When it comes to stuff like this don't some games use a twitch based mechanism where you have to hit the button when the little dot is in the proper spot? Just a thought...

ECM is very fun and not boring.

Counters to ECM that don't include ECCM

Bring friends.
Drones.
Attack from range.
Fleet with high alpha damage.
Fleet with same racial ships.
Some ships have high natural sensor strength (usually Ewar ships)

ECM is very fun and not boring. Things that are chance based usually aren't boring because you don't know what is going to happen. Am I gonna Jam everyone like a boss or die in a fire?

I don't think anyone said it was boring, I think they said it was out of place.

ECM is to the rest of PvP as slots are to poker.

Did... you even read the OP? I'm not arguing that ECM doesn't have counters, but rather it has nothing that the jamming ship or the ship being jammed can do to affect its outcome or effectiveness. It's about as fun and skill-involved as this.

I disagree, as a maxed out ECM pilot with a full Centurion set, I have a lot of fun jamming while this plays in my headphones.

The uploader has not made this video available in your country.

Is... is that a stealth "jamming" pun? I am in awe.

SENSORS JAMMED BABY.

'Save or die' mechanics have pissed people off since the first guy got polymorphed in D&D in the mid-seventies. ECM has pissed people off in Eve since its inception.

OP, give a suggested mechanic for ECM for us to mull over please.

I'm trying to, but drawing a blank. That is, I can't think of anything where ECM would still possibly have the "die" consequence of breaking the lock and jamming locking, but without the chance-based mechanic. These ideas have been proposed before:

• Reducing scan res or targeting range? Damps already do that.
• Selectively breaking locks (just breaking, not jamming)? Sure, but how?
• Denying new locks? Maybe, but with a couple SeBos we're back to the same old problem, possibly worse.
• Reducing max locked targets? Maybe, but the balancing on that is very hard.
• Turning the target's mods off? That is just really weird.

I don't know. Your thoughts?

IMO that "crippling effect of losing targets" - essential and the same thing happens with a sensor damp hitting you at range - you lose targeting. I don't see why ECM should be gutted so badly but I do find the current operations to be a problem.

Also, ECM deals with targeting - not slots that may or may not hold targeting equipment. Sensor damps mess with range & time to acquire a target - ECM? ... Yours is an interesting idea but it has some ugly implications.

I did come up with a different approach that is ... odd. What other attributes are there to targeting? Quantity.

No chance based operation. It works reliably and predictable all the time, just like Sensor Damps and any other type of EW.

ECM and ECCM go over to a system more like points/scrams vs warp core stabs but allow/mandate stacking to use for high effects - just like most other types of EW.

Each cycle of the initial ECM would cost you all your targets - additional applications (stacking of mods/drones) would not do this though each module/drone would decrement your max target count. You can target 8 ships, a strength 3 ECM would drop that to 5 ships max you could target.

The target reduction would be based upon your skills more than the ship. So if you had Targeting + Multitasking both at 5; to block targeting, they'd need to jam that 12 max, not just the 2-10 that a ship can target to entirely prevent locking of any targets. (you could train to enable better protection - just like other EW have skills to help against them.)

If at any point a jamming ship goes out of range or loses targeting on the jammed ship, it stops - just like killing a sensor damp ship, it frees you from all effects when the signal is disrupted. (no 20s jam timer).

ECCM would provide 2 effects: 1) Potential protection from being jammed at all. 2) Added number of targets that can be potentially locked (excess targets - like having skills trained to target 12 while flying a ship only able to target 8. It would take that 12 to 14 -- zip effect unless ECM jammed.)

"jammed at all" protection - if it's protection value exceeds the jam value of the ECM ship, you won' t lose all targets each time it cycles (though it will reduce your "excessive" max target count). In other words, a multi-spectral jam with a strength of 1 hitting a ship with an ECCM strength of 2 - the target wouldn't lose targeting though it's max target count would be decremented by 1. (stacking could still gut your ability to target anything but you wouldn't lose targeting every cycle).

Modules and rigs to help ECM would change to range, cycle time, etc. vs strength to improve /rand chances. It opens up a lot of options for how meta variations can work while still retaining most of the GTFO protection - 100% target loss per cycle if they don't have ECCM? Yet you still may not get away - it only decrements the absolute max count of targets while costing the lock but only at cycle time.

