Ships & Modules

It could probably be a way of dealing with the issue - if that was actually the issue.

From a Game-design perspective:

Now it isn't the issue which means that CCP would invest a limited amount of design-time for a limited amount of intended effect, with a massive workload on QA to ensure it doesn't cause unforseen imbalances and vastly negative repercussions (which it probably will anyway, considering complexity and track record). It falls under the cathegory of "don't touch what isn't broken", though that too sadly seems quite trendy (introducing changes for the sake of introducing changes with short term yield and long term wastage.


Popularity: the why's and not's...

The reason BC are popular is because up until and including that level of gameplay, skillpoint advancements is measured in swaths of weeks. Past the point of BC they are measured in swaths of months. The same goes for ISK-investment. Both issues can be described in terms of comparison. Once you can fly a tech one Cruiser you are merely days away from flying a Battlecruiser (when you first play the game you are merely a couple of weeks away from both; and then i'm considering the inclusion of core skills and some basic tech two fitting). The two ship classes then use the same modules with no additional training time or larger cost-deficit either, while insurance ensure no larger deficit on the hull.

A very new player may disagree, but in the larger scheme of things the two classes of ships are the same - takes as long time to fly and cost as much to fly, with some generalization. That's why people fly BC, because as a larger hull they are meant to be slightly better in a straight up performance comparison, but the effort required to gain the performance increase is next to non-existant.


Popularity: the effects...

For me that's fair to some degree though, i don't mind Cruisers being a stepping stone in terms of skillpoints at least. The problem is with the nigh risk-free use of BC, which some people (very likely including some of our key designers) consider a positive side of engaging risk-adverse players in PvP. What they don't understand is that they feed risk-adversity while doing it and marginalize a legacy that form some important core aspects of EVE as a meaningful game. Meaningless PvP is useless PvP, there are other MMO's for that; and a powerful aspect of the plight in the current endgame (0.0 life, even though the same designers try to redirect that perspective as well, instancing the game to pamper everyone because they have failed to balance the sandbox to be inclusive, interactive and for everyone - on the same server, in the same world). The point of EVE.

I've criticized that time and time again lately, since while the majority of the community have reacted to design-trends regarding other industry trends (alternate subscription models etc) i have been trying to point out similar cop-outs and double-edged choices with regard to sheer game-design issues. We have had a vast increase of instanced-gameplay of our sandbox, scripted-gameplay of our emergence and band-aid patchwork to give "something" until the underlying issues could be dealt with. Crucible in that manner is quite similar to Apocrypha - with an array of short-term appealing changes to postpone the screaming need of complex core changes.

I'm drifting off topic.

How to nerf BC? Make them more expensive to fly.


Enter Garmon:

One fairly refreshing take on that was what was proposed by Garmon in his guest-appearance on Bring solo back #6, where they casually discussed rebalancing production resources of tech II hulls and tech II modules. Making modules cost more and hulls cost less. That would drive up prices on your typical tech one ships with tech two fitting that has been staple for many years while maintaining an equilibrium among those that aim to fly ships with a general notion of loss. Inadvertedly that also balances hulls as a tech two fit Cruiser would be far more on par with a tech one fit BC, while filling the extra slots on a BC with tech two modules would make up a larger part of the loss mail, while the proceeds of ship kills would drive scoring kills - while cheapening out on modules (and thus drops) has a direct negative effect on performance.


Positive-Productive design:

Enticing players into PvP with potential gains is far more effective than trying to goad them in by marginalizing loss. It also focuses on the positive instead of the negative, which makes Garmons idea far more productive for the game than recent trends of pampering risk-adversity while ruining balance seen with Crucible and in continued balance-discussions on this forum, in CSM-minutes or elsewhere.

I've read it, i consider myself to be a fairly analytical person, i still struggle to understand the point of it.

I get the obvious, they are planning a massive reform project to streamline ship-class progression.

I lack the understanding of what it is they presume to achieve with it, why it's needed and what direct positive results we can draw from it. Why is it necessary, why do we want it, why is it prioritized?

The information we've got so far does not really invalidate the current discussion in this thread either - since all we can expect is a major overhaul without any details so far.

Allow me to stay sceptical on all levels based on the currently available information. I'm sceptical of the motivation and ambition, i'm sceptical of the amount, resource allocation and ability to carry out the full reform (eg., they presume to streamline it yet the overview charts look more complicated than what we have - they spend more time reassuring the playerbase of lost skillpoints than they do discussing the results of the changes); and i'm sceptical of the continued development, results and details of the following ship-changes likely to come after it.

