Siege
Minmatar
Siegecraft Bounty Hunting
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Posted - 2006.09.01 00:50:00 -
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Edited by: Siege on 01/09/2006 00:54:20
Warp to '0' causes more problems than it fixes, which is why it was removed a looooong time back into beta.
Problem one is bouncing off the gate, if you carry too much momentum coming out of warp. It happens now if you warp in and hit a POS shield that you don't have a password for. So just from that problem it needs to be probably 1 or 2 km at the bare minimum to prevent that.
Another issue is that while it does decrease travel time (good), it also makes you pretty much uncatchable. Fit a bunch of stabs, take a ship with a small signature radius, and fly through anything that doesn't have a warp bubble or interdictor sphere. Not just on the approach to gates, but also at stations. That will drive the PvP guys even more bonkers than instas do now.
Bubbles/Spheres and a warp to 0 combination isn't really the answer, because you'll always need to have somebody around with enough skills, money, and cargo space to carry one around. Bubbles are far too static, and slow to employ. Interdictor spheres are way too expensive and skill intensive. And making them mandatory to have PvP combat will make their prices go through the roof, and that makes it harder for players to get involved. A medium bubble at 20mil is already a tough thing for many players. If you introduce more modules that can interrupt warp, then you need more stuff to lock a target down. Catching a frigate will now need a webber, warp scrambler, and module X also.
Going with skills based systems for travelling, unfortunately this is also a big hit to new players. A month old character who is having enough trouble figuring out the skill system and getting more than a civilian autocannon, will definitely not have this skill enough to survive. But players who do have the skills will be just as invulnerable as they are now. The imbalance will still exist.
The module thing to speed travel and reduce vulnerability.... it might not be a bad idea, but then people will complain that they have to permanently have that module fitted and cant use whatever else they want to put in that slot. And the PvP crowd already complain enough about stabs, I can just imagine the howls if there is another 'can't catch me' module option.
One thing I've been curious about is maybe we are taking the wrong approach to a solution. We are talking about fixed distances, skill based, or module based approaches that will affect all ships equally. But the PROBLEM isn't one that all ships share equally. An interceptor with MWD at 15km is only 2-3 seconds from a gate at 15km, which is less time than some battleships can lock in. But a Freighter, which is an instant-lock for anything that is armed.... they are upwards of a minute from the gate at 15km. So the problem really isn't a distance problem, but an imbalance in the TIME issue.
Maybe we should be looking at other ways to resolve the issue of TIME to travel at sub-warp speed to a gate/station. In other words, base the distance you warp to a gate according to the mass/velocity/maneuverability of the ship you are flying. Or just have it as a ship characteristic, where different ship types have a different 'mimimum warp distance' that can be tweaked as needed. This can mean that the freighters, battleships and other slow-boats can come in closer and get to the gate just as fast as a frigate or interceptor, which would warp in at a larger distance. And it's something that all players can have equal access to from day-1.
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