Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Unacceptable to you; not, it seems, to many of the other RS pilots sounding off here. I elaborate:

You have not elaborated on your fits or play style; I am assuming you fly the RS primarily for L4 missions. As someone who has flown more L4s than I care to admit in a fairly diverse mix of ships, including the Rattlesnake, it is my experience that battleship-grade weapons fired at range are vastly more effective at killing L4 frigate rats than light drones, bonused or no. That goes for whether you're firing an 800mm autocannon at 20+ km, a tachyon beam laser at 50-100 km, or, yes, a sentry drone at pretty much anything over 20-25 km (and this applies even more when shooting destroyers and above—I echo previous commenters when they say that medium drones have little place in a battleship drone bay, particularly for missions). Now, I grant that if your frigate targets close to inside those ranges, you may have a problem hitting them with the sentries, and you may be forced to rely on lights; but as a Rattlesnake pilot myself, I have rarely seen that happen, and when it does, it means a) I probably did something wrong, which b) I can easily correct with a micro-jump.

It should also be noted that even as light drone DPS is decreasing ~33%, missile DPS is going up by as much as 87.5%. This includes cruise missiles, and in particular precision cruise missiles, which I can tell you (from non-Rattlesnake missile boat experience) are just excellent at killing L4 frigates. (And that is before any consideration at all for RHMLs.)

Now again, your mileage may vary, as I have no idea what kind of fits you're using or how you're flying them; but from where I'm sitting, my post-patch ability to deal with frigates in a Rattler is going up, not down.

Maybe I'm off base here but is this like saying:
The mach uses its mobility in lieu of a tracking bonus?
And/Or
The vargur uses tracking in lieu of mobility?

If this is the case, does that not make these offensive profiles very similar?

Then we agree. I'm not just talking about using lights and mediums in missions either. The bonused mediums are the best choice at combating cruisers when you do not want to remain stationary.

Best way to combat cruisers is to web them and lash out with the heavies and missiles. The bonused torps and heavies will do a lot more damage to a crusier than bonused med drones and unbonused missiles.

Except that you're losing far less DPS from the lost bonus to medium drones than you gain with the 5th launcher hardpoint and missile damage bonus using any large missile system, including rapid heavy launchers (and yes, even taking into account their reload times).

Lol no....
Mach will almost always be able to make use of that tracking bonus given its speed, if not anything else.

Because ur talking about PvE, mach is def the better arty platform. Even if u wanna give up a low for fitting, you arnt going to fit more than 4 gyros, and maybe 1 te. still gives u a slot left for whatever. The cycle time is low for 1400s and you can split the dmg across 7 turrets to lower your overkill. Not to mention, mach has much better turret dps and better drone bandwidth.

I disagree, but you're welcome to your opinion.

To me, the role of a Vargur and a Mach aren't that similar. The Mach is based on speed & movement, the Vargur on it's Bastion mode - complete immobility... (Hence, why I don't see the need to differentiate them.)

Their offensive profile is similar, but in terms of their use, they are not similar.

I don't mind... It's a civil discussion, which is always nice... (Sorry for the long reply, as well.)

I'll speak to the Pali/NM, as I use both... (And I love my NM )

Previous to the Marauder rebalance, it was simple:

The NM was generally considered to be the go to for Tach lasers, the Pali was generally considered to be the best for pulses. The tracking bonus on the NM allowed it to use Tach lasers at mid range, while the Pali's old bonus to stasis webbing was ideal for pulses.

Both could function with either weapon system, and there were advantages to fitting either on both hulls, of course. NM fits tended to come out a little ahead on firepower, as they could fill their lows with HS without issues. (But cap for a NM pilot was always an issue.)

Now, it's a bit more complex...

Previous to this balance, the Paladin's new bonuses set it up to be simply better than the Nightmare. The NM's tracking bonus was still useful, but the optimal range bonus on the Pali is useful for both Tach's & pulses. Add to that the better cap, lower cap use of armor reps, higher base speed, higher base lock range, bastion mode (the NM, while mobile, was not especially mobile) & the Pali was the better choice for most things.

With this rebalance to the NM, the two ships come into a bit more balance. The NM's AB bonus & base speed boost will allow it to control range & stay mobile. The extra low gives a bit more flexibility in fitting.

In order to balance the hull, they had to add an additional bonus, which didn't previously exist. (The Pali & the NM do have an overlapping bonus, it's just been folded into the base bonus to it's weapon system.)

The Mach already has mobility... Really, the Mach has 1 completely different bonus not listed as a bonus... 161 m/s speed. That's a built in 46% speed bonus.

I'm not especially opposed to changing the falloff bonus, but I don't think that tracking is it. At most ranges where you really need it (with AC's, not Arty), as I said, I think you'd be better off with blasters. Personally, I'd rather love to see that 46% speed bonus turned into a 100% speed bonus, but that would be more than a bit OP...

Edit: Also, it would still have the exact same duplicating bonuses with the Vargur, it would just be tracking duplicated, instead of falloff.

Not in much depth until we get to abuse them on sisi.

I believe Rise even went so far as to say that capacitor issues on Sansha ships are intentional.