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DarkAegix
Blue Republic
RvB - BLUE Republic
108
   |
Posted - 2011.10.20 08:32:00 -
[1] - Quote
It is possible that a satisfactory hybrid rebalance will remain unattainable for CCP. I'll be using blasters as an example, since they're the main point of my concern.
TL;DR - Blaster boats are too slow, and will always remain that way.
Let's go over the flaws of blasters:
-Barely any extra DPS compared to other weapon systems (Can be fixed, of course)
-Terrible range (This is by design, and thus must be kept short)
-Awful tracking for their operational range (Can be fixed)
-Absurd fitting requirements (Simply reduce blaster powergrid requirements, or buff the powergrid of blaster boats)
-Armour tanks and Gallente are slow, and enemies may simply kite them to death
Note the last point. I don't think CCP are willing to change it. I will list several options below, as well as an explanation as to why neither of them are optimal:
-Buff the range of blasters? No. Blasters are designed as close-range weapons, and not even pro-hybrid buff supported want AC/pulse laser territory trodden on.
-Reduce the penalty of armour tanks? Dangerous! This will affect half, perhaps more, of the ships in EVE! In my opinion, the shield/armour comparative sacrifices are well balanced, and this option will skew it.
-Make Gallente faster! Seems obvious, right? Apparently this cannot happen.... CCP want Minmatar to be the fastest race, because they would like to keep the "racial stereotypes" of EVE intact. IIRC, this was said in the May CSM minutes.
There are several reasons why that last point is particularly insurmountable. If CCP were to make Gallente ever so slightly slower than Minmatar, then the armour tanks will slow down Gallente and the nanos will speed up Minmatar. There will be a large speed difference, and blaster boats will be kited, perhaps even by Cadari ships as well.
In order for Gallente to be able to get into range of all the other shield nano ships, blaster boats will need to be much faster than Minmatar so that once the armour/shield modifications come in, the gap is not as large.
Gallente could shield tank, but then where would the webs go? We'd basically have 2.75 shield tanking races, and then Amarr and a tiny portion of Minmatar 
Gallente could receive specific bonuses to reduce the speed penalty of armour, but there are more problems.
If blaster boats all receive a a free bonus, then other ships will be missing out.
If blaster boats have one of their bonuses replaced with an armour penalty reduction bonus, then there is effectively a useless bonus there for the sole purpose of covering the flaws of a ship which shouldn't be there in the first place. Minmatar will get their double damage bonuses, Caldari will get there damage-shield resist bonuses and Amarr will get damage-armour resist bonuses. All of which are useful. |
JitaPriceChecker2
State War Academy
Caldari State
6
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 08:39:00 -
[2] - Quote
I agree blasters design is contradicting it self on every occasion.
Short range (shorter the range you need better tracking ) - limited tracking
Short range - armor tanked by design( i always fly shield blaster ships :D )
Blaster eat a lot of capacitor - bonus for armor tanking for ships
|
Tippia
Sunshine and Lollipops
687
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 09:01:00 -
[3] - Quote
Not as such no.
Blasters just need to be on a different platform GÇö something fast and agile that lets that short range come into play GÇö and they need to have the tracking to support that short range.
Rails are more problematic. They have a niche, but that niche is irrelevant in today's fleet doctrine. Perhaps they should simply be turned into the GÇ£blastersGÇ¥ of the long-range weapon systems: shorter range than the others, but more damage (or at least more DPS).
And yes, there are also issues of fitting space and cap draw and the like, which are especially tricky to get right since two races use these weapons, and they have quite different fitting space layouts (Gallente has more grid to fit armour tanks; Caldari has more CPU to fit shields; hybrids use up a lot of both, but giving both races more of both would make them a bit too versatile).
GÇöGÇöGÇö
GÇ£If you're not willing to fight for what you have in GëívGëí
you don't deserve it, and you will lose it.GÇ¥
GÇö Karath Piki-á |
Deviana Sevidon
Jades Falcon Guards
56
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 09:22:00 -
[4] - Quote
It might help if they give all hybrid turret ship something like a build in hidden bonus, that lower the effect of the mass increase of plates, but that would also be only a bandaid solution. |
Goodwill George
For a fistful of Veldspar
0
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 09:34:00 -
[5] - Quote
While it's true, that tracking, PG, and other minor adjustments could be done to improve hybrids themselves, it's the ships that are the main issue.
