Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I heard a suggestion somewhere saying that maybe instead of a hard cap, it could be a skill that gives 10 or 15 drones per level, or 5 drones at L0 and then +9 or +10 per level (still 50-55 max assist drones) or something like that anyway... skill-based bonus!

No. We don't need more SP sinks for things we can currently do.

Nobody has said that drone assist causes the lag, in fact if you read the dev blog its saying that its basic drone behavior that causes it as its doing all its figuring. If anything properly assisted drones reduce lag as they're not thinking as much on their own, instead they're just sitting still waiting to be told to fire.


EDIT: None of this even comes close to addressing the fact that the 'balance' team just gave every damn ship in the game a drone bay

From re-reading the article, I can't actually tell if from a technical standpoint, an assisted drone takes up less server resources than an active one. The server still has to track each of the drone objects in space and pass that on to each client. Each of the calls for drone attacks still have to be calculated simultaneously, even if it is triggered by one player firing. There may be some simplification here, but the physics calculations for the objects in space remains the same, at least from what I understand from the article. It would be ironic if drone assist was actually HELPING reduce server load if this was true, and now we're talking about nerfing it, which will increase server load.

What concerns me is if we are changing gameplay mechanics with the excuse of technical limitations. If we have to do it, fine, but lets be up front about it.

Missiles have been nerfed repeatedly, due to their previous popularity as well. I don't think it's a coincidence that they also put increased load on the server. This was outlined in one article by CCP Veritas (there's a follow up article which is missing). The HED-GP article talks about how similar optimizations may be needed for drones.

My conclusion is by removing/nerfing drone assist, we are making the gameplay worse, to make the drones less popular, so less people will use them in large fleets.

So if we're doing this to help server performance just say so, and be up front about it. Just say Gunnery is the Master Race, since it is the least impact on server performance, and therefore will kept the most attractive weapon system by "balance".

Let all the new players joining after B-R to know from the tutorial and up to train guns and not drones or missiles, because they will be kept inferior to make them less attractive to use.

If drone assist didn't exist, drones wouldn't be as prevalent - pure and simply. And yes, I agree - why every ship needs a stupid drone bay is beyond me. Before everyone rags on missiles, it would be interesting to know which creates more overhead: drones or missiles. I suspect it's the former...

It's kind of hilarious that there has been no good argument for drone assist as a game mechanic beyond "It was already in the game" or "FYF is too powerful"

It's because incursion runners would lose another 1% ISK/hour without it…

CCP: crap we are having bad press due to lag in large scale battles, let's fix this!
Devs: we don't have resources to redo the engine, tidi gave us a 2 year buffer until fleet numbers rose to break engine again, during this time we built a new fps game from zero instead of redoing the code!
CCP: let's get game design to fix it, I want to go back to work on the script for the tv series - games suck and EVE sucks, Hollywood here I come!
Devs: errrrrr.....ok. This sucks for EVE but I get paid and it's my job so whatever - let's get the CSM on board!
CSM 1: as long as it's good for my side let's roll, who cares about the rest of EVE or game design!
CSM 2: as long as it's good for incursions lets do it, who cares about the rest!
CSM 3: as long as it's good for afk miners you have green light!
CSM 4: just roll with it who cares about the game this is now game design PVP politics and I want to win!
Devs: Announce to players and let's pretend we want feedback! Let's hope they don't realize how half thought and cheap this is!
Players: that is stupid and doesn't fix the problem!
Dev: thank you for the awesome feedback! We'll just go forward and iterate in a near future!
Players: there's is nothing to iterate on, this will break things!
Dev: we understand your point of view, we discussed this a lot with CSM and it's the way to go!
Players: but it's broken!
CSM: HTFU! CCP is awesome!
Players: there's 999 other real problems to fix!
CSM: HTFU! CCP is awesome! They are totally committing everything and pay lots of attention! We should be thankful!
Players: but EVE doesn't get fixed, the fps is crap, vampires are non existent, Valkyrie is a risky question mark, now they are building 5m tall phallic statues and want to make a TV series - wtf???
CSM: HTFU! CCP is awesome! Also monument is great marketing move!
Players: B-R alone brought 15k new subscribers! Can't you see with fixed SOV, better engine and whatever 999 things need fixing, the game could be better and we could all win if we get CCP to focus on what matters?
CSM 1: what matters is if my side wins!
CSM 2: I'm an internet politician, if my side does good I don't care!
CSM 3: afk miners are good, just don't touch the asteroids!
CSM 4: all I do is win, if only there was a killboard for ideas that suit me!
Devs: let's push it to the next point release! Hopefully Riot will poach me soon, at least they don't care about having a single title! Game industry stardom here I come!
CCP: is the lag quick fix done? I don't want bad press to ruin my tv audience ratings! Can we find some way to keep customers paying and not play or log on? That's the best option since it minimizes trouble! Do you think I would be a good movie actor? I already wrote my Oscar acceptance speech, I based it on the one I have prepared for the Nobel Peace Prize I'll win next year! Iceland FTW!!! No one can stop the Viking Warrior!!!

So, other than that, no particular reason? That argument is pretty weak, which may be why I earlier dismissed it as "not an argument".

Grath, you make a good point about the advantage of manually controlling your drones being more effective/attractive than automating it by assisting/guarding. Granted, that method of forcing recall/engage probably wasn't intended by CCP and is just bad coding but the principle is sound. If the problem we are trying to solve is the use of automation, making manual control more attractive might be a better solution. I don't see forcing more micromanagement onto a fleet being "better gameplay" personally.

I keep thinking about the autopilot as another good example. It exists to make your life easier, but it takes you longer since you land 15km from the gate, and at risk longer for attacks. If that automation was removed, I can't imagine haulers would be thanking CCP for improving their gameplay.

If the Drone Assist mechanic was changed so it wasn't a simultaneous attack by all users (perfect alpha), and instead had a random delay based on the cycle time of the drones, this would do a few things:

• Remove the "Finger of God" perfect alpha that currently exists with drone fleets, and gives logistics ships a better chance to lock and land reps on the target in time.
• Actually reward player skill when the fleet members and FC have the coordination to attack simultaneously with manual drone control.
• Leaves drone assist effectively the same for less critical tasks like in PvE for clearing small targets.

The only downside I can see here is that some fleet members like Logistic ships won't get on the kill if the random delay is too large, but the idea of getting them onto killmails in some other "support" capacity has already been brought up multiple times, so they don't have to rely on drones and whoring guns.



I don't see having to assign more drone triggers in large fleet fights actually improving the play experience for the average player. The solution I am suggesting would make manual control more attractive and effective, but allow you to assist during a 20 hour fight for a bathroom break for example.

I've already made my points about "balancing" ships and weapon systems based on popularity/usage and server load, and it's been pointed out how those numbers can be manipulated by the large blocs.