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Incoming titan adjustments

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GeneralDisturbed
Pator Tech School
Minmatar Republic
#1361 - 2012-03-14 11:03:13 UTC
It's funny to see that pretty much the only people in this topic who complain about numbers counting for something are the people who stand to lose the ability to just instantly win a fight with titans. The same people who consistently manage to match our numbers when we fight them, and then drop titans when we start to win the fight based on strategy. They're not mad because they're being blobbed, or at risk to being blobbed, -they're not-. They're mad because their ability to instantly win a strategic battle with no effort is being taken away from them. Now they -will- have to be elite pvp.

I've seen time and time again that numbers are only a small part of what matters in a fight. Especially now with things like Time Dilation and the lack of lag. In the old eve, jumping a large fleet into a larger fleet was suicide, or a roll of the dice on who loaded first. And most of the fight was just hoping your guns would fire once in 15 minutes, before the node crashed. Now every action is accepted, everyone loads, everyone has a fair shot.

People ***** about drakes, but goons have tons of fleet doctrines, and I've seen 2 or 3 separate doctrines used in the same fight. Bombers, drakes, sniper t3's, sniper hurricanes, autocannons neuting canes, maelstroms, armor hacs, sniper hacs. All of these supposed cookie-cutter FOTM doctrines require coordination and a ton of support to survive. Dictors in the right place dropping bubbles at the right time, and knowing how to survive. Logistics knowing how to keep themselves alive and in position to rep. Interceptors and fast ships screening tackle and getting warpins. FC's that know how to probe, how to fight, when to run. When to bounce the fleet. Bombers knowing when to strike, who to strike, recons running scrams and webs on the people who need to be hit by... etc

The point of all this is, all these fleets require coordination and precision to win, and ALL OF THEM HAVE A CHANCE. You drop 300 ships on 200 ships, both sides can still win. You drop 50 titans on 300 ships, 400 ships, 500 ships, 800 ships... the titans just won. Hands down, no contest. No subcap fleet can stand on the field, and do the damage required to break reps, when they're losing a ship every single time the titans guns cycle. This is not the way eve is meant to be played, CCP has been nerfing titans since they came out, because they DO NOT FIT WITH EVE and never have. Every ship matters in eve, in every fleet, regardless of size. Until you bring titans in, and then the only ship that matters onfield is how many titans you have. That's not eve, and it's never going to be eve. So they're getting nerfed again, and will get nerfed more... get over it.
CCP Greyscale
C C P
C C P Alliance
#1362 - 2012-03-14 11:09:25 UTC
Shadoo wrote:
I don't think anyone who has flown a titan in combat can argue that the ship is not currently overpowered in combat when used in great numbers, just like no one could seriously argue about AOD DDs when they started to be used in 3+3 scale every 10 minutes

Of course, same goes for every ship in eve -- when used in great numbers, but Supercapitals certainly show this curve more often on the field

So I'm extremely happy that you state that the ship needs a role change - last time we were campaigning for AOD DD change -- this was exactly what a lot of us were asking for

But that was 3 years ago

I am therefore rather dissapointed that what we, the community at large, have been asking for a very long time is rather haphazardly brushed off as something that "will be looked at long term" with a surgical change that SCREAMS of a kneejerk reaction without really providing us with much to go on here to see your vision or have comfort you are going to do something in the long term for the "end game" ship in EVE

And forgive me for saying this -- but you have not always had a great track record of revisiting changes you've made in the past as surgical adjustments. Thus I feel like pressing a bit harder on the high level thoughts that have lead you to make this current fix

What is your intended role for Titan with this change on TQ today?

How will you evaluate if your changes implemented will match up with that role on the TQ combat field in this release? For example -- as far as I can see -- a large group of titans will still obliterate a large group of battleships/drakes -- all you've delayed is the first hit and require more micromanagement in making sure the lock queue is evenly spaced out

Given how large fights today unfold on TQ -- how do you see this ship fulfilling your intended role on heavily TiDi systems with the sig change

What is your future vision, even at high level, for the Titan ship class? Will it remain a combat asset or are you looking and overhauling it for something else (personally btw I've argued for the last 4 years that titans should NOT be a combat ship at all, but rather a massive alliance level asset for logistics/cloning/staging/etc)

What assurances can you offer us this change will not remain a permanent fixture for the long term?

