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Dev blog: Command Bursts and the New World of Fleet Boosting

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DeadGuyVegas
JABOFPE
#1681 - 2016-11-16 23:19:03 UTC

CCP is doing a good job of eliminating long-term subscribers one account at a time. Sad
[/quote]


Yep I have lost so many friends... Seems every new expansion some other friend leaves the game.

Maybe it's better to get the new money then keep the old money...
Rroff
Antagonistic Tendencies
#1682 - 2016-11-17 15:14:10 UTC  |  Edited by: Rroff
Urduri wrote:
[quote=Vyctam Shadowclaw]
CCP is doing a good job of eliminating long-term subscribers one account at a time. Sad


What gets me - I don't know why they had to double down on the solution - like many of the past changes that have resulted in a not insignificant number of people leaving they've gone full tilt at it rather than try to find a balance between the different types of players.

While you'll always get some complaining keeping some of the (local) defensive bonuses, web range and mining, etc. stuff to the old system but moving some of the offensive centric boosts to the new system i.e. point range, remote rep, ewar and prop mod speed would have gone a long way to dealing with the main complaints about 10+km/s frigs pointing at 30+km or whatever, added some degree of interesting gameplay to it (the new setup is way too much of a chore) while not ******* off those players who'd invested in links setups for PVE, certain fleet compositions, etc. Also while making drug boosters essential for PVP isn't probably a good end result a certain amount of balance could have been provided as well by introducing PVP specific boosters for small gang and solo type use that don't stack with links and provide a potentially more desirable benefit over links for specific areas like point range.
Minamel
Perkone
Caldari State
#1683 - 2016-11-17 15:53:28 UTC  |  Edited by: Minamel
Quote:

Can anyone explain when someone would want to swap out the ammo in their bursts?

At max skills+mindlink in a command ship (best duration bonus), the duration is 129s.
At max skills, the min time between bursts is 60s cycle time + 30s reload time = 90s.

You can't run more than one burst off of a single module:
- 2 bursts off of one module would require a duration of 180s.
- 3 bursts off of 2 modules is almost doable, but you're still short a few seconds, even at max skills. Assuming an even stagger of 45 seconds between modules means you get a gap time (i.e. time when a burst is not being applied to fleet members) of 5 seconds for each burst (practicing on SiSi I've found that the combination of lag, ticks, and pilot error means that this is more like 7-10 seconds of gap time). Even if that gap time is acceptable, it still means that you have a really long "build up" period for your fleet as your bursts start applying. Burst 1 is applied instantly, burst 2 has to wait 45 seconds (!) and burst 3 has to wait 90 seconds (!!). Also keep in mind that this whole thing requires Command Ships V and a mindlink -- it's pretty bad with CSIV and unworkable without the mindlink.
- 4 bursts off of 3 modules isn't doable due to the type restrictions on bursts (i.e. info bursts can't load armor ammo).



This!

I brought the new mechanics to fleet yesterday and this i have to say:

1) Ships that have to be ongrid is fine to me even as carebear that likes to hide in a cloaked nullified ship on a save. I like the tears of all the mighty pvpers that where used to get advantages from there offgrid altboosters. This was a stupid game mechanic.

2) Love it. As fleet booster now people see you doing it they see what they get and you get all the love from them you deserve

3) Some boost (blue ones) look (maybe too) similar to dictor bubbles. Some fleetmembers where almost panicwarpoff every 2 minutes.

4) Itn my opinion a T3 should have a max of 4 boost modules (+1) and a Command Ship should have 5(+1). You could do that with a T2 command burst rig that give +2 modules instead of the +1 from the T1 version. Please?

5) The most important thing: Like someone postet above. With absolute maximum skills and faction implant i could not aply 2 bursts from on module. They last 2 minutes but cooldown+reload is more than one minute. So every skill that boosts up boost duration and lower reload times are just useless because it changes nothing. One burstmodule for one burst type.
That feels wrong. With max skills there should be a "ongoing single burst or maintain 2 bursts with reloading and micromanagement" option. If you ask me the reload time shoud be much much shorter.

Overall: Like it, bringing booster ongrid was the right desicion.
Frances Voltaire
Eldorado Exhumers
Fractions of PI
#1684 - 2016-11-18 22:11:12 UTC
Apparently you get a weapons timer when you boost.
While this makes sense for Shield Armor Info and Skirmish, but Mining Boosts?

Armor, Shield, Info and Skirmish boosts can be used to own advantage against others so it makes sense you get a weapon timer on these whether you do or do not attack another.

Mining Boosts can only be used for self while they can improve your ability to harvest ICE Rocks and Gas, they provide 0 combat advantage. There is no way to use them offensively against another player or even NPC. There does not seem to be a reason to have a weapons timer while boosting miners.

However, you can boost while in warp. Not sure what that will be used for.

