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TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:24:00 -
[1]
We have been working on an overhaul on the NPC Pirate system for a later patch, the current changes that have already happened and will be tuned from this day on are:
- Elite NPC Frigates
All NPC frigates in Deep Space (all solar systems not belonging to any Faction) have been replaced with new NPC frigates using similar ships as the Elite Frigates known to players at current date. These NPC's are extremely fast when approuching a target and some are very fast in orbit mode. These NPC's will be doing the Stasis Webifying and Warp Scrambling from now on, giving players both harder oponents in the smaller form but also give players a more of a chance for narrow escape by focusing on killing the smaller targets instead of the need of killing 2-3 battleships that have you warp scrambled.
- Propulsion Jamming "Removed"
Old NPC's as you know them currently on the Live Server will not continue their warp scrambling / stasis webifying, they have gotten bored with it as their damage and defence output decreases to much for them. The new Elite NPC Frigates will be doing these action from now.
- Stargate Pirates
Stargate Pirates have been re-introduced, there will be a chance of Pirates infesting stargates in all 0.0 - 0.3 systems, they vary in strength mostly based on ore value of systems and location (home region of pirate factions will have nastier stargate pirates than the ore value indicates). These pirates can go up to cruisers in low security Empire Space and up to Battleships in Deep Space. These pirates how ever do not warp scramble so they are not as big of a threat as asteroid pirates can be, they will simply be able to be pests in the way of travellers, if they even infest a stargate (only a chance of infestation as mentioned).
These features listed are already test-able on Chaos.
Further Tuning
Further tuning will involve changes to the NPC Factions, based on more racial manner such as: Guristas focusing more on shield, getting better shield recharge rate but less armor and structure - Sansha's / Bloods getting more armor HP and better armor Resistances vs. high armor damaging damage types etc.
Another feature that we would like to get into game as soon as we can are changes in the targeting logic for NPC's, at current they use logics based on their turret types. The feature addon to the range logic would for example involve ship classes becoming threat levels to determine suited targets, so that frigates and industrials wouldn't be on the same caliber of threat for NPC Battleships as battleships or cruisers would be.
The reason for this post was basically to inform the players of the new NPC's and stargate pirates already testable on Chaos as well as further tuning that will take place the next weeks. The current NPC's and stargate pirates are currently in a prototype stage but comments are still dearly needed, any thoughts about these currently or feedback. I will then later post again in this threat when the new tunes to racial difference takes place and ask for more comments and feedback.
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
Joshua Calvert
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:28:00 -
[2]
Some cool ideas.
It'll be interesting to see how the elite npc's work when you're trying to kill them to get away from their warp-scrambling.
Will all of the frigates in a spawn warp-scramble or just a certain number at a time?
It's nice that the races will determine their ability to recharge shields etc. will Sansha NPC repair armour damage?
LEEEEERRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY! |
TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:37:00 -
[3]
 Quote:
Will all of the frigates in a spawn warp-scramble or just a certain number at a time?
Currently not, they only have a base chance of activating their warp scrambles and stasis webifiers but I'm looking at the possiblity of fixing this for the NPC patch.
Quote:
It's nice that the races will determine their ability to recharge shields etc. will Sansha NPC repair armour damage?
I'm looking into it right now 
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:39:00 -
[4]
Would like to add that in the world there are over 1000 variant NPC Pirate groups, the creation was always done through database level and tuning the groups and system commands after creation was basically hell. We have now improved the NPC command and grouping functions allowing us to tune this afterwards with much ease.
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
Cirle
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:43:00 -
[5]
All sounds wonderful, to be honest, and more fun :)
Quote:
Further tuning will involve changes to the NPC Factions, based on more racial manner such as: Guristas focusing more on shield, getting better shield recharge rate but less armor and structure - Sansha's / Bloods getting more armor HP and better armor Resistances vs. high armor damaging damage types etc.
What level of recharge rate are you talking here, one which would simulate a cruiser or battleship running a shield booster, or just one to make them harder to take down (assuming you add armour recharge as well). Essentially the question is; is the intent to just increase the difficulty, but with a nod to the faction, or try to mimic player controlled ships?
Additionally, are you going to fine tune the weapons used by the different ships to match those that can actually be mounted, and alter the characteristics based on the load? For example, having a slow but high shield cruiser, or some frigates mounting the equivalent of 125 rails and other 150s?
Cirle |
Toulak
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:51:00 -
[6]
Gonna fix NPCs so they dont have infinite cap, infinite ammo, infinite locking range etc?
