Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Folks are likely also including the massive heavy missile nerf...which makes a mockery of the current "severe" nerfs people complain about.

-Base flight time reduced by 35%
-Base velocity increased by 14.66%
-In total, base range reduced by ~25%
-Damage decreased by 10% (rounded to closest digit)
-Explosion radius increased by 12%

And that was slightly watered down, they originally wanted a 20% nerf.


So yeah, there's no question about new vs old drake when you consider this along side it.

oh, yea, CCP rise if everything need to be ~balanced, as in equal, then where are my drone implants?

So,

Your FORCING us to go from shield fits to armor fits by changing the slot layout.
Does this also mean you are going to remove the T2 shield rigs we have on our hundreds of shield ishtars?

Myself i got like 30 of them on different chars placed in different locations.
Thats a whooping 650 mill or more thats we have to rip off them.

For some this might not be that much but thats besides te point.

ForceM

I've been in this game for almost 3 years now, and the "re-balancing" nerfing and buffing approach that CCP uses to solve "problems" that I am not certain actually exist seems to take away one of the more interesting aspects of the game. How to beat the superior combat vessel (try strategy, tactics, special fits, gang approaches, etc). Today's Ishtar changes remind me of the Drake changes several years ago. To be quite frank, if you build a superior ship with superior capabilities, so what. That is in the nature of the game, and in reality. Does CCP make these changes because players are whining that they can't beat the superior ships and therefore they are about to go home and stop paying the monthly fee? I know that you have game-wide statistics that show the relative dominance of ships, but unless one is actually destroying competition and altering the fundamental landscape of the game, it ain't a problem, so don't fix it.

The latest notion to reduce drone damage across the board as a means to nerf the Ishtar does not make any sense at all. My Vexor is not a super killer in NULL or low-sec under the present module statuses. All you will do as a result of the proposed nerf is to reduce it's capabilities further. And what's the point of that? Another obsolete ship for the reprocessing junkyard.

If this is all about competitive balance, why not try to improve the capabilities of other ships in dominant ship classes, and while you are at it, add capabilities to other ship classes to allow for greater flexibility in combat fits. Something more substantial than the changes to the Force Recon cruisers done several months ago, which were cosmetic at best, e.g., the Arazu turret and drone limitations were essentially untouched, leaving a nice covert ops scout cruiser with little firepower or survivability against NPCs or other combat boats in low sec and null.

BTW, the Gila is a monster. the 500% increase (5x) means that the 2 medium scout drones that you can launch have the damage and hitpoint capability of 10 drones -- it's a 10 drone boat with a significant missile pop. And you have 4 extra 2-drone flights in the bay. I have seen documentation of people running level 4 and 5 missions with this cruiser. But hey, that's ok. Someday when my missile skills are up to par, I will get one and see what I can do with it.

Maybe CCP should let the council take on these issues of ship nerfing and if they authorize CCP to act, then do so.

Not really seeing the need to reduce drone damage amps effectiveness, while ramping up heavy missiles 5%. All people are going to fly now are drakes and tengu's. a lot of drone boats are used because ammo is a significant factor in the pve experience when trying to earn isk. Why are you nerfing an entire weapon system into the ground, when in comparison to the others it is already weaker? oh that's right, because you still have your hand in the cookie jar via PLEX and buying ammo is just one more isk sink.

+1 on DDA changes

On Ishtar...I totally agree CCP Rise on where you're coming from on the 'flexibility' of drones. It is what makes the weapon system dynamic and unique. Removing Sentries or even the bonus from the Ishtar doesn't necessarily solve the problem. Nerfing the actual hull of the ship is an ok start, but perhaps the real problem is the drones themselves.

Sentry drones don't need a direct nerf to damage, but perhaps their ability to strike should be.
-Optimal Range and Falloff could be reduced
-Tracking Speed could be heavily nerfed (they are stationary after all)
-Perhaps integrate EWAR to affect Sentry Drones only
--i.e. target jamming, sensor damping, and weapon disruption on the host ship affect sentry drones (only)

A final, outlandish suggestion if you will, is to develop an anti-drone system or even a ship platform. Tier 3 Destroyer for giggles, why not? Much like drones, missiles, and bombs, develop a unique weapon system that auto-targets enemy drones. Call it "Point Defense" modules or some such and make them follow the S/M/L module tiers with S being effective against Small and Medium Drone, Medium effective against Medium and Heavy Drones, and Large being effective against Heavy Drones and somewhat effective against Fighters/Bombers.

Uses ammunition for varying ranges and dmg (as normal). Have the T2 variants follow typical range/dmg ideology. The large and medium modules, with T2 longrange ammo could be able to reach out to sentry drones around 75km. Drones don't have THAT many HP, so the modules could be used against ships but would be inferior to standard weapon systems. Think Defender missiles for drones. Hell, rework defender missiles FOR drones...that works too.

Again, crazy idea but maybe the problem with drone boats isn't the boats themselves but the lack of effective means for handling them. You really have only one option: kill the hull as killing the drones is neither easy nor effective. Short of nerfing drone bays (please don't, that's stupid) I personally think there needs to be a better counter to drones than smartbombs and FoF.

I concur i was scared for a second but the changes wont effect me too badly +1 for drone damage amps

I just have two things to show you all.

First, watch this.

Then watch this.

There is a lot of information in those two videos that explains what CCP is trying to do. Don't be the ill-informed player that endlessly spouts; "They dun took our Ishtars, dang nab-it."

Actually, the problem IS the drones.

Not because they are "a battleship sized weapon on a cruiser platform". it's that they break the traditional EVE philosophy of Short Range = high DPS, Long Range = low DPS.

With sentries, you get high DPS, end of-story, to very long ranges for a cruiser. Compare a sentry ishtar's DPS at 75km to any high-DPS gank turret or HAM cruiser hull. ishtar can actually do DPS, AC, blaster, pulse, HAM ships are <30km at best. Best you can do to project high DPS is the Cerb with HAMs out to about 50km, or Orthrus.

That's the problem in a nutshell. Sentry drones, if their DPS was literally carved in half, would be fine. An Ishtar doing 250-350 DPS at 55 + 55km? No problem, totally competitive with the Eagle, Munnin, Zealot.

So what, you say, they will just drop heavies and get 650 DPS again. Great - slow, lumbering Ogres can't chase anything down. They take ages to reach their targets at 50km, have tracking issues, have less hitpoints, and are thus essentially a short-range damage option. No problems there.

I doubt we will see this change, however. it's just too sensible.

So much could be done diferently

With this your hurting PVE players becouse of PVP fleets!!!!!

T2´s ARE suposed to be better, HAC ARE suposed to hit hard. Thats why they take so long to train. That´s why theyr in the ADVANCED cruizers tab.
You could just create a command mod, siege mod that fleet boosters can use to mitigates the over traking(less hits) or bandwidth (less drones flying around) of drone boats in system. Or some kind of temporary portable deployable with a limited range with one of the above efects. And would only afect PVP.
This alone would reduce a lot of damage delt by sentrys or any other drone for that matter.

I spent months training HAC´s and drones for what? Just too see my choosen PVE ship get nerfed in every new release CCP lauches? I simply don´t use guns at all.
I will have to cross train to other faction cruizer and missiles (since i don´t like guns hence the drone training) and there goes another set of months training for them.
Making a slow boat even slower?
1 extra low slot for an extra nerfed DDA?
1 less mid slot to hurt shield buffers or tankers?

Everyone can point me for bitching for such a small nerfing, but my problem is i don´t know when this will stop.
It´s seems easy´er to keep nerfing on and on than to look at it in a creative manner.


Cya all o7