So, the Sacrilege still has a useless high slot, and no ability to tank in the lows if it wants any level of decent damage... awesome.

Remove the high slot, add a low slot. It's currently -2 low slots on the zealot, and has a bonus that only recovers one of those slots tank wise. How can you expect it to be a brawler if it's tank is garbage. You already hurt it's tank with the resist bonus changes.

Actually let it stay with the current slot layout. Adds a ton of flexibility to the number of valid setups that you will be able to use in TQ.

The last tunes to the Sacrilege are perfect. No touching it anymore pls.

CCP Rise: The Sacri slot layout is still a major problem in my eyes.

I am still of the opinion that removing a launcher, increasing the ROF or Damage bonus to compensate, and shifting a high to a low is the best solution. This will allow reasonable DPS, projected thanks to your changes, while retaining the utility high that makes the Sac such an awesome brawler.

I really think this would work perfectly. Remove a launcher, change damage bonus to 10%, ROF bonus to 7.5%, and we end up with the same base damage; switch a high to the low, resulting in a 5/4/6 slot layout, and BOOM, every single problem with this ship is solved.

This really, really needs to happen.

These new changes seem a bit more reasonable but i think the Ishtar needs a bit more work.

Maybe CCP want to force the ishtar into a shield role but i'd prefer it to be an armour tanker just like all the other Gallente ships. For that to happen, it need drone damage and hitpoint bonuses not tracking. The pilot can then use its low slots for tank and its med slots for drone tracking/range/speed.

Also has anyone calculated how OP the sacrilege will be now?

One thing I think Really need to b done for sake of balance and coherence is. Give the HAcs the SAME HP pools of the t1 ships!

There is absolutely no excuse for not doing so. Otherwise the role of being a tough nut cruiser as you describe is impossible.


Just that. Same shields, Armor and hull.

Hi all

Wanted to post and let you know I haven't disappeared or something, just had to go home and sleep and stuff.

I've been reading all of this and will continue to do so. I would not expect any changes at the scale of this last iteration, maybe some small tweaks after a few more days of feedback at the most.

We are a little concerned that some overpowered configurations might be popular following these changes, but I know many of you are still worried they aren't powerful enough. I'll keep reading for now and if we decide to make any changes you will be the first to know.

Thanks!

Why the vaga got a smaller signature then all ahacs? Very strange.

Please compare the sacrileg with a caracal. Caracal got more speed and lows for similar DMG for 10% hullprice. Why should i take a sacrileg? Only benefit of the sacrileg is the armor- tank.

Self-quoting bump because folks seem to like this idea and dear CCP Rise should read it and comment on it, because it's a perfectly balanced solution to a questionable ship.

Yea, its like the old CCP mentality of "we know best and to hell with everyone else".

Translation:

"Thank you for all your constructive comments and suggestions, but we've decided that you don't really know what these ships are good at, or even what they should be used for. We do, and we're not going to tell you.

Suffice it to say that all of our previous assertions regarding Tech2 specializations were simply to give the playerbase some hope for the future, and after the massive boost given to the Tech1's and Navy cruisers, we are at a loss as to how to give the HAC hulls a distinct specialization, so we're going to conveniently ignore that part.

We already recognize that a few of these HACs will be popular, and the rest will remain on the shelf, so to speak, but as the number of popular HACs is anticipated to increase from the currently used two (Zealot and Vagabond) to FOUR (Zealot, Vaga, Ishtar and Cerb), we're pretty happy with that.

Again, thank you for all the time, effort and thought that you have put into two threads now. We know that you are passionate about having a gaming experience that is fun and rewarding, and understand that you saw a unique opportunity to enhance a game that we all love in an underused and much-needed area. Sorry it won't work out that way."

[/me is almost disgusted with herself for getting her hopes up]

Let's take a quick look at the 4 that will likely be popular in 1.1:

Zealot - The current baseline. Good sig (AB), great dmg projection, decent tank, holds up well under reps
Vagabond - 1/2 speed, 1/2 shield thank. only lacking *a little* in projection, otherwise fine
PROPOSED Ishtar - some nice changes here, only concern is that it's being forced into a shield tank role (ref. Gallente lore). :Drones: aside, great projection.
PROPOSED Cerberus - Finally enough dps, great projection, nice speed

What I see all of these having in common? DPS, and the ability to apply that DPS. These feature a winning combination of Speed, Sig, DPS and dmg projection. A large portion of their survivability comes directly from the T2 resist profiles, but also have the capability of fitting a significant tank without unduly impacting the ability to land hits on target.

