I agree with this in principle.

However, given the current fleet bonus' mechanics, I'm pretty sure its not possible to limit fleet booster effects to ongrid without completely revamping the fleet boosting system.

However, given the current fleet bonus' mechanics, I'm pretty sure its not possible to limit fleet booster effects to ongrid without completely revamping the fleet boosting system.

Your proposal is based on a false premise. Namely that off grid ganglinks are immune to attack. Back when it was possible to make a ship unprobable, it was broken as they had no risk beyond spies in fleet. Now however, they can be probed just like everything else. There is nothing stopping you from probing and killing them other than your own ineptitude. Some people do put them inside POS's and although that blocks attacking the booster ship, you can always go kill the POS instead. It probably costs more anyways tbh.

rewards of mining.

What rewards?

I agree as well with the idea of limiting the range of gang links. Especially in respect to mining. I've been in 0.0 before and I have seen plenty of players park their Rorqual/Orca alts in the safety of a POS while other mine (reaping the bonuses). Not much risk there compared to the rewards of mining.

Gang links should only apply to the grid where they are active.

Off-grid gang links these days are pretty popular with "solo" players and small groups that operate in a single solar system. I believe that if a pilot and ship are affecting your on-grid combat, they should be on-grid with you so that there is a chance to eliminate the force multiplier. This is already the case with every other ship and module that affects combat unless you count assigned fighters -- and in that case you can destroy the fighters to eliminate their effect.

I have no problem with gang links in general as I've been the beneficiary probably more often than the victim, but someone ought to be at the helm and the ship ought to be vulnerable to counterattack.

Likely the main detractors will say that since a gang linked ship has to be uncloaked to provide bonuses it is vulnerable -- but this isn't true if the ship is at a POS.

This means that the whole fleet has to stay together in the system. Eg: you cant have the heavy ships shooting a POS and the lights camping the in gate.

Also, the Fleet Command ships will need to be reworked to be able to have buffer tanks comporable to the Damnation; the Eos and the Claymore will need to lose their lolrep bonuses in favour of some kind of EHP boost. Shield tanking Fleet Commands may also need their slot layout revising, as the Command Processors replace tanking mids.

Being required to be on grid would make T3 gangboosters effectively useless.

by the way, just letting you know that your suggestion encourages blobs

but I do believe that fleet boosters should not be in NPC corps

The reason it encourages more blobbing is because practically no one is willing to sit in an unarmed ganglink ship in the middle of a fight, especially if they are heavily outnumbered. If you did put the link ship on grid in we'll say a 2 v 10 fight including the link ship, the very first thing that would happen is the other fleet would nuke the ganglink ship or drive it off grid, and then subsequently crush the lone combat ship.

The reason it encourages more blobbing is because practically no one is willing to sit in an unarmed ganglink ship in the middle of a fight, especially if they are heavily outnumbered. If you did put the link ship on grid in we'll say a 2 v 10 fight including the link ship, the very first thing that would happen is the other fleet would nuke the ganglink ship or drive it off grid, and then subsequently crush the lone combat ship.

Currently it works a bit different in the right hands. The boosting ship is reasonably safe because that 10 man blob didn't bother to bring a prober. All 10 of them are also obsessed with km whoring so no one brought a link ship of their own either. As a result, the lone combat ship on grid facing off against the 10 man gang is able to kite them or in some cases tank them (at least for a while) and put up a decent fight.

Like it or not, off grid boosting is currently about the only thing keeping "solo" and small gang pvp alive. Remove it, and anyone that's alone is just cannon fodder for the 30 man BC/BS gangs with full logi support and a cyno to titan bridge in 500 more if needed. And they won't hesitate to use it all against a single nano-cane if they can catch it. The only counter to that blob mentality is to stay out of hard tackle range so they can't all pile on you so easily. And it by no means makes you invincible either, all it takes is a single rapier on their side and they'll blob you to death regardless.

I believe boosting is working as intended and to change it as proposed would be a serious blow to the game as a whole. The absolute last thing this game needs is changing mechanics to favor blobbing even more heavily.

Your proposal is based on a false premise....

...sit in an unarmed ganglink ship...

Honestly, this whole proposal sounds a lot like "I can't fly a certain type of ship and I feel that because of that no one else should be able to have something better than what I can use because that's totally unfair" type of proposal.

