And could lead to hilarity regarding ninja salvagers, canflippers and suicide gankers when the rats attack them...

thusly making Hi-Sec safer yet?


TIME WILL TELL!

We can adjust their hatred of drones though which is why we are asking for feedback when this hits a test server.

Q) Will NPCs do any new ewar?

A) No. Their actual weapons and effects will not be changing.

There are ways to tank this with a subcap ship you either need small sig and speed or a Command Ship or Heavy Dictor with logi support. I am sure there might be other ways but these are two ways to deal with this. The capital is just the quickest way as you have enough damage to kill it quickly.

Currently rats mostly use their EWAR at the start of the engagement and then only occasionally. Will they use their EWAR more? If so that will impact certain complexes and missions very heavily.

So basically you're nerfing nullsec personal income again.

Q) Will the NPC's switch targets now?
A) Yes, yes they will.

Q) Will NPC's kill my drones?
A) Yes, but they don't hate them nearly as much as sleepers. I ran 9 level 4 missions and lost 2 drones.

How is this nerfing nullsec income?

Excellent and long overdue!

As a part of this, has there been any thought to go through the NPCs and give them more GÇ£realGÇ¥ weapons? ECM was a classic case of the NPCs cheating but not using the ECM rules until that one was fixed, for instance, and while they may use the same hit and damage rules, a lot of rats still fire rather improbable weapons (150km torps, grid-wide webs and tracking disruptors, 90% webs, etc.).

After all, if the idea is for them to behave more like GǣrealGǥ enemies, taking away their h4x might be a good idea as wellGǪ

Special in what way? Why would we?

It makes exploration considerably harder (repping ships are more likely to die now). Most sites (which will, doubtless, not be redone) also rely on being able to carefully control aggression.

If you are a solo mission runner using turrets or missiles, this is a virtual non-change. It only impacts drone users and fleets.

What about sites like Dread Guristas Fleet Staging Point 3?
There is a Guristas Fleet Stronghold that launches Citadel Torpedos every 30 seconds. It will obliterate any subcap support for the capital already required to tank it if it switches targets.
Or is it expected some sites become cap only?

You're more than welcome. If possible we would love to get some feedback from people testing this on the test server. While we are working fast to make changes and we are testing this stuff internally there is only so much testing we can do. That and you guys always find ways to break our ****. :/

It makes exploration considerably harder (repping ships are more likely to die now). Most sites (which will, doubtless, not be redone) also rely on being able to carefully control aggression.

Right, precisely this. The result is less incentive to live in nullsec which is the opposite direction CCP should be going.




Except wormhole pilots have access to far higher incomes and are working together, whereas the stuff we're talking about is solo content. Two completely different things.

After all, if the idea is for them to behave more like GǣrealGǥ enemies, taking away their h4x might be a good idea as wellGǪ

A sea of tears over this... you should have seen what else we wanted the NPC to do.

Except wormhole pilots have access to far higher incomes and are working together, whereas the stuff we're talking about is solo content. Two completely different things.

It makes exploration considerably harder (repping ships are more likely to die now). Most sites (which will, doubtless, not be redone) also rely on being able to carefully control aggression.

Our ultimate goal is that PvP and PvE fits should be the same and a lot of the thought process should be the same. That is... a long way off though.

This is going to ruin the standard plexing setup in 0.0. Now you are going to have to have ships that can tank the site on their own which will mean lower dps and end up means taking more time to complete. I hope you are going to increase something to compensate for this, higher bounties on rats or a better drop rate of deadspace mods. It is going to be near on impossible to do the higher end plexes that require over a certain amount of dps unless you bring a fleet of friends with you but when the drop occurs it wont be worth peoples time as the share will be so low. In the end people are going to stop doing them and the price of deadspace loot is going to sky rocket. I can see the need to increase the rats AI but doing this will have a serious impact on peoples ability to earn isk on their own. I could see people unsubbing accounts over this I am afraid as they just wont be able to afford to keep them if they are paying by PLEX.

Logistics ships do generate a lot of threat as far as the NPC are concerned and will probably switch to them pretty quick. As for exactly how this will change your strategies, well that we shall have to wait and see.