Now for the other 4. Perhaps not surprisingly, these four are the ones that don't have the combination of speed & projection...

Sacrilege - Slow as balls. Option to EITHER fit tank OR fit dps, and even if you fit dps it's still not going to be impressive. Bonus to HML is nice, but low dps makes that fit unlikely. Bonus to HAM range will mitigate speed disadvantage somewhat, but closing range will still be an issue. Used to be able to dual active tank like a boss... not so much soon(TM).
RECOMMENDATION FOR VIABILITY: Keep the dps where it is, change the missile velocity bonus to explosion radius or explosion velocity. 25m3 drones. +1 low or move the utility high to a low. (personal wish list: Please roll the whole cap bonus into the hull).

Eagle - Also slow as balls. Slower than even the Sac. How is this thing supposed to brawl? Is it supposed to brawl? Dual optimal range bonuses imply 'sniper,' but that's a role better filled by ABC's. The only HAC of these four that has only a single damage bonus, giving it weaker raw dps than pretty much anything with a cruiser-sized gun mount.
RECOMMENDATION FOR VIABILITY: If you want it to be able to brawl, drop one optimal bonus for another damage bonus to give it some alpha. Increase speed to 200 so it can compete. If you're going for a dedicated sniper platform, then drop the shield resist bonus for extra tracking. Medium rails will thank you.

Deimos - It can bring the pain, it just has trouble bringing it close enough... Especially if you take 10-15% of its raw hit points away. The MWD capacitor bonus is rendered superfluous by the proposed cap recharge rates. Personal pet peeve: Why do the Gallente hulls have more structure hit points than shield or armor? Haven't they read the "Hull Tanking Elite" certificate writeup?
RECOMMENDATION FOR VIABILITY: Don't be daft - give this thing some armor hit points to work with. Also, drop the MWD bonus in favor of a bonus that either allows blaster dps to be applied at range or increases tracking. This thing already does beastly dps, so reduce the dronebay to 25m3. Web range bonus might also be an option.

Munin - Good arty platform, but completely overshadowed by Tornadoes. Optimal range bonus does ~nothing for autocannons. Only 3 mids severely limits the fitting options.
RECOMMENDATION FOR VIABILITY: Give Autocannons some love. Change the 10% optimal bonus to 5% optimal and 5% falloff. Smooth the T2 resist profile on this one to be slightly more uniform. Boost armor HP to 2200. Consider moving the utility high to a mid.

For these last four, can you PLEASE consider a different Role bonus than the MWD bloom? And PLEASE consider 16 fitting slots?

Still throwing in my 2 cents, even though I honestly doubt Rise is actually listening...

the sac needs the utility high , but it also needs a low so just take away a launcher , tweak the bonuses so the dmg stays the same , and move one high to low slots.

voila , the sacrilege is fixed!

also the zealot needs drones

P.S. Thanks for not giving the Sac another low

I think my favorite line ever is a dev saying he doesn't believe cruisers should fit all cruiser sized modules as a design element.

My jaw literally dropped.

Hi guys

Sorry I've been away. Been out of the office for two days because of barfing etc.

I'm behind on the thread so I'm going to get caught up today and respond to some of the common points in a few hours.

Sacrilege: The Sacrilege was definitely one of the more difficult ones to pin down, but I think we're in a pretty good place. We looked at a few other options for its layout and bonuses but because of the power of the resist buff it's very easy for it to become too strong. We also really like that it tends to fit in to fleets as a ship with enormous utility rather than being all tank and gank like a lot of the other HACs. For that reason we really wanted to leave the utility high and the 4th mid. It would often make a better straight up brawler with another low, but by going the route we went of adding more drone dps and more fitting room, we improved it a lot as a brawler while preserving its character as a very high-utility HAC that can do a lot of different things.


.

Im not sure I understand the line of thinking here . . . Earlier in this thread, you said

Then later you made this comment about the Sacrilege . . .

These two things seem to be in conflict with each other.

I feel like these HACs should be super specialized, and im not sure being a "utility ship" is a specialization . . .

Shameless re-bump. Many agree this is a worthy idea. I hope you're reading this, CCP Rise. We can revive one of the most underpowered and underappreciated HACs in the game, without making it OP in any way, by implementing this redesign alone.

Hear the prayer of every Amarr Victor and fix this darn ship.

Good changes.

Although I would like to see the Sacrilege lose the utility high and gain a low slot.

Keep looking is all I can say.