Gang link ships can be made completely combat worthy. Command ships and Strategic cruisers are renowned for their ability to tank. Sure, they can't fit the most epic tank once you fit them properly (with gang links) but doesn't that make sense?



That is a completely separate problem.

Wut? You forgot to add logic to your post. I point out that the only fleet command ship able to stay on the field in fleet fights is the Damnation, you say that fleet command ships are supposed to be tanky, then admit that the rest of them aren't tanky enough, but that's not a problem when we're proposing forcing them to all be on grid.

Active tanking has been an irrelevance for fleet fights for years. It seems to me that when you're proposing a change to Fleet Command ships work in fleet fights, then a look at the ship bonuses might perhaps be a very unseperate problem indeed.

GǪ because a 1 v 10 fight wouldn't have simply squashed the lone combat ship, off-grid booster or not?

Wut?...

Sorry to be rude but most people have no idea how the gang links work.

1. Gang links dont work in warp so ship needs to be stationary.
2. Gang links dont work when cloaked.
3. If CS is on grid nobody is calling it primary due to huge tank capability. If you call a CS primary you are doing somethink wrong.
4. If you cant kill a stationary uncloaked ship you suck at game.

And btw that someone has a pos is no reason to nerf somethink becouse everyone and his grandmother has pos for staging caps, fleets etc...

Gang links should only apply to the grid where they are active.

Off-grid gang links these days are pretty popular with "solo" players and small groups that operate in a single solar system.

Given the force-multiplier, if the CS is in a gang of more than 10 or so fighters, you'd be doing something wrong NOT calling it primary after you've taken care of ECM and logistics.

To do this, then they would have to change the mechanic so you can have multiple people boosting fleet at the same time, even if only one of the boosting is actually taking affect. This is because command ships can and WILL among the first targets in an engagment, so there need to be redundant boosters or else boosting becomes near useless in large fleets.

The reason it encourages more blobbing is because practically no one is willing to sit in an unarmed ganglink ship in the middle of a fight, especially if they are heavily outnumbered. If you did put the link ship on grid in we'll say a 2 v 10 fight including the link ship, the very first thing that would happen is the other fleet would nuke the ganglink ship or drive it off grid, and then subsequently crush the lone combat ship.

Currently it works a bit different in the right hands. The boosting ship is reasonably safe because that 10 man blob didn't bother to bring a prober. All 10 of them are also obsessed with km whoring so no one brought a link ship of their own either. As a result, the lone combat ship on grid facing off against the 10 man gang is able to kite them or in some cases tank them (at least for a while) and put up a decent fight.

Like it or not, off grid boosting is currently about the only thing keeping "solo" and small gang pvp alive. Remove it, and anyone that's alone is just cannon fodder for the 30 man BC/BS gangs with full logi support and a cyno to titan bridge in 500 more if needed. And they won't hesitate to use it all against a single nano-cane if they can catch it. The only counter to that blob mentality is to stay out of hard tackle range so they can't all pile on you so easily. And it by no means makes you invincible either, all it takes is a single rapier on their side and they'll blob you to death regardless.

I believe boosting is working as intended and to change it as proposed would be a serious blow to the game as a whole. The absolute last thing this game needs is changing mechanics to favor blobbing even more heavily.

10v1 isn't nearly as one sided as you might think. When solo, GǪ with a loki booster alt.

GǪ

This thread really does look like a case of you just moaning about being unable to use the ship yourself. Off grid boosters are very much a field leveling tool. They allow you to take a small weakness in an enemy fleet composition and convert it into a huge gaping whole that a heavily outnumbered force can pull a victory from. The loki + nano ship is the simplest and most obvious example, but a well flown active tanked ship + appropriate tanking bonus booster can be just as effective if dps/tracking is the opposing fleet's weakness.

combat probes, use them you must

This suggestion is about having to make a choice between having your cake or eating your cake. You shouldn't be able to have both

When it comes to on-grid boosters, there is always the option of using grid-fu to stretch the grid in such a way that you can safely boost from hundreds of km away.

Pretty sure CCP classified deliberate grid manipulation as "undesirable" (ie. exploitive, you will be GM smacked). Messes up the database or something .. way old blurp so won't try to find it, so don't ask :)

Also, the Fleet Command ships will need to be reworked to be able to have buffer tanks comporable to the Damnation; the Eos and the Claymore will need to lose their lolrep bonuses in favour of some kind of EHP boost. Shield tanking Fleet Commands may also need their slot layout revising, as the Command Processors replace tanking mids.

