ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

Any suggestions so that Ishtars, VNI's, and ordinary Vexors are not completely and totally **** afterwords?
Or are you one of the "gut them into uselessness and let CCP never sort them out." crowd?
-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.
And -10 for laziness.

just make it so their bonuses only affect med drones i had thought that was the idea when they re-arranged the skills in order to make that possible

So, when you've successfully nerfed Ishtars into oblivion, are you going to then beg for nerfs to whatever takes its place as the OP hull of choice? And when that hull goes the way of the drake, are you going to protest the next FOTM hull? When does it stop?

I would really like an honest answer to these questions from OP.

That would probably be the gila as the people who hate the ishtar seem to have an issue with drones in general :D

Easy solution to counter a fleet of ishtars: use them, too. These are not titans, everyone can afford one. So do some training and join the rest.

That would probably be the gila as the people who hate the ishtar seem to have an issue with drones in general :D

Any suggestions so that Ishtars, VNI's, and ordinary Vexors are not completely and totally **** afterwords?

Or are you one of the "gut them into uselessness and let CCP never sort them out." crowd?

-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.

And -10 for laziness.

He's from TVC. Don't expect much from him in terms of long-term thinking.
CCP already listened to people when they added the limit of drones being assisted. It's now up to you to get a doctrine that isn't "drop titans" to counter the Ishtars.
Oversized ABs are there for a reason (hinthint dictors).

well assisting drones was never an issue with this since you never have been able to assist sentry drones and this is only talking about removing the ability for cruiser size hulls to use them.. not even talking about lowing drone bay or bandwith.. so heavy drones are still an option..

That was less a question on which ship is going to be next, and more of a question on when OP and his ilk are going to be done whining about ships they think are OP.

As for the Gila, while it is pretty strong, it does have one glaring weakness. An arthritic tortoise tied to #50 boulder is able to outrun it.

i dont have an issue with drones in general... i have an issue with sentry drones being used by a cruiser sized hull....
i dont even have issue with the ishtar and gila type ships useing heavy drones because being a specialized drone ship and all...

why fly a bs drone boat when isthars can do it.... and that is why every alliance flys ishtar fleets all the time. because its bs dps with cruiser sig and speed.

Did you somehow miss the tons of Domis in recent AT's?

And the main reason alliances fly Ishtars over Domis is that Ishtars are less prone to dying in the first few minutes of the fight from two bomb waves, since they are far more mobile and have lower sig radius that a Dominix.

If bombers were nerfed heavily, BS fleets would be far more common, but bringing just about any large BS fleet other than rattlesnakes is basically just a "kill my entire fleet with 20 bombers" sign being waved about.

i think thats the point isnt it..... its a cruiser hull that brings battleship dps to the field without all the drawbacks of being a battleship...

and btw if they implement these changes it still will be able to with orgre 2 but will be forced to fight and closer ranges and carry differnt types of drones than just flights of sentry drones

and would force a 1-1 ratio of heavies and sentries.

Whut? sentries... 25 m3 space.. 25 mb bandwith. Heavies... the exact same.

*confused head scratch*

lol .. i.e a 250 bay and no bonuses for small/medium drones would force 125 for heavies and then you have 125 left for sentries

You would have to drop the sentry bonus and give the heavies a lot more of a boost for people to use them. you drop sentries, and they start firing. drop heavies and they commute to the target.

You would have to drop the sentry bonus and give the heavies a lot more of a boost for people to use them. you drop sentries, and they start firing. drop heavies and they commute to the target.

have you tried using geckos on a ishtar .. they are quite nasty

Easy solution to counter a fleet of ishtars: use them, too. These are not titans, everyone can afford one. So do some training and join the rest.

Impossible, Gila is so bad for most things you might as well take offense at the hurricane. Rattlesnake and Domi though will e the next choice of permawhine.

I'd nerf the drone bay to 250m3. Force Ishtars to make the tough choices as to what to use.

ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

Just nerf the drone control range and all good, meaning got to be 'so close' to control sentries.

Just nerf the drone control range and all good, meaning got to be 'so close' to control sentries.

^^^Just saying this is not me, I like my words coming from my own mouth

And to copy-pasted "don't take my shiny PVE boat away" PVE is what you do for isk to PVP. The reimbursements big alliances have circumvent that first bit. There are other shiny isk machines, you'll recover.

Any suggestions so that Ishtars, VNI's, and ordinary Vexors are not completely and totally **** afterwords?

Or are you one of the "gut them into uselessness and let CCP never sort them out." crowd?

-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.

And -10 for laziness.

ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

The ship isn't the problem its the sentries.

Tracking and range bonused ones maybe. Without that they're not special.

