EVE General Discussion

I'm having trouble understanding you.

First, you seem to suggest that there are actions that a player can take to mitigate the effect of a successful jam once the jam has landed, although you don't actually mention what these actions might be.

But then you suggest that ECM is in fact based on RNG, which was the point that has been made repeatedly in this thread. So it looks like you start off disagreeing with me (without giving any reasons for doing so), but then end up pretty much saying what I said. Only with more profanity.

Care to clarify?

It's obvious: The counter to ECM is being lucky! Learn to RNG, noob!

Actually, I think the majority view ECM to be fine at its current level.

Sure, it can be annoying to get ECM'd when roaming around solo or in a small gank. But one can take measures to diminish the chances of taking engagements against people with ECM. Just like miners can take measures to decrease the chance of getting suicide ganked.

But miners don't. They prefer to come to the forums and whine.

While people love to tout the line of "ECM is worse than other EWAR types because there's no counterplay", the fact is there is very few realistic things you can do to counter other EWAR types while in the heat of battle. And some of the same things you do to counter those other EWAR types are the same things you'd do to counter ECM, so ECM is not unique or special in that regard.

"That regard"

I emphasize that because ECM is a bit different than other types of EWAR, and I believe that the problem is in what it does to a victim, not what counterplay may or may not be functional in the game. Let's break it down in a very simple format.

If you are webbed- you can still do pretty much anything except move. You can shoot enemies, point, neut, etc.

If you are pointed - you can still slowboat. You can shoot enemies, point, neut, etc.

If you are tracking disrupted - no matter what people may say about manual piloting, you're not likely to make use of any guns. What few hits you may get are either dumb luck from the enemy not doing basic piloting, or just luck with the RNG hit chances. Here's the kicker though, did they bring the right type of tracking disruption? If they bring the wrong type of weapon disruption, their EWAR is useless. Even if they do disrupt you, you can move, sic drones, neut, point, web, etc.

If you are target pointed - you take some more damage. You can still do anything you want; there's no hostile action preventing you from doing anything.

If you are neuted - neuting is more of the long game when it comes to engagements. The prevalence of cap booster setups in PvP means that you're not likely to deprive someone of cap quickly. That's why they call it pressure, because they're basically nudging your cap supply and hoping to eat up your cap faster than you can boost it or that you run out of boosters. While under neut pressure you can still do everything you want, just micromanage your cap, hope you have enough boosters, etc. Even if your cap runs dry, you can shoot projectile guns, missiles, sic drones, and slowboat.

If you are damped - well this might be the most universally hated EWAR type because it's universally effective. It may not be ECM but it'll deprive you of combat ability all the same. Being able to get in close to brawl is very situation-dependent and pulling range to try to out-range someone actively dampening your lock range is kinda ironic, if it's even an option. While damped, you can still move about freely, but your combat options will be limited to whatever pittance of lock range you still have. Heck, why even bother with turret disruption when you can cut the enemy's ability to lock down to 5km? His 40km optimal range doesn't mean anything if he can't lock you anyway.

If you are ECM'd - you can sit and regen some cap, move about freely, check Twitter, listen to some voicemails.

So you see, most of those EWAR effects have things you can do, even if not "counterplay" to the direct action taking place (as in, if you're turret disrupted, you can still point and web a target). ECM prevents you from doing anything. In fact I think it was put very succinctly by someone just a bit earlier, so I'll quote directly.


However I wanted to illustrate that point as much as possible, hence the long post.

Point, web, neut, damp are all universally effective. Even if they don't completely cripple your combat ability, they will hinder you greatly. Their counterplay modules also don't do much to stave off those effects - by design I believe. People can holler about it from the top of the hills all they want, but a bonused EWAR used against you is going to be much more effective than however many modules you stacked up and gimped your fit to get on your ship. Those counters mitigate but can never fully eliminate hostile influence over your systems.

ECM, by contrast, is very weird. It's binary pass/fail, rather than a measured effect. It's counterplay module offers no advantage in battle aside from the counter (as opposed to something like a tracking computer which was already providing you with turret bonuses). And that pass/fail effect is brutally different than the other modules.

So, ECM feels very powerful, but it's also very, very finicky. There's also many ships with high sensor strength that makes attempts to jam them an exercise in futility (*cough*guardian chains*cough) for how few actually land. And as was stated earlier, jam ships tend to be paper thin. Overall, I think ECM is in a very odd spot yes, but I think it's in a balanced spot nonetheless. I wouldn't mind the jams being changed over to 10 seconds a shot, and perhaps sensor dampeners being nerfed in regards to their "targeting range" attribute to perhaps emphasize their use with scan resolution scripts in combination with ECMs to deprive enemy ships of lock-ons even longer after the ECM jam ends.

Even that is not true, though. Say somebody webs you ... well, web them back. Or damp them, so they can't kite you anymore. Or suck them dry with your neuts. Or blow them to bits with your guns.