Being required to be on grid would make T3 gangboosters effectively useless.

Like it or not, off grid boosting is currently about the only thing keeping "solo" and small gang pvp alive.

Not supported, unless the grid mechanics are also dramatically reworked as well... after all, if you're wanting to talk about weird meta stuff that affects combat in counter-intuitive ways, there is NOTHING that does this quite so badly as the grid. If you make any kind of 'on-grid' requirement for command ships, then what happens next is that more people start playing grid-fu, and suddenly all sorts of fights are taking place on ridiculous grids designed to isolate the CS from the battle while still keeping it technically 'on-grid'.

With reward you talking about, reward its none almost spend time and noting els ;( dis days mining is worst profesion in eve, max wath you can ern per hour is 25 milj mining arkonor bistot, so tell me how the poor miner with such income will genareta back his lost rork how much hours its takes to mine so much minerals back to replace it with all fiting.
I not talking that evrage income per hour its verry poor that is 11 milj per hour with one hulk by perfect boosting, by mining randome ores. so for rorqual need to mine around 181 hours with one hulk. So look numbers and befor posting somting calcualte how that guy will ern back that money and if there is eny good reward at all.

This days ppl mining not for money eny more:
1, they minign for fun - to rest from hard work day.
2. they minign thatthey like to mine and chill in chats and voice.

If wie wish keep 0.0 mining att al in eve wie ned to create buble around hiden belts that one shjip with guns cant warp in it, that comes out form current mining incomes.

How will this hurt shield links? Leaving grid and coming back again means you could lose a lot of shield HP.

How will this alter the role of Orca's and Rorquals and Carriers, etc?
How will this . . .

Moving them to grid only will alter several aspects of this game, from Plexing to Mining to PvP. I don't think this move should be made casually, as it will have significant impacts on too many areas of the game (not just fleet PvP).

I can go with this one. It always seemed weird that with no intel, sight or any connection to a battlefield, a command ship is "commanding" the fight. This would certainly help aliviate other issues as well. Such as, t3's being better command ships than a purpose built command ship, offgrid/pos boosters, and command alts. (personally, i think if you can play the game afk and still produce a noticable effect you should suffer a nerf.) even froma pve perspecive, this would kill the 6 link tengus for incursion fleets.

Gang bonuses represent command and control improving the abilities of their fleet. If the fleet is not anywhere near the command and control, it shouldn't benefit.

You do realize that in modern warfare command and control is normally not even on the same continent, much less actually at the fight. Modern communications systems, satellites, and computers make it unnecessary to risk your CNC staff at the front lines. All you need on the front are guys to receive and carry out the orders. Surprisingly that's very much how fleet bonuses in Eve work.

I think this is what people normally call blob incentive.

The whole thread is blob incentive.

Or did you think people would keep bringing tiny little fleets with their now on grid command ships?

Actually I do. I fly in small gangs all the time. If the fleet is too small to support a combat effective command ship on grid with us, then we don't bring one and make do without the links. If the fleet is of sufficient size then we bring a command ship. Sufficient falls somewhere around 8 to 10 dependent upon the fleet composition. That's what EVE is all about, taking risks and either losing in a blaze of glory or reaping the rewards. The risk now for off-grid gang links is so minimal compared to the benefits that it is unbalancing. If somebody can do it practically AFK or on a third instance of EVE, it shouldn't have that much influence over a fight.

It seem you guys spend more time crying your eyes out on the forum rather than adapting and pvping

Would you like a tissue

Requiring the Command Boosting ship to be on greid is dumbing down the game

removes the role of the scan down ship for the planet hugger ship or removes the advantage of getting to the fight early and putting up a POS.

The Key is to adapt. - Possibly take out the Command Boosting ship before it makes it into system.
Trick you enemey to fight on YOUR terms. have the terrain on your side.

-1 I will not support dumbing down the game to a bunch of ships sitting on 1 grid and just calling primary.
A little hide and seek .

When solo, I ....with a loki booster alt. ..

Solution?:
- Commandships have been needing a once-over for a while, increase the tank of the link platforms slightly and change what needs to be changed in regards to the links (Info Link "lolz").
- T3 Command subsystem changed to decrease signature slightly and allows for TWO links right off the bat.

Increasing these bonuses is obviously a bad direction for the game.

