EVE General Discussion

It's a shame Gnauton has stopped replying. Kinda stifles discussion if you're not sure if anyone is listening.

Wattage ftw!

This is one of my pet peeves and I understand the rationale behind it.
But Tachyon Beam Laser is a contradiction in terms.

A Tachyon is a faster than light particle
Laser stands for " "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation"
So you have light going faster than light

So either ditch Laser or ditch Tachyon

Ditching laser makes searching for the item more difficult
Ditching tachyon makes more sense, maybe replace it "Focused Mega Beam Gun"
but alot of people have an attachment to the name Tachyon.

So really the solution works fine, but I just hate the term.

While I think that the current system is fine -- don't you dare touch my Mega Pulses, Heavies, and Tachyons -- if you're going to change meta levels, do it like this:
Make it like the current missile launcher system but with either religious names or names that sound related to lasers. Make two different sets, one for pulse and one for beam, adding both variety and ease of recognition.
Like malkuth < limos < XX-#### < arbalest, you could have Elohim < Jibril < Malakhim < Seraphim.

For example, Mega "Seraphim" Pulse Laser I, or Focused Tachyon Beam Laser I.


Lasers are not magnets, nor are they resistors. Neither unit would make any sense at all; it'd be like Scourge Heavy Missiles being renamed to Happy Water Balloons.

Well for one all the names should be spelled as Lazors

I'm for this, but Joules could be used instead, as that would make more sense and not cause inconsistencies with powergrid and energy usage, but rather focus on the actual output of the laser.

"130 MJ Quad Laser I" sounds nice and simple to me. The use of one crystal for 4 barrels is actually simple to explain too, in that the crystal could be placed further inside the laser before being split and refocused into 4 separate firing points. I have no problem with that.

Gatling is a bit odd.

I like the idea of keeping some form of more original and less generic meta naming scheme too, but I'm not convinced it has to remain as is. It could be separated by corp name from R&D or any number of other things.

Meta items are what they are, it doesn't matter if they are easily identified so long as it is not hard to tell what class they fall into. Some consistency with who makes the better model would be good though.

Heck, if you want to keep it super simple and retain the originality, why not just add a Meta tag to the market and other entries on the item. Sort of a classification rating system that has been standarized by the SCC or something. Mta.2 for example, or M-2, or ML-2, or whatever. MC-2 for Meta Classification 2 might work too.

As Amarr and a traditionalist, I would like to stick as much as possible to the old naming schema.
Fix obvious flaws (calling small lasers medium) but for the sake of the Empire do not punish us with barbaric naming schemata which feel Minmatar. Simple minds might need a number to be able to distinguish magnitude, educated Amarr do not.

Do you really think that our elegant culture should align to a categorization developed by our former field hands? Should we give up names handed over by spirits on whose ingenuity our Empire was founded so that it might be easier for riffraff in rusty ships?

Never. Our weapons are for a more civilized age and they are the way they are.



(And do not even get me started about Ohm metrics when we speak about power or people claiming the term laser is reserved for light when it is used more liberally for coherent radiation.)

Gatling sounds ridiculous. There's no reason for a laser to be Gatling. This is one of those opportunities to remove a naming convention that just doesn't make sense

Here's my proposal. Introduce "cannons". Everyone knows cannons are better than regular guns.


Small Pulse:
Gatling Pulse Laser -> Rapid Light Pulse Laser
Dual Light Pulse Laser -> Dual Light Pulse Laser (unchanged)
Medium Pulse Laser -> Light Pulse Cannon

Small Beam:
Dual Light Beam Laser -> Dual Light Beam Laser (unchanged)
Medium Beam Laser -> Light Beam Cannon

Medium Pulse:
Focused Medium Pulse Laser -> Medium Pulse Laser
Heavy Pulse Laser -> Medium Pulse Cannon

Medium Beam:
Quad Light Beam Laser -> Quad Light Beam Laser (unchanged)
Focused Medium Beam Laser -> Medium Beam Laser
Heavy Beam Laser -> Medium Beam Cannon

Large Pulse:
Dual Heavy Pulse Laser -> Dual Medium Pulse Cannon
Mega Pulse Laser -> Mega Pulse Laser (unchanged) OR Mega Pulse Cannon

Large Beam:
Dual Heavy Beam Laser -> Dual Medium Beam Cannon
Mega Beam Laser -> Mega Beam Laser (unchanged) OR Mega Beam Cannon
Tachyon Beam Laser -> Tachyon Beam Cannon

XL:
Dual Giga Pulse Laser -> Dual Giga Pulse Cannon
Dual Giga Beam -> Dual Giga Beam Cannon

EDIT - I've made separate posts regarding my desire to see Meta Level in the Show Info -> Variations tab as well as the Compare Tool and Market. The only thing that lets me retain my sanity, even after over 8 years of playing this game (yes, my memory is that bad) is having the Meta Level column for my hangar inventory. What's sad is I usually look for the item in my hangar inventory based upon Meta Level and then just type that name into Market search because it's easier that way. Fix this and 90% of the naming convention "problem" is solved.

If you'd like to just toss in some actual words from the LASER world, you could use phrases like:

Gain-switched or Mode-locked LASER to indicate one which fires faster, but with less power,
Q-switched LASER to indicate one which fires less frequently, but with greater power.

Note: this doesn't exactly correspond to the science but fortunately the wikipedia entries for those terms should be mostly incomprehensible to folks who do not understand it in the first place

Assumably the goal is, simply, to make sure that if there's "medium" or "heavy" in the name of the module, it is "medium" (cruiser) or "heavy" (battleship) module. Additionally, the extra large lasers should follow a similar naming convention, though this is easier when there's only one size of those.

Therefore, I'd like to suggest the following:

The "smallest" laser in the category becomes an "array". Fluff text explains that it is, in fact, an array of smaller lasers.
The "medium-sized" laser becomes "focused". Fluff text tells about the entire power of the system being focused on a single emitter.
The "largest" becomes "tachyon". Fluff text references design for longer-than usual ranges.

Hence,

Light Pulse Laser Array (Gatling Laser)
Focused Light Beam Laser / Focused Light Pulse Laser (Dual Lights)
Light Tachyon Beam Emitter / Light Tachyon Pulse Emitter (Mediums)

Medium Beam Laser Array (Quad Light)
Focused Medium Beam Laser / Focused Medium Pulse Laser (lookie, no change)
Medium Tachyon Beam Emitter / Medium Tachyon Pulse Emitter (Heavy)

Heavy Beam Laser Array / Heavy Pulse Laser Array (Dual Heavy)
Focused Heavy Beam Laser / Focused Heavy Pulse Laser (Mega)
Heavy Tachyon Beam Emitter (Tachyon Beam Laser)

Furthermore,

Very Heavy Beam Laser (Array) / Very Heavy Pulse Laser (Array) (for Dual Giga Beams)

I am somewhat fond of the megawatt-based energy turret naming, though the OCD part of me tells that it'll be impossible to make the number on the tin act anyway reasonable with the system determining damage. (I am also somewhat amused of people mixing up the SI prefixes for a megawatt and a milliwatt.)