With the combat ability of this ship being "surgically adjusted", would you be even willing to look at for example increasing the jump range of the ship to balance the change

And lastly -- are you going to allow those pilots who wish to wait for your stated longer term role adjustments to GM-dock their ship until such a time that this change is no longer a surgical measure in order to still utilize the account/character for combat in EVE?


The intended role for titans is a) jump bridging, b) doomsdaying things, c) fleet boosting and d) doing a decent job of killing capitals with their main guns.

We'll be assessing the success of this change based in the first instance on whether or not players are still telling us they're having problems with this sort of thing, and then if they are, looking at the situation objectively and seeing if it merits further work.

On systems under Time Dilation, we're expecting this to work mechanically identically but subjectively slower. Time Dilation is a technical fix to prevent performance issues on heavily loaded systems; it's not a game mechanic and we're not currently considering it for balancing purposes.

We don't currently have a clear future vision for titans, as mentioned in the first post. We've repeatedly tried and failed to find a role for them that we're happy with in the past, and we don't want to spend significant balance resources on revisiting this right now because we have other priorities.

We can't offer any assurances about our future plans. Every release (~6 months) we sit down and look at what our priorities are for the various different resources we have available (balancers, general designers, UI designers, various breeds of programmer, artists etc) and then allocate accordingly. These priorities change based on the current state of the game, the resources available and so on. Spending significant resources on a major titan rework is not currently on our short-term plan, and beyond that we don't have any reliable way of offering guarantees on what we will and won't be working on. This approach means that we're always delivering maximum possible value, but at the cost of not having rock-solid long-term plans. I would also note here that we're doing this "quick fix" precisely because we don't know when we're going to have a comprehensive solution - we regard the current situation as broken, and we don't want to leave it broken indefinitely while we wait for a "proper fix" with no clear timetable. This is the best way to deal with this general sort of problem in our opinion.

We're considering additional changes to balance out this adjustment; we'll do it if we feel it's necessary, but we'd prefer to make as few changes as possible at this time.

We're also considering ways of letting people "park up", but we can't make any commitments about that this morning.
baltec1
Bat Country
Pandemic Horde
#1363 - 2012-03-14 11:11:35 UTC
Smoking Blunts wrote:



they were beaten by a bigger blob after making dumb choices.


The only flaw in that statement is that they all had the largest blob at the time. Many of the fights back then were decided by the blob bringing down the node. This no longer happens so the blobs main weapon is gone which means skill > numbers will win most fights now that CCP is removing the I-win buttanz.
Razzor Death
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#1364 - 2012-03-14 11:12:14 UTC
GeneralDisturbed wrote:
It's funny to see that pretty much the only people in this topic who complain about numbers counting for something are the people who stand to lose the ability to just instantly win a fight with titans. The same people who consistently manage to match our numbers when we fight them, and then drop titans when we start to win the fight based on strategy. They're not mad because they're being blobbed, or at risk to being blobbed, -they're not-. They're mad because their ability to instantly win a strategic battle with no effort is being taken away from them. Now they -will- have to be elite pvp.

I've seen time and time again that numbers are only a small part of what matters in a fight. Especially now with things like Time Dilation and the lack of lag. In the old eve, jumping a large fleet into a larger fleet was suicide, or a roll of the dice on who loaded first. And most of the fight was just hoping your guns would fire once in 15 minutes, before the node crashed. Now every action is accepted, everyone loads, everyone has a fair shot.

