CCP Ytterbium
C C P
C C P Alliance
2057
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Posted - 2013.07.01 12:13:00 -
[1] - Quote
Yes, YES, the only reason why we are nerfing them down is to generate a river of tears from our player base - we need it to add some flavor in our morning oatmeal 
No, no, actually that's not true. We have a "trolling" contest going on between CCP Fozzie, Rise, Tallest and myself to see who can create the biggest rage threadnought on the forums, while we keep scores on a whiteboard. 
Also, when we are going to nerf them, we'll just launch a 6-faced dice to see how many slots we are going to randomly remove. Except for the Legion, we'll use a 20-faced dice. Doesn't matter if we end up with negative slot number!
Ok, more seriously, let's sit down a bit and talk about this. See that big sofa over there? Yes, the big black comfy one. Let's sit down and relax. Now breathe deeply. Slowly. See? There is no reason to go into panic mode waving your arms all over the place. May hurt yourself. Then spill fluids all over the place. Messy.
First, we are not even sure on how we want to tackle Tech3s yet - we have a general direction on where we want to go, but not how yet. See that hill far away in the horizon? That's the end of Tech2 rebalancing - if we had to put Tech3s into perspective, we wouldn't even be able to see them due to the curvature of the Earth. Sure, some small tweaks may happen more or less shortly (like the rebalancing of Warfare Links and associated bonuses on Tech3 when we get to Command Ships), but we are not up to the point where we are going to touch the Tech3 hulls themselves.
So speaking of nerf at this point is just plain premature. When we get to them we'll discuss the changes through the proper channels, like the CSM and the Features & Ideas Discussion sub-forum section, so you'll have plenty of time to see them coming and voice your concerns.
Then, we are not going to casually blanket-nerf them with one hand while eating a jambon-beurre-fromage sandwich with the other at a random lunch break. Along with capitals, Tech3s are the most complicated hulls out there, and we will be careful they still have a proper role when we're done with them. As much as I want to nerf the Tengu to oblivion while singing dirty French limericks, we actually have responsible and fully-mature people out there, like CCP Fozzie and Rise that won't let me run amok in the office.
But yes, there may be some changes on how they function as a whole - for instance we have discussed things like making them more flexible by allowing rigs to be removed from them, rebalancing the sub-systems to be less terrible in their selection while offering gameplay not necessarily competing with current hulls, or even introducing a new line of modules with flexibility in mind to complement Tech3 hulls.
Whatever we end up with may be different with what we have now, yes. I like to pick the same crappy frozen pizza brand when I go food hunting instead of trying something different, like I don't know, cooking for instance. That's just because I don't want to get out of my comfort zone, even if the pizza tastes like chewed plastic. It's the same exact problem here, fear of change can be a potent adversary.
We are not making such a change because we like to troll our player base by randomly switching various numbers on ships while staring at our screens drunk. We do it because we feel such an effort is justified for the overall health of the game, and because in the long term, the gained value will outweigh the pains involved. That's also a given we will be careful when we get to it, because our jobs remain based on what on player subscription and what they may or may not like.
Wrote a wall of text  Oh well, hope that helps a bit. |