EVE General Discussion

Yep, CCP is accepting a pvp nerf (even if it is a minor one) as ok. "Anti-PVP" zealots (who inhabit a pvp oriented game for some) rejoice.

I just don't get why they are doing this, you don't have to nerf any kind of pvp to make pve better.

The stealth bomber (or any other ship that isn't part of the faction in question) is hostile and will be targeted and destroyed, regardless of who it is currently shooting. The frigate in question is likely NOT the only ship of that faction on the field... not that that matters in the slightest. Even if it were, and knew it was going to die, it's best course of action is to take out the vessel that is within it's capability to destroy.

Now I'll agree, in a perfect world the frigate would wait and get as much damage out of that stealth bomber on it's other target as possible before destroying it. But as it usually turns out with player characters... blood lust, standing destroy ALL reds orders, lack of situational awareness, or lack of a psychic ability to determine the motivations of other pilots... the end result is the hostile stealh bomber gets blown up along with the hostile battleship.

Now really, seriously, lets stop with the trying to attribute human motivations to NPC game logic. It doesn't work either way.

It's been shown in this thread, the mining barge threads, and countless other threads that just about any PvE change can be looked at in just the right angle to be a perceived nerf (or buff) to PvP.

But, if you have a magical solution to make PvE better without even the most contrived "nerf" to PvP, go ahead and share it.

We only get a very brief testing window before CCP pushes the change through regardless of feedback.

There's effectively no reason to push this change through. Adding simple AI changes nothing for people who do PVE alone and without drones (read: Tengu) and makes it more difficult for drone pilots. Fine, but what about other scenarios?

NPC AI will now switch targets in any situation, and this includes certain complexes that are tankable only with capital ships or extremely expensive subcap setups. One of these ships warps in and takes aggro, and then the DPS comes in and does the rest of the site. With these changes it will be almost impossible for smaller groups to do these sites. It's a nerf to nullsec PVE.

As stated before it's also a nerf to any kind of ratter hunting in nullsec. Things are already too easy for ratters, this change only makes things easier for them.

Ok let me start by saying:
Thanks for providing your opinion I appreciate your attempt to continue this discussion and I am fully supportive of your right to an opinion.

Now the my rebuttal:
Your opinion is horrendously misinformed and laughable to people who actually gank ratters.

Let me explain
First of all your protip. We already fit ab's and mse's to our bombers. We also fly thrashers and slashers, ranis' and atrons all fit with a tank of some form (mse usually with resist rigs). So your protip is redundant but thanks anyway.

Secondly outhinking:
We ran tests on sisi and used these fits against ratting fits we commonly face to see if it affected us and by god it did. Rats continuously swapping to us because of ewar, ratting carriers having everything kill the interceptor tackling it and of course thrashers getting blapped like there's no tomorrow. Oh and by the way the rats aren't the only thing we have to out think most ratters will carry a light set of drones. Ever see what those will do to a frigate/destroyer?

What if we upgrade our ships and fly cruisers or battle cruisers? Well first of all it becomes harder to catch ratters, secondly gate camps start appearing, thirdly home def gangs are much more common because who wants to kill a t1 thrasher flown by a newb? Now they can kill a cruiser or battlecruiser flown by a newb.

And so that is my response.

The problem here is xxpizzaxx and others who gank ratters are victims of our own success. We show you all our amazing kills and you see it as proof ganking is easy. What we don't show you is for every dead ratter there are 40 missed and at least 2 hours wasted in searching.

We have to be far more active than those we hunt to even have a chance of success.

This, dear god, this.


So you think nullsec PVE needs a nerf?
You wouldn't, by any chance, have a valid defense for that position?

lol, "people" may be, YOU are not.

I'm not ignoring anything relevant, you've simply said nothing compelling. The people disagreeing with those of us who are advocating CAUTION (unlike you, who are just cheering this madness on) are not thinking about the possible downsides of this.

Tunnel vision? Sorry, now, if you check the thread CCP FoxFour made and has participated in, I've been a part of the discussion from the start and after that brief testing I've simply pointed CCP at some really bad possible outcomes of doing this.

See, here is the thing, If I'm wrong about it and my fears prove unfounded, NOTHING BAD happens, nothing gets broken and everyone is happy.

If YOU knee-jerk supporters of this idea are wrong, the bad things people like me are predicting come true, then elements of CCP have to go back and fix it when they COULD be working on "the next big thing".

You are advocating recklessness and foolishness, and some of us simply pray wiser heads at CCP prevail.

I see this disturbing trend emerging from CCP whereby they're trying to make PVE similar and equally desirable as PVP. In the same breath they're also making subtle changes here and there that ensure that people who want to do PVE don't ever have to do any kind of PVP if they don't want to.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZP9NZ-I0IE&hd=1

Watch this video and see how long it takes to land on grid with the ratters. This is a perfect scan pretty much, he loads grid at 1:02 and doesn't land on grid with the ratters until 1:58, that's almost a whole minute that the ratters had to notice local spike and warp out. Why do they need another layer of defense, when they already have such a massive advantage? I actually don't think he even caught these ratters since they were 50km off when he warped in cloaked, but it couldn't have been any faster.

This form of PVP will be dead and gone if these changes go live. You can't simply "use a Proteus" instead, because a Proteus is too slow, can be easily baited and doesn't have a 0 second lock delay after decloak. You can no longer use a stealth bomber because it will simply die to rat and ratter damage. You could try use an interceptor if it wasn't for the fact that rat EWAR will neut /target paint / ECM the interceptor if they don't just straight up kill it. As for some other suggestions; an assault frigate doesn't have a long enough point or enough speed. A force recon doesn't have enough tank to tank the rats or the DPS to kill the ratter and that's assuming you can get a point in a super slow ship with a decloak delay.

Please also bear in mind this is only one aspect of the game hugely affected by something meant as a change to PVE, there are several more in the OP. I urge CCP to reconsider these changes until they are sure they want to affect and effectively destroy so many different things.

While the rest of us urge CCP to continue testing a change in the game mechanics that is long overdue, with an eye towards tweaking the variables (during the considerable testing period we have left) to ensure that both PVP and PVE players are affected to the degree they have in mind.