Player Features and Ideas Discussion

In Scylla we are deploying a set of high-impact balance changes.

This thread is for discussing a proposed changed to the Ishtar. We are planning to split it's drone damage bonus in to two bonuses so that we can lower the bonus to sentry damage. It would look like this:

Old bonus: Gallente Cruiser bonuses (per skill level):
10% bonus to Drone hitpoints and damage

New bonus: Gallente Cruiser bonuses (per skill level):
10% bonus to Light, Medium and Heavy Drone hitpoints and damage
5% bonus to Sentry Drone hitpoints and damage

This change is being made to encourage diversity in ship choice across EVE. The Ishtar has proven strong enough with its current bonus set to dominate in many environments and we want to make sure there is plenty of room for ship choice other than the Ishtar. We came to this decision using a combination of internal metrics, community feedback and by using EFT like everyone else.

Too much? Too little? Let us know.

To be honst I think that the dps itself was not the problem but rather the ability to deploy sentries and GTFO.

Anyway lets just see what impact this change has on isthars online.

17% damage reduction doesn't seem like it will fix the massive imbalance in damage done

when the drake got gutted them main thing targeted was application, and i think you should look at that for the ishtar too

its simply too good at all different kinds of ranges

bouncers have crazy range and tracking at that range
gardes have battleship damage and cruiser tracking and scorch range
pve wise wasps have frigate tracking and battleship damage and you can be afk and have warpcore stabs fit so there really isnt any reason to use any other ship [other than a vexor navy because its the same thing but cheaper LOL]

honestly 17% damage off the top of the sentry part seems irrelevant in on a ship which had battleship damage and yet its main imbalance is was flexibility

why can it fit and run 100mn AB with no fitting mods btw? it has fitting/cap regen for guns yet does not need to fit them, i think addressing this would help

edit: im not suggesting gutting it like the drake, which was clearly terrible and resulted in a bad ship [and weapon sysem]
but i do think harsher treatment is necessary here

Was about to post the same.
The damage is not the problem, but the damage projection over crazy ranges.
Removing the sentry bonus entirely, would be my suggestion, too.
(And mabye descrease the fitting capabilites a little)

This

This will achieve the goal of making Ishtars less useful, but unfortunately does nothing to make other ships useful. Range and speed are overpowered in EVE, and only doctrines with damage projection and mobility work.

In other words, people will just use the next platform that outranges others while remaining mobile, leaving whole shipclasses gathering dust in hangars.

This.

This again.

It seems that this won't change much in that a 17% reduction in dps mean that the blobs will simply bring 20% more ishtars just to be sure.

Perhaps drop the damage and hitpoints bonus from sentries entirely and instead apply it as a velocity and tracking bonus to heavies. This would put the emphasis on using mobile drones that makes sense given the mobility of the hull and give more of a reason to use heavies since they would be nearer to mediums in speed and tracking but the hull would need to be at greater risk to make use of them.

do something to push it toward armour tanking