And Im not too keen on the increase in shield recharge rate on gurista battleships, theyre already powerful in that department.
I do like the NPC elite frigate idea though.
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Clipped Wings
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:53:00 -
[7]
Most fascinating, definately. One must wonder why 95% of the cases where the word NPC battleship is mentioned, it's underlined ;)
One thought, though: The mentioned pirate infestation (which sounds truly enthralling - it'll give players something to fight back in 'their' systems), although it was specifically stated that they would NOT carry warp disruptors...Might it not still pose a problem as the NPC pirates still have the insta-lock-ability?
Obviously, I should much rather lose my ships to NPC ganking (as the risk of a pod-death is near zero to NPCs), but it might result in some rather nasty sideeffects.
One last idea: Would it be possible to - if not on a permanent basis, then at least for a set amount of time - clear the gates of bug infestation? So if I gather up a few friends and clear the gate, that the pirates won't respawn on it x minutes later?
Ohwell. All in all, I shall eagerly anticipate this on TQ! :)
regards,
-Clipped Wings of LFC
"I believe in the theoretical benevolence, and practical malignity of man."
~William Hazlitt
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Reah
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Posted - 2004.04.15 10:56:00 -
[8]
btw i do hope atleast some of those frigs orbit at >5km range, else a smartbomb will be the solution to all your warp scrambling problems 
other than that, those changes seems cool 
also, im wondering if you could give a boost to using missiles(and thus boost caldari and actually make caldari ships useable for npc chaining) simply by removing npc defender missiles. Im all for them having an odd chance of launching a defender missile, but with the battleship pirates having like 90% chance of launching defenders(not entirely sure about the number, but i tested a raven with cruice missiles on chaos and it was something like 1 of 10 missiles that did actually hit.
This multiply's your ammo cost(witch is already extremely high due the production cost of missiles) several times. If the defenders was removed, missiles would still be very expencive to use for chaining npc's. But it should be possible without actually having to spend/lose money hunting npc's.
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TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:01:00 -
[9]
Quote:
Gonna fix NPCs so they dont have infinite cap, infinite ammo, infinite locking range etc?
That is not possible without adding loads of attributes to fake for tuning which is already enough problem at the moment (NPC's need attributes of ships, characters, turrets, missiles, MWD's, webifiers, scramblers etc. and more for each kind of action that ships & modules for them to work in a way that we want to achieve). The NPC's are not as powerful compared to players besides some that are suposed to be very powerful, giving NPC's and edge in basic stats is some times a must as they can not train smart thinking and can not use all types of modules.
Infinite locking range is how ever a bug which we will fix.
Quote:
And Im not too keen on the increase in shield recharge rate on gurista battleships, theyre already powerful in that department.
These are basically just tunes I'm speaking of, the only NPC's that have shield recharge rate worth a while are NPC battleships, keeping these on Guristas Battleships. Tunes would be increasing on other Guristas NPC's, tuning on other factions and most likely removing of Sansha's / Bloods.
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:04:00 -
[10]
Quote:
Might it not still pose a problem as the NPC pirates still have the insta-lock-ability?
They do not have insta-locking time, the problem is that their targeting timer doesn't get displayed as a threat.
Quote:
One last idea: Would it be possible to - if not on a permanent basis, then at least for a set amount of time - clear the gates of bug infestation? So if I gather up a few friends and clear the gate, that the pirates won't respawn on it x minutes later?
Their re-spawning time is chance based and time limited, so clearing a gate will keep it clean for quite some time. Feedback from testing these are wanted
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
Ebedar
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:10:00 -
[11]
Will Serpentis rats begin to use drones, or is that something planned for a much later point?
My life in pictures:
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TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:14:00 -
[12]
Quote:
Will Serpentis rats begin to use drones, or is that something planned for a much later point?
Not just yet, the deployment and cleaning them up for NPC's would need alot of work to keep the CPU cooled on the server...but it's planned for later.
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
TomB
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:17:00 -
[13]
Quote:
btw i do hope atleast some of those frigs orbit at >5km range, else a smartbomb will be the solution to all your warp scrambling problems
Some do, some don't, they differ in strength, close orbit frig with super blasters can still be a major pain as their defences are much better than frigates you have seen before
Quote:
also, im wondering if you could give a boost to using missiles(and thus boost caldari and actually make caldari ships useable for npc chaining) simply by removing npc defender missiles. Im all for them having an odd chance of launching a defender missile, but with the battleship pirates having like 90% chance of launching defenders(not entirely sure about the number, but i tested a raven with cruice missiles on chaos and it was something like 1 of 10 missiles that did actually hit.
