Ships & Modules

What a load of crap. Both of you, cite eveidence, name names or stfu. Everyone is stating opinion unless you have a poll and/or qualifications and research you'ld like to present for your supposed authoritative statements.

I've flown commands a lot, and I don't pretend to have polling data or knowledge that people expressing opinions here have no experience or are posting out of butthurt.

Regardless, Rroff your position has lost. The change is coming just of matter of when. The devs agree with those that say Tech III should not obsolete tech II ships. ISK cost is not a method to balance a game. That only rewards rl rich players through plex sales and/or encourages ISK grinding through botting. If rl cash determines better ships then congrats on crashing the player base as those without such say **** it for playing a game like that. It has not been what eve has been about and it almost switched to that and CCP learned it would be done at the peril of their company.

That being said a novel suggestion I've seen is just delete command processors from the game and leave everything else as it is. That would mean you could use a tech III but only with one uber link. You would still want the command ships to run the racial 3 and only those three links. This would make fleet structure and choices for each leadership position within a fleet mean a great deal.

Also, devs have stated in the past that they would prefer on-grid boosting because every role should have destructibility. However, they said that something about coding that would be near impossible. However, I wonder how hard it would be to substitute a specific km radius to the effect. I don't know how often and how costly a range check of that kind would be for a fleet of 250 ships to see if each individual ship in the fleet should receive the bonus, but would be nice if devs would say whether that was possible or too costly on processing.

Anyway, blanket unprovable statements about what the "majority" wants or that the other view is just a "vocal minority" are meaningless. State you opinions and on what they are based, your own experience, or because joe the dictor pilot said, or whatever they are based on, but don't pretend to know what a majority or minority thinks (as if it matters anyway for an internet game run by a company in Iceland).

Don't you dare nerf my new Proteus Sentry boat!!!!!!! Its still much less specialized in its purpose than an Ishtar but now its actually viable.

Neutering T2 and T3 just so you can fly a Rupture w/o feeling like you're inferior in every way just means that BC and BS will always be better than cruiser-class hulls, all other things being equal. As it stands right now, even what you consider "overpowered" HACs can't really engage any kind of competently comped and flown BS fleet past the medium scale and only Tengus are (barely) viable against them.

But hey, let's nerf things so it's straight up bricks of EHP slugging it out, because only numbers should count.

A complete overhaul is well outside of the scope of merely Strat Cruiser vs. HAC vs Cruiser balancing. Which I suppose is kinda my point as well, "overpowered" T2 and T3 hulls provide something beyond simple EHP+DPS brick options and instead lend themselves to tactical variety even if in doing so they "obsolete" T1 hulls.

Yeah, cost should be determined by specialization (it's the only ship that can do this role so well) or customizeability (this T3 ship will fly exactly how you want it to fly, within reason.) Larger ships in general should also cost more, as they can bring more raw power to the battlefield (especially when you get into structure popping territory.) But the idea that one type of ship is just flat out better than another type of ship in every area and so therefore should be more expensive is what needs to go. No ship should be obsolete.

Continuing on the Ruppy/Munnin/Loki theme;
Munnins and Broadswords should have better stats than the Rupture. You pay 20 times as much, you expect better performance. They gain combat and EWAR capabilities which exceed T1. Everyone agrees this should be the natural order of things. That does not mean you cannot murder an arty-fit Munnin with a plated, gank Rupture if you get web and scram. This is where piloting skill comes in, and by way of addressing the "I paid a lot I should get a lot" crowd, if you let a Ruppy get into range of any arty ship, you are toastballs. Same for a Broadsword, to be honest; nowhere does it state a Broadsword should be able to be killed by a Rupture, nor does it make sense.

Making the leap from Munnins to T3's, the argument is as much about cost as it is capabilities. The thing is, even with EWAR capabilities below that of a T2 ship, a T3 if it is fit well, should still be able to survive and win an encounter with a T2 ship. Eg, a Loki can fit an interdiction nullifier sub and get away from a Broadsword even if it doesn't have enough DPS to kill it or EHP to flat out tank it. An arty Loki vs an arty Munnin, the Loki should be able to fit well enough to survive a fight mano-a-mano, due to having higher EHP at equivalent DPS. A Loki with 24km web should be able to dominate a Vaga. An armour Loki should be able to dominate a Huginn.

The key is, the Loki can't do all of these fits to kill all these T2 ships, at the same time - but it can do any one or two of them in the same fit. An armour web Loki can be soloed by a Vaga. An arty Loki can be soloed by a Broadsword, as it would be impossible to break the Broady's tank.

The fact you cannot do all these things all the time isn't a problem. Theoretically (and yes, in EVE you hardly have this luxury) you can refit your Loki at any time to counter a Munnin, Broadsword, Huginn, etcetera. so you are not locked in to a specific set of T2 bonuses to EWAR or combat abilities. People carry on about "but I paid 700M to fly a Loki it should be able to solo any T2 cruiser".

Thinking about it this way, if you had to buy individual T2 ship hulls to gain the flexibility of a single Loki hull plus a couple of subs, you'd not be very much better off, cost wise, as you've had to shell out on a Vaga, a Munnin, a Huginn, a Broadsword, and a Claymore. That's a cool billion just on hulls. The cost point is moot.