So, when you've successfully nerfed Ishtars into oblivion, are you going to then beg for nerfs to whatever takes its place as the OP hull of choice? And when that hull goes the way of the drake, are you going to protest the next FOTM hull? When does it stop?

I would really like an honest answer to these questions from OP.

Here's what I think:

Aside from a reduction in top speed don't change the ishtar itself, but nerf dps and tank on sentry drones. Set them up so they're more of an alpha strike weapon platform, and have their dps significantly reduces do heavy drones are top dog for dps. The balance problem with the ishtar exists more for the weapons systems it uses, and not necessarily for the ship itself.

Nerf the ishtar and we move to the domi, nerf the domi and we still have the problem with sentry spewing carrier blobs. They are the cause of a good number of issues out there. Dealing with the sentries would save a good deal of time.

It's been said before and I still think it's the best option:

Reduce Heavy Drone bandwidth to 20 M/bits/s

Reduce Offending ships drone bandwidth to 100 Mbits/s

Ishtar/VNI can only field 4 sentries then (20% dps nerf) but can still field 5 heavies if they want.

Myrm gets a brawling buff so may need a rebalance.

Remove Carrier ability to use sentry drones and introduce a new fighter type called "Lancer Fighters". Lancer fighters orbit the carrier very slowly and have Sniper weapons fitted. Would obviously struggle to track anything smaller than a BS but would leave the "Slow Cat" ability intact somewhat.

Did you somehow miss the tons of Domis in recent AT's?

And the main reason alliances fly Ishtars over Domis is that Ishtars are less prone to dying in the first few minutes of the fight from two bomb waves, since they are far more mobile and have lower sig radius that a Dominix.

If bombers were nerfed heavily, BS fleets would be far more common, but bringing just about any large BS fleet other than rattlesnakes is basically just a "kill my entire fleet with 20 bombers" sign being waved about.

Your suggestions don't fix the underlying problems. The problem with the ishtar is that it drops sentries and runs out of combat range and still does damage. It can kill you, but you can't kill it is the problem. It can kill you 20% slower and you can't kill it doesn't fix the problem it just reduces incoming damage by 20%. When I say ishtar, I mean all cruises. Just make the sentry drone a BS and up thing.

You crap lance fighter ideas is crap too. Face it, archons assigning sentries is game breaking. Get rid of it. Don't half get rid of it w/ the 'lancer garbage fighter pacification drone'. The tactic sux, so take it away. Keep assignment of fighters and fighter bombers. Thats cool. Get rid of the ability to assign sentries and other normal drones.

Nerf the ishtar and we move to the domi, nerf the domi and we still have the problem with sentry spewing carrier blobs. They are the cause of a good number of issues out there. Dealing with the sentries would save a good deal of time.

Broken record here so I am just going to start a copy and paste into all the nerf Ishtar threads I can find.

-1

Again with the nerf Ishtar / sentry drone combination. Why is it that everyone misses the most logical first step in balancing this combination and jumps immediately to the nerfs instead?

Based on reading online the most common complaint with Ishtar / sentry combination is the ability to set them to aggressive mode which allows them to attack without the pilot needing a target lock or to set them to assist another ship in which case the Ishtar becomes nothing but a transport mechanism either of these allows them to drop and run away and hide.

While nerfs to damage, control range, bandwidth and various other ideas would solve the problme for the PvP crowd it would have an even larger and un-intended affect on the usefulness of the Ishtar for PvE. We don't care about PvE you say and my response is you should, this is a game that is played by many different types of players and we all have to share the same ships and equipment and the needs of ALL segments of the game need to be considered in any balance adjustment that is made.

As this applies to the Ishtar / sentry combination why start with the nerf bat big time when a simple change to drone use mechanics may solve the problem for the PvP crowd yet have minimal impact on the PvE crowd.
Just one such idea is to remove the aggressive mode and the ability to assign drones to assist another ship, so what does this do for the situation.
1. It requires the drones pilot to have a target lock to be able to shoot anything.
2. It prevents them from dropping drones and running away like a scared baby.
3. It makes drones ships just as susceptible to EWAR as most other ships.
4. It would have minimal affect on the use of this combination in the PvE segment of the game.

So I say give these simply fixes that have minimal impact on the PvE side of the game a try first. When they are tried and IF they do not solve the balance issues for the PvP crowd then we can start to look at other things that can / should be done.

What exactly is stopping anyone from shooting the sentries? I remember having that discussion a couple days ago with my corp mates after a fight with a gang of 3 ishtars and a couple cerbs. We noticed the ishtars did the most damage after looking through the lossmails and questioned why we never shot their sentries down.

Obviously, It will not be so easy especially with short range weapons and given the 6k ehp of sentries but I don't see why it's not done often. If the ishtars are running away then kill the sentries. It's so simple.

