Player Features and Ideas Discussion

This was one of the first vessels the Sisters of EVE made available to capsuleers. It had been under development by the Sanctuary corporation, whose interest in exploration includes not only search & rescue operations but also a constant inquiry into the nature of the EVE Gate. Thanks to the Sisters' efforts and the Sanctuary's particular expertise, the Nestor is an agile, tenacious ship that aptly adheres to the mantra of both rescuers and explorers: Stay safe, stay hidden, and use every tool at your disposal.

It is particularly adept at venturing into dangerous territories, not merely in recovering whatever may be of interest but also in being able to safely bring it back. Its engines have alternate power sources that come into play should any of its cargo - for which it has plenty of room - cause serious interference with internal systems. Its weaponry runs best on renewable sources, an ideal for a ship that doesn't know how long it'll be in deep space. Its carapace is extremely well armored for a ship this agile, and covered in sensors capable of letting its crew track a myriad of different organic signatures. The crew itself is safely protected from any number of transmittable ailments from rescues and other unexpected passengers, thanks to special quarantine bays that are conveniently located near jettisonable openings.

The Sanctuary corporation poured uncountable resources into making the cloaking technology developed for the Stratios fit the Nestor, but were eventually forced to concede that it was impossible. The effort was not without benefit though, as part of their work focused on reducing the Nestor's mass enough that it could make its way into unexplored territories that might've been hazardous to bulkier vessels. This paid off by affording the Nestor unmatched access to wormhole space, and meant that the embedded miniature rescue vessel on the ship's hull could be relegated to a decommissioned role. With covert function off the table, the Sanctuary turned their eyes on logistics and now the Nestor serves as one of the best support platforms in New Eden.

Traits
Gallente Battleship bonuses (per skill level):
10% bonus to Drone hitpoints and damage

Amarr Battleship bonuses (per skill level):
4% bonus to all armor resistances

Role bonus:
10+ bonus to Relic and Data Analyzer virus strength
50% bonus to Core and Combat Scanner Probe strength
200% bonus to Remote Armor Repairer range
50% bonus to Remote Armor Repairer amount
50% bonus to Large Energy Turret optimal range

I will try to contribute to the discussion with my perception and a few ideas about the issue, just take what you find useful - if anything at all. :)

Currently: Drastic changes apart, it is evident that most Capitals will need some rebalance in one way or another.

- Carriers: Currently they are too versatile: they can use both drones and fighters and can deal with caps and subcaps while also repairing each other, which resulted in the massed fleets we saw. They can also be fit for Triage, which is, imo, their most interesting application and the model I will take for proposing changes later. While the "modes" proposed by the OP should be able to solve the issue I would like to suggest something more light/traditional. Make non triage capital remote repair worthless, create a "Sorting" module that carriers can fit instead of the Triage module (they still have both option but could only fit, or at least activate, one at a time) and tie the carrier's offensive power to that. Make it so they can only deploy fighters, make fighters ok against subcaps and marginally useful or ok against capitals, allow them to use fighter bombers while Sorting is active so they can attack Capitals effectively (this suppose wide changes to fighters and bombers), or whatever you prefer to lessen their offensive power while not in Sorting. I believe that most of any ships flexibility in EVE already comes from the vast fitting options they have and adding "modes" as we see in the T3Ds to Capitals is not a clean enough way to deal with them and ignores that.

- Dreads: Used to bash structures and other capitals. Not having structures to bash anymore most of their value will derive from the value the ships it is meant to combat: other capitals. Tracking Dreads may be a thing in certain scenarios, but I believe that widespread use of capitals as anti-sub-cap platform isn't desirable. Maybe dreads could use some more versatility with a twin module for Siege as I suggested in Carriers, but I really can't think of what that could be and will leave that for you (maybe mobility, maybe range, or something else entirely different). Capital weapons should be changed though. With POS shields no longer requiring capital blasters to have enough range to target the towers maybe CCP can drastically modify the weapons and Dreads parameters enough to make them really fresh and interesting with just that.

