus heavy drones and it's a very high dps brawler. It can fit in w/ the other armor hacs. ( "ARMOR HACS..... ARMOR HACS" do you guys remember that video??)

Heavies aren't bad. They just don't work w/ risk averse kiting setups.
Deacon Abox
Black Eagle5
#125 - 2015-02-03 13:40:50 UTC
Serendipity Lost wrote:
Heavies aren't bad. They just don't work w/ risk averse kiting setups.

Your commentary on kiting v brawling and tackling is ok, but it does not make heavies good. It is not the damage of heavies that is lacking. It is the speed and their travel time between targets.Blink

This is why Heavy Drones suck. BSs suck now for the same reason. The warp speed and align time of BSs, and the speed and agility of heavy drones are both too cumbersome. CCP needs to unnerf these. Then there might be more BS and heavy drone use. Until then sentries and an agile cruiser are just way better to use in about any situation.

CCP, there are off buttons for ship explosions, missile effects, turret effects, etc. "Immersion" does not seem to be harmed by those. So, [u]please[/u] give us a persisting off button for the jump gate and autoscan visuals.

Serendipity Lost
Repo Industries
#126 - 2015-02-03 13:59:30 UTC
Deacon Abox wrote:
Serendipity Lost wrote:
Heavies aren't bad. They just don't work w/ risk averse kiting setups.

Your commentary on kiting v brawling and tackling is ok, but it does not make heavies good. It is not the damage of heavies that is lacking. It is the speed and their travel time between targets.Blink

This is why Heavy Drones suck. BSs suck now for the same reason. The warp speed and align time of BSs, and the speed and agility of heavy drones are both too cumbersome. CCP needs to unnerf these. Then there might be more BS and heavy drone use. Until then sentries and an agile cruiser are just way better to use in about any situation.



If you scram and web your target then they are fine.

I'm a wh gal, so I only do the small gang stuff. When guys scale the fleet to 100+ then I'll agree that heavies become impractical, but then again when you get to 100+ in fleet, it's about the alpha. If you want 100+ pilot sentry gang... there is the dommi or other BS sentry platforms some fitting genious can come up with.

I think the biggest contributor to the OP in the ishtar is that it drops sentries that have a high alpha strike AND then run. They are fast and can (as a group) drop flights in spread out locations. You really can't take mobility away from a HAC - that's kind of their thing. You can take away sentries. I think that strategy would bring them in line with the other HACs and bring them in line with what a HAC is supposed to do.

The whole 'mess with the band width' just won't adress the high alpha kiting HAC problem. You just have 80% damage output with all the same issues. Less damage doesn't fix the problem.

Look, there is a crowd out there that just aren't comfy risking their ships. They have to kite. That's fine. The trade off for flying a kiting ship is reduced damage because your are at range (fall off, heavies/hams, cruise/torps). The ishtar kites with close up brawler damage. That's the borked part of it. That's what needs fixed. Dropping 1 less sentry won't deal with the problem.
Solj RichPopolous
Silent Havok.
H A R D L I N E R S
#127 - 2015-02-03 17:38:43 UTC
Anhenka wrote:
Pravius wrote:
ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

Any suggestions so that Ishtars, VNI's, and ordinary Vexors are not completely and totally **** afterwords?

Or are you one of the "gut them into uselessness and let CCP never sort them out." crowd?

-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.

And -10 for laziness.


So having to use them in normal engagement range makes them absolute ****? Use your ogres.
Solaris Vex
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#128 - 2015-02-03 20:11:19 UTC
Sentry drones need to be nerfed before we talking about changing the ishtar.
Rain6637
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#129 - 2015-02-03 21:22:05 UTC
I'm completely fine with EOS sentry DPS, and my fleet is ready for such a change. +1 I guess, just for the shakeup.

Domis too. Whatev.

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Phaade
LowKey Ops
Shadow Cartel
#130 - 2015-02-04 23:58:59 UTC  |  Edited by: Phaade
Anhenka wrote:
Legetus Shmoof Metallii wrote:
HACs: Cerberus/Eagle, Ishtar/Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
Battleship Weapons: Cruise Missiles, Torpedoes, Large Railguns/Blasters/Artillery, Cannons/Autocannons/, Pulse Lasers/Beam Lasers, Sentry Drones

HACs that cannot use Battleship Weapon Systems: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
HACs that can use Battleship Weapon Systems: Ishtar

I see a problem here

HAC's that can project damage without Battleship Weapons: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
Hac's that cannot have their primary weapon system be destroyed by the enemy: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot

HAC's that can have their weapon system destroyed by an enemy, and only have one size of effective weaponry: Ishtars.

