Bugsy VanHalen
Society of lost Souls
227
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Posted - 2012.11.02 14:18:00 -
[1] - Quote
This is a great change from my point of view. It adds much more utility and ease than it removes. ORCA's will no longer be the super safe gank proof way of moving high value cargo. They will however still be able to use the cloak/MWD trick to get thru relatively safe.
One issue remains though. It would seem that this will greatly increase the number of gank targets in high sec. Which in theory the more targets there are the less chance you have of getting targeted. PVP does not work this way however. And since gankers view themselves as PVPers we need to look at this from a PVP perspective. In PVP more targets means more opportunity for PVP which will result in a major increase in gankers to attack these abundant targets. So in fact this will have the opposite affect. the chances of getting ganked will become much higher when this patch goes live.
This is the only down side I see to this change is, it is a major buff to ganking. All cargo will now have a chance to drop when ganked adding ORCA's to the list of profitable targets. Since an max tanked orca only has EHP comparable to a freighter at much higher skill costs, and will now not have the no scan/loot corp hanger I expect most haulers will go back to using freighters as the security benefit ORCA's had will be gone.
Although there have always been ways to increase the safety of haulers through escorts there is really no defense against an alpha strike. Since both ORCA's and Freighters are generally hull tanked, I would like to see some sort of logistics module added that remotely affects hull ehp, like a remote hull hardener adding resists. This way a logistics ship running escort for a freighter could use this module to enhance the freighter or ORCA's tank. This being a hull module, it would have limited use in other engagements.
Freighters are just way to easy to gank now. With the new battlecruisers a freighter can be ganked at a cost of about 650 mil. This is not to say you only need 650 mil worth of ships, but once you factor in the loot and salvage of all the ganking ships, plus the salvage from the freighter. Any loot drop from the freighter over 650 mil in value can mean profit for the gankers. this just seems out of balance to me.
However considering that it takes a well organized fleet to pull this off, I believe the counter should also require a fleet/escort for the freighter. This is why I suggest some sort of remote tank that can be activated on the freighter before it is hit to allow it to withstand a much higher alpha strike letting it survive until concord shows up. Successfully ganking a remote tanked freighter should cost 1.5-2 bil isk compared to the 650 mil it costs now. Ganking would still be very possible just cost more. And I am sure there would still be an abundance of unescorted freighters around to gank at the lower cost. |