Deirdre Anethoel
Antimatter Delivery Inc.
3
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Posted - 2013.07.20 07:00:00 -
[1] - Quote
Zealot is mostly fine in it's role as a pulse boat. Maybe a slight buff to make it viable compared to navy omens in small gangs, but it's perfectly viable in larger engagements. One sad thing is the fact that it still doesn't really support beams, with their massive fitting requirements and the fact that it isn't really suited for sniping/kiting (3 mids, not that fast). But I think that it's more a problem of beams than a problem related to the zealot. Beams have awful T2 munitions compared to the goodness of scorch and conflagrate. A standard shield beam fit will only hit at around 300 dps with aurora. Not speaking of shorter range munitions in a kiting configuration, because they are overshadowed by scorch pulses. A buff to beam range in addition to damage would maybe make it viable. Or Aurora damage ratio. Because right now there is no way this would compare to tier3 BCs (they are a huge problem to balance any other sniper ship).
The sacrilege already have a net advantage compared to other options (ham drakes). It can sig tank. But the fact that it's a very slight improvement in damage compared to the zealot for a MASSIVE loss in how easy it is to apply this damage is sad. I think it should get a slight damage buff to compensate and make it into a viable fleet option by making it worthwhile to embark the needed target painters and web in fleet. Also add RLM damage bonus, because why not? Also, the capacitor bonus is pretty bad, I think. the only reason you would have to need it would be active tanking, and if you active tank a sacrilege, you use cap boosters, because one repper isn't going to save your life. If you want to push the sacrilege as a solo boat instead of a fleet boat (which sounds awkward on a HAM boat, since HAMs really need ton of support to become effective, HM do not need reppers, only speed to kite, and sacrileges lack any rapid light missile bonus), you should add a repper bonus instead of a cap bonus. Or a repper cap consumption bonus, that would be new and interesting! And also make RLM bonused on it, since they're awesome for solo/small gang.
Cerb is way too slow, but if you make it faster, it will just overshadow caracal/navy caracals. Instead, I think it should be a cruiser sized missile brawler, a role that isn't filled right now, since caracals and navy caracals are way too fragile. Remove all range bonuses, swap the resist bonus with the eagle and add a damage or explosion velocity/radius bonus.
For the same reason, the eagle should not become a blaster/short range railgun brawler. This role is already filled by a lot of ships. Instead, it should be a long range railgun platform at cruiser size, something new. Remove the resist bonus, add something like an agility bonus (while keeping it slow if they want to make it into a sniper and not a kitter, or they could fix the speed to enable both roles). It should have an overwhelming agility advantage compared to tier3 cruisers to make up for the lost damage. The same observations I did for the beam zealot applies here: you either have an awful range for a sniper/kiter (CN AM) with short range munitions, and don't even have decent dps to go with it, or you have decent range (contrary to beams and the zealot, you at least can reach a good range), but sacrificing all your dps. The problem is still tier3 BCs. No way you could compare with them with those stats. I really think the way to balance sniper hacs is to nerf tier3 BCs really hard. They should not be close in term of agility and speed. At all. They should be heavier than other BCs, not lighter. Unless you fix tier3 BCs, there is no way you can fix sniper hacs without breaking the balance somewhere else with med long range guns being used at closer range. Of course, sniper hacs should not have more damage than tier3 BCs, but they should be made competitive by giving them a ton of mobility compared to those. We're comparing a BC and a cruiser here. An eagle and a naga have roughly the same speed. How is this even conceivable?
All the problems I talked about for the eagle and beam zealot applies to the munnin. But if those are fixed, the munnin should go the same way the eagle goes, but with less damage/range and more alpha. Buff it's agility by a ton to make it a viable option by allowing it to warp quickly where you want it to be on the battlefield.
The vagabond was pretty okay as a nano gang ship, and the added shield boost also pushes it as a very viable solo ship. Maybe a tad bit too much.
The deimos should become fine in small gangs (awesome with blasters, able to zip around with MWD on), and competitive in larger fleets because of it's range flexibility compared to a zealot when fitted with railguns. Didn't need that utility high anyway. I think the mwd capacitor bonus should be switched to a generic propulsion capacitor bonus, though, because you should have the choice of propulsion. Not that a reduction in AB capacitor consumption would be massive, but right now, it seems like you're only pushing MWD play on it.
The ishtar is mostly fine as a smaller sig dominix, the swap towards drone tracking is going to make it into a fleet staple, like for the dominix. Pretty happy about this one, since it was never designed for small scale anyway. Massive up for pve too, though. And ishtar multiboxing may have been already a bit too good there. Should become used a lot more. Sad that non-sentry drones aren't pushed at all, though. Could add a drone speed & warp speed in addition to tracking & optimal, maybe by pushing the drone bay into base stats.
But to be fair, this should be posted in a tier3 BC rebalance thread, not in a hac one. Those are the main problem with hacs viability right now. I think we should go back to them before jumping into tech2 rebalance, because they play a huge role in hacs rebalance. Before their introduction, the medium guns change could have been enough to push the eagle, beam zealot and muninn into use... |