I too see a problem here.

Lets not just gloss over all the downsides and pretend that removing sentries will somehow make them "balanced"


You mean project less damage at less range?

Then, can switch weapon sizes on the fly? Or can drop their DPS, and still deal it outside their engagement range, regardless of ewar? Can switch damage types on a whim? Yeah, must be that zealot.
elitatwo
Zansha Expansion
#131 - 2015-02-05 00:50:53 UTC
Solaris Vex wrote:
Sentry drones need to be nerfed before we talking about changing the ishtar.


Nope they don't. There are quite a few battleships that strongly disagree with a sentry nerf. They wouldn't even mind a drone control range increase.

Rain honey,
The Eos is not a sentry-boat.

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This is the law of ship progression!

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Nolak Ataru
Hedion University
Amarr Empire
#132 - 2015-02-05 01:47:56 UTC  |  Edited by: Nolak Ataru
elitatwo wrote:
Rain honey,
The Eos is not a sentry-boat.

Dammit, I was looking forward to seeing an Eos fleet Sad
Rain6637
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#133 - 2015-02-05 02:03:52 UTC  |  Edited by: Rain6637
Pravius wrote:
ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

Ishtar -> Eos. Sufficient drone bandwidth, OK drone bay capacity. Battlecruiser.

What's amusing is Eos sentry gangs would make people cry more. Same problem, negligible ISK difference.

More tank, practically same mass (uses the same holes), +1 low, same damage bonus, good for structure bashing. Better rails, and 2 utility highs... yeah, people would cry more.

And the tank bonus is guaranteed by the prereq structure that CCP loves.

Nerf Ishtars and the meta moves to Eoses. The problem isn't Ishtars, it's drones. They're a wildcard of weapon types. They're automated, they don't use ammo or cap, they're tiny and numerous (which makes locking a chore), they can be assigned to fast lockers, and the damage type is selectable.

They're a lore / RP-based idea like auto targeting missiles, defender missiles, mines, and bombs, and they're out of control because they work.

CCPLEASE Nerf Eos fit drone control range 80 km (at the edge of Garde II first falloff), 700 drone DPS.

Runner-up MMJD version, is tight like USB.

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President of the Commissar Kate Fanclub

PLEX: A Giffen good? (It's 1B?)
elitatwo
Zansha Expansion
#134 - 2015-02-05 05:34:35 UTC
Rain6637 wrote:
Pravius wrote:
ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

Ishtar -> Eos. Sufficient drone bandwidth, OK drone bay capacity. Battlecruiser.

What's amusing is Eos sentry gangs would make people cry more. Same problem, negligible ISK difference.

More tank, practically same mass (uses the same holes), +1 low, same damage bonus, good for structure bashing. Better rails, and 2 utility highs... yeah, people would cry more.

And the tank bonus is guaranteed by the prereq structure that CCP loves.

Nerf Ishtars and the meta moves to Eoses. The problem isn't Ishtars, it's drones. They're a wildcard of weapon types. They're automated, they don't use ammo or cap, they're tiny and numerous (which makes locking a chore), they can be assigned to fast lockers, the damage type is selectable.

They're a lore / RP-based idea like auto targeting missiles, defender missiles, mines, and bombs, and they're out of control because they work.


Yes, dear.
And with everything, the devil is in the details. While drones have an apparent weakness, sentry drones can be troublesome to say the least.

If we disregard small, medium and heavy drones for a moment and focus on sentry drones, let me quote a question I was asked on SiSi a few months back.

I was flying a Gila and someone wanted to know how much dps I would get with the drones and I said somewhere in the region of 700dps.

Then the question was, how would that be possible, since I can only launch 2 medium or 4 small ones at a time.

My response was,
drones have a rate of fire of four seconds. Split between two drones, how much alpha would a medium drones have to make to get to 700dps.

Okay it is not very polite to answer a question with another question but he got the idea.

Now while two medium drones need to fly to the target first, sentry drones are just turrets that sit in space and alpha everything in range of the field, regardless of piloting, speed or signature radius.

No other turret has those abilities. We have said it before, Ishtars are not a problem and battleships with sentry drones are not very kitey, so the problem comes with a very small hull that drops five sentries and gets away with it.

Even if the Myrmidon would have gotten five sentries, the outcry would be smaller since the Myrmidon is a small moon with a mwd on and can be deal with, with a Ferox fleet of similar cost.

So here we are with a conundrum, what to do.

Eve Minions is recruiting.

This is the law of ship progression!