Apologies for the repeat post from Ascension Feedback, this just seems a more appropriate place to post about Command Bursts and weapons timers
Gulmuk
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#1685 - 2016-11-23 04:21:07 UTC
Why is it that the boost effects last longer than cycle time? Shouldn't the cycle time increase with boost effect time? For instance on my porpoise, I have a 60s mining boost module cycle time, but I get a 97s effect timer from the boosts. So why not make it all 97s? There aren't any skills from what I have read.. Maybe I missed something, but there's no skills to increase cycle time for the booster modules.

On top of that. Today when I was boosting. The first time I lit my modules off, they wasted 2 cycles before they started boosting my fleet of miners. The guys were sitting there going, WTF is going on, where's the boosts. I was just like "IDK... The modules are active and I have an effects timer on my hud..." So for 2 min my group was looking at me like I was stupid and couldn't figure out how to load and turn on a command module. Flippin stupid...


Also I had a group of 6 miners land on field after going to drop ore in a POS. All of them landed within 10km of me, and I cycled my boosts on right after they landed. But the boosts only applied to 1 of the miners. The other 5 had to wait till my modules cycled a second time to get the boosts.

IDK why CCP would deploy an expansion that is SO DAMN BUGGY!!! C'mon CCP... That's why you have SISI for... TO work out the bugs!
HandelsPharmi
Pharmi on CharBazaar
#1686 - 2016-11-23 06:36:57 UTC
Gulmuk wrote:
Why is it that the boost effects last longer than cycle time? Shouldn't the cycle time increase with boost effect time? For instance on my porpoise, I have a 60s mining boost module cycle time, but I get a 97s effect timer from the boosts. So why not make it all 97s? There aren't any skills from what I have read.. Maybe I missed something, but there's no skills to increase cycle time for the booster modules.

On top of that. Today when I was boosting. The first time I lit my modules off, they wasted 2 cycles before they started boosting my fleet of miners. The guys were sitting there going, WTF is going on, where's the boosts. I was just like "IDK... The modules are active and I have an effects timer on my hud..." So for 2 min my group was looking at me like I was stupid and couldn't figure out how to load and turn on a command module. Flippin stupid...


Also I had a group of 6 miners land on field after going to drop ore in a POS. All of them landed within 10km of me, and I cycled my boosts on right after they landed. But the boosts only applied to 1 of the miners. The other 5 had to wait till my modules cycled a second time to get the boosts.

IDK why CCP would deploy an expansion that is SO DAMN BUGGY!!! C'mon CCP... That's why you have SISI for... TO work out the bugs!


Your miners have been out of range?
If they are still in warp (even if landing on the grid), they may be invulnerable for the boost...
Sgt Ocker
What Corp is it
#1687 - 2016-11-23 08:08:05 UTC
HandelsPharmi wrote:
Gulmuk wrote:
Why is it that the boost effects last longer than cycle time? Shouldn't the cycle time increase with boost effect time? For instance on my porpoise, I have a 60s mining boost module cycle time, but I get a 97s effect timer from the boosts. So why not make it all 97s? There aren't any skills from what I have read.. Maybe I missed something, but there's no skills to increase cycle time for the booster modules.

On top of that. Today when I was boosting. The first time I lit my modules off, they wasted 2 cycles before they started boosting my fleet of miners. The guys were sitting there going, WTF is going on, where's the boosts. I was just like "IDK... The modules are active and I have an effects timer on my hud..." So for 2 min my group was looking at me like I was stupid and couldn't figure out how to load and turn on a command module. Flippin stupid...


Also I had a group of 6 miners land on field after going to drop ore in a POS. All of them landed within 10km of me, and I cycled my boosts on right after they landed. But the boosts only applied to 1 of the miners. The other 5 had to wait till my modules cycled a second time to get the boosts.

IDK why CCP would deploy an expansion that is SO DAMN BUGGY!!! C'mon CCP... That's why you have SISI for... TO work out the bugs!


Your miners have been out of range?
If they are still in warp (even if landing on the grid), they may be invulnerable for the boost...

And sometimes you can have all your miners warp in sit stationary at 1,000m of the Orca and only part if the gang will get boosts on the first cycle - It's like the mechanics of the new bursts can simply "miss" ships in the fleet..

My opinions are mine.

  If you don't like them or disagree with me that's OK.- - - - - - Just don't bother Hating - I don't care

It really is getting harder and harder to justify $23 a month for each sub.
CaptCommando
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#1688 - 2016-11-23 18:15:24 UTC
Will the command burst apply the effect to the caster? so if you fit out say a BC with one and take it out solo and use the burst in combat will you get the effect or does it effect all but the caster?
HandelsPharmi
Pharmi on CharBazaar
#1689 - 2016-11-23 19:18:44 UTC
Caster = booster?
Yes, it affects the guy, who applies the boost.
Nevyn Auscent
Broke Sauce
#1690 - 2016-11-23 19:49:13 UTC
Sgt Ocker wrote:

And sometimes you can have all your miners warp in sit stationary at 1,000m of the Orca and only part if the gang will get boosts on the first cycle - It's like the mechanics of the new bursts can simply "miss" ships in the fleet..