Why wouldn't it be possible to start tweaking the Gallente blaster ships and the Caldari gunships? Why wouldn't it be possible to tweak the T2 ammo?
That being said, the best way to fix the Ferox would be to give it a bonus to medium autocannon falloff. |
Tallianna Avenkarde
Beasts of Burden
86
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 10:51:00 -
[6] - Quote
Tweak Grid on gallente boats, and give them a MWD speed boost. Make them SUPER fast in a straight line, but with the agility of a hyperspeed brick. That leaves Minmitar as fast and agile, the rally cars of eve, and gallente the top fuel dragsters...
bump up the damage of blasters to make them be the face meltingly awesome weapons they should be.. Short range, super deeps.
And a sudden plunge in the sullen swell. Ten fathoms deep on the road to hell. |
Orion GUardian
54
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 11:00:00 -
[7] - Quote
Rails: I think Rails should have a DPS role like Lasers do, but because of the Pulse Laser Range (up to 80km with T2 ammo on BSes) even using Short Range T2 Ammo in a Railgun is inferior.
At the same time Railguns are Long-Range guns but the really long range is not needed in todays fleets (Especially Rokh Ranges at 350km+ which are not useful at the hardcoded 249km lock range max).
In my opinion the aim should be: For everything above Pulse Laser Range Railguns should have the most DPS.
Blasters: Need more tracking to support their short Range. Other than that: They are not really suited for Work on BSes due to the Speed. that is a Problem, and one that cannot be solved easily. Speeding up Gallente would be weird. Shield Tanking them as well. So I am out of ideas there |
GeeShizzle MacCloud
11
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 11:31:00 -
[8] - Quote
the way i see it is that gallente and blasters have a major issue of not getting their optimal because of their ships design.
the OP's thoughts seem to confirm this in my head anyways. A lot of people seem to bundle speed with agility without really grasping exactly what the difference is.
for example the misheald belief that minmatar should be the fastest race. In my mind Minmatar should be the most agile race.
if you want a RL comparison think of gallente ships to be drag racers and minmatars to be F1 racecars. you initially think of F1's to be the fastest but theyre actually not, theyre just muuuuch faster round corners etc...
Same way Minmatar can keep their traversal up and kite. Gallente shouldnt be able to.
Gallente should have biiiiiig straight line speed! but baaad base align speed. which would only worsen with an armor tank.
Further proof of this is in the fact Gallente ships are often bonused with web bonuses. but i honnestly believe that those web bonuses sould be on more ships and have slightly higher range bonuses than they do now. |
Wacktopia
Sicarius.
Legion of The Damned.
18
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 11:53:00 -
[9] - Quote
To 'really' fix blasters CCP will probably have to bite the bullet on one of these points: either overhaul the blaster boats to be faster or more agile; or increase range of blasters. No amount of tweaking the tracking and wacky ideas about alpha are going to solve the simple issue that blasters (hybrids) are themselves not the whole issue. |
Angel Lust
Vikinghall
1
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 12:02:00 -
[10] - Quote
Its somethig strange with tracking on blasters an rails allso...
On blasters you have to be inside sweetspot to do damage...
Inside 5k with large blasters you dont hit anything..... outside 25k... no.
Rails variate dps badly from shot to shot... eaven on targets standing still.
So... something is wrong.
Im talking about large gunns here..... |
Kikia Truzhari
Teraa Matar
0
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 12:20:00 -
[11] - Quote
You're looking at this the wrong way. Blasters aren't supposed to always be good anymore then autocannons or lasers are.
Minmatar are supposed to be able to kite the other races, its what they do.
Amarrians are supposed to be able to outrange the minmatar to cut through their kiting.