Say, somebody damps you. Fly up to him with heat on your prop, maybe do a couple slingshot shenanigans. That will pretty much make the damp useless. And then you rip him to shreds, which will shut off the damps.

Somebody paints you .... keep moving, to decrease imcoming damage, boost shields more often to mitigate the increased damage and concentrate on getting DPS off the field before your cap runs dry. If you can catch him, kill him. That will shut off the painter.

Somebody tracking-disrupts you - reduce transversal, or get closer, so you can still hit, even if disrupted. overheat your tracking computer (that is useful even if you are not getting targeted with a specific module, unlike ECCM) to counter the tracking disruption to a degree. And then kill the guy, which will shut off the disruptor.

Somebody neuts you - neut them back - that will shut off their neuts. Or boost cap - that will let you ignore their neuts to a degree. Or kill them, which will shut off the neuts too. Or have a cap battery (that is useful even if you are not getting targeted with a specific module, unlike ECCM), that will let you ignore at least a couple of neuts.

Those are all realistic, and those are all counterplay in the sense that you can react when the guy activates the module and by reacting counter the effect, ignore the effect or even make it go away. Yes there are situations where a scramweb-kiter may just outspeed and outrange you and there's nothing you can do. Or the same for a very fast range-damp-kiter. But those are just the usual rock beats scissors type situations, and there are many ships and fittings those tactics may not work on. The only rock that beats the ECM-scissors is luck.

Somebody jams you - you are a brick. You can look longingly at your guns and neuts, you can overheat your prop and ... bump into the jammer. And you can wait and hope that the next cycle doesn't hit.

It's a matter of consistency.

The majority is in favor of griefing, which has exactly the (supposedly) negative effects that the ECM-whiners here claim are bad about ECM. It follows that the majority is also in favor of ECM, and like griefing, they want to see more ECM, and for it to be harder to counter.

BTW - don't assume that my suggestion of a ranged bumping module has anything to do with mining. EVE players aren't just supporters of CODE (and anyway you could argue CODE are honest blackmailers rather than griefers) .

A long-range bumping module would be helpful for many other kinds of griefing too - the point is that it can't be countered. ECM should be the same: there should be a skill that lets you get the probability of ECM taking effect to 100%.

All weapons shoot potential non-participation. I shoot bullets. You die. Therein begin the non-participation. ECM modules take module slots, CPU, PG, and capacitor energy from the enemy ship. Having one more ECM boat on the enemy team is one less DPS ship shooting at you. Or one less Logi undoing your damage.


Stop crying because the enemy is using effective weapons. Learn to use effective weapons of your own and counter theirs and you will profit.

Don't forget to stay at deep falloff of the ECM dudes when shooting at his friends in order to set the RNG against the jammer. Also, set all your drones on the ECM as soon as the opportunity presents itself to force him to bugger off the field.

And I already pointed out or refuted all of these points.

Damp - situation-dependent and might even be counterproductive. If you have rails and you get into brawling range, you're at a heavy disadvantage. Maybe he is too, or maybe he fit blasters and that was his plan all along, but don't pretend that flying straight into a cluster of enemies is always a good or recommended idea.

Paint - I said it wasn't even that big of a deal. Yes your assertion in this case is accurate, but it's also common knowledge and every bit a part of normal combat piloting regardless of EWAR but especially in the event of hostile EWAR. So, it shouldn't need to be said. Okay if you want brownie points for summoning Captain Obvious, you can have 'em, but nothing about this statement is a revelation.

Disrupt - already addressed this. In combat all pilots are constantly moving and changing direction and speed. Good luck getting transversal down long enough to get viable hits enough to be effective. I already said it's possible in the event of bad enemy piloting, but don't count on it. Yes, you can probably get tranversal down for a few seconds, but you're not going to keep it because the enemy pilot is going to change direction shortly. A few glancing blows will only make a difference in fringe cases, and again, I'm talking about more general combat and not fringe cases and situations.

Nuets - may be a common module to carry, but not every ship has the spare highslot or fitting. I was giving more general advice for a theoretical fleet ship which might have tank, local reps, a cap booster, etc. But if you have neuts, you should have neuted him first. If you're getting hit with neuts before you can bring your own to bear, then you're likely getting hit by a bonused hull or a larger sized neut carried on a bigger hull, so counter-neuting is probably not going to work out unless it's a fringe circumstance where a dozen of your teammates all also have neuts to contribute. In which case, ganging up on a primary target is again common knowledge and tactics. I even pointed out that many PvP setups have cap boosters, so again, you're treading territory already refuted or covered by my earlier post.

The realistic counters I already listed and there's nothing new you're bringing to the table here.

Caldari need ECM because their PvP ships suck (outside of RLM Caracals and Cerb fleets).
Take away ECM and their empire dies.