People ***** about drakes, but goons have tons of fleet doctrines, and I've seen 2 or 3 separate doctrines used in the same fight. Bombers, drakes, sniper t3's, sniper hurricanes, autocannons neuting canes, maelstroms, armor hacs, sniper hacs. All of these supposed cookie-cutter FOTM doctrines require coordination and a ton of support to survive. Dictors in the right place dropping bubbles at the right time, and knowing how to survive. Logistics knowing how to keep themselves alive and in position to rep. Interceptors and fast ships screening tackle and getting warpins. FC's that know how to probe, how to fight, when to run. When to bounce the fleet. Bombers knowing when to strike, who to strike, recons running scrams and webs on the people who need to be hit by... etc

The point of all this is, all these fleets require coordination and precision to win, and ALL OF THEM HAVE A CHANCE. You drop 300 ships on 200 ships, both sides can still win. You drop 50 titans on 300 ships, 400 ships, 500 ships, 800 ships... the titans just won. Hands down, no contest. No subcap fleet can stand on the field, and do the damage required to break reps, when they're losing a ship every single time the titans guns cycle. This is not the way eve is meant to be played, CCP has been nerfing titans since they came out, because they DO NOT FIT WITH EVE and never have. Every ship matters in eve, in every fleet, regardless of size. Until you bring titans in, and then the only ship that matters onfield is how many titans you have. That's not eve, and it's never going to be eve. So they're getting nerfed again, and will get nerfed more... get over it.


This is the most factual post you will read in this thread. All of my 5s
Cyaron wars
Academia RED HOT Corporation
#1365 - 2012-03-14 11:13:07 UTC  |  Edited by: Cyaron wars
CCP Soundwave wrote:
BioZvin wrote:
CCP Soundwave wrote:

Actually, Greyscale went to Cambridge, and while we haven't IQ tested him yet, I'm pretty sure he'd score high Bear


I am sorry in advance here, but could we get some indication from CCP that we are being heard here. Put a lot of time into this game and really would ratter not be forced to leave because I feel like CCP only listens to Goons. I know they say we are less people then they are, but they don't number 345000 like they would have us believe.


We're absolutely listening.

Titans are an anti-cap/supercap ship and we need to limit their ability to kill subcaps. That's a change that's happening and is unlikely to change. The practical details on how that happens we'd love as much feedback on as possible. We've been talking about the lock timers this morning based on feedback from the playerbase, looking at what adjustments we can possibly make. The changes in the OP are still subject to change if we get feedback on how to achieve our goal better.



According to your logic Battleships are BC killers and they should be unable to pop anything smaller and so on. Now while u are doing your math please also pay attention to targets that titans kill, their signature radius, fit of "blap" titan. As far as I remember game mechanics recognizes ship as sphere of specific size. Size of this sphere = signature radius and is affected by mods fitted on ship. Size of MWD Maelstrom with shield rigs and LSE = Carrier (Capital ship) size. Since there is no difference between mwding BS and carrier according to EVE game mechanics, Titan does what it should do - kill capital.

Why don't u just balance signature radius of ships instead of nerfig something that takes 668 days to train from scratch, twice time to get ISK for it?

Sort your stuff out guys, you are about to have an issue with subscribers. 1 titan pilot = running at least 3 accounts.
Bob Random
Industrial Mining and Mayhem
Sigma Grindset
#1366 - 2012-03-14 11:14:03 UTC
I can't believe this thread is only on page 69.

I expected there to be more complaiing than this.
John Maynard Keynes
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#1367 - 2012-03-14 11:14:38 UTC
baltec1 wrote:
John Maynard Keynes wrote:


Then take your time and develop a decent concept that doesn't hurt only one side and gives every ship an viable role. If you think that supercaps should be only good at killing dreads and carriers, than make dreads and carriers a viable weapon against BS (+50% Tracking bonus to dreads in siege mode would help). Right now they are only used for ratting and structure shooting. Thus, there is simply no need for a anti-capital pownage machine. --> Supercaps become useless!!! (ok you can still bridge stuff with titans)

Honestly, it would be fairer to simply remove all supercaps and to reimburse the players than this one-sided nerf into oblivion. Right now titans are the only weapon against huge blobs only one alliance is able to field. You basically force us now to do the same. Not sure if having only two huge powerblocks is good for eve.

Oh, and maybe you should take a closer look at the alpha damage of artillery. (High-Sec people would love you for that and they comprise the majority of players.)