Its rock paper scissors, don't look at making blasters good against everything, that'd just make them OP, look at making their ships useful and able to take on about 2/3 to 5/6 of the ships in eve if you're flying them well. There are all sorts of ways to go about this, here's just a few examples of how you could shuffle the bonuses around on Gallentean ships to make them ideal blasterboats:
*Give a huge bonus to MWD speed but spike its cap usage enough that if it can't run it for more then a cycle or two, allowing the skilled Gallentean pilot to suddenly go from being helpless and trapped under your guns to charging you down throwing on webs and scrams. They wouldn't be able to kite with it, cause they'd cap out too quick and wouldn't be able to do sort of important things like fire their guns but it'd give enough of a burst of speed to run down someone whose trying to keep at range.
*Give bonuses to plates on Gallentean ships so they don't hurt their speed as much, allowing them to go fairly quickly while plated.
*Give bonuses to webs, enough to put webs back where they were before the web nerf on certain Gallentean ships.
That said, blasters do still need a huge tracking increase as well as a bit of a DPS increase, to the point where if pretty much any ship of equal class or smaller manages to get trapped inside a blasterboat's optimal, it just melts.
Honestly, blasters shouldn't be that hard to fix once CCP sits down and starts working on them. I'm much less sure how you'd go about fixing railguns. You can't give them the most range, because in fleet fights and sniper situations you sit at the range of your least high range weapons. You can't give them huge dps or volley cause that starts to encroach on arties or beams. Blasters have a role and a place where they fit. Railguns seem to have much less of a definable role. |
Tippia
Sunshine and Lollipops
690
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 12:36:00 -
[12] - Quote
Kikia Truzhari wrote:You're looking at this the wrong way. Blasters aren't supposed to always be good anymore then autocannons or lasers are.
Minmatar are supposed to be able to kite the other races, its what they do.
Amarrians are supposed to be able to outrange the minmatar to cut through their kiting.
Its rock paper scissors The problem is that that's not rock paper scissors GÇö that's stone-scissors and anti-celluloid-rock. There is no room left for paper in the equation, and it doesn't serve any purposeGǪ
GÇöGÇöGÇö
GÇ£If you're not willing to fight for what you have in GëívGëí
you don't deserve it, and you will lose it.GÇ¥
GÇö Karath Piki-á |
Wot I Think
State War Academy
Caldari State
56
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 12:49:00 -
[13] - Quote
Set the optimal for blasters to
Small: 5k
Medium 10k
large 20k
and you win EVE.
|
Sam Bowein
Sense Amid Madness
8
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 13:10:00 -
[14] - Quote
You're right, blasters and gallente ships are basically incompatible.
But I believe they can still be fixed. For example, you could give give blaster boats a lot of hull hit points, thus removing the need to add an armour tank (as a simple DCII could give you enough buffer).
Then, you can put hybrid or astronautic rigs that will balance the ship inherent weaknesses (range and speed) :D |
Velicitia
Open Designs
17
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 13:19:00 -
[15] - Quote
Tallianna Avenkarde wrote:Tweak Grid on gallente boats, and give them a MWD speed boost. Make them SUPER fast in a straight line,
...They've gone plaid!
|
GeeShizzle MacCloud
11
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 13:52:00 -
[16] - Quote
tbh with rails u cant go DPS and u cant go for alpha.. so you have to think what sort of fleet combat niche can be filled with it.
i see them as the longest range (but keep it within 250km plz!) and fastest tracking of all long range weapon systems, but the worst alpha, with better dps than beams. they need to have a high rof.
the interesting addition should be to sensors, like the railgun turret ties itself into the sensor systems of ships and boosts it. so a small bonus per turret to sensor resolution, lock range, and sensor strength.
this would allow it to become the backbone of a fleet type that can swap targets fast and apply damage fast at range to beat logi lock times and pilots broadcast times. |
Apollo Gabriel
Mercatoris
Etherium Cartel
70
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 14:15:00 -
[17] - Quote
Tippia wrote:Not as such no.
Blasters just need to be on a different platform GÇö something fast and agile that lets that short range come into play GÇö and they need to have the tracking to support that short range.