- Super Carriers: I don't understand much about them, really. Extremely high DPS with remote tanking and support abilities, while not restricted by Siege/Triage is close enough? They look perfect for massing and are really expensive, but they really need some unique factor to them or they should be in a worse place than Dreads when structure bashing ceases to be a thing. Or maybe not. Anyway, I have a suggestion for them that maybe proves interesting enough, later.

- Titan: Mostly used for bridging and doomsdaying things, does worse DPS than Dreads if you don't take the DD into consideration, I believe. Gives some insane fleet bonuses, not that people are willing to risk one for them if they can't escalate with a few dozen more of them.

Now, my following suggestion tries turn Capital ships and their escalation into a game that benefits from having a few of certain classes, but not so much from massing them, taking what I already said in consideration. The model or inspiration for this is the current triage carrier: You drop one of those with a subcap fleet and suddenly people either break the triage or the subcaps simply won't die. Drop two or three and they can do wonders supporting each other and keeping each other alive with pure skill, but massing triage carriers become pointless pretty fast after that.

You can escalate that dropping Dreads, which in Siege have a, arguably, interesting combat dynamic with the other Triage Carriers and Dreads. They need to commit, they need good planning and execution to be used, they are the Capital Ships of EVE online after all. Up to this point I'm really fine with Capitals, even without structures to grind, with the previous consideration it is an interesting dynamic imo. The issue is how to escalate further.

Turning Super Carriers into "super fleet boosters" isn't exactly fair with their pilots. They used to be the most well rounded engines of destruction in EVE, after all, to be shoehorned into glorified command ships won't do. Actually, maybe that could be an interesting option for Dreads to get their other cycle module I suggested.

Anyway, my suggestion for Super Carriers is turning them for Capitals into what a Triage Carrier is for subcapitals: make them capable to repair Carriers and Dreads (but not supers, or maybe yes, idk discuss if you want) while they are in Siege/Triage/Sorting and not repairable otherwise. With this, having a single or a handful of Super Carriers at hand will render your Capital Fleet invulnerable until the Supers are dealt with, making them able to "bail" these ships out of harm's way. This assumes heavy tweaking in stats as to make maybe sieged/triage capitals have a bit more (or less?) buffer, the super stats itself etc., but that would be the overarching concept. You could top other things over that, I suppose, take what you want from this post, if anything, like I said at the start.

Titans would become a more interesting next step escalation because they can completely bypass the repairs from Super Carriers through one-shooting doomsdays. Their main role as bridges won't change and maybe they can make do with just this small boost in usability.

Maybe some bits of what I suggested with other bits of suggestions actually helps CCP with this task, at least that's what I hope. Sorry for the wall of text.

TLDR: Make Super Carriers able to repair Dreads and Carriers while in Siege/Triage.

RR scales due to range not rep amount otherwise tech III would be the standard to logi.

I've found that Nestor fit, 5x LRAR's, cap stable 46.7% (non-rem cap supported), 149k of EHP, costs arround 2.33b.

So I can bring two fit Triage carriers (before insurance return), or around 6 Triage carriers (after insurance return) for the price of a single decent logi BS that has less EHP than a standard fleet Dominix, a 25 Km rep range, and repairs less than a single triage rep?

*Start Sarcasm* It's a wonder Nestors are not more popular with these sort of qualifications. *End Sarcasm*

Well I think we have established that there's a reason the Nestor is not used as a common armor logi in BS fleets. I knew it was bad, but I didn't realize it was that bad.

That being said, thanks for actually going out and finding the fit.

2.33 Bil for a repping BS though is crazytrain.

Serves CCP right in many ways, these ships should never have been introduced in the first place.

I think most of the suggestions here are just so much re-arranging the deck-chairs on the Titanic. Here's the problem:

Grinding through structure HP will become far less important in the new sov scheme.