Net effects:
ECM always has "some" effect when applied to a target yet that effect can be mitigated by skills and fittings vs hit or miss based upon a randomizer.

ECCM works predictably and reliably to counter ECM effects; it isn't seen as a crap-shoot solution but a predictable counter.

tl;dr for lazy people:

• ECM as an all or nothing chance-based mechanic is out of place in Eve.
• ECM as is is not fun.
• Don't buff/nerf ECM, change it completely so it's not chance-based.
• Discuss.

You also missed the part of permajamming. While it's acceptable to be jammed once or twice during the fight - and even those 2 cycles can become a turning point - being shut off completely for the entire fight is stupid as heck. But this surely is a general EW flaw, which for some weird reason does not get its efficiency reduced over time and allows ugly things such as permajamming to happen.

I don't mind ECM...

However I do believe that ECM should never be able to JAM a target when that targets Sensor Strength is higher than the ECM module cycle. So a Falcon pilot trying to jam me with one racial ECM module pumping 250, should then never be able to jam me when my Sensor strength sits at 260. If he activates a second module and his total ECM output agaist me is now over 300 then yes I should be jammed.

I think most people issue with ECM that % thing no matter how high your Sensor Strength is.... your always going to get jammed.

you are not always going to get jammed - you have always a chance to get jammed

it may feel that way but what you are suggesting (if jammer > sensor then jam) is actually what you complain about (you always going to get jammed).

i think quite a lot of EVE players just have issues with how probability works, that would explain the success of somer blink as well - then again, that might not be an issue limited to EVE players


no clue if you knew but the entire turret mechanic is also chance based - you can hit people out of your range and tracking
even if you are orbiting a titan at 1 km with 10.000 km/ms speed with a signature of 1, there is still a 1% chance that he hits you in the face - it is called a perfect hit, regardless what you do you can not avoid it

just deal with it - you wont win in the lottery, ecm will not always jam you - this is your mind playing tricks on you

P.s: Unless its a Leviathan - if its a Leviathan you don't have that issue

I swear I must be the unluckiest player when it comes to ECM. 300 Drones perma jam me.

Maybe CCP will just remove ECM when all 75% of the bans in the precious tournament are ecm boats.

I sure as heck wouldn't complain

I already gave my suggestion on how to chance ECM once before - be prepared for a slight wall of text of pure wisdom:

Basically instead of breaking locks ECM "hides" ships depending on their signature radius vs scan strength/distance. The stronger the dose of ECM a ship receives, the bigger the ships will be that said receiver cannot detect and lock on to.

It wouldn't drastically chance ECM the way it works compared to how it is now, but on the other hand it would also NOT be a chance-based all-or-nothing module that locks out ships completely from the game. On top of that, the ECM would be a constant effect now just like any other e-war module instead of based on cycles.

Generally the idea is that a ship that is being ECM'd would quickly lose track of the small ships whilst still be able to detect larger ships unless he gets multiple stacks of ECM on his own ship. On the other hand it would require more stacks on a big ship than on a small ship to get the same results due to the sensor strength differences.

For even better complexity, make distance of ECM vs target AND any enemy ship vs target play a role. As an example:

Ship A uses ECM on Ship B from a distance of 100km

Ship B is now is unable to lock on to or see on the overview any ship that has a signature radius of X that is beyond distance Y. The smaller an enemy ship is, the closer said enemy ship can be to B without being lockable

If Ship A moves in to 50km from Ship B then the effect of the ECM will of course be stronger. If Ship A uses multiple ECM's, the effect will be stronger. Faction specific ECM's will naturally give an even bigger effect so nothing will change in that regard. Radar ECM vs Radar, Ladar vs Ladar, well you know this already.

This change would pretty much also make ECM true to it's name unlike the way it is now. ECM is all about confusing enemy radars after all. Breaking locks like it is in EVE now is not what I would call "ECM". More like an "EMP" weapon. The ECM burst module should in fact be renamed to an EMP burst to be frank.

The added bonus with this system is that it will give small roaming gangs using small ships an advantage if this is used correctly, which is something I believe was sought after in this blob-infested capital ship environment?


Well, that's my wall of text for now.

Why's that? ECM can be easily fixed if they only listen to me. It still fits a role, it's just implemented in a most horrid manner.

