Just to ask the question again:

Is the skill requirement for Light/Med drones changing from Scout Drone Operation to Combat Drone operation skills?

Currently you need to train Scout Drone Operation (distance) to get the T2 drones, it sounds like that's getting changed to the new skills that combat drone operation is getting split into.

Did I misunderstand?

wtf CCP? Is it getting changed? What % of drone users have this at lvl 5? How many people are going to lose access to the simplest of the T2 drones? And it's a higher rank skill, driving up the SP requirements by 50%. You're just screwing over everyone with the summer expansion, aren't you CCP? One bad announcement after another.

It's intentional, and seemingly justified by the closure in gap between T1/Faction and T2 performance.

So the fix is to change
* "We are also splitting the current Combat Drone Operation skill into two new skills, Light Drone Operation and Medium Drone Operation"
to
* "We are also splitting the current Combat Drone Operation "Scout Drone Operation (to be renamed to Drone Avionics)" skill into two new skills, Light Drone Operation and Medium Drone Operation"

edit: bleh. still not clear.

Light/Medium Drone Operation (LDO/MDO) should be split from Scout Drone Operation (SDO) to ensure that folks don't lose their existing access to T2 light and medium drones. Combat Drone Operation (CDO) is removed and skill points refunded.

Optionally, if CCP is feeling generous, Light/Medium Drone Operation can then be raised to your current Combat Drone Operation (CDO) skill if it happens to be higher. Meaning, LDO and MDO are split from the higher of CDO or SDO. (CDO skillpoints would not be refunded.)

I may have missed it, but in the dev blog I didn't see which -level- of racial specialization is required to use T2 sentries. I'm just wondering because it would be dreadful if it were level 5. Require a 16-20 day training time for one type of T2 drone, and months for all 4, when a turret specialization on requires lvl 1 to fit T2s, would be harsh. It already seems kind of bad that you have to train ~12 days after training a ~20 day skill to get the T2 heavies. I understand they are racial seperations, but they aren't 4 different weapon systems, they are all drones. It's very skill intensive compared to any single turret.

Splitting the current Combat Drone Operation skill into two new skills is hardly going to make drone usage less skill-intensive, since it's gonna add one more week of training (unless Light Drone Operation and Medium Drone Operation will have 1x traning time multiplier, which I think would be more appropriate than 2x). Yes, I know you could train Combat Drone Operation V to make this issue non-relevant, but there'll be newer players and maybe even your alts coming to EVE after this change and this will affect them.

Sorry for the delay in answering some of the skill questions guys.

As many of you have suggested, we'll be giving pilots the same level in Light Drone Operation and Medium Drone Operation as the highest level they have in either Scout Drone Operation or Combat Drone Operation over the patch downtime.

The Light Drone Operation skill will be rank 1, the Medium Drone Operation skill will be rank 2.

I also would like conformation on this. I am in the same situation (scout drone op 5, combat drone op 4.)

After the update Ill have light and medium drone op both at 5 and now will suddenly be able to fit the T2 drone link augmenter?

Please confirm. Thanks.

I know quite few

How can u claim no time was lost. If we take 2 players with same amount of sp at the patchday, who started playing the same day one with both skills at 5, one with rank 1 skill at 5 and rank to at 1. After the patchday, the second player has 500k sp more. first player has actually lost 7-8 days.

The sollution proposed in devblog was allright and fair to current players:

" During the patch downtime, existing players with the Combat Drone Operation skill trained will receive both new skills trained to the same level that their Combat Drone Operation skill was trained to."

THIS however is wrong:

Dont ask me ask them:)

Ok, so what is it? Is it Scout Drone or Combat Drone Operation? And why wouldn't that be mentioned in the Dev Blog? The only thing the blog references is Combat Drone Operation skill, and it's clear as day here:

Confused, how is the comparative benefit of combat drone op V going away? Isn't it actually becomeing more valuable to do it now prior to the split?

And now I'm even more lost.

From what I understood

SDO is being renamed to Drone Avionics with no functionality change
CDO is being split into 2 skills, 1 for lights, 1 for mediums. Much like the BC/Destroyer skill changes it's clearly beneficial to train this up prior to the changes should you anticipate ever using these types of drones.

What I don't see is how the 2 skills intersect. I apologize if I missed a later clarification, but I don't see how CDO became less valuable in itself or how SDO in any way provides the same benefit after the changes as CDO does now. If you can break it down I'd appreciate it.

Ah I see it now, it was a post i missed, though that said, if you had SDO V you had access to the T2 drones, CDO wasn't needed, so I'm not sure why replicating SDO to CDO is necessary unless the CDO derivatives are being included in T2 progression, which I'm guessing is another change not stated in the blog itself.

As Erasmus Phoenix points out, it hasn't actually been said that Drone Avionics will unlock drone link augs GÇö it's just an assumption based on how all the bonuses and abilities are being put in order. Even if Fozzie forgot about that poor old module, I'm sure it's being quietly snuck into the change doc as we speakGǪ

Because you have not trained them yet?

Fozzie,

have you considered not decreasing the fighter base damage? I first thought these changes would buff them enough to make then usable, but if you are going to need to use two low slots just to make them as sucky as before, this is actually a nerf.

Hmm?

No. Assigned fighters are totally unbonused.

I'll be honest, I've never tested it. Maybe a dev could confirm one way or the other? Pretty please? With an exotic dancer on top!

Racial Drone Bonuses will affect Fighters and Fighter Bombers?
If so then;
Is not entirely correct. Or will the specialization skills add 2% per level above current damage?
Does this also mean the requirement of Drone Interfacing 5 is to be lowered for Fighters?

Okay, I'm a little confused now. Instead of the much simpler version of "Combat Drone Operation M >> Light Drone Operation M and Medium Drone Operation M" which makes logical sense, you're using the higher of two different skills to do both?

Seems to me the devblog had the simpler and more sense-making version.


Semi-unrelated:

I think Combat Drone Operation (or rather, Light/Medium Drone Operation) and Scout Drone Operation (Drone Avionics) have their unlocks backwards.

Scout Drone Operation currently gives a 5km/level bonus to drone control range, but unlocks T1/T2 versions of the light and medium combat drones. Combat Drone Operation gives a 5%/level bonus to light and medium drone damage, but unlocks T1 and T2 Drone Link Augmentor modules.

Isn't this backwards? Shouldn't the skill that gives bonuses to control range for all drones (SDO/Avionics) unlock the control range modules, and the skill(s) that gives bonuses to drone damage unlock the drones it gives bonuses to?

I'm curious, does this mean if i have scout drone operation 5, drone interfacing 5 and combat drone operation 4 I will have a lower skill level?