Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Exacly, the rifter was already the most powerfull T1, it doesn't need any type of buff

Don't mess with T1 frigates balance please :( , go change nullsec stuff and ship or whatever

Well overall I think it should be broken down into families at least

Attack - Pure DPS
Combat - Jack of Trades
Electronics - Debuffer
Intercept - Tackler
Logistics - Healer
Support - Buffer
Battery - Ranged
Bombarder - Tank
Leadership - Party Leader

Thanks for the update Ytterbium, those stats look a lot better. I do like more drone stuff for the amarr too, it makes sense

Bringing cap levels back to normal is good it will allow you to tackle bigger stuff long while getting neuted and with more off the ships now having extra high slots where you potentially can fit af nos on will make these ships good tackle.
I really like the look off what you did to the tormentor, it looks really nice and got a lot off potential fitting options,and I like drones on frigs.
The Merlin getting its resistance bonus back is nice, and combinded with the damage bonus this could become the "new rifter" once stuff get on the test server it will be interresting to test.
The Incursus just seem way to strong with the repping bonus, it will be cap boosted and no frig will be able to bring enough dps to kill it which is just silly. Instead give it a tracking bonus or a tanking bonus like most the others. considering it got a big Hull you could potentionally give it like a 10% extra Hull hit points. But really mostly anything else would be nice.
I personally think its silly that you dont what to do anything to the rifter, It seems silly that the caldari ship doesnt have any launcher points while the Rifter stil have 2.

Keep the updates comming!

This might be a dumb suggestion but why not ask the people who actually fly the ships what the specific problem is with each ship and try to fix it rather than just changing stuff?

Some of the changes look good so far but there needs to be some viable alternative to flying a Rifter all the time. The Tristan was my favorite Frigate when I started playing but it just sucks compared to its Caldari and Minmatar competitors.

Seriously, does a Frigate need a Tracking bonus?

Hmmm, Merlin getting damage AND resist bonus? Interesting!

It might work well for the Merlin, but I hope it doesn't get replicated for the Rokh when you come to Battleship balancing, as Rokh is supposed to be a long-range platform which needs its optimal range bonus. I would like to see Damage and Range bonus on the Rokh instead of the shield bonus.

I dont want to see Hybrid Damage and Shield Resist bonus on ALL the other Caldari Tech1 gunboats. You need at least some Caldari ships to have that Range bonus.

Here are my ideas for bonuses:

Merlin: Hybrid Damage, Shield Resistances
Moa: Hybrid Damage, Optimal Range
Ferox: Hybrid Damage, Shield Resistances
Rokh: Hybrid Damage, Optimal Range

Completely forgot about the Naga.

CCP, please don't touch the Naga!

If you're planning to abandon the 'tiered' feeling of frigates with this new rebalancing effort are you going to be changing the skill requirements of these ships as well?

I realize they're frigates and the skills are short trains already, but I'd think that support and scanning ships would have lower skill requirements than combat or attack frigates. As you change ship roles and adjust where they fit in the grand scheme of ship design, consider also where they fit in the grand scheme of the skill trees as well.

If you set the trend for it now then when you get around to rebalancing destroyers, battlecruisers, and any other class of ship you feel needs rebalancing it won't be something that bushwacks you during the process since those skills are much longer trains than frigates. :)

It's a complex thing trying to redesign a large group of ships. Balance is very important, and is the entire reason why they're being redesigned in the first place. Beyond just discussing the changes among themselves and with us they'll have to work out how the planned changes are going to affect the game at large. How will these changes affect the players' decisions on what ships to use, and for what purposes. Then you have justify your changes and how they'll affect the game and the players and finalize the changes you plan to make. Deciding on actual numbers is probably the easiest part once you decide what you're actually going to do.

After you've done all of that you need to actually make the changes to the game, whether that be through actually recoding the ships or through simply altering the stats of the ships. That part is all contingent upon how the game is built behind the scenes, and if they actually need to recode the ships that means programming, iteration of updates, and bug testing to make sure the changes they've made aren't doing anything they didn't intend them to do.

All of this is being done by a small group of developers that have other projects they're responsible for as well. Things I would assume are more important in the long term than rebalancing frigates as a test run and proof of concept for their future plans of rebalancing Destroyers and Battlecruisers, and any other class of ship they feel needs tweaking.

That's why it takes so long, or would you prefer they rush a bunch of haphazard changes into the game? :)

Please keep in mind that using multiple weapons systems is significantly more skill-intensive, which can be a deterrent to new players, many of whom are already put off by having to train for days/weeks to fit and use just one weapon system well, let alone two or three different systems.

Split weapon systems on a ship are particularly bad, since the ship either gets bonuses for only one of the weapon systems, or gets a single bonus applied to each weapon system. This often puts them at a disadvantage compared to ships with a single weapon system. The Tristan, for example, tends to take a backseat to the Incursus, for this particular reason.

Having multiple lines of ships, based upon different weapon systems, within the same race, is almost as bad. Caldari pilots usually choose to go either the missile route or the gun route, not both, in order to maximize their DPS in the shortest amount of skill training time. This effectively limits them to a single line of ships, which they can fly well, and another line of ships, which they can fly poorly (or less well).

Perhaps, it would improve matters if ships simply had generic hardpoints, to which players could choose to fit turrets, launchers, or drone bays - or mix them up as desired. For example a Rifter would have 4 hardpoints, which could be fit with 4 turrets, or 4 launchers, or 4 drone bays (which allows use of up to 4 light drones, say) - or a mixture such as 2 turrets and 2 launchers. (Drone bays are a bit tricky, though, so maybe it would be better to start off by just allowing turrets and launchers to be interchangeable.)

So, a new player could initially focus skill training for projectile turrets, fitting his/her ship with all turrets. Later, the player could expand his/her skills into missiles, and then opt to replace the turrets with launchers, or fit a mix of turrets and launchers, depending on the circumstances.

This would also make ship fits much less predictable, which is always a good thing.