Ships are on grid in warp a lot longer than you think often. So it could easily be the in warp part.
If it's not send a reproducible bug report in.
But user error accounts for more 'bugs' than actual bugs do.
Sgt Ocker
What Corp is it
#1691 - 2016-11-24 10:57:04 UTC
Nevyn Auscent wrote:
Sgt Ocker wrote:

And sometimes you can have all your miners warp in sit stationary at 1,000m of the Orca and only part if the gang will get boosts on the first cycle - It's like the mechanics of the new bursts can simply "miss" ships in the fleet..

Ships are on grid in warp a lot longer than you think often. So it could easily be the in warp part.
If it's not send a reproducible bug report in.
But user error accounts for more 'bugs' than actual bugs do.

Land on grid, keep at range 1,000 m of the Orca, wait till all ships are at chosen range (1,000 m), fire up boosts - more than half the gang DID NOT get boosts on the first cycle.
I'm not sure exactly how warp mechanics work but do know, you can't keep at range on something while in warp.

You might be able to find "user error" there but it has happened too many times to be as simple as that.

"reproducible bug report", your joking right?

My opinions are mine.

  If you don't like them or disagree with me that's OK.- - - - - - Just don't bother Hating - I don't care

It really is getting harder and harder to justify $23 a month for each sub.
Rroff
Antagonistic Tendencies
#1692 - 2016-11-24 11:24:07 UTC  |  Edited by: Rroff
Not spent that much time with them so far since returning as I dislike the system - but I noticed a couple of times with 3 characters in fleet it said something like "boosts applied to 1 ship" when activating them with all ships in range and active on grid (I had the other 2 target locked).

EDIT: So far testing it it has applied to all fleet members correctly :S
Urbusk P'Tchu
Imperial Shipment
Amarr Empire
#1693 - 2016-11-29 15:27:43 UTC
NOT at all happy w/ this change . Do not understand why you turn everything we work to get . And just tell us to bad .
Rroff
Antagonistic Tendencies
#1694 - 2016-11-29 16:04:28 UTC
Urbusk P'Tchu wrote:
NOT at all happy w/ this change . Do not understand why you turn everything we work to get . And just tell us to bad .


One thing I don't like about it - for stuff like local tank buffs, mining, etc. if you make the ammo too limited it becomes too much of a chore to be worth dealing with, if you make the ammo relatively plentiful (as they've done) then most of the time for all intents and purposes its the same as unlimited except that very rare case you forget to stock up - which is a mechanic that over the last few years they've worked extensively to remove from eve so not sure why its been introduced here.

That said I do like the way the system works for stuff like point range, ewar and remote repair as they have a much bigger impact and that level of bonus should require some effort - infact if remote repair bonuses were a targeted limited area of effect (say 8km or something around the targetted ship) that could be quite interesting.
Trinitro
Net 7
Cannon.Fodder
#1695 - 2016-12-04 14:28:35 UTC
why the hell does a burst module auto fire every 30 seconds when the related skills that "Make it more efficient" make the effect last four times that while the module keeps on wasting ammo every 30 seconds. Don't tell me you want to give me something to do while boosting a mining fleet because babysitting burst modules and clicking them all every 2 minutes instead of leaving em on auto repeat is a joke not a meaningful addition to the game play at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I never post on forums and this lapse in judgement has forced me to comment. remove your heads from your asses please
Nevyn Auscent
Broke Sauce
#1696 - 2016-12-04 18:10:45 UTC  |  Edited by: Nevyn Auscent
Trinitro wrote:
why the hell does a burst module auto fire every 30 seconds when the related skills that "Make it more efficient"

Because the skills are not about making it more efficient. But about making it easier to maintain boosts on people even if they are moving around the grid. Understand what the skills actually are meant to do makes it much easier to understand why they work that way. Not everyone is in a stationary barge fleet even if we are talking miners.

Additionally the charges are so cheap that it's an irrelevant additional cost. What the charges mean though is that you don't have to refit modules to change boosts, just change ammo, which makes it much easier to change boosts in the middle of combat if the circumstances change. Since you can't refit with a weapons timer, but you can reload.

And no Ocker, I'm not joking, I've done Dev work myself. If the user can work out exactly what combination of steps causes errors, it makes the Dev time involved in tracing a single bug vastly shorter, and means it might actually get fixed. Because otherwise what tends to happen is the Dev spends 2 hours chasing their tail, not finding any issues in the code, and gives up and moves onto a bug that they do have a specific reproduction method for that they can find the error for to fix.
Logan Revelore
Symbiotic Systems
#1697 - 2016-12-04 19:42:55 UTC
Oobiedoob Benubi wrote:
Amazing. You've figured out a way to destroy the entire CASMA community. CCP, you really suck.