Rails are more problematic. They have a niche, but that niche is irrelevant in today's fleet doctrine. Perhaps they should simply be turned into the GÇ£blastersGÇ¥ of the long-range weapon systems: shorter range than the others, but more damage (or at least more DPS).
And yes, there are also issues of fitting space and cap draw and the like, which are especially tricky to get right since two races use these weapons, and they have quite different fitting space layouts (Gallente has more grid to fit armour tanks; Caldari has more CPU to fit shields; hybrids use up a lot of both, but giving both races more of both would make them a bit too versatile).
Had minmatar had hybrid weapon stats, it would have made more sense. |
Alara IonStorm
Caldari State
89
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 14:26:00 -
[18] - Quote
Orion GUardian wrote:Rails: I think Rails should have a DPS role like Lasers do, but because of the Pulse Laser Range (up to 80km with T2 ammo on BSes) even using Short Range T2 Ammo in a Railgun is inferior.
At the same time Railguns are Long-Range guns but the really long range is not needed in todays fleets (Especially Rokh Ranges at 350km+ which are not useful at the hardcoded 249km lock range max).
In my opinion the aim should be: For everything above Pulse Laser Range Railguns should have the most DPS.
Blasters: Need more tracking to support their short Range. Other than that: They are not really suited for Work on BSes due to the Speed. that is a Problem, and one that cannot be solved easily. Speeding up Gallente would be weird. Shield Tanking them as well. So I am out of ideas there
I agree, beams are pretty much obsolete in PvP as well with Scorch and Arty is so good people would rather put 1400mm's on there Baddons then bonused Beams.
I really hope Rails become PvP viable.
|
Sobaan Tuan
Spaceship Hooligan Productions
0
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 15:18:00 -
[19] - Quote
Angel Lust wrote:Its somethig strange with tracking on blasters an rails allso...
On blasters you have to be inside sweetspot to do damage...
Inside 5k with large blasters you dont hit anything..... outside 25k... no.
Rails variate dps badly from shot to shot... eaven on targets standing still.
So... something is wrong.
Im talking about large gunns here.....
are you sure about this? |
Dusty Meg
Redbull Air Race Inc
3
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 15:24:00 -
[20] - Quote
Dunno if you read dev blogs but as stated in this one http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&nbid=2428
The balance is coming in winter |
Igualmentedos
Shadow Veil Industrial
Shadow Directive
14
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 15:30:00 -
[21] - Quote
I agree with the other posters saying the boats need fixed, not necessarily the weapon system. Also, I would like to see a nice buff to Caldari boats.
- Make their target range HUGE! Why is it the rokh's guns can out range the tracking computer thingy? (i understand typically bullets go much further than someone's ability to aim IRL, but it's a video game FFS)
- Also, increase the optimal on caldari boats please. Whats the point of trying to kill something when you can barely scratch the paint on it?
These are some ideas off of the top of my head. Ultimately, I'd like to see sniping become a feared tactic. Snipers should make people **** their pants. Missiles don't count. A couple thousand years and our missiles are slow as ****, yeah thanks CCP. |
a'akanelle
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
0
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 15:52:00 -
[22] - Quote
One suggestion I have not seen much of is using the traditional scram/disruptor range bonuses on the Arazu and the Keres to a ship like the Deimos (a la the Adrestia). Deimos with a 30-40km scram would definitely put a stop some of the kiting, and would allow it to get closer more easily. |
Alara IonStorm
Caldari State
89
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 16:00:00 -
[23] - Quote
a'akanelle wrote:One suggestion I have not seen much of is using the traditional scram/disruptor range bonuses on the Arazu and the Keres to a ship like the Deimos (a la the Adrestia). Deimos with a 30-40km scram would definitely put a stop some of the kiting, and would allow it to get closer more easily.
That would take away the Arazu and Keres jobs though. I would prefer a straight up MWD Speed Bonus, the Blaster Range to reach the edge of Scram and enough power to fit Ions or Nuetrons.