[quote=Gillia Winddancer]I already gave my suggestion on how to chance ECM once before - be prepared for a slight wall of text of pure wisdom:

Basically instead of breaking locks ECM "hides" ships depending on their signature radius vs scan strength/distance. The stronger the dose of ECM a ship receives, the bigger the ships will be that said receiver cannot detect and lock on to.

It wouldn't drastically chance ECM the way it works compared to how it is now, but on the other hand it would also NOT be a chance-based all-or-nothing module that locks out ships completely from the game. On top of that, the ECM would be a constant effect now just like any other e-war module instead of based on cycles.

Generally the idea is that a ship that is being ECM'd would quickly lose track of the small ships whilst still be able to detect larger ships unless he gets multiple stacks of ECM on his own ship. On the other hand it would require more stacks on a big ship than on a small ship to get the same results due to the sensor strength differences.

For even better complexity, make distance of ECM vs target AND any enemy ship vs target play a role. As an example:

Ship A uses ECM on Ship B from a distance of 100km

Ship B is now is unable to lock on to or see on the overview any ship that has a signature radius of X that is beyond distance Y. The smaller an enemy ship is, the closer said enemy ship can be to B without being lockable

If Ship A moves in to 50km from Ship B then the effect of the ECM will of course be stronger. If Ship A uses multiple ECM's, the effect will be stronger. Faction specific ECM's will naturally give an even bigger effect so nothing will change in that regard. Radar ECM vs Radar, Ladar vs Ladar, well you know this already.

This change would pretty much also make ECM true to it's name unlike the way it is now. ECM is all about confusing enemy radars after all. Breaking locks like it is in EVE now is not what I would call "ECM". More like an "EMP" weapon. The ECM burst module should in fact be renamed to an EMP burst to be frank.

The added bonus with this system is that it will give small roaming gangs using small ships an advantage if this is used correctly, which is something I believe was sought after in this blob-infested capital ship environment?


Well, that's my wall of text for now.

My favourite idea is actually not stats-related, but rather to make it a proper information-warfare module: make it mess up the overview by reducing information detail depending on how well-jammed (on a continuous scale) the ship is.

Oh my. Is every single engagement in EVE identical each and every single time now all of a sudden? Could someone please inform me when on earth that ever happened?

If that was adopted players would soon work out which small ships could attack which big ships using X ecm against Y type of big ship to always 100% make them undetecable at Z range. The trick then is to find a weapon layout that can kill the big ship from Z range. Once that is figured out it will work every time. It will be like being cloaked but able to shoot at your target as long as you keep range Z. If you can scram said big ship from Z range then you can kill them every time with that particular combo. There is no random in your idea!

That's when ECCM would come into play, altering said big ship's sensor strength.

I'm trying to, but drawing a blank. That is, I can't think of anything where ECM would still possibly have the "die" consequence of breaking the lock and jamming locking, but without the chance-based mechanic. These ideas have been proposed before:

• Reducing scan res or targeting range? Damps already do that.
• Selectively breaking locks (just breaking, not jamming)? Sure, but how?
• Denying new locks? Maybe, but with a couple SeBos we're back to the same old problem, possibly worse.
• Reducing max locked targets? Maybe, but the balancing on that is very hard.
• Turning the target's mods off? That is just really weird.

I don't know. Your thoughts?

Yes but do to number of slot limits there will always be a certain combo that will always work. No matter what the big ship would do it could not defend itself. Everybody would have it worked out in short order. Big ships with low number of mid slots would be most at risk vs small ships with lots of mid slots. Since nothing is random it can be figured out due to known limits and cetain combos will always work 100% of the time.

• Each ECM module reduces max locked targets by 2
• Each ECCM module prevents jams from 1 ECM module
• Each ECM drone reduces max locked targets by 0.25 (for a total of 1.25)
• Each cycle of ECM has a chance to break 1 (off race), 2 (multispec), or 3 (on race) targets following current mechanics, possibly slightly less aggressive

A full rack of jammers could still disable a single ship, but range or a partner would stop that in an instant.

Then again, it could be just that you are not as good as you thought at PVP and it was not the fault of ECM all along.

But keep going, i am sure eventually CCP will be annoyed enough to listen if you just keep screaming at the board. Worked for mining after all and its not like you are utterly disgracing yourself and the entire concept of "HTFU" that you believe to represent.

Carry on.

Sigh... and the thread turns into "fit a module to counter it" and "ECM isn't OP"

Good job, guys. If you posted the above, please re-read the OP.

