Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Hello everyone. Those of you who were at the Fanfest FW roundtable heard a bit about some improvements to FW complexes that we have planned for Kronos. Time for some details!

We are making changes to three aspects of the FW complexes:

• New Large Outposts
• NPC and Spawning Changes
• Cloaking prevention within capture range

I want to make it clear that these changes are intended to create a more interesting environment for FW plexing and to make pvp fits more competitive with "farming" fits on an lp/hr scale, but are not intended to somehow bring an end to "farming" or other evasion tactics. We have no intention of hard blocking warp core stabs or cloaks from complexes. Players should have tools to help mitigate risk, as long as those tools require tradeoffs.

New Large Outposts
We've received a lot of requests that we introduce more opportunities for larger ships to participate in FW. The relative rarity of large FW complexes has been an issue here.

In Kronos we're adding Large Outposts to the dungeon distributions. Like other Outposts these complexes will always respawn in the same system after a delay. This means that unless the large outpost in a given system has been run recently, there will always be at least one large complex available.


NPC and Spawning Changes
When we recreated the FW complexes in Retribution we removed the old waves of NPCs and replaced them with single spawning NPCs with extremely low DPS and active tanks. These NPCs are essentially intended to be dps tests that gently encourage use of combat fit ships for running the complexes without getting in the way of PVP. We actually wrote the initial design with the intention of having these NPCs respawn on a delay after they are killed, but some broken content tools forced us to shelve that design at that time.
One of the content tools that Team Space Glitter made for the Ghost Sites in Rubicon actually fixes this hole so we are going ahead and returning to the original design for the Retribution FW NPCs.

As of Kronos, the NPCs in FW complexes will respawn on a randomized timer after the previous NPC is destroyed. There will never be more than one NPC spawned at once.
The respawn timer will be between 90 and 180 seconds for Novice and Small complexes, and between 90 and 300 seconds for Medium and Large complexes.

We're also making some tweaks to the NPCs themselves. The dps of each NPC is being decreased even lower than their current levels, by between 20 and 40%.
We are also increasing the active repair rate of the NPCs and decreasing their raw hitpoints. This will ensure that higher dps fits have an advantage in how quickly they can clear the NPCs and get back to capturing the plex.


Cloaking prevention within capture range
To help ensure balance around cloak use in FW complexes, we are disallowing cloaking within 30km of the capture point. This is achieved through an inert beacon with a 30km radius, so that when you are within capture range of the point you are also always 0km from an object.

We received some requests at Fanfest to increase this radius farther, which we will consider after we have seen how this first change plays out. One of the advantages of using the 30km radius is that it will still be possible for a cloaking combat ship to sit 30km from the capture point in the direction of the warpin location and remain close enough to the warpin to make hunting viable.


These are obviously not the only changes we could make to improve FW and they are not the only changes we want to make as we move forward, but we still believe that this package of complex improvements will benefit FW significantly.
We look forward to hearing your feedback!

The inability to cloak within capture rage was needed!

+1

Yes, these large outposts are ungated just like the current large plexes


We're aware of the increase in potential flip speed. However with the respawning and harder repping NPCs slowing capture rates of each plex we think the overall change will be acceptable. We'll be keeping an eye on feedback of course and tweaking respawn rates would be very easy if needed.

I don't see why this is a bad thing.

Yes, this is a good idea.


FTFY.


I'm looking forward to see the rest of the FW changes, and hopefully one of them will be reduction of LP from idle orbiting and a substantial increase of LP gained by killing pilots of opposing militias and also pirates.

I'm also looking forward to a solution for popular plexing fits such as this.

Well let's see how to begin...
First, my arazu would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Second, my rapier would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Third, my pilgrim would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Fourth, my falcon would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Fifth, my astero would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Sixth, my stratios would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Seventh, my nemesis would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Eighth, my manticore would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Ninth, my purifier would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.
Eleventh, my hound would like a word with you about how it won't be viable in plex fights anymore.

Should I keep going with every other cloaking ship in the game that has now been ruined because you decided to fix the farmers ability to cloak inside a plex instead of addressing the problem of it being better and more profitable to just run instead of fighting?

Bad move on this one. I now have to burn over 30km once inside the plex to cloak up and then always be at least 30km from the target if they sit at 0 on the warp-in. Which warp scrambler goes out beyond 30km on the arazu again? Oh that's right they don't unless I spend over 150mil for a faction scrambler and have maxed out boost in system....

/me starts a slow cap in rememberence of those brave cloaky ships that can't be flown in the warzone again

I too want to introduce quasi-bubbles to low sec. And risk my implants to continue FW. Just no....

I would like to see Faction Warfare LP payouts function somewhat like it does in Incursions - you don't get the LP for the plexes you have captured until after the system you captured them in has been flipped. This has two significant benefits:

1. Farmers don't bash iHubs therefore they could no longer get quick ISK by farming FW.
2. It would encourage focussed campaigns in FW space so that people actually get payouts for their work.

Focussed campaigns lead to more players in space and active, which leads to more PvP.

Obviously, that would not be applicable to defensive plexing. I think that's a good thing because it might encourage more people to D-plex.

Cloaks are not the problem. They can be used to evade a fight or to enable one.

Warp stabs are the problem. They are good for nothing but avoiding fights.