What worries me is that they still seem to draw alot from shallow popular interjections and belief, such as "the tiering system must go" and use that as a basis for the massive reform rather than some concrete and tangible objective or end result. That's all i have to say about it here and now, i reserve myself for any future comments when we've seen more, or when i've read it through more thuroughly - i could definately have misread something.

As such, discussing the would-be of that Devblog is pretty off topic here, imo.

1/10. NH has 2 less slots than drake.

Community knows and has known for years that the progression from drake to Nighthawk is underwhelming at best...

I more or less agree with the entirety of your point however there are a few things stated here that i generally do not agree with.


The idea of buffing field commands to make them viable in today's eve relative to their training times and hull cost is perfect. Field commands generally have a sig radius that is slightly smaller than a bs w/o being small enough to make a significant impact on comparable tracking unless you're orbiting at sub 500m. So this more or less puts them on a similar level to tier 2 bcs when you talk about combat application however they do not have the high efficiency price tag that makes BCs so desirable. Essentially what I'm getting at here is that going from tech 1 to tech 2 BCs nets you one of the smallest progressions in the entire game for one of the steepest skill investments. This needs to be changed.

Hit points, as stated above. If you notice the progression from tech 1 to tech 2 combat ships in almost all other classes there is at least some form of an hp buff. Sadly with Field commands this was once true however the hp buff that BCs received years ago was only applied to tech 1 ships leaving many of the field commands with lower hp values than their tech 1 brothers. This needs to be change.

Resists, There are so many ships that have been added/fixed since the introduction of field commands that are so significantly better that there is no longer a justification to keep this line of ship's resistance nerfed to keep them from being op. They need to have their racial t2 resists increased to the level of HACS as the quoted poster as already stated.

Slots, All of the field commands need to have an additional slot added except for the Sleipnir as it's already very very good and has 1 more slot than the rest anyway.

Nighthawk: This ship should receive one additional midslot allowing it to have a brick tank advantage over both the tengu and drake. With the addition of full tech 2 resists this will allow the ship to be the end all be all of combat related brick shield tanks shy of specific faction BS that carry a much steeper price tag than the NH. The NH also needs like +170ish grid... With these changes there might actually be a reason to fly a NH in pvp or pve over a drake or tengu.

Absolution: This ship should receive one additional high slot along with 1 additional turret hard point and the grid to be able to fit +1 heavy pulse laser. The main reason I see this is needed is because of the legion. Currently the legion posses very similar levels of dps while have a significantly beefier brick tank, significantly better locking time, and significantly better range while maintaining better speed and a smaller sig. With the addition of 1 more turret the absolution will at the very least have a good dps advantage over the legion at close range and with the change to it's resists will be at least on par with it's armor beef tank.

Astarte: This ship needs another low. Making an active tanked armor gank ship is foolish with only 6 lows. You're gank and tank take the same slots and with the mechanics of larger blaster ships both heavy amounts of gank and tank are mandatory as the dps advantages seen in smaller ships does not carry over as well when looking at larger hulls. The addition of 1 low slot will allow the ship to be either slightly gankier or slightly tankier making it a viable alternative to the sleipnir which should have the advantage in range, speed and cap rather than just everything as it currently does. The Astarte also needs a slight bit more grid making a reasonable 7 t2 neutron setup not require grid implants...

As for the quoted comment about changing the models over to their tier 2 BC hulls... I'd prefer not to do this and instead upgrade every single t2 ship model in the game to look like heavily modified versions of their tech 1 counterparts. The changes to models should reflect the way in which these ships improve upon their tech 1 variants instead of having either silly looking throw on thrusters or shiny new paint jobs like they currently do.

The problem is that to fit a cruiser competitively you need to spend like 20+ mil on modules/rigs/ammo making them close to the same cost as a BC after insurance payout with significant disadvantages in the tank/gank department with minimal advantages in speed and agility.

I'd argue that is time for another "Class" of rigs that is somewhere between small and medium that is to be used on destroyers and cruisers. Or you could go the other way around and introduce a new class of rig between medium and large designed to be fit onto BC class hulls. Either way the net result needs to be that fitting and flying a cruiser needs to be significantly less expensive than a BC.

1/10