On the topic of nerfs, a reduction of the ishtar drone bay size to 175 will ensure only a set of sentries or heavies can be carried at once.

P.S. How is there anything wrong with assigning sentries when it's ok to assign fighters that are more likely to hit?

Delete Sentries.

Its not just 0.0 where Ishtars are a poblem. Lowsec is just as bad about Ishtars Online. They're not fun to fly, they're not fun to fight. They're an "I win" button, and that's the only reason people fly them.

Not the are not, there are counters to ishtars. Go and find them.

-1

No, most of the "find a counter and stfu" is from people who have seen people complain about every ship in the game, and are tired of it. Off the top of my head, one easy way to mess with a Ishtar fleet is to fit a bunch of 425s to something, hyperspatial rig and add warp speed lowslots, and warp them in such a way that there's zero transversal between them and the Ishtar fleet. Then you just headshot the anchor and the FCs, and you continue to do that.

Its not just 0.0 where Ishtars are a poblem. Lowsec is just as bad about Ishtars Online. They're not fun to fly, they're not fun to fight. They're an "I win" button, and that's the only reason people fly them.

Any suggestions so that Ishtars, VNI's, and ordinary Vexors are not completely and totally **** afterwords?

Or are you one of the "gut them into uselessness and let CCP never sort them out." crowd?

-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.

And -10 for laziness.

I beg to differ with you on this. After they nerfed the utility out of the rattlesnake the Ishtar has become one of my favorite ships.
I guess it is all in what you expect.

ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

I would rather CCP make ewar hitting a ship affect the drones it has deployed. That way, its not a dumb nerf to one ship, its giving players an in game counter to use.

Either that, or drop all cruisers down to 50mb bandwidth and give them an additional size specific bonus to medium drones. We've already seen that this works on the Gila. It could be made to work on other cruisers too.

If its 100vs100: quite some Nomen will be killed. 20vs20: 3-5 dead omen until catching. 1 vs 1: omen players wins easily.
2400m/s? Sure, with links and overheating( but then you have less dmg)

The only problem is in BIG groups. Everything else is ok.

nerf everything!

Impossible, Gila is so bad for most things you might as well take offense at the hurricane.

Ah 2400m/s without links etc. Those ships are easily caught by those 6000m/s navy omen in their usual pvp fit. Everything ofc without overheating or links. And the capacitor is big enough to cycle mwd indefinitely AND use energy neut at the same time. Noone needs cap rechargers. See? I can pull out stupid numbers too. Doesnt make it true

Your suggestions don't fix the underlying problems. The problem with the ishtar is that it drops sentries and runs out of combat range and still does damage. It can kill you, but you can't kill it is the problem. It can kill you 20% slower and you can't kill it doesn't fix the problem it just reduces incoming damage by 20%. When I say ishtar, I mean all cruises. Just make the sentry drone a BS and up thing.

You crap lance fighter ideas is crap too. Face it, archons assigning sentries is game breaking. Get rid of it. Don't half get rid of it w/ the 'lancer garbage fighter pacification drone'. The tactic sux, so take it away. Keep assignment of fighters and fighter bombers. Thats cool. Get rid of the ability to assign sentries and other normal drones.

Then please explain why almost every match in AT XII had Gilas either picked or banned.

This guy has a brain, and has it right.

CCP do this.

[quote=Soldarius]Not empty quoting.
Those things are MONSTERS. 75+ lowest resist, significant buffer, over 800 dps.
Yup, terrible

It's a pirate faction cruiser with a bonus +20% to resist, and a very nice slot layout. What did you expect???

It's a pirate faction cruiser with a bonus +20% to resist, and a very nice slot layout. What did you expect???

It's been said before and I still think it's the best option:

Reduce Heavy Drone bandwidth to 20 M/bits/s

Reduce Offending ships drone bandwidth to 100 Mbits/s

Ishtar/VNI can only field 4 sentries then (20% dps nerf) but can still field 5 heavies if they want.

Myrm gets a brawling buff so may need a rebalance.

Remove Carrier ability to use sentry drones and introduce a new fighter type called "Lancer Fighters". Lancer fighters orbit the carrier very slowly and have Sniper weapons fitted. Would obviously struggle to track anything smaller than a BS but would leave the "Slow Cat" ability intact somewhat.

A good bombing wing can be lethal to an Ishtar fleet, the pressure of them/their drones being bombed constantly coupled with fighting the enemy fleet would hurt.

Rather than resorting to nerf's, think of a counter instead. EVE is basically a giant game of rock-paper-scissors in space after all :P

This is the good solution, if we'd somehow reach the conclusion that there is a problem.