P.S: Please start to play your own game. The reason why titans are so good at killing subcaps atm is not because titans have such great tracking but rather because a MWD Drake and a Maelstorm have a signature of a carrier.


There are 3 blocks that can field the same number and carriers are still good for large fights as are the dreads. Also, if the blob is unbeatable why did the NC, BoB, Goons, DRF, Red Alliance, Tri, ASCN ect ect never manage to take over all of 0.0 in the past?

Ok I know it is pointless to argue with you. As always you will ignore arguments and facts and say your opinions is the only right one simply because it is your opinion.

For other people who might read this:
Would you please show me a huge fight where dreads were fielded for other reason than stucture shooting or against supercaps?
Yes, carriers are sometimes used in such fights but they can't be RR- repped in triage so that a mael fleet can easily alpha them (no need to field expensive titans).

Not sure what numbers the AAA/Solar block can field, but team dot usually has 300 less players in fleet than goons do. And obviously, having only 3 powerblocks isn't much better than having 2 powerblocks.

Old NC and CFC actually did hold the entire north in the past. The other half was held by DRF.
CCP Greyscale
C C P
C C P Alliance
#1368 - 2012-03-14 11:15:52 UTC
Crystal Wolf wrote:
I think the opportunity to even post intelligent stuff in this thread is gone but here goes

With regards to the nerf i agree with the tracking nerf something did need to be done there even if it was just a temporary measure. However the targeting nerf is ridiculous

As a person who has been on both sides of a titan fight i can understand why people are whining however this nerf appears to be incredibly short sighted

CCP have thought about how to balance titans to what they believe is an acceptable level but they have failed to take into account how this affects the game as a whole. Titans do need a clearly defined role however CCP have just nuked titans because they claim they don't have the resources to do an overhaul so they slapped something together and just put it in a forum post

Titans will loose their place as an endgame piece of equipment because dreads will be just as effective and cheaper to field what alliance is going to waste time expanding their titan fleet when all they become is a massive jump bridge with a DD

For those who say titan pilots are complaining too much you have to understand that titans don't just grow on trees for some people. For those who aren't in larger alliances or those who don't have tech money it actually does take time and effort to build a titan

From a political standpoint CCP are effectively changing the balance of power towards alliances who can just field hundreds of subcaps. The alliances who rely on supers to augment their fleet strength have been forgotten and just pushed aside. This change definitely needs to go back to the drawing board and CCP need to take factors like this into account.


We would be totally happy with an outcome where people stop expanding their titan fleet. It shouldn't be coming as a huge surprise to anyone that, all other things being equal, we would prefer a situation where there were fewer titans in EVE.

People who're augmenting their fleet strength with supers we're OK with, and they should continue to be OK after this change. We're not happy with situations where supercaps are making up the bulk of the fleet strength. If that's becoming less viable, then this is a desirable outcome for us.
CCP Greyscale
C C P
C C P Alliance
#1369 - 2012-03-14 11:16:54 UTC
Krutoj wrote:
Lets summirise this patch with nerfing of the biggest End game item, most expenssive and now most useless. Well done at rolling this game back by 7 years.
I will address some of the things that Greyscale thinks are true or were "discussed"

Quote:
We have talked to the CSM about this, and we're comfortable going forward with these changes in light of that discussion. I'm not going to put words in their mouths, though.


While this is true and we did discuss this, the major consensus was that nerfing titans is just trying to use a quick fix on a problem that is larger than a titan. Its the problem of 0.0 warfare, ship balance and how the end game currently built around those. Fixing titans as opposed to trying to come up with a better sov mechanics and better ship balance (between tech3 ships and titans), seemed to CCP like an easier way out that would buy them some more affection from the majority of players who cant comprehend this.


