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/Approved.

I do not really see the game design upside to these changes, so I think it best that we either work with CCP to ensure that we do not get totally screwed when this logic is put up on Tranq... or simply un-sub, speaking the only language that CCP hears consistently: cash-money.

guys cammon
to make drones pull agro from npc dosnt make the game more chalanging
it simply prolongs the process of killing those npc

and in the end u will sit with npc EWAR on u with all drones either dead or in drone bay
hopelesly hoping that the next cycle of ewar will fail

it dosnt make the game more exiting but simly more boring and frustrating
where logistic ships will becoume npc tanks, half of the mission income will be used to replace drones
and many more negative sides

Simply wrong. The new AI does have aggro management elements. Try fitting some ewar on your main tank ship.


Also to those saying this kills solo drone PvE. Again simply wrong. There are tonnes of people who solo drone boat in Wormholes where sleeper AI is even MORE aggressive against drones. If they can do it, so can you

Fitting an eWar Mod can cause problems for a few tighter fittings, though. WH drone boats usually fly content one step below what they could fly wihout having to fit eWar Mods.

Besides, it would be nice, if those eWar Mods had an actual use besides generating threat. Unfortunately that would require the already mentioned general changes to NPCs (less ships with better stats/bounties/loot/salvage), because what good is it to take out 1 out of those 20-30 ships via eWar methods? This is, btw, the main reason for limited NPC group sizes in regular MMOs.

Really! Because you have to realize that Aggro Management in MMOs is just a crutch as the Real Life equivalent (strategic positioning) is a lot more complicated to implement.

In a realistic scenario you could of course ignore that shiny knight and go for his (less threatening) support. But in order to do so you would have to pass him and expose yourself to being stabbed in your flank or back.

Besides, the knight is usually - through training and equipment - your highest damage threat, you will often WANT to remove that to demoralize your opposition. The peons were often just fodder used to tire down the knights in order for your own knights to finish those easier.

Problem is, how would you translate that into an MMO? Who would want to play the peons and not the knight?

Btw: a part of that concept is actually incorporated in Eve via the difference between cap and drake/welp fleets. This only works in hierarchically structures, though, because someone has to tell people that they can only be the peons today.

For the moment, I'd like to ignore the actual affects of the NPC AI change.

Instead, I want to point out how well the Diablo III dev team is handling a massive PvE change. They are nerfing damage reduction skills and simultaneously nerfing NPC DPS (In the high end mode - Inferno). The goal is balance. You can read about it here.

They get to the nitty gritty with exact numbers. They show how the changes will affect certain classes and certain builds as well as equipment choices - objectified with numbers. They discuss battle strategies using all the above in the context of the changes. They state their rationale for making these changes. They even state their communications with the player base as part of their rationale.

It is clear that the Diablo III devs have played their game extensively, understand how the users play their toons, and have very carefully and thoroughly thought through their changes, after communicating with their player base.

If the EvE NPC AI change follows historical patterns, we will continue to test it out, offer feedback; that feedback will be ignored, and the change will happen whether we want it or not in, and in whatever half baked form it is in. (reference the UI changes or CQ's or many others)

After reading the Diablo III dev blog, I was left with a feeling of confidence that the upcoming changes will benefit the game a lot. After reading the EvE dev blog and this thread, the only feeling I have is a complete lack of confidence in the EvE dev team and a sense that this change is yet another bad idea that will alienate an array of users.

It seems so stupid to publish a piece of a change needed for a future change. It has to be the worst way to manage development. It reminds me of when we had our bathroom remodeled. Living in a compromised environment until the work was finished was unavoidable. This is avoidable in EvE, except for the inept practices of the dev team who do not seem to have any sense of how their changes affect the players and paying customers.

I wish they would learn from the Diablo III dev team.

While you may be right regarding CCP's policy in the past, i DO have the feeling things are improving somewhat.

It seems a bit unfair to compare the fully fleshed out patch announcement to this discussion based on announcement of a feature that is currently in its alpha , possibly early beta, stage of development.

So while I don't think coming up with numbers at this point makes sense, I would like to see some kind of general idea regarding threat generation, a tiny bit more detailed than 'NPCs hate eWar most, logistics second, damage third'.

Something more along the lines of:
'Our idea is roughly that 1 eWar module constantly running (or based on successful applications? lacking information there!) should generate about the same threat as 6 large weapon modules at optimal range or 2 logistics modules running at full capacity'

Noone said something from positive standings preventing kills.
I was about NPC in general preventing kills on bears, which should NOT happen! And noone should have to grind standings to pirate factions for pvp.
As soon as someone warps into a complex or anomaly with a bear inside, rats shouldnt target this ship just because they can as long as it didnt show any aggression on them. Otherwise NPC would spoil player kills, which wouldn't be fine but even extremely frustrating.

What evidence is there of that?

From my point of view, nothing has changed. A while back ccp announced a nerf to null sec anomalies because the original scheme made space to "even". That's fine, but we told them to not go to far because people had invested a lot in upgrading systems AND anomalies were a big source of individual level (as opposed to alliance level) income.

They didn't listen and nerfed the hell out of them. The result were large flocks of us either unsubbing ratting alts or moving them (like I did) to high sec, low sec (for lvl 5 missions) or NPC null sec for pirate faction missions. The effect was so severe even ccp noticed it, which led to another round of development (which has to cost money) to change the actual anomalies in a way that made the profitable even without sanctums and havens in a system, which of course led to the 400 mil isk per hour Titans in forsaken hubs before the titans got nerfed to not beable to do that ect ect ect.

Same thing happened with Incursions. I was in favor of nerfing incursions (the isk was insane for high sec) but many of us still urged caution because too much nerfing just sends people packing. What happened? CCP nerfed incursions so hard even those of us who supported an adjustment were appalled, which OF COURSE led to a new round of development to un-nerf them to a point where they are at least viable.

These weren't ancient events, these things have occurred basically in the last 12-18 months, they are recent history. Those of us who log in every day and play for several hours every day get to see this pattern repeated over and over again and I for one am a little bit sick of it personally. And you'd think ccp would be sick of wasting stakeholders money....

It's good ccp is letting us know about this stuff now, maybe some good will come from this discussion, but if the past is any indicator........

Diablo III is a steaming pile of horseshit and the devs are roundly hated for their ruining of the Diablo franchise. Good example.