Don't make fast enough it to kill Vagabonds, make it so it can run down and OBLITERATE! Hurricanes, Harbinger's non speed bonused HAC's with overwhelming Blaster DPS. That the major problem, not ony can a Hurricane out fight a Deimos, a Nanocane can out run it. If it can not it can keep it at range for a short time while it's cap slowly burns out on the MWD then the second it gets the Deimos in Nuet range there goes it's guns. It's gotta rush in there like a bat out of hell and tear that thing apart fast. Maybe dump the free high slot for a mid that firs Cap Booster or 2nd Web.
Make it a fast little Sledge Hammer that rushes in on top of you and just starts swinging. Not a modified EW Boat. |
a'akanelle
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
0
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 16:19:00 -
[24] - Quote
Alara IonStorm wrote:That would take away the Arazu and Keres jobs though. I would prefer a straight up MWD Speed Bonus, the Blaster Range to reach the edge of Scram and enough power to fit Ions or Nuetrons.
True to a point, but I think the combination bonuses to Gallente make sense (i.e. blasters, damps to bring ships closer, bonuses scrams, and tracking links on the Oneiros), I would love to see the existing combinations tweaked a bit to give people a reason to use ships and mods in conjunction to reach maximum effectiveness. Maybe see some all Gallente gangs flying about. |
Stan Smith
Remenent British Federation
0
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 16:46:00 -
[25] - Quote
GeeShizzle MacCloud wrote:tbh with rails u cant go DPS and u cant go for alpha.. so you have to think what sort of fleet combat niche can be filled with it.
i see them as the longest range (but keep it within 250km plz!) and fastest tracking of all long range weapon systems, but the worst alpha, with better dps than beams. they need to have a high rof.
the interesting addition should be to sensors, like the railgun turret ties itself into the sensor systems of ships and boosts it. so a small bonus per turret to sensor resolution, lock range, and sensor strength.
this would allow it to become the backbone of a fleet type that can swap targets fast and apply damage fast at range to beat logi lock times and pilots broadcast times.
This, give the ferox a hybrid damage bonus, and make caldari missile ships get damage bonuses for non-kinetic missiles (10% to kinetic, 5% to others is fine with me)
Quote:- Make their target range HUGE! Why is it the rokh's guns can out range the tracking computer thingy? (i understand typically bullets go much further than someone's ability to aim IRL, but it's a video game FFS)
- Also, increase the optimal on caldari boats please. Whats the point of trying to kill something when you can barely scratch the paint on it?
since caldari gunships dont have optimal range ship bonuses
wait... |
Barbelo Valentinian
The Scope
Gallente Federation
81
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 19:26:00 -
[26] - Quote
I think there has to be some sort of "bull rush" ability for Gallente blasterboats, as others have said (MWD bonus of some kind?).
Gallente blasters are the equivalent of "melee" in other games - ultra-close range, ultra-high damage. To have "melee" without some kind of reasonably high-cost but effective (at decent skill level) means to get into range just makes nonsense of "melee".
Also, Gallente are supposed to be pretty high tech aren't they? It makes sense that they could be able to overcome their mass disadvantage for short periods in order to be able to "rush" their opponent by squeezing uber performance out of the MWD for short periods with respectable cooldowns (so you can maybe only use it once every few minutes).
I suggest a special ability for Gallente blasterboats that enables an overdrive injector in the lows to act as a sort of "hyper boost" for MWD, changing the nature of the MWD clickie to the "bull rush" ability (i.e. super fast for short time, long cooldown). That way you'd still have to sacrifice a little tank for gank, but with a PG increase, you could still fit a semi-decent armor tank even with sacrificing one slot to the "special" overdrive injector ability.
An alternative might be making dampeners much more effective on Gallente ships?
The rationale that the weapon type that needs to get in range, but has big fat heavy ships, should try and "tempt" the enemy to get into that range - that kind of makes sense, doesn't it? Maybe drone boats could work more like this, to bring opponents into close range for extra hurt from guns - as opposed to the blasterboats specifically, which could be bonused with the MWD thingy.
Oh yeah, and more PG please - at high skills, you should be able to fit your top class T2 weapons and some kind of semi-decent tank, like other races can. That's very rare with Gallente, which is ridiculous.
