I don't care much for drone doctrines, so personally I don't get too fuzzed about this. However, what makes me annoyed is that you seem incredibly keen on nerfing symptoms, rather than actual issues.

Letting one person control the combined drones of an entire fleet is bad. Okay, fair enough. But why oh why, is it absolutely fine for one person in the entire fleet be the prober, the fleet warper and the broadcaster of targets for the entire fleet? How is that in any way different from drone assisting, in terms of what is required of a player? Oh no, you have to shift+clik and push F1, mad skills there!

If you really wanted to make players more involved in these fights, you would put more responsibility on the individual pilot, for instance removing fleet warp and broadcasting targets, and only being able to warp/broadcast to your own wing.

I would think that changing how fleets work altogether should be the goal, to require more pilot involvement, but instead you are trying to cure underlying mechanics by putting on a bandaid on the most superficial wound. It is the exact same pattern as with the changes to supers vs. the underlying problem of sov mechanics and too easy movement of big fleets.

Did someone mention that the last AT was won by 39 Sentries?
so why dont go to like 20?

Did someone mention that the last AT was won by 39 Sentries?
so why dont go to like 20?

Putting cap for 50 drones is good direction, but:
- fast locking ceptor having assist of 50 sentry drones is still way OP
- fleets will go from assist to drone bunny to assist to your squad leader. ( this is still very bad )

My proposal:
- frigates/destroyers/cruisers/battle cruisers can have max 5 drones assisted.
- other ships can have 25 drones assisted with the exception for command ships that can go to 50 drone cap when fitting some new module reserved only for Command Ships.

No, no you haven't. 50 is not even enough for a typical VG fleet (12 pilots) and certainly not for an HQ with 40 pilots.

Just make the assist depend on drone bandwidth. That way you can limit alpha with sentries which can be considered main weapon while not interfering with light drones which are used as secondary damage application.

1250 bandwidth and this change is at least reasonable.

Can we take this as a sign, then, that CCP holds the opinion that capitals should offer even fewer advantages to offset the increased cost, effort, risk, and skills required to effectively field them, as compared to simply fielding big piles of subcaps?

Putting cap for 50 drones is good direction, but:
- fast locking ceptor having assist of 50 sentry drones is still way OP
- fleets will go from assist to drone bunny to assist to your squad leader. ( this is still very bad )

My proposal:
- frigates/destroyers/cruisers/battle cruisers can have max 5 drones assisted.
- other ships can have 25 drones assisted with the exception for command ships that can go to 50 drone cap when fitting some new module reserved only for Command Ships.

2 people have to take care of their own drones. ISK/h ruined. -17 accounts. Thanks CCP.

I don't care much for drone doctrines, so personally I don't get too fuzzed about this. However, what makes me annoyed is that you seem incredibly keen on nerfing symptoms, rather than actual issues.

Letting one person control the combined drones of an entire fleet is bad. Okay, fair enough. But why oh why, is it absolutely fine for one person in the entire fleet be the prober, the fleet warper and the broadcaster of targets for the entire fleet? How is that in any way different from drone assisting, in terms of what is required of a player? Oh no, you have to shift+clik and push F1, mad skills there!

If you really wanted to make players more involved in these fights, you would put more responsibility on the individual pilot, for instance removing fleet warp and broadcasting targets, and only being able to warp/broadcast to your own wing.

I would think that changing how fleets work altogether should be the goal, to require more pilot involvement, but instead you are trying to cure underlying mechanics by putting on a bandaid on the most superficial wound. It is the exact same pattern as with the changes to supers vs. the underlying problem of sov mechanics and too easy movement of big fleets.

This.

Since you are removing the upsides of drones what about the downsides? Will they get any boosts? Like more better resists for drones to increase their lifetime on the field? Given how stupidly easy it is to strip drone doctrines that are not capital based of their dps?

As an active incursion runner I strongly believe this change will (negatively) affect incursions as it's not uncommon to see more than 70 drones(small and medium) at a single site.
On the other hand, heavy drones and sentries aren't used due to their slow dps application(heavies) or the need to keep moving(sentries).

Is it possible to have separate caps for sentries and small/medium drones? The current 50 for sentries and let's say 100 for small/medium drones?

normally id be with you, but there are a number of hearing impaired people who require broadcasts to be able to do anything in big fleet pvp

Lol sad people brutally discovering that they actually need to play the game to make isks.

Being able to let someone else control your ship while afking is stupid by definition. This mechanism shouldn't exist in the first place.

WOW!!! so you think a condor controlling the alpha of 50 sentries with a lock time of what 2 secs is balanced?

missing the point entirely here.......

Drones, especially sentries, are a main weapons platform. It's one thing to "broadcast" a target to an entire fleet. A broadcast is simply an electronic message, so to say. Fleet warp isn't broken. I've never seen anybody complain about entire fleets being able to be warped by one dude. It's too bad you can't see the difference between main weapon systems of an entire fleet being controlled by one dude with a fast lock ship and fleet broadcasts.

Assigned sentry fleets are literally one guy playing the game (fighting the battle) while the rest of the fleet goes off to make a sammich. Guess it's back to lock/press F1/keep at range time again for you sammich makers.

Wish peeps would stop grizzling about the way that CCP's designs are utilized, after all it's a game feature your talking about here, one dreamed up by the Dev's that they did not apply enough thought to at the time.

Better to grizzle at CCP to update the games coding and the servers rather than complain that players use the games features to there best advantage.

To CCP directly, if your going to insert new features in to the game do not be so intent on trinkets, think about the impact of your designs on game play and server load, better more updates that improve content and work over change just because you thought it was a good idea.

Building from your point. Would a "lock time" delay on the drones first shot help with that. ? Like a 3-5 secs delay to simulate the drone actually "locking" the target. hence removing the "insta-lock" effect from assisting fast tacklers.

Just a tought.

What's the lock range on a Condor?

No we aren't. Not even slightly.



WOW!!! so you think a condor controlling the alpha of 50 sentries with a lock time of what 2 secs is balanced?

Dude, just shoot the condor.


missing the point entirely here.......

What's the lock range on a Condor?

What's the lock range on a Condor?