Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Personally I hate the cormorant change. I can see where CCP is coming from, and what they're trying to do, but in the process they are killing what the cormorant does best. The ability to fit four mids gives it versaility with its fittings.

One low slot might seem impractical at first but in fact is its strength, it can fit a tank in the mids, dual webs, dual prop, a TD, whatever it likes, while losing out on either damage or tank as a consequence. If you want a ship that does those better, then the thrasher and catalyst there for variation.

I suppose the biggest issue with dessies atm is the small amount of choice that you get, you're stuck between four ships that vary mostly in slots. I can't wait for the second line of dessies, and finally getting my missile dessies. The Heretic is nice but costs a rediculous amount for T1 stats :P


Quake

I am pretty sure destroyers are only the first ship to be so bonused. It fits in well with their role as basically a weapon platform. The larger vessels firepower is probably a bit excessive for close support anyway. I am sure as dust and its relationship with eve expands you will see more ships that can cross over, hopefully culminating in the much wished for t2 planet killer dreadnaught.

Here's my results:

For long range weapons:
Corm niche is super long range sniper. 105km.

Coercer and Cat long range excels at lots of dps at mid range. (Coercer seems to have the numbers on the cat). For equivalent fits it seems to me like the Cat is outpaced by the Coercer. There may be some piloting issues that make them equal, but I haven't found it yet. These ships can easily blap frigates and will eat corms alive if they are within 40km

Thrasher range niche is arty alpha. Gate camps, nanofaggotry. Needs to (and will) get shot off first to kill Cat/Coercer.

Short Range:
Catalyst sucks in real PvP. Can't project damage. Can't control range. Probably a good blob ship where the larger opponent can't cycle his weapons fast enough to kill multiple cats before getting popped. Catalyst's niche is ganking haulers with massive dps.

Coercer is awesome, can project massive damage out to long range weapon territory (125mm rails with antimatter for example). This is its true niche.

Thrasher is awesome since it is a Minmatar hull. Suffers same damage projection issues as cat but is much more versatile.

Cormorant - Better range than cat and can control range with midslots.

Otherwise, after studying this for a bit the reason they give Thrasher/Corm more PG is so they can fit a Medium Shield Extender as their minimal tank which has about the same effect as a damage control unit. These two ships can also increase their tanks by quite a bit by also installing a damage control, but at the cost of losing a damage mod. So there's a gank/tank tradeoff there.

The Cat really doesn't have that option. It only makes sense as a hull tanked or no-tanked ship. It's a clear winner in the "gank haulers" niche, and is worse than the other hulls in real pvp at short range - especially if they decide to tank their hulls (Corm, Thrasher) to allow time to control range. The Coercer just has an unbelievably long engagement range with Scorch.

So, in the end, the Catalyst can be used for real pvp and be effective. But like most Gallente hulls it will never have a clear niche vs other destroyers other than face melting dps against undefended civilians.

---

And please get rid of the drone! Too much time needs to be spent for too little result.

I'm +1ing the keep 4 mids on Cormorant cause. The Cormorant is an extremely powerful frigate sniper and losing its 4th mid would gimp its sniper fit.

Are you guys seriously missing the 20km 329 dps coercer and the 6km 460 dps coercer fits after this change? In what ******* joke of a world would you ever pwn a coercer with a thrasher again?

I mean seriously, if the coercer were a ******* ****** and sat at 0 speed and let the thrasher approach, he's going to knock off 1200 EHP before the thrasher can even start to project normal barage damage, and then at free will can change ammo 9 seconds faster to much harder hitting ammo at a longer range.

About the only chance a thrasher has post change would be to land inside 5km to start the fight.

Honestly, this is one of the first paper tiger changes I actually like, and I really wish all Destroyers worked in that 20-40km range at some ridiculous dps levels.

The cormorant is really close too if they don't nerf the CPU as proposed.

Catalyst and Thrasher are the close range boats, which I'm pretty heavily against personally.

=============================================


All that said, I stick with my original comment, they should just swap the damn ship to 100% damage bonus, 4 guns, 100% web range bonus. leave 2 utility high slots, add the spare slots to the lows/mids, and provide the ship with a pg/cpu gun fitting bonus so that they can keep the actual ship fittings super tight while making the guns super easy to fit... this would limit excessive tank builds.

By default, all these ships should be high base CPU and low base PG so that they are encouraged to fit weapon upgrades and not extenders/plates.

AC thashers rarely beat coercers now. The coercers current problem is dying to tracking disruptor dramiels and fast frigates that ab under its guns.

Lets see your fits.

Right now I am hitting about 400 dps with them along with a solid tank and an mwd to help get in range.

This is a problem for all destroyers. It takes good piloting of specific fits to take down a td frigate.

Marginally worse. MWD Frig, "TD - Keep at range 18km" is almost all you need to solo all short range destroyers, and many long range dessies not using T2 long range ammo. Not advisable against groups of dessies unless you are really pro pilot.

Another vote for eliminating the drone bay on the Catalyst and adding another Mid slot...otherwise I'm totally psyched to fly it! The Cat is my favorite "affordable" ship. Drones on a destroyer just doesn't make sense anyway (unless they are torpedo interceptor drones - see below). These are supposed to be gun boats of frightening offensive and defensive capability in a small and nimble package (lots of room for argument here of course but this is my ideal destroyer). Destroyers should be able to equal Cruisers in firepower (DPS) but with more numerous smaller guns/racks for tracking numerous targets simultaneously. Granted they shouldn't be tanked as well as a cruiser but they shouldn't be far off either. These changes would make the destroyer class the most numerous ship in any fleet as it should be. Frigates are for privateers and should be far less common in fleet battles outside of specialized roles.

Wanna' make it interesting? Add an anti-torpedo/bomber capability to the class. Maybe something like the ability to lock onto and eliminate torpedoes/bombs while in flight! This would add a very traditional role into the destroyer class while adding a much needed and unique capability to all fleet battles.

Anyway...just my craziness shining through! Kudos to the Devs! Keep up the great work.

-1 for Changing the Cormorant slot config.... Caldari Ships as a whole rely on range and Shields to see them through combat... Low slots are used support rest of the fit