Player Features and Ideas Discussion

So I am messing around with Tengu fits in Pyfa and I came to the conclusion that T3's were not just overpowered, but there is this awkward design in subsystem.

I know that CCP has previously stated that they intend to balance T3s and that there are plenty of forum posts about this subject.

I believe that T3s are supposed to be more powerful than T1 cruisers but less powerful than T2 hulls in similar roles. So a Rail Tengu should be less powerful than a Rail Eagle, and a ECMgu should be less powerful than a Rook.

I believe that the subsystem system is great and should remain.

I believe that a complete overhaul is needed, but should that complete overhaul take a while there needs to be a more immediate tweak to the useless/boring subsystems.

The Engineering Subsystems, and some Navigation Subsystems.

Since I came to some of these conclusions based on the Tengu I will use it as my example.

The Engineering Subsystems are secondary Offensive Subsystems. Each Engineering Subsystem (ESS) gives either and extra hard point or extra power grid. In the Tengu's case they have one subsystem with a Turret HP, one with a Launcher HP, and then 2 with an extra 200-300 PG and a Low slot, but no launcher.

With the two hardpoint SS's you gain extra turret, but with the others you get an extra weapon upgrade and the extra PG. This concept is good, but implementation vastly limits choices.

If you go Power Grid Multiplier you get a turret slot and the power grid to fit it.

If you go Augmented Capacitor Reserve you get a launcher slot and 500 Cap.

If you go Cap Regen Matrix you get a low, Cap stability, and 200-300 PGU.

If you go Supp Coolant Injection you get a low, more sustained DPS/Tank, and 200-300 PGU.

Here comes my problem with these subsystems. You only ever have 3 real choices unless you really want to waste a lot of what the subsystem offers.

The two hardpoint subsystems should not be divided, they should both give a launcher and turret hardpoint.

The PGU SS should be changed to something more dynamic, as should the CPU SS as they are sort of uninteresting. But separating turrets from it would open it up to use in missile boats.

In summation the Engineering Subsystem choices need to be separated slightly from the Offensive Subsystem choices.

Tengu's have the misfortune of having the Gravitational Capacitor, which I have yet to find a practical use for. Maybe it would be better if it was a MWD sigradius or cap use bonus. The Proteus also suffers from this horrid SS.

Other offhanded musings....

The Covert Reconfiguration should be shifted to either the Engineering or Electronic Subsystem with a 2M or 1M/1L slot layout. This would allow for you to choose your weapon of choice ECM, Missiles, Hybrids, Drones, Nuet but if you want to fit a cloak you can if you give up a hardpoint/ utility high slot. A cloaky missile/drone Legion, a cloaky drone Proteus, or a Cloaky Missile Loki would be cool.

Doesn't make it good though. There's no reason why Covops couldn't be moved off the Offensive sub and still have a damage reducing role bonus or whatever. A little bit fo flexibility wouldn't go amiss, especially if it allows more wiggle room for nerfing the **** out of their headline stats

Stop messing with stuff. K, thanks.

you can still fit a tengu with 6 hml or ham launchers with spare cpu/powergrid. Your choices are not really limited.



and what's the problem here?
1st gives you extra launcher/turret and extra power.
2nd gives you extra launcher and extra cap
3rd gives you ALOT of cap comparing to other subsystems and extra low
4th gives you extra low and heat reduction



first you talk about 4 subsystems that that and 'only' have 3 real choices, but then you want 2 subsystems to have nearly the same bonuses. There is a reason why subsystem with extra turret hardpoint has bonus to powergrid, turrets require more powergrid than launchers.



No they don't, they offer extension of offensive subsystem and make you choose if you want more gank(hardpoints) or tank( capacitor subsystem)


If you look closely at propulsion subsystems, then you'll notice there's fuel catalyst subsystem. It gives you bonus so you don't actually have to fit mwd on your tengu and have signature of a battleship.

Why should a T3 ship be less powerful than a T2? Both from a matirials and a technological standpoint this does not make sense. A fully fit rail tengu is much more expensive than a rail eagle. Often the subsystems and hull cost 500m or more.

While i agree that T3s need a rebalance, nuetering them to be worse than a t2 ship would remove the point of having a T3 ship.

They're not supposed to be worse than a T2, they're supposed to be worse that the T2 at what the T2 does. You should not be able to make the tengu a better rail sniper than the eagle, but you should be able to make a competent rail sniper with solid ECM or a RLML system that can put down competent remote reps as well. Overall the T3's should be 80% as good at two things for a higher cost, which is great in small gangs but less useful in fleets.

I think the way I worded my problem with the engineering subsystems came off wrong. My main problem with the Power Multiplier SS is that if gives an extra turret hard point and the powergrid to fit it whereas the Augmented Cap gives a launcher and some cap. I have no problem with the other two SS. Hell I don't even really have a problem with the Augemented Cap SS as it does actually give you benefits outside the extra hardpoint. I'd like to see the Power Grid Multiplier give the hardpoint, have the extra 100PGU shifted to its baseline and have a minor engineering bonus added.

The balance between individual subs is a serious issue that does need to be comprehensively addressed during their next major balance pass.

In regards to the cloak sub, it would be a simple issue to move the covops ability to all of the covops offensive subs into the Emergent Locus Analyzer, but remove any cpu reduction so it has to have 100 spare CPU to fit it properly. This would ensure that combat fits using covert ops would be gimped to fit them appropriately, and the normal use for the sub, which is scanning, doesn't go to waste since generally it's not used for direct combat outside of combat probes.

Freeing up the offensive sub from covert ops would allow for new weapon options. Something that focuses on damage application, like tracking speed and (new bonus) sig reduction for turrets, or drone speed and tracking for drone subs, would be appropriate.

Something else that would be interesting for defensive sub balance (still needs a full rework) would be to order resist amount by usage. Example would be the logi sub and active tank subs would have the highest native resists, while the HP and warfare link subs would have the least, around where ewar frigs and dictors are at now. This would help focus their roles a little more, and reduce the absurd ehp you can get out of legions and proteii.

Rest of post follows below since I don't like making huge text walls.

ISK is a poor choice for a basis on balance

T2 ships fill specialist niche roles
T3's are multi-role generalists

A Tengu can duplicate the roles from several T2 hull classes based on subsystems
Frigate - Cov-Ops
Cruiser - HAC, Recon, Logistic
Battle Cruiser - Command Ship
Industrial - Transport


[edit]
If you want a Logi ship
best choice is a Logi (no brainer there really)
a T3 will work, but its not as effective
a HAC is really bad choice

this choice process SHOULD follow the same pattern for each role that a T3 can assume
for some T3's and some roles, this is not the case



T3's lose a lot of this versatility as some people are reluctant to destroy equipped riggings

Augmented Plating subs at 7.5% still broken with exact T2 resist profiles.

But nobody cares.