The issue with the T2/T3 gang links is, the bonus is greater on the T3 than the T2, and the capabilities in the real-EVE-world situations with the amount of ISK people throw at booster alts (and money, viz, subscriptions/PLEX to keep their alts current!), basically means you will never see Claymores used when people can afford and deploy Lokis. The Loki exceeds the Claymore in every concievable way.

With that out of the way, there is of course the whole Caracal/Cerb/Tengu progression. Unlike the Ruppy/Munnin/Loki progression, there is a major problem here. Not because the Tengu ECM subs give OP bonuses relative to the Falcon/Rook (armour ECm Tengus are still good, though), but because the Tengu can all too easily fit RR, Cerb-like damage projection, and ridonk tank, all at the same time. A Tengu can out-DPS two Cerbs, tank two Cerbs, with ease. With missiles, there's no argument based around tracking/sig/EHP comparisons where a proficiantly flown Caracal could take out a Cerb or a Tengu, it's just DPS and EHP.

That may be the way it goes. I think I've illustrated that while T2 ships have defined roles at which they exceed the T3's capabilities,and should be able to at least trouble T3's who are not fit to defeat them, it is not a level playing field across all races of T3's. The risk with attacking a T3 in a T2 ship (unless you can pick the subsystems visually ahead of time) is that if it is fit to defeat your T2 ship, you are toast.

Changing the command bonuses aren't going to change that, either. What it will do is make all those people who sank billions into off-grid booster alts cry into their weaties. Well, tough luck guys.

Guys hurricanes are obsolete because sleipnirs are better in every way



Just gonna point out a few things that are flat-out wrong



Not if the loki were even remotely well-fit



I wasn't aware the loki had a bubbling subsystem, thank you for informing me.

When you factor in the additional subsystem cost as well as the fact that a loki can't be a broadsword, they about even out. That said the loki is arguably the worst T3 so your point is even worse-off.



I take it you've never been on an actual fleet. Boost lokis can't fit a tank, and as a consequence basically have to sit in a safespot to give bonuses, it severely reduces the mobility of your fleet since you have to wait for the T3 to be "in position" before you get links, while a CS can stay with the fleet. It also means they're defeated by a decent prober since they have to warp off or just cloak up if they get probed down. T3s are only useful for boosting if they can stay in a pos or you're fighting bads that don't have a prober.

Look at any large battlereport, you'll find command ships are alive and well.



No, no, and no. Making stuff up makes you looks stupid and uninformed.

It'd be more accurate (and factual) to say the Cyclones are obsolete because Sleipnirs are better in every way. Of course, there are still people who use Cyclones, but they are people who either can't do math or else can't afford them (very likely both, and the problems are also very likely related to each other.)

The canes do the armor thing better, so they have that much at least. :) Then again, haven't people been complaining about how OP Tier 2 BCs are for quite some time now?

It does baffle me why anyone would get a (predominantly) shield tanking battleship (Tempest) that doesn't do as much damage and has less of a shield tank than another battleship (Maelstrom) that does the exact same thing only better. It's not like price is an issue unless you're very careless and/or stupid. Why fly something that is blatantly inferior? While there is some merit to having an army of throwaway ships that aren't very effective overall, it's just not a good enough reason for ships (and modules) to be in the state of obsoletion which so many of them are currently suffering.

That said, I tend to think armor tank when I think of a Mach, but I haven't outright crunched any numbers regarding whether or not the Mach will actually out shield-tank a Mael.

Overall, though, pricing would have to be rebalanced along with any changes to ship balancing. Pricing is indeed a factor, but it's no excuse for having a ship in the game that just isn't comparably good at anything except being salvaged.

@ Viribus:

No, i've never been in a fleet and seen 100 Nagas rip through 5 Vultures in 10-15 volleys, and Claymores likewise, leaving their 80-odd Drakes up the creek without a paddle. Nope.

Never seen people get their interdiction nullified T3's out of bubbles and to safes to provide gang boosts to avoid precisely this predicament. Nope, never seen it.

Therefore, your point is invalid.

You also say that a properly fit web Loki can't be soloed by a Vaga. I would tend to agree that if you dump 150M on two DB webs, and overheat them, you can web down a Vaga at 28km. But an AB-fit armour Loki with T2 webs and AC's, it can be a chancy thing. But we are now discussing the pilot skill, the various investments in their ships (RF warp dissy counters DB webs, etc) and so on and so forth, versus the ship's native attributes - which, sadly for you, means your point is invalid. But you are still douching along being douchey and thinking I've been joining your fleets on Jita 4-4 undock where it seems you've got all your PVP experience from.

As for Mechael, who thinks the Pest can only be fit shield and Machs fit for armour, there are some situations where raw EHP and DPS are not as useful as, say, being able to fit 2 neuts. How do you not gimp a Mael by fitting 2 neuts? Or an armor RR and a energy transfer? Or armour tank a Pest and fit webs, TD's, TP, etc etc, and get a tidy buffer? Oh, right. Better blow a billion on a Machariel and take that to a POS bash RR armour fleet. Yep.