No grinding means that caps (much less super-caps) aren't worth the risk entailed in fielding them, especially since the de-facto primary in any fight (the ship with an active entosis link) can't receive reps.

The result is that caps and super-caps have no role that justifies their cost, other than fighting over moons, and that role will disappear when the structure changes hit. Other, less costly doctrines can and will be just as effective.

There's the problem to be solved. Solve that. Arguing over balance issues is pointless when you're arguing about balancing ships that aren't going to get used unless they get a new reason for being in the fozzie-sov era.

I would like to encourage you to read my post right above yours where I am trying to address the problem you describe among others.

The scaling loss of resistance proposal is basically a game mechanic equivalent of saying:

"We have no idea how to make these ships fit into a role, or how to make them not excessively powerful in large groups, nor are we willing to change their function significantly, so we are going to settle for an arbitrary mechanic that makes them **** if you bring a lot of them." Not going to happen.

Even if titans got their tracking back with Fozziesov, it would not be all that relevant since the situations that created the massive battles where tracking titans were useful (Dominion timers) are getting removed.

The limited BPC auctions are bad because it takes the tools that benefit people who have them, makes it easier to acquire money if you own them, then restricts obtaining them to the people that already have the money and can afford to pay more in the auctions.

TLDR: No, No, and No.

However the changes capitals occur, there are three basic criteria that the change needs to fit.

1: People must have a reason to deploy capital class ships away from structures. And more than just as links.
2: Large numbers of carriers should not be able to fulfill both the tank and dps role at the same time.
3: Capitals must be accessible to everyone with the mineral resources to create them.

#1 is required because with the removal of Sov structure grinding, the only relevant uses for carriers/dreads in PvP is Bashing POS's, Repping POS's, and Triage (Yes I know you WH's have some unusual uses, but it's not relevant in this discussion). Simply tweaking existing numbers does nothing to encourage people to use capitals in Fozziesov.

#2 Is required because carriers ability to both tank and DPS at the same time means that carriers can be used exclusively in static defense locations through the use of non fighter drones. That's basically been the main problem with them over the past few years. Yet you can't remove non fighter drones or repping power/range and not add other abilities without both greatly setting back #1 and making ratting and Lv V mission carriers nearly useless.

#3 Is required because there are current massive capital stocks. Removing the ability to freely build caps and supercaps means that those who have caps now gain a massive advantage over any up and coming group. Especially in a limited auction format like you proposed.

The people with the caps own the highend moons, because it's too much effort to bash Dickstars without them. Since they have the caps, they get the moons. Because they hold the moons, they have the money. Because they have the money they can use part of it to capture the lions share of the new capital construction.

TLDR: None of the three proposals will work.

From my point of view, the only effective solution (That I have seen so far) to all three requirements is to move the carrier out of fulfilling both tank and gank roles by moving it into a local force multiplier role for assisting ongrid subcaps.

This removes the ability to create giant death balls of slowcats, and gives them incentives to be deployed on grid in Fozziesov. This means more opportunity for people to counterdrop dreads, supercarriers, or titans on them in turn.

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=5685883#post5685883

Was my proposal on the general shape of changes. It certainly has some holes in so far as in what bonuses to give to each racial carrier post patch, but the framework seems to be fairly solid in fixing most of what people consider the most useless or most overpowered aspects of carriers in Dominion Sov.

WHY do we need large changes to capital ships?
Null, low and WH all use carriers for logi as it is now. Dread make short work of carriers, SC and Titan may be a bit costly but not needing siege to do dps is a huge bonus over Dreads (SC do same or more dps than sieged Dread, and have ALOT more range)

Titan does good dps, dont use siege, fleet booster (assume it need some changes to strenght) and can bridge fleets around.

Make sure Carrier have a good role after sov changes and the rest will follow, that role dont need to be linked sov in any way for it to be good