However, this "Ishtar issue" is nothing more than another installment in the never-ending series of "what the other guy is flying is always OP, CCP hjalp".

You know something is stupid when the counter to it is itself...

This is the good solution, if we'd somehow reach the conclusion that there is a problem.

However, this "Ishtar issue" is nothing more than another installment in the never-ending series of "what the other guy is flying is always OP, CCP hjalp".

No.


How can you not see how broken Ishtars are? It's been dissected and explained numerous times. You obviously don't PvP...or PvE as it's the go to ship for that as well.

I really believe some people simply cannot grasp the concept of balance.

No.


How can you not see how broken Ishtars are? It's been dissected and explained numerous times. You obviously don't PvP...or PvE as it's the go to ship for that as well.

I really believe some people simply cannot grasp the concept of balance.

This is exactly what I meant. You don't provide a single argument why it would be "op" in your opinion. You simply parrot other forum clowns, and in your cluelesness you start to believe in it if it's repeated enough.

You obviously don't PVP or PVE, or even log in, if all you see is Ishtars.

There are ships far, far more broken than what you claim the Ishtar to be. Most of them, however, are broken in the other direction. The Drake, for example, was nerfed so badly because of whiners like you that no one uses it anymore. Do us all a favor and post your lossmails so we can see why you're so hurt over the Ishtar.

LOL.

You are illustrating my point beautifully.

The old Drake was utterly overpowered. Why do you think 80% of the BC's in space were Drakes? Why were 3% of the BC's in space Prophecy's before teiricide? Balance man. It's Really, really simple. The drake is not un-useable, it's simply more in line with the others. Heavy missiles were what's broken anyway. HAM drakes are still good, though predictable.


And to Aiyshimin the fanboy (or woman, because you behave like a woman), there are literally hundreds of posts explaining exactly why the Ishtar is overpowered. I do not need to regurgitate information. So far I have not heard a single reasonable counter argument.

I also have first hand experience. Judging by your killboard you do not. Do not offer your opinion on the matter; it is worthless.

HACs: Cerberus/Eagle, Ishtar/Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
Battleship Weapons: Cruise Missiles, Torpedoes, Large Railguns/Blasters/Artillery, Cannons/Autocannons/, Pulse Lasers/Beam Lasers, Sentry Drones

HACs that cannot use Battleship Weapon Systems: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
HACs that can use Battleship Weapon Systems: Ishtar

I see a problem here

I'll purchase your beloved ishtar for a reasonable price post nerf. I'm sure if they remove it's riskaversyness you'll be more than willing to unload it. If it's a pve ishtar.... I'm only intersted in DED space fit ishtars.

I've reviewed your comments and "However, this "Ishtar issue" is nothing more than another installment in the never-ending series of "what the other guy is flying is always OP, CCP hjalp" seems to be your most 'valid' arguement for a non nerf. Stop throwing stones.

LOL.

You are illustrating my point beautifully.

The old Drake was utterly overpowered. Why do you think 80% of the BC's in space were Drakes? Why were 3% of the BC's in space Prophecy's before teiricide? Balance man. It's Really, really simple. The drake is not un-useable, it's simply more in line with the others. Heavy missiles were what's broken anyway. HAM drakes are still good, though predictable.


And to Aiyshimin the fanboy (or woman, because you behave like a woman), there are literally hundreds of posts explaining exactly why the Ishtar is overpowered. I do not need to regurgitate information. So far I have not heard a single reasonable counter argument.

I also have first hand experience. Judging by your killboard you do not. Do not offer your opinion on the matter; it is worthless.

Oh look, Ishtars are OP!!! There's no counter to be found!!!

Enough said.

so your counter is for an fc of ishtar fleet to go full ****** durring a fight check... once agian i feel so stupid for not thinking of that.

HAC's that can project damage without Battleship Weapons: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
Hac's that cannot have their primary weapon system be destroyed by the enemy: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot

HAC's that can have their weapon system destroyed by an enemy, and only have one size of effective weaponry: Ishtars.

I too see a problem here.

Lets not just gloss over all the downsides and pretend that removing sentries will somehow make them "balanced"

How can you not see how broken Ishtars are? It's been dissected and explained numerous times. You obviously don't PvP...or PvE as it's the go to ship for that as well.

I really believe some people simply cannot grasp the concept of balance.

Just a thought, perhaps he, like me and many others that have posted here have experienced this "Ishtar online" phenomenon and like me and the others we simply doe not believe you. Both sides are opinions and those opinions are based on our in game experiences, because we view this differently than you do does not make us wrong and it does not make us blind anymore than you are.