We will have a look at this, good feedback on missile fighting vs. Pirates like this one would be swell to help us out.
2004.07.06 19:30:45combatTomB strikes you critically with his Nerf Bat, pwning you for -100% everything. |
SKiNNiEH
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:38:00 -
[14]
As a matter of fact, i had a full set of "belt NPC's" at a gate yesterday (0.0 TQ). They didnt lock me, but they did start shooting once someone made agression against 'em.
Is this a freak occurance or just a bug?
I have made a screenshot.. will post a link to it when i get home.
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Judicator
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Posted - 2004.04.15 11:42:00 -
[15]
Is there any possibility that pre-castor chaning will come back with these changes?
As it is now it takes far too long to be worthwhile unless you are able to devote many hours to it. I'd prefer NPC chaining myself, but as it stands I am far better off just mining bistot or crokite in terms of profit.
If they now become more dangerous I fail to see why the timer cannot be more like pre-castor. Back then it took me about 10 minutes to set off a chain and then I good make good use of it for an hour or so before other things required my attention.
Could be tough that the current chaining is also just a bug that will get fixed.
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Zen Jakkaru
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Posted - 2004.04.15 12:07:00 -
[16]
Quote:
These pirates can go up to cruisers in low security Empire Space and up to Battleships in Deep Space.
Nice.
Har-de-fraggin'-har-har!
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Douro
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Posted - 2004.04.15 12:33:00 -
[17]
Any chance of better loot from Elite NPC frigs?
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GenocidalSpliff
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Posted - 2004.04.15 12:44:00 -
[18]
Sounds great but it would be better if u updated chaos so people can test with more than a velator with civilian light blasters :|
2004.08.22 21:03:00 combat Your Anode Light Neutron Particle Cannon I perfectly strikes callonious [BSC], wrecking for 236.9 damage. |
Serak Tur
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Posted - 2004.04.15 13:28:00 -
[19]
Edited by: Serak Tur on 15/04/2004 13:31:20
/emote is seriously worried.
While I'm overjoyed that NPCs are being overhauled I find these new changes when, combined with the new frigate combat mechanics, could make hunting much more dangerous. Currently the greatest threat from spawns are not warp scrambling BS but the warp scrambling mwd equiped escort cruisers (i.e. Mortifiers).
What I foresee is a pack of Elite frigates mwd at insane speed, being very, very difficult to hit. They will soon be orbiting you (ws and webbified) and there won't be a whole lot you can do.
Smartbombs? Sure, but Tomb already pointed out that some will not orbit that close. Fire missiles? Perhaps, these guys may go that slow...but wait you probably have smartboms on (if you don't fighting gurristas you are wrong anyway).
Fire your guns at them maybe you'll get lucky you say?
Read the frigate combat mechanics I say.
Last but not least deploy your drones man! Ahh there we go. No, wait. The BS and Cruiser escorts evaporate them (light and medium of course to kill the frigates) in 3 nano seconds (why do they hate drones so much btw?).
Its just a concern though and I'll give it a try here soon and post any findings. Hopefully my fears are groundless as I do very much love npc hunting and it can already be very challenging.
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Butter Nutz
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Posted - 2004.04.15 13:42:00 -
[20]
TomB are u one of the head guys behind eve?
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NGRU Rix
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Posted - 2004.04.15 13:47:00 -
[21]
What about the way they respawn in the belt? It's rather unrealistic to think they could spawn directly on top of you, which they do at this time. How about they have to warp into the belt at a distance just like everyone else? Spawning on top or within a few hundred meters is just ridiculous.
TomB, from my understanding, is in charge of balancing.
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SKiNNiEH
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Posted - 2004.04.15 14:13:00 -
[22]
As promised.. gate npc's... i thought this shouldn't be happening with current path/build?
In any case.. here's the linkage: click me
They didnt fire unless fired upon, btw.
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Bellicose
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Posted - 2004.04.15 14:33:00 -
[23]
Quote:
TomB are u one of the head guys behind eve?
hes more like ... God
Who needs a shovel when you have a nice big cannon?
KittenArmy
capn' crimson |
Xavier Perez
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Posted - 2004.04.15 14:38:00 -
[24]
Guiristas are something of a special case, simply because they are so ungoldly powerful compared to other npc pirate factions. We've learned to adapt to the 100+ missiles/torpedos coming at us, but dont move too fast on this. We really dont want a repeat of the horrors of castor's release by having to completely re-learn their tactics. I can dig interceptors being the warp scramblers, though. As an apoc pilot I'm never too proud to mount a few heavy beam lasers to pop some frigates open.