It's a no thank you, from me.

If someone has a pos up, they took the time to do exactly that. Why shouldn't they then reap the benefits of this later in fights.

Also they fixed tech 3, just because you can't be arsed to probe them down is your problem and not the problem of the tech 3 ships, or gang links. They fitted to be harder to probe, you need to fit to find them. Sounds like balance to me.

It's not as if this isn't open for all. Why do you lot always insist this game be dumbed down and made so much easier?

It's a no thank you, from me.

If someone has a pos up, they took the time to do exactly that. Why shouldn't they then reap the benefits of this later in fights.

Also they fixed tech 3, just because you can't be arsed to probe them down is your problem and not the problem of the tech 3 ships, or gang links. They fitted to be harder to probe, you need to fit to find them. Sounds like balance to me.

It's not as if this isn't open for all. Why do you lot always insist this game be dumbed down and made so much easier?

...If someone has a pos up, they took the time to do exactly that. Why shouldn't they then reap the benefits of this later in fights.

Also they fixed tech 3, just because you can't be arsed to probe them down is your problem and not the problem of the tech 3 ships, or gang links. They fitted to be harder to probe, you need to fit to find them. Sounds like balance to me.

If someone has a pos up, they took the time to do exactly that. Why shouldn't they then reap the benefits of this later in fights.

I for one run exploration sites and I use an offgrid boosting alt. This proposition requires me to fly 2 accs at the same time just to get bonuses so whoever wants to gank me can get the advantage. NO ******* WAY!

POSes already influence fights through cyno jammers, jump bridges, weapon & EWAR batteries. If you want to benefit from a POS during a fight, bring the fight to the POS.

You're already flying two accounts to get the bonuses, the only difference is they now both require attention.

This all comes down to one simple fact.......

It seems we never agree.

You think it would dumb the game down to require booster ships on the battle grid? I think that is a very hard case to make.

If POS were complicated, demanding, expensive and required player skill to set up then yes, most definitely, the owners deserve the <2 days worth of absolute immunity for their links .... not the case though .. and now POS are getting dumbed down to boot.

You done a lot of combat probing after the change? Sure, it is theoretically doable.........

Off-grid boosters allow an AFK player to influence combat. In what bizarro world does this make sense? In the meantime I am of course training my alt to fly a 6-link tengu to boost incursion fleets. Am I a hypocrite? Certainly. Am I going to exploit any valid game mechanics to my advantage? Of course!

We may agree on something in the future, who knows.
Rather than asking questions 1 & 2, you need to ask the correct ones.

1. Should someone be able to fit a tech 3 to work off grid?
2. Should a corp gain the benefits from a pos they took the time to install?
3. Do all these options have a counter and are they open to all?.......

You lot are basically saying: "We don't want to be bothered with finding tech3 or fitting/equipping ourselves for the task. Therefore we think CCP should nerf it."

[
Oh and this idea will make it more tedious, not less. (That was a weak argument to bring tbh)

at least not solo like I normally do.

1. Should someone be able to fit a tech 3 to work off grid?
2. Should a corp gain the benefits from a pos they took the time to install?
3. Do all these options have a counter and are they open to all?.......

So it is working as intended then?

If they intend to make eve a game that can't be played unless you are multi-boxing alts then yes its working as intended.

Is that good for the game?

I am just saying that CCP (via player feedback) has decided that group play is better than solo play.

They consistantly give carrots to activities and tactics that require 2+ characters by granting bonuses or positive scaling mechanics. CCP does not, however, have an ingame mechanism to filter out alt characters from real characters (bad terminology but you get my drift). Nor do I think that CCP would want to have such a mechanism even if it was possible. I know a lot of players who wouldn't that is for sure.

So long as efficiency is greater by bringing more characters (whether more people are at screens or not) alt use will increase.

Are multiple players engaged in activity cooperatively good for the game? CCP and many players seem to think so.

Is bypassing the need for friends via the alt mechanics good for the game? Any rule to the contrary would be un-enforceable so the point is moot imo.

It's understandable from a business perspective.

But lets assuming they "intend" to drive out all the solo players.

to justify losing the number of people who thinks it sucks that you have to mess around with multiple accounts in order to play this game competitively?

You did not answer my questions so I will take it you admit it does not dumb down the game to require link ships to be on grid.