Quote:

XL turret tracking halved, siege module tracking penalty removed
Titans reduced to 3 maximum locked targets, and base scan resolution reduced to 5


So now titans cant lock fast enough or track. Whats the point of locking anything at all other than structures and supercaps if it cant be tracked in the first place? Why nerf scan resolution, which together with cloak is non existent? I will tell you why, because CCP thinks that if some wanker managed to buy the most rarest fucken items in the game and killed with that titan 10 people, its a cause for concern for entire player base. That said, taking a look at statistics, were a titan normaly an alliance asset, not many can afford to outfit their titan like a christmas tree of officer modules and yet, this became the major factor for this nerf. Funny that, tech 3 officer/deadspace ships (yes with deadspace/officer 100mn afterburners) dont get treated as such and yet there are more of them and they pose more balancing issues.

Btw mr "our assumption"Greyscale, assumptions are the mother of all fukups. I hope you will remember this saying next time you draft a patch.


We had a three-page discussion over the course of a week and you didn't post in it once. It's hard to have a discussion with people who don't participate.
CCP Greyscale
C C P
C C P Alliance
#1370 - 2012-03-14 11:18:43 UTC
Mara Rinn wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Adding a "minimum sig radius" attribute to turrets, below which damage would fall off regardless of tracking

Too big a change and more technical work than we actually needed to solve the problem.


All turrets already have sig resolution attribute. This is already used in the damage calculation, you just need to double it for XL weapons.


This doesn't scale the damage, it scales the hit chance. Part of the problem we're having is that titans aren't hitting subcaps all that often, but when they do hit they do full anti-capital damage and frequently one-hit things as a result.
baltec1
Bat Country
Pandemic Horde
#1371 - 2012-03-14 11:19:19 UTC
Cyaron wars wrote:


Sort your stuff out guys, you are about to have an issue with subscribers. 1 titan pilot = running at least 3 accounts.


Im willing to lose 300 titan pilots to make tens of thousands happy.
CynoNet Two
GSF Logistics and Posting Reserves
Goonswarm Federation
#1372 - 2012-03-14 11:19:30 UTC
GeneralDisturbed wrote:
It's funny to see that pretty much the only people in this topic who complain about numbers counting for something are the people who stand to lose the ability to just instantly win a fight with titans. The same people who consistently manage to match our numbers when we fight them, and then drop titans when we start to win the fight based on strategy. They're not mad because they're being blobbed, or at risk to being blobbed, -they're not-. They're mad because their ability to instantly win a strategic battle with no effort is being taken away from them. Now they -will- have to be elite pvp.

I've seen time and time again that numbers are only a small part of what matters in a fight. Especially now with things like Time Dilation and the lack of lag. In the old eve, jumping a large fleet into a larger fleet was suicide, or a roll of the dice on who loaded first. And most of the fight was just hoping your guns would fire once in 15 minutes, before the node crashed. Now every action is accepted, everyone loads, everyone has a fair shot.

People ***** about drakes, but goons have tons of fleet doctrines, and I've seen 2 or 3 separate doctrines used in the same fight. Bombers, drakes, sniper t3's, sniper hurricanes, autocannons neuting canes, maelstroms, armor hacs, sniper hacs. All of these supposed cookie-cutter FOTM doctrines require coordination and a ton of support to survive. Dictors in the right place dropping bubbles at the right time, and knowing how to survive. Logistics knowing how to keep themselves alive and in position to rep. Interceptors and fast ships screening tackle and getting warpins. FC's that know how to probe, how to fight, when to run. When to bounce the fleet. Bombers knowing when to strike, who to strike, recons running scrams and webs on the people who need to be hit by... etc

The point of all this is, all these fleets require coordination and precision to win, and ALL OF THEM HAVE A CHANCE. You drop 300 ships on 200 ships, both sides can still win. You drop 50 titans on 300 ships, 400 ships, 500 ships, 800 ships... the titans just won. Hands down, no contest. No subcap fleet can stand on the field, and do the damage required to break reps, when they're losing a ship every single time the titans guns cycle. This is not the way eve is meant to be played, CCP has been nerfing titans since they came out, because they DO NOT FIT WITH EVE and never have. Every ship matters in eve, in every fleet, regardless of size. Until you bring titans in, and then the only ship that matters onfield is how many titans you have. That's not eve, and it's never going to be eve. So they're getting nerfed again, and will get nerfed more... get over it.

bump
Smoking Blunts
ZC Omega
#1373 - 2012-03-14 11:20:50 UTC
baltec1 wrote:
Smoking Blunts wrote:



they were beaten by a bigger blob after making dumb choices.