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Viceroy
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Posted - 2004.04.15 14:45:00 -
[25]
Edited by: Viceroy on 15/04/2004 17:18:46
Edited by: Viceroy on 15/04/2004 14:48:52
So you're saying, npcs in empire space wont scramble or web, thus removing the risk of NPC farming greatly while leaving the high reward, and NPCs in deep space will scramble with miserable frigates that will probably be very inefficent and die fast, thus removing the threat of scrambling/webbing in deep space also, and leaving the 1mil/500k bounties.
I think you should leave normal frigates (not elite ones) in 0.0-0.3/4 empire space to do some scrambling to add atleast SOME risk to empire space farming.
Also I hope those NPC elite frigs are kickass and dont drop like flies, otherwise 0.0 farming = no real risk (unless you CTD or get your ****** bship stuck on a roid).
And as to NPC battleships/cruisers spawning at gates in low sec space;
Totally useless and pointless since they dont have scramblers or webs. This will only annoy PvPers, as one of the last places to PvP are gates. I dunno about you, but 2 NPC bships spawning right in the middle of a 3v3 fight at a gate aint pretty. Also this will totally destroy gate camp/ambushing for frigates and even cruisers, and lone pilots will have no chance of fighting anyone at a gate, cause Uncle Fatal and his buddy The Rabbit might spawn right next to you in their bships and gank both of you.
It will only be thorn in the side of PvP, just like the psycho npcs in belts that stop people from fighting cause they randomly pound ships for no reason.
So yea, the elite frig changes and NPC balance/specialization/racial properties are good, but;
NPCS AT GATES = NO NO NO
Useless (No web or scramblers), pointless (We already have plenty of people camping gates), annoying (It'll mess up PvP at gates, NPCs intefering and randomly ganking people aint good, for pirates, alliances, pirate hunters or ANYONE in general).
Leave Gate Camping to players as it should be, not brainless NPCs that dont have the decency to use webs or scramblers. Putting NPCs at gates to bother people is a step towards making EVE a single player game with a chat client. DONT DO IT TOMB. DONT DO IIIITTTT! 
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Jarjar
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Posted - 2004.04.15 15:03:00 -
[26]
Quote:
As promised.. gate npc's... i thought this shouldn't be happening with current path/build?
In any case.. here's the linkage: click me
They didnt fire unless fired upon, btw.
Central Gate or nearby system?
They fired on me at sight, though.
Serak Tur: Stasis web?
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Joshua Calvert
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Posted - 2004.04.15 15:14:00 -
[27]
Quote:
What about the way they respawn in the belt? It's rather unrealistic to think they could spawn directly on top of you, which they do at this time. How about they have to warp into the belt at a distance just like everyone else? Spawning on top or within a few hundred meters is just ridiculous.
TomB, from my understanding, is in charge of balancing.
Yeah, that is silly!
It's not like it happens 1 times out of 20 - the NPC's land within 15km of your hull EVERY time.
I'd love to see NPC's give us some smacktalk in local too
Guardian Trooper: Calvert, you killed my mother, my father, my sister, my brother, my uncle, my aunt, my cousins and my pet dog Lulu!!!! DIE SCUM!
Joshua Calvert: O.o
LEEEEERRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY! |
Candy
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Posted - 2004.04.15 15:17:00 -
[28]
So much for camping gates in my punisher :(
Please dont make the NPCs at gates a variable PvPers have to worry about. For those of us who rely on our ability to calculate risk to decide our action, this is too random a factor.
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CKOZUK
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Posted - 2004.04.15 15:17:00 -
[29]
Quote:
As promised.. gate npc's... i thought this shouldn't be happening with current path/build?
In any case.. here's the linkage: click me
They didnt fire unless fired upon, btw.
I already thought gate npc's are around I have to deal with a few Gate Npcs every day when haulling stuff back to empire even in 0.8 systems theres a few NPC hanging around gates. Someday I don't get to the gate till my armor is on 75%
The above text is my own views which may not represent my corps views.
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ArcticWolf
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Posted - 2004.04.15 15:25:00 -
[30]
Edited by: ArcticWolf on 15/04/2004 15:33:25
Quote:
They do not have insta-locking time, the problem is that their targeting timer doesn't get displayed as a threat.
So do the npcs in kill missions, namely the Rogue Pirate Escorts, use sensor boosters? they seem to have me locked before i can right click and start locking 
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