1) It can work but it's work should not directly influence a battle that is happening on grid.
2) Yes and I am not suggesting we remove every reason to build a pos.
3) Yes it has a counter. The counter is the immersion breaking GÇ£eve is a choreGÇ¥ option of dragging an alt around yourself and multiboxing your combat so you can compete. That option sucks. The other GÇ£countersGÇ¥ don't work well as explained above.

This sounds like a complaint against needing a gangbooster even as a "solo" player. To that degree it does not matter if that boosting is done by a POS alt or by an ongrid (because ongrid does not mean actually vulnerable) player/alt..

You hit the nail on the head with the complaint about :effort: involved in dragging an alt around for boosting. That effort will be even greater if it has to be ongrid (which is why people dont like such a change... especially when splitting up a gang/fleet across many grids) which means that much more frustration. Unfortunately, as you yourself point out, many people see gangboosters as "necessary" to be competative. So people wont stop using them, they will just be bitter about how much more effort it takes with them being on grid.

Or they stop bothering to PVP in small gangs completely.

It was a loaded question and if he's dumb, it really makes no difference where he is, he'll still diaf horribly.

So they all have counters, it's just back to the 'we can't be arsed' argument.

If the counter to this is - "well get your own army of alts to multibox" then that is crap.

Notice no one is denying that you will need these booster alts to be competitive after the t2 links hit the market.

Now the only question is how long will it take before people realize that eve is a game that in order to play it you must invest in alts that you multibox around the universe?

I can tell you if I knew eve was going to be a game that you *had* to multi box alt accounts to be competitive I never would have installed it. Does ccp really want the game to get this reputation?

Like I said the only reason they would want this is to get the short term burst of new accounts so that they can demonstrate numbers to sell the game. But in the long run this sort of thing will ruin the game.

+1 to OP

Makes no sense that you can boost from 100% safety. You're gang should be assembled in order to receive gang bonuses.

I'd be totally satisfied if it was completely axed, but a variation (and more dev work) to this could be that off-grid boosting is nerfed to something like 20% of full value, and stays full value when the booster is on-grid.

I think that would be an excellent compromise. Maybe make one of the skills increase the effectiveness of gang links accross distances to allow it to get above 20% but not too much higher. I think the incentive should be to get the pilot to have a reason to be on grid and in the battle with bonuses instead of just being 100% immune and safe while contributing to the fight.

I don't understand why people are complaining about this, it's not like it's impossible to kill offgrid boosters unless they are in a pos, in which case it's a matter of the residents of a system having a slight advantage, which is fine..

Limiting boosting to ongrid will make managing fleet hierachy a nightmare with the current game mechanics, as you will lose bonusses (potentially for the entire fleet) whenever a commander of some sort dies or is forced to leave grid for some reason,

and it'll also screw up if you have to split your fleet up to fight in several places at once. ..

The people who think fitting command t3s with buffer and weapons is a good idea are just plain wrong. It will be useless and outperformed by a drake, and also only have 1 link, and be overpriced (noone would ever use that subsystem on a t3 again). Commandships, however, are meant to be on the field - I wouldn't mind if those were buffed in order to be doing the job better than offgrid t3s . Maybe switch the bonusses so the commandships give a bigger bonus that T3s. Or make some kind of mechanic that enhances Command bonusses for a command ships if they are on grid, so it'll have the role intended.

If the t3 ship is already aligned and using an afterburner the pilot would have to be afk to get caught. Meanwhile the gang that is uselessly trying to chase the booster ship is short at least one pilot that should be on grid during the fight.

The advantage will not be slight once t2 links are out. People who do not use these alts will not be able to compete.

It won't be a nightmare. It will of course hurt the fleet if a booster needs to leave grid or dies - but that is expected right?

Even now if they are fighting in different systems there is no bonus.

I don't think people are saying t3s should be used on grid as command ships.

Yet more lazy excuses and 'can't be bothered' arguments.

If they don't bring a booster, then isn't that simply bad planning? Bring a booster and compete, simple.
Also, everyone has the ability to gain the same advantage with T2 links.

Limiting boosting to ongrid will make managing fleet hierachy a nightmare with the current game mechanics, as you will lose bonusses (potentially for the entire fleet) whenever a commander of some sort dies or is forced to leave grid for some reason, and it'll also screw up if you have to split your fleet up to fight in several places at once.

The way this has been going:

A:Off-grid gangboosters are bad! They can't be hurt! Put them on grid.

