Shivus Tao
Broski Enterprises
Elite Space Guild
2
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Posted - 2011.11.02 10:48:00 -
[1] - Quote
Shadowsword wrote:Didn't read past the first three pages, but here's what I think:
- Atrilleries are more or less fine, tought maybe have too much alpha. It's supposedly countered by lower dps, but depending of the time frame you're taking as a sample, the total can actually be higher than other weapon systems. Maybe a 20% lower alpha is in order, along with a rof increase to keep the same dps.
- Autocanons are out of whack. The things you can do with them are ludicrous. The Tornado, unless changed, will have 89km falloff with barrage and a pair of tracking enhancer (which it can fit without needing to sacrifice anything important). 89km falloff! Didn't some of the fineprint somewhere mention autocanons being a short range weapon?
The second problem with them is that they're dirt-cheap to fit. Which mean you can have a pretty oversized tank on a cruiser/BC-sized powergrid, and don't need to do any compromise to take the biggest AC tier. An armageddon can't use 7 mega pulse lasers + plates + MWD. A Dominix can't fit 6 neutrons + plates + MWD. Yet which minmatar BS has to use 650mm AC because 800mm wouldn't fit? There is none.
Let's look at FOTM ships in the last few years: Dramiel, Machariel, Cynabal, Vaggabond, Ishtar, Drake, Hurricane, Abaddon, Maelstrom. Notice a pattern here?
The issue with artillery balance is that fleet doctrines dictate the "in" weapons. Artillery seems overpowered because of alpha fleet. But if you get a hellcat fleet within range of an alphafleet then alphafleet gets torn apart. If blasters were any good they would also counter alphafleets with good warp ins. Rails just have a poor niche, being mediocre in putting strict kinetic damage on target at long range isn't really a good niche to fill and needs to be re-evaluated. At those ranges you need things to die fast, or immediately because either the warpin is a comin, or the target is a warpin'. I will say however it's awfully easy to fit a full rack of 1400's with no real compromise of tank, utility, or damage/tracking mods, even on abaddons *wink wink*.
Even with tracking enhancers barrage is a fairly poor tracker as anyone who's flown a vagabond can attest. That negative is reduced as transversal is reduced at long ranges, but barrage is still not the best in pure DPS, further reduced by a significantly wide gap between optimal and falloff. And don't forget these are large guns we're talking about. I'd be amazed if they can hit anything smaller than a cap, or at least a battleship reliably using barrage if it's moving with any decent speed. Furthermore, the tornado will, if lucky have as good of a buffer tank as the cyclone or hurricane if it even has that. Chances are it will be more like a well tanked Rupture.
Oh and the geddon has little trouble using 7 megapulses with 1600's and all the fixin's, it is a tight fit though needing a 3% pg implant or AWU 5 and a 1% I think, been quite a while since I've flown pvp geddons.
I would not actually be against altering requirements on autocannons and arty's or PG on the ships since it seems silly the only ship that actually has to use 650's for the lack of power is the Vargur. That spirit of balance also says I wouldn't mind them re-evaluating the purple elephant in the room that is scorch. |