Valea Silpha
Abyssal Heavy Industries
Narwhals Ate My Duck
49
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Posted - 2012.04.04 19:26:00 -
[1] - Quote
I absolutely agree with the the idea here.
The reason for this is that in general terms, tracking in Eve, while being based on some very long numbers, and having multiple degrees of depth, normally breaks down to being 'can hit' and 'can not hit'.
99% of the time, tracking just doesn't factor into fights for a few reasons. In gang fights, a primary is going to be webbed and scrammed, and you are going to be able to hit the guy. Outside of that, tracking falls broadly into small guns (can hit anything), medium guns (can hit cruisers and slow/far away frigs) and large guns (can hit bs, slow cruiser and immobile frigs). And people apply their guns accordingly. The difference between the tracking on blasters, ACs and pulses is largely irrelevant. Same for rails, arties and beams. It works the same on the other end. Frigs and nano-cruisers always move at top speed, because it is essentially impossible to figure out how to only be inside your tracking by a fraction.
This FAR easier to use approach to tracking allows that difference to become much, much more useful to you. You can see if your guns actually could hit that frigate who is out at range, for example. You can push your tracking advantage to its extreme by going just fast enough to still be able to track the target, knowing he can't track you.
This kinda feature gives people the tools to push small advantages in tracking speed or maneuverability or speed. I've been in quite a few BS slugging matches and there is distressingly little movement happening. Minmatar ships kite, again, because they can OBVIOUSLY do that to decrease damage. But that's it really, because a lot of the time moving at all hurts you as much as it does the other guy. You don't have a genuine feeling of where the boundary of your tracking lies, and that knowledge can be very empowering, particularly to the non-mini ships.
Finally, a solid understanding of when you a missing the target by miles, and when you are missing by a fraction, would also be very useful. If he's WAY too fast, well, at least you KNOW you can't hit him, and you'll need to figure out an escape plan. However, if you are only just missing him, then that gives you a chance to counter with your own movement.
More information coming out of spreadsheet form and into an easy to use, but challenging to turn into an advantage form is the stuff that can't fail to improve the game. Im sure that some people have complained at extreme length about staticmapper and dotlan and similar tools that make eve too easy. But those kind of sites prove that well presented information can radically improve the experience of the game. For a lot of people, the tools have no relevance or interest, but that's no excuse for not having the the information out there for us to turn into awesome plans, or at least use to better apply the mechanics.
This in no way makes things easier, it just helps us understand hat is happening, and to take the relevant actions. It's like having a parking sensor on a car. They don't make driving a car easier, and in fact you definitely don't need one. It just gives you data that you already have access to in a way that is comfortable.
I know I have totally rambled. But this idea is amazing, and should be implemented. |