- What the hell does a "brawler" need a 40km SR weapon system range for, that is kiting distance. Might be a good idea for you to sit down and hash out the (role) definitions before committing to anything as the schizophrenic Sacrilege indicates that you are harbouring some confusion as to what a brawler is.
- How many ship through the history of Eve has had the moniker "high utility, lots of different things" and how much were they actually used .. It is all fine if they are on par when doing the things they can do but then you are in generalized territory (ie. no longer T2/HAC) as a T2 hull being able to do any one thing as well as a ship tilted towards a single mode would be OP as hell.
Result is a Swiss Army knife made of plastic; Great utility, can do loads of stuff. Just be prepared to go elsewhere when it fails the second time it is used for something other than as a letter opener.

It can still be saved however, will still be a plasticky utility knife but with a few titanium reinforced utilities:
Two options remain that will not break it, at least not more than the norm for rebalanced ships, take one or both as deemed necessary.

Sacrilege has anaemic dps comparatively, you are forced to carry ec300 (when are they getting the nerf bat by the way?) outside the blob so in reality you are only getting the equivalent of 2 light drones worth of damage from the drone bay changes which are the only real changes made to it with regards to brawling.
HAM's do not have stellar application without explosion velocity/radius bonuses and generally require target to be largely stationary and/or painted or have an unsupported buffer tank that can be whittled down .. all four mids are spoken for (prop/cap/web/point) so if it meets an active tanked ship it is likely to lose.

- It needs another low to be able to tank through enemy damage while its own whittles down the opponent. With more (reliable) staying power the ec300 can and will be swapped for damage. The added low enhances its ability to kite brawl (hahahaha) at disruptor range and opens up for more than viable shield fits.
- It doesn't need the missile range bonus, that goes double now that you included HML's in the primary bonus, what it needs is someway to either apply its damage or fuckup an enemies ability to tank.
Replace the velocity bonus with either explosion velocity or radius to allow for application -or- replace velocity bonus with a neut/nos amount bonus a la Pilgrim (it is Khanid after all) to allow for a tank off-switch.

Now if you are clever you'll see what I just proposed and the nervous laughter it will probably bring .. by adding both (high to low, neut bonus) you are forcing a dps decrease if neuting is wanted by pilot (same as Zealot). Bonused neuting pretty much ensures the use of medium combat drones however as the fight can theoretically be ended before backup arrives and it expands its repertoire to include going all neut support in the fleet theatre.

As it stands choosing any of the other HACs is a better option regardless of what one wants to do. Diemos (note the absence of the 't' ), Muninn and Ishtar will all be far superior brawlers and Eagle, Ishtar, Cerberus, Zealot will be superior kiters .. even when doing their "off" thing (ex. Diemos as kiter) the others will be better than the Sacrilege.

PS: If you didn't catch it, great Diemos change. Will be an absolute horror on the small scale .. the proverbial wet rolled up newspaper only moistened with concrete instead of water.

Edit: Just remembered .. there is another hope-of-salvation for the Sacrilege .. some years ago CCP mentioned adding a high-slot TP. That might do the trick if followed through.

^Not a serious remark, would love if the entire hac line had kiting as its specialitation.

Yes i know, but there are tons of brawling boats and very very few dedicated kiting ships, especially in the cruiser class.

Yes i agree that HAC's should be the premier kiting ship in the game think much more mobile ABC's but with the resilience/ ability to mitigate damage much better but with less dps.

Brawling HAC's is just pointless who want's to risk 200 plus mil in a brawl when you can use much cheaper and more effective brawlers ... i.e. bc's why do you think people use the Vaga but not the eagle or sacrilege as much?

No the problem with that is you might aswell make a new class of ship because they will be so different but then again they are already like that which is why people are confused about the role of a HAC.. there is no consistency in the class.

What would be interesting would be if they made that separate class say Fast assault cruisers or fast attack cruisers.
This class could have all the fast skirmishers essentially T2 attack cruisers
- Vagabond = Weak tank/active + medium damage + amazing speed
- Deimos = Weak tank/active + strong damage + excellent speed
- Cerberus = decent tank + strong damage + strong speed
- Zealot = decent tank + medium damage + strong speed

HAC's
-eagle = Heavy tank + medium damage + slow speed.
-sacrilege = Heavy tank + medium damage + slow speed.
-Ishtar = Heavy tank + medium damage + slow speed.
-Muninn = Heavy tank + medium damage + slow speed.

did you not just describe the current hac lineup with its proposed changes?

Of course when you same low/medium/high damage you mean..... at all ranges, at all tracking....