Cor Aidan
Shore Leave
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Posted - 2011.01.05 23:37:00 -
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Edited by: Cor Aidan on 05/01/2011 23:38:38 Actually, an interesting possible change to the New Eden universe related to remote repping I've been pondering might be as follows:
Unreppable damage.
Specifics: Some portion of damage cannot be repaired using active (ship based) repair modules, either local or remote. This would eliminate "unbreakable" tanks. Say, something like 0.1 or 0.2% of taken damage is "permanent" and can only be repaired in station. Station repairs are also changed to require both isk and minerals (T2 might require T2 materials to replace parts, etc.).
This would have numerous other effects, and I'll be honest and say I don't know if it would be Good or Bad. Some notable effects: mission runners now have a "cost of doing business" that's higher than mere ammo costs (which are small mineral and isk at the moment (LP store fees)) or the occasional lost drone. It would also vastly increase the isk sinks in the game, because who right now actually pays to have their ship repaired in a station (there are some cases where this makes sense, but for mission running folks it becomes a toss-up for heavy hull damage between time lost to hull rep vs direct isk cost of station repairs)? This also adds a mineral sink - something that currently exists only in the form of ship losses and ammo construction. So we'd have an increased counter to both isk and mineral inflation. Depending on the ratios, mineral prices might go up (due to higher mineral demand) or down (because there is less isk floating around).
It would also adversely effect bots, because now they have higher operating costs; macros using drones and T1 lasers currently have exactly zero recurring costs, so adding a recurring cost will help counter that behavior.
Probably the only group that would really scream about this change is mission runners. Hardcore PvP may not care too much because they are used to losing ships; while it will make them possibly lose ships faster, they won't lose them faster than their opponents because the change would affect all ships equally.
I haven't really been able to think of any debilitating detrimental side effects to this concept (that's what the forums are for!). Yes, it will change combat tactics, but there are very obvious benefits across multiple facets of the pod piloting experience.
Regarding module swaps such as shield extenders or plating: I'd make the permanent damage a percentage of the total hitpoints, not an absolute number, so that adding or removing modules doesn't result in being able to play games by changing modules (or get the strange effect of negative hitpoints like if you offline plating with extreme armor damage).
A slight alternative to this strategy would be to have damage pass through to shield and armor mods (similar to heat damage) so they will fail after a sustained attack; that seems much more difficult to tune properly than a bulk ship effect though; it's also not clear how to apply damage to remote rep modules in this situation.
Edit: Corrected ammo use to be an isk sink for LP purchases
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