With nearly all Gallente ships, a lot of the time, it seems to make more sense to fit autos and arties, even taking into account the relevant bonuses and lack thereof. How borked is that? |
Caulk H0lster
Kazakh Ministry of Wealth Redistribution
6
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 19:35:00 -
[27] - Quote
Not ALL of the things that the OP laid out NEED to be fixed.
Blasters, and to a lesser extent, rails, need to be worth using for something. For blasters, I would see that advantage as raw DPS. Right now though, the extra DPS blasters do just simply isn't enough to offset the weaknesses they bring to the table in their design and the ships designed to use them. Every other "short-range" weapon system our-ranges them significantly. Therefore, in a straight-up fight, the blaster boat has already taken significant damage just simply closing into range. Then when it gets into range, the damage type (kin/therm) is one of the most overall highly resisted types ships are naturally tanked for, and it's worse when the non-blaster ship has a proper omni-tank fit, because invuln fields and EANMs are generally used, and kin/therm usually goes WAY high, or at least one of them does. The end result is, the blaster boat takes such heavy damage on approach, the deficit is insurmountable, even to it's superior DPS. That is if you don't take into account the fact that most blaster ships are easy to kite, or don't have the tracking to actually hit anything in their optimal range. Thus, even if you don't make any mistakes, and fly your ship to the limit of it's abilities, you don't stand much of a chance of anything but going down in a ball of fire in a blaster boat.
Rails are a bit more complicated. Frankly, CCP needs to revisit probing mechanics to allow for the viability of sniper BS once again. Currently, there is no way to engage a hostile fleet with long-range weaponry outside of 150km, because probing is now so near-instant, it takes longer for the BSs to align out than it does for a prober and bubbler to land on the BSs, then they're forced to engage at point-blank range with long-range guns that don't track at close-range, and you die. Changing probing mechanics so that BSs have time to bounce to sniper spots frequently without getting caught is really the only thing that will bring sniper BS back into style. From there, rails would probably only need a slight buff in DPS output and they'd be considered "useful" again.
Another interesting suggestion, if CCP wanted to leave out an actual damage buff, would be to allow hybrids some more choice in ammo and damage types. This would probably provide enough versatility that combined with a tracking buff, and maybe a minor range buff for blasters, would make hybrids competitive again.
tl;dr... blasters need to do a lot more dps, so fights can actually be won by burning into range and 0wning, or they need a significant range boost. Tracking must also be fixed, and the speed+armor tank combo should be looked at. Rails need only a tiny buff, if at all, but probing mechanics need to be changed so sniper BS can be used once again. |
Herping yourDerp
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
171
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 19:43:00 -
[28] - Quote
uh
give blasters the stats of autocannons and autocannons the stats of blasters
same with rails/projectiles
the end result?
slow gallente boats basically have autocannons which are perfect for them
fast minni boats that can dictate range have blasters to tear up anyone
gallente alpha dmg will be inpressive with arties
rails...... never used them... |
David Grogan
The Motley Crew Reborn
83
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 20:04:00 -
[29] - Quote
simply reduce the MASS of blaster boats only... that would help with their speed issues
Everytime you buy something that says "made in china" you are helping the rising unemployment in your own country unless your from china, Buy locally produced goods and help create more jobs. |
HakerElite
The Pro Choice
1
|
Posted - 2011.10.20 20:26:00 -
[30] - Quote
Caulk H0lster wrote:Rails are a bit more complicated. Frankly, CCP needs to revisit probing mechanics to allow for the viability of sniper BS once again. Currently, there is no way to engage a hostile fleet with long-range weaponry outside of 150km, because probing is now so near-instant, it takes longer for the BSs to align out than it does for a prober and bubbler to land on the BSs, then they're forced to engage at point-blank range with long-range guns that don't track at close-range, and you die. Changing probing mechanics so that BSs have time to bounce to sniper spots frequently without getting caught is really the only thing that will bring sniper BS back into style. From there, rails would probably only need a slight buff in DPS output and they'd be considered "useful" again.
You can use a Dictor to set up a block bubble so they cannot warp to you. A block bubble is a bubble somewhere between you and them. |
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