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Greetings

Please post your feedback about hybrid turret balancing in this thread.

Thanks.
Your Tallest.

update (23/11/11): Final list of hybrid changes for the Crucible expansion.

Hybrid Turrets

* XL Turrets: -5 CPU
* L Turrets: -3 CPU
* M Turrets: -2 CPU
* S Turrets: -1 CPU
** Exception: 75mm Railguns (they already have very low CPU requirements.)

* All hybrid turrets: -12% Powergrid usage. Rounded to nearest whole number.
** Exceptions: Light Electron Blasters, Light Ion Blasters, 125mm Railguns, 75mm Railguns (they already have very low Powergrid requirements.)

* All hybrid turrets: -30% capacitor use

* All hybrid turrets: 5 second reload time

* All blaster turrets: +20% to Tracking speed
** Exception: XL turrets (they already have good tracking when compared to other XL turrets)
* All blaster turrets: + 5% to Damage modifier
** Exception: XL turrets (they already have good tracking when compared to other XL turrets)

* All railgun turrets: +10% to Damage modifier
** Exception: XL turrets (they already have good damage when compared to other XL turrets)
* All railgun turrets: +5% to Tracking speed
** Exception: XL turrets (they already have good damage when compared to other XL turrets)

Ships

* Max Velocity +10 on the following ships:
** Arazu, Astarte, Brutix, Catalyst, Deimos, Dominix, Dominix Navy Issue, Enyo, Eos, Falcon, Guardian-Vexor, Helios, Incursus, Ishtar, Lachesis, Maulus, Megathron, Megathron Federate Issue, Megathron Navy Issue, Thorax, Tristan, Utu, Vexor, Vexor Navy Issue, Vigilant

* Max Velocity +5 on the following ships:
** Cormorant, Federation Navy Comet, Hyperion, Kronos, Sin, Vindicator

* Inertia Modifier -5% on the following ships:
** Adrestia, Arazu, Ares, Astarte, Atron, Brutix, Catalyst, Celestis, Cormorant, Daredevil, Deimos, Dominix, Dominix Navy Issue, Eagle, Enyo, Eos, Eris, Exequror Navy Issue, Falcon, Federation Navy Comet, Ferox, Guardian-Vexor, Harpy, Helios, Hyperion, Incursus, Ishkur, Ishtar, Kronos, Lachesis, Maulus, Megathron, Megathron Federate Issue, Megathron Navy Issue, Merlin, Moa, Phobos, Raptor, Rokh, Sin, Taranis, Thorax, Tristan, Utu, Vexor, Vexor Navy Issue, Vigilant, Vindicator, Vulture

Ammo

* All hybrid ammo: 50% smaller volume (and hybrid turret capacity reduced to keep same number of charges)
* Javelin (all sizes): Removed cap penalty
* Javelin, Gleam and Quake (all sizes): Removed tracking speed penalty, added 25% tracking speed bonus
* Hail (all sizes): Reduced falloff penalty from 50% to 25%

I agree or you better make the void ammo dish out way more damage to make it worth getting 2km from your target.

please remove speed penalties from armor rigs, or just make Gall ships shield-tankers.

because there's no way a blaster boat can get into range before getting shredded by AC's or pulses. we're back at square one really.

rails need more damage and tracking as well. (or fix the ship bonuses)

Additional changes I want;

Small Blasters +5% DMG
Medium Blasters + 15% DMG
Large Blasters +10% DMG

I posted my thoughts in response to the hybrid rebalance in a different thread, so please refer to that: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=290102#post290102

Some other things:
- The damage difference between the 2nd and 3rd tier railguns is too small. Give the 150, 250 and 425mm rails a bit more damage, to make them a worthy step up from the 120, 200 and 350mm calibres.

A few things about ammo:
- Null ammo needs +50% for both optimal and falloff. Barrage gives a 50% falloff bonus, and Scorch gives 50% extra to range. Blasters depend on both range and falloff, so Null ought to give a 50% bonus for both, to help truly address the range issues of blasters.
- Significantly increase base damage for Antimatter, Void and Javelin. This would make blasters truly melt face at close range. Railguns would be more viable for mid-range engagements, where their counterparts are actually pulse lasers and autocannons with long-range ammo.
- Simplify the ammo types. There's too much granularity of range at present. Instead, make hybrid ammo more like projectile ammo, so different ammo types have different balances of thermal and kinetic damage, such as 20/80, 50/50 and 80/20.

Fitting wise, they are a dream. Excellent work

Rails are great, when used in conjunction with tracking mods
Blasters are fine, but a little extra damage would go amiss

For those saying change it to shield, Do you really want to have to try getting a Booster/MWD/Tackle/Tank on 6 slots. Please think about it. Armour works damn well. Maybe a little more speed would be nice, but it's definitely the way forwards

i wholeheartedly support this. Tallest, you guys could resolve a LOT of issues by buffing hybrid ammo in this way. take this guy's suggestions into account. honestly, i think it's the best idea on these forums right now.

i can still scan someone down in 8 seconds snippings is still useless... change the optimal range bonus for a fate of fire bonus ...

its great that blasters have good dps but thats not enough to warrent using them at such a low range limitagions we needs a massive alpha boost to make them worht while...

the tanking bonus on gal ships needs to either boosteed or changed to a armour amount per lev... that way you wont have to fit trimarks or 1600's if you want to be fast and have an armor tank.

the mrym needs 100mn band withdth to be usefull 3 heavy drones is not enough for a bc...

change the trimakrs to agility nerf from speed...

