Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Just playing devil's advocate here... I can think of two, but that's about it.

Frigate gangs will consider fitting Nos as it gives them a dual ability to damage the cap of larger ships to a greater extent than previously possible, while retaining the classic neut defence role, unaltered in potency for the reasons explained above. Of course, if damaging a larger ship's cap is the main idea, then they'd be better off with the ~3x greater cap drain of a small neut, but frigates typically don't have space for a cap booster with which to reliably run the neut. So this is new and quite useful.

The other ability that becomes possible is unsupported cap warfare against capitals. A Curse, Bhaal or Geddon can fit Nos, or a mixture of Nos and neuts, with the idea of becoming cap-stable against a capital. However, as noted previously, this independence comes at the cost of a significant reduction in cap drain rate - their primary role! Now, this tradeoff between cap dependence, target selection range and drain rate is quite well balanced in itself, but it runs up against the practical problem that gangs with dedicated neuting ships are already well used to setting up the cap chains necessary to feed full-neut ships. Will they then choose to fit Nos, gaining more cap independence at the cost of target flexibility and drain rate? It's hard to say. Maybe they'll fit one Nos and try to hedge their bets. Of course, when refitting is available, then a neuting ship can switch between neuts and Nos at will, although it should be noted that if carrier refitting is available, then so are carrier cap transfers! This is a new ability of moderate utility

But that's about it, really. Certainly, generic combat cruisers and BCs will not benefit significantly from switching from a neut or weapon to Nos.

i doubt its going to change fleet setups too much as you still need to take you cap down to less than the target for it to work, this is likely to mean that the doctrines might strike a balance between the 2 for example running 1 neut 1 nos in you spare highs on a tempest, or even marauders using them to manage their cap.

wrong if you only bring NOS you wont get the same effect as a Neut.

Think of it this way, a guardian chain has the cap transfer link in order to break that chain you MUST neut them a nos wont work as they will still be left with some cap in order to rep or start a transfer cycle, therfore if you want to break the chain you must neut them.

NoS on a solo ship is usefull to make sure you dont drop your active tank mods, but in full fleet formats where you have an aim at killing an opposing fleet you will use Neuts more often, unless you have a spare high slot i.e Megathron , where a nos would be handy just to help your cap

...if you're a frigate. BC's and BS's have even fewer reasons to fit them now which is my main beef with the change. There are plenty of more pressing issues they could have fixed (and no changes don't need to be made incrementally at a snail's pace for a module with so little use as a NOS, as seen by tieracide and the fact that CCP has a habit of making a single change and not touching the module for 6 years).

A nosferatu does not drain enough to fuel a *full* tank, no. That would be epically overpowered. It would be making your opponent pay the full cost of healing you. Maintaining your own tank is *your* cost, so take some cap boosters.

But the nosferatu does *help* with the tank, and it does make your opponent pay *some* of the cost. Certainly enough to run your tackle, and more with medium and large modules.

I can tell you exactly how much a NOS drains, as it's published in the item description and on EFT, EveHQ etc so please don't get stroppy with me sonny.

A medium nosferatu II drains 6Gj of cap per second. This is almost exactly 30% of the cost of running a medium armour repairer II with maxed skills and no nanobot accelerators.

So assuming you are dual-repped, the presence of that one module is giving you 15% more effective hitpoints over the course of a fight (roughly) and crucially *removing* 15% of your opponent's effecitve hitpoints (if he's dual-repped too).

That gives you, for the same hull type, a 30% advantage. Or in other words, your opponent must be doing 30% more damage than you in order to win.

I'll take that 30% every time thanks. It's better than an extra low slot.

Of course for this mechanic to work, you just need to keep your cap a little bit below your opponents. That requires some judgement and skill. Welcome to Eve.

Numbers do not lie, and forum dwellers do not deliberately lie, but they sometimes make claims without putting in the work prior...

See you on the battlefield!

So, does NOS still work on rats? Can a heavy NOS drain (same amount of) cap from small to large rats? Do NOS work at all on rats?

Needs confirmation, could be broken.

I wouldn't waste your time. I already ran the numbers by them, and was told that despite the numbers the new mechanic didn't change anything.

In situations (such as large fleet engagements) that have full logistics support the Neut has advantages. By the same token smaller engagements with little or no logistics support will likely find a NOS highly beneficial, especially since enemy cap chains (if present) then also become a source of cap for them to use.

It will barely keep a 1 MN Afterbuner II running but not a MWD, though depending on how the cycle times line up the AB may drop for a non-trivial amount of time. This system didn't change with the proposed fix.

Because everything described in the quoted post already happens. Anyone using a cap-heavy tank like that should already have been using a Nos.

Simply changing the activation threshold against some ships really isn't that big a deal.