B: Yes they can, just scan them down! Leave them alone.

A: But you can't actually catch an aligned t3 even if you can scan them, so you are just wasting a pilots time chasing them.

B: You're just lazy.

...

The way this has been going:

A:Off-grid gangboosters are bad! They can't be hurt! Put them on grid.

B: Yes they can, just scan them down! Leave them alone.

A: But the sig is too small! You need mad-1337 skillz to scan them!

B: HTFU


Why not just make ganglinks increase sig/decrease res (make them easier to scan down), but keep them off grid, and then everyone only a little unhappy...

Bad idea, it allowes a solo pilot or a smaller gang to engage a larger group and still be able to win the fight.

The way this has been going:

A:Off-grid gangboosters are bad! They can't be hurt! Put them on grid.

B: Yes they can, just scan them down! Leave them alone.

A: But the sig is too small! You need mad-1337 skillz to scan them!

B: HTFU


Why not just make ganglinks increase sig/decrease res (make them easier to scan down), but keep them off grid, and then everyone only a little unhappy...

Bad idea, it allowes a solo pilot or a smaller gang to engage a larger group and still be able to win the fight.

Are you required to have a Falcon alt, too, in order to be competative?

Or may be another damage dealer? You know, dual-boxing 2 battleships isn't that hard.

Or a cloaked tracking-disrupting pillgrim? Or logistic ship?

Some should better deal with the fact that bringing in another ship is always beneficial. It's another story whether on- or off-grid boosting is Ok - just don't bring irrelevant facts to the discussion.

How about this.

Nerf T3 links slightly (mby just remove the command bonus so they are the same as Battlecruiser links) but leave them alone otherwise (still able to be offgrid).

Then buff commandship links to current T3 stats but limit them to ongrid.

You people do realize that majority of people that do use t3 gang links operate in small gangs. All your proposal does is promotes blobs and makes solo/small gang pvp even less viable.

You people do realize that majority of people that do use t3 gang links operate in small gangs. All your proposal does is promotes blobs and makes solo/small gang pvp even less viable.

How about this.

Nerf T3 links slightly (mby just remove the command bonus so they are the same as Battlecruiser links) but leave them alone otherwise (still able to be offgrid).

Then buff commandship links to current T3 stats but limit them to ongrid.

This will allow small roaming gangs, who doesn't have manpower to bring people in command ships, to still bring their alts in cloaky t3s like they do now - slightly less effectively. And it will ensure that an ongrid dedicated command ship will do the job better, rewarding the people who actually bring their links to the fight.

tbh I would rather not see it changed at all, but this is a compromise I can live with

In a fleet fight, you can destroy your enemies damage dealers, logistics, ewarfare, dictors/hictors, tacklers, etc.

You should be able to destroy your enemies fleet boosters as well. Destroying a fleet booster means removing enhanced abilities that may be affecting the entire enemy fleet, thus possibly improving your odds in a fight.

The concept of safespotted T3 with ganglinks running during a fight with cov ops/interdiction nullifier to move around unchecked is beyond terrible.

I have to say that I find off grid boosting lame (even though I enjoy Will Adama's PvP videos and the fact that he doesn't hide that he uses off grid T3 gang links). The boosts that these ships give are clearly profound and to be able to use them in relative safety is baad mmkay. ...

I do not think this should apply to miners because miners do not affect the outcomes of battles, that wouldb . It would be a impractical and extraordinarily risky to park a Rorqual or Orca in a belt in 0.0 or on grid there. I suppose being 400km away from the hulks would give you plenty of time to warp back to POS.

It should apply to them as well. It may not be a combat advantage but it is still an advantage. Risk should be required for advantages of this scale. With good intel/scouts/security there should be no issue.

They are not used solo.

There is no reason to think they are used by small groups more than large groups.

The proposal just makes it so you do not need to multibox an alt t3 with gang links to be competitive.

But like I said before if there were a way to give the bonuses and allow others who do not want to multibox alts a way to be competitive I wouldn't mind so much.

crew members

...Large groups rarely use T3s for boosting, as the fleet is rarely stationary. A three-link Loki, Legion or Tengu would have a hard time surviving even with logistics (you have ****-all resists), and considering that such groups routinely use fleet warps (i.e. to land the fleet on a POS at optimal) it would be impractical to boost from off grid....