I just had an idea. Not necessarily a good one, but maybe something to mull about?
ECM messes with the electronics of the target ship (obviously .. ) but maybe it could do so more on a per module basis:

Like.. one ECM module can jam one module (effectively disabling it) of your target ship (maybe introduce scripts for ECM so you can choose whether it's a high, low or mid slot module to jam) .. which one exactly could be determined by chance.

Ecm strength vs. jam strength determines how long you can jam that module. Make it something like, if the strengths are equal you jam the module for half as long as your jammer cycle is.

Or make the jammer able to jam all of either high, mid or low slots, but you'll need a considerable amount of jam strength (several 'right' racial ECM targeting one ship) against a ECCM'd ship to have the jam last a significant time (subject to balancing). Duration of the jam could, in this case, be calculated not only based on jam strength vs. sensor strength, but take into account the number of jammed modules, too, maybe. Or not.

Like I said, only rough ideas.

Edit: some typos... I'm sure I missed some, though, hehe.

I thought about module jamming myself before but in the end I for one figured that this would probably not work out too well at all. On top of that it would still keep the ECM from being ECM. Your suggestion falls under an EMP category more than anything else.

The big problem is that this idea would end up pissing off a huge amount of people for the sole reason that a critical module like say an active resist module or shield booster module shutting down would equal instant game over. On top of that it would still have chance based attributes which you really don't want to see in EVE as pretty much all other modules are purely statistics based. Sole exception is probably shield penetration but that is a different case.

The inability to lock on another target does fall under what an ECM should be doing. It just needs to be implemented properly instead of this current shoddy implementation. On top of that it should fall in line with other electronic warfare modules in that it should be a constant effect from the moment it activates, without any "chance of success" attributes.

Thus the only solution that I saw would be ECM vs signature radius with all the appropriate attributes playing a role (sensor strength, signature radius, distances etc).

In my second suggestion you wouldn't have a chance-based element anymore. You'd jam high, mid or low rack, depending on which script you use, and the jam duration is determined by sensor strength vs. jam strength.

If balanced properly, you can't shut off another ships module permanently either, due to jam duration being lower than cycle duration. I'm sure you could find a function to make it near permanent when focussing the ecm of three falcons on one module rack on a single battleship ship or something like that, while having a single ecm on an unbonussed ship maybe negate the effect of those modules for 1 second out of a cycle duration of 20 seconds.

Just example numbers, here. You'd have a tactical choice to make as ECM user, and you wouldn't be permanently useless as ECM victim. What's left would be to give ECCM modules a purpose aside from being a counter to ECM, like other counters to e-war have.

I get that the way this would work doesn't fit what ECM stands for in our world, but, taking it literally, electronic counter measures could also be a focussed remote hacker attack on internal ship electronics, for example. imo.

Well, what about multiple ECM stacking a single ship? You have to allow that without adding too many hefty penalites, yet on the other hand, having multiple modules disabled at once will guaranteed have the ship destroyed in the blink of an eye, even if the duration would be just a few seconds.

This is just assuming that the ECM would only affect active modules.

Going passive is supposed to be a counter-measurement mainly against energy draining, but this would pretty much force everyone to go passive non-stop. And come to think of it, this kind of ECM would in fact be doing a much greater job at disabling active modules than any energy drain module by simply bypassing the capacitor and everything related to it.

Nah, I dunno. As I said, I put a lot of thought into this bit and in the end decided that disabling modules directly is way too much of a risky area to dabble in. At the very least any such module should have very hefty fitting requirements though that would still leave the blob issue out in the open.

... and the thread was in the beginning already "i'll claim that something is overpowered because i do not want to fit a module to deal with it".

Bad job, guys. If you made this topic or supported it, please re-read the "EVE-Ewar, manual for beginners and people who just do not get it".

Seriously, whats next?

"Did not care to fit a tank, guns are overpowered" - oh wait we already did that and it was fixed in the recent change to mining ships.
Oh cruel world. - Well i guess mining ships are a bit weak against ECM so i see your point.

I'm just going to post this old thread since it has a few ideas and useful problem definitions in it.

...oh, and this one, since it expands on the same problems and discusses a few other solutions in more detail.

Petrus, you're being overly optimistic about people's ability to actually read, comprehend and create logical reasoning.