Aura sound-clips: Aura forever
Rain6637
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#135 - 2015-02-05 05:38:21 UTC
My fits are copypasty, and they're not solo. They're meant for large groups, and the point of sentry Eoses is placing the drones in space. The MMJD version has valid uses for structure bashes and PVP engagements against slow, big things, using a different kind of kite.

I'm curious why you say the Eos doesn't get sentries? 250 m3 drone bay, 125 drone bandwidth... isn't that 5 sentries?

those fits again

http://i.imgur.com/OCLrxNt.png

http://i.imgur.com/kAjaUUy.png

Help, I can't download EVE

President of the Commissar Kate Fanclub

PLEX: A Giffen good? (It's 1B?)
elitatwo
Zansha Expansion
#136 - 2015-02-05 07:22:31 UTC
Rain6637 wrote:
My fits are copypasty, and they're not solo. They're meant for large groups, and the point of sentry Eoses is placing the drones in space. The MMJD version has valid uses for structure bashes and PVP engagements against slow, big things, using a different kind of kite.

I'm curious why you say the Eos doesn't get sentries? 250 m3 drone bay, 125 drone bandwidth... isn't that 5 sentries?

those fits again

http://i.imgur.com/OCLrxNt.png

http://i.imgur.com/kAjaUUy.png


Oh no dear, that is not what I meant.

Nobody is stopping anyone from putting sentrie drones in the dronebay of yours. What I meant was that the Eos gives a nice bonus for heavy drone kiting.
With just one drone navigation computer and command ships V, heavy drones will chase interceptors of the field or inst-pop them.

It's just I didn't see anyone use the ship bonus instead of doing the same thing most of the rest of EVE is doing at the moment.

Eve Minions is recruiting.

This is the law of ship progression!

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Corraidhin Farsaidh
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#137 - 2015-02-05 10:05:58 UTC
Raeding up on the circadian seekers stuff I saw people mention that their drones were going idle whilst in combat and assigned on a target. There may be new modules on the way that will affect drones I think...
baltec1
Bat Country
Pandemic Horde
#138 - 2015-02-05 10:16:47 UTC  |  Edited by: baltec1
elitatwo wrote:


Nope they don't. There are quite a few battleships that strongly disagree with a sentry nerf. They wouldn't even mind a drone control range increase.



Carrier blobs and massed domi fleets would not agree with you. At the very least the sentries need to go from sub battlrships, the ishtar itself requires no nerfs as it is the sentries that break it.
Harvey James
The Sengoku Legacy
#139 - 2015-02-05 11:04:57 UTC
baltec1 wrote:
elitatwo wrote:


Nope they don't. There are quite a few battleships that strongly disagree with a sentry nerf. They wouldn't even mind a drone control range increase.



Carrier blobs and massed domi fleets would not agree with you. At the very least the sentries need to go from sub battlrships, the ishtar itself requires no nerfs as it is the sentries that break it.


its a little drastic too remove a gameplay style from a ship entirely and would make the ishtar a weaker gila (granted armour tanked with more drone control range).

i think the better option is too give sub battleships a specific damage bonus to sentries rather than blanket 10% for all drones,
they did it with guristas, although i disagree with 2 uber drones and tons of replacements, but point being they can now give bonuses to specific drone types now, i also think cruisers dronebays should be smaller than battleships.

cruisers/bc's- 10% damage to medium drones only
frigs/destroyers - 10% damage to light drones only
battleships - 10% damage to heavy and sentry drones only

-i would advocate making HP bonuses a seperate bonus, or perhaps a gurista specialty

VNI - keep as an exception perhaps or give 15% medium drones perhaps? (what i think gila should have)
ishtar - 7.5% heavy and 5% sentry drones only, 125/250 dronebay

T3's need to be versatile so no rigs are necessary ... they should not have OP dps and tank

ABC's should be T2, remove drone assist, separate HAM's and Torps range, -3 HS for droneboats

Nerf web strength, Make the blaster Eagle worth using
Solj RichPopolous
Silent Havok.
H A R D L I N E R S
#140 - 2015-02-05 13:04:21 UTC
Corraidhin Farsaidh wrote:
Raeding up on the circadian seekers stuff I saw people mention that their drones were going idle whilst in combat and assigned on a target. There may be new modules on the way that will affect drones I think...



(Insert scientific name dealing with radio communication disruption) scrambling burst. Hi slot utility module. When activated has a chance of making drones lose their wireless connection to the controlling ship.

Host would need to initiate a reconnect to lost drones which would then go through a recalibration period and reconnect to host ship after an arbitrary amount of time.

Work out the details to make it balanced.