The only flaw in that statement is that they all had the largest blob at the time. Many of the fights back then were decided by the blob bringing down the node. This no longer happens so the blobs main weapon is gone which means skill > numbers will win most fights now that CCP is removing the I-win buttanz.


they had the largest single blob, but when the other blobs teamed up with other blobs, they out blobed the blob.

was there for the fall of delve, the north and now the east. the biggest blob wins most times. while ive been on both sides of a titan blob and agree they need fixing, i dont think this change will alter much on the battlefields. they need to have there role defined before chnages are made, but as greyscale just stated they havnt a clue what they want them to be able to do so are just making a 'quick fix' .

OMG when can i get a pic here
Dan Massell
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#1374 - 2012-03-14 11:29:21 UTC  |  Edited by: Dan Massell
CCP Greyscale wrote:

We had a three-page discussion over the course of a week and you didn't post in it once. It's hard to have a discussion with people who don't participate.


oh no!
3 pages and one week!!!
That seems like WAY too long to give everyone from CSM chance to have a say.
Please cut it down. Such a small change deserves max 1-2 days.
or more like half a day. in US TZ would be the best.

You managed to fly everyone to Iceland because of the monocle tho.

Its good to see CCCP being back where they are most comfortable. Telling you how its going to be or you can go.
Tippia
Sunshine and Lollipops
#1375 - 2012-03-14 11:30:14 UTC
Cyaron wars wrote:
According to your logic Battleships are BC killers and they should be unable to pop anything smaller and so on.
No, that is not his logic. You're extrapolating one role from something completely different and unrelated, so your conclusion winds out up in the ditch… unsurprisingly.

His logic is that their ability to kill subcaps lies too far outside of the role intended for them. This tells us absolutely squat about how BSes should perform compared to BCs and sub-BCs.

Quote:
As far as I remember game mechanics recognizes ship as sphere of specific size. Size of this sphere = signature radius and is affected by mods fitted on ship. Size of MWD Maelstrom with shield rigs and LSE = Carrier (Capital ship) size. Since there is no difference between mwding BS and carrier according to EVE game mechanics, Titan does what it should do - kill capital.
…except that there is a massive difference between an MWDing BS and a carrier — one that anyone with even just a basic grasp of the mechanics will understand. In fact, the MWD makes very little difference when it comes to tracking the target.
John Maynard Keynes
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#1376 - 2012-03-14 11:31:44 UTC
Dr 0wnage wrote:
First off... ITS ABOUT TIME!

Secondly... its not quite right...

Tracking changes are exactly what we need. The scan res and locked target changes however are not needed. A tracking penalty alone will prevent titans from effectively engaging sub cap fleets. The changes to their scan res will only hinder them in their anti-capital role.

My suggestions are as follows...

1. Nerf XL tracking a bit more. Reason being is that a tracking moros hits BS with relative ease currently (same tracking titans will have with this change). As you said, we have to assume faction / officer tracking computers will be used if it means they'll hit BS / BC.

2. Increase Titan damage bonus (up to 200% at least). As it is currently, titans can be out damaged by dreads. If there role is an anti-capital one, then they need the best at it.

3. Give the dread siege module a tracking bonus. If dreads can fill the role that people were using titans for before (killing BS and BC), then we have a perfect formula for capital escalation. subs < dreads < supers < subs


Bump!
Freelancer83
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#1377 - 2012-03-14 11:32:58 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Mara Rinn wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Adding a "minimum sig radius" attribute to turrets, below which damage would fall off regardless of tracking

Too big a change and more technical work than we actually needed to solve the problem.


All turrets already have sig resolution attribute. This is already used in the damage calculation, you just need to double it for XL weapons.