Guess you could say that they suck tears?
Logan Revelore
Symbiotic Systems
#1698 - 2016-12-04 20:03:51 UTC
Cpt Hidoshi Ambraelle wrote:
Absolutely the FIRST thing to say about this is IT'S TERRIBLE.
Here is why
I currently have 2 Rorq's If your currently planned changes go ahead As soon as the November expansion hits I will Reprocess them Plus My Orca as I would rather mine with NO Boosts at all than to put a rorq on grid NO MATTER what you do to it.
I would Rather put the capital parts from the 2x Rorq and 1x Orca towards some more dreads to sell than to keep and use them.
Rorq's currently cost what 2bill why in hell would someone want to try and boost with it on grid while trying to micro manage everything else.


Game design isn't terrible just because it negatively impacts your current applied strategy. If you look at it, not from your own view point, but from the game design view point, then you'll see that it makes sense to remove off grid boosting.
Rroff
Antagonistic Tendencies
#1699 - 2016-12-04 21:03:18 UTC  |  Edited by: Rroff
Logan Revelore wrote:

Game design isn't terrible just because it negatively impacts your current applied strategy. If you look at it, not from your own view point, but from the game design view point, then you'll see that it makes sense to remove off grid boosting.


From a game design perspective there isn't really a right or wrong perspective to off grid boosting what is more important is the overall gameplay that surrounds it and how it is executed and even then just because a particular implementation is "more right" doesn't mean that the right approach is a dramatic shift to that end.

There are some aspects of the new system I really like and infact don't think CCP has gone far enough while on the other hand there are changes that while more "valid" maybe as a gameplay mechanic had a bigger impact on people who were making use of links in more esoteric fashion or other ways that weren't directly connected to the areas where links caused an undesirable impact and IMO far less imperative to make such dramatic changes to even if the changes could be seen as more "right".


EDIT: Regarding mining boosts - the porpoise actually makes a pretty decent on grid boosting platform though it could do with a few more tweaks to really encourage people to use it on grid even more and doesn't have the same sting as a rorqual or even orca loss.
Sgt Ocker
What Corp is it
#1700 - 2016-12-05 11:49:55 UTC
Nevyn Auscent wrote:
Trinitro wrote:
why the hell does a burst module auto fire every 30 seconds when the related skills that "Make it more efficient"

Because the skills are not about making it more efficient. But about making it easier to maintain boosts on people even if they are moving around the grid. Understand what the skills actually are meant to do makes it much easier to understand why they work that way. Not everyone is in a stationary barge fleet even if we are talking miners.

Additionally the charges are so cheap that it's an irrelevant additional cost. What the charges mean though is that you don't have to refit modules to change boosts, just change ammo, which makes it much easier to change boosts in the middle of combat if the circumstances change. Since you can't refit with a weapons timer, but you can reload.

And no Ocker, I'm not joking, I've done Dev work myself. If the user can work out exactly what combination of steps causes errors, it makes the Dev time involved in tracing a single bug vastly shorter, and means it might actually get fixed. Because otherwise what tends to happen is the Dev spends 2 hours chasing their tail, not finding any issues in the code, and gives up and moves onto a bug that they do have a specific reproduction method for that they can find the error for to fix.

And your little blurb is why in many cases it is not worth submitting bug reports.

Not everything is easy to reproduce but that doesn't mean the bug doesn't exist.

Three times last night half my exhumers missed getting boosts despite having been sat 1,000m from the Orca for just under a minute (the time since I last unloaded it and warped back to the ice belt).

How would you reproduce this error? Warp miners in, set keep at range 1,000 on the Orca, fill Orca, warp out dock and empty Orca, warp back to gang, set keep at range 1,000m (which most already are due to not having moved), start cycling boosts..

I have tried to reproduce it reliably, I can't - It is a random thing (it happened 3 times over 4 hours of mining).

PS; What the skills may be meant to do and what they actually achieve as far as your explanation goes - They leave a LOT to be desired. Max skills with faction implant, you get 126 seconds (that's if you go as soon as the boosts cycle) - Not really enough time to be "moving around a grid" and keep boosts. Like a lot of things Devs dream up, practical use often gets disregarded in the design.
The ONLY benefit to the new ongrid boosts comes when one dies mid cycle and another booster takes its place. Move away from the boosters, your as good as dead because your also out of logi range. So unless your feeling suicidal, don't do it..

My opinions are mine.

  If you don't like them or disagree with me that's OK.- - - - - - Just don't bother Hating - I don't care

It really is getting harder and harder to justify $23 a month for each sub.