You do not need to run a T3 gang link alt to be competitive, believe it or not

...granted this is probably an API swapping session changing nightmare, having people's stats going up and down depending on whether their squad, wing, or fleet boosters were warping on and off grid...

Guess that depends on where and how one operates. Try going up against a boosted Hurricane in your unboosted ditto and see how well you fare .. he'll have longer scram, higher speed, lower sig and more EHP than you can ever achieve "alone". But for a gank on a gate/undock or a bait/trap it does indeed make little difference.

So you want off-grid fleet boosting to be nerfed, to the detriment of practically everything in the game (incursions, ratting, mining, defense fleets, etc.) for the marginal benefit of ~honour~ matches?

Actually, yes, they are...

Guess that depends on where and how one operates. Try going up against a boosted Hurricane in your unboosted ditto and see how well you fare .. he'll have longer scram, higher speed, lower sig and more EHP than you can ever achieve "alone". But for a gank on a gate/undock or a bait/trap it does indeed make little difference.

After 8 pages of posts it is blatantly clear that the only people who don't want this change are the ones that abuse this mechanic already.

Whereas the only people that do want this change are likely upset that they lost their 1v1 in Rancer or whatever because the other pilot was ~dishonourable~ with an off-grid T3 link ship.

It has nothing to do with the other pilot simply being more competent, that's for sure!

No...it has to do with immunity from the risk vs reward scale that EvE is supposed to have.

Whereas the only people that do want this change are likely upset that they lost their 1v1 in Rancer or whatever because the other pilot was ~dishonourable~ with an off-grid T3 link ship.

It has nothing to do with the other pilot simply being more competent, that's for sure!

Overwhelm them with superior numbers, bait them next door, or deny them a fight. If you're that worried upset you can't get a killmail on some chucklefuck in a linkship (because you're not equipped to probe it down, or you don't want to bubble its POS, w/e) then I don't know what to say.

Because denying them a fight was the only option I proposed

"who says I need to use tactics, tactics are for the boring sov nullsec blobbers"

A full week with no bump...this is unacceptable...

Gang links...on grid. You wanna contribute to a fight then you need to be in the fight. Period.

This is obvious and should have been done a long time ago.

ECM. WCS. Superspeeds. Falcon. Dramiel. Will a nerf to offgrid boosters be the next killer of small gang PVP?

Don't see the problem. This nerf would hurt our miners too.

As an aside, how many people have to nay/yay something before someone at CCP considers it?

The way the watchlist works makes me think that there already is some sort of check whether stuff is on grid with you or not. The watchlist is also more data-intensive than simply seeing if something is there or not.

Watchlist only shows HP of stuff that is on-grid with you, right?

..Perhaps the whole gang link mechanic could do with an overhaul? eg Retain off-grid, give Capitals bonuses..

In case gang-link mods are not made on-grid in near future:
- Command and Control Jamming module.
Blocks all (friendly and hostile alike) gang-link communications from off-grid.

Just added this idea to CCPs module brainstorming request in Test forum, might be an outright alternative to changing mechanics in the first place if a decent/competitive hull can be found to carry them.

Make them fit in gang link slots ;)

Make them fit in gang link slots ;)

it should be the new destroyer hull's role.

since theyve expanded all other classes of ships except destroyers.

I agree with this ...

I would however leave 'mining' bonus's off the table.

Orca's and Rorqs cost waaaay too much with minimal defenses to force them to be sitting in an asteroid belt in 0.0 space.

Otherwise +1

Damn pharisaism.

I do not agree that fleet boost should be limited to on grid. actually with the number of systems in EVE the argument could be made it should extend to the hole constellation.

Destroyers are not exactly known for their lightning speed or extreme tanks .. a fleet could just have a sniper or speedy HAC clear Destroyers of the field and keep doing what they do with nigh unkillable safe-spotted T3s

Bumpin' for great Justice!

im getting really depressed that eve null sec is either completely empty - has too man ships for a solo pirate to do didly against, and when you get a system with 1-2 players in one is a booster ><

i like the idea of on-grid boosters but how about a compromise?

make pos shields negate any and all boosting effects while on grid with them. so if the boosters want to boost thats fine, but they have to be away from a POS - if they get worried about dying they can warp to a pos but their boosts become negated. simply set the activation so if your within say 300km from a POS they wont turn on?

so u can scan down the booster and do something to them instead of scan them down and watch them laugh at you thru a shield