This doesn't scale the damage, it scales the hit chance. Part of the problem we're having is that titans aren't hitting subcaps all that often, but when they do hit they do full anti-capital damage and frequently one-hit things as a result.


Just wanted to grab that little gem, so tracking not being the issue why the reduction in tracking?
Tippia
Sunshine and Lollipops
#1378 - 2012-03-14 11:37:40 UTC  |  Edited by: Tippia
Freelancer83 wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:
This doesn't scale the damage, it scales the hit chance. Part of the problem we're having is that titans aren't hitting subcaps all that often, but when they do hit they do full anti-capital damage and frequently one-hit things as a result.
Just wanted to grab that little gem, so tracking not being the issue why the reduction in tracking?

Because it's the next best thing do introducing the kind of mechanic that would allow for the other option (i.e. introducing a sig-dependent damage modifier).

Mara Rinn was suggesting that this was possible with the current mechanics, and Greyscale is pointing out that it wouldn't do what Mara thinks it would — it would, in fact, do exactly the same thing as they're already doing. He's not saying that this change will solve the problem they're having; quite the opposite: he's saying that it's a problem that currently cannot be solved.
Kazanir
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#1379 - 2012-03-14 11:38:33 UTC
Freelancer83 wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:
Mara Rinn wrote:
CCP Greyscale wrote:

Adding a "minimum sig radius" attribute to turrets, below which damage would fall off regardless of tracking

Too big a change and more technical work than we actually needed to solve the problem.


All turrets already have sig resolution attribute. This is already used in the damage calculation, you just need to double it for XL weapons.


This doesn't scale the damage, it scales the hit chance. Part of the problem we're having is that titans aren't hitting subcaps all that often, but when they do hit they do full anti-capital damage and frequently one-hit things as a result.


Just wanted to grab that little gem, so tracking not being the issue why the reduction in tracking?


There must be some misunderstanding here. If I understand the math correctly, doubling the signature radius of a gun would have exactly the same effect as halving the gun's tracking, since the two factors end up being multiplied together anyway. This combined factor (of the tracking-to-angular-velocity ratio and the gun-sig-to-ship-sig) gets entered into the chance-to-hit equation which determines both how often you hit, and (indirectly) the damage multiplier which affects your bullet.
CynoNet Two
GSF Logistics and Posting Reserves
Goonswarm Federation
#1380 - 2012-03-14 11:39:32 UTC
CCP Greyscale wrote:

This doesn't scale the damage, it scales the hit chance. Part of the problem we're having is that titans aren't hitting subcaps all that often, but when they do hit they do full anti-capital damage and frequently one-hit things as a result.


This is the underlying issue, in that the mechanics behind all tracking and signature radius are fundamentally broken. It's why we have to resort to this quick fix in the first place.
The best example is to just compare an MWDing Drake to a Carrier and see that they have the nearly the same sig radius. This makes it next to impossible to balance ships that shoot at one but not the other. The same applies to targeting, in that it takes the same time to lock an MWDing subcap as a capital ship.

Obviously the quick-fix to that is to re-factor the base sig radius of all capital ships (and probably structures), letting Titans lock large targets much more quickly while preventing them from picking on sub-caps as effectively. But I'm guessing that kind of work is outside your scope for now. It would negate the need for such a dramatic scan res nerf.


I also have to ask - did you consider revisting the Doomsday as an indirect solution to this? For example:

Reduce DD cycle time to 1 minute (90% reduction)
Reduce cap and fuel use by 90% too, so they're effectively the same.
Reduce base damage from 2mil to ~300k (DPS buff).

The net effect is that the overall DPS from a Doomsday is increased against capital targets (as compensation to titan pilots), but it also acts as a 'mini siege-mode', because as long as the module is active the titan is subject to being unable to align. This stops 'hit and run' titan attacks as they have to hang around longer to apply their damage. The 10min jump countdown would begin from the end of the last activation.
The net effect would be that once deployed, Titans would be more commited to a fight and would take longer to extract should things go wrong. Owners would have to choose more carefully about when they deploy titans rather than relying on them as the backbone of their damage.