The idea of messing with rigs seems like a poor idea. It affects too many aspects of the game and in the end will only make the other platforms that much better over the hybrid boats, particularly if Amarr gets a speed bonus from changes to armor rigs and the shield tanked Minmatar boats don't get a sig radius increase from shield rigs, because they already enjoy a very low sig radius to start with. Messing with rigs just impacts so many other aspects of ship designs of all the races. The changes need to be Gallente boats specifically. Caldari long range rails I think is simpler to deal with directly to the rail gun stats.

I think the most succinct argument to date is that there is just no good reason to fly Gallente boats. Whether you are talking solo/small groups or in bigger fleets. They tend to be more expensive and every time you go into a fight, you are committed 100%. All the other races can fight aligned or kite out of damage and warp. Even fighting within single point range is viable and can be exited from with MWD. Gallente fight inside scram/web/neut range. The cost/benefit just isn't there. In the POP,POP, POP of fleet fights its often very frustrating for a Gallente pilot to try and get into range of primary as targets change. Right as you get there, primary goes pop and now new primary is far away again. Even with frigate tackler support most Hurricanes have such high tracking that if frigs try to tackle with a scram on, they die. But scram is what is needed to slow the immense speed of these ships.

There has to be a reason to fly Gallente over other options. Currently there are none, except maybe the Arazu.

SPEED/AGILITY arguments: These boats need both but I think agility cannot be overlooked or nerfed. The speed required to catch a kiting target is ridiculously high and only viable for small ships. We don't have to be faster than Minmatar, but we need a bit more than now. Tactics and using a cloaky or a inty is key to this effort. But even if you can land at zero on a kiter, by the time you align, approach, target and try to apply scram/web, they are out of range. So the ability to quickly achieve speed is key for any hope of catching targets. This also applies to orbiting w/ speed in a fight and the ability to rapidly change direction in fleet fights as different targets are called. And we must do this as we lack weapon range to be effective otherwise. CCP is on the right track with increasing this directly to Gallente ships, they just need a larger increase directly applied to overcome the rig penalties a bit. Removing rig penalties or changing them only then make the other races more appealing.

The SECOND BONUS: Any Gallente ship that has the horrible 7.5 armor repair bonus(and the stupid Thorax's MWD cap bonus) should have that replaced with something that assists with controlling range in a fight. My recommendation would be for some, like the Brutix to have a significant range bonus to SCRAMs only. Some should have a bonus to WEB velocity factor or WEB range. This would make them much more capable of achieving a lock down when warping in on someone. Catching a kiter is rarely viable in a pure speed race. That requires good use of cloaky's and inty's.

Tank: Fine, Gallente should be shield tanked to be a close in brawlers w/speed, but they are not. Even some ships that will attempt shield tanking like the Myrm and Hyperion just aren't as effective since their sig radius are already big, and when shield tanked the Myrm is almost Battleship size. A fully shield tanked cane is roughly the same sig radius as a armor tanked Mrym. CCP will not support 3 shield tanked races. So the tank needs to be impressive on a brawling, close in fighter that has to commit 100% every time to every fight. Half the reason why people don't fly gallente is that they get tired of being killed because they have to commit every time to do so. Can't warp off like every one else. So do a slight plug of the Explosive hole in every Gallente ship to help increase tank. Maybe 20% to T1 hulls, higher in others.

HYBRIDS: Ok, Blasters. They have the worst aspects of lasers and projectiles and none of the benefits.
1) Since they will deal with the highest transversal (closest to the center of the orbit circle), they should have the highest tracking. This needs serious boost since low slots on armor tanks have to be dedicated to armor unlike the shield tanked Minmatar boats.
2) Instant ammo changes to help control application of DPS in the high stress/quick decision cycle of close in fighting.
3) Much lower CAP usage as we fight in Neut territory. I'd say remove all together frankly. Or give a utility high slot to every Gallente boat for a vampire perhaps. (which some have, and probably boost performance of vampires in general)
4) Increase damage by 30%. Make them dominate the close in fight and give people a reason to commit to the fight and probably still lose their ship.
5) Increase range by just a bit of optimal. Not crazy but on some of these its damn near seems like zero. Just perhaps 10% to optimal.
6) Get rid of void's tracking/cap penalty. If you can get this close, you deserve to **** your target.
DRONES: Add a Scram drone. That would help with catching kiters. They still have a chance to blow up the drones before you catch them. I would think that with 3 light scram drones applying effects, that should be enough to shut down the MWD. the other 2 are buffer or even web drones. Some of the Gallente Drone boats need some love. A bit of bandwidth would help some for the Mrym for sure.

So that's my piece of advice that will absolutely get ignored and probably trolled.