Let me deal with the "there are no counters to Ishtar online" theory with a few things that I have personally seen work extremely well. I do have another character that is in a low sec corp and we routinely face Ishtar fleets, granted nothing in the hundreds of ships size that nul sec players are reporting but I see no reason why these would not be effective even there.

First ignore the Ishtar and deal with the drones, and yes it really is that easy unless you care more about the Ishtar kill than driving the enemy out of your territory.

Any ship that can fit cruise missiles can be particularly deadly to a drones ship. They can warp in at ranges that have the sentries deep into fall off so they are not hitting particularly well which minimizes the damage you take. And in the ultimate PvP no no we have found that slightly modified mission fits and their active tanks are the most useful as it minimizes the need for reps, leaving more pilots for dps roles. Drones vanish quickly and the Ishtars warp off because they have nothing left to shoot with. But hey we miss the kills so if you care more about the kills then this is a fail procedure. But then based on the comments here you are failing anyway so what do you have to lose?

Hard tanked fast assault is another tactic that works particularly well. Small fast ships can get in close enough and move fast enough that the sentry drones simply cannot hit them. This forces the Ishtar pilots into a decision, leave sentries out that are dying but cannot hit anything, or move back in to recall the sentries and risk the swarms of fast attack ships. Definitely more risk in this one vs the long range above but it is still effective and we even get Ishtar kills out of it. The major drawback here is you must have a decent set of cloaky scouts to set up warp ins so the fast attacks do not die trying to get in tight. But what the hell if a group of retreaded carebears can pull this off it should be easy for you "serious" PvP pilots.

We have used various combinations of these two extremes as well and they are just as effective.

No these will not work for every group of players and they will not work in every situation but if you are willing to think and play out side your comfort zone you would probably find they are an effective counter in many if not most situations.

But I still go back to an earlier post as the best option for the first attempt at balancing that which you all seem to think is broken. Eliminate aggressive mode and the ability to assign drones to assist another ship and lets see what happens, then adjust as needed from there. To those who say no to this idea as it would affect their PvE play. The changes being discussed here and in other sections of these forums as well as the internet in general will have far more negative impacts than these simple changes will so it is a decent compromise that PvE players should be willing to endorse.

HAC's that can project damage without Battleship Weapons: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
Hac's that cannot have their primary weapon system be destroyed by the enemy: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot

HAC's that can have their weapon system destroyed by an enemy, and only have one size of effective weaponry: Ishtars.

I too see a problem here.

Lets not just gloss over all the downsides and pretend that removing sentries will somehow make them "balanced"

A good bombing wing can be lethal to an Ishtar fleet, the pressure of them/their drones being bombed constantly coupled with fighting the enemy fleet would hurt.

Rather than resorting to nerf's, think of a counter instead. EVE is basically a giant game of rock-paper-scissors in space after all :P

The "drone ball" only exists because killing drones is barely practical even with bombers. If that is actually undertaken en mass, they just enter a long orbit and scatter the drones to the winds and killing them becomes beyond a bad idea.

I know this, because it's what we do when the enemy can only muster bombers and they try and bomb the drones. Then you're down to locking up and shooting individual sentries, whilst taking return fire. That is only going to end one way because if you can soak the fire in the first place, you're shooting the ishtars.

It's a nice idea on paper, only works in limited circumstance/vs poor or inexperienced FCs.

The "drone ball" only exists because killing drones is barely practical even with bombers. If that is actually undertaken en mass, they just enter a long orbit and scatter the drones to the winds and killing them becomes beyond a bad idea.

I know this, because it's what we do when the enemy can only muster bombers and they try and bomb the drones. Then you're down to locking up and shooting individual sentries, whilst taking return fire. That is only going to end one way because if you can soak the fire in the first place, you're shooting the ishtars.

It's a nice idea on paper, only works in limited circumstance/vs poor or inexperienced FCs.

Counter proposal: Give up on killmails. If you fight Sentry Drone Ishtars, kill their drones first and foremost and then the ship itself. It's that easy. The only thing that needs to change is the mindset of the players from "Must have killmails" to "Must win this fight". "Must have killmails" is flawed and backwards as you cling to tactics of the past and do not adapt; whereas "Must win this fight" opens up so many possibilities to counter people and Ishtars in particular: Focus on destroying their drones instead of the ship, orbit the drones and you won't get damaged, warp out to pings and back to the next drone ball/drone streak if the Ishtar drops another set and repeat step 1. Do it again and again and again. And if the Ishtar flees to a station to restock the drone bay, camp the station. If the Ishtars flee to another system, camp the gates, camp the route, intercept them -- without drones they can't hurt you. If they go to a POS, find the POS and watch it or camp it depending on its set up. If the Ishtars warp to save spots/a safe spot and you see mobile depots, scan down the depots and rf them/kill the Ishtars there. You might not get as many kills in the first place, but you win the fights. That is what should count.

There is no doubt that Ishtars could need a little nerf, which, depending on the nature of the change, is going to make them completely inviable as a fleet ship but that's another story; however, as long as it is as it is you need to adapt and change your way to play the game. You ought to stop only complaining about the Ishtar, you need to take on its weakness and use it against the ship.

Nobody uses heavies, because they are trash.

If you were to remove sentries, still, nobody would use heavies in 99% of PvP, barring very rare brawling setups like Blasterthrons, Armageddons, or Rattlesnakes. Please note that none of these are cruiser hulls.

A small, fragile, kiting ship that can only use heavies or other non sentry drones is thus, also trash. Nobody would be forced to do anything with Ishtars, because just about everything would be better than them. I would pick a T1 fit hurricane over a t2 Ogre wielding Ishtar.

Heavies are just that bad.

Heavies aren't bad. They just don't work w/ risk averse kiting setups.

Your commentary on kiting v brawling and tackling is ok, but it does not make heavies good. It is not the damage of heavies that is lacking. It is the speed and their travel time between targets.

This is why Heavy Drones suck. BSs suck now for the same reason. The warp speed and align time of BSs, and the speed and agility of heavy drones are both too cumbersome. CCP needs to unnerf these. Then there might be more BS and heavy drone use. Until then sentries and an agile cruiser are just way better to use in about any situation.

Any suggestions so that Ishtars, VNI's, and ordinary Vexors are not completely and totally **** afterwords?

Or are you one of the "gut them into uselessness and let CCP never sort them out." crowd?

-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.

And -10 for laziness.

HAC's that can project damage without Battleship Weapons: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot
Hac's that cannot have their primary weapon system be destroyed by the enemy: Cerberus/Eagle, Deimos, Munnin/Vagabond, Sacrilege/Zealot

HAC's that can have their weapon system destroyed by an enemy, and only have one size of effective weaponry: Ishtars.

I too see a problem here.

Lets not just gloss over all the downsides and pretend that removing sentries will somehow make them "balanced"

Sentry drones need to be nerfed before we talking about changing the ishtar.

[quote=Solaris Vex]Rain honey,
The Eos is not a sentry-boat.

ishtars are a tad op... every 0.0 group uses them for obvious reasons......

limit sentry drones to battlecruiser and above...


seems like a good idea.

Ishtar -> Eos. Sufficient drone bandwidth, OK drone bay capacity. Battlecruiser.

What's amusing is Eos sentry gangs would make people cry more. Same problem, negligible ISK difference.

More tank, practically same mass (uses the same holes), +1 low, same damage bonus, good for structure bashing. Better rails, and 2 utility highs... yeah, people would cry more.

And the tank bonus is guaranteed by the prereq structure that CCP loves.

Nerf Ishtars and the meta moves to Eoses. The problem isn't Ishtars, it's drones. They're a wildcard of weapon types. They're automated, they don't use ammo or cap, they're tiny and numerous (which makes locking a chore), they can be assigned to fast lockers, the damage type is selectable.

They're a lore / RP-based idea like auto targeting missiles, defender missiles, mines, and bombs, and they're out of control because they work.

My fits are copypasty, and they're not solo. They're meant for large groups, and the point of sentry Eoses is placing the drones in space. The MMJD version has valid uses for structure bashes and PVP engagements against slow, big things, using a different kind of kite.

I'm curious why you say the Eos doesn't get sentries? 250 m3 drone bay, 125 drone bandwidth... isn't that 5 sentries?

those fits again

http://i.imgur.com/OCLrxNt.png

http://i.imgur.com/kAjaUUy.png

Nope they don't. There are quite a few battleships that strongly disagree with a sentry nerf. They wouldn't even mind a drone control range increase.

Carrier blobs and massed domi fleets would not agree with you. At the very least the sentries need to go from sub battlrships, the ishtar itself requires no nerfs as it is the sentries that break it.

Raeding up on the circadian seekers stuff I saw people mention that their drones were going idle whilst in combat and assigned on a target. There may be new modules on the way that will affect drones I think...

Oh no dear, that is not what I meant.

Nobody is stopping anyone from putting sentrie drones in the dronebay of yours. What I meant was that the Eos gives a nice bonus for heavy drone kiting.
With just one drone navigation computer and command ships V, heavy drones will chase interceptors of the field or inst-pop them.

It's just I didn't see anyone use the ship bonus instead of doing the same thing most of the rest of EVE is doing at the moment.

Carrier blobs and massed domi fleets would not agree with you. At the very least the sentries need to go from sub battlrships, the ishtar itself requires no nerfs as it is the sentries that break it.

(Insert scientific name dealing with radio communication disruption) scrambling burst. Hi slot utility module. When activated has a chance of making drones lose their wireless connection to the controlling ship.

Host would need to initiate a reconnect to lost drones which would then go through a recalibration period and reconnect to host ship after an arbitrary amount of time.

Work out the details to make it balanced.

So your fix idea is to make me give up a high slot on my ship because the ishtar is borked?

I'll help you with the details to balance your idea. NO

Oh look, Ishtars are OP!!! There's no counter to be found!!!

Enough said.

Or you could, ya know, try out other ships to counter the Ishtar instead of the current doctrine....

I wonder what you'd have to say if CCP were to move to nerf large Railguns, or the Megathron hull.....

I'm getting the vibe that you're a subpar pilot making a living in an OP ship. To preserver you subpar but OP lifestyle you're trying to gimp any opposition by taking a utility high slot away from them.

I wonder what you'd say if CCP decided to allow eagles to fit large hybrid turrets...

It is also possible that you are wrong. However, the difference between me and you is that I don't run to mommy to get them to ban every FOTM until a reasonable amount of time has passed of people trying to find a counter.

I don't like to be the bearer of bad news but EVE changes ten times per year now. And you should know by now that alpha is always preferred by blobbs.
Some of you might remember that a big fleet back in 2005 was maybe 100 rail Megathrons vs 100 tachyon Apocalypses.
Fast forward in time and you bring a 100 Ishtar gang alphaing carriers of the field regardless of piloting, positioning or target calling while Ishtar pilots farm keyboards and play diablo while that one ceptor pilot selects the next victim or 5000 very angry looking sentry-guns start to look at you funny.

People will always choose the least amount of effort for 'good measure' on their keyboards.

It is also possible that you are wrong. However, the difference between me and you is that I don't run to mommy to get them to ban every FOTM until a reasonable amount of time has passed of people trying to find a counter.

The counter requires very particular fleet setups and incredible amounts of coordination, planning and execution.
The Ishtar's just have to be Ishtar's.
This is not balance. Unbelievable how proponents of Ishtars don't see this. Self serving agendas and all that.

It's ineffective to regulate sentries by any means other than a massive damage nerf with equally massive sentry damage bonuses to specific hulls.

Not sure what's so ridiculous about my comment. Sentries are too effective while un-bonused. Their damage in non-sentry hulls needs to be anemic, like 50 DPS. Non-sentry hulls meaning any hull that isn't specifically intended to have good sentries. Ishtars are enjoying sentry use by virtue of being Gallente and having the bandwidth, but I think I showed a good fit example of how the Eos is liable to be just as guilty of Null-wide use.

Ishtars and Eoses have heavy drone bonuses, so I assume they aren't intended to see so much action with sentries. I think damage nerfs to un-bonused sentries is the answer because touching bandwidth affects use of heavies.

The main difference between sentries and heavies is reaching through forcefields, and instant turret damage. It's not crazy to say sentries are the superior drone over heavies.

Sentries are too good in any ship with sufficient bandwidth, the smallest being Ishtars. It's sloppy role assignment. If Then Else failure.

If bonused,
Then 700 DPS
Else 50 DPS

Been awhile so I will inject this again.

Remove the ability to set drones to assist another ship.
This eliminates the possibility that anyone in a sub cap ship can control more than 5 drones.
It requires the (insert drones ship of choice here) pilot to stay close to the battle because they have to control their own drones.

Remove the aggressive mode.
This prevents the drones from attacking an un-targeted ship.
This makes the (insert drones ship here) and it's weapons as susceptible to EWAR as most other ships.

Besides the list of positive changes in the PvP arena these changes would have minimal affect on those who use drones for PvE activities. Yes the PvE crowd is going to complain about these changes and as a PvE player myself I will be first in line to say tough crap, sometimes we have to give because it is broken in the PvP arena.

On the other side of that is you as PvP players need to give as well and in this situation that means we try things that might balance the situation but have minimal impact on the PvE side of the game like my suggestions above before we jump off into the nerfs posted here, some of which would have huge impacts on the PvE side of the game.

And then sentry nano snakes would be the new thing, and you'd be back here in a month complaining that they're OP and broken and CCP should nerf them because you can't 1-volley them with your megathrons and apocs even with a sig radius the size of a small moon...

Today I Learned: Advocating for sensible change instead of constant whining to mommy = angry.

If you take sentries from sub-BS ships like Ishtars and Vexors, you'd better be willing to give them a buff to their other types of drones, and you'd better believe that they will swap instantly to those types. Gilas + Hammerheads already do 800+ DPS and can push 100k EHP, imagine if that becomes more mainstream.

Today I Learned: Advocating for sensible change instead of constant whining to mommy = angry.

If you take sentries from sub-BS ships like Ishtars and Vexors, you'd better be willing to give them a buff to their other types of drones, and you'd better believe that they will swap instantly to those types. Gilas + Hammerheads already do 800+ DPS and can push 100k EHP, imagine if that becomes more mainstream.

Today I Learned: Advocating for sensible change instead of constant whining to mommy = angry.

If you take sentries from sub-BS ships like Ishtars and Vexors, you'd better be willing to give them a buff to their other types of drones, and you'd better believe that they will swap instantly to those types. Gilas + Hammerheads already do 800+ DPS and can push 100k EHP, imagine if that becomes more mainstream.

If the Ishtar is OP and needs a nerf I fully expect the Worm and Gila to get the same treatment.

The difference is you can smart bomb non sentry drones when they are putting damage on you. This is what some of us call a reasonable counter. They have to travel from one intended target to the next, so if you're piloting your ship in an intelligent manner - it actually means something. If they want to be able to apply heavy drone damage they will have to actually engage their targets with a web to allow the heavies to get on them.

....it would be more mainstream if it was more effective.
You really think the Gila price tag is what stops Nullsec coalitions from using them?
Or any well established group, really.

While they might need a slight toning down, sentries are really the problem. People can deal with drones that have to fly at you much better than drones that sit there and wreck you out to 100km+.

Yeah, Bouncers are just insane. 100 kilometers of friggin falloff.

If the Ishtar is OP and needs a nerf I fully expect the Worm and Gila to get the same treatment.

Agreed, we'll prevent both of these ships from using sentries because they are not BS. (It's good to have another voice on my side)

I wonder what you'd have to say if CCP were to move to nerf large Railguns, or the Megathron hull.....

-1 for a bare sketch of an idea, -1 for not searching to find the other 999 Ishtar threads, -1 for the "make them totally useless" suggestion.

And -10 for laziness.

Actually I think Ishtars would still be overpowered with that change, but yes it would screw up all of the other cruiser drone boats: Vexor, VNI, Arbitrator, Thorax, Omen, Sacrilege.

Difference being that rails and the mega are not overpowered.

(Holy **** a response!)
Define "overpowered" please. I only skimmed the article on the "day of 1000 megathrons", but from what I've heard, the Baltec fleet is the new sub-cap meta for engagements.

Your info is a tad out of date, we retired them some time ago. Ishtars do most of the leg work, domi fleet are the hammer and boot fleet is godmode. All of them use sentries because they are hilariously overpowered.

Your info is a tad out of date, we retired them some time ago. Ishtars do most of the leg work, domi fleet are the hammer and boot fleet is godmode. All of them use sentries because they are hilariously overpowered.

So, when you've successfully nerfed Ishtars into oblivion, are you going to then beg for nerfs to whatever takes its place as the OP hull of choice? And when that hull goes the way of the drake, are you going to protest the next FOTM hull? When does it stop?
I would really like an honest answer to these questions from OP.

CCP has done the ballsy thing with recons lately, where all ships were brought up to the level of the falcon. Perhaps they'll do something similar with HACs to become as popular as the Ishtar. Or so I can dream.

Rattlesnakes could have a rebuff to sentries to complement the sentry nerf, to preserve its role as a sentry boat.

As for Fozzie and current game design, it's time he works for Riot, I think.

And btw, lowsec PVP and drones... you mean to tell me you use sentries for your ships, and not fighters?

Are sentries used simply because they're considered overpowered, or is there a "ease of use" to them that makes them good choices? From the article, ease of use trumps power quite often for larger engagements.

Rails are easier to use as you simply click and they fire plus they move with your ship, sentries need to be deployed and kept in range. We use them because they can blap everything from frigates to capitals with battleship level firepower all while abusing the sig and speed of a HAC. Sentries are simply overpowered, hence why we are abusing them so much.

Fozzie is as Fozzie does and there is nothing that we can do about that. Beside laying all of this on Fozzie is short sighted and no doubt ignores the reality of the situation. Unless you think that everyone at CCP is so stupid and gullible that they will blindly follow where ever Fozzie leads no matter how bad it is. Personally I am sure that Fozzie and his ideas are reasonably well looked after and I think it is safe to say that if a majority of the folks at CCP thought one of his ideas was bad for the game we would not see it on TQ.

I was not aware that sub-cap ships were allowed to equip fighters simply because they are in low sec, wondering when this change happened and why it was not in the patch notes. Or was I having a Rip Van Winkle moment and slept through that part of class? No it must be a senior moment and I simply forgot that I read all about it, yeah that must be it.

Hey Rain, I've never gone out with sentry Ishtars in Null. Can you tell me how easy they are to use?