Arya Greywolf
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
36
   |
Posted - 2013.01.21 17:16:00 -
[1] - Quote
I won't try to speak specifically about the other changes to BCs, but I am happy they are getting the 'tiercide' treatment. Some interesting things happening. I do want to speak about the changes Harbinger specifically though. I'm a little confused on your thought process here and why you made the changes you did, especially when you seemingly are aware of the actually issues of the Harbinger.
In a previous post you seemed to recognize at least one of the problems with armor tanking and maneuverability:
"What about armor tanking? The imbalances caused by the mass of plates, the speed penalty on armor rigs and the weakness of armor reps in pvp situations are a problem that becomes more pronounced for these ships than for any of the smaller classes and should be fixed as soon as possible!
(your response) I completely agree. ~Working on it~. However since we want to be very careful about what we promise and when that's all I can say at this exact moment."
You seem to understand the issues with active armor tanking rigs and mass issues. You recognize that active armor rigs shouldn't have the large mass addition to active armor tanking ships that they do now. One could see then, that the reason you added mass to the Harb, was in anticipation of the removal of the mass addition from active armor rigs. The problem here is that no one fits the Harb for active tanking, and yet you added mass to the ship anyway. Can you please discuss this? It doesn't seem to make much sense to make this already sluggish ship even slower, especially when you have taken away PWG making it even harder to fit plates/a decent fit without sacrificing rigs or getting implants. *Note - this is NOT the case with other BCs.
Seemingly, you reduced the PWG and CPU because, even though you -1 turret, you pumped up the damage bonus to 10%, making the projected damage in effect every so slightly better. However, even before with 7 turrets and the original amount of PWG and CPU it was still unreasonably hard to fit a decent tank + (edit) heavy pulses on.
Mynna explains this pretty well:
"The problem people who have with the Harbinger have is that decent fits require unreasonably large compromises. You have to jump through some pretty serious hoops to get both heavy pulse lasers and a 1600mm plate on, like "ditch two trimarks for a CPU and Grid rig and add in a CPU implant" compromises. Even if you drop to an 800mm plate, you still need an implant. It can also drop to smaller guns, but that's a ~14% loss of range and damage, and it still requires a CPU implant too. Compare that to the prophecy and myrmidon, which can fit a 1600mm plate with no problems. Or compare it to the hurricane - to fit a 1600mm plate and 425mm autos, it either uses one fitting rig, or downgrades the guns to 220mm ACs, which is a only a ~5% loss in damage/range. Or it can go all the way down to dual 180mm ACs, which is a 17% loss of range and 10% loss of damage, more similar to the price the harbinger pays...but in return, it gets to actually use its utility high, fitting a neut or something. Even a lot of Tech 1 cruisers have an easier time fitting a plate than a Harbinger does.
So no, it's not actually "fine"."
Mass addition to the prophecy doesn't even make sense either because it makes sense to go EHP over active armor tanking (given the assumed reduction in active armor tanking rigs).
Could you explain?:
- What the point of the mass addition to the Harbinger was? (because even if active armor rigs get reduced in mass addiction, people don't fit the Harb for active armor tanking)
- Why the reduction in PWG and CPU, when it was already unreasonable hard to fit a Harb? (-1 turret doesn't fix the fitting issue)
In summary, I don't understand the reduction in PWG and addition to mass. Taking away PWG from the already hard to decently fit Harb + adding mass makes your changes very confusing and wrong - unless you're trying to make this ship useless. Basically, we can either fit crappy guns along w/ trimarks and a decent tank to be an unreasonably slow, low DPS ship (even for Amarr) or sacrifice any good rigs to get an absolute crap tank (compared to other BCs and slow Amarr ships) and have good DPS.
And if anyone tries to claim that "it's like a mid-grade Armageddon" you're missing the fact that the Armageddon